Edgars Auziņš
Fascinating geography
– So, they dragged me to the townsfolk, sat me on a box of brown soda, and I still didn’t have time to tell this goblin policeman that I was a brilliant poet…
«You’ll make yourself known again,» Dan waved his hand in the direction of the advertisement taped to the post.
«A polyglot magician. 456-78-90».
The dragon shuddered from his unkind gaze.
Chapter 4. About Russian slang and Japanese poets
Old man Methodius was sitting in the kitchen drinking tea with raspberries when the doorbell rang.
«How fast they are,» he shook his head and went to open it.
Mother Nature did not endow the old man with a height of a meter with a cap, if not lower.
Jumping, he hung on the handle, and the door opened. On the threshold stood a tall, broad-shouldered man, a thin girl slightly shorter than her companion, and a pet dragon clutching a colorful notebook to its chest.
– Did you call me, gentlemen? – the grandfather lisped into his beard.
And the old man’s hair was thick, long, and curly. Even his light brown hair had not turned grey, despite the fact that this man could have been at least a hundred years old. And if you take into account the specifics of life on the second layer, then all three hundred. But judging by his behavior and the energy that was overflowing, it was as if my grandfather had turned twenty a week ago.
«Yes, dear Methodius,» the necromancer said, putting his hand on his heart. – My name is Daniel, this is my friend Alina, and this is my black dragon.
«Come in, come in,» muttered the magician, opening the door to the library for the guests.
And all three entered the only room, which the owner rightly called a book depository.
The abode of the polyglot magician was no different from the traditional housing of Russians of the twentieth century: a single room, a workplace and a bedroom at the same time, a narrow corridor, a kitchen three by three meters. And, being lined from floor to ceiling with dictionaries of all kinds, such an apartment looked even smaller than what was noted in the warrant.
Methodius covered the windows in the only room with black curtains that did not let in a single ray of light. It was possible to see at least something only thanks to a small lamp standing on a small round table in the middle of the room. All the furniture was made exclusively of wood, and instead of carpets, the old man laid out bear skins on the floor.
«Here,» the grandfather complained, taking a stepladder from around the corner, «he lived in the village, he had a good house, a pine frame, so they demolished it, the damned trolls, they, you see, expanded the city, and so as not to get angry and send letters to the Council, they gave me an apartment.
Grumbling, he placed the ladder at one of the shelves and walked to a round table, on which, in addition to the lamp, lay a large notebook covered in small handwriting. This is how only students write cheat sheets and experienced magicians encode their wisdom.
– Yes, dear guests, what languages would you like to learn? Modern ones – one hundred dollars, ancient ones – one thousand, encryption – five.
«I want to know modern Russian,» Dan said, picking in his pocket for money.
When he found a hundred dollar bill, he placed it on the table in front of his grandfather.
The satisfied old man smiled and, lifting up the hem of his long linen shirt, groaning, climbed onto the stepladder and took out a small soft-bound book from the top shelf.
– Does the Great and Mighty take up so little space? – Alina was surprised.
Then she began to read the inscriptions on the remaining dictionaries: English, Spanish, Italian. It was as if she had ended up in the foreign literature department. But all the other books were much thicker than the dictionary that her grandfather got, and this alarmed her. But, alas, it’s too late. Before she had time to share her suspicions with Dan, the old man began to perform witchcraft.
Methodius seated the necromancer at the round table opposite him. The magician, who turned out to be almost twice as tall as the old polyglot, felt very uncomfortable on the small, low three-legged stool. But he endured, because investing knowledge in five minutes is much faster than learning the language on your own.
In general, the magic of polyglots has always been considered very dangerous. Any magical effect on the brain is like this. One wrong word in a spell, and a person may forever lose his memory or knowledge of his native language. Therefore, as Dan managed to tell Alina on the way to Methodius, in childhood all wizards and sorcerers studied one or two foreign languages, and then, at the age of twenty, they were allowed to visit a polyglot magician so that they could correct their grammar and remove their accent. Such actions are not too dangerous; it is difficult to make mistakes in spells to improve knowledge. Why is that? The whole point is not the science of magic, but the fact that nothing can be given for nothing. And even if a licensed polyglot magician teaches someone to speak gibberish in five minutes, on the other side of the world a connoisseur of this language may completely lose his memory. Wizards called this effect the law of equal exchange in nature.
