They were soon out and onto the grounds as the firefight was pushed ever eastward.
“Stay low,” the man with the thick beard said. “The danger is not yet over.”
They crouched as they ran, some shots still coming in from the Kamarisi’s guard, but soon they were beyond the grounds and into the northern buildings of the Shattering. They reached one-a domed building-and were led inside.
At last Atiana saw who her savior had been, for Siha s stood there among several men.
Seeing Atiana, he spoke low to the others and then came to her. “You should have left the city while you had the chance,” he said.
“I would not have. The fight is here.”
He stared at her soberly. “It is, My Lady Princess, but it’s much larger than you could have guessed.”
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
A s Nikandr was led around the edge of the clearing, many of the children-the akhoz-on the outermost row of posts craned their necks and followed his movement. They could no longer see, and yet they seemed drawn to him. He had no idea why this should be, but it made his skin crawl.
The men of the Hratha led him to a tree where a spike had been nailed into the trunk. He fought, but the Hratha yanked the chain between his wrists viciously when he did, the shackles biting deeply and drawing blood. When they reached the tree, the Hratha threw the chain up and over the spike, securing Nikandr. Just as the akhoz were.
Bersuq watched all of this with dispassionate eyes. He seemed to acknowledge that he had betrayed Nikandr, that he had allowed the Hratha to do this to him, but then he turned his head back toward the clearing, making it clear that in the end, they were on different sides of a conflict bigger than the one playing out here in the clearing.
The Hratha that had brought Nikandr here to the clearing moved to another group of men. Rahid was there, and when his men arrived, he looked back at Nikandr, tilting his head to listen to the quiet words of his men.
The day grew longer, but nothing happened. Midday passed, which would have been an auspicious time to perform this ritual. There seemed to be some concern among those gathered. Most watched through the trees to the west, waiting expectantly. A group of men were dispatched, presumably to search for Muqallad.
And then at last, as the sun was beginning to set, Muqallad came. He was flanked by many of the Hratha, and a few of the men from Siafyan. Kaleh was with him as well. They reached the edge of the circle, and Muqallad stopped. He turned to Nikandr and walked toward him. Strangely, he had cuts along his forehead and on one side of his nose. His left eye was half red where it should be white, and a host of bruises marked the left side of his neck and jaw.
When he stopped a few paces away, Nikandr realized that Muqallad was staring at Nikandr’s chest, where his soulstone should have been. Nikandr realized in this instant that he could feel Nasim. It was weak, very weak, but he could feel him. It was the first time in years he’d felt anything like it.
Muqallad must have sensed it too, though how this could be he had no idea. “We will speak when this is done,” Muqallad said, and with that he turned and strode into the clearing.
The sun was touching the tops of the trees now, a time that was perhaps more auspicious than high noon, for he could think of nothing more apt than the setting of the sun for what was about to happen to these children.
Muqallad walked over the ashes, over the bones, to the center of the clearing. He held up his hand and in them held two stones, both of them blue and brilliant even under the setting sun. “Who will take them?” he asked.
After only a moment’s hesitation, Bersuq strode forward and bowed his head. Muqallad handed him the stones, and without returning the bow walked from the clearing to stand at its edge.
Bersuq situated himself at the center of the posts. After taking in the faces of the akhoz, he held the stones aloft and began to chant. The rest of the gathered men and women-including Muqallad-soon picked the chant up. The roots of the words were both familiar and foreign, but the cadence drove a spike of fear through Nikandr’s heart. Surely the words were Kalhani, the mothertongue. It was an ancient language, and indeed, this ritual felt as if it were tied to the making of the world, as if the fate of Erahm hinged upon it.
With so many eyes turned toward the clearing, Nikandr was able to look up to his chains. He pulled down upon them, hoping to pull the spike free, but it had been driven too deeply into the wood.
The akhoz began to moan. The sounds came louder at the end of each recitation of the chant. Bersuq held the stones high above his head, pressing the two pieces together. The stones seemed to draw in the breath, draw in the voices and guttural calls of those nearby. There came a tugging within Nikandr’s chest, and his heart skipped a beat as the first of the children burst into flame. It was a girl on the outer ring. As her hair singed and burned and her skin lit like burning scrolls, the pitch of her moaning rose, as if the pain somehow excited her.
Soon the two next to her were aflame, and then the two beyond them. And so it went, more and more of the outer ring lighting like torches, until the circle was completed. The flame then leaped to the middle ring, and at last the innermost ring. The chanting rose higher as the akhoz burned bright like beacons. Nikandr could feel it now, even from this distance.
The smell of it-burning hair and burning skin-filled the clearing. It made him retch. His mouth filled with saliva, and he spit to clear the taste of it.
Bersuq had somehow been spared from the flames. Surely he was protected by the suuraqiram nearby, but it could not last long. His body twisted from the pain, but he continued to hold the pieces of the Atalayina above him.
The chanting rose higher. The calls of the akhoz became little more than inhuman screams rising above the sound of the roaring flames.
Bersuq could not last forever. Soon it became too much. He screamed, still holding tight to the Atalayina. His robes caught fire, and then his hair and his beard. He shivered from the pain as his screams became a piercing cry that rose above all other sounds.
Nikandr followed the black smoke up and into the sky, if only to be free from this horrific vision for a few moments. That was when movement among the clouds caught his eye. Flying low, above the trees to the north, was a ship. He recognized it immediately. It was the Chaika.
A moment later, the ground near the outer ring of akhoz blossomed into a high plume of fire and dirt and ashes, a resounding boom coming a split-second later. Three of the posts flew up and outward, the akhoz still attached. They twirled lazily until they struck the ground near the feet of the chanting Maharraht.
Muqallad raised his hands, but as he did another cannon shot shattered the ground in front of him. Two Maharraht nearby were thrown wide of the blast. What happened to Muqallad, Nikandr didn’t see, for the crowd was now in disarray. Some were taking up muskets and firing on the ship while the qiram drew upon their hezhan. Others continued to chant, so lost in the ritual were they. But most took cover in the nearby trees.
Nikandr looked up to his chains. He jumped and tried to fling the chains up and over the spike. But he was weak, and the motion caused the sockets of his shoulders to scream in pain after remaining stretched and immobile for so long. As the Chaika slipped over the clearing and began heading over the far side and beyond the trees, he tried one last time, and this time the chain came rattling down.
He lost his balance and collapsed. When he finally managed to come to his feet, he found four men standing before him-Rahid and the three Hratha that had brought him from Siafyan.
Rahid’s men bore muskets, while Rahid, his sword held loosely in his right hand, used his free hand to grab Nikandr’s chains and pull him into the forest. Nikandr resisted, pulling on the chain in a vain attempt to remain in the clearing, until two of Rahid’s men struck him with the butt of their muskets, forcing him onward.
A sudden rise in pitch from the clearing made all of them turn back. The akhoz burned white, their voices adding to one another, driving those closest to
put their hands over their ears. A moment later, Nikandr did the same, as did Rahid and the Hratha. Bersuq fell to the flames at last. The Atalayina slipped from his grasp and was lost.
Only then did the sound of the akhoz begin to wane. The moment that it did, Rahid ordered his men to continue. They moved beyond a rise, and into a stand of trees. They could still hear the flames and the akhoz and the occasional snap of musket fire, but they were effectively hidden.
Rahid’s men fanned out behind him. Rahid stepped forward, facing Nikandr, the tip of his sword swinging back and forth, as if he were itching to swing it.
But then Nikandr saw hanging around Rahid’s neck a chain. His chain. The one that held his soulstone.
Rahid noticed Nikandr’s lingering gaze. He pulled the stone out and held it up for Nikandr to see, and then he let it fall against his black robes. The chalcedony stone glimmered dully in the waning light. “They say you can feel those who’ve worn your stones. Is it so?”
Strangely, these words served only to calm Nikandr’s coursing blood. What Rahid said was true. Grigory had done this to him years ago, and for the short time he’d worn the stone afterward-before placing it in Nasim’s mouth to draw him away from Adhiya-he’d felt the taint, felt Grigory’s hatred of him. There was no doubt that the same would be true now, but he had come to accept that the ancients worked in strange ways. If this was something they had chosen for him-to have his stone worn by a Maharraht-then he would accept it.
“A pity you won’t be afforded the chance.” He spat at Nikandr’s feet. “It is long past time I put an end to your presence on these shores.”
“Tell yourself what you wish,” Nikandr said, “but you were the trespassers here, not me. You came and you raped your sister tribe. You’re worse than anything the Landed ever did, for you did this to your brothers and your sisters. You did this to their children.”
Rahid stalked forward and raised his sword high with both hands. He brought it down and Nikandr, who’d been hoping for such an attack, dodged backward. He was still hobbled by the rope, but he knew its length well and was able to compensate with short, quick steps. Rahid swung again, and again. He came closer, for he was pressing the advantage of his longer strides, but Nikandr was still able to outpace him.
And then Rahid became too bold. He came in fast, his sword swung in at an angle. Nikandr spread his manacled hands wide and allowed the sword to strike the chain, allowed it to yank his arms sideways.
This simple action halted the blade. Nikandr twisted his arms, twisted the chain around the blade, and while he did he lunged forward and grabbed Rahid’s wrists and slammed his forehead against Rahid’s face.
Rahid turned and tried to pull away, but Nikandr had hooked his foot behind Rahid’s, and Rahid went sprawling.
A quick jerk of his arms and the blade was free. Before Rahid’s men could react, Nikandr twisted it around and brought it down in one fierce motion. The tip drove down through Rahid’s chest and into the cold earth beneath him.
Rahid’s eyes went wide. He shivered and grabbed for the sword. The blade cut his fingers deeply, but he didn’t seem to notice. He stared into Nikandr’s eyes, coughed once, twice, and then his head fell back as he stared at the sky, unmoving.
Nikandr yanked the blade free.
By now the men in their black robes and turbans had pulled their muskets up. Nikandr dodged as one fired. The shot went wide and Nikandr brought the sword down sharply across the rope tying his ankles together.
He dodged another, but the shot bit into his thigh. He tried to roll to his feet, but he put too much weight on his wounded leg and fell back down.
He scrabbled away on the soft floor of the forest until the third man pressed him down with the barrel of his musket. He was young, this one, the youngest of the three. He stood there, staring at Nikandr, glancing back at the other men, before turning back to Nikandr, his eyes hard.
The man’s head jerked back sharply as a musket shot took him in the face. A burst of skin and red flew from the back of his head, showering his comrades. They both blinked and stepped back, their eyes shocked as they watched him fall to the ground. Then they looked beyond Nikandr, the direction from which the shot had come.
Nikandr turned and found Soroush charging forward with seven others-six Maharraht, and Jahalan.
Jahalan had a stone in his circlet. He stopped-allowing the others to continue-and spread his arms wide.
The Hratha pulled their shamshirs and advanced. Had Nikandr’s allies not been barreling forward, they might have been more sure with their weapons, but as it was, they were rushed and clumsy. Nikandr fended off their first hasty swings. A musket shot zipped in and narrowly missed the one closest to Nikandr. A moment later, the wind whipped up through the boughs of the trees above them. Pine needles swirled through the air, stinging the skin. Nikandr was not the center of the wind’s attention, however. It focused on the Hratha, forced them to hide their faces or lose their eyes to needles and pinecones and fallen bark.
They had just begun backing away when Soroush and his Maharraht arrived and drove swords through them.
