"Lee,_Mary_Soon_-_Vigil" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lee Mary Soon)

"Then why are we going to the village?" Evan twisted free of her grip. He scowled up at her, but she saw his chin tremble. "I heard your sister say you'd send me away."
Branwen's throat suddenly ached. "Evan, I don't want to send you away. I won't ever want to send you away. But the war is coming, and it won't be safe for you to stay."
"Are you staying?"
"Yes -- "
"I want to stay too."
Branwen took a deep breath, searching for an explanation that might satisfy Evan. "I have to stay, to keep vigil for the people who will die in the coming battle. You have to go, so that you can keep vigil for the battle's survivors in the years to come. We share the same duty, you and I, but yours lies in the future."
She picked up the gold chain, and threaded it round Evan's neck. "All right?"
"All right," said Evan in a very small voice.
"Then let's go." Branwen took Evan's hand in hers. Together they walked out of the cottage and down to Darseton.
* * * *
The next day the first of the casualties arrived. The battleground had shifted so that the Darseton burial site was now the closest.
Branwen watched the draft horses pull the wagonload of corpses up the path, led by six soldiers. Each corpse lay wrapped in the deep blue cloth of the Salian flag, but the bodies had been heaped on top of each other to fit them in. Other soldiers must have risked their own lives to recover the corpses, so that they might be safely laid to rest.
As the wagon rounded the last corner, Branwen took a clove of garlic from her pocket, whispered a charm over it to disable her sense of smell, and swallowed it whole. Better that she reek of garlic than that she gag while handling the corpses.
She met the wagon at the entrance to the burial ground, nodded to the young soldier in charge. "Corporal."
"Mistress Branwen, my men and I are here to assist you." He glanced back at the wagon nervously. He didn't look more than twenty years old, a lean, angular man, all bone and muscle. "Is there -- can you see their spirits?"
Branwen followed his gaze, looked carefully at the bodies, but as she'd expected no ghosts were visible. "Not yet, Corporal. Most spirits don't know how to follow their body when it's moved. The first rite I'll perform at the burial will summon the spirits."
"Ah," said the corporal, a shade paler than he had been just a minute before. That was the way of it; most men were more scared of ghosts than of thunderbolts and battle.
Branwen told the other soldiers where to park the wagon, giving the young corporal a chance to recover himself.
The corporal cleared his throat, some of the color back in his lean face. "What, what do you need us to do?"
"Can you tell me how many casualties we're likely to receive in the next few days?"
"Three hundred, maybe more. The fighting goes badly."
So many. Branwen braced herself against the wall, trying not to think about the magnitude of the ordeal ahead of her. "I'll need you and your soldiers to dig burial pits. We'll bury the soldiers in groups of a dozen. If there's time later on, we can disinter the bodies and bury them separately."
Branwen doubted they'd get that chance. More likely the enemy would kill Branwen and the corporal and his men, and then desecrate the burial ground. But she saw no point in voicing her concerns. The work they did here would last, even if they themselves did not. Once a spirit was bound to its bones, it would remain at peace, no matter if those bones were later disturbed. The binding turned the spirit's essence inward, beginning its slow but inexorable return to the earth.
"Burial pits," said the corporal. "That I can do."
"Wait," Branwen said as the man turned to leave. "Did you stop at Darseton? Are the army evacuating it?"
"Yes." The corporal's voice gentled. "All the children will be out by evening, and the rest of the civilians by noon tomorrow."
"Thank you." Branwen fingered the bracelet on her wrist, the gap where the rabbit used to be. Let Evan be safe, let her sister be safe.
* * * *
That night seemed unending. Dead men's ghosts ringed the burial pits. Some of the spirits had forgotten the war, regressing to a happier time, plaintively asking for their wives or lovers. Other spirits remembered the battle all too clearly. Those wraiths screamed for vengeance, pale grey blood dripping from dismembered limbs and gaping wounds.
Branwen knew the grey blood had no substance, fading as soon as it touched anything solid; she'd seen such ghost wounds before. But somewhere between sunset and moonrise, she lost track of that certainty. Each time a wraith approached her, Branwen shrank back, her fingers faltering midway through a spell.
Her head pounded; her skin flushed hot then chill. Too slow, this was all too slow. The enemy would reach them before she settled any of the ghosts. She could not think straight.
A figure loomed out of the night, grabbed her.
"Mistress Branwen?"
She blinked up at the corporal's face. "Y-yes."
"Can we help you with this? Can I help you?"
"No," she said. But he'd already helped, the sound of his voice an anchor against the chorus of ghosts, restoring her balance. "Thank you for coming to ask, but I'll be fine."
"It's hard to fight any kind of battle alone," the corporal said gruffly. "I can sit nearby if you want, if that would help."
Branwen nodded. "It would, thank you."
She moved over on the reed mat, making room for the man to sit down. He hesitated, then took his place beside her, his back ramrod-straight.
"It's all right, Corporal. The spirits have no power to hurt you." As she said it, the words sank into her, and she relaxed. She worked the spell again, concentrating on the movement of her hands, the command to bring spirit and body back into a whole. Before her a wraith wavered, its form thinning to mist as it sank into the earth.
Over and over she worked the binding spell, until her fingers cramped. As the last ghost faded to nothingness, she saw a faint light glimmer through it. She looked around; the dawn sun stood out against the sky. The corporal's head lolled to one side; sometime in the night the man had fallen asleep, too tired to be afraid any longer. Branwen draped her cloak over him, and left for a more comfortable bed.
* * * *
Five wagonloads of corpses arrived over the next two days. Branwen had never been so exhausted in her life. She had no time to rest, pausing only for hasty meals. The ground seemed unsteady under her feet whenever she moved from one burial pit to another.
On the third morning, she had a few minutes alone. She walked to the drystone wall that rimmed the burial ground. Down by Darseton the forest was burning, hundred-year-old trees disappearing in a haze of smoke and flame. Branwen smelled the smoke in the wind, relief from the stench of putrefying corpses -- she had no energy left over for minor spells to spare her nose.
The corporal strode over to join her. "The enemy forded the Pleth a few hours ago, and now they have troops to the east, south, and west of us. If you ride north, you might still escape them. I could give you a horse."
He made the offer straightforwardly, no hint of rebuke in his tone. Branwen hesitated. "I take it you still expect more bodies to arrive."
He nodded.
"Then I'll stay." She twisted the bracelet round her wrist. "How long before they reach here?"
The corporal shrugged. "Maybe by evening. Get some rest. I'll wake you as soon as you're needed."
* * * *