"Sheri S. Tepper - Awakeners 1 - Northshore" - читать интересную книгу автора (Tepper Sherri)

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 NORTHSHORE-Awakeners1

within it, the pale soft grain of the face, the darker grain of the long, smooth hair, the gown, clinging to her as though wet
so he could see every line of her sweet breasts and belly, the curve of her thighs and the soft mound where they joined.
Even her feet had sprung out of the wood magically, every toe perfect, the fines of the nails as clean as the line of her lips.
"Suspirra," and he set her down, turning her slightly away from him.
"You should be artist caste," Blint had said when he first saw Thrasne's carvings. "Some of these towns give high status to
artists."
Thrasne had shaken his head. "I'd rather see everything. Not just stick in one town. Maybe, someday, when I'm tired of the
River."
Though he could not imagine being tired of the River. There was always something to see on the River. As there was right
now the new piers fringing the edge of Baristown.
When he reached the deck he gave it a careful look over. No signs of nets or hooks. The net poles were put away. He could
still smell the sulphur and frag, but the River breeze would carry it out river this time of day. He checked the hatch over the
net locker to see it was tight. Funny the way shore bound fishermen resented any fishing done by the Riverboats. Even
though the Riverboats caught different kinds of fish, to say nothing of the deep River strangeys, which probably weren't
fish at all. Glizzee spice, now. Everyone wanted that, even fishermen. And Glizzee spice was nothing but ground strangey
bone, though the boatmen didn't tell everyone that.
When he'd completed the round, he went back and climbed up to the rudder man. "What did Blint say?"
"Told me to pick the longest pier and see could I come around it."
"No side wharfs, hmm?"
"None we can see from here," Some of the towns had at the end of their piers sideways extensions that ran along the River
flow rather than across it. A Riverboat could steer close, toss a line to be made fast, then let the tide turn the boat on the line
to lay alongside. Coming around a long pier was harder work than that.
"Is Blint getting the sweeps set?"
"He got Birk out of his hammock. Said for you to stand by here where you could see everything." The man sniggered, not
maliciously, and Thrasne grinned at him. Taken all in all, the boatmen rather liked having a carver aboard. There wasn't
one of them he hadn't carved something for, as a pretty for themselves or a gift for someone they treasured. When a man
only came to his home place every six to eight years, he wanted to have something special for his children, at least. Though
it wasn't uncommon to find more children than reason suggested was appropriate. Many a man gone six years came back to
find two- and three-year-olds, but such was the life of a boatman and accepted as such. The women couldn't be blamed, not
with the procreation laws the way they were. And after all, if things like that mattered to a man, he wouldn't be River.
The pier was coming up on the right, a long one, not completed yet. The oarsmen had the sweeps set in the rope locks to
turn the ship as soon as the pier was past. The tide wasn't strong just now, not with the moons all strung out like this, not
like Conjunction, when no one in his right mind would try to tie up except at the Riverside itself.
"Hold fast," breathed Thrasne, locking the sculling oars out of the way of the rudder. "Hold fast."
"I see it," grumbled the steersman. "Been doing this for twenty years."
Thrasne ignored him. If Blint wanted him on the steer-house, it was to take charge of things.
"Hold fast," he muttered again. "Now! Hard over!" He bent his back to the rudder as the bite of the oars took hold, taking
up the slack on the tackle until it was tied hard over and they could watch the sweating men at the sweeps. Blint himself
was at the line cannon. In a moment it went off with a dull thwump of its huge wooden springs, and the line arched out
over the pier, where half a dozen stand bouts made it fast.
"Sweeps up," cried Blint. "Stand by the winch!" The ship shuddered as it began to draw toward the pier, moving against the
surging tide. Thrasne shook his head, remembering the time they had taken on a boatman from a place called Thou-ne.
"Born in Potipur," he said he was. Sanctimonious half-wit. Insisted that no ship had the right to oppose the tide, and the
only way to moor was at the end of a line along the bank. Fool had said winching was evil, anti-life, and against the will of
Potipur. He lasted until the time he took an axe to the rope during a winching operation. Assuming he had been a good