冰与火之歌系列之《权力的游戏》第107期:第八章 布兰(7)

 As angry as he was, his father could not help but laugh.  尽管父亲气得半死，终于还是忍不住笑道：

You’re not my son, he told Bran when they fetched him down, you’re a squirrel. So be it.  "你一定不是我儿子，"当其他人把布兰抱下来时，他对儿子说，"你根本是只松鼠。算了，我认了，

If you must climb, then climb, but try not to let your mother see you. 如果你真的非爬不可，那就去爬吧，尽量别让你母亲瞧见就是。"

Bran did his best, although he did not think he ever really fooled her.  布兰很努力，虽然他认为母亲对他的举动其实一清二楚。

Since his father would not forbid it, she turned to others.  既然父亲不愿阻止他四处攀爬，她便转而采取迂回策略。

Old Nan told him a story about a bad little boy who climbed too high and was struck down by lightning,  首先来的是老奶妈，她跟他讲了一个故事，说从前有个不听话的坏小孩，越爬越高，最后被雷活活劈死，

and how afterward¹ the crows came to peck out his eyes. Bran was not impressed.  死后乌鸦还来啄他眼睛。布兰听了不为所动，

There were crows’ nests atop the broken tower, where no one ever went but him,  因为残塔上多的是乌鸦窠巢，那里除了他没人会去，

and sometimes he filled his pockets with corn before he climbed up there and the crows ate it right out of his hand.  所以有时他会在口袋里装满玉米。一上塔顶，乌鸦便都开开心心地聚拢来从他手心啄食，

None of them had ever shown the slightest bit of interest in pecking out his eyes. 怎么也不像会啄他眼睛的模样。

Later, Maester Luwin built a little pottery² boy and dressed him in Bran’s clothes and flung him off the wall into the yard below,  眼看这招无效，鲁温师傅便用陶土捏了个小男孩，为它穿上布兰的衣服，然后从城墙上丢下去，

to demonstrate what would happen to Bran if he fell. That had been fun, but afterward Bran just looked at the maester and said,  好让布兰了解他若是摔下，会有多么凄惨的结果。那是个有趣的实验，但事后布兰却只盯着鲁温师傅，面无表情地说：

I’m not made of clay. And anyhow, I never fall. "我不是泥做的，而且我绝对不会摔下去。"

Then for a while the guards would chase him whenever they saw him on the roofs, and try to haul him down.  在此之后，轮到了城里的守卫，有一段时间，只要他们发现他在屋顶上，就会吆喝追赶，想把他赶下来。

That was the best time of all. It was like playing a game with his brothers, except that Bran always won.  那是最紧张刺激的时刻了，简直就像和哥哥弟弟们玩游戏，只不过，这游戏每次都是布兰获胜。

None of the guards could climb half so well as Bran, not even Jory. Most of the time they never saw him anyway.  卫兵们谁也没有布兰这种本事，连乔里也拿他没辙。不过多数时候他们根本就没看见他，

People never looked up. That was another thing he liked about climbing; it was almost like being invisible. 人是从来不往上看的。这也是他喜欢爬墙的原因之一，仿佛可以因此隐身遁形。

 

1 afterward   

adv.后来；以后

参考例句：

• Let's go to the theatre first and eat afterward. 让我们先去看戏，然后吃饭。
• Afterward,the boy became a very famous artist.后来，这男孩成为一个很有名的艺术家。

2 pottery   

n.陶器，陶器场

参考例句：

• My sister likes to learn art pottery in her spare time.我妹妹喜欢在空余时间学习陶艺。
• The pottery was left to bake in the hot sun.陶器放在外面让炎热的太阳烘晒焙干。