The Winds of Khalakovo - Bradley P. Beaulieu [157]
Then suddenly Ahya had turned, tears streaming down her cheeks, and embraced her. “I’m sorry, Memma. I’m sorry.”
As they had hugged, Rehada began to understand. Ahya thought she had driven a wedge between them by telling a secret. But in truth, there was nothing to be ashamed of. It was something she should have told Soroush herself. Her daughter had been honest where she should have been, and she was deeply embarrassed over it.
“Child, stop your tears. There is nothing to be sorry for. Nothing.”
Ahya had buried her head into her shoulder and said, “Please. Please forgive me.”
Rehada had leaned her head in close to Ahya’s ear and whispered. “I forgive you.”
Rehada came out of her dream whispering those words to Atiana. She felt her own tears creeping down her cheeks and leaking, salty and hot, into the corners of her mouth.
“I forgive you,” she said one last time, to Ahya, not to Atiana.
And then she felt Fahroz’s hand on her shoulder. “Enough, Rehada. It is enough.”
She pulled away and found the older woman crying nearly as hard as was she. There were no tears in Atiana’s eyes, but there was a certain shock there, and a faint look of apology. Rehada was not, surprisingly, angry at this. She had shed too much of that emotion already this day and so she simply nodded to her.
“Come,” Fahroz said while walking toward the doors, “let us go to the lake.”
CHAPTER 48
Atiana had been sure, in that small instant after Rehada had confessed that her daughter had been killed on Nazakhov, that she had somehow orchestrated the attack of the suurahezhan on Radiskoye’s eyrie. But as the questioning continued, she became less convinced, and when the Aramahn beauty had begun crying upon her shoulder, she was not at all sure that Rehada could be turned to such violence... It seemed as though she had locked her emotions away for so long that it would be inconceivable for her to perform murder and still hold such feelings inside. Surely, if that had been so, they would have been released like vapors from a bottle.
Still, the entire experience had been jarring. She hadn’t known that Rehada had been a mother, and certainly hadn’t known what sort of pain she had gone through. It was strange, once again, to be faced with a different reality than the one she had pictured for Nikandr’s lover.
One thing bothered her about this, though. Clearly Rehada had harbored resentment for the Landed since her daughter’s regrettable death. Why, then, would she remain here in Uyadensk and flirt with the aristocracy? Why wouldn’t she simply take to the winds or stay with her own kind? Perhaps what she said was true: that she wished to know a place as she had Nazakhov. But that didn’t explain her attraction to Nikandr. It may be that she wanted to use him, to place herself in a position of power that she could achieve in no other way.
The thoughts fled as they moved deeper into the village toward the lake. It had not been long since Atiana had taken the dark, but as always, a churning in her gut began to rise as the ritual approached.
The lake, once they reached it, felt different. The first time, it had been a unique experience. She had known about the lakes in the villages, but she had had no idea what sort of power they held. She wondered if the Matri knew that they could be used in the same way as the drowning chambers. Surely they must, but who would use them? Only a handful of Aramahn in all the world could do such a thing; Fahroz was perhaps their most adept and still she was like a child to Atiana, who in turn was like a child to the longstanding Matri.
Despite these assurances, the lake seemed like a weakness, something that should be dealt with. In time, if she had any say over it, she would.
Fahroz and Rehada led the way to the shoreline. They waited as Atiana disrobed, at which point they worked together to rub the rendered goat’s fat over her body.
She lay back in the freezing water and with the other two women’s arms holding her, floated free. She fought against