"Lawrence Watt-Evans - Ethshar 8 - Ithanalin's Restoration" - читать интересную книгу автора (Watt-Evans Lawrence)

her pet held high before her.




Chapter Two
Kilisha watched Lady Nuvielle go, but Ithanalin didn't bother; he picked up the purse and opened it.
He smiled at the sight of its contents, then turned to the workshop door.
"You can come out now," he called.
"I know," Yara answered from the doorway, "but Pirra and Lirrin were fighting again." She emerged,
with her two daughters on either side. Lirrin was eight; Pirra only three. Yara released them, and they
immediately dashed to the front window.
"She's pretty, Daddy," Lirrin remarked.
"I do enjoy working for the nobility," Ithanalin said, as he poured a stream of golden bits into Yara's
outstretched hands.
"You did that with the Familiar Animation?" Kilisha asked, still staring after the departed customer.
"That's right," Ithanalin agreed, his head bent over his wife's hands, counting the coins. "A variant,
actually."
"When are you going to teach me that spell?" Kilisha asked.
"Soon," Ithanalin replied, still counting.
"And when are you going to dust in here?" Yara asked. "Or let me dust it?"
"Soon," he repeated. Then he paused and looked up. "We'll have to close the drapes, of course. We
can't let anyone sec you doing it." He kicked at the rag rug, which was humped again. "You know, I think
I've accidentally animated this stupid thing, at least slightly. This wrinkling can't be natural."
Yara sighed. She suspected Ithanalin was right about the rug, which was certainly a nuisance; she was
convinced he was wrong about the drapes, though. She would have been glad to dust the place in broad
daylight, with an audience, but Ithanalin wouldn't allow it. He insisted it would look bad if anyone saw an
ordinary human being dusting his furniture, rather than a sylph or homun-culus.
Yara had argued often enough that not having anyone dust it looked even worse, but Ithanalin was
adamant. He would only allow housework to be done in the front parlor, the only public part of the shop,
when no customers were expected, and only behind tightly drawn drapesтАФand since he kept the shop
open long hours, and Yara did like to cat and sleep on occasion, that meant the dusting wasn't done very
often.
Yara thought it was a foolish minor annoyance.
Kilisha thought it was bad advertising, to let the place get so dusty, but she knew better than to argue
with her master. She was just an apprentice; it wasn't her place to say anything, let alone to side against
her master, even if it was only with her master's wife. She had acquired a bit of a reputation for rushing
into things without thinking, but even she wasn't going to argue with the man who controlled almost every
detail of her life.
It had long since occurred to her that as the apprentice in the household she probably ought to do the
dusting herself, but as yet Ithanalin hadn't told her to, and she had enough other obligations that she didn't
care to volunteer.
Ithanalin himself clearly thought that it was in keeping with a wizard's image to let the place get a little
dusty. Wizards were supposed to be somewhat unworldly, after all.
Even so, for the sake of peace, he kept promising to animate something that would do the job, but as
yet he hadn't gotten around to it.
Yara maintained that he never would get around to it, and every so often she would sneak into the
room when Ithanalin was out and run a surreptitious rag over the most offensive surfaces, without
worrying about whether the drapes were drawn.
Kilisha did wonder why the wizard hadn't just animated something long ago and gotten it over with.