Pegasus, Lion, and Centaur

“It’s illogical,” objected Dennis. “Illogical for us but logical for Duoka. We have a world of cyclic variations. Morning, day, evening, night. Spring, summer, fall, winter. Sit by the window, pick your nose, and life will revolve around you. The Duoka world though is three-dimensionally constant. Here everything has unfolded.”

“How’s this?” Dennis did not understand. “Like this. The source of light and heat is somewhere in the centre of Duoka; it nevertheless must exist, although none of us has seen it. You haven’t noticed that all the trees lean a little to one side? On the edge, nearer to the swamp, it’s always night and cold. Here it’s always early dawn. Further is morning. They don’t come by themselves. In order to change something, one must move constantly.”

Dennis pulled his jacket zipper. “But if indeed so, then it’ll be hotter nearer to the centre!” Yara nodded, not seeing any sense to deny this. “Here everything is this way. When it’s difficult and painful, it means you’re moving in the right direction. But today we won’t find ourselves in the centre really.” “And you?” “Me neither. Each hdiver has his personal boundary. It moves back a little with each successful dive. Not so much that they wouldn’t let us in. Simply doesn’t turn out otherwise.”

Dennis again began to torture the zipper. “And if I’m unable to dive to a marker at all?” he asked suspiciously. “Possible to dive to some, but you’ll do it on your own. It’s not too deep. Otherwise you wouldn’t have gotten this job.” “And if we force ourselves and whip off to the centre? Simple drive the horse and all?” Dennis obstinately asked. Yara thought that what happened with her hairpin would happen to him then; however, she kept the thought to herself and only muttered, “It’s impossible. An icicle can’t fly to the sun and remain an icicle.”

Dennis walked the five metres to Delta as if they were five metres to the gallows. Having seen out of the corner of an eye where he was heading, sly Delta moved aside several steps. It did not run away, but moved away imperceptibly, each time managing to maintain the same distance. “Look at what I have!” Dennis shouted plaintively, trying to pretend that he had a piece of rusk in his pocket. Delta looked around and at his pocket with an explicit sneer.

Yara knew that Delta was capable of pushing him around this way till eternity. Horses, of course, are good essences, but not enough to pity a tired rider. Without letting go of Eric’s rein, Yara overtook Delta in several leaps, jumped with her stomach onto its back and, after slapping its rump with her hand, drove the mare to Dennis. “Don’t let go of horses on Duoka. If you really must leave them, then tie or hobble them,” she reminded him.

At this point the horses were not getting up high but racing above the ground. Eric was considerably ahead of Delta and Yara had to hold it back so that it would not rush off completely. The plain over which they were flying became stony. Chains of boulders similar to the spikes on the back of a petrified dragon looked out of the earth. Yara clearly distinguished in front a long rocky ridge resembling a horseshoe.

It was already light here, but somehow inconclusive, as if early in the morning. The air became dryer. It seemed to Yara that she was bouncing towards a fiery wind; however, to her, weakened and drained by the swamp, this thought was not scary but cheerful. Now she already had to wipe off sweat continually. Dennis sat in the saddle only because it was not clear to him in which direction to fall.

Yara slowed Eric down, letting it cool down. After recalling that they had shot at it from a schnepper, she looked over the wound and with relief discovered that it was not dangerous. The blood had dried and here, on Duoka, the scratch would skin over in an hour or two.

After flying up closer to the rocks, Yara hobbled the horse’s front legs and with a short belt bound the base of its wings. Eric was Eric. The pine tree, to which she tied it, was young. Yara did not trust it too much. “Rest! You already worked. Now it’s my turn!” she said and, after loosening the girths, unfastened the trowel from the saddle. A sandy slope began in front of Yara. Gradually becoming steeper, it abutted against a cliff with many cracks.

Delta appeared to have fallen behind. The sly old mare did not fly but dragged itself along the last length. It knew from experience that they would now tie it up.

“The first ridge. The Horseshoe Cliff. This is our mine. There are others here, but we would have to cross the ridge,” Yara shouted to Dennis. Dennis slipped down from Delta. His face covered with sweat became less streaky. The boundaries blurred, the red spots were changing to pink. “Don’t fall asleep, else can’t even rouse yourself with kicks later!” she warned.

