As Duke Ranos read off the accomplishments of each man, he gave them a medal—in the case of Denis, he received two—and then he took them into tight embraces, slapping their backs and kissing their cheeks. The men bowed and were asked to leave, one by one, until it was clear that Styophan would be the last. No one would be here to see the Duke speak to him—only the Duke himself and Prince Nikandr—which made it clear that for him there would be no medal. For him there would be no honor. Why they would make him watch this ceremony he did not know, but his gut wrenched at the notion that it was for no good reason at all.
Finally, the sixth officer left through doors behind Styophan. As they had for the others, the crowd clapped as he entered. When the door closed, it sounded like a gavel, for the sound in the room dropped to an ominous silence.
Ranos stepped in front of Styophan. He had rarely seen Ranos up close. The Duke was a young man still, not quite forty years old. Grey streaks ran through his closely cut, dark brown hair. His russet-colored eyes were hard. They weighed Styophan while giving little away in turn. There was much of Iaros in him, but his eyes… Those were his mother’s.
“My brother has spoken well of you, Styophan Andrashayev.”
Styophan bowed his head. “As you say, My Lord Duke.”
“He’s spoken well of your time together on the winds. You are stout and hard-willed, and yet you listen to your men when needed.”
Styophan bowed his head again, trying hard to keep his eyes fixed on Ranos and not Nikandr, who stood on the dais near the throne.
“We’ve spoken much about those final hours on the Spar, but Nikandr remembers little beyond the time his mind was taken. What can you tell me of it?”
“In truth, My Lord, I can tell you little. I continued to fight after My Lord Prince had fallen, but the akhoz and the Hratha… They were too many, and we were quickly overrun. I was taken by the akhoz, and I thought surely my ancestors had come for me, but I awoke early in the morning, when the great storm was still raging. A woman and her husband were over me, dragging me into their home, to safety.” Styophan motioned to his ruined eye, the scars on his face. His heart was pounding, and his eye, though six weeks had passed since those events on Galahesh, was still not fully healed, and just then it hurt terribly. “They bandaged my wounds, helped me as much as they were able, until the following day when the streltsi began to arrive in Vihrosh. I was taken then to a proper physic and eventually brought back here to Uyadensk.”
“You have a wife.”
“I do, My Lord.”
“I’m glad for it,” Ranos said. “I truly am. And I wonder if I should give you a choice at all.”
Styophan shook his head, confused. “My Lord?”
At this Ranos turned, and Nikandr stepped forward with a shallow wooden box. Ranos lifted the hinged lid and from within cradled a golden medal with a ribbon of purple and white. The medal was fashioned into a hawk, talons bared, eyes fierce.
A medal of valor. For him…
Ranos stepped forward and pinned it onto the left breast of Styophan’s cherkesska, above all the other medals. He spoke while adjusting the medal just so. “With quick and decisive action—even despite Nikandr’s orders—you saved his life on Rafsuhan. You returned for him, when others might have left. You sent him away on Galahesh after the gunpowder had been taken, and you’ve protected him in battle dozens of times. This is all reason enough for me to grant you a title and give you a keep here on the islands. And so I wonder if I shouldn’t simply grant you that and give you your time with your wife.” Apparently satisfied, Ranos stopped fussing with the medal and stood tall, hands clasped behind his back. “But troubled winds lay ahead, Styophan, son of Andrasha. Bahett ül Kirdhash has retreated to Alekeşir. He’s ingratiated himself with the Kamarisi’s eldest son, and he’s been appointed regent. He is already gathering forces so that he can return to Oramka and Galahesh, so that he can retake them either in hopes of returning to his seat on Galahesh or, more likely, to gain a larger title under the newly proclaimed Kamarisi when he comes of age.
“I have need of men like you, but still, I would grant you your title and your keep if you’ve thought better of your place in the staaya.” Ranos motioned to Styophan’s eye. “Ancients know you deserve it, and you’ve been serving our house for nearly twenty years already. No stain upon you or your house were you to decide that is what you wish. It’s why I’ve saved you until last. Whatever your choice, the decision won’t leave this room.”
“Of course, My Lord.”
