The Straits of Galahesh: Book Two of The Lays of Anuskaya by Bradley P. Beaulieu

then he returned to watching Ghayavand, an emerald in a field of sapphires.
    Nasim let him be and focused on the path ahead. He was not entirely sure he trusted Ushai and her motives, but he believed in her warning. He told the others to release their hezhan and to refrain from communing with another until they reached the island itself.
    He did not release his own, however. It was not yet time. He began to feel his vanahezhan spirit more clearly. It felt closer , as if but one small tug would pull it through the veil between worlds. He suppressed the spirit, however, held it at bay while calling it to position the skiff so that the prevailing winds—once he released the havahezhan—would carry them over the island.
    It was difficult, though. The winds were unpredictable here. But he could only do the best he could. He released it when he felt the hezhan was too close.
    As soon as he did, the ship was tossed about. The skiff dropped suddenly. They held tightly to the ropes that were tied around the interior of the skiff.
    A sudden upsurge twisted the skiff, tipped it dangerously. Sukharam was tossed over the edge of the gunwales, but he held on, and Nasim and Rabiah pulled him back to safety.
    And then the skiff began to fall once more, spinning about so quickly that Nasim lost his bearings. He was nearly ready to ignore Ushai’s advice and call upon a hezhan to help them, but the winds softened and then died altogether.
    This was when he began to feel it—a subtle discomfort in his chest that began to grow the closer they came to the island. He began to cough, and soon he was forced to drop to the floor of the skiff and hold onto the thwart as his breath slowly left him in one long exhalation.
    “Nasim!” Rabiah cried.
    She helped turn him over.
    She called to him, but Nasim couldn’t hear her. He could only stare up at the blue of the sky.
    When Ashan had brought him here years ago, he had felt the island. He’d felt the mountain peaks, the forests, the grassy plains. He’d felt the shattered city, Alayazhar. He felt all these things now, but he also knew that he was tied to it like he hadn’t been before. He was part of this island, as the Al-Aqim were. He was trapped. There would be no chance of leaving.
    He wondered, as stars played in his vision and Rabiah continued to shout his name, why he hadn’t felt the same thing the last time. Surely this was Muqallad’s doing, or Sariya’s, he thought. Surely he hadn’t felt it before because the two of them had yet to reawaken from the trap Khamal had lain for them.
    But he felt a certain familiarity to this. It was as if he had done it himself…
    And then it struck him. The wards that had been in place, keeping Khamal and Sariya and Muqallad here. That was what he was feeling. Not a trap laid by the others. Why, then, hadn’t it happened the last time he’d come? The answer was obvious, though. He hadn’t been himself when he’d been here last. He’d been only half a boy. The other half had been lost in Adhiya. The wards had not sensed him, but he was healed now, and surely whatever had been done to keep Khamal here was now working against him.
    He was trapped, well and good. He knew this, but it also brought a sense of peace. He’d come here not planning to leave, but believing it was possible. He knew now that it wasn’t. He knew that he would never leave, not unless he healed the rift or he died. It was a notion that was more freeing than he ever would have guessed.
    So much so that as the pressure in his chest eased, he started to laugh, and once it started, he couldn’t stop.
    Rabiah knelt over him, a look of shock on her face, like she wanted to slap him. He wouldn’t blame her if she did. He almost wanted her to.
    “What’s happened?” she asked.
    “The wards,” he said, pulling himself up to lean against the skiff’s hull.
    “What about them?” Her eyes narrowed, and she looked at him closely, as if she wasn’t sure he was completely