Nine Layers of Sky Read online

  “Did he ask for me by name?”

  “No. He said, ‘The two people who came here this afternoon.’ ”

  “It might be someone from the university,” Ilya said, to diminish her suspicions. “I told my son to phone first, but you know what youngsters are like… . Perhaps it’s one of his friends.” Behind the lie, his mind was racing. “What does he look like?”

  “I can’t really tell—his coat’s pulled up. I told him you’d have to come down. My husband doesn’t like people who aren’t guests coming into the rooms. We’ve had things stolen. Not that I’m suggesting a friend of yours—”

  “It’s not a problem. We’ll come downstairs.” He picked up the sword, still in its fishing-rod case. “For my son,” he added, in response to the landlady’s puzzled glance. His thoughts were speeding ahead. What if they had to put up a fight in the hallway? Raisana would call the police, assuming they weren’t already here. He could not think of a way to say, “Is this man from the FSB, do you think?” without arousing her suspicions.

  But when they stepped into the hallway, he saw that it was not a policeman at all. It was Manas the bogatyr.

  Interlude

  BYELOVODYE, N.E. 80

  From the heights of the Edraya, Pergama Province stretched below in a blur of heat. The waves of dark green and azure forest were broken only by the little towns, basking in the sun. The smoke of the recent fires still hung above the peaks of the Balchus, and the dim land was marked with a long scorched scar. Shadia Anikova found herself reluctant to look at it, as though she could force it from memory.

  “Look, you can see it,” Natasha said, destroying Anikova’s attempt at denial. “Must have been one hell of a bang.” She reached out and squeezed her sister’s hand. Anikova gave a tight nod.

  “I didn’t think we were going to make it. I still can’t believe it happened. One minute everything was fine and normal, and the next moment … There was a breach. No warning, nothing.” She closed her eyes for a moment, trying to blot out the recollection of that great rift of light opening out over the land. It was, however, the reason she was here today. Kitai had insisted that she take a break for a couple of days, and Anikova had been happy enough to agree, though not for reasons of personal trauma: a weekend at the family dacha had won her a brief respite from the Mechvor.

  “I didn’t see anything in Novosty this morning, and you know I always read it from cover to cover.”

  “Of course not. They don’t want information like that to get out.” They? When, she wondered with bemusement, had Central Command ceased to be us? “The Rad told the newspapers it was a gas explosion. Who knows, some people might even believe it.” It didn’t matter whether they believed it or not, Anikova thought, nor how convincing the government-doctored information really was. The important thing was that people wanted to believe that it had just been a gas leak, that their world was not starting to fall apart at the seams.

  Only two generations, and already the truth of where they had come from was classified information, available only to the military and the upper echelons of government. And even among those in the know, it was receding into legend. After all, Anikova thought, I was born here, and so was my mother. My grandparents came here for a reason; they were pioneers.

  No one wanted to go back to the mess that was Russia, the swift deterioration of revolutionary goals that should have remained pure, and they had not been given the option. Everyone knew it was a one-way trip. But although she had known no other place, she couldn’t help wondering about the Matraya-Derevnya, the Motherland: what kind of people lived there now, and whether they spoke the same language, followed the Party, worshiped the same God.

  Natasha had parked the siydna on the landing spot immediately above the viewpoint. Now, she leaned over into space to catch the breeze.

  “You could fly from up here,” Natasha said, hanging over the edge. “You could just jump, and soar.”

  “God, Tasha, please, could you not do that. Ever since the—the explosion”—it was becoming easier to get used to the fake term—“I’ve started having a problem with heights. Anyway, you wouldn’t soar for long. You’d plummet.”

  “I’d fly,” Natasha said, her voice distant. The breath of wind carried her voice away, lifting her dark hair like a wing. It was not safe to say such things, not even here into the wind’s silence.

  “So, shall we go on up to the point?” Anikova said, uneasy.

  “When does the switchback run? On the hour?”

  “As far as I know.”

  “We haven’t been up here since October,” Anikova said. “Do you remember? We took Uncle.”

