1 号车间 翻箱底终于找到了扭曲1的完整故事了！！！
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感谢OU812兄弟的帮忙啊。。。呵呵。。。他保存了我以前贴出来的故事，我中间换过几次电脑，自己怎么也找不到了。。。还好还好。。。
大家慢慢欣赏，故事情节非常好
这里我放了中英文对照，以便英文好的朋友自己对照的看，有不足之处还请多多见谅，翻译这个扭曲是我最累的一次翻译，整整碌碌徐徐用了1个月的时间，太多奇怪的名词了。。。
这是我的原创翻译，请勿随意转载，如需要转载请尊重我的劳动，标明我的网址和出处，谢谢！
扭曲的灵魂1故事－－第一部分
I . The Secret Face of Genesis 揭开起源的神秘面纱
I
他能改造人类的形状，他是魔鬼的制造者。但凡有人带着足够的理由，足够的渴望前来向他要求进行变异，并且愿意承受这种变异将带来的痛苦，那么他就会满足他们的要求。最后，他亲手将他们变成了形状鬼魅的生物；重塑后的身体远远超乎他们的想象。
He is a transformer of human flesh; a creator of monsters. If a Supplicant comes to him with sufficient need, sufficient hunger for change – knowing how painful that change will be – he will accommodate them. They become objects of perverse beauty beneath his hand; their bodies remade in fashions that they have no power to dictate.
几个世纪以来，这个超凡的家伙不断变换不同的身份，用不同的名字出现在世间。但人们习惯用他最初的名字称呼他：阿冈尼司帝斯。
Over the years, over the centuries, indeed, this extraordinary creature has gone by many names. But we will call him by the first name he was ever given: AGONISTES.
那些要求变异的人是在哪里找到他的呢？通常是在一个被他称为“燃烧之地”的偏远沙漠里。但，有时“燃烧之地”就在我们的家门口——当爱和希望从我们灼热的城市里蒸发殆尽时，他就会出现。
Where would a Supplicant find him? Usually in what he calls 'the burning places': deserts, for instance. But sometimes he can be found in 'the burning places' in our own inflamed cities: places where despair has seared away all belief in hope and love.
他总是悄无声息地出没，无人能够察觉到他的行踪，渐渐地，他成了一个传说里的人物。传说他静静地等待着那些需要他的人能寻找到他的踪迹……
There he moves, silently, irreproachably, his presence barely more than a rumour. And there he waits for those who need him to come to find him.
II
所有的请愿者都是心甘情愿的，没有人会胁迫威*或是动用武力，至少在他们签字献出自己的躯体之前是这样。然而，一旦变形开始，他们或者会改变初衷。事实上，大多数的请愿者后来都乞求阿冈尼司帝斯不要再继续为他们进行变形手术了，他们宁愿放弃将要得到的力量去死。当阿冈尼司帝斯用解剖刀和火把为他们实施那恐怖的变形手术时，请愿者们呻吟着对他说这个过程实在是太痛苦了。但是，在阿冈尼司帝斯游历世界的漫长岁月里，他只允许一个请愿者在改变心意之后平静地死去。那个人就是犹大。除此以外，他从来对人们的抱怨充耳不闻，日以继夜地进行手术，一个部分完成伤口痊愈后他就立即回来做另一部分。
When a Supplicant presents him or herself there is never coercion. There is never violence, at least until the Supplicant has signed over his or her flesh. Then yes, there may be some second thoughts, once the work begins. The truth is that on many occasions a Supplicant has begged to die rather than continue to be ‘empowered’ by Agonistes. It hurts too much, they tell him, as his scalpels and his torches work their terrible surgery upon him. But in all the time he has been wandering the world Agonistes has only ever granted the comfort of death to one Supplicant who changed his mind. That man was Judas Iscariot. The rest he works on despite their complaints, sometimes for days and nights, coming back to his labours when a piece of flesh has healed and he can begin on the next part of surgery.
有时候，阿冈尼司帝斯也会在手术时为那些受刑人提供一些小小的安慰来补偿他们所受的痛苦。比如说，他会为他们歌唱，据说他会唱世界上所有的催眠曲，无论何种语言的摇篮曲或童谣他都会唱，他用歌声来安慰这些痛苦中的男男女女。
There are some minor compensations for all this pain, which Agonistes will sometimes offer his Supplicants as he works. He will sing to them, for instance, and it is said that he knows every lullaby written, in every language of the world; songs of the cradle and the breast, to soothe the men and women he is remaking in the image of their terror.
如果阿冈尼司帝斯因为某些原因特别怜悯某个请愿者时，他甚至会用最锋利的手术刀从自己的大腿内侧或内嘴唇上切下最柔软的一条肌肉喂进那受刑人的口中。传说阿冈尼司帝斯的肉是世界上最细嫩可口、最具有安抚作用的食物。只要放小小一条阿冈尼司帝斯的肉在请愿者的舌尖上就能使他（她）忘却所承受的一切痛苦，变得仿佛进入天堂一般安详。
And, if for some reason he feels particularly sympathetic to the Supplicant, Agonistes may even give his victim a piece of his own flesh to eat: just a sliver, cut with one of his finest scalpels, from the tender flesh of his upper thigh, or inner lip. According to legend, there is no food more comforting, more exquisite, than the flesh of Agonistes. The merest sliver of it upon the tongue of the Supplicant will make him or her forget all the horrors they are enduring, and deliver them to a place of paradisiacal calm.
然后，一旦他的主顾们平静下来，阿冈尼司帝斯就开始继续完成他的工作：切割、缝合、烧灼、扭曲、重新整形……
Then – once his client is soothed – Agonistes continues his work, cutting, infibulating, searing, cauterizing, stretching, twisting, reconfiguring.
有时他会带面镜子给他的请愿者们，让他们看看手术的进展情况；有时他则会宣称要给他们一个惊喜，工作完成之前不会给他们看到自己的容貌，任凭他们在痛苦中想象自己将变成什么样子。
Sometimes he will bring a mirror to show his Supplicants what he has so far created. Sometimes he will announce that he wants the results to be a surprise; and so the Supplicant is left to imagine, through the haze of pain, what Agonistes is turning them into.
II
阿冈尼司帝斯的工作称得上是一门艺术。
It is an art, what Agonistes achieves.
他认为这是一种最原始的艺术形式——创造一个崭新的肉体，曾是上帝在创造生命时运用过的一门艺术。阿冈尼司帝斯信奉上帝，日夜向他祈祷，感谢上帝赐予他这样一个充满了绝望与复仇欲望的世界，只有这样才会有无数请愿者前赴后继地追随他的踪迹，乞求他将他们重塑成想象中最可怕的模样。
He claims it is The First Art, this creation of new flesh, being the art God used to call life into being. Agonistes believes in God; prays to Him night and morning: thanking Him for making a world in which there is so much hopelessness and such a profound hunger for revenge that Supplicants will seek him out and beg him to reconfigure them in the image of their monstrous ideal.
上帝显然认为阿冈尼司帝斯的所作所为并没有冒犯到他，因此在过去的2500年间，他任由阿冈尼司帝斯的足迹遍布全球，到处进行他所谓的神圣艺术创作。事实上，阿冈尼司帝斯的事业非常兴旺发达。
And it appears that God apparently finds no offence in what Agonistes does, because for two and a half thousand years he has walked the planet performing what he calls his holy art, and no harm has come to him. In fact he has prospered.
