Лес перевод на английский

Prologue
It is always nice and fertile in the forest. In summer the forest is rich in gifts of nature. Here you can find mushrooms and berries, as well as numerous medicinal herbs. It is easy to breathe in the forest. "Walk through the forest and breathe in the clean air to your heart's content."

Chapter 1
Ku-ku. Ku-ku – it’s the cuckoo. It’s somewhere far away. It speaks about our life, conveying the sounds of nature. When in the forest, everyone counts by its cuckoo, and how much time is left to live. But will all these sounds reach you? So there’s nothing to worry about.

Chapter 2
How peaceful it is in the forest. You see slender pines, fluffy firs and you are so happy. A fairy-tale creature may emerge from the rows of trees, and you will be stunned. Your heart will stop, because you have met this miracle. Just don't bewitch me. Otherwise I will turn into something. And I will stay in the forest forever.

Chapter 3
This forest air is nourishing, giving strength and energy. How many blueberries and bilberries there are. I pick berries from the branches and put them in my mouth, which turns blue over time. And here is a porcini mushroom. What a giant. It has a pot-bellied stem and a wide cap. An hour will not pass, as a basket full of porcini mushrooms is already collected.

Chapter 4
Look, a squirrel! She's so nimble. How she runs nimbly along the tree trunks. But then she came down to me. I had some hazelnuts, the squirrel took the nuts from my hands. And jumped onto the pine tree again. I watched the squirrel for a while, and then wandered further along the forest path.

Chapter 5
This time I wandered deep into the forest. And somehow I needed to get out. I wandered through the forest for three hours and finally came out on the path leading to the house. The sky was ash-gray. The clouds were gathering.

Chapter 6
I managed to get home before the rain. I went into the house as a torrential rain poured down and pounded the roof and windows. I took off my windbreaker and rubber boots and put a basket of mushrooms in the hallway. Today I will cook mushroom soup and fry mushrooms with onions.

Chapter 7
I ate a hearty meal and turned on the TV to watch the news. The news was about fires, the situation in the world. Not encouraging news.

Chapter 8
I will write more today. Soon it will be night. I lit a candle and sat down at the computer. I started writing the novel Forest. I do not write long novels or stories. I will leave my impressions of the forest on the computer. I breathed easily in the forest. I was enchanted by nature. Extraordinary beauty, which is very impressive.

Chapter 9
When I returned to the forest the next day, the path I remembered had disappeared. Instead, a dark clearing gaped between the pines, as if the forest had parted to let me go somewhere further. I froze. "Have you really decided to bewitch me?" I whispered, but the only answer was silence... After a while, the wind picked up:
-Listen to me, girl. Adventures await you further. The Bur is unfriendly to you and wants to destroy you.
-Wind, who did I harm to make you hate me so much?
- Baby, human envy.
- After all, it doesn't lead to anything. But only evil spreads to the people themselves.

Chapter 10. Clearing
A dark clearing gaped before me like an open mouth. The wind that had just whispered in my ear had died down. Now the forest froze in an unnatural silence - even the cuckoo did not make a sound.
I took a step forward, and the dry branches crunched under my feet with a sound like bones breaking.
“Bur...” I whispered, as if challenging him.
The answer was a gust of wind, sharp and cold. It pierced me through and through, and in my ears a voice sounded like the creaking of old trees:
- You didn't come here by chance. But you won't find what you're looking for.
I clenched my fists, feeling my heart pounding in my chest.
- What am I looking for?
The wind swirled fallen leaves around me, and for a moment a face flashed in their dance - no eyes, no mouth, just a shadow.
- You are looking for a way out, but the forest has already chosen you. You have tasted its berries, breathed its air. You are a part of it now.
There was a rustling sound behind me. I turned around - the path I had come along had disappeared. In its place stood pine trees, tightly closed together, like a wall.
"You're afraid," the voice hissed. "But fear is the key. It will open the door for you... or close it forever."
In the distance, between the trees, a light flickered. Not the warm light of a firefly, but a cold, bluish light, like swamp gas. It pulsed, as if breathing.
I realized: it was Bur. And he was waiting.

