"James Alan Gardner - League of Peoples 06 - Trapped" - читать интересную книгу автора (Gardner James Alan)

"This particular dog was a tenor," said the Caryatid. "I don't know its breed or gender. So it told meтАФ"

"Did it have an accent?" Pelinor asked.

"No," the Caryatid snapped. "And it had flawless diction, even though it didn't have lips or a larynx, all
right? It told me,You're going on a quest. I said,What kind of quest? and it answered,A dangerous
one. I asked,Why on Earth would I go on a dangerous quest? It said,Hey, lady, I may be a talking
dog tongue, but I'm no mindreader."

"Don't you just hate it," Myoko murmured, "when animal parts get uppity?"

"So," the Caryatid went on, "I say,What's this quest about? The tongue tells me,Love, courage,
meaning... the usual. A lot of good that does me.Details, I say,give me details! The tongue wiggles
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around like a long strip of bacon, then finally gasps out,Future cloudy: ask again later."

"That was the end?" Myoko asked.

"I thought so," the Caryatid said. "But as I set down the crucible, a piece of chalk flew into the air and
scrawled on the blackboard,Your friends have to go too."

Myoko and I groaned. Pelinor and Impervia exercised more restraint, but both showed noticeable
bulges around their jaws as their teeth clenched. "Well," said Pelinor after a few moments' silence, "a
quest, eh? What jolly fun."

We all glared at him. None of us truly believed his "knight of the realm" personaтАФrumor had it he was a
retired corporal from the Feliss border patrol, and he'd faked both his r├йsum├й and his accent to get the
cushy post of academy armsmaster. Still, he did his job well... and one had to admire the way he gamely
kept up the facade of being a sword-sworn crusader. "Never fret," he told us, "a little adventure is just
the thing to chase away our winter blues: battling monsters, righting wrongs..."

"Finding lost treasure..." Myoko added.

"Doing God's work..." Impervia put in.

"And perhaps impressing Gretchen Kinnderboom," I finished. "Won't that be ducky."

The Caryatid sighed. "If nothing else, maybe we'll be too busy slaying dragons to proctor final exams."

"I'll drink to that!" Myoko said, her face cheering up. "To our questтАФmay it get us out of promotion
meetings."

All five of us clanked cups and tankards with exaggerated enthusiasm... trying to pretend we weren't
terrified.