"Mary Kirchoff. Kendermore ("Dragonlance Preludes I" #2) (angl)" - читать интересную книгу автора

whom had gathered around the bar to see what was happening.

Tas stopped his struggling. "I think this lady wants me to go
back to Kendermore and get married," he said, avoiding his friends'
eyes.

"To her?" Flint asked, his brows raised in amazement.

"Don't be insulting!" the female dwarf cried, drawing back.

"Of course not, Flint," Tas sniffed. "She's not even a kender."

"Look," Tanis said impatiently. "Would somebody tell us what's
going one" He gazed directly at the unusually vivid-looking dwarf.
"Who are you, and what's the real reason you want Tasslehoff?"

The woman regarded Tanis's handsome face with interest. Suddenly
she thrust out her hand, palm down, and said sweetly, "My name is
Gisella Hornslager. Yours?"

"Tanis Half-Elven," he responded, awkwardly returning the
woman's crushing handshake.

Gisella withdrew her hand. "As I was saying, Buzzfoot is under
arrest for breaking a marriage oath according to some kender law or
another," she said vaguely. "Now, as much as I'd like to stay and
chat," she continued, letting her gaze wander down Tanis's lean form,
a smirk on her lips, "I really must be going. Schedules to keep,
places to be, you know how it is."

Flint, who had been quite obviously staring at the woman since
her arrival, gulped in surprise. "You're a bounty hunter?"

"Oh, not specifically," she said, spinning on her heel.

"I'm in the import-export business; my motto is 'You want it, I
got it.' The Kendermore Council asked me to do this job, and I thought
'fabric, a kender - what's the difference as long as it's portable?'"

She lifted her broad, raspberry-colored shoulders in a weary
shrug. "Now, I don't mean to be rude, but I really must be going. I've
got two bags of rare merganser melon out in my wagon getting riper and
costing me more money every second I delay. Kendermore's Autumn
Harvest Faire opens in a little more than a month, and that load is
worth a half-year's profits to me there. Woodrow?"

The young man stepped forward obediently and wrapped his strong
arms around the wriggling kender.

"Sorry, little fella," he mumbled.