"Joel Rosenberg - Omnibus 03 - To Home and Ehvenor" - читать интересную книгу автора (Rosenberg Joel C)

Last but not least, I tucked two Therranji garrottes into their separate, leather-lined pockets. Vicious
thingsтАФthe slim cables were made with springy barbed wire, the barbs canted backwards so that the
garrotte could only be tightened. Just tuck the handle through the loop, then slip the barbed-wire noose
over a head, give the wooden handle one hard jerk, and let goтАФin order to get it off, the poor slob
would have to remove the handle, then slip the loop off the butt end.

Can't get it over the head? No problemтАФwhip it around the neck, put the handle through the loop, and
pull. Trust the Therranji to come up with a weapon that meanтАФelves can be nastyтАФand somebody like
me to carry two of them on his person.

Still, peace is nice. You don't have to take a lot of precautions before going out for a simple walk in the
woods.

I wanted to take one last look at Kirah sleeping, and I wanted not to take one last look at her, so I hung
a quiver from my shoulder, grabbed my best longbow and a couple of spare strings, and headed down to
the stables.
***

Jason was already in the saddle of a huge red geldingтАФanother one of Carrot's foals, I thinkтАФand the
stableboy was finishing saddling a stocky roan for Tennetty. I picked a smallish piebald mare and saddled
her myself, earning a broad, gap-toothed smile from the stableboy, touched that the great Walter
Slovotsky would handle his own horse.

Well, it didn't hurt for him to think that.

Water and field rations are always kept ready in the stables. Until they string the telegraph to Biemestren
and out to Little Pittsburgh, there's no way to know when a messenger will have to be dispatched in a
hurry. I slipped a canteen over the saddlehorn, and a pair of saddlebags in front of it.
We rode out through the main gate and into the day.

The gently rolling land around the former Castle Furnael, now Castle Cullinane, had been cleared at least
a mile in each direction, in part to give the baron some farmland of his own, I suppose, but mainly to
prevent any large force from sneaking up on the castle. The western road cut through at least two miles
of wheat fields before it swung north toward the woods that countless Furnael barons had used as their
private hunting preserve. That was down the road almost two miles away, just enough distance to warm
the horses.

Hooves clopped quietly on the unpaved road, while above, soft white clouds scudded across a deep
blue sky, something that only soft white clouds ever do. Below, waist-high stalks of young green wheat
bowed gently in the breeze. The air was still cool from the night, with none of the afternoon tang of
sunbaked fields, but the day was young.

"Nice day," Jason said.

"That it is," I said, hitching at my holsters. Nice days make me nervous.

Jason had one of his twin revolvers in a holster on the left side of his chest, the butt facing forward, just
about even with his left elbow. Not a bad placement, actuallyтАФit would be a bit clumsy to get at it with
his left hand, but it could be done.