The Scar by Marina Dyachenko, Sergey Dyachenko Page B

threatened to be chafed until they bled. Wishing to peer down Egert’s throat, the physician nearly ripped out his tongue. Then he dried his hands on a snow-white handkerchief, and letting out a sigh, recommended the usual remedy of doctors who have come up against a brick wall: bloodletting.
    Soon a large copper basin was delivered to the room. The leech opened a black valise and set out scalpels and lancets, gleaming like a fine spring day, on the clean tablecloth. Small round jars clanked in the little bag, and the old first maid dragged out fresh linen.
    All these preparations drove Egert into a desolate, black anxiety; he began to think that it might be better if he returned to the maneuvers. His father, heartened that there was some way to help his stricken son, solicitously assisted him in taking off his shirt.
    The preparations were finished. However, when Egert saw the businesslike blade in the inexorable healer’s hand, it became very clear that bloodletting would not do.
    “Oh, my son!” muttered his father perplexedly. “Glorious Heaven, you really are very ill.”
    Cowering in the corner with a heavy candlestick held in front of him, Egert breathed heavily. “I don’t want it! Leave me in peace.”
    The old first maid pensively chewed her lips. A pale, middle-aged woman stood at the threshold of the room. It was Egert’s mother.
    Looking around at those present and then taking another appraising glance at Egert, who was naked to his waist, his round muscles protruding prominently, straining against his fair skin, the doctor dolefully shrugged his shoulders. “Alas, gentlemen.”
    The instruments were returned to the valise. The bewildered elder Soll vainly tried to extract an explanation from the physician about the meaning of his alas. Did it mean that Egert’s illness was already too far advanced?
    Having gathered his things, the doctor glanced at Egert once more, shook his head, and announced, appealing more to the boars on the tapestries than to the Soll family, “The young man, humph, he is extremely healthy. Yes, masters. But if something is troubling the young man, it is not a medical problem, kind masters. Not medical.”
    *   *   *
     
    Glorious Heaven! Stalwart Khars, Protector of Warriors, how could you allow this?
    Lieutenant Egert Soll was mortally wounded; his stricken sense of self whimpered plaintively. The most extraordinary and distasteful thing was that Egert’s pride had been wounded not from without, but from within.
    He stood in front of the mirror for a solid hour, performing his own medical inquest. The same old familiar Egert looked out at him from the depths of the mirror: gray blue eyes, blond hair, and now the scratch that had taken up residence on his cheek. Prodding the wound with his finger, Egert decided that it would scar. Henceforth, Egert Soll would display a distinctive mark. Well, a scar on a man’s face is more a mark of prowess than a defect.
    He breathed on the mirror and traced an oblique cross in the circle of mist created by his breath. It was too soon to lose heart; if all the events of recent days were simply caused by an illness, then he knew a surefire way to cure it.
    Changing his linen shirt for a silk one and ignoring the pleas of his distraught father, Egert left the house.
    *   *   *
     
    All the guards knew that the wife of the captain, the beauty Dilia, graced Lieutenant Soll with her favors. It was a wonder that so far the captain himself knew nothing about it.
    His visits to Dilia conferred a twofold pleasure to Egert: delighting in the ardent embraces of the captain’s wife, he also relished the risk and the awareness he had of his own audacity. He especially enjoyed kissing Dilia when he could hear the steps of the captain on the stairs, coming ever closer, closer. Egert understood very well what would happen should the captain, a decent yet jealous man, find his lieutenant in Dilia’s lace-covered bed. The steel nerves of the