“We row up the Strait,” Tycho said as he pointed toward the distant lights of the ships farther up the Bosporus. “And pray that we stay ahead of the aether. Maybe we’ll come along side one of our ships, and they’ll have a doctor on board. But we need to keep moving.”
“All night?”
“All night.”
Chapter 16
Omar massaged the side of his neck and heaved a loud sigh. The bright sword in his hand felt heavier than it had in a very long time. The light from the blade cast a long black shadow of his legs that stretched over the fields. He glanced across the road full of frozen heads and arms and said, “I could use a drink.”
Nadira grunted as she sat up. She’d flopped down on a pile of dismembered corpses, spread-eagled on one of her little victory mounds. Now she sat with her legs sprawled wide apart and her sword leaning against her thigh. “You could use a bath, too.”
Omar smiled and slipped his sword back into its scabbard. Above them in the dark, he could hear the Vlachians and the Hellans on the top of the wall still talking about the battle, about the dead. They had continued firing volley after volley of arrows down into the mob, even after Omar and Nadira had cut all the way through to the gate itself. He had taken two arrows to his arm and shoulder. He was fairly certain that Nadira had taken more.
But the wounds healed as soon as the barbs were pulled out and, as always, the injuries were quickly forgotten as the pain vanished. But the weariness remained.
A heavy metallic banging echoed from inside the gate.
“I suppose we should be moving on before our friends finish clearing the barricade and come out here to poke at the bodies,” Omar said.
“What do you care? You’re their hero,” Nadira said. “Don’t you want them to adore you and worship you and beg to hear how you saved their city?”
“No, I don’t.” Omar started walking along the edge of the wall.
After a moment, he heard Nadira following him. She stomped through the frozen snow and smashed through the delicate, skeletal bushes along the way. He slowed a bit so that she could come alongside him.
“Bashir?” she said.
He blinked. “Actually, it’s Omar now.”
“You changed it?”
“I change it every few decades. It keeps things simple for my business partners,” Omar said. “Not everyone can pull off the mystique of an immortal savior, century after century.”
Nadira shrugged. “I’m not trying to pull off anything. I’m just trying to protect my people.”
“I thought your people were in Damascus. The last time I checked, that wasn’t anywhere near Stamballa.”
“It’s near enough. There are several companies of soldiers from Damascus here, and I intend to see that they all make it home to their families. After all, it’s better to fight the infidels here than at home. This way, the city itself is safe.”
He nodded.
“Five hundred.”
“What’s that?” he asked.
“Five hundred years, more or less. That’s how long I did your research for you, back home. That’s how long I stayed a nun and studied the aether for you.”
“Oh.” Omar cleared his throat. “Thank you. I don’t suppose you discovered anything that you’d like to share?”
“Why didn’t you come back?” she asked quietly. “I knew it might be a long time, but five hundred years? And now, how long has it been? Two thousand?”
“Give or take,” he said. “I’m sorry about that. I didn’t forget about you. I never forget about any of you. I just…” He shrugged. “I’m always getting distracted by one thing or another. I mean, I spent the last ten years at the top of the world on a whim, and half of that in a cave. Don’t ask. But I suppose I always say to myself, well, there’s always next year. We have forever. There’s always more time.”
Nadira shook her head. “That’s a hell of a way think.”
“That’s a hell of a way for a nun to talk.”
“I’m just a soldier now. I can talk however I want.”
He nodded. They passed the length of rope he had climbed down a few hours ago, but they kept walking, crunching along in the snow. The starlight shone brightly on the icy ground.
“Gideon left first,” she said. “He said he was going to look for you. I guess he never found you.”
“How is he?”
“The same. Happy as a puppy.”
“What’s he doing these days?”
“He destroys seireikens,” she said casually. “And he often kills the people carrying them.”
“Really?” Omar pouted thoughtfully. “Good for him.”
“Good for him? He’s killing your Osirians and destroying your precious sun-steel. I thought you’d be more upset,” she said.
Omar sighed.
So did I.
He scratched at his stubbly beard and said, “And Lilith?”
“I don’t want to talk about her.”
“What do you want to talk about?”
“Death. Dying. Not living anymore.”
Omar stopped and rubbed his eyes. “We talked about this on the boat the other night. I’m not going to kill you.”
“Why not?!”
“Because I don’t kill my friends.”
“I’m tired, Bashir!” Nadira threw her sword down. It bounced and clattered on the frozen earth. “So damned tired. I’m tired of watching the same human filth crawling through my city, stealing and raping and killing people, century after century. It never changes. It never gets any better. I thought that maybe, one day, I would see Damascus become the paradise that it should have always been. But it’s still the same pile of rocks, full of the same predators and vermin.”
“I know,” Omar said softly. “I know all of that. I feel the same way about Alexandria. And believe me, Alexandria is not nearly as pretty as Damascus. At least, not that I recall. But it sounds to me like your little crusade to save your city needs to stop. You need to find something else to do with yourself.”
“Like you? Wander about turning people into your immortal servants trying to unlock the secrets of the universe for you?” She spat in the snow. “How is that going, by the way? Have you met God yet?”
