The Mist and the Lightning. Part VIII

A little earlier:

“He is alive, sir Kors,” said the overseer, “for three days we kept him in a stone bag and he is alive!”

Kors looked up at him.

“Are you surprised?”

“Allow me to answer?”

“Of course, since I asked you myself!”

“Honestly? Yes, sir, I’m surprised.”

“That means nothing,” Kors smiled slightly at the edges of his lips, “nothing, after a couple of days… He certainly won’t stand it! Without his drugs!”

“Yes, sir, he seems to be unconscious, but breathing, and there is a pulse.”

“It's not for long, it’s just a matter of time. Four days…”

Kors stumbled half a word. As if in horror, someoneknocked on the door.

“Well, who else is there?!”

“Sir Kors! This is Clive Gabriel! Allow to report!” Heliterally burst into the office, without waiting for permission. He was breathing heavily and generally looked out of breath. His eyes seemed to bulge out even harder

“What?!”

“Sir Vitor Kors! I'm just out of court! Karina didn’t confirm that Lis was Sigmer!”

“WHAT?!” Kors looked at Clive as if not understanding his words.

“I ran here to report to you. She said: “No, I don’t know him! Sigmer has long been dead and you're wrong.”

Kors looked with a distant look at the warden who was just reporting to him about Nikto, and whom he listened with such interest only a couple of minutes ago.

“You are free, I will call you later!”

The guard immediately jumped out the door without any questions

“How so?” Kors even somehow bewildered, as if looking for help and support from Clive, looked at him.

“I don’t know,” he muttered, he, too, looked bewildered, and also frightened.

“I needed to go with her,” Kors said, reasoning rather than addressing Clive. “But hell! I have a lot to do here! And this demon is not dying!” He paused and looked at Clive again. “Hey, sit down already… And now what?”

“Now? “ Clive squirmed in his chair. “Lis was released, the case is closed for lack of other witnesses. And evidence.”

“They’re crazy there!” Kors literally yelled, and Clive staggered back startled.

“Dumb warriors! Gods, how stupid they are! They lethim go! And his confession is not enough for them?!”

“But he did not confess, sir. No matter how they beat him, he didn’t confirm anything.”

“They don’t know how! They don’t know how to work! And still try! They didn’t manage to knock it out of him, to press him to sign… Oh Gods! Why didn’t he come to me! Why did these stupid warriors take himfrom me! Well, that’s what they need! And where is henow?”

“I don’t know. He was released from the courtroom.”

“Why didn’t you detain him?!”

“But how? On what basis?”

“Fuck! It was so easy for to invent, he is a man of the prince, which means we have questions for him! Dumbass!”

***

“Karina! Karina, open the door!” Shouted Vitor Kors, having lost all composure, he violently pounded on locked door:

“Karina, open! Open, you the motherfucker! Oh Gods, forgive me, forgive me, Iness, that I involuntarily offended your memory, but this bitch has driven me to frenzy!”

And Kors kicked the door with force.

Clive huddled beside him, in such fury he had never seen his boss before.

With a couple of strokes, Kors kicked the door open and burst into the room. Clive was behind him. Karina’s apartments were empty, only a dress thrown apparently in a hurry lay on the floor. The dress of black velvet in which she performed in court. Kors picked it up:

“I knew it! I knew that this stupid bitch would run away with him!” He yelled again. “Well, we’ll see! I will catch you! I know where you will go…”

“Where?” Literally meowed Clive.

“To the estate of the prince, where else! Now we will go, we will catch up with them, remember the tavern outside the city, in the east?”

“Yes.”

“They will have to stop there. At least in order to water the horses! Check out immediately! I will kill Lis! Gods see, in memory of my Iness, I will kill this son of a bitch!”

“Sir Kors!” They heard shouts, this was the overseer of the root part of the prison tower hurrying to them/ “Sir Kors, finally I found you! We have big problems!”

“What?! Has he died?”

“No! He ran away! He is not in the chamber, and the guard is killed.”

And seeing Kors turning pale right before his eyes, the overseer hastened to add:

“I think he’s still in the tower, it’s not so easy to get out of there, and we raised the alarm…”

Kors looked at Clive, then at the overseer, he clearly didn’t know where to run, where to rush.

