"George R. R. Martin - The Hedge Knight" - читать интересную книгу автора (Martin George R R)

“I was once,” Dunk admitted. Till the old man took me in.

“If you took me, I could squire for you.”

“I have no need of a squire,” he said.

“Every knight needs a squire,” the boy said. “You look as though you need one more than most.”

Dunk raised a hand threateningly. “And you look as though you need a clout in the ear, it seems to me.
Fill me a sack of oats. I’m off for Ashford alone.”

If the boy was frightened, he hid it well. For a moment he stood there defiant, his arms crossed, but just
as Dunk was about to give up on him the lad turned and went for the oats.

Dunk was relieved. A pity I couldn’t . . . but he has a good life here at the inn, a better one than he’d
have squiring for a hedge knight. Taking him would be no kindness.

He could still feel the lad’s disappointment, though. As he mounted Sweetfoot and took up Thunder’s
lead; Dunk decided that a copper penny might cheer him. “Here, lad, for your help.” He flipped the coin
down at him with a smile, but the stableboy made no attempt to catch it. It fell in the dirt between his bare
feet, and there he let it lie.

He’ll scoop it up as soon as I am gone, Dunk told himself. He turned the palfrey and rode from the inn,
leading the other two horses. The trees were bright with moonlight, and the sky was cloudless and
speckled with stars. Yet as he headed down the road he could feel the stableboy watching his back,
sullen and silent.


The shadows of the afternoon were growing long when Dunk reined up on the edge of broad Ashford
Meadow. Three score pavilions had already risen on the grassy field. Some were small, some large;
some square, some round; some of sailcloth, some of linen, some of silk; but all were brightly colored,
with long banners streaming from their center poles, brighter than a field of wildflowers with rich reds and
sunny yellows, countless shades of green and blue, deep blacks and greys and purples.

The old man had ridden with some of these knights; others Dunk knew from tales told in common rooms
and round campfires. Though he had never learned the magic of reading or writing, the old man had been
relentless when it came to teaching him heraldry, often drilling him as they rode. The nightingales belonged
to Lord Caron of the Marches, as skilled with the high harp as he was with a lance. The crowned stag
was for Ser Lyonel Baratheon, the Laughing Storm. Dunk picked out the Tarly huntsman, House
Dondarrion’s purple lightning, the red apple of the Fossoways. There roared the lion of Lannister gold on
crimson, and there the dark green sea turtle of the Estermonts swam across a pale green field. The brown
tent beneath red stallion could only belong to Ser Otho Bracken, who was called the Brute of Bracken
since slaying Lord Quentyn Blackwood three years past during a tourney at King’s Landing. Dunk heard
that Ser Otho struck so hard with the blunted longaxe that he stove in the visor of Lord Blackwood’s
helm and the face beneath it. He saw some Blackwood banners as well, on the west edge of the
meadow, as distant from Ser Otho as they could be. Marbrand, Mallister, Cargyll, Westerling, Swann,
Mullendore, Hightower, Florent, Frey, Penrose, Stokeworth, Daffy, Parren, Wylde; it seemed as though
every lordly house of the west and south had sent a knight or three to Ashford to see the fair maid and
brave the lists in her honor.