* * *

"Did you eat all the sugar?" Said a rather affirmative voice from above.

"N-no," I blurted out in response, experiencing a little shame and a lot of joy at the same time. "I hadn't been eaten in the night after all."

"Then who did?" Smirked the scarred face as he continued to hover over the bed.

"Co-cockroaches?"

I squinted in anticipation of the slap.

"Get up, you chief cockroach," the man responded with some warmth. "You've eaten your sugar for the next week."

The mood leaped towards a slight sadness, as everyone knows - new sugar is always sweeter than eaten sugar.

"Help yourself," he nodded towards the table with the steaming cups.

I don't even have to get up - sit closer to the window, and I'm at the table. I put my palms around the cup and looked suspiciously at the watchman, taking my time drinking. The Tale of the Sleeping Princess was also read to us. It's not the apple, though, but the giver is also very suspicious.

"Let's get acquainted, I guess." The watchman emptied his portion in two gulps and set the empty mug aside. "Uncle Kolya."

T.N. Addressing "Uncle" is a polite way of addressing an adult male from a child. The analogy would have been Mister. But I left it as it is.

"Vanya."

If I run away, he won't catch me.

"'What Vanya'?" resented the reply.

"I-ivanov?" I timidly suggested.

The watchman stared at me and made a scary face.

"P-petrov?"

"Tell you what, Maxim, don't twist my brain."

I shook my head sharply and even set my cup aside to stretch my hands out with my palms forward - let him see that I wasn't twisting anything.

"Let's stay calm," Uncle Kolya closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "Your name is Maxim. Is it? Don't answer! Nod. Here. Maxim, can we be friends?"

Have you ever been offered friendship by a horrible ogre monster?

"NOOOOOO!"

"Quiet! Silence! Shut up!" He shouted in a way that made my ears hurt.

I fell silent but looked suspiciously in his direction, ready to shout again.

"We're going to live nearby..." he hesitated mid-sentence, clearly noticing my skeptical expression.

I will definitely run away.

"Push-up!" he barked so sharply that I only realized myself doing push-ups on my fists. "Who are we?!"

I sniffed diligently, looking wistfully at the door.

"Who are we?!" barked again at the hundredth repetition.

"H-humans." I had no doubts about me, but about...

"Who are we?" an already calm voice from above asked and slurped tea from the mug.

"I don't know," it was hard to push off the floor. The score was lost in the middle of the second hundred.

"We're friends," Uncle Kolya prompted contentedly, putting his foot on my back. "Go on."

To hell such a friend.

"Who are we?" Bored, the watchman clarified after a minute.

"F-friends," I conceded defeat.

"That's another matter. Have a seat at the table, friend."

I peeled myself off the floor and moved onto the bed.

"Since we're friends now, here's a present for you." A calloused hand moved a coarse bracelet woven from three wires to the middle of the table. "It's to keep you from killing anyone."

I looked from the bracelet to the watchman and back again in surprise. I wasn't going to kill anyone, so why would I...

"The way you scattered your abusers, remember?" He encouraged me to think. "It was your Gift. It protected you. But it can also kill because you have no control over it. You don't want to be a killer, do you?"

I shook my head hastily. The police once came to the boarding school and explained how bad it was to be a criminal - they gathered the whole boarding school in the gymnasium and put us, the youngest ones, in the first row. So the pictures they showed us were memorable for a long time.

"The bracelet will become very hot if your gift is awakened again. The gift cannot harm you, so it will extinguish on its own when the metal of the bracelet burns your skin."

"Does it hurt?"

"It hurts," Uncle Kolya nodded in agreement, "but it's better than killing someone."

It was hard to argue with that. I sighed heavily and reached for the bracelet, but froze midway, jerked my hand away, and moved away from the table.

"What is it again?" The watchman asked with barely contained irritation.

"What if I am attacked again?" I cocked my head bravely.

"There are other ways to punish the abusers," he smiled with one corner of his lips.

