"Pierce, Tamora - The Circle Opens 01 - Magic Steps" - читать интересную книгу автора (Pierce Tamora)

honestly don't know what to tell Lord Frantsen anymore."
Sandry didn't like the duke's ambitious oldest son. They had met in the past,
and since the duke's heart at tack the tone of Frantsen's letters had grown
arrogantЧas if he had already inherited. "Tell him and that grasping wife of his
that Uncle cut them from his will."
The parlor door opened. "Don't think it hasn't crossed my mind," the duke said
quietly. The door closed again.
"Wonderful," Erdogun muttered and stalked down the hall to the large workroom
from which he oversaw affairs at Duke's Citadel.
Sandry followed him wearily. She missed her old life, before she had found
herself watching the health of a man who didn't want to be fussed over and
dealing with a hundred retainers, each more prickly than the last.
She thought dreamily of Discipline cottage at Winding Circle. By this time her
teacher Lark would be at her loom, at work on her newest creation. She even
envied Pasco: by now he must be sauntering through the marketplace with his
friends, without a care in the world.
* * *
"Pasco!" The padded end of a baton thumped the side of his head firmly enough to
make him stagger. "Scorch it all, boy, pay attention! Knowing the baton might
save your silly skull in a dark alley one day!" Exasperated with her youngest
child, Zahra Acalon pushed a lock of dark, wavy hair out of her face. She was a
tall woman in her late thirties, handsome rather than pretty, with strong black
brows, dark eyes, and a wide, decided mouth. Sweat glued her cotton shirt to her
back. Impatiently she twitched the cloth away from her chest, flapping it
slightly to cool her skin. "If I've told you once, I've told you a hundred
timesЧ,"
"Daydreams will be my death," he said along with her. "Sorry, Mama."
"Pasco got thu-umped, Pasco got thu-umped," sang his cousin Rehana wickedly.
Five of the residents of House Acalon who were Pasco's age or a little older had
gathered in the courtyard. There his mother Zahra taught them the Provost's
Guards' traditional weaponsЧstaff, baton, weighted chainЧand hand-to-hand
combat.
"I'll thump you, Reha," Pasco muttered out of the side of his mouth.
A baton tapped him under the chin. "Learn to keep from being thumped yourself,
before you deal out knocks of your own," his mother advised. "And the rest of
you, you aren't doing so well that you can torment him."
Fast as a snake, she whirled and swung overhand at Reha. The girl blocked her
strike with her baton, almost as quick as Zahra herself. With her attention on
that de scending baton, Reha did not see Zahra reach out with a booted leg and
hook the girl's feet from under her. Down Reha went, still remembering to keep
her own baton between her and any attack from overhead.
"Well enough," Zahra said with approval. "But look at the weapon just long
enough to tell its direction. Your main attention should have been on my chest.
My body's movement there would have warned you of my kick."
"Fat chance," muttered Reha.
Zahra grinned evilly at her. "Perhaps not." She swept their small group with her
eyes. "The point of all this is to make sure you come home from your watch
alive. To do that you have to pay attention. Live the moment you're in. Stay
open to all the things around you, be they smell, sound, or sightЧ,"
Her baton flashed up and to the side. This time Pasco was readyЧhe'd seen the