"Joel Rosenberg - Hour of the Octopus" - читать интересную книгу автора (Rosenberg Joel C)

Helgramyth." Of course, the need to tie the twine into a noose was not apparent, nor the need to set up a
bent sap-ling and a carved trigger for the noose, so I didn't mention it.
He nodded. "I see."
 "Well, it sometimes happens that when you're drying your twine, as the saying goes, a rabbit will on
occasion tangle itself in your twine and be dead by morning. Now,
even a peasant is allowed to eat dead animals he finds; that's hardly hunting."
I didn't go into how the rabbits are quickly skinned and roasted, the skin, bones, and offal buried
before you swing out on the day's march, lest anybody walking along the path misunderstand and think
that you'd been snaring rab-bits.
"This happens often?"
"Rarely, Lord. And never within the domain of Lord Toshtai, of course." I tried on my most sincere
voice.
His nod accepted me at my word.
Horses were saddled and hitched to the viny hitching trellis at the stables. Beyond, half a dozen or so
matched brown horses pranced, their riders, the guards, already in the saddle.
Arefai's horse stood waiting for him, a coal-black mare, its hooves lacquered to a high gloss and
crimson and yel-low flowers woven into its long mane. A dull, almost taupe gelding stood listlessly
waiting for me.
I didn't know whether to be jealous of Lord Arefai's fine animal and resentful I'd been given such a
drab mount, or happy that I wasn't going to be bouncing on the back of an animal I'd be decidedly
unable to control. The dull little gelding suited me, I decided as I climbed up the trellis and gingerly
lowered myself into the saddle. While richer peasants have draft horses, horses as riding animals are
permitted only to the bourgeois and members of our beloved ruling classтАФit would be a shame to have
the head of a peasant sit higher than that of a lordтАФand both horses and saddles were a relatively new
thing to my tender bottom.
This was the thirdтАФno, fourthтАФtime that I had been on a horseтАФeach time to accompany
ArefaiтАФand it was no better than the first. With every step, the saddle would try to jerk my hips
forward; when the horse broke into a faster pace (a canter, they call it; I call it a personal assault) it
would try to bounce my buttocks up around my ears.
Personally, I would rather have walked. That I can do well.
Thankfully, Arefai wasn't in a hurry this morning, so he kept his mare at a slow walk, the smaller
gelding briskly stepping to keep up, prodded with a sheathed lance by one of the trailing bodyguards
when it lagged.
Well, at least they weren't prodding me; I take what good fortune I can get.
2
The Joy of the Chase, the Thrill of the Hunt, and Other Blatant Falsehoods
The hunting preserve lay most of an hour's ride to morningwise of the keep: a fan-shaped expanse of
forest, fields, and three lakes, some of it as carefully trimmed and maintained as the gardens in the inner
court, other parts al-lowed to go wild.
We talked as we rode past square fields of wheat and riceтАФeach one a standard one peden in area;
Lord Toshtai divides land neatlyтАФto where a forested ridge of low hill was broken only by our road.
More accurately, Arefai talked and I listened; his wed-ding with Lady ViKay of Glen Derenai was
coming up in a few weeks, although it had yet to be formally an-nounced, and he was having to take time
from his other activities to supervise the preparation of her quarters, ad-joining his.
I had spent a few moments in Arefai's rooms, once. His tastes were simple and really quite good. I
understood ViKay's to be other than simple, and perhaps not entirely possible. If I understood Arefai
correctly, it seemed she wanted her rooms floored with warm green marble; she needed privacy screens
that wouldn't interfere with the air flow fitted tightly over the windows; she simply must have ancient
Mesthai artwork newly carved for the headboard
of her sleeping pallet; and she fully expected Arefai to su-pervise the installation of all of that.