Methodius wrapped the dictionary in skin and placed it in front of the client. After that, he quickly ran to the kitchen and brought a kettle. Judging by the way the grandfather carried it, it was heavy, filled to the brim. From there he poured a viscous black liquid (was it tar?) into a bowl that stood on the window, and then splashed the substance onto the skin in which the book was wrapped. As soon as the first drop touched the fur, the fur began to glow bright blue. Having finished with the impregnation, the old man removed the skin from the book and wrapped it around the head of Dan, who was sitting at the table.
The black dragon sat comfortably in a corner and immersed himself in his favorite pastime. Alina looked at everything that was happening with her mouth open. She had seen similar actions more than once in television programs on the first layer, where various psychics and other suspicious individuals who considered themselves magicians performed.
When the skin stopped glowing, the old man removed the bandage from Dan’s head. The necromancer sat on a chair, closed his eyes, and was afraid to move.
«Well,» the grandfather lisped, «say something in the new Russian.»
– Cool, bro! – the magician slapped the old man on the shoulder, so that he could not stand on his feet and sat down in surprise.
– Whaaaat?!?!?! – Alina was indignant.
– Oh, great, chick! – Dan smiled, hugging the girl’s hips.
Five minutes ago, this intelligent Czech guy addressed her so respectfully: «beautiful girl,» but what if… something is wrong… Is it possible that along with knowledge of the language, a person acquires disgusting character traits?
«Dan,» she said offended, pulling his hand away. – What do you say?
She grabbed the guy by the shoulders and started shaking him in the hope of knocking out this gross nonsense.
– What a cool bazaar, absolutely nothing! Are you, like, not getting it?
«I get it, I get it,» the sorceress mimicked him, «but why, having learned a foreign language, start being rude in it?»
– I’m freaking out! – the necromancer rolled his eyes, picking up a thin dictionary.
«Modern Russian slang and obscene expressions,» Alina read what was written on the cover.
«Dear Methodius,» she shouted at her grandfather, «do you even pay attention to what you teach a respectable foreigner?»
– Why the hell stare?
The old man chuckled, took the book from the girl and put it in its place, and then began to look for something.
– Isn’t this necessary? – she asked, taking out from under the leg of the stepladder Ozhegov’s thick black Explanatory Dictionary.
Almost every Russian schoolchild knew this book very well. But… the ladder, from under which the thick book was taken out, naturally fell to one side along with the old man.
It turned out that the grandfather carelessly touched his lamp and it, coming into contact with the bear’s skin, started a serious fire. With the number of books in the room, everyone present could have burned alive in a matter of minutes.
The dragon jumped up on its hind legs, clutching the precious manuscript to its chest. Dan, deprived of any vocabulary except Russian Newspeak, stomped on the tabletop and shouted heart-rendingly:
– The author is burning! Ftopku sovar of the Russian language!
Methodius, numb with horror, watched as the fire approached both him and his precious collection.
And only Alina, who by some miracle did not lose her composure, stretched out her hand, free from the dictionary, and shouted:
– Sandstorm!
The spell again spontaneously surfaced in her memory, from which book or film – she did not remember. The girl imagined how the earth began to move under her feet, how dust rose in a column and circulated around her feet, and then dispersed and was covered by fire, which had almost reached the dictionaries of the polyglot magician. The grandfather sat on his knees, looking with fear at the burnt wool on one of the skin-carpets, and tears welled up in his clear blue eyes. His collection was saved!!!
When Alina lowered her hand, the tornado stopped circulating, and the sand fell to the ground in an even circle around the girl. Definitely, after this spell, the magician’s apartment required cleaning.
The sorceress put Ozhegov’s dictionary on the table at Dan’s feet and stared at the old man with an imperious gaze:
– Teach him Russian back! Correct your mistakes.
Grateful for saving the collection, Methodius agreed, despite the fact that the fire happened due to Alina’s carelessness. Somehow the old man quickly forgot the bad things, but he seemed to remember the good things well for a long time. He did not demand a hundred dollars from the brave sorceress in exchange for the necromancer’s half-burnt bill sticking out of the sandy hill.