一些经过他改造的人，例如：本丢·彼拉多（圣经中的人物）等，在历史上扮演了非常重要的角色。当然，更多的人依旧默默无闻。他为各色人等实施变形手术，有君王、土匪、过气明星、建筑师，女校工、香料商、训狗师、炭火工等等；甚至还有遭到丈夫背叛的妻子们前来要求变形，好让她们捉奸在床进行复仇。上至达官显贵，下至平民百姓，贵如皇族，贱如农夫，只要他们是诚心的请愿者，祈祷的话语情真意切，阿冈尼司帝斯就会来到他们的身边，正所谓心诚则灵。
Some of the people who went under his knife, like Pontius Pilate, have a place in our culture’s history. Many are anonymous. He has transformed potentates and gangsters, failed actors and architects; women who’ve been cheated by their husbands and come seeking a new form to greet their adulterer in their marriage beds; school mistresses and perfumiers, dog-trainers and charcoal burners. The mighty and the insignificant, the noble and the peasant. As long as they are sincere Supplicants, and their prayers sound genuine, then Agonistes will be attentive to them.
这个阿冈尼司帝斯究竟是何方神圣？这个艺术家、流浪者、这个能够改造人类血肉身躯的家伙究竟是谁？
Who is he, this Agonistes? This artist, this wanderer, this transformer of human flesh and bone?
事实上，答案从未被人知晓。在罗马教廷图书馆中有一卷名为《论上帝的疯狂》的藏书，由红衣主教盖利米亚写于十七世纪中期。在这本书中，盖利米亚主教对《创世纪》所描述几个上帝创造世界的细节提出了质疑，以下是主教论述的一段摘抄：第七天，上帝并没有休息。相反，由于陷入了一种成就感所带来的淡淡欣喜之中，上帝兴奋起来，继续埋头苦干。但这次，由于疲劳，他的作品与以往他为伊甸园所创造的那些美丽生命大相径庭。整整一天一夜，上帝迷失在创造的荣耀感中不能自拔，所创造出的新生命否定了一切他先前工作中所运用的美感。破坏者与魔鬼，它们成为了他前六天作品的敌人。
In truth, nobody really knows. There is a heretical volume in the Vatican library called ‘A Treatise on the Madness of God’, written by one Cardinal Gaillemia in the mid-seventeenth century. In it, Gaillemia argues that the Creation of the world offered in the Book of Genesis is wrong in several particulars, one of which is relevant here: on the seventh day, the Cardinal argued, God did not rest. Instead, driven into a kind of ecstatic fugue state by the labours of His Creation, God continued to work. But the creations He summoned up in His exhausted state were not the wholesome beasts with which He had populated Eden. In one day and one night, wandering amongst the fresh glories of creation, He summoned up forms that defied all the beauty of his early work. Destroyer and demons, these were the antithesises of the wholesome forms that He had made in the first six days.
主教提到，其中的一件作品就是阿冈尼司帝斯。这就是为什么阿冈尼司帝斯能够向他的天父祈祷并被接受的原因。他是上帝亲手制造出来的（至少根据盖利米亚红衣主教的结论是这样的）。
One of the creatures Jehovah created, the Cardinal claims, was Agonistes. That’s why Agonistes can pray to His Father in Heaven, and expect to be listened to. He is – at least according to the Cardinal Gaillima’s account – one of God’s own creations.
毫无疑问，阿冈尼司帝斯尽管从事邪恶的勾当，却一直终于职守。千百年来，他满足了无数祈祷者的愿望，赋予了他们复仇的力量。
And there is no doubt that in his perverse way Agonistes serves a function. Over the years, over the centuries, he has been the answer to countless prayers for deliverance from powerlessness.
祈祷者的话语或许各不相同，他们的意愿却是共同的：
The words may change from prayer to prayer, but the meat of them is always the same:
“哦 阿冈尼司帝斯 黑暗的使者
请将我变成仇敌的噩梦吧
让我的肉体被您雕刻成他们恐惧的模样
让我的头颅成为他们的丧钟
让我的歌声令他们感到绝望
让我用这绝望的歌声夜夜令他们不得入眠
重塑我吧
重组我吧
改变我吧
倘若您不肯这么做
阿冈尼司帝斯
那就让我放弃一切化做虚无
为了复仇
我不成功 便成仁”
“听候您的安排 我的主人”
‘O Agonistes, dark deliverer, make me in the image of my enemies’ nightmares. Let my flesh be the stuff from which you carve their terrors; let my skull be a bell which sounds their death – knell. Give me a song to sing, which will be the song of their despair, and let them wake and find me singing it at the bottom of their beds.
‘Unmake me, unknit me, transform me.
‘And if you cannot do that for me, Agonistes, then let me be excrement; let me be nothing; less than nothing.
‘For I want to be the terror of my enemies, or I want oblivion.
‘The choice, Lord, is yours.’
===================================================
第二部分
原创翻译，请勿随意转载，如需要转载请尊重我的劳动，标明我的网址和出处，谢谢！
II . THE SCYTHE – MEISTER 镰刀手 - 梅司特
I
普利摩顿比神话或历史上任何一个伟大城邦都要古老。事实上，根据许多史料记载，这是有史以来最造建造的一个城邦。远在特洛伊、罗马、耶路撒冷建立之前，普利摩顿就已经存在了。
The city of Primordium was founded before any of the great cities of myth or history. Indeed, it is according to many sources, the first city ever built. Before Troy, before Rome, before Jerusalem, there was Primordium.
长期以来，这个城邦由一个君主王朝统治着，其残暴程度可以与古罗马暴君恺撒相匹敌。就拿国王普菲多十一世来说吧，他在人民大起义爆发前统治了这个国家整整16年，是个极度腐败、灵魂堕落的人。他的生活穷奢极欲，住在一座他自认为坚不可摧的宫殿中，对普利摩顿三百多万民众的死活毫不关心。
Until recently it was ruled by a dynasty of Emperors, whose long tenure had steadily produced a capacity for cruelty that would have challenged the worst excesses of Rome’s corrupted Caesars. The Emperor Perfetto XI, for instance, who controlled Primordium for sixteen years until the Great Insurrection, was a man familiar with every corruption of mind and spirit. He lived in excessive luxury, in a palace he believed impregnable, caring little or nothing for the two and three quarter million people who occupied Primordium.
最后，他的末日来临了。
In the end, that was his undoing.
等一下我们会说到的，现在先来说点其他的吧。
But we’ll come to that.
II .
首先，让我给你讲讲扎尔斯·克里奇的故事吧，他来自这个城市的最低层。童年时，他经常去罗马大竞技场通道里找东西吃，那里到处都是有钱人吃剩下的美味佳肴，因此吃饭对他来说完全不成问题。克里奇非常幸运地在如此恶劣的环境里存活了下来。根据某些自然观点，经历能使绝大多数人重塑自我，扎尔斯的经历就使他强壮起来。13岁时，他就已经比他所有的哥哥们都高大了。并且，在获得了体能上优势之后，他开始对自己所居住的这个堕落城市是如何运作的感到好奇。在尚未看清自己所处境地之前，他就认定自己是无法逃脱这个陷阱的。
First, let me tell you about Zarles Kreiger, who came from the lowest strata of the city. As a child, it was common for him to eat at the Vomitorium, where – as in ancient Rome – the rich food disgorged by the wealthy and over – fed could be purchased for a small amount of money, and consumed a second time. It was Kreiger’s good fortune that such a life of poverty did not kill him. By some physical paradox, experiences that would have reduced most men to shadows of their former selves, served to strengthen Zarles. By the time he was thirteen he was already larger than all his older brothers. And along with his physical prowess came something else: a curiosity about how the infinitely corrupt city in which he lived actually worked. Without understanding the trap in which he was caught, he reassured, he would never be able to escape from it.