"I'm not snitching!" I scowled, folding my arms across my chest.

"Kiddo, what were you listening to?" The creepy guy was openly grinning. "You have a Gift. And you can do this." He folded his hand in a handful and shoved it subtly in my direction.

I was kicked in the chest, and my teeth clattered as the back of my head hit the wall. But there was no pain, only amazement at what had happened, at who had done it, and even more at his words.

People with a Gift are the kind of superheroes who save the world and take care of our city and country. That is not me at all, much less the one-legged nightmare next door.

"I'm a what?" I rubbed the back of my head, looking at the watchman with my mouth open. "But... You?!"

"I once had two legs and healthy arms."

"And what happened?" I asked, looking at my neighbor with a different look.

"The same thing that robbed you of your parents happened. The war. So you and I are sort of comrades in misfortune. You know what I mean?"

The smile disappeared from my face, and tears welled up in my eyes.

"So, friend, would you like to be able to do the same?" The watchman made a smooth pass with his big hand, and the metal bracelet floated above the table on its own - lurching, jerking violently, it floated by sheer magic!

I nodded so often that my head almost fell off.

"I will teach you, but on one condition. No one must know about our lessons. Not even the headmistress. Not even the babysitter or your closest companion."

"But then how does one fight?"

"I told you, I'll teach you," the not-so-scary man winked at me. My friend!

"And when?" I fidgeted in my seat.

"I could do it right now." Uncle Kolya stood up, tried to look under the bed as far as he was flexible enough, and tried to get something out with his cane without any success. "Come on, boy, dash to the floor."

There was a clap of two hands on the floor almost immediately - interesting, isn't it? My elders used to say he had a dead body in there, but I know that's a lie now. Except he had put it in five backpacks - huge ones, like our gym teacher's.

"Do you see the furthest bag?"

"Which one?"

"Which is the dustiest."

After assessing the layer of dust with my finger, I confidently grasped the green-colored bag with dirty yellow streaks.

"I see!"

"Pull it to the center of the room. Aye, well done, now open it."

"Are you sure there isn't a dead body in there?"

"If you fool around, it will appear."

I bit my tongue with anticipation as I unfastened the tight locking mechanism, folding the edges of the bag together so that I could jerk it open and shudder at the magical stuff! Except there wasn't even anything shiny inside - some sand-colored uniform and massive boots took up half the space. There was also a cap, a dull-colored flask, one thing... Oh, binoculars!

"Get your hands off it!" There was indignation over my ear, backing up the order with a slap.

I had to put it aside with great reluctance - I didn't even look through it.

"Look in the inside pocket," my neighbor directed my search.

The contents were even duller - some sheets of grey paper, little books with no pictures. The more surprising were the uncle's words.

"Here's what you need," he gratefully snatched it out of my hands, glancing through it until he stopped at one of the books. "Here, read it."

"Print run of five hundred copies."

"Flip it over!"

"Me-tho-do-lo-gi-cal gui-de-lines..." I said carefully, running my finger down the line.

"Stop!" Uncle Kolya grimaced in pain nearby. "Who reads like that, eh? What do they teach you there?"

"They don't teach me anything," I wondered.

"How's that?" It was his turn to be surprised.

"They wouldn't let me into the school. I don't go there," I complained to the watchman with a hidden grudge.

"I see..." he rubbed the bridge of his nose, thinking hard about something. "So, instead of school, what?"

"Nothing," he shrugged. "I work out in the morning, then I eat, then I play with the younger group, then I eat, then I play with mine, then I eat, then I work out, then I eat again, then I sleep..."

"I'll wish my life was like this... I see. So we'll take care of your studies, too."

"Shall I read on?" I waved the book around.

"No. You will learn the book yourself. Do not show the book to anyone."

"Huh...?" I stretched out disappointedly.

"It's a test," he winked. "Maybe you can't learn."

"Am I incapable?!" I was indignant in response. "I am the most capable in the world!"

"Then you'll also learn this booklet."

Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

"But I'm humble, so don't," I turned my back, pretending that I had already started to study.

"How's it going?" The watchman asked after ten minutes, getting ready to go somewhere.

"Five hundred copies!"

"Turn it over! I'll be there in the evening, don't lose the book, don't show it to anyone. One more thing, Maxim..."

"Аh?" I looked up at the uncle."

"The book is actually magical," he winked at me, rubbed my hair one last time, and left.

He should have said so in the first place! I stared at the folded sheets of paper with renewed interest. Hmm, how about eating it?

Five minutes later, the babysitter came to pick me up for training.

The day went very interesting! I used every spare minute to sneak in a new line and memorize it while making a new approach or running a new lap - I was hardly followed, but still, I came very close to failing a couple of times.

The first time I was seated behind a bush during my morning walk, I was spotted by the babysitter.

"What are you always looking at?" She almost caught me.

I barely had time to hide the book by stuffing it under my trousers.

"Nothing," I shook my head, adjusting the crease from the book on my trousers.

"Be... careful with... that... thing," she said, looking at me strangely.

What do you know about magic, woman?

The second time, the elders pestered me on the general walk in the second shift. There were three of them, looking at me warily. They also had sticks. And I had a bracelet that wouldn't let my gift protect me. And no knowledge that Uncle Kolya had promised me... Hmm, what if he knew this would happen, and gave me the book for a reason?

"Synchronous energy bursts increase aberrations by two orders of magnitude!" I called out in a magical voice, waving my hands like Father Christmas at a matinee (he's a magician, too).

"Get out. He's crazy!" Wailed one, dragging the others along with him.

"M-magic," I said as I stroked the book in my pocket.

Anyway, I learned the book, and in the evening, after an afternoon nap, I looked forward to seeing the uncle to brag.

"Why did you chew on the pages, eh?" He reacted to the paper handed to him.

The man didn't come empty-handed, but with a bunch of big books in a white bag. Probably magical too.

"I learned everything." I let the question pass my ears and closed my eyes defiantly. "Ask!"

"Seriously?" He was genuinely surprised. "I mean, well done! Do you understand anything?"

"Well... the words are complicated," I reluctantly admitted, "but I learned them anyway."

"Thirty-six pages," he flipped through the book to the very end. "Strong. Let's start at the beginning, then."

"Methodological Guidelines for the Development of Energy for Junior NCOs. The City of Moscow, one thousand nine hundred and eighty-seventh year. Page one. Novice-level certification. What is methodological?"

"Have you ever been told the story of Ivanushka and Koschei the Deathless?"

"Yes."

"If he had been given the methodological instructions straight away, it would have said: "Set up a beacon on an island with a lonely oak tree. Leave the two-kilometer zone. Carry out a bombing raid on the bearing of the beacon". And that's it, no oak, no chest, no duck, no egg, no needle, no Koshchei."

"Cool! What are beacon and bombing raids?"

"That's... Don't pull on my nerves, petty! 'Methodical' means only what you have to do and know to do."

"And I'm not pulling anything," I muttered, looking at my own palms.

"Keep going."

"The Novice rank examination is considered acceptable when the examinee is in conscious control of the Power. What is conscious?"

"This means that one must understand how, why, and what one does. Next."

"A visit to the Sovereign Fountains complex is recommended for quick preparation. Sign up by phone..."

"Forget the phone, and don't you dare dial it!" The man got worried. "Especially since no one will let us into those fountains."

"Why?" I fidgeted in my seat.

"The queue there is from here to sky."

"Wow," I waggled a glance at the ceiling. "In the field, concentrated energy action on a sensitive area of the skin is recommended. What are 'concentrated' and 'sensitive'?"

"Was your ass beaten with a belt?"

"Well... But it wasn't me who broke the window!"

"Now that was a concentrated action on a sensitive spot," grinned his neighbor.

"Maybe... screw this training?" I could feel an itch below my waist, and I looked at the front door with interest.

