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

around. "We could be spending our time complaining about the seasons. Or the weather. Something
productive, something useful."
With that he turned back to his own neglected breakfast, to leave the two of them to patch things up
on their own. Or not—but they were both responsible adults, and he was fairly certain they would
behave sensibly.
They whispered tensely for a few moments, then took themselves elsewhere. Well, that was fine,
and even if they were foolish enough to continue the quarrel, so long as they did so privately,
Amberdrake didn't care....
I'm slipping, he thought as he held out his cup for a hertasi to refill, rewarding the little lizard with a
weak smile. I would have cared, a while ago. I would have stayed with those two until I was
certain they had reconciled their argument. Now I'm too tired to make all the world happy.
Too tired, or perhaps, just too practical. He used to think that everyone could be friends with
everyone else, if only people took the time to talk about their differences. Now it was enough for him if
they kept their differences out of the working relationships, and got the job done.
I'm settling for less these days, I suppose. I just pray there isn't less out there to settle for.
Right now he couldn't have said if this lack of energy was a good thing, or a bad one. It just was, and he
harbored his resources for those times when they were really needed. For his clients, for Urtho, for
Skan—if he spent every last bit of energy he had, he'd wind up clumsy at the wrong time, or weak when
the next emergency arose. That—
"Are you Amberdrake?"
The harsh query snapped him out of his reverie, and he looked up, a little startled. A young man
stood over him, a Healer by his green robes, and a new one, by the pristine condition of the fabric. The
scowl he wore did nothing to improve his face—a most unlikely Healer, who stood awkwardly, held
himself in clumsy tension, whose big, blunt-fingered hands would have been more at home wrapped
around the handle of an ax or guiding a plow. His carrot-colored hair was cut to a short fuzz, and his
blocky face, well-sprinkled with freckles, was clean-shaven, but sunburned. Not the sort one thought of
as a Healer.
Well, then, but neither was I....
"Are you Amberdrake?" the youngster demanded again, those heavy hands clenched into fists.
"They said you were."
Amberdrake didn't bother to ask who "they" were; he saw no reason to deny his own identity. "I
am, sir," he said instead, with careful courtesy. "What may I do for you? I must warn you my client list is
fairly long, and if you had hoped to make an appointment—"
"Make an appointment?" the boy exploded. "Not a chance! I want you to take my patient off that
so-called 'client list' of yours! What in the name of all that's holy did you think you were doing, taking a
man that's just out of his bed and—"
The young Healer continued on in the same vein for some time; Amberdrake simply waited for him
to run out of breath as his own anger smoldered dangerously. The fool was obviously harboring the usual
misconceptions of what a kestra'chern was, and compounding that error by thinking it was Amberdrake
who had solicited his patient for some exotic amorous activity.
All without ever asking anyone about Amberdrake, his clients, or how he got them. One word in
the Healers' compound would have gotten him all the right answers, Amberdrake thought, clenching
his jaw so hard his teeth hurt. One word, and he'd have known clients come to me, not the other way
around... and that "his" patient has been sent to me for therapeutic massage by a senior Healer.
But no—no, he'd much rather nurse his own homegrown prejudices than go looking for the truth!
When the boy finally stopped shouting, Amberdrake stood. His eyes were on a level with the
Healer's, but the outrage in them made the boy take an involuntary step backward.
Amberdrake only smiled—a smile that Gesten and Tamsin would have recognized. Then they would
have gleefully begun taking bets on how few words it would take Amberdrake to verbally flay the poor
fool.