"Shane Tourtellotte - String of Pearls" - читать интересную книгу автора (Tourtellotte Shane)

Jun Hua chuckled to himself. "I know the game, but this one builds sentences instead of words, and has
many other differences."

"Like, what spelling is to ours, syntax is to theirs." Marcus nodded, then knitted his brow. "But it isn't like
they can use a dictionary as a judge, unless--" He found it just as Jun pointed: an on-off switch. The game
had a built-in computer judge, and probably used chips in the tiles.

He still frowned. "So, I'm supposed to learn the language from this?"
"It's another part of the immersion. One more tool, and we have few enough. You should have plenty of
opportunity to test yourself at it."

Marcus caught what hadn't yet been said. "Bunwadde plays this?"

Jun closed off any expression. "One of Earth's minor diplomats ... learned this. It seems reasonable he
would play you, if you were willing."

Marcus took that as a challenge. "Sure I'm willing." He looked at the board and the scattering of tiles. He
pinched the tile he'd been manipulating between two fingers. "But forgive me if I'm not sure putting
together rote sentences with--" He dropped the tile into its bag. "--a very limited vocabulary is better than
hearing and speaking their language in context."

"Consider it part of the context, at least culturally. Besides, your stay with Bunwadde is all about doing
several things at once. You'll be teaching yourself by hearing and reading and speaking, and playing; just
as your work on Obrith is to learn the syntax, as well as to help Bunwadde build his--how did I see it
described?--his pirate empire."

"Now, now, Jun. Not even I would call it that."

"Of course you wouldn't." Jun smiled. "Not in Kevhtre Union presence, certainly."
****
Marcus studied the game during spare hours in the week before planetfall. There were few of those. He
had his other language studies, jumbled by the shift in sleeping patterns he was forcing to match Obrith's
diurnal pattern. He almost never left his cabin.

He told himself it was helping his adjustment. It didn't help his learning. The great insight did not come. It
felt like going into a battle unarmed.

The ship made sub-light transition during what was now to him the small hours of the morning. The shift in
hum woke him, but he went back to sleep. It wasn't until mid-afternoon that Naha's shuttle touched
down outside Ubhettid, Obrith's administrative seat. (Kevhtre Union translators rejected "capital" as too
centralized.) Most of the passengers went in a group to the embassy, leaving Marcus alone in the
terminal, standing outside the streams of Kevhtre walking by.

He was used to the people, but not to the numbers. They moved in streams of blue and silver, with robes
in nearly every other color. A few looked his way. If he read their faces right, they were amused.

Soon, one was sure to come over, to say something to him. He'd be hoping for a good laugh. Marcus
hoped he wouldn't give him one.

"Mister Parrish?"