She kicks one last time and feels her control betray her. She feels the island, the sea, the air above, the stars beyond. She feels herself breathe, her skin prickle, her bones ache…
CHAPTER 32
Atiana felt a beating upon her chest. Lips pressed to hers and air filled her lungs. She coughed. The beating ceased.
She was dying. She knew this in her heart.
She tried several times to open her eyes, but they wouldn’t respond. Neither would her voice comply when she willed it to speak. A simple word would do, any word, so that she could ground herself more fully in this reality.
And yet, despite the vague sense that she should be struggling for her own survival, it felt so peaceful that she no longer cared what the outcome might be. She would let death take her. She would welcome it with open arms.
She fell into herself, hoping it would be so if only to make the pain go away.
Then silence…
Followed by a single note, fading in and out of her consciousness.
Then a string of syllables, more song than voice.
Someone was speaking-who, she couldn’t guess.
They were speaking another language.
Mahndi.
She was still among them. She hadn’t died.
Her eyes finally fluttered open.
She licked her lips once… twice… still unable to speak.
“What…” The word came out in a croak. “What happened?”
The voices stopped. A face moved into her field of vision.
Fahroz.
“You nearly crossed to the other side, Atiana Radieva.” Her voice carried with it a completely unexpected note of concern.
Atiana’s bones ached. It felt as if someone were driving a spike through her hips as the Aramahn women levered her up. They forced upon her several sips from a steaming earthenware mug. She felt the mulled wine drift down her throat, down her chest, and it was the most wonderful feeling she could ever remember experiencing, except that its warmth suddenly made her fingers and toes feel deathly cold.
She began to shiver uncontrollably. “It is… painful.”
“That is to be expected,” Fahroz said, wrapping a new, dry blanket around her shoulders. “Come. We will take you to a place where you can rest.”
She was allowed to pull on her clothes, but immediately after they left the great cavern and reentered the rounded hallways of Iramanshah. She could remember little of her time in the dark, but one thing was clear.
“I f-found no rift,” she said, her teeth chattering.
“We can discuss that once you’ve rested.”
Atiana nodded, but more and more of her voyage was coming back to her. Her time in Radiskoye, her search while feeling the island.
Atiana sucked in a deep breath.
Fahroz tightened her grip on Atiana’s shoulders. “What is it?”
She could not answer, for she had remembered her battle with her mother and the other Matri. The ships allied with Father were ready to attack. Tonight. She had to get back to Radiskoye before it was too late. But she couldn’t tell Fahroz. There was no telling if they would allow her to leave, not with an attack imminent.
“The time in these tunnels weighs heavily on me.” She hoped Fahroz couldn’t hear the lie in her voice. “I can barely breathe from the weight of it. Please, I wish to be in clean air. Take me outside.”
“You shouldn’t go-”
“You will lead me from this mountain!”
They walked in silence for several paces, but finally Fahroz nodded. “Ushai will escort you. When you feel well enough, come inside and warm yourself.”
Fahroz and one of the women stopped. There was a bit of silence as, perhaps, they watched Atiana continue on with Ushai, and then she heard their footsteps receding.
The village was a labyrinth of maddening proportions. Every time Atiana thought she recognized a hallway, a room, a stair, she turned out to be wrong. When they finally reached the main gates and stepped outside into the valley that housed the entrance to the village, she released a breath of air she hadn’t realized had been pent up.
The sun was setting in the west, spreading golden light across the top of the valley’s ridge. In the stone-lined court that lay at the foot of the entrance’s stairs, a fountain bubbled. Several women stood in the water, chatting and washing clothes while their children played stones near its base. As was true for most Aramahn villages, several buildings were positioned near the entrance: a granary, a mill, several large animal pens, and the place Atiana needed the most, the stables.
“Might I walk for a time? Alone?” Atiana asked.
Ushai was not much older than Atiana. She stared at Atiana severely. Finally, she nodded and moved to the fountain and began scolding one of the children in Mahndi.
Atiana strolled around the fountain, holding the blanket tight around her frame. She was still chilled to the bone, and what she was about to do brought her no comfort in that regard. The ride to Radiskoye was going to be long and miserable.
And dangerous.
She had no choice, though. There was no way to warn them other than to ride there. So ride she would, setting sun be damned.
She bided her time, acting as if her walk was aimless. Finally Ushai began talking with the other women, and Atiana knew it was time. She made her way toward the stables, and when she reached it, she stayed a while-becoming, she hoped, part of the background.
When she thought it was safe, she ducked inside.
She had chosen her pony well. It attacked the inclining slope not with impressive pace but with a steadfastness that would hopefully get her to the palotza in time. She felt her stomach flutter as she glanced at the western sky. Little light remained, and that would be gone in less than an hour.
Now that she was out of the valley, and pursuit was hopefully far behind, she pulled the pony to a stop. She gripped her soulstone and tried desperately to reach Saphia. She felt nothing in return.
Her pony shivered her mane and stomped her forehooves.
“Be good”-Atiana patted the pony’s neck soothingly-“and take me home.”
And then she kicked her into a full gallop.
She rode like she had never ridden before. She rode until the night had robbed the western sky of all but an indigo swath. She was forced to slow to a trot, the stars giving barely enough light to keep her on the trail. She urged the pony into a faster pace as the moon rose in the cloudless sky. Her stomach churned as she came closer. She was sure she would arrive too late.
She crested the ridge running the full length of the island. She would be only an hour or more away now. She reached the spur in the road that led to the eyrie, then Volgorod itself, and still she rode, her pony’s breath coming hard and heavy.
By the time she reached the road leading up to Radiskoye, she saw it. She slowed her frantic pace, tears coming to her eyes. By her ancestors, she was too late.
A fire rose in Radiskoye, tainting the clouds high above a tender shade of yellow.
CHAPTER 33
Nikandr returned to the cells deep beneath Radiskoye. He had taken a healthy amount of elixir before he’d come. He felt lightheaded because of it, as if he’d downed a mouthful of vodka.
He found Nasim staring at him as he entered. He had no doubt that it was due to the elixir, but he still felt watched and somehow vulnerable. He had never come to Nasim with ill intent. He’d only wanted to discover his nature-to find how, and to what degree, he’d been involved with the summoning of the suurahezhan. This time was different, and he found his heart beating at what he and Mother were about to do.
“Are you here, Nasim?”
Nasim stared at Nikandr as he moved into the room and took a chair at the table.
Nikandr pulled the necklace over his head and set it on the table, the heavy chain coming to rest with a sound like jingling coins.“Can you sense it?” He pushed the stone toward Nasim. “Do you remember what you did to me? Do you remember allowing the hezhan i
nside me?” Nikandr had thought on this much. The hezhan near the lake. His shared bond with Nasim must have allowed it. But perhaps it hadn’t merely been the bond. Perhaps Nasim had compelled it.
Nasim, as if in a daze, drew his eyes closed and opened them again. He swallowed and stared at the dead stone as if he were about to cry.
“Tell me about it, Nasim. Why did you do it?”
“The gap narrows.” Nasim’s voice was hoarse, and it came out so suddenly that it startled Nikandr.
“What gap, Nasim?”
“The gap within me. Within you.”
“I don’t understand.”
The look on Nasim’s face was one of profound misery, and when he turned and looked at Nikandr it was as if he were pleading with Nikandr to make it stop. “It hurts.”
Nikandr kneeled. “I know.” He pulled Nasim into an embrace. “I know, Nasim.” He rocked him, hoping to ease the life of a boy whose world was a living agony.
“It will soon close if we are not careful.”
“What will close? The gap?”
