"Mercedes Lackey - Firebird" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lackey Mercedes)

eat from and pottery goblets to drink from, with more to trade outside the kingdom.
Ilya understood that there had been some grumbling in the kitchen about the extra
work involved in cleaning the plates, but once Ivan threatened to take off the hand of
the chief troublemaker, there had been no more complaints. The tsar did not like to
be considered backward and savage, and his new mother-in-law's audible sniffs at
the sight of the few wooden implements he'd had until then had been enough for him
to order the plates to be made and used at all meals.
The hall was lit by torches and oil-lamps, and the flickering light made it difficult
to judge expressions. Ilya ate warily, trying to ascertain if anyone was giving him a
more suspicious glance than usual, but he couldn't tell if there was anything going on
in anyone's mind except thoughts of what to intercept next as the servants went
around. Ivan, who was hacking his way through a thick slab of venison, seemed
preoccupied with his dinner. His third wife, still pretty in spite of the odd beating and
her husband's neglect, leaned over to make sure Ivan got the greater share of a
special dish of eels in broth, something he particularly enjoyed, that had been served
only to the important members of the family.
By this time, Sasha was cramming venison into his enormous cavern of a mouth,
and Ilya was just about full. He appropriated another piece of bread and spooned
honey over it, leaning back to enjoy his treat and his goblet of wine.
"How'd practice go?" he asked his brother. Sasha shrugged.
"Mischa broke that new guard's arm; there'll be hell to pay when Father finds out.
Alexi cracked a rib and Boris sprained his ankle. Pietor showed up late, so Mischa
addled his wits for him. About the same as usual."
"Ah." He took a bite of the honeyed bread, followed it with a gulp of sour wine.
"Pretty new laundress," he offered, knowing that Sasha preferred to find his girls
among the washerwomen.
Each of the brothers had his own "territory" for skirt-chasing. As the eldest,
Mischa tended to tread the dangerous path of chasing the house-servants;
dangerous, because that was where their father also found his frolics. Gregori and
Boris kept to the kitchen-girls; Pietor, Yuri, and Alexi favored the goat-and
sheep-herders, or went out among the farms and fields to see what human crop had
matured.
Sasha grinned ferally at the mention of the laundress. "Mine," he stated, with an
edge to his voice. "And don't forget it."
"I wouldn't think of it!" Ilya replied fervently, for Sasha had a heavier hand than
any of the brothers but Mischa. Ilya never had figured out why he had the dairy as a
hunting-ground all to himself. Maybe it was Mother Galina's presence; the others all
seemed unaccountably afraid of her.
Too bad for them; the milkmaids were some of the prettiest girls in the palace,
and they were always clean and sweet-smelling, for Galina would not permit dirt in
her dairy. Of course, the laundresses were always clean and sweet-smelling too, but
they had coarse, rough hands that were not to Ilya's taste. The milkmaids' hands
were soft from working with the butter and cheese.
Content, Sasha turned his attention back to his food; Ilya contemplated the rest of
his loving family.
There was not the slightest shadow of a doubt who their father was; they were all
variations on the theme of Ivan. Tsar Ivan, at the center of the head table, though
going slightly to fat, still boasted enough muscle to daunt even Mischa, his eldest
son. All of the men of the family were tall, blond, blue-eyed, square-jawed. Ivan's
hair was going to silver, and his harsh features softening a bit with the fat of good