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

Clodia reached the ship staggering; her breath had the sound of tearing cloth.
Behind them wavered a line of torches, and hounds were baying.
тАЬGet under weigh!тАЭ Wulfhere commanded. тАЬBy the shields of Asgard, we have half Nantes breathing up our
backsides! We stepped into a trap, companions, and someone will pay for it. But do we bide here, the paying
will be done by us!тАЭ
Cormac heaved himself over the thwarts, streaming water. Clodia, wading out, stepped in a sink-hole and
screamed.
тАЬHelp mee! Abandon me here and you murder me!тАЭ
An oar pivoted her way. She seized the blade, and felt her legs pull free of the sucking mud. Cormac, his
black mood increasing if such were possible, stood impassive. Wulfhere turned from giving orders, showed
his teeth in something not a smile, and raised a hand with the fingers tensely clawed.
His meaning: Thor strike you, shut her up!
With a curse, Cormac leaned far out and grabbed ClodiaтАЩs skirt. It was the nearest thing to his hand, its ends
having come loose from her girdle, and she having got one knee precariously over the oar.
He dragged her, sliding, along the oar-shaft. She stuck briefly, and then tumbled aboard with her sodden skirt
ripping up the seam. Her legs were stockinged up to the thighs in slate-coloured, ill-smelling mire.
Clodia looked about as erotically fetching as a halfdrowned kitten, and her language withered the reeds for
thirty paces around.
RavenтАЩs square sail rose on its long yard, to fill with the land-breeze. She began to move. The line of torches
dropped away astern.
Cormac watched the bright smears fade in the night almost with regret, for heтАЩd have relished further fighting
in that moment. It would have been more enjoyable than thinking, for what had he to think upon that was
good?
The grey pallor of false dawn was showing when Raven cleared the LoireтАЩs mouth. Clodia huddled as small as
possible. She was among cut-throats and slayers who might do as they pleased to her, with only their
leaderтАЩs word to restrain them. Most Viking captains would give her to their men, and afterwards to the sea.
She did not look for that from Wulfhere, yet neither did she suppose heтАЩd pamper her.
ItтАЩs slavery in a foreign land for you, girl, she told herself grimly. Yet it was preferable to what would happen to
her father. She sniffedтАФand looked thoughtfully at the Gael.
тАЬWarships!тАЭ someone howled.
It was naught but the truth. Out of the half dark came the shapes of two Roman galleys, with war-men tough
as the Visigothic marines, and better disciplined, on their decks. Jolted out of his bleak introversion, Cormac
stared while his thoughts took urgent form, like layers of pearl, around the word again!
Planned, he thought, all planned, and the vow of blood-vengeance formed in the back of his mind. For now...
They could not fight and win.
Southward down the coast lurked aroused, alert and blood-hungry enemies.
Westward along Lesser BritainтАЩs shores, they would inevitably be run down when dawn appeared. Nor was
dawn far off.
тАЬCormac?тАЭ Wulfhere said tranquilly. тАЬMethinks they truly have us this time. We will taste mead and ale in
Valhalla this day; or do we fare to Helheim, weтАЩll go there escorted with due honour. Not even you can trick
us out of this.тАЭ
тАЬHad we time, IтАЩd bind ye to a wager! Southwest is our way, sea-wolves! Cut across the open water, and if
they dare follow they are not Romans, but seamen! Be ye with me?тАЭ
Jaws dropped and crewmen muttered. Some raised cries of protest.
Better to die in clean battle, they said, bathing their weapons, than lie cold in the arms of Ran! For only fools
did other than follow the shore on their voyaging, clinging close as sea and shoals permitted. From choice,
they never ventured far out to sea. Like all former invaders, the Germans who crossed the water to Britain did
so where it was narrowest.
Concerning the wide gulf lying north of Spain, it was more feared than the open Atlantic itself, for the winds
and currents that unpredictably stirred it. The Cantabrian Sea, it was called by Roman geographers; to