"Victor Milan - The Nobles 02 - War In Tethys" - читать интересную книгу автора (Milan Victor)

She picked herself up and felt her side again. The soreness was fading quickly. The hunger pangs that
gnawed her every waking hour like a rat in her belly were already stronger. She tottered off to the pump
be-tween stalls redolent of horse-sweat and hay and ma-nure, on legs that seemed to have atrophied from
dreams of flight.
 Part I
Astronomy Domine
 1
The golden mare tossed her long white mane and said, "I sense trouble ahead, Randi Star."
The woman who sat astride her in a high-cantled Calimshite saddle frowned. "Of course you do," she
said. "We're about to enter Tethyr. And don't call me 'Randi.' It's far too young a name for me."
The mare flared her nostrils and produced a ladylike snort. The slow sound of her hooves rebounded
from natural walls of dark granite, lichen-splashed and for-bidding, so high that, although it was midmorning,
the day's first sunlight had yet to spill farther than halfway down them. Playing around their ears like
schools of fish were the hoofbeats of burden beasts and outriders' mounts, the jingle-jangle of harnesses,
the calls of the muleteers, all muted as the caravan wound through the secret pass across the Snowflake
Mountains.
They were bound for Zazesspur on the Sword Coast, a city of fabled wealth and intrigue; the years of
trou-bles had, in truth, little scratched its wealth and done nothing at all to diminish its intrigues. The
caravan's hundred mules were laden with luxury goods, wizardry supplies of nonmagical nature, and
specialty items for Zazesspur's demanding craftsmen, but the core of the profit Zaranda planned to realize
on this expedition was a handful of rare and immensely potent magic ob-jects.
At that, the caravan and its richesтАФdeceptively great for its size and unassuming appearanceтАФwere
merely a facet of Zaranda Star's complex scheme to re-tire her debts, and then just retire.
The mare, whose name was Golden Dawn, abruptly twitched her long, well-shaped ears and laid them
back along her neck. From behind, one set of hoof noises de-tached itself from the rest and grew louder.
"Behave, Goldie," Zaranda hissed under her breath.
"Our fat father needs to wash his ass," the mare replied quietly. "The bandy-legged little brute stinks
abominably."
"I think Father Pelletyr regards the smell as some-thing of a penance."
"The best kind," the mare said. "That which doesn't interfere with stuffing his belly."
The ass in question drew alongside, trotting to keep up with the longer-legged mare's walking stride.
Zaranda Star twitched a nose that, while still long and fine, had been broken once in the past, and reset ever
so slightly askew. The beast's rank smell made itself apparent even over sun-heated rock and the stink of
man- and beast-sweat, leather and weapon-oil from the caravan behind. In truth, the priest's mount could
have been kept cleaner. But the father had a wondrous way with healing magics, and for one in Zaranda's
line of business, that counted for much.
"Ah, Zaranda, child," said the priest. "How much far-ther through these beastly mountains, do you
think?"
She laughed. She had a good laugh, and strong, white teeth to laugh with, though she often thought her
lips were on the thin side. There were even those who had thought them cruel, but most such had been
ill-in-tentioned to start with.
"Many hard years have passed since I've been a child, Father," she said. "And in answer to your
ques-tion, not much farther at all."
"That's good to hear. The men and beasts are suffer-ing in this heat." In truth, the day's heat had filled
the chasm much more quickly than its light had.
"You're suffering, you mean," Goldie said. "You'd be best advised to go easy on the elf-bread, Father."
She gave him a meaningful sidelong look. The father was a man of substance, much of which was
rhythmi-cally jiggling inside a threadbare gray robe. He had a big florid face with a prominent nose and
white hair ra-diating like the petals of half a sunflower from around the ample tonsure Nature had granted
him, atop which was perched a gray skullcap, now mottled with sweat. A golden pendant bearing the