Chapter 11. The Tree with a Face
The path had disappeared. In its place was a palisade of roots, dug into the ground like someone's crooked fingers. I turned around: the forest had closed behind me, and even the sky had disappeared behind the treetops.
Then I saw Him.
An old oak, thicker and taller than the others. In its bark, in the interweaving cracks, the outline of a face appeared - deep furrows formed into a mouth, two knots stuck out like antlers, and in a crack between the bark, two yellow eyes glowed, as if fireflies were stuck in the tree's flesh.
“You’re back,” the oak creaked. The voice was like the creaking of branches.
I didn't remember being here before. But the air suddenly became thick as syrup, and golden specks of dust danced in it - spores, ash, or something else.
“I didn’t call you,” I said, but my words were lost in the rustling of leaves.
The face on the bark distorted, as if the tree was smiling:
— I did. Every time I picked mushrooms, tore berries, I breathed too deeply. You absorbed the forest, and now it will absorb you.
Dark resin crawled out from under the bark. It flowed down the trunk, forming the words:
"GIVE BACK WHAT YOU TOOK"
I looked at the basket - the porcini mushrooms had turned black, turning into dust.
“What do you want?” I whispered.
The oak groaned and an object fell out of its crevice: a small stone with a hole in it, similar to those called "chicken gods."
"This is your way out," the face creaked. "But first find what is hidden between the worlds. Where the roots drink the stars."
The wind suddenly died down. The eyes on the bark went out.
And the stone in my hand began to pulse as if it were alive.

Chapter 12. Where the Roots Drink the Stars
The stone in my palm pulled me forward, like a compass leading to an invisible goal. I walked without making out the road, and the forest around me changed:
- The tree trunks stretched out, becoming thinner and more transparent, like mica.
- The air rang like a taut string, and underfoot the moss moved, like the fur of a sleeping animal.
- The light here was strange - not sunny, but bluish, as if filtered through ice.
Finally, I came to a ring of fly agarics - perfectly round, as if it had been drawn with a compass. In the center lay a mirror of water, so black that even the sky was not reflected in it.
The stone slipped from my fingers and fell into the water.
There was a dull thud, and the surface of the lake began to shake. Bubbles rose from the depths, and then hands. Not skeletons, not shadows, but real hands, made of roots and cobwebs. They grabbed my wrists.
I didn't resist.
Testing the Drill
A reflection rose from the water - but it was not me.
It had my features, but its eyes were green like moss and its hair was entwined with branches.
"Did you think the forest would let you go?" the reflection asked. Its voice sounded like the rustling of leaves. "You're already part of it. But if you want to come back..."
It extended its hand. In its palm lay a knife, crooked as a crescent moon.
- Cut off my memory. Leave it here. And go.
I realized: Bur doesn't want me dead. He wants me to forget.
I forgot the smell of pine needles, the taste of blueberries, the whisper of the wind...
Choice:
1. Take a knife - but what will remain of me if I cut out these moments?
2. Refuse - and then the hands will drag me to the bottom, to the roots that “drink the stars.”
I reached out for the knife...
But at that moment a scream was heard.
A magpie flew over the lake, hit the water with its wing, and the reflection crumbled. The hands unclenched.
The stone with the hole floated up at my feet. It now had the word engraved on it:
"TIME"

