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

now. He told the King that Ma'ar sent a spell of fear into them. However," she said while re-braiding a
lock of hair, "it seems not all of us were affected."
A shadow fell across the threshold and was followed a second later by a severe-looking,
impeccably uniformed woman. Her brown hair was shortcut but for three thin braids trailing down her
back, each as long as a human's forearm, all placed in mathematical precision along her smooth neck. As
she stepped in, her hazel eyes flicked from human to gryphon to hertasi in that order; she then flowed like
icy water toward Aubri. Or rather, she would have flowed, had she not been trying to cover a limp. Skan
stared at her; to intrude uninvited into a tent was not only rude, it was dangerous when the tent contained
injured gryphons. Yet Aubri did not look surprised or even affronted; only resigned.
"May we help you?" Tamsin asked, openly astonished that the woman had not offered so much as a
common greeting.
The woman did not even look at him. "No, thank you, Healer. I am here to tend to this gryphon."
"And you arrre...?" Skandranon rumbled, his tone dangerous. Either she did not catch the nuance, or
she ignored it.
"His Trondi'irn, Winterhart, of Sixth Wing East," she replied crisply—not to Skan, but to Tamsin as
if Skan did not matter. "His name is Aubri, and he has suffered burns from an enemy attack," she
supplied.
Oh, how nice of her. She's provided us with details of the obvious, as if we had no minds of
our own or eyes to see with. How she honors us! Except that she was paying no attention to the
nonhumans, only the humans, Tamsin and Cinnabar. What does this arrogant wench think she is?
Urtho's chosen bride?
But the woman was not finished. "I've also come to reassign you, hertasi Jewel. Your services are
required in food preparation with Sixth Wing East. Report there immediately." Jewel gulped and blinked,
then nodded.
Winterhart drew a short but obviously sharp silver blade from her glossy belt and cut one of Aubri's
bandages free, looking over the blistered skin underneath.
"I don't think—" Tamsin began. The woman cut him off as Jewel scurried out of the tent.
"Aubri doesn't require her any longer," she said curtly, "and the Sixth is shorthanded."
Skan ignored the rudeness this time, for Winterhart had caught his attention. "Sssixth Wing—that of
Zhaneel?" he asked.
The woman looked at him as if affronted that he had spoken to her, but she answered anyway.
"Yes. That is an extraordinary case, though. She surprised us all by somehow distinguishing herself."
Winterhart's shrug dismissed Zhaneel and her accomplishments as trivial. "Rather odd. We've never had
a cull in our ranks before."
Skandranon's eyes blazed and he found himself lunging toward the woman. "Cull?"
Tamsin and Cinnabar held onto both of Skandranon's wings. He repeated his incredulous question. "
Cull?"
Winterhart ignored both his obvious anger and his question. Instead, she rebandaged Aubri and held
her hands over his burns.
Even Skan knew better than to interrupt a Healing trance, but it took him several long moments to
get his anger back under control. "Cull, indeed!" he snorted to Tamsin, indignantly. "Young Zhaneel is no
more a cull than I am! These idiots in Sixth Wing don't know how to train anyone who isn't a
musclebound broadwing, that's their problem! Cull!"
Tamsin made soothing noises, which Skan ignored. Instead, he watched Winterhart closely. The fact
that this cold-hearted thing was Zhaneel's Trondi'irn explained a great deal about why no one had
tended to the youngster's obvious emotional trauma and low level of self-esteem. Winterhart simply did
not care about emotional trauma or self-esteem. She treated her gryphon-charges like so many catapults;
seeing that they were war-ready and properly repaired, and ignoring anything that was not purely
physical. Zhaneel needed someone like Cinnabar, or like Amberdrake, not like this—walking icicle.
But she was giving Aubri the full measure of her Healing powers; at least she was not stingy in that