"Laura Anne Gilman - Staying Dead" - читать интересную книгу автора (Gilman Laura Anne)

"Nothing. Look, whoever this was, he's a subtle guy, definitely strong, but not too bright. He squelched
the elemental but forgot to sedate them."

"Which, in English, means what?" Sergei did exasperated like a guy with years of practice.

Wren grinned, forgetting he couldn't see her. Tweaking Sergei was always so much fun. He did the staid
businessman thing so well, sometimes he forgot to take it off. "It means exactly that, which if you would
ever remember anything I've told you about elementals you'd, well, remember." He had the weirdest
mental block about certain aspects of currentтАФshe'd almost given up trying to figure it out. Then again,
non-Talents should be uneasy around current. She shouldn't blame him if even knowing things wigged
him out enough to not want to think about it. "I tapped into the wiring, and there was a horde of
elementals there. Quiet, but jazzed, like something'd shoved a massive current up their tails, but told them
to lay low about it.

"But when I stirred them up, they came shooting out, like they were hoping whatever it was had come
back."

And once they had come to her hand, she had been able to stroke them into giving up the residue from
that burst of magic. That was another one of her stronger skillsтАФreading magic like some people could
read Braille, or maps, or any other code. It made her useless in a really powerful thunderstorm, stoned
like kitty on catnip from the overload of power, but the rest of the time it was part of her stock-in-trade.
Where one magic-user had gone, she could go, recreating their trail with remarkable accuracy. Well,
mostly. Unlike her other skills, which had names and entries in the skillbooks her mentor had shown her,
this one seemed to be particular to her and the way her brain worked. Or if other Talents had it, they
were keeping just as quiet about it as she was. The end result either way was that she had no real idea
how it worked, or why, or how to control it.

Then again, she didn't understand any of that about her computer either, and it still worked fine. Most of
the time.

"I skimmed off a decent enough emotional memory of the thief to recognize him or her again. Pretty sure
of it, anyway."

Sergei made an unhappy-sounding noise in the back of his throat. She didn't think he was aware he did
it-she couldn't imagine him making it during negotiations with clients, or the highbrow, hoity-toity art
collectors who made his gallery so obnoxiously successful, which meant it was a Wren-specific
complaint. The thought made her grin again. "Even if you were sure, that doesn't help us unless you
actually run into himтАФ"

"Or her."

"Or her, in the near future. WrenтАж " A sigh, and she knew he was fiddling with one of the slender brown
cigarettes he carried with him everywhere and never smoked.

"Yeah, I know. Doesn't help worth diddly, realistically. But what, you expected this guy to leave a calling
card? It happens, sure, but not real often. Which is good, otherwise we'd both be out of work."

Sergei made a noncommittal noise that might have been agreement, amusement or a growl.