Unconquered Sun (4 page)

- Well, made laugh … Well, umor … Long ago I so did not laugh … Even the Puppy with the Kitten of such jokes do not break away …

- Answer immediately who you are?! And by what right you so treat me?!

The person Fei accepted crafty playful expression again:

- And on it! By the right of the conqueror! I took you prisoner and you are my captive, and the captive is obliged to answer when he is interrogated, isn't it?

And here the Fairy buzzed wings and - hop! - instantly it appeared directly in the middle of a room.

The prince, just like the scared child, whisked with the head under a blanket.

"Fairy! - in horror he thought. - Oh, Creator, real fairy! With wings! I houses at the fairy! I was gone!" On a forehead at Prinze cold sweat acted, and in eyes darkened, each inhabitant Tselestiya from the cradle knows that that man who at least once met in a dense forest the fairy never comes back home any more!

The fairy ceased to laugh. She was very puzzled with such turn of business.

- Hey, you, and well get out! - she began to stick into Prinze with some stick. - And well get out, I speak, and I will pull out that by force! Unless you do not know that with fairies mortal do not act this way, a-a-a? They have to answer when they are asked!

From stick touches on all body of Prinze some unpleasant itch crept away. At last, it did not sustain and put out the head from under a blanket:

- And you will not turn me into a rabbit or into a partridge? - stared Prinze at the Fairy big, childly naive eyes, and that swept with laughter again.

- And from what …. from what … suddenly … to me … … to turn you?

- Well-at-at-at … In fairy tales read about it. And all speak in the district - fairies, they, … - and Prinze turned that a finger at a temple.

- Okhkhkh … well … long ago … I … so … not … laughed … long ago … Everything, is solved! - otsmeyavshis, the Fairy loudly clapped, - you remain with me to live! You will entertain me at a leisure, and that Animals already rather bothered me: at them already what one thousand years the same numbers! - and then it playfully slapped Prinze a stick directly in the head. From pain Prinze turned white and grabbed a healthy hand the hurt place, wounds its sense did not heal yet. The fairy understood that here she obviously overdid and scaredly embraced Prinze.

- What is with you? To you it is bad? And well, wait … - it got the magic pink comb again: couple of touches to Prinze's hair - and pain right there ceased.

- Forgive me, Prinze, I absolutely forgot that you at me the wounded, you cannot be touched … Just I so could not wait to take a fun with you, I so seldom have guests! - and the Fairy sadly looked down.

- How … as … as you called me? - puzzly Prinze asked.

- How? - also with astonishment the Fairy answered. - "Prince"! And unless you are not a prince?

- I do not know … I do not remember … Some blackness in the head …

- And how call you, too you do not remember?

- Too … - Prinze uncertainly answered, having scratched the top.

- And where you live? Where your parents?

- N are N - N do not, any failure … I do not remember …

- Everything is clear! - having clapped, the Fairy exclaimed. - Probably, when you hit the head against that fir-tree root, and struck your memory!

- Well and it is remarkable! - suddenly unexpectedly she burst out laughing. - Means if you do not know from where you and who you are, then, therefore, and are no place to go to you, and therefore you will live at me - and a point!

- About what such root? And why I am "Prince"? Tell me for the sake of the Creator, oh, the Beautiful Fairy!

It was necessary to sit down to the Fairy on a chair at a headboard of a bed of Prinze and to tell all story of the first meeting with it about which we already know, and also about what is meant by his medallion and a signet ring which mere mortals cannot have.

- … There now, - the Fairy summed up, playfully smiling. - So judge: you - "time" - bending fingers, she told, - was taken prisoner to me (it is my wood and to people not the place here!), and - "two" - I to you saved life, and therefore you - "time" - are obliged to obey me and - "two" - to entertain me and to make laugh, and …

- Madam, madam, well leave you alone the patient, I beg, mya-at-at! I as the master of medicine insist on it! - the big-eared gray head of the Kitten seemed in a doorway. - The patient has an amnesia, a severe craniocereberal trauma, two fractures, and you slight him here! You will play with it when recovers, I beg, to a mya-u! And in general, long ago it is time to feed him and it is time for you to have breakfast.