“Not yet.” Omar sighed. “Nadira, I’m sorry. I’m sorry you’re unhappy. And I’m sorry that I put you in this position. But I’m not going to help you die. What I will do is help you find something else to do with your life.”
Nadira laughed. “Like Yaga and Koschei? Like Gideon?” Her smile vanished. “Like Lilith?”
Omar shook his head and sat down on a rock. It was cold and sharp, and he shifted his buttocks. “I’m not a god, or even a priest. I’m just a very old man with an obsession.” He nudged a chunk of ice with his boot. “I don’t have any real answers for you. Just ideas. Places you could visit, people you could meet, or even help. Someone like you could do a lot of good in the world.”
“What’s the point? Those places, each one is just another Damascus, isn’t it?”
“Maybe you’re right. So maybe you don’t need a change of scenery,” Omar said. “Maybe you need a change of vocation. Maybe it’s time to put that sword away and learn some new skills and find some other way to pass the time.”
“I don’t want to pass the time. I want out.”
Omar frowned at the ground. “There are ten thousand places out there that are nothing like Damascus, or here, or anywhere you’ve been. Ifrica, Rajasthan, Jochi, Ming, Nippon.”
“I’m not listening to this.” Nadira picked up her sword and started walking.
Omar sighed again, planted his hands on his knees, and pushed himself back up to follow her. “I’m not going to just let this go. I’m not going to disappear on you again. I’m here and I’m staying right here.”
“Shut up.” Nadira stopped. Her breath steamed away from her mouth as she stared off into the distance. She began to draw to her sword.
“What is it?” he whispered. He heard nothing.
/> She drew out her long, silvery saber. Its damascened face writhed with spidery etchings in the moonlight.
Omar hesitated, then drew out his seireiken. The blade’s light washed up the high walls of Constantia and far out over the snowy fields. He held the sword high over his head to let the cold white light reach a bit farther out into the darkness. “There’s nothing out there.”
Nadira whirled on him and slashed at his sword hand.
Omar barely had a moment to feel the adrenaline surge of fear in his chest before the ghost of Ito Daisuke seized control. Omar leapt back and dropped into a low fighting stance with the seireiken held back away from the woman. “What the hell are you doing?”
“What’s it look like?” Nadira dashed forward. “If you won’t kill me, I’ll just have to do it myself.”
“I won’t let you!”
“You’ll have to kill me to stop me!”
The Syrian saber flashed in the starlight as Nadira’s hand spun faster and faster until her sword became a flat shining disc of steel whirling at her side.
Omar grimaced. “Nothing is ever easy for me.”
Nadira attacked and Omar retreated, stomping and stumbling through the frozen snow. He swept the ground around him with the tip of his blazing seireiken and the ice became shimmering water and the snow began to rise in waves of steam.
“I’m better than you, old man.” Nadira slid to a halt in the soft warm mud.
“You’re not better than my sword.” Omar lowered his seireiken to his side.
“But I only need to be better if I want to win.” Nadia loosened the clasps on her armor and let her breastplate crash to the ground. “I want to lose.”
She lunged at him and brought her saber down in a vicious slash at his shoulder. Omar raised his seireiken in a simple square block and let the blades crash together. The scorching sun-steel burned straight through the Damascene sword and the broken tip flew through the air and clanged on the stone wall beside them.
Nadira stumbled away and then straightened up to look at the twisted, melted ruin of her saber. “I’ve had this for a very long time.”
“And as I tried to tell you, I think it’s time you put it aside.”
“I will, in a moment.” She hurled the handle at him and charged again, empty-handed.
Omar swatted the broken saber out of the air, shattering it into half a dozen pieces, and then he slipped his seireiken back into its clay-lined scabbard just as Nadira tackled him to the ground. They crashed into the soft mud and slid into the sharp edges of the nearby ice.
Her hands instantly went to his belt, clawing at the shark skin grip of the seireiken. Omar grabbed the handle to hold it in place and the ghost of Ito Daisuke appeared off to one side, staring down dispassionately at the two figures rolling about below him. The samurai said nothing and did nothing.
Nadira kept one hand on the seireiken, straining to pull it free, as her other hand went to the neck of her shirt. She pulled out a slender steel chain and yanked it up over her head. Omar saw the little golden heart dangling from the chain.
“No!” He twisted sharply, throwing her off his chest and sending the tiny pendant skittering across the icy snow.
Nadira dove for her sun-steel heart.
Omar stood up and backed away toward the wall with both of his hands clutching his seireiken, pressing it tightly down into the scabbard so not even a sliver of the deadly blade was exposed.
She really wants to die.
Omar took a moment to catch his breath and he watched as Nadira found her pendant and got back up on her feet.
“If you do that, you won’t be free,” he said. “Your soul would be trapped in my sword. Forever. I don’t think you want that. It’s just another sort of immortality, and frankly I don’t think you’d find it an improvement over your current situation.”
Nadira looked at him. Her face was pale and shining with sweat, and for the first time that night he didn’t see any of her casual bravado in her narrowed eyes or frowning lips. She just looked tired.
“Then I’ll find another way to die,” she said softly.
