The Flames of Shadam Khoreh

by Bradley Beaulieu

  The wind whipped harder as the havahezhan gathered around him. It held Nikandr like a babe and bore him aloft. He pleaded for it to save Sayyed, to bear him as well, but it was too late. Sayyed crashed into the rocks below, little more than a swath of red against black rock and frothing surf.

  Grimacing, Nikandr asked that he be carried north toward Sihyaan. The hezhan complied, the roar of it filling his ears, and together they flew over the forests of Ghayavand toward the dark peak ahead. The blue light of the Atalayina was still bright, and as he came closer he saw Ushai standing there, the brightness of the Atalayina casting her skin in a blue-white glow. She looked like a ghost, a woman already halfway to the world beyond.

  Around her, men were fighting, the streltsi of Khalakovo and the warriors of Kohor. The desert men were vicious fighters with a sword in hand, but those he’d sent with Styophan were the best soldiers Khalakovo had to offer, as skilled with sword as they were with pistol or knife.

  Nikandr found Styophan, who was engaged side-by-side with another strelet against two Kohori swordsmen. Near them, a Kohori was engaged with two streltsi. The Kohori wielded his shamshir masterfully, beating off swing after swing while preventing the two soldiers of Anuskaya from flanking him.

  But then he made a mistake. He slipped on the uneven ground, leaning too close to the nearest strelet.

  As the hezhan carried Nikandr lower and lower, he realized it was all a ruse. “Watch him!” he cried, but they couldn’t hear him, not from this distance, and not with the roar of the wind around him.

  The strelet’s shashka came down. The Kohori snaked to his right, the blurring blade narrowly missing him. He spun and brought his sword down in a two-handed chopping motion across the strelet’s shin, cutting cleanly through the leg just below the knee.

  The other strelet overcompensated. He came in hard, but his bull rush was defended masterfully. Three quick parries were followed by a sharp thrust to the strelet’s neck, then deep through his chest.

  Both streltsi fell, one holding his neck as blood spurted through his fingers, the other trying desperately to slow the blood pouring from his severed leg.

  Closer now, Nikandr dropped from the air, drawing his shashka before his feet had even struck solid ground. The Kohori was looking for a new enemy. He saw Nikandr down the hill, saw the threat of the hezhan, but Styophan was closer, and his back was to the Kohori.

  As the Kohori ran toward Styophan, Nikandr raced up the slope, hoping to intercept, but he already knew he’d never be able to reach Styophan before the Kohori cut him down.

  The bond Nikandr now shared with the havahezhan was unlike anything he’d felt in the past. Only the wind spirit that had attacked him on the deck of the Gorovna those many years ago came close. The bond with a hezhan that had crossed was more intensified, which only made sense with the aether no longer acting as a veil between them. With the bond so much stronger, so too was the spirit’s ability to draw upon Nikandr’s soul. And so even as the hezhan did his bidding, as it blew down against the desert warrior, Nikandr’s knees were made weak. He quivered, not from pain, but from this ancient spirit using him up. He felt like fruit left drying in the sun.

  Still, his sacrifice had the desired effect. A great gust of wind pulled warrior’s legs out from underneath him. He fell clumsily to the ground, yet moments later the wind began to deaden and the Kohori returned to his feet. He was working against the spirit with his own hezhan, but he couldn’t hope to fight a spirit that had crossed over for long, not with a spirit still trapped in Adhiya.

  Nikandr charged, if only to distract him. They traded a flurry of blows, the ring of their steel mixing with the sounds of swords and dying around them. Nikandr’s rage over these past many months returned to him. His frustration at having lost Nasim, his feelings of impotence as the events in the Kohor valley, then Shadam Khoreh and Alekeşir unfolded. But now he had blade in hand and the ability to help Nasim see this through. He channeled all of this into his battle with the Kohori, who was a better swordsman than Nikandr had ever seen. Back and forth they moved, parrying, feinting, cutting viciously in a furious dance before having to cede ground back.

  And all the while the two havahezhan fought as well—a similar back and forth, each trying for supremacy over the other. It was clear, though, that Nikandr’s was winning. The wind was beginning to rise. It wouldn’t be long before Nikandr’s won altogether and then Nikandr could do as he would with this man.

  The Kohori knew it too. He brought his sword down against Nikandr’s defenses—three sharp strikes that forced Nikandr back. The moment Nikandr stepped back, the Kohori did so as well. He raised his hand, and flame formed in his open palm.

  Nikandr wanted to bid the havahezhan to help, but the bond he shared with it was too tenuous. He could no longer maintain the bond and fight this man at the same time.

  So he released it. He let it go where it will, if only to have the energy to defend himself.

  Nikandr advanced quickly. He used his shashka to slap the Kohori’s curved shamshir out of line, then flicked the tip of his sword toward his neck. The Kohori retreated, raised his free hand high. The roiling ball of flame was now the size of Nikandr’s head. Nikandr backed away, preparing to leap, but when the Kohori brought his arm forward, Nikandr already knew it was headed straight for him.

  It streaked toward his chest, but made it only halfway when it was caught in a powerful eddy of wind. The havahezhan had placed itself between them and trapped the flame within it. In the time it took Nikandr to breathe in, the flame was drawn up to a single orange thread and snuffed into a thin line of black smoke. The hezhan fell upon the Kohori then, drawing wind and grass mercilessly upward as it tried to steal the warrior’s breath away. The Kohori was working against the hezhan to free himself, but Nikandr didn’t allow him that luxury. He stepped forward and drove his sword deep through the Kohori’s chest until the tip buried itself in the earth below him.

  No sooner had Nikandr yanked his sword out than the havahezhan fled. It slipped up and away and with one final gust shoved Nikandr unceremoniously backward and onto his rump.

  Nikandr scanned about for more of the enemy, but thank the ancients they had all been killed. Styophan was now striding toward him, sword in hand, watching the fallen warriors for hints of movement. He’d lost his leather eyepatch somewhere along the way, revealing the mass of scars where his right eye used to be. As he came closer, his gaze fell to the dead Kohori near Nikandr’s feet. “You have my thanks, My Lord Prince.”

  Nikandr waved his thanks away, pointing toward the pedestal and the Atalayina and those gathered around it.

  Standing opposite Ushai—who by now Nikandr understood must be Sariya—were Nasim and Sukharam and Kaleh. They were speaking, trying to reason with Sariya, perhaps. But then, as Nikandr neared the slope below the glowing Atalayina, Sariya’s face went ashen and she collapsed in a heap.

  Nikandr and Styophan traded glances. Neither had any idea what had just happened.

  They strode together with the other surviving streltsi toward Ashan, who was just then approaching the pedestal where Nasim, Sukharam, and Kaleh stood. Sukharam and Kaleh watched Ashan approach with uneasy looks on their faces, but Nasim couldn’t seem to pull his gaze from the impossibly dark hole far above them. So intent was he that Nikandr looked up as well. The gateway, Nikandr realized. It was smaller than it had been only moments ago.

  “Nasim?” Ashan called. “Nasim, hear me. The way is closing.”

  Nasim pulled his gaze down from the heavens and stared at Ashan, then Nikandr and the streltsi. “It is, and the Matri cannot hold it open.”

  “Perhaps not the Matri,” Kaleh said, “but Sariya managed it.”

  “Through death,” Sukharam replied. “She did so through death.”

  “Not through death,” Ashan countered with a smile. “Through rebirth. Those souls were not lost. They went to the world beyond, and they will return to us brighter than before.”

  And suddenl
y it struck Nikandr—what Ashan was saying, what he truly meant. The old arqesh was offering his own life and Nikandr’s and the lives of the streltsi so that Nasim and the others could ascend.

  Nasim stared, unable to give an answer to Ashan’s offer. How could he? How could he ask this man—his father, more than any other—to do this for him?

  “You need not say it,” Ashan said, sensing Nasim’s thoughts. “In fact, you shouldn’t.” He then turned to Styophan, all but ignoring Nikandr. “But I will not take life unless it is offered.”

  Styophan took a long step forward so that he was now closer to Ashan than Nikandr was. He looked over his men, weighing them, then looked to the sky, over Ashan’s shoulder where the battle was dying. “This will save the islands?” he asked. “It will save the world?”

  Ashan’s smile widened, showing his stained and imperfect teeth. “It may very well do so.”

  Styophan looked to his men again, asking each for his assent. Each and every one of them nodded to him. And then Styophan nodded to Ashan.

  Only then did Ashan turn to Nikandr, smiling his crooked smile. “Your timing is ill, Nikandr son of Iaros.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The lives of these men, and my own life, will be enough. There is another you should find further down the mountain.”

  He meant Atiana, of course. Nikandr could feel her through his soulstone. “If this is needed, then I will go. I am a Duke of the Realm.”

  And now it was Styophan that stepped forward. He nodded to Ashan, and then his men. Ashan nodded back and led the streltsi up toward the Atalayina.

  “Our story should be told, My Lord Prince.”

  “It should, and you should be the one to tell it. Go home, Styopha. Go home to your wife. Raise children and tell them what we did this day.”

  Styophan shook his head sadly. “This I cannot do.”

  “It wasn’t a request, Styopha. It was a command.”

  Styophan smiled. He embraced Nikandr, kissed him on both cheeks, then held him at arm’s length. “Then just this once, My Lord Prince, I must disobey.” And with that he snatched Nikandr’s wrists in an iron grip and nodded to someone over Nikandr’s shoulder.

  Not all of the streltsi had gone, Nikandr realized. One had remained.

  Styophan held Nikandr in place, but Nikandr was able to turn his head to see Styophan’s cousin, Rodion, snaking his arm around Nikandr’s neck. In the blink of an eye Rodion had locked the one arm with the other and pulled tight, cutting off Nikandr’s breath.

  Nikandr raged. He fought against Rodion’s hold. He tried to drop his weight to throw Rodion off balance, but he was strong and so was Styophan.

  Blood coursed loudly through his ears. Stars filled his vision.

  “Forgive me, My Prince.”

  Nikandr wasn’t even sure who had spoken those words.

  All too soon the darkness swept in.

  Styophan checked to make sure Nikandr was still breathing, then he stood and walked with Rodion to the circle that was now forming around the Atalayina and the black pedestal upon which it rested. Nasim and Sukharam and Kaleh all stood in the center. His streltsi were already in a larger circle around them, but Ashan was taking care to place each man just so. Styophan watched as Avvakum took his place, then Roald and Rabyn and Estvan. As Ashan finished with each soldier, Styophan looked to them, waiting until they met his eye. He nodded to them, one by one.

  He was so proud—more than he could ever express—and yet there was part of him that felt as though he’d utterly failed, a part that yearned to protect them even now. But that was not the way of things. The ancients were holding out their hands, summoning the living to take their place among the dead. They would, these soldiers, these sons of Anuskaya. They would protect their families from beyond these shores, adding to the wisdom that had been collected over the course of ages.

  Ashan came to Rodion next, and here Styophan nearly broke down. The wodjana had predicted this. He remembered Queen Elean’s words with crystal clarity. When you go to Alekeşir, she had said, the path there and the path beyond will lead to your graves. He didn’t mind dying. Everyone dies sooner or later. He only wished he could have seen Roza one last time, could have held her in his arms once more. Goodbye, sweet love. And now he did break down. He wished that he could be reborn, like the Aramahn believed. He wished that Roza could one day be too, and that they could find one another again.

  Perhaps we will. Ashan came and stood before Styophan. Perhaps we will.

  Ashan moved him back and to his right. He took Styophan’s shoulders and adjusted his stance, grinning his infectious grin even at a time like this. Styophan wiped away his tears and managed a smile. He was sad, but there was no doubt this was a time for happiness as well. What they did would heal the world. What greater gift could he give Roza and the children she would one day have?

  Finally, Ashan was done, and he stepped into place across from Nasim. After one last smile just for Nasim, he placed his hands to his side and lifted his gaze to the sky.

  And Styophan did the same.

  Nasim swallowed hard, trying to clear the growing lump in his throat. He held hands with Sukharam and Kaleh as Ashan guided the streltsi in a wider circle around them. He was glad that Nikandr would live. It felt as if a part of him would remain behind, and that gave him some small amount of comfort.

  He looked to the streltsi. Some watched him, particularly the one-eyed strelet, who regarded Nasim with something akin to reverence. Others were too lost in the moment to do so. He was as proud of these men as anyone he’d ever known. They would return to this life much brighter than before, and for this he was glad. When Ashan had finished arranging the last of them, he took his place in the circle. He stood opposite Nasim, a conscious choice, one last gift before he and Nasim parted ways. Tears formed in Nasim’s eyes. They flowed down his cheeks as Ashan nodded, giving him comfort.

  “Go well,” Ashan said to Nasim.

  “Go well,” Nasim replied.

  And with that Ashan spread his hands wide. He closed his eyes, turned his face up toward the sky. The soldiers of Anuskaya, though they knew they could not help him, did the same.

  And then the first of them burst into flame. The soldier shivered from the pain, but did not cry out. He merely grit his jaw and stared up, trusting that his sacrifice was worth it.

  Another burst into flame, and another, and through it all Nasim realized he could feel the world as he rarely had before. He felt its inner workings, as though he could unravel it bit by bit had he so chose.

  It had been the same on Mirashadal, when Kaleh had murdered Fahroz, and again on the Spar, when Nasim had stabbed Nikandr in the heart, and once more in the depths of Shadam Khoreh.

  And now here.

  It took only a nudge, a mere push of his will.

  And the world slows.

  Flames continue to form on the soldiers of Anuskaya. None of them make a sound. It is bitterly strange to stand there as men are dying from fire and the only sound the wind through the grass and the flames themselves. Nasim grips the hands of Kaleh and Sukharam tightly. Too tightly, he realizes. As the three of them breathe in time, as the men of Anuskaya burn, he relaxes. He loosens his grip. He falls into the world around him.

  Soon only Ashan remains untouched.

  Still he smiles. Still he holds Nasim’s gaze, offering him guidance and protection even at the last.

  Nasim wants to open his mouth, to offer some word of thanks.

  But to do so would distract too much.

  As the hint of orange flame curls around Ashan’s arms, as they lick at the hem of his robes, Nasim turns his head skyward. He looks to the narrowing circle of black.

  The way is widened as the first of the streltsi dies. As his soul is lifted and borne to the world beyond. The second goes, and the third. One by one, the streltsi are taken.

  Ashan goes last. He holds on until the end to make sure all others have crossed before allowing himself to be b
orne upward.

  It is enough. Nasim’s awareness spreads. He feels the land itself and the fires that lie beneath. He feels the roiling sky above and the falling rain to the west. He feels the life around him. The swaying grasses, the stoic trees. The streltsi. The Matri. The hezhan.

  He feels Soroush, who flies on one of the few Anuskayan ships that remain.

  He feels Atiana, who kneels upon the fields below Sihyaan’s broad shoulders.

  He feels Nikandr, with whom he shared his life for a time.

  But more than anything, he feels the place above. It is dark, and he knows not what to expect. He worries that he will not be up to the task, that he will fail to guide the world properly or that he will allow Sariya or Kaleh or Sukharam too much sway, if not now then millennia from now. But in some ways this feels like the way things should be. He should not approach his charge with absolutism, but with open arms. He does not know if Kaleh and Sukharam feel the same. They may or they may not. This is the nature of things. After all, even the fates may not know all that lies ahead, with the world, with one another.

  He can but try. And with that, he is ready.

  After one final breath, he closes his eyes.

  And he ascends.

  CHAPTER SEVENTY

  Nikandr woke as the hole above was beginning to close. He stood on shaky knees, looking to the place where Nasim and the others had gathered around the Atalayina. They were there still, but they had all fallen. Nasim and Sukharam and Kaleh. Ashan and Styophan and the streltsi. Many of their bodies were still aflame, though none of them now moved. The smell of it sickened him.

  He waited for the fires to die down, the only sound the wind through the tall grasses. He had no idea what he was waiting for, what he was hoping for. Perhaps some small sign. Some sign that Nasim had made it, that the others had as well, and that their sacrifice had been worth it. That the rifts had been healed.