The Mist and the Lightning. Part VI

And I want you to feel how it feels to be naked, blinded, a toy in the wrong hands!

At that moment, it seemed to Lis that Nikto wanted to object, wanted to say something. He only opened his mouth, preparing to make a sound, as Lis screamed at him, he remembered his scream. It seemed to him that if Nikto said anything, he would begin to explain, justify or deny, generally blabber him, and Lis would not do what he intended. And he was used to doing what was intended.

Lis taped his mouth, hastily, rudely, furiously, in several layers. Ninto didn’t resist. Absolutely. Like when they painted arrows on his eyes and wrote “Arel’s Litter” on his forehead. Probably, Nikto found some perverse pleasure giving his human body to be torn to pieces. That is what Lis thought, thought already later, when he was trying to analyze all these inadequate and not logical actions of Nikto, who allowed to do all kinds of vile things with his body without feeling like neither a sense of humiliation nor a sense of fear, as if he himself hated it and wanted to destroy it. In Nikto there was strength and dignity, and at the same time

it was not. Absolutely. Lis didn’t understand this. It was another mystery.

It still seemed to Lis that at such moments Nikto was a human being. A human taking revenge. Destroying himself in revenge. Was it pleasant for a demon to return to a fucked body? Or even be there at the same time. These were funny thoughts. However, later the opposite, not so funny thoughts came to his mind. It is possible that it was not at all that man took revenge on the demon, but quite the opposite. Forcing the body to be submissive, the demon thus punished and asserted his authority. In this case, Arel and now Lis were “raising” Nikto in the best possible way. Well, “daddy” should be pleased.

Then Lis taped Nikto’s eyes. He asked how Nikto felt, was it pleasant? And spreading his legs wide, holding his knees, he fucked him for the first time the way Arel could fuck, without turning his partner on his stomach. Fucked with some indescribable pleasure and animal

desire, knowing that Nikto couldn’t see the expression on his face, and

experiencing relief from this. Relaxing, throwing away the eternal contemptuous expression on his face – his mask, he gasped for air and closed his eyes as an orgasm covered him with a wave. After waiting a second, he immediately continued, not allowing his cock to rest and fall. Trying to get an orgasm after an orgasm. It seemed to him that all his sperm had long ended, or it was actually so. But he had this tickling feeling in the head of the penis, some crazy pleasure, the desire to feel this trembling of pleasure again and again, reaching the tips of the toes and bringing them to a cramp. More and more, like a horse jumping over a barrier after a barrier. And at that moment, when he takes the barrier… Lis seems to have begun to understand the meaning of the word – ecstasy. He watched his cock go back and forth; he looked fearlessly

into Nikto’s face, not fearing the mocking glance of his icy eyes anymore. Blind and dumb. With such Nikto it was easier for him. He wondered what Arel would have told him if he had seen them? This thought alone made Lis come to an end. He imagined how Arel would enter the room and see this. His Nikto … his mouth is sealed, and instead of his eyes… Nikto will lose half his eyelashes, Lis spared his eyebrows by sticking the tape a little lower. But it will still hurt… to tear off glue from the delicate skin of the eyelids. Lis imagined how the half-blood marks in the lip of Nikto would stick to the patch, clinging to it. It will

be difficult. He’ll have to be careful not to tear his lip. If Arel saw it all! If he saw how he mutilated his Nik. Oh, that would be great! But only at the first moment. Then quarrel and hysteria of Arel would begin, and Lis didn’t want it at all. But nobody could forbid him to dream about the

first reaction of Arel.

The Lis saw that Nikto’s dick was erect, and this amused his pride. He graciously allowed him to, at some point, grab his hand on his tattooed organ, and finish. Cum because Lis himself fucked him. Great and terrible! Lis was drunk and therefore surpassed himself. He would have wiped Nikto until blood, if Nikto had not been such a used whore, and if Lis had not come straight into him. But he liked to finish into him, then let his sperm squish inside. His dick whipped it in the foam, like

egg white. He continued this act for as long as he could. Probably Nikto was satisfied. And if he could, he would thank him, Lis.

Then Lis left, not saying a word and not tearing off the patch. Let him do it himself, or wait for Arel. Nikto’s hands were free, and Lis was a little warped only by one small spoonful of tar in a barrel of honey. For all this time, Nikto hasn’t touched Lis. Yes, his cock was horny and he came. But Nikto never hugged Lis.

