The Winds of Khalakovo - Bradley P. Beaulieu [212]
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.
Ashan stood just outside the skiff, holding his hand out to her. “Come,” he said. “There is work to do yet.”
She wanted to tell him to go on without her, that she would be useless, a danger to the soldiers who were there to protect her. But far up the hill, the havahezhan was already cresting the wall and flying toward them. It drew snow up from the ground, which whirled around it, making plain something that was normally difficult