"Ann Maxwell - Concord 1 - The Singer Enigma" - читать интересную книгу автора (Maxwell Ann)

Tarhn held the craft toward Wilderness’ sun. Later he would change course into a nearly flat
trajectory which would put Wilderness between them and the cruise ship. But now there was little to do
but sit, review what had happened, try to guess why.
The assignment had begun in the usual manner—mental alert from a Carifil, vivid image of whom he
was to watch, directions as to the place he should intercept her. So he had soon found himself aboard the
Adventure. He had discreetly watched over Lyra’s cabin until she finally left it. When she went to the
forward lounge and sat alone, he sat well behind her, waiting to see whether she had friends or enemies
aboard.
Although the lounge was thick with people, his quarry was easy to keep track of. Lyra Mara was a
silent amber pool surrounded by flocks of yammering life. Not so much as a ripple of awareness crossed
her face when a man dyed the last shade of orange sat beside her and attempted conversation.
A discreet mental probe of the gaudy man gave Tarhn only the impression of a fashionable predator
seeking diversion from the boredom of interplanetary flight. Tarhn was not satisfied. His own mind was
broadcasting the fiction of a rich tourist, in case anyone was curious enough to probe. The orange man
might easily be working beneath a similar cover.
Tarhn stepped up the probe in stages until it reached the point of diminishing returns; more
information could be gained only at the cost of revealing the probe to an alert psi. If the orange stranger
was other than he appeared to be, a cursory probe would not uncover him.
After a few minutes of listening to the persistent stranger, Tarhn was ready to believe that he was no
more than his mental and physical surface proclaimed, a vain, mildly intoxicated man of wealth who could
not believe that Lyra was not interested in him.
Tarhn chuckled deep within himself. At least the slizzard showed good taste. Lyra had a tranquil,
self-contained beauty that made others appear garish. Her hair could have been spun of the finest amber
and her skin had-a rich translucence which invited, even demanded touch. And her eyes ... though he had
seen only a vicarious mind-picture of her when he had been given the assignment, he was certain that no
gemstone in the galaxy could match the red-brown depths of her eyes, much less the tiny starburst of
gold which was their center. Most Galactics had only darkness for pupils. Was the dilating mechanism
the same as his? Would sudden light, interest, fear, or mental effort cause the gold to expand?
With practiced ease, Tarhn brought his thoughts back to duty. Lyra was undoubtedly attractive, but
she was also endangered, dangerous, or both, and in some way also pivotal to Galactic politics. The
Carifil wouldn’t waste him guarding a nonentity, no matter how beautiful.
Tarhn leaned forward fractionally, his senses on full alert. The orange man was entirely too persistent
about getting Lyra to his cabin. Either he was uncommonly crude or had more than simple pleasure on his
mind.
With the easy motion of a hunting cat, Tarhn rose and walked up the aisle.
“I am unaware of your home planet,” said Tarhn in high Galactic. “Is it one on which ceremonial
rudeness is practiced?”
Perhaps it was Tarhn’s sheer size which made the stranger speechless. When Tarhn repeated his
question in low Galactic, the now furious man interrupted.
“I understand high Galactic better than you,” the man said loudly.
Tarhn’s dark hands lifted in a polite indication of disbelief, then turned palms up in an apology which
was thoroughly negated by his ice blue eyes. At the same time, the severe planes of Tarhn’s face
smoothed into the expression of one who waits patiently for a dull child to answer a simple question.
“On Danir I would have you killed,” said the man in a guttural tongue.
“And on Tau,” replied Tarhn in the same language, “I would feed you to the slakes—after you had
been bathed. As we are here rather than there or Danir, I await your pleasure.”
“I wouldn’t lower myself to touch you,” said the man.
Tarhn bowed and murmured, “Good ... for you.”
The insult was doubly telling, for Tarhn had delivered it in the gutter patois of Danir, a language which
a Danirian aristocrat wouldn’t understand. The stranger’s surge of outrage proved that he had indeed