Total pages in book: 40
Estimated words: 38711 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 194(@200wpm)___ 155(@250wpm)___ 129(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 38711 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 194(@200wpm)___ 155(@250wpm)___ 129(@300wpm)
A small, fluffy-looking koloversh shivered, flinging snow off his feathery fur, and opened his mouth.
“Call the client,” the little koloversh snarled in Wayne’s voice.
“Wayne, we just lost half our team. You’re not thinking of giving back the money, because we’ve got to pay out the death benefits…”
Roman muttered an incantation under his breath.
“Fuck no, we’re not giving back the money. Call the fucking client. This wasn’t how the job was sold to us, so if he wants it done, he’s gonna have to pay us a hell of a lot more. Tell him he gives us more money, or we walk. If he has a problem with it, he can get on site and see what we’re dealing with. And after that, call Fulton and tell him to get his ass and our antimage squad down here. This whole fucking job has been a shit show and that ends now.”
The pain had climbed into his chest.
“It’s going to take all night for them to get here from Columbus.”
“Then they better get a fucking move on.”
“We should’ve done that when the skulls came on,” a third voice growled. “But no, you went all gung-ho because a pagan priest didn’t roll over for you.”
“Not right now, Pike. Don’t fucking test me.”
The koloversh shut his mouth.
The last words of the incantation fell from Roman’s lips. Magic sank into the bolt head like the fangs of a striking snake.
“Poison me, you zaraza.” He hurled the bolt into the fire.
A howl of pain ripped through the night. One sniper down.
Roman pointed at the little koloversh. “Fedya, good boy. Finn, no matter what happens, stay inside the house. The rest of you, protect the kid.”
He plucked the blue vial from Finn’s fingers and gulped the liquid antidote. It burned through him like fire and crashed against the cold stabbing into his heart. He grabbed the green vial, drank it in one swallow, and twisted the cap off the black goo.
“Nobody panic. I’ll be back.”
He turned the vial upside down. The congealed drop of Chernobog’s tear fell onto his tongue.
Darkness rose and swallowed him whole.
The snow crunched under his feet, pristine and white, like the sugar glaze on a paska. The Milky Way glinted across the dark sky, clothed in magic, a brilliant backdrop to the full moon, unnaturally bright. Its gauzy light played over the woods, and the snowdrifts glittered as if dusted with crushed diamonds.
Around him pines towered, their fluffy needles perfectly still. Their scent floated in the air, a crisp, tangy fragrance, at once nostalgic and fleeting.
It smelled like Koliada.
His hands were free this time, but the pull across his chest assured him that the weight was still there, attached to him.
Of course. He hadn’t finished dragging the damn tree yet. The moment he’d passed out, Chernobog had put him right where he’d left off, and he must’ve gone right back to pulling, unaware he was doing it.
When he chose to enter Nav on his own, he was instantly conscious. When Chernobog summoned him from a dream, however, awareness became a divine privilege. Sometimes he was aware, and sometimes he came to and found he’d been sitting by Chernobog’s throne for hours in a catatonic state, his physical body in the human world, his metaphysical presence in Nav, while his mind was blissfully dreaming.
You single-minded bastard.
Roman felt the dark cloud of irritation rising inside him. Chernobog’s tear suffused him with divine power, purging all poisons and ailments. A last resort, it packed a wallop that always knocked him out for about an hour. An hour Finn had to spend defending the house on his own, but only an hour. He should’ve woken up long ago.
Roman glanced over his shoulder. The massive tree lay on the snow behind him. Past it, through a gap in the pines, he could see a vast field rolling out to the horizon, where the jagged wall of another forest rose. He had dragged the tree past the firs of the Twilight Forest, past the Grueling Field, and was now in the Evening Woods. He had been in here for hours.
“Seriously? Did you not see I had my hands full? It’s your marriage. Your wife is mad at you, not me. Why the hell am I involved in it?”
The woods didn’t answer him.
Roman swore and checked himself. A harness woven out of a strange dark leather crossed his chest, looping over his shoulders. He was bound to the tree like a burlak, a barge puller from Russia’s old past, a human beast of burden dragging the trade ships up the river. This forest was his personal towpath.
“So now I am an ox? Is that where we are? I am to drag the tree like a mindless animal?”
The night remained silent.
“You know what, fuck right off. I’m your beck-and-call boy for 362 days out of the year. I don’t complain. I do whatever the fuck you want, no matter what is happening in my life. I’m with a nice girl, I think it’s going well. I wake up in my kitchen standing in my own piss. The girl is gone. Never see her again. That’s okay. I read the fine print before I signed. I knew what I was in for. I just do it. I always do it. I always do whatever you want even if it’s stupid. I am supposed to get Koliada off. Three fucking days out of the year when you don’t fucking bother me. I am off.”