Ви Корс - The Mist and the Lightning. Part 18

Kors watched his dangerous entertainment anxiously, admiring his son and his skill at the same time. He admired his every movement, tense muscles in his arms, he enjoyed how concentrated his expression was when he fought.

Once – and the enemy is already lying overturned on his back, crushed by a heavy boot, two – and the next warrior with his face distorted from pain is holding his right hand, and the sword knocked out of his hand is lying far to the side. Three – at some point, getting too close, the opponent receives a crushing blow with his fist in the face, falls backwards and hits the back of his head, losing consciousness.

The unclean ones screamed incessantly. When Nik once again forced the enemy to lie at his feet, he, smiling, took off his glove and walked around the circle, raising his hand with an open palm, and his unclean ones with their palms and paws beat on it, shouting words of praise. The fights became more and more difficult, the warriors who had defeated the others fought to knock out each other, and in the end there was only one left. At some point, a very bulk and powerful unclean one hit Nik in the gut so that he literally flew backwards, bent over, and crashed into the surrounding howling crowd of unclean ones. They supported him, preventing him from tipping over on his back, as the enemy expected, and pushed him back into the perimeter of the arena. Kors turned pale. This unclean warrior was very bulk and strong, and Kors had no idea how it would be possible to overwhelm him at all. But damn it, his Nik did it, despite the fact that he missed a few more blows. The spectators rejoiced; they jumped, howled and shouted like animals: “White Lord! White Lord!” Nik didn’t leave the arena, waiting for the next fighter to win him over again. And he won. Again. This time, however, he got such a blow in the teeth that bloody splashes flew out of his mouth. And Kors involuntarily screamed along with everyone. Next, another unclean one was supposed to conduct several fights, with whom Nik was supposedly to meet in the final.

Breathing heavily, Nik approached Kors, whose face was literally twisted:

“Is that all?! Have you lost your expensive teeth?”

“No,” Nik shook his head and bared his teeth and showed Kors that his teeth were intact. Kors saw that his mouth was full of blood, and his teeth were also covered with it.

“Get some water,” he handed Nik a flask.

“Is there something stronger?”

“I won’t give it to you!”

Nik took a flask of water, took a sip, and rinsed out his mouth and spat the blood onto the ground.

“It’s enough for today, let’s go,” said Kors.

“What? The final is ahead!”

“You have been fighting for several hours, you started to miss strikes, you will miss your final now!” Kors started to wind up. “Don’t you understand?! That’s all! You need to be able to stop in time!”

“No!”

“Yes! You don’t need this final, it doesn't make any sense!”

“I need it!”

“That’s it, I said! You’re done!” Kors shouted it so loudly that the unclean ones standing nearby heart him. They turned their heads to look at them, and Kors froze. He shouted now at their commander, their White Lord. Nik lowered his head and wiped his mouth, which was still oozing blood. He didn’t look at Kors. And Kors started to shake, but he saw that the unclean ones didn’t interfere, and Nik was silent.

“Come on,” said Kors a little calmer and quieter.

“No.”

“Come on!” Kors shouted again. He began to get really angry, and the stubbornness of his stupid son pissed him off. Kors felt that he simply couldn’t stand it if Nik was hit again, and he was hurt, this is understandable to anyone who knew at least a little about battles – Nik was tired. And Kors could no longer bear this sight, his heart would simply break.

Kors grabbed Nik by the forearm and pulled:

“You have finished, I have told you! Stop fooling!” He raised his eyes to the unclean:

“That’s all! Your White Lord has finished for today! He’s not involved anymore! I am his father and I am taking him away!” He pulled Nik behind him, and the unclean ones parted, not holding them back and seeing them off. Nik silently followed Kors and didn’t even try to remove his hand, and Kors firmly squeezed his forearm, painted with naked whores and monsters, with an iron grip, as if he was afraid that Nik would break free. In this manner, without letting him go for a second, Kors dragged him into the room, and, unable to resist, hit him several times: in the head, in the face and in the ribs. Nik made a dull sound like a soft, short growl. Kors threw him away from him. Nik fell – only the steel shields clinked, which were protecting his legs below the knees. Kors turned away, and, going up to the table, began to violently stir the medicine in a cup of water. He handed it to him son:

“Get up, take the medicine. Rinse your mouth thoroughly. Hold it in your mouth for a while before spitting. And wash yourself; you’re dirty, covered in dust.”

Nik stood up silently, took the mug, and without looking at Kors, went into the bathroom. Kors exhaled heavily. He continued to shake from the fact that Nik had been beaten and what Kors had done in front of everyone. But he was sure he was right.

Kors entered the bathroom and saw that Nik had removed his protection and was standing slightly bent over the bathtub, holding the medicine in his mouth. Kors approached Nik from behind and roughly undid the buckle on his belt, pulling his pants down, and bent him over the bathroom, jerking him sharply. From a strong jolt, Nik only bent more, resting his hands on the opposite edge of the tub, and healing water poured out of his mouth, mixed with blood. Kors wheezed, panting with orgasm, and fell off:

“Clean up and go back to the room,” he ordered.

