"Patricia A. McKillip - Alphabet of Thorn" - читать интересную книгу автора (McKillip Patricia A)

Alphabet of thorn/Patricia A. McKillip.тАФ lsted.
p. cm. ISBN 0-441-01130-6
1. Teenage girls тАФFiction. 2. Translators тАФFiction.
3. OrphansтАФ Fiction. I. Title.
PS3563.C38A78 2004
813'.54-dc22 2003062912




ONE

On DreamerтАЩs Plain, the gathering of delegations from the Twelve
Crowns of Raine for the coronation of the Queen of Raine looked
like an invading army. So the young transcriptor thought, gazing
out a window as she awaited a visiting scholar. She had never been
so high in the palace library, and rarely so warm. Usually at this
time of the morning she was buried in the stones below, blowing on
her fingers to warm them so they could write. Outside, wind gusted
across the vast plain, pulling banners taut, shaking the pavilions
thrown up for the various delegationsтАЩ entourages of troops and
servants. A spring squall had blown in from the sea and crossed the
plain. The drying pavilions, huffing like bellows in the wind, were
brilliant with color. The transcriptor, who had only seen invading
armies in the epics she translated, narrowed her eyes at this
gathering and imagined possibilities. She was counting the horses
penned near each pavilion, pelts lustrous even at a distance after
the rain, and as clear, silhouetted against one anotherтАЩs whites and
grays and chestnuts, as figures pricked on a tapestry, when the
scholar finally arrived.
A beary man, he shed a fur cloak that smelled of damp and an
unusual scent of tobacco. He carried a manuscript wrapped in
leather that he laid upon the librarianтАЩs desk as gently as a
newborn. As he unswaddled the manuscript, the transcriptor
standing silently at the window caught his eye. His hands stilled.
He stared at her. Then his head, big, dark, and very hairy, jerked
toward the librarian who had shown him in.
тАЬWho is this?тАЭ
тАЬWe called her Nepenthe,тАЭ the librarian said in his austere voice.
His name was Daimon; Nepenthe had known him all her life, for he
had found her and named her. Of the child she had been before she
became Nepenthe, neither of them knew a thing. In sixteen years
since then, she had changed beyond recognition, and he had not
changed by a moment, being the same dispassionate, thin-haired
wraith who had picked her up with his bony hands and tucked her
into a book bag to add to the acquisitions of the royal library. тАЬShe
is one of our most skilled and creative translators. She has a gift for
unusual alphabets. Such as you say you have, Master Croysus?тАЭ
тАЬIтАЩve never seen anything like it in my life,тАЭ Master Croysus said.
He continued unwrapping the manuscript, still tossing glances at