"Simon R. Green - Haven 06 - Bones of Haven" - читать интересную книгу автора (Green Simon R)

they hold the contact, the more real they become, while you fade into a ghost, a fancy, a might-have-
been. Sorcerers create Pale Men from old love letters, blood spilled in anger, an engagement ring from
a marriage that failed, or a baby's shoes bought for a child that was never born. Any unfinished
emotion that can still be tapped. Be wary of them. They're very good at finding chinks in your
emotional amour that you never knew you had."

"How many of them are there?" said Fisher.

"We don't know. It tends to vary. We don't know why. Then there's Johnny Nobody. We think he used
to be human, perhaps a sorcerer who lost a duel. Now he's just a human shape, consisting of guts and
muscle and blood held together by surface tension. He has no skin and no bones, but he still stands
upright. He screams a lot, but he never speaks. When we caught him, he was killing people for their
skin and bones. Apparently he can use them to replace what he lost, for a time, but his body keeps
rejecting them, so he has to keep searching for more."

"I'm surprised he hasn't killed himself," said Fisher.

"He's tried, several times," said Winter. "His curse won't let him die. Now, if I may continueтАж
Messerschmann's Portrait is a magical booby trap left behind by the sorcerer Void when he had to
leave Haven in a hurry earlier this year, pursued by half the sorcerers in Magus Court. We still don't
know what he did to upset them, but it must have been pretty extreme. They're a hard-boiled bunch in
Magus Court. Anyway, the Portrait was brought here for safekeeping, and it's been in Hell Wing ever
since. The creature in the Portrait may have been human once, but it sure as hell isn't now. According
to the experts who examined the Portrait, the creature is actually alive, trapped in the Portrait by some
powerful magic they don't fully understand. And it wants out. Apparently, if it locks eyes with you
long enough, it can walk out into the world, and you would be trapped in the Portrait, in its place. So
don't get careless around it."

"You should be safe enough, Hawk," said Fisher. "It'd have a hard job locking eyes with you."

Hawk winked his single eye. Winter coughed loudly to get their attention.

"Crawling Jenny is something of an enigma. It's a living mixture of moss, fungi, and cobwebs, with
staring eyes and snapping mouths. It was only five or six feet in diameter when it was first removed
from the Street of Gods because it was menacing the tourists. Now it fills most of its cell. If some
fool's let Crawling Jenny loose and it's been feeding all this time, there's no telling how big it might be
by now.

"The Brimstone Boys are human constructs, neither living nor dead. They smell of dust and sulphur,
and their eyes bleed. Their presence distorts reality, and they bring entropy wherever they go. There
are only two of them, thank all the Gods, but watch yourselves; they're dangerous. We lost five
Constables and two sorcerers taking them. I don't want to add to that number.

"And finally, we come to Who Knows. We don't know what that is. It's big, very nasty, and completely
invisible. And judging by the state of its victims' bodies, it's got a hell of a lot of teeth. They caught it
with nets, pushed it into its cell on the end of several long poles, and nobody's gone near it since. It
hasn't been fed for over a month, but it's still aliveтАФas far as anyone can tell."

"I've just had a great idea," said Fisher, when Winter finally paused for breath. "Let's turn around, go
back, and swear blind we couldn't find Hell Wing."