Grandfather shook the sand out of his sandals and asked Dan to get off the table and sit on a chair.
– Shave yourself! – the client stuck his tongue out at the grandfather.
– I’ll shave you! – the magician groaned, kicking one of the table legs.
Dan expected anything from the old man, but not that his leg would be kept on his word of honor. As a result, he fell painfully on his back, hitting his head on a stack of dictionaries.
– You’re a fool, rotten old man, ax-head! – he hissed through his teeth, picking up the extinguished lamp from the floor.
Alina took it from the magician’s hands and, snapping her fingers, lit the wick, wanting to give the lamp to her grandfather, but that was not the case. The necromancer held it by the base with a strong grip and was not going to give it up. He jerked the lamp towards himself so that the sorceress almost fell nose-first into the dusty, scattered books of the old man Methodius. Dan squeezed the lamp in his left hand, and with his right began to move over the flame, as if he was writing fancy runes in the air. So this is how necromancers cast their spells!
The magician with the lamp walked straight towards the old polyglot, who at that time was reciting a spell over Ozhegov’s dictionary.
The dragon diligently scribbled quatrains without raising his head. At such moments, the muse came to him without asking and did not leave until the poet’s owner accomplished a feat.
Alina was unable to do anything. All that remained was to rely on fate. The fox’s skin sparkled blue, and the old man turned to the necromancer. And he had already raised a lamp high above him with a ready-made spell and a soul summoned from the Kingdom of the Dead. It’s just like an illustration for «Crime and Punishment» in the magical world, only Raskolnikov’s motives are completely stupid.
The grandfather, as the sorceress often recalled later, turned out to be dexterous and prepared for any actions on the part of his clients, so he accurately threw the skin at the necromancer’s head, and he rolled head over heels at his feet.
Blinded Dan, who did not expect such a turn of events, dropped the lamp into a pot of ficus standing on the window.
At the same moment, the room was filled with the smell of incense, and everyone present closed their eyes, because the acrid fog painfully stung the iris. Only a minute later the desperate dragon-writer decided to see with his own eyes the heroic feat of his grandfather.
– What was it? – the necromancer removed the faded fox skin from his forehead.
Alina and Methodius sat in different corners, closing their eyes and bowing their heads. The satisfied dragon, biting his tongue, wrote the next chapter of the poem, and instead of a ficus, a motionless long-haired tortoiseshell cat sat on the window.
– Yana?! – Dan rolled his eyes. – I didn’t call you!
The animal meowed in response, but did not move. The frightened sorceress first opened one eye, and, realizing that the danger had passed, opened the second one. The polyglot grandfather did the same.
«Forgive me, dear Methodius, for the mess and the attack on your person,» Dan bowed and continued to apologize, «when you gave me a dictionary of modern Russian slang, I could barely restrain myself from saying something obscene, and for some other reason the vocabulary began to control my character.
«Believe me, dear Daniel,» the old man said, putting his hand on his heart; the necromancer understood from his eyes that he was sincere. – I didn’t want to teach you this. When you said that you wanted to know modern Russian, I seemed to be bewitched, and I went for a slang dictionary.
Dan and Alina looked at each other. And the dragon settled down on an overturned table, as if on a barricade, and began to read a poem in Czech:
Fifa Pink is a bastard, And she secretly ordered the polyglot Dan to teach him swear words.
«Dear Daniel,» Methodius interrupted the dragon’s recitation, «to atone for my guilt, I am ready to do anything for you.»
The necromancer scratched the back of his head, and at this time the dragon continued:
Skins are burning, books are burning, and Alina slowly, a tornado suddenly catches up with everything, and that fire goes out!
– Hurray, it’s catching up and fading! I finally got a rhyme! – the poet squealed, jumping up and down on the table lying on its side.
– ABOUT! – Dan raised his index finger up, – teach our dragon Japanese. Let him write haiku! And so that he could not express himself in other languages!
And, after thinking a little, he added:
– That is, he can understand, but he doesn’t speak.
– You’re welcome.
– Dan, what are you doing? – the pet was indignant and was about to rush at the owner, but Alina held the animal by the paws, and Methodius successfully carried out the retraining operation.
The tortoiseshell cat watched everything that was happening in surprise, but could not move.