Dennis reached for his trowel. His turned out to be collapsible, with initials, which he, as the malicious owner, had burnt on the handle. He attempted to pull the retainer ring down from it, but dropped it. He leaned over, grabbed it with the other hand, and clutched it between his knees, hoping to finish the struggle with the ring. The ring was mocking him. It willingly turned over but remained in place.

“What happened?” Yara was surprised. Dennis raised his right hand. She saw that two knuckles on the edge were broken and the fingers were shuddering continuously. “How did you manage that?” she was amazed. It turned out, against the front pommel. Dennis was leaning back carelessly and when Delta abruptly touched the cliff with its hooves, his pelvis was thrown onto his own hand. “I’ll dig with the left,” he said, convincing himself. Yara silently took his trowel, unfolded it and began to walk along the slope.

Their clmses were radiant, sensing the proximity of markers. The reddish sand did not sink under her feet, but produced a narrow crack in the shape of a toe. Occasionally there were areas with white sand, which drifted in front of large stones. Yara and Dennis got up quickly along the gentle slope; however, soon the incline became noticeably steeper. It was necessary to climb, using their hands.

Yara was clambering, looking out for hdiver signs on the rocks and the stones. She met few signs today. Only scratches on a piece of bark cut with a trowel, warning, “Do not tie horses!” Maybe, the ground is slipping away? Who knows? An experienced hdiver always trusts a warning and will not tempt fate.

Dennis frequently stopped, squatted down and rested. He was no longer pulling air in through his nose but swallowing it with his mouth like a fish. “How are you doing? Quite poorly?” asked Yara. Dennis wheezed that he had never felt better and she understood that it was worthwhile to restrain from further questions. It is better not to pity people in this state. There are moments when even a friendly hand, sympathetically placed on a shoulder, is capable of breaking one’s back. “The overhang in five minutes. Almost there!” she said to the side, as if to herself. Dennis nodded, pretending that it was unimportant to him.

“The overhang” turned out to be a narrow, about twenty steps, ledge under the vertical cliff. Detached rocks and formations sliding down whole spoke of frequent landslides. The cliff was fragile, heterogeneous. Compressed sand and cockleshells were discernible in it. Many pieces broke off easily and crumbled in the fingers.

After estimating where best to begin, Yara walked several steps along the ledge. She stopped and, showing that they had reached it, dropped the trowel. The blade went in, but shallowly, and, having splashed sand, tumbled down. Dennis slid wistful eyes along the endless ledge. “And where are the markers here?” “Everywhere. Sometimes directly under your feet. But most of them are waist deep, chest deep. Don’t know why. Maybe, the cliff crumbled more at that time?”

Yara wiped her nose with a boyish gesture and, after getting down on her knees, stuck the trowel into the sand. They dug for a long time. The sand was revealed as layers, but under it began caked clay. Every now and then the trowels caught something and tinkled, producing dry sparks. It was necessary to stop and look, after clearing the clay. In the majority of cases this turned out to be a stone.

It had to be harder for Dennis than for Yara. He had to dig with one hand. “Let me dig and you drive the trowel in the cracks and enlarge them!” she proposed, having forgotten whom she was dealing with. “Leave me alone! I’m not tired!” Demonstrating that he was managing very well, Dennis struck the trowel with such force that a splintered off stone cut his upper lip, almost knocking out a tooth.

In the first hour Dennis attacked the clay with impatience, rejoicing with each tinkling of the blade. However, the happiness of expectation was dulled after many failures. He was short of breath. Instead of a heart, a stone with sharp edges was turning in his chest. Now he was rather annoyed when he heard the next tinkling sound. His back had gone numb. He often stopped and jerked up his head. His gaze was lost in the endless vertical cliff, either rather rusty, or yellow, or almost white. How much he thought about Duoka! What he had not imagined when he was going through preparation in HDive! But here only clay, sand, and stone.

Yara was standing chest-deep in the pit, which she had dug out in the past two hours and, not going deeper, enlarged it with short strokes. There were no blisters on her palms yet, but a special sensation and redness were detected on the skin, which would only go away with the white bubbles.

Dennis drove in the trowel at random about three steps from the base pit and dragged it towards himself. In the peeled-off layer of earth something was scattering light. He leaned over and picked up a hand-sized piece of rock covered with clay. One side was cleaned by the impact of the trowel. He swung his arm, intending on throwing the stone down along the slope. “Stop!” Yara yelled, crawling out of the pit on her stomach. She took the stone away from a confused Dennis and started to scrape the clay off carefully. He fussed around first on one side, then on the other. He squatted, got in the way, and caught the handle of her trowel with his forehead. “Get out of here! You wanted to throw it away!” she shouted merrily to him. “Don’t fuss around a hdiver when he’s holding a marker!”