Nikandr felt Nasim nod. And then the boy stiffened, and a keening moan escaped him. Nasim always suffered in silence, so this took Nikandr by surprise. Nasim’s eyes were opened wide and he stared up with a look of wild fear. “They are coming.”
The hair on Nikandr’s arms stood on end. His breath sounded loud in his ears. “Who is coming?”
Nasim arched back and screamed. He tilted his head up toward the ceiling and threw his arms wide. His entire body shook, and Nikandr knew Mother had just assumed him.
He stood and grasped his blackened soulstone. “Mother, nyet! Please, let him go!”
Nasim fell to the floor, shaking, eyes clenched shut and neck muscles taut. The skin along his face and neck was blue.
Nikandr dashed from the room. Had he been able to reach the drowning chamber in time, he would have gone there, but he went instead to the only other place he thought could provide help.
The strelet at Ashan’s door opened it for Nikandr as he approached. Ashan was already near the door, a look of worry on his face.
“Bring him,” Nikandr said to the strelet.
The three of them raced down the hall. The moment they entered Nasim’s room, Nikandr lost his footing. He felt Ashan fall on top of him as piercing cracks rent the air like a series of musket shots going off in tight sequence. The floor shook. It felt as if the walls were about to buckle.
Nikandr stared in horror, wondering how this could be.
A great wedge of stone crashed into the corner bookcase, sending splintered wood and books about the room. The ground shook for a moment more, and then, blessedly, all was still except for a fine sifting of dust that was pattering to the floor near the corner.
Nikandr made it to his feet, surveying the damage. On the far side of the room, a gap wider than his fist ran from floor to ceiling. He and Ashan moved to Nasim, who was unconscious.
Nikandr heard footsteps coming from down the hall.
“Lord Khalakovo!” It was the strelet’s voice.
There was a pause, then a scuffle.
“Halt!”
Gunfire erupted. Two men cried out. There was silence for a moment, and then Nikandr heard a man draw in several wet, halting breaths. One final shot filled the air, and then the footsteps of many men approached.
“Who comes?” Nikandr said, getting to his feet. He hadn’t so much as a knife to defend himself, so he stood there, waiting, but all he heard were the sounds of men reloading their guns.
Then a man stepped into the open doorway, and for a moment Nikandr couldn’t believe his eyes.
It was Borund.
And he was aiming a pistol at Nikandr’s chest.
CHAPTER 34
Borund wore a thick cherkesska, the type one would wear on a long journey, and his cheeks were flushed as if he’d been in the elements.
Nikandr stared at the pistol, realizing he had come for Nasim. “Never did I think to see this day.”
“Then you’re as blind as your father.” He pointed to Nasim with his pistol. “You should have given him to us the day you found him.”
“You would have done the same in our place.”
Borund paused. “You are right. We all have our pride. But I think, all things being equal, we would not have placed the life of two Motherless so high that it would cloud our vision.”
“There is more to him than meets the eye,” Nikandr said.
“We will be the judge of that-not you, not your father, and certainly not that Motherless qiram. Now come.” Borund waved his pistol, indicating that Nikandr should step into the hall. “I would rather this trigger go unpulled.”
Nikandr complied. A dozen Vostroman streltsi stood at the ready in heavy winter coats. In the other direction were two dead guardsmen.
Three of Borund’s men moved into the room-one of them hoisting Nasim over his shoulders, the other two pointing their pistols at Ashan.
Ashan looked completely helpless. He held his hands before him in a gesture of peace. “Please don’t hurt him.”
Their only response was to shove him into the hall. They all left en masse, seven soldiers to the fore, then Nikandr, Ashan and Nasim, and finally Borund and the remaining men. The gaoler had also been shot. He lay behind his desk, a sea of blood pooled beneath him.
As they took to the stairwell leading up, it was clear Borund’s mission had not gone unnoticed. A smattering of gunfire could be heard above, and by the time they reached the ground floor, the clash of swords rang through the halls of Radiskoye.
Nearly two dozen Vostroman streltsi had set up a host of tables and statues as barricades, but the Khalakovan soldiers had broken through, and there was now a violent skirmish being waged not twenty paces down the hall. The polkovnik of the royal guard was among them, and when he saw Nikandr he shouted for his men to push, and the fighting intensified.
Borund pressed his pistol into Nikandr’s back. “Come, quickly, and you’ll live to see another day.”
Nikandr allowed himself to be taken. They moved southward, toward the eyrie, and Nikandr wondered how much damage had been done in order to capture one small boy. How many men had been killed?
They moved through a set of tall glass doors and into the garden. The eyrie lay just beyond, and a great fire was raging through the rigging of the Tura. As he watched, flames washed over the deck of the Gorovna, which was moored to the perch.
Nikandr swallowed, his hands balling into fists at his side as the flames began climbing the starward mainmast. Gravlos had worked day and night to repair the ship, completing it well before his estimates in hopes of appeasing Zhabyn Vostroma. But now it was another victim in this cowardly attack.
Nikandr turned, but Borund had guessed his intentions and had his pistol raised and aimed at Nikandr’s chest.
“Don’t be foolish, Nischka. It’s only a ship.”
Gunfire cracked over the eyrie, coming from the walls. One of the streltsi on the Gorovna screamed and fell. Two of his countrymen carried him. A dozen more returned fire and retreated toward Vostroma’s ship.
I am lost, Nikandr realized.
He would be taken as a hostage, a bargaining chip to force Khalakovo to do as the southern alliance commanded.
He could not allow it, but he could see no way out of it other than simply leaping from the eyrie or getting shot in the back.
Shortly after Radiskoye came into view, Atiana’s pony collapsed. She was thrown to the ground, dirt and stone biting the palms of her hands as she rolled away. She whispered a prayer of thanks to the ancients for giving the animal such strength as she jogged up the hill.
Her will was strong and her need was great, but the pitch of the road soon slowed her. A smatter of gunfire came from the palotza, echoing moments later against the cliffs of Verodnaya. By the light of the flames she could see Khalakovan men firing into the palotza grounds-aiming, no doubt, at her countrymen. Atiana bent over, grasping her knees as her lungs burned. Afte
r only a moment, she spit to clear her mouth and pushed on, worried now not just over Nikandr, but her family as well.
When she came within a hundred paces of the wall, where the ground finally leveled off, a cannon blast lit the night. She felt it in her chest, and she saw outlined in the white flash the streltsi manning the weapon.
The gates were closed, and Atiana saw no one manning them. Most likely they were on the far side of the barbican, training their muskets toward the courtyard. She approached and was just about to call out when another cannon lit the wall. The blast had also lit the low clouds, giving off enough light to reveal the forms of men-a dozen or more of them-crawling up the wall.
She stood stock still, afraid to move, afraid to give her position away. As the flash from the cannon fire faded and her night vision returned, the glow from the fire gave her enough light to detect the dark forms of the men climbing upward. They were already halfway to the top.
It was the Maharraht, she realized. In moments they would gain the battlements.
“On the wall!” she screamed, hoping she wasn’t making a huge mistake. “On the wall, attackers!”
She didn’t know if they could hear her, but the Maharraht certainly did. Several of them looked her way, and she could see the dull glow of the jasper gems upon their brows. Two slid down the wall, reaching the ground in less than a breath. They sprinted toward Atiana as she continued to yell. “To the wall! To the wall!”
Atiana made for the barbican as quickly as her leaden legs would allow.
One of the Maharraht was just below the crenelations along the curtain wall. As he reached up, the report of a flintlock broke the crisp night air. He struck the earth with a hollow thump. Another Maharraht flung his arm. A spray of rock flew from his hand toward the strelet who had fired. Like the spray of grapeshot it cracked along the top of the wall. The strelet screamed, grabbing his face with both hands, losing his musket. Three more streltsi arrived and were treated to a similar attack.
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