The Flames of Shadam Khoreh (The Lays of Anuskaya) (70 page)

Or were they?

Heodor was a man who put the law of the land above all else. It was why his own allegiance had shifted. Years ago, he’d brought a trade dispute to Nikandr’s father, Iaros, claiming that, under the agreement, the taxes being levied against the windwood supplied to Lhudansk were too dear. Iaros had denied Heodor, claiming new agreements superseded it, but Heodor had insisted. It led to a severing of ties and had pushed Heodor to side with first Stasa Bolgravya as the Grand Duke and then Zhabyn Vostroma.

But it was that very narrow way of reading such things that Borund and the others might have counted on. Indeed, Heodor was watching Leonid fiercely beneath his black, bushy brows.

Leonid must have sensed the shift in the wind as well, for his face grew red. “You would deny me?”

The dukes were silent, waiting for Leonid to back down. As they stared on, as the wind blew through the bare branches of the tree above, Leonid’s face calmed. His skin lost its hue. And a cold calculation entered his eyes.

Before Nikandr knew what was happening, he’d pulled the ornate wheellock pistol from his belt. He whipped around and pointed it at the rightmost pony.

Then he fired.

The bullet took the pony in the rump. The pony jolted forward.

Nikandr grabbed the rope with both hands a mere moment before he was hauled up.

The screaming of the pony was quickly drowned out by the rush of blood through his ears, and then a high-pitched tone that sounded like a call from the world beyond. He saw the grey sky above through the black of the branches. He saw the beating of wings, the rook taking flight, though why it would do such a thing he had no idea.

Though he fought to keep the noose from cinching, it had been pulled tight when the pony had bolted. He was still rising into the air until at last he could go no further. The bough prevented him. But that only pulled the rope tighter.

He heard voices above the ringing. Or thought he did.

They sounded like his father. Like Ranos. Like the calls of those taken by the wasting.
The rifts
, they said.
Why haven’t you closed them?

He could feel more as well.

A hezhan. Standing just on the other side of the divide between Erahm and Adhiya. It was there to welcome him, he was sure, to the life beyond. And yet it was close enough to touch. He could feel its expanses, feel the way it caressed the wind of the world.

He could feel the stone of alabaster in his cherkesska pocket, a source of power, a way to ease his path to Adhiya. But he didn’t need it anymore. He knew with certainty what would happen when he called to the hezhan.

Come
, he said to it.
Come, and you shall taste of this world.

And this time, it did.

It’s like the feeling he has when he reunites with Atiana. A love deeper than he can hold in his mind at the mere thought of her. It is only when he sees her, smells the scent of lilies in her hair, feels the first touch of her hand upon his skin, that it all comes rushing back.

And this hezhan…

The one he was bonded to before was completely different. This one is deeper. Older. The tree his body hangs from is but a child compared to it. The nearby city of Izlo is little different. This spirit is older than the hills in which Soroush was found, older than the nearby river that wends its way across the landscape.

Welcome
, Nikandr calls to it.

He hears no response, but he feels its glee. It rejoices as it embraces the material world. And Nikandr rejoices as well. Never has he felt Adhiya so clearly, not even while he was on Rafsuhan trying to heal the children there. This is deeper, as if he’s
in
Adhiya already.

Am I dead
? he wonders.
Have I crossed over?

He feels the wind as it courses through the branches of the tree, as it makes the ancient oak sway. And now, at last, he draws upon it. He calls it down upon those gathered. It howls with glee. It revels in the men who cower from it, at the ponies who fear it.

The rope around his neck tightens. It will soon snap his neck.

But only if he allows it.

He directs the wind, forces it against his swinging frame. It lifts him, carries him like a newborn babe up and over the thick lower bough. The pony, temporarily freed of restraint, bolts forward. Like a daisy tied to a summer ribbon, Nikandr is dragged along with it, still aloft, until he calls on the wind again. He calls upon a gust to blow against the pony, to tip it over, so that he can pull the rope free.

Stars swim in the air before him, and for long moments his breath refuses to return to him, but the stars begin to fade as the wind bears him down to the ground.

Movement draws his attention.

There, at the tree, Soroush swings, as Nikandr had moments ago. This time when he calls upon the wind it is no different than a lift of his arm, a cupping of his palm to cradle Soroush over the bough and set him down on the ground.

He turns now toward the assembled men. The dukes are upon their knees covering their faces as snow and mud are lifted and driven against them. None can look upon him, so strong has the wind become.

Good.

Let them cower.

He strides toward Leonid, who lies upon the ground, his arms over his head. He allows the wind to wane here at the center of things. Around him it still howls, but here, like the calm eye of a monsoon, the wind blows as idly as a springtime breeze.

“Stand,” Nikandr calls to Leonid.

It takes Leonid long moments to pull his arms away, to regard Nikandr. When he does it is with a look of naked contempt. “Unmasked at last,” he says as he props himself onto his heels and stands.

Nikandr waits until he’s recovered himself, until he pulls himself taller. “You killed my father. I would hear it before this is done.” Leonid glances to those around them. “Only the two of us can hear one another.”

“Your father?” At that Leonid begins to laugh, and he seems unable to stop it. “Allow him to sweep in and take the mantle from me? You’re joking, child. And you! A duke? You’re but a mewling prat traipsing among your betters. A lover of motherless whores and beggars. And when this wind dies, which it shall, whether I live to see it or not, you’ll be taken from this world and forgotten by all who knew you.”

Nikandr feels something rise in his throat. He swallows, trying to clear it. Fails. For months after his father’s death he wanted nothing more than to stick a knife in Leonid’s side and watch him bleed, as his father bled. But now is not the time to call upon that score. As much as he hates it, he needs Leonid. He needs him to call off the ships, for only in that might they affect the outcome of what’s happening on Ghayavand.

“You’re taking us into ruin,” he finally says, “and I won’t allow it.”

“
You
won’t allow it? You’re the very one who led us to this place.”

“If you believe that, you’re as blind as you are brash.”

“It’s clear to anyone who considers what you’ve done, where you’ve been, and with whom.” He waves his hand around him. “And there’s this.”

“This? This is a gift from the ancients, who sent Nasim to us to protect us. They sent Ashan as well. And Soroush.” Nikandr waves behind him toward Soroush, who is still coughing on the windswept ground. “You cannot have him. He will come with me. And you will be voted down. The tide has turned against you, as you well know. We will call off the fleet, and I will go to Ghayavand to see if there is still time to heal the world.”

Leonid laughs. “You can’t call the fleet away. They’re filled with
my
men, Khalakovo. Mine… Your mother, or the three sisters, or Radia… Send all the rooks you wish. None of them will force the ships to turn course.” He laughs harder. The wrinkles around his eyes deepen as he squints in genuine amusement. It makes him look like a wizened apple. “The ships left Galahesh
days
ago. They will reach Ghayavand soon, and when they do, they will lay the Kohori to waste.”

Nikandr feels his heart drop within his chest. “You must stop them. You must call them away.”

Leonid, wind whipping his white beard in the air around him, raises his chin. “
Never
.”

With that word, something inside Nikandr snaps. All of the effort he and the others have put forth in trying to save what they could, the emotions Nikandr buried in order to prevent himself from drawing steel against Leonid. All of it comes bubbling up in a fount of seething anger.

The wind at the center of the storm rises, becomes a gale, becomes a tempest. The air itself turns atavistic and hungry. It steals breath, steals life, Nikandr’s included, but he’s prepared for it.

Leonid is not.

This wicked, pathetic little man wards with his arms, trying to bat away some unseen foe. He stumbles, rises again, tries to break for the edge of the howling wind, but he doesn’t make it two steps before the wind throws him backward.

He falls, slipping in the mud and slush. He claws at the ground, clutches at the trampled grass. For long moments he writhes, unable to breathe, and then, at last, he falls still.

And the wind dies away.

Nikandr was so taken by the visage of Grand Duke Leonid lying dead on the ground before him that it took him long moments to realize the havahezhan had retreated. Not
left
, but retreated. It was close enough to call, and Nikandr would when the time was right.

The lack of wind felt strange, as if a friend with whom he’d been holding hands was suddenly and inexplicably gone. He looked around him, took in the devastation. As far as the eye could see the camp was ruined. Tents fallen. Gear scattered. Ponies running wild in the distance.

And streltsi. Hundreds. Thousands. Watching him with naked fear.

The dukes watched him with wary expressions on their faces. They took him in—he and Leonid—but none approached. None but Vadim, but he was tackled as Soroush bulled into him from behind and restrained him.

None moved to help.

Slowly, Borund approached. Others closed in behind him. The circle of men that was once so wide was now closing in around Nikandr like a fist.

Nikandr was sure they were going to take him, place him in chains and bring him back to the islands or elsewhere to await a trial, but when Borund spoke, he spoke these words, “What do you need, Nischka?”

Confused beyond reason, Nikandr shook his head. “What?”

“What do you need, to take you to Ghayavand?”

CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE

Styophan pulled the spyglass up to his good eye, his left, and peered down its length. He stared out over the expanse of the sea to the island of Ghayavand, a virescent gem against a bed of blue. The
Zhostova
ran low to the waves, the seaward mainmast mere yards above the churning sea. Styophan scanned the island carefully, but so far there was no sign that they’d been seen.

Which was well and good, for yesterday, he’d spotted the ships on Ghayavand’s northern shore. Luckily the day had been cloudy and dark, and they’d not been spotted themselves. There had been strange ships in the distance. They looked like living things shaped like the tips of spears, and yet they had floated in the air like windships. He knew not what they were, but he knew enough to avoid them.

“You plan to moor near Alayazhar?”

Styophan brought the spyglass down and turned. It was Anahid, one of the two qiram that had joined him on this journey. As the wind played with her long black hair, throwing it across the shoulders of her coral-colored robes, an opaline gem glowed softly in the circlet she wore over her brow.

“I do,” Styophan said. “From what we know, Sihyaan is the place they will be focused on, not the city, which now lies dead.”

“There is dead and there is dead,” Anahid replied.

She’d warned him of going there several times already, but he’d already made up his mind. “You’ve become superstitious.”

Anahid stared out over the water. Against the surrounding green landscape Alayazhar and the gutted white shells of buildings stood out like bones upon new summer grass. “I merely respect the power of that place. It is the source of much of our misery.”

“You sound like you hate it.”

Styophan expected her to deny it, but instead she glanced up at him and for the first time in memory was unable to hold his gaze. “It is our people’s darkest stain.”

“It happened three hundred years ago.”

“It was yesterday,” she shot back. “We inherit the sins of our former selves.”

“You inherit their virtues as well.”

She tried to smile. “Sometimes I wonder.”

Styophan took her hand and squeezed it. “You do.”

Her smile faded, and she took her hand back from him, but not before giving his hand a squeeze back. “We’re getting close,” she said, glancing out over the water.

A short, uncomfortable silence followed, but when Styophan ordered the ship brought down, all returned to normal.

They moored on the beach beneath the city. He’d chosen this location not only because it hid their approach, but because the beach was low enough that the ship would be hidden from much of the nearby landscape.

He and three sotni—thirty men in all—treaded across the beach. The tide was low. Mossy green rocks lay beneath the sun as crabs scuttled among them. They were headed toward the trail that led up to the city proper, but before they’d gone a hundred paces, Styophan saw movement. On a massive rock near the shoreline, cloth fluttered. He couldn’t see what or who was atop the rock, but it looked strange indeed.

He called a halt and climbed to the top of the stone, and there he found the desiccated creature Nasim had saved in the Gaji. Tohrab, Nikandr had named him. He was staring up toward the sky, his breath coming slowly as the wind tugged at his robe and made it flutter.

“Are you well?” Styophan felt the fool for asking such a thing, but he didn’t know what else to say.

Tohrab didn’t move, didn’t speak.

In the center of his chest Styophan could feel a thrumming. The rock below him seemed to shudder with it. It made the very waves of the sea and the air around him seem alive.