The radiance became bright, persistent. Yara squinted. She shaded her eyes. A dark-blue flower, woven from a live, timid fire, blazed up inside the rock. Small, like a bluebell. How it had fallen into the rock and grown there was a riddle. Yara no longer scraped off the clay. She held the stone in her hand and was continuously tossing it up, as if it was very hot.

“A good marker. Strong… Only it’s blue,” added Yara with regret. “And what’s so bad about blue?” Dennis tensed up. “Nothing. But today we need another one. Blue markers are for talent and ability. For example, the owner of this will be busy with his favourite work for twenty-four hours right through without getting tired. And he’ll never be disappointed, never droop, never let down, although there will only be obstacles around.” “How do you know?” Dennis asked suspiciously. “It told me.” “With words?” “Of course not. But while you’re holding a marker, you feel that it is so.”

Yara leaned over and lowered the marker onto a flat fragment of rock etched with brown cracks. Dennis looked at her interrogatively. “I put it down so it wouldn’t begin the merge. And tossing it up for the same reason. I don’t want to tease myself. If I keep it, Duoka will never let me in again.” “Why?” “One can never take for oneself. Only for the job,” she explained. Dennis’ questions did not surprise her. Earlier he knew everything in theory. But what is theory? A cardboard folder with training inside. “And if you for me, and I for you?” proposed Dennis. “No go. Either you’re a hdiver or you’re not,” she said with confidence.

Dennis squatted, lovingly looking at the marker. The flower had piped down. It was burning, but no longer as vividly as in Yara’s hands. It was resting. “Are you going to leave it here?” “Let’s say this: it’s in reserve. If we don’t find what they sent us here for, we’ll take it with us so as not to return empty-handed,” said Yara, wavering. She was wavering because she was trying to recall the regulations: does the guide have the right to take a marker when accompanied by a beginner? She had had several dives, but till now, she had always acted strictly on the job.

“But two of us today!” said Dennis. “Finding a marker is a little thing. Still have to smuggle it through the swamp. The most failsafe is to leave with the marker you’re sent for. It’ll give you strength. If a marker is more than your performance capabilities, better not ask for it,” Yara explained seriously. “Do you mean to say that the elbes know which marker I’ll be carrying?” Dennis asked suspiciously. Yara did not answer. She only looked at him.

“How many years before this flower formed?” Dennis suddenly asked. Yara shrugged her shoulders. Such a thing never occupied her. “Many.” “To what degree, at least?” he tried to find out. “A hundred million… A billion. I don’t know,” she answered carelessly. Dennis became round-eyed. Yara had forgotten what significance numbers have in a man’s mind. “It’s not exactly a flower. Well, that is, not like pine trees, grass. They disappear, they replace each other, but this is eternal,” she added, as if justifying herself.

The marker, which no one was touching, almost faded. But Yara knew that if she would take the stone and, not letting go, hold it, then the flower would burn so vividly it would melt the rock. Then the marker would merge with her and would hand over its gift to her.

“Is it always a flower in a marker?” asked Dennis. “Depends. A blue one is most often a plant: a mushroom, moss, a branch. Sometimes a hardened fruit. I found a peach, a plum. A scarlet marker, and we’re searching for it now, has something like wild strawberries inside the stone. I like the scarlet ones more. They always fit. For a blue one though, you have to dive ten times to find a suitable one…” With her need to feel everything, Yara ran her hand upwards along the cliff. The cliff was rough as a tree, but no life could be perceived in it.

“Markers – they’re like a separate world flowing independently inside Duoka. Once Ul saw an ant,” said Yara. “And what did it do?” “The ant? What all ants do. It was crawling.” “Crawling?” Dennis again asked suspiciously. “Simply crawling along the stone. Throughout. Very simply and businesslike. Maybe, already five thousand years. Or a hundred thousand years. Or more. And sometimes it’ll crawl out of it. A real live ant, shining like a small sun.” “Did Ul take it?” “He had another job. And when he returned for the ant after several days, he no longer found it.” “But what could this ant be?” “Anything you like. A live marker is always a riddle.”