Lis drove these thoughts away. He wanted revenge, and he took revenge. What else is needed? Why would he hug him!

He gave himself a vow to no longer think about Nikto, not even look in his direction.

Nikto didn’t take any initiative either. As if nothing had happened. Arel hugged him, Arel talked to him. He sat at Arel’s feet, and laid a shaggy head on his lap. And he did not look at Lis. Why did he need Lis?!

And Lis didn’t know, simply didn’t know how to eradicate these thoughts from his consciousness, how to stop thinking about him.

Come again, just talk? What a stupid excuse! With such an excuse you cannot deceive even yourself, even if you really want to be deceived. Lis was disgusting to himself, he convinced himself that he was simply ridiculous. No, of course, it was not love! Not even sympathy! Unrequited feelings? Excluded! Just… Just, he wanted… He wanted Nikto to knock on his door the same way that Lis knocked on that ill-fated evening to him.

He wanted Nikto to come to him. Maybe for revenge. Never mind. Then Lis would have recouped! He would just throw Nikto out. Why does he need this… this misunderstanding, subhuman, let Arel continue to mess with him. But Lis would not even listen to him, he would immediately point to the door. It may even be polite. Polite and indifferent.

But Nikto didn’t come. In waking life.

He began to come into his dreams. And it was completely terrible.

A thin stream of cold rusty water banged against the bottom of an old iron bath. Probably, only Lis in the rooms still had some semblance of a water supply. Uncomfortably bent, and putting the back of the head and crown under this stream, Lis rubbed and rubbed his hair, soaping and washing off again and again. The crooked-footed bathtub, once polished to a shine, had long been rusty. The rust was ginger and the

trickle of water was ginger. Only Lis’ hair, no matter how hard he tried, never acquired its original shade.

Lis scolded himself again. Feeling sick and having a hard sleep knocked him out of the rut. This, of course, no one saw, but he was ashamed of this weakness even before himself. Now he will put himself in order, put on his face his usual mask of arrogant contempt, and not Arel, nor Enriki, nor anyone else, will ever guess what is really happening to him.

Now he will go to Nikto and tell him everything! Everything that he thinks about him. He will achieve recognition. Let Nikto explain to him whom Lis was fucking, a demon or a human, and who Nikto is, a demon or a human. And why all that was between them. Why was all this? Let him explain. Why did he do this, why did he allow it, and what does he want.

And what does Lis want? And Lis understood that he was afraid to answer this question even to himself, and this feeling of weakness infuriated him and made him angrier more than everything else taken together.

And he also understood that he didn’t have to go to Nikto, no way! And he could not help but go.

Chapter four

Visiting

Lis was walking down the hall when he saw Tol. Involuntarily Lis pulled himself together, looking around, however, he immediately relaxed. Firstly, there was absolutely nowhere to hide in an empty and straight corridor. It was too late to look for the unlocked door. Secondly, Lis even wanted to meet someone who could distract him from these endless exhausting thoughts. Of course, the very last he wanted to meet this morning was Tol. But he didn’t have to choose. Tol could distract him. Hold up. Get lost in thought. Yes, anything just to prevent Lis from reaching where he was heading. And it was a chance.

Seeing Lis, Tol sincerely rejoiced, waved his hands so that he stopped and waited for him. And Lis stopped. And already for this he was grateful to the idiot Tol, and was ready to listen to his next nonsense.

“I brought the meat!” Tol cried joyfully, from afar. Spreading hands, as if wanting to hug Lis, grab him, like welcoming a friend. Lis recoiled, rather abruptly. Tol obediently stopped, and stood in front of Lis as if rooted to the spot, shining with his narrow deep-set eyes. One eye is brown, and the iris of the second is half brown and half green.

“I brought the meat,” he repeated joyfully.

Lis didn't give a damn about the meat. He didn’t understand what this moron was talking about to him. He didn’t give a shit about meat and Tol, and generally about everything except… And Lis asked:

“What kind of meat?” In the soul he was cursing Tol and thanking him at the same time.

“Meat for barbecue!”

“I see, get the hell out of here,” Lis thought, and said: “Where did you get it?”

“The owner of Backara gave it to me! After all, today is a holiday, do you know?!”

