“The Maharraht will never learn. More turn to their cause every day.”
Rehada’s silence made Atiana turn.
“They will learn,” Rehada said, almost too soft to hear.
“You’re deceiving yourself if you believe that.”
Rehada turned, a mournful expression on her face as she met Atiana’s gaze. “What are we to do?”
Atiana was about to snap back a reply, but she held her tongue. Nearby, the tribunal clasped hands until the circle was complete. Muwas looked up at the ones who would lose their ability to bond, and Atiana saw in him not anger, not contempt, but a sadness she would never have predicted. She thought at first it was an act, a gesture meant to garner sympathy, but as the ritual continued, the expression deepened, became so palpable that Atiana could feel it in her chest.
“Please,” he said in Mahndi, glancing between the two of them. “Do not do this.”
The ritual continued. Atiana thought that he would show some outward sign of pain, that he would cry out, but he did not. He exhaled and fell to his hands and knees. The exhalation continued until surely there was nothing left in his lungs.
Then, all was silence.
The two Aramahn that had given of themselves bent over. The old man had to be held up by the two on either side of him. One by one, they dispersed, leaving Muwas alone with his past.
Atiana watched him closely. His legs were folded beneath him. His eyes were distant, searching.
What would it be like to lose such a thing? Like losing a limb? Losing a loved one? Would the memory of it fade with time or would it burn forever, a constant reminder of what he’d once had?
“Will he return to the Maharraht?” Atiana asked.
“That is what the village hopes.”
“So he can tell them of his pain...”
Rehada nodded as a tear slipped down her cheek. Muwas was studying Rehada now, and there was a strange look in his eyes. One of regret, perhaps, or a keen yearning—why, she couldn’t guess.
“Why do you cry?” Atiana asked.
“That should be obvious.”
“I want to hear it from you. Your words.”
Rehada turned impatiently. “We’ve all lost much this day, Atiana Radieva, even you.”
Atiana turned back to Muwas. She nearly began crying herself. “I believe you, daughter of Shineshka.”
The boom of a cannon brought Atiana out of her reverie. She looked up, the memories of her time in the aether returning in a flash. She recalled her fight with the jalahezhan. She knew that she had caused Muwas to release his bond with that spirit. What she had forgotten was her mother’s promise to find her.
Against the solid white cloud cover, sails rose above the ridge. It was a smaller ship, only six masts, but it mattered little. She had already been seen by the men on deck. Their commander shouted, and only then—as the words washed faintly over her—did Atiana realize that it was her brother who had given the command. His beard was fuller, and he seemed to have become more gaunt in the weeks since she’d seen him, but there was no doubt.
Four ropes snaked down from the ship. Eight streltsi slipped along them quickly and efficiently to the ground. They swung their muskets off their shoulders and advanced through the circle of obsidian stones.
Rehada watched the streltsi, the muscle along her jaw working feverishly. Her fists were bunched, and her eyes were filled with more hate than she had ever seen among the peace-loving Aramahn.
Atiana touched her arm.
Rehada jumped and looked down upon Atiana with a look not unlike the one she had favored the streltsi with, but then she seemed to recognize Atiana, and her face relaxed.
“Don’t do anything foolish,” Atiana whispered.
Before Rehada could respond, one of the streltsi shouted for them to lie down.
“Nyet.” Borund’s voice. “There is no need for any such thing. They will come quietly, won’t you, sister? You and the woman, both...”
“Rehada Ulanal Shineshka will go nowhere.” Fahroz placed herself in Borund’s path. “She has done nothing, nor has Atiana Radieva Vostroma.”
Borund motioned for his men to stop.
Fahroz’s face was red and her eyes were fierce. “You come bearing weapons into an Aramahn village.”
“Atiana is a daughter of Vostroma, and she will come with us.”
“Atiana can do as she will, as can Rehada, but if they wish to stay, they will both be allowed to do so.”
Borund took one step forward. Atiana could tell by his posture alone that he was tense as catgut and might be pushed too far if Fahroz didn’t back down. “Their presence is requested by the Duke and Duchess of Vostroma.”
