The Flames of Shadam Khoreh (The Lays of Anuskaya) by Bradley Beaulieu

like very expensive tabbaq into the bowl of the shisha. After lighting it, they handed tubes to each of them and then left, attending to the crowd that filled the room.
    Nikandr smelled the araq and was surprised how complex it was. It smelled of anise, but also of butter and smoke and honey and earth. The taste of it was deep, like a well through the center of a mountain. Nikandr closed his eyes as the warmth of it suffused his chest and gut. Were he alone he would have downed the entire glass and poured another, and perhaps downed that too. But he couldn’t. Not with the others watching so closely. He noticed Atiana watching him. He smiled to her, to tell her he was well, but she seemed as unconvinced as he was.
    If only to assuage her, he took up his shisha and drew upon it, inhaling the smoke and holding it for as long as he could. He breathed it out slowly, up toward the ceiling as the taste of oak and loamy forest floor complicated the finish of the araq.
    Dahud studied Nikandr’s face for longer than was polite. “You’re a long way from home.” Smoke wiggled out from his mouth and nostrils like a drakhen breathing fire. “I’m sure you know your way, but it’s good you’ve come through Andakhara instead of the taking the western paths.”
    “And why is that?” Ashan asked.
    Dahud’s smile was wicked. “They aren’t so kind among the hills.” He was perhaps fishing for information—where were they headed? what was their purpose?—but Nikandr would share none of this, and neither would the others.
      No sooner had the thought come to him than Ashan said, “We’ve come seeking a boy.”
    Nikandr snapped his head toward Ashan. He shook his head, hoping Dahud wouldn’t see, but he didn’t understand what Ashan was doing.
    Dahud relaxed more deeply into his pillows as if he’d been afraid of their purpose here in Andakhara. “A boy,” he repeated as the young serving woman returned with a platter of dates.
    Ashan waved to Sukharam. “As old as him, and a girl five years younger.”
    “Who would they have been traveling with?”
    “Only themselves.”
    Dahud plucked a date filled with goat cheese and pistachios from a wooden tray and popped it into his mouth. “Describe them.”
    “The girl had dark brown hair with bright blue eyes.”
    “And the boy?”
    “Hair the color of aged oak, and burning brown eyes. He might have worn the clothes of the Aramahn, but he would wear no stones. Neither would the girl.”
    Dahud shrugged. “There was a girl who came through Andakhara three months ago. She had blue eyes, but she looked older than this young man”—he motioned to Sukharam—“and she came alone.” He took a deep pull off of the shisha, holding the smoke for a long time as the conversation and revelry continued around them. As he blew the smoke upward, adding to the layer hanging over the room, he peered more closely at Ashan. “Is there nothing else you’re searching for?”
    Atiana looked cool, but Nikandr could tell from the way she held her hands tightly in her lap that she was nervous. Sukharam, however, seemed as cool as the winds of winter, and it was Ashan that seemed nervous. He licked his lips as if he were dying of thirst and glanced to the people over Nikandr’s shoulder.
    Dahud leaned in. “I know much, and I know many people far beyond the reaches of this small caravanserai. If there’s anything, you need only name it.”
    Ashan looked as though he were ready to ask a question, but then he suddenly looked down at his shisha tube as if it had offended him. “We seem to be out,” he said, motioning to the bowl.
    “Ah,” Dahud said. “Right away.” He turned and snapped his fingers to get the attention of one of the women, the younger. As he did, Ashan nodded toward the crowd. Sitting at another shisha was the large man from the water house. He caught Nikandr’s eye and shook his head back and forth while staring pointedly at Dahud, who was still facing away.
    The