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The door slammed silently, separating the two generations. Thirty years apart between a young man full of hope and energy and a crippled old man who had also once believed in his lucky star and did not at all imagine himself as an unwanted cripple, a watchman on a paltry salary. Nevertheless, that was the way life had worked out.

Nikolai Ivanovich Roskov was not born disabled; on the contrary, the bourgeois family listened with delight and a sinking heart to the slightly tipsy (how not to drink to that!) and gently smiling medical attendant, who repeated for the tenth time to the happy family: "Your son is healthy... and he is Gifted". The father, they say, was a little less happy, drank vodka, and glanced sideways at his wife - the gift is often inherited, but he and all his ancestors could not boast of this, as well as the other half. It would have come to a brawl, but then great-grandmother squeaked that her grandfather served the Prince of Novgorod, and not an ordinary, but a druzhinik. And that meant the rank of "Knight", no less. It could come through the generations.

Kolya was not a fool either - his grades were at least good, and his attention span and his excellent memory would get him into any university. The more so since the Gifted were admitted much more readily, making allowances during the entrance examinations.

But the thirst for adventure was boiling in his blood, the attention of those around him was dizzying, and the rapturous wows warmed his soul when he reached for the native element of the wind and played a bit of mischief. Something was pounding in his chest, demanding action, deeds, and new horizons. Nicholas could not sit quietly at his desk, absorbing knowledge.

So he met his eighteenth birthday at the recruitment office of the Drevichi Squad, the largest and most famous in Upper Novgorod. He was a bit tipsy and full of excitement Nikolai almost danced as he waited for the officer on duty to open the door for him. The station worked around the clock, inviting all who wanted a new life or to flee from the old one. The main thing was a Gift and the absence of blood feuds. In general, Kolya was suitable - as he was informed, taking his passport along with the contract he had signed without looking at it.

Training, drills, teamwork, a bit of maths, chemistry, physics, landing in the Arctic Circle, Initiation. A dozen operations - first in the perimeter guard, then directly. The first dead bodies from his hand, shock, pills from a metal pencil box, adrenaline, courage. One week of drunken binge drinking, and it all repeats. Ranks of Second Lieutenant, own combat threesome. Flights all over the world, do not bring any pleasure anymore because they became a job. Fifteen years of service, six to eight operations a year, new epaulets and five triples of subordination, a solid bill, and thoughts of retirement.

And then a new operation, a dead-end street in the concrete jungle of Tokyo, and an unnaturally serious boy in a strict black suit against a blank wall with a scarlet School crest against his heart. And the bullets from six barrels could not make a path to a seemingly motionless body. The wind rumbled angrily, shrinking into a whip under the pressure of Nikolai's will, a born-again fire erupted between the hands of his deputy Sementsov, and the ground shook, blocking with its groan the close roar of machinery - the Unit was not at all confused, not for the first time they had been given a difficult target, not wanting to bring the payoffs any closer. They strike. All three of them. It's not so hard to aim for a figure that was still there.

Pure physics. The pressure, the ideal environment for combustion, the stone walls of the crucible - all so that the three elements combined would strike an order of magnitude harder than singly. The tried and tested combination didn't even damage the uniform on the dude's shoulders this time as he stood there staring at his executioners with an impenetrable oriental countenance. And then came the reply that crossed out two-thirds of the squad alive, turning Nikolai into a cripple... The rank of 'Teacher' is roughly a tank platoon. A tank platoon worked its way through a narrow cul-de-sac between two warehouses, into which they did not drive the target, but the target led them after it.

Nikolai woke up in the prison hospital - for some reason, they did not kill them on the spot and did not take them to the family torture chambers. They were simply left to die in the rubble, under the rubble of boulders and rebar. The news gave him hope - Drevichi had not abandoned their own, which meant they were soon to be pulled out, transported to their homeland, and provided with healers and prosthetics. He was terribly sorry about his legs and very worried about his arm, but if he had the money, that too could be solved.

They have been abandoned. Some big politics involved the rapprochement of the two empires. There were no Dreviches in Japan, no Nikolai Roskov detachment, but bandits who allowed a robbery against an aristocrat of the Great Family. The punishment was to rot to death in a damp cell of the local prison, and the sentence was passed and carried out. A year in confinement put an end to the recovery of his leg, and his left arm completely failed. A persistent cough and swelling on the healthy leg were added. Funnily enough, the new illness saved him. By an unknown twist in the brains of the locals, they diligently treated even convicts like him to be thrown back into the cell and prolong the agony. In the sanitary block, they managed to talk with a Hindu orderly. English, spiced with the language of big money, helped to bond and build a relationship, and the password key to one of the anonymous accounts made them close friends - close enough to send a letter from Nikolai by courier to distant Upper Novgorod.