Nikandr pulled himself over to Rahid and slipped his soulstone necklace from around his neck. When he slipped it over his head, he could immediately feel his hezhan. He ached to draw upon it, to summon it, but he did not. It felt too close, and for the moment things seemed to be in hand. Better to commune with his hezhan when he had the time to be patient.
Soroush and another of his men helped Nikandr to his feet, and then put Nikandr’s arms around their shoulders and helped him to shamble eastward. They moved as quickly as they could, but Nikandr was slowing them down. Eventually the forest thinned and left them on the edge of a meadow. Hidden behind a rocky hill ahead of them was a ship, one of the Maharraht’s. Beyond it, floating low on the wind and well out to sea, was the Chaika.
Dozens of Maharraht were already aboard the moored ship, and more were boarding now. Many of the parents Nikandr had seen along the lake in Siafyan were there, as were others-men and women with younger children, children that hadn’t yet been affected by the wasting. Zanhalah was there was well, watching their approach with a small but satisfied smile on her face.
Soon they were loaded and into the air. Nikandr stood by the gunwales, watching the forest closely as they rose higher and higher. They had risen only an eighth-league when a column of fire broke high into the air over the clearing to the west. It shot straight up and into the cloud cover leagues above. The bright column-orange and yellow and white-turned and roiled, but it did not twist. It was as if the ritual of the akhoz had sent a spear of fire up in the hopes of piercing the sky.
Nikandr thought it would end quickly-he wanted it to end quickly-but it continued on and on as they headed north and eventually west. It hung on the horizon, all through the night until at last it was lost from view.
PART II
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
K hamal steps out from under the celestia’s dome. It is the hour of the new day, and the stars are bright, bright enough to guide his way down from the celestia toward Alayazhar. He has not gone far before he realizes that there is someone waiting for him on the road ahead.
It is Inan, the mother of Yadhan.
“Peace to you,” Khamal says, and tries to pass her by.
He hopes that she has come to visit the celestia, to meditate upon the stars, but he knows that she has not. She falls into step alongside him, and together they make their way down toward Alayazhar. The light of the quarter moon illuminates the sea below, makes it glimmer and give shadow to the crescent bay at the edge of the broken city. Years ago the city would have danced with light. Dozens would have come to the celestia on a night like this. But now most have left. Most have abandoned the island and her Al-Aqim. Some have come to mistrust or even fear them. It is a strange position to be faced with. It has been years-since his childhood among the wastes of the Gaji-that Khamal has dealt with such.
“What is it you wish?” Khamal
asks.
For a while the only sound he hears is that of their soft leather boots sighing over the low grass of the trail.
When at last Inan speaks, it is with a heavy heart. “Yadhan is lost to me, Khamal. Dozens of others have lost their children as well. And yet the rifts are beginning to grow again.”
“You knew your children would be lost.”
“ Yeh, you explained everything so well, down to the last detail.”
“I did,” Khamal says. He spoke the words harshly, much more harshly than he’d meant to. The months since the sundering have worn on him greatly, but he takes a deep breath and begins again, careful to keep his tone soft, understanding. “The rifts may grow, Inan, but not nearly as quickly as before.”
“So of course more must be taken.”
Khamal stops in his tracks and turns to Inan. By the moonlight he sees her face, the tightness there, the anger. She was once his most devout disciple. She left with his blessing and after her time on the wind-a mere two circuits of the world-she returned to him, her eyes bright, her mind sharp, ready to learn more.
How much has changed.
After the sundering, she did not offer Yadhan to him-he suspects she knew all along that her daughter would be one of the children able to become akhoz-but she accepted his request that Yadhan be given. That day in the celestia, though, when the first akhoz had been born, something inside of her broke. She lost her faith in him, lost her faith that the rifts could be closed, and she infected others. There were only a few at first, but the idea took root among his followers and grew like creeping vines.
Until they came to this: a woman who would have done anything for him now stands ready to defy, to take from him the salvation of the world.
If she thinks he will let that happen, she is mistaken.
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