“So I put it to you. Would you stay here on Khalakovo? Or would you take to the winds?”
Styophan could only stare. He’d never even considered the option of leaving the staaya. Truth to tell, ever since Nikandr had chosen him for service in his own personal unit, he’d never considered leaving his side.
But to be in a keep? A lord of Khalakovo? A lord of Anuskaya? He was stunned. He could live there with Rozalyna. They could have the children they’d always wanted. They’d tried, many times. It seemed to be difficult for her, but if they lived here, he was sure she could have a child. And he could watch his son grow, watch him run along the halls of a keep, or outside it along the snowy grass in winter.
He looked to Nikandr, who had been strangely silent through this whole affair. That same look of shame was on his face, and Styophan was sure it had to do with his assignment, were he to take on a new commission.
“Forgive me, My Lord Duke,” Styophan said, “but if I were to accept this new commission, where would I go?”
Ranos cleared his throat. “This is sensitive, Styophan.”
“Of course, My Lord.”
“One month ago a woman of Hael made her way to these shores. I spoke to her in this very room with Nikandr. She is a wodjan. Do you know the term?”
“I’ve heard it spoken.”
“And what do the wodjana do?”
“In truth I know little. I’ve heard they perform heathen rituals, and that they act as healers for their tribe.”
Ranos nodded. “They’re soothsayers. They claim to see the future.”
Styophan chuckled. “A lot of good that’s done the Haelish.”
Ranos shrugged and gave Styophan a smile that told him he’d be foolish to underestimate the Haelish. “Who can say? What might the Haelish have become without their wodjana? Yrstanla is vast and powerful. They may not have wodjana, they may not have Matri, but they have overwhelming numbers. They have gunpowder and they have steel. In any case, this has little to do with why she came. She came to treat with us. She asked us to send rooks to speak with the Kings. She asked us to offer aid to the Haelish so that they might take up their war with Yrstanla, which she says they are ready to put down.”
“Why would they abandon a war they’ve waged for generations?”
The sound of clapping and laughing rose up from the next room. Ranos glanced that way and then regarded Styophan seriously. “She would not say.”
Styophan worked this through in his mind. “She came at the behest of the Haelish Kings?”
“I think only the wodjana know. Much as the Matri work here, the women of Hael form their own counsel, and they advise the Kings in their way. She asked that I speak with our Grand Duke.”
“And what had the Grand Duke to say of it?”
Ranos smiled a humoring smile. “The Grand Duke thought our ships would be better spent as firewood than giving them over to Hael—or worse, to Yrstanla. He thought any gems we might grant the Haelish would be better served as jewelry for dogs than to give them to the Haelish warriors. He believes them impotent, ready to fade into history, and so he bid me to keep our ships moored, to keep our gems locked away.” Ranos paused, running a hand down his trim moustache and beard. “What have you to say to that, Styophan son of Andrasha?”
Styophan was not a man accustomed to the halls of power, but he chose his next words as carefully as he could. “It seems as though the Haelish might prove a distraction, and that however sm
all it might be, it could be worth a few gemstones.”
Ranos’s smile turned genuine. “Yrstanla will come. They will attack. And in doing so they will all but ignore the Haelish. For now the Kings know little enough of our war, and when they do hear of the conflict, they may think it small. They might even think it a ruse formulated by the Kamarisi. But we need them. They must attack the Empire, for in this lies our only hope of blunting the forces of Yrstanla that now gather, preparing to head east. Three weeks ago I sent a rook to the Haelish. Ishkyna Vostroma spoke with them for eleven days. They’ve agreed to treat with us. I would have you go, Styophan. I would have you fly westward, over the bulk of the Motherland and down along the great mountains until you reach Haelish lands. I would have you tell them what’s happening so that they can come to our aid—or their own, as they may see it. Now is the time to strike, for if we wait and simply entrench, as the Grand Duke would have us do, we will be doomed.”
“And the Grand Duke?”
Ranos pulled himself taller. “This is why it must go to someone like you, Styophan. The North must tend to Anuskaya if the Grand Duke will not.”
“Would I be going with My Lord Prince?”
