"Lawrence Watt-Evans - Dus 4 - Book of Silence" - читать интересную книгу автора (Watt-Evans Lawrence)

final ruination that had prompted the question was so well hidden that Garth
was not really aware of it himself.
The King said nothing; his head moved very slightly, almost
imperceptibly, to one side and then back.
"You must tell me where it is, old man, if you want me to fetch it."
The King did not reply and moved not at all. Garth felt a surge of anger
at this silence.
"Speak, old man," he said.
No answer came. Garth's annoyance increased.
"Has your tongue shriveled in your head, then, O throneless King? Are
you trying to imitate the corpses you resemble, since you cannot rightly join
them? Have you now forsaken speech, the better to serve your foul black god?"
He did not shout; his voice was flat and deadly, a dangerous sign among his
kind.
The Forgotten King moved slightly, as if emitting a faint sigh, but
still said nothing. Garth drew breath for another question, but was distracted
by the arrival of the innkeeper with a fresh mug of ale. The overman snatched
it from him, swallowed half its contents at a gulp, and then ordered, "Be off,
man!"
The taverner risked a glance at Garth's baleful red eyes and inhuman
face, then hurried away, wondering if it would be safe to cut the overman's
next serving of ale with water. He knew the signs of Garth's anger; rudeness
to underlings like himself was one such indication. He did not want to worry
about dealing with an overman in a drunken fury-but an overman enraged at
being cheated might be equally bad. He looked at Garth's mail-covered back and
decided, at least for the moment, that his reputation for honest measure and
good drink was worth preserving. He could only hope that the old man would
calm the overman down.
Garth was in no mood to be calmed down. When the innkeeper had moved
away, he asked, "Why do you not speak? Is it perhaps that I am unfit to
address you, O King of an empire long since dust, monarch of a dying memory,
lord of a realm unknown? Is the Prince of Ordunin, a lord of the overmen of
the Northern Waste, suited only to serve your whims, but not to speak with
you? Does the master of ashes and woe, wearing rags and tatters and dwelling
in a single dim room of an ancient inn, not deign to answer the exiled killer,
the disgraced berserker? Will the servant of Death not choose to acknowledge
the pawn of destruction?" His voice was calm, as still as water pooled on
black ice, and laden with far more threat than any shout as he said, "Answer
me, old man."
The old man answered. "Garth," he said in a voice like ice breaking,
"why do you disturb me? You know I prefer not to waste words in idle chatter."
The overman was wrenched momentarily from his anger by the sound of the
old man's voice, a sound unlike any other, dry and brittle and harsh, so
unpleasant to hear that it could not fully be remembered. He regained his
composure quickly, however, and replied, "Is everything I say idle chatter?
Have I not the right to an answer when I ask a polite question?"
"Hardly polite," the old man demurred. "I will answer, however. No, I
have not yet recalled where I left the Book of Silence in those ancient days
when last I held it."
"So I must linger here, still waiting?"