"Shirley Meier & S. M. Stirling - Fifth Millenium 03 - The Cage" - читать интересную книгу автора (Meier Shirley)

Zak law did not allow any child to be completely disinherited.
Mother had always been there; there was always the two of
them, when the Zak children chased him home with jeers and
rocks and tricks that he was too young to ignore. But Mother
had told him of his heritage, beside which F'talezon was nothing
but a backwoods pile of stone. The Zak might have been here
since the Earned Fire, but what had they ever done to equal Tor
Ench? He had his mother to thank that he knew civilized ways.

Now she has a real manor, he thought with satisfaction and
rare happiness. Everything she needs. He raised a hand and
scratched formally at the door.

"One would enter," he said carefully in her own language.

The slave's voice trailed off; he heard the girl moving to the
door.

"The Amam says that her son, the strength of her age, need
ask for nothing." The door swung open.

The rooms within were spacious; they had been Megan's, the
best the manor had to offer. They were conveniently far from his
own, since there was much of his life it was necessary to keep
from his mother.

Latialia had furnished them in the classic Tor Enchian style;
it was the first time she had been able to, in her life in F'talezon,
and Habiku did not much like it. The outer halls were still
decorated as MegтАж she had liked them, warm colors but spare,
depending on the purity of line in a single chair or picture to fill
the space exactly rather than cluttering with many things.
InsideтАж the costly rugs were well enough; bright, abstract
patterns on wool soft as maiden's hair. Tapestries covered the
walls, of Latialia's own embroidering; most were scenes from
The Vengeance of Curlion on the Rebels, an odd subject for
someone he had rarely even heard raise her voice in anger. On
the hammered brass table rested a pipe, a fantasy of spun purple
glass and gently bubbling waters, its mouthpiece carved of ivory.
It had been filling the air with the burnt sweetness of poppy
resin. He scowled at it; the pipe was new, but the scent familiar,
a companion of his youth.

She's lonely, he thought. There was no one in F'talezon she
could really talk to; the noble families received her reluctantly,
even if they had to, now, and in any case they had no
conversation the cloistered Enchian noblewoman would
understand. But he wished that she would use the poppy less
now that he could buy her the things that would make her
happy. At least it isn't dreamdust. That killed in a year, less for