The Winds of Khalakovo

by Bradley P. Beaulieu

“Da, to warn me. But”—Iaros turned, pointing toward the eyrie where the fighting had made its way onto the deck of the Olganya—“your father has committed murder within these walls.”

  The blast from a cannon rose above all else, but Atiana could not tear her gaze from the eyes of Duke Khalakovo.

  He, as well, seemed so intent on her that he barely noticed the world around them. “Your father has stolen away men who were not his. And yet he leaves his daughter here.”

  Atiana had always been able to keep a straight face when being questioned. She was as competent in this as Ishkyna and even better than Mileva. But this was different. Truth was on her side, but Iaros wouldn’t believe a word of it.

  Her throat had gone dry. “It—” She cleared her throat. “It must have been a mistake.”

  “My son is on that ship.”

  Atiana swallowed again. “I am sorry.”

  Iaros’s expression hardened. He snatched Atiana’s arm and collected the pistol from Ranos and then marched her down the hall. Her heart was already beating heavily, but now she felt it pound within her chest. She felt blood course through her ears. Her fingers and toes began to tingle.

  Pulling Atiana behind him, Iaros pushed open the heavy doors leading to the garden. The fighting had subsided. The Olganya had begun to pull away from its perch, while the two ships next to it were fully ablaze. The Maharraht had gained the ship, but as Iaros stalked forward, his grip like an iron shackle, an angry shout spoken in Mahndi came from the Olganya’s deck. A moment later two bodies fell downward beyond the far edge of the ship. They were followed moments later by a skiff.

  A flurry of new shots rang out, and Atiana cringed. Two men—Soroush and the other from the beach—leapt from the ship to the perch, the tails of their turbans fluttering behind them like pennants. They landed, at which point one of them crawled onto the back of the other. The two slipped over the side of the perch and were lost from view.

  After several more musket shots from Father’s men, all was silence save for the sounds of the wounded and the roar of the nearby fire.

  Duke Khalakovo summoned a lungful of breath and shouted. “Zhabyn!”

  Several moments of silence followed. Iaros’s grip on Atiana’s arm tightened, and she feared that if her Father did not show himself Duke Khalakovo would simply shoot her like a mongrel dog.

  Finally Father came to the edge of the ship and looked down. The ship was beginning to list.

  Iaros’s breath came in great heaves through his nostrils. She couldn’t look at him. All she could do was stare at Father, who looked down on her with a steely expression.

  Iaros raised his pistol and pointed it at Atiana’s temple.

  She could feel the barrel, could feel it in her bones, in every part of her being. Part of her wanted to cringe, to curl up into a ball and pray to her ancestors that the trigger would not be pulled. But she would not—she would stand tall and accept her fate. She was Vostroman, after all.

  The seconds passed, and the ship continued to drift. The bowsprit had caught itself in the rear rigging of the ship next to it.

  Her brother’s voice bellowed from the deck of the Olganya, “Nikandr, stop!”

  And Nikandr’s form leapt from the deck of the ship.

  CHAPTER 35

  Nikandr’s shoulder flared in pain as he leapt. He grabbed the gaff rigging and slid downward. His hands slipped, but he caught the rope in the crook of his arm. It burned his skin until he slammed into the rigging block, barely catching himself.

  He looked up as the heat from the fire below him intensified. Borund stood at the gunwale of the Olganya. A moment later, his father appeared next to him. They were in dire trouble. Without a havaqiram they would be at the mercy of the winds. It was possible to control a ship without a havaqiram, using the keels to control the heading of the ship against the prevailing winds, but the larger the ship, the more difficult it became. The Olganya was no Aramahn skiff, and would not respond well to such maneuvers.

  Nikandr slipped over the side of the ship and made it to the nearby perch. The heat from both ships was strong—so strong that he was beginning to feel lightheaded. He held his sleeve to his mouth. He wished he could run toward solid ground, but the fire was licking the perch closer to the fore of the two ships. There was no way he would make it past them.

  He felt something small strike his head. Then again.

