The Flames of Shadam Khoreh (The Lays of Anuskaya)

by Bradley Beaulieu

  “There’s little time left,” Nikandr said. “The wards once held up by the Flames of Shadam Khoreh are gone.”

  “They are not all dead,” Selim said.

  “True, one of the Tashavir remains, but the spell erected in Shadam Khoreh has fallen. Tohrab says that the wards on Ghayavand will remain for days, perhaps weeks, but soon they will fail altogether. Clearly that is what Sariya has been planning for all along.”

  Through the cell window the sound of laughter came, then two women talking with one another loudly, as if drunk. From their tone—which was haughty and free of worry—Nikandr guessed they were two of the Kamarisi’s wives returning to their tower. Heavy shadows from the lone candle played along Selim’s neck as his throat convulsed. When he looked to Nikandr again, his momentary expression of worry was gone. “Time is growing short. Tomorrow I will address my people. Bahett will join me, and while we’re gone, you and whoever you say should come with you will be released from your cells. You will be led to Bahett’s apartments, and when Bahett returns from my address”—Selim’s eyes hardened—“you will kill him.”

  “And what good will that do? Another regent will simply be appointed.”

  “There will be another, evet, but it will take time. And even if it were done the very same day, it would be better than what we deal with in Bahett. With Bahett gone, I can do much.”

  “I need only to be released that I can return to the Grand Duchy and Ghayavand.”

  “You’ll need a good deal more than that. Bahett thought Sariya would return, but he is no longer sure. He will move, now, after taking care of you and the others. He will go east himself to ensure that Ghayavand is ready. He will ensure that your Grand Duke is sufficiently baited, sufficiently angered, so that the way is paved. And if that happens your only hope is that Sariya truly is gone. A thin hope indeed, Nikandr Iaroslov.”

  Nikandr considered his words. There was a part of him that respected this young man, even though his father was an enemy of the islands—even though Selim himself would likely have been as well had Sariya not arrived in Irabahce. It was a bold plan he was offering, perhaps bold enough to catch Bahett and Sariya’s other allies off guard.

  “And what happens when Bahett is dead?”

  “You’ll be given stout horses and you’ll ride eastward to rejoin your countrymen. But there’s more. And this is important. Sariya came to Alekeşir twice. Once nearly two years ago, shortly after the battle for the Spar. The second was a year later, just six months ago. She returned with red-robed men, the qiram of Kohor. She was shaken when she came. I know not why, but something she’d found in the desert had alarmed her. After she left, Bahett let something slip when he thought I wasn’t near. Bahett was given a few of the Kohori, but most were being sent east, to Ghayavand. There they were making preparations.”

  “And why not?” Nikandr said. “We know she plans to return there.”

  “It’s a trap,” Selim said. “She plans to draw in the ships of Anuskaya, and when the time is right, the forces of Anuskaya will be baited. With such a threat on Ghayavand, your ships will be sent. Is it not so?”

  Nikandr nodded, acknowledging the point. “If the threat is great enough.”

  “You cannot let this happen. You must convince your Grand Duke not to attack, for if they do, Sariya will have what she wants.”

  “And what is that?”

  He shrugged. “I only know it is her desire. Prevent it, and then your Nasim and Sukharam can close the rifts.”

  “To do that we would need the Atalayina.”

  “Sariya will take it to Ghayavand. You must find her there and take it from her before all is lost.”

  Nikandr couldn’t help himself. He started laughing. “Do you think all of this so simple?”

  Selim smiled, but it was grim indeed for one so young. “We live in difficult times. The mountain is steep. Is that not what they say in Anuskaya? Well, it’s true. The mountain is steep, and we must climb, together, you and I, or all will be lost. When Bahett is gone, I will send documents ahead, telling the commanders on the warfront to retreat. It won’t last long, especially if the Kaymakam move quickly to replace Bahett, but it will be enough to give a pause in the battle, enough that you can convince your Grand Duke to give you men for an attack on Ghayavand. The rest will be up to you.”

  Nikandr shook his head and chuckled sadly. “You’ve no idea how stubborn Leonid Dhalingrad can be.”

