"Kerr, Katharine - Deverry 02 - Darkspell" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dragon Stories)

Year after year, the fighting raged around the true prize, the city of Dun Deverry, taken by one side one summer only to fall to another a few years later. After so many sieges, Gweniver doubted if there were much left of the Holy City to claim, but taking it was crucial to holding the kingship. All winter it had been in Cantrae hands, but now it was spring. Everywhere across the torn kingdom the claimants to the throne were mustering their vassals and reaffirming their alliances. Gweniver was certain that by now her clan’s allies would be in Cerrmor.
‘So listen, Maccy,’ she said. ‘We may have to stay here all summer, but eventually someone will bring his war-band and get us out.’
Macla nodded miserably. They were sitting in the temple gardens, on a little bench among the rows of carrots and cabbages. Macla, who was sixteen, was normally a pretty lass, but today her blond hair was pulled back in an untidy knot, and her eyes were red and puffy from weeping.
‘I just hope you’re right,’ Macla said at last. ‘What if no one thinks our lands are worth having? Even if they married you, they’d still have to fight with the rotten old Boar. And you can’t afford to give me any dowry now, and so I’ll probably rot in this awful old temple for the rest of my whole life.’
‘Don’t natter like that! If I take the holy vows, then you’ll have all the land for your dowry that any woman could want.’
‘Oh.’ Hope came into her eyes. ‘You always did talk about being a priestess.’
‘Just that. Now don’t worry. We’ll find you a husband yet.’
Macla smiled, but her flood of complaints had raised doubts in her sister’s mind. What indeed if no one wanted to take the Wolf lands because they brought the Wolf’s feud with them? Since for all of her life Gweniver had listened to the constant talk of war, she knew something that the more innocent Maccy didn’t: the Wolf lands lay in a bad strategic position, right on the Cantrae border and so far east of Cerrmor that they were hard to defend. What if the King in Cerrmor decided to consolidate his frontier?
She left Maccy in the garden and went for a restless walk. If only she could get to Cerrmor and petition the King! By all accounts, he was a scrupulously honorable man and might well listen. If she could get there. She climbed up the catwalk and looked out. After three days, Burcan and his men were still camped in the meadow.
‘How long are you going to stay there, you bastards?’ she muttered under her breath.
Not much longer, as it turned out. The next morning, when she climbed to the ramparts just after dawn, she saw the warband saddling up and loading their provision carts. Yet when they pulled out, they left four men and one cart behind, a guard over her provisioned to stay for months. Gweniver swore with every foul oath she’d ever heard until she was panting and out of breath..Finally she told herself that she should have expected no less. All at once, she felt hopeless. Even if Burcan had taken all his men away, she never could have travelled alone the hundred and eighty miles to Cerrmor.
‘Unless I went as a priestess?’ she remarked aloud.
Once she had the blue tattoo on her cheek, she would be inviolate, as safe on the roads as an army. She could go to the King with her holy vows lending her force and beg for the life of her clan, find some man to take Maccy and keep the Wolf’s name alive. Then she could return here and take up her life in the temple. Turning, she leaned against the rampart and looked down at the compound. Already the neophytes and lower-ranked priestesses were working out in the garden or carrying firewood to the kitchens. A few strolled in meditation near the round temple itself. Yet for all the activity it was silent in the warm spring sun. No one spoke unless necessary, and then only in a quiet voice. For a moment she felt as if she couldn’t breathe, just from the stifling vision of her future here.
AH at once she felt a blind, irrational rage. She was trapped, a wolf in a cage, chewing and raging at the bars. Her hatred of Burcan rose up as strong as a lust and then spilled over on the King in Cerrmor. She was caught between them, begging one to let her have what was rightfully hers, begging the other to take her vengeance for her. Like a madwoman she trembled and threw her head from side to side as if to say nay to the whole universe. She was caught by a feeling that was far beyond her understanding, because its roots lay far in the past, far in another life, in fact, where once before she’d been caught between two men through no fault of her own. The memory, of course, was lost to her, but the core of feeling remained, as bitter and hard as a splinter of glass in her throat.
Slowly she calmed herself again. Giving in to mad rages would do her no good.
‘You’ve got to think,’ she told herself. ‘And pray to the Goddess for her aid.’
‘The main body’s pulled out,’ Dagwyn said. ‘But they left four men behind.’
‘Bastards!’ Ricyn snarled. ‘Treating our lady like she was a prize horse or suchlike, there for the stealing!’
Camlwn nodded grimly. The three of them were the last men alive from the Wolf’s warband, and for days they’d been camping in the wooded hills behind the Temple of the Moon, where they could watch over the woman that they considered their sworn lord. All three of them had served the Wolf clan from boyhood; they were prepared to go on serving it now.
‘How good a watch are they standing?’ Ricyn said. ‘Armed and ready for a scrap?’
‘Not on your life.’ Dagwyn paused for a grim smile. ‘When I snuck up on them, I saw them sitting around in the grass, as happy as you please, and dicing with their shirt sleeves rolled up.’
‘Oh, were they now? Then let’s hope that the gods make their game a nice long one.’
