Angel on earth

Mikhail stooped recklessly and lowered his head, the first time he touched his nose, and the third time he found his lips.

Aaron suddenly shed a tear.

The suitcase fell to the ground with a thud, and he stood on tiptoe, wrapped his arms around Mikhail's neck, and greedily sucked those young and fresh lips with a girlish fragrance.The wound bitten by him had healed, but he still licked the remaining blood pityingly, as if Mikhail was still in pain.The boy's reaction was more enthusiastic than him, and Mikhail agreed to stop for him, so he was always burning as passionately as when he was 16 years old.

Aaron says:

"I hate him, I hate Arnold Calvin Edwards. All he did for Isabella was futile self-impression, but did he consider us? Even if Isabella was a good person to him , the church is also correct, what about the Norrens? Why did he give the key to the disaster to the City of Covenant and the City of Lieyang? Are we his descendants alone? The love and respect that our grandmother, Countess Hardy received Is it so hypocritical that he sent compensation in advance?"

He took off his glasses, and Mikhail wiped away the tears that oozed from his right eye.He said:

"If God really ate us up, I don't have so many complaints. But the ones who ate us up were the people sitting in the City of Oath, the people who guarded Sun City, and even Candy Kane.— —God, Misha, I beg you to forgive me, but I can't tell you the specific truth now, I'm much weaker than you think."

"It's okay, I forgive you." Mikhail held his face with a smile, his bony and slender hands were warm and reliable, "No matter what happened in Lieyang City, it was never your fault. So be weaker It doesn't matter, you can rely on me. I will be your Harvest Priest and Sun Knight, whoever wants to hurt you, I will smash every bone in his body like I did to Rollins."

Aaron was overwhelmed by his words, and after a while he stammered: "Don't...don't say such things, Misha, I..."

"I don't lie." Mikhail bowed seriously, "I will do this, and I should say so."

"It hurts." Aaron rubbed his face with a smile, and said contentedly, "Don't do that, okay, Misha? Let me do it. Don't be like everyone else... Misha!"

Mikhail's face turned pale, and Aaron hurriedly explained: "I didn't, I don't remember being treated like that, it doesn't make any sense, does it? Good Misha, I'm talking about Joyce, although not so much Seriously, but..."

Mikhail pursed his lips and froze in mid-air with his eyes raised, unexpectedly angry at his excuse.Aaron stopped comforting him, because the more he talked, the more unhappy he became, so he picked up the suitcase, led him by the belt, and walked to the edge of Mirror Lake, followed by two army horses.

Mirror Lake is quite vast, and now in the afternoon, the shadow of Bell Mountain has also reached the other side. The entire lake is sparkling, and the remains of the mossy city wall near the cliff show a brilliant meaning.The festival market was on the shore close to the city. Aaron took Mikhail by the hand, found Fox and returned the horse, chatted vaguely about Joyce, and met the Victor brothers and sisters again. Twopence bought Mikhail a glass of lemonade.

Mikhail drank stale lemonade and shuffled behind Aaron.The circus and the orchestra, the sound of the Jebusites' piano, drums, and singing mixed together, making the already crowded crowd even more noisy.Aaron took him to the temporary puppet theater to line up to buy tickets, but was told that the seats inside had just been sold out a quarter of an hour ago, so he had to stand to see it.Not far away, warm cheers and applause broke out in the circus venue surrounded by colored canvas. Mikhail stretched his neck curiously, then lowered his head.

Aaron scratched his hair and said:

"You haven't visited such a market, Misha? There is no puppet show, we can go there to join in the fun."

Mikhail snorted noncommittally, and Aaron saw that he was sour from the lemonade, and went to buy him another cotton candy.The woman in the headscarf dexterously picked up a thread-like syrup with the tip of a knife, and quickly twisted it into a bird's nest-shaped candy, but handed it to Mikhail.Aaron was still fumbling for the change, a little surprised, but he looked up at Mikhail's face and laughed.The two of them stood together, and at a glance they knew that Mikhail was the kid who was in a bad mood.

Aaron drank the glass of water with his head up, and led Mikhail to the circus.Knowing that Mikhail couldn't see, he still carried the medicine box in one hand and Mikhail in the other, pushing and shoving into the crowd. The boy beside him held up the cotton candy in one hand, and the not-so-pure syrup solidified slightly Yellow, like a helpless white flag in the sun.

There was a slight commotion in the crowd, because the Abaddon who pushed forward was too tall and blocked many people's sight.Aaron pretended not to know, and explained a few words to Mikhail in a low voice. He spoke quickly and cheerfully; the boy closed his eyes, feeling the cheers of the crowd and the wind blowing in all directions from the thin acrobats. .

After a while, people from the circus came to ask them to leave.Aaron didn't care, he apologized reservedly, rewarded him with two shillings, took Mikhail and squeezed out.Before leaving, Mikhail softly comforted the nervous black bear in the middle of the arena.

Not far away, a new band recklessly played an extremely cheerful and noisy waltz, but because of its superb technique and skillful coordination, it overwhelmed other people's voices, and even the puppet theater was affected. . The "Punch and Judy" puppet show is the next program, and when the waltz rushes to the climax, the actor who plays the poet is singing and introducing the background of the story:

"From then on this incomparable pain,

Appears now and then to torment me;

My heart burns in pain,

Until I tell this story. [4]"

Soon a group of less well-dressed musicians came aggressively and drove the unruly Jebusite band to the edge of the market.A few tents and board houses were randomly built by the lake, and several boys were encouraging each other, asking each other if they dared to pee in the haunted Mirror Lake.

