"SM Stirling - Change 02 - Scourge of God" - читать интересную книгу автора (Stirling S. M)

УLady Juniper,Ф he said. УSir Nigel. You are expected, and most welcome. Bors, Drogo, announce our noble guests.Ф
Even so there was an indefinable bristling from the men-at-arms, and the same from the kilted Mackenzie armsmen behind her. A few of them touched the yellow yew staves of the longbows slung over their backs beside the quivers . . . perhaps unconsciously, perhaps not.
УSilence in the ranks,Ф Nigel Loring said quietly, and it subsided.
Juniper looked over her shoulder.How young they are! she thought.Changelings . . .
TheyТd been children when the new-made Clan fought the PPA in the War of the Eye twelve years ago; few had been so much as toddlers at the Change, many not even gleams in their parentsТ eyes.
УSacred is the guest upon our soil,Ф she said softly, and saw them blush and shuffle a bit; the new world was all theyТd ever known. УTo even think them harm isgeasa so long as they keep the peace. Even if we were at feud with them, the which we are not.Ф
They touched the backs of their hands to their foreheads at that, and then managed to smile in friendly fashion at the household men of the Regent. One of those held the flap of the tent open. They went through, into the stillness of an anteroom hung in gray silk, and then into the main chamber. A ripple ran through the two-score of guests, everything from elaborate curtseys to casual waves.
She looked around, nodding. This being a formal occasion and she fifty-three, sheТd decided to forego the kilt and wear a tartan arsaid, a long cloak wrapped around the waist like a skirt and then pinned at her shoulder with a broach of silver knotwork, over a shift of linsey-woolsey dyed in saffron and embroidered at the hems. Her belt was linked silver worked in running patterns, and she had a diadem with the Crescent Moon on her forehead. Even so, she felt a bit underdressed compared to some of the guests.
And this whole pavilion issoSandra, Juniper thought.SheТs gone camping . . . with a palace wrapped around herself, so.
The ground was covered in softly glowing not-quite-Oriental rugs, and the walls with tapestries, both made in the workshops of Newberg and Portland; flowers and vines, lords and ladies hawking or hunting boar and tiger or dancing stately pavanes in pavilions out of dream. Lamps of fretwork in gold and silver and carved jewels hung from the peaks of the ceiling. The light folding furniture was inlaid with mother-of-pearl and rare woods. A prie-dieu and icon of the Virgin stood in one corner; Juniper made a gesture of respect to the Madonna and Child there.
УYou can tell the economic pyramid up North comes to a demmed sharp point,Ф Nigel drawled under his breath, echoing her thought.
УAnd that weТve been married so long weТre starting to finish each otherТs sentences,Ф Juniper replied. УEven the unspoken ones!Ф
A minstrel wearing a great hood with ridiculously long liripipes and tippets elaborately decorated with foliated dagges strummed a lute and sang softly from a corner:
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УHer only will I sing
Who, challengТd by the Boy
Or bids him wing or crowns him King
In courtesy and joy.Ф
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Serving girls in tabards and double tunics were carrying around trays of drinks and nibblements, salty cured sturgeon roe on crackers and bits of caper and smoked salmon and goose-liver pasteЧwhat Sandra insisted on calling canapщsЧand pyonnade, fabulously expensive because the main ingredient was candied pineapple shipped in from Hawaii or the Latin countries.
Juniper grinned as she accepted a glass of white wine from the Lady RegentТs demesne estates and a little sausage on a toothpick. SheТd heard that when she was beinginformal Sandra Arminger referred to this sort of thing as faculty fodder. Her gossoon of a husband, Norman, had been a medieval history professor, of all thingsЧspecializing in the Norman duchy and its offshootsЧas well as a Society fighter before the Change. After March 17, 1998, heТd branched out into warlording, conquest, torture, murder and general wickedness, with the gleeful relish of a man at last living out the dreams of his heart.
Though itТs true he saved many a life in that first year, if only so theyТd be alive to serve him.
УSpeak of the devilТs widow,Ф Juniper murmured beneath her breath.
Sandra came towards her, hands extended, the silk of her pearl-gray cotte-hardi skirts rustling, her face framed by an elaborately folded noblewomanТs wimple of white satin confined by a net of diamonds and platinum. The buttons from waist to high lace collar and down the long sleeves were carved from old ivory and mother-of-pearl.
