The Straits of Galahesh: Book Two of The Lays of Anuskaya (14 page)

“How did the arqesh move through the city?”

“I don’t know, but I can tell you how
I
did it when I was here last. The best way I can put it is that I slipped deeper into Adhiya. Come, I’ll teach you.”

He strode forward, keeping a careful eye out for the akhoz, but when he turned back he saw that Rabiah hadn’t moved. She was a brave girl—braver than she ought to be at times—but this was too much even for her.

“We’ll be careful. We won’t go far. Not today.”

She nodded, though not before visibly gathering her courage.

Together, the three of them made their way deeper into the city. As they walked, Nasim felt for the veil, felt for the world beyond. It was easy to do here, as easy as sensing the direction of the sun by the warmth it left on the skin.

“Can you sense it?” Nasim asked Sukharam. “Adhiya?”

“
Neh
.”

Nasim touched his shoulder. He felt Sukharam jump, but then he calmed down, and his breathing slowed. “Don’t try so hard. It’s much easier than you expect, and most likely you’re looking beyond it.”

They walked in silence for a time, and as they did Nasim pulled Adhiya closer, used it to envelop them as he had done for Ashan and Nikandr and Pietr. He could feel the akhoz now. They, like he had been, were creatures of two worlds, but their senses were largely attuned to Erahm, the physical world. By drawing the three of them deeper into the world of the spirits, he was able to skirt their perceptions.

Or so he thought.

The one nearest, the one that had called not long ago, moved toward them. It was already close, and now it was running.

Nasim pointed to an open doorway. “Inside, quickly.”

And then he felt the others. How many more, he couldn’t tell, but they were going to be on them in moments.

As they ducked inside the ruined stone home, Nasim touched Adhiya through Rabiah, preparing to defend them against the akhoz. Rabiah stared, eyes wide, though she seemed to have found some hidden source of resolve. Sukharam, however, was petrified. He moved to the corner of the room and hid his head between his knees. He shivered there, and a sad whimper escaped him each time he released his breath.

Rabiah turned to go to him, but Nasim held her arm and shook his head.

Crouching down, the two of them watched over the stone lip of the windowsill. Several buildings away, a girl of ten or eleven ran out into the street. She was naked, her skin ashen. She dropped to all fours, chest heaving, head swinging back and forth. The skin of her eyes had grown over, making her look like some grotesque creature made from clay, not someone who once had been a normal girl—a daughter or a sister.

Then came another akhoz, further down the street, this one a boy, a few years older than the girl. He approached in a feral crouch, his lips pulled back, revealing blackened teeth. The area where his nose had been was now nearly flat, the nostrils more like a frog’s than a boy’s. There was an intelligence in his gait and in the way he studied the girl, as if he had returned, at least somewhat, to the thinking, reasoning boy he had once been.

The girl backed away, clearly exhausted. The boy stalked forward, as if he had paced himself carefully in order to have reserves while his prey spent herself.

Rabiah squeezed Nasim’s arm. She nodded to an alleyway close to their hiding spot. Another boy stepped out from the shadows, padding silently along. His left arm was bleeding from a deep, blackened wound along his shoulder. His left hand hung limp, and he favored that side as he walked. In his other hand he held a curving, rusted khanjar.

He was close now, but the girl sensed him. She turned and screamed, releasing a blast of fire from her mouth as she did so.

Her attackers rushed forward. The one with the knife leapt onto her. They tousled on the ground like rabid dogs. The knife was held at bay momentarily, until the other attacker reached them. Together, they pinned the girl down, and then the knife was drawn across the girl’s throat.

Black blood oozed from the wound. Slowly, the girl lost strength and fell slack against the stones and the yellow grass that grew between the cracks.

Nasim didn’t understand why they would be fighting. The akhoz protected the city; they worked together, or at the very least didn’t fight with one another. Why would they have attacked?

Before any sort of answer could come, the akhoz with the khanjar used it to hew at the chest of the girl. The boy seemed to be taking great care. Nasim had difficulty watching the gruesome act, but also found it impossible to look away.

When the cut was wide enough, the boy reached into the girl’s chest and with one more series of sawing motions, pulled out her heart. Then he stood, arms akimbo and blackened with blood, while scanning the empty windows of the nearby homes.

He paused and turned toward Nasim.

Nasim froze, ducking further into the corner of the opening. The akhoz watched, head swiveling. Nasim thought surely he would run toward them, would attack, would use the knife to cut his heart from his chest and claim it as some bauble he would hide away with dozens of others he’d collected.

But then the misshapen boy turned and after the release of one last heavy grunt began jogging northward toward the center of the city. The other followed a moment later, leaving them alone and shaken.

When Nasim could feel them no more, he left the home and treaded toward the body of the girl. Her chest was still wide, revealing its blackened interior. She was smaller than he had guessed, but this close she was grotesque, not just her form, but the putrid smell and the sickening way the sun shone from her dull, gray skin.

Behind him, Rabiah approached. Sukharam was behind her, but he stopped when he came within ten paces. He looked about the city, to the blue waters of the bay, anywhere but at the akhoz that lay at Nasim’s feet.

“What happened?” Rabiah asked.

Nasim shrugged, unable to do anything but stare downward at this miserable thing. Perhaps it was better for her now that she was dead. But then he looked to her chest. “Why her heart?” he asked, more to himself than to Rabiah.

“Perhaps with Sariya and Muqallad gone, they’ve devolved into savagery.”