«Arigato, Mefodiusu-san! note 6,» the dragon bowed to the magician when the polyglot removed the skin from his forehead.
«Now say it in Russian,» Dan grinned.
«Denieru-sama no baka desunote 7,» the animal snorted, clutching the precious notebook to its chest.
The old man laughed hysterically, his mustache comically moving up and down, and the wizards, who did not understand anything in Japanese, could only guess what was funny about the black dragon.
«It’s okay, you’ll have a fight and then you’ll stop,» the grandfather grinned, stroking him on the withers.
He only looked at everyone present with a pitiful glance.
«Allow me, Mr. Methodius,» the necromancer began, not paying attention to the pet, «to borrow a dictionary of curse words from you in exchange for… the cat that is on your window.»
The old man ruffled his beard, looking first at the furry creature, then at the book in Dan’s hands, but still agreed to the exchange, complaining about his guilt. This was all the magician needed. He put the bad dictionary in his bosom and, taking Alina by the arm, gallantly said goodbye to the polyglot.
«Jaa ne, Mefodiusu-san! note 8,» the dragon shouted, leaving the linguist’s apartment.
As soon as the grandfather closed the door behind the guests, Dan pressed Alina to his chest, so that the girl did not even have time to be embarrassed from surprise, and the animal, with its mouth open, watched what the owner would do next. And this event will become the theme of his first tercet in his life.
«I don’t like this grandfather,» the necromancer whispered in her ear.
The girl sighed sadly. She expected at least a kiss on the cheek, and again there were things to do, surveillance, FIFA and other nasty things of this world.
«Don’t be upset,» he took her hand, «do you think I didn’t leave him a cat on the window on purpose?» I am, of course, not a spy, but I have some experience in this matter.
– Is the dictionary enchanted?
«I don’t think so, I’ll have to buy a magic meter and check.» Most likely, this is due to the old man, who was treated before our arrival.
All three went downstairs. As soon as the sorceress Alina, Dan and the dragon came out from under the entrance canopy, a large red brick fell right in front of them and broke into small pieces.
«Those times are like in a joke,» the sorceress said under her breath, remembering her previous life.
– KSO! note 9 – the dragon swore, but no one understood him, they only appreciated negative emotions.
The wizards looked up and noticed that a small imp was sitting on the fifth floor balcony, and next to him were three more bricks.
– Here are those two! – the devil chuckled, throwing off the second brick.
If the «Shield’ spell had been cast a millisecond longer, then none of the victims would have been alive. And so, hitting the transparent shield, like a drop on an umbrella, it shattered into small pieces. The disgruntled little devil wanted to throw down two more bricks, but, realizing that the idea would not succeed anyway, he disappeared into the apartment, finally waving his tail with a donut on the tip.
«Eh, a good witness ran away,» Dan was upset, «otherwise we are all hiding, hiding and doing nothing.»
«Yeah,» Alina agreed, «we’ll find it again.» These evil spirits are following in droves.
«So desu ko! note 10,» the dragon confirmed.
If he often speaks Japanese, then the sorceress and the necromancer will soon learn this language even without any polyglot magicians.
«Okay, let’s go to the metro,» Dan took the sorceress by the hand, «we’ll go to the hotel, but for now I’ll tell you how the world works.» Otherwise, on your first layer they don’t know anything except all sorts of Darwinian theories.
They walked slowly along the wide avenue, and the magician began to give a tedious lecture, which even the black dragon refused to write down. Or maybe his muse just got bored, and they didn’t want to put together hockey.
Alina made a discovery for herself: on planet Earth, it turns out, there are two layers of reality and they develop in parallel, in the same way, because energy constantly flows from one to another and back. There is a third layer, but everything that goes there can never return, which is why that world is called the Kingdom of the Dead. No one knows what is going on there, because not a single living creature has been able to return from there. Yes, there are magicians on the second layer who call themselves necromancers, who can temporarily summon someone from the Kingdom of the Dead, but, alas, for a finite period. A blocker is placed on the soul so that it does not tell anyone about living there. There are rumors that there is an eternal carefree life there, but no one has yet confirmed or denied this speculation.
Many necromancers are struggling to remove the blocker, and they even offered a bonus for this. However, as soon as the magician manages to destroy the protection, he immediately finds himself in the Kingdom of the Dead following the soul of the summoned one. Did you want to? Look!