14岁那年，克里奇成了东方城邦中一名叫做杜拉夫·卡斯卡利安的黑帮头子的信使，并且很快在这个犯罪团伙里得到了提升，原因很简单：他愿意做吩咐他做的任何事情。作为回报，卡斯卡利安把他当成自己的儿子一样对待：为了不使他被捕，卡斯卡利安在克里奇每次杀人后都找人帮他清理后事。而克里奇则成了一个无恶不作的杀手，他不喜欢一刀命中要害，而喜欢用长镰刀先把被害者的内脏挖出来，然后再用他们自己的肠子将他们活活勒死。
As the age of fourteen he became a runner for a gangster in the East City called Duraf Cascarellian, and quickly elevated himself in the criminal’s employ, simply because he was willing to do anything requested of him, In return, Cascarellian treated Keiger like a son; protecting him from capture by sending men out after Kreiger to clean up after one of his murders. Kreiger was a messy killer. Not for him the simple slit across the throat. He liked to use scythes, first disembowelling his victims then strangling them with their own entrails.
—
即便是在普利摩顿这样一个堕落的城市里，克里奇的罪行还是没多久就败露了。尤其是当人们发现被害者大多是卡斯卡利安的政敌时，克里奇这个名字一下子便家喻户晓了。那些对皇帝不满的法官、议员、记者们常常成为克里奇的刀下鬼。对克里奇自己来说，他并不在乎自己杀的人是谁，血就是血，并不因身份不同而有所区别。无论是杀共和党人还是皇亲贵族，他都能从中获得同等的乐趣。
Now such behaviour does not go unnoticed for long, even in a city as filled with excesses as Primordium. And Kreiger’s reputation was increased considerably by the fact that the hits Cascarellian was having him make were often political. Judges, congressmen, journalists who were critical of the Emperor: these were often Kreiger’s victims. Blood was blood as far as Kreiger was concerned, and he took the same pleasure in it whether it poured from the flesh of a Republican or a Royalist.
然后，他遇见了一个名叫露辛迪克的女子，一切都改变了……
The he met a woman called Lucidique, and all that changed.
III.
露辛迪克是一位议员的女儿，她的父亲在最近的一次露天演讲中对城市日渐颓废堕落这一现实表示不满。他指出普菲多王朝把人民的税收用于满足自己的欲望，而这一切必须被制止。
Licidique was the daughter of a Senator who had been lately g in open forum about the fact that the city was running into a state of decadence. The Perfetto Dynasty was using the people’s taxes to fund its own pleasures, the Senator argued: it had to stop.
国王立即亲自下了命令：替我把这个议员干掉。卡斯卡利安非但没有对此表示异意，还满心欢喜地建议国王派克里奇去杀掉这个惹麻烦的政客。
The order quickly came down from the Emperor: rid me of this Senator. Cascarellian, not gibing a damn about the philosophical issues, but happy to oblige his Emperor, sent Kreiger out to kill the political troublemaker.
克里奇来到议员的住处，在种满玫瑰的花园里抓住了他的目标，轻而易举地挖出了他的肠子然后把他抬进屋子。正当他把议员的尸体安置在餐桌上时，露辛迪克走了进来。她正在沐浴，大概听见不寻常的动静，便拿着两把刀，浑身赤裸着跑来对付入侵者。
Kreiger went to the Senator’s estate, caught him in the garden amongst his roses, gutted him and carried him inside.He was in the act of arranging the Sanator’s body on the dinner table, when Lucidique entered. She was naked, having just came from bathing. But she was also prepared for the intruder. She carried two knives.
她绕着站在她父亲鲜血和内脏中间的克里奇走了一圈。
She circled Kreiger, as he stood amongst the blood and the innards of her father.
“你要是敢动一下的话，我就杀了你，”她说。
“If you move I’ll kill you,” she said.
“就用这两把餐刀？” 克里奇挥舞着他的镰刀问道。“回去洗澡，就当你什么都没看到。”
“With two table knives?” Kreiger said, slicing the air with his scythes. “Go back to your bath and forget I was here.”
“可是你刚杀了我的父亲！”
“This was my father you just murdered!”
“是的。你们长得很相象。”
“Yes. I see the resemblance.”
“我真想知道象你这样的人在杀我父亲之前有没有动过脑子想一想。他想推翻国王的统治为的正是让你和所有象你一样的人不再受到他们的剥削。”
“I would have thought a man like you would have thought twice about taking a knife to my father’s throat. He wanted to overthrow the Empire so that you and your like would not be exploited.”
“为我和象我一样的人？你对我几乎一无所知。”
“Me and my like? You don’t know anything about me.”
“但我可以猜想，” 露辛迪克说，“你出生贫寒，长期生活在阴暗肮脏的角落以至于渐渐无法明辨是非。”
“I can guess,” Lucidique said. “You were born in filth, and you’ve lived in filth so long you don’t even see what’s going on right in front of you. ”
克里奇的表情起了微妙的变化，“这么看你或许知道那么一点点，”他很不自然地说道。这个女子的自信让他感到很不自在。“我要走了，让你好好哀悼你的父亲，”他边说边从餐桌旁退开。
Kreiger’s expression changed. “So perhaps you do know a little,” he said his voice uneasy. The woman’s confidence unnerved him. “I will leave you to mourn your father,” he said, retreating from the table.
“等等！” 露辛迪克叫道，“别这么着急。”
“Wait!” the woman said. “Not so quickly.”
“‘等等’是什么意思？要知道我可以不费吹灰之力就杀掉你。”
“What do you mean: wait? I could kill you in a heartbeat if I wanted to.”
“但你不会这么做，否则你早就已经杀了我了。”
“But you don’t want to, or you would have done it.”
“你叫什么名字？”
“What’s your name?”
“露辛迪克。”
“Lucidique.”
“那么好吧，你想从我这儿得到什么？”
“So then, what do you want from me?”
“我要你跟我一起去普利摩顿最阴暗的街道看一看。”
“I want you to come with me, into the filthiest streets of Primordium.”
“相信我，我已经看过那些景象了。”
“Believe me, I’ve seen them.”
“那么你就让我也看一看。”
“Then you show me.”
IV.
这样的一男一女并肩行走实在是件非常古怪的事情。虽然克里奇已经洗去了身上的血污，他仍旧还是杀害议员的那个刽子手。而现在，他却和受害者的女儿一起在夜幕下同行。
It was the strangest walk a man and a woman ever took together. Though Kreiger had washed the Senator’s blood from his faces, hands and arms he still stank of murder. And here he was, Walking beside the daughter of the man he’d just murdered, wrapped in dark linen.
他们就这样一起目睹了普利摩顿最阴暗的一面：疾病，暴力以及从未得到过救济的困苦生活。露辛迪克不时地指着国王冬宫的高墙和城堡，那里任何一个房间里的财宝都足以清除所有这些贫民窟，喂饱那些挨饿的孩子。
Together, they saw the worst of Primordium: the disease, the violence, and the grinding, unrelieved poverty. And every now and then Lucidique would point to the walls and the towers of the Emperor’s Winter Palace, any one room of which contained sufficient wealth to clear the slums of the city, and feed every starving child.