“That was not savage,” Nasim said. “That was filled with intent.”

N
ikandr stood at the bow of the
Chaika
, watching the black shape on the horizon for any signs of movement.

The
Chaika
had two masts above deck, in the starward direction, and two below, in the seaward. One more ran windward and another landward, bringing her total to six. She carried only one gun to the fore. The keel—comprised of the obsidian cores that ran through the center of the mainmasts and guided her along the ley lines—was too delicate for more cannons to be mounted, but she was light and spry, perfect for what Nikandr had planned.

For now, though, while they waited for news from the other ship, her sails were tucked in.

Nearly an hour later, well beyond the time they had agreed upon, a black rook winged across the bow of the ship and landed with a beating of wings on the perch that stood near the ship’s helm. It was Vikra, Atiana’s favorite.

“The
Strovya
is ready,” Vikra said in a ragged voice.

The
Strovya
was their second ship, a stout, six-masted cutter. It had been sent ahead in preparation for their pending mission.

“Set sail,” Nikandr said to Jonis, the ship’s boatswain.

The sun had recently set, but the western sky still lit the masts above. Three large sails were unfurled along each of the two starward masts, while more crewmen did the same with the seaward masts below the ship. The headsail, which curved gracefully down from the mainmast to the bowsprit, was unfurled next, and finally the sails along the lone masts to landward and windward were set, and soon the ship was picking up good speed, making headway against the ley lines caught by the keel, which slowed the ship in a way not dissimilar from the sea against the hull of a waterborne ship.

Jonis returned to the helm when this was complete, snapping his heels together and bowing his head to Nikandr.

Nikandr nodded to him. “Light the lanterns and ring the bell.”

As a dozen lanterns were lit and hung from hooks about the fore of the ship, Nikandr watched Vikra flap her wings from the corner of his eye. He had thought of asking Atiana to send another of the Matri to stand in her place—perhaps Nikandr’s own mother, Saphia, or Atiana’s sister, Mileva—but in the end he’d decided against it. Atiana knew his purpose already, and he didn’t wish to explain any more than was needed. To anyone. They would finish this together, and Atiana could go where she wished.

Part of him hoped she would speak—the same part that desperately wanted to apologize to her for what he’d said on Ivosladna—but another part of him thought it just as well that the two of them were silent. Somehow it felt proper, for really there was nothing else to say. They’d both made up their minds. She was doing what she thought was right for the Grand Duchy, as was he. They were simply going about it in completely different ways.

One of his windsmen began ringing the
Chaika’s
brass bell over and over, alerting the Aramahn to their presence.

The dark shape ahead was the floating village of Mirashadal. He could only see its silhouette from this distance, but it looked like an overturned wine decanter, circular at the top with a long tower hanging down from its center. When they came within a league of it, two skiffs floated up and away from the dark shape and approached the
Chaika
. It took little time for them to reach the ship. When they did, one stayed well back while the other approached. An Aramahn woman stood at the bow holding a siraj stone that gave off a rose-tinted glow. The stone of alabaster upon her brow glowed dully. She stared at Nikandr with a look of disdain.

Not so different from the stares of the Maharraht, Nikandr thought.

“State your name and your business in Mirashadal.”

“I am Nikandr Iaroslov Khalakovo, and I have come to speak with Fahroz Bashar al Lilliah.”

“You have come to a place where you’re not welcome, son of Iaros. She will not see you.”

“I thought all were welcome among the villages.”

“That may once have been true, but we find ourselves in difficult times.”

“Tell her I’ve come. She’ll wish to speak with me.”

She studied Nikandr for a time, and Nikandr thought he’d misjudged her, that she would simply refuse his request, but then she nodded to her dhoshaqiram, a man who sat at the base of the skiff’s mast. “Come no closer,” she said, and then they were off.

The second skiff remained, watching from a good distance as Nikandr ordered the sails pulled in. Then they waited, the
Chaika
, the skiff, and the dark shape in the distance all drifting on the wind like clouds.

Nearly an hour later, the skiff returned. It was the same woman, and her expression was even more dour. “Come.”

They followed, heading toward the village as it loomed larger and larger. Nikandr had heard stories—stories that told of how large Mirashadal was—but none of them had done it justice. The closer they came, the more it struck him how massive the village was. It was the largest windborne structure Nikandr had ever seen. Elegant, rounded shapes, each as large as a windship, were connected by walkways. It seemed frail in some ways, but that certainly wasn’t the case—nothing this size could withstand the gales of the open sea without a supremely rigid structure.

No sooner had the thought arrived than a ripple ran through the village like the endless swell of the sea. The structure gave, but it was strong as well, not unlike the canopies of the windwood forests of Uyadensk. The bulk of the village was patterned like the delicate tendrils of a windborne seed. Indeed, below the massive structure was an inverted tower that hung down toward the sea—ballast, in effect, but to call it so was to make it crude, and this was anything but crude. It was beautiful.

Fanning outward from the edge of the village were dozens of windship berths. Some were quite small—made for skiffs and the like—but others were large, for ships like the
Chaika
. Standing at the end of the berth they were being led toward were a handful of Aramahn—many of the stones in their circlets glowing softly in the bare light—and at their head stood Fahroz.

As the ship’s mooring ropes brought the
Chaika
snug against the berth, Nikandr leapt down from the gunwales to land on the deck. It didn’t sound like cut and cured wood. Rather it felt as if the wood itself were living, as if the entire structure of the village had been
grown
instead of built.