Dan also studied blockers in secret from the masters of the school; he studied all the theory, but was afraid of experiments. After all, if he does it himself and doesn’t succeed, then there will be no one to continue, and if you attract volunteer magicians, then you can end up on a tribunal and be disembodied for experiments on human life. This is how the Kingdom of the Dead remains a mystery to the living for many years.
The second layer or ’true earth’ is the very wealth of the planet. This is where the best people in the world are born, who call themselves magicians. Everyone has their own specialization and has no right to meddle in other people’s areas of knowledge. Even if someone very much wants to become, for example, a polyglot or a cook instead of their destiny as a doctor, this will not be possible due to natural characteristics. Only a few everyday spells such as levitation and fire spark, which many magicians replace with mini-fireballs, or ordinary healing spells to treat minor injuries and colds could be used by almost everyone without exception. But necromancers, for example, were forbidden to take their own fire for the ritual of summoning the soul.
A magical gift cannot be chosen; it is inherited down to the third generation: that is, from fathers, grandfathers and great-grandfathers. It turns out that your distant relative was a shapeshifter magician, and you can become one, and then your son will be born an alchemist, like your father’s uncle. The gift is determined immediately after birth. It happens simply: Alina had the honor of seeing a similar detector at the Novosibirsk airport. Then it’s a matter of technique: school, college, specialization, and the magician is ready for life. Fighters, however, are taught spells earlier, but this is an exception, because aggressive magic is much simpler than necromancy, alchemy, teleportation, polyglotism or healing.
– That is, if I marry someone who had a skeleton in his relatives, then my child may turn out to be bony? – the sorceress was scared.
– No, what are you doing? – Dan waved his hands and continued. – To begin with, my relatives are only necromancers and healers.
– What you’re suggesting? – She looked at the magician with a suspicious look.
«So, stupid thoughts,» he muttered, looking at the sky, and quickly turned the conversation to skeletons.
They cannot be born by any person, despite the fact that everyone has a set of bones.
«Skeletons are the remains of lovers of an idle life from the first layer,» Dan explained, «before you get to the Kingdom of the Dead, you need to work hard.» Those who serve as skeletons for us died on the first layer, their souls went where they were supposed to, but the third layer did not accept their bodies. So they work off their rent here. Two or three hundred years until the bones wear out. When the skeleton cannot move, it is written off either for experiments at the school of necromancy or to the investigative department.
Why is this? Alina’s face stretched out in surprise, but the magician popularly explained to her that necromancers can summon the soul of the deceased only into a body in which there is life. Summoning while alive is prohibited by the Magic Council on pain of disincarnation, except in cases of self-defense, of course. And into the bodies of decommissioned skeletons is not only possible, but also necessary, because this is the only way for the poor fellows to reunite with their souls.
– Did you see the cat on Methodius’s window?
Alina nodded.
– So, it was I who called into the ficus the soul of my favorite, who died when I was ten years old. If I did this to a skeleton, the cat would be indistinguishable from a living one. And she would be as tall as a man at the withers. The growth of the person brought from the other world is directly proportional to the volume of the successor body. As you can see, it is possible to push a soul into inanimate objects, but the result is a paralyzed creature. This is how the souls of particularly violent criminals are summoned to our courts. So that they don’t do anything…
The sorceress opened her mouth, wanting to ask, but the necromancer immediately guessed what she wanted to know and continued:
– Orcs, goblins, trolls and other lower creatures live here constantly. Some say that these are people of the past and future who came to work part-time, but judging by their mental abilities, they have nothing in common with the human race. Once at our school they examined the brain of a dead troll. We came to the conclusion that this is a developed species of animal, suitable for learning. So they use all these creatures as cheap labor; their wages in hamburgers are enough! And they are happy to work until they go crazy. It seems like I told you everything about the second layer, right? – the necromancer asked Alina.
– How do I know? This is my first day here. But there are no questions yet.
Dan nodded and began to talk about the first layer. When the girl lived there, she believed that the earth was solid, but according to the magician’s theory, it turned out that her homeland was ten centimeters above the world of magicians, invisible and transparent.
– Why are you looking like that?