Yes, yes, Lis was in the know of some regular religious holiday of “blacks”, “Spring Day” or “Day of some sacred tree”, or “Some kind of a motherfucker day”. There is only one meaning, endless sacrifices and donations to temples, and universal blessed fun. Lis didn't give a shit.

“Yes, of course I’m in the know.”

“Well! How many times have I asked Arel! The weather is warm! We must get out, if not to the river, so at least sit in the garden. Fry meat!”

Yes, Lis remembered it, Tol has been mumbling about it to Arel for the past week. Arel sent him to hell. And he did it right. Tol generally needs only to be sent to hell. “Tol, fuck you!”

“Do you want me to help you persuade Arel?”

“No!” Tol rejoiced. “I have already persuaded him! He allowed everything! Tonight we will have a barbecue! I already ordered the cook and servants to pickle it in the kitchen!”

“But won’t they themselves devour it?”

Tol looked at Lis a little surprised, then laughed: “Good joke!”

“Do you think they will not eat it? What a joke! Or now only human meat should be given to them? Legs of beautiful young girls…”

“And what kind of meat?”

“Lamb! Lamb, still very young!” Tol sincerely rejoiced and answered Lis, not noticing either his sour appearance or his absent glance. He believed that Lis was really interested. It just could not be not interesting! And no matter what Lis was a narcissistic and arrogant type, not seeing anything around, except for his beloved person, THIS should have been interesting even to him. Tol didn’t doubt it.

“Lamb?” “Yes!”

“And legs too?”

“Legs?! No, why the legs! Al! You don’t understand anything in barbecue, legs don’t go for barbecue. Legs are possible if only in aspic…”

And Tol delved into the subject. And Lis stood and thought that only Tol, and only between them, calls him Al. Shortens his surname – Alis. Because they are paired. Because he insures Lis in battle. Covers him. And sometimes she shouts loudly and quickly to him during a fight. Apparently “Al” is easier for him to shout out than “Lis” or “Alis”.

“Al, right!”, “Al, how are you ?!” “Like shit, my dear Tol. Like shit.”

Tol has already completed an excursion into the jungle of cooking, and now he was staring at Lis, he was surprised that he never interrupted him and didn’t tell him to fuck off. But the truth was that somehow he

quickly finished, he could have screwed longer. And Lis would have listened, stand there. Damn, Tol can’t even say anything long and tedious, well, what a blockhead! What to ask?!

“And the weather is not very good, Tol, it seems like it’s going to start raining?”

“It is going to, but it hasn’t started! And when it start, nobody knows! It’s normal weather! Don’t worry! Everything will be just at its best! Listen up!”

And Tol still grabbed him, hugging with one hand:

“I'll tell you such a thing now! About Lila! By the way, I invited her! We can arrange a really good time this night! Come, come to my place, I’ll tell you everything now! This is something!.. You just get fucked when you find out!”

“He was not even surprised that I was going after him,” thought Lis, doomed, “he considers me his friend. And judging by how all this is offered to me, he considers me his equal. Congratulations, Al!” Lis grinned bitterly.

He didn’t want to go to Tol and listen to some dubious vulgarities about Lila, he didn’t want to. But even more he didn’t want to go to him… Well, of the two evils, as you know, they usually choose the lesser.

Asa only grunted when she saw them on the threshold. Her next puppy, barked and rushed around. Lis realized that she, unlike Tol, noticed changes in his appearance. Noticed and appreciated.

“You look good!” She said, in “black” language, with a terrifying accent. In her performance, it sounded like: "You rook grood." Why do they always add these damn “g” and “shh”! Soft sounds don’t seem to exist at all for them. Vowels are also a problem.

Asa sat down by the mirror to preen. Well, at least she understands what kind of guest made them happy with his presence. Tol thundered with bottles, and at the same time with no less enthusiasm, as if he had just not told Lis, he began to share his stunning news with Asa:

“It will be an unbelievably tasty barbecue! You will swallow your tongue! I ordered to add to the pickle…”

“To the marinade, moron!”

“Can you imagine how fucking great it will turn out! Real jam!”

Lis sat in an armchair. Pictures of naked girls were hung on the walls in Tol’s room (on one of the pictures, the girls washed themselves in a bathhouse – and very naturalistically). Over the table hung a cheap

portrait of Jazmina, a singer popular in the “Lower”, bought at the fair. And above the fireplace, there were framed sheets with clever sayings:

“In the bowels of black, tri-color is born – black, white and red!” “Only black is true color, and the rest origin from it!”

