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Reapers Of Suffering 19
This year 's morning did live up to its name, because it settled down dank and gray due to the incessant winds and rains. This morning, too, the siverko rushed at the windows, trying to tear off the wooden shutters. The shutters with their wrought-iron hinges didn't budge, they only creaked with strain. And the reckless reckless man from anger threw handfuls of icy drizzle at them. Eilisha woke up with a bone-chilling chill. I desperately wanted to warm up. Alas, the hearth burned out long ago, the wind blew out all the heat, so much so that the floor was covered with ashes. To go to the soap-house, to stand by the hot stove! But for this it is necessary to get out from under the blanket, pull on cold, wavy clothes and go down to the cellars along the icy corridors. The girl shuddered. For several days now, she had felt overwhelmed and weak. It was like some kind of ghoul drank strength from her. Pulling the skinny blanket up, the young healer curled up in a ball, trying to keep war
Reapers Of Suffering 20
- I give them all a tincture! the healer barked, fed up with the unfair onslaught. - And this snot and the colors are still not really getting better - that is, it is not! What her tincture? To bleed out? And then, last month there were paints! I checked. Who has grown her belly, I do not know. I can’t put her to sleep with me in order to save me from stupidity! - Kill the bastard ... - sighed the voice of Ichthor. Why didn't you ask permission? Birga quipped. - Because she is here, without memory. And this bastard - neither ear nor snout! Kref answered bitterly. - Fool! The sorcerer's teacher shook her head. “If she had been squeezed against her will, Mairiko would have known, you can’t hide traces.” Here is something else. They got it all out of love. Look yourself. The man approached the barely breathing novice, ran his hand over her stomach, and again a barely noticeable blue radiance streamed from his fingers, it seeped into the thin body and ran through it with hoar-frost l
Reapers Of Suffering 21
Eilisha came to her senses because she was swimming somewhere. The body weakened, and the eyelids became heavy, heavy. It seemed to the girl that she was swinging in a cramped boat on the waves of the unhurried river Pereksha, which meandered in the meadows near her native village. But you can’t hear the splashing of the waves, you can’t smell the water ... When the novice opened her eyelids, she saw a disfigured face with an empty eye socket. Close, close. Ichthor! - What are you shaking? – black-haired healer carried her so easily, as if the girl weighed nothing. - Don't like it? “I... I...” she stammered incoherently. - You fell. I got a cold, apparently. Yes, and the colors have come, ”the cool voice of the mentor came from somewhere on the side. - Well, I found you in the corridor, otherwise I would have frosted over on the floor. Fell? Ah, yes... Eilisha remembered how dizzy she was, how she was tormented by chills. “I was going to the lesson…” the novice weakly tried to
Reapers Of Suffering 22
On one of the blizzard days of a student in the first month of winter, fate prepared a new test for her. As soon as the doctor ran into the tower, shaking off the snow from the casing and breathing on her chilled palms, Ichthor stunned her with the news: – Today, we will learn to deprive a person of life. From these terrible words, spoken with ordinary indifference, Eilisha froze. Naughty lips whispered of themselves: - I'm a healer. Not a killer. - And what will you do, healer, with those who cannot be saved, and you will not leave alive? the kref asked dryly. - How do you give an easy death? And to instant, without torment. Will you sing a lullaby?- I do not know. At home, every time I ran away from the yard when a bird or cattle was slaughtered. I was sick for a week afterwards, I could not see the meat. I… I… can't,” the girl backed away. “Everyone was laughing at me. They called it blessed. “They talked about it,” said the guard. But this is not a house. And, pushing the s
Reapers Of Suffering 23
“Well, quietly, quietly, why are you like a wild animal ...” the man grumbled, handing out vicious cuffs to the children pushing on a blanket that was spread over the frozen trunk of a fallen tree. “Look, you’ll start snatching bowls from each other. Well, calm down everyone! This commanding cry made the seven children quiet down. Even the smaller ones stopped making offended noises. They sat down, folding their cold hands in shabby mittens on their sharp knees. Worn beggarly skins, red noses and eyes shining with hunger and anticipation. Seven pairs of eyes. And everyone, without stopping, is watching how an emaciated woman with an exorbitantly large belly pours hot steaming out into old bowls ... Food! - Take it. Yes, don’t choke, don’t choke, that’s enough here, - and the woman with a sad smile looked at how the little boy of two springs greedily dipped her face into a spacious bowl. The man sat down on a hummock sticking out of a snowdrift. “Diven…” the woman began, but the p
Reapers Of Suffering 24
- What are you, what are you? – tightly hugging his beloved, the young man asked. She wanted to tell him about her fears, to ask him to be by his side, but inappropriately she completely remembered the animal eyes on a human face, remembered the predatory claws and death rattle, and escaped from her lips:“Tamir, if I were reborn as a walker, would you… be able to… kill me?” He looked surprised, but then laughed. “Stupid, you will never walk, I won’t let you,” he kissed the curly top of her head and began to cradle the girl like a child. This was not the answer Eilish was expecting. And I realized with bitterness: if something goes wrong - like Lesana, Tamir's hand will not tremble ... * * *Since that time, the healer apprentice seemed to have been replaced. The daughter of the Medenich family froze. With cold indifference, she did everything that the mentors ordered. There were no more refusals, questions, tears. They confidently cut the girl's hands of the body, washed the ab