  Selim stood and moved to the door. “You must convince him.”

  “Oh, I will,” Nikandr said. “Believe me, I will.”

  “Tomorrow near dusk, Nikandr of Anuskaya. Be ready.” And with that he left, locking the door behind him.

  CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

  The air is thin and the sun is high when Khamal and the other Al-Aqim reach the final plateau. The crags of Sihyaan’s sheer black cliffs make her look like the dark steps to the heavens themselves.

  As Khamal wipes the sleeve of his white robes across his brow, clearing it of sweat, Sariya navigates the last of the climb. Muqallad comes after her. All of them are breathing heavily, but they have expectant glints in their eyes. It feels as though their past lives have been leading slowly but surely like the steps of a child over stones in a stream toward this very moment, the crossing of a threshold, the waking of the world to a new dawn.

  And yet Muqallad and Sariya seem tentative. Perhaps now that the ritual is upon them they wonder whether the timing is right. Khamal has no such doubts. He is sure the fates are shining on them. He’s never been more certain of anything in his life.

  Muqallad points to a rock—grey, lifeless obsidian—that stands above the snowy grass. “Come.”

  As they gather around it, Muqallad reaches out and touches the stone. The currents of the aether shift, and a vanahezhan approaches. The stone melts before their eyes, reforming into a pillar as black as the darkest night. The top of it is smooth like glass, and a hollow is set into it, one that will cradle the Atalayina. Sariya sets the Atalayina there.

  And the moment she does, the wind tugs at their robes. It twists their hair. The land around them—a plateau of knee-high grass—looks like a white, frothing sea in the dead of winter.

  But then the wind dies, until Khamal can feel little save the score upon score of elder spirits that have gathered in this place. They are older than any Khamal has ever communed with. By the fates, they feel as old as the world itself, as if they were the first the fates had drawn forth from the firmament and the stuff of stars.

  They know, he realizes. They know the end draws nigh, and they’ve come to watch. Or help.

  Or hinder, Khamal thinks.

  He pushes these fears away. They all knew the danger in coming here. It could be no other way.

  The three of them hold hands. Muqallad stands on his left.

  Strong Muqallad. Wise Muqallad.

  And on his right is Sariya.

  Thoughtful Sariya, she of subtle mind.

  As one, the three of them nod. They tip their heads skyward. Their eyes relax, half-lidded, and they open themselves to the world around them. Khamal has never felt as at peace with the world as he does now. Everything else has paled in comparison, and it is not due to the Atalayina. It is not due to the other Al-Aqim. It is due to the world itself. It is ready. He knows this now.

  Slowly, the walls between worlds peel away. Adhiya is so close to Erahm one might reach forth and part the veil with the brush of a hand. But it isn’t proximity that they hope to bring about. It’s unification. The aether must be banished that the worlds might merge, and this, they soon discover, is no easy task. As they hold one another’s hands and draw upon the Atalayina, clouds form above. In moments the blue sky turns grey. They swirl as the ground rumbles, low and deep. The same is happening in Adhiya—the stuff of that world trembles at what is to come.

  But there is more. Around the worlds, cradling them like the arms of a mother, is the firmament itself. And there…

  There are those wh
o watch. Those who’ve been waiting for this day for eons.

  There are three.

  The fates… The fates have come.

  In anticipation they watch these three mortals who seek to alter the course the fates themselves have set.

  Khamal did not know until that very moment that he’s felt them before. Every time he’s taken breath, every time he’s communed with a spirit, every time he reached across the aether to the world beyond, they were there. They were watching, taking note, neither helping nor hindering.

  Do they think him worthy?

  Do they think the three of them worthy?

  Khamal does not know. He hopes it is so.

  And yet, even as these thoughts come, he feels in the fates something he never expected. It is barely present, like the scent of orange blossoms on the day’s first breeze, but the longer they stand, staring up toward the sky, the stronger it becomes.

  It is an ache. A yearning. A burning desire so strong the fates themselves can barely contain it.

  Never in a thousand years would he have thought to find it so, but now that he has, he wonders how they could have hidden it from him all along.

