"Kerr, Katharine - Westlands 02 - A Time Of Omens" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dragon Stories)

"Imph. I hate to admit this, but you're probably right."
"Of course I'm right. I've spent many a long and guileful hour in thought, working this scheme through. We'll probably even turn a profit."
"Oh, very well, then! Since there's naught I can do about it all, anyway, I might as well go along with your daft scheme. Poor little Marka-a fine way to start married life!"
"Aha! You're the one who's making the mistake this time. You're remembering pampered Alaena, the rich widow who lacked for naught. Marka has lived as hard a life as ever you did as a child, following your father round the kingdom."
Jill said something foul beyond repeating, simply because he was right, but he merely laughed at her.
Later that afternoon Jill went looking for Marka and found her sitting in front of the tent she shared with Delya and Keeta. She'd spread out a large mat and arranged the tiles, which might possibly have come back to her from another life, in tidy lines to study them.
"Marka?" Jill said. "I've just come to offer my congratulations."
"Oh, thank you!" She looked up with a smile of such sheer, innocent joy that it wrung Jill's heart. "You know, I never ever thought I'd be this lucky, not ever."
"Well, I'm glad you're so happy." Jill sat down on the ground across from her. "Keeta tells me that the troupe's going to join together to buy you a wedding dress."
"Yes, and it's so wonderful of them." She hesitated briefly. "You look sad, too, just like Keeta and Delya do. Why?"
"Oh, there's just something about a wedding that takes us old crones this way. Don't let it trouble you."
"But it does trouble me. You're all acting like I'm going to get dragged off to the archon's prison instead of married."
Jill hesitated, but the girl deserved an honest answer.
"Well, I suppose it's because this kind of happiness just can't last, just because of the way life runs, I mean. It's sad, in a way, like seeing a spring flower and knowing it's going to fade when summer comes. I know that sounds awfully harsh, but do you think you'll always be this gloriously happy?"
"Well, I wish I could be, but of course you're right. All right, then, if that's all it is."
It was, of course, a great deal more than that, but this was no moment to turn vulture and dwell upon all those worries that used to trouble older women at a wedding: the slow death of a girl's youth, the quick death of the little freedom allowed her in life between her father's house and her husband's, to say nothing, in those days-hundreds of years before the dweomer taught women to control their pregnancies-of her possible literal death in childbirth or from the simple exhaustion of birthing too many children.
"That's a nice set of fortune tiles," Jill said instead. "Did Salamander buy them for you?"
"Yes. Aren't they lovely?" But she frowned, tilting her head a little to one side. "You know, it was the oddest thing. I saw these in the marketplace, just sitting in their box, and I didn't pick them up or anything. I didn't even touch them. But I somehow knew that there was this wine stain on the bottom. And you know what the oddest thing was? Ebany knew it, too. And he never looked, either."
Jill's doubt that the girl might be Alaena reborn vanished.
"Well, odd things like that do happen." She stood up quickly, before Marka could ask further and touch the edge of secrets. "I think it means you were meant to have them. And meant to have Ebany, too, most like."
Marka favored her with a smile as brilliant as the moon at her full.
Later that evening, after the show, when the troupe was eating its midnight meal round a leaping fire, there was a celebration. Vinto was a fine musician, playing the wela-wela, a zitherlike instrument; another of the acrobats played the drum; the flute boy outdid himself, especially since there was plenty of background noise to cover his occasional squeak. Everyone was laughing and singing, toasting Salamander and Marka with cups of red wine and taking turns in wishing them happiness, and even some of the merchants who were sharing the public field drifted over, getting into the spirit of things by bringing stuffed dates and nut cakes and the other traditional gifts for this sort of celebration. After about an hour the noise and the crowd began to get on Jill's nerves, and when she drifted away for a quiet walk, Keeta and Delya joined her. They found a bench by the public fountain and sat down to watch the water splashing in the moonlight. Although Delya was smiling, a little flushed from the wine and humming a tune under her breath-in fact, she never did add a word to that entire conversation-Keeta looked downright melancholy.
