The Straits of Galahesh

CHAPTER SEVENTY-THREE

N asim looked up into the beautiful face of Rabiah. She’d come to take him. Of this he was sure.

She kneeled, and the moment she did, the numbness that had been spreading through him stopped. Then it receded, and the pain began to return.

She touched the knife, and pain seared through him-white hot at the center of his being, like embers hidden deep beneath the ash.

“I can’t! Let me go!”

He couldn’t go back. He was ready to leave this world, one way or another.

She leaned close to his ear. “You cannot go,” she whispered. “Not yet.”

He could do little more than draw breath, though each one fluttered in his throat and caused so much pain he felt as though he were merely holding his breath. He had been prepared to leave, but staring into her eyes, the eyes of a girl he had come to cherish, he realized he couldn’t do it. What a poor man he would be if he gave up now-on himself and Rabiah and the world itself-simply because of pain.

He swallowed, staring into Rabiah’s beautiful eyes. He swallowed again, not sure if he could go on.

She nodded to him with a smile on her lips, a smile as wide and deep as the sky.

With that one simple gesture, his nerves began to calm. He could not go, he told himself. He could not.

There was still much to do.

Rabiah waited for him to nod in return, and then in one sharp motion pulled the knife free.

His body rigored. His muscles tightened like catgut. His head convulsed, heedless of stone beneath him.

And he screamed for the first time. He screamed to the sky above, to the seas below, to the mountains beyond and the fires beneath. He screamed, unable to understand who he was, what he was, until he felt cool hands touch his forehead, urging him to stillness.

He thought it impossible, but the more her palms pressed downward, the more he was able to control the pain. It did not fade, but he found that with that one simple touch of skin against skin he was able to master it, and himself.

“How did you find me?” Nasim asked.

Rabiah did not respond. She merely helped him to sit up.

When he did, he realized the pain was not so great as it had been only moments ago. He looked down and saw that the flow of blood was merely a trickle. The wound was beginning to close as if drawn by purse strings.

She helped him to stand. Her hands were warm. They were wonderful. It was so glorious to have her near.

If she noticed his rush of emotions she didn’t mention it. She held his hand as they stepped down from the rock-as Muqallad and Sariya had done only a short while ago-and together they trekked along the sand back toward Alayazhar. They went beyond the beach, and by the time they’d climbed the path up to the city proper, his wound had closed entirely. It felt strange, though. Tender. But more than this, it felt as though it would never heal. Not completely.

Rabiah led him toward the tower until Nasim stopped and pulled his hand away.

“We can’t,” he said.

She turned and regarded him. “There’s no other way.”

Nasim shook his head. “We cannot place ourselves in her power again.”

“We will not,” Rabiah said.

As she said these words, he felt souls about the city, the souls of the akhoz that still remained. He knew that these were those that had remained to keep the rifts stable. They were also those that Khamal himself had sacrificed. Though Nasim himself had had nothing to do with them, he also knew that they were attuned to him-yet another effect, intended or not, of the circumstances surrounding Khamal’s death.

Through the broken streets and alleys of Alayazhar, the akhoz approached. Their presence made him aware of the aether and of Adhiya beyond. By the fates, they felt closer than any time since the ritual on Oshtoyets, a time when he’d barely been aware of himself or the worlds around him. His mind had been only a shadow of what he would become, and yet he had lost so much since then. Had it been because of Khamal, or had it simply been because he’d tried too hard? Had it all been self-imposed?

He longed to reach beyond, to commune with the hezhan. He longed for their touch. He wanted to give of himself so they could learn from him. But he knew that such a thing would be foolish here. Now was not the time.

The akhoz were near. They approached the tower, not with rage or hunger, but with reverence. They shambled, their arms to their sides, their faces slightly uplifted, as if they were basking in some unseen glow.

“Come, my children,” he said to the crisp air. “Come, and we will go where we are needed.”

They moved more quickly now, but with no lesser sense of awe and deference. There were dozens, all of them ready to do what Nasim asked of them. He was saddened-their lives had been cut short so long ago, and they’d been forced into an existence infinitely worse than beasts of burden-but at least their lives might have some meaning in the end.

Rabiah tugged Nasim’s hand. She nodded toward the tower. “Time grows short.”

He did not want to enter the tower, but he would trust her. He would trust her, he thought, as he had not trusted her in life.

As they walked toward the iron fence, the smell of the air changed. The wind calmed. The clouds in the sky paused.

“What’s happened?” Nasim asked.

“What do you mean?”

“The sky,” he said. “The wind.”

“Nothing is different…”

Nasim looked to her, wondering how she couldn’t have known, but her gaze was fixed on the tower ahead, as if that and that alone was what mattered.

Nasim felt it, though, and it was growing worse, this feeling of pregnant intent. It felt like the time before a great storm, but this one, thought Nasim, was going to be worse than any other.

They walked through the open gate, the akhoz following. Rabiah stopped at the door to the tower. Nasim didn’t understand at first, but it soon became clear she was waiting for him to open it. Why she refused to touch it he didn’t know, but it seemed important that he not ask of it, so he took the handle and opened it himself.

Inside it was dark and foreboding, but beyond this he could not sense Sariya’s presence. He stepped within, and immediately the akhoz swept into the room behind him. They moved like a pack of animals. Nasim didn’t know what had changed, but they seemed hungry-hungry for blood. Some climbed the stairs as if their hunger drove them to hunt, to move, even knowing there was nothing to find in the upper levels of the tower, but most of them remained in the room, crouching, their eyeless faces trained on him and the door.

It felt strangely comforting to have these forgotten souls join him, but the one he most dearly wished would join him-Rabiah-remained just outside.

