"David Gerrold - The Flying Sorcerers" - читать интересную книгу автора (Gerrold David)

sorcerer !"
"I didn't even know of him myself, until just a few moments ago. Perhaps he
only arrived today."
"Arrived today? And immediately began throwing red fire about? Without first
informing himself of the local gods, tidal patterns, previous local spells and
their side effects? Ridiculous! Lant, you are a fool. You are an idiot of the
first circle where magic is concerned. Why do you bother me?"
"Because you are an idiot where diplomacy is concerned!" I snapped back, my
fur bristling. (I am one of the few people in the village who can bristle at
Shoogar and survive to tell about it.) "If I let you go charging up the
mountain every time you felt you had been wronged, you'd be fighting duels as
often as the blue sun rises."
Shoogar looked at me, and I could tell from his expression that my remarks had
sunk home. "Smooth your fur, Lant. I did not mean that you were a complete
fool..I just meant that you are not a magician."
"I'm glad you are aware of my skill as a diplomat.." I said, and allowed
myself to relax. "Our abilities must complement each other, Shoogar. If we are
to succeed in our endeavors, we must maintain a healthy respect for each
other's powers. Only thus can we protect our village."
"You and your damned speeches, he scowled. "Someday I'm going to make your
tongue swell up to the size of a sour melon -- just for the sake of some peace
and quiet."
I ignored that remark. Considering the circumstances, Shoogar had a right to
be testy. He closed up his travel kit, tugging angrily at the straps.
"Are you ready?" I asked, "I'll send a message up to Orbur, telling him to
ready two bicycles."
"Presumptuous of you," Shoogar muttered, but I knew that he was secretly
grateful for the thought. Wilville and Orbur, my eldest two sons, carved the
best bicycles in the district.
-----
WE found the new magician near the cairn of Musk-Watz, the Wind-god. Across a
steep canyon from the cairn, there is a wide grass-covered mesa with a gentle
slope to the south. The new magician had appropriated this mesa and scattered
it with his devices and oddments. As we pulled our bicycles to a shuddering
halt, he vas in the process of casting a spell with an unfamiliar artifact.
Shoogar and I paused at a respectful distance and watched.
The stranger was slightly taller than me, considerably taller than Shoogar.
His skin was lighter than ours, and hairless but for a single patch of black
fur, oddly positioned on the top half of his skull. He also wore a strange set
of appurtenances balanced across his nose. It appeared that they were lenses
of quartz mounted in a bone frame through which the stranger could see.
The set of his features was odd and disquieting, and his bones seemed
strangely proportioned. Certainly no normal being would have a paunch that
large. The sight of him made me feel queasy, and I surmised that some of his
ancestors had not been human.
Magicians traditionally wear outlandish clothing to identify themselves as
magicians. But even Shoogar was unprepared for the cut of this stranger's
costume. It was a single garment which covered most of the stranger's body.
The shape of the cloth had been woven to match his own precisely; and an oddly
bulging shape it was. There was a hood, thrown back. There were high-flared