"Terry Goodkind - Sword of Truth 2 - Stone of Tears" - читать интересную книгу автора (Goodkind Terry)

of metal flying and stone dust boiling down the hall. Zedd rolled to his feet
and ran.

The screeling bounded out of the Garden of Life and into the hall. Its body
was hardly more than a squat skeleton covered in a veneer of dry, crisp,
blackened skin. Like a corpse that had dried in the sun for years. White bone
stuck out in places where the skin, hanging in flaps here and there, had been
torn in the fight, but that didn't seem to bother the creature; it was a thing
of the underworld, and not hindered by all the frailties of life. There was no
blood.

If it could be torn up enough, or hacked apart, maybe it could be stopped, but
it was awfully quick. And magic certainly wasn't doing it much harm. It was a
creature of Subtractive Magic; Additive Magic was just being absorbed into it
like a sponge.

Maybe it could be harmed with Subtractive Magic, but Zedd had nothing of that
half of the gift. No wizard in the last few thousand years did. Some might
have had the calling for the Subtractive - Darken Rahl was proof of that - but
none had had the gift for it.

No, his magic wasn't going to stop this thing. At least, the wizard thought,
not directly. But maybe indirectly?

Zedd walked backward as the screeling watched with blinking, bewildered eyes.
Now, he thought, while it's standing still.

Concentrating, Zedd gathered the air, making it dense, dense enough to lift
the heavy door. He was tired; it took an effort. He pushed the air with a
mental grunt, crashing the door onto the back of the screeling. Dust rolled up
and across the hall as the door slammed the creature to the ground. It howled.
Zedd wondered if it was howling in pain, or anger.

The door lifted, stone chips sliding off. The screeling held the heavy door up
with one clawed hand as it laughed, a woody tendril of the vine he had tried
to strangle it with still coiled around its neck.

'Bags,' Zedd muttered. 'Nothing is ever easy.'

Zedd kept walking backward. The door crashed to the floor as the screeling
stepped out from underneath it and followed. It was starting to learn that the
people who walked were the same ones who ran or stood still. This was an
unfamiliar world to it. Zedd had to think of something before it learned any
more. If only he wasn't so tired.
Chase went down a wide marble stairway. Zedd followed him at a quick walk. If
he had been sure it wasn't Chase or Rachel the screeling was after, he would
have gone a different way, drawing the danger away from them, but it could
just as easily go after them, and he didn't want to leave Chase to fight it
alone.