Crematorium for Phoenixes by Nikola Yanchovichin Read Free Book Online Page A

emanated the strongest sources of the smell even though
it had been masked by the thick baked bricks that formed the walls
of the room and the jars filled with fragrant water distributed
around it.
    Once they understood that it would be very
difficult to break the masonry, they leaned on the brownish-wood
sandstone throne and fell silent.
    Entangled between horror and the task they
had undertaken, the men realized that life is a winding road upon
which we leave pieces of ourselves.
    They had to go forward.
    And there was no way for them to do so.
    Out of anger and frustration, Tammuz pounded
on the handles of the throne. The carving in the form of a
salamander echoed like thunder coming off of a mountain rock.
    Tammuz smiled like a breathless child, ready
at any moment to cry. As always, fate had given her answer. Then he
motioned to the men to each take one of the bronze axes that hung
like meteoritic iron on the wall. He wedged the ax under the
throne. The other men followed his example.
    They heard the scrape of retractable levers.
The throne moved. Beneath it, stained in silver, gaped a hole with
winding unrailed stairs leading down into the womb of the
Earth.
    Waving their arms, the men began their
descent.
    Chapter
Nine
    Like a swarm of ghosts, figures surrounded
the man with the hairy robe, trying to convey their messages and
extract information that is difficult to accept because of the
barriers between the worlds.
    “Who are you?”
    “What on earth happened to you?”
    Questions rained down one after another,
accumulating as the fog does, cast over fields and forests.
    The man was silent and waited for the
unleashed stream of questions, for the human curiosity, to
stop.
    The patients clustered around the
linen-white lean body. It was strange to watch them embrace vanity
with their (seemingly) immortal souls dressed as they were in their
simple hemp shirts, which hung like robes or cloaks on their
bodies.
    “He is the white devil, I tell you,” said
one of them whose disease had dried him like a rolled up
yellow-brown newspaper.
    “Nonsense, this will be a new disease,”
added a second, who did not look any better.
    “Everybody is talking nonsense. I’ve heard
that north of us lived the Ainu, and there are more paleface people
such as begotten snow,” said a third, wincing all the while like
the upper twigs of a tree.
    The man stood still in the meantime and
looked at them. He began to speak unknown languages; they were not
the familiar Asian speech, throaty and gurgling.
    After several exclamations resembling an
adjustable radio, sparkling and elongating, the new arrival adapted
and began to speak with that cold, clear focus of a computerized
machine.
    “I’m here because I need your help,” he
said, choosing his words among thousands.
    “Who or what are you? We know that if we
announce you to the authorities . . . .” interrupted one of the
sick.
    “Nothing will happen because no one will get
close enough to believe infectious ones,” completed the man,
stretching his face into a lifeless smile. “In your lands people
called me ‘Takeshi’ and I’m here to offer you the chance to regain
your health if you go with me,” he said.
    “My friend, we do not know much, but we know
that these things happen with the good and the evil ones. We are
suffering from leprosy.
    “Let’s forget about it. You came here by
accident. Leave now and we can guarantee that we will take your
secret to the grave,” Akuma said, shouting above the rest.
    Takeshi smiled. His protruding cheekbones
with their pink hue trembled, and he ran his hand over his right
arm, as if stroking an animal hidden there.
    “Trust is the only sign of life on the roads
that are pointed straight ahead. I thought that of all the people
in the world, you would want to be healed. But apparently I was
wrong.”
    There was silence.
    “Yes, we would give anything to be healthy
once more,” Akuma replied, breaking the silence with a quiet