  He used his finger to probe his hair, worrying that embers from the fire were striking him, but the palm of his hand came away wet. More water fell, primarily on the Gorovna. The water cooled the air just enough for Nikandr to run the length of the perch. By the time he made it clear of the heat he was exhausted, and he couldn’t seem to clear the smoke from his lungs.

  Two jalaqiram standing within the stone garden had their arms spread to the sky. Azurite gems glowed brightly in the dim light as they commanded the rain to fall against the ships. Rain hissed and steamed as it struck the Gorovna’s deck.

  Nikandr saw Father standing nearby. With the blood along the side of his face, the dirt and glass in his hair and beard, the haggard look upon his face, it looked like he alone had defended Radiskoye against the traitor dukes. He stared at Nikandr with a strange mix of emotion on his face, so much so that Nikandr felt uncomfortable.

  Ranos broke away from several soldiers and gave Nikandr a long hug, breaking the spell. “I didn’t know if I would see you again.”

  “Nor I you.”

  Movement caught Nikandr’s eye. Near the broken doors leading into the palotza, he saw a woman being watched by a strelet. He didn’t recognize her at first—she wore a dirty riding outfit, and her hair was tied back behind her head in a long tail—but it was Atiana. She stared at him with a soft expression, a worried expression. Stranger than the show of emotion, however, was her mere presence. He had thought her gone with the rest of her family. What was she doing here? And what had happened on the eyrie when Zhabyn had been called to the edge of the ship?

  Three sotnik and a polupolkovnik came and spoke with Father, and as they did Jahalan and Udra arrived. The skiff that Nikandr had seen returned to him in a moment. “Father, forgive me, but I beg your permission to take the Gorovna.”

  Father turned and regarded Nikandr anew.

  “The skiff that was ripped from the Olganya... Ashan escaped with it—he and Nasim, both. I can still find them, but I must leave now.”

  Father looked to the east. The night still reigned, but there was a band of indigo along the horizon. “The sun is already starting to rise. The blockade will find you before you could find such a small ship.”

  “That’s why I need to hurry.”

  “Ashan could be headed anywhere.”

  “Nyet. He is headed toward Ghayavand.”

  When Nikandr had last discussed it with Ashan, he had seemed mystified by the possibility that Nasim might be one of the three arqesh who had destroyed the island. Whether or not that was true was no longer the point. Ashan believed it, and he would take Nasim there to discover the truth.

  He also understood that Ashan would need him. The bond that was shared between him and Nasim was unmistakable. It was the key to a very large and complex problem—he’d admitted as much when they’d spoken of Ghayavand. Nikandr didn’t care, though. He sensed a need to discover the nature of their connection as well, and if it meant traveling to a distant island to do so, then he would answer the call.

  Nikandr explained as well as he could, as quickly as he could, to his father. “I’ll bring them back for you, Father,” he concluded. “Please.”

  “You won’t find them.”

  “If I fail, I’ll return. I’ll bypass the blockade. It hasn’t truly begun in any case.”

  “They have two dozen ships, Nischka, with more on the way.”

  Outside, the two jalaqiram had put out the fire on the Gorovna and were trying to stem the tide on the Tura, but it was too little, too late. The ship was damaged beyond repair. By now the fire would have compromised the
ability of the windwood to maintain its buoyancy. Soon the ship would sink and snap its mooring lines, as heavy as any waterborne craft.

  “Father,” Ranos said, “they wanted the arqesh and the boy. Surely with the two of them gone they’ll stop this madness.”

  Father pulled a grimy hand down over his mouth and along the length of his beard while looking at Atiana further down the hall. “There is his daughter to consider now.”

  “He’ll have her back. Surely you won’t—”

  “He won’t be satisfied with just her. He needed the marriage for the ships we were to provide. Nothing has changed. He needed them then and he needs them now. He had hoped, clearly, to use Nikandr as a wagering chip, but with that unavailable he will demand his daughter and the ships and offer nothing in return.”

  Nikandr watched as Jahalan and Udra and a half-dozen other Aramahn gathered in the garden. They spoke amongst themselves, looking occasionally to the bodies of the dead Maharraht and the section of the palotza wall that now lay in ruins.

  “Father, forgive me, but you said it yourself. Mother is ill, and I saw with my own eyes what happened to Nasim when she was attacked. He may be the only way to revive her.”

  Father considered his words, but just then two young men were carried in on canvas being used as makeshift stretchers. They were alive, but unconscious. They looked bloodied and broken. Father watched them go by. His jaw worked and he seemed to become smaller. But then he stood tall and took a deep breath.

  “Go to your mother, Nischka. Keep her company in her time of need.”

  “Father—”

  “Go!”

  Nikandr remained, the blood settling in his veins as Father paced toward the room where several dozen people were being administered to by the palotza’s small and suddenly overwhelmed cadre of healers. Atiana, escorted by her assigned strelet, went as well, perhaps to comfort her wounded countrymen.

  Outside, Udra had stepped onto the Gorovna. She reached the starward mainmast and looked along its length, her arms spread, her head to the sky. It looked as if she were mourning the ship—and perhaps she was considering how intimately she’d been involved in the curing of the ship’s wood. Dhoshaqiram looked upon the ships they’d built as children, and although the Gorovna wasn’t dead, it had been sorely wounded.

  Jahalan was speaking with the other Aramahn, and a dozen other men—streltsi and servants—were still clearing away and organizing the bodies of the dead.

  Nikandr coughed, a ragged sound. He tried taking in a deep breath, but that only made things worse. Ever since the fire it had felt as if he had been buried alive, the air slowly being squeezed from his chest. He felt completely powerless. He had been so close to reaching Nasim, and now it felt like it had all slipped through his fingers.

  Before he knew it, he was walking toward the doors that would lead him to the eyrie.

  “Nikandr.”

  He turned and saw Atiana standing near the infirmary. He nodded to the strelet, and Atiana stepped forward, her eyes darting toward the eyrie as she came. She stopped just before him, and Nikandr found himself confused. A part of him was enraged at what her father had done, but another part, the part that remembered how she had looked at him upon seeing him safe, saw a woman he wanted to take into his arms, especially considering what he was about to do.

  Atiana spoke softly, “You will find him, won’t you?”

  He nodded, seeing no sense in denying it.

  “There is something in that boy...”

  “There is, and he may just be the ruin of us all.”

  Father’s voice echoing into the hallway caught Nikandr’s attention. Time was slipping away. If he didn’t leave now, he would never be able to.

  “I must go,” he told Atiana.

  “Wait.” She gripped his wrist. Her skin was warm. With her other hand she pulled out her stone from within the depths of her white riding shirt. “Touch stones.”

  He pulled his own necklace out, and Atiana gasped.

  He looked down and understood what had surprised her.

  His stone... by the ancients, what had happened?

  It lay dead as a piece of granite.

  PART II

  CHAPTER 36

  The day was warm and humid in the lowland swamps of Uyadensk, one of the first true days of summer. White-barked trees crowded the waterways, their roots exposed and arthritic, their canopy shielding out the sun. Clouds of biting insects swarmed everywhere, breaking only when dragonflies swooped through them to feed. All manner of sounds could be heard, from the croaking of frogs to the screech-screech of insects to the melodic call of the sparrows that plagued the upper reaches of the canopy.

  Rehada had entered the swamp with the first light of dawn. It was nearly midday already, and there was some ways to go yet. She had traveled the swamp many times, but the last had been some years ago, and she was beginning to doubt her memory. She should have come across the island by now.

  Well used to the balance of the thin raft, she drew her pole up from the putrid water and allowed it to slip through her hands until striking bottom. She used it to propel the raft through a narrow artery that seemed familiar.

  In the distance, the boom of cannon fire played across the swamp. It had been four days since the attack on the palotza. The traitor dukes had been making these not-so-subtle reminders of their presence ever since their retreat from Radiskoye and the commencement of the blockade. It had taken several days for word to trickle down to Volgorod. The fight had been vicious—duke attacking duke as well as Maharraht. Rehada knew that Soroush had been after Nasim and Nasim alone, but some claimed that the traitor dukes had hired the Maharraht as mercenaries. Others believed they had come to finish what they’d started with the Grand Duke.

