"Tales Of Einarinn - 04 - The Warrior's Bond" - читать интересную книгу автора (McKenna Juliet E)

“I’m sorry?” Casuel spared his injured colleague a scant glance. “Please speak more slowly.”

I decided to turn the conversation to less contentious matters. “When did you cut your hair?”

Temar ran a hand over the short crop that replaced the long queue I’d last seen him with, hair as black as my own but straight as a well rope. “Practicality is now the watchword of Kel Ar’Ayen. Fashion is a luxury we cannot yet afford.” I was glad to see a smile of good-humoured self-mockery lightened the severity of his angular features.

“We’d better get this lot under lock and key, Temar, over yonder.” I pointed to the warehouse I’d bespoken when we first arrived in Bremilayne. Sodden sacks and battered casks were being swung on to the dock in capacious slings, stacked anyhow as everyone hurried to lighten the stricken vessel. I caught an avid expression on more than one onlooker’s face.

“I will direct the men aboard ship.” Temar returned to the gangplank without further ado.

“I’d better see to whoever that mage is,“ Casuel said hastily as he watched the injured man being lifted on to a litter.

“Absolutely.” Casuel could deal with wizardly concerns and I’d see to my own responsibilities. Noticing D’Olbriot insignia on the cloak of a thickset new arrival by the lofty warehouse, I hurried over and ushered the man inside the shelter of the echoing building, speaking without preamble.

“This arrival’s going to be the talk of the taverns, so who do we have to secure the place if the wharf rats come sniffing around?” I ran fingers through my hair to shed the worst of the rain, damp curls clinging tight to my fingers.

“I’ve a double handful of newly recognised and four sworn and loyal.” The man’s grizzled and wiry hair ran unbroken into a full beard framing a prominent nose and bulbous eyes, leaving him looking like an owl peering out of an ivy bush. “Sorry we’re so behind hand. We’d have been here day before yesterday if a horse hadn’t gone lame.”

“It’s Glannar, isn’t it, from the Layne Valley holdings?” His rich, rolling voice helped me place him, sergeant-at-arms to those most isolated holdings of the House of D’Olbriot.

The man’s face creased into a ready grin. “You’ve the advantage of me. I recall you came up when we had that trouble in the shearing sheds but I can’t put a name to you.”

“Ryshad.” I returned his smile. “Ryshad Tathel.”

“Done well by the House, I hear,’ Glannar observed with a glance at the shiny copper circling my upper arm. He spoke with the self-assurance of a man who’d earned chosen status long enough since to let his own arm ring grow dull with the years.

“No more than staying true to my oath.” I kept my tone easy. Glannar was only making conversation, not fishing for secrets or better yet salacious detail, like some I’d met since half-truths about my adventures in the Archipelago had escaped Messire’s orders for discretion. “You’ve got your lads well drilled?” I’d spent my share of time training raw recruits with wits blunter than a plough handle.

Glannar nodded. “They’re lead miners’ sons, all bar one, so won’t stand any nonsense. We’ll keep this lot safe as a mouse in a malt heap.”

“Good.” I turned my head as the great doors swung open to let a row of wet and laden dockers enter. I curbed an impulse to shed my cloak and make myself useful; getting my hands dirty wouldn’t have been appropriate to my shiny new rank or to Glannar’s consequence as sergeant-at-arms hereabouts. So I watched as he sent the sworn men about their business with brisk gestures. They in turn were visibly diligent in organising the recognised men, lads newly come to the service of the House, on the lowest rung of the ladder and keen to prove themselves worthy of invitation to swear the oath binding them to D’Olbriot interests.

I watched the well-muscled youths set to with a will. I’d sworn that same ancient oath with fervent loyalty and believed in it with all my heart until the events of the last year and a half had shaken my faith to its roots. I had come within a whisker of handing back my oath fee and abandoning my allegiance to the Name, believing the House had abandoned me. Then reward had been offered, the rank of chosen man as recompense for my anguish, and I had taken it, more than a little uncertain but not sure enough of my other choices to abandon what I’d known for so long. But I had taken other obligations on myself as well, where once my oath had left no room for other loyalties.

Glannar’s genial commands rang to the rafters behind me as I went out. The rain was slackening but the sky stayed grey and sullen. About as sullen as Casuel, who was standing in the meagre shelter of the dockside hoist being addressed by a tall figure wrapped in a bright blue cloak. I let a burdened sled scrape past over the cobbles before making my way over.

“Ryshad Tathel, this is Velindre Ychane, mage of Hadrumal.” Casuel looked as if he were sucking a lemon. “Her affinity is with the air, as you’ve no doubt guessed. It was her on the other ship.”

“My lady.” I bowed low. “We are deep in your debt.” I doubted Casuel had shown any gratitude but the House of D’Olbriot owed this woman a full measure of thanks, and for good or ill I was its representative here.

“It’s lucky you were there,’ chipped in Casuel.

“Luck had nothing to do with it.” She made a plain statement of fact out of words that could so easily have been arrogance, rebuke or both. “I’ve been making a study of the air currents off the Cape of Winds this past half-year. When I heard Esquire D’Alsennin would arrive around the middle of the season, I decided to work our way up the coast. I scried his ship as well as the likely impact of the storm and thought it best that we make landfall together. Given Urlan’s accident, it’s as well we did.” She addressed me directly, leaving Casuel tugging impatiently at the ties of his cloak. Her voice was low and a little husky, as self-assured as her stance. For all her Mandarkin name, the regular accents of Hadrumal were unshaded by any older allegiance and I guessed she had been born on that distant, secretive island.

“You want to meet Temar? Esquire D’Alsennin, that is?” This was setting a new piece on a game board already well into play. I’d want to know more about this unknown lady before letting her loose among the complex concerns of the colony and the House I served, whatever Casuel might have to say about the unquestioning cooperation a mage was entitled to as of right.

“When he has leisure from more pressing matters.” Velindre’s smile lent a sudden feminine air to her almost mannish features. She would never be considered a beautiful woman but her striking appearance would halt any eye and that impact would outlast more conventional charms. A few wisps of fine blonde hair escaped the confines of her hood and she brushed them away from pale lashed hazel eyes. “So you are Ryshad,’ she mused. ‘I’ve heard a lot about you.”

I decided to match her directness. “From whom?”