Further, the logical conclusion followed that the “blacks” were the true progenitors of all mankind. Probably such “true blacks” as Arel. At first there were only them. And only then, from them, “whites” appeared, or rather, according to the logic of the writer, “whites” are the same “blacks”, only in a slightly different guise. They are “blacks” who have moved to the upper sublevel. And only then… only then the “reds" were born the very last.

They told him shit like that at a military school. Lis remembered that. They were raising the patriotic spirit of future warriors. “Blacks” are a chosen race,

“whites” are so-so, but “reds” is just a burp. Gods! What is he doing here?! Why is sitting here, barked by a fucking dog, and doesn’t leave? Lis knew why.

Tol set a tall crystal glass in front of him and poured wine. Lis really wanted to take him by the hair, because Tol’s tail, despite shaved temples, was two Lis’ arms and waist length, and to muzzle him on the tabletop.

Asa languidly approached the table to clink glasses with them too. Lis wanted to hit her no less.

They drank. Everything at once. Neither Tol nor Asa knew how to drink in sips, savoring the taste, and Lis didn’t want to. He was now not in time to enjoy the bouquet. He wanted to get drunk and fall asleep until the evening. Until these fucking lamb barbecues. He was sure that Nikto would be there all the time with Arel, and Lis would not have a chance. And this is good.

Tol immediately poured again. The wine was not sweet. Tol knew what kind of wine to pour to his friend, and Lis was at least a little pleased.

He nodded toward the puppy: “What’s this?”

“My dog!” answered Asa proudly.

Yes, she obviously already pretty well learned to chatter in “black”

language.

“Can you make it shut up?” “Bushuy! Bushuy, lie down!”

“Gods! Why Tol? Why did he meet Tol this morning!”

Bushuy lay in a basket and began to tear something violently there.

“And I told him: “Fuck, Arel! There is such weather, you have to get out of the hole in the end! And he told me: “Where are you going to take the meat? Are you going to hunt for meat?” And I already got it in “Backara”…”

Lis read the following saying:

“Believe in God's purpose! God hurts us to save! ” Something new.

“Tol?”

“I say… it will not rain. And he… Yes?” “What's this?”

“Where?” Tol looked at the wall as if he had seen it for the first time in his life:

“Ah, that! This is a great thing! Lila gave it to me! And yet…” Tol with his inherent impulsiveness began to run around the room, scattering things.

“Asa! Where are the “Words of God”!”

Esa finished the wine, put the glass on the table and wiped her lips with a sleeve.

Tol cried out, trying to drown out the rumble from the collapsed arms rack:

“And Lila! Listen up. I wanted to tell you about Lila! We tumbled with her this way…” Tol froze. “It was a threesome.”

He started running again:

“Me, Asa and her.” She and Asa were doing such things!” He froze again, looking in the corner with a basket.

“Damn! Damn! Damn!” Jumping to the puppy, Tol pulled from his mouth a chewed parchment.

“Look!”

He joyfully thrust the “Word of God”, which was in the dog’s saliva, under Lis’ nose.

“And I will give you a new heart. And I will give you a new spirit. And I

will take from the flesh your heart of stone and give you the heart…”

Lis could not read what heart it was promised to give them, the ending was irretrievably lost in the stomach of the dog.

Tol was looking at Lis with enthusiasm:

“She’ll come to barbecue today. She has promised! Do you want to arrange the foursome, to look what the girls will be doing?”

“Do I look like an idiot? Why does he think that I can be offered this?”

“Drink!” Asa irritably shoved Tol into the stomach with a glass poured to the brim. She was unhappy with the prolonged gap between the first and second, or the third drink.

“At least one sensible thought!” Lis drank in one gulp. He was still not getting drunk. He still wanted to leave.

“Do you want Asa?” Suddenly suggested Tol, casting the dictum away from himself. He was absolutely sincere in his impulse of hospitality.

And Asa smiled at Lis. She smiled beautifully, feminine. Lis really wanted to leave…

“I want her!”

“That's it! And when Lila arrives, she will start such tricks… By the way, you have already nagged her. Have you noticed how crazy she is?”

Asa sat down on Lis’ knees and stroked his hair: “Red,” she said.

“Yes, dear, fucking red. And the “reds”, as you know, are the most crappy race. They have a rotten gut, so they say.”