"It's different over there. No belt, you'll see for yourself later," the watchman brushed aside. "You just need a lot of that same 'energy' in one place. At the Sovereign's Fountains, for instance, everything is full of that energy. It comes from under the ground. But as I said, they won't let us in there. Read on, straight to the end of the page."

"The first stage is to feel the energy under the guidance of the instructor. In the second stage, the perceived volume must be influenced. In the third stage, tinted targets are set in the energy environment. The examiner's task is to move the targets clockwise and then counterclockwise without resorting to physical action."

"You messed up all the pronunciations," Kolya sniggered, putting the book aside, "but you remembered it correctly."

"What is...?"

"You'll see for yourself. Follow me."

I didn't have to go anywhere - I just took two steps to the table itself, in the center of which there was a glass jar half-full of water.

Uncle Kolya moved the jar to the edge, pulled a stool from under the table, signaled for a closer seat, and stood next to it.

"Put your hand inside. All the way to the bottom, don't worry, it's just water," he commanded rather strangely. "Now, hold still. There'll be a little splash of water.

A cold wind blew on the water-covered hand, just a little at first, and then more and more strongly, causing the water to ripple, to overflow, to swirl into a funnel. After a couple of seconds, the surface calmed down, and all that was left of the funnel was a thin but long strand of air all the way to the bottom, from which the same small waves diverged in circles. I even held my breath, staring. And then... then the water began to rise, leaving a void at the bottom. I wiggled my fingers, already free of the water - unusual. And the layer of air continued to grow until it took up all the space where my palm was.

"Wow, that's great!" I wanted to turn back to where the uncle was but was stopped by a stern voice:

"Sit still, don't twist, don't reach your hand. Next to your palm is air filled with my Power. Try to find the differences, feel the difference, feel the Power... but don't do anything with it!"

"What's going to happen?" I swallowed, staring at the seemingly empty space.

"If you break the jar, I'll have you whipped for sure."

"I won't do anything!" I promised heatedly, continuing to almost nose into the jar.

"Well, do you feel anything?" Inquired the uncle impatiently, shifting behind.

I listened carefully to myself.

"I want to go to the toilet."

"Hmm, maybe you're just a mediocre loser." A thoughtful tone echoed back. "You're wasting my time."

"No, no, no! I'm trying!" I flopped my hand in the water, listening with all my strength to my sensations. And nothing - just regret growing inside my chest and tears wanting to come out. No, I can handle it! Just a door nearby, but I can't see it - as the babysitter said, standing in front of me and the broken window.

I closed my eyes, tilted my head slightly sideways, and... decided to say hello. That is, I imagined a sad little frog next to my hand and silently said: "Hello!" And when it didn't say anything - frogs aren't very talkative at all - I stroked it with my finger. I touched it and felt something. I opened my eyes, expecting to see the edge of a jar, and my hand was floating in the air... I imagined it... probably. I closed my eyes and tasted it again... It was rough... like the watchman's boots, the brown ones. I opened my eyes again and touched the same spot - nothing. I closed one eye - aha, there it is! I swiped my finger, and it did not look like a frog, as if my finger had gone down the hill. How do you look? I squinted my eyes and kept running my hand over the rough lines but could not see any sign of it. It didn't look like a frog at all, more like a cloud pressed against the far wall. It was easy to press down with my finger, but it was almost immediately as before - and I was afraid to check any further, remembering the belt.

"Bingo! It's rough, and it's like a cloud. It also floats upwards."

"Are you sure?" Uncle Kolya asked incredulously.

"It's also so... It's not cold, it's not hot... It's kind! Is it... curious?" I realized with surprise.

"Not him, you. It's a reflection of you in the Power," a warm voice corrected me.

"So, did I make it?" I turned to my neighbor with hopeful, burning eyes.

"You did it. You are good! Now go on. It's lunchtime. And remember, not a word to anyone!" Smiling rather like a cat, almost at once, Uncle Kolya escorted me out.

"Hey, what's the reward? He could have given me some sugar..." I muttered through the closed door.

