“Do you remember when you came here with Ashan and the men from the islands? I was still in the throes of the spell you’d cast upon me and Sariya.” He took another step forward. “You managed to slow the world around us. You managed to banish me from this plane, send me back to the place you’d prepared for us until your return. I hardly think you even knew what you were doing then, but I wonder if you do now.”
Nasim knew exactly what Muqallad was talking about—he’d thought on it often—and the truth was there had been little he’d done consciously while on this island. He’d felt as though he were walking in someone else’s dream. Surely Khamal had hoped that a man in control of himself and his mind would make his way back to Ghayavand. He couldn’t have been prepared for a boy who barely understood the world around him.
Muqallad approached, and Nasim could do nothing but step back. Muqallad raised his hand and Nasim froze in place. His muscles would no longer respond. Muqallad stopped when he was face-to-face with Nasim.
“You’ve grown in many ways, Khamal, but you are still as a babe in the ones that matter most.”
Muqallad reached out and grasped Nasim’s head. As soon as Muqallad’s warm skin touched Nasim’s ears and cheeks, pain coursed through him like a red-hot iron.
CHAPTER FORTY
Nasim’s mind was lit afire. Memories played through him, things he hadn’t thought of in years, things he couldn’t recall ever happening to him. What Muqallad didn’t realize—or disregarded—was that Nasim could read his thoughts as well. It was difficult to understand, but Nasim knew this: Muqallad was searching for something. He was desperate for it.
Through the haze Nasim recalled the sense of clawing from Muqallad in the depths of the village. He remembered as well his yearning to be free from the trap Khamal had laid for him when he’d last been on the island.
And then it struck him.
Muqallad was not yet free.
Khamal’s trap was still in effect, and Muqallad needed to unlock its secrets to free himself from this island once and for all.
This was something Nasim could not allow. At all costs, he had to prevent Muqallad from attaining this information. But Muqallad was already getting closer. He was sifting through Nasim’s dreams, his memories of Khamal. There were glimpses of Khamal’s life that Nasim couldn’t remember dreaming.
Time passed. Just how much Nasim had no idea, but he began to understand what Muqallad was doing, and how he was doing it. He could sense the hezhan Muqallad was bonded to, five of them at once.
It was these that Nasim called upon now.
He drew upon Muqallad’s havahezhan to raise the wind. It blew through the celestia, pulling dust and dirt and fallen leaves into the interior of the dome. It swirled around Muqallad, confused him.
Then Nasim caused the stone beneath Muqallad’s feet to soften, to become little more than mud, and the moment Muqallad sank to his ankles, he firmed the stone up once more.
He drew upon the jalahezhan to slick the surface of the celestia’s floor and he used the dhoshahezhan to draw himself away from Muqallad.
But then it all stopped.
Muqallad cut him off. He knew of Nasim’s limitations, and had devised his defenses accordingly.
Muqallad ripped his feet free, and the stone—solid once more—cracked and clattered and skittered over the floor. As the wind died, the leaves settled onto the wet floor like pattering rain.
“Come,” Muqallad said as he neared, “I would have thought you’d want me to uncover these things. Is it not what you’ve been searching for for years?”
Nasim worked desperately to force himself to move. He railed against Muqallad’s will, trying to gain access to the hezhan once more, but it was impossible. Muqallad was too aware of what he was trying to do, and he stopped him at every turn.
But then, as Muqallad tore through Nasim’s mind once more, Nasim felt something—someone—at the edge of his awareness. She—for Nasim was certain the presence was a girl—reminded him of Rabiah at first. But of course that was impossible. Rabiah lay dead at the center of the celestia floor. And then he thought it was Sukharam, for who else could it be?
In a flash a vision came to him—the memory of the girl walking across the bridge toward the village’s entrance. She had been leading the akhoz—he was sure of this—and yet here she was, watching as Muqallad came closer and closer to finding what he needed, and it seemed as though she was asking Nasim to use her abilities, asking him to stop Muqallad.