  “Oh, that’s right. Nursultan came with us, too.” She gave Anikova a reproachful look for editing her boyfriend out of their personal history, as so much had been revised from their nation’s.

  “I remember that,” Anikova said with a thin smile. She did not like Natasha’s boyfriend, whom she suspected of countergovernment sympathies. That she secretly shared those sympathies did not lessen her dislike. And there was the Islamic question, too: Nursultan’s grandfather was the Imam of a major mosque.

  The switchback began at Voronezh Point, careening across the sharp hills of the Edraya as far as Mariupol. There, the hills dropped in a scarp to the forested plains surrounding Azhutsk. By the time the sisters reached the point, there was already a queue. They could see the returning switchback coming down the opposite slope before crawling back up the ridge to the point. Anikova started to laugh.

  “What?”

  “So much for exercise,” she said. “First we take the siydna, then we take the switch.”

  “Well, we’re walking now,” Natasha said.

  “A couple of hundred meters, yes.”

  The switchback came in with a thin electric hum. Above it, the air wavered. Anikova could smell hot metal: an enticing, tarry odor. They filed through the gate and strapped in.

  “Oh, I’m sitting backward,” Natasha said, dismayed. “Change with me, Shadouschka?”

  “No, thanks. You can handle it.”

  “Shadia!” Natasha cried. But her sister’s name was lost in the gush of air as the switchback took off, hurtling down the slope and up the other side of the ridge. As they climbed, the pace slowed and the scent of pine, resinous and acrid, filled the car. Anikova could have reached out and drawn her hand along the branches. Blue fronds of dzadra floated out between the clusters of fir. All the roads in Pergama skirted the forests, but the switchback had been carved straight through, to follow the line of the gorges.

  They were far enough into the woods at this point for Anikova to feel that a bridge had been crossed, that they were in the part of Byelovodye that belonged only to itself, and not to the colonists. She knew that it was foolish, there on the plunging, plummeting monorail with the pergolas and cafes of Lake Irrin at the other end, but she wished the switchback would stop, that they could get off and wander into the woods’ heart. Then she thought of the rusalki, smiling behind their mantles, and of the other things that were supposed to live in the forests, and she felt herself grow cold.

  As they came up over the last ridge, Anikova caught a glimpse of Lake Irrin lying below, blue and gentle in the afternoon sunshine. The switchback rolled down to a halt beside the lake station. As they stepped down onto the platform, the air was noticeably cooler, with a breeze blowing across the water. Anikova felt as though she could breathe for the first time since the breach. The psychic turmoil left behind by the Mechvor’s probing was ebbing away, too. But she did not want to think about Kitai, not today.

  They walked slowly along the promenade, to the edge of the water. Irrin glittered in the sun. Carp swam lazily in the shallows, between the green banners of weed. The little town itself reached up the slopes of Drezneya, built in the thirties as a resort and self-consciously charming. It was much favored by the members of Central Command and the Rad for their summer homes. It was pretty in winter, but difficult to reach without siydni transpor
t, and often walled off by the blizzards.

  “Some wealthy people up here,” Natasha said, as she did every time they came. At the end of the promenade a teahouse overlooked the lake, and they secured a table on the terrace. Natasha sat looking up at the chalets, each with its balcony and dark curling roof.

  “You could afford to live here,” Anikova teased. Natasha snorted.

  “I couldn’t. Nursultan’s family could.”

  “That’s what I meant.”

  Natasha raised her dark eyebrows.

  “And what makes you think Nursultan wants to live cheek by jowl with Christians? Not that he’s prejudiced, you understand, but—”

  “How is he, anyway?” Anikova asked.

  “His father’s influence has put him on the Standards Committee. I haven’t seen that much of him.”

  “He passed selection, then?” It surprised Anikova. She thought again of those doubtful sympathies; of the earnest counseling of the Mechvor.

  “I suppose so. Did I tell you he’s out in Tatzinsk?”

  “No. What’s he doing there?”

