Ви Корс - The Mist and the Lightning. Part 13

“Eh, he is already going through the second assault,” Lis answered him in the unclean one too and grinned.

Lis put everyone in points in his plan and explained who would be where and how to act.

“The sewer drain is walled up, but I'm sure they will try to undermine it, you are standing on the wall at the top, Ariel, and your people, don’t allow them to do it.”

“Yes, it is clear.”

“Nik,” Lis turned to Nikto, “what about the Portal?”

“I have blocked it,” Nikto answered. He didn’t take off his mask and was at the meeting in it. He didn’t even pull out the black glass that obscured his eyes, although the room was dim, and only a few candles were burning on the table. But Kors didn't care what his commanders would think, yes, his Nik looked shameful, but now Kors even liked it and it gave him perverse pleasure.

“Does he pose a threat?”

“I put a block long ago and during this time they tried to break through from Horn twice, but could not.”

“And from the Ore town?”

“No. Well… I knocked down all the landmarks, this Port is no longer visible in our World, is not visible from Ore town. For the Upper World I couldn’t do that. I just blocked it.”

“Great!”

“Do you understand the action of the Portal?!” Asked Prince Ariel Riel in surprise, and unlike Prince Arel, he really was the king's nephew.

“Ariel, then read the “Upper Messenger” at your leisure, there everything is written,” the Fox cut him off sharply, – now we are discussing the current situation and the defense of the Fort.

“I've read it,” said Prince Ariel.

“Then all the more, what the questions?”

Ariel said nothing.

And Kors again admired Lis and how impudently he stopped the push on Nikto, despite Ariel’s high position.

“If, nevertheless, they from Upper or from Horn manage to break through, Nik?” Lis didn't care about titles.

“I hope it won’t happen,” Nikto replied, he didn’t react at all to Ariel’s words.

“The door is locked, even if they unlock, they will not leave the basement,” said Nija, “we have closed all the doors and holes in the basements tightly. All the cracks. You cannot leave the Fort and you cannot enter it.”

“Like a rock, exactly,” whispered Shrad quietly, “even if you want, you can’t get out.”

“Who could have tried to reach us from Horn?” Lis said thoughtfully. “Do they care about the frontier Fort?”

“I had an assumption,” said Kors, “that the chief of the garrison had a woman in Upper World. He went there a couple of times a month. Maybe she is worried and looking for him? I assume he has a woman or a family there.”

“I don’t know anything about his family, he never mentioned her,” said Lis. “Marmer, what do you say? Did Digmer have a family?”

“He is from here, from our World,” Marmer shook his head, “No, Digmer was definitely born here. He is from Ore town. I knew people who knew him, I don't know about his family. But I heard about Horn that there is no more beautiful city! It is a rich city and filled with jewels. They drink from golden cups, eat from golden dishes,” as the story progressed, the eyes of the former marauder flared up with an increasingly unhealthy, greedy gleam, and he spread his arms to the sides, as if to show wealth. The noble commanders of Kors listened to him with a haughty, slightly condescending grin.

“And they have many, many beautiful things, and watches and pictures!”

“And there are many of them in our rooms,” said Salafael Myrtle, “and pictures and things. Did they steal jewelry from the Horn? And here they hid it. Who would guess to look here? Everything is packed with this shit in the main tower.”

“Oh!”

“Okay,” said Lis, “then we'll figure it out.”

“If it’s stolen,” Nija said, “they will come for it and try to break through and take their jewelry in any way! Can we enter into negotiations with them?”

“That’s the last thing,” objected Zagpeace Gesaria, “to enter into negotiations with thieves!”

“Let's defend the Fort first,” Lis interrupted them, “and then we'll decide how to sell the stolen goods.”

And the unclean ones, Shrad and Marmer and Lis himself laughed.

3

New life

Value friendships. Try to understand your partner and he will understand you. Understanding will help restore what was destroyed and overcome any obstacles.

Kors returned to his room. He had several hours to clean himself up and sleep, but he could not. He wanted to be with Nikto and listened nonstop to his thoughts. What if suddenly the Demon would call him? But Kors didn’t hear him. Kors wanted Nikto to call him, he wanted to hear his voice in his head and immediately run to him.

But he didn't hear anything. Nikto wasn’t calling him. And Kors couldn’t do anything, not even just fall asleep, although he was very tired. The tension kept him from relaxing. Why wasn’t the Demon calling him?

Jealousy began to gnaw at Kors, he began to imagine that Nikto, instead of calling him, caressed and kissed his prince Arel. Shitty, fucking crazy Arel, whom the Demon not clearly because of what loved so much. All these thoughts drove Kors crazy, it seemed to him that a whole eternity had passed, but looking at his watch, he realized that he was tormented for no more than half an hour. Maybe Nikto would call him a little later?

But Kors couldn't wait any longer. Unable to bear it, he decided to go to them without an invitation.

He knocked on the door.

“Come in, it’s not locked,” Kors heard the voice of Nikto.

He entered.