多年来第一次，克里奇感受到了埋藏在心灵深处的真情实感，回忆起了他自己成长的环境——每次重病的母亲卖身给国王警卫队的侍卫时，他总是一个人孤零零地坐在普利摩顿街道的那些下水道里。走着走着，他的心中燃起怒火，这愤怒的情绪慢慢滋长起来。
And for the first time in many, many years Kreiger felt some measure of real emotion, remembering circumstances of his own up-bringing, left to sit in the open sewers of Primordium’s streets while his mother sold her drug-riddled body to one of the guards of the Emperor’s guards. There was anger in him as he walked. And it steadily grew.
“你想让我做什么呢？”他问道，他被内心的感受和无望的感觉击倒了。“我是永远无法与国王抗衡的。”
“What do you want me to do?” he said, frustrated by what he felt, and his own helplessness. “I could never get to the Emperor.”
“别那么肯定。”
“Don’t be so sure.”
“你什么意思？”
“What do you mean?”
“不错，对于你这样一个被雇来解决不安分议员的小杀手来说，王朝的确坚不可摧。但要是你远比现在强大呢？那么你就完全可以推翻它。”
“You’re right, the Dynasty is untouchable as long as you’re just a man; a scabby little assassin hired to kill overweight Senators. But suppose you could be more than that? Then you could bring the Dynasty down.”
“要怎么做才行？”
“How?”
露辛迪克斜睨了克里奇一眼道：“在这儿我没法告诉你。何况，我还得为我的父亲办后事。要是你真想知道更多的话，明天晚上到西城门外来找我。一个人来。”
Lucidique gave Kreiger a sideways glance. “It’s nothing I can show you here. Besides, I have a father to bury. If you want to know more, then meet me tomorrow night outside the Western Gates. Come alone.”
“要是这是个陷阱……”克里奇说，“……想以此替你父亲报仇的话……在你的人抓住我之前，我会把你的眼睛挖出来。”
“If this is some kind of trap…” Kreiger said, “…some way to revenge your father… then before they take me I’ll cut out your eyes.”
露辛迪克笑了，“你的情话真动听，”她说。
Lucidique smiled. “You make such pretty love-talk,” she said.
“我是认真的。”
“I mean it.”
“我知道。我还不至于蠢到密谋害你。恰恰相反，我相信我们是命中注定要相识的。我注定会在你杀我父亲的时候走进来，而你则注定收手不杀我。这是我们之间的某种默契。你能感觉到的，不是吗？”
“I know. And I wouldn’t be so stupid as to conspire against you. Quite the reverse. I believe we were meant to know one another. I was meant to walk in on your killing my father, and you were ment to hold your hand off and not kill me. There’s some connection between us. You feel it, don’t you?”
克里奇看着他们之间隔着肮脏街道。这个夜晚他经历了前所未有的感觉。而现在，他又必须承认自己与这个刚刚被他谋杀的人的女儿之间的亲密感觉。
Kreiger looked at the dirty street between them. The night had been filled with feelings he had not anticipated experiencing. And now here was another; admitting to the strange intimacy he felt for the daughter of the man he’d murdered.
“是的，”他说。“我感觉到了。”在很长的一阵沉默之后，他问道：“明天晚上什么时候？”
“Yes,” he said. “I feel it.” Then, after a long silence: “What time tomorrow night?”
“凌晨一点以后。” 露辛迪克告诉他。
“Sometime after one.” Lucidique told him.
“我会去的。”
“I’ll be there.”
V.
第二天，普利摩顿的大街小巷里充满了猜忌和议论：议员的死在引发了各种流言。这次谋杀是否是国王阻止民主化进程的第一步呢？结果，参议院里的许多人匆匆离开普利摩顿，担心自己成为国王谋杀名单上的下一个人。动荡不安的气氛四处漫延开来。
The following day the streets of Primordium were alive with gossip and speculation: the death of the Senator had started all kinds of rumours. Was this murder the first indication that the Emperor would put up with no more moves towards democracy in the city? Believing this to be the case many members of the Senate left Primordium hurriedly, in case they were next on the Emperor’s hit list. There was a general sense of unrest, everyhere.
而在克里奇的心里，一种对不可知未来的复杂感受油然而生
And in Kreiger, a profound sense of anticipation.
他一夜不眠，思索着昨天到底发生了什么。不，不仅仅是昨天。他在思考自己的人生：他已经走了多远，以及——如果露辛迪克的诺言是真的——他将走向何方。
He had barely slept, thinking of what had happened the night before. No, not just the night before. Thinking about his life: where it had led him so far, and whrere — if Lucidique’s promise were a true one — it would go after this.
他不时地抬头看一眼城堡的高墙（今天在那里巡逻的侍卫是昨天的两倍），想知道她说要想办法让一个人去推翻王朝究竟是什么意思？
Every now and then he’d glance towards the walls of the palace (which had twice as many guads patrolling them today as yesterday) and wonder to himself what she had meant about finding a way for one man to bring down a Dynasty?
VI．
凌晨一点钟，克里奇坐在距离普利摩顿西城门一公里外的一块岩石上守侯。大约在一点零九分的时候，两匹马从远处飞奔而来（与克里奇预想的相反，她不是从普利摩顿城的方向来，而是从城市西南面那片广袤无边的沙漠中来。）
At one o’clock in the morning, a mile outside the West Gate of Primordium, he sat on a stone and he waited. At nine minutes past one, a pair of horses approached (not from the city, from which direction Kreiger had expected her to come, but from the Desert, which lay, vast and largely uncharted, out to the West and South-West of the city.)
他们越来越近，然后翻身下马。
They drew nearer, and dismounted.
“克里奇……”
“Kreiger…”
“怎么？”
“Yes?”
“我想让你见见阿冈尼司帝斯。”
“I want you to meet Agonistes.”
克里奇曾经听说过关于阿冈尼司帝斯的传闻。它在杀手之间流传甚广，但更象是个传说而不是现实。
Kreiger had heard rumours about this man Agonistes. It was the kind of story that was wxchanged between assassins, more of a legend than a reality.
但是此刻，他确确实实在这儿。和带领他来到的露辛迪克一样真实。
But here he was. As real as the woman who’d brought him.
“我听说你想使普利摩顿成为一个共和国，”阿冈尼司帝斯开口说道，“用你一个人的力量。”
“I hear you want to make Primordium a Republic,” Agonistes said. “Single-handed.”
“她劝说我相信我可以办到，”克里奇回答说，“但是……我并不相信。”
“She persuaded me it was possible,” kreiger replied. “But… I don’t believe it is.”
“你应当自信一点，克里奇。我能让你成为国王们恐惧的目标，只要你自己有足够的愿望这样做。一切都由你自己决定。快点决定吧，要是你不想让我为你服务的话今晚我还有其他更重要的事要去做呢。每时每刻，我都能听见上百个祷告者的倾诉声从普利摩顿城里倾泻出来；人们正在等我去赋予他们力量来改变他们的世界。”
“You should have more faith, Kreiger. I can make you the terror of Emperors, if you want it badly enough. It’s up to you. Make up your mind quickly, for I have better business elsewhere tonight if you don’t require my services. I can hear a hundred prayers pouring out of Primordium at this very moment; people wanting me to give them the power to change their world. ”
露辛迪克抬起手放在克里奇的脸上。“此时此刻，我发现你并不想要它，”她说，“你害怕了。”
Lucidique put her hand up to kreiger’s face. “Now the moment’s here, I see you don’t want it,” she said. “You’re afraid.”
