And then the spire will fall.
Hundreds will die. Thousands. The seat of Vostroma’s power will fall to enemy hands. It is a bitter leaf to chew, but they all know what will happen if Anuskaya doesn’t surrender. Muqallad is coming-they know this now-and when he does, the scene upon Oshtoyets will be as child’s play.
The decisions made in the aether are not made alone. One is entwined, and it is sometimes difficult to pull away, to make decisions clearly. It is why the Matri often do not make decisions when they first meet; they merely discuss. Only after they remove themselves from the others-either by leaving the aether entirely or retreating to their own corner of the world-can they think clearly. With the three of them sharing so much, it is hard for Atiana to focus her mind on notions of loyalty and patriotism for Anuskaya.
Not so for Mileva. She pulls away easily, her anger flaring.
I will not bow and offer up our spire to Yrstanla like a lamb for the slaughter.
We have no choice, Atiana says.
There is always choice, Mileva replies, her mood cold. Yrstanla can pull their ships north of the straits, and then we can talk.
Sariya’s response is felt before she speaks. You have few ships, and the winds are beginning to quell. In another day we will attack. This is the only chance I granted to Atiana in the interest of avoiding further bloodshed, but make no mistake. I won’t hesitate to bring those ships to bear-all of them. The threat of Muqallad demands no less.
Whether we lie upon the ground wounded or not, I will not treat with the likes of you while a sword swings above our necks.
Her words are meant for Atiana as well. Mileva’s blood is up, and it seems to strengthen her will and revive her strength. She pushes the three of them away.
And strangely, it works. Atiana feels a gap form, a distancing, as if Mileva can no longer stand to be so closely tied to them. Even knowing Mileva’s strength in the aether, Atiana is surprised. Sariya is Al-Aqim, Atiana’s abilities still outstrip Mileva’s, and though Ishkyna is the weakest of the three, together they should have been able to prevent Mileva from doing so.
This is when Atiana first senses the bitter cold through the haze of the aether. It is a draining, like a trickle of blood from a wound she didn’t know she had.
The feeling grows. It saps her strength. It takes from her what little warmth there is in the aether, until all around her feels like the coldest and darkest part of winter.
Atiana knows only moments after Sariya does that it comes from the tower, and the moment that realization comes to her, she knows it happened because of Ushai.
Sariya withdraws so quickly Atiana and Ishkyna cannot follow, and soon they are left alone. And now, not only is the supporting presence of Sariya gone, but so is the Atalayina.
Ishkyna!
Atiana can feel her slipping away, blown like a feather on the wind by the forces of the aether.
Ishkyna, hear me! Follow my voice!
But she can’t. She drifts further away, her mind drawing and thinning like smoke.
Atiana feels the same happening to her. She’s cast adrift over the Sea of Tabriz.
How massive it is. How dark and deadly. She can feel its depths, feel the cold touch of its embrace. It pulls her downward, no matter how much she might like to reach the surface.
But there is one thing that brightens the borders of her mind. Anger… Anger over what has happened. Anger that-however improbably-Ushai arranged for this to happen. Her emotions were so plain when they entered the tower, and now Atiana knows why: betrayal was on her mind, not the imposing presence of Sariya nor the task that lay before them.
Only betrayal.
And it spurs Atiana to find her way back.
She detects the barest of scents-Sariya. She moves toward it, pulling herself inward slowly but surely. The sea retreats. The mass of Galahesh lies before her. And then Baressa.
And finally the tower.
When Atiana woke, she remembered everything. Never had she recalled her time in the aether so completely, so vividly.
But as sharp as her memories were, her body was dull. It did not respond to her commands. For long moments all she could do was stare at the stone ceiling of the room she lay within-she and Sariya and Ishkyna.
At last she was able to roll her head to one side, toward Sariya.
Sariya was staring at Atiana with wide blue eyes. Blood stained her dress along her chest and ribs, a puddle collecting there and slowly expanding across the stone floor toward Atiana.
Sariya coughed. Blood slipped from between her lips, slid lazily along the dark skin of her cheek. Her eyes were the eyes of a frightened child.