She leaned toward his mouth. Lis answered her kiss, it was better than…

He lifted Asa in his arms and went to the bed, threw her at the bed. Asa immediately knocked him over.

They tumbled for a long time, Lis felt excited, but couldn’t cum, no matter how he tried. Tol drank wine and didn’t intervene, watching them with a pleased grin, as if anticipating the coming unforgettable evening.

Asa also seems very impressed. She was sitting on top of him now, and galloping, galloping, galloping… And Lis’ horse was galloping. On flat terrain. Without any barriers.

He looked at her tattoos. Beautiful. A little darker than her dark skin, with swirling patterns. He recognized familiar themes in these interweaving. They mean something. Some are like those… this monogram on the thigh, slightly convex like that of…

And Lis timidly ran his hand over her tattooed thigh. He felt irregularities, light bulges of the picture, where the skin was apparently pierced deeper than necessary. Ahhh…

Satisfied, Asa fell off to the side. Tol stood at the foot of the bed, holding the puppy on its hind legs. The puppy twisted frantically, bending and trying to bite Tol’s fingers. He was too round and pot- bellied to get what he wanted.

“You know, Lis,” said Tol, not paying attention to the dog trying to get out, “I’ll tell you as my best friend! When you're not showing off, you're so cool!”

Arel sat on the bed:

“My stomach hurts,” he said plaintively.

“What's wrong with your stomach?” Nikto asked aloof, he was looking for something in his bag and it seemed he couldn’t find it.

Outside the window, a windy but clear spring day began.

“It hurts, awful. Maybe the stomach, I don’t know… And the same thing yesterday! What should I do?”

“Smoke and everything will pass.” “Make me a smoke, Nick.”

“And “hard” does not suit you?”

“I love grass more. I like “hard” less. It’s you who likes “hard”.”

“Okay, now… wait…” Nikto stopped rummaging in his bag, went to the table and poured some grass on a sheet of paper.

“Hey?! What are you doing there? Nik, I think this is some important document. Are you going to tear it up?”

“I will just pin on it and that’s it. I am not going to tear anything.”

“Well, pin it… Arel tightened again, hugging his long-suffering belly with both hands. “Or maybe…” he began timidly after a while.

“No.”

Arel sighed heavily.

Nikto laughed, bowing his head over the paper and reading it: “Twelve days, three hours.”

“What?”

“This paper. Document,” Nikto handed it to Arel. Arel indifferently took the sheet:

“Ahhhh…” he said, “it was Enriki who gave me that. The decree. He grunted scornfully. Those freaks imposed a fine!”

“You’re taking time, it’s dangerous.” Arel cocked his head:

“What do you suggest?! To give you away?!” He asked in exasperation. Nikto looked down, handing Arel a clogged cigarette:

“Hold on.”

Arel literally snatched it from Nikto’s fingers.

“Why did they set such a deadline?” Nikto asked. “Why such strange numbers, twelve days, three hours?”

Arel blew smoke, and handed the jamb back to Nikto: “Will you?”

Nikto nodded.

“They are morons,” Arel continued, “for me their stupid orders mean nothing. Twelve days, thirteen days, a week. I don’t give a shit… shi-i-i- t…”

“It just sounds so cool – twelve days, three hours, they should have written twelve minutes, three seconds!”

“Yes, fucked up,” agreed Arel, taking the cigarette again and taking a deep drag.

“They first demanded for a week or something,” he continued after a while, when he blew smoke. “Then they realized that it was pointless, they wrote this demand. Knowing fully well that this was pointless. They just supposedly do everything according to the law. First warning, second, third. Then a fine.”

“And what next is the law? Nikto asked. “When these twelve days end?” “Next? Guard is next, Nik…”

Nikto shook his head.

“I have a finale in the “Lower” Coliseum.” “I know.”

“It sucks…” Nikto returned to his bag.

“It’s jamming me so much, oh!” Arel leaned back on the pillows. He crouched into a lump, and covered himself with a blanket:

“Why is shit always happening to me, Nik? Will you explain me? Why am I always a laughing stock? Why do stories go about me, not you, not Lis, not Enriki, it’s me who always gets into a stupid position!”

“Don’t talk nonsense, you are just high a little, that's all.”

“Aha! And why didn’t they manage to comb out my horse properly? All combed out, and mine skims like cattle!”