Reapers Of Suffering 25
- Hold him! - Tamir, calm down. Take it easy! He didn't hear them. Didn't understand what they were saying. He rushed to the body prostrate in the snow, shaking off those who prevented him from moving from his shoulders. He wheezed from the tearing light pain, from a soundless scream stuck in his throat, from suffocation. Everything was purplish red before his eyes. And in this bloody veil, he saw only an awkwardly prostrate girl. Broken, mangled. - Klesh! Klesh, help! After that cry, the air around Tamir seemed to turn to stone. Don't move, don't rush. Like a bug frozen in resin. - Look at me. He moved his wild eyes, not understanding who was addressing him, not knowing why to obey him. - Look at me. The guy stared blindly. Kref of the warriors held him tightly by the shoulders: - Like this. Do you hear me? Tamir nodded heavily, slowly returning to his body, to his mind. - You're going to her now. Myself. You won't be held... - ... Kleskh! - someone resented his arbitrari
Reapers Of Suffering 26
I suppose the quiet woman found out that they drugged her with a decoction so that the child would be overthrown. The girl was already moaning, taking the wrong side of healing, and the act of the mentors completely crushed her. If they didn’t do meanness, you look, I would have remained alive. It was impossible to deprive her child, it is impossible! They thought they would save Dar, but they lost everything. And Mairiko, without taking her eyes off the floor, began to tell how she found out about Eilishina’s indolence, how she made her drunk with a decoction to throw it away, how she charmed ... “Looks like her Gift overcame our efforts... She broke the spell. I remembered. That's why it didn't last. I have no other interpretation. Head blackened face: “Ah, there are no other interpretations?” Why didn't you give her a tincture. AND? Why, when she suffered - did not voluntarily force the broth to drink? Didn't you intimidate more than death, so that she would snatch this jug wit
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Reapers Of Suffering Epilogue
And then the caretaker laid siege to himself. Again he is angry with Kleskh. Again he is blamed. As if all the troubles of the Citadel are from him alone. No, not from him. Or not from him alone. Trouble is a great many. Only now, Lesana's kref teases everyone tirelessly, does not obey the word of the elder, goes against the will. And maybe right? Maybe, indeed, youth and strength tell him a different truth? The one that Ned, with his stagnant mind, can no longer hear? Wants, wants Kleskh, lascivious bastard, power! It is eager to lay a hand on the Citadel, to establish its own rules here. Just mindless. Mad. By the stubbornness of the young! Heaps things up, let him come to power. He'll screw up, he'll put everyone under attack. But the head pulled himself up again, realizing that Kleskh was perhaps the only one who would be a fortress and learn to protect more than the apple of his eye. And if not? Will not if? If he loves to amuse himself with power?"How are you?" whispered the
Reapers Of Suffering 51
When lilac twilight spread over the fortress and hung in the corners like grayish shadows, Lesana was finally girded and released from the chambers of the dejected leader. Instead of a student's dress, the amulet was now wearing the clothes of a warrior, belted with a wide heavy belt, which, surprisingly well, grabbed her thin waist. In unusual attire, the girl still felt uncomfortable. It seemed that the novelty of a black shirt made of good quality linen, a leather top with short sleeves, pants, and the belt itself was too noticeable. The thought flashed through my head that five student springs flew by somehow too quickly. It seems like yesterday she dreamed of unlearning and returning home, but now she has unlearned, and will go home tomorrow. Somehow there? Mother and father would see, cuddle the young. Although ... who is there to squeeze, everyone has already grown. Styoshka is seventeen this year. And what is Styoshka like now? Stoyana Svet Yurdonovna. Elke, that is, Elavi,
Reapers Of Suffering 50
- I brought a novice who went to my students for five springs. Now her training is over, and I speak my word for her. Lesana of the Ostrikova clan is ready to accept the belt of a warrior from the hands of the head of the Citadel. The krefs looked at each other. Ned looked at Kleskh from under his brows, gloomy as a thundercloud. It seemed that a little more and start throwing lightning. - So, the belt ... - said the caretaker and thunder could be heard in his voice. - A belt for a worthless girl. Where were you? For three years - neither hearing nor spirit - only sent quitrent money with occasions. Yes, even magpies flew several times with notes, where they learned to look. Only by your magpies, not a single novice could be obtained! And now he appeared, when they didn’t even look forward to waiting, the belt demands! Lesana's mentor answered evenly. - I, the head, do not have a great day to wait for me. And I don't need a belt. My belt is with me, - Kleskh pointed with his eyes
Reapers Of Suffering 49