Aaron saw it, twisted his lips, and said to Mikhail, "Listen, Misha, that's why we have to filter the well water. After all these years, the Norrens have forgotten all about it." !"

"Mirror Lake is not the source of water for the residents of Wakefield." Mikhail took a bite of some melted marshmallow and said contentedly, "I remember that there is a tributary of the San Sisijia Canal that flows outside the city, and the hops planted farther away And the garden is watered by it."

"That's not as good as Mirror Lake," Aaron said.Although Mikhail couldn't see, he still squeezed out a smile harder and more sincerely than when facing other people.Mikhail seemed to have noticed it, and stretched out his big empty hand to touch his face, and he was no longer angry.

He ate the marshmallow in two or three bites, stuck the stick in the ground, and said, "You're not done, Aaron. What does Diana's remains have to do with vampires?"

The wooden sticks quickly sprouted delicate branches and leaves, struggling in the cool breeze of late spring.The two entered the shadow of the mountain forest again. Mikhail reached out to take the medicine box, and Aaron said:

"There are two types of vampires. One is those like me who can retain their self-awareness. Of course, they are also like Tristan and Ashley. Most of the humans I transform will die directly, and only a few will survive and become like us. Vampires; the vampires transformed by me and then transformed into others, the survivors can only become inferior products, the ones we have just seen, with only instincts left, but with better physical fitness. That is to say, everyone who looks sober now All vampires, good or bad, were transformed by me."

Mikhail nodded, and Aaron jumped onto a big rock to look at him, and put his hands lightly on his shoulders:

"It doesn't matter to the church whether there are Diana's remains or not. Lieyang City has real gods and enough artificial vampires. The former can give the latter reason and make them docile; the latter can also be the former's cage, and The key to the shackles is in the hands of Isabella and Ethan. However, the state of the blood of the gods will also lead to wildly different results. For example, Micah's blood can destroy me, but your blood can stabilize me. That's another story. I don't It is clear what the Oath City wants Diana's remains to do. It was probably to strengthen the power of wizards at first, after all, guns cannot replace saints. Now——vampires will also seek allies, Misha."

After a pause, he leaned closer to Mikhail's face and said in a low voice, "We are lonelier than humans."

Mikhail smiled and lightly kissed his lips: "What about now?"

"More than ever," Aaron replied.

Mikhail looked distressed.The doctor laughed hoarsely, patted him on the shoulder, and said, "It's nothing, Misha.—you don't forget what Tristan and Ashley did in the Siegfried Commonwealth, and neither do I. Tristan Hardy was a Noren nobleman, and his whole family was buried with us. I'm not kidding you, we parted ways after he was transformed, until we met again in Potosí. Anyway, he used to be a formidable It’s not surprising that merchants and the city of oaths use each other. Aiden’s little Marino probably heard the news and used trade as an excuse to steal things. I don’t know where to get so many artificial vampires. Vampires are like hyenas. Sensitive to corpses—don't look at me like that, Misha, I was wrong, Misha... We love your blood like we crave life, and if Diana is delicious enough, then we can find her corpse."

"So, does it exist?" Mikhail asked, looking away, "Diana's remains."

Aaron smiled softly again, looking a bit nasty, with a kind of expectation that had nothing to do with himself: "That's why I didn't tell you just now..."

"Liar." Mikhail interrupted, "You have forgotten, just like forgetting the story of the heaven on earth."

"Okay, isn't it all because of you? What's the matter, Misha?" Aaron took off his gloves and stuffed them into his pocket, reached down and touched his wrist, guiding him to bend down and put the medicine box on the ground , and held his warm hand by the way, "There are indeed His relics there, but Marino came late—maybe he wasted his time at Viscountess Sharp's house."

"Tristan asked him to come here." Mikhail muttered, "Regardless of whether Marino got it or not, to Oath City, he is the thief, right?"

"Yeah." Aaron raised his eyebrows, "It's a pity that you can't beat him up for now, Misha."

The unruly waltz by the lake is still enthusiastically playing with a self-entertaining attitude, as if these people are not here to ask for money, but to share everything.Cellos, violas, and violins, marimbas, clarinets, oboes, and flutes, piccolos, tubas, trumpets, and trombones, French horns, and harps, timpani, and bells, their sounds bursting solemnly all around, The cheerful and short rhythm has been permeating into the quiet woods on the mountain.

Mikhail planted a kiss on the doctor's white forehead, then took his hands and gently led him off the stone.

He took a step back, and the two of them danced a waltz to the faint sound of festive music and the rustling of leaves overhead.The tall, white-haired boy wore a servant's smock, and his stern, handsome master unbuttoned his windbreaker.

The sun was about to set in late spring in Wakefield, and they lowered their eyelashes, tiptoeing through the fallen leaves and shallow soil, spinning, spinning, spinning, enjoying the last scent of spring.

The author says:

[4] Coleridge's "Ode to the Ancient Boatman"

The method of making cotton candy refers to the manual method of British housewives in the eighteenth century (or in the nineteenth century)