“我并不害怕！”克里奇说。他想起了他那死于瘟疫的母亲，想起了童年时惨死在贵族马蹄下的哥哥们，想起了他那精神失常的妹妹，她被送进疯人院永远也没有恢复的可能了。
“I’m not afraid!” Kreiger said. He thought of his mother, dead of the pox, of his brothers killed in the street as children by noblemen passing on horses, of his sister, in the asylum, never to be sane again.
“带我走吧，”他说。
“Take me,” he said.
“你肯定吗？”阿冈尼司帝斯问他，“记住，这可是一条不归路。”
“You’re sure?” Agonistes asked him, “Remember, there’s no way back.”
“我不会回头的。带我走吧，让我变形。”
“I don’t want to go back. Take me. Change me.”
他瞥了一眼露辛迪克。她正朝他微笑。
He glanced at Lucidique. She was smiling.
“把马带走，”阿冈尼司帝斯对她说。“我们不再需要它们了。”
“Take the horses,” Agonistes told her. “We won’t need them.”
然后，克里奇和阿冈尼司帝斯一起掉头朝着沙漠走去。
So together, Kreiger and Agonistes turned round and headed into the desert.
VII.
第二天露辛迪克掩埋了她的父亲。城中的流言渐渐平息了，但潜藏在人们心中的阴影仍无法被磨去，虽然淡薄却深入人心：普利摩顿是一个非常暴力的城邦；整个城市就象个大炸药包，随时都有爆炸的可能。
The next day Lucidique buried her father. The rumours quietened down a little in the city, but there was still and undercurrent, subtle but pervasive: Primordium was in a very volatile state; like an explosive, which might be set off with a jolt.
—
阿冈尼司帝斯带着克里奇进入沙漠之后的第八个夜晚，露辛迪克被附近皇宫里的尖叫声吵醒了。
Eight nights after Agonistes had taken Kreiger out into the desert, Lucidique—whose father’s house lay close to the palace—woke to the sounds of screams.
她跑上楼，从窗户向外眺望，看到皇宫里每个窗户都亮着灯。大门被冲开了，侍卫们四处逃窜，惊慌失措。
She go up, and went to the window. There were lights burning in all the palace windows. The gates were flung wide. Guards were running around in confusion.
她穿上衣服，乔装打扮，走上街头。喧闹的声音把整个城市的人都吵醒了；尽管国王的侍卫们骑着马横冲直撞，试图强制实施宵禁令，却没有人理睬他们。
She dressed, anonymously, and went down into the streets. The din had woken the city; and though the Emperor’s guards were riding back and forth, attempting to enforce an on-the-spot curfew, nobody was attending to them.
露辛迪克走进皇宫。尖叫声已经平息了，取而代之的是断断续续的轻声祈祷。
Lucidique went into the palace. The screams had died down now; to be replaced by half-whispered prayers.
没过多久，她就看到了那个曾经是扎尔斯·克里奇的怪物所做的一切。皇宫里尸横遍地，他不分对象地进行了屠杀：男人、女人以及他们的孩子、婴儿，甚至是还没有出生的婴儿全都没有放过。
But it didn’t take her very long to discover what the creature who had once been Zarles Kreiger had wrought. There was death on every side. And his slaughter had been indiscriminate; men and women, yes; but also their children, their babies; their unborn babies.
普菲多王朝在那个夜晚停止了对普利摩顿的统治，因为已经没有人活下来了，克里奇把他们全部杀死了。
The Perfetto Empire ceased to rule Primordium that night. There were none left alive to do so. Kreiger had killed them all.
当露辛迪克站在血流成河的宫殿大厅里时，她突然感到了什么，于是抬起头。
As Lucidique stood in the Great Hall of the Palace, in a pool of blood that reached to the walls, she caught a reflection. She looked up.
克里奇就站在她的面前，现在他是被重塑后的镰刀手-梅司特了。从他身上几乎没有留下任何扎尔斯·克里奇的影子：阿冈尼司帝斯用他精湛的手艺把这个低微的杀手变成了丑陋的恶魔，他在之后的许多年里一直出没于人们的噩梦以及普利摩顿的大街小巷间。
There he was. Kreiger, remade. THE SCYTHE-MEISTER. There was almost nothing left of the man she’d known: Agonistes’ handiwork has transformed the humble assassin into something that would haunt the nightmares, and the streets, of Primordium, for many years to come.
他慢慢靠近她。她以为自己马上就要被他杀死了，就象他杀死所有其他残余的人一样。但是，他没有。他只是俯身在她耳边轻声呓语道：
He approached her. She wondered if this was her last moment; if he intended to kill her as efficiently as he’d dispatched all the rest. But no. He simply leaned down and whispered in her ear:
“……你无法想象……”
“… you cannot imagine…”
然后他拂袖而去，消失在夜幕中，只在花园中的一个喷泉旁停了一会儿，洗了洗他那满是血污的刀锋。
Then he left the carnage behind him, and wandered out into the night, pausing only to wash his blades in one of the many fountains in the courtyards.
=======================================================
第三部分
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III．LUCIDIQUE -THE AVENGER 复仇者露辛迪克
I
扎尔兹·克里奇过去曾是一个普普通通的人。作为土匪头子杜拉夫·卡斯卡利安的杀手，克里奇是个为了钱财杀人不眨眼的家伙。但有些任务总会有些意想不到的代价，这就是其中一个：当参议员美丽的女儿露辛迪克用沾满鲜血的双手抓住克里奇，告诉他其实他也是个受害者的时候，克里奇竟然被说动了。她说，他们所生活的这个城市——普利摩顿——的统治者才是真正拥有罪恶灵魂的人，他们违背命运的意志，随意践踏生灵，让象克里奇这样的男人成为疯狂的野兽，让象她这样的女子失去亲人和爱人。
Zarles Kreiger was human once. An assassin working for the gangster Duarf Cascarellian, Kreiger was a man who would do anything for a price, and this proved to be one of them. Caught red-handed by the Senator's daughter, the exquisite Lucidique, Kreiger was persuaded that he in his turn had been a victim. The rulers of the city in which they all lived - the vast, degenerate city-state of Primordium - were the truly guilty souls; and until the dynasty was brought down life would continue to be a bloody confusion in which men like Kreiger acted like rabid animals and woman like Lucidique lost their loved ones.
这一切都必须停止，而露辛迪克知道该怎么做。她劝说克里奇去找一个叫阿冈尼司帝斯的远古神灵，他能让克里奇改头换面。
It had to stop. And Lucidique knew how. She persuaded Kreiger to put himself into the hands of an ancient entity called Agonistes, who would traumatically reconfigure him.
克里奇遵照她的话做了，在城外沙漠中度过整整八天八夜后，他以镰刀手-梅司特的身份回到了普利摩顿，成了一架威力无比的杀人机器，在短短几个小时里将普菲多王朝从历史的舞台上彻底抹掉了。
He did as Lucidique suggested, and after eight days and nights out in the desert, he returned to Primordium as The Scythe-Meister: a powerful engine of destruction, who in a matter of hours brought the Perfetto Dynasty to a close.