“Clive! Go for Lis and Karina! Kill Lis, bring Karinaback! Do you understand? Why are you looking at me like that? Show me what you are capable of!”

“Yes, sir!”

“Act!”

“And I’ll deal with this damn demon, he can’t go far. Did you block all the exits?”

“Yes, sir, all exits are blocked!”

“Follow me!”

Chapter one

What really happened

Karina felt complete devastation and fatigue, it would seem that she should have been happy, because she had done good, and Lis would not be hanged. The crowd in the marketplace will not mock him, and the platform will remain in the full possession of the dancer Norta. But Karina was not at ease, probably she was afraid of her father. Of his reactions. And this fear poisoned and overshadowed all other feelings. It froze everything, leaving only emptiness. She just didn’t know what to do! And what she had already done, was that right? Her head was full of confusion, and she really needed to talk with someone, talk about everything and hear some kind of unbiased opinion in response. Maybe hear some practical advice. How to look in the eyes of her father now. What to tell him?

“I need to talk to Nikto! He reasons wisely and he will help me to gather my spirit before meeting with my father! He’ll tell me how to behave!”

Nikto has some kind of wholeness that she so lacks. And yet, there is an inner calm in him, which she too is very lacking now!

He told her to stay away from him and not come again, but in this situation it doesn’t matter. No!

And, quickly changing clothes and grabbing her bag, with which she usually went to Nikto (it contained all the passes, medicines and a “stone flower” in a special glass case, it didn’t need light, but lit everything around no worse than a candle), Karina rushed along the usual path into the depths of the prison tower.

The guard near hs chamber, not at all surprised, already as usual, without question, let her in.

And trembling with excitement, Karina ran to Nikto:

“Nik! Nik! Are you sleeping?”

Nikto didn’t answered her. He lay on his side, not moving, holding one arm under him, the other was twisted up, fastened by the handcuffs to a ring in the wall.

“Nik?” She called him again, already scared. He didn’t seem to sleep, and there seemed to be something very wrong with him. “Oh Gods!”

Nikto really looked like a corpse now. Not a spot on his pale face, cheekbones very clearly defined, facial features sharpened unhealthy. And the complete absence of at least some reaction to her words…

She tried to moisten his forehead with a damp rag, constantly repeating his name, interspersed with affectionate words, and to her joy he stirred, opened his eyes, but his gaze didn’t express anything.

“Nik! Wake up, please! I beg you! I need you!” Unable to see him in such a deplorable state, so exhausted, Karina burst into tears. She began to lift him, because his unhealthy twisted arm scared her. He sat very slowly, still without making a sound. Karina brought a cup of water to his lips:

“Here it is, drink, you need a drink. What should I inject you? Gods! If you need “black water,” she stopped short, because with these words Nikto flinched and recoiled from her, clinging to the wall. Karina didn’t understand him, she continued:

“If you can't do without it… I will try to get it somehow, steal it from my father’s safe in which he stores material evidence. I think it should be there… Or… I don’t know… I will go to the castle, to Arel, and there I will turn everything upside down and find it. I have nothing to lose! You just tell me where to look?”

Nikto seemed to hear her, he somehow strange, frantically ran his hands over his face, over his eyes, over his scar, lips with rings. And his face twisted in such despair, in such anguish that Karina instantly forgot all her problems and questions.

“Gods! What's the matter? Answer me something?! Don’t act as if you are out of your mind!”

Nikto touched his hair, ran his palm along the entire length of his face, it felt as if he were feeling himself, while his eyes looked into the wall behind Karina’s back, past her, and she realized that he couldn’t see anything.

“Are you okay?! Oh please! Stop it! Gods! He moved off his mind! What to do now?”

Nikto turned his head slightly, as if guided by the sound of her voice, and shook his head in a negative gesture, this made her unspeakably happy, since it meant he still heard and understood her.

The chain clanged, Nikto ran his hand along the rough wall, then with his free hand down, he felt the floor slabs and straw as if he didn’t understand where he was and what was surrounding him.

“Nik! Can you hear me? Tell me something! You scare me very much!”

Nikto froze, and slightly bending his head, slowly ran his fingers over his dry cracked lips, as if crossing them crosswise.

