"Katherine Kerr - Deverry 06 - A Time Of Omens" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kerr Katherine)

With a grunt of near-physical pain, Nevyn leaned back against the cold stone wall.

“How long ago were they killed?”

“Oh, a ghastly long time.” Maryn looked half-sick at the memory. “Maddyn says it was probably a
couple of months. They froze first, he said, and then thawed probably just last week. The ravens have
been working on them. It was truly grim. And all their gear was pulled apart and strewn around, like
someone had been searching through it.”

“Oh, no doubt they were. Could you tell anything about these poor wretches?”

“They were Cerrmor men. Here.” Maryn reached into his shin and pulled out a much-tarnished message
tube. “This was empty when we found it, but look at the device. I rubbed part of it clean on the ride
home.”

Nevyn turned the tube and found the polished strip, graved with three tiny ships.

“You could still see the paint on one shield, too,” Maryn went on. “It was the ship blazon. I wish we had
the messages that were in that tube.”

“So do I, Your Highness, but I think me I know what they said. We’d best go down and collect the
entire troop. No doubt we’re months too late, but I won’t rest easy until we have a look round for the
murderers.”

As they hurried back to the broch, it occurred to Nevyn that he no longer had to worry about
communicating with his allies by dweomer. It was obvious that their enemies already knew everything
they needed to know.



Even though Maddyn considered hunting the murderers a waste of time, and he knew that every other
man in the troop was dreading camping out in the chilly damp, no one so much as suggested arguing with
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Nevyn’s scheme. If anyone had, Maddyn himself would have been the one to do it, because he was a
bard of sorts, with a bard’s freedom to speak on any matter at all, as well as being second in command
of this troop of mercenaries newly become the prince’s guard. The true commander, Caradoc, was too
afraid of Nevyn to say one wrong word to the old man, while Maddyn was, in some ways, the only real
friend Nevyn had. Carrying what provisions the dun could spare them at the end of winter’s lean times,
the silver daggers, with the prince and old Nevyn riding at the head of the line, clattered out the gates just
atnoon. With them was a wagon and a couple of servants with shovels to give the bodies a decent burial.

“At least the blasted clouds have all blown away,” Caradoc said with a sigh. “I had a chance for a word
with the king’s chief huntsman, by the by. He says that there’s an old hunting lodge about ten, twelve
miles to the northeast, right on the river. If we can find it, it might still have a roof of sorts.”

“If we’re riding that way to begin with.”