  “There’s talk of a joint party summit in the autumn: us, Bakistan, and Uralesk. The Bakistanis want to develop Tahe as a free-trade zone.”

  “The Uraciks won’t like that.”

  “They’re pragmatists,” Natasha said absently.

  “They’re willing to concede a certain amount, as long as they get what they want in return, which is a chunk of the southern steppe. That’s the trouble with this world. What with the tribes, Christians, Islam, and the Party, it’s not big enough for all of us any longer.”

  Anikova stirred her glass, watching the tea—the color of beechwood—swirl within. God forbid that they should go back to the situation in the fifties. She and her sisters had heard their father’s stories over and over again: the spark attack on Akcholai, the firestorms set by the horse tribes. Place makes you what you are, Anikova thought, and when that is stripped away and you are forced to live somewhere utterly new, then you have to revise who you are and where you derive your identity. Their mother had gained hers from nationalism, but she had watched her father become increasingly disillusioned, until the breach had taken him from them.

  And where do I take my identity from? Anikova wondered, staring out over the rippling waters of Irrin.

  Voices drifted across the lake from an ornamental pleasure boat, and Anikova could hear the tap of a horse’s hooves along the road. The Rhus and their horses, she thought, inseparable wherever they went. The sun was skimming the western rim of the Balchus, floating above the Edraya. Soon it would be gone.

  Anikova and Natasha walked back along the lakeshore and sat on the station wall to wait for the switchback. Going toward Voronezh, the woods were dim in the fading light. Anikova strained her eyes looking through the shadows, but the woods were still. The scent of resin was still strong in the early evening air. She leaned back in her seat and shut her eyes, and, unbidden, the thought came to her: We are still here, we Russians. After all this time and all the things that have befallen us, we are still here.

  The thought made her uneasy, as if time was reaching back to them, a breath of future change in the idyllic day.

  That was the problem with her people, Anikova reflected, always giving a nod to fate in case something unpleasant waited around the corner, never accepting that life, even for a short while, could be truly untroubled.

  Part Six

  One

  KYRGYZSTAN, 21ST CENTURY

  At first, Ilya did not recognize the bogatyr. Manas had been tall, flamboyantly bearded, filled with a nonchalant and menacing elan. Now, Ilya saw only a stooping figure huddled in the folds of a dirty coat. When they entered the hallway, Manas was perched on a nearby chair, staring into space. He started at the sound of their footsteps, then hastened up to Ilya and put both hands on his shoulders, standing too close, with obvious intent. Ilya took an involuntary step back. The long Kyrgyz face was still handsome, though now it was clean-shaven. Manas’ eyes were bright and hectic. Ilya felt a momentary gratification that he had not been the only one whom the years had not treated so kindly.

  So, Ilya thought. It seems I am not the last, after all. The realization made him shiver, like cold rain. And if Manas is still alive, then how many others of my strange kind? And why has there been no trace of them until now? Why have I not heard them all these many years? And then, the coldest thought of all: They used to say only one bogatyr could kill another.

  Manas’ thoughts were, it seemed, running along similar lines. “Such a long time! When was it we last met?” There was clear challenge in his face. We are born enemies. Manas, Ilya recalled, had always loved to walk on the edge. At least the bogatyr had the wit not to use Ilya’s real name.

  “It must be the eighties, at least,” Ilya said politely. True enough. The eighteen eighties, anyway.

  “Amazing. It seems like yesterday. Listen, I need to talk to you.” His eyes slid over Elena with evident appreciation. Ilya bristled. The landlady’s eyes were shining with curiosity. “Alone,” Manas added.

  “All right,” Ilya said warily. “We’ll go up to the room.” He looked toward the landlady. “I’ll keep an eye on him, I promise.”

  “I’ll wait here,” Elena said. Ilya cast her a mute plea: Explain this. As he headed back up the stairs, Manas in tow, he heard her say to the landlady, “Perhaps my nephew’s in trouble… .”