It seemed strange.
It felt like a trap.
But in his desperation he couldn’t deny himself this chance for escape. He drew upon her, as he had with Rabiah and Sukharam, as he had Muqallad, but this time was so much easier. It was like picking up a pen to write. Like strumming the strings of a lute to make sound.
The wind came again, and this time there was nothing Muqallad could do to stop it. He was pushed away. The debris from around the celestia struck him. He fell to his knees, arms up, warding against the attack.
Nasim freed himself. It was not like he had broken bonds, but rather as if he’d stepped to one side and the bonds had fallen away.
Muqallad was already recovering. He drew upon his own hezhan, perhaps more than he had in decades. He was angry now. Nasim could feel it, could see it in his face. He stood and summoned water to envelope Nasim. In a flash, Nasim was pulled up from the floor until he floated within the muddy water.
He had been weakened from the pain Muqallad had inflicted, but this would not stop him. Not now.
He drew upon a vanahezhan, called it to action.
And it obeyed.
The floor shook. The columns began to crack. The sound of it resonated beneath the high dome.
Nasim demanded more.
Muqallad knew what was happening, knew that he had to leave, but Nasim drew upon a dhoshahezhan to force him to remain in place. He had not expected something that he had used so effectively against another to be used against him. He stood frozen, and the water around Nasim fell in a loud rush.
Nasim stumbled back, the ground beneath him rising and bucking, shifting and sliding. And then a crack resounded above him. It was followed by another and another. The high dome focused the sound, making what was already loud deafening.
He ran, but a chunk of stone struck his shoulder and sent him sprawling. Smaller pieces of rock and scree bit into the skin of his scalp and forehead and hands. Rock dust billowed around him, making it nearly impossible to breathe.
Gathering himself, he called upon the wind to blow the dust away. He sprinted forward as a crash moved the ground. He slipped on the slick marble floor, half crawling and half running from the crumbling structure.
As he reached the edge of the circular floor, the fluted columns nearby groaned and bowed and finally gave way. He ran as quickly as he was able, but he was still thrown forward onto the ground. It sounded as if the island itself was being swallowed by the world.
As the sound began to fade, Nasim got to his feet. Though he could sense the girl standing not fifty paces away, he found his path to Adhiya cut off.
Nasim approached her while the ruins of the celestia grumbled and groaned. The dust parted and flowed around her like a weathered stone in a long-forgotten stream.
“Who are you?” Nasim asked.
She looked over Nasim’s shoulder to the destruction beyond. “He will not remain for long.” She held out her hand to him and turned, waiting.
“Where do we go?”
“Do you not wish to find your friends?”
“Who are you?”
“Kaleh. Now come,” she said, shaking her hand for him and glancing again toward the ruined celestia.
He took it, and together they ran. Fear drove them, and it took little time to reach the streets of Alayazhar and to pass beyond Sariya’s broken tower, but they had gone only halfway through the city when they heard a resounding boom from the hill behind them. Nasim turned and saw on the celestia’s hill, above
the shattered remains of the buildings, a pillar of dust flying high into the air.
They pushed themselves harder after this. Nasim was too worried to speak, to ask Kaleh questions. He felt as though breaking the silence would also break this spell of good fortune and reveal it to be yet another trap.
Kaleh was just as silent, though whether this was simply her nature or a symptom of her own fear he didn’t know.
They raced through the city and reached the outskirts. The road through the hills led them up toward the peaks and the bridge that led to the village. The bridge itself, tall and white and ill kept, was empty. It looked fragile, as if adding their weight to it would force its collapse. As they crossed, holding hands, Nasim looked down toward the river, to the place he and Rabiah had run from the akhoz. It felt strange to be looking down upon it, walking on the bridge with the same girl he’d seen from that lower vantage. It felt as if he’d allied himself with Muqallad, as if Rabiah’s death had been a plan in which he’d played an integral part, and each step he took cemented these feelings until it felt like little more than betrayal.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered.
