"Doris Egan - Ivory 01 - The Gate of Ivory" - читать интересную книгу автора (Egan Doris)

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The Gate of Ivory by Doris
Egan
Chapter One
I was laying down cards in the marketplace when I got the latest job
offer. "Here comes money," Irsa, the vendor next to me had said and
moved out of the way so as not to scare him off. So I'd given him his
fortune, all the usual sort of nonsense, and out he came with this. I hadn't
expected it of him; he looked too respectable. True, he hadn't mentioned
the exact nature of this job. But I'd been in the Square long enoughтАФI
thoughtтАФto know what that meant.

"I might want to hire you," he repeated, as though he expected a
dim-witted foreigner like me might need it said twice.

"Move on," I said, picking up my Tarot cards. "Your fortune's been
told."

"I'm serious," he protested.

"Please, noble sir. I'm well aware that people hired by Street of Gold
Coin procurers are never seen again. Unless you want me for one of the
Great Houses?" I smiled with polite rudeness. It was obviously out of the
question. By Ivory standards, I'm not even pretty. Eight centimeters
shorter than everyone around me, hair auburn instead of blackтАФthey
wouldn't let me into a Great House as a domestic servant. Not that I felt I
was really cut out for prostitution.

"I'm not talking about Gold Coin kanza." The word he used was Ivoran,
and meant rotten flesh, animal dung, scum to the tenth power. I looked at
him in surprise, as he'd intended. "I like your card-reading."
 "Thank you, noble sir." I was as phony as any other market
fortuneteller.

"I'm not a noble sir. 'Gracious' will do."

So he wasn't part of the nobility, although he dressed like it. More and
more interesting. And it hadn't been easy to read his cards. Usually the
marks responded, gave you answers, hints, facial expressions. "Someone I
know has had an accident? Why, you must mean my great-uncle Hobar."
Not this man. Total silence as I interpreted the pictures. It was unnerving.

He said, "You're not Ivoran. How did you end up here?"