"Sara Douglass - The Troy Game 2 - God's Concubine" - читать интересную книгу автора (Douglass Sara)

Troy Game was physically located. It was the lodestone for both of them, and unless
Asterion had also somehow managed to keep Genvissa-reborn away from the city,
William knew she would be there, somewhere.
But who was she? Who?
William pondered the fact that as this night was his own wedding night, so also it was
Edward of England's wedding night. He knew Edward well, the Saxon king having spent
a number of his youthful years at William's court while he was exiled from England by

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 Sarah Douglass - God's Concubin


the murderous intentions of his stepfather Cnut, and he wondered at this new bride of the
man's. Caela, daughter of Godwine, earl of Wessex. William knew the marriage had been
forced on Edward by Godwine, but Caela had caught his attention. He was aware that
Genvissa, if not actually reborn within the region of London (the Veiled Hills, they'd once
called it), would do everything in her power to return to London and to a position of
power. What better position as queen?
Genvissa would loathe the necessity of becoming a wife, as she would loathe the
inherent subjection to a man that marriage meant in this Christian world. It went against
her very nature as Mistress of the Labyrinth, an office of such feminine power and
mystery that its incumbents refused to subject themselves to any man. Well might a
Mistress form a partnership of power and lust and ambition with a Kingman, but never
would she subject herself to him.
But William also knew that Genvissa-reborn would do whatever she had to do in order
to achieve her ambitions. In this world women had little power. No longer did Mothers
rule over households and over their people; the idea of an Assembly of women setting the
course of a society was unthinkable now, when men ruled and subjected women to their
every whim. Unpalatable as it might be to her, Genvissa would subject herself to
marriage, if it meant gain. Marriage to Edward would give her the most gain of all. Queen
of England. The highest power a woman could hope for if she held the kind of ambitions
that William knew Genvissa secreted.
The moment William heard of Edward's betrothal to Godwine's daughter Caela,
William had been almost certain she was Genvissa-reborn. True, Caela was by all reports
very young, and as timid as a mouse, but maybe that was merely Genvissa's way of
disguising her true nature.
William idly wondered what was happening in Edward's bed this night. Had he
enjoyed his bedding with the Mistress of the Labyrinth as much as William had enjoyed
his with Matilda?
William's face sobered, and he flexed his fingers back and forth before the fading heat,
slowly stretching out some of the tension in his body. He needed desperately to contact
Genvissa-reborn. He wondered if Caela had any idea who he was. Did she suspect
William was more than just a struggling duke of Normandy, or did she merely think of
him as some bastard upstart who brazened his way about the courts of counts and princes,
and of little consequence to her own life and ambitions.
William stared into the fire, then grinned as a means of contacting Genvissa-reborn
occurred to him. He would announce himself in no uncertain manner. She would know
him by his actions, and by his message, and then she would make herself known to him.

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