"Mercedes Lackey and Roberta Gellis - Ill Met by Moonlight" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lackey Mercedes)

marked the amulets with his finger "—as well as what I have in my hand."

The gnome protested and bargained. Pasgen allowed himself to be divested of three of the amulets he
had marked because to fail to chaffer would also mark him as unusual; however, he was growing
impatient and finally made as if to throw down the amulets he was holding and walk away. That brought
the gnome to heel and he accepted Pasgen's last offer of the five-times spell for the handful of amulets.

"Which shall I bespell for you?" Pasgen asked, about to pick up any amulet the gnome indicated.

Instead the little brown creature pulled a box from under the counter and opened it. Inside was a very
plain oval, lightly inscribed with a small tree entwined with a clinging vine. When Pasgen picked up the
amulet, it was blood warm in his hand, but it was the material of which it was made, not magic that
warmed it. He bent his head and began to murmur. He could see the gnome straining to listen but ignored
him. He doubted the creature could make his harsh and scratchy voice sound the liquid vowels and sweet
tones of the elven-mage-tongue.

"So." Now Pasgen was in a hurry, and he dropped the amulet back in its box. "You can give the amulet
to the person you want to wear it all the time, or you can lay it on that person's forehead or breast at the
time you want the person to sleep. Then, to invoke, you say 'Minnau ymbil' and when you want the
person to wake, you say 'Deffro deffroi.'"

"And to whom do I complain if the spell doesn't work?" the gnome growled as Pasgen picked up the
amulets for which he had bargained.

Pasgen started to turn away, but then hesitated and said, "Cry for justice to Vidal Dhu at Caer
Mordwyn."

"Vidal Dhu is dead," the gnome protested. "You know we are between the Bright Court and the Dark
and we had that news from both sides."

"Oh, no," Pasgen said, with a lifted eyebrow. "Then I give you a gift, along with the price of the amulets. I
assure you he is alive and well and will be holding court at Caer Mordwyn ere long—but the spell will
work. Never fear it."

And he slipped away, weaving skillfully among the booths and the customers. Actually he made two
rounds of the market in random fits and starts until he began to move into less crowded areas and finally
slipped behind a booth displaying very small gardening implements. There he waited rather patiently,
considering his urge to continue to his goal, but he neither heard nor felt any magic. Finally he took out
the amulet of the snake and sang to it the spell that opened a small, one-passage Gate.

Clutching the amulet in his hand, he walked away from the market into the narrow streets of the town.
The houses were hardly higher than his head and after some random turns and crossings, he could see
that no one was following him. Then he walked directly out of town until the open ground that faced him
blended into a formless mist. He invoked the Gate and stepped through, although if he had not known
that he had passed through a Gate, he could easily have believed he was still in Gnome Hold.

Here, however, the mists were not formless. They swirled and twisted, retreating from him and then
billowing toward him as if an erratic wind blew. Only there was no wind. Pasgen set out into the chaos
with a steady step. As he went, he turned his head sharply to sniff in a wisp of mist that was passing his
shoulder. A sharp scent, but not unpleasant.