"(ebook) Anthony Piers - Xanth 03 - Castle Roogna" - читать интересную книгу автора (Anthony Piers)

He was answered by a spate of yellow hailstones, and had to hunch over like a zombie and shield his face with his arms until they passed.

"Be halfway sensible, Dor!" Grundy urged. "Don't mess with that mean storm! It'll wash us out!"

Dor reluctantly yielded to common sense. "We'll seek cover. But not at home; the zombie's there."

*'I wonder what Millie sees in him," Grundy said.

"That's what I asked." The rain was commencing. They hurried to an umbrella tree, whose great thin canopy was just spreading to meet the droplets. Umbrella trees preferred dry soil, so they shielded it against rain. When the sun shone, they folded up, so as not to obstruct the rays. There were also parasol trees, which reacted oppositely, spreading for the sun and folding for the rain. When the two happened to seed together, there was a real wilderness problem.

Two larger boys, the sons of palace guards, had already taken shelter under the same tree. "Well," one cried. "If it isn't the dope who talks to chairs!"

"Go find your own tree, twerp," the other boy ordered. He had sloping shoulders and a projecting chin.

"Look, Horsejaw!" Grundy snapped. "This tree doesn't belong to you! Everyone shares umbrellas in a storm."

"Not with chair-talkers, midget.**

"He's a Magician!" Grundy said indignantly. "He talks to the inanimate. No one else can do that; no one else ever could do that in the whole history of Xanth, or ever will again!**

**Let it be, Grundy,*' Dor murmured. The golem had a sharp tongue that could get them both into trouble. "We'll find another tree.*'

"See?" Horsejaw demanded triumphantly. "Little stinker don't stand up to his betters.'* And he laughed.

Suddenly there was a detonation of sound right behind them. Both Dor and Grundy jumped in alarm, before remembering that this was Horsejaw's talent: projecting booms. Both older boys laughed uproariously.

Dor stepped out from under the umbrellaЧand his foot came down on a snake. He recoiledЧbut immediately the snake faded into a wisp of smoke. That was the other boy's talent: the conjuration of small, , harmless reptiles. The two continued to laugh with such enthusiasm that they were collapsing against the um-,-; brella trunk.

Dor and Grundy went to another tree, prodded by

another sonic boom. Dor concealed his anger. He didn't like being treated this way, but against the superior physical power of the older boys he was helpless. His father Bink was a muscular man, well able to fight when the occasion required, but Dor took after his mother more: small and slender. How he wished he were like his father!

The rain was pelting down now, soaking Dor and Grundy. "Why do you tolerate it?" Grundy demanded. "You are a Magician!"

"A Magician of communication," Dor retorted. "That doesn't count for much, among boys."

"It counts for plenty!" Grundy cried, his little legs splashing through the forming puddles. Absent-mindedly Dor reached down to pick him up; the one-time golem was only a few inches tall. "You could talk to their clothes, find out all their secrets, blackmail themЧ"

"No!"

"You're too damned ethical, Dor," Grundy complained. "Power goes to the unscrupulous. If your father, Bink, had been properly unscrupulous, he'd have been King."

"He didn't want to be King!"

"That's beside the point. Kingship isn't a matter of want, it's a matter of talent. Only a full male Magician can be King."

"Which King Trent is. And he's a good King. My father says the Land of Xanth has really improved since Magician Trent took over. It used to be all chaos and anarchy and bad magic except for right near the villages."

"Your father sees the best in everyone. He is entirely too nice. You take after him."