The fairy has a snack a sponge from disappointment:

- "Still Animals did not order me! Who here hostess?", - she thought. But arguments of the Kitten seemed to it convincing, and the Fairy unwillingly went to a door. There she once again turned to Prinze and, cunning smiling, winked at him:

- You here especially do not relax! You will recover - you will expiate the debt to me to the last droplet! - and, having playfully threatened it with a finger, left.

And the Kitten with the Puppy, meanwhile, opened a door more widely and imported into the room a little table on castors with food and drinks. A kitten, as if apologizing, quietly made a purring sound, tying a napkin on Prinze's neck:

- You do not take offense at our hostess, m-r-r-r-myau. It is kind. Just we here, in a solitude, seldom have guests … For the last years five hundred, in my opinion, in general was nobody! A puppy, and you what you cost? Give, impose so long!

And Prinze from surprise could not utter words: "Well, dela-a-a-a! In one day miracles such - the fairy with wings, plush toys talk to me as live … To tell whom - will not believe!"

And the Kitten, meanwhile, suddenly lowered a voice and conspiratorial tone whispered to it on an ear:

- She at your bed spent three days, all conjured, treated you - could not drag with the Puppy! Keep in mind, she is a girl good, kind, house …

8.

In a week it became better for Prinze. He could already pace the room slowly. The beautiful Fairy, using it, began to discharge gradually the Kitten and the Puppy of treatment, and then and began to feed the patient independently, generally with cotton candy from magic pink clouds which fairies eat. Still she forced it to drink curative broth from bitter korenyev. The prince, of course, screwed up the face, but the Fairy so strictly and imperiously watched at him that he submitted and drank - as we know, in general better not to contact fairies.

Soon the Kitten allowed Prinze is behind a dining table and even to walk on vicinities, and now for communication of the Fairy and Prinze there is no obstacle left at all - to it, it is necessary to tell, to great happiness. And Prinze understood more and more that his affection for the Fairy grows. Earlier he was afraid of it - you never know, still will turn into an animal what! - and now began to notice that derzkovaty imperious tone of the Fairy - no more than a mask. In soul it at all not such …

- … Hey, Prinze, and well we will go for a walk with me on the river! The kitten resolved!

Though hours struck already eleven o'clock in the evening, it was necessary to go to Prinze for a walk.

The lodge of the Fairy settled down on round as a saucer to the green lawn which grew with camomiles, dandelions, cornflowers and other forest flowers why from outside she reminded a flower bed. Slightly farther, on rise, the cozy pine coppice with an arbor for rest settled down. There was a marvelous smell of pine needles, "useful to lungs", - the practical Kitten noticed as always. Behind a coppice - the sloping river bank which grew with willows which so surprisingly rustled with leaves on wind that there was a feeling as if they exchanged words with each other about something mysterious in language, clear only for them. And further, on other side of the river, there was a thrown water-mill which empty was shaking up water blades: mermaids liked to ride them with happy squeal at night.

Across these places also there passed walk which, of course, was necessary in order that Prinze restored the health somewhat quicker.

- Tell, the Fairy and what you do here, in this solitude? Why you cannot leave this place? - at last, did not stand Prinze and asked a question which was at it at the tip of the tongue for a long time.

- "Curiosity killed the cat", so, apparently, at you speak? - as always the Fairy maliciously answered.

The prince some time kept silent, and then again with some children's ingenuous spontaneity inattentively blurted out:

- Tell, the Fairy, and you in general marry somebody? Or you breed not as people and animals?

