"George R. R. Martin - Ice and Fire 0 - The Hedge Knight" - читать интересную книгу автора (Martin George R R)

one time in Maidenpool. It was the inn boy who ate the widow womanтАЩs pie, not me, I told you. It donтАЩt
matter now. The gods keep you, ser.тАЭ He kicked dirt in the hole, then began to fill it methodically, never
looking at the thing at the bottom. He had a long life, Dunk thought. He must have been closer to sixty
than to fifty, and how many men can say that? At least he had lived to see another spring.

The sun was westering as he fed the horses. There were three; his swaybacked stot, the old manтАЩs
palfrey, and Thunder, his warhorse, who was ridden only in tourney and battle. The big brown stallion
was not as swift or strong as he had once been, but he still had his bright eye and fierce spirit, and he
was more valuable than everything else Dunk owned. If I sold Thunder and old Chestnut, and the
saddles and bridles too, IтАЩd come away with enough silver to. . . Dunk frowned. The only life he knew
was the life of a hedge knight, riding from keep to keep, taking service with this lord and that lord,
fighting in their battles and eating in their halls until the war was done, then moving on. There were
tourneys from time to time as well, though less often, and he knew that some hedge knights turned
robber during lean winters, though the old man never had.

I could find another hedge knight in need of a squire to tend his animals and clean his mail, he thought,
or might be I could go to some city, to Jannisport or KingтАЩs Landing, and join the City Watch. Or
else . . .

He had piled the old manтАЩs things under an oak. The cloth purse contained three silver stags, nineteen
copper pennies, and a chipped garnet; as with most hedge knights, the greatest part of his worldly wealth
had been tied up in his horses and weapons. Dunk now owned a chain-mail hauberk that he had scoured
the rust off a thousand times. An iron halfhelm with a broad nasal and a dent on the left temple. A sword
belt of cracked brown leather, and a longsword in a wood-and-leather scabbard. A dagger, a razor, a
whetstone. Greaves and gorget, an eight-foot war lance of turned ash topped by a cruel iron point, and an
oaken shield with a scarred metal rim, bearing the sigil of Ser Arlan of Pennytree: a winged chalice,
silver on brown.

Dunk looked at the shield, scooped up the sword belt, and looked at the shield again. The belt was made
for the old manтАЩs skinny hips. It would never do for him, no more than the hauberk would. He tied the
scabbard to a length of hempen rope, knotted it around his waist, and drew the longsword.

The blade was straight and heavy, good castle-forged steel, the grip soft leather wrapped over wood, the
pommel a smooth polished black stone. Plain as it was, the sword felt good in his hand, and Dunk knew
how sharp it was, having worked it with whetstone and oilcloth many a night before they went to sleep.
It fits my grip as well as it ever fit his, he thought to himself, and there is a tourney at Ashford Meadow.


Sweetfoot had an easier gait than old Chestnut, but Dunk was still sore and tired when he spied the inn
ahead, a tall daub-and-timber building beside a stream. The warm yellow light spilling from its windows
looked so inviting that he could not pass it by. I have three silvers, he told himself, enough for a good
meal and as much ale as I care to drink. As he dismounted, a naked boy emerged dripping from the
stream and began to dry himself on a roughspun brown cloak. тАЬAre you the stableboy?тАЭ Dunk asked

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him. The lad looked to be no more than eight or nine, a pasty-faced skinny thing, his bare feet caked in