Читать книгу Werecat Choice - Enrike Fluence - Страница 5

There was a knock on the door. Marianne’s heart sank into her heels.

“Jacob is back!”

Marianne was confused. Now he is trapped. This time, nothing will distract Jacob. Then he will kill Marianne. The knock was repeated. And oddly enough, now at its sound it became easier. The ghost would pass freely through the door. Marianne dared to come closer. Someone pushed the door, then the words were heard:

– Open it! Let me in, please!

“A living person”.

Tired quiet voice. Marianne opened. A stranger wrapped in a fur coat quickly entered the house. He closed the door behind him, took off his hood and exhaled heavily.

– Uh-uh, finally warm!

He threw off his burden and sat down by the hearth to warm his hands. He had a short beard and bushy eyebrows. He looked Marianne up and down and said:

– Didn’t expect to meet anyone here. – Then he looked around the room and continued: – My name is Viator. And you? How did you get here?

– I’m Marianne… strayed from my class.

– Well, you look like a student. – Viator looked at Marianne’s jacket. – Are you alone here? – asked the guest, making sure that there was no one else in the room.

– Yes…

Viator was thinking about something. Marianne asked:

– Are you a hunter?

– Am I a hunter? – Viator almost laughed. – You can say so. Better tell me: how did you get off your own? And where are those of yours? Do they walk anywhere nearby?

– No. I’m lost, “Marianne said partially. Then he wondered what else to answer? Can’t he say that he has a “hidden beast” in his blood? Viator gave Marianne a displeased glance.

– My class and I went on a hike, and on the way back I fell behind. And then he fell off the hill. I went to this house by rail.

– On a hike? – asked Viator. – Nobody has been here for a long time. Especially on hikes. And how did you fall?

– I went to the edge of the mountain and stumbled. I was washed down by an avalanche.

– Yes, it happens. And what kind of school?

– Saint Elvis. I recently entered there.

Viator nodded.

– Yes, there is one. She’s a little south of here. I heard that the disciples there are called “saints”. And yet it’s just wonderful that you got here.

Marianne had never heard anyone call him or another student “saint.” It seemed to him that this was an unflattering nickname, and he looked at Viator in surprise.

– Wild lands here. You could freeze to death. … Well, I’ll help you.

Viator looked around and went to the chest in the corner. He put his backpack down next to him and began examining the insides of the old chest. Marianne hesitated, and then asked a question that was tearing him to pieces from the inside, although he felt that it was better not to ask:

– How did you end up here? Are you hunting here?

Viator chuckled to himself again. Marianne was embarrassed, and he decided not to say anything more. At least until the morning.

– I’m lost too. Just like you, – Viator smiled at his joke. – I walked with a friend to the east. We wanted to get to Esterby. His brother lives there. But they quarreled as soon as possible, and parted. I chose to walk along the railroad. And he – directly through the forest. Here’s a story. Now you can’t tell who was right. I’ll have to spend the night here with you. And he is probably already in Esterby. Sleeps, snores in a warm bed, my old friend. Like this!

Viator slammed the lid on the chest. Noticing Marianne’s questioning look, he explained:

– I left something here. Last time.

Then he fixed his gaze on Marianne’s backpack. Viator’s eyebrows came together on the bridge of his nose. He walked thoughtfully to the hearth, sat down by the fire and began to put logs. His face, lit by flames from below, looked stern and hard.

Marianne saw that Mignis was no longer on the bench. Looking more closely, he noticed her under the bench. She diligently dragged the woolen mitten into her burrow.

Marianne called out to her, but stopped short. He didn’t want Viator to see her. The man stared inquiringly at Marianne. Mignis disappeared into the shadows, leaving her mitten behind. Of course, she will come back for her.

– And how did you go hiking without snowshoes? – suddenly asked Viator.

Marianne shrugged.

“Lost,” he thought quickly.

– You are probably already looking for? – Viator took the phone out of his pocket and looked at the screen.

– I could tell who needs to, call the school, but there is no network. There is no signal at all in this area. Nowhere. Wow, it’s almost midnight. – Tomorrow I’ll show you the way. Don’t worry, go back to your school. Go to bed now. I’ll settle down on the bench. Not against?

Marianne settled down near the hearth. It’s warmer here than anywhere else in the house, he thought. Having warmed up by the fire, he felt an overwhelming weakness. Thoughts were confused, eyes closed themselves, the crackling of wood in the hearth soothed.

“And what tomorrow? Walk a little south until this Viator disappears, and then immediately north?”

Through sleep, Marianne felt someone nearby, a careful rustle and fuss. Something touched my ear. But the young man did not pay attention to it. “Mignis, I guess.”

Suddenly the dream washed away. Through the veil of slumber, Marianne heard a muffled exclamation, full of fear and horror. A yellow flash before his eyes seemed to burn his eyebrows. A strip of steel from a long knife blade flashed overhead. An indistinct black figure hovered in the air. And at the same instant fell on him. Marianne leaned to the side. The knife hit the floor where Marianne’s head had been a second ago. Ragged breathing smelled in my face.

A new acquaintance attacked him. Marianne covered himself with his hands, preparing to reflect the next blow, but Viator only managed to swing his knife.

A shadow slid from under the table. A wide, shapeless and dense haze, from which the hair fluttered as if from the wind. She crashed into Viator’s figure, and he crashed to the floor. Then she dragged him to the corner of the room. There were screams of terror and the noise of a struggle. Viator frantically waved his knife, trying to wound the ghost, trying to get up, to break out of the mortal grip. But Jacob was much stronger. He pushed Viator to the floor and sat astride him.

