The Winds of Khalakovo (27 page)

For several moments the only sounds were from the burning ships. Then Father’s voice called out from the eyrie. “Zhabyn!”

Zhabyn, for the first time, seemed unsure what to do. He measured the carnage around him. Perhaps in that one moment he had come to regret what he’d done, but then the look was gone and he strode across the deck toward the gunwale.

As Zhabyn stared downward, Borund moved closer to Nikandr, pistol in hand. What Zhabyn saw, Nikandr couldn’t guess. He said nothing—only stared—but he was stiff, as if what he saw below had come as a complete surprise.

The
Olganya
had slipped toward the
Tura
, which was almost completely engulfed by fire. The bowsprit of the
Olganya
was momentarily caught in the rigging of the starward mizzenmast.

With most of the streltsi reloading, Nikandr ran for the bow.

Borund shouted behind him, “Nikandr, stop!”

He didn’t. He couldn’t.

A pistol fired.

Nikandr felt his shoulder flare in pain as he leapt for the rigging.

Ranos held Atiana’s arm in a tight grip as they made their way through the halls of Radiskoye. When they reached the long hallway that led to the eyrie, they found the Duke of Khalakovo standing behind a dozen streltsi, speaking with a man dressed in the uniform of a sotnik. The soldiers were filing outside, taking aim and firing on her father’s ship, the
Olganya
.

Before Ranos and Atiana could reach him, a rumbling shook the foundations of the palotza. It increased in intensity, and Atiana saw from the corner of her eye the crumbling of one of the palotza’s turrets. It happened at an impossibly slow pace, as if everything were caught in honey.

Then the leaded glass within the row of tall windows crashed inward. Atiana raised her arms, turning away as the sound intensified. A deafening roar filled the air, and she screamed as bits of glass tore into her arms and shoulders.

The roar subsided, followed by the sound of impossibly heavy stones clacking hollowly against one another. Other sounds entered her consciousness: the coughing and moaning of wounded men, a shrill cry for help, the sporadic crack of musket fire.

Ranos dragged Atiana to her feet. Bits of glass tore into the palm of her hand as she steadied herself, but she did not cry out. She refused to let Ranos hear such a thing.

“Up!” shouted the sotnik. “From the wall! Defend yourselves!”

A vanahezhan—the same one that Atiana had seen on the rocky shore-line—had stalked out of the great cloud of dust surrounding the fallen turret and was bearing down on the
Olganya
. A half-dozen Maharraht followed. Fear welled up within her as she recognized the two from the seashore. Their attention appeared fixated on the eyrie’s perches, however.

The rate of musket fire increased, both from the
Olganya
as well as from the Khalakovan soldiers, but the hezhan kept stalking forward, its huge arms held up before it as if it could feel the bite of the shots tearing into it.

Ranos pulled a pistol from a holster at his belt. Watching the garden closely, he pulled her before Iaros, who was wiping vainly at the dust on his fine golden coat. He looked up and stared at Ranos for a time before turning his head slowly toward Atiana. His face was smeared with dirt and bits of broken glass littered his graying hair and long white beard. He blinked, and Atiana thought surely he had struck his head, for there was a fresh wound on his forehead. Blood dribbled down his cheek and into his beard—a river of red against a snow-swept field.

Whatever disorientation he felt seemed to vanish the longer he stared at Atiana. “What, child, are you doing here?”

Atiana held her tongue. This was not a question to be answered lightly, not with the Duke
measuring
her so.

How it was that emotions had boiled over in a single day she couldn’t say, but she was not entirely surprised. Grigory had been beating the drums of war ever since Stasa’s death. Leonid had been of a similar mind, and although Father had nominally stepped within their circle, Atiana thought he would have been able to control them. None of this, however, gave her any clue as to why she had been abandoned.

“I came from Iramanshah, to warn you.”

“The Matra was attacked”—he glanced outside, toward the eyrie—“by the boy your father has stolen from these walls. Did you lead them here?”

Atiana was stunned. He meant the Maharraht. “
Nyet
, I came to warn you.”

Iaros looked to his son.

Ranos shrugged. “We heard her just before they gained the wall.”

Atiana could see the muscles in Iaros’s jaw working.

“Please, I came—”

“
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.