Hard to Be a God Read online

  Anton, lying on his side, was spinning the little wheel to draw the bowstrings. A shot rang out, and some debris fell on him. The raspy, inhuman voice informed them, “The don was struck in the heel!”

  Anton moaned and grabbed his foot.

  “Not in that one, the other one,” the voice corrected.

  You could hear Pashka giggle. Anton carefully peered out from behind the stump, but he couldn’t see a thing in the thick green gloom.

  At this instant, there was a piercing whistle and a sound like a tree falling. “Ow!” Pashka gave a strangled cry. “Mercy! Mercy! Don’t kill me!”

  Anton immediately jumped up. Pashka was backing up out of the ferns toward him. His arms were above his head. They heard Anka’s voice: “Anton, do you see him?”

  “I see him,” Anton answered appreciatively. “Don’t turn around!” he yelled at Pashka. “Hands behind your head!”

  Pashka obediently put his hands behind his head and announced, “I’ll never talk.”

  “What are we supposed to do with him, Toshka?” Anka asked.

  “You’ll see,” said Anton, and took a comfortable seat on the stump, resting his crossbow on his knees. “Your name!” he barked in the voice of Hexa the Irukanian.

  Pashka expressed contempt and defiance with his back. Anton fired. A heavy bolt pierced the branch above Pashka’s head with a crack.

  “Whoa!” said Anka.

  “My name is Bon Locusta,” Pashka admitted reluctantly. “And here, it seems, will he die—‘for I only am left, and they seek my life.’”

  “A well-known rapist and murderer,” Anton explained. “But he does nothing for free. Who sent you?”

  “I was sent by Don Satarina the Ruthless,” Pashka lied.

  Anton said scornfully, “This hand cut the thread of Don Satarina’s foul life two years ago in the Territory of Heavy Swords.”

  “Should I stick a bolt in him?” offered Anka.

  “I completely forgot,” Pashka said hastily. “Actually, I was sent by Arata the Beautiful. He promised me a hundred gold pieces for your heads.”

  Anton slapped his knees. “What a liar!” he exclaimed. “Like Arata would ever get involved with a villain like you!”

  “Maybe I should stick a bolt in him after all?” Anka asked bloodthirstily.

  Anton laughed demonically.

  “By the way,” said Pashka, “your right heel has been shot off. It’s time for you to bleed to death.”

  “No way!” Anton objected. “For one thing, I’ve been constantly chewing on white tree bark, and for another, two beautiful barbarians have already dressed my wounds.”

  The ferns rustled, and Anka came out onto the trail. Her cheek was scratched, and her knees were smeared with dirt and grass. “It’s time to dump him into the swamp,” she announced. “When an enemy doesn’t surrender, he’s destroyed.”

  Pashka lowered his arms. “You know, you don’t play by the rules,” he said to Anton. “You always make Hexa seem like a good man.”

  “A lot you know!” said Anton, coming out onto the trail as well. “The saiva means business, you dirty mercenary.”

  Anka gave Pashka back his rifle. “Do you always let loose at each other like that?” she asked enviously.

  “Of course!” Pashka said in surprise. “What, are we supposed to yell ‘Boom-boom’? ‘Bang-bang’? The game needs an element of risk!”

  Anton said nonchalantly, “For example, we often play William Tell.”

  “We take turns,” Pashka caught on. “One day the apple’s on my head, the next day it’s on his.”

  Anka scrutinized them. “Oh yeah?” she said slowly. “I’d like to see that.”

  “We’d love to,” Anton said slyly. “Too bad we don’t have an apple.”

  Pashka was grinning widely. Then Anka tore the pirate bandanna off his head and quickly rolled it into a long bundle. “The apple is just a convention,” she said. “Here’s an excellent target. Go on, play William Tell.”

  Anton took the red bundle and examined it carefully. He looked at Anka—her eyes were like slits. And Pashka was enjoying himself—he was having fun. Anton handed him the bundle. “‘At thirty paces I can manage to hit a card without fail,’” he recited evenly. “‘I mean, of course, with a pistol that I am used to.’”

  “‘Really?’” said Anka. She then turned to Pashka: “ ‘And you, my dear, could you hit a card at thirty paces?’”

