The Black Khan
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Illarion stared back at her, his clever face unreadable.
“Go,” she muttered. “The lights will sweep from the tower in thirty seconds. If we run out of time, you must divert their attention at the door.”
“I know what I’m doing, Anya. Whether you believe it or not.”
Larisa and Elena waited in the shadows as Illarion crossed Jaslyk’s courtyard. Torches flared at the gate, men’s voices ringing out. Illarion showed them something from his pack. A pass? A document? Elena couldn’t guess.
“Now.”
She tugged at her sister’s hand, guiding her through the barricades in the courtyard, the secret hiding places, the small patches of cover, ducking out of the path of the lights. Dogs began to howl in the distance. A patrol shifted on the perimeter, doubling back to the gate. The Salikh sisters moved forward, darting ahead under the great weight of the ominously pooling shadows.
The courtyard was as vast as the prison itself. Neither sister could look at its walls with anything other than despair. How many members of the resistance had been broken at Jaslyk? Drugaddled and pain-ridden, they had told the Crimson Watch everything they knew before they had died, painfully, pitilessly rendered from themselves. Based on their confessions, new prisoners had been captured, Basmachi hunted through the Hazing, and still there was no shortage of screams to shatter the sightless eyes that watched over Jaslyk.
One day she’d burn the prison down.
But not this night. She had no fighters or armory at her disposal. All she had was Larisa, and she could see Larisa was faltering, overcome by the memory of her time at Jaslyk. Both sisters had been drugged, raped, and tortured; both had suffered the full range of the Technologist’s experiments. Both had lost their ability to hear the Claim. Though the loss of it had once been unbearable, for Larisa’s sake, she had pretended to a strength she didn’t possess.
“Don’t think of it, Larisa.”
Another high-pitched scream scraped against the walls, spurring Elena on. The sisters found their way to the door that fronted the basin of the lake. There were dogs at the door, accompanied by guards. They had picked up the sisters’ scent, and now they began to howl.
“Hurry.”
Behind the outer rings of its walls, Jaslyk was composed of irregular shapes designed to maximize the interior space, while giving guards and staff the ability to transition easily between the courtyard and the prison blocks. This allowed the Crimson Watch greater vigilance. It also reduced the possibility of escape. Elena and Ruslan’s mission to rescue Larisa, a year ago, was the last time a prisoner had left Jaslyk alive.
But the diamond-shaped construction of the prison also concealed a weakness. The Basmachi had been able to dig tunnels beneath the transition areas, and the Crimson Watch couldn’t cover them all, particularly as more and more men were being summoned to the Wall.
The sisters skirted the barricades that had been erected over Larisa’s escape route.
It was meant as a feint, of course. Elena pressed her sister’s hand, holding a finger to her lips. She had no intention of using the same tunnel. One of the dogs barked, closer than she expected. She stumbled against the barricade. Her hand pulled something from the pack she carried—a scented powder that she flung over the risers. The dogs began a frantic whining. She pulled Larisa around a corner. “Let them cover their ears for once.”
She led Larisa along the south wall, away from the patrol. As they’d planned, the torches along the southern perimeter had been redirected to the gate, where Illarion engaged the guards. It was the first sign to suggest that perhaps Illarion could be trusted.
Feeling her way along the wall, Elena stopped when she came to the stone she had etched with Basmachi signals. She’d imprinted each of the prison blocks with a series of directions, distinguishing the Technologist’s Wing from the others. She picked out the command center at the intersection of the blocks, a heavily guarded nexus she knew they needed to avoid.
“It’s here.”
Elena dropped to her knees, running her hands along the stone base of the wall. She looked over her shoulder at Larisa. “What’s our mission here?”
She knew the answer; she was making sure Larisa understood the cost of what they were leaving undone: their friends in the resistance left behind to face the Technologist.
Larisa hesitated. Then she confirmed her choice. “The Companion of Hira. Her safety is paramount now.”
Elena shifted a stone. A narrow and airless passageway opened beneath it. She’d heard a dozen rumors about the fall of the Registan, yet she still didn’t know which of the rumors were true. “Why? Because you swore an oath to the Silver Mage? Did his comeliness bewitch you?” This had been rumored as well.
