"Mercedes Lackey - Bardic Voices 03 - Eagle and the Nightingales" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lackey Mercedes)

beside her, his panniers loaded with her gear and her two harps strapped over the top of
it all. She had a tent as well, if a small one, and with the donkey she could carry provisions
to see her through to better lodgings instead of being at the mercy of greedy or stingy
innkeepers.
She was all packed up and ready to go, and eager to be on the road and away from the
all-pervasive aura of tragedy that hovered over the city across the river. Only one thing
kept her here, an appointment that she had made last night, and she wished he would just
show up so that
"Thank you for waiting, my friend." Talaysen's speaking voice was as pleasant as his
singing voice, and Nightingale gratefully turned her back to the river and the Church's
stronghold to catch his hands in hers in the traditional greeting between Gypsies of the
same clan. Talaysen smiled at her, his grey-green eyes warming, and gave her hands a
firm squeeze before releasing them. Free Bard Talaysen looked prosperous, too, in his
fine leather jerkin, good linen trews, and silk shirt with the knots of many-colored ribbons
on the sleeves that denoted a Free Bard. He did not owe his prosperity to the Faire,
however. Talaysen shared the post of Laurel Bard to the King of Birnam with his wife,
Bard Rune, and his clothing reflected his importance. They were the only Free Bards with
any kind of position in all of the Twenty Kingdoms.
Not that he has ever let rank go to his head, Nightingale reflected, allowing his
pleasure at seeing her to ease the distant ache of Kingsford's sorrow within her. He has
made Birnam a haven of freedom for all of us.
"I would wait until the snow fell for your sake, Master Wren," she told him truthfully,
scanning his honest, triangular face for signs of stress and his red hair for more strands of
grey than there had been the last time she saw him. She saw neither, and felt nothing
untoward from him, which eased her worries a little. He had been so adamant in asking
her not to leave after the Faire closed at least until he had a chance to speak with
her that she had been afraid there was something wrong with him personally. They
were old friends, though only once, briefly, had they ever been lovers.
"Well, it is lucky for us both that you won't have to do that," he replied, and his eye fell
on her little donkey. "So, the rumors of your prosperity were not exaggerated!
Congratulations!"
She raised her eyebrow at that, for there was something more in his voice than simple
pleasure in her good fortune. There was some reason why he was particularly pleased
that she had done well, a reason that had nothing to do with friendship or his unofficial
rank as head of the Free Bards.
"This simplifies matters," he continued. "I have a request to make of you, but it would
have been difficult if you had already arranged to travel with anyone else this winter."
A blackbird winged by, trilling to find them standing in his territory, so near to his
nest. Her other eyebrow rose. "A request?" she said cautiously, a certain sense of
foreboding coming to her. "Of what nature?"
Wren can charm birds out of the trees and honesty out of Elves, and I'd better
remember that if he's asking favors of me. It was mortally hard to refuse Wren anything.
But I can hold my own with the Elves; it will take more than charm to win me.
 Talaysen sighed, and shifted his weight from one foot to the other, like a naughty little
boy who had been caught in the midst of a prank which further hardened her suspicions.
"There is something I would like for you to do for me or rather, not for me, but for the
Free Bards. Unfortunately, it will involve a rather longer journey than you normally
make; I expect it will take you from now until the first Harvest Faires to reach your goal
even if you travel without stopping on the way."
She pulled in a quick breath with surprise. "From now until Harvest Faire?" she