The Straits of Galahesh: Book Two of The Lays of Anuskaya (66 page)

Atiana rubbed the smooth surface of the stone. “Why not remain together and overwhelm the Grand Duchy before focusing on the Maharraht?”

Ushai seemed amused by this. “Do you have the sense that things have gone beyond Sariya’s control?”

“
Neh
. Which brings me back to my question. What shall we do?”

“The stone,” Ushai said. “While we may not know its history to our satisfaction, its history on Ghayavand has not been lost. It is said that the Al-Aqim used it in an attempt to bring about indaraqiram. They failed, and at that moment—as the first of the rifts was created over the island—the stone broke into three pieces. If what your Nikandr says about Muqallad is true, he now has two of the three pieces. I suspect they will try to fuse the stone, to make it one so that they can finish what they began three hundred years ago.” She pointed to the stone. “Even broken, it will have strong powers. Were you gifted in the ways of the hezhan, you would no doubt be able to use it to great advantage, communing with elder hezhan, perhaps even summoning one to this plane. Your gifts lie elsewhere, but I suspect it will enable you to touch the aether like you never have before. In this lies our greatest chance.”

“To stop Sariya?” Atiana scoffed. “How?”

“I’ve heard the story from Fahroz of how Nasim, when he was taken beneath Radiskoye, drew upon Saphia Khalakovo’s soul. He nearly killed her.”

Atiana shivered at the memory. Nasim had done the same to her, as if she were nothing more than water to be poured from an urn. “He did.”

“Can you do the same?”

“To Sariya?”

“Would that bother you?”

In truth it would not. What shocked her was the fact that one of the Aramahn had suggested it. And not just any Aramahn; Ushai had been a disciple of Fahroz herself. Which raised the question: would Fahroz condone such a thing? The Aramahn had always been peace-loving, had always stood aside and waited for the fates to intervene on their behalf, but Fahroz had taken a stand on Oshtoyets, inserting herself and the Aramahn of Iramanshah into the affairs of the Landed and the Maharraht, and now here was Ushai, not merely suggesting, but
condoning
murder.

“Don’t be so surprised,” Ushai said. “There are those of us who have come to believe that we are all of us tools of the fates, and that where we know their purpose, we should use whatever is at our disposal to achieve it.”

“You claim to know their purpose?”

“How can I not? The fates would not wish the end of the world in this manner. Of that we can be sure.” Ushai’s eyes were deadly serious, her expression fervent. It sent a chill down Atiana’s frame, but she could not deny the wisdom in her words. With this stone—Atiana hefted it, felt its weight in her hand—she might be rid of Sariya, and then, perhaps, the tide might be turned against Hakan and Muqallad.

“Is there a lake within the village?” Atiana asked.

“
Neh
, and we can’t go back to the Shattering.”

Atiana knew there was little choice, then, as to where they would have to go. Taking the dark was not a simple matter of submerging oneself in cold water. The water itself had to have a certain quality. It had to be connected in some way to the earth, as it was in the drowning chambers of the Grand Duchy’s palotzas, as it was in the Shattering within the deep wells Ushai had found.

As it was in the cemetery, in the mausoleum Bahett had prepared for her.

She wondered whether they would suspect her return. If so, they might have dismantled the fountain.

She hoped not, because if so, their plan would be ruined. But there was really no choice in the matter.

She had to take the dark.

And she had to kill Sariya.

Irkadiy was the first one over the cemetery wall. Four streltsi in black cherkesskas and kolpaks followed. After a soft whistle, Siha
ş
approached with ten of his men. They brought a rope ladder, which they flung over to the other side. After his men had weighted it down with two men and Irkadiy had done the same on the other side, Atiana climbed the ladder with Ishkyna following right behind.

They were along the far eastern end of the massive cemetery, a place few traveled save the caretakers. They wound their way through the rows, moving up toward the hill where the mausoleum they needed lay. The morning was bitterly cold, but that only helped. The royalty of Baressa liked to visit the graves of their forebears, but on a day like today fewer would be out.

As they walked, Ishkyna fell into step beside her and took her hand. Atiana nearly thought it was in jest, but when she glanced over, Ishkyna was staring straight ahead, refusing—for the moment at least—to look at Atiana. Atiana did not smile. The day was too grim for this. But she felt her heart lighten at this rare show of solidarity from her sister.

“Be careful,” Ishkyna whispered.

“I shall,” Atiana whispered back.

They reached the mausoleum without incident, though the kasir on the Mount—less than a quarter-league away from their position—looked like a sleeping beast. It felt, as Atiana gave it one last glance before entering the tomb, as though it would wake at any moment, and when it did, all would be lost.

The mausoleum had felt so foreign the first two times she’d come, but she had been here on Galahesh for some time, and now—the small rooms, the trickling fountain, the strangely shaped basin—it all felt familiar. It felt as though it were an old friend, this room deep below the earth, and she just hadn’t recognized it before. It was a comforting thought, but she didn’t allow it to lull her into any sense of security. What she was about to do was dangerous, and there was a good chance she would never again take to these steps to return to the light.

Irkadiy and the streltsi accompanied her down to the lower rooms. In the closeness, the sound of their muskets rattling, their bandoliers clacking, was loud. When they reached the bottom of the stairs, Irkadiy inspected the rooms carefully, much more carefully than he needed to, and then he stood before Atiana, asking her with a nod, one last time, whether she was ready.

“I’m as ready as I’ll ever be,” she said.