Larisa slid into the tunnel first, Elena following behind, careful to shelter her ribs. She’d smoked timbaku to dull the pain inflicted by the Ahdath’s blade in Marakand, something she’d withheld from Illarion. She wasn’t in the habit of confessing weakness, especially to an Ahdath. Once they reached the corridors of Jaslyk, her injury would be the least of her concerns.
“Don’t insult me,” Larisa answered. “You know what I think of men. I swore my oath to the First Oralist. And I would do it again.” She turned to face Elena suddenly, a cold and deadly warning in her eyes. “We have one purpose, Elena, one. And that is to free our sisters, a mission the First Oralist shares. Do you understand me?”
Elena nodded, satisfied that Larisa hadn’t led them on a fool’s mission. Her sister was still committed to their cause.
They moved along the tunnel, swallowed by the dark.
13
ILLARION WAS ESCORTED TO THE COMMAND CENTER BY THE WARDEN OF Jaslyk, a stooped-over man whose wisps of white hair covered his scalp like a crown. The Warden’s vision was distorted by a pair of goggles. From behind the goggles, his blue eyes scanned the room. He dressed in a long white smock, cinched at the waist by a thick metallic belt sectioned into chambers. As a functionary, he wore no crimson: he wasn’t a member of the Ahdath.
Illarion scanned the command center. It was staffed by eight men, all members of the Crimson Watch, each with an area of jurisdiction patrolled with relentless regularity. Each man was junior to Illarion in the Ahdath’s hierarchy, and each accorded him the necessary signs of respect. He briefed them on the fall of the Registan, concluding by asking, “Could it have been orchestrated by prisoners held here?”
“There have been no escapes and no communications, as far as we are aware. But a prisoner has just arrived from Marakand. Marat can tell you more.” The Warden nodded at the man responsible for the Technologist’s activities.
The soldier named Marat saluted Illarion. “Captain Illarion. Or are you Commander of the Wall now?”
“No. The Authoritan sends Commander Nevus from Black Aura to take command. We expect him any day.”
The men in the room straightened at the mention of Nevus’s name. It was a name they feared more than Araxcin’s.
“He won’t be coming here,” Illarion clarified. “Unless he has some reason to suspect your prisoner’s involvement in the attack on the Registan.”
Marat considered this. “Perhaps he does. She was taken to the Technologist on arrival. She’s due to be moved to the Plague Wing tomorrow.”
Illarion straightened. He placed his hand on the pommel of his sword. “When? If she’s who I think she is, she will need to be interrogated.”
But the men in the command center had their own sources, and another man spoke up. “She’s not the First Oralist. The First Oralist and the Silver Mage were captured some days ago in Black Aura. The Authoritan has them now.”
“I know that,” Illarion barked. “But your prisoner may be a Companion of Hira. She must have had some knowledge of the attack.”
“She is,” the Warden conceded. “I thought as much—two members of the Council of Hira would not make their way behind the Wall without a purpose. If there’s anything to know, the Technologist will have the answers for you tonight.” He nodded at a heavy-lidded pewter bowl on the table behind him.
“Why tonight?”
The Warden lifted the lid of the bowl. “The Companion of Hira took longer to break than one of the Basmachi. But once we removed her circlets, she fell to the persuasion of the needle.”
He did not touch the objects in the bowl, even though he wore gloves. Illarion had no such qualms. He gathered the golden circlets in his hands. He’d seen them once before, on the arms of the First Oralist. This pair must be Sinnia’s. “A pretty prize to take to the Wall.”
The Warden grabbed his arm. “The Technologist hasn’t finished with them.”
Illarion shook off the Warden’s hand. His voice was low and dangerous. “I will present them at the Wall. If you wish otherwise, you may explain your wishes to Commander Nevus.”
The guards in the room glanced at one another. No one intervened.
His face pale with alarm, the Warden cleared his throat. “What is it you wish?”
“I wish to be taken to the prisoner. You, man.” He snapped at Marat. “You will show me the way.” He slipped the circlets beneath his breastplate, taking the measure of the Crimson Watch. At last his gaze came to rest on the slack-mouthed Warden. “You may accompany us.”
“The Technologist is in the midst of an experiment. You cannot enter the room.”
Sinnia’s earsplitting scream sounded through Jaslyk again.
“I’m well aware.” He jerked another object off the table behind the Warden. A mask with goggles larger than the Warden’s own. He tossed a second mask at Marat.
“You’re coming with me. Before her mind collapses, I want to know what she knows.”
14
DANIYAR RESTED HIS HEAD AGAINST THE RIM OF THE GREEN-MARBLED tub. He was soaking in a bath prepared for him by two of the loveliest women he’d ever seen, slaves from the northernmost regions of the Transcasp, their skin translucent, their hair and eyes golden, their luxurious flesh softly rounded. They murmured to each other in dove-soft voices, and he recognized their tongue as the ancient tongue of the people of Russe.
His bath was scented with rose petals and a luminous gold powder that worked its way into the tissue of his deepest scars, easing his pain and healing his damaged skin. His forearms were wrapped in a soft leather binding, protecting his wounds from the water.
The Khanum’s maidservants hovered on either side of the tub, passing him lotions and oils, offering to scrub him from head to toe. He dismissed them with a frown, yet the instant they left, he missed their raillery, their utter absence of malice when everything else the Ark had to offer promised him unrelenting pain. And if he was honest with himself, the gentle feminine interest expressed by the doves’ attentions was a respite he welcomed as a man pushed too hard and too long by his trials.
He was forced to fight in the rites of the Qatilah, sometimes with a sword, sometimes with a club, oftimes bare-handed, falling back on his limited abilities with the Claim. Though each night’s trial concluded in hard-fought victory, his battered and bloody body was dragged back to his cell, his limbs aching from the effort it had taken him to resist, his thoughts inevitably darkened by the killing of so many men.
To be shifted from the Pit to Lania’s luxurious apartments was a contrast that weakened his resolve, testing the extent of his honor. He held fast to one thought in his mind—if he responded to Lania’s overtures, perhaps he might lure her to his side. If he could make her believe he was drawn in by her allure or her resemblance to Arian, an opportunity might arise: a chance to escape the Ark with Arian at his side.
He was half-dressed when Lania called him. Moving less stiffly now, he let her pull him down beside her onto a chaise cushioned in silk. Her feline eyes grew heated as she viewed his state of undress. She leaned close to him, resting a hand on the sculpted planes of his chest. “Another man would not deny himself the pleasures my courtiers offer.”
He met her gaze, his voice courteous but firm. “We’ve discussed this,” he said. “These girls from the north of the Transcasp are slaves. They’re compelled to your wishes by their servitude. I am the Guardian of Candour. I have never touched a woman against her will.”
Lania’s laughter sounded, low and quiet. When she was alone with him like this, she relinquished the adornments of the Khanum. She wore a plain silk dress and had left her face unpainted, her gold-flecked eyes soft and clear. She looked younger and more vulnerable, freeing the silk of her hair with a graceful movement of her arms. A traitorous thought slipped into his mind. He imagined her slender arms gilded by Arian’s circlets. Bound though he was to Arian, it was Lania who held his attention at this moment. Indeed, she looked so much like Arian, defenseless and unafraid, that his yearning and sense of loss expanded. Here was a woman who would grant him what he wanted, with a warmth he could take if he wished. She would gladly end the self-denial he’d chosen to endure too long, a temptation he’d thought himself immune to.
“You underrate yourself, my lord,” she answered him. “You would not need to compel my doves—they would attend to you gladly.” She moved from the chaise to kneel behind him. When he couldn’t see her face, she added, “As would I, if you asked.”
Her hand came to rest upon his bare shoulder, moving to the base of his throat. The air between them was fraught. He knew she could feel the racing of his pulse.
“Am I not teaching you?” she urged him. “Do I not gift you with the Claim and share with you the secrets of the Authoritan? Do I not heal your wounds with the mysteries I know?”
Daniyar tipped back his head. Their eyes met in a dangerously slow seduction. His glance raked over the unpainted curves of her mouth. He caught a handful of her hair in his hand and used it to tug her closer. An answering spark lit her eyes.
“The Qatilah is rigorous,” he murmured against her lips. She kissed him, and he let her feel his response, heat stealing through his blood.
“The Authoritan insists on it,” she said when she had the chance. “He is jealous of my … interest … in you. He takes his revenge through the Qatilah.”