УJuniper, dear, itТs wonderful to see you again,Ф she said with a smile. УAnd to visit your home at long last.Ф
For the rest she was no taller than Juniper, and her face was quite unremarkable except for the care which made her look younger than her mid-fifties . . . and the depth of thought in her brown eyes, like a shifting complex pattern at the edge of sight, never quite glimpsed.
They exchanged the air-kiss of peace; Nigel bowed over her hand. УI like your little twelve-bedroom pup tent,Ф Juniper said. УIt takes the rough out of roughing it, sure and it does. Though a little heavier than a sleeping bag on a trip, IТd think.Ф
Sandra chuckled. УGetting in touch with nature or back to the land always struck me as more a matter of wallowing in the dirt with the bugs.And the railroad runs most of the way here now.Ф
Which was a point; horses could pull fifteen times more on rails than on the best road.
And why do I suspect Sandra would have brought the pavilion just the same even if she had to have it carried on the backs of porters?
There were two grandees with her. Juniper was glad to see she hadnТt brought any of the ordinary Protectorate nobility alongЧthe Stavarovs in particular gave her the crawls. But she could tolerate Conrad Renfrew, Count of Odell and now Lord Chancellor of the Association. He was a thickset, shaven-headed man in his fifties, with a face made hideous by old white keloid scars. His arms of sable, a snow-topped mountain argent and vert were in a heraldic shield embroidered on the breast of his T-tunic.
УI never managed to haul as much freight this way during the ProtectorТs War,Ф Renfrew said, grinning like something squatting on a cathedralТs waterspout. УEven with an army of two thousand men to feed. The logistics were hell.Ф
Nigel gave the man whoТd commanded the AssociationТs armies in the War of the Eye a nod of wary respect.
УWe didnТt expect you to besiege Sutterdown so quickly,Ф he said.
Renfrew chuckled. УIdidnТt expect you to corncob me by looping through those damned mountains and cutting our siege lines at Mt. Angel and beating Lord EmilianoТs army.Ф A pause. УThough hewas a complete idiot, granted. Most of those jumped-up gangbangers never did learn a war isnТt an enlarged drive-by.Ф
Juniper shivered slightly, remembering the earth shaking as the knights charged into the arrowstorm, and the sound of the horses screaming, louder and more piteous than men in their uncomprehending agony.
УTheir sons, however, have learned better,Ф Tiphaine dТAth said. УConrad and I have seen to that.Ф
The woman in her thirties on SandraТs left was in what the PPA considered male dress, which was a rare thing in the Protectorate. And she was a Baroness in her own right rather than by marriage or inheritance, which was still more uncommon, her arms of sable, a delta or over a V argent self-chosen. Before the Change sheТd been named Collette Rutherton, a Girl Scout and up-and-coming junior gymnast of Olympic caliber at Binnsmeade Middle School in Portland. Sandra had seen her potential.
And took the girl under an elegant, batlike wing. Better to be SandraТs girl ninja and hatchetwoman than starving or being eaten by cannibals or dying of plague in those camps around Salem, I suppose.
Together she and Conrad were the RegentТs right hand, and a portion of the left.
Both sides exchanged equally courteous murmurs in a protocol that sounded ancient and was no older than the Change, cobbled together out of novels and remembered stories and playful Society anachronisms turned deadly serious. She knew Nigel found it all hilarious, despite his poker face;his family had come to England in the train of William the Conqueror.
Sandra clapped her hands twice. The minstrel fell silent with a final stroke of his fingers across the strings, and the buzz of conversation died.
УThank you all for your company, my lords and ladies,Ф she said. УAnd now, if you will forgive us . . .Ф
The heads-of-state and their closest advisers went through into an inner room with a table clad in white damask; servants set out a cold collation. Juniper took a chair near SandraТs and waited politely while Abbot Dmwoski of Mt. Angel spoke:
УBless us, O Lord, and these Thy gifts which we are about to receive from Thy bounty, through Christ our Lord. Amen.Ф
Half the people around the table joined in as he signed himself with the Cross; Eric Larsson the Bearkiller war-chief did, for example. His sister Signe Havel made the sign of the Hammer over her plate as Juniper spoke:
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УHarvest Lord who dies for the ripened grainЧ
Corn Mother who births the fertile fieldЧ
Blessщd be those who share this bounty;