“What does it mean? I don’t understand you! Can’t you talk? You have a dumb attack, that’s why you are called “dumb” in Lower? Not only blindness, but also dumbness happen to you? Fuck!” She remembered how the doctor said something about his cropped vocal cords, she then missed it by her ears. Apparently a stone bag, and the non-regular intake of “restoratives” perceptibly violated something in his body.

“I understand that you have not yet returned to normal, you cannot see and speak. I have understood. Now I'll inject you something, just… Wait!” Karina feverishly began to delve into her purse:

“Here! Hold on!” She put a small little book for notes and a pencil in Nikto’s hand:

“Write me as you can. I will understand what to inject!”

Nikto took a pencil and slowly scratched something on the sheet, his fingers didn’t obey him. Karina literally grabbed the notebook from his hands, but instead of the name of the drug and the proportions, it was written on the sheet:

“What is today’s date?”

Karina sat and stupidly looked at these curve uncertain words. Then she looked up and said:

“Three and a half days, if I'm not mistaken, you spent in a stone bag. My father told me so.”

Nikto shook his head, and held out his hand, she immediately returned the notebook to him. He wrote only one word: “Date.”

And stunned, Karina, called him that day’s date and year.

“By the way,” she said, “to believe my father, today is your birthday,” she tried to smile, forgetting that Nikto couldn’t see her smile anyway, and barely said, “congratulations,” and the words got stuck in her throat.

Nikto leaned back against the wall and bowed his head. He didn’t move. She, too, was silent, not knowing now what to say, waiting for Nikto to come to his senses and give her a sign. But he seemed to become numb. So minute passed by minute, and nothing happened. They sat together in a dark and moldy prison casemate, and a stone flower, unlike a candle, could dispel the darkness all around forever. Nikto was cringed, cowering in the corner, and Karina sat next to him, just opposite, on a low bench.

“Nik?” She finally called, unable to waste any more time in vain, her father had probably already been informed of her act in court, and he would soon begin to look for her. Of course, looking for her here would never come into his head, or it would come last, but still…

“Nik?”

He raised his head. And to her disappointment, Karina saw that nothing had changed. His gaze was still frighteningly empty. Only… or it seemed to her in the obscure flickering light of a flower, his eyes shone strangely somehow, and his cheeks were wet.

And Karina couldn’t stand it, she rushed to him, hugging him:

“Dear, darling, don’t do that… Gods, I can’t bear it! Why is my father so cruel to you?! Why does he think you’re a demon?! He should have seen you now! It is unbearable! It is inhumane to make you suffer because of idle gossip and speculation!”

Nikto didn’t pull away from her embrace, and she put the pencil in his hands again:

“Write me something. Write that everything will be fine!”

Nikto obediently took a pencil in his hand, Karina only now realized that his right hand was fastened to the wall, and he wrote all the time with his left! But it seemed that this didn’t bother him and he succeeded.

He handed her a piece of paper.

“I want to die” was written on it.

“I… I will show this sheet to Arel, and he will arrange such a thrashing for you! You mustn’t give up!”

Nikto held out his hand, and again receiving a pencil, wrote as if specifying:

“I'm dying.”

“Do you need black water?”

Nikto shook his head.

“Damn, I will find it, inject you, and you will come to your senses! Fuck! Damn! Can you walk? When will your vision be restored? I’ll get you out of here! I will get you out of here, no matter what it costs me, and I will return you to Arel! Safe and sound! I pulled out Lis, and you are my brother, so I’ll get you out too! I have decided!”

Karina jumped up:

“Let's go!”

Nikto didn’t move.

“Let's go! Either now or never! You make me commit this madness and betray my father, but I can’t see it! I can’t see you like that! After all, you saved my life. Have you forgotten it?! And you smiled there, in Backara, you were a merry villain, like all your friends! I liked you more like that!”

She drew her sword:

“Move back a little…”

With force she slashed several times along the links of the chain, freeing Nikto’s hand. Fortunately, the chain succumbed. Nikto pressed his freed hand to his chest, as if it were a small wounded animal. And Karina was already pulling his other hand, lifting him from the floor:

“Let's go! If we don’t do it now, he will put you in this damned coffin forever, and I won’t be able to help you! Neither I, nor anyone else!”

