"Andrew J. Offutt - Cormac 02 - The Tower of Death" - читать интересную книгу автора (Offutt Andrew J)

his knees. He let her slip to the ground, giving her a pinch for luck.
Cormac knelt for a brief space on the roof, listening from that vantage to the noises borne on the night air.
Sigebert was shrieking his wrath and pain yet, somewhere at the front of the building. The citizens of Nantes
were raising a racket in the background, while soldiers in the warehouse came blundering after their lawful
prey. Cormac wished fiercely thereтАЩd been time to fire it about their ears. With a jerk of his head, he slid down
the rope.
Aground, he sliced the rope through with his sword as far above his head as he could reach. Mayhap the
Franks would miss seeing it nowтАФat any rate, the first time they passed the spot. And if they missed it then,
it was like they would obliterate their quarryтАЩs tracks in the mud with their own trampling feet.
The three legged it.
The dark twisting alleys of the Nantes waterfront were as well known to all the trio as RavenтАЩs deck to
Cormac and Wulfhere. To the eastern Franks, they were an unknown maze.
тАЬNow, girl, we part,тАЭ Cormac said. тАЬBy the great Lord of the Mound, we got ye clear of yon trap, but weтАЩve not
adopted ye! Go your way.тАЭ
She gulped. тАЬI dare not. You s-saw what manner of man is that Sigebert. HeтАЩd have used me; now he will
torture me besides.тАЭ
тАЬThen do not be letting him catch ye. ThereтАЩs all the world open to ye.тАЭ
тАЬNot for a woman alone. The Devil, Cormac! IтАЩve nowhere to go.тАЭ
тАЬAye, Wolf,тАЭ put in Wulfhere. тАЬThe lass has the right of it.тАЭ
Cormac swore savagely. тАЬThe soft-headed great gomeral ye are! So then; come with us, girl, if ye can be
matching our pace. But it will tax yourself. Blood of the gods!тАЭ
He spoke not another word till they reached the ship, and few then. A black Gaelic melancholy akin to
madness was upon him, with its immediate cause in the loss of the boatload of plunder, the richest they had
taken yet.
But the loot, as loot, meant little.
What it had symbolized to Cormac, he was hardly aware himself. He was exile, outlaw and pirate, and these
dark facts had the casual treachery of kings for their direct cause. It was not strange that they had marked
him. Lacking any home but RavenтАЩs deck, or any safety but that to be found in his weapon-arm and his
companionsтАЩ, he lived for the day each day, trying to forget the past and with no confidence at all in his
future.
Yet the Gael of Eirrin was young. Cormac mac Art had less years on him then his looks made credible.
Younger he was than he had let even Wulfhere know, or than the mighty Dane would have believed. In
outward seeming he had become more Spartan than Celt, though his raceтАЩs fanciful, extravagant temper had
not quite been ground out of his soul.
He was not beyond dreaming of a return to Eirrin in wealth and power, to claim one unforgotten girl whose
face still troubled his sleep.
(Years had passed. She was girl no longer, but woman, and married woman, he was painfully certain.)
Nor had wealth or power come his way on the reiverтАЩs path. HeтАЩd scars and red memories and a reputation to
show for it, naught more. The haul at Garonne-mouth had been the richest ever to fall into his hands, and
now, like others, it had slipped from between them. Not in itself, but as a foundation to build on, that booty
might have made him at last able to buy justice at homeтАФand that justice in this world usually had to be
bought, Cormac knew well.
He ground his teeth in a fury of frustration as he fled through the Gaulish night. The womanish presence was
distinctly unwelcome, merely a further burden.
Clodia kept pace with them. They were fighting men in their heavy battle-gear, and she unburdened. They had
come through a long wearing day; she was fresh. These helped lessen the menтАЩs advantage of longer legs
and harder condition, and above all she matched their pace because she dared not do otherwise.
The young woman ran, with skirt lifted about her thighs, its ends tucked through her girdle. Pale legs flashed.
She ran through streets and convoluted lanes, swam an inlet the men were tall enow to wade (and in their
iron, were constrained to) and then plunged further through mud and reeds.