A handful more Aramahn stepped out of the tunnel, their faces angry. Upon seeing them, several streltsi trained their weapons upon them. Borund had a look of desperation about him, though why that was Atiana couldn’t guess.
There was no clean way out of this. Borund would not leave this place without her. She had no choice but to go with him.
“I will go,” she said simply, hoping to jar Borund out of his state of mind.
“Of course you will, sister,” he said, his attention fixed on Fahroz.
Atiana ignored him. “Fahroz, I would go with my brother.”
Fahroz nodded and waited for Rehada to give her own answer.
Rather than reply directly, Rehada moved in and embraced Atiana. “Forgive me,” she whispered, and then she stepped back to Fahroz’s side.
Atiana stared, confused. When they had hugged, she had felt, just as she had felt in the cold water of the lake, the locus of aether. It was now in Rehada’s robes, secreted away.
Perhaps Rehada saw her watching, staring at the precise location of whatever it was she had hidden. She looked uncomfortable, and she crossed her arms in front of her, feigning a chill.
It was Atiana who shivered, however. Rehada had lied to her. She knew now that whatever it was—stone or jewel or some unearthly remnant of the jalahezhan—Rehada had wanted it all along. She had wanted it before coming to the village. Before stepping into the chamber for her confession. Before lying to Atiana so completely.
She knew now what she should have known from the beginning.
She knew that Rehada was Maharraht.
CHAPTER 50
Nikandr watched as Nasim walked forward several more steps over the rubble littering the streets. His eyes were closed, as they had been since entering the city over an hour ago, but he had so far unfailingly led them deeper toward the center of Alayazhar.
Nikandr glanced up at the sun, which had already begun to descend. “We’re taking too long,” Nikandr said when Nasim had remained in the same place for an interminable amount of time.
Ashan held his hand up and whispered, “I asked for silence.”
“That was three hours ago. We are past high sun already. We will have little enough time in this tower of yours, and even less to get ourselves outside the city before the sun goes down.”
“That is something I am prepared to face.”
“And take us with you?” Pietr asked.
Ashan frowned at Pietr. “Give Nasim the time he needs.” He took two steps forward, following Nasim’s movement. “And by the fates, be silent.”
Pietr looked back the way they’d come. “My Prince, it will take us some time to regain the forest...”
“How much longer?” Nikandr asked Ashan.
“As long as it takes.”
Nasim shambled forward. They hadn’t known when they’d entered the city where they were headed, but Nikandr knew it was toward the tower, the one he’d seen in his dreams. The only trouble was they didn’t know what might lay in wait.
“They must know of our presence,” Nikandr had said when they’d first entered the city.
“Were that true,” Ashan had replied, “we would have been met long before now. As I approached this island, it felt as if it were asleep.”
“But our ship...”
Ashan had nodded. “There is no doubt that the island began to wake when we arrived. I hope that we can find Sariya before Muqallad himself rises from his slumber. We must trust to Nasim, let his memories return. He will find the way.”
Beyond the shattered husks of a nearby building, a column of smoke rose—a thin black trail weaving against a clear blue sky. Surely it was a suurahezhan, yet when Nikandr grabbed Ashan’s arm to make him aware of it, the arqesh merely glanced up and brushed his hand away.
Nasim came to a halt in the intersection of two wide streets. The trail of black smoke was shifting, coming closer. Soon the hezhan would cross their path, and Ashan was just standing there, studying Nasim, while Nikandr’s heart pounded in his chest.
“Enough,” Nikandr said. They’d already been attacked by one hezhan this day; he wasn’t about to stand idly by and allow another to find them. He threw Nasim over his shoulder and ran as quickly as he could manage down one street, out of the suurahezhan’s path.
Pietr grabbed Ashan’s arm, twisted it behind him, and forced him to follow. They hid behind a half-collapsed wall of stone. Nikandr set Nasim down and peered around the corner. The smoke, two streets up, had ceased moving. Nasim breathed rapidly, nostrils flaring, eyes closed. Somehow the boy was communing with the suurahezhan—Nikandr was sure of it.
