King Stakh's Wild Hunt

by Uladzimir Karatkevich

  “And I believe in that,” I said simply.

  When we had ridden away, I again saw from the edge of the forest his big silhouette on the mound. Ryhor was standing against the background of a crimson sky with his long gun in his hands, the gun reaching above his head, and on him his closely-fitting leather-coat turned inside out. The wind was blowing his long hair about.

  All day and all night we rode through forests. The following morning we were met by the sun, by wet, tall grass, by joy! It was only now that I began to understand the difference between the Janoŭski region and this land.

  Enormous nests of storks and a sky-blue silence over the clean huts.

  Then how was my lady from the eighteenth century to look at this new world, if even I, during such a short period, had forgotten all this?

  I glanced at her who was to be my wife. Her eyes were wide open and happy, she pressed herself against me and from time to time sighed, as a child does after tears. I much desired that she should feel even better. And I bent to kiss her hand.

  What worried me at this time and later, too, was her illness. Therefore I rented a small house with a garden on the outskirts of the city. The doctors said that everything would pass living a peaceful life. And indeed, it did pass, when we had been living together two months and she told me that we should have a child.

  We surrounded each other with such a sea of kindness and attention, with such love, that even after seventy years I wonder at it as at a dream. Everywhere life was kind to us, even in Siberia where I found myself in 1902. She was more than just a wife, she was a friend until death.

  We lived long and happily, as in the song:

  While over the land

  Sunshine did reign…

  But even now I sometimes see in a dream the grey heather and the stunted grass of the waste land, and King Stach's Wild Hunt leaping, dashing through the marshes. The horses' bits do not tinkle, the silent horsemen are sitting up straight in their saddles. Their hair, their capes, their horses' manes are waving in the wind, and a lonely star is burning overhead.

  King Stach's Wild Hunt is racing madly across the earth in terrifying silence.

  I awaken and think that its time is not yet over, not as long as gloom and darkness and cold, social inequality and dark horror exist on earth. Across the land, half drowned in fog, still clashes The Wild Hunt.

  Примечания

  1

  Mužyk — peasant, man, fellow.

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  2

  Manuscripts telling of the creation of the world.

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  3

  Minister of defense in Great Duchy of Lithuania, Belarusian state in Middle Ages.

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  4

  Dziesiacina — a measure of land equal to 2.7 English acres, or 1.1 hectares.

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  5

  1 pud — 16.38 kg., 36 lb.

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  6

  This illustrates the myth about the “conqering” of Belarusian land by Lithuania (Litva) tribe.

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  7

  Here Balt-Samogitian.

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  8

  A “Vladimir” — an order given for services to the state.

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  9

  “The Vampires' Night” — a great slaughter of aristocrats committed by peasants during the Muraška Rebellion in the 17th century.

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  FB2 document info

  Document ID: ooofbtools-2013-3-20-22-28-14-148

  Document version: 1.1

  Document creation date: 20.03.2013

  Created using: OOoFBTools-2.12 (ExportToFB21), FictionBook Editor Release 2.6.6 software

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