The door swung open for a moment, letting in a packet of raffinates thrown by the right hand. Such a thing has no right to fall to the floor!

"Another thing," I stroked the sealed packet, got up from the floor, and shook it off.

"Oh, Maxim, hello!" he was called out from across the hall. "Wow, sugar!" They added without transition.

"Yes, sugar," I said, nodding to Sasha and Vitya from the younger group.

"Can I have... a piece?" Hesitantly Sasha hesitated.

"Hmm," I mimicked thinking. "An exchange?"

"Exchange!"

"I want a big mug, sneakers with blue stripes, and a coloring book with pencils."

"It'll cost you half a pack!"

"Ten cubes, and there must be at least half of the clean sheets in the coloring book."

"Ten each!" They looked at each other.

"Okay!"

Nikolai collapsed on his bed without energy. The costly ritual, the first stage of the Air Blizzard, which required a lot of raw energy to form a "Veteran" level technique, had taken all his reserves, which meant that with his broken energy, the gift could be forgotten for at least a week. As planned in general. He was well aware of the consequences when he prepared the Initiation.

That is why it was so important to get it right the first time. It was important to press the guy, to turn a fundamental procedure into a trifle, which is not easy at all - here, in a small room, with a simple jar and water. This is not the golden luxury of the Sovereign's Fountains, not the amazing Gemstone Roads in the lands of the Sheremetevs, and not even the most accessible because of the very weak source of Power on Ararat. Instead of triumph, pride, and a sense of belonging to the greatness of others was a primitive test from the first page of a chewed-up (bastard!) manual. Maybe that's why it worked, but at the same Fountains people sometimes live for two days until something works.

It is done, it is done, Nikolai whispered soothingly to himself as he continued to stare thoughtlessly at the ceiling. But light emotions did not hurry to wash away from his soul the memory of the terrible tension of the last minutes. Because something hadn't gone according to plan - and that was why his fingertips were trembling, the world was blurring around him - when he opened his eyes, his heart was pounding wildly.

In waves, the feeling of a terrible, terrifying loss of control over the feisty element returned. The feeling, like fingers slipping from the held boulder of the Power, beneath which the whirling little boy was frozen, struggling. The broken gift reminded him of himself - what he'd been able to hold for hours before had torn the snare.

It was possible to dispel the incomplete technique while there was an opportunity - it was not that uncommon for a battle to force a spell to be canceled, so the skills had been built up. So even now, crippled, he could easily shake off the Blizzard from his fingers... But Nikolai kept waiting. Bad persistence, dangerous and stupid - he somehow understood this now, but not then, before, standing behind the boy and sincerely wishing him luck.

Nikolai didn't want to break Maksim's faith in himself, didn't want to postpone the ritual for a week, and just... just believed that the kid could do it. So he stood there, gnawing his teeth into his lip, bleeding... and holding a willful spell that could kill them both.

And when the boy did feel the elements and Kolya finally dumped the energy into the ground (rotten pipes in six months guaranteed), another shock came over him - this time from the very another side, from the most peaceful thing in the room. From an ordinary clock.

Ten minutes from the start of the ritual to the end. Which, in terms of combat rank potential, equaled... Holy shit.

"Who's your daddy, Maxim?" Nikolai muttered into the ceiling.

Of course, the boy could have been a wunderkind, but more often than not, fighters of the rank of 'Teacher' and 'Master' were born under big names. Simple genetics comparable to the ability to see in the dark in nocturnal animals or the ability to pick up vibrations from miles away in aquatic life are the things that help one survive, amplified with the next generation. In old families, survival is linked to the ability to kill and not be killed, so in their environment carefully choose wives and grooms, after a few millennia, they achieve birth of children with the potential of at least the rank of "Veteran". It is rumored that there are families where children are born exclusively to future "Teachers" and even higher...