The room smelled strongly of chemistry and blood from weapons and ammunition. Kors was relieved to see that Nikto was not lying with Arel, but was sitting at the table and giving himself an injection. Prince Arel was sitting on the bed undressed to the waist, and Verniy gave him an injection too. They didn't fuck, but injected themselves, and Kors felt a relief from his heart. In his room, Nikto was finally without a mask, he looked at Kors and raised the syringe:

“Will you?”

“Yes,” Kors replied, not believing what he was saying, “I cannot sleep.”

“Now Ver will stir up something for you, sit down,” Nikto responded, he didn’t react at all to the words of Kors, he was not surprised. Everything was somehow ordinary, as if nothing had happened, as if Kors was not his slave now, and as if Kors had always done this – coming and taking drugs with them.

Kors sat down on the edge of the bed and looked at the prince, with a sealed cheek and without a ring in his nose he looked very dignified. Arel didn’t show any aggression towards him, looked indifferently and turned away.

“Did you free his tongue?” Kors asked Nikto. Maybe Arel was silent because he was still limited.

“Yes. It is difficult to fight with this decoration in the mouth. I freed him,” Nikto answered, “I always release Arel so he can fight.”

“So he can talk?”

“Nope,” Nikto shook his head, “He has been wearing the braces for too long.”

“What?! And he will remain dumb now?”

“It takes time for the tongue to recover.”

Kors even felt a little sorry for Arel, this metal instrument of torture, which he had to carry in his mouth, and which Nikto called “jewelry”, was really rigid:

“By the time it recovers, we’ll take the Fort back and you’ll decorate it again,” he said.

“Maybe,” Nikto answered.

Verniy approached Kors and handed him a filled syringe, drops of the “restorative” were dripping from the tip of the needle. Kors looked at the unclean one with some dismay:

“I'm not very good at injecting drugs into a vein,” he said, embarrassed.

“Ah-ah-ah, noble blacks who don’t know how to do anything themselves, I completely forgot,” Nikto said. He got up from the table and, going up to the bed, took the syringe from Verniy, looked at Kors:

“Better take off your jacket.”

Kors began to unfasten the buckles. His fingers didn’t obey him, and he so awkwardly tried to hang the jacket over the back of the chair that his gold cigarette case slipped out of his inner pocket, clinking loudly on the floor, only the blue stones gleamed. The cigarette case opened from the blow, it was still empty. Kors didn’t pick it up, but rolled up the sleeve of his shirt strongly. And Nikto just turned his head to Verniy, looked at him and nodded. Verniy silently wrapped the black cord around Kors’ forearm and tightened it tightly. This action scared Kors more than the syringe in the Demon’s hand. He involuntarily recoiled from the unclean one.

“Don't tremble, give me your hand,” said Nikto.

Kors swallowed hard.

“What will I feel? Hot pots and pans on which devils fry sinners, or whatever you have in Hell?”

“There will be no hallucinations,” Nikto smiled, “this is a good drug, relax.

“Good drug,” Kors whispered and shook his head.

He stretched out his hand, seeing that from the cord, on the inner side of the elbow, blue paths of the veins clearly manifested. Kors continued to have a nervous shiver. He didn’t understand what he was doing and what he allowed to do with himself. Kors looked at the concentrated face of Nikto: now he didn’t seem handsome to him at all – under sunken eyes there were dark circles, he was too pale, with too sunken cheeks and black inscriptions on the cheekbones further emphasized the unhealthy thinness. Living Dead.

“It will be good,” Nikto so inhumanly “smiled”, exposing the edges of the fangs, bent to Kors’ hand holding a filled syringe in his black fingers and slightly at an angle putting the needle to the white clean skin. He carefully punctured skin, piercing it with the sharp end of the needle and damaging the wall of the blood vessel. Bright scarlet blood swirled behind the glass, mixing with the substance. Nikto slowly pushed on the piston, injecting a foreign mixture into Kors’ blood. Verniy relaxed the cord. From the fact that the unclean one touched him with his furry paw, Kors involuntarily shrank. The demon and his dog touched him and performed unacceptable actions with his body. Kors felt defiled and already regretted letting them do it.

But suddenly everything passed, and he was released. This difference between the previous nervous state, full of tension and fatigue, and the current one, was so palpable, as if Nikto had not a syringe in his hands, but a magic wand and he waved it and – wow! Just a moment ago Kors felt so dreary and bad, but now he felt so good! Kors didn’t expect such a sharp transition, for some reason he thought that he had to wait and maybe after a while he would feel some slight relief. But not that it would be like this! Fast, magical, wonderful! And Nikto, seeing his face, laughed:

“Well? Does it hurt?”

“No. Only very slightly at the beginning when you pierced.”

Kors felt relieved, nervous exhaustion was gone, and interest in life reappeared. Yes, that was truly a “restorative”! Verniy walked away from them, he took the bloody sword of Nikto and went with him to the adjacent room.

“Is your sword the sword of the unclean?”

“Yes.”

“Where did you get it here? Have the unclean ones brought it?”

“Yes. When Wolf arrested me in Lower, they disarmed me and threw everything away. Arel handed over Power and my weapon to the unclean Borgan, and he then passed them on to Zaf.”

“It is beautiful, it is clear that it is expensive. Does your sword have a name?”

“No, no, I'm bad with coming up with names.”