"Mary Stewart - The Arthurian Saga 03 - The Last Enchanment" - читать интересную книгу автора (Stewart Mary)

brought, and rode down through the quiet woods.

It was late when I came to the gates, but these were open, and no one
challenged me as I rode in.
The place was still in a roar; the sky was alight with bonfires, the
air throbbed with singing, and through the smoke one could smell
roasting meats and the reek of wine.
Even the presence of the dead King, lying there in the monastery church
with his guards around him, could not put a bridle on men's tongues.

The times were too full of happening, the town too small: only the very
old and the very young found sleep that night.
I found none, certainly.
It was well after midnight when my servant came in, and after him
Ralf.

He ducked his head for the lintel--he was a tall young man--and waited
till the door was shut, regarding me with a look as wary as any he had
ever given me in the past when he had been my page, and feared my
powers.

"You're still up?" "As you see." I was sitting in the high-backed
chair beside the window. The servant had brought a brazier, kindled
against the chill of the September night. I had bathed, and looked to
my hurts again, and let the servant put me into a loose bedgown, before
I sent him away and composed myself to rest.

After the climax of fire and pain and glory that had brought Arthur to
the kingship, I, who had lived my life only for that, felt the need for
solitude and silence.

Sleep would not come yet, but I sat, content and passive, with my eyes
on the brazier's idle glow.
Ralf, still armed and jewelled as I had seen him that morning at
Arthur's side in the chapel, looked tired and hollow-eyed himself, but
he was young, and the night's climax was for him a new beginning,
rather than an end.

He said, abruptly: "You should be resting.

I gather that you were attacked last night on the way up to the
chapel.

How badly were you hurt?

' "Not mortally, though it feels bad enough I No, no, don't worry, it
was bruises rather than wounds, and I've seen to them.

But I'm afraid I lamed your horse for you.