Читать книгу The Mist and the Lightning. Part 19 онлайн
“I’m teaching her!”
“Martial arts?”
“She must be able to take care of herself!”
“Teaching her to fight with a sword is not exactly what is needed to raise a future woman. In the capital, she can become a friend of the princess, shine at court, find a profitable match! You don’t want a happy future for yourself, but you don’t want one for Karina either! You don’t think about her future, you break her fate! Is this what Inness wanted for your beloved girl? What would Inez say to you?
And Kors shudders.
“What will you say to Inness when you meet in the afterlife? How will you justify your selfishness? How will you explain that you broke the fate of your daughter?! You don’t really love Karina! And you don’t love Inness either! You don’t care about them!”
“I love them. And for them I am ready for anything!”
“Then let’s go to the city!”
Kors sits silently for a while and then finally quietly says:
“My life is broken, and I don’t care about any career, but you’re right, friend, I have to overcome myself, for the sake of Inness and… Karina.”
Varakh freezes in tension, never taking his eyes off his friend.
“Let’s go to the city,” Kors says.
And Varakh, in a happy gesture, folding his palms, raises his hands:
“Thank Gods!”
Dad! Don’t leave me! Don’t leave me! Don’t leave me!
Having inadvertently touched and knocked over the bottle, Kors awkwardly gets up from the table, staggers him:
“Let’s get out of here! To hell!”
“I will order the preparations to begin immediately!” Varakh hurriedly adds, as if afraid that Kors will suddenly change his mind.
“Let’s go,” Kors repeats. “The Black City has been waiting for us for a long time!”
Don’t leave…
Don’t leave…
Don’t leave…
Chapter 6
Kors woke from the haze of memories and sat up abruptly on his camp bed. Yes, he left then, succumbing to Varakh’s persuasions, he left for the Black City to start a new page in his life.
He had forgotten the past, and later didn’t match either the place or the time. He hadn’t even bothered to think that the white half-blood from Komra was just about as old as his lost child would have been at the moment. Kors had completely forgotten about everything, and, without looking at the boy, by an evil irony of fate, he identified his son in the trash. He branded him as a slave, dooming him to death, or at best to a humiliating existence as a living thing. And ten years later he made him his lover. Kors put his head in his hands. Varakh knew something, he said: “I didn’t want to upset you even more, you were already crushed by the loss of Inness!” It would be better if you upset me, stupid Varakh! Do you see what your silence has led to?