  —and the landlady’s reply, “Often it happens, when the mother dies. One minute they’re such good boys and then they go right off the rails.”

  Ilya smiled to himself. His own mother had died hundreds of years ago, but he still felt the loss, even though he could no longer remember exactly what she had looked like. She’d had blonde hair, like Elena’s. The recollection was somehow unsettling. He reached the door of the room and motioned to Manas.

  “Inside.”

  “Oh, no,” the bogatyr said, balking like a horse. He made a sweeping gesture with one hand. “You can go first.”

  “Very well,” Ilya said, but he unfastened the fishing-rod case and kept Manas in the corner of his sight as he went through the door. The room was as silent and empty as they had left it. A halo of light could be seen through the window: a streetlamp, blurred. It was raining again.

  “So,” Ilya said, turning. “How was the twentieth century for you?”

  Manas gave an indifferent shrug. “Nothing much.”

  “Oh, come on. Not even Kyrgyzstan’s been that quiet.”

  “I spent most of it in the mountains with my people. They still believe, you know, up in the Alatau. They don’t give a damn what happens outside their own valleys. They still sing songs about me.” He paused. “Actually, now that the Russian rabbits have scuttled back to their burrows, I’m getting a lot more attention these days. There’s even been a TV series about me.” He looked up at Ilya with sly pride. “That’s something, eh? What about you?”

  “Someone wrote an opera,” Ilya said. It was hard not to be bitter, harder still not to see the funny side of the matter.

  “Oh, but that’s wonderful,” Manas said with a thin edge of contempt. “As long as they’re still singing songs about us, we live on, eh?”

  It had occurred to Ilya more than once that there might be greater truth in that than Manas realized. What if they really were no more than phantoms, the embodied dreams of their respective lands, anchored to the world by a tenuous thread of belief? It would explain why he had spent the last decade in a haze of heroin and alcohol. No one believed in anything anymore. Perhaps he was no more than a reflection of that lack. We are, none of us, individuals. We are only what society makes of us, humans or heroes. What was a hero but a collection of valued qualities, in service to his fellow man or the State? It was a central tenet of Marxism and it seemed appropriate to Ilya that a hero should be less real than ordinary men, rather than truly superhuman.

  “So why are you here, Manas? Have you come to welcome me to your mountains? And ho
w did you find me, anyway?”

  “I followed the people who are following you.”

  It was a shock, but not a surprise.

  “And who are they?” Ilya asked.

  “For a man who is a hero, you’ve certainly managed to attract some undesirable characters. Not your lady friend—she’s lovely—but you had a party of dream-stealers on your tail, did you know that? You’ve lost them for the moment, though. Do you know why they’re following you?”

  “Do you mean the FSB?”

  “What? A bunch of petty bureaucrats? No, not them. I mean dream-stealers. People who control what goes on inside other people’s heads. The people who run organizations like the FSB.”

  “Manas, I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Best to pretend ignorance for the moment.

  “Of course you don’t. You’re a Russian. You probably don’t have anything going on in that head of yours except where the next vodka’s coming from.”

  Finally, the realization hit Ilya. “Do you mean a volkh ? A man named Kovalin?”

  “That’s the one. You’ve met him?”

  “Yes.”

  “And what did he tell you?”

  “The same thing that you just did. They are working against the creatures known as rusalki. My enemies.”

  “And so you immediately assumed they were your friends.”

  “No, I am not completely an idiot. I agreed to help them because Kovalin told me he had the power to give me something I wanted. In turn, they wanted me to find an object for them. Something belonging to the rusalki.”

  “And did you find it?” There was a sudden burn behind Manas’ gaze, an eagerness.

  “Not yet,” Ilya said cautiously. Instinct told him that it was best to keep quiet about the object. “I went to meet Kovalin’s contacts. Elena came with me. She’s a scientist.”

  The bogatyr was frowning.

  “Once you found this object, what were you planning to do? Hand it over to Kovalin?”

  “I arranged to meet his contacts, to discuss the matter,” Ilya said, “but the rusalki got to them first.”