Perfil de Egreso

When Methodius, Julitta, and Ares departed on Paulus’ rumbling coach and Bolshaya Dmitrovka again was immersed in the cobweb of a warm Moscow night, Daphne returned to the residence of Gloom. This was the first occasion when she dared to enter there alone. The rune at the entrance started to glimmer in investigation, as if wavering in its decision, and nevertheless let her past. Daph experienced anxiety. For several days already she had not materialized her wings. She did not do this partly because there was nowhere to fly and partly because she felt that there were more dark feathers on them.

Depressiac coolly marched beside her. The flickering flames of the candles were reflected in its convex pupils. Occasionally the cat flopped to the floor and licked its left front paw with such diligence, as if it had not tended to it for around two weeks already.

Meanwhile it had licked the same paw only a minute ago. The rest of the paws for some reason did not enjoy such popularity with it. At the most — it remembered them once a month. Having finished licking, Depressiac jumped onto Julitta’s table, whisked onto the floor a couple of forgotten parchments with denunciations and stretched itself out between the inkpot and the large press of Gloom, used for prolonging the registrations of succubae and agents.

“Well, I’ll be!” Daph thought. “They hide nothing from me! No secrets! Take, but I don’t want to! Espionage under such conditions is simply uninteresting!” She approached the table, looked at the press, stretched out her hand, and clearly perceived that she should on no account touched it. Any material thing has its… no, not aura, people have aura… a thing, if we look at it with true sight, has a certain outline — benevolent, neutral or, on the contrary, secretly hostile. For example, a good bread, dry bread, and poisoned bread have three completely different true outlines, three imprints in existence, even if outwardly there is nothing distinguishing. However, the press of Gloom had no outline at all. A chasm. A black hole. The tear on the rags of existence, under which there were only death and Tartarus, was haphazardly darned with thick threads.

Daph walked away from the table and glanced into the partially opened door of Ares’

office. There she met an unexpected void, as if Ares, departing, had taken away together with himself the true essence of everything that surrounded him. Only a draft was rolling white flakes of dust along the floor. The parquet was rotten, fallen through. With great difficulty again tuned in to the previous sight — here something did not let her — Daph saw Ares’ armchair and next to it on the table the two cases with the swords. One was Ares’, the other — Methodius’. A dense ring of darkness surrounded both swords. To touch them meant to doom oneself to a service to Gloom. Daph’s flute emitted by itself a thin, sorrowful sound.

Daph returned to reception. In the corner grown white were several marble antique statues among those never found by moronoids in the ruins of Pompeii. On one of them, the nose was broken off by a pistol shot. Julitta probably was not pleased with herself in the mirror again today.

“Somehow everything is stupid!” Daph thought. “I was bored in the Garden of Eden.

All the time they looked at me as at an improper guard. Now I must look after Methodius, although Troil, giving me this order, was himself clearly under the influence of an

artefact of Gloom. And as long as the entire matter is in the artefact, it turns out, Gloom ordered me to look after Methodius? Hmm… Then why did the Transparent Spheres, which are guardians to the guards, take me under their patronage? Everything somehow is indeed entangled, contradictory… Were I, let’s say, thirty thousand years old, I, perhaps, would figure it out. But here all of some thirteen thousand! Poor me, unlucky person, who has no power! And I won’t fall in love with Buslaev, let him not hope! He would have to be at least fifteen-sixteen thousand… True, he looks grown-up nevertheless … Darn it! I’m not thinking about that again!”

In the small room behind the flimsy door, Ares’ crow was walking along the back of the sofa and muttering something. Daph stopped outside and, after opening the door slightly, listened. “After death the soul wanders in the labyrinth of those sins, in whose cobweb it got entangled during life. Gloom creates evil in the world by means of people.

Fishes do not know what water is, since they only live in the water and nothing else. Your enemy will render you harm, hater will repay badly, but incomparably miserable evil will bring you an erroneous thought…” the crow growled.