  Because he hadn’t known. He hadn’t known how to sense them at all, much less discern their mood. He’d been like a babe listening to the sounds of his parents, unknowing, uncaring that they’re trying so desperately to speak to him.

  The worlds touch. The veil begins to part. The aether itself becomes so thin that the currents begin to rip it, to tear it apart. The hezhan that had been waiting so eagerly step through. The disciples of the Al-Aqim, waiting in anticipation in Alayazhar, are drawn across and into Adhiya.

  Neh, Khamal realizes. They are not drawn through. That distinction can no longer be made. In this place, on this island, the worlds are one.

  And above—can it be?—the fates smile.

  Khamal’s heart fills with joy. It is this, more than anything, that convinces him that all is as it should be.

  The worlds are beginning to tear.

  And the fates are smiling.

  Nasim opened his eyes.

  He was cold as he had ever been. Again, as it had been since he’d woken from Sariya’s spell, the dreams of Khamal were crisp and clear. He remembered them now as if they’d happened yesterday, or mere moments ago.

  He shifted on the cot he’d been given the day before. When he did the chains that ran from the iron bands around his neck and wrists and ankles jingled. The iron was cold. It chafed the skin around his neck, especially near his left collar bone—a necessary consequence of the only position he’d found late last night that brought him some amount of comfort. He swung his bare feet over the edge of the cot and set them on the cold stone floor.

  Across from him, Sukharam woke. He grimaced as he sat up, his chains clinking. It struck Nasim just how much Sukharam had grown over these past few years. When Nasim had found him in Trevitze, he’d been a callow youth, unaware of the world around him. It was understandable given the orphanage and the lack of influence from his Aramahn parents, but since then he’d grown in leaps and bounds. It had to do with the way he saw the world, the way he could peel back layers to find the soul within, not just with people, and not just with hezhan, but with the worlds themselves. He more than any other gave Nasim hope that they could still return to Ghayavand and complete what they had begun.

  And yet Sukharam was staring at Nasim with eyes that barely concealed his disdain. He didn’t trust Nasim—that much Nasim already knew—but what was worse: he didn’t believe Nasim worthy of touching the Atalayina, didn’t think him worthy of returning to Ghayavand to close the rifts. Sukharam had taken up the quest that Nasim himself had given him, and now he considered himself the only true judge of what was right.

  Not so different from Muqallad, Nasim thought, though at least Muqallad had known his limits. Sukharam had yet to find them.

  “I dreamed of Ghayavand again”—Nasim leaned over and strapped on his beaten sandals, the very same that had borne him across the wide expanse of the Gaji—“and this time I dreamt of the ritual.”

  At this, Sukharam sat up straighter. He knew Nasim rarely dreamt of the sundering itself. It had been something that he’d pressed Nasim about in the weeks before they’d reached Ghayavand.

  “The three of them went to the top of Sihyaan,” Nasim continued, “just below the peak, and there they used the Atalayina to begin the ritual. I felt the aether—” He stopped. Sometimes he recalled things so clearly that he had trouble distinguishing Khamal’s memories from his own. “Khamal felt the aether parting. He felt the worlds touch. Felt the fates themselves watching.”

  “Would they not be drawn to such a thing?”

  “You say it as if it’s obvious. You say it as if you feel the fates each time you reach for the world beyond.”

  “Not every time.” Sukharam stood and moved to the window, which had a thick wooden door over it. He unlatched it and pulled the door back, allowing frigid air to enter the room. “But there have been times when I’ve thought”—he turned back to Nasim—“where I’ve hoped that they were watching. It’s something I’ve spent much time on, for it seems to me that the fates must help us close the rifts. It cannot be us alone. It cannot be a mere matter of manipulating the Atalayina, no matter how powerful it may be.”

  Nasim considered this. “After seeing those early moments of the ritual, I cannot help but agree, but I didn’t see the end. Only the opening moments.”

  Sukharam frowned. “Get to the point.”

  Nasim finished tying his sandals and stood. “You cannot do this alone, Sukharam, and unless I’m wrong, we’ll need one more. It must be three.”

  “I don’t deny that, Nasim. I only question your presence.” Before Nasim could protest, he continued. “You were an integral part of the sundering, so much so that I’m convinced that you should have no part in its redress. You are emotional and petulant. You are incomplete. How could I trust you to join me there?”

  “Join you?”

  “It is my fate. I’ve been sure of it since the day you plucked me from the great room in that orphanage. I will find the Atalayina, and I will go to Ghayavand. You may accompany me, Nasim, but you will not ascend to Sihyaan.”

  Nasim found his anger rising. “Do you know, then, how to touch the Atalayina? Do you know how to draw the worlds close? Are you so wise that you can reach up to the heavens and speak to the fates themselves?”

  Sukharam’s jaw grit. “I have done so already.”

  Nasim’s words died on his lips as he tried to determine whether or not Sukharam was lying.

  “In the valley of Kohor,” Sukharam went on, “Ashan brought me to the Vale of Stars, and there the world opened up for me. I saw the place from which the fates look down.” As he spoke, his eyes went wide, his expression beatific. “It was wide. Wider than I could ever have imagined.”

  “Think well on this, Sukharam. Even at the height of their powers, even with the Atalayina, even in the place they’d chosen, the center of the world itself, the Al-Aqim had difficulty. The fates were reticent. They do not wish to touch the world they set in motion, at least not directly. And it will be no different for you.”

  “I will manage.”

  “Do you know their minds then? Do you know their thoughts? When I felt them, through Khamal’s dreams, they did not look upon the sundering unkindly.” At this, all signs of Sukharam’s self-assurance vanished, but Nasim pressed on. “They looked upon the ritual with smiles upon their faces, as if they’d been awaiting that moment from the very first days of the world.”

  Sukharam worked this through in his mind. “It cannot be. Khamal must have been mistaken. Or your memories… They’re seen through the veil of the dead, Nasim.”

  “And yet they’ve never been wrong. Not once, Sukharam.”

  Sukharam stared at him, his eyes searching, as if he were trying to reconcile an understanding that moments ago he’d been entirely certain of.

  And then the sk
in of his cheeks flushed red. His fingers began to quiver. He looked around the room as if he’d just woken to find himself here in this place. He turned sharply to stare out through the iron bars of the open window, his chains clinking as he did so. He looked up toward the heavens while swallowing heavily, as if something altogether unpleasant had suddenly become caught in his throat.

  From outside their cell door, there came the sounds of chains clanking and the gritty slide of boots upon the winding staircase.

  “Sukharam,” Nasim said in a harsh whisper. “What’s wrong?”

  Sukharam turned to him as if he’d forgotten Nasim was there. His face was distant, his eyes wide.

  “Sukharam, quickly.”

  But Sukharam only shook his head. A few moments later, the jingle of keys came, and a click, and then the door was swung wide. Tohrab shuffled through the doorway. His cheeks were sunken, his skin ashen, and he had a faraway look that Nasim hadn’t expected. He didn’t appear to be physically harmed, but he was staring at the wall blankly, not as though he were lost in thought, but as though he had no thoughts at all.

  A man followed Tohrab into the room. Nasim expected a janissary from the kasir, but it was not. It was a man dressed in the red robes of Kohor. He had rings of gold along his ears and in his nose. His beard was long and brown. He was stout, his arms thick and hands gnarled. He looked more like an old oak than a man. Nasim realized he recognized this man. He’d seen him in Kohor when Sariya had first brought him there. Yet here he was in the heart of the Empire with the last remaining Tashavir in tow. “Come,” he said to Sukharam.

  Sukharam looked between the Kohori and Nasim, unsure of himself. It was a look Nasim was surprised to find no longer suited him. Sukharam had been so confident these past few weeks that seeing a bit of the boy he’d found in Trevitze was unnerving.

  “What do you want with him?” Nasim asked.

  The Kohori gazed upon Nasim with a jeweler’s stare. “Mind your tongue, Nasim an Ashan.”

  With that he left with Sukharam, closing the door behind him with a boom.