“She’s ahead, Kapitan,” a crewman shouted, pointing off the windward bow.
The ship leveled off, and Alesya was able to restore control once more.
She could see through the snow the barest hint of the ship’s form, but she could also feel Nikandr somewhere below. The feeling was beginning to fade, though she didn’t understand why.
Alesya forced her to the gunwale. Far below, there were two skiffs, barely visible. They were lost among the currents of snow a moment later.
“Nikandr is on one of the skiffs, along with a score of streltsi.”
“Prepare the skiffs!” Grigory shouted. “Quickly.”
“ Nyet. Let them go.” Alesya stared downward, into the swirling snow. “Allow Nikandr to think that he hasn’t been seen.” She turned back to Grigory. “ Then we’ll fill our skiffs and send them hunting.”
Nikandr watched as the streltsi spread out in rows of four and began marching forward, muskets at the ready. The snow was falling so heavily he could see little more than white. The snow was already a foot deep and getting deeper by the moment, making the going slow and arduous.
The site of the suurahezhan’s crossing was less than a mile ahead. So far there had been no sign of the Maharraht, but the sounds of the battle for the eyrie and Radiskoye had shown no signs of letting up.
Then he heard it. Chanting, from a single voice. He signaled to the sotnik to slow the men, and to spread them out. They obeyed silently, all except the sotnik and his two desyatni.
The snowfall had eased. They could see dozens of yards ahead of them. The ground was white except for the blackened face of a small outcropping of rock and the handful of scrub brush that dotted the terrain.
Nikandr turned to Ashan, whose forehead was pinched in concentration. He looked to Nikandr and shook his head. There was nothing, apparently, he could do to help.
If Ashan were powerless, Nikandr wondered if it had more to do with the rift than the Maharraht.
He waved for the men to lower themselves to the ground. They did so, crawling through the deep snow until they saw a depression in the terrain. A man sat in the middle of it. His eyes were closed, and he was chanting softly. He wore a black turban dusted with snow. Upon his brow was a brown gem of jasper, sparkling brightly despite the relatively dim light.
The sotnik turned to Nikandr and pointed his finger at the Maharraht, cocking his thumb like a musket.
Nikandr shook his head. He didn’t want to do anything rash. They had no idea where Nasim might be, and he refused to jeopardize him needlessly. He turned to Rehada, who was studying the man with a piercing stare. She was conflicted-sadness and doubt clearly warring within her.
Nikandr moved to her side and whispered to her, “Who is he?”
He never heard her response.
A series of sharp cracks resonated beneath him. He could feel it running along his hands and knees.
“Back up!” he shouted.
Before any of them could react, the ground erupted.
Nikandr felt himself lifted and thrown through the air like dust on the wind. He fell softly onto his back in the deep snow, his knee burning from the awkward angle at which he’d landed. Several yards away, standing tall as two men, was a mound of snow-covered earth not unlike the vanahezhan he had seen on Ghayavand. It stalked toward Ashan as the sotnik fired his musket. The flash from the pan was dimmed by the burlap sack protecting it against the snow. The musket ball struck the beast’s head as two more shots tore into it. Nearly all of the streltsi discharged their firearms into the hezhan.
Mere moments later, a cry rose up behind them.
Nikandr turned, recognizing the trap well too late.
It was the Maharraht-at least a score of them-advancing through the drifts. They trained their muskets as they advanced. A split second later, they stopped and released a clatter of musket fire.
Nikandr’s men cried out in pain as musket shots tore into them. Four dropped to the snow. Ashan spread his arms wide, and gazed to the sky. A musket shot pierced his pale yellow robes just below one arm, tugging at the fabric like a child trying to gain his attention.
“Ashan, beware!” Nikandr shouted as he backed away, but Ashan didn’t listen.
The vanahezhan pounded through the snow, but before it could come within striking distance its feet were caught as if it had stepped into deep, sucking mud. Its momentum carried it forward. Loud snaps broke above the din of battle. The beast’s body tumbled to the ground, and though its arms caught it, they were held by the same effect. The thing struggled like a collared wolf against the restraints holding it.
As one, the streltsi began retreating toward the depression where the vanaqiram had been only moments ago.
The Maharraht pressed their advantage, but then several of their muskets discharged before they were ready. Rehada’s doing.
“Something is wrong,” Rehada told Nikandr as she knelt down beside him.
“You noticed?”
Rehada shook her head. “I mean this doesn’t feel right. Soroush should be here, and so should Nasim.”
“Behind!” the sotnik yelled.
Nikandr glanced back while reloading his own musket. Several dozen yards up, firing from the top of a small knoll, were more Maharraht. Another strelet and the burly desyatnik were felled as the sotnik ordered half of them to return fire.
After one volley, as his men were reloading their weapons, the Maharraht charged.
Nikandr stared at them, knowing they were severely outnumbered, knowing they would most likely die whatever they did.
That may be true, Nikandr thought, but he would not go easily.
He drew his shashka and held it high over his head. “Charge!” he yelled as he sprinted forward.
Atiana watched in horror as Bolgravya’s streltsi unloaded from the skiffs. They marched forward, muskets at the ready. She could feel Alesya’s growing desire to have this done with and to rid herself of Atiana-she was growing increasingly disgusted by her nearness to Atiana’s emotions and thoughts.
Meanwhile, Atiana’s awareness of the rift had been growing like the coming light of dawn. There was a distinct feeling of familiarity to it that she could only attribute to her discovery of it within the aether. It lay wide open, a gaping maw in the fabric of the world, and through it she could feel the touch of Adhiya. She could feel warmth and earth and water, even air.
And running through it all was the scent of life.
But there was something else, the feeling that this place-the rift-was like one of any number of threads that ran through the fabric of Erahm-as if the filaments of Adhiya were spread throughout the world like thistledown. The nearest was the one on Duzol, all the more familiar since she had just come from there, and it felt-as it had within the aether-ripe.
Alesya paid little attention to these thoughts because the sounds of battle had broken out. And it was close.
Very close.
The shouts of Duchy men could be heard, as well as the high calls of the Maharraht. The crack of musket fire pattered like the first heavy raindrops of a terrible summer storm. Flashes of white were seen through the curtain of snow.
Grigory raised his fist, a signal that was quickly passed down the line. The men halted.
“Can you feel the boy?” Grigory asked.
Alesya forced Atiana to shake her head. “ Nyet. There is nothing.”
“Where is he?”
“She does not know.”
And then Nikandr’s voice filtered through the cries.
Grigory’s face hardened.
He motioned for the men to fan out to his left, to converge on the sounds of the musket fire that lay between them and Nikandr. They stalked forward, but one of the Maharraht called out a warning. Many of them turned and fired, as Grigory’s men laid into them.
It was then, with several Maharraht dropping their muskets and charging with wickedly curved shamshirs drawn, that Atiana realized why Duzol felt so near. Why it felt ripe.