"Rawn, Melanie - Dragon Star 2 - Dragon Token" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dragon Stories)

"Certain things they wouldn't approve."

Arnisaya's breath caught. "I'll do everything I can to help."

"You are the most impulsive woman I ever met," he said with a smile, and after a moment added, "Have you also discovered—finally—that you married the wrong brother?"

*

At Dragon's Rest, Prince Miyon of Cunaxa was hard put to master himself. Dead, finally dead! he kept telling himself, barely restraining laughter. Feeling his lips begin to curve, he dug the sharp prongs of a ring into his palm, the discomfort reminding him of the sobriety demanded by the occasion.

"What's to become of us now?" he murmured, shaking his head.

Edrel of River Ussh, whose grief marked him as if it

were years instead of only moments old, raised his eyes to the Sunrunner who had brought the news. "It's certain? Absolutely certain?"

"Yes, my lord." Hildreth twisted her rings. "Poor Sioned. ..."

Miyon recalled that the two women had grown up together at Goddess Keep. Hildreth misplaced her emotion, however; it was Pol who deserved pity.

Aware that they were looking to him for instructions, he repressed another grin and said, "You both know better than I how such rituals are arranged here. Please see to it. I wish to spend some time alone."

He escaped to the gardens, found a secluded bench screened by shrubs and a willow tree, and rocked back and forth with silent laughter for some time. But not even glee at Rohan's death could cancel his lingering fury at the trick his daughter had played on him. Had Meiglan still been here under his thumb, life would have been much simpler. Now he would have to choose his meal instead of nibbling from both ends of the loaf.

Could Pol withstand the invading Vellant'im? Indications were he could not. Radzyn, Remagev, Stronghold—the three shining jewels of the Desert were lost. And at the smoking ruins of Tuath Castle in the far north, Miyon's own bastard son camped with his Merida brethren, soon to descend on coveted Tiglath. With its capture—and Birioc had damned well better not destroy it, or Miyon would have his head—Cunaxan steel could be shipped safely and swiftly to the Vellant'im. More importantly, Desert troops would be kept out of reach of that same precious steel, unable to rearm. He thought of the swords, shields, spears, and arrowheads stockpiled in his armories, and smiled. Birioc had bought himself into partnership with the Vellant'im with that treasure; Miyon intended to buy a princedom. Maybe two.

Not that he would forgive his future allies for gutting Stronghold. It was easier to believe Rohan dead than that seemingly eternal pile of stone gone. Now he would never ride through its gates and take possession of what was rightfully his. Well, he would think of that while the

ritual was going on—it would put a properly somber look on his face.

And the mourning period would at least give him the chance to think. With Laric departed for Firon to reclaim his princedom from his wife's treacherous brother, there was only Edrel left to deal with. And Evarin, the Master Physician from Goddess Keep. And Hildreth and her husband and sons.

There was much to be thought over, and several deaths to be planned.

*

At New Raetia, it was a bright, windswept morning, the sort of day that almost made Rohannon wish he could tolerate being in a boat. How wonderful to skim across water like a dragon on the wind. The closest he could come to it was Sunrunning, but his father had forbidden it until he truly knew how.

At least he didn't have the faradhi seasickness as bad as his sister. Sometimes Chayla turned green just looking at the ocean from the windows of Radzyn. Rohannon smiled briefly at the memory, then turned away from the view of the restless water far below. It would be a very long time before he saw whitecaps off the shores of his home, or teased Chayla about her susceptibility, or walked the battlements of his ancestral keep again.

"Rohannon? Ah, here you are." Prince Arlis grabbed for the folds of his cloak and wrapped the heavy wool more tightly around him. "What a wind! Not the contented sighs of a Storm God made happy last night in the Goddess' arms!"

"I hope he blows the Vellanti fleet to the Far Islands and smashes them on the rocks."

"Hmm. I wonder what—if anything—they believe in." Arlis leaned his elbows on the stone and peered down to the harbor. "Rohannon, why did no one know my brother Saumer is faradhi!"

He'd been waiting for this question for quite some time

now. "I have no idea, my lord. Was he sick on the voyage to Syr?"