  Pashka was placing the bundle onto his head. “‘Some day we will try,’” he said, smirking. “‘In my time, I did not shoot badly.’”

  Anton turned around and walked down the trail, counting the steps out loud: “Fifteen … sixteen … seventeen …”

  Pashka said something—Anton didn’t catch it—and Anka laughed loudly. A little too loudly.

  “Thirty,” Anton said and turned around.

  At thirty paces, Pashka looked incredibly small. The red triangle of the bundle was perched on top of his head like a dunce cap. Pashka was smirking. He was still playing around. Anton bent down and started slowly drawing the bowstrings.

  “Bless you, my father William!” Pashka called out. “And thank you for everything, no matter what happens.”

  Anton nocked the bolt and stood up. Pashka and Anka were looking at him. They were standing side by side. The trail was like a dark, damp corridor between tall green walls. Anton raised the crossbow. The weapon of Marshal Totz had become extraordinarily heavy. My hands are shaking, thought Anton. That’s not good. He remembered how in the winter Pashka and he had spent a whole hour throwing snowballs at the cast iron pinecone on the fence post. They threw from twenty paces, from fifteen, and from ten—but they just couldn’t hit it. And then, when they were already bored and were leaving, Pashka carelessly, without looking, threw the last snowball and hit it. Anton pressed the stock of the crossbow into his shoulder with all his strength. Anka is too close, he thought. He wanted to call to her to step away but realized that it’d be silly.

  Higher. Even higher … Higher still … He was suddenly seized with the certainty that even if he turned his back to them, the heavy bolt would still sink right into the bridge of Pashka’s nose, between his cheerful green eyes. He opened his eyes and looked at Pashka. Pashka was no longer grinning. And Anka was very slowly raising a hand with her fingers spread, and her face was tense and very grown-up. Then Anton raised the crossbow even higher and pressed the trigger. He didn’t see where the bolt went.

  “I missed,” he said very loudly.

  Walking on unbending legs, he started down the trail. Pashka wiped his face with the red bundle, shook it, unfolded it, and started tying it around his head. Anka bent down and picked up her crossbow. If she hits me over the head with that thing, Anton thought, I’ll thank her. But Anka didn’t even look at him.

  She turned toward Pashka and asked, “Shall we go?”

  “One second,” Pashka said. He looked at Anton and silently tapped his forehead with a bent finger.

  “And you really got scared,” Anton said.

  Pashka tapped his forehead with a finger again and followed Anka. Anton trudged behind them and tried to suppress his doubts.

  What did I do wrong, exactly? he thought dully. Why are they so mad? Well, Pashka I understand—he got scared. Except I don’t know who was more frightened, William the father or Tell the son. But what about Anka? She must have gotten scared for Pashka. But what could I have done? Look at me, trailing behind them like a cousin. I should just take off. I’ll turn left here, there’s an interesting swamp that direction. Maybe I’ll catch an owl. But he didn’t even slow down. That means it’s for life, he thought. He had read that it very often happened like this.

  They came out onto the abandoned road even sooner than expected. The sun was high; it was hot. The pine needles prickled under Anton’s collar. The road was concrete, made of two rows of cracked, grayish-red slabs. Thick dry grass grew in the interstices. The side of the road was full of dusty burrs. Beetles were buzz
ing, and one of them insolently slammed right into Anton’s forehead. It was quiet and languid.

  “Look!” said Pashka.

  A round tin disk, covered with peeling paint, hung in the middle of a rusty wire stretched across the road. It seemed to show a yellow rectangle on a red background.

  “What is it?” Anka asked, without any particular interest.

  “A road sign,” Pashka said. “Says not to go there.”

  “Do not enter,” Anton confirmed.

  “Why is it here?” Anka asked.

  “It means you can’t go that way,” Pashka said.

  “So why the road?”

  Pashka shrugged his shoulders. “It’s a very old highway,” he said.

  “An anisotropic highway,” declared Anton. Anka was standing with her back to him. “It only goes one way.”

  “The wisdom of our forefathers,” Pashka said pensively. “You drive and drive for a hundred miles, then suddenly— boom!—a do-not-enter sign. You can’t go straight, but there’s no one to ask for directions.”

