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

bake oven, by Mithros."
Kel stared blindly at the paper on top of the stack Raoul had just thrown on to the desk. It was
decision time: await the Crown's orders, or slip away to wait for the northern passes to clear so she
could track down the Nothing Man? She didn't know enough; that was the problem. She needed
information, and there was only one place she could think of to get it. "Sir, has anybody entered the
Chamber of the Ordeal a second time?"
For a moment the only sound was the crackle of the fire in the hearth. Raoul froze. At length he said, "I
must tell the bathhouse barber to clean my ears tomorrow. I could have sworn you just asked me if
anyone has ever returned to the Chamber of the Ordeal. That's not funny, Kel."
 "I didn't mean to be funny, sir," she replied. Shortly after her Ordeal and knighthood Raoul had
commanded her to address him by his first name, but "sir" was as close as she could bring herself. She
clenched her hands so he couldn't see them shake. "I'm serious. I need to know if you've ever heard of
anyone going back there."
"No," Raoul said firmly. "No one's been mad enough to consider it. Most folk can tell when once is
more than enough. Why in the name of the Great Mother Goddess do you ask?"
Kel swallowed. If he didn't like her question, he really wouldn't like what she was about to say. "I need
to talk to it."
Raoul scrubbed his face with one hand. "You need to talk to it," he repeated.
Kel nodded. "Sir, you know me," she reminded him. "I wouldn't ask anything silly, not when you bring
such important news. But I have to know if I can enter the Chamber again. I need to find something out."
"You're right, I do know you," Raoul said glumly. "No, no, you wouldn't jest at a time like this. I'm
afraid you're stuck, though. No one has been allowed back inside that thing in all history. No one would
ever want to go back. You'll just have to settle for what you got in there the first time." He held her
questioning eyes with his own anxious ones.
Kel wished that she could explain, but she couldn't. Knights were forbidden to tell what had taken
place during their Ordeal. "I didn't mean to worry you, sir," she told him at last.
Raoul scowled at her. "Don't frighten me like that again. I've put far too much work into you to see you
go mad now." He looked around. "What were we doing last?"
"Wagon requisitions, sir," she replied as she held up her slate.
He took it and reviewed her numbers. "Let's finish this now. I won't be able to work on them this
afternoon - the council will be meeting."
Kel fetched the papers he needed. "There was a Stormwing in the courtyard this morning," she
remarked as she laid them out. "I think he already knows how bad things will be this summer."
Raoul grunted. "I wouldn't be surprised. They probably smell it. Now what's this scrawl? I can't read
Aiden's writing." They spent the rest of the morning at work, sorting through the endless details that had
to be settled before the men of the King's Own rode north to battle.
After lunch Kel saw to her horses, stabled in the building the Stormwing had turned into his momentary
perch. There were hostlers, whose job it was to mind the hundreds of horses kept at the palace, but Kel
preferred to see to her riding mount, Hoshi, and her warhorse, Peachblossom, herself. The work was
soothing and gave her time to think.
Jump watched as she tended the horses. The scruffy dog had put in an appearance at Kel's side about
mid-morning, clearly recovered from having his morning's sleep interrupted by Kel and a Stormwing.
Jump was not a typical palace dog, being neither a silky, combed, small type favoured by ladies, or a
wolf- or boar-hound prized by lords. Jump was a stocky, short-haired dog of medium size, a combat
veteran. His left ear was a tatter. His dense fur was mostly white, raised or dented in places where it
grew over old scars. Black splotches covered most of the pink skin of his nose, his only whole ear and
his rump. His tail was a jaunty war banner, broken in two places and healed crooked. Jump's
axe-shaped head was made for damping on to an enemy with jaws that would not let go. He had small,
black, triangular eyes that, like those of any creature who'd spent a lot of time with Daine the Wildmage,
were far more intelligent than those of animals who hadn't.