If someone asked the student Kleskh to tell about how she lived for three years, wandering with kreff through cities and villages, the girl probably could not tell beautifully and smoothly. And what is there to say? About the days spent in the saddle - under the wind, rain, snow? About spending the night under the open sky, when did the heat overcome, or cold, or dampness? About how sometimes she woke up in the fall, and her hair (fortunately short) froze to the roll placed under her head? Or how you wanted to wash and sleep, but instead you had to drive carts one by one along the forest roads? How did you learn to wield a sword? How did she kill the first werewolf, who, for her bad luck, turned out to be not a wolf, not a fox, not a forest cat-lynx, but a bear? Or remember how Kleskh ran after her with a jerk at the ready through a remote village and yelled: “I’ll kill the scrawny !!!” Well, this is after she shied away from him for nothing, mistaking him for a walker in the middl
Reapers Of Suffering 48
How good is the greenery at the very beginning and the air smells! Young grass, damp earth, tart needles, buds that are ready to bloom with sticky young leaves. That is why a childish bubbling joy boils in the chest at this time. Lesana stood, bent over a boiling pot. Fragrant bread bubbling merrily. Above the clearing, where the girl and her mentor settled down to rest, a sweet mushroom spirit floated. The student smiled as she stirred the stew. Kleskh was not picky, but he did not like mushrooms - passion. And precisely because he hated them to the point of mental inversion, the girl deliberately kept a handful of dried mushrooms at the bottom of her shoulder pad. Kref grew up on the shores of the Evil Sea. They did not know and did not eat mushrooms there. Therefore, he could mutter two turns about these "slugs" and never repeat himself. The girl chuckled, foreseeing how the mentor would burst out, returning from the forest to the parking lot. White, boletus, russula - only they
Reapers Of Suffering 47
Evening descended on the Citadel. Kleskh returned from Lesana to his unheated dark rest and sank down on the bench, inhaling the smells of the Citadel: dampness, stone, preli. It was necessary to order one of the servants to heat it. And, however, one night and so you can endure. I was too lazy to light the light. And the guard sat in the dark, listening to the silence. Ned, without knowing it, made exactly the decision to which he was diligently pushed by kref - exile. And together with Lesana. The mentor of the warriors chuckled and closed his eyes. To tell the truth, the indignation of Ichthor and those who joined him turned out to be unexpected, which almost ruined everything. Well, at least Rust and Donatos have not changed themselves. Klesh smiled contentedly. At that moment, there was a soft scratch at the door: - Open it. Mairico. The guard hid. Can he believe that he doesn't exist? The light is not on. The hearth is cold. You never know where he goes. - I know you're he
Reapers Of Suffering 46
Kleskh dismounted, threw the reins over the horse's head and handed them over to the jumping servant. - Mentor... Lesana stood a little apart. She looked at the kref with eyes that were dimmed, but filled with hidden relief. - Take him to Nurlisa, then to the soap house, to the doctors and to the refectory. Show the Citadel, explain everything. Then we'll talk. Go with her,” the last kref said, turning to his companion, a strong, broad-shouldered fellow who had just left the saddle and now stood at a respectful distance. The guy tried to look calm, but confusion was reflected in his dark eyes. Lesana gave the newcomer a quick glance and nodded, inviting him to follow. He obediently moved after her, but the girl felt his eyes glowing with curiosity behind her back. Still - a girl in ports and without braids. Or maybe he did not understand that she was a girl? And then Lesana remembered how Febr led her, Eilisha and Tamir in the same echoing corridors of the Citadel to the lower ti
Reapers Of Suffering 45
The rope, thrown over the dryer pole, swayed measuredly. It was hot. The barn smelled of old manure. Shreds of last year's dry hay stuck out of the gaps in the eaves. Skotin had to slaughter greenfields in the middle , when Siyana fell ill, and Volynets was up to nothing. The wife had a hard time giving birth, but the daughter was born strong, pink and noisy. The father and grandmother nursed the child together, because the mother fell ill. Volynets treated his wife with Dar, but even Dar did not help in such rotten weather. A rainy spring turned into a cold and also rainy summer. Water poured down from heaven day after day in unstoppable torrents. The earth became limp, the young grass began to rot, neither mushrooms nor berries grew in the forest, the fields turned into swamps - there was nowhere to sow bread, and no one ... However, little by little, Shiyana stood up, although she was still weak. Volyn breathed a sigh of relief. Therefore, when on a rainy morning of the month of
Reapers Of Suffering 44
“Whoo! Wow!!!" the wind whistled through the trees "Tsh-sh-sh ..." - powerful crowns responded to his thin howl. Tamir tried to fall asleep, but for some reason sleep escaped his head. And, although for a few days spent in the saddle, the guy was exhausted - even fatigue could not knock him into a slumber. He was still afraid of the forest. Not even so much those who walk, live here, but the thicket itself. With my mind I understood that the forest feeds, waters, gives shelter. Look, take them with Veles - already nine days on the road, and there is nothing to complain about. Sleep on soft, eat hearty. And yet the forest remained a forest. He frightened the novice, who still did not really know how to find his way among the impenetrable thicket, did not know how to remember the path he had traveled. Velesh was from the village, so he willingly told the youngest about everything he knew: he taught him to find streams in the thicket, remember the way and find the way in the sun. But