  “Imagine what could be beyond the sign!” said Anka. She looked around. They were surrounded by many miles of empty forest, and there was no one to ask what could be beyond the sign. “What if it doesn’t even say do not enter?” she asked. “The paint is mostly peeled off …”

  Then Anton took careful aim and fired. It would have been fantastic if the bolt had shot through the wire and the sign had fallen at Anka’s feet. But the bolt hit the top of the sign, piercing the rusty tin, and the only thing that fell was dried paint.

  “Idiot,” said Anka, without turning around.

  This was the first word she had addressed to Anton after the game of William Tell. Anton smiled crookedly. “‘And enterprises of great pitch and moment,’” he recited. “‘With this regard their currents turn awry, and lose the name of action.’”

  Good old Pashka shouted, “Guys, a car has driven this way! Since the thunderstorm! Here’s the flattened grass! And here …”

  Lucky Pashka, thought Anton. He started examining the marks on the road and also saw the flattened grass and the black stripe left by the treads when the car had braked before a pothole.

  “Aha!” said Pashka. “He came from past the sign!”

  That was completely obvious, but Anton objected: “No way, he was going the other direction.”

  Pashka raised his astonished eyes at him. “Have you gone blind?”

  “He was going the other direction,” Anton repeated stubbornly. “Let’s follow him.”

  “That’s ridiculous!” Pashka was outraged. “For one thing, no respectable driver would go the wrong way past a do-not-enter sign. For another, just look: here’s the pothole, here are the tracks of the brakes … So which way was he going?”

  “Who cares about respectable! I’m not respectable myself, and I’m going past the sign.”

  Pashka exploded. “Do what you want!” he said, stuttering slightly. “Moron. The heat’s gone to your head!”

  Anton turned around and, staring fixedly in front of him, went past the sign. The only thing he wanted was to come across a blown-up bridge and to have to fight his way through to the other side. What do I care about some respectable guy! he thought. They can do what they want—Anka and her Pashenka. He remembered how Anka had cut Pavel down when he called her Anechka, and he felt a bit better. He looked back.

  He saw Pashka right away: Bon Locusta, bent in two, following the receding tracks of the mysterious car. The rusty disk above the road swayed gently, and the blue sky flickered through the hole in the disk. And Anka was sitting by the roadside, her elbows propped on her knees and her chin on her clenched fists.

  On their way back, it was already dusk. The boys were rowing, and Anka was at the rudder. A red moon was rising over the black forest, and frogs were croaking incessantly.

  “We planned the outing so well,” Anka said sadly. “You two!”

  The boys were silent. Then Pashka asked quietly, “Toshka, what was there, beyond the sign?”

  “A blown-up bridge,” answered Anton. “And the skeleton of a fascist, chained to a machine gun.” He thought a moment and added, “The machine gun had sunk into the ground.”

  “Hmm,” Pashka said. “It happens. And guess what? I helped that guy fix his car.”

  Chapter 1

  When Rumata passed Holy Míca’s grave—the seventh and last along the road—it was already completely dark. The much-ballyhooed Hamaharian stallion, received from Don Tameo in payment of a gambling debt, had turned out to be completely worthless. He had become sweaty and footsore, and moved in a wretched, wobbly trot. Rumata dug his knees into the horse’s sides and whipped him between the ears with a glove, but he only dejectedly shook his head without moving any faster. Bushes stretched alongside the road, resembling clouds of solidified smoke in the gloom. The whine of mosquitoes was intolerable. Scattered stars trembled dimly in the murky sky. A mild wind was blowing in gusts, warm and cold at the same time, as was always the case in autumn in this seaside country, with its dusty, muggy days and chilly nights.

