"Lawrence Watt-Evans - Dus 3 - Sword Of Bheleu" - читать интересную книгу автора (Watt-Evans Lawrence)

sentries, we'll break camp! I want us out of here before sunset!"
When the warrior was well on his way, Garth dismounted, swinging himself
easily to the ground, and strode toward Kyrith. She met him halfway, and they
embraced briefly. There was no passion in their embrace, and they did not
kiss; for overmen and overwomen, marriage was a matter of convenience and
companionship; sex was an involuntary function that occurred when an overwoman
was in heat. Their mouths were virtually lipless and hardly suited to kissing.
Had Kyrith been in heat, Garth's attentions would not-have been so
perfunctory.
When they released each other Garth asked, "Where are Myrith and Lurith
and the children?"
Kyrith pointed northward. Garth asked, to be sure he was not
misinterpreting her gesture, "You left them to take care of the house?"
She nodded.
"That's all right, then. Why did you come here, though? What did you
want to stir up trouble for? Didn't Galt tell you that I'd be back by the end
of the year?"
She reached for her tablet. Garth stopped her. "Never mind. We'll
discuss it later." Communicating with Kyrith was annoyingly slow and
inconvenient ever since the accident that had put shards of ice through her
throat and destroyed her voice. He knew that she found it as frustrating as he
did, and she resented it when he let his irritation interfere with their
conversations; ordinarily he would have been more tactful about declining to
let her write out her answer, but he did not want any unnecessary delays now.
The people of Skelleth might well have been stirred up by the siege or his own
ride through town. He said, as a partial explanation, "We have to straighten
out the situation in Skelleth. Thord told me that Galt is your co-commander.
Where is he?"
She pointed to one of the tents and made a sign indicating sleep.
"He's asleep? It's after noon!"
She scribbled on her tablet and showed him the words: "Night watch."
"I need to talk to him."
Kyrith signed for him to wait and headed for the tent.
Garth waited and looked about. There was no organization to the camp at
all, it seemed. The warbeasts were off to one side, in a rope enclosure that
obviously wouldn't stop them for more than five seconds should they decide to
leave; there was no sign of any food supply for them, and a hungry warbeast
was as dangerous to friend as to foe. Had the overmen been letting them hunt
their own food? That was fine for one, two, or maybe even three, but there
were half a dozen in the pen, and more still out on sentry duty. A dozen
warbeasts hunting in the same territory could strip it clean in a matter of
days and might well start fighting amongst themselves over the game they
found. Furthermore, most warbeasts weren't picky about what they ate so long
as it was sufficiently large and fresh; they would hunt humans as readily as
anything else, and that would hardly be good for interspecies relations.
He couldn't judge just how hungry the penned beasts were, but they did
not look as if they had been fed in the last day or two; that was good, as it
implied they had last hunted somewhere to the north, where humans were rare
and uncivilized and wouldn't be missed by the people of Skelleth. It was also
bad, however, because it meant they would demand feeding soon.