The fairy got up as driven and is attentive, seriously looked at it. At the same time it seemed to the prince that he at all desire cannot look away from her eyes, which as if saw him through so did not remain hidden any his secret thought or desire. This feeling was very unpleasant and Prinze felt a great relief when the Fairy, at last, released his eyes. Her face accepted the same playful and derisive tone again, as earlier:

- And what it so interests you? Unless you do not know that it is dangerous to fairies to ask such questions?

- Why it … - Prinze was frightened outright - at him old fears concerning transformation into rabbits began to come to life again.

The fairy swept with laughter and familiarly tapped it on the shoulder.

- Be not afraid, I will not turn you into a rabbit! Simply … - here her face suddenly became serious, there was some sad, a look - released. - Generally, it is the biggest problem at fairies. We are the most lonely beings on light! - and eyes of its steel slightly damp. It quickly stepped aside and leaned a hand against a pine trunk, having turned an eye somewhere afar, for the river.

- I do not understand … - Prinze murmured, puzzly making a helpless gesture. - You - such beautiful, such clever, such powerful …

- … both such unfortunate and lonely! - sadly the Fairy sighed. - You think, it is easy for us, to fairies to find to itself suitable couple? - bitterly she smiled, turning around to Prinze.

- I understand. Our men almost nobody neither to read, nor are not able to write. They definitely do not suit you, - Prinze spoke. - And at you what, there are no?

- It is secret. It is dangerous to people to stick the nose in affairs of fairies, and that you will be left without nose! - having sharply changed tone, again the Fairy playfully derisively told and clicked fingers on a tip of his long nose, and then quickly went further, any more without turning around.

9.

However after this episode of the relation between them were sharply changed. The fairy became more open and, as if to tell it, available, gentle, and Prinze … The prince began to notice that he cannot do without Fairy any more.

And behind a dining table, and behind game in checkers, and during long walks, everywhere and everywhere Prinze was pursued by invincible desire to look at the Fairy, to admire it. It long could not tear off a look from her silky golden hair glowing even in the dark, transparent and deep as the mountain lake of eyes, harmonous lines of the body which is hardly covered with a dress. And when the Fairy began to sing on a lute, already not only eyes, but also thoughts of Prinze with delight ran towards to voluntary slavery. From luscious and sweet sounds of its magic lute and a voice Prinze lost any ability to see something, except those images which were cast by the song. To it languid walks on the shady avenue lit only with stars, a silvery lunar path and splash of sleepy fish in a whirlpool seemed. He as if in reality heard enthusiastic trills of a night nightingale, penetrating whisper of a cane at a backwater …

And after a while Prinze with surprise noticed that he already is not in a small pink room, and there - in the night wood or at the river - and walks hand in hand with the Fairy or sits together with it in silence of a moonlight night. As in reality he heard splash of waves, the remote singing of night birds, inhaled the stupefying aroma of hair of the Fairy, felt heat of her hands on the palms … - exactly as a moment ago about it the Beautiful Fairy sang. Dreams and reality indissolubly intertwined with each other and the farther, the that knot which, appear, not in forces any person on light was to untangle was more closely and more strong tied.

And what to tell of how quickly and as unexpectedly the Fairy changed the wonderful dresses! For the same evening - or day? (The prince plainly did not know as songs began even in the afternoon, and came to an end in the dead of night) - it reincarnated several times. Every time it were really magic dresses - all weaved out of gold solar or silvery lunar beams which were poured by all flowers of a rainbow. Each new dress cast over Prinze absolutely different moods and a state of mind - for euphoric pleasure to light thoughtfulness and pensiveness. And when the Fairy began to dance …

The prince himself did not understand what happens to him where reality and where the dreams cast by the hostess of this wood, but all this definitely was pleasant to it. He all life dreamed to appear in the fairy tale and when, at last, got to it, he did not want to come back in such boring and the gray "real world" at all.

There was only one "but". Really, Prinze already finally recovered so plaster and bandages were removed from him, and therefore formally there is any more no reason left to remain on a visit with the Fairy. Position of the Prince in her house became ambiguous …