"Tanya Huff - Be It Ever So Humble" - читать интересную книгу автора (Huff Tanya)

The room rippled with laughter.

"I could," Magdelene admitted.

The room fell silent.

Magdelene cleared her throat. She might as well get it over with. "I'm the most powerful wizard in
the world," she began. The middle-aged woman snorted. "Says who?"

"Well, uh ..."

"Doesn't matter. Would this conjured trader do us any good?"

"Probably not." A trader conjured suddenly into the village would be more likely to trade in strong
hysterics than anything useful. "I thought as much." The woman expertly lit her pipe with a spill from
the lamp. "What in Neto's breath are we wasting our time here for, that's what I want to know?"

"1 thought you might like to know that a stranger, a wizard, has come to the village," Carlos told her
tartly. She snorted again. "All right. Now we know." She pointed the stem of her pipe at Magdelene and
demanded, "You planning on causing any trouble?"

"Of course not," Magdelene declared emphatically. She never planned on causing any trouble. "Will
you keep your nose out of what doesn't concern you?" She had to think about that for a moment,
wondering how broad a definition could be put on what didn't concern her. "I'll try."

"See that you do."

"So I can stay for a while?"

"For a while." Her head wreathed in smoke, the woman rose. "That's that, then," she said shortly, and
left. The headman sighed and raised both hands in a gesture of defeat. You heard her. You can go." As
people began to leave, Magdelene leaned over and whispered to Carlos, "Why does he let her get away
with that?" Carlos snickered, his palm lying warm and dry on Magdelene's arm. "Force of habit," he said
in his normal speaking voice. "She's his older sister, raised him after their mother drowned. Refused to
be headwoman, said she didn't have the time, but she runs every meeting he calls." The headman smiled,

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for Carlos's speech had risen clearly over the noise of the departing villagers. "Look at it this way,
grandfather, the village gets two fish on one piece of bait. I do all the work and Yolanda does all the
talking." He stood, stretched, and turned to Magdelene. "Have you got a bed, Wizard?"

Studying the muscles of his torso, still corded and firm for all his forty-odd years, Magdelene
considered several replies. All of which she discarded after catching a speaking glance from the
headman's wife.

"While the weather holds," she sighed, "I'm perfectly comfortable under my cart."