Daph glanced at it in the nook. The crow looked askance with a round eye at her, turned to the other direction and, after suddenly pulling one of the few remaining feathers from a wing grown bare, threw it at Daph. Daphne squatted down, looking at the feather and thinking what this could mean. The feather was lacklustre, with edges torn off and…

absolutely black. Daph became terrified. At that moment, she even wanted Depressiac to break the neck of the mocking bird. Having read her thoughts, the crow hurriedly flew into the cage. Must be, its own wizened body still presented some value to it. “If there is no power to start and distribute a light, then at least don’t block it,” it uttered with reproach. Whether it was a quotation or its own words, Daph did not understand.

Unexpectedly Depressiac started to hiss and arch its back. Daphne looked around. The cat’s eyes were looking at the wall. Daphne concentrated, her consciousness slipped through the stone, saw what the cat saw, and, stumbling, she hurried outside. After finding herself under the grid, she rapidly began to clamber up along the scaffolding, rattling the iron stairs. On the fourth level of the scaffolding, Essiorh was sitting at a safe distance from the identifying runes. In the hands of the guard-keeper were a can of beer and a stick of smoked sausage, from which he decisively bit off with his strong teeth.

Daphne stopped in confusion.

Essiorh raised martyred eyes to her. “Don’t be surprised! My body wants to eat and drink all the time. It still wants to fight with someone. Also almost constantly. But this isn’t the most terrible,” he complained. “What’s the most terrible?” Daph asked. The guard-keeper kicked the scaffolding using his heavy boots. “This is nightmarish… It talks with women!” he pronounced with horror. “So?” “What do you mean ‘So’? Women — there is a nightmare, they’re the ruin of any thinking essence. They’re hastily created from Adam’s rib. This is intolerable! And they still need help all the time.” “Everyone needs help. Me for example,” Daph said philosophically.

Essiorh waved his hands indignantly and with the sausage made a chopping motion, such as a gladiator makes, terminating a devastated enemy with a hit into the split helmet.

“One of them addressed me today. She required urgent consultation. She feigned such helplessness! Oh women, oh deceit!” “What consultation?” “She asked where the trolley stop was.” “Well, you could answer,” answered Daph. She did not see a problem here.

“BUT THIS TOOK PLACE AT THE TROLLEY STOP! I immediately pointed out this

scandalous fact to her and advised her to be more attentive hence. It’s my obligation to be of assistance to someone close-by. And I walked further. But further the most terrible began.”

“What? She turned out to be a guard of Gloom in disguise?” “Worse. She caught up with me. She said that she had reconsidered waiting for the trolley and asked me to hold her bag for her. And again I couldn’t make up my mind to refuse.” Daph smiled. “But didn’t you know? Women cannot carry heavy bags.” “Heavy? She had quite a small bag.

Such a tiny leather bag, which even keys have to be shoved into! I carried her bag and did not raise my eyes, but she laughed loudly and for some reason attempted to tickle me!”

“Nightmare! You ran into a fruitcake!” Daph sympathized. Essiorh nodded. “I think so too. We walked, walked, and it was never-ending. But at the crossing I dropped the bag on the asphalt and ran away like a despised agent golden-wings are after. But this insolent daughter of Eve laughed loudly behind me! Oh, if I could return now directly to the Transparent Spheres and play the flute there! But, alas, it’s impossible! I cannot leave you without guardianship for a moment!”

Essiorh sadly gulped down beer and offered Daph the beer. “Want some?” he proposed.

“No. It seems, still early for thirteen thousand years,” refused Daphne. “Excuse me, I forgot. I’m terribly absent-minded. But sausage is okay for thirteen thousand years?” “Let me have the sausage!” Daphne sat down next to Essiorh on the scaffolding and dangled her legs. It was amusing: to sit with ones guard-keeper on scaffolding and munch on smoked sausage. The sausage was solid like a stump. Sensing that Daph was experiencing explicit difficulty, Essiorh extracted a knife from his jacket. Daph carefully pulled out the blade. It had a raptorial bend and a number of notches.