Nikolai ordered Drevich's own rescue - a set of measures with one-person evacuation from a secure facility and transportation home. The letter highly recommended giving him a substantial discount, but there was not a single threat or swear word. A discount was given.

Nevertheless, the operation had cost most of the money set aside for retirement, and the rest was spent on medical treatment, and even that was not enough. A cripple with a twisted energy system in his body, unable to do anything more than sweep away leaves and snow with a gust of wind, he left the private clinic. This is how a janitor and watchman in one person appeared in the Boarding School. There was food, a bed (there was no place of his own, and the parents' flat was occupied by his younger brother and his family), no questions about the past, and they preferred not to notice the days when Kolya was wasted away on vodka, trying to numb the terrible pain in his body that came with every sudden change in the weather. Elsewhere he would have been kicked out a long time ago... There was even a woman here... a woman he would never have looked at before. The bar had dropped pretty low now, to the very bottom, as had his whole life - so he was glad to have one. Life had settled into a measured rut and rolled on unhurriedly, eating up day after day. Until today.

His heart was feverish, pulsing to his temples, and the palm of his right hand was covered in sweat - whether he wiped it on his jeans or not, it was useless. And even his numb hand felt like it was shooting fire sparks from the tension. The last time it had happened to him was a long time ago, when the target, drunk to astonishment, had decided to crawl out from under the tank's armor and take a piss near some nearby bushes. And Nikolai, then only a week as a "druzhinik", hurriedly set up his aiming frame so as not to miss his Chance.

There was no hurry now, but how could he explain it to the wild imagination that was pushing his body to go even faster? It was hard to stay calm when the big-lettered Chance, who now looked like an utterly resentful child, came to him in a mundane way, taking the next bunk.

In fact, the watchman wanted to beat the boy banally, putting him in his place and marking his dominance. It is impossible to do otherwise with the locals; they only appear to be innocent lambs, but in reality, they are beasts. If you turn your back, they'll steal you. If you believe them, they'll cheat you. If you get attached, they'll jump on your neck. Even if the new guest isn't one of them, it doesn't change anything. He'll just be forced to steal by his elders. The only solution was for the little one to be more afraid of him than anyone else. And here's how it turned out...

It is all about how the boy dealt with his abusers, and it is about those little details, hardly known to anyone who was not part of the small number of Gifted. One Gifted per ten thousand - unwittingly a community is formed, the release of information from the boundaries of which is strictly discouraged. And if you remember what a tiny percentage of them belonged to the High Aristocracy and how they protect their secrets ... In general, Nicholas also did not know everything, but some of it was no doubt.

Aristocratic clans of more than half a millennium can develop a bloodline ability - completely random: martial or defensive, peaceful or designed to kill. The ability is simply by Right of Blood. It does not need to be studied - as if it were a characteristic trait, like a willed chin, only on an energy level. Initially, the skill is weak at the 'Journeyman' level.

However, with each generation, its power grows if both parents of the new bearer are Gifted and fades (or may fade away altogether) if one of the spouses does not possess the gift. Over millennia of dynastic selection, this ability has developed into a form of terror for enemies, a weapon of the 'Master' or 'Virtuoso' rank, and a trump card that can be used by anyone in the family, regardless of their military rank, gender, or age. It is not customary to talk about it, and no one would approve of anyone talking about their skills belonging to a particular clan. Only the aristocrats of the highest rank keep an eye on the Power of the Blood, weeding out any mention of them in newspapers and books, on the radio, and TV. The subject is taboo for discussion.

So the two hens, Headmistress and Mashka, could hardly have realized what they had seen. They knew that the boy was Gifted, but they could not see that he was no ordinary boy whose mother had sinned with a noble and sent the fruit of a brief passion to an orphanage.

And they certainly did not know that the key to the Power of Blood is pure emotion. The stronger the love, curiosity, rage, and hatred - the more the dormant power of generations unfolds in the body. And the kid did not even hate his abusers - he was angry, yes... So, he hit with a grain of power - from the ocean, which a whole stratum of noble generations had rewarded him behind his back.

How did it happen that Aristo ended up in boarding school? Not much of a mystery, really. During the tribal wars, all newborns are forcibly registered under someone else's name and surname, putting a disclaimer of parenthood in the "parents" box. This is so that the executioners of the opposing side do not kill the baby.

