Soroush leaned over and placed something in Nasim’s mouth. Nasim accepted it. It tasted metallic. Of the earth. It was smooth and cool to the touch.
“Stop, Nischka,” Rehada shouted.
He felt it slip down his throat and fall heavily into the pit of his stomach.
Rehada slapped him across the cheek.
He felt the pain, but it was nothing compared to the feeling of ecstasy as another spirit, a havahezhan, was drawn from Adhiya into the mortal realm. She slapped him again and again, and finally his men had to hold her back. As he saw Rehada screaming in pain from their attempts to prevent her from striking him again, he was drawn back from the edge.
At that moment, Ashan released his hold on the ropes. The sail flew upward and flapped in the wind as he opened his arms wide and stared up to the sky. A heavy mist formed between them and the suurahezhan, which now stood less than a hundred paces away. Nikandr heard the beast moan as a fireball flew from the palm of the beast’s raised hand. As it sped toward them, the mist continued to coalesce. It formed into sleet and snow and ice, and the wind held it in place, pulling it together tightly.
“Hold on!” Nikandr shouted. He could still feel Nasim, could feel the havahezhan forming within the courtyard, but he was, for now, in control of his feelings and thoughts.
When the ball of flame struck the forming cloud a hiss was released as loud as lava pouring into the sea. The ball of fire was weakened, but not extinguished. It was off course, but then it curved sharply, guided by the suurahezhan, and struck the underside of the skiff.
The skiff rotated around the keel, nearly to the point of overturning. Nikandr lost his grip and slipped free from the confines of the skiff. He was saved when he grabbed onto the gunwale, but five others slipped from the sides and fell screaming to the waves below.
But then the skiff righted itself, and the hull struck him in the chest. He lost his grip. Two streltsi grabbed his wrists, but the palms of their hands were slick, and they could not hold on.
Nikandr fell, the skiff above him falling away.
As he plummeted, he could feel the havahezhan, not the elder that had been summoned moments ago, but the one that had been with him since before the attack on the Gorovna.
Help me, he called to it.
Please help.
It did not, and the wind whipped by him faster.
The words of Sariya came to him then. Give yourself to him.
She’d meant the words for Nasim, but he knew that it applied to the qiram as they gave themselves to the spirits.
He did so now.
He turned as he fell so he was facing the frothing water below. He spread his arms wide and closed his eyes as he had seen Jahalan do so many times before. He felt the wind whip past him, felt the pressure of it on his chest. He opened himself to the spirit, to do what it would with him.
Atiana knows she is dying. She can feel her body failing as it lies upon the snow on the coast of Duzol. Oddly, she is much more in tune with it now that it is broken and nearly useless than she had ever been able to do when she was healthy and whole. Her lifeblood spills, but it has so far done little to stifle her ability to walk among the winds of the aether.
She studies the tendril that flows from Nasim to the ghost of his self in Adhiya. Nasim in the material world is solid and stable, a white brand against the darkness of the keep. Nasim in the spirit world is impossible to define. His form shifts abruptly, as do the colors that he contains.
As the third stone is placed upon his tongue, the tendril thickens. She can feel him, his pain, his desire to stop what is happening but also his utter inability to do so. She tries to strengthen him, to support him so that he might make it through this trial alive and fight those that are trying to use him, but it is no use. Though she can feel him and his emotions, she is powerless to affect him.
Nikandr is still near, but he is not so focused on Nasim as he once was. She must change this, and Bersuq is the key. Soroush is too intent on what he is doing, whereas Bersuq is allowing his mind to float as he chants. He is ripe for the picking, and if she can assume him, then it would loosen the hold they had upon the keep.
She moves closer to the men. Fear grows within her, for she has never assumed another. She can feel upon Bersuq his gem. He is bonded to a spirit, and it glows in the aether like a bright, piercing star. She steps toward him, careful to avoid the spirit.
And then she enters Bersuq.
Immediately he rails against her. She maintains the tenuous hold she has upon him, but by the barest of margins. She can sense his fear-fear that the Matri have found him-and she presses her advantage.
Dozens of ships are on their way, she tells him. In moments, a horde the likes of which you’ve never seen will descend upon Oshtoyets.
But he is emboldened. He knows that even with a thousand men the Grand Duchy will have difficulty holding against such beasts. And they are not like the first elder that had been summoned those weeks ago. These would not willingly dissipate and return from whence they’d come. These would batter the Landed until their masters gave them leave to stop.
Only if you can keep the boy alive, she says.
It is their only weakness, and it gives Bersuq pause.
It is enough. She storms through him, forcing him into the deepest corners of his mind to the point that he can no longer comprehend the possibility of regaining himself.
The world comes alive through Bersuq’s senses: the smell of a peat fire; the heat from the suurahezhan against his skin; the touch of Bersuq’s tongue as she forces him to continue to chant, mimicking his low, rhythmic sounds.
The other Maharraht do not appear to have noticed, so lost in their actions are they. She watches closely as Soroush takes another gem: jasper. He reaches out to Nasim, and she nearly stops him, nearly throws herself against him so that Nasim will not be forced to summon another elder to the mortal plane. As she watches Nasim’s mouth open, watches Soroush place the milky stone upon his tongue, she realizes that there is a sense of satisfaction within Bersuq. He is still buried in the corners of his mind, but it is unmistakable. He is pleased.
Nasim swallows the stone, his head bobbing as he does so, and she believes at first that Bersuq’s satisfaction comes from what Nasim is doing. Four stones have been swallowed. The earth begins to crack as the vanahezhan takes shape in the courtyard. It is a mass of cracked brick and dark, packed earth. It stands and pounds the earth with its four massive arms.
And then Soroush’s chanting stops.“Did you think,”he says while turning his head to look at her, “that we would be taken so easily?”
Bersuq’s fingers go cold and tingly.
She cannot respond, for she suddenly realizes why Bersuq is satisfied-not because of Nasim, but because of her. He is pleased that she has assumed him, that her soul now rests within the constraints of his physical shell. And she knows that she must escape.
She attempts to but finds herself trapped. She claws toward the aether, scrabbles away, hoping that by throwing everything into this one last gasp that he will lose hold. But it’s no good. She is bound. Very faintly, but perfectly clear, she hears Bersuq laughing.
Soroush is smiling as well. “Settle yourself, Matra.” He picks up the final stone-an opal, the stone of life. “You’re going nowhere.”
CHAPTER 64
Rehada watched numbly as the streltsi leapt over the gunwales. As they moved in formation up the hill toward the keep, Rehada remained in the skiff. She had watched and had been able to do nothing as Nikandr fell from the ship, lost to the winds and the sea. She swallowed, fighting back tears, fighting back the rage that was boiling within her.