I did not mean to! said Egert to the imaginary Dinar. I did not intend to kill you; you impaled yourself on my sword. I can’t really be a murderer, can I?
Dinar was silent. The rusty claws clutched at Egert.
He shuddered. He turned a page of the book, hiding the portrait of Toria beneath it, and his gaze fell on a black band of lines. Mechanically running his eyes over the same fragment a few times, he suddenly became aware of its meaning.
It is believed that the protector of warriors, Khars, was once a real person, and furthermore that in the depths of unrecorded time he distinguished himself by his ferocity and brutality. It is said that he killed the wounded, those whose case was hopeless as well as those who might be healed, and that he did this, of course, not out of charity, but for purely practical reasons: the wounded were useless, a burden to all, and it was easier to bury them than …
Dinar was buried beneath a smooth slab with no ornamentation. The sword had run through him, and the last thing he had seen in life was the face of his murderer. Did he have enough time to think of Toria? How long had the seconds of dying dragged out for him?
The cemetery by the city walls of Kavarren. The weary birds on the headstones. And that inscription on someone’s grave:
I shall take wing once more.
The rusty claws clenched into a fist, and the realization that what he had done to Dinar was beyond recall descended upon Egert with an unbearable heaviness. Never before had he been so keenly aware that he lived in a world that was filled with death, a world that was divided by the boundary between all that could be amended and all that was irreversible: no matter how much grief it caused, there was no turning back.
Recovering his senses with difficulty, Egert saw that he was clutching the portrait in his hands: the slip of paper with the drawing was crushed. Egert spent a long time smoothing it out against the table, biting his lips and trying to think of what he should do now. Did Toria know about the drawing? Maybe she had searched for it and grieved at its loss; maybe she had forgotten about it, oppressed by the misfortune that had befallen her. Or perhaps she had never even seen the portrait: maybe Dinar had drawn it in a burst of inspiration and then lost it.
He put the drawing back inside the book; then he gave way once more and took it out again to have another look: for the last time because, whether he wanted to or not, he had to give the book to the dean. It is possible that this was a trap, and it would be best to put his discovery back where he found it, but might it not be important to Toria? The drawing should belong to her. Egert would hand it over to the dean, and he could decide when and how to show it to Toria.
He made the decision and immediately felt better. Holding the book in his hands, he walked toward the door, intending to go to the dean’s study right away, but then he turned back. He sat at the table for a minute, then buried the dark book under his arm, clenched his teeth, and went out into the corridor.
His journey turned out to be long and arduous. As soon as he set out, Egert perceived the complete madness of his plan. He would show up at the dean’s study, give him the book, and in so doing, he would confess that he had seen the drawing. And whose was it? Oh, just the deceased fiancé of Toria, the victim of his own cruelty.
He turned back two times, meeting shocked students along the way who looked askance at him. Clutching the book in numbed fingers, Egert finally stood at the doors to the dean’s study, but he felt that he could not continue; he felt that if he carried out his plan it would be tantamount to an acknowledgment of his own infamy.
With his whole heart, he wished that the dean would be anywhere at that moment except in his study, and his heart fell when the familiar voice called out to him in greeting. “Egert? Please, come in.”
The steel wing gleamed dimly. The cabinets and shelves beheld the guest in severe silence. The dean put his work aside and stood to greet Egert.
Egert could not hold his gaze and lowered his eyes. “I came to … give you…”
“You already finished it?” the dean marveled.
Egert took a faltering breath before speaking again. “This is … not that book. This is one I … I found…” And, unable to squeeze out another word, he held out the ill-fated volume to the dean.
Either Egert’s hand was shaking or Luayan hesitated while taking the book, but, quaking as if it were alive, its pages flew open, and it almost fell to the floor. Breaking free as if by its own will, a single white slip of paper described a spiral in the air and then settled at Egert’s feet; as before, the drawing of Toria seemed just about to smile.
A second passed. The dean did not move. Slowly, like a wind-up toy, Egert bent over and picked up the portrait; without looking up, he held it out to the dean, but another hand pulled at it with such force that the paper tore into two pieces.
Egert raised his eyes: right in front of him, pale, shaking with fury, stood Toria. Egert recoiled, burned to ashes by the hatred filling her narrowed eyes.
Perhaps she wished to say that Egert had committed a sacrilege, that Dinar’s drawing was now defiled by the hands of his murderer, that in touching an object that had once belonged to her fiancé, Egert had transgressed all possible bounds of shamelessness: it is possible that she wanted to say these things, but the instantaneous flush of rage had robbed her of the ability to speak. All her pain and all her indignation, which had been restrained until this moment, now rushed forth; this man, tainted with Dinar’s blood, desecrated not only the hallowed halls of her university, but also the very memory of her deceased beloved.
Without taking her annihilating glare from Egert, Toria extended her hand and took—no, snatched—Dinar’s book from her father. She took a breath into her lungs, as if she was about to say something, but instead she suddenly walloped Egert in the face with the book.
Egert’s head rang.
Having expressed her strangled fury in the blow, Toria regained the ability to speak, and the words were accompanied by another blow. “Scum! Don’t you dare!”
It is scarcely possible that Toria herself knew at that moment just what it was that Egert should not dare to do. Having fully lost the power to control herself, she lashed out at the scarred face in a frenzy.
“Don’t you dare! Scoundrel! Wretch! Get out of my sight!” Desperate, spiteful tears flew from her eyes in all directions.
“Toria!” Dean Luayan seized his daughter by the hand. She struggled with him briefly; then she convulsed into hysterical weeping, and falling on her knees to the floor, she gasped through fitful sobs, “I detest him. I … de … test … him.…”
Egert stood still, unable to take even a step. Blood flowed down his lips and chin from his broken nose.
He sat at the edge of the canal, where he could watch the arched bridge from below: the mossy stones flecked with water; the solid brickwork; the underside of the railing; the clattering wheels; the tromping feet; the boots, shoes, and bare soles, gray from dust; and again wheels, hooves, shoes.…
From time to time he lowered a bedraggled handkerchief into the water and applied it to his nose. The flow of blood had calmed, but at times it began to flow once more. The sight of it caused Egert to shudder involuntarily.
He watched the smooth surface of the stagnant water and remembered Toria crying.
He had never seen her tears before. Not even when Dinar died; not even at the burial. Though, truth be told, Egert had not actually been at the burial; he knew about it solely through the words of others.