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

more important tasks, according to the judgment of the ranking human officer.'" He thumped his tail
against the bedframe. "I don't think Urtho knows. It's the most stupid thing I've heard in years—we aren't
tools to be traded around! Hertasi know their charges. It takes time to learn someone! And to send off a
hertasi when their charge is in pain—it's unthinkable. Worse—it's rude."
Amberdrake finished his cupful and thought for a moment. Gesten apparently expected him to do
something about this—an assumption that was confirmed when Gesten produced Amberdrake's full
wardrobe for the day, laid out his sandals, and stood with his arms crossed, impatiently tapping his foot.

"So, just how did you manage to get yourself bunged up?" Skandranon asked his erstwhile
companion when they had both finished the hearty breakfast that Gesten brought them at dawn.
Somehow—possibly from Cinnabar, or one of Cinnabar's hertasi—the little fellow had learned that Aubri
was without an attendant and had simply added one more gryphon to his roster of duties. Hence, the
double breakfast; a lovely fat sheep shared out between them. With the head, which Skan had
courteously offered to Aubri, and which Aubri had accepted and had Gesten deftly split, so that each of
them could share the dainty.
Aubri had been profuse with his thanks, and Skan had thoughtfully kept his requests to an absolute
minimum so that Gesten could concentrate on Aubri. By the time Gesten left, Aubri was cradled in a soft
nest of featherbeds that put no pressure on his burns, and the telltale signs of a gryphon in pain were all
but gone.
"How was I hurt?" Aubri asked. "Huh. Partly stupidity. We were flying scout for Shaiknam's grunts;
we had one report of fire-throwers coming up from behind the enemy lines, but only one. And you know
Shaiknam."
Skan snorted derision. "Indeed. One report is not enough for him."
"Especially when it comes from a nonhuman." Aubri growled. "Needless to say, one report was
certainly enough for us, but he ignored it. He didn't even bother to send out a second scout for a
follow-up on the report."
The broadwing grunted a little and flexed his talons, as if he'd like to set them into the hide of a
certain commander. Skan didn't blame him.
"Anyway," Aubri continued after a moment, "I was just in from my last flight and officially off-duty,
so he couldn't order me on one of his fool's errands, and I figured I was fresh enough to go have a
look-see for myself. And I found the fire-throwers, all right."
"With your tail, I see," Skan said dryly.
Aubri snorted laughter as Tamsin arrived with Cinnabar and two of the Lady's personal hertasi. "At
least Shaiknam believed the evidence of his eyes and nose, when I came in smoking and practically
crushed him!" Aubri chuckled. "You should have seen his face! I set fire to his tent when I landed, and I
only wish I could have seen how much of it burned."
"Not as much as you or I would like, Aubri," Tamsin said. "By the way, flaming hero, we've had you
reassigned for the duration of this injury, anyway. You're our patient now, and if Her Royalness
Winterhart comes giving you orders, you tell her to report to me first."
Skan blinked in surprise; it wasn't often that Tamsin made room in his overcrowded schedule for a
patient from another wing and another commander. Winterhart must have truly angered him yesterday!
"Tchah, Shaiknam should be set down to scrub pots a while," Cinnabar added, wrinkling her elegant
nose in distaste. "My family has known his since our grandfathers were children, and it is a pity that
anyone ever gave the cream-faced goose any vestige of authority. The only thing he truly has a talent for
is losing interest in one project after another."
"And spending someone else's money," Tamsin reminded her.
She shook her head and brushed her hair back over her shoulders. "That was for peacetime," she
corrected him. "Now he simply trades upon his father's reputation, rather than spending his father's gold
on one incomplete project after another." She began telling off some of them on graceful fingers, as Skan
and Aubri listened with pricked-up ears. "There was the theater company he abandoned, with the play