在屠杀结束即将回到黑暗沙漠之前，他对露辛迪克说了一句值得玩味的话：
“……你无法想象……”
Before disappearing into the desert, he had words for Lucidique, three teasing words:
"…you cannot imagine…"
II
人们将那个王室被屠杀的夜晚看作是“大起义”的开始。这场屠杀唤醒了人们心中压抑已久的仇恨，一系列的起义在各地展开了。大法官、主教、神职人员、商会领导等等这些曾经依附于普菲多王朝横行于世的权贵们突然发现自己变得孤立无援起来，他们现在不得不直接面对那些曾被自己欺凌压迫的人民。
They called that night - the night the Emperor and his family were murdered - the Great Insurrection. In its wake, a host of minor insurrections took place, as old enmities erupted. Powerful figures who'd used the decadent reign of the Emperor Perfetto as a cover for their corruptions -
judges, bishops, members of the clergy, guild and union leaders - found themselves unprotected, and face to face with the people they'd exploited.
即便是那些拥有私人军队，向来为权贵们效力的黑帮头子们也开始感到害怕了。就拿土匪头子杜拉夫·卡斯卡利安来说，他从来都不是一个傻瓜，事实上，自从他的杀手扎尔兹·克里奇在“大起义”那个夜晚失踪之后，卡斯卡利安就开始怀疑王朝的突然颠覆与克里奇有关。而他的一个在皇宫做守卫的探子报告说他曾经在王室大屠杀当夜亲眼见过那个被叫做镰刀手-梅司特的怪物，当时它正在皇宫的喷泉上濯洗它的武器，那个探子说虽然自己也不确定是不是看错了，那个半人半鬼的镰刀手-梅司特虽然机敏过人，但看上去长得确实有点象杀手扎尔兹·克里奇。
Even those amongst the criminal classes who had private armies to protect them against this very eventuality were fearful now. Take for example, Duarf Cascarellian. He wasn't by any means a stupid man. The fact that his assassin, Zarles Kreiger, had disappeared the night of the Insurrection made him highly suspicious that Kreiger's fate was tied in with the almost supernatural fall of the Emperor. Indeed one of Cascarellian's spies, who had been a guard at the palace the night of the slaughter, had seen the creature everyone called The Scythe-Meister washing his weapons in one of the Palace's many fountains. The informant had escaped the massacre without harm coming to him, and
reported that unlikely as it seemed the semi-mythical figure of The Scythe-Meister bore a subtle but undeniable resemblance to Zarles Kreiger.
这可能吗？卡斯卡利安想，难道失踪了的杀手克里奇和镰刀手-梅司特会是同一个人？难道有什么超自然的力量作用于克里奇把他变成了威力强大的复仇者？如果真是这样的话，那个和镰刀手-梅司特说话的女子露辛迪克在其中又扮演了什么样的角色呢？
Was it possible, Cascarellian wondered, that the missing assassin and The Scythe-Meister were somehow the same person? Had some incomprehensible sea-change been worked upon Kreiger, turning him into this unstoppable avenger? And if so, what part did Lucidique - who
had been seen in a brief exchange with The Scythe-Meister - play in the process?
III
卡斯卡利安从此失眠了。他被噩梦缠身，总是梦到镰刀手-梅司特破门而入，象闯进皇宫一样闯进了他的家，然后象杀掉皇宫侍卫一样杀掉他的副官，最后象来到国王床前一样来到他的床前，将他千刀万剐。
Cascarellian did not sleep well any longer. He had nightmares in which The Scythe-Meister broke down his doors, as it had broken down the doors of the Emperor's Palace, killing his lieutenants, as it had slaughtered the palace guards, and finally come to the foot of his bed - as the
killer had come to the Emperor's bed, pulling him from limb to limb.
他最后认定，保护自己最好的办法是利用露辛迪克。他派自己的三个儿子去绑架露辛迪克，嘱咐他们一定要尽量小心不要惹怒她。在他的内心深处（尽管他不会对任何人承认，即便对牧师忏悔时也不会承认），他是有点怕露辛迪克的。因此，他用比以往对待任何女性都恭敬的态度来对待她。
He decided the best way to protect himself from this unknowable force was through Lucidique. He sent three of his sons out to take the Senator's daughter captive, ordering them to do as little as possible to arouse her wrath. In his heart (though he would never have admitted this to anyone, not even his priest) he was a little afraid of Lucidique. She needed to be treated with more respect that he was used to proffering woman.
很可惜的是，他的儿孙们没有能继承下他的聪明才智。尽管他们被一再告诫绑架的时候要对露辛迪克有礼貌，他们却把父亲的话当成了耳边风。露辛迪克被他们肆意辱骂奚落了一番，要不是老卡斯卡利安当天提前回家，还不知道他们会对她做什么更过分的事呢。老卡斯卡利安及时制止了他的儿子们，勒令他们不许再辱骂这个人质。露辛迪克立刻质问老卡斯卡利安为什么要绑架她。她告诉老卡斯卡利安说，她见过太多的死亡，对于他和他的儿子们，甚至对于生命本身，她已经厌倦了，要是他们想杀她的话尽管可以动手。
Unfortunately, his offspring weren't as smart as he was. Though they'd been told to respect their captive, they took the first opportunity to test the limits of their father's patience. Lucidique was taunted, abused, humiliated. No doubt worse would have come her way had Old Man Cascarellian not returned from his day of business early, interrupting his son's taunting of the woman. Lucidique instantly demanded to know why she was being held. If Cascarellian intended to kill her, why the hell didn't he get on with it? She was sick and tired, she told him. Of him, of his sons, of life itself. She'd seen too much blood.
“大屠杀那天晚上你在皇宫里，是吗？”
"You were at the Palace, weren't you? The Night of the Great Insurrection?"
“是的，我在那儿。”
"Yes. I was there."
“那你和那个怪物镰刀手-梅司特之间是什么关系？”
"You have something to do with this creature: this Scythe-Meister?"
“这是我的私事，卡斯卡利安先生。”
"My business, Cascarellian."
“我完全可以把你交给我的儿子们，他们会在半个小时内让你开口的！”
"I could give you to my sons for half an hour. They'd have it out of you!"
“你的儿子们吓唬不了我，你也一样。”
"Your sons don't intimidate me. And neither do you."
“我并不想为难你。现在你在我的保护之下，仅此而已。你知道要是现在出去站在大街上会怎么样吗？整个普利摩顿正在变得四分五裂！”
"I don't wish to make you uncomfortable. You're here under my protection; that's all. Do you know what it's like out there on our streets? Pandemonium! The city is coming apart at the seams!"
“你觉得把我关在这儿就能让你摆脱厄运？”露辛迪克问道。
"Do you think holding me here is going to protect you from what's coming your way?" Lucidique said.
老卡斯卡利安的脸上闪过一丝恐惧。“我的厄运？”他看着露辛迪克，“难道你能预测未来吗？”
A look of superstitious fear crossed Cascarellian's face. "What's coming my way?" he said. "You know something about the future?"
“不。”露辛迪克幽幽地回答道，“我可不是什么预言家。我不知道你将来会怎么样也并不关心。我想要是世界末日来临了，你也不会好受到哪里去，不过……”她耸了耸肩，“……这又关我什么事呢？反正我也不会在地狱里看到你受苦受难的样子。”
"No." Lucidique said wearily. "I'm not a prophet. I don't know what's going to happen to you and frankly I don't care. If the world ends tomorrow, I don't think you'll be judged very kindly, but -" she shrugged. "- why should I care? I won't be there to see you suffer in Hell."
老卡斯卡利安的脸色渐渐阴沉下来。尽管露辛迪克对自己话里的含义也一知半解，但她对这种结果非常满意并乐在其中。眼前的这个人是她的杀父仇人，看到他恐惧的样子真让人高兴！
Cascarellian had grown pale and clammy while Lucidique spoke. She only half-knew what she was doing to him, but she took a certain pleasure in it. This was the man who'd orphaned her; why not enjoy his superstitious fear?
