"Christopher Stasheff - Warlock 11 - The Warlock Rock" - читать интересную книгу автора (Stasheff Christopher)

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The Warlock Rock by
Christopher Stasheff
Chapter One
"Praise Heaven!" Cordelia sighed. She may have been overdoing the
sigh a little, but Alain had managed to sneak back to their table to join
them, and he was very handsome, in addition to being a crown prince.
Cordelia was fourteen, and noticing such things with great interest these
days. "Praise Heaven that Mama hath given it to the Lord Abbot!"

"Given what?" Prince Alain watched the High Table, where the
Gallowglass children's mother was slipping off a thick chain that held a
massive pendant.

She was thirty feet away, for the children sat at a side table, and the
Great Hall was seventy-five feet long by fifty wide, which may not be
gigantic, but was big enough for the ceiling and the corners to be lost in
shadow when the Hall was lit only by torches along the walls, and candles
on the tablesтАФand, of course, the great fireplace in the north wall. In the
centers of the walls, though, there was enough light to make the lions and
dragons on the tapestries seem to jump out at you, and the knights in
their shining armor seemed much brighter, and the damsels much fairer,
than they ever could by daylight.

But Lady Gwendolyn Gallowglass seemed the fairest of allтАФat least, to
her children's eyesтАФas she held out the pendant to the Lord Abbot. As he
took it, Lady Gallowglass flipped the cover open, and the grown-ups all
gasped. Small wonder; even from ten yards' distance, Alain could see the
glow of the stone. "What is it?"

"Tis a circuitтАж ouch!" Geoffrey Gallowglass swore, grasping at his shin.
 " Tis a rock that Father hath made," his sister Cordelia explained to
Alain.

"Say rather, 'found' or 'cut'," said Diarmid, Alain's little brother. "A
man doth not 'make' a rock."

"Speak of what thou knowest, sprat!" Alain scolded, and Gregory, the
littlest Gallowglass, said helpfully, "Papa doth. Thou canst, too, if thou
dost mix the right potion. Make a brine so salty it doth become thick, then
hang a twine in itтАФand in some days, thou wilt see rocks of salt growing
on it."