The state clinics were under the protectorate of the Emperor, but they were not a fortress at all, and there were no "Masters" and "Virtuosos" at the door. And those who attacked still had to be caught and charged... Brutal, messy - of course. But if you imagine that such a precious child grows up guided by hatred towards parents' killers and one sunny day one will make a Fiery Storm of the Tribal Power over the estate of its offenders, with all its inhabitants, including children... At this point, you will think, choosing - one innocent life of others now or hundreds of your relatives, equally innocent, afterward.

So they renamed the children, listed them as not gifted, and did not put them in the mothers' register - all to give them a chance to survive, to take them out of the flames of war.

The birth mother, of course, knows her child's name and will easily find it later when the threat to her child's life has passed, except... sometimes the secret goes with the mother to the grave. And such a total orphan appears - Maxim. Nobody wanted a child. His fate - once the gift is awakened - to adorn his person with the armed forces of the Emperor, working off the money spent on his content ... Unless a good-natured uncle Kolya arranges for him to reunite with his family much earlier - of course, for a huge fee. For some reason, Nikolai did not doubt that a clan with such a Power of Blood would give an enormous reward.

Kolya wiped his forehead with his sleeve and panted in front of another staircase, this time to the third floor, where the archive with the files of pupils was. And Mashka will bear it. She's not going anywhere...

There were no locked doors in front of the watchman - and the bundle of keys on his belt was the best proof of that. The latch was carefully turned, and the heating rectangles of lamps flickered, illuminating a dozen racks across the long room. Nikolai didn't need the kid's last name - were there many Maximovs in the line? He guessed the approximate year of birth, so the task of finding a personnel file of his Chance and finding in it the blood group and a number of the maternity ward did not seem so difficult. The next step was to go there, ask around, and see if anyone was looking for the boy. He had to start somewhere, to have some data on hand to act on his own or to ask old acquaintances for a favor.

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A rack of peers was found fairly quickly. The only thing was that none of the named cardboard folders had Maxim's name on them.

"Maybe you got the year wrong," Kolya muttered, scratching the bridge of his nose.

There were indeed Maksims in the next rack, only they were in their twenties, and they looked - in the black and white three-by-four photos attached to the case - quite different from his neighbor.

That's all right. There are general logs. There are logs of allowance and bedding allocations. There are inoculations. Nicholas was fully immersed in the search.

After an hour and a half, he put the file cabinet back together, turned off the light, slowly closed the door, and only then allowed himself a strong word and a slap on the wall with an open palm. He froze, leaning on his hand. There was no Maxim. It was as if he had never existed.

Nevertheless, in his room sat the boy in question. He was living here, studying, sleeping, fighting. So the information had simply been taken away. His subconscious shared the answer.

It is not difficult to determine who did it - only Headmistress, on her orders, with her involvement, would have the power to do such a thing. Much harder - why? A difficult question, a bit nerve-wracking, as in any other case where someone, albeit unknowingly, is prying into your plans.

Nikolai needed the boy to give to his family and get his reward. There is no need to hide documents, conceal and engage in forgery to do this. A family reunion - what could be more legal and easier? A drop of blood, a DNA test, a lawyer in a good suit, and the state will easily give up a dependent.

Did Headmistress want... a gifted one? Unaccounted for by the state, who, because of his birth peculiarities, had slipped past the well-established mechanism for determining a gift...

No, it doesn't add up, Kolya shook his head. He's easier to adopt legally, like a normal child without a gift. He would be adored by his new parents, a pet weapon that could easily be sold later.

It was nonsense: no matter how he thought about it, he could not find any reason to remove a whole person from the list of the living. It was much easier to solve everything with a couple of fake certificates, a signature, and a stamp.

And the Headmaster must have accomplices. You can't hide something like that on your own. Someone has to keep an eye on him and keep him from being questioned. Mashka, for example.

The name fitted in perfectly, immediately lowering the mood by a couple of points. He remembered other bedtime conversations in which a lukewarm friend painted pictures of life together. Nikolai nodded and mouthed but was generally not against it - who else would want him like that? It turned out that, for some things, their relationship was not close enough. Or Mashka was intimidated.

After circling on the stair landing, distressed by thoughts he could not have imagined two hours ago, Nikolai took the next step. Or rather, he went down a flight of stairs and stepped confidently into the dark corridor, following his memory to the headmistress's office. He had been there often, not on official business, but in the pleasant female company - for some reason, Mashka liked to do it on the boss's desk, and Nikolai generally did not care.

