Black Star Light

Chapter 4

“There is so much admiration in your words,” said the dark one.

“So much experience,” I corrected him.

It was at that moment that somewhere far away, in the mountains, a collapse clearly occurred.

“The Well of Eheya has been freed from your spell?” I suggested.

“Yes,” the world answered me.

I smiled at the Prince of the Night Terror, even hiding the obvious anticipation, after all, I was never a nice girl. He immediately got up, and the next moment only roses in my hands reminded of his presence.

Under the walls of the fortress, the revived water of Eheya rustled and splashed. How I love this river.

The next moment, a spatial crystal flared up in front of me, pushing the space with sparkling edges, and my eyes actually appeared ... my husband. The appearance of the Caesar was extremely original - blond hair cut to the neck, a leather jacket, leather gloves with cut off fingers, which my husband was now frantically pulling off himself, a green bead of obviously emerald threaded through a strand, green eyes rapidly returning to their previous color, form and tenacity in the look.

- Mmm, and how is it for you to portray the Light? I inquired sincerely.

Was there a kyar? - not answering my question, the Caesar demanded an answer.

“Naturally,” I replied, embracing the bouquet revealingly, “how could he not come if you so diligently provoked him to do so.

Caesar's smile said a lot.

I, throwing down the bouquet, dropped my curtsy as well, and asked bluntly:

- Where have you been?

A mocking look of icy eyes and an unexpected offer:

"See you at the bridge?"

“Thanks, I already had a date today,” I replied caustically.

The look is frozen.

“I am your wife and empress, there was no consent to become your woman in addition to everything, my Caesar,” she reminded him with a sweet smile.

“The status of a wife, my dear, actually implies such a thing as “being a woman,” he answered angrily.

"I don't think arguing at the moment will solve anything." I continued to be disgustingly nice. "So where were you?"

Unbuttoning his black leather jacket and throwing it aside, the Caesar looked at me mockingly and, just as sweetly as I, answered:

- I would satisfy the curiosity of my woman with pleasure, my tender, the curiosity of my wife and the empress - no.

And the communication crystal self-destructed in the most mocking way!

- Yes, goblins ate you! I wished furiously into the void.

The void was naturally silent, but somewhere there, in the snow-white bedroom, the Caesar was clearly smiling victoriously, and this angered him incredibly.

Rising, she kicked the roses with all her heart, then returned to her room.

By the way, Dinara was not at the post, there was only one guard.

***

Enraged, I went upstairs, and, tearing off my dress, rushed from corner to corner, trying to understand what was going on in general! Three men, three games incomprehensible to me, and one whole such creative self, which at the same time restores the Free Isles, and, in addition, manages all the affairs of Eradaras. I won’t be surprised if tomorrow the chief arachnid comes to me with a proposal to deal with the economy of Tenetra at the same time! And that, given the trends, I should definitely expect something like: “Dear Kari Oneiro, I would love to f**k you, but while I’m looking for opportunities to access your body, could you at the same time take care of the Tenetra economy, otherwise we will fall the course of the Teneri gold has been outlined and, in general, a general economic downturn is just around the corner!”

In general, if you are so serious, then yes, not far off, I was going to completely bring down their domestic market with a shaft of cheap goods sold at a reduced price from needles to fabrics, and do this before the dark ones realize to block the borders. There was no point in killing their currency - if the Caesar had already created cellars littered with gold in a couple of minutes, which prevented Arakhandar the Lord of the Night from doing the same. Nothing. But you go and try to create a silver pepper, which grows exclusively in the Free Isles and is gently but surely introduced by me as a monetary analogue. And given that this seasoning has so far remained the main export item of the island, I strongly doubt that the light ones will, in principle, be able to fake it. As well as dark ones. And then we will smoothly but surely approach securities, and then, we are all happily waiting for a single trading space!

In principle, I planned to raise the Free Islands to the rank of states equal to both Eradaras and Tenetru at the end of the year, it remains to educate my people, and maintain personal independence until the end of this year. I don’t even know what is more difficult ... I suspect that problems will arise precisely with the preservation of independence ...

The spatial crystal flashed in the darkness completely unexpectedly, and I, just changing clothes, was not that very glad to see my husband.

“Go on, my dear, you don’t embarrass me at all,” the Caesar remarked with a sneer.

“I never doubted it for a moment,” I quipped, and pulled on my nightgown.

Not to say that she was hiding something, but the locals were convinced that if I was supposed to wear clothes, then they were mostly made of lace, so the Caesar clearly had something to look at, he looked, it seems, forgetting what he was going to talk.

“Yes,” my illustrious husband confirmed, “I was slightly distracted ...

“You tend to be…distracted in general,” I remarked, and moved towards the bed.

The crystal glided smoothly behind me, stopped as if the Caesar sat down on the edge of the bed in which I settled. I do not argue that it was more convenient for the emperor to sleep, for people the conveniences in general left much to be desired, but only for now.

“Did the execution of the old woman upset you so much?” Araeden suddenly asked.

To my surprise, I replied:

- Yes.

- In vain. You acted absolutely right and you know about it, my gentle, - Caesar raised his glass and saluted me, took a sip.

“I know, yes,” I agreed. “But knowing that you are doing the right thing does not relieve me of screams behind my back, of blood flowing again and again at my feet, of the taste of death on my lips, of guilt ...

“Would it be better if you found a child dying and bleeding the same on the steps of your tower?” Husband asked softly.

- No, - I lay down, I was very tired and on the whole the day turned out to be difficult, turned on my side, and looking at Caesar, asked: - Was it hard for you to kill? I mean at the beginning?

Just about the fact that at the end, in the sense of the middle, or I don’t even know what to call it, but in general, now this clearly did not cause trouble to Caesar.

Araeden smiled, no doubt reading my thoughts, and said:

- At first? - the smile became, to put it mildly, not cheerful. - It's better for you not to know.

- Why? Do you think I will judge you? I? she asked with an undisguised sneer.

Caesar did not answer, looking at me strangely. A few long seconds, then said:

- Come back.

- No! - I answered confidently, and quietly remarked: - I have been your toy for too long, my Caesar. And it was not the most pleasant feeling, I must admit.

"You don't feel much better now," he said with a touch of irony.

No, not much.

“Freedom always has a price, and it’s not always pleasant, but mostly worth paying for,” she said confidently in the end.

"Do you want guarantees of your freedom from me?" - again taking a sip of wine, the Caesar asked.

- You will be freed from you, how - how, and I'm not so naive as to believe your "guarantees", - she answered him quite sincerely.

Araeden narrowed his eyes slightly.

I, despite the fact that I was brutally sleepy, returned to the most important thing at the moment:

“So what about the higher ones?”

This time, Caesar did not mockingly remain silent and briefly let me in on the matter:

“I managed to transport myself from the true Eradaras to the Overworld. It has already been destroyed by a third.

I bit my lip, realizing that not so long ago, only a quarter of the world was destroyed ... now a third ... The upper world was dying at an incredible speed.

“So the higher ones will continue to try to invade us?” she asked after a short silence.

“I wouldn’t be so sure of that,” the Caesar unexpectedly smiled. “You have shown Ran to Sidion Agnar how much you own both the world and its subordinates. I believe that the death of his strongest Lights he ... suffered hard.

“The strongest,” I seized on the most important word.

Araeden nodded majestically.

“Is there a chance that, having lost the strongest of those who pave the Way, he will die in his dying world?” I asked directly.

Caesar did not answer immediately, for several seconds he examined the remains of wine in a glass, then said:

- An animal driven into a trap is hundreds of times more dangerous. The higher ones want to live. And for the sake of their own survival, our former gods will do anything.

“The High Ones destroyed two worlds!” Two whole worlds! Just destroyed on a whim! Retribution, it seems to me, is more than justified! I exclaimed.

“For you,” Araeden smiled, “for me, for those who managed to escape from the perishing Eradaras and Tenetra, but not for the higher ones, my tender one. For the higher, the question of ethics has never been in principle, and now, on the verge of survival, it has completely lost its meaning. Believe me, now, in the current conditions, for the sake of survival, a kind of higher ones will even agree to sleep with human women.

- Didn't you agree before? I asked skeptically.

- Previously not. People in principle and for us, the Elars, are the lowest stage of evolution, what to speak of the highest.

Nothing to say about the higher ones. True, a thought flashed through, for a moment the thought flashed that assimilation with the higher ones would instantly put people on an equal footing with both light and dark ones, but no. No, because I saw what happened in the capital of Tenetra, no, because I saw the former Eradaras, no, because giving the deities who destroyed even their own world a second chance is, firstly, senseless, and secondly, suicidal.

“You have always been a smart girl, my gentle,” the Caesar smiled.

"I wonder what it's like for you to see your gods perish?" I asked.

“Not mine,” the Caesar’s smile became a little more distinct, “I was born in this world.

“In my sense,” I smiled sweetly.

I expected a lot of things, but Araeden suddenly confirmed, looking at me intently:

- In yours, my tender.

And there won't even be any controversy?

Pulling the blanket up, she drowsily remarked: