Yvanna’s anger drained away, and she suddenly became reluctant to meet Atiana’s eyes. “She grows weaker every day. My difficulties with the dark continue, and I would ask…” Yvanna licked her lips. “I would ask for you to take the dark, to see if you might help.”
Atiana tilted her head. “Victania is trained in the dark, is she not?”
Yvanna did meet Atiana’s eyes then. There was no anger, only resignation. “She is no longer able to.” She smoothed the tablecloth absently. “Perhaps from the wasting. Perhaps from the storms over Khalakovo. No matter what she does, she wakes within minutes of slipping under.”
“Is it the same for you?”
“ Nyet. I can no longer enter. Victania has the potential to be as strong as Saphia, but she tries too hard. The aether has come to mistrust her, or she mistrusts it, and she overcompensates.”
“And you wish me to help?”
“She was to be your mother.”
“She is head of the family that is holding me hostage.”
“You are a member of a sisterhood. You cannot turn your back on it now.”
“A rather convenient perspective, don’t you think? The Grand Duchy has been split, and here I stand with one leg on either side. What I do here might tip the conflict in your favor.”
“You are thinking like the men.”
“I sit here because of the men.”
“It is a baseless conflict.”
“Yvanna, come. When has reason ever stood in the way of politics?”
“My mother needs you.”
Atiana paused, remembering the way Saphia had spoken to her. She had not been kind, but neither had she been harsh. She had been matter-of-fact, and that was something to be valued among the halls of the Duchies.
“If you need it,” Atiana said at last, “I will try.”
Yvanna stood, a grateful smile on her face. “Then come.”
They were heading for the door when the strelet unlocked it. Victania strode in, her face a picture of rage. As she stared at Atiana and Yvanna, she seemed to gather strength, like an approaching storm cloud before it unleashes its fury. “You would come to her for help?”
“We need her, Victania.”
“We need many things, Yvanna, but a forgotten Vostroman whelp isn’t one of them.”
“Would you abandon your mother to her fate?”
“Leave us, Yvanna.”
Yvanna stood, pulling herself to her full height, which was still a half-head shorter than Victania.
Victania stabbed her finger toward the door. “I said leave us!”
Yvanna glanced at Atiana, a brief look of apology on her face, and then she strode from the room.
“I would help your mother if I could,” Atiana said.
“You are deranged,” Victania said as she stepped forward, “if you think I would let you near my mother. It is because of your family that she is ill.”
Atiana met her, refusing to be cowed. “It is because of her presumption. Nasim is no rook to be assumed as she will.”
Victania’s hand lashed out and struck Atiana across one cheek. Her cheek flared white with pain as her head snapped to one side.
“Do not think to judge my mother,” Victania said.
Atiana’s chest heaved as she fought down her anger. She nearly raised her fist, but thought better of it-it was the very thing Victania was hoping for. Instead, she sat at the table, ignoring Victania as she began eating the food from her tray. She refused to meet Victania’s gaze, so she couldn’t judge her reaction, but she could sense the tightness in Victania’s stance, could hear the rapid pace of her breathing.
She thought it a small victory, but when Victania strode from the room, her footsteps echoed down the hallway in sharp, satisfied strokes, making Atiana feel small and defeated.
Two days passed. The routine of the previous days resumed: meals and water brought only by the guardsmen. She nearly asked them to speak to Yvanna, but decided against it, wagering that Victania had left strict orders to be informed of any such overture.
Late on the third night, Atiana heard the door to her cell being opened. She woke, groggy, to find Yvanna standing at the door.
“The Matra?” Atiana asked.
Yvanna nodded. “She is gravely ill. Please, if you care for her at all, you will come.”
“What of Victania?”
“She hasn’t slept properly in weeks, but she sleeps now. We won’t be disturbed.”
“Then I will come.” She dressed and together they moved quickly and quietly down the hall. The strelet and the gaoler were gone, and Atiana asked no questions. “What can I do?” she asked as they took the stairs up.
“Be quiet,” Yvanna whispered.
Yvanna stopped at a landing and pressed something behind a marble statue of a rearing horse. The wall behind it swung inward, and soon they were taking one of the tunnels that threaded its way through the interior of Radiskoye. They continued and took a steep set of stairs downward, and then another set upward before Yvanna spoke again.
“Her breathing is shallow. There are times when she moans and we think she’s ready to wake, but she does not. Each time, she returns to her slumber, weaker than before. I fear she will live only a day or two more if this continues.”
“And you believe the solution to this lies in the aether?”
“It must be so. I have tried to take the dark, but each time it becomes more painful, and I see little or nothing. Victania managed to take the dark for nearly an hour, but she was unable to find her.”
“What do you mean, unable to find her?”
“That is all she said.”
They reached a fork, where Yvanna turned left. The draft in the tunnel became markedly stronger, chilling Atiana’s skin. The tunnel here was cut directly from the rock, the smooth whorls in the stone indicative of an Aramahn mason’s hand.
“Has there been news from my father?” Atiana asked.
“Little. With no Matra, negotiations have been slow, but the Lord Duke has spoken with your father.”
“Has he asked of me?”
“I don’t know-My Lord Father has not deigned to share it with me-but do not worry. As long as the blockade continues and we aren’t attacked, I imagine your release becomes more and more a likelihood.”
Atiana had resigned herself to living here on Khalakovo as Nikandr’s bride, but these last few days had been an entirely different matter. She felt abandoned. Forgotten. Betrayed. Not by Father, but by Ishkyna and Mileva.
She had thought long and hard on how such a thing could have happened, and the only answer was that they had told Father that all was well, that Atiana would be safely away with the rest of the family.
Yvanna stopped suddenly.
“What is it?”
“Be quiet!” Yvanna whispered.
Far ahead, a dim light shone in the tunnel. Yvanna waited, perhaps wondering-as Atiana was-who was coming to meet them.
Atiana took a step back, preparing to flee.
“Stay where you are,” Yvanna said. “It’s only Olgana.”
The pace at which the light was approaching quickened, and a voice filtered up to them. “Lady Yvanna, please come quickly!”
Yvanna rushed down the hallway, perhaps feeling the same sense of dread that was building within Atiana. Olgana’s face became visible as they approached. She looked like she feared for her life… Or someone else’s…
“What is it, Olgana?”
She swallowed hard, her chest heaving like an overworked bellows. “It’s the Matra, Yvanna. I think she’s dead.”
CHAPTER 38
“Dead?” Yvanna asked.
“Please, hurry!”
They rushed down the tunnel, practically running. They took the slope as fast as they could handle, and several times on their harrowing run Atiana nearly tripped. When they came at last to the end, the tunnel opened up into a long hallway-impossibly tall and intricately decorated by Aramahn hands. They stepped out from behind a s
tatue of a stout man wearing a thick coat and cloak, but they did not pause to close it. They continued down a hall with several shorter spurs diverting from it. Among each of these were glowing stones set into ornate marble plaques. They had come to Radiskoye’s mausoleum, where the soulstones of those dead but not forgotten were mounted.
They hurried to the end, where two large doors lay open. They were into the stairwell that lay deep beneath the spire and into the drowning chamber moments later. Far across the room lay a bed, and in it-illuminated dimly by the fire in the hearth-was the Matra.
They reached her side, all of them breathing heavily. Olgana moved to the other side of the bed and stroked the Matra’s hair as Yvanna put two fingers to the pulse point of her neck. Yvanna closed her eyes and waited. Long moments passed, certainly long enough for Yvanna to discover the truth of the matter. A tear slipped down her cheek, and she opened her eyes. She sniffed several times, composing herself before speaking. “The Matra is dead.”
Olgana opened the Matra’s robe and pulled from its recesses her soulstone. Yvanna gasped. The chalcedony stone was dark. Saphia’s had always been brilliant, brighter than any Atiana had seen, including her own mother, who had been treading the aether nearly as long as Saphia had. But there had been the briefest of flashes when Olgana had touched the setting.
Yvanna seemed not to notice, however. “It cannot be…”
“The stone,” Atiana said breathlessly. “Did you not see it?”
“See what?”
“When first you touched it, it glowed, however briefly.” Atiana stepped closer, opening her mind to the aether, as she supposed Saphia did while she was outside of the drowning basin. She passed her hands over the gem, feeling nothing at first, but when her fingers brushed its surface, she felt the cool touch against her skin, like a ripple in an underground lake.
“I see nothing,” Yvanna stated flatly.
“It is there.” Atiana still had the stone, and she was trying desperately to keep her mind open for any small sign, but the harder she tried, the more numb and clumsy her senses seemed to become. “And there will be more to see in the aether.”
Olgana looked to Yvanna, who looked nervously down at Saphia. She seemed ready to send Atiana back to her cell, perhaps afraid of what it might mean if Atiana were caught, Yvanna having freed her.
But then she looked up to Atiana, perhaps realizing how vulnerable all of them were. She needed Atiana, and she knew it. After taking a deep breath, she nodded to Olgana in response.
Atiana moved to the drowning basin and undressed as Olgana prepared the jar of goat fat. Atiana was rubbed down hastily but efficiently, and then Olgana moved to the lever that allowed the chill mountain water into the sluice.
Water crept up the sides of the drowning basin while Atiana took deep, measured breaths. She had nearly resigned herself to the fact that she wouldn’t be taking the dark, and now that she found herself here, about to do just that, she felt unprepared, unbalanced. But there was nothing for it.
When it was high enough, she stepped into the bone-chilling water and lay down before her fears had a chance to take hold. Olgana inserted the breathing tube. Atiana stared into Olgana’s eyes, hoping she hadn’t promised too much. But Olgana seemed to understand, for she leaned over and kissed the crown of her head, and then lowered Atiana into the water.
“May your ancestors keep you,” were the last words she heard before she was underwater.
She had difficulty at first-her mind was running wild with possibilities, with fears and emotions-but she focused on her breath, on the expansion and contraction of her ribs, the elongation of her spine, and the way the water cradled her.
And soon… Soon…
She wakes in the impenetrable darkness of the aether. Unlike the previous times, she sees little-faint overtones of midnight blue, nothing more. Slowly, as she allows herself to fall deeper, the colors coalesce: the handservant standing over the basin; the Matra herself, lying in her bed; the fire in the nearby hearth, which glows not yellow and orange but a deep, deep red.
The Matra’s form is dark-almost entirely black-but there is color to her still. It might say nothing about whether or not she is truly lost to the winds, however. It may be because she has so recently passed.
The stone around the Matra’s neck is dim. Atiana moves forward, opening her mind to allow the Matra’s soul to touch hers, but there is nothing. No response. Not even a faint glimmer. Just the cold embers of a once-raging fire.
She touches the stone, and there is the briefest of flashes. She feels a thread leading from the stone, but she is prevented from following it.
What are you doing here, child?
It is the Duchess Polina Mirkotsk. She is not strong in the ways of the dark, but she has always been good at speaking through it, so there is little wonder that they set her as the watchdog.
I am trying to help the Matra, Saphia.
Who allowed you into her chamber?
Yvanna, now begone.
Atiana tries to drift outward, to follow the trail leading away from Saphia, but Polina stops her.
Polina speaks softly to the other Matri, bidding them to verify Atiana’s words. No doubt one of the others would assume one of the palotza’s rooks and ask; Atiana only hoped they didn’t ask Victania.
I do not have time to wait, Atiana says. The Matra’s life depends on it.
Nyet, Polina says.
Tell whomever you wish in Radiskoye, but do not stop me in this. You know she is close to death. I am near where you are far, too far to do anything to help her. Is it not so?
Silence.
I can feel her, Duchess. Let me go to her, please, to do what I can.
Polina is unsure of herself. One of the others-perhaps Lhudansk-advises caution, but Polina ignores her and her presence retreats.
Do not betray us, Vostroma.
Atiana says nothing in return. She turns to Saphia. She is faint, her presence distant. Atiana touches the Matra’s stone once more, feeling wind and the open sea. She keeps herself within the stone, knowing this is the key to finding the Matra, but like a single note plucked from a harp, the feeling is beginning to fade.
Desperation pushes her toward haste, but this has never been the way with the aether. She keeps the sound of the note in her head, however faint, and allows it to carry her.
When she opens her eyes again, she finds herself far from any island, floating on the winds like the liberated seed of a thistle. Nearby, an Aramahn skiff floats. There are only two aboard. Ashan sits at the helm, guiding the winds into the billowing sail above him. He seems at peace-a man who has come to grips with the world around him. On deck with Ashan is the boy, Nasim, and it is to him that the connection from the Matra terminates. The thread, rather than being thin, is thick and vibrant, as if the connection originates from the boy, not the other way around. Nasim is sleeping, but his head and shoulders-even his legs-jerk and twitter as if he is trying to waken but cannot quite do so.
And then she sees them.
Dozens of havahezhan, wind spirits, float about the skiff. They trail about in lazy arcs, always circling back. She thinks at first it must be at Ashan’s bidding, but then she realizes they are coming for the boy.
They pause for brief moments in their circling, and it is at these times that Nasim’s body spasms. She cannot understand what is happening, but it seems as if they are feeding on him. Preying upon him. Does the boy realize it? Does he allow it? Has it been so all along?
This seems doubtful given the scrutiny he received at the hands of the Matra. And so it seems it must be something particular to his departure from Radiskoye or his time on the wind.
Or the tether that exists between him and the Matra.
The thought makes her go cold.
The hezhan are feeding, but it is the Matra’s soul-not Nasim’s-that they feed upon.
She moves into the path of the tether, and opens herself to it. The writhing rope leading to the boy brightens, and
she realizes that she has added herself to it. She senses both Nasim and the Matra, though Saphia’s terminus is very, very faint. She feels a tug at her breast as one of the havahezhan swoops in and swallows another piece of the Matra’s soul.
Atiana rages against it, for it has taken a bit of her as well. She wonders how the Matra could have taken it for so long. It must have been this way ever since Nasim left the palotza five days ago.
She knows not what to do. She is helpless against such things. She feels herself becoming lost, and the more she tries to direct her awareness, the tighter the hold Nasim seems to have upon her. Soon she is forced to stop altogether for fear of losing herself to the power of this boy.
The wind spirits continue to feed. The Matra’s soul is nearly extinguished, perhaps all the quicker because the hezhan somehow sensed more meat upon the bone. They swoop in, hungrier. They take larger bites, and with each one she feels weaker.
She tries to fend them off, but they only become more animated, and swoop in faster.
Her chest aches. Her bones ache. She screams and tries to wake, but it is not possible. Not any longer.
Nasim sleeps, and yet he appears to be screaming. Ashan attempts to wake him. He looks about the craft, over the water, perhaps sensing something, but there is nothing he can do. Either that or he chooses not to.
The bites continue, and it is clear that she is lost. She is no Matra of five decades; she is a child, and she will not be able to pull herself from this no matter what she tries.
CHAPTER 39
When the sun rose on Nikandr’s fifth day on the wind, he saw near the horizon-as he had on the four previous mornings-the telltale sign of Ashan’s skiff. He had come to understand that Ashan was allowing himself to be followed. Three times on the first day Jahalan had summoned all the winds he dared in an attempt to catch up to the skiff, but every time they closed in, the winds would push them away. They had tried again the following day, hoping Ashan was tiring, but the same thing happened, and by this time Jahalan was nearing exhaustion. Nikandr thought they would lose the skiff, but it always stayed just on the edge of sight, a dark speck on the cloudy white horizon.
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