Ashan tried to approach, but Pietr made it clear that to do so would be unwise.
Nikandr returned his attention to the street.
And his breath caught.
Standing beyond the remnants of an ornate stone fountain was not a suurahezhan, but a boy—a boy who appeared to be a few years older than Nasim. His lips were pulled back in a rictus grin, and his lips were coal black. He had no hair, nor clothes, and he was crouched like a feral animal, penis and scrotum hanging beneath the jaundiced skin of his backside. Though taut skin smoothed the valleys where his eyes once were, his head swiveled back and forth, back and forth, all the while the telltale wavering of intense heat rising from his form.
This was an akhoz, Nikandr remembered, one of the children that remained, twisted and haunted, after the sundering of Alayazhar.
The akhoz crouched lower, head twisting and turning, but ever closer to their position.
Something deep inside Nikandr—the part that fears the wild things of the night—told him how foolish it would be to draw this twisted creature’s attention.
Nasim, who had been squirming restlessly ever since they’d seen the akhoz, released a strangled cry and fought to pull away.
The akhoz snapped its head in their direction.
Nikandr picked Nasim up and sprinted way, Pietr and Ashan close behind. Weakened from the ordeals of the last several days, Nikandr had trouble moving with any great pace until a sound like the bleat of a diseased and dying goat spurred him onward.
They ducked into an open doorway halfway up the block. Inside was a room that was largely intact. The ceiling had crumbled in one corner, and the wooden floorboards had partially rotted away. Near the center of the room were the remains of two skeletons—one larger, one smaller. Immediately, an image came to Nikandr of a woman holding her child that was so vivid he began to believe he was seeing an echo of the past.
Nasim had stopped crying. Nikandr held him tight against his chest just inside the interior wall, largely out of sight. Were he to lean forward he would have a good view of the street, but he refused to do so. He refused to do anything but breathe, and when he realized that his breath was coming altogether too quickly, he forced himself to slow its pace.
Outside, footsteps approached. They scuffed against the stone. Closer and closer. His heart thumped madly. He was terrified Nasim would scream again, so he held him tight and rubbed his hair tenderly, hoping it lent the boy some sense of calm, some sense that things would be all right.
A smell like burning wool drifted into the room. It heightened sharply as the footsteps reached the doorway. Sounds of sniffing came, like a hound snuffling for truffles. The air in the room became warmer, and there was a sound, amplified in the enclosed space, of a crackling, like a pine cone thrown into the embers, a dying fire.
The thing bleated—a lonely, heartless thing, as if it were calling out to more of its kind.
Nikandr prayed it wasn’t so.
A noise came, like whispering. Nikandr looked down when he realized it was coming from Nasim. He held him close and shushed quietly in his ear, but Nasim wouldn’t stop, and Nikandr couldn’t find it in himself to take a step any more drastic than this.
Nasim’s whispered words sounded like Mahndi, but the cadence sounded different, as if it were some other dialect than what was used among the islands today.
The creature at the doorway spoke, perhaps in reply. It sounded like the voice of a dying man, ragged and harsh, and it had the same cadence that Nasim had used.
Nasim responded—a bare whisper—and the akhoz spoke again.
Then the sounds of its footsteps retreated, softened, and finally were gone.
Pietr crept to the doorway and dared a look outside. “Empty, My Prince.”
Ashan pulled Nasim away from Nikandr and kneeled in front of him. While holding Nasim’s shoulders, he stared deeply into the boy’s eyes. Nasim’s face was tight. Sweat rolled down his forehead. He whispered words soundlessly, perhaps coaxing the akhoz away from them.
Nikandr shivered as he watched. He cared for Nasim—cared for him deeply—but there was something about him that shook Nikandr to his very core.
“My Prince,” Pietr said, taking his eyes off of the street only long enough to send him a serious and worried look. “We should leave.”
“Pietr’s right,” Nikandr said. “We would be wiser to leave and study the city more closely.”
