Realizing Nikandr’s intent, Grigory lowered his pistol and aimed.
Nikandr’s heart pounded in his chest.
Grigory fired.
The report of the pistol resounded over the ship.
The shot struck the bulwarks behind Nikandr.
Nikandr released his breath, realizing how mad this was.
He lowered his own pistol and aimed wide of Grigory. When he pulled the trigger, the pan flashed and the shot flew harmlessly over Grigory’s right shoulder.
In a moment Grigory had pulled his shashka and was stalking forward.
Nikandr pulled his own and the two of them met amidships. Nikandr beat off a flurry of hasty sword strokes. He retreated as Grigory expended a furious amount of energy. Their blades rang, and for a moment he wondered what Soroush must be thinking, hearing these sounds coming to them through the fog.
Nikandr baited Grigory over and over again, and eventually Grigory accepted. He lunged too deeply, and Nikandr sidestepped the thrust and brought the pommel of his sword across Grigory’s forehead.
Grigory was dazed, but he managed to nick Nikandr’s leg while falling backward.
Nikandr grit his teeth and stomped his boot onto Grigory’s sword. He dropped to one knee, keeping the blade firmly pressed against the deck and allowed Grigory to grab his sword hand. With both of Grigory’s hands occupied, Nikandr brought his fist down and across Grigory’s cheek. Grigory’s eyes fluttered for a moment.
Nikandr struck him again, the sound of it resounding through the deck. On the third strike, Grigory’s eyes went up in his head and his arms went slack.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-SIX
A tiana rode behind Siha s on his pony over a snow-covered plain. After a night that had seemed endless, the sun was rising, and Atiana could see through the morning mist a keep that stood at the edge of the tall white cliffs.
It brought Atiana no relief whatsoever. They had ridden throughout the night, weaving through the cold streets of Baressa, skirting the Shattering and heading west as quickly as they could manage. They heard sounds of pursuit several times throughout the harrowing ride, but when their pursuers had come too close, the gallows crow had led them safely through danger. Once they had reached the city’s outskirts, they had found the streets not just empty and silent, but eerily so.
They may have found shelter, but Atiana’s mind was still afire. It was clear that Ishkyna wasn’t completely lost, and yet Atiana knew there was something deeply, deeply wrong. Ishkyna wasn’t acting normally, and she appeared to have risen in power sevenfold. To do what she’d done on the walls of the kasir and throughout the city… Ishkyna could never have done this. She was too undisciplined. Too uninterested in the aether to plumb its depths to such a degree.
But even Saphia Khalakovo could not have done what Ishkyna had done with apparent ease, as if she were part of the aether.
Perhaps she was. Atiana couldn’t know for sure, but she doubted Ishkyna had found her body lying in the upper reaches of the kasir.
Nyet, Ishkyna had changed, perhaps for good.
As they reached an escarpment and began taking a narrow but gently sloped path down toward the keep, Siha s glanced back at her. He’d been doing such things ever since there had been enough light. The look in his eyes was not one of distrust, but of judgment. It was a weighing look.
He doesn’t trust me, she thought. He was wondering whether she should be left so that he could return to the Kamarisi and free his lord. He might come to the conclusion that killing her would be wisest. Her mind went wild with the possibilities, but Siha s merely turned back and guided their pony onward.
His thoughts were anything but misguided. Ishkyna had revealed the truth. She had said that Atiana was still under Sariya’s spell, that she’d been under it for some time now-ever since the two of them had communed with one another in the aether-and yet, even knowing this, Atiana wasn’t sure. Ishkyna could be wrong, could she not? Atiana had been so close to Sariya. She had known her mind. Known it fully. As well as she knew her own.
She shook her head vigorously.
Had she been doing this all along? She couldn’t remember.
Siha s glanced back.
“I’m fine,” she snapped in Anuskayan.
His face grew incrementally more grim.
“I’m fine,” she said, softer, this time in Yrstanlan.
“You’re troubled.”
“Of course I’m troubled.”
“I only mean to say it’s understandable.”
She didn’t respond, and after a time he cleared his throat. “The Kamarisi. I don’t know how I can reach him.”
She didn’t know Siha s well, but she knew him well enough to know that this was a plea for help, for understanding. He was a man of cold steel and hot blood. He knew nothing of the Al-Aqim and the Matri and their powers of the dark.
Atiana’s attention was caught by movement near the top of the keep. Over the edge of the cliff, carried by the updrafts, was the gallows crow, its wings spread wide, motionless as it glided back and forth. For a moment it seemed like pure joy.
Atiana hoped it was.
Siha s noticed her shift in attention and turned to look.
“We will speak with her,” Atiana said, “and we will see what can be done for the Kamarisi.”
They reached the keep, and Siha s ’s men took the ponies. Irkadiy joined Siha s and Atiana on the second floor of the keep, a room filled with four beds and several old wooden chests. No sooner had they levered the lone window of the room open than the gallows crow flapped to the stones of the sill and rested there, taking in each of them in turn.
It flapped down to the floor, cawing once, long and lonely.
“Do not-” The crow cawed several times and pecked at the musty carpeting, kicking up dust to cloud the low sunlight coming in through the window. “Do not speak her name.”
Atiana felt her fingers tingle, felt her insides twist.
Do not speak her name. She meant Ishkyna, of course. Her sister was lost, and by the ancients, Atiana was not even allowed to speak her name.
“The Kamarisi moves to secure the city,” the crow continued.
“From whom?”
“The men of Anuskaya have arrived by sea. One hundred sotnik or more, led by Iaros Khalakovo. They’ve brought ponies and cannons; even the hussar have come. They’ve already taken Baressa’s southern quarter, and they’re moving now to secure the Shattering.”
Siha s opened his eyes wide. “Ten thousand men…” The look on his face was one of wonder and respect and no small amount of relief. “Perhaps there’s hope yet.”
Ten thousand, Atiana repeated to herself. It would leave the islands defenseless, not only against the Maharraht, but against the hordes of diseased and dying that were rioting among the cities of Kiravashya and the other islands. Surely Iaros and the other Dukes realized how dangerous it was to leave Vostroma unattended, but this was still a surprise.
“There is more. The Hratha have arrived as well. They, along with Muqallad and the akhoz, have taken the old keep on the eastern end of Vihrosh.” The bird turned a cold eye on Atiana. “They’re preparing something, and it will happen soon, perhaps today, no later than tonight.”
“What?” Irkadiy said. “What are they preparing?”
“They have the third piece of the Atalayina. They will fuse it, or attempt to.”
