L. Modesitt - Imager's challenge
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- Название:Imager's challenge
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Just as the first bells of eighth glass began to chime from the anomen tower, Master Poincaryt stepped through the open studio door. “Good morning, Rhennthyl.”
“Good morning, sir.”
Master Poincaryt frowned, ever so slightly, an expression that lent severity to a lined and squarish face softened but a touch by a chin that was slightly pointed and rounded. Under jet-black hair and heavy eyebrows, also jet-black, his pale gray eyes took in everything, as always. He wore exactly the same gray garb as did every imager, with the addition of a small silver four-pointed star circled in silver and worn high on the left breast of his waistcoat, seemingly identical to the one Master Dichartyn had given me the day before. “Do I want to see the final version of the portrait?”
“I would hope so, sir. But it’s not framed, and that will improve the setting.”
“Is it that unflattering?” His words were offered with a smile.
“No, sir, but since it’s your portrait, in the end you’re the one who has to judge.”
He laughed. “You flatter me, Rhenn. In the end, the artist is always the judge, for the portrait always outlasts the person painted.” He walked over to the easel and studied the image. “It’s accurate, and not too unflattering. It’s a good work.” He paused. “You didn’t sign it, Rhenn, not fully.”
“According to the Portaiturist Guild, only paintings which are commissioned and sold through the guild can be signed. So I just used my initials-‘R D’I.’ That seemed the best compromise. Since it’s acceptable, I’ll arrange with the cabinetmakers to get it framed.”
Master Poincaryt nodded. “Whom do you think you should paint next?”
The person I really wanted to paint next was Seliora, but I’d have to work out how to pay for the paints and supplies for that, since the Collegium had equipped the studio fully, but I didn’t want to bring that up with Master Dichartyn. Not yet, anyway. “I hadn’t thought about that, sir, but shouldn’t it be Master Dichartyn, Master Rholyn, or Master Jhulian?”
“Those would be good choices, but of the three I would suggest Master Rholyn . . . for a number of reasons. I will discuss it with others. Whoever it is will be here next Samedi.”
After Master Poincaryt left, I worked more on the design for Seliora’s portrait and then tried a rough sketch of Master Rholyn from memory, setting him in the Council chamber at the Chateau, standing below the upper dais where the High Council sat.
Ferlyn and I were the only masters at lunch, unsurprisingly on a sunny Samedi, since there were perhaps a score and a half of Maitres D’Aspect across all of Solidar, only a handful of Maitres D’Structure, and just two Maitres D’Esprit. At present, the Collegium had no Maitre D’Image, and there had been but a handful of imagers that accomplished in the entire history of the Collegium. Most of the masters were married, and seldom took meals in the dining hall, except the noon meal during the week or when they had duties that kept them near the quadrangle.
Afterward, I reread sections of the patroller procedures for a while in the study of my personal chambers. I had mixed feelings about the evening ahead. I knew I’d be glad to be with Seliora, but I couldn’t say that I was totally looking forward to a dinner with my parents and two other couples who were their friends.
I walked across the Bridge of Hopes at just before fourth glass, glancing down at the lower than usual gray waters of the River Aluse. I was holding full imager shields, as I’d had to do for months now, although I had doubts that High Holder Ryel would resort to something as direct as assassination, not after he’d had Taudischef Artazt garroted for attempting to have me assassinated. Still, matters couldn’t have gotten any better, either, not since the High Holder’s daughter had asked me to dance at the Council’s Harvest Ball, and flaunted the fact before her younger brother, the heir to his father.
Once across the bridge, I looked for a flower seller, but I didn’t see one. Then, no one had taken the place of the woman who had been shot when the Ferran had tried to kill me. In a strange way, I missed her and her faded green and yellow umbrella.
Before I had stood at the corner of East River Road and the Boulevard D’Imagers all that long, I saw the familiar brass-trimmed brown coach that belonged to my parents. Charlsyn spotted me at close to the same time and eased the coach over to the curb, just in front of the west end of the narrow gardens that flanked the boulevard-behind the low stone wall at the edge of the sidewalk.
“Master Rhennthyl.” He nodded.
“Charlsyn, thank you for picking me up.” Although Charlsyn had never said a word, I had the feeling that he was as pleased as my mother had been about my becoming an imager master.
“You’re most welcome, sir. NordEste Design?”
I nodded, trying not to smile too broadly, then climbed into the coach. Normally, I’d have used a hack to pick up Seliora, but when Mother discovered that, she’d insisted that the family coachman pick both of us up, declaring that it was unseemly that a master imager arrive in a coach for hire. Unseemly, anyway, if certain guests might be there.
From the east side of the Bridge of Hopes, the drive took only about a third of a glass before Charlsyn brought the coach to a halt before the north entrance of NordEste Design on Hagahl Lane. That was the private family entrance, with gray stone steps up to a small square and pillared covered porch that shielded a stone archway, and a polished oak door. NordEste Design was manufactory/crafting hall/home, all in one, to Seliora’s family. The yellow brick building with its gray cornerstones rose three stories. All the casements and wooden trim-even the wood of the loading docks at the south end-were stained with a brown oil.
I clambered out and looked up. “If you’d just wait, Charlsyn. She’s usually ready.”
“Yes, sir.”
I continued to carry full shields all the way to the door, but I didn’t have a chance to even lift the brass knocker before Bhenyt-Seliora’s young cousin-opened the door.
“Master Rhennthyl.” He grinned at me. “She’s already waiting.”
“Thank you, Bhenyt. Lead on.”
I followed him up the stairs toward the second level, which held the more public rooms of the two living levels, the second and third levels of the building, since the ground-floor level was given over to workrooms and power loom spaces. The carved balustrades and shimmering brass fixtures emphasized the elegance of the staircase, which opened at the top into an entry more than eight yards wide and ten deep. The walls were paneled in light golden oak from carved baseboards to ceiling. Only a yard or so of the intricate parquet floor was visible, largely covered as it was by a deep maroon carpet, with a border of intertwined golden chains and brilliant green leafy vines. An assortment of various chairs and settees were upholstered in the fabric designs that I now knew had been largely designed by Seliora and her mother. A pianoforte dominated the far end of the hall.
Seliora stood at the front edge of the carpet, wearing a crimson dress, trimmed in black velvet, with a filmy and shimmering black jacket and a matching black scarf. With her black eyes and jet-black hair, the effect was stunning-and not just to me, I’d discovered over the past year. If I could somehow capture that in the portrait . . .
She smiled, and for a moment, all I could do was look. Then I stepped forward and embraced her . . . gently, not wanting to disarrange her, at least not before dealing with my parents and their guests. I did get a warm kiss.
“You look wonderful,” I murmured. “As always.”
“If you had the chance, you’d tell all the women that.”
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