"Katherine Kerr - Deverry 10 - The Black Raven" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kerr Katherine)

Every now and then a servant girl would come to the table to pour the men ale
from a dented flagon or set out a meagre basket of bread. One particular
evening, Rhodry realized that it was always the same girl, a buxom little
blonde, when she stopped for a moment to chat with one of the archers,
Melimaladar, a dark-haired fellow whose eyes were a smoky sort of green,
unusual even for one of the People. They whispered together, head to head,
until something he said made her giggle, and she trotted off, still smiling to
herself.
Vantalaber took a sip of the ale she'd brought and nearly spat it out.
'Ye gods, it's watered!' the captain snarled, but in Elvish. 'Thin as swill!'
'The dun's running out,' Rhodry said in the same language. 'Soon enough the
steward will be breaking out the vinegar.'
'What? Why would anyone drink vinegar?'
"You don't drink the stuff for itself. You just put a dollop in a tankard of
well water. To make it safe, like.'
'Well, the way these people live in filth, I'm not surprised. But I don't mean
to insult all of humankind. Gwerbret Cadmar's a fine man in his way.'
'He is that,' Rhodry said. 'Though I worry about his health. He doesn't have a
son to inherit the rhan, and the last thing the Northlands can afford is a
cursed feud over rulership.'
'That doesn't make any sense. What about his daughters?'
Van, they can't inherit. They're women. If Cadmar were only a tieryn or a
lord, maybe his vassals would back a daughter, but she could never rule as
gwerbret.'
Vantalaber rolled his eyes in disgust. Melimaladar, who'd been watching his
blonde as she served other tables, leaned forward to join the conversation.
'The daughters have got sons, right? What about them?'
'Cadmar can designate a grandson as heir, yes,' Rhodry said. 'But the High
King will have to approve it.'
'Huh.' Mel paused, thinking. 'It's a strange place, Deverry. I don't like it.
I feel like riding out right now, snow or no snow.'
'We'll all be leaving in the spring,' Rhodry said. 'What's so wrong?'
Melimaladar exchanged a look with Vantalaber. All the archers at the table had
fallen silent, Rhodry realized, to listen.
'Well, look,' Van said. 'Here's our Prince Dar, and he is a prince; none of us
would deny it. But he's a prince of the People, not one of your lords, and
before this he's always known what that means and how he should take it. Now
look at him! He's learning to give himself airs, isn't he? With all the
Round-ears bowing and scraping every time he walks into a room!'
Rhodry slewed round on the bench to look across the great hall. Near the
honour hearth Cadmar was sitting in his carved chair with Prince Dar at his
right hand and his favourite hounds lying at his feet. Once Cadmar had been a
powerful man, but now his hair was white and his face somehow shrunken. Every
now and then he would rub his twisted leg and its old injury, as if it pained
him despite the warmth of the nearby fire.
By contrast Daralanteriel seemed all youth and strength, even though he sat
still, contemplating the enormous sculpture of a dragon that curled around the
hearth with its stone back for a mantel. He was an exceptionally handsome man
even for one of the Westfolk, and Rhodry could see how a young girl like Carra
would have followed him anywhere once he'd been kind to her. Over the winter