"03 - Sword Dancer" - читать интересную книгу автора (Roberson Jennifer)

Sword-MakerSword Maker
Book 3 of the Sword Dancer series
By Jennifer Roberson




Sword Maker
Table of Contents
Prologue

Part I: One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, Eight, Nine, Ten, Eleven,
Twelve, Thirteen, Fourteen, Fifteen, Sixteen, Seventeen

Part II: One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, Eight, Nine, Ten, Eleven

Part III: One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, Eight, Nine, Ten, Eleven,
Twelve, Thirteen, Fourteen, Fifteen, Sixteen, Seventeen, Eighteen





Prologue
She is not a woman for idle conversation, having little patience for small talk,
and even less for excuses and explanations. Including those dealing with life
and death; mine, or her own. And yet I resorted to both: excuses, explanations.
Somehow, I had to.
"It wasn't my fault," I declared. "It wasn't. Did I have any choice? Did you
leave me any choice?" I snorted in derision. "No, of course not--not you... you
leave no choice or chance to anyone, least of all me... you just stare me down
across the circle and dare me to take you, to cut you, to chop you down with my
blade, because it's the only thing that will make you admit you're just as human
as anyone else, and just as vulnerable. Just as fragile as anyone, man or woman,
made of flesh and blood... and you bleed, Del... just like anyone else--just
like me--you bleed."
She said nothing. Fair hair shone white in firelight, but blue eyes were nothing
more than blackened pockets in a shadow-clad face lacking definition or
expression. The beauty remained, but changed. Altered by tension, obsession,
pain.
Behind me, tied to a tree, the stud snorted, stomped, pawed a thin layer of
slush away from winter-brown turf. Pawing again and again, stripping away even
the turf until what he dug was a hole.
Horses can't talk, not like humans; they do what they can with ears, teeth,
hooves. What he told me now was he didn't want to eat. Didn't want to sleep.
Didn't want to spend the night tied to a bare-branched tree, chilled to the bone
by a Northern wind that wouldn't--quite--quit. What he wanted was to leave. To
go on. To head south toward his desert homeland where it is never, ever cold.
"Not my fault," I repeated firmly. "Hoolies, bascha, you and that storm-born
sword of yours... what did you expect me to do? I'm a sword-dancer. Put me in a