"ab Hugh, Dafydd - Jiana 02 - Warriorwards" - читать интересную книгу автора (ab Hugh Dafydd)

"Pour away. Still, they'll make a bonny batch of martyrs. To the Cause, you know."
"To the Cause."
"End to the Troubles!"
The glasses clinked. Jiana felt a tightness in her stomach, and her throat closed. Martyrs. The Cause.
She stood quickly and ghosted out of the teahouse. Tooqa, name of the Nameless Serpentine. How many of us aren't slaves anymore?
"I ought to get the dueling license," she said, shivering on the walkway in the chilly night breeze. She enunciated carefully, "They close at midnight."
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She pulled her coins from her pouch and fingered them in the waning sunlight, chewing on her lip drunkenly.
She looked across the water, watching the cracked and bloated sun fall into the ocean, quenching its fires again for the night.
"No, I'm a warrior, and 1 need a horse, not a fucking piece of paper. License! A horse, just a horse, b'Gad. Maybe I am a Briar, in the center of my breath. My dead past is no worse than this living hell." She spat on the sidewalk and staggered towards the Causeway. She crossed the Prince's Causeway on willpower alone.
She saw the world through a tunnel, as though she wore horse blinders. She swum through the air, hands out to steady herself, calculating each step. No sir, no sir, no one is going to know that I have had a drop or two. We heroes, we heroes must set an example.
She staggered along the gravel-built Causeway and eventually, after an indeterminate time, she left the wetlands behind her. The buildings were all of white stone, with not a splash, not a scribble, not a chip to mar their surface. This was the Prince's quarter.
When she set her foot on truly dry land again, it was the first time in six moons. She stooped, scooped up some sand, and swallowed a mouthful. Sobered a bit, she began walking towards the ranches while there was still sufficient twilight to pick her way.
She followed her nose to the nearest stable and refused to think about a little bird she had held in her hand and thrown in the air, but never quite taught how to fly.
The brisk walk to the stable did not sober Jiana, but it woke her up a bit. She walked up then down the row of stalls. Jiana did not know what she sought, but she did not find it.
"Don't you haveЧhave any other horses?" she asked, a hiccough spoiling the illusion of sobriety.
The stableboy peeked at her cleavage and mumbled, "No, ma'am, all we have is yan stable-stalls in." A Souther, by his voice. He pushed past her, squeezed close though
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he had plenty of room. He showed her a horse she had passed.
"This one is fine, fine! See not his silvery coat, cockleburrs all combed out? See his sharp and shiny hooves?"
"I'm not buying a sword, kid. Show me a horse with muscle and breeЧbrains, that is." She took the beast by his bridle and looked him in the eye. He lowered his gaze and tried to pull from her grasp, shivered in submissive fear. "No, he won't do at all. Damn your wandering eyes, find me something for a warrior queen!"
A sudden scream from the back of the stable caught her attention. A horse cried again in terror and agony, then fell heavily to the ground. A brute stallion, black and red as firey coals, burst open the gate to his stall and charged into the walkway. Left behind was a maimed and bloody gelding that kicked and crawled feebly.
"God's cock!" the stable boy cried and ran to Jiana. He threw his arms around her, terrified.
She put him behind her protectively and faced the snarling brute. They closed, he unblinking and she unyielding, and stood nose to nose. The horse bared its teeth.
Stone sober, Jiana swung her fist too fast for the eye to follow. She connected with a right cross, and the horse staggered from the unexpected blow. It shook its head, then reared.
Jiana charged the rampant beast. She threw a shield-press without the shield, and the horse fell to the ground.
It rose, regal and calm as the Nameless Serpentine rising before the Hero-Queen of Scale Mountains. The beast approached gently. It rested its nose on Jiana's shoulder and nickered. She seized its bridle, holding the great head steady.
"You're a horse among horses," she whispered. "Why didn't I see you before? I'd have noticed a double-stalled pair, I'm sure."
The boy still cowered behind her, pressed close, but through fear, not desire. "Ma'am ... is that n-not the horse for you? D'you want to take him the stables from?"
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"How much?" she asked without turning.
Some trace of manliness returned to the boy. His heart beat less rapidly against her back, and she felt the beginning of a lump in his crotch. "Ah, such a horse, it's only twelve you forЧI mean ten Eagles!"
"How much?" she repeated, menace creeping into her
voice.
"Nine serpents. Eight! He is yours eight Eagles for. Or Serpents! Eight Serpents."
"This beast just killed that gelding," she pointed out. "Your price is high. Perhaps 111 simply let him go, and you can put him back in his stall."
The horse jerked against her hand and laid his ears back, whinnying savagely. The boy staggered back away from Jiana and fell to his buttocks on the floor.
"Take him!" he cried. "Take him away the stables from! He is yours, sure, and never to see him again herein!"
She turned and looked at the Souther. He was young, as innocent as anybody could be in the wickedest city afloat. She led the horse away, but as she passed the poor boy, she pried a silver stud from her gambeson and threw it to him. It was worth at least five claws in the Maze, more than the value of the slain gelding.
"I'd have given two," she explained, "if you had had the simple courage to look this gift in the mouth. Good life, kid."
She grabbed up a servicable saddle with her free hand and left without a glance behind. She followed the road to Bay Din, towards the Toolian camp.
How long Radience sat, she did not know. But all at once she leaped up in shock, seeing the growing darkness.
The lights! The lamps! The fire in the kitchen!
She darted from the slave khayma to the great khayma, her heart squeezing down to her stomach. As she ran, she tucked her left arm inside her shirt.
She sped through the tent flap, rounded the turn and
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realized, a fraction of a heartbeat too late, that she was going to collide with Lord Giathudin, Overman of Slaves.