Yara picked up her trowel and, having climbed down into the pit, started to enlarge it with short strokes. She knew from experience that it would progress faster this way. When she came across stones, she cleaned them, quickly inspected and rejected them. She tried to move in the same direction, where Dennis had found the nugget.

Hoping for a repetition of his success with the flower, Dennis stuck the trowel in wherever. Yara shook her head. Dennis reminded her of a person biting off bread in different places from a loaf. “Why is it mandatory to dig? If we fly along the cliff and look out for markers directly in the thick layer? What if they’re somewhere on the outside?” he suddenly proposed. Yara smiled. Novice hdivers loved to generate ideas. And she did too. Dynamite, a shaft, a mine. Only what bright thoughts have not visited a person tired of working with a trowel! Up on her knees, she swung the trowel evenly, controlling the narrow flow of earth escaping from the crack and clay. “Can’t see in the thick layer. A marker has to answer. And it answers to touch. Otherwise, a rock is just a rock,” she muttered. Dennis turned away.

For a long time they worked in silence. To the right of the pit a whole pile of rejected stones was already scattered around. Yara managed to drive a fragment of one of them in under her nail. She tied up the finger with a handkerchief and, listening to the pulsation of pain, continued the search. The pain disrupted her rhythm. A jab of the trowel gave a shot of pain. She remembered Dennis none too soon. That one was moving like a sleep-walker. He had dropped the trowel and was groping for it on the ground. Yara started to pity him.

“I hurt a nail. Let’s rest a little,” Yara proposed, knowing that he would not agree otherwise. Dennis stopped groping for the trowel and turned his head to her. She felt like saying to him, “I have flattened fingers, but you some nail!” She crawled out of the pit and lay on her back. A rock lumped over her. From below it was similar to a crumpled piece of paper with watercolour. A small stone ran along the rock and fell onto the overhang.

“There beyond the ridge is a huge valley. Transparent trees of live glass grow on the water. A flying fern. It attaches itself onto a horse’s tail and drifts together with it,” Yara said dreamily. “Have you seen it yourself?” Dennis echoed suspiciously. He was not lying down but sitting, nursing a hurt hand. “Ul described it. I haven’t dived there. The eyes water, the ears begin to feel pressure. Too much light there. Both smells and sounds, everything is solid, tangible. It seems that both sound and smell can be felt. Imagine: touching sound with your hands! And the colours! Such red that it burns the eyes. Or such green that you can’t tear yourself away at all. And the blue indeed knocks you over… And in the distance, mountains – white with snowy caps.” “More mountains? And has anyone been beyond those mountains?” asked Dennis.

Yara got up and jumped into the pit. Now the pain was gnawing her finger slowly, with enjoyment. Dennis, tardily trying to start his own pit, quickly wore himself out and, after jumping down, worked beside her. He held the trowel like a sword and was swinging it in such a way that Yara feared for her head.

After four hours Yara felt a metallic aftertaste in her throat. She touched her nose with the back of a hand and saw a speck of blood. “Time to go! The time of a dive is over,” she wanted to say, but at this moment Dennis yelled. At first Yara decided that he had hit his hand, which he had put far in front for equilibrium, with the trowel. With his adroitness this would have been the logical outcome. But no. After dropping the trowel, Dennis, shaking it loose, freed an average sized stone. Half cleaned by slanting strokes of the trowel, the stone was burning so that its crimson flashes were everywhere: both on Yara’s trowel polished to a shine and on Dennis’ sweaty face. It was hard to believe that these flashes originated from just three small berries inside. “Three ‘strawberries’! You’re lucky today! First dive and two markers!” Yara was happy for him. That she had dug out the enormous pit and, in essence, done all the preparatory work, had no importance for her. The main thing was to deliver the marker to HDive.

Dennis greedily felt the stone with his good hand. He looked stunned. The marker was talking to him in the nonverbal language of being. “Hide the marker in the knapsack!” ordered Yara. He looked at her without understanding. “Huh? What?” he echoed. She understood that he had not even heard her. “Don’t hold the marker! We’re returning! Job’s done,” she pulled him by the sleeve. “Yes! That’s it! Already!” As if coming to, he said.

Entangled in the straps, Dennis hastily pulled a small leather knapsack off his shoulder and thrust his hand inside. Yara, from her own experience knowing how difficult it was to part with the first marker, took a breath with relief. She began to crawl out of the pit, but here he took his hand out of the knapsack and… she again saw the stone. The three red berries could not be made out. Now it seemed that the entire stone was one enormous blazing berry. “Okay. I’ll put it in the knapsack. Then what?” asked Dennis. Yara froze, anxiously looking at him. “You’ll save the girl,” she reminded him. “Yes, I know,” he said impatiently. “But describe in greater detail!”

