She bounced off like a ball, but immediately hopped back and stared inquisitively at Yara’s sleeve. The sleeve was shining as if engulfed in fire. “The snow!” said the little girl. The snow falling on Yara’s sleeve up to the elbow instantly disappeared. On the other parts of her coat, it was lying like firm white cereal grains. Yara in a hurry hid her arm behind her back. The obstinate little girl kept stomping beside her and did not intend to leave. A returning Ul saved Yara from the girl. Approaching from behind, he patted the curious child on the back of her head. “Did you see the maniac? Come, I’ll show you!” he proposed in a nice voice. The child sped away in short spurts, frequently glancing back and whimpering. “Am I really not some gadget? Scared the child!” Ul stated smugly.
He took Athanasius aside and told him about tomorrow’s dive. Athanasius became pigheaded, especially when he found out who would be guide instead of him. Usually reasonable, here he simply showed asinine stubbornness. “Holy, dang!!!!” said Ul, grabbing him by the neck like a bear. “Now you listen to me! You’re not in shape. You’ll get stuck and ruin the newbie too! I have a girl and a friend! And I need you both!”
The subway station emerged unexpectedly. It had the external appearance of a red letter S on the side of the passage. Beside it stood a frozen old lady in a downy shawl, already almost transformed into a snowdrift, and who was selling violets sprouting in mayo jars. There were four. Yara purchased all from her, in order to keep Ul’s hands busy and deprive him of the possibility of hugging her in the subway. True, Ul got himself out of it and loaded Athanasius down with the violets. “All the same for you!” he said.
On top of the escalator, they launched beer bottles. Yara was pondering something and her face was temporarily in stillness. The green ski cap did not suit her. Her face seemed boyish, rather rude. Athanasius thought that she was plain and started to cultivate this thought in every way. Like any person fighting the love virus, he had in his heart a special box, where Yara’s shortcomings were carefully gathered. When love heated up, he would usually blow on some of her deficiencies like on coal, until it began to seem unbearable. Approximately, at the middle of the escalator, Athanasius finally conquered love and complacently drew himself up, perceiving himself free. However, here Yara revived, started to talk, smiled. Athanasius, confident that nothing would break him already, haughtily looked at her and… he wanted to howl.
The railroad car was the new type, trimmed with white plastic. Without the delightful corners for standing by the door. Because of the violets, there was no way Athanasius could hang on. He was swaying from side to side and Ul caught him by the collar. “You see how lucky you are that I’m beside you?” he asked, and then suddenly shouted to the entire car, “Hey, people! I’m happy! This is my friend, and this is my girl!” The superstitious Yara tugged at his sleeve. “Shh! Keep quiet! You’ll frighten off happiness!” It would be better if she had kept quiet. Ul immediately wanted to be contradictory. “Hey! Happiness! Hello!” he began to yell.
“Cuc-koo! I’m leaving already!” a person passing by commented in an intoxicated voice. His back was striped like a zebra with clearly marked steps. The railroad car started and like a sluggish caterpillar crawled into the tunnel.
Chapter 2
The Wings of a Friend
When a man does not deny himself pleasures but gets too many of them, he becomes accustomed to them and ceases to feel anything. He needs increasingly more ingenious and artificial pleasures, and everything ends with inevitable degradation. But if pleasures, on the contrary, are limited by degrees, then each day everything will be new. Real. Even just a drop of water, the sun, or a five-minute rest on a hike will make you incredibly happy.
At five in the morning Ul got up to guide Yara. He climbed up, then again descended and, taking a shortcut, went through the gallery. His steps resounded far along the long empty corridors of HDive. In the dining room there was not a soul – not even the angry old lady Supovna, who, unceasingly grumbling and complaining that no one helped her, allowed no one to approach within ten metres of the stove. However, even without Supovna in person, her presence was felt. The infallible remedy for sleep stood on the centre table: three mugs of strong tea, pickles, and a plate with heavily salted black bread. One mug was empty.
“It means Dennis is already in the stable,” said Yara, appearing soon after Ul. She was eternally late, but late in a civilized manner: about five minutes. Ul nodded and salted a pickle. “I love everything salted!” he said to himself. “Although what can one think about the man who salts pickles? Lacking some mineral!” Sitting in the semi-darkness, Yara bit off black bread in large mouthfuls, sipped her tea, and examined a thick stack of photographs, small and hard as playing cards. The photographs were taken in part with a hidden camera, in part with the help of a telescopic lens.
“This is only in the last week. What do a system administrator, a gym teacher, a theatre lighting technician, a student, a boiler room attendant, and a deaf fellow, a former musician, have in common?” she asked, hiding the photographs from Ul. “The same as the elderly astrologer, the gloomy unsociable person with an umbrella, and the respected-by-law criminal with fingers like sausages. But earlier we didn’t deal with these. It means they’re recruiting new warlocks. Expanding the reserves of the forts,” Ul instantly answered. Yara stopped chewing. “What? You knew?” “It was simple to guess. Athanasius took the picture of the lighting guy. Then showed me the scratch on his jacket. He maintains: they fired at him from a schnepper,”2 said Ul.
“I wish they were vampires,” Yara sighed. “In your dreams. If they were vampires, the problem would be solved in a week with the strength of forty-fifty people. Or could appeal to the Vends.3 But they aren’t vampires, and there’s nothing more to say,” Ul cut her off.
He went out first and stopped on the porch to wait for Yara. Suddenly huge hands grabbed him and lifted him up off the floor. Ul was dangling with his head down and contemplating the wide-mouthed essence in an unbuttoned sheepskin coat. By the porch, a giant of three-and-a-half meters in height was standing unsteadily. This was a living attraction, an incident, animated by one of the founding fathers of HDive. In the daytime it hid in the Green Labyrinth, at night it trampled around HDive. Several times girls that had disappeared were found in its stomach, once even Kuzepych himself.
“I am Gorshenya, clay head, hungry belly! I’ll eat you!” the giant informed him. He pronounced the words slowly and thoughtfully. “You’ll choke! Let me run up and jump!” proposed Ul. Gorshenya chewed on this thought for a while and then unclenched its hands. Ul’s head stuck in a snowdrift. Gorshenya took a step back and trustingly opened its enormous mouth. Four hundred years in a row it had fallen for one and the same trick.
The snow thawed in the night and shaped well. Ul rolled a snowball and threw it into Gorshenya’s mouth. When Gorshenya was standing with mouth open it saw nothing, because the two amber buttons, which served as its eyes, were thrown back together with the upper half of the head. Gorshenya slammed shut its mouth. “Perhaps I did not eat you?” “You ate my brother. And you’re not supposed to eat two brothers in one day.” said Ul. Gorshenya was saddened.
Yara came out onto the porch. Gorshenya stretched its hand out to her, but Ul slapped it on the fingers. “She doesn’t taste good,” he whispered, “but she has a tasty sister. She went that a way!” Gorshenya, waddling, limped off to search for the sister. “Poor dear! It believes everything,” Ul leniently said. “We’re the poor ones, believing nothing,” remarked Yara. “They say it buried treasure somewhere, and now it’s guarding it,” recalled Ul. The body warmed in the night was lazy. Ul generously scooped up snow and, snorting, washed himself. Melted water flowed down his collar. After understanding that whining would only make it worse, his body put up with it and agreed to be cheerful.
A pistol crossbow.
“Vend” is an abbreviation and will be explained in Chapter 6.