«It’s hard… the first layer…» she muttered, turning pale, stopping.
– Let’s go further, I’ll explain…
Dan gallantly hugged the sorceress by the waist and said that the first layer seemed hard only to those living there. Although, this is the second one. And the first is only protection for him. Those born there are deprived of magical abilities due to the fact that the sun’s rays burn them out. Ultraviolet radiation reaches the second layer in an acceptable dose, and all the magical abilities of the creatures living here are preserved.
Of course, there are exceptions to all rules, and sometimes both magicians and vampires are born on the first layer. It is difficult for these people in a non-magical environment, so they suffer a lot. Vampires, for example, age slowly, are immune to human diseases, and even if they are possessed and progressed, this does not affect the health of the bloodsuckers in any way. They eat regular food, and instead of blood, they suck positive energy from those around them. If they sense the presence of a vampire, they gradually stop communicating with him, but the bloodsucker finds more and more new victims, because if he is left alone, he falls into depression associated with emotional hunger, and soon dies from all the diseases that have managed to populate his body or imposes hands on yourself.
With magicians the situation is worse; it is in no way possible for them to settle on the first layer. They are born with congenital diseases, or experience many hardships, as a result of which they are left without eyes, arms, legs or other organs. The health of magicians deteriorates sharply with every year of their life, and few of them live to be twenty-five. But those who have crossed this line live long and benefit people. Vanga, for example.
– But why then did my abilities manifest themselves only at nineteen years old? – Alina didn’t understand.
«In general, they might never have appeared if you were happy with your life.» You would have died at twenty-two years old from heart disease, and no one would have remembered you except your brother. Nothing happened to you at nineteen?
– Not with me, but…
And then she told her companion about her parents.
«Yeah,» Dan drawled, «deep down in your soul you wanted to resurrect them, you started looking for strength, and they came to you.» You are a magician of a different orientation, so your abilities did not manifest themselves where you expected. A combatant will never become a necromancer. You initiated it yourself. This is not possible on our second layer. A certain sorceress Lina did this to herself a thousand years ago, and that’s all. The rest are helped to discover the abilities of the midwife. Don’t look at me like that, our people are still engaged in initiation.
Then the sorceress began to ask the necromancer about her transition to the second layer, but he only spread his hands and said:
– No idea. Until today, I rightly believed that this was impossible! We come to them – please, they come to us – no way.
– You’re lying! – Alina flared up, which caused his surprise. – When I disappeared from that layer, I saw you!
After such a statement, he stopped dead in his tracks and stared at the magician, asking: «My dear, did you make a mistake?» But she said with confidence that she saw exactly a fair-haired man with yellow eyes in a blue robe. The sorceress didn’t remember the dragon, but the necromancer doesn’t always take it with him.
– I’m always next to Dan! – the black pet blurted out.
– Do you even go to the toilet with him? – Alina remarked sarcastically.
The animal looked down, giving the girl an embarrassed ’no’.
«You made a mistake,» the magician sighed with relief, «I can’t summon from the first layer.» Wenceslas brought you here.
– Your double? – the sorceress winked.
«My ancestor,» Dan walked, looking at his feet, kicking an empty soda can, «because no other magician is able to risk calling someone from the first layer.»
«Too many coincidences,» she didn’t give up, «you appear when I’m dying, then I meet you at the airport, and meanwhile I also received a self-written message in broken Russian, and I didn’t get a ticket to Moscow on a flight from the second layer.» bought. Or do you want to say that your great-great-grandfather brought me here to be your bodyguard?
– The great necromancer of the Middle Ages, who could summon any person and attract him to himself, the founder of the entire direction of summoning souls and the school of necromancy in Prague Castle. A person who is capable of allowing someone called to remain on the second layer as long as he wants, and even freeing him from his influence…» Dan whispered under his breath in fascination. – And to protect me?
– Like this? Are the summoned slaves of necromancers?
The magician shook his head negatively. It’s just that all the souls of the resurrected are forever blindly loyal to the owner, and they return to the Kingdom of the Dead as soon as he frees them. Souls also leave when they spend several hours out of reach of their owners. After all, they draw all the energy for life from the necromancer. The further away he is, the weaker his aura is felt. The instinct of self-preservation forces those called to be closer to the owner, but anything can happen.
