She woke, and gasping in surprise sat up quickly, rubbing her fists against her eyes. It was night, and the air was still, almost calm save for a small crisp breeze that came in through the rectangular window spaces in the hard sandstone walls.
"Peace, daughter."
She turned her head at the sound of a voice, a woman's voice that came from the other side of the room.
"I… I don't understand," she said as she stood, backing away from the figure who crossed the space toward her. The woman's body was just showing the slight bloom of pregnancy beneath the billowing, silken pants she wore. The arms that were held out towards her in an attitude of peace bore the twin leather bracers that marked her as Usertim.
"I am Asru, daughter of the High Priestess of Usert," she said.
"Isetnophret was your mother?" she gasped in surprise.
"It matters not," Asru said softly, "You were sent to me that I might warn of great danger; a danger that will once again require you to assemble my mother's sistrum. You cannot fail in this daughter, else everything that is now set in motion…"
She stopped speaking, and laid her hand over her belly – maternal and protective. For a moment she looked as though she would ask something, but then she shook her head.
"You cannot remain where you are. What must be done cannot be done without Her voice. The son… of the son I carry needs Usert's blessing, daughter and you must be the one to bring it. You and no other."
"But I—"
"Meiri…?" Ayesha gently shook her by the shoulder to waken her and held out a cup. "You were dreaming."
"No… not dreaming," Meiri took the cup and sipped at the water. Then she ran a hand over her face, looking round at the blandness of the rock walls of the cavern.
…Protection against the rising power of the gods…
The walls whispered at her and she shivered, backing away from Ayesha when the healer reached for her.
"It's all right, Cousin," Ayesha said softly, oblivious, "You're safe…"
…Once gave you their support…
She caught Ayesha's hand and gripped it tightly, pulling herself toward the other woman.
"Outside," she gasped, "take me…"
"We must stay here," Ayesha ran her fingers through her hair, "Master