“你是不是觉得我很蠢？”他开口问道。
"You think I'm a stupid man?" he said.
“你是说你现在这样瑟瑟发抖的样子？是的，我觉得你这个样子很可笑。”
"To be afraid the way you're afraid now? Yes. I think that's pitiful."
“我并不需要你的侮辱。”老卡斯卡利安异常诚恳地说，“我的敌人够多了。”
"I don't want your contempt." Cascarellian said, with a strange sincerity. "I have enough enemies."
“那就别再让我与你为敌了吧，”露辛迪克说，“放我走，让我看看外面的天空！”
"Then don't make one of me." Lucidique said. "Let me go. Let me see the sky!"
“要是你想的话，我会放你出去的”
"I'll take you out, if that's what you want."
“真的？”
"You will?"
“当然，我们可以一起去你想去的任何地方。”
"Yes. We'll go wherever you like."
“那好吧，我想去沙漠。远离这座城市。”
"I want to go out into the desert. Away from the city."
“是吗？为什么？”
"Really? Why?"
“我告诉你了，我想看看外面的天空……”
"I told you. I want to see the sky…"
IV
第二天，一支由三辆马车组成的护卫队穿过混乱不堪的普利摩顿街道直奔西城门而去。打头的一辆车上坐着卡斯卡利安最出色的两名手下，这两个忠心耿耿的保镖曾好几次救过老卡斯卡利安的命。压阵的车上是卡斯卡利安三兄弟，他们这几天来对父亲的古怪行为越来越感到不理解，甚至怀疑老头是不是疯了。否则他为什么如此纵容这个叫露辛迪克的女人，对她的怪念头言听计从呢？难道他不知道这个女人有足够的理由恨他并设计陷害他吗？中间一辆车由为老卡斯卡利安驾车三十年的老车夫马鲁斯驾驶，上面坐着老卡斯卡利安本人和露辛迪克。
The next day, a convoy of three cars wound through the chaotic streets of Primordium and headed for the West Gate. In the first car, two of Cascarellian's best men - loyal bodyguards who'd seen him through many attempts upon his life. In the back car, the three brothers, wondering
aloud (as they increasingly did these days) if a kind of lunacy had overtaken their father. Why was he indulging this woman Lucidique in her whims? Didn't he understand that she had every reason to hate him, to plot against him? In the middle car, chauffeured by Marius, Cascarellian's driver for three decades, sat the Don himself, accompanied by Lucidique.
“现在你满意了吧？”一出城门老卡斯卡利安就开口对露辛迪克说道，他们眼前的天空看上去无边无际。
"Satisfied?" he said to her, once they were outside the gates, and in sight of the open sky.
“请再走远一点……”她说。
"A little further, please…" she said.
“你这个女人可别自作聪明以为可以耍得了我。或许你在女人里算是聪明的，可要是你想逃出我的手掌心可没那么容易！”老卡斯卡利安狠狠地说道。
"Don't think you can fool me, woman. You may be cleverer than most of your sex, but you won't escape me, if that's your thought!"
接着，他们又在沙漠里默默地行驶了很长一段路。
They drove on in silence for a distance.
“我想我们走得够远了，你看了一整天天空也该看够了吧！”
"I think we've come far enough. And you've seen enough of the sky for one day!"
“我能下车散散步吗？”
"Can't I just get out and walk?"
“你是说现在散步？”
"Walking now, is it?"
“求你了。难道这会有什么害处吗？四周是一目了然的荒原我能往哪里跑呢？”
"Please. There's no harm in that surely? Look…open ground in every direction."
老卡斯卡利安想了一会，然后喝令护卫队停车。就在此时，一阵沙尘掠过地平线，慢慢向路这边靠近。
Cascarellian considered this for a moment. Then he called the convoy to a halt. A dust storm was on the horizon, slowly approaching the road.
“你最好快点！”老卡斯卡利安嘱咐露辛迪克。
"You'd better be quick!" the Don told her.
露辛迪克望着远处慢慢靠近的沙尘，回头扫视了一眼正在下车的人们，尤其是那三兄弟，他们对她的注视报以狡诈的微笑，其中一个还伸出舌头舔着嘴唇做出猥琐的表情。这是最后一次了吧，露辛迪克回头背对着他，背对着所有人，开始朝着沙墙走去。众人立刻大声警告她不许再走了。
Lucidique watched the approaching wall of sand, then glanced round at the men who were getting out of the cars; particularly the brothers. They smiled slyly as they eyed her. One of them flicked his tongue between his lips, the obscene inference plain. It was the last straw. Lucidique turned her back on him - on them all - and began to walk towards the sand-storm. A chorus of warnings instantly erupted behind her.
“要是你再往前走一步我就开枪了！”三兄弟中的一个叫道。
"Don't take another step!" one of the brothers said, "Or I'll shoot you!"
她掉头看着他，张开双回应道：“那你开枪吧！”
She turned to him, her arms opened wide. "So shoot!" she said.
然后她转身继续大步向前走去。
Then she turned again and strode on.
“给我回来，你这个女人！”老卡斯卡利安喊道，“那儿除了沙子什么都没有！”
"Come back here, woman!" the Don yelled. "There's nothing out there but sand."
沙尘暴带来的风吹动了露辛迪克的头发，沙尘遮掩住了她的面庞。
The wind from the storm was whipping up Lucidique's hair now. It was like a dark halo around her head.
“你听见我的话了么？”老卡斯卡利安在背后叫道。
"Do you hear me?" the Don called after her.
露辛迪克回头望去。
Lucidique looked over her shoulder.
“跟我来呀。”她对他说。
"Come walk with me," she said to him.
老人拼命抽了两口雪茄，然后向前跟随她向前走去。
The old man drew hard on his cigar, and then went after the woman.
他的儿子们齐声抱怨起来：他在干什么？难道他疯了吗？
His sons set up a chorus of complaint: what was he doing? Was he out of his mind?
然而老卡斯卡利安丝毫不理会儿子们的抱怨，默默地跟随露辛迪克的足迹在沙漠中继续前行。露辛迪克回头看了一眼紧跟其后的老人，他满脸都是疑问和好奇。奇怪的是此刻他竟然觉得非常快乐，面对热辣辣的飓风和一个美丽的女子，他感受到了多年来不曾感受到的快乐。看上去他现在非常听从她的旨意，她收回目光继续盯住近在眼前的沙尘暴。沙尘舞动的中心仿佛有什么东西，但露辛迪克看上去一点也不惊讶，虽然这之前她并没有刻意策划所发生的这一切，但在内心深处她仿佛隐约感觉到了将要发生的事情。自从踏进客厅看到父亲被害的遗体和凶手克里奇的那一刻起，露辛迪克的生活就彻底改变了，一切都变得象梦境般离奇诡异，而梦中的她无须对任何事情表示惊讶，因为一切都有可能发生。
He ignored them. He simply followed in Lucidique's footsteps across the sand. She glanced over her shoulder at the old man, who wore a curious expression. In some strange way he was happy at that moment; happier than he'd been in many years, with the wind hot against his face, and the beautiful woman calling to him to come with her - Seeing that he was obeying her, she returned her gaze to the sandstorm, which was now no more than a hundred yards off. There was something moving at its heart. She was not Though she hadn't planned the reunion that lay ahead she had nevertheless known in her heart that it was coming. Her life since she'd stepped into her father's death-chamber, and seen Kreiger at work, had been like a strange dream, which she was somehow shaping without conscious effort.
