"Tamora Pierce - Protector Of The Small 4 - Lady Knight" - читать интересную книгу автора (Pierce Tamora)

The miserable-looking guards who watched the wagons scowled at Kel, but fetched the
quartermaster.
Once Kel placed money in his palm, the quartermaster allowed her to open the crates and barrels in a
wagonload of boys' clothes.
The wagon's canvas hood kept off the weather as Kel went through the containers. Tobe looked to be
about ten, but he was a runty ten, just an inch or two over four feet in height, bony and undersized from a
life of cheap, scant rations. She chose carefully until she had three each of loincloths, sashes, shirts,
breeches and pairs of stockings, three pairs of shoes that might fit, a worn but serviceable coat and a
floppy-brimmed hat. If she was going to lead Tobe into battlelands, the least she could do was see him
properly clothed. The army tailors could take in shirts and breeches to fit him properly; the cobblers
could adjust his shoes. Once she had bundled everything into a burlap sack, Kel mounted Hoshi, giving a
copper noble to the soldier who had kept the mare inside a shelter, out of the wet. As the rain turned to
sleet, they plodded back to Queensgrace.
In Kel's room, Tobe sat dozing against the wall, afloat in her shirt. When Kel shut the door, his eyes
flew open, sky-blue in a pale face. "I don't care if you was drunk or mad or takin' poppy or rainbow
dream or laugh powder, you bought my bond and signed your name and paid money for me and you
can't return me to ol' Alvik," he told her without taking a breath. He inhaled, then continued, "If you try I'll
run off 'n' steal 'n' when I'm caught I'll say I belong to you so they'll want satisfaction from you. I mean it!
You can't blame drink or drug or anything and then get rid of me because I won't go."
Kel waited for him to run out of words as water trickled off her hat and cloak on to the mat by the
door. She gave Tobe a moment after he stopped talking, to make sure that he was done, before she
asked, "What is that about?"
"See?" he cried. "You forgot me already - me, Tobeis Boon, whose bond you bought tonight. I knew
you was drunk or takin' a drug or mad. But here I am an' here I stay. You need meтАж toтАж to carry your
wine jug, an' cut the poppy brick for you to smoke, an', an' make sure you eat - "
Kel raised her eyebrows. "Quiet," she said in the calm, firm tone she had learned from Lord Raoul.
Tobe blinked and closed his mouth.
Kel walked over and blew into his face so he could smell her liquor- and drug-free breath. "I'm not
drunk," she told him. "I take no drugs. If I'm mad, it's in ways that don't concern you. I went out to get
you clothes, Tobe. You can't go north wearing only a shirt."
She tossed the sack on to her bed and walked back to the puddle she'd left by the door, then
struggled to undo the tie on her hat. Her fingers were stiff with cold even after grooming Hoshi and
treating her to a hot mash.
When she removed the hat, a pair of small, scarred hands took it and leaned it against the wall to dry.
Once Kel had shed the cloak, Tobe hung it from a peg, then knelt to remove her boots. "I have clothes,"
he said, wrestling off one boot while Kel braced herself.
 "I saw," she replied, eyeing the heap they made on the floor. "I wouldn't let a cat have kittens on them.
I ought to take Alvik before a magistrate anyway. Your bond says you get two full suits of clothes, a coat
and a sturdy pair of shoes every year."
"It does?" he asked, falling on his rump with her boot in his hands.
Kel reached inside her tunic and pulled out his indenture papers. "Right there," she told him, pointing to
the paragraph. When Tobe frowned, she knew Alvik had neglected something else. "You can't read, can
you?" she asked.
"Alvik said I din't need no schoolin', bcos I was too stupid to learn," Tobe informed Kel,-searching for
a cloth to wipe her boots with. He was practised at this: the innkeeper had taught him to look after
guests' belongings as well as their horses, Kel supposed.
"Lessons," she said, folding the papers once more. "After we're settled in the north." She yawned.
"Wake me at dawn. We'll try those clothes on you then. And I'm not sure about the, the -" she yawned
again - "shoes. I'm not sure these will fit. If we stop on the way, perhapsтАж"
She looked around, exhaustion addling her brain. Her normal bedtime on the road was much earlier