When Nik returned to their room, Kors was sitting at the table and smoking. He looked at Nik, so sad and silent now:

“Was I wrong now?” Asked Kors and put out his cigarette. “Have I done the wrong thing to take you away?”

Nik was silent.

“Answer me!”

“I don’t know.”

“No, you know. You know perfectly well that I was right! And that’s why you obeyed me!”

In frustration, Nik reached for the bottle on the table.

“Eh, no! Give it back!” Kors jerked the bottle out of his hands.

“Vitor, give me a drink! I’m tired!”

“Of course you’re tired! Who made you fight?! You don’t need this final and prize money, you don’t need it all! I will give you as much money as you want! That’s it, Nik! Relax, you don’t need money anymore, you have a rich father who will give you everything! And when we return to the Black City, I will buy you many of the best clothes and cure you with the best doctors. You will no longer fight in the Colosseum and risk your life for the amusement of the crowd. Forget it!”

“I’m not poor myself!” Nik shouted. “I have enough money! I just had fun!”

“I understand, and I didn’t interfere until I saw that it would end badly for you now!”

Nik sat down heavily on the edge of the bed and looked at Kors:

“Please give me a drink.”

Kors stood up abruptly and poured him a full glass.

“Here it is!”

Nik immediately drained it in two gulps, and Kors involuntarily winced and lit a cigarette:

“Take this as well!”

Nik took it.

“So, was I wrong now?” Kors asked again.

Nik smoked in silence.

“How tired I am!” Kors tugged at his hair with all his might, forcing him to close his eyes in pain and almost drop his cigarette. “What’s in your head? And on the head?! I explained to you how to comb your hair! When are you going to behave well, Nik?”

“Never,” Nik muttered.

“What?!” And Kors hit him again, so that Nik dropped his almost smoked cigarette, and Kors rudely extinguished it, pressing his boot into the expensive carpet:

“No, you will!” He grabbed his bangs, strongly throwing his head up so that Nik would look at him.

“You will obey me, because it is right, and you need to learn to behave normally in order to advance further in your Mission, therefore you obey me! You understand that I am right and that you need it!”

“I don’t need anything! I obey you because I love you! And I don’t want to upset you!”

“I love you too,” Kors slowed down and let him go, “so I do all this and take care of you.”

“I understand,” Nik said.

“Show me your lip. Oh fuck! You ruined your beautiful face again!” Kors clasped his head in his hands in absolutely genuine despair. “What is it!” He grabbed a small round mirror from the table and handed it to Nik:

“Look! Look what’s wrong with your lips! My beautiful, lovely lips, what have you done to them… damn…”

Nik completely indifferently looked in the mirror at his now crooked and swollen lip, which slightly turned upward from the incipient edema.

Kors tossed the mirror aside and thrust the opener into his hand.

“Take out the rings!”

“Why? It hurts,” Nik disagreed.

“You have edema, they interfere, don’t you see?!”

“It happened a hundred times, it will subside and everything will be fine a bit later.”

“Get it out, fuck!” Kors growled with such anger that Nik immediately grabbed the unclamping instrument, hastily removing the jewelry from the purple lip.

“You ruined your tender lips, you don’t take care of your beauty at all!”

“What’s the difference? I’m not a piece of cake for everyone to lick at me.”

“What does this have to do with it? How stupid you are! You don’t know how to use your advantage. Good looks, correct posture, unaccented speech and noble manners – that’s it! You are sitting pretty!”

Nik shook his disheveled head a little.

“I’m not a girl! I fought and they broke my lip a little, what’s wrong with that?!”

Kors looked at his beautiful face, like a girl’s, and involuntarily smiled, realizing that Nik had completely misinterpreted his phrase “you are sitting pretty”, and seeing also Kors’ condescending smile, he literally burst inside with indignation, but endured and kept silent.

“You misunderstood me a little,” nevertheless tried to explain Kors, rather not because he felt that Nik was unpleasant, but simply because he loved to teach:

“To be sitting pretty” – this is a phrase from a game on a chess board, you can still play a simpler game of checkers, and if a checker crosses the entire field and has not been eaten…

Nik looked up at him.

“Maybe it’s enough? Please…”

“Nik, you don’t understand your advantages and don’t use them. You have not only a beautiful appearance, but also a good voice, I am not kidding. In fact, you have a beautiful voice.”

Nik looked at Kors dubiously.

“I speak seriously. Yes, your voice is low and hoarse, but there is something exciting about it. If you remove gross mistakes in words, it will be very good.”

Kors calmed down a bit:

“What will your unclean ones think now? I yelled at you in front of them, won’t that hurt your reputation as a commander?”

“They won’t think anything, everything is fine…”

Zaf came to them, he grinned like a satisfied cat:

“What, my Lord, are you getting away with your greyhound daddy?” Zaf, unable to resist, laughed. Kors froze.

“No,” Nik said.

“I left to feed Barla,” Zaf continued, “and when I returned, I saw that you were not there, and they told me how dad yelled at you and took you away.”