“Duoka is a world of deeper bedding,”4 Yara was speaking hastily. “Do you remember that before the dive we seemed to ourselves less real than the horses? It’s because the pressure of our world is less. Our world still hasn’t hardened, hasn’t taken shape. It’s seething, there’re waves, but here everything has calmed down in the depth. What happens when you get down to the bottom and disturb an air bubble?” “It floats.” “And a marker will float, though not alone, but together with you. You’ll guide it through the swamp. There, in the dead world, they’ll try to take it away from you. If the marker doesn’t give you strength, you pass the swamp slowly. The elbes report to the warlocks your exit point, and those wait on hyeons for you. But, I hope, everything will be managed. In HDive you’ll give the marker to Kavaleria. And… honestly speaking, I don’t know what then. I know that the marker itself will arrange everything.”

The crimson flashes were reflected in Dennis’ pupils. They irritated Yara’s eyes and she could not understand how the novice could look at the marker without blinking.

“And what about me?” Dennis asked brusquely. “You’ll become a hdiver. Possibly, for several hours you’ll have a headache. Nausea, sharp pain in the eyes, a cough. For bringing the marker and not keeping it for yourself, you have to pay. But this is also part of the path of a hdiver,” Yara was talking rapidly, choking with words. Each second was precious. Dennis looked first at the stone, then at Yara. His fingers began to unclench, but suddenly they closed again.

“Give it to me!” asked Yara. “It’ll be easier for you. The first time is always hard and painful.” Dennis started to laugh nervously. “I’ll give it. Certainly, I will! Do you think I’ll keep it?”“I don’t think so,” she assured him in a hurry. She was feeling sorry already that she had begun to talk about this. “Why did you say it at all?” muttered Dennis. “You think I’m only saying that I’ll give it but I won’t? In your opinion, I don’t want the girl to be healthy?” “Yes, I believe, I believe. Only unclench your fingers!” Yara rushed him. “I can put it in the knapsack myself.”

Dennis licked his lips. His fingers were shaking. He almost let go, but suspicion flickered on his face in the last second. “Why do you want to take away my marker? How do I know that you’ll return it to HDive? Maybe there isn’t even a girl? I broke my fingers, they nearly finished me off in the swamp!” his voice broke. “What guarantees that Kavaleria won’t keep my marker for herself? That she hasn’t kept all the markers for herself?” Yara kept silent. It was pointless to answer.

Dennis’ face was distorted. He jerked a hand up and decisively, as if trying to tear off his own face, ran it over the skin. “I don’t know what I’m saying. I don’t want to be someone evil! I’ll give it, but a little later,” he said in a sick voice. “Give it now! Please!” Yara repeated persistently. “Business isn’t decided in a few minutes, is it? Do you think I can’t deliver the marker to HDive myself? You all can, but I alone can’t?” he again began to get irritated. “Of course you can. But the longer it remains with you, the…” “Nonsense! This was my job! They sent me for it! ME! Naturally it’s easy for you, but not for me! How do you know that it’s so? You have a heart like a young mare!”

Yara realized that this would go on forever. And the longer, the worse it would be. She no longer looked at Dennis’ face, which sometimes brightened up, sometimes became obstinate, but at his fingers. The stone gradually faded. The scarlet radiance was creeping over onto his wrist. His nails were glowing as if enveloped in fire. Pretending to tie her laces, she squatted and then jumped him like a cat would. She succeeded in grabbing Dennis by the hand, but he hit her chin with the base of his right palm. Yara fell.

“Did you want to cheat me? YES? YES???” Yara sat on the sand and looked at the marker in his hand. “Excuse me for hitting you… Earlier I never raised a hand to… Why did you jump me?” Dennis, coming to his senses, muttered guilty. Yara got up silently and, reeling, walked to the horses. He overtook her, pushed her in the shoulder, and easily brought her down to the ground. She felt that he had become much stronger. The awkwardness and chaos of movements had disappeared. “Wait! I’ll give it! But why, say why?” shouted Dennis. “We must,” Yara responded frigidly. After the hit she was in a fog. “Whom do we owe this? We’re the ones who dived here! By our own efforts! Like condemned men!”