"McBride, Goldie - Wulfgar" - читать интересную книгу автора (McBride Goldie)

He was frowning. The hard root that had been pressing into her seemed to have vanished. He rolled off of her and lay staring up at the trees for some time.
Finally, he got up and moved away. Hesitantly, Alinor sat up, as well, pushing her skirts down, studying him warily as he moved to the pack on his horse and withdrew something from it.
When he returned, he squatted down beside her and opened a leather pouch. Withdrawing something dark and withered looking from it, he tore it in half and handed a piece to her. She took it, looked it over and finally sniffed it. It appeared to be meat of some kind, dried to the consistency of leather. She wasn’t sure what she was supposed to do with it until he put the piece he still held to his mouth, tore off a piece with his teeth and began chewing.
"Merci!" she said gratefully, and cautiously bit down on the piece she held. She discovered it didn’t just have the appearance of leather. It also had the consistency. Struggling for several moments, she finally managed to pull off a small piece and began chewing. At first, it was about as flavorful as chewing on leather, but it was not an unpleasant taste and the longer she chewed the softer it became. Her stomach, stimulated by the possibility of appeasement at long last, began clamoring once more in delighted anticipation. Finally, she decided she’d chewed it sufficiently and tried to swallow. It took several, convulsive efforts, but she finally managed to get it down.
When she looked up at him her eyes were watering with the effort. Wulfgar, she saw, had returned to the horse for a wine skin while she was working on the piece of dried meat. Without a word, he handed the skin to her. She thought she saw his lips twitch, but when she glanced at him, he was frowning and she decided she’d imagined it.
She had been almost as thirsty as she was hungry, and she took the skin eagerly, but she was not accustomed to drinking from a wine skin and discovered very quickly that there was a trick to it. Her first attempt resulted in a squirt of wine in her eye. Squeezing her stinging eye shut, she tried again. About half of the second squirt went up her nose, but she managed to get some of it in her mouth.
Wulfgar snorted, rose abruptly and strode toward his horse once more. She peered at him suspiciously for several moments after she’d wiped the wine from her nose, eye, chin and neck, but although his shoulders shook slightly, he didn’t appear to be laughing at her. Dismissing it, she returned her attention to her feast.
It was easier to get the wine than to chew the dried meat. Moreover, she’d been very thirsty before she’d tried to chew up the meat and that had only made her more so. She focused primarily upon the wine, therefore, although, in truth, she had never had wine that tasted any worse. Her head began to swim before it occurred to her that she should pace herself more carefully.
Apparently, Wulfgar noticed she’d been imbibing rather too freely at about the same time that she realized it, for he took the skin from her. Shrugging, she returned her attention to her meat and took another bite. A sense of well being settled over her and she smiled at Wulfgar in a friendly way. He returned her smile with a suspicious glare. "Do you not speak French at all, Monsieur?" she asked him in her own language.
He merely stared at her.
After a moment, she sighed. It was going to make things very difficult if he couldn’t speak her language, because she didn’t know much of his at all. "You are like a grumpy bear," she muttered. His eyes narrowed at the comment, but she had turned her attention to her surroundings and didn’t notice. "I wonder if we will stay here until Jean-Pierre pays the ransom?" she speculated out loud.
"No ransom!" Wulfgar said sharply, drawing her attention back to him.
Alinor looked at him in surprise. "If you have not taken me for ransom, then why?"
He said nothing and she decided he had not really understood as she’d hoped, but had merely recognized the word ransom. She searched her mind for some time, but discovered that she simply could not come up with any idea of how to frame the question in his own tongue. "Ransom, no?" she prodded.
He refused to be drawn into a discussion on the matter, however, and Alinor wasn’t certain what to think of it. She wasn’t particularly perturbed either. She thought about it several moments, wondering if it was the wine and finally decided that there was some possibility that the wine had dulled her anxieties.
She wondered if the wine was responsible for the fact that Wulfgar didn’t look nearly as threatening to her as she’d originally thought. In fact, quite the opposite. Now that she’d had a chance to look him over at close range, she saw that he was quite well favored. The sharp features that had seemed so unnerving when his face was shrouded by night, seemed, in truth, rather predatory, but they also made for a face that was quite fascinating. She thought he was probably not much, if any, older than Jean-Pierre. Certainly, he could be no more than thirty.
She sighed, wiped her hands on her gown and looked up at him expectantly. "I am ready, Monsieur. You may ravish me now."



























Chapter Three

Wulfgar scowled at her. "You are drunk," he growled.
Alinor giggled, but sobered immediately at the look he gave her. "No, Monsieur!"
Bending, he grasped her by both her arms and pulled her to her feet. She stood a little uncertainly, swaying slightly, watching him curiously as he snatched the furs from the ground, rolled them up and moved to tie them to the rump of the horse.
His movements as he gathered the few personal objects strewn about were jerky with irritation.