“A wicked knife. Here I didn’t think that a guard of Light could have one like this,”

Daph was astonished. “It’s not mine. It’s the biker’s knife,” the keeper said in justification. “Biker?” Daph did not understand. Essiorh leaned down and showed her the deep fresh scar on his neck. “There’re a couple more under the jacket,” he explained. “A scar? Where did you earn it?” The keeper smiled sadly. “Where do you think the terrestrial storage gets their bodies from?” “Well… eh-eh… I think that…” Daph started hesitantly. The truth was too terrible to state it simply.

Essiorh pitilessly nodded. “Quite right. The biker failed to follow the bend on the out-of-town highway… Since in life he had time to do a couple of good deeds, in particular, saving an old man from a burning garage that was full of tanks of gas, guards of Light collected his eidos… I installed myself in his body, which we revived and patched up.

The body, likely, didn’t even notice the substitution.” “Is that possible?” “Oh, you bet.

Bodies are very naive. Besides food, sleep, a roof overhead, and other small pleasures, they need very little. And although that fellow has been in the circles of Light for a long time and it’s good for him there, believe me, he left me a bundle of habits, basically harmful.”

Essiorh finished drinking the beer and mechanically flattened the can in his hand. Daph threw Depressiac the piece of sausage, which the cat swallowed in flight, and returned the knife to the keeper. “Listen, but all this is really sad. I pity the biker,” she said. “Me too,”

remarked Essiorh. “But, to judge by the highest standards, death is only terrible if the eidos falls into Gloom. The rest have the infinite path of Light in front of them. And our motorcyclist will speed along it on the best of motorcycles, which he couldn’t even have

dreamt of in this world. On a motorcycle with an engine that doesn’t overheat, oil doesn’t gush from all the holes, disks don’t chew up rubber, and brakes don’t jam.”

The keeper pensively looked at his empty hands. His face expressed regret that the beer was all gone. “And now the important thing. Are you ready for a serious conversation?”

he asked. Daph involuntarily looked around. Although on the scaffolding, nevertheless, they were in the territory of the residence of Gloom, and here even walls had ears.

“We’re not… well, you understand?” she asked. Essiorh edifyingly poked with a finger into his belt buckle in the form of a skeletal hand. “Do you see the rune in silver? This is the rune of temporary limitation. Unfortunately, it acquires power only once in a 24-hour period. From eleven in the evening to one in the morning, I don’t exist for any guard of Gloom and all the more for trifles like agents. Now it’s somewhere near twelve.

Understand the hint? The zone of action of the rune is exactly three metres.”

“Clear. So what secrets do we have?” Daph asked flippantly. “You can no longer remain in Glumovich’s high school. You must leave it immediately. Temporarily you’ll settle with Methodius’ relatives. It’s too obvious a place. They won’t begin to search there for you. Imagination simply won’t be enough.” “But why can’t I remain in the high school? Sort of boycott Uncle Glumovich and his stupid high school for fools?” she was astonished. “The problem isn’t Glumovich. It has become known to golden-wings that in this part of the city someone regularly uses Light magic. In other words, they cut a card, they comb house after house and can come unexpectedly into the school any minute. You indeed used magic, admit it.” “No.” “Recall!” Essiorh insisted. “Well… m-m-m… It seems I played the flute several times. But it’s not enough and only trifles. Yesterday and the day before. I thought if I use only a tiny bit of magic, they wouldn’t catch me in the act,” she said dejectedly. Daph felt like a complete idiot. Did she not indeed know that she must not? She knew. Nevertheless she was counting on the off chance. “Do you see, she thought! A turkey also thought that moronoids feed it only because it’s so beautiful,”

Essiorh said mockingly. “So?” “In any decent store you’ll find it in the meat department!

Moreover, take note, idealism comes completely free of charge.”

Daphne thought for a bit. “Why didn’t golden-wings seize me, if they caught the magic?” she asked. “First of all, they received the signal very recently. Secondly, it’s only a signal, which, together with other signals, stands in the queue for verification.

And, thirdly, fortunately for you, golden-wings are currently extremely occupied. They’re searching for something important…” The keeper waved his hand vaguely somewhere in the direction of the roofs.

