Soon the premiere of the 3rd volume from the series "Lviv Odyssey" by Magdalena Kawka!

For the heroes of the "Lviv Odyssey" series, war turns out to be a test of humanity. Magdalena Kawka brilliantly talks about difficult human relationships in even more difficult times.

After the well-received novels A Season of Sighs, A Season of Storms and Return from Hell, the time has come for the next part of the Lviv Odyssey series. How did the lives of Gustaw, Marianna, Lilka, Jakub and little Michaś go? Readers will find the answer to this question in the latest volume, A New Beginning, which will have its premiere this winter!

Together with the Prószyński i S-ka Publishing House, we encourage you to read the pre-premiere fragment of the New Beginning:

September 1944

Nothing had ever hurt him so much in his life. The pain radiated, spreading along the spine and attacking the whole body. He was out of breath; his mouth gasped for air as the numb muscles of his ribs choked his lungs.

- Ukrainian Christ - laughed one of the torturers, flashing a golden one.

Indeed, he suffocated like a certain Jew crucified on Golgotha. The meaningless comparison crossed his mind before he fainted.

He was awakened by a cup of cold water poured over his face. The salutary gulp of coolness and hope that comes from moisture, but it was vain and deceptive because the pain immediately returned.

He was hanging naked on the door. His hands were bound at the wrists and tied with a long rope to the doorknob. He was hanging by his arms bent backwards on the other side of the door. His feet were bound at the ankles. After a minute, when the weight of his own body was tormenting him like his worst enemy, he pursed his lips, tracing the murderer's eyes over the executioners. They sat smoking cigarettes and seemed not to be interested in him at all. One poked a knife in his ear, then wiped it on the chair's upholstery.

–Now, come on, she meant, what hundred were you in? Who was your commander? Yes, it's true in the volume - a man in breeches tucked into jackboots scratched his cheek and frowned - that you don't have a commander, Onyshkevych. Or maybe I dołżej is a pseudonym? What do you prefer? Billy? oil? Or Orestes? True, that's what they called you on Łącki Street. So let it be Orestes.

- I already told you...my name is Bonder...

– Bonder, you say – the one in the jackboots nodded. "Let there be Bonder."

- We believe you, but you imply, we are tired of checking ... - said the second of the torturers, rocking in his chair. – We will not beat you like those duraki from the UB, you will hang, you will wise up…

After five minutes, he began howling and struggling. Shoulders seemed to break from the doors digging into muscles, joints cracking under the weight of the body. The fight for every breath became more and more desperate. The door was strong, oak, mounted on three steel hinges, a real gem of carpentry installed in the living room of a landowner's mansion.

- Calm down! Think about it, you'll break your shoulders, you'll become a cripple, so why don't you wear it? Your name is Onyszkewycz, Myrosław Onyszkewycz, you colonel, UPA commander.

He clenched his teeth to keep from screaming.

– Not gowari, not gowari, we know this…

Tears rolled down her scarred cheeks. He was like a child, a weak, tortured child. Angry at them, at himself, and powerless; a man stripped of dignity, on the verge of collapse.

He opened his chapped mouth, bruised so many times in previous interrogations, he wanted to shout it all out to them, ready to admit he was the devil's servant to get him off that damned door.

Some footsteps could be heard in the corridor. The boards creaked.

- Attention!

The man in jackboots who was interrogating him jumped out of his chair, tensing like a string. The other guardsmen followed suit. The charge always made Muscovites run amok of obedience and submission; no matter: tsarist, white or red,

– Comrade Colonel! he heard again before fainting again. The last image he remembered was a face in a blue cap with a red rim of an NKVD officer looking down at him.

It smelled like wet litter. There hasn't been a drop of rain in days, and today's downpour has been a blessing to the forest. Lifeless, dusty and thirsty plants waited for water for more than three months. Some have not survived; between the trees were patches of dried, rusty ferns and drooping raspberry shoots. Only the carpet of blueberries and moss was doing well and still pleased the eye with a slightly dusty green. The rain rustled in the branches, tore through the tall canopy of beeches, birches, and spreading oaks, bombarding the leaves, then fell heavy on the thirsty undergrowth. It drummed on the tarpaulin of the truck parked on the forest track, splashing into millions of drops. For the first few minutes, kicking up dust, they bounced off the sand, which was not yet ready to receive them, one at a time. Only after a while, having gathered, they flowed in rushing streams in the ruts, turning the sand into mud.

For the first time in his life, he didn't see the rain, he just smelled it. From the smell of wet trees, he recognized that the forest was deciduous, devoid of the characteristic smell of resin. Even in the truck, he thought they were heading towards Brzuchowice, but the forests there were full of spruces and pines. After all, what difference does it make, he thought. A forest is a forest, everyone is equally suitable for a grave.

He buried his father in 1943, in the fall. The perverse God saved the old man from the dubious honor of dying in war, but sent him an ordinary flu, which did not distinguish between war and peace, and for which he had been treating patients for so many years, reassuring them that it was not the Spanish flu, and that one did not die from it.

He put up a birch cross for him, carved it himself. Father would have liked it; the old man always liked birch trees, he said they exuded good energy.

He lifted his head, letting the rain run down his face. The rag covering his eyes became wet in a few minutes, which he was relieved to see. The swollen, black eyes finally stopped pulsating with unbearable heat and caught some respite. The cool water soothed his burning shoulders and arms, easing the pain and allowing him to take a deep breath without fear of broken ribs puncturing his lungs. Even the battered spine seemed to have calmed down and no longer radiated pain to every inch of his body.

Since he and the others had pushed him out of the truck, he'd been standing in line with his hands tied behind his back. Several long moments had passed, and there was still some bustle behind him, shouted orders in Russian, curses. He listened tensely for the clash of weapons. He knew it would come eventually, he was ready, and at the same time he clung to some desperate, unfounded hope. Always logical, down-to-earth, now he desperately wanted to believe in God. He called to him silently, but even if God existed, he was silent.

He was tense, his heart pounding painfully against his ribs, but he didn't even try to calm him down. He could feel the adrenaline coursing through his blood, and the thought crossed his mind that if he was going to die anyway, he shouldn't be like a calf obediently going to the slaughter. "Run away! Do something! fight!” A voice screamed in his head. It sounded like his wife's fiery voice. A bright figure appeared before his eyes; he saw that warm smile and luminous eyes that darkened when something bad happened.

Sorrow gripped his heart; he had had such a short time to enjoy her, so many things he hadn't told her, hadn't taken care of her as she deserved. Every time he looked at it, he wanted to put it in his pocket. To hide from the world, to protect from war; to always be there when she needs him. They'd only been married for a few short months, and he'd spent most of that time in the woods anyway.

He was overjoyed when she agreed to become his wife. He simply could not believe that the same, delicate, shy girl who before the war was afraid of his gloominess, his lifestyle and friends, and whom he himself considered a naive goose, although he could not get rid of the thought of her even then, was finally his. She didn't fit with the women he surrounded himself with at the time: confident, rich, and spoiled, mostly married women, whom he used as much as they used him. Today he loved her like no one else in the world, and he couldn't bear the thought of her crying because of him.

Suddenly, the movement behind her stopped. The shouts and commands ceased. The wind picked up, adding to the rustle of the leaves and furiously flapping the tarpaulins of the trucks. Dull murmurs rolled through the forest, a storm was approaching from the west. The barking rasp of weapons was heard over the increasing sounds of the downpour.

The man standing to his right instinctively grabbed his hand.

The second volume of the Lviv Odyssey series can be purchased at popular online bookstores: