“Barkav can wait,” said Astinsai, her voice hoarse with age and smoke-weed. “This cannot. Follow me.”
Why? he wanted to ask. But he kept quiet and followed her as she slowly made her way toward her tent, despite his growing bewilderment. Astinsai was one of the few people alive who could make kataris from the kalishium that the Ones had left behind when they went back to the stars. It was a long and arduous process, and it was now many years since she had accepted a new assignment. But she had made many of the kataris that the Marksmen of Khur now carried, including Rustan’s. He could not have disobeyed her, even had he wanted to.
They reached Astinsai’s tent at the southern edge of the Khur camp, Rustan bending almost double to squeeze inside. He could not remember the last time he had been in the Old One’s smoky little home. She did not often invite anyone inside, preferring to keep to herself or, if needed, summon people to the council tent.
Astinsai lowered herself to sit cross-legged on the felt carpet, and the hood fell away from her seamed face and sparse white hair.
“So, you become stronger and braver, Marksman?” she said, dark eyes flashing in the lamplight with an emotion he could not identify. “Let me see your katari.”
Feeling light-headed from exhaustion and from the close air of the tent, Rustan withdrew his katari and proffered it. The kalishium blade pulsed with a soft blue light and, as always, he was struck by its beauty. It seemed more alive than either him or the bent old woman who had forged it.
Astinsai’s expression clouded. “Put it away,” she said. “I have something for you. Something that will set you on a path you cannot yet imagine.” She rose and hobbled to the back of her tent, where she removed the stopper from a decanter and poured a clear liquid into an earthen cup. She held the cup up to him.
“Drink,” she commanded.
“Is that Rasaynam?” said Rustan, dumbfounded. “There are easier ways to kill me.”
Rasaynam was a spirit Astinsai brewed for herself that was rumored to drive men mad. Even she partook of it but sparingly.
Astinsai’s face softened. “There are, but this is the one we must choose. Rasaynam will show you the truth of what happened today.”
The terrible doubt that had seized Rustan in Tezbasti rushed back. He swallowed. “The truth is that I took down a mark. I obeyed orders. I should go to the Maji-khan now and report. He will be waiting for me.”
Astinsai put down the cup. “I cannot force you,” she said. “You must want to know, for it to work for you. You must need it. But ask yourself this: How will you atone?”
Again Rustan heard the wailing sounds that had followed him out of the village and into the open desert. Again he heard the man’s pleas of innocence.
Rustan reached for the cup with a hand that was not quite steady. The liquid was bitter tasting, as if flavored by grief itself. Although he wanted to stop and spit it out, he swallowed each drop. And he knew, in the depths of his soul, this was the start of his punishment. For when he had drunk to the bottom of the cup, he saw, instead of Astinsai, the face of his mark, clutching his ruined throat as if trying to prevent blood from spilling out of it. But it spilled out anyway, running between his fingers, leaving red tracks on his arms. And the specter said, full of reproach, “I told you I was innocent.”
Rustan rose, the cup tumbling out of his hand. He tried to speak, but the scene shifted. Two elders of the Kushan council sat down to a meal with the murdered man, the father of his luckless mark. There was much talking and laughter. And then the flick of a wrist over a cup of tea—the slow-acting poison that would claim the victim’s life later that night. One of the elders stabbed a finger at Rustan. “Do you see?” he said, jovial. “See how we fooled the council and the Maji-khan. See how we fooled you.”
The victim’s face had become swollen, purple. He opened his frothing mouth and echoed Astinsai’s words, “How will you atone?”
“I will kill them!” shouted Rustan, and he reached for his katari. But the scene shifted, back to Astinsai’s tent. The old woman had not moved; she sat in the same position, watching him like a hawk.
“Is that what you will do, Marksman?” said Astinsai, a note of pity in her voice.
Rustan wiped the sweat from his forehead with a sleeve. His head was pounding as if someone had hammered nails into it. How could the Maji-khan have sent him to Tezbasti to kill an innocent man? Rustan had always trusted his elders, had never questioned them. That trust had been betrayed, his world turned upside down. And no matter the reason, it was Rustan himself whose katari had done the deed. How could he ever rely on his blade again?
“Why tell me now,” said Rustan, trembling with anger, “when there is nothing I can do about it? Why not tell me earlier?”
“I am sorry,” said Astinsai, not sounding sorry at all, “but I did not know. Not until your blade took his life.”
“I must tell the Maji-khan,” he said, wondering at his ability to speak so calmly, so normally, after what he had witnessed. “The Kushan elders will be punished.”
“But that will not bring back the dead man,” said Astinsai. “It will not undo what you have done.”
No, it won’t. He wanted to smash something, wipe that knowing look off the Old One’s face. It was as if she saw the torment he suffered, had, in fact, planned it.
Instead, he left Astinsai’s tent without another word, almost at a run, to find the Maji-khan.
Chapter 4
Mental Arts
Kyra raced up the flower-strewn slopes behind the caves of Kali, where Tamsyn liked to hold Mental Arts. Once again, she’d slept through the gong for morning assembly. She couldn’t afford to be late for class, especially not Tamsyn’s, but it was happening with depressing regularity since her initiation. She now had to take advanced classes with older, more experienced Markswomen, in addition to the classes she usually took, and it was hard to keep up. Most days, she was covered with bruises by the time she lay down to sleep.
But her sleep was filled with disturbing dreams, and brought little rest, especially since she had decoded the message Shirin Mam had given her. Kyra had hoped the parchment would be a secret of some kind, some special counsel that Shirin Mam divulged only to those who had been initiated as Markswomen. Instead, the number string had resolved into a perfect pyramid of palindromic primes. She had stared at the solution, coldness creeping up her limbs.
“Mathematics is the language of the universe,” Felda had once told her, “and primes are the building blocks of that language. The Ones probably used primes to generate codes for all their doors, even in their home world—and palindromes are beautiful in their symmetry and easy to remember. Lucky for us they used base ten in Asiana.”
Transport codes were always palindromic primes.