“You would not,” Nikandr said, stepping off the dais and moving to Ranos’s side. “There are other places I must go.”
“Were I given the choice,” Styophan said, bowing his head, “I would accompany you.”
Ranos shook his head. “That’s not the choice you’ve been given. You are needed elsewhere.” The Duke took a deep breath as someone in the next room began to make sounds like a snorting bull and laughter rose around it. “And so it comes to it. Think on it tonight. Stay here in Radiskoye, and we’ll speak in the morning. I will have your answer then.”
Ranos did not speak as if this were punishment, but it somehow felt like it, or at the very least as if it had been Nikandr’s choice all along. Part of him wanted to take the lordship and be done with this life. But what would he be if he took it and left the Grand Duchy wanting? He could not take the lordship and simply wait as the war raged on. He had to go. He had to see his country safe. Only then could he settle with Rozalyna.
How he was going to tell her, he didn’t know.
Please forgive me, Roza. “I can give you my answer now, My Lord Duke.”
Ranos paused. He glanced to Nikandr at his side, and then met Styophan’s gaze. Again he seemed to be weighing Styophan. “Go on, then.”
“I will go west. I will find the Haelish and bring them down like a hammer on the crown of Yrstanla, if that is what you wish.”
Ranos’s face did not change for a breath, perhaps two, but then he smiled proudly, slapped Styophan’s shoulders, and took him into a fierce embrace.
PART I
CHAPTER ONE
Nikandr grunted as he attacked the rocky red slope. He pushed as well as he was able, but he still had several hundred yards before he would reach the summit, so he stopped and leaned against a boulder the bright color of coral. His breath left him so quickly here. A hot wind blew, picking up dust and forcing him to draw his ghoutra across his face. Even so, he had to squint against the dust and the bite of the sand. The wind pulled at his kaftan and the loose pants he wore beneath, until at last the wind died down.
The path he was following was easy enough to spot, but it was also treacherous. It was important he be able to see far enough into the desert beyond, though. Soroush and Ushai had already been gone a day longer than planned, and he’d told Atiana that they would stay only one more night. If they didn’t return by tomorrow morning, Atiana, Nikandr, Ashan, and Sukharam would have to go into Andakhara to learn what had become of them.
Behind Nikandr was a vale with a meager stream running through it. They’d timed their entrance to the desert to take advantage of the spring rains, but the gentle weather wouldn’t last much longer. It made it all the more important for them to get into the Gaji and out before it became too dry.
His breath had returned. There was part of him that didn’t want to complete this climb. He knew what would happen at the top. It scared him, and yet he was unable to deny the urge to go there, to look upon the desert below from such a height, so he took to the path once more. His breathing became labored halfway up, but he pushed now that he was so close. Near the top the slope was not so brutal, but he still found it impossible to catch his breath. Eventually, however, he came to a narrow ridge.
The wind here was cooler. It blew more fiercely than below. Ahead of him, the red desert floor opened up. It went on forever, flat as could be. Who would have guessed that so much land could be amassed in one place? He was so used to the islands, so used to the span of the sea, that he never thought what it would be like to see something so grand and humbling as this. It was a dangerous place, but beautiful, perhaps more so because of the danger.
He stared at the edge of the cliff ahead. The ridge was wide in places, but this was its highest point, and also its narrowest. Only a score of paces separated him from the edge.
He stepped forward, feeling the wind against his fingertips.
He took another step, felt the soles of his boots scrape.
He had hoped, in the days that had followed the events at the bridge on Galahesh, that his sense of the wind would return to him. He had hoped that he could once more feel the touch of the havahezhan. He had hoped he could summon the wind as he once had. But the days had turned into weeks, and the weeks into months, and still he felt nothing. He had tried from the towers of Galostina, and later, Radiskoye. He had tried from the mountains of Uyadensk. He had tried from the perches of the eyrie and the decks of windships. But each and every time, he’d felt nothing.
As was true now.
He took another step forward.
The wind gusted, tugging at his clothes.
He breathed deep, swallowing the spit that filled his mouth now that he was so very near the edge.
