"Mindy L. Klasky - Glasswright Apprentice" - читать интересную книгу автора (Klasky Mindy L)

"If you please, Instructor Morada," Rani could hardly speak past the constriction in her throat
as she tried desperately not to see the offending metal coil. "Would you like me to tend to the
brazier while you finish your work?"

Morada's hand flew faster than Rani could follow, and then the girl's cheek stung; her eyes
watered involuntarily against the slap. "I would like you to remember your place, Apprentice.
Get your miserable carcass down the scaffold, and return to the guildhall. You have shown
nothing but insolence since you were ordered to assist on this window. You merchant-rats are
all the same—too stupid to follow directions and too stubborn to learn."

Protest bubbled in Rani's chest, the words fueled by her stinging cheek. Still, Morada was the
instructor, and Rani only needed to swallow twice before managing the guild's formula. "Yes,
Instructor, you speak the truth, imparting wisdom to this apprentice."

"A mynah could say as much. Go, wretch! I'll see you in the Hall of Discipline when I return
to the guild."

"Yes, Instructor." Rani turned to the rope guide, ready to toss it down to steady her descent.

"Apprentice!" The word cracked out in the autumn air, brighter than the sunlight on the
cathedral's new copper roof. "You climbed up here without the rope. You can certainly make
your way down without it."

This time Rani could not keep from gaping at Morada. Anger was one thing—Rani
constantly set the instructors' teeth on edge because she had not mastered the obsequious
tones of her fellow apprentices. But to be forced to descend the scaffold without the rope,
when one was perfectly available… Rani might have been confident in her climbing skills,
but it was a foolish risk to descend without a guide rope. "Or perhaps you'd like a faster way
down?" Morada's eyes were furious, and Rani had no doubt that the woman would follow
through on her threat—at the very least giving Rani a shove to help her down the wooden
ladder.
"No, Instructor." Rani scurried to the platform edge, catching her lower lip in her teeth as she
steadied her feet against the suddenly too-smooth wooden rungs. She silently appealed to
Roan, and despite one slip in the middle of the structure, the god of ladders guided her feet
safely to the ground. Only when she had made her way to the bottom of the scaffold did she
indulge the hatred that simmered beneath her heart, spitting onto the ground to get a nasty
taste off her tongue. Merchant-rat! Rani's parents had paid good money to get her into the
guild—better money than Morada would earn for the Defender's Window, whatever the
instructor's mastery of her craft.

Even now, the guild payment forced Rani's family to live like paupers. Her older brother,
Bardo, who had hoped to make his Pilgrimage this year, had had no choice but to postpone
his journey. Of course, he could walk the Path of the

Gods here in the City, but that was not the same. Every night, as Rani fell asleep in her closet
of a room, she tormented herself with the knowledge that she — she alone — was responsible
for her family's failure to complete the Pilgrimage and gain immediate passage to the
Heavenly Fields upon their deaths, long may those be in the future.

Such speculation drove her to the familiar verge of tears. After all, it wasn't as if she had asked