Daph began to drum her fingers on her knee. “Listen, Essiorh! Transparent Spheres are higher than Eden, isn’t it so?” “Of course!” “And Eden listens to the opinion of Transparent Spheres!” “Per se.” “Excellent! Then why not you explain to golden-wings that I’m good and there’s no need to hunt me? So simple!” Essiorh shook his head. “No can do. Everything but this. The incident with Troil and the theft of the horn have made too much noise already. It has become a matter of honour for the majority of golden-wings to catch you.” “But it’s possible to tell them the truth!” “What truth? That you’re ours, Light?” “At least,” muttered Daph, after looking sideways at Depressiac’s jagged tail, with which it had already twice contrived to brush against her cheek. “And my cat is no brighter,” she thought.

“And now sort it out with your brain. If Light suddenly stops hunting for you, Gloom will immediately suspect something. It’s a mistake to think that Gloom doesn’t have its

spies in Eden. Alas, they do. Daph, pardon me, but to change anything for you isn’t in our power. You cannot return to Glumovich’s high school. You must live for a certain time with Zozo and Khavron.”

Daph sighed. “You’ve persuaded me. But as compensation you’re to tell me about the scroll, which everyone is searching for! Only I entreat you: don’t pretend that you’re not in the swim of things!” she proposed impudently. Essiorh scratched the bristle on his chin. “Okay, shake hands, although it’s also against the instructions… The Scroll is a neutral artefact. It can serve both Light and Gloom.” “Is such a thing really possible?”

Daph doubted. “Why not? Let’s say, a stick has no evil in itself, but it can easily serve evil. Possible to bring down nuts from a branch using a stick, and possible to knock someone on the head. Everything depends on the unruly conduct of the imagination.”

“Jolly imagination. But what does this have to do with the Scroll?”

“The Scroll of Desires, or to be more precise: the Scroll of Small Desires. The magician-alchemist Brugus invented it. A simple magician, take note, not a guard. In his own workshop, he produced thousands of such scrolls and established trade on the Skaredo Market. They were inexpensive, since they worked for the performance of foolish desires. To find lost keys, get rid of warts, make the neighbour’s dog hoarse for its annoying bark… In order to carry out the desire, it was enough to write it down on the scroll and throw it into the fire afterwards. The only condition: the logs had to be birch.

The scroll burned — the wish was fulfilled.”

“But they’re all trifles,” Daph said thoughtlessly. Essiorh looked at her reproachfully.

“They were trifles until a specific moment,” he spoke with authority. “Brugus was already in old age when he produced the only Scroll, on which he put the strengthening spell.

This spell doubled the simple magic of the Scroll every ten years and quadrupled every thirty years. He hid the Scroll in one of two boxes, protected by magic of Light, which were also made in his workshop, and, having told no one about this, he sent the boxes to wander in the moronoid world. They only learned about this a couple of weeks ago, when our clerks examined his records for their inclusion in the catalogue. And now think: in the past centuries the Scroll has acquired amazing magical power. If Tartarus will be the first to discover the box with the Scroll, we’ll find ourselves to be in a nightmarish position…

Recently it became known to us that one of the boxes was intercepted by Gloom, but, judging by everything, nothing turned out to be there. However, then the probability is higher that next time Gloom will be lucky. Indeed there remains all of one box!”

Daph hesitated. “Now I understand why our golden-wings are bustling so. It’s worthwhile for Gloom to write on the Scroll: ‘Bring down all Seven Heavens, cut them up with a jigsaw!’ And bang! — throw the Scroll into a bonfire with birch logs.” Essiorh looked with reproach at Daph. “My child, now I understand where you get dark feathers

Daph hesitated. “Now I understand why our golden-wings are bustling so. It’s worthwhile for Gloom to write on the Scroll: ‘Bring down all Seven Heavens, cut them up with a jigsaw!’ And bang! — throw the Scroll into a bonfire with birch logs.” Essiorh looked with reproach at Daph. “My child, now I understand where you get dark feathers