The free men who worked the temple’s lands were extremely loyal to the high priestess, partly because she took far less of their crops in taxes than a noble lord would have, but mostly because they considered it an honor for them and their families to serve the Goddess. Ardda was sure, or so she told Gweniver, that one of the men would make the long trip to Dun Deverry for her with a message.
‘This has got to stop! I can’t order those men off land that doesn’t belong to me, but cursed if I’m going to let them sit there all summer. You’re not a criminal, come here for sanctuary, but we all know they’d murder you if they could. We’ll see if this king Burcan serves can make him call his men off.’
‘Do you think the King will listen to your petition?’ Gweniver said. ‘I’ll wager he wants our lands in the hands of one of his vassals.’
‘He’d best listen! I’m asking the high priestess in the Dun Deverry temple to intercede personally.’
Gweniver held the bridle of Ardda’s palfrey as she mounted, adjusting her long dresses over the sidesaddle, then walked beside her horse as she rode down to the gates. Since the four Boarsmen had shown no inclination to try entering the temple, the gates were standing open. Gweniver and Lypilla, the gate-keeper for the day, stood together and watched as Ardda rode out, sitting straight and defiantly in the saddle. As she reached the road, the Boarsmen scrambled to their feet and made her deep, respectful bows.
‘Bastards,’ Gweniver muttered. They’re keeping to every letter of the law while tearing out its heart.’
‘Just that. I wonder if they’d even murder you.’
‘Take me to Burcan for a forced marriage, more like. I’d die first!’
They shared a troubled glance. Gweniver had known Lypilla, who was in her early forties, all her life, just as she’d always known Ardda. They were as close to her as aunts or elder sisters, yet she doubted deep in her heart if she could bear to share their ordered life. Out on the road Ardda turned round the curve of a hill, riding north, and disappeared. The Boarsmen sat down and returned to their dice game. Gweniver found herself remembering the man she’d killed on the road and wishing that she could deal those four the same Wyrd.
Although she could have gone back and made herself useful in the kitchen, Gweniver lingered at the gates for a while, idly talking with Lypilla and staring out at the freedom of hill and meadow denied her. All at once, they heard distant hoofbeats, riding fast from the south.
‘I suppose Burcan’s sending messengers or suchlike to his men,’ Lypilla remarked.
The Boarsmen in the meadow seemed to agree, because they rose, idly stretching, and turned toward the sound. Suddenly, out of a stand of trees burst three riders in full mail and with swords at the ready. The Boarsmen stood frozen for a moment, then yelled and cursed as they drew swords: the riders were charging straight into them. Gweniver heard Lypilla scream as a Boarsman went down with his head cut half off his shoulders. A horse reared and staggered, and Gweniver saw the rider’s shield full-on.
‘Wolves!’
Without thinking she was running, sword in hand, down the hill while Lypilla screamed and begged her to come back. The second Boarsman fell as she ran; the third was being mobbed by two riders; the fourth broke and ran straight up the hill, as if in his panic he was trying to reach the sanctuary of the temple that his very presence was desecrating. When he saw Gweniver racing straight for him, he hesitated, then dodged to one side as if to go around her. With a howl of unearthly laughter that sprang out of her mouth of its own will, she charged and swung, catching him across the right shoulder before he could parry. When the sword slipped from his useless fingers, she laughed again and stabbed him in the throat. Her laughter rose to a banshee’s shriek as the bright blood ran, and he fell.
‘My lady!’ It was Ricyn’s voice, cutting through her laugh. ‘Oh by the Lord of Hell!’
The laughter vanished, leaving her sick and cold, staring at the corpse at her feet. Dimly she was aware of Ricyn dismounting and jogging toward her.
‘My lady! My lady Gweniver! Do you recognize me?’
‘What?’ She looked up, puzzled. ‘Of course I do, Ricco. Haven’t I known you half my life?’
‘Well, my lady, that’s not worth a pig’s fart when a man goes berserk like you just did.’
She felt as if he’d thrown icy water in her face. For a moment she stared half-witted at him while he looked her over in bemused concern. Just nineteen, her own age, Ricyn was a broad-faced, sunny-looking blond who was, according to her brothers, one of the most reliable men in the warband, if not the kingdom. Jt was odd to have him watching her as if she were dangerous.
‘Well, that’s what it was, my lady,’ he said. ‘Ye gods, it made my blood run cold, hearing you laugh.’
‘Not half as cold as it made mine. Berserk. By the Goddess herself, that’s what I was.’
Dark-haired, slender, and perpetually grinning, Dagwyn led his horse up and made her a bow.
‘Too bad they left four men behind, my lady,’ he remarked. ‘You could have handled two all by yourself.’
‘Maybe even three,’ Ricyn said. ‘Where’s Cam?’
‘Putting his horse out of its misery. One of those scum could actually swing a sword in the right direction.’
‘Well, we’ve got their horses now, and all their provisions, too.’ Ricyn glanced at Gweniver. ‘We’ve been up in the woods, my lady, waiting to make our strike. We figured that the Boar couldn’t sit here all cursed summer. Here, the dun’s razed.’
‘I was cursed sure of that. What of Blaeddbyr?’