“I imagine you’ve been trying to find another way to die for a very long time.” Omar moved a little closer to her. “The only way out is to destroy the sun-steel heart, and the only thing that can melt it down is the heat of another sun-steel object. I’m sorry. It’s a trap, I know. It wasn’t something I ever thought about in the old days. I don’t have any answers for you.”
She nodded and sighed, and slipped her pendent back inside her shirt. “So what do I do?”
“Whatever you want. But whatever you do, you need to do something new, something different,” he said. “This soldier-of-fortune routine of yours is tearing you to pieces.”
“I’m not the same person you knew back in Damascus,” she said.
“Neither am I. You know, it’s funny, the nature of our immortality is that our bodies can’t change because our souls are inside these pendants, yet our souls seem to go on changing all the same.”
“It’s not funny at all.”
“Sorry.” Omar wiped his hand across his mouth. “Well, we’ll figure it out. Come on, let’s get back into the city and call it a night. All right?”
She nodded and they started walking again. She paused by her dented armor lying in the snow.
“Leave it,” he said. “That’s in the past now.”
She nodded again and they continued along in the shadow of the wall. They eventually found another smaller gate and a quick flash of Omar’s seireiken convinced the guards to let them enter.
As they walked through the empty streets of Constantia, a cold wind began to blow gently down the wide boulevards. Omar saw the tiny shiver in Nadira’s shoulder and the prickling gooseflesh around her bare throat. He shrugged off his coat and held it out to her, and she took it and slipped it on without a word.
“So what’s the story with the walking corpses?” she asked.
“I don’t know yet. Are you interested in that sort of thing?”
“I’m interested if I need to be.”
He shook his head. “I doubt it’s anything we’ll need to worry abo—”
A moan echoed out of the alleyway beside them.
Omar looked over and saw three figures staggering toward them. He drew his seireiken. “I’m starting to regret destroying that lovely sword of yours.”
“A pity, but that life is behind me now,” Nadira said as she gestured to the alley. “Whenever you’re ready, old man.”
He sighed. “This is turning into Ysland all over again.” The three corpses began shuffling along faster, their frozen eyes fixed on his bright sword.
“What happened in Ysland?”
“Very bad things.” He raised his weapon and saw Ito Daisuke standing to one side out of the corner of his eye. “At least this time it’s not my fault.”
Chapter 17
“It looks like the aether is starting to settle,” Wren said. “If the wind could move it, it would probably thin out pretty fast, I think. Oh well.” She lingered by the balcony a few more moments and watched the stars shine down on the palace and the water.
The screams echoing across the city outside had died down shortly after she took the bracelets from Yaga, and once she had used her own ring to sweep the aether out of the tower, most of the nightmare sounds had faded away completely, leaving the city quiet, though still shrouded in darkness.
Wren came back inside and sat down by Yaga’s head. “How are you feeling?”
“I hate you.”
Wren sighed. “I suppose I can keep you like this. Without a sun-steel resonator, you can’t move the aether, and as long as I’m nearby, I can keep the aether from carrying your nightmares out there.”
“Idiot child,” Yaga muttered. “I am forever.”
“I know, and that’s the problem. I can’t always be here, taking care of you, can I?” Wren played with the silver bracelets and ran her fingers over the veins of gold running a
round them. As she touched the warm sun-steel, dozens of strange faces flashed in the shadows around her, the ghosts of men and women wearing furs and leather cloaks covered in bones, almost like armor.
Her ancestors? Her enemies? Her priests? What sorts of souls would a woman like this collect for her trinkets?
Wren said, “So you can’t sleep, and you can’t stop having the nightmares. All right then. I can fix that.”
“No, you can’t.” The answer was a mangled chorus of Yaga, the ancient valas of Denveller, and the souls inside the bracelet she was holding.
Wren dropped the bracelet into her lap and frowned. “Thanks for the support.” She shuffled over closer to Yaga’s head. “So, you’re always having these nightmares, eh? All right then. Let’s take a look at your ghost.”
She reached out and laid her right hand on the woman’s brow and pressed down tightly, squeezing her sun-steel ring between their skin. Wren closed her eyes.
Gudrun had explained ghost-talking to her once, during one of the old crone’s more lucid moments, but the lesson had been less than helpful. Omar had found the story amusing and offered a few similar anecdotes, but no lessons of his own.
I can do this. If Gudrun could do it, I can do it.
For a brief moment she felt herself falling through the darkness, falling forward through a shadowy space where eight old women sat clustered around a tiny circle of moonlight. They glanced up at her as she passed, and Wren saw the cold eyes of Kara watching her fall.
And then she was standing on solid ground in the middle of a dirt road that had been churned up by horses and wagons and then frosted with snow and ice. The houses on either side of the road were log cabins with stone chimneys gently exhaling their hearth smoke into the pale blue sky.
This is the nightmare?
There were goats, sheep, and chickens in small wooden pens. There were people all around, chopping wood and carrying buckets of water and trudging down the lane toward a small lake with their fishing poles. The men wore dark shabby suits and women wore dark shabby dresses with colorful scarves tied over their hair.
It looks a little like Vlachia, or what Vlachia must have been like before the corpses. Is this Rus?
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