"Ah, well," she said at last. "At least Salamander looks like he'll make her a better husband than most."
"Oh, he certainly will," Jill said. "I've known him a long time, and I can honestly say that."
"Good. By the way, has he mentioned anything about going to Anmurdio to you?"
"Oh, yes. What do you think of the idea?"
"It's a good one. The towns over there are so starved for a good show that we should do really well."
"Well, that's a relief. I didn't want to drag the rest of you along only to have it turn out to be a disaster."
"What I don't understand, frankly, is how there could be any rare books and things over there for you to find."
Jill fell back onto a version of the truth.
"There may not be any, indeed. But a long time ago there was a horrible war in the country adjoining our kingdom, and a large band of refugees fled south. Now, they didn't settle in Bardek proper nor here in Orystinna. What I'd like to know is where they did end up, and what books they brought with them when they fled."
"I must say that you people seem to have a ghastly lot of wars."
"Well, yes, I'm afraid so."
Keeta glanced at her companion and suddenly smiled. "Delly, you're just about asleep. Want to go back?"
"Mph?" Delya woke with a start and yawned. "I'm fine."
"I think we'd best get back." Keeta got up and held out a hand. "Come along."
With a nod and apologetic smile in Jill's direction, Delya rose and allowed herself to be led off to camp. Jill considered going, too, then decided to sit in the cool and moon-shot dark for a while. Not only did all the noise and rire's heat seem a burden, but she was hoping that Dallandra would come through into the physical plane again. Ever since Dalla had appeared to her with Elessario along, Jill had been trying to puzzle out her cryptic last words, which she'd heard only as "islands Evandar." Whether "Evandar" was the name of the islands where the refugees had settled or of some person, she simply didn't know. Yet, though she waited there for hours, the elven dweomerwoman never returned.
When Jill got back to the camp, she found it silent, with no one up but Keeta, sitting yawning by a dying fire.
"I moved your gear and blankets and things over to our tent. Better let Salamander and Marka have one to themselves. Thought I'd better wait up and tell you."
"Ah, I see," Jill said. "Thank you."
On the morrow, when the troupe marched off into town to register the wedding officially at the archon's palace, Jill stayed in camp, but she came to greet them when they paraded back again. At the head of the line, sitting sidesaddle on Salamander's dapple-gray horse, rode Marka, flushed and smiling, with her new husband walking beside her. In full costume the acrobats followed, singing, laughing, doing a bit of juggling or a dance here and there. A crowd of children and citizens brought up the rear, treating the acrobats' wedding as just another show, although, in all fairness, Salamander and Marka seemed delighted to provide them with it. When they reached camp, he swept her out of the saddle and kissed her soundly. To the cheering of the crowd they held hands and bowed, while the rest of the troupe scurried round collecting the small coins that rained down upon the pair. Jill could only think that indeed, Salamander had found himself a perfect wife.
Toward evening, however, Jill dragged him away from the dancing and music. In the lengthening shadows they walked together among the palms at the edge of the campground. A sunset wind was springing up, sending drifts of dusts across the dead-flat plains.
"Somewhat I wanted to ask you," Jill said in Deverrian. "When you agreed to come to Bardek with me, was it mostly on the hope of finding Alaena again?"
"I cannot tell a lie. Indeed it was."
Jill snorted profoundly, realizing even as she did it that she sounded just like Nevyn.
"But, Jill, it all worked out for the best, didn't it now? Have I not been your guide, your escort, your loyal companion and faithful dog, even, while at the same time rescuing my beloved from a life of virtual slavery to her bestial father?"
"It was Keeta who did the rescuing. You were just the bait."
"Imph, well, I suppose so, but how crudely you put things sometimes."
"My heart bleeds. On the morrow we're going to find a ship for Anmurdio and get on with our search and that's that."
"I've already found the ship." He favored her with a brilliant grin. "We had to wait a fair bit down at the archon's palace, and there was a ship's captain waiting there as well to register his last cargo, and so lo and behold! A deal was struck."