"Mercedes Lackey & Larry Dixon - Mage Wars 01 - The Black Gryphon" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lackey Mercedes)

Skandranon was grateful to be alive, even more grateful to have gotten his mission completed
successfully, and entirely grateful to have been put back together. He'd been assured—repeatedly—that
he would be able to fly again. But he was in constant pain, his head pounded horribly, and on top of all of
it, having to be that grateful made him want to bite.
This was very bad of him, and he knew it, which made him want to bite even more. He only liked to
be bad on his own terms. If only he could have someone show up to see him who deserved a good,
scathing dressing-down—the fool who had assured Urtho that Stelvi Pass had been in no danger, for
instance, or the idiot who had issued the orders that grounded the gryphons between specific missions.
Even the imbecile cook who had first sent him raw fish for breakfast instead of good, red meat, then had
made it worse by sending yesterday's stew instead of fresh, still bleeding meat. But the only people who
came near him were those he was supposed to be grateful to—how annoying!—Gesten and Drake,
Tamsin and Cinnabar, the members of his wing, and the scouts and mercs who had risked their lives to
get him home. After Gesten's lecture, he made doubly sure to convey his proper gratitude to them.
But he still wanted to bite—so he did. The camp could find another pillow somewhere.
Now if only his beak didn't hurt; there was a persistent sting from small scratches around his nares,
and an itch across his cere, and his sinuses felt like—
Like you hit something hard after a prolonged plummet, bird.
It didn't help that he was forced to lie in a completely unnatural position, forelegs stretched in front of
him, hindlegs stretched straight under him and bound by splints, unable to get comfortable. He knew
Healers could fuse the bones of a mage-bred creature like himself in a single session of concentrated
Healing. He also knew that there was plenty of pain on the front lines, and people in real danger of dying
if they didn't get to a Healer, and that such a session was fairly low on the list of priorities.
That didn't help.
But much to his surprise, late in the afternoon, Tamsin and Cinnabar made an appearance at his
tent—and from the implements their hertasi was carrying, this was no social call. Tamsin was in his usual
simple green breeches and shirt, his short-cropped blond hair and beard in stark contrast to many of the
other Healers, who usually let their hair grow long and went clean shaven. And he could not have made a
better foil for the graceful and tall Lady Cinnabar; he was as stocky and muscled as a wrestler. Cinnabar,
of course, was as elegant as if she had just come from holding court, her scarlet gown cut to mid-calf,
showing scarlet leather boots and slender ankles, her sleeves cut tight, displaying her graceful arms
without an unseemly show of flesh. Skandranon had heard that by human standards she was not
beautiful, not even handsome, but her strong-nosed face, so like a proud falcon, seemed attractive
enough to him. She even had a crest; her hair was cut short on the sides and top so that it stood up, and
flowed in a braided tail down her back. Lovely.
Both of them looked relatively rested and full of energy. Skan's hopes rose. Were they—?
"All right, old bird," Tamsin said cheerfully as he held the tent flap open for the laden hertasi. "We
need to do something about those legs so you can get a proper rest. Think you're up to it?"
"Do you think I would sssay otherwisse?" Skan countered. "I would do anything!"
"Anything?" Cinnabar replied archly. Then, at Tamsin's eloquently raised eyebrow, she added
hastily, "No, don't answer. You are the most insatiable creature I have ever met!"
Skan wanted to leer but couldn't manage it. "Pleasssse," he near-whimpered instead.

By near sunset, after much effort on their part and pain and cooperative effort on his, the fractured
bones of his forelegs fused, and the hindlegs healed enough that the splints could come off and he could
carefully walk a few steps. He could attend to his personal needs—which was just as well, since so far as
he knew, no one had come up with the equivalent of a chamber pot for a gryphon. He would be able to
feed himself, and since Cinnabar had blessedly done something about the headache, he was ravenous.
Now he could lie back down in a much more comfortable position to listen to his bowels rumble.
Cinnabar looked as serene and composed now as when they had started; Tamsin was clearly tired,
but just as cheerful. "That should do you, old bird," he said, slapping Skan on the flank. "Dinner first, or