"01 - A Difficulty With Dwarves" - читать интересную книгу автора (Gardner Craig Shaw)

'Wuntvor,' Norei said, taking my head in her hands. 'Are you trying to say -'

The unicorn's majestic horn came between us, pulling us apart.

'Why not rest awhile?' Alea insisted as she pursued the grandly trotting beast.

'Ahem. There are laps, and then there are laps,' the unicorn replied haughtily.

'Norei -' I began, as Snarks ran screaming between us once again.

'And you need instruction in some of our sacred ceremonies!' insisted the Brownie, close upon the demon's heels. 'You know, like the ritual tying of laces -'

'Wuntvor!' Norei complained. 'It's impossible to talk to you!'

'Yes, it is, isn't it?' the unicorn agreed sadly. 'Oh, what a heavy head!'

'Wuntvor!' another voice called out from across the clearing. It was the voice of my master, Ebenezum.

58

'Norei -' I turned to excuse myself, but my beloved was already marching away to the opposite side of the willow, with no sign that she had even heard me call her name.

But I had no time to worry about what would happen now. Ebenezum needed me. I jogged across the grass to my master.

'Wuntvor,' the wizard addressed me as he pulled upon his long, white beard. 'I am sorry to have kept you, but it has taken me somewhat longer to confer with my colleagues than I had at first anticipated.' He nodded to both sides. I followed his gaze, and saw a pair of wizards, one left, one right, each a good twenty paces distant, and twenty paces beyond each of them, another pair of magicians, and so on. I realized then that wizards circled the entire courtyard.

'Indeed,' Ebenezum replied to my questioning glance. "Tis but a precaution against further mischief on the part of the Netherhells. We wizards are close enough to form an effective magical unit, but not so close as to affect our immediate maladies.'

My master scratched at the shock of white hair that protruded from beneath his handsome wizard's cap. 'But we must discuss our plan, for even with precautions such as these, who knows when another . . .'

Ebenezum paused as we both heard a low rumble which seemed to come from deep beneath the earth. The ground where we stood began to shake.

I knew this kind of quake. This was no little Brownie explosion. This was an attack, by the demons of the Netherhells!

'And so it begins,' my master remarked grimly.

FIVE

'The successful wizard must plan to spend a fair amount of time away from home, whether in the company of other mages or working for the common man.

7 have known the occasional wizard who had attempted to buck this trend and work completely and forever alone, but there is danger here as well. A close personal acquaintance of mine locked himself inside his lair for sixteen years, until at last he discovered a spell for turning dirt into gold, and spent the last few months of his exile amassing a great pile of his magical wealth.

'What could be wrong? you might ask. Ah, but sixteen years away from human contact had taken its emotional toll. This wizard had become afraid to even walk outside his home, and confessed to me, through his closed and bolted door, that he was even more afraid to leave his horde of gold, and cursed his riches for a burden!

'The solution, of course, was simple. Whenever such a tragedy occurs to a fellow sorcerer, the wise wizard should always be prepared to take the burden from their hands.'

- WHEN BAD SPELLS HAPPEN TO GOOD WIZARDS

(fourth edition), by Ebenezum,