The desert yawned wider and wider, and yet it was not this he was most aware of, but the sheer height of this vantage.
With one more long step he reached the edge. The wind howled for a moment along the face of the cliff below. The desert seemed as wide as the sky. The ground was rocky, the vegetation sparse. The red floor of the dry plain ahead felt limitless. In the distance, below the cloudless blue sky, was a line of dark mountains, but it didn’t feel like they encompassed the desert, or even obstructed it in any way. It felt as if the mountains were merely one small obstacle, and that the desert continued on and on, eating more of the world as it went.
In those mountains was a village named Kohor, an ancient place where they could learn more of the Gaji and the secretive tribes that had for centuries remained hidden from the world. Closer, much closer, was a caravanserai, little more than a few dozen red-stone buildings with a well and a thousand-year-old trade route running through it. It was another stop on their journey toward the mountains, and the place Soroush and Ushai had gone the day before to secure them passage with a caravan.
Nikandr’s eyes were drawn to the base of the cliff where a whirlwind rose and twisted on the wind before spinning away into nothingness. Nikandr knew it was a havahezhan slipping momentarily into the world of Erahm, playing with the wind before being drawn back to Adhiya.
He often noticed such things. He didn’t want to; he simply did, and it made him painfully aware of the weight around his neck. For weeks after the events on Galahesh, he’d reached for his soulstone and gripped it tightly in his hand, hoping to feel the wind spirit—the havahezhan—he’d been bonded to ever since seeing Soroush on the cliffs below Palotza Radiskoye six years ago. He would eventually release his grip, for he felt nothing, and knew that he never would. His bond to that spirit had been broken the moment Nasim had driven the khanjar into his chest.
He scraped his feet forward. The tips of his boots were now only inches from the edge.
There were days when he wished he’d never gone to Galahesh—days when he wished he could once again feel the touch of
the havahezhan, to summon the wind with mere thought—but he knew such hopes to be foolish. Had those events not occurred, Nasim would never have been freed. He would never have been able to stop Muqallad. And the world would have ended.
In the distance, another whirlwind lifted and twisted and fell. He knew it was foolish to think of such things, but still…
He inched one foot forward. He settled his weight onto the other, afraid to lift it from the dry earth lest he do something foolish.
He pulled the ghoutra from his face, pulled the headband from around his head and tossed it to the dirt behind him. With shaking hands, he spread his arms wide, tilted his head back, closed his eyes. He felt the sun upon his face, felt the wind through his hair. He breathed deeply and took in the scents of the desert—sage and baked earth and the strange spiky bushes that smelled like burning cedar.
He could feel the wind running through his fingers, could feel it tug at his kaftan and the white cotton legs of his sirwaal.
He recalled where his journey had begun. Before Galahesh, before Ghayavand. Before Nasim had been healed.
Before Rehada had died.
He had flown above his homeland, the island of Uyadensk. Soroush and his Maharraht had come to gather elemental stones for a ritual. One of them had stood at the edge of a cliff, as he stood now. He had spread his arms, looked up to the sky. And he’d leapt. He’d leapt from the cliffs, and the winds had saved him. They’d borne him upward until setting him gently down like a thrush alighting on a lonely branch.
Nikandr had thought much on that day. That spirit, the one the man had called forth, was the one that had attached itself to him, an elder, a spirit of the wind so old, the Aramahn said, that it had been eons since it had crossed over from Erahm, preferring, for whatever reason, the world of the spirits to the world of the living. Centuries ago, the Aramahn and Maharraht had no need of stones for summoning spirits. They’d done it on their own, as Nasim and Muqallad did. But before them, when the earliest of wandering desert tribesmen were first learning how to tame the spirits, they did what that lone man on that cliff had done. They gave of themselves. They offered themselves to the spirits. They did so in small ways at first. Submerging themselves in water, covering themselves in dirt, running their hands over flames. But as their thirst for knowledge and power grew, they tried things that seemed more and more desperate. Those aligned with water would drown themselves. Those aligned with fire would burn themselves. Those aligned with earth would bury themselves.
The Flames of Shadam Khoreh (The Lays of Anuskaya) Page 3
