Wandering Spark - Part 3
Three seasons ago, when Varan was fourteen years old, he nearly left his home with the rafters.
They arrive in the first month of autumn every year. Usually, they were noticed on the horizon a day before the arrival - in the center of the colossal raft a wheel with people running in it towered, huge paddle rose and fell foaming water, but the raft moved like a drunken turtle. It was so heavy, multilayered, and rose above the water and deepened profoundly underwater, and all its monstrous mass was - wood from distant lands, white and yellow, hard and soft, almost impervious to rot, fragrant, and fresh wood.
If there was a wind in the off-season – the rafters would put sail. But the season passed, and with it, the winds eased, and the light boats of the rich Gorni - boats under colored sails found shelter somewhere in the caves of the upper world...
The rafts moved leisurely and traded thoroughly, all of them were solid, with white or yellow faces. Everyone behind the belt had a curved dagger, and some had a sword or a crossbow behind them: the raftman always has something to lose. They walk the seas on a pile of money - it's no surprise that raft hunters are much more popular occupation than rafters. Everyone wants to saddle other's raft - and trail with slow pace from island to island, until the raft is leaky, and the purse is huge like a bubble...
Sometimes wood is sold with blood stains. Superstitious people do not want to take it; the rafters tell: do not take it. But some others gladly but it. They say it is only rust. It will dry up and fall off, it will burn in the fire - you will not notice it, it will wash away with rain...
And one day near the Round Fang, a huge raft with the new owners was auctioned. A crowd of thugs, one more terrible than another. Among them were a few Gorni, and some thugs were white, like ice, all in scars. There was almost no pure wood in the auction. And from the rafts, there was no one left. It is known that they do not surrender in captivity. Nothing good in captivity awaits them.
On the first day, the whole village was shocked, no one comes out on the auction. They prepared the guards, loaded a single cannon, sent a plea for protection upstairs to the lord. The answer came immediately: to find out the intentions of the merchants thoroughly. If they really sell wood, why to panic? The garrison at the top is small, and it’s best not to disturb the Emperor, especially if there is no real danger.
Among people begun doubts. Some shouted "do not buy bloody wood! It will not bring you anything good. You'll give your money to the murderers - you'll be in conspiracy with them, Think about this kind people!"
Varan's father stood in the middle of a town square, stood motionless, his hands on his hips. And around him jumped Sol, our neighbor:
"And if there will not be others this year? And if there won’t be any wood, only this? With what will you heat your house? Your hair? With a beard?"
Varan's father was only arguing with others, but he did not move from his place and did not buy anything. On the third day, the villagers quietly, one by one, pulled to the shore - to the auction. They hid their eyes, the wood was unusually cheap, all took a lot and the whole coast was filled with pyramids of logs, only Varan's father did not take a bitch.
A week later the pirates left on a fairly diminished raft.
There were no others in that season, no matter how long they waited. Somewhere in the middle of autumn in the Varan’s house, there was no wood to heat; his father bought dry seaweed, which usually was used to melt the most wet and most stubborn wood. Dry seaweed was expensive and burned almost instantly.
In the house was damp and cold. The kids cried; father burned a boat in the hearth. Everything that was wooden in the house, one by one, went into the hearth.
In the beginning of winter, someone threw a pile of logs under the door. All of them seemed clean, bright, and warm. The thirteen-year-old Varan sat for a long time lullabying a single log, looking at its patterns, breathing in an unusual smell...
Then the mother of Varan, who did not say a word to her husband after the last auction, finally opened her mouth.
"Take it," she said.
And he took it. He did not leave the wood to get wet in the rain, as he had intended first.
Throughout the winter, the neighbors were secretly helping them - who with a log, who with ten, and who with a pile. And the whole winter Varan’s father silently took all the offerings.
He has changed a lot since then. He drank a lot. Sometimes broke on Varan, which has never been before... Well, at least, he did not touch the girls.
And Varan decided to leave; at night he dreamed of woody streaks. He imagined lands where trees grow not just above a person, but up to the sky; probably under them you can even hide from the rain. He dreamed of a forest – in the way the old rafts dense were telling stories about it. In dreams, he saw trees’ annual rings, and Varan himself opened his mouth: is this tree three times older than me? And this ten times?!
In his dream, there was a smell of resin and leaves. At home there was a smell of smoke and raw fish, the father sat on a stone bench, gloomy and drunk. Kids were playing around his legs, begging for sweets... But where can we get them, sweets, if everything that was earned in the season was let down on the expensive seaweed?
Varan decided to leave.
During the season, his determination not only did not evaporate, but even got stronger - he especially sought out visitors and, sold lacquered trinkets. While this he starts talking about distant countries. Travelers were eager to tell him their stories - and about the forests, and about the grass-filled steppes, and about the snow deserts. About countries where you can wander all your life along the roads and never wet your feet; about countries where there are no mountains, but there are deep ravines. About the countries where live people with golden skin. About the countries where the stones are alive and the rivers are whispering...
The rafts came late, at the end of the first month of autumn. Varan hired to help at the unloading - he was a kid, but strong and skilled. He was put to chop the knots - he worked cleanly and cheerfully, like a barber in a barbecue for Gorni; a few days before the sailing of the raft Varan made his way to the captain and asked to work for him.
"Phew!" Said the captain and wrinkled his nose. "How much do you weigh? You'll crawl in a fly the wheel!"
And he added, seeing Varan's perplexity:
"I do not need here youngsters and not the cutters. I need the spinners on the wheel, so they would walk for weeks and do not cry... And you with your weight it is an extra mouth!"
Varan gave a vow that he would put a bag of stones on his back and walk in the wheel with an extra load - and thought to himself, that after reaching the shores where the forests grow, he could just run away, and that's would be the end of it. The captain grinned and thought that the boy is a good baggage and he can sell him somewhere in free waters, on the very outskirts of the Empire.
At night on the eve of the sailing, Varan secretly climbed to the raft, and at the dawn of the next day they set off to sell wood, and then (very soon, as Varan imagined) to distant lands, to forests, to the end of the world.
On the second morning of the voyage, Varan was no longer so cheerfully. After the night watch, Varan’s legs and shoulders ached a lot, and the portion of water turned out to be so small that I Varan had to lick the drops running down his face. Varan did not even get scared when a few hours after dawn a rowing boat appeared on the horizon, much faster than a raft. In the boat sat Varan’s father, the headman and swarthy black Gorni - a representative of the lord of Round Fang himself.
Varan was not present at the negotiations of the three with the captain. He didn’t know what they were talking. His father told him to jump into the boat. He jumped and immediately sat down on the oars.
All the way to the home - almost a day's journey, there was not a word said. Varan waited for anything - a belt, stick, imprisonment in a stone cellar with water and stinging jellyfishes... But nothing happened.
The mother sobbed but did not say a word of reproach. And from that day Varan’s father came to life in a strange way - he was awake. He quit drinking and started to spend time with kids, teaching them to read and write, singing at weddings. Everything was same as before...