她停下了脚步，老卡斯卡利安乘机追了上来一手抓住她的胳臂，另一只手上握着一把匕首对着露辛迪克的心口：
“快说，他在哪儿？你的那个镰刀手-梅司特在哪儿？！”老卡斯卡利安瞪着沙尘暴中心处那巨大的阴影质问道。
She stopped walking. Cascarellian had caught up wit her and seized her arm. He had a knife in the other hand. He pressed it to her breast."So that's where he is!" said Cascarellian staring at the dark giant in the heart of the storm. "Your Scythe-Meister."
这时，沙暴突然卷起一股沙子以迅雷不及掩耳的速度向他们甩去。“不许再靠近了！”老卡斯卡利安冲着沙暴中的不明物体大叫起来，“否则我就杀了她！”
As he spoke, the sandstorm picked up a sudden spurt of speed and came at them – "Don't come any closer!" the Don warned the creature in the storm. "I'll kill her."
他用匕首刺破了露辛迪克的皮肤，殷红的鲜血流了出来。
He pressed the knife into Lucidique's skin, just enough to draw blood.
“叫他走远点。”他命令露辛迪克。
"Tell him to keep his distance," he warned.
“这不是克里奇，这是传说中的阿冈尼司帝斯，他是上帝的儿子。”露辛迪克平静地回答说。
"It isn't Kreiger. It's a man called Agonistes. He has God's finger-prints upon him."
这邪恶的论调让老卡斯卡利安感觉一阵阵胃部痉挛。“胡说八道！”他无法接受这种异教邪说，内心中对上帝的虔诚信仰驱使他冲动地将匕首刺进了露辛迪克的心脏。露辛迪克不可置信地伸手捂住伤口，在摔倒之前用她沾满鲜血的手指在老卡斯卡利安额头上画了一道血印。这是死亡的印记。
The heresy of this made Cascarellian's devoted stomach turn. "Don't talk that way!" he said, and with a sudden spurt of righteousness he drove the knife into her heart. She reached out, and touched the wound, then with her finger bloody grazed his forehead. A death mark.
老卡斯卡利安丢下露辛迪克的尸体，在沙暴卷到他之前飞一般朝他的车队跑去。他深知自己并没有摆脱最终的厄运，恰恰因为自己杀死了露辛迪克，他的噩梦才刚刚开始。
Cascarellian let the body drop to the ground and ordered a quick retreat to the cars before the storm reached them. The grim business wasn't finished, just because she was dead. He knew that. It was just beginning.
-
老卡斯卡利安回去后立即把家搬进一座坚固的城堡里。他把门窗禁闭，每天用圣水做祈祷。他甚至用砖头把所有烟囱口砌了起来，规定侍卫带着狗日以继夜地在城堡四周巡逻，一刻都不准懈怠。
He turned the house into a fortress. He had the windows sealed, and blessed with holy water. He bricked up the chimneys. He had guards and dogs patrolling the place night and day.
就这样过了一个星期，他开始相信或许那些送给主教教区用来让众教士虔诚为他做祈祷的金银财宝奏效了，或许因此他已经逃脱了厄运。渐渐的，他放松了戒备。
After a week he began to believe that perhaps his faith and his gifts of money to the diocese, buying congregations praying for his safety, were having some effect. He started to relax.
接着，在第八天的下午，城市的西面刮起了一阵大风。大风席卷着沙尘拍打着城堡禁闭的门窗，从门缝和地板缝隙间呼呼地吹进房间。老人服下两副镇定剂，又喝了一杯酒，然后象往常一样去洗澡。每次坐在满满一缸热水里的时候他都觉得非常舒适和放松。正当他昏昏欲睡的时候，房间里突然传来露辛迪克的声音，不知何时她已经悄无声息地潜入了浴室。她怎么会没有被他的匕首刺死反而穿墙而过站在这里的呢！
Then, on the afternoon of the eighth day, a wind came out of the West: a sandy wind. It hissed at the sealed doors and the windows. It whistled beneath the floorboards. The old man took two tranquilizers and a glass of wine, and went to sit in his bath. A pleasant torpor overcame him as he sat in the warm water. His eyes fluttered closed. And then her voice. Somehow she'd got in. She'd survived the knife to her heart and she'd got in.
“瞧你，”她温柔地说道，“光着身子象个婴儿似的。”
"Look at you," she said. "Naked as a baby."
老卡斯卡利安下意识地抓过浴巾遮掩住自己的裸体，露辛迪克从阴暗的角落里走到他的面前，向他展示自己无比美丽光辉的躯体。她再也不是他记忆中的那个露辛迪克了，一点都不是了。她整个身体都被改造过了，现在，她已经成了一件活杀人武器，全身上下都装备了致命的利器。
He grabbed his towel to cover himself, but as he did so she stepped out of the shadows and showed herself to him, in all her terrible glory. She was not the Lucidique he'd known; not remotely. Her whole body was transformed. She'd become a living weapon.
“哦，上帝啊，救救我吧……”老卡斯卡利安呓语起来。
"Oh Jesus help me…" he murmured.
她慢慢靠近他，用镰刀轻而易举地割下了他的生殖器。老卡斯卡利安用双手紧紧捂住伤口，跌跌撞撞地从浴缸里爬出来倒在地上大声呼救。可奇怪的是整幢城堡死一般的寂静，没有丝毫的回应。他叫着儿子们的名字，一个接着一个，可谁都没有回答他。只有他的老狗穆勒斯在远处用叫声回答着他的呼号。他从浴室挣扎着跑进了厨房，身后雪白的地毯上留下一长排鲜红的血脚印。
She reached forward and she castrated him with one sweep of her scythe. He clamped his bloody hands to his empty groin and stumbled out to the landing, calling for help. But the house was silent from roof to cellar. He called his sons' names, one by one. None came. Only his old dog Malleus answered his call, and when he trotted through from the kitchen he left red paw-prints on the white carpet. He was eating something human.
“他们都死了。”露辛迪克静静地说。
"All dead." Lucidique said.
接着，她象母猫叼起顽皮的小猫一般轻轻地抓住老卡斯卡利安的后脖子，毫不费力地将他腾空提了起来，鲜血从他空荡荡的两腿间滴落到地毯上，一滴一滴拍打着地面。她用锋利的刀片划开他的胸膛，挖出了他的心脏。老卡斯卡利安的身体蹒跚地向后倒下，一路从台阶滚落下去……
Then, very gently, she took hold of the back of Cascarellian's neck, the way a mother-cat catches hold of an errant kitten, and lifted him up, effortlessly. The blood from his vacant groin slapped against the carpet. She put her blade to his chest and cut out his heart. Then she let his body tumble back down the stairs.
-
最后，当大风停下，天上的星星清晰可辨时，露辛迪克走上街道，任凭卡斯卡利安官邸的大门敞开以便让人们尽快发现这场恐怖的屠杀。而她则掉头穿越密密麻麻的大街小巷，直奔西城门而去，隐入那静静守侯着的荒漠之中……
Later, when the wind had dropped, and she could see the stars clearly, she went out into the street, leaving the door to the Cascarellian mansion wide open so that atrocity there should be soon discovered. Then she headed out, through a variety of back streets and alleys, to the West Gate, and thence into the waiting desert.