Chapter 13. Knife
The stone fell from my fingers, fell into the black water and... disappeared. I froze, expecting gnarled hands to rise from the depths at any moment, like last time. But the lake remained motionless, like glass.
Then I noticed him.
There was a knife lying on the edge of the fly agaric ring. Not the shiny blade that the reflection had shown me, but the real thing – crooked, with a handle wrapped in birch bark, and a blade covered in red spots. Either rust, or…
I picked it up. The metal was warm, as if alive.
The forest held its breath.
Even the wind stopped moving in the treetops. Only my fingers trembled as they slid along the handle.
“Cut,” the leaves whispered overhead.
I looked around the clearing. Where? What?
“Cut the truth,” came from the right.
“Cut the lie,” they corrected from the left.
The blade gleamed in the bluish light. I brought it to my face and...
She saw a reflection. But not her own. The face of an old woman with eyes like an owl flashed in the metal. It twisted into a smile, revealing gums without teeth.
“You know where,” said the old woman. “Where it hurts.”
I mechanically pressed my palm to my chest. Something moved under my fingers.
The knife began to whine like a bee. I realized he wanted me to cut the skin.
But not my own.
I knelt down in front of the largest fly agaric and poked the blade into its red cap. The mushroom howled – high-pitched, childishly. Black liquid gushed out of the cut, and in it...
Key. Small, iron, covered in mold.
“Now find the lock,” the knife hissed and crumbled in my hands, turning into a handful of needles.
I picked up the key. Drops of either mushroom juice or blood had frozen on its grooves.
And the wind rustled around again, as if the forest had exhaled.

Chapter 14. The Tree Castle
The key burned my fingers. I walked, following the drops of black liquid that fell from it to the ground. Each one, touching the moss, left a burn - a spot where the grass curled and turned gray, as if it was aging before my eyes.
The fly agarics tilted their caps along the way, indicating the direction. Their spots now resembled eyes.
And then I saw Him.
An oak tree, ancient and twisted, as if it had been twisted out of the ground for a long time. In its trunk, at the level of my chest, there was a gaping hole. Not a hollow, but a hole - smooth, with metal notches inside. Like in a real castle.
I brought the key. At the last moment I wavered:
— What will open?
In response, the forest turned upside down.
No, literally - the ground went out from under my feet, and I was hanging in the air, and the trees were now growing downwards, into some kind of abyss. Only the oak remained in place, but its roots stretched upwards like tentacles.
The key itself jumped into the keyhole and turned with a click.


Chapter 15. What's Inside
The door didn't open. It fell - fell off the trunk and crashed down into the upturned forest. And before me there was... emptiness.
A black rectangle in the tree. I stepped into it and found myself in a room.
A room of cobwebs and bones.
- The walls were woven from silver threads in which bird skulls were frozen.
- The floor was covered with scales (fish? snake?).
- There was no ceiling - instead of it hung the sky, but not ours, but some alien one, with green stars.
There was a table in the center. On it was a book with a birch bark cover.
I opened it. The pages were butterfly wings, and the text was stamped on them, as if someone had written with their fingernails:
"You thought you got out? You just moved from one cell to another. The forest is you. The drill is you. Cut again. Deeper."
There was a knife lying nearby. The same one. Only now its blade was clean, as if it had just been forged.
I took it. And then the walls began to move.

Chapter 16. The Last Cut
The web tore. The skulls snapped their teeth. And stars rained down from the ceiling (sky?) - they turned out to be drops of the same black liquid that flowed from the mushroom.
One fell on my hand and burned the skin to the bone.
But there was no pain. Only understanding:
"It's ink," I whispered. "The book was written in it. I was written in it."
I brought the knife to my chest. The forest froze.
Section.
Not blood, but words - they gushed from the wound like sand through fingers:
"fear", "loneliness", "wind", "deception"...
As the last word, "I," hit the floor, the room fell apart.
I stood at the edge of the forest. In my hand was the last mushroom. A white one. But when I unclenched my fingers, it dissolved into thin air.
And in the distance, between the trees, a light loomed - real, sunny. Homely.

Epilogue
I'm back. But sometimes, when the wind blows from the north, the scar on my chest whispers:
"You forgot your knife there. It's waiting."
And I know - one day the door will appear again. And the key... the key is already in my possession.