“And you, Lania? Do you seek to punish me as well?”
She slid onto his lap in a whisper of silk, fastening her arms around his neck. “Does this feel like punishment?” she asked.
He kissed her again, the kisses slow and rough, her rich curves pressed against the hard lines of his body, appreciating anew how different she was from Arian—the pampered softness of her flesh distinct from Arian’s strength, the calculation behind her response instead of Arian’s honesty. He pushed the thought of Arian away and kissed Lania more deeply, grasping her head with his hand. When she was pliant in his arms, he murmured the question on his mind—the question he’d waited to ask.
“Your attentions to me are not as marked at the Qatilah. Do you fear the loyalty of the men who bring me here?”
Surprised but too languid to stir, she answered, “No, these men serve only me. Just as the doves are mine.”
“Then what do you fear? If the Authoritan does not claim you as his own, what is it that he wants?”
Irritation crept into her voice. “What does any man want? Territory.”
He traced his hand over the silk of her dress, gently squeezing. “Is this not territory enough? As it would be for me.”
Suspicious now, she asked, “Do you play with me, Daniyar? Or do you offer the truth?”
He sensed the uncertainty behind her words—her longing for his regard, and a deeper yearning yet to take him for herself. But he didn’t know if it was the man she wanted or the legend of the Silver Mage. Or whether she was more damaged than he knew, and she sought to strike at Arian where she knew it would hurt her most. Because unlike Arian, when Lania was in his arms, she resisted the chance to surrender. Beneath the luxurious entreaty of her kisses, she maintained a conspicuous control.
“You are an Augur, Lania.” He used her name to mitigate her mistrust, urging her to believe he respected her sorcerous gifts. “How could I hide the truth from you?”
Suddenly alight, she searched his face for confirmation. “Would you have me think you have given Arian up in the face of this trifling temptation?”
He took her hand and dragged it down his body, forcing her to acknowledge the evidence of his desire. “Do not disparage yourself. And do not think me a fool unable to see who you are.”
For a moment there was silence as Lania caressed him, pushing him back against the chaise. She leaned over to whisper in his ear, her artful tongue flickering inside. “I think you are a man who does not forsake his bonds, though why you have chosen Arian when she is beholden to Hira, I cannot understand. What power does she possess that you practice this self-denial?” Her eyes became hazy and slumberous, occupied by the work of her hands. “Why beg for crumbs from her table when I offer the banquet entire?”
Her clever, caressing hands nearly stole his resolve—it took him a moment to remember his purpose in this room. He shifted her off his lap on the pretext of stretching his back.
“I will fight for you,” he vowed. “But not for the pleasure of the Authoritan. Think of how he diminishes you, while I would be eager to serve you. If I am to stand at your side, why spend my strength at the Ark?” He dropped his voice to its lowest register, growling the words in her ear. “Don’t you wish me to claim the Wall?”
Lania drew away, as if something in his eyes made it impossible for her to hold his gaze.
He pulled her back, curling a hand around her neck, letting her feel the potency of his desire. She needed to believe he would fight at her side, unconquerable in his strength—her partner in all things.
“I see a man at the Wall,” she answered. “And that man is not the Authoritan. More than that, I cannot make out.” Her voice grew cool. “There is a woman at his side … a woman who commands the Wall.”
But Lania wasn’t certain, and Daniyar read the truth of this as well. “The woman must be you.”
“She is dark and fights like a man.”
She misread his frown, drawing away to stare out the window. Daniyar followed her, conscious of his state of undress. He needed to press her now—or all he’d risked to persuade her would be lost, his commitment to Arian forfeit.
“The man at the Wall could be me—it feels as though it should be.”
She touched her forehead to his. Daniyar misjudged the action, hurrying into speech.
“To stand at the Wall at your side, I would need the magic of the Bloodprint. Every moment hastens it away. Flee Black Aura with me. Set me on the Black Khan’s trail.”
Lania went still, in no doubt now of his intentions. With an angry grimace of dismissal, she freed herself from his embrace, spearing a quick glance at the upper galleries of the room, screened by lattices of stone. “I cannot betray the Authoritan. Not after everything he’s sacrificed for me. Besides which, the Bloodprint would not serve you. Why do you imagine the Authoritan was willing to trade it away? He was High Priest of the Bloodless. He studied it so deeply he twisted its meaning beyond recognition. He has mastery over the Claim. You cannot use it against him.”
