"Katherine Kurtz - Kelson 3 - The Quest for Saint Camber" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kurtz Katherine)

your lady?"
Conall smiled lazily as Tiercel withdrew from the hand-clasp and pulled
on his cap, moving toward the door.
"I have some unfinished business here, I think," he said, hooking his
thumbs in his belt as Tiercel paused with a hand on the latch. "And this time,
I shall take suitable precautions to make certain I'm not interrupted."
 Tiercel only flashed him a forbearing grin before dashing back into the
rain.
CHAPTER ONE
I will make him my firstborn.
-Psalms 89:27
"Well, it's a relief finally to have official confirmation that my
foster brother is not a bastard!" King Kelson of Gwynedd said.
He flung a playful arm around the neck of Dhugal MacArdry as the two of
them followed Dhugal's father and Duke Alaric Morgan into Kelson's suite of
rooms in Rhemuth Castle, Bishop Denis Arilan bringing up the rear. All of them
were dripping rain. It was the Saturday before the beginning of Lent, the
Vigil of Quinquagesima Sunday, the first day of March in the Year of Our Lord
1125, and Kelson Haldane had been King of Gwynedd for a little more than four
years. He had turned eighteen the previous November.
"Not that I ever believed he was, of course," Kelson went on drolly, "or
that it would have made any difference to me if he had been. I am glad that I
won't have to defy the law to knight him on Tuesday, however."
The bluster evoked a chuckle from Morgan and a snort of disapproval from
Arilan as everyone shed wet cloaks and gathered before the fire, for all were
aware that the king might have done precisely that, if necessary, to see
proper honor done to his beloved foster brother. Kelson had already waived the
usual age requirement for the accolade-a royal prerogative whose exercise
would raise no eyebrows, given Dhugal's outstanding service in the previous
summer's campaign, and Dhugal only just seventeen. Several others were also
being knighted early, for the same reason.
But age was one thing-a somewhat arbitrary milestone that easily might
be set aside for reasonable cause, even royal whim. The bar sinister was quite
another. Even with royal patronage, illegitimacy was normally a serious, if
not absolute, bar to knighthood.
Fortunately, Bishop Duncan McLain had proven today, to the satisfaction
of an archbishop's tribunal, that long before entering holy orders, he and
Dhugal's mother had exchanged vows that constituted a valid, if irregular,
marriage. The proving had not been easy. The first sticking point had been
that the vows were witnessed only by the two principals and the sacred
Presence signified by the ever-burning lamp in the chapel of Duncan's father,
at Culdi.
"Mind you, I don't dispute the precedent of per verba de praesenti, old
Bishop Wolfram de Blanet had said, acting as devil's advocate as he and Arilan
reviewed the case for Archbishop Cardiel in closed session. "Common law in the
borders has long recognized the validity of a marriage declared before
witnesses when no priest was available- though the Church has always urged a
more solemn ratification at some future date."
Duncan, standing alone before the tribunal's long table, shook his head
in objection, aware of the tension of his son and the others seated behind