Of course, the potential is not something you can measure with an instrument, but there are also indirect signs. Like the time it takes to first search for and 'understand' the energy of Gift. It is not a feeling, but understanding - and not from a person, but as if the energy itself touches the person, gets interested, reflects the person in itself, makes itself felt, recognizes the right to rule oneself. The main thing is to seek, not to think about other things, to desire to find the power that is nearby. And it will respond - after some time. Sometimes in an hour, sometimes in a few days. And for those who, by the right of blood, by the right of the ocean of efforts of past generations, are much closer to the gift, it can take dozens of minutes. Which pretty much sums up the enormous potential.

Honestly, Nikolai expected a couple of hours of the ritual - he had already had experience at the Drevichi. And even when the spell was broken, he could last half an hour. And after the dropped spell he felt as if half an hour had passed. But no, ten minutes

Also part of the big picture and help the search.

This morning Nikolai had time to visit the maternity hospital where his new neighbor was born. He stomped around at the reception, asking about the veteran staff of the maternity hospital, and complained to the head of the hospital about the departure of excellent specialists. For a chocolate bar and a large can of coffee, he was even allowed to rummage through the children's personal files. Not at once, of course, but after a sincere and utterly made-up story about a foolish daughter who gave up her child and did not tell her grandfather ... and now an old invalid to die without seeing his grandson. His story, according to the eternal Russian tradition, was treated with full faith and women's oohs. All the more so because he knew the boy's name, surname, and date of his birth (of course, he had memorized the questionnaire). He was counting on the fact that they would let him see all the papers, which meant that the mother's questionnaire would be there somewhere.

But they could not help - the papers of that time had been neatly seized, which the local authorities had not been aware of for seven years. In the noise of the commotion, Nikolai preferred to leave the building, scratching out for himself a couple of home addresses of midwives who had worked in those years but had quit. It was also some kind of clue, though Kolya did not believe that women would remember one of the thousands... especially after all these years.

The next attempt promised to take much more time and could easily end in another dead end. Nikolai planned to find Maxim's parents. For one thing, it would be a help to know the details. He knows that they are strong, he knows about the long lineage, and he can identify them even by their appearance - after all, their copy resides on the next bed! But on the other hand, the stronger the families are, the more careful they are to make sure no one knows about other cases and that history books, newspapers, and magazines print the "right story" rather than what really happened. The High Aristocracy has the truth, in chronologies and chronicles, but where are the High Ones, and where is he? The real data will have to be accessed through friends-companions, which is not fast at all.

There was another spark of chance - the Power of the Blood, an individual trait of any ancient family. Maxim had something to do with electricity. All that remained was to send a card to Father Christmas, asking him to tell which family had such an ability. Because anywhere else, they would kill him for a question like that.

While the search is going on, the boy's education will have to be done. He was not doing it out of the kindness of his heart - he would have to answer Maksim's relatives. Nikolai doesn't seem to be obliged to, and it was not him who prevented the boy from going to school... It is much more advantageous to appear before aristo as a caring veteran, not as a drunken watchman. Even more so because education is a bonding experience, and one who is close to a foundling would certainly not be abandoned.

And the lad's a bit quick-witted for his age. They say it is also a sign of the breed. When during millennia of wars, children become grown-ups at ten and go to war, when they head families because adults are already dead when they have to manage whole factories because blood is blood and nobody else dares to take the lead - then you get such offspring. I'd rather have a happy childhood...

As for the Power and mastering the Gift, Nikolai was afraid to go further than the air elemental 'Novice' exam. Because, once again, it was kin. He had no idea which element Maksim's kin practiced, but he certainly knew that if it did not coincide with air and he continued his studies, someone would be very unhappy. Because the more you master something, the harder it will be to switch to something else. And the Novice and general training is quite enough to develop the guy's mindset. He doesn't have to go further at all.

After summing up, Nikolai calmly allowed himself to go to sleep for a couple of hours.

The fact that he had learned the booklet to the end did not come to mind at all. Probably because it was completely impossible to learn it on his own. Well, he thought so...

* * *

Chapter 4

The secret which is obvious