"Elizabeth Moon - Gird 01 - Surrender None" - читать интересную книгу автора (Moon Elizabeth)

In the year of his birth, and far away, the boy already lived who
would make his parentage worthless.




Chapter One

«^»
“You’re big enough now,” said the boy’s mother. “You don’t need to
be hanging on my skirts any more. You’re bold enough when it’s
something you want to do.” As she spoke, she raked at the boy’s
thick unruly hair with her fingers, and wiped a smudge of soot from
his cheek. “You take that basket to the lord’s steward, now, and be
quick about it. Are you a big boy, or only a baby, then?”
“I’m big,” he said, frowning. “I’m not scared.” His mother flicked
her apron over his shirt again, and landed a hand on his backside.
“Then get on with you. You’re to be home right away, Gird, mind
that. No playing about with the other lads and lasses. There’s work to
be done, boy.”

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Elizabeth Moon - Surrender None


“I know.” With a grunt, he lifted the basket, almost hip-high, and
leaned sideways to balance the weight; it was piled high with plums,
the best from their tree. He could almost taste one, the sweet juice
running down his throat…
“And don’t you be eating any of those, Gird. Not even one. Your Da
would skin you for it.”
“I won’t.” He started up the lane, walking cantways from the weight,
but determined not to put the basket down for a rest until he was out
of sight of the house. He wanted to go alone. He’d begged for the
chance, last year, when he was clearly too small. And this year, when
she’d first told him, he’d—he frowned harder, until he could feel the
knot of his brows. He’d been afraid, after all. “I’m not afraid,” he
muttered to himself. “I’m not. I’m big, bigger than the others.”
All along the lanes he saw others walking, carrying baskets slung
over an arm or on a back. A handbasket for each square of bramble-
berries; an armbasket for each tree in its first three years of bearing; a
ruckbasket for each smallfruit tree over three years, and a back-
basket for apples in prime. Last year he’d carried a handbasket in
each hand: two handbaskets make an armbasket, last year’s fee. This
year was the plum’s fourth bearing year, and now they owed the lord
a ruckbasket.
And that leaves us, he thought bitterly, with only an armbasket for
ourselves. It had been a dry year; most of the fruit fell before it
ripened. He had heard his parents discussing it. They could have
asked the lord’s steward to change their fee, but that might bring