"Lawrence Watt-Evans - Ethshar 7 - Night of Madness" - читать интересную книгу автора (Watt-Evans Lawrence)

"You can say that because he's never dragged you along," Alris said. "He insists I have tomeet people."

"He sends me out to meet them on my own, instead," Hanner said. "I don't see that as much better."

"You don't have to stand there looking innocent while the great man seduces some poor woman who's
dazzled by his title." She picked at a loose thread on her skirt and said, "I don'twant to meet people."

"Have you ever told Uncle Faran that?"

"Of course I have! But he doesn't pay any attention." She looked up from the thread. "You'll get to meet
his latest conquest."

"I will?"

"He told me this one wants to see the inside of the Palace, so he'll probably be bringing her up here."

"And he'll probably want us to stay out of the way," Hanner said. "She won't be coming to meetus."

"Which is a good thing. She's probably stupid. Most of them are."

Hanner did not want to argue about their uncle's taste in women, so he attempted to change the subject.
"Where's Nerra?" he asked.

Alris gestured toward the passage to their bedchambers. "In there somewhere," she said. "She and Mavi
were talking about clothes again, and I got bored."

"Mavi's here?" Hanner tried not to sound too pleased. While he generally didn't think much of his sisters'
friends, Mavi of Newmarket was an exception. Nerra had met her while shopping for fabrics in the Old
Merchants' Quarter, and the two had quickly become close; Hanner admired Mavi's generosity of spirit
and lively interest in almost everything. And her fine features, charming smile, shapely figure, and long
lustrous hair didn't lower Manner's opinion a bit.

Alris nodded. "She's boring," she said. "Like Nerra."

Hanner grimaced. Alris was thirteen and thought everything was boring.

Or almost everything; like Uncle Faran, she was fascinated with magic. She had tried for months to
convince Faran to apprentice her to a magician, but he had refused, on the grounds that she might well
inherit or marry into an important position in the government of the Hegemony of the Three Ethshars-but
that she could not take such a position if she were a magician.

Hanner suspected that Uncle Faran might well intend to marry Alris off to some important politician, as
much for his own advancement as hers; as Alris said, she and Nerra were often taken along on Faran's
travels, while Hanner never was.

Any such intention got no support from Alris herself. She had argued that she didn'twant a government
position or a prestigious marriage, but as usual their uncle had prevailed, and now that she was six weeks
past her thirteenth birthday she was too old to be properly apprenticed to anyone, magician or otherwise.

So now she spent her time moping around the Palace, being bored and disagreeable.