Aszparuh Page #3

appear every night?

When you spread the bones of the Bulgars

from the river Tanais to the end of the world,

you'll remain wandering alone,

a lonely horseman, with no tribe!

No land, no children!

You're brave, because you know

the khan can't judge the first kolober!

But I can always prove you ordered

the assassination of Belisarius!

And I can condemn you as a murderer!

I decree!

If anything happens to Belisarius,

you'll answer before the law!

It would be good, if you

talk with my mother soon.

You found me in a moment

of weakness, daughter!

I give her to you!

I'll never forget the hand

I bent down to kiss!

The hand of a woman who gave birth,

nursed, built and fondled,

buried and fought!

Her whole life had left its marks

on the unsightly, almost scary hand!

It seemed to me that such a hand,

from times immemorial,

would've created the Universe!

Ie's mother didn't go with us

to the south with the spring.

She, like many others who

were too weak

to reach our next camp,

would remain here.

A great farewell weighed

over the deserted settlement.

Yuvigi!

This morning this one tried

to steal a sheep from me.

There were three of them, white ones,

but the others ran away.

Let me punish him by our law!

Who are you from?

- I'm Kostur! From the Dobrovichi!

Who's your master?

- I have no master!

What do you mean?

Who owns these lands?

The Dobrovichi!

- Untie him and go!

I want to speak with your people!

All right!

- When will you bring them?

We'll find you.

- Go on your way!

Yuvigi, you didn't punish

a captured thief!

The simplest thing is

to spill blood.

Our ranks have much more

Slavic land to pass through.

If the Slavic sea rises, will our

law against the thieves save us?

Our attitude towards the Slavs

should be different!

We have many enemies,

we're in need of allies!

Your late father

taught us otherwise!

The law is above everyone

and everything!

The law is to help,

not to hinder!

I am Radil, of the Dobrovichi!

Our boy told us

you wanted to speak.

Me and my people are passing

through these lands.

Why do you

treat us with enmity?

You steal from us, yet

we've done you no harm!

It's not true!

You trample on our sown fields!

You kill our game!

You hunt our fish!

We'll be careful with your crops!

The rest is common!

How come?

The land is ours!

If it's yours,

where's your state?

You don't even have a ruler!

- But we have a big land!

And we've heard

that you live by war!

How can we know when

you'll turn against us?

If you consider us enemies,

then come out to fight!

Why should we fight?

Listen!

I can do two things!

Stay here or pass through!

The latter is better for you, isn't it?

It would've been best

if you hadn't came at all!

But now, when you

leave our lands,

you'll go to the lands of

other clans and tribes of ours.

We'll pass through there as well!

The land isn't Slavic till its end!

As it's known, it's all Slavic,

if you go towards the sunset.

Here's what! If we start trading,

will you leave us in peace?

Trading, you say?

All right! We have

millet and wheat.

Cloth. We also have

hemp ropes.

We want tanned hides and

iron arrow-tips!

I don't exchange weapons!

- You see, you think only of war!

And we need it for hunting.

- And for ambushes!

If we're trading and something

of yours goes missing on our land,

great misfortune will fall

on our people.

And all Slavs will

be our friends, is that so?

Not at all! Each of our clans

stands for himself.

You'll have to make arrangements

with each clan separately!

Are you the chief here?

I, kanasubigi Asparuh,

ruler of the Bulgars!

We've heard you

come from the sunrise!

All plagues come from there!

The locusts, the blizzards,

the horse people!

We came to tell you that the river,

the fish and everything here is ours!

The land and the water

belong to everyone!

My people spend the winter

in no one's fields.

No one's? Around us are our

richest fishing grounds!

God himself has chosen

these places for us!

When the spring comes, the river

becomes white from all our boats!

How many are you?

Even if I knew,

I wouldn't tell you!

You're planning to enslave our

children and kill the others!

We're here since early winter.

Whom have we done harm?

The winter stops you and that's

why we came to tell you!

Once the weather gets softer,

make yourselves scarce!

Or you'll suffer for it!

With or without your hospitality,

we're leaving this spring!

Until then, let's trade,

if you wish!

We'll give you hides and everything,

if you bring food!

I was looking for honey.

My daughter was ill.

There was no millet for the nursing

mothers in the camp since months.

The livestock was dying out

from hunger.

People were starving, saving some

piece of dried meat for their children.

Slaughtering

the scraggy horses.

The little one wasn't

getting better!

The shaman treated her with

healing potions in vain.

My daughter was dying!

In those horrible days, my

wife, terribly worried,

started looking at me with

more than blaming eyes.

She was looking at me with hatred!

As if only then, years

after our wedding,

Ie realized she had trusted herself

and her children to an unfit man.

Soft!

Foolish foreigner!

She died, Belisarius.

The child died.

Give her to me!

- No!

Give her to me, Ie!

- No!

I'll take care of her! Give her to me!

- No!

Wait!

- No!

Ie!

- No!

Come to your senses!

- No!

No! No!

- I'll take care of everything!

We have other children!

Give her to me, Ie!

No!

Ie!

Yuvigi.

I'm afraid Ie

has lost her mind.

She's clutched at

the dead child since yesterday,

doesn't eat, doesn't sleep,

doesn't let me bury her.

Ie!

The khan has came to you!

The khan himself wants

to bury our child!

Ie!

Give her to me, Ie!

Yuvigi!

I'll take her where all our

dead from the long road rest.

They're dying!

My people are dying!

I've led them along

a too hard path!

But if we stay here,

it will be the end!

You've told the boils that the people

should prepare to leave, is that so?!

Yes!

There are 40 days till

the day of the green steppe.

Enough time to saddle

and gear up.

I came to tell you

that no one will

follow you this time.

You, too?

Me, too!

Yuvigi, something's happening!

The people are coming here angry!

I know, Belisarius!

You stay!

I'm listening!

Yuvigi!

We can't stand it anymore!

You can't

or you don't want to?

We can't and we don't want to!

It's all for nothing.

If we had stayed to defend Phanagoria,

we would've lost less people.

Let us stop, yuvigi, so we can

protect our still living children!

People, it will be disastrous to

stand on the path of all nations!

The land to the north is too cold and barren,

while the basileos reigns to the south!

So I've ordered onward!

- We have no strength to go!

We'll build a new Phanagoria here!

- If other people come, we'll fight!

We'll fight!

People!

Should I trust my eyes and ears?

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