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"Broadsword. Interesting choice."
"Popular on the coast."
"And in Shaurone."
Malthus raised an eyebrow at Torquil's suspicious tone.
"Have you been beyond the borders of this valley?"
"No. But the battle-clans "
Malthus cut him off. "Then don't question my choices."
Torquil shrugged. "We might have something. You have gold?"
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Malthus brought several coins from his pouch and extended them to Torquil.
Torquil tucked the sheath under his arm and took the coins. "Sharani ten-dolu
pieces. You've gotten around a bit."
"I told you, I was kandoyarin until a few weeks ago when I
came home."
Torquil took a blade down from the wall and handed it to
Malthus to inspect. The steel was very well made, supple, and yet strong. It
would not break easy.
Malthus slid it into the sheath and noted the fit. He paid for it. "You should
have a drink with us sometime, Torquil," he told him. "Shouldn't he, Shalto?"
Shalto grinned. "Yeah. Malthus here likes to buy and he tells great stories. I
think I'd like to be a kandoyarin someday."
"I've met many lycans working for them, but you need to be able to handle a
blade," Malthus said.
"Would you teach me?" Shalto asked.
"Certainly. I'd be glad to."
Torquil laughed, with a trace of skepticism. "I'll have to stop by with a pair
of practice blades, human, and see what you can do."
"By all means ... do so."
As Malthus and his companions emerged, they saw Nikko and Tempest watching
them from across the street. A small, fuzzy dog frolicked around them,
returning again and again with a stick in his mouth, begging for Tempest or
Nikko to toss it. Malthus snarled inwardly. Sooner or later they would misstep
and he would eat them.
Serpent's Quest [Lycan Blood Vol. I]
by Janrae Frank
78
* * * *
Nikko knelt and patted Moss, took the stick from his mouth and tossed it
toward some trees on the Common. Moss darted after the stick, barking with
simple joy. Nikko glanced up at
Tempest and straightened, brushing his dark brown robes off.
"He knows we're watching him."
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"It'll keep him on his best behavior."
"You know he's sleeping with Beth?"
The lines deepened to crevices across Tempest's face as he frowned. "I hadn't
known. How long has he been here?"
"Two weeks."
"And he's already..." Tempest made a distasteful face, clearly looking for a
polite euphemism. "Beth is a gentle, impressionable bitch."
Nikko nodded and bent down again as Moss pranced up with the stick in his
hairy mouth. The lawgiver tossed the stick farther this time. "She's lonely.
You've said it yourself enough times."
"Better alone than with the wrong mon." Tempest sighed and ran a hand through
his gray mane, working his fingers through the tangles. "How long has it been
going on?"
"According to Rory Scott, since his first night here. Rory and Hamish have
been spying on them. So have the Hansley cubs."
"Have you spoken to their parents?"
"I threatened to. They haven't come round the Camp since then."
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"Lawgiver. Your holiness." Kynyr Maguire sauntered up, followed by Finn and
Ramsey.
Finn grinned at them, his thumbs hooked into his belt. "Did
I hear you say someone was slipping the bone into Old Beth?"
Ramsey struggled to repress a snicker, and it escaped as a snort.
Tempest scowled as Cullen sauntered up to them with his hands resting on his
fighting knives. "If I'd known old Beth wanted some, I'd've already been to
see her."
"You are a slut, Cullen Blackwood." Tempest's lips tightened with disapproval.
"You should be dipped in tar and feathered."
Cullen shrugged. "It's been tried, priest."
Nikko gave Moss a hand signal to sit next to them. "That newcomer, Malthus
Estrobian."
Kynyr's expression hardened. "Every day for the past three, he's shown up at
the manor gardens to walk with
Merissa."
"I'll talk to him," said Tempest.
"If you don't, I will. And I promise it won't be pretty."
Kynyr's hands settled on the long fighting knives that rode at his hips.
"Who made you the defender of bitches' virtue?" Cullen muscled in between
Ramsey and Finn.
Kynyr gave Cullen a quiet glance that still managed to tell him he was trying
to piss on the wrong tree.
"You better be as good as you think you are, boy."
"I am."
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CHAPTER FIVE
SLUT
Kynyr Maguire sat on his bed in the barracks, oiling his long knives. His
broadsword rested on a weapons rack built onto the wall beside the bed. A
nightstand sat to the opposite side and a large chest at the foot. Forty beds
identical to
Kynyr's, each with their own nightstand and weapons racks, filled the room.
Five rooms like this one fanned out along the barracks wing of the manor. Claw
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had two hundred guardsmyn, not counting the officers who had private quarters
on the second floor. Kynyr had turned down Claw's offers of a private suite
for over a year, because he did not have the rank to justify it in the eyes of
the rank and file, many of whom were already referring to him as "Old Claw's
pretty boy."
Kynyr found his good looks to be more often a source of discomfort and [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]