Nikto didn’t get up.

“Nik! For me! For my sake – I'm your sister! And for the sake of Arel and Lis, Enriki, Tol, Squint-Eye, Vil and all your other friends! They need you! Let's go! I beg you! For the sake of your Rosa and our mother, Iness. I beg you, Nikto, let’s go!”

Forced by her, Nikto stood up. Without releasing his hands and holding the sword ready, Karina cautiously approached the door and knocked with a special signal. The guard immediately opened. Leaving Nikto for a second, Karina came out first. The guard had not even had time to ask her anything, as she, having invested all her strength, hit him with a sword in the lower abdomen, just there the protective bib ended. She turned the sword, ripping open his stomach. And when he, clutching at the falling out insides, fell to his knees, she hit him in the neck, it certainly was not Arel’s crown blow, but very rough and clumsy work, but the guard was huge and healthy, and Karina was small and fragile. And although she didn’t take his head off, this was quite enough.

“Dad, I'm sorry,” she whispered, seeing how she had like a butcher finished the guard, who, by the way, covered her all this time.

Well, okay! Well, let it be so!

She returned for Nikto:

“How are your eyes? Can you see anything?”

Nikto shook his head.

“Well! Come on!”

Having left the chamber together with Nikto, she squatted down next to the guard lying prone, unfastened his bandage and his knife.

“Let’s take his sword,” she explained, “suddenly it may come in handy.”

Both the knives and the bandage were stained with blood. She could be accused of murder and imprisoned, this was not a joke and she got into a really bad thing, Karina understood this. But she reasoned so: she will pull out Nikto, sit out somewhere, and then her father could not bear the separation and would call her back. Time will show that she was right and did nothing wrong. Maybe she could even manage to reconcile him with Nikto? And the security guard… well, it could well be self-defense, or she could even blame it on Nikto… For him it already doesn’t make any difference. Having calmed herself in this way, Karina handed a weapon to her plagued brother.

“Here it is, take a sword, it can come in handy.”

But he shook his head.

“Can’t you fight blindly?”

She still hung an additional sword on her back.

“Okay, let's go!” She pulled Nikto after herself.

Slowly they moved along the low corridor. Karina’s heart was pounding so that it seemed to her that now it would jump out of her throat. It was one thing to go here and get to Nikto secretly, even if they caught her, she was sure that her father would quickly forgive her, it was an innocent prank, a whim, especially since the doctor himself sent her for the first time here. And it was a completely different thing to wade past posts like this, with blind Nikto who was out of his mind. When any patrol would be a disaster for them. She frantically scrolled various options in her head and realized that her plan, by its lack of thought and stupidity, didn’t enter into any framework of sanity.

“I hold your hand. Follow me as quietly as possible, just sneak. If they spot us, I’m not sure that I will handle it!”

Slowly and carefully they walked along the narrow corridor. Karina turned into a low arch, inside of which steps immediately began to go up, and up there… there should have been another guard, no, no, not the last. Just another one. And Karina didn’t know how to pass him. And how to pass the rest?

“Wait, who's coming?”

“Karina Kors, I’m leading a convicted person to my father for interrogation!” She replied loudly, suddenly realizing with all clarity why Nikto refused to take the sword.

“Your pass!”

Karina boldly held out the paper, the guard knew her. He glanced at Nikto, perhaps it was worthwhile to put a bag on his head for greater persuasiveness?

“Lady, are you doing this alone? Can I help you?”

“No,” Karina answered very quickly and probably too harshly, “I… the soldiers and Nolan will meet me there… and you… you must let me in and not leave your post!”

“I obey, madam!”

Gods! This guard was dumb, and what will happen next? The higher they rise, the more savvy the guards will be. But! In any case, they managed to pass by this one. And some confidence that she was doing everything right settled in the heart of Karina. Nikto slowly, but to pay tribute to him, despite blindness and a lame leg, very quietly, almost silently stepped after her, and she remembered his complaints about how he fell several times on the stairs.

