"Jane Lindskold - Firekeeper Saga 1 - Through Wolf's Eyes" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lindskold Jane)

Ox, who had finished putting up the tents and was now effortlessly chopping wood, paused, his axe in the
air.

“If you’re cold, Derian, you can help me chop this wood. You know what they say, ‘Wood warms you
twice: once in the cutting, once in the burning.’ ”

Derian grinned at him. “No thanks. I’ve enough else to finish. Do you think we’ll get snow tonight? The
air almost has the scent of it.”
Ox shrugged, measuring his answer out between the blows of his axe. “The mountains do get snow, even
this late in the season, but I hope we’re not in for any. A blackberry winter’s all we need.”

Derian frowned thoughtfully. “At home I’d say snow would be a good thing for business. It’s easier to
move goods by sled and people by sleigh, but out here, on horseback… I could do without the snow.”

“We won’t have snow,” announced Race, re-entering the camp from the forest fringe. Three long, shining
river trout dangled from one hand. “The smoke’s rising straight off the fires. Clear but cold tonight.
Derian, you might want to break out your spare blankets.”

Derian nodded. He’d slept cold one night out of a stubborn desire to show himself as tough as the
woodsman and had been stiff and nearly useless the next morning. Earl Kestrel himself had chided him
for foolish pride.

“Our mission is too important to be trifled with,” Kestrel had continued in his mincing way. “Mind that
you listen to Race Forester’s advice from here on.”

And Derian had nodded and apologized, but in his heart he wondered. Just how important was this
mission? King Tedric had seemed content enough these dozen years not knowing his son’s fate. And
Prince Barden had shown no desire to contact the king.

Earl Kestrel had been the one to decide that knowing what had happened to the disinherited prince was
important—Kestrel said for the realm, but Derian suspected that the information was important mostly
for how it would affect the earl’s private ambitions.


The young woman was bathing when a thin, tail-chewed female informed her that the One Male wanted
her at the den. The messenger, a yearling who had barely made it through her first winter, cringed and
groveled as she delivered her message.

“When shall I say you will come before him, Firekeeper?” the she-wolf concluded, using the name most
of the wolves called the woman—a name indicating a measure of respect, for even the Royal Wolves
feared fire.

Firekeeper tossed a fat chub to the Whiner. She certainly wasn’t going to have time to eat it, not if she
must run all the way to the den. Ah, well! She could catch more fish later.

“Tell him,” she said, considering, “I will be there as fast as two feet can carry me.”

“Slow enough,” sneered the Whiner, emboldened as she remembered how all but the fattest pups could
outrun the two-legged wolf.