by Yury Nikitin
* * *
In his third week in the stone pit, Oleg saw a violently bashed man nearby: half-naked, his neck in the iron collar, his legs chained. It took Oleg some time to recognize him as Thomas, and just a moment to forget it. He worked hard, but his thought was free to shrink deep into the soul, so he was searching the Real World desperately for answers to the questions that tormented him, while in the other world his mortal body, along with other two-legged animals, would drive wedges, raise a heavy hammer, drag boulders.
Suddenly he heard a hoarse voice nearby: “Wonderer? Er… Sir Oleg?”
He saw Thomas’s face: dripping with sweat, thinned, his southern tan gone. In the clatter of picks, no one was looking to their side. “Yes, Sir Thomas, it’s me,” Oleg replied slowly. He was still in another world.
“I didn’t recognize you at once. This work does good for you! You got stronger, put some muscle on… Are you going to stay?”
“I can speak to gods anywhere,” Oleg said indifferently.
They heard a foreman’s warning shout. Cursing, Thomas brought his pick down on the rock, the stone fragments flew high. A cloud of dust raised and made everyone look alike. In the commotion Oleg lost the sight of Thomas, but in the evening the knight found him again. “I’ve changed with the man you worked with,” he whispered.
“We’re all men,” said Oleg indifferently. “All humans.”
For a while, Thomas crowbarred a granite boulder, thinking over an answer, then gave a guarded look around and whispered, “No men here but slaves! Does it befit you, a freeborn…”
“Slaves are men too,” Oleg interrupted.
“Not men like us.”
“No one is made a slave by God. Only by people.”
Thomas shook his head angrily, his blue eyes blazed with fury. “Sir wonderer! You are too humble. I want to get out of here. I need help. A bit of help!”
Oleg nodded at the other men’s backs that glistened with sweat.
Thomas waved away angrily. “They’ve died out. But not you! I feel a glimmer in you…”
Oleg looked indifferent. He was driving his crowbar in a narrow slit, crushing the stone. Thomas breathed heavily. His muscular arms raised the pick over his head frequently, his blows cracked rocks like ripe nuts. The chain on his ankles clanked miserably.
“You’ll burn out,” Oleg said.
“What?” Thomas wondered.
“Overstrain. Run out of your strength soon.”
“I shan’t linger! If no way out, I… swear on the Heaven and Holy Communion, I’ll smash my head!”
His breath rattled, as he had swallowed much stone dust. His neck was squeezed by the collar, his burnt blisters rubbed till they bled. The glitter in his eyes could belong to a small animal at bay, his fingers trembled. Oleg realized clearly that the handsome knight was not long for this world. At least, for the part of the world where Baron Otset’s castle stood.
“How will you get out?” Oleg asked without interest.
“I don’t know,” Thomas said desperately. “But here I shan’t live till Sunday. I know it. And no one to trust! Slaves… They’re slaves after all! It’s only you I know. You cured me, and I once saved you from dogs!”
The wonderer raised his arms evenly and strongly, bringing the sharp end of the heavy crowbar down into the crack between boulders. Thomas could almost see other boulders that moved unhurriedly in Oleg’s head, casting a dim glimmer into his impenetrable green eyes.
“But,” the wonderer spoke gently, “people should not be forced, even to their good. If they can’t forget their flesh here, if they’re unhappy because of its suffering… they must be released.”
Thomas jerked his shoulder impatiently. “Damn your wise words! Who will release them?”
“We,” the wonderer replied in the same humble voice.
In the evening Thomas was brought to the common slave barn. None of the exhausted, work-gutted men paid any attention to the novice. Thomas made his way to the corner where Oleg was sitting. “You’ve travelled a lot,” he whispered with excitement. “Might have seen more of such pits than I. Do you see a way to escape?”
“There’s always a way,” Oleg replied softly. “But our collars will give us away… and our rags. We’ll be stopped in the nearest village and handed back. No one would like to quarrel with Baron.”
Thomas nodded. “I think so. And I can’t leave without… some things. I hate to part with my warhorse, my armor and sword, but let the damned Baron have it! But in my saddle bag there’s an old copper cup…” He stopped, gave Oleg a searching look.
“Yes, I’ve seen it,” the pilgrim said quietly. “In search of something to dress your wound… Why is it so important?”
“It’s holy,” Thomas whispered. “A sacred thing.”
“Ah,” Oleg said, “ritual. I see. Every sorcerer used to have a cup on his belt. Back in the times of Targitai, the golden plow, yoke, and cup fell from the sky…”
Thomas hissed angrily, “Don’t you liken holy Christian relics to some Pagan things!”
“Well, well. On the way out, we’ll pass the armory first. You put your iron pot on, we take horses and gallop away.”
“I have to smash the Baron’s head before we go!”
“Then we’ll be seized. Speed is our only escape.”
“But the cup must be in his bedroom! He’s no fool to keep it elsewhere. I’d rather die than leave it!”
The wonderer watched him with a strange expression, then sighed, tossed and thrashed heavily in the stone corner. “Man is reckless… Isn’t that a simple Truth?”
“Ho-ly won-de-rer!” Thomas spoke in measured tones. He choked with fury, veins in his neck bulged, the metal collar strangling him like the Baron’s iron fingers. “Will you help me?”
The wonderer had big, mild, all-forgiving eyes. Those could belong to an icon, a righteous man close to Christ, one of his twelve paladins. “By chance I shan’t abandon my search of Truth despite this… In Great Reclusion, do as others do.”
“Will you help?” Thomas moaned.
“A little,” Oleg replied in a quiet voice. “Don’t expect much.”