"Jane Lindskold - Firekeeper Saga 2 - Wolf's Head, Wolf's Heart" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lindskold Jane)

He'd recited that formula many times in just the few hours since his arrival at the castle. The entire thing
would need to be redone subsequent to the formal coronation, but these interim oaths were necessary,
confirming that he wasn't out to strip everyone of their rank and privilege just because he'd managed to
strip the queen of her throne.

All the other times the person so reassured had made some small speech of thanks and had then hurried
off to do whatever needed to be doneтАФmaybe pausing along the way to reassure kith and kin that their
particular royal stipend wasn't about to be stopped.

This time, though, Lord Ivory had rocked back on his heels and given his kingтАФfor although not yet
formally crowned,

Allister Seagleam effectively had been king for these twenty-odd daysтАФa look that might have been sly,
but that just might have been a bit sad.

"Well, Your Majesty," Lord Ivory had said, keeping his voice low, "if you can spare an old man a few
minutes, I believe there is something you should see."

Allister had found those minutes. Accompanied by Shad, his eldest son and heir, and a brace of trusted
guards, he had followed where the old Pelican led.

Any onlooker would have immediately seen the likeness between father and son. Shad was as fair of skin
and hair as his father, but where Allister was lean and with a vaguely scholarly untidiness to his bearing,
Shad had inherited House Oyster's rounded lines from his mother. When he'd been a boy, the
uninformed had often mistaken this apparent plumpness for softness, but now that several years at sea
had put muscle on him, Shad showed promise of a whale-like solidity that did not preclude grace.

But where they were most alike was in a frank curiosity regarding the world around them, a curiosity that
Shad did not bother to conceal as Lord Ivory Pelican led them into reaches of the castle that before this
day had been the private quarters of the now-deposed Queen Gustin IV.

Allister was less a stranger to the castle. His father had been Prince Tavis, brother to Gustin III, third in
line to the throne after his elder sister, Princess SeastarтАФthat is before Gustin III had finally fathered his
little Valora, a child born fairly late in his life, after others had become ambitious for the throne.

Prince Tavis had never held much hope that he or his son would be king. Indeed his own mother, Queen
Gustin II, had entered into a pact with King Chalmer of Hawk Haven to wed Tavis to Chalmer's
daughter Caryl in a pledge for peace between the kingdoms. The pact did not include the power to
enforce those ideals. Perhaps that was why it had failed.

But Tavis's son by that marriage had frequented the royal castle as a child, escorted by his father,
whoтАФmuch though he resented being a playing piece in kingdom politicsтАФwould not let his son be
dismissed as an inconvenient nonentity.

Prince Tavis had made certain that his son would bear a titleтАФthat of dukeтАФand hold lands he could
pass on to his own children. More than that, he could not do; and when he died at sea, a comparatively
young man of fifty-six, it was whispered that he had welcomed death.

By then, however, Allister had made peace with his odd place outside of the usual order. His was no
Great House, yet he was first cousin to the queen. He attended sessions of court, held office, sailed for a