The Winds of Khalakovo - Bradley P. Beaulieu [34]
Nasim was staring up at the underside of the dome, which was layered with a dark mosaic of the nighttime sky at winter solstice. As she neared, she could see that his eyes were moving from constellation to constellation. His eyes would thin, and he would mumble something as if he were conversing with the stars, and then he would move on, his eyes widening. She sat cross-legged nearby, hoping he would take notice of her, and when he didn’t she simply watched, curious how long it would continue.
“Can you hear me, Nasim?” she asked. “Are you there?”
Nothing.
She continued to speak to him, but in the end decided it was a fruitless tack. Soroush had been unable to speak with him reliably in the years that he’d held him. How could she in mere minutes hope to do any better?
Instead of trying, she closed her eyes and opened her mind to the suurahezhan she had bound to her the night before. She let the world around her fade and bid the fire spirit to come. She could feel it on the far side of the aether, and as she communed with it, she asked it what lay nearby within the spirit world of Adhiya. But bonding with the hezhan was a wholly different thing from communicating with them, and it was not a skill with which she was particularly gifted. She tried for a long time, learning nothing.
She was startled by a tapping on her shoulder. Looking up, she realized that Ashan was standing over her.
Immediately she stood and bowed. Her heart was beating madly. “I am grateful our paths have crossed.” She had hoped to speak with him on this foray into Iramanshah, but she had had no idea she would be so cowed by his presence. Again she regretted she had never met one of the arqesh while she had been on the path of peace. Why was it only now, when she had tied her fate to that of the Maharraht, that the fates decided she should meet one?
She would contemplate this later, and hopefully learn from it, but for now she pushed the thoughts away and gave all her concentration to the task at hand.
Ashan bowed his head, smiling a wide, crooked smile. “I am Ashan Kida al Ahrumea.”
“My name is Rehada Ulan al Shineshka, and you are known to me.”
“I see you have met my young charge, Nasim.”
Rehada was surprised that he used his real name, but then again, he was arqesh, and would find it difficult to lie. Plus, no one on the island, except perhaps her, would know anything about Nasim. It was the unfortunate nature of the Aramahn and their ceaseless travels that so many of them were strangers to one another, even if they did have long memories.
“I can’t say that I’ve truly met him,” she replied. “He seems like a contemplative boy.”
Ashan chuckled. “I’ve heard him called many things before, but contemplative hasn’t been one of them.”
“What would you call him, then?”
“I would call him lost.”
“Lost.”
“Lost within the confines of his mind, constantly trying to find his way out.”
Rehada looked down at the boy and considered this. He continued to study the mosaics above. His lips moved, but she could hear no sound.
“And you’re helping him to find it?”
He shrugged. “As I can, though the path has been difficult.”
“If you’ve come to the island to learn, then perhaps I could help. I’ve been living here for nearly seven years.”
Ashan smiled that same crooked smile, as if he knew something Rehada did not. She should be grateful for any words she spoke with such a man, but she had to admit that the gesture was starting to annoy her.
“What is it you find so amusing?”
“I am not amused, daughter of Shineshka, but surprised. Your mother, in all her years, never stopped in one place for more than a season.”
“You knew her?”
“At one time I knew her well, though we lost touch shortly before you were born.”
“How did you know her?”
He raised his eyebrows. “She came to me often,