Marianne jumped up, throwing things that fell under his feet, and drew away from the fighting.

Suddenly, Jacob’s shaggy figure rose to the ceiling, while the ghost wheezed in a low, terrible voice, and once again fell upon its victim. Viator died down. A faint groan of exhaustion completed the cacophony. Jacob slowly, not paying attention to his victim and not noticing the frightened Marianne, slipped through the wall. In his hand, Marianne made out an ax.

For a minute, Marianne stood still, recovering. Then he moved slowly towards the shapeless figure in the corner.

– He is dead? He asked barely audibly. He took a step towards the body, which was sprawled on the floor, and noticed that blood was slowly spreading across the floor. I did not dare to come closer. He knew he couldn’t help. And Marianne felt sorry for Viator, despite the fact that he tried to kill him in his sleep.

– If not for Jacob, Viator would have killed me, – whispered bitterly in Marianne’s voice, after thinking a little. And then he turned around.

“Where is Mignis?”

“If you hadn’t fallen asleep so soundly, you would not have killed,” came the voice of the mouse. – I tried to wake you up. Yes, it’s good that Yakov was under the table all this time. I didn’t like this “hunter” right away.

– He saved me? Marianne marveled, not entirely sure what had happened. – It turns out that Yakov saved my life?!

Mignis crept slowly from under the bench.

– He took a picture of you.

– What? – did not understand Marianne. Mignis was looking not at Viator’s immobilized body, but at a rectangular object nearby.

Marianne approached cautiously, recognizing the familiar outline.

Marianne picked up the phone from the floor. Password protected. Graphic key, standard lock screen. Marianne ran his thumb across the screen, connecting the dots with lines to form the letter O. Nothing happened.

“I don’t know the key,” Marianne said.

Mignis ran to his leg and squeaked:

– Give me.

Marianne put the useless device in front of the mouse and turned it to face her, not understanding why and following Mignis with interest. “What’s the use of this? She doesn’t know how to use a telephone, can she?

Mignis touched the screen with her small paw and slowly traced it over it, forming a “Z” shape. At the same time, she had to climb over the phone twice on outstretched legs, which looked very funny. The lock screen went out, and the application icons appeared on the background of a bright picture of the sea and clouds.

– Wow! – Marianne sincerely admired. He fell on his knees in front of the mouse and looked at the phone. – Mignis, you are a miracle!

– Come on, – Mignis was shy, but was very pleased with the praise. – I saw how he ran his finger across the screen.

Marianne touched the middle of the touchscreen and brought up the downloaded app. A white and yellow picture with lines of different thickness opened.

– It’s a map! – The scale was too large to understand what kind of terrain. – There’s a marker here. Goal. Yes exactly. Look, here are the coordinates displayed. Marianne pointed to the corner of the screen. – The phone is receiving GPS signals. Navigation software. I have one on my phone. Hmm, looks like a laid out route. This line shows the path traveled. This point in the center is the current position of the phone. Yes exactly. This line is a railroad. So this is our home. It is not on the map.

Marianne was silent for a short while, then said:

– The target on the map matches our position. It turns out that he was heading here. This place is the goal of his path. And he was talking about Esterby.

“Look closely,” said Mignis. Marianne tilted his head to the side. “What else is there? The map is unmarked, there are no names nearby.”

“Viator told you he was heading east. East is on the right side of the map. He came from the east. And he walked west.

Marianne quickly zoomed in on the map. Mignis was right. Viator came from the southeast. And the starting point of the path also did not have any settlement nearby.

Marianne sat down on the floor and thought. “Viator lied about Esterbi! What for? What did he want here?”

“He also talked about his friend,” Mignis said. A sense of renewed unease swept over Marianne.

“Of course, Viator could not be alone!”

– Right, I also don’t like Viator and what he told me. Marianne looked around the room. The lamp did not burn, the hearth was almost extinguished. The backpack is in the same place.

– I have to get out of here! – Marianne perked up. He had long forgotten about the photograph he wanted to find on his phone. He didn’t like this house any more.

– How far are you going? Mignis asked with a plaintive note in her voice. – Take me with you.

Marianne stared at the mouse. This thought did not occur to him, although he did not want to part with Mignis. She was the complete opposite of the gloomy house and became a friend in the last hours.

– Of course, with joy! – blurted out Marianne and smiled at Mignis.

– I’m hungry and cold here. Let me out in the first warm house. And even better – in a hotel or in a tavern. Or wherever you want. I’m not demanding at all … – said the mouse quickly, as if Marianne was trying to persuade.

He nodded, wondering where to put the mouse.

“Shouldn’t I put it in a backpack?”

But Mignis was already climbing up Marianne’s clothes with her tenacious paws. He pressed his head into the collar as it climbed onto his shoulder. Then Mignis went down to her breast pocket, opened the valve with her nose, and climbed inside. Marianne listened, expecting what would happen next. Inside the pocket, Mignis seemed to be digging with her paws or biting something. The fabric twitched. Then a small hole formed at the bottom, in which a mouse nose appeared for a second and then disappeared. “Mignis can look outward through such a hole with only one eye,” Marianne estimated when the mouse looked out of his pocket.

“Don’t forget the mitten,” she squeaked and disappeared into her new hiding place.

A mitten lay in the middle of the room.

Stepping to the door, Marianne touched something with her foot. The object bounced off and rang across the floor. Viator’s Knife. The young man recognized him with disgust. But then he decided that the knife in the forest was a useful thing, and he picked it up. And from Viator’s belongings, Marianne took snowshoes with him.