One of the Al-Aqim, Atiana thought, brought to this…
She had not been afraid, but she was now.
Sariya’s lips moved. She was trying to speak, but Atiana could not hear her words.
Then, finally, her voice reached Atiana’s ears.
“ Istizhar.”
It was a single word, spoken not in Mahndi, but in the mothertongue, Kalhani. It meant, simply, help.
CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE
A tiana watched as Ushai hunched over the Atalayina, which spun in the space between the four pallets. Ushai glanced at Atiana-nothing more than this-and then returned her attention to unraveling the spells Sariya had placed on the gem. Why she hadn’t simply killed Sariya, Atiana didn’t know. Perhaps she feared that the stone, as it had been in Ghayavand, would be lost in the tower. Perhaps she feared she would be lost as well, unable to escape unless she was able to leave before Sariya perished.
Atiana realized this was an altogether too real possibility. Worse, though, was the knowledge that she had been betrayed by a woman she had come to trust, a woman she had believed to be one of the Aramahn.
“You may not have it,” Atiana said.
Ushai glanced again. “There you are wrong.” With an opal glowing brightly within the circlet upon her brow, Ushai reached out and grasped the Atalayina.
The hair rose along the back of Atiana’s neck and along her arms. A sizzling sound rent the air, and Ushai was thrown backward. She struck the granite floor and slid toward the far wall.
A sound came like leaded crystal tinkling against stone.
The smell of burned flesh came to Atiana as she rolled over. Her body was sluggish, and it was a mighty struggle to simply prop herself on hands and knees. She looked around, confused. Sariya was gone. She had simply vanished.
Ushai, grimacing in pain, made it to her feet. The fingers of her left hand were blackened. Blood oozed between cracked skin. It dribbled on the floor, the sound of it like the last pattering of rain after a sudden summer storm. The pain she was experiencing was plain on her face, but she seemed to think Atiana posed no threat, for she strode forward and kneeled next to her.
The Atalayina lay on the floor, not spinning, but lifeless. Inert.
Ushai had grasped the stone knowing she would trigger the spells that protected it. She had done so knowing she might be harmed, but she’d clearly thought the risk worth it.
Ushai shivered as she reached down and picked up the stone. Her lower lip quivered and her eyes watered from the pain. And then she met Atiana’s eyes with a defiant gaze that reminded her of another who had done so in the same manner. Rehada… Rehada had looked at her this way on the mountain above Iramanshah, and she had done so knowing Atiana had discovered her secret.
“You are Maharraht,” Atiana said, the words thick on her tongue.
Ushai blinked. Tears sped down her cheeks and fell to the floor to mingle with her blood. Atiana knew the tears came from more than her pain.
In the end, Ushai merely grit her jaw, glanced to where Ishkyna lay, and took the nearby stairs, down and out of sight.
As Atiana slid over the floor toward Ishkyna, she heard no sounds of resistance, no cries for help. But she cared nothing for this, nor did she care that Sariya had vanished; for the moment all she cared about was Ishkyna, who still breathed but would not wa
ke when Atiana shook her.
“Ishkyna?” Atiana called, shaking her harder. “Ishkyna!”
But nothing she did mattered. She would not wake, because her mind had been taken. She was lost among the aether, and there was no telling when, or if, she would find her way home.
The following day, Atiana stood in the opulent receiving room of Kasir Yalidoz, less than a quarter-league from Sariya’s tower where the horrific events with Ishkyna had occurred.
At the head of the room, seated in Bahett’s throne of office, was Hakan ul Aye s e. Beside Atiana was Vaasak Dhalingrad, the envoy father had appointed, and beside him Siha s ul Mehmed. Both had been freed from their cells in the lower levels of the kasir.
Bahett stood to Hakan’s left, watching this meeting with great interest. The rest of the expansive room was empty. No others would be allowed to witness this meeting. Were it known that Hakan was treating with the Grand Duchy after murdering the Grand Duke, there would be chaos in the courts of Yrstanla.
Atiana had just finished relating the tale of the tower. It was the third time Hakan had heard it, but the repetition was necessary. He had trouble remembering what had happened. He would ask her to repeat the simplest of things, and even when she had, she doubted he fully understood. She had little doubt now that what Siha s had told her-that Sariya had beguiled him-was true. What was unknown was how long her spells would remain, and what he would do when finally he returned to himself.
And this was the true danger. The Kamarisi had always been bellicose; it simply hadn’t, until now, been directed toward the Grand Duchy.
As Atiana’s story came to a close, and she spoke of Sariya’s departure, Hakan seemed to understand at last. He was handsome, and the gleam of brightness had always rested within his eyes, but now there was something more-perhaps calculation over what all this would mean for Yrstanla as he weighed the choices before him.
“What of Arvaneh?” Vaasak asked. “Has she not been found?”
“There’s no need for pretense,” Hakan replied. “She is Sariya of the Al-Aqim. And she has not been found.”
“One might wonder, were they in my place, where that leaves us.”
“In a difficult position.”
Vaasak stared at Hakan, his hard eyes evaluating the man who still had the power to ruin the islands. The question wasn’t whether he wanted the islands. The question was whether he would risk it.
“I don’t wish to admit it,” Hakan said at last, “but I was not of my own mind. Even you will admit that you would be hard-pressed to stand against one of the Al-Aqim.”
“The Grand Duchy already has.”
He was speaking of Nasim, a subject that had come up early in the conversation.
“Then you know their power,” Hakan continued. “Sariya may be gone, but Muqallad is coming. As Atiana has told us, she is Maharraht, and there are certainly more about the city and the countryside.” He paused, bowing his head in Atiana’s direction. “Would that I had Matri of my own to look for them.”
He refused to meet Vaasak’s eyes as he spoke these words. He would be asking for many things over the course of this conversation, but begging the man he had effectively imprisoned-whether he had been sound of mind or not-was not something he could do.
Vaasak considered this, his head lifting, but his face clearly relieved. “If the Grand Duchy can be set aright, Kamarisi, there may be some aid that could be lent.”
It was the first hint Vaasak had given that he would be willing to bargain with Hakan for the safe return of the peoples of Anuskaya.
Hakan considered this for a time, glancing not at Bahett, but Siha s, for confirmation. This was a strange shift in power, indeed, but it shed some light on just how much Hakan valued each of these two men.
Siha s bowed his head ever so slightly, at which point the Kamarisi turned his head to Vaasak and smiled.
“What ships we have will be set to scouring the land and sea around Galahesh for the Maharraht, but certainly a few can be spared to return you and your countrymen back to Vostroma.”
“And certainly, assuming the storms have died down enough for me to speak with the Matri, the ships of Yrstanla will be granted safe passage in their return to Galahesh.”
The problem standing before Hakan was a difficult one to solve. He had ships amassed that could attack Vostroma. They could defeat the remains of the staaya now housed in the eyrie of Kiravashya, but he had no way to reach them, no way to issue them orders. He had no way to order them home or to continue on to the other islands. They were, for the moment, isolated from his command, at least until such time as Sariya returned- if she returned. Add to this the fact that Hakan clearly didn’t believe in Sariya’s cause-he had, after all, been cast under her spell unwillingly-and it all added up to a powerful man who simply wished to retreat, to return to the things that had occupied him before the building of the Spar had begun.
Hakan, of course, knew this. Everyone in the room knew it. As strange as it seemed, Vaasak was now the one who stood in control of this conflict.
“A grant that would be most appreciated,” Hakan said, not deigning to tip his head in thanks, but with a subtle expression of contrition that did much the same.
“We’re missing the point,” Atiana said. “We must look beyond the return of ships.”
Hakan turned to her. “You speak of Muqallad, of course.”
“He’s here, or soon will be, and he will then have all three pieces of the Atalayina.”
Hakan sniffed. “It is not clear that he will come to Galahesh.”
“There can be no doubt.”
“Who can know the will of Muqallad? Who can know where he will go?”
Atiana wanted to grab his silver kaftan and shake him. “I tell you, he comes here.”
“If he does, we will find him. We will root him out, he and his Maharraht.”
“As you rooted me out?”
Hakan nodded, a gesture so patronizing Atiana wanted to scream. “If you hadn’t noticed, good princess, you have been in the care of the Kasir for days now.”
“You are a fool if you ignore the threat Muqallad poses.”
The words echoed into the far reaches of the room. Hakan’s face reddened.
Atiana knew she had crossed a line when she spoke those words, but she didn’t care.
Vaasak stood stiffly beside her.
Hakan’s eyes narrowed as he stared intently at Atiana. Suddenly it felt like the two of them were alone to fill the immensity of this room-she representing the Grand Duchy, he the Empire.
“A shadow was laid over my mind for years-such is the power of the Al-Aqim-but the shadow lingers no longer, Atiana Radieva. I am the heart of Yrstanla. I am her thought. Her blood. And now that I can see, I tell you that Muqallad will be found.”
Atiana did not speak. There was nothing to say. The Kamarisi would try to find Muqallad or he would not, but she bore no illusions that Muqallad would allow himself to be found. He was too careful, and they knew too little of his plans.
She did know one thing, however.
She couldn’t leave. She couldn’t return to Vostroma while this was still undecided. Vaasak would leave on the morrow, and though she wasn’t sure how she would manage it, she knew, as surely as the winter winds blew cold, that she wouldn’t be going with him.
CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX
W hile Sukharam slept, Nasim manned the sails. The coastline of Galahesh lay ahead. They had flown in toward the northern half and so Nasim could not see the straits, but he could feel it. In fact, he’d been able to feel it for days, but it had since grown tenfold, starting as a tickle in his chest and growing to a constant burning feeling. He could feel the closeness of Adhiya as well, and further inland, where he supposed the massive bridge stood, there was a yawning hole that felt large enough to swallow the island whole.
These things were similar to what he’d felt on Ghayavand, which was surprising. The island was still protected by the wards, and Galahesh was not so protect
ed, which made Nasim wonder just how close to the edge this place was. How little might Muqallad have to do to open the rifts once and for all? Then again, Nasim knew that Muqallad considered it insufficient to simply call down destruction upon the world. He wished to bring about indaraqiram. Whether or not he could do this wasn’t the point. Muqallad believed it was possible, so he would try to bring Erahm and Adhiya together. He would try to merge them. Anything else would be abject failure. And so he would be careful. He would ensure that conditions were perfect. This, more than anything, convinced Nasim that there was still time to thwart his plans, even though he now had one of the secrets he’d been searching for ever since Khamal had died at the top of Sariya’s tower.
Drawing upon Sukharam’s abilities, Nasim raised the skiff. He could see over the top of wooded land the southern cliffs. He wondered if Kaleh was there with Muqallad. She had betrayed him, and yet she felt more like a sister to him than anyone ever had. He hoped, though he knew it was foolish, that if he could talk to her, he might be able to lead her from the path Muqallad had set her on.
Nasim shifted the ropes tied to the lowest corners of the billowing, triangular sail. He called upon the winds to shift and the skiff began to turn as it headed for land.
When he did, Sukharam woke and pulled himself up and sat on a nearby thwart. He crossed his arms over his stomach and leaned over his knees.
“Should I stop?” Nasim asked.
Sukharam shook his head. “I can feel him,” he said after a time, his voice scratchy.
“Muqallad?” Nasim asked.
Sukharam nodded, pointing toward the straits. “He’s there… Somewhere.”
“And the Atalayina?”
His brow creased in thought. “Of the stones I feel nothing.”
“They may no longer be separate. By now Muqallad might have recovered the third piece and fused it to the other two.”
Sukharam shook his head. “We would have felt it.”
“Perhaps, and perhaps not. The Atalayina has always been difficult to sense, even for those who know how.”
“Have you considered-” Sukharam coughed and shifted to ease his discomfort. “Have you considered whether you’d like it to be or not?”
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