  Rumata wrapped his cloak tighter and let go of his reins. He had no reason to hurry. There was still an hour until midnight, and the jagged black edge of the Hiccup Forest had already appeared above the horizon. Plowed fields flanked the road; swamps flickered beneath the stars, stinking of inorganic rust; barrows and rotting palisades from the time of the Invasion were visible in the dark. To his left, a grim glow was flaring up and dying down; a village must be burning, one of the innumerable indistinguishable places known as Deadtown, Gallowland, or Robberdale, though august decree had recently renamed them Beloved, Blessed, and Angelic. This country extended for hundreds of miles—from the shores of the Strait until the saiva of the Hiccup Forest—blanketed with mosquito clouds, torn apart by ravines, drowning in swamps, stricken by fevers, plagues, and foul-smelling head colds.

  At the turn of the road, a dark figure materialized from the bushes. The stallion shied, throwing back his head. Rumata grabbed the reins, adjusted the lace on his right sleeve out of habit, and put his hand on the hilt of his sword before taking a good look.

  The figure took off his hat. “Good evening, noble don,” he said quietly. “I beg your pardon.”

  “What is it?” Rumata asked, listening hard.

  There’s no such thing as a silent ambush. Robbers give themselves away by the creak of their bowstrings, the gray storm troopers belch uncontrollably from the stale beer, the baronial militiamen breathe avidly through their noses and clatter their weapons, while the slave-hunting monks noisily scratch themselves. But the bushes were quiet. It seemed the man wasn’t a bandit. Not that he looked much like a bandit—a short, thickset city resident in a modest cloak.

  “May I run alongside you?” he asked, bowing.

  “Certainly,” said Rumata, lifting the reins. “You may hold the stirrup.”

  The man began to walk next to Rumata. His hat was in his hand, and a substantial bald patch shone on top of his head. Probably a steward, thought Rumata. Visiting the barons and cattle dealers, buying flax or hemp. A brave steward, though … Maybe he isn’t a steward. Maybe he’s a bookworm. A fugitive. An outcast. There are a lot of them on the night roads nowadays, more than there are stewards. Or maybe he’s a spy.

  “Who are you and where are you from?” Rumata asked.

  “My name is Kiun,” the man said sadly. “I’m coming from Arkanar.”

  “You’re running away from Arkanar,” Rumata said, bending down.

  “I’m running away,” the man agreed sadly.

  Some eccentric, thought Rumata. Or maybe he really is a spy? I should test him … Actually, why should I? Who says I should? What right do I have to test him? No, I don’t want to! Why can’t I simply trust him? Here is a city dweller, clearly a bookworm, running for his life … He’s lonely, he’s scared, he’s weak, he’s looking for protection. He meets an aristocrat. Due to their arrogance and stupidity, aristocrats don’t understa
nd politics, but their swords are long and they don’t like the grays. Why shouldn’t Kiun the city dweller benefit from the disinterested protection of a stupid and arrogant aristocrat? That’s it. I won’t test him. I have no reason to test him. We’ll talk, pass the time, part as friends …

  “Kiun …” Rumata said. “I knew a Kiun once. A seller of potions and an alchemist from Tin Street. Are you a relative of his?”

  “Unfortunately, I am,” said Kiun. “Just a distant relative, but it’s all the same to them … until the twelfth generation.”

  “And where are you running away to, Kiun?”

  “Somewhere … The farther the better. Lots of people run away to Irukan. I’ll try Irukan too.”

  “Well, well,” Rumata said. “And you think that the noble don will help you across the border?”

  Kiun was quiet.

  “Or maybe you think that the noble don doesn’t know who the alchemist Kiun from Tin Street is?” Kiun stayed quiet.

  What am I saying? thought Rumata. He stood up in his stirrups and shouted, imitating the town crier in the Royal Square, “Accused and convicted of terrible, unforgivable crimes against God, peace, and the Crown!”

  Kiun was quiet.

  “And what if the noble don adores Don Reba? What if he’s wholeheartedly devoted to the gray word and the gray cause? Or do you think that’s impossible?”

  Kiun was quiet. The jagged shadow of a gallows appeared out of the darkness to the right of the road. A naked body, strung up by its feet, shone white beneath the crossbeam. Bah, it’s not even working, thought Rumata. He reined his horse in, grabbed Kiun by the shoulder, and spun him around to face him.

  “And what if the noble don decides to string you up right next to this tramp?” he said, peering into the white face with dark pits for eyes. “All by myself. Quickly and neatly. Why are you quiet, literate Kiun?”