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

picked bare and rattling in the wind. Understood?тАЭ
Under those innocently staring blue eyes, they did assurance on him that they understood.
тАЬSo. LetтАЩs get on, then. These piratical swine have shown that they too keep themselves informed. I mean to
tempt тАЩem with a cargo they can scarce resist. Wine, for the most part, but with a treasure of lighter goods,
and none of the dangers of fakery; the lading will be true. It will sail from Narbo, and around Hispania hither.
Word will be let fall. The Dane and the Gael, if I judge them aright, will not waylay the ship off the Hispanic
coast. They will choose to take it within comfortable distance of their marketтАФand Athanagild will be
waiting.тАЭ
Guntram paused but long enough to glance at Athanagild; the commander nodded with enthusiasm.
тАЬAnd do you, sirs, know the best part of all?тАЭ Guntram went amiably on. тАЬIt is you who will public-spiritedly
provide the bait, and at your own cost.тАЭ
The merchants broke into a babble of protest. Proculus silenced them by gazing dreamily at the ceiling and
murmuring, тАЬTreason. The knives. The clamps. The hot lead.тАЭ
Count Guntram nodded approval. This Proculus fellow might be snobbish and finicky, but once he got into the
spirit of things the man was downright useful.
тАЬBut my lord,тАЭ Desiderius bleated, тАЬthey may succeed after all!тАЭ
тАЬIn which case you will have to take your losses, now wonтАЩt you? But aye, itтАЩs a thought. I should like them to
have a nasty surprise awaiting then in Nantes, in the event they do. It requires thought. But you have more to
tell me yet. You may not traffic with Wulfhere and Cormac, but you are to betray to the full measure of your
grimy knowledge the pirates you do buy from. Either they are taken and executed within the yearтАФhooves of
the Devil, within the season!тАФor you, dear sirs, suffer in their places. Well, sirs, I am waiting.тАЭ
They did not force the noble count to wait overlong.


CHAPTER ONE: Trap for A Pirate

At the mouth of a reedy creek perched a raven with whetted beak and talons flexing. Dark was the predator,
with sharp eyes for that which would feed her. Yet this raven was no bird, but a ship. And unlike her
namesake, Raven was no scavenger of corpses, unless it were the great sprawling corpse of RomeтАЩs empire
in the west. She was a fighting bird.
Two men stood in her bow in the morning light. Athanagild had described them without error, save in one
point only. Yet still he had not conveyed their presence; to accomplish that would require a bard aflight on the
inspiration of his demon.
Wulfhere was immense, and no less; a man huge of height and thew, with fire-blue eyes under thickets of
brow and a beard like a conflagration. Though he was restless with waiting, he moved not save to fondle the
great ax he held across the front of his body and, once in a while, to sigh. At such times his scale byrnie
expanded as if it were hard put to contain him. That was but illusion, though a remarkable one. On the Danish
giant gleamed heavy golden buckles, studs, and armlets. His war-gear was adequate and more. In his belt
gleamed the whalebone hilt of the broad-bladed dagger sheathed there, and a smaller ax was tucked through
that same broad thick belt at his other hip. Against his knee leaned a shield like a scarred moon of battle.
AthanagildтАЩs one mistake had been in saying that the Skull-splitter overtowered him by a foot. It was half a
foot only, though the high bullтАЩs horns adorning the DaneтАЩs helmet made it seem the more; Wulfhere affected
the style of his ancestors. But then AthanagildтАЩs one sight of Wulfhere Hausakliufr had been from a distance.
The which was confirmed by the fact that Athanagild BericтАЩs son was yet alive. Wulfhere was only five inches
over six feet...
The man at his side was equally still, and seemed more at his ease in that moveless waiting. Leanly
muscular in his shirt of black link-mail, Cormac mac Art of Eirrin wore no ornaments on his darkish skin.
Strange this was, in one of a race whose men loved to adorn themselves, and never more splendidly then
when they went forth to fight. This Gaelic Celt, though, had ceased long since to care for show. He was all
stark professionalism as he scanned the nearby sea, casting an occasional searching glance into the reeds