The right key was found almost immediately - because it was different from the others in terms of its solidity and relief. Which didn't stop him from opening the door in a second, fumbling for the switch and staring intensely into the familiar surroundings with a T-shaped conference table, at the head of which was the massive desk of the headmistress, with a leather chair under portraits of the venerable Emperor and the Prince of Upper Novgorod. Curtained windows concealed the street from Nicholas and Nicholas from the street; the left wall was occupied by two sideboards separated by a floor clock. The worn parquet was successfully concealed by a red-and-black carpet. It was as if it were an official's office, not a boarding school. But the character was immediately apparent, along with the ambition. Such a person could well have gone in for forgery.

It was intuition rather than logic that brought Nikolai here - the latter was indignant at the idea that a stolen personnel file could be hidden in such an impudent manner, while intuition told him not to hurry in assessing a person's reasonableness.

She shouldn't be carrying that kind of paperwork home, should she? A timid thought flashed through.

Put it in an anonymous safe deposit box if you can't burn it! The army-style barked back.

Nevertheless, Nicholas decided to check it out. He took off his shoes at the entrance - they were dirty and would make a mess on the carpet - and leisurely walked over to the prince's portrait. It was behind the canvas with the wise face of Yaroslav Semyonovich that the mistress of the office had set up a small safe for her personal use. Mashka had once boasted - and he remembered, noting at the same time the strange awareness of his friend.

The massive, gilt-painted frame with the portrait moved to the floor, giving access to a white rectangle door with a mechanical butterfly handle and a keyhole. A little relieved - if there had been crafty electronics or the monogram of the Demidovs in the corner of the door, it would have been easier to leave, having convinced himself that the boss could not be such a fool... But otherwise - smirked Kolya - let's see what else he could do.

He was not one to break into safes at all, but this was hardly even a safe. It was a parody of the occasional thief, or rather a piece of furniture to complete the big boss's image. The only thing to do was to figure out the location of the spring-loaded part which blocked the deadbolt of the lock from moving and to "push" it with the elements. Even a mangled gift is enough for such a thing. With a click and the heavy, seemingly secure door swings open to his complete satisfaction.

The smell of perfume wafted in from the open bottle by the door. Nikolai recoiled - he did not want Mashka to smell it - and, picking up the bottle with two fingers, put it on the far edge of the table with his outstretched hand. On the way back, he grabbed a chair - it was easier to see the contents of the safe from above without touching it.

Inside are papers stapled together, stacked in colored plastic files, neatly stacked. At the left edge are several miniature cassettes and a black recorder case, all in a clear file. Two plump stacks of scarlet banknotes at the back, sheltered from casual glances by the weekly magazine.

And at the very bottom of the safe, beneath the other papers, a grey cardboard personal file was peeping out - just like the hundreds of files in the archives.

For another dozen minutes Nikolai scrutinized the contents, imprinting into his memory the location of every leaf, every curve of plastic - everything must look exactly the same after he left. The thought that he had already crossed the line that separated mere curiosity from breaking and entering forced him to act as carefully as possible. The visit to the office could be explained somehow - he heard a noise, the clinking of glass, and decided to check it... but about the safe, he would have to explain to the prosecutor. So he stood there, closing his eyes to reconstruct the contents down to the last detail, then opening them again, checking what he had remembered with reality.

When Nikolai was sure he had remembered everything accurately, he gently reached under the bottom of the pile of papers and slowly moved everything to the table. Then - arrange everything in layers, "spreading" the contents on the table. And then, as a final act, he took off his jumper and tucked it under the door, so the light did not penetrate the corridor and closed the door with the key.

The reading turned out to be... entertaining. So much so that Nikolai, before he had even looked through a third of the papers, began to silently repeat: Bastards. What bastards they are.

The information did not settle in his head. They are women! Even wild animals took pity on babies, and these... it was hard to find the word. Nikolai could not call himself 'clean', but neither he nor his unit had ever gotten into such blatant filth.

If you take away the emotions... cunts, what cunts they are... Anyway, if you take away the emotions... Gifted people have a generally logical feature - the body changes under the influence of the gift, getting used to passing energy through itself and getting stronger to perceive the loads. The nature of the changes is as individual as an iris pattern or a fingerprint - it is affected by everything: age, experience, elements, frequency of practice, heredity, favorite spells, and a hundred other reasons. A gift draws a unique picture inside the body of energy lines and their interaction - which is why, after losing his leg, Nikolai practically lost control over the elements. Now imagine that as a result of an injury, illness, or old age and organ malfunctions - gifted people are not immortal and are prone to illnesses, though to a much lesser extent than ordinary people. Healers can be called upon to help, but they are not all-powerful either. Sometimes there is no other choice but to transplant an organ.