Ashan stood, apparently satisfied that Nasim had not been unduly affected. “If we give Nasim the time he needs now, he will find the way to the tower, and it will be at a time of our choosing.” He stared at Nikandr severely. “If we leave, Muqallad will wake. We will never get back in, and we will be hunted and killed if they find a way beyond the protection Nasim is providing us. Our best chance to get what we need, to learn more, is to go on. Now.”
The last thing Nikandr wanted was to remain, especially not without knowing more of the city and its dangers, but they had come this far, and Ashan’s words rang true. This may be their last, best chance to learn more of Nasim’s past life and to unlock his potential. There was something to be said for surprise, and the quicker they finished their business here, the quicker they could find a way off this island.
They continued, and Nasim moved faster. Before the akhoz the city had been a study in silence, but as they treaded lower into Alayazhar—closer to the waterfront—they began hearing long, wailing bleats that tainted the cool air. Each one sent shivers running down Nikandr’s frame. Pietr seemed worse. He was constantly scanning the avenues around them, even when Nikandr whispered for him to stop. Even Ashan seemed uncomfortable with the sounds which were at times far away and at times very close—perhaps only a block or less away.
Over the next few hours, despite the wretched cries, they did not see another akhoz.
They came to a section of the city older than the rest. Tall, rounded buildings dominated here. The traceries carved into the surface of the pink stone were intricate and weatherworn. Far ahead stood an ivory tower with two sprawling wings spreading out from its base. The tower was nestled between other hulking structures, many of which looked like they were mere shells.
Nikandr had seen such buildings on his first and only trip to the Yrstanlan island of Galahesh. One of its oldest cities, Baressa, was the site of the final battle between the Empire and the islands. Much of the old city had been gutted by cannon fire, both from the armada that the fledgling state of Anuskaya had amassed, and from the sizable army that had landed. Though Nikandr was sure there had been no cannons on Alayazhar when the rift had formed, the buildings looked much the same as those in Baressa had—walls stripped away, revealing gutted int
eriors. They were skeletons more than they were buildings. But the tower was different. It appeared to be whole and untouched, and Nikandr knew that it was the tower from his dreams, the one where Khamal had been killed.
Nikandr’s stomach felt rank, and the closer he came to the tower, the more pronounced it became. He couldn’t shake the feeling that within the walls of that tower lay his doom. By the time they had reached its tall, wrought-iron fence, the feeling had become so pronounced that he was forced to grit his teeth against the pain.
He reached out and grabbed one of the rusted bars of the fence.
And the moment he does, he feels a change, as if the world has shifted from underneath him. The pain in his gut is no less painful, but he straightens and takes in the surrounding buildings, which are now complete, whole, pristine. The wind is hot and stifling where only moments ago it was cool, and there hangs in the air a sense of change, of coiled intent, like a lion in the moments before it leaps.
He pulls himself upright.
And only then does he realize that he is alone.
CHAPTER 51
He pulls open the gate. It swings soundlessly. The black iron is dark with a freshly oiled luster and not a single trace of rust.
Lining the stone path are dried bushes with bare branches and parched earth beneath. As he walks, leaves sprout and fill until the bushes are full and vibrant. The wooden door buried into the deep stone walls of the tower lays open, and he walks in without another thought. When he steps inside, he realizes something is different. Whether it has been this way since the destruction of Alayazhar or when he stepped into the tower, he is not sure, but he can now for the first time since leaving Khalakovo sense his soulstone. It feels much the same as it always has—a warmth within his chest not unlike the feeling of deep-seated contentment. It should provide comfort, but does not. The feelings ring false, another illusion in this ancient and ruined place.
Inside is a circular room that occupies the entirety of the lowest level. A set of stairs with an ornate stone banister hugs the interior curve of the wall. He takes this, feeling more and more uncomfortable the higher he rises. He climbs level after level, finding nothing but empty rooms and lonely thoughts, but there is always a yearning that urges him to go on like that final and inevitable march toward death.
The Winds of Khalakovo Page 39
