"Elizabeth Lynn - Chronicles of Tornor 1 - Watchtower" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lynn Elizabeth A)

He was light-headed. He curled into the stone, wondering how many other
men of Tornor were still alive, and what Col Istor planned to do with them --
with him. He had expected to die with the men of his watch. He still expected to
die. He did not want to, but it was hard to summon up a will to live with Athor
dead, with the balance broken, the order of things spoiled. He wondered if Col
Istor had had him dragged inside and chained in order to make an example of him.
The stone was rough beneath his cheek. He shivered. From somewhere in the great
square Keep he heard the sound of chickens cackling, and the voices of the women
rounding them up. The winter had just begun, two weeks back, and he was not yet
cold-hardened. The second big snow had ceased that night. No, he thought
muzzily, the snow stopped two nights ago...
Fitfully, between shivers, he slept. He woke trying to roll away. Someone
had kicked him in the side.
He looked up. Framed against the blue winter sky, Col Istor stood over
him: black hair, black beard, a fat swarthy southerner's face.
"We just got the fire out," he said to Ryke casually, as if he were
talking to a friend, not a chained and defeated enemy. "Those crazed people set
the kitchen on fire rather than surrender." He squatted. He wore mail and a
long-sword. His iron helmet looked like an old pot. He smelled of ash. "You warm
enough?"
"Too close!" said someone sharply from behind him.
"Shut up." He was thick-shouldered, a bulky man. His dark eyes inspected
Ryke as if the watch commander were a goat marked for slaughter. "You fight
well," he said. "You're not really hurt, are you? No wounds except that head
knock. It saved your life. No broken bones. You're young. You're better off than
your lord."
Slowly Ryke sat up. He considered hitting the man with the chain around
his hands, but he did not have the strength left in his arms to swing the heavy
iron cuffs. "Athor's dead."
Col Istor chuckled. "I don't mean the old one," he said. "I mean the
young one, the prince."
"Errel?" Ryke blinked. The smoke stung his eyes. He had not slept in two
days, his head was thick. He scooped up a handful of snow and rubbed his face,
trying to think. Errel, Athor's only son and heir, had been out hunting when Col
and his soldiers appeared at the Keep five days ago. He had not come back. Athor
and the commanders had assumed him safe. Ryke had hoped so, very much. "He's out
of your reach."
"He's among us," said Col Istor. Standing, he beckoned to the man at his
back. "Get him on his feet."
That man stepped forward and dragged Ryke up. He had big ungentle hands.
Ryke leaned against the wall until his legs stopped shaking. Col watched him
with detached interest. The man did not look like a warlord. Everyone knew that
war came from the north. It was born in rock, and it toughened in the constant
strife, now at truce, between Arun and the country yet farther north, Anhard-
over-mountain. Athor of Tornor, watchful for signs of the Anhard raiders, had
paid no heed to the rumors that reached the Keep through the southern traders,
about a mercenary chieftain rising out of the peaceful farms of Arun, the
shining golden grainfields, the Galbareth. Yet this man had warred on wartrained
Tornor in winter, and won.
"Bring him," Col ordered.