Passing a few more unguarded arches and turns, they entered a rather wide corridor. Just a little more, and narrow loopholes of windows will appear, maybe to get out the window, it will not be very high, the second floor, they can try, and if to cling to the rough masonry of the tower… so what? Once in the prison yard, they will be in full view. Who will open the gates to them? Only if you put everyone down, steal the horses… if Nikto was in good condition… he could “put everyone down”, for some reason she had no doubt about it. “Yes, and I would also help,” she thought, not without pride. Only, they still have to go to the windows, and maybe it’s easier like that – to go through the cordon after cordon, supposedly leading him for interrogation. And to meet with her father at the door of his office, huh…

Her feverish thoughts were interrupted by the sound of footsteps. Security was checking the floor around the perimeter. The corridor was quite wide and there was nowhere to go. What to do?!

She pushed Nikto around the corner, into some small dead-end arch, and herself darted behind him. Maybe they will not be noticed?

Her back felt a quiet breath. Nikto didn’t move, and even his heart seemed to be beating quietly, but her one must have been beating so that the guards could hear it. Their steps were getting closer, closer …

“Who is there?!”

That was the end. They were noticed…

“I’m Karina Kors, I’m leading a prisoner to my father for interrogation…” She slowly stepped apart from Nobody, came into the light.

“Your pass!”

“Here you are,” Karina glanced at this overseer and understood everything. Slowly, without making any sudden movements, while the overseer was still interested in her pass, she again stepped back a step, pushing Nikto who was still standing in the arch with her back, a little rude, probably as if making it clear: “It's trash!”

“Why are you hiding from us, lady Karina Kors? And where is the escort? Are you alone?!”

“Because the matter is secret, you see! No one should know about this!”

And with relief, Karina felt that Nikto understood her, and slowly, carefully, gently was pulling the sword of the murdered guard from the sheath behind her back.

“A secret matter? Show me your prisoner! Why are you hiding him behind you, behind your back?”

Karina pulled away frowningly.

“Oh! What is with his eyes? The Devil’s son bewitched the daughter of Kors!” They all snapped at once.

“Take…”

But the guard didn’t finish, blind and weak Nikto at the oblique trajectory cut him from neck to chest. Karina drew her sword, too, one of the guards ran away from them, to where there were other corridors to the exit, to where there were windows, and he desperately blew a trumpet, giving out the most vile sound that Karina had ever heard. Karina looked at Nikto, and at the bodies of four guards lying on the floor, only one there was killed by her.

“Well, you're a monster! But what should we do now? Soon my father’s entire army will be here!”

And in confirmation of her words, somewhere up there, the buzzing sounds were heard, a clang was heard, and the ringing of additionally locked doors and bars. The path to the top was cut off. Everything was blocked. They couldn’t walk forward even ten meters. What to do?!

And as if answering this dumb question, Nikto pulled her back.

She ran:

“Run, faster, Nik!”

They had already heard the clatter of guard approaching behind them. So far, only the nearest patrols were in a hurry to help, but soon there will be many more. The failed fugitives, of course, darted back, but Nikto couldn’t run fast, although he tried very hard. At least with one hand, from time to time, he needed to stick to the wall, feeling his way. Here they walked slowly, but now they had to retreat quickly. And she could not even reproach him, because she saw that he was trying very hard and was doing everything in his power. They would be now overtaken by the next group of the fastest soldiers… No! Karina couldn’t stand this hell the second time! Moreover, they again descended to the basement level, which meant that the passages there were narrower and narrower. If Nikto waves his sword, then who will give a guarantee that he will not touch her. No! No! No!

She withstood it. Again fiercely defending themselves and retreating, they didn’t allow the guard to come to themselves. And again, Nikto, fighting silently and blindly, shocked her, and even scared her to some extent. He never hit her, although there was nowhere to turn around in the narrow corridor. Once again, getting out of this two-minute mess, although it seemed to Karina like an eternity, Karina exhaled convulsively. For her, the first time was enough, how she withstood this tension and was able to repulse the second attack, or rather help Nikto to repulse it. She herself didn’t understand how she managed to do it! But what was the use? They had nowhere to run. Only down, which meant that sooner or later they would be caught like rats in a dungeon. There were no exits. The more they resisted, the more corpses they would leave behind, and the worse it would be… the worse it would be for Nikto. Later.