  Some rumors, spread by Radiskoye, said that all the Maharraht had been killed, the all out attack an indication, the palotza claimed, of their growing desperation. Others spoke of another hezhan that had been summoned. The people of Volgorod, already tired and hungry, were becoming fearful over what this might mean. With the blockade now in full effect, preventing aid from coming in from Yrstanla or the outlying Duchies, unrest was threatening to spill over into all-out revolt.

  Rehada had feared that Soroush’s body would be counted among the dead. Later she heard that some of the Maharraht had escaped, and she knew in her heart that he had not died, but her relief soon gave way to fears over what Soroush would do to her in retribution. She had stolen Atiana away from him, and there had been no time to explain. She could only hope that he would listen to reason when she saw him again. And see him she must. Allowing him to come to her was not an option; she must seek him out.

  He hadn’t shared where he and the Maharraht had hidden themselves, but when he had come to her after Malekh’s hanging, she had smelled the rot of vegetation and noticed on his boots the remains of a bright green algae that only grew in the lowland swamps.

  Relief washed through her when, shortly after midday, she came to a broad bank of land. It was the tip of a long island, one of the largest in the swamp and the only one that had enough stone to form natural caves.

  She pulled the raft up onto the bank and headed inland, warding the tall grasses away from her body as she went, careful to avoid the webs of the bright yellow spiders. She was obvious in her approach; she would be watched, and she would not wish the guards to kill her before they knew who she was.

  As she was heading toward a rise, where the first of the caves would be, a Maharraht dropped down from a massive cypress. He was young, no more than fourteen, as were most that joined the Maharraht these days.

  He didn’t appear threatening. He merely pointed toward the caves and said, “He hoped you would come.”

  He led her to a camp that was set up beneath a group of ancient willows. A dozen Maharraht were gathered around a small fire, one of them cooking flatbread over a baking stone. Several were eating, others conversing. They looked thin, these men, emaciated, but their eyes were sharp,
and none of them looked defeated.

  They all stopped what they were doing as she approached. Their expressions were not unkind, but neither were they charitable. She nodded to them, and most bowed their heads in return.

  Her young guide took her to the edge of a hillock. Beyond a stand of grasses, set into a face of exposed rock, was a hole that led into the earth. He motioned to it, then turned and left.

  Rehada got onto hands and knees and crawled into the hole. Once she was inside, the temperature dropped. For a while the way ahead was pitch dark, but then her eyes adjusted and she saw faint light up ahead. She heard words being spoken, too soft to distinguish, and they stopped as she came near.

  She reached a small, natural cavern lit by a glowing pink stone, a siraj, set onto a ledge. Her fears had eased when the boy had told her she was expected, but when she saw Soroush lying there in the cavern, wounded, all of them returned in a rush. He lay on a blanket padded by folded grasses. One thigh was wrapped in bandages dark with dried blood. His head was propped up by a rolled blanket. He was watching her, but the effort of contorting his neck seemed to cause him pain, and he rolled his head back until he was staring at the roof of the cavern.

  Bersuq sat cross-legged nearby, as did another—an old, barrel-chested man with as much gray hair poking out from under his cap as there was black. His name was Muwas. Rehada had met him when she was twelve. He had been leaner then, but she recalled his stocky frame and the odd way he waddled when he walked.

  They remained seated, staring at her as she approached.

  “Leave us,” Soroush said.

  Muwas stood and bowed his head to Rehada before stepping past her. Bersuq, however, gave Rehada a severe expression, weighing her.

  “Go,” Soroush repeated.

  Bersuq, silent as the earth, stepped past her, leaving the air scented with his heavy musk.

  Rehada kneeled and placed a long, tender kiss on his forehead. “What happened?”

  “I took a musket shot to the leg and passed out as Bersuq was taking me to safety. I nearly died in the waters below the palotza before Muwas found me and pulled me to the boat.”