She stood, the whites of her eyes visible in the early morning light. She stared at him as if she didn’t know him.
Nyet, he thought, as if she were afraid of him.
“Atiana,” he said, softer this time. He reached for her hand, but she snatched it away.
It was then that Nikandr realized that all of them-he, Styophan, the Maharraht-all of them were in a narrow stretch of street, one easily defended on both sides.
“Reload!” he shouted, while Atiana stared at him with uncaring eyes.
The men responded, but too slowly. Dark forms slid into the street from an alley ahead. They swept in behind.
One of the Maharraht brought his weapon up.
Three muskets flashes came from the men ahead, and in that brief moment, Nikandr could see that they were Hratha, their black robes merging with the deep shadows.
The Maharraht grunted and fell to the ground. As he wheezed, a gurgling sound coming from a chest wound, the Hratha called in Mahndi, “Lay down your arms.”
Nikandr had no intention of obeying. The Hratha could not be trusted, especially now with all their plans so close to fruition.
He drew upon his hezhan, pulling the wind to swirl through the narrow street. Dust and dirt stung him as he grabbed Atiana’s wrist and pulled her back toward the edge of the alley.
The Maharraht and the men of Anuskaya took this as his answer, and those that had already reloaded fired.
The Hratha returned fire, and Nikandr saw a glowing stone of jasper upon one man’s brow. Another of azurite glowed a deep shade of blue. A cracking sound rent the ground. It shook the street and the nearby buildings.
Nikandr held Atiana close as he called upon the wind to drive the Hratha back. He saw several raise their muskets, but only two shots were released.
Nikandr opened himself wider. He stepped away from Atiana and spread his arms wide. The presence of the hezhan filled him. He felt the flow of the wind through the streets of the city and called upon it to converge here. He called upon it to scour the Hratha from their path.
The wind answered, hungry for the breath of man, but just as it rose to a gale, Nikandr felt a rising fury within him. His mind went wild, memories of walking on the fields below Radiskoye coming to him, of planing curls of wood as he worked on the helm of the Gorovna, of those nervous moments before he’d touched stones with Atiana years ago when they were to be married. Those and a thousand more came unbidden. He had no control over them, and soon after he felt his muscles going slack.
He realized in a distant and disconnected way that this was no illness, that this was something being done forcibly to him.
He was being assumed, he realized, and he couldn’t at first understand who would attack him in such a way.
Stars filled the field of his vision as his knees gave way and he tipped toward the ground. As the ground rose up, he had a sudden moment of crystal clarity. He knew who had done this to him.
He knew without a doubt.
It was Atiana.
He would have felt betrayed if it hadn’t been for the stone-hearted indifference radiating from her.
He willed his arms to arrest his fall, but they refused him, and he struck the ground like a tree felled. And then the darkness, held at bay for so long, finally embraced him.
CHAPTER EIGHTY-TWO
A tiana watches as Nikandr falls to the ground.
He goes limp. Beneath him, strangely, are two glowing soulstones, not one. She kneels down to inspect them, but the akhoz are hungry. They shuffle toward him until she holds her hand up for them to stop.
Two of the Maharraht charge her, and she’s forced to back away.
“My Lady Princess!” This comes from a strelet at the head of a group of soldiers. Atiana has seen him before. This is Styophan. For years he’s been Nikandr’s steadfast second, a loyal soldier who would protect him above all things.
“Please wake!” Styophan runs toward the Maharraht, dropping his musket and pulling his eagle’s-head shashka from its sheath. The sword gleams for a moment in the early morning light. “Call them away!” he pleads, just before the first of the akhoz leaps through the air toward the Maharraht standing before him.
The first of the akhoz loses an arm to a fierce swing of a blade from the first of the Maharraht, a young man with bright eyes and a black beard. The akhoz falls to the ground from the force of the swing, but it is up again moments later, blood pouring from its wound as it ducks beneath another hasty swing by the Maharraht. It is within the young man’s guard now, and it is vicious, grabbing the Maharraht’s sword arm and snarling forward toward his throat.
“Princess Atiana! You must wake!”
She looks toward Styophan. For a moment, she remembers who she was, remembers that she came to this place for a different purpose. She came to kill, perhaps, but not these men. Not this man.
Then something bears down on her and smothers her will. In the time it takes her to flick her wrist toward the akhoz, she has forgotten her allegiance to this soldier of Khalakovo.
The akhoz abandon their attack on the two Maharraht, who have fallen to the cobblestones, moaning in pain, bleeding their lifeblood. The akhoz charge Styophan and the streltsi who stand by him, shashkas at the ready. The first is cleaved through its ribcage where it has no arm to defend itself. Styophan kicks the akhoz free and drives his sword tip-first through the second. This one, a girl who might have been twelve or thirteen when she was changed, is run through, but she reaches out, snatches his jaw, and pulls herself forward until she’s able to pierce his right eye with a long, claw-like thumb.
Styophan screams, writhing, trying to shake her away. His comrades step in, and the girl leaps to another man, darting forward until she’s high enough to latch her jaws onto his throat.
The last of the battle rises to a bloody frenzy in its closing moments. More and more of the Maharraht and the soldiers of Anuskaya fall, and at last it is ended, and all Atiana can hear is the ragged breathing of the akhoz; all she can feel are the stares of the Hratha as they wait for her.
She ignores them, gazing down upon the soldier, Styophan. Blood pours from his ruined eye, from the jagged cuts along his scalp and face from the akhoz. She watches his chest rise and fall slowly with breath. It won’t be long before he passes the veil. She should care that he is about to die, but the truth is she does not. All she feels is a cold satisfaction that the end is finally near. What does it matter if one more is lost before the time has come?
And yet, she’s unwilling to order his death, not when he’s no longer a threat. Let him lie here in the streets. Let him pray to his ancestors if he wishes. That will be a good enough death for this soldier of Anuskaya.
One of the Hratha approaches, but she turns and points him back toward the Spar, then she beckons the akhoz and motions to Nikandr. “Take him.”
The nine that remain obey, lifting Nikandr and bearing him on their backs like food for their burrow. The Hratha in their dark robes and black turbans walk ahead and behind, watching for any signs of the enemy who might be lying in wait. She knows already that the city is all but deserted of military men. All that remain are the huddling inhabitants of this doomed place.
There is something that draws her attention, however.
Ishkyna.
She moves through the aether like a moth, barely visible as she flits near the flame. Atiana wants to find her, to rend her as a cat rends meat, but she cannot-not unless Ishkyna falters and comes too close.
For now, Atiana ignores her and heads for the bridge, moving through the old city with its graceless stone buildings. Under the growing light of dawn, they look like things long ago abandoned, the sad remnants of man. She wonders whether the buildings will remain-and the roads and the eyries and the homesteads-or will they be gone? Will they be burned as the akhoz were, forging the world anew as the Atalayina had been?