But Daniyar didn’t believe this. Why else would Arian have been subjected to the humiliation of a slave-collar? The Authoritan feared the powers of the First Oralist of the Claim. Which meant that the Claim could still be used against him. He pressed her for an explanation. “Then why did you summon Arian here, if not to make use of her gifts?”
“I do not require Arian to teach me what she once learned from me,” Lania snapped. “I asked her to tell me of Hira.” She studied him, sensing something of his reaction to her use of Arian’s name—the longing that he was never completely able to suppress.
“Of Hira? Why?”
“It was the seat of my childhood. It was everything I aspired to. Can you not fathom that I have missed the sisterhood of the Companions?”
Daniyar schooled his thoughts. She was lying, an undercurrent of hate feeding the words. And though he couldn’t think why, there might be a way to use it. “Come to Hira, then,” he said. “Arian would aid you in any way you wished. If you help her against the Talisman, she will stand at the Wall by your side.”
“That is not what I have Augured. There is one man, one woman at the Wall. And I know I shall never leave Black Aura.” She said this without self-pity.
She left him and he knew he’d lost her. When she turned back to face him, she was robed in the premeditated power of the Authoritan’s consort again, his betrayal of Arian for naught.
“Are you imagining I would cede command of the Wall when I labored all my life to secure it? Can you possibly believe I would swear my fealty to yet another man, dependent on his intercession to save me from being ravaged by his soldiers?” She spat her next words at him. “Black Aura is mine; these are my men, my slaves, my prisoners. You will take your place among them. Or not, as you decide.” She let the words burn through him.
Daniyar bowed his head. He had moved too soon and lost.
She called her guards to take him to his cell, speaking with perfect indifference. “You will fight in the Qatilah tonight. I will send Arian to watch you.”
Daniyar risked another question, knowing he had nothing to lose. “What of my blood, Lania? Why do you collect it for the Authoritan? What use does he make of it?”
She moved to stand before him, raising her hand to his chin to tilt down his head. She gazed into his eyes, focusing her attention on the silver pinpoints. “Yes,” she murmured. “You have the birthright of the Silver Mage, just as the Black Khan shares the mark of the Dark Mage. I have often wondered how a Mage is chosen and marked. Your eyes give your birthright away. They are remarkable. They gift you with your powers. They keep you alive in the Qatilah.”
But that was only part of it, and Daniyar knew better than to share with her the rest. How he too had some small knowledge of the Claim to aid him in unobtrusive ways.
She smiled a secret smile suggesting she already knew. “Your blood is magic,” she said to Daniyar. “And you are magic, my lord.”
Though he needed to know how his blood was usurped, she told him nothing else.
How beautiful and lost she was, he thought.
As he had nearly lost himself.
15
THE TECHNOLOGIST EXAMINED THE SUBJECT ON THE TABLE. SHE HAD passed out, her exquisitely dark limbs lying limp. Some of his men had asked to use her, but she was not a prize to be squandered on the base desires of rabble.
There was something about this Companion.
Though she craved the needle, the gas affected her differently than it did the others. When he gave her a respite, she thrashed with all her strength against her restraints, her liquid-dark eyes sharp with rage. She became clearer, more powerful, more certain of who she was. And though she couldn’t speak, her eyes promised him a savage revenge.
It was intriguing. It was exciting.
He bent over her, his barbed fingers tracing the thin white circles the mask had outlined on her tautened flesh. She was nothing like the women of the Tilla Kari, cosseted and indulged. Her limbs were lean and muscular, capable and well formed. A delicious sense of possibility curled through his awareness. What use could he make of this creature? How could he bend her to his will? How long would it take to wrench the beauty of the Claim from her throat?
He pressed his thumbs against her larynx. How easy it would be to silence her for good. He very much wanted to, but there was more to learn from the gifts of this Companion from the Negus. To her credit, between her screams she’d tried to calm herself by murmuring verses of the Claim. He’d increased the volume of the gas, and her voice had fallen silent, but it still preserved the strength the Companion contained within.