He smiled at her awkwardly. “On this—” He cleared his throat. “On this day, My Lady Princess, I am proud to be Vostroman.”

She took his hand and waited for him to look her in the eye. “I’m sorry I didn’t say something when Siha
ş
spoke ill of your family.”

“Think nothing of it.”

She shook her head. “Don’t dismiss my words. I was thinking the same things as he was.” She waited for her words to settle, and indeed, as she’d known would happen, his eyes looked at her in shock, in pain. “But your family was nothing short of heroic for what they did for us. They
saved
us, and I will never forget it.”

His eyes softened, and he smiled. A handsome man indeed was Irkadiy. “Thank you, My Lady Princess.”

Atiana stepped in and kissed him on the cheek. “Thank
you
.”

Ishkyna watched as Irkadiy and the streltsi left, their tall black boots clopping against the stone stairs at they spiraled their way up.

“You were right, you know,” Ishkyna said once their bootsteps had faded.

“About what?”

“His family probably did alert the Kamarisi.”

“The family his cousin married into is large. Perhaps one was tempted to speak to the guard, but the rest were loyal and brave. Had they not been, we would have been found before the sun had set on that first day.”

Ishkyna shook her head. “You’re too sentimental, Atiana. It’s going to be the death of you one day.”

“You’re not sentimental enough, Ishkyna. You’re going to die rigid and lonely and lost to the world.”

Ishkyna’s face was not angry at these words. It was instead thoughtful, as if she’d been thinking the very same thing, and Atiana’s words had merely reinforced the idea. “Best we begin,” she said at last, motioning to the basin.

Atiana undressed and with Ishkyna’s help began rubbing the rendered goat fat over her body.

“Be careful,” Ishkyna said as she worked Atiana’s back. “There’s no telling what’s become of the aether now that the Spar is complete.”

“I know.”

“Sariya had a plan, and there’s little doubt it included the Matri.”

“I
know
, Shkyna.” She turned and found, by the golden light of the two small lanterns, tears welling in Ishkyna’s eyes. Had this been Mileva, she might not have been taken aback, but this was Ishkyna, a woman so unused to sharing her emotions that this was akin to a deathbed confession in its seriousness. And then Atiana realized. Ishkyna thought Atiana wouldn’t wake once she’d taken the dark.

She reached up and with the backs of her fingers brushed the tears away. “I have no plans of leaving just yet.”

“Be serious. You need to be careful.”

“And as you’ve said it thrice, there’s no longer any doubt that I shall be.”

Ishkyna held up the stone, the Atalayina. It glimmered beneath the soft light. It was usually bright, but here in the bowels of the earth it looked deep and dark and dangerous. “Use
this
as your anchor. Avoid the spires, for I think she’ll sense you if you do.”

Atiana nodded and took the stone. She stepped into the basin, and when she did, the cold of the water felt proper. She welcomed it, welcomed the drawing of her warmth, welcomed the icy touch as she sat and then lay back with the breathing tube in her mouth. This, she decided, this subtle strength granted in part by the Atalayina was a welcome thing.

A welcome thing indeed.

As the water enveloped her and her breathing slowed, her mind became more and more aware of the aether, so near she could nearly reach out and touch its soft, gauzy veil.

And soon… Soon…

She feels the small room. Feels the earth bearing down on it.

She searches immediately for the Atalayina. She thought it would be bright in the dark of the aether, but it isn’t. She cannot see it. She cannot even see it in her hands as she lies in the basin.

Though she tries to stop it, her awareness expands. She feels the cemetery with its rows of mausoleums. She feels her loyal men standing guard above. She feels Kasir Yalidoz and her servants within, her guardsmen and her royalty. She feels the Mount and her winding roads, her proud and ancient estates. She feels Baressa and her thousands upon thousands of children, many of them cowering from the attentions of the Kamarisi. She feels the Spar, and the ley lines being drawn through it from the spire to the north to its sister in the south.

Then, at last, she feels the Atalayina. It is just as deep and dark as it was in the chamber where she lay. It is an anchor every bit as strong as the spires. She tries to bind herself to it, but it is not easy, and she feels herself thrown by the winds. The harder she tries to stop it, the more the aether gusts around her. It draws her thin. The aether rages in her ears, in her eyes, in her mind. She is lost in a wind-tossed sea, adrift and moving further and further from shore.

She feels now not only Baressa, but the whole of Galahesh. She feels Oramka to the north and the islands of Vostroma to the south. There is familiarity among the islands of her homeland. She became a woman there. She learned to tame the aether there. She spent hours, days, carefully tending to the ley lines between the spires of the Grand Duchy.

And she knows immediately that something is horribly, horribly wrong.

The spires…

Some are missing. Ildova to the west, her sister spire to the south, on Tolvodyen. And Elykstava to the east. It is there, on Elykstava, that she feels a momentary pang of familiarity.

Nikandr… Nikandr is there. She desperately tries to reach out to him, but her mind is drawn away, tossed among the waves.

She knows she is losing herself. There were times when she was able to bring herself back from the edge of such madness, when she reined herself back once she knew that she was spreading herself too far and too thin. But this is different. She had always been able to rely on the spires, like mooring lines to anchor a windship. Not so now.

As her mind drifts outward, she remembers Ishkyna’s words:
Be careful
.

She had, but she hadn’t been careful enough.

The last thing she feels is the well of darkness in the distance—the Atalayina—calling to her like the sirens of the southern seas.