And so a piece of another person's body is inserted into the gifted person's body, into his energy structure, into the picture of the gift. If it is an organ of another gifted person, the effect will be worse than a nail hammered into a mirror. The son may be able to share a kidney or a part of his skin with his father, but he will do it only if they had the same elemental practice... and so on. No guarantees. That's why transplants are made from ordinary people. In the fine-tuned mechanism, an extremely fragile part appears, akin to a clay cog in the cast-iron mechanism of a steam engine. If you strain it, it will shatter, ruining the owner's life. The new part will take a long time to mend, and the greater the age, the more capricious the gift is to the damaged body.

But let's imagine an impossible situation - a well-developed, athletic, perfectly healthy gifted person who, by the age of fourteen, has never even touched his Gift. His body is permeated with energy, but because of the lack of practice, instead of the gift pattern, there is a blank canvas. Cut and patch any old canvas - the painting will restore itself... and there are no restrictions on the use of the gift.

An impossible situation, absolutely. First, a guy has to pass a gift test at birth, when he enters kindergarten, school, and on to school medical examinations. Second, follow a diet, exercise, and be sufficiently intellectually and spiritually developed. And third, do not use force, do not train, and do not realize that one is gifted at all, otherwise, one will reach for the elements, and will not be able to hold on. Impossible, especially with the ratio of the gifted one to ten thousand .... Impossible, especially given the close attention of the ISS... Or very, very expensive. What bastards they are, Maxim.

Nikolai had taken a keen interest in this subject in his time - he was a cripple himself, but even he was disgusted at the thought of killing a child to gain a leg or an arm. You had to be completely turned on your head, fed up with power and lawlessness, to wait indifferently for a new heart, liver, and kidneys to be grown for you. The thought echoed - where had he got himself in?

Much more calmly he listened to the recordings on the miniature cassettes - the recorder showed almost full charge, so Nikolai hoped that the mistress would write off the lack of one battery division to self-discharge... if she noticed at all. Only Mashka spoke, giving out plans in response to the seemingly harmless questions of her boss. If you listen, it seemed as if the only and main organizer of everything was the burly babysitter. The headmistress was evidently taking care of herself, treading on a slippery slope. True, these records will not help her at all: it is enough to get out the edge of the truth - all will be killed. The involved, the uninvolved, him - Nikolai. They will burn out the whole boarding school. The client won't give the ISS a chance to get a clue. Because there are such crimes that neither title, nor money, nor old merits, nor one's army will help - everyone will come to kill such a scum.

And the recorder continued to sing in a thin voice of a woman who had been close yesterday... And there was even a glimpse of him when Maria was discussing how she would spend the whole lake of money. The cripple was not in the plans, and when the boss reminded her about the watchman... The answer made his heart tingle, and his temples poured with heaviness, like a change in the weather. Nikolai did not even expect it could be so painful.

Outside the window, dawn was scarlet, hinting softly that the paperwork should be done away with. Kolya put everything back in place, carefully recreating its original appearance, picked up his sweatshirt off the floor, put on his shoes, and left the office, pondering gloomily: what should he do next?

Take everything and bring it to the nearest police station. Let's say the most ideal scenario is that he doesn't get killed right away. The case goes to trial, and the perpetrators are convicted. Then what? Next, he's found by relatives - some kind of third cousins who can't be connected to the case - and given a very long and very painful death. Justice, or lack thereof, has nothing to do with it. That's tradition. A commoner cannot cause the death of an aristocrat and still be alive.

He wouldn't cut in with the chicks - he hadn't burned out enough of his soul to sink that low. And they wouldn't take him in - it would be cheaper to kill him.

Dump the information to journalists by dropping an envelope with no sender? The boarding school will burn down on the same day.

He waddled back to his room, thinking unhappy thoughts. Then he looked at the sleeping boy, buried under three blankets, and everything was back to normal. He had a plan, hadn't he? Find the boy's folks, make a lot of money, and live like a prince! So what's wrong with that? And as for the plans of the big men ... Kolya smiled excitedly and moved his right shoulder, stretching. He doubts that the boy will refuse the lessons of the Elements of the Wind. And if he did, he'd get it in the neck. The old ways are reliable ways, any of the Drewitches will tell you that.

Time will pass, and the boy will get his power drawing. After that, it's up to his luck. If things turn out badly, at least he'll take the customer with him to the grave. And the dead man's kin will destroy the executors for such a setup. That's worth a lot, too...

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Chapter 3

Secrets from under-bed