“Will you not come?” Nasim asked her.

She did not respond.

He nodded, not wanting to close the door, for he knew that when he did, she would be gone forever.

Rabiah seemed to hear something, for she turned and looked deeper into the city. What had attracted her attention Nasim couldn’t guess. Rabiah glanced back once through the doorway, her eyes searching, confused. She didn’t seem to notice him.

And then she turned and walked away.

Nasim held the door open, hoping she would return, knowing she would not.

Then, knowing he had to leave now if he was ever going to, he closed the door until the latch clicked shut.

In that moment, he felt a boom. The earth shook and stones of the tower rumbled above him. He heard shouting and screams. Musket fire erupted, rising to a fierce intensity as men shouted and the clash of steel rang out. When Nasim opened the door again, he saw outside a completely different city filled with bloodied men waging war against one another.

Beyond the tower stood dozens of men wearing dark woolen cherkesskas. They held berdische axes in one hand, muskets in the other, and when they prepared to fire, they dropped the butt of the axe to the ground and placed the barrel of the musket at the crook of the axe head before sighting along the length of the barrel and pulling the trigger.

It all seemed as it should be, as if these men were merely a force of nature unleashing their vengeance upon another.

Another boom shook the tower. Grape shot tore through the forward ranks of the streltsi. Dozens of them spun and twisted and arched backward, as if they were men made from cloth and sticks, not blood and bone.

He thought at first that this was all happening in Alayazhar, but of course it was not. This city looked nothing like Alayazhar. Rabiah had transported him, or rather, the magic of Sariya’s tower had.

But where had he come? Kiravashya? Had the war stretched so far?

Neh, he thought as he took in the imposing form of the Mount. He was in Baressa, and the streltsi were warring against the men of the Kaymakam and the Kamarisi.

There were hundreds of Anuskayan soldiers along this length of road. The akhoz had gathered behind him. They watched, mouths open, tongues lolling, as if they tasted the battle that raged only paces away. They strained at their leash. They hungered for battle. But Nasim would not allow it. Not yet. Not here.

Among the cries of the wounded and the crack of musket fire and the sound of a charge in the distance, he heard the cawing of a rook. He saw the bird fly over a tall stone building and come winging down straight toward him. It landed and pecked at the ground. A young man of Anuskaya lay dying nearby. His fur-lined kolpak had fallen away, revealing dirty blond hair. He blinked several times with a look on his face that made it clear he thought the bird had come to save him. He tried to speak, but words failed him, and then he fell slack.

The rook beat its wings against the air and cawed over and over again, but then it regained itself and hopped toward the open doorway as the battle continued to rage.

“I have looked long and hard for you, Nasim,” it said in Anuskayan.

“Matra Saphia,” Nasim said, bowing his head though he knew not why. “I’ve just returned.”

“Returned to her tower.”

It was a question, one he could not in any way answer fully. “They took me,” he said simply, staring down at his robes, which were still bright red with blood.

The rook clucked three times. “So they did.”

The tower shook as another shot thundered into it. Stone and sand rained down. He could feel the entire structure begin to shift with several piercing cracks breaking through the sounds of war.

Behind the rook, riding on ponies from the same direction in which Saphia had come, were four streltsi wearing red kolpak hats.

“Quickly,” she said. “We must get you to safety.”

More screams of the dying came. As he stepped out of the tower, musket fire tore through the line to his right. A roar was taken up, and dozens of janissaries wearing tall turbans came rushing forward. Their strangely bent kilij swords were drawn, and they broke into the double line of streltsi. The shouting intensified as men were shifted from other parts of the line, but as soon as those orders were passed, another roar was heard. More men of Yrstanla counterattacking along the right flank.

All four ponies galloped forward. One was felled a dozen yards from Nasim. Another broke away to meet the charge of three Yrstanla soldiers. The pony rammed one, and the soldier took out another, but the third swung his kilij high over his head and down against the strelet’s thigh. The pony reared and clubbed the soldier, but the strelet was lost, blood poring from his nearly severed thigh before he struck the blood-slick stones of the street.

Before Nasim could stop them, the akhoz streamed out of the tower. Three ran like hounds toward the soldiers of Yrstanla. The soldiers’ eyes went wide. They warded the akhoz with their swords just before two gouts of flame were released from widened maws, catching them across their chests and heads. The third akhoz leaped upon one of the flaming men, taking him down and tearing into his neck with its teeth.

This one was shot point-blank by two other soldiers. It reared back, baring its teeth and blackened gums and leaping at another soldier despite the black blood seeping down from its chest and shoulder. It was caught by another musket shot in the temple, and a vicious slice from a sword across its neck, and it fell twitching to the ground.

Its brothers and sisters bayed in sickening tones, bringing the battle to momentary silence. Soldiers of both sides turned, weapons lowered, as they looked on with fear plain on their faces.

“Come!” Nasim called to them as the streltsi on the ponies rode near. One of the remaining two streltsi reached down. He and Nasim locked forearms, and then Nasim swung up into the saddle behind him. “Hear me! Come!” he called again.

And now they obeyed. Slowly, reluctantly, they turned away from the battle and followed the pony that bore Nasim southward.

The rook flew silently up and over the same buildings, guiding them. The streltsi followed, the hooves of their two ponies ringing, gaining in volume over the sounds of the battle as they wound their way through the empty streets.

As the sounds of battle faded, the relative peace allowed Nasim to notice what he hadn’t before. The sky. The wind. The taste of the air. It had that same feeling that it had had in Alayazhar.

And it felt worse.

The time was growing short.