"Carolyn Ives Gilman - The Honeycrafters" - читать интересную книгу автора (Gilman Carolyn Ives)

When they had demolished virtually the whole formula and suggested a dozen substitutions, Magwin said, "Well, what is your verdict? Dubich?"
"It might work," he said, "but with so much hanging on the outcome, it is terribly risky."
"Brahm?"
"Not without revisions."
"Zabra?"
"It's a reckless experiment. We can't afford it."
"Reema?"
"The route would be too hard."
"Well." Magwin looked around. Yannas' eyes were on the smokehole, her jaw clenched. "Yannas?" Magwin said softly. "Has Renata approached you?"
They all looked at her. Yannas stared at Magwin, knocked from her self-absorption by the bluntness of the question. At last she said, "Yes."
There was a hiss of indrawn breath from Zabra. "The bitch!"
No one else spoke. The next question was on all their minds: What had Yannas answered?
Magwin did not ask it. Instead, she leaned back against her pillows and said, "I have decided on our journeycourse. We will follow the route of Yannas' formula, without revision. It will be hard on us, and there will be little chance to gather the ingredients for our staple honeys. We will have to cope. It is for a good cause."
Her tone closed off discussion. Zabra rose abruptly, then turned to the tent flap, sparing only a single suspicious look at Yannas. The others followed more slowly. Yannas sat frozen, staring at Magwin Ghar. Last of all, she turned to go.
"Yannas," Magwin said.
Yannas turned. They were alone.
"Did you think you could goad me into giving you an excuse to join Renata?" Magwin said.
It was true, yet not true. Yannas felt a surge of anger that Magwin knew her so well. "Renata?" she said contemptuously. "She's a vain, reckless dreamer. A child. I would no more work for her than..."
"Than what?"
Than grasp after lost youth? Yannas was silent.
"Well, I hope you will work for me now," Magwin said seriously. "I have put my life in your hands."
Yannas looked down, scowling. There was so much past between them that their shells were fused. There was no pulling apart.
"Don't worry," Magwin said, "I am content with the risk. Just do your best."
After Yannas had gone, Dubich returned to the tent. He blew out the candles, then sat down and watched Magwin sip a horn of mead. "You're taking a big risk," he said. "Zabra is saying that Yannas is a turncoat and her formula was planned to make us lose. She is saying you took Renata's bait."
"Jealous old whiner. We have to stop her, Dubich. Everyone must have absolute faith in Yannas."
"What about you?" Dubich asked. "Do you have faith in this formula?"
"I was about to ask you."
"I told you already: risky. It might be inspiration or delusion. Now you."
"I don't know, Dubich. But I've learned over the journeys that if you have a genius on your hands, you don't try to steer her. Just leave her alone. That's what I'm going to do."
"I'm glad it's not my life staked on it."
A smile spread across Magwin's face. "I'm glad it's not yours, too. Come here." He took the pillow next to her. She ran a finger down his cheek, then playfully kissed his nose. Not in the mood for joking, he drew her against him, aware how every knot and hollow of their bodies fit together. All the things he had taken for granted--the softness of her skin where the sun had not touched it, the contented little "Hmmm" she gave--all seemed impossibly precious. They rolled back on the pillows together, every touch poignant with the knowledge that there would be no long forever together.


Before long, Renata's group packed up their hives, tents, and equipment, and pulled out of camp, bound for the first stop on whatever journeycourse they had chosen. People gathered to watch them go, expecting to see amateurish disorder--but they didn't. The move was smoothly run without a single voice raised.
Yannas stood at the entrance of the hive tent, glumly watching a troop of bare-chested young men hoisting the last of the hives onto litters. She had tried to offer them advice to avoid jarring the bees, but they had told her they knew what they were doing. The galling thing was, they did. Yannas knew her own hives would not be moved with such swift efficiency.
"Sure you won't change your mind?"
Yannas turned; it was Renata. She was dressed in leather: tight-fitting boots and elbow-length gloves that glistened as she moved.
"Whose formula are you following?" Yannas asked. She wondered which of this group was capable of more than mimickry.
"Several of us have ideas," Renata said. "I gather Magwin Ghar will follow yours?"
Yannas nodded.
"Then I suppose you are my mortal enemy," Renata said. Her tone was light, but her eyes were serious.
It came to Yannas that if she succeeded, Renata would die. All of that boundless daring, arrogance, hope, silly flamboyant gloves -- all would cease to be. Utterly extinguished, never more to tempt or tease her with memories. Dead as surely as that other youth like her, that youth Yannas had once been.
"Go away," Yannas said harshly.
Renata stood watching her, puzzled.
"Go on! Go join your young heroes and athletes. Leave me to my crones and codgers."
A smile flashed across Renata's tanned face. She turned and trotted down the slope after the litter-bearers, like a frisky young colt. When she came up to the last one, she clapped him on the back with a comradely gusto. Yannas could hear their laughter faint on the air.


They saw no more of Renata's group for a long time. Even at the well-known meadows where they often encountered other motherholds, there was no sign of her. "She must have led them far away," Magwin Ghar said to Dubich. "Too bad. I was counting on some defections."
"Maybe she foresaw that," Dubich said.