The Flames of Shadam Khoreh (The Lays of Anuskaya) (57 page)

Datha’s answer was to face downward, and lift his head
into
the barrel of Styophan’s gun, daring Styophan to pull the trigger.

Nikandr slipped down, ready to order Styophan to hold, but his words died on his lips, for just then shadows played across the ground in front of him and behind him and all around. A flapping of wings came. A white-breasted jackdaw came to rest on the edge of the roof of the building to Nikandr’s left. Another came, and another, then dozens descended. But it wasn’t the birds that drew Nikandr’s attention. It was the girl that walked down the street, partially hidden by the shade of an ancient, slouching pistachio tree that hung over the stone wall of a hidden yard. She had straight, jet-black hair, and she wore a flaxen dress with simple-but-elegant embroidery around the hem and sleeves. She walked not as a normal child might, but with a strange, shambling gait.

The akhoz
, Nikandr thought.
The akhoz are here.

But when she stepped into the stark sunlight, he realized the girl’s condition had nothing to do with those strange, twisted creatures from Alayazhar. Her eyes were half-lidded, but at least she
had
eyes, and her skin… Her skin was the normal olive hue of a child from the Empire’s heartland, not the sickly grey of the akhoz.

Soroush slipped down from his horse and pulled his wheellock, but he paused as well. Even Datha seemed confused, for he turned his head to look at the girl, then arched awkwardly to take in the strange birds that were still collecting all around them. Except for the flapping of their wings they made not a sound, not the squawk or quorks the jackdaws would normally make. They merely stared, their collective eyes watching as the girl approached.

Some that stood in her way jumped and flapped to one side as she approached. They seemed
of
 
her, somehow. Connected in some way Nikandr couldn’t understand.

But then he felt through his soulstone something he hadn’t felt in months.

“Ishkyna.”

Hers was an imprint he knew well at this point, but it felt different, as if his memories were of a girl and here before him was a woman fully grown. The realization was unnerving, for it meant that Ishkyna had widened once again her already considerable powers.

“Ishkyna,” Nikandr said again, stepping forward.

The girl turned and looked to a nearby street that angled off the one they’d been riding along. She spoke with the voice of a little girl, but it came out in a croak, as if she were sick and hadn’t used her voice in days. “The King of Hael is two streets over, hiding behind a mule cart, waiting for their signal.”

“And when will that be?” Nikandr asked.

“Why, no time at all, Nischka.”

Before Nikandr could ask her what she meant, the rattle of musket fire came from the direction of the dome.

“Mount,” Nikandr called, running to his horse and swinging himself up and into the saddle. “Head down the street there.” Nikandr pointed to a narrow street that went westward up a steep hill.

Styophan remained, holding Datha’s arm tight.

“Leave him be,” Nikandr called. “One more won’t make a difference.”

Styophan glared down with his one good eye and released Datha. Then he mounted as well, and soon they were riding toward the street Ishkyna had indicated. As Datha sprinted southward, pulling a long, wide sword from inside his robe as he went, Nikandr guided his horse forward and reached down to the girl.

Ishkyna, however, merely stared westward, perhaps toward the king, perhaps to something Nikandr would never have the ability to see.

“Come, Ishkyna. Quickly, now.”

He shook his hand in front of her face, but the moment he did, the girl collapsed to the ground. She lay there motionless. Nikandr had no idea whether she was alive or dead.

The sound of gunfire grew, as did the shouts from the crowd. The streets were going to be utter madness in moments. The girl would be trampled.

Nikandr slipped down from his horse and carried the girl over to the edge of the road and laid her against the worn stone of the building there. She was still breathing, thank the ancients, and she’d be in plain sight here. Hopefully someone would find her and care for her.

He vaulted back onto his horse, grabbed the reins, and kicked the black stallion into action. It responded well. This was a horse of war. It was jittery from the sounds that were now coming closer, but not from nerves. This was a horse used to the smell of blood and the sounds of battle. He caught up with the others, who were waiting for a sign. As if in answer to their call, a swarm of jackdaws swooped down from above the height of the nearby homes and swept along the road heading south.

They followed the birds, turning right, then left, up an alley filled with the stink of a tannery, all as the first of the refugees from the Kamarisi’s address came running along the roads. The crowd was still thin, but the streets would be teeming in moments.

The sight of the jackdaws caused the Alekeşiri to stop in their tracks. They stared at the black, writhing vision before them—it looked more like a swarm of bees than a flock of birds—and then backed away as the birds flew overhead, revealing the eighteen pounding war horses riding down the street toward them.

They parted like kindling beneath the blade of a hatchet.

Nikandr and his men came to a wide thoroughfare, one of the major streets running north to south through Alekeşir, and here the birds swarmed over one figure.

“That’s him!” Styophan called over the din of hooves and the growing alarm of the crowd. “That’s Brechan.”

They headed straight for him, but as they did, Nikandr saw the mass of people and horses and soldiers coming down the street toward them. Somewhere, a woman screamed for her child. Citizens fled before a vanguard of janissaries on horses, and behind came a group of Kiliç Şaik. They surrounded a golden chariot pulled by two white horses with grey manes.

It was the Kamarisi, Nikandr realized. Selim ül Hakan was coming, and Bahett was with him.

CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE

Nikandr watched as Styophan kicked his horse, urging it toward Brechan. Styophan slipped down and shouted to the Haelish King as the sounds of panic and screaming became first loud and then deafening.

The janissaries had seen Nikandr and his streltsi. They were still dressed in the uniforms of Yrstanla, but somehow they knew. Their commander was pointing. His men trained their muskets a moment later.

And then a man—seven feet tall if he was one, wearing a simple brown robe—swept in front of the charging horses, grabbed the reins of the lead horse, and yanked the horse’s head down so sharply the beast tipped forward and tumbled onto the stones of the street. The Haelish warrior was lost from view as several horses behind tumbled over the first. More and more crashed into the fallen beasts, and the screaming of horses rose above the din of the crowd and mingled with the smattering of gunfire that was raining down not just on Nikandr and his streltsi, but three Haelish warriors, who were just now charging with great swords drawn into the crowd.

“Ishkyna!” Nikandr called. “Stop them!”

The jackdaws had flown up above the buildings, but at Nikandr’s words they swept in around the Haelish men, who had already started swinging their swords, cleaving the soldiers of Yrstanla in their saddles or the legs of the horses they rode. Blood poured along the cobbled street like barrels of spilled ink.

As the hundreds—thousands—of black birds wheeled around the Haelish, they became confused. They batted at the birds, trying to carve a path to the Kamarisi, but the janissaries had recovered and they were firing en masse into these three hulking men. It was hard to discern, but Nikandr could see what looked to be chips of stone flying from the men as the shots bit into them. He knew it wasn’t stone, however, but skin.

Closer, Brechan stood and shoved Styophan away. His face was angry. He looked to his men. More of the Haelish had come now. Four more rushed in from a street Nikandr and his streltsi had ridden down a short while ago, and behind Nikandr six more advanced along the wide thoroughfare. The Kiliç Şaik beyond the line of janissaries had turned to face another threat—surely more of the Haelish, probably those that had flushed the Kamarisi in this direction toward Brechan and the others.

As the jackdaws spread out to harry the approaching warriors, Styophan shouted something to Brechan. Brechan drew his sword and rounded on Styophan.

Nikandr raised his pistol to fire on Brechan, but before he could the Haelish King stopped. He became stock-still. His face went vacant, but then it regained some of the emotion it had had only a moment ago—not the anger, but certainly the grim determination.

He turned and bellowed to his men. His words—spoken in Haelish—carried over the sounds of battle. The jackdaws flew higher and hovered like a black fog over the street as Brechan called again. He called out again, louder still, and his men turned toward him, their faces confused.

The fighting continued beyond the tight grouping of the Kamarisi’s guard, but closer, to this side of Selim and Bahett, the janissaries stopped. They watched, and a tenuous but mutual detente settled over this place in the heart of Alekeşir.

Nikandr kicked his horse forward, raising his hands in an appeal for calm. Heads began to turn toward him. The hostilities would end. At the very least he’d be able to speak for a moment with Selim to have him order his men to stand down.