“What?” Kaleh asked.
“Nothing.”
They entered the village and wended their way down through the tunnels. Nasim did not see any of the akhoz, but he could feel them lurking in the darkness. They did not bar their way, however. It made this strange situation feel even more surreal, and soon Nasim couldn’t take the silence any longer.
“Why are you helping me?” he asked.
“Because Muqallad is using me. He would use you as well, and that, at least for now, I will not allow.”
“How is he using you?”
“You of all people should know. You were what gave him the clues he needed.”
“Clues to what?”
“Finding the way Adhiya and Erahm are linked.”
“They are linked through the aether.”
“That doesn’t answer the question of how they’re linked.”
“Then tell me.”
She pulled him down a tunnel where several siraj stones lit the way from sconces set into the walls. “That I cannot say.”
“Why not?”
“Because I don’t yet know whether I will allow Muqallad to use me further.”
“You have a choice?”
“Do you?” she asked, her eyes flat and judgmental.
“I don’t know.”
“And neither do I.” They came to the doors. “Get them, quickly. Muqallad is coming.”
Before Nasim could move, he heard the braying of one of the akhoz, far in the distance. It was picked up moments later by others, dozens of them. They were closing in already.
Nasim took a siraj from a sconce and went to the nearest door, which opened at his touch. Inside, sleeping, was Sukharam. He stood from his bed of matted hay, blinking at the light.
“Come,” Nasim said. “We have little time.”
Sukharam’s eyes were wild with fear, darting to the hall behind Nasim, and yet he stood his ground. “What of Rabiah?”
Nasim waved him to leave the room. “Not now, Sukharam.”
“Where is she?”
“She’s gone, Sukharam. Dead. Killed in Sariya’s tower.”
Sukharam lowered his arm, allowing the light to strike him full in the face. His look of anger became one of disgust, a mirror of Nasim’s own feelings.
The wails of the akhoz approached. They sounded hungry, and it made Nasim’s stomach turn. “We must go, Sukharam!”
Sukharam walked past Nasim, the cold air of the tunnels wafting by as he did so. “We’ll speak of this again.”
Nasim rushed into the next room. Ashan was lying on the floor, his face a mass of cuts and bruises and half-healed burns. Soroush was already standing, and looked as though he’d received no ill treatment whatsoever. Seeing him next to Ashan, who looked as though he’d been beaten for weeks, was strange indeed.
Soroush and Sukharam slipped Ashan’s arms around their shoulders and half carried, half dragged him from the room.
“This way,” Kaleh said as she continued down the tunnel. There, however, they came to a dead end.
“What have you done?” Nasim cried.
“Be quiet,” Kaleh said. With a touch of her finger, a small hole opened in the wall and widened.
Behind them, the akhoz rounded the corner. They went mad when they spied the five of them.
The hole widened until it looked like the open maw of an earthen beast. “Step inside,” Kaleh said. “Quickly.”
They did, without hesitation. As soon as the last of them were in, the walls began closing in again. The world darkened, and the stone pressed in around them.
Sukharam shouted in fright.
Nasim’s last thought was that Kaleh had betrayed them.
What followed was darkness and a freezing embrace as the cold stone pressed ever more surely against their frames. Nasim could not draw breath. He could not move.
A panic as deep as the earth had just begun to set when the earth shifted—
—and opened before them.
Light flooded into the space, making Nasim cringe like a newborn.
Ahead was a short, earthen tunnel that led to a forest of white birch. Nasim could see the trunks and the bed of fallen leaves that covered the forest floor.
“By the fates, where are we?” Sukharam asked.
In a croaky, long-neglected voice, Soroush replied, “We are returned to Rafsuhan.”
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Nikandr waited in the dark halls of Ashdi en Ghat, listening for the sound of footfalls. He heard them at last near midnight, the hour at which the Maharraht changed watches. One man—one of Bersuq’s most trusted—walked past with a siraj stone hanging from a leather cord. He turned his head toward the hallway where Nikandr lay in wait, but then continued on as if he’d seen nothing, as if he didn’t know that Nikandr was there.
“Is it time already?” the guard further down the hall asked.
“Neh,” said the other, “but I haven’t been able to sleep in days. Go. Get some rest. The ships will most likely return tomorrow.”
A pause. “What will become of them?”
“To that you already know the answer.”
When the first guard spoke again, his voice was lower. “There are times when I think Thabash’s arrival was an ill omen.”
“Silence,” hissed the one who had carried the stone past Nikandr. “Rahid has ears everywhere.”
“But sending ships to attack our own…”
“They weren’t sent to attack, merely to return the children that were taken away.”
“If you believe that, you’re a fool.”
“I do believe them.”
A short laugh echoed down the hall. “Listen to the words of Bersuq if you must—listen even to Rahid’s—but do not try to tell me that no harm was meant to those who fled.”
“We lead the life we lead.”
“We do, but why is it we must kill even amongst ourselves?”
There was a long, uncomfortable silence.
“Go. Find rest. You’ll think better under the light of the morning sun.” Footsteps approached Nikandr’s position again. He made himself small as the Maharraht approached. “This will look no better under the sun,” he said. “It may in fact look worse.” He passed the tunnel entrance with no stone in his hand, and soon his footsteps had faded.
All was silent for a time, then sounds came of the remaining soldier pacing further and further away in the opposite direction.
The light, however, remained.
With cautious steps Nikandr made his way forward, finding the siraj sitting on the stone floor of the cool, vacant tunnel. He picked up the siraj and made his way deeper, taking the directions Jahalan had given him earlier that day, and at last he came to a door set into the wall of the tunnel. He turned the handle and swung it soundlessly inward.
Resting on three pallets were his men: Styophan
and Avil and Mikhalai. They looked to the doorway not with fear, but something akin to it. No doubt they understood that something was about to happen.
“It is well that you’re here, My Lord Prince,” Styophan said in Anuskayan. “Are we to leave?”
“Da, the three of you will go, and quickly.” Nikandr hugged Styophan and kissed his cheeks. “You will take the Chaika and return word of these events to Khalakovo.”
Styophan sent a confused glance back at Avil and Mikhalai. “My Lord Prince, we cannot leave you here. There’s talk of the Hratha returning.”
“I know, but I cannot leave.”
“Then we stay as well.”
“Nyet,” Nikandr said, raising his voice as loud as he dared among these tunnels. “Khalakovo has need of you. The Grand Duchy as well. There will be need of ships, and soon. But first, you will return to Ranos. Tell him what has happened here. Bid him send no men, and tell him I will return to Khalakovo as soon as I’m able.”
“You try to heal them, My Lord, but they don’t deserve it. They—”
“I will not speak of it!” Nikandr’s words echoed off into the distance. “Believe me when I say this is necessary. Ranos must understand what is happening. He must know of Muqallad and the rift. Tell him, and tell him to speak with the Aramahn. We will need their guidance in the weeks ahead.”
Styophan looked into Nikandr’s eyes, anxious, but willing to do as Nikandr bid him. “What will you do?”
“If I’m able, I will heal. If I’m not, I will leave.”
They both held the other’s gaze, knowing that in all likelihood it wasn’t in Nikandr’s power to do this. With Thabash came a singular mind, no matter that some of the Maharraht may doubt his purpose.
Styophan stepped in and hugged Nikandr. “Fare well, My Lord.”
“And you,” Nikandr said.
He hugged and kissed Avil and Mikhalai as well, and then they were off, taking the turns Nikandr gave them to reach the upper exit from the village.
Nikandr returned to the place where he’d found the stone and set it down.
The Straits of Galahesh Page 34
