"Tamora Pierce - Protector Of The Small 3 - Squire" - читать интересную книгу автора (Pierce Tamora)

"What do you mean?" Kel demanded. Sometimes Neal took forever to get to the point; sometimes,
even when he got to it, the thing didn't feel like a point at all. This was starting to feel like one of those
times.
"You'll be in public view most of the time," Neal explained. "Not everyone you meet will be your
friend, so they won't be for you, and some will have enough Gift of their own to tell if magic's being
worked on you. No one will be able to claim you did anything but what was under everybody's nose
after four years in the King's Own."
"If I cared for their opinion, I'd be relieved," Kel informed her friend. "So you think this is good."
He nodded vigorously. "I'm envious," he admitted. "Lord Raoul's got to be the most easygoing man
alive. My new knight-mistress is famed for wielding sharp edges - sword, knife, and tongue."
Kel scratched her ear. She hadn't considered the Lioness's temper, though the realm's sole female
knight was infamous for it. "You'll just have to get on with her," she said. She knew her words were silly
as they left her mouth. Neal couldn't just get on with anyone. He could no more resist poking at other
people's conceits or ideas than he could resist breathing.
"I'll manage," Neal said. "She and Father are friends, so she probably won't kill me. Now," he went
on, changing the subject, "why are you packing, if you have such a wonderful knight-master?"
"I have to be ready to go with him at any time," she explained, sitting on her bed. "My room's next to
his. I don't even know how often I'll be in the palace - he's on the road all year."
"We'll see each other during the Grand Progress," Neal pointed out. "Unless - maybe you won'tтАж I
know you wanted Lady Alanna."
Kel had to make this better. "Not see you, when you won't eat vegetables if I don't nag you?" she
demanded. "I'll bet Lady Alanna -" Her throat tightened. Dreams died so hard, and this one she had kept
for most of her life. "I'll bet she doesn't care what she eats, let alone what her squire does. I should send
Crown along to peck you as a reminder."
Neal's answering grin was shaky, but it grew stronger. "As if these feather dusters would be separated
from you," he retorted.
"I hope they can," Kel told him. "I doubt even Lord Raoul will welcome fifty-odd sparrows."
Neal slung his legs over the arm of the chair. "I bet he and Lady Alanna planned this. They're friends,
and she did say you were looked after. And she has to know what people would say if she took you."
"That maybe I was right to look up to her all these years? That if anyone can teach me how to be a
lady knight, it's her?" Kel asked bitterly. She wished she hadn't spoken when she saw the hurt in his face.
Most times I can keep silent, she thought, folding a tunic with hands that shook. But the one time I say
the first thing in my mind, it's to Neal. I should have said that to anyone but him.
His eyes were shadowed. "You are angry."
Kel sighed and straightened to work a cramp from her back. "Not with you." Never with you, she
thought, wishing yet again that he liked her as a girl as well as a friend. "To tell you the truth, I don't know
what I feel. First I was just about as low as I could be - Neal, I had a vision."
He raised an eyebrow. "My dear Kel, I'd say Jump, your sparrows, even Peachblossom are likelier to
have visions than you. I have never known anyone who had both feet nailed to the ground."
She had to smile. He was right. "It didn't come from me," she informed him. "I was in the Chapel of the
Ordeal - "
"Finally!" he interrupted. "You took your own sweet time in going - "
It was Kel's turn to interrupt. "Do you want to hear about my vision or not?" She described what had
happened when she touched the Chamber's iron door. "And then I went to the tilting yard and Lord
Raoul found me," she finished. "But Neal, it felt just as real as anything."
He smiled crookedly. "Then here's a word of advice - don't touch the door again. That Chamber is a
law to itself. No one knows how it works. It's killed squires, Kel. Killed them, driven them mad - "
"And left plenty to become knights," Kel pointed out before his imagination galloped away with him.
"Like it will us." She refused to admit he'd raised goose bumps on her skin. I climbed down from Balor's
Needle, she thought, reminding herself of the day she'd finally lost her terror of heights. I can handle the