This was when Nikandr caught movement along the top of a three-story building to his left. It was Datha. He was no longer wearing the brown robes he’d had on earlier. Instead he had only the soft leggings of the Haelish. Scrawled across his bare chest were primitive patterns drawn with glittering red paint. He called out a strange and throaty ululation as he leapt from the building and dropped onto one of the Kiliç Şaik. He’d chosen the only one wearing white armor, surely the leader of the Kiliç. Datha drove his sword straight down through him. It entered at the space between his shoulder blades and pierced his body like a pig on a spit. The rear legs of the horse the Kiliç had been riding collapsed. It neighed as it rolled, the other horses skittering away, and for a moment Datha was lost.

“Stop!” King Brechan called in Yrstanlan.

But Datha wouldn’t. He’d come to slay the Kamarisi, and even the words of his king would not stay his hand.

Nikandr pulled his pistol and trained it on the Haelish warrior. Those few janissaries still watching somehow seemed to know that Nikandr was trying to stop him, and they did not raise their muskets against him. The others fired at Datha. The Kiliç Şaik closed, but Datha was simply too near. He leapt up to the chariot that carried the Kamarisi and grabbed Selim’s head by his hair.

Nikandr pulled the trigger. The wheel spun, sending sparks flying.

The pistol roared, kicking the palm of Nikandr’s hand.

The shot caught Datha on the crown of his head. A chunk of something the size of a peach pit flew from Datha’s head. Blood followed the chunk of Datha’s skull in an arc as his hair burst into flame.

Datha screamed in triumph and surprise and pain as the muscles along his arms flexed and he drew his sword across Selim’s neck.

Nikandr swore that in that final moment Selim looked straight toward him, his eyes wide with shock and fear. And then his body tilted and fell away from his neck.

Blood rained down from Selim’s disembodied head while Datha screamed and went rigid. The Haelish warrior’s body tightened. Fire gouted from his mouth, from his eyes and ears. And soon his whole body was engulfed in flame.

Nikandr could think of no other than Stasa Bolgravya, the Grand Duke who years ago had been consumed by a suurahezhan as it stepped onto the deck of his yacht. Here again Nikandr could hear the screams of man and spirit alike, a sound that somehow bridged the gap between worlds.

Bahett scrambled off the imperial chariot. The Kiliç Şaik backed away.

And the janissaries turned toward Brechan and the Haelish. Toward Nikandr and his countrymen.

Brechan looked into Nikandr’s eyes. “Run,” he shouted, and then drew his sword and charged into the line of janissaries, swinging as he went.

The other Haelish followed, and the battle that had paused resumed.

Nikandr reined his horse over and kicked it into motion. “Ride, men! Ride!”

No sooner had he said these words than he saw more riders coming down the street behind them. Dozens of janissaries, and more riding along from the narrow street Nikandr and the others had used to reach this wide thoroughfare. Where they’d come from he had no idea. Perhaps some had circled around while they were fighting. Perhaps they’d come from some nearby post. It mattered little. What mattered was that they were surrounded.

Nikandr was ready to try to drive through them. Ishkyna must have sensed his thoughts, for the jackdaws returned, driving against the bulk of the soldiers ahead of them.

The cloud swooped in, clawing at faces and pecking at eyes. Many were hampered, but many more were not. Musket shots came raining in. A streltsi to Nikandr’s left went down. And two on his right. Those that still had loaded weapons returned fire. The rest pulled shashkas and prepared to engage.

But before they could close, the jackdaws scattered. They flew upward in one sweeping motion that reminded Nikandr more of a dancer swinging a veil than it did a flock of birds.

Then the ground tipped and Nikandr’s horse fell.

He was thrown wide as his horse struck the ground hard.

It was then that he felt it. The world around him rumbling. The ground itself moving, shifting, bucking as if it were little more than the skin of some titanic creature long since forgotten by the minds and hearts of men.

The sound of crumbling stone rent the air. One of the nearby buildings shuddered and then collapsed to the street, the stone blocks crashing into a spray that caught the janissaries. Another building fell behind Nikandr, taking many of his men with it. Just how many Nikandr wasn’t sure, for the dust that billowed up was impossible to see through.