"Liaden Universe - 04 - Plan B" - читать интересную книгу автора (Miller Steve)

She did not, as he expected, erupt into giggles at this, but returned the bow most creditably, murmuring an exquisitely proper "The pleasure is mine."

She straightened, then, adjusted the strap across her shoulder and smiled. "I have to go before my tutor tells Aunt Emrith I've been late again."

"Please do not allow me to be the cause of such distress to the House," Val Con said, and thatdid draw a giggle, cut off as she slipped out the door and pulled it closed behind her.

He stood alone in the music room, considering his options. Miri was closeted with Erob's Historian, filling details in the lives of Miri-eklykt'i and Katalina Tayzin Чan interview that promised to be both lengthy and productive of an uneasy temper in one's lifemate.

His duty plainly lay in the direction of Erob. Some explanations must, in courtesy, be made to the delm of Korval's oldest ally, and yetЕ

Music tingled in his fingertips, awakened by his brief playing for the beacon. Surely, he might steal ten minutes to set the rest of the music free?

Slowly, knowing that duty called him elsewhere, yet unable to resist the lure of a concert-quality instrument perfectly set in a room tuned for its unique voice, he went to the omnichora, sat on the bench and pressed the power plate.

The wall he faced over the omnichora was mirrored.

Val Con sighed, recalling the revulsion on several faces last night, despite the courtesy due a guest; wondering if he should have followed tel'Vosti's hint and had the scar canceled.

The scar was there for a reason, after all; he might have had the autodoc erase the wretched thing anytime during their voyage from Vandar. He had chosen to allow it to remain, a constant and sometimes painful reminder of the wages of foolishness.

"No more than you traded for, young sir." He heard Uncle Er Thorn's dry reproval in his mind's ear, and half-smiled in agreement.

It would be another matter entirely, he told himself, fingers adjusting stops and frequencies, had the cut failed to healЧor if one's lifemate objected to the mar. But the wound was clean, as he had told tel' Vosti, and Miri made no objection.

"No call," Uncle Er Thorn's voice instructed him from memory, "to concern yourself with the comfort of non-kin. Korval acts upon its own necessities. Let others mind their melant'i."

"Yes, uncle," he murmured, and touched the keyboard, softly playing the cool and logical line of his uncle's musical signature, that the boy Val Con had composed many years ago. His ear caught a possibility in the old theme and he played on half-aware, letting his fingers find what they might.

Let others mind their own melant'i. An old lesson, that; among the first. One kept one's own care close, for clan, for servants, for kinЕ Val Con's fingers faltered on the keys.

Shan would be hereЧsoon.

Shan was his cha'leket, the brother of his heart. Shan might well mind the scar. Might well mind other things, truth told; things that would distress one who had helped a green-eyed fosterling grow. That would surely distress one who was a Healer and able to see what was now that fosterling's soul.

The Department of InteriorЕ the Department of Interior had done much damage, severed memories, stolen home, love, music, motherЧ"Е our mother," Shan's voice said from years gone. "Your mother's gone, but you can share mine, all right?"

Our motherЕ Anne Davis: chestnut hair, merry dark eyes, clever hands, scented with bound books and flowers; wide-hipped and full-breasted, as many Terran women; full with laughter and passion and more than enough love for the children of the houseЧher own three and the child of her life-mate's cha'leket. She had taught him to play the 'chora, taught him his lettersЧTerran and TradeЧwiped tears, comforted child-woes and halfling griefs, shared out justice and kisses, rejoiced with him when he was accepted to Scout AcademyЧ

And the Department of Interior had stolen her.

"My kinswomanЕ" He recalled his own voice, telling MiriЧa Miri nearly lost, gods; wary-faced and distrusting, as she had very good cause to be. "Mykinswoman Ч" without feeling, without even such a memory as flashed now, of big, warm hands holding his, shaping tiny fingers above the keyboard.

His right hand dandled True Scale as his left rose to adjust stops. Both hands centered above the keyboard, and at once came down, with sure authority, sweeping headlong into theToccata .

It allowed much, as great music does, endless opportunity for variation and lessons from one's own fingers being among the chiefest of its joys. But their mother had loved it for its own sake, as well, and he played it that way now, as he had for Shan, while memories, suppressed and twisted and made strangeЧrepulsiveЧby intent of his enemies, loosened and flowed and touched him true, until he closed his eyes and gave himself to the music and the remembering and didn't even know if he wept.

The music reached a natural end, as music will, and his fingers went still upon the keys. After a moment, it occurred to him that he was no longer alone in Erob's music room and he opened his eyes.

"Hi," she said from her perch on the polished curve of a listening-stool. Her hair was braided today; he saw the copper length of it gleaming down her back in the mirror. She was dressed in a rich yellow shirt and soft trousers the color of Shan's favorite wineЧproper attire for an extended session with the clan historian. She leaned forward, eyes intent. "You OK?"