Lions of Al Rassan by Guy Gavriel Kay

Author:Guy Gavriel Kay [Kay, Guy Gavriel]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Fantasy, General, Physicians, Historical, Fantasy Fiction, Kings and Rulers, Desert People
ISBN: 9780060733490
Google: YSrqohctt8AC
Amazon: 0060733497
Barnesnoble: 0060733497
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 1995-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eleven

?Where’s Papa now?”

Fernan Belmonte, who had asked the question, was lying in clean straw in the loft above the barn. Most of him was buried for warmth, only the face and brown, tousled hair showing.

Ibero the cleric, who had reluctantly acceded to the twins’ morning lessons taking place up here today—it was warmer in the barn above the cows, he’d had to concede—opened his mouth quickly to object, but then shut it and looked with apprehension towards where the other boy lay.

Diego was completely invisible under the straw. They could see it shift with the rise and fall of his breathing, but that was all.

“Why does it matter?” His voice, when it came, seemed disembodied. A message from the spirit-world, Ibero thought, then surreptitiously made the sign of the sun disk, chiding himself for such nonsense.

“Doesn’t really,” Fernan replied. “I’m just curious.” They were taking a brief rest before switching courses of study.

“Idle child. You know what Ibero says about curiosity,” Diego said darkly from his cave of straw.

His brother looked around for something to throw. Ibero, used to this, quelled him with a glance.

“Well, is he allowed to be rude?” Fernan asked in an aggrieved tone. “He’s using you as authority for impolite behavior to his older brother. Will you let him? Doesn’t that make you a party to his action?”

“What’s impolite about it?” Diego queried, muffled and unseen. “Do I have to answer every question that comes into his empty head, Ibero?”

The little cleric sighed. It was becoming increasingly difficult to deal with his two charges. Not only were they impatient and frequently reckless, they were also ferociously intelligent.

“I think,” he said, prudently dodging both queries, “that this particular exchange suggests that our rest is over. Shall we turn to the matter of weights and measures?”

Fernan made a ghastly, contorted face, pretended he was strangling, and then pulled straw over his head in unsubtle protest. Ibero reached for and found a buried foot. He twisted, hard. Fernan yelped and surfaced.

“Weights and measures,” the cleric repeated. “If you won’t apply yourself properly up here we’ll just have to go down and inform your mother what happens when I’m tolerant of your requests.”

Fernan sat up quickly. Some threats still worked. Some of the time.

“He’s somewhere east of Ragosa,” Diego said. “There’s a fight of some kind.”

Ibero and Fernan looked quickly at each other. The matter of weights and measures was, for the moment, abandoned.

“What does somewhere mean?” Fernan demanded. His tone was sharp now. “Come on, Diego, do better than that.”

“Near some city to the east. There’s a valley.”

Fernan looked to Ibero for help. The straw on the other side of the cleric shifted and disgorged a blinking thirteen-year-old. Diego began brushing straw from his hair and neck.

Ibero was a teacher. He couldn’t help himself. “Well, he’s given us some clues. What’s the city east of Ragosa? You both ought to know.”

The brothers looked at each other.

“Ronizza?” Fernan hazarded.

“That’s south,” Ibero said, shaking his head. “And on what river is it?”

“The Larrios.

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