Читать «Rulers of the Darkness (хвв-4)» онлайн - страница 434

But so what? Ealstan thought, and his face twisted into a grin almost as fearsome as the Swemmel-wolf's. So what, by the powers above? If the Unkerlanters keep pounding Mezentio's men, what Forthweg thinks about them won't matter. The Algarvians are losing. That was sweet as honey to him. Ever since the Algarvians overwhelmed the Forthwegian army- and so many others afterwards- he'd wondered if they could lose, and feared they couldn't.

Still wearing that grin, he turned away from the broadsheet and walked down the street. A news-sheet vendor on a corner shouted, "Read about the Algarvian counterattack in the Kingdom of Grelz! Herborn threatened! Swemmel flees to Cottbus with his tail between his legs! Heroes of Plegmund's Brigade!"

Ealstan strode past him as if he didn't exist. He wondered how many times he'd done that, in Gromheort and now in Eoforwic. Too many- he knew that. He pretended news-sheet vendors didn't exist whenever the Algarvians moved forward. And whenever he thought of Plegmund's Brigade, he hoped his cousin was dead: horribly dead and a long time dying, with any luck at all.

PYBBA'S POTTERTY! screeched a sign ever so much larger and gaudier than any broadsheet the Algarvians had ever put up. This wasn't the enormous warehouse down by the Twegen River, but the home of Pybba's kilns and his offices. The only pots and plates the magnate sold here were the ones that came out of the kilns too badly botched to go to the warehouse or to any shop, no matter how shoddy. OUR MISTAKES- CHEAP! another sign proclaimed. Pybba did a brisk business with them. Pybba, as far as Ealstan could tell, did a brisk business with everything.

He was prowling through the offices when Ealstan came in. "You're late," he growled, though Ealstan was no such thing. "What took you so long?"

"I was looking at a new broadsheet," Ealstan answered.

"Wasting time," Pybba said. "Sit your arse down in front of the books. That's what you're supposed to be doing, not leering at Algarvian tripe. I bet it had naked women on it. The redheads are shameless buggers."

A couple of men who'd beaten Ealstan into the pottery works laughed. Pybba was reliably loud and reliably vulgar. Ealstan perched on a tall stool and got to work. His boss' legitimate books were quite complex enough. The others…

Before long, Pybba let out a roar from inside his sanctum: "Ealstan! Get your arse in here this minute, curse you, and see if you can't bring your brains with it."

More snickers came from Ealstan's coworkers as he got down from the stool. They weren't without sympathy; before long, Pybba would be bellowing at somebody else, and everyone knew it. "What is it?" Ealstan asked, standing in the doorway.

"Shut the cursed door," the pottery magnate rumbled. Ealstan did. Pybba's voice suddenly dropped: "Which broadsheet were you talking about? The one with the wolf?"