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

behind him. Had they moved contrary to the light sea breeze, heтАЩd have issued a warning. For copper-beaked
Raven lay in ambush here as in the jaws of a bearтАФhopefully a sleeping one.
Cormac, Wulfhere, and their crew of Danes lurked in no less than the home waters of the Visigothic
kingdomтАЩs Garonne fleet. In truth, from where he stood at RavenтАЩs bow, Cormac mac Art might have hurled a
stone into the River GaronneтАЩs estuary. Moreover, just the other side of that great estuary nestled Saxon
settlements, and Saxon pirate ships along with some few thousand Saxon fighting men under a dozen
independent chieftainsтАФand every one was willing to be known as friend to WulfhereтАЩs greatest enemy,
Hengist the Jute, King of Kent over in Britain.
Four nights agone they had lowered RavenтАЩs sail, unstepped her mast and rowed softly in with muffled oars.
Since then they had eaten cold food only, spoken almost never, and then not above whispers. They had
endured the mosquitoes and midges. As Cormac seemed scarcely to notice them, someone had murmured
low that any gnat biting the sombre Gael knew it would die horribly.
Waiting strained them sore, and chafed men of action. They endured. They exercised as best they could by
arm-wrestling on the oar benches, and straining betwixt them with braced feet and backs.
Rather nearby, other men than they were weary of waiting.
On the estuaryтАЩs northern side, two galleys of the Visigothic royal fleet lay tucked behind a woody point of
land. Athanagild BericтАЩs son, treading the deck of one ship, tugged his heavy moustache and frowned at his
marines, who were eating their supplies at a deplorable rate. Had he known the men heтАЩd been ordered to
capture had been almost within shouting distance for days, unseen and undreamed of, Fleet Commander
Athanagild might have suffered a seizure.
The while, beating up the coast from Bayonne in the merchant tub Thetis, came one Gervase, a plain sea
captain. He squinted brown eyes northward, and then at the coast; Gervase was both fearful of Saxon
war-boats and hoping for a Gothic galley on patrol.
My luck, he thought morosely, to meet the Saxon pirates so near safe harbouring!
An odd sort of voyage, too; the whole distance around Spain, and having to pay toll to the Vandals on the
way. Curious. He spat to landward, with the wind. It wasnтАЩt long since those towheaded heretical bastards
would have taken the whole cargo, and slaughtered the crew for being Orthodox. A lot of them still would, and
did. But Gaiseric was the man who had made their seapower, and he was a decade in hell.
The Vandals were not the terror of all the Mediterranean any longer, but only the western half... and learning
that one did not kill a cow for its milk. Still, they were unchancy, and it had been good to see the Pillars of
Hercules fade into distance.
It was strange, though, the way the backers had insisted on this route. They had brassed up so readily, too,
with the VandalтАЩs toll. Not like them at all. From Narbo to Toulouse by road, and then down the river to
Burdigala by barge, that was the proper route! Simpler and the Devil of a lot safer.
Aye, but the royal court was at Toulouse. The Gothic king might have decided to buy the lotтАФat his price.
Likely enough the backers had decided the Vandals were a better risk. In any case the danger money was
coming to Gervase for it.
Had he known that his backers and the Count of Burdigala had of a purpose set him out as bait for pirates, he
might well have dropped in a fit at the same time as Athanagild. Both men were thus protected by lack of
knowledge.

At the creek-mouth, a fox barked twice.
Sudden fierce eagerness filled WulfhereтАЩs Danes; not often did foxes bark from treetops. One of their own,
called Halfdan Half-a-man for his short stature, swung nimbly down from branch to branch to soggy earth and
made for the ship. An oar swept out over RavenтАЩs strakes. The blade grounded on the creek-bank and Halfdan
walked up it, a stocky personification of delight. He took shield and ax without having to think on it the while
he moved forward to give word to his chieftain.
His grin told the news ere his tongue could form it. тАЬItтАЩs the one! Or if not, there be two corbitos for Burdigala
under brown canvas with a pale three-sided patch!тАЭ
тАЬHow does she ride?тАЭ