Part Eight

Together, Nevsky and Takashi picked their way through the rubble and out of the breach. Snow began to fall with a faint, almost imperceptible whisper. As they stumbled and trudged through the breach, they saw that the camp had moved to the plain in front of the city. Soldiers rushed about, carrying canvas, poles, personal belongings, and sundry other things. Several of the Valashian soldiers, guarded by their conquerors, dug graves at the part of the plateau farthest from the camp and the city.
"Let's try to find the hospital tent," said Takashi while he and Nevsky stood hesitating. "We might find Hideoshi or Galen there."
They forced a way through the bustle and haphazard tent arrangements, until Nevsky spotted one with a wagon filled with wounded before the door. In they crept, and began to scan the rows of patients.
"There you all are!" Called Galen from behind them.
Nevsky, groaning, said, "I feel ill."
Galen laughed, then groaned himself. "You feel ill! How would you like a splittin' headache instead? Ever been knocked out?"
"No."
"Then quit whinin'! And I have to hustle 'round here too!"
"We'll help you!" Takashi cried.
"You can," replied Galen, "but not Nevsky. He'd faint or shriek in the middle of an operation or something! He can go and get some sleep (and after robbing me of a whole night too)." Nevsky turned and strode out dejectedly.
Meanwhile, after a bumpy ride during which the wagon wheels creaked and bounced at every rock or hollow, Hideoshi found himself carried into a hot tent and placed in between two other soldiers. His thigh smarted and swelled, while pain shot up to his heart at intervals.
"Blood-this place reeks of it. And sweat, the agonised, feverish sweat of the suffering, the dying," Hideoshi thought.
"I feel like I can't breathe in here," Hideoshi moaned.
"And pain, pain-it seems like I can't think of anything else but that jabbing, throbbing pain in my thigh! Why did I have to play the hero? Or was it really heroism? Pain such as this must have a meaning, a purpose-or else mankind would've gone mad long ago. But it hurts!"
Hideoshi tried to shift himself, but he was jammed between two other wounded soldiers, one coughing and wheezing in his ear. So he sighed, and covered his head with his arms as much as he could in his cramped quarters.
Several hundred yards away, Nevsky stumbled into his tent after pitching it. He felt his coat pocket, and felt Aunt Olga's letter inside. A sudden awareness dawned on him, for he whispered, "I have no home."
Once more his heart began to race, despite being worn out by two days and a night without sleep. He felt weak, and the nerves in his limbs tingled with numbness and fear.
He walked a few steps into the tent before stopping, thinking: "Fear. Why does this fear cling to me, making me irrational? I should not be afraid, for I'm a grown man-or am I-yet those loud guffaws and voices outside, even friendly ones, make me jolt and quake.
"Could it be something that I've done that's haunting me? But I'm no doer of heinous deeds! What is it then? Am I going mad? But no, I'll never go mad! I won't go mad!"
Nevsky's face stiffened in resolve as he continued to think.
"Then why am I worrying if I can care for myself? I must stop this-this rambling which only produces fear, fear! Perhaps fear is my nemesis, or, my path to glory through overcoming it. But how can I 'get used to it' as Hideoshi said if it doesn't go away?"
Nevsky sat upon his sleeping bag, then flung himself upon it, splaying his arms. For awhile he lay sprawled upon his sleeping bag, gazing with glazed eyes upon the billowing canvas ceiling.
"Maybe it will never leave me," he sighed before yielding to sleep.
Pale blue light filled the tent when Nevsky awoke. Beside him stood Takashi, combing his hair.
"What are you doing here?" Nevsky mumbled.
Takashi wheeled round, saying, "Galen sent me to find you after several hours, and he told me to get some sleep. When I came in, you were splayed out on your sleeping bag! I even fell asleep and woke up well before you did! But, let's find Galen and Hideoshi- and get some breakfast as well."
"Okay," yawned Nevsky as he sat up, then combed his hair.
After pulling on their woollen, fur-lined caps, the two stepped out of the tent into the pale blue morning. Fires smoulder here and there, surrounded by clusters of soldiers huddled together, crouching over the embers. Steam arose from iron pots and kettles in which soup simmered.
Nevsky, while absentmindedly looking around him, saw Galen winding through a crowd of sleepy soldiers.
"Look, there's Galen!" He cried.
Takashi answered, "Let's follow him!"
Jostling and brushing past other soldiers, Takashi and Nevsky followed Galen into a hospital tent. The close, sweaty air and the smell of blood overwhelmed them at first, but then Takashi's green eyes began to glow, and he rushed towards one of the wounded who had covered his face with his arms.
"Hideoshi! It's you!"
Hideoshi uncovered his head, rubbed his eyes, fixed them upon Takashi, then grinned. Quickly, Takashi knelt in front of Hideoshi, and grasped his right hand. Nevsky approached Hideoshi meanwhile, with a shy and wistful demeanour.
"Galen found me," Hideoshi began. "He was going to tell you all, but you two came before he could take a break."
Takashi began asking "Are you okay?"
But General Tacitus Morini strode into the tent, booming:
"Emperor Dietrich of the Southern Fairies is about to enter this tent! So the utmost respect due to him!"
Immediately behind General Tacitus came Emperor Dietrich and his two standard bearers. They gazed round them with compassion for the sufferer they saw, and were about to approach a wounded soldier, when Lord Anomijah said, "Who are those two that are so like another, though one is brown haired and the other black haired?"
Other Fairies had entered the tent before Lord Anomijah said this, so many eyes fixed their gazes upon Hideoshi and Takashi. These two, however, were baffled, and stared at each other in bewilderment. Nevsky smiled.
"There's strange blood there," said one.
"From what place do you come, and are you two related?" Asked Emperor Dietrich, his dark brown eyes staring fixedly, his brown beard stiff upon his gaunt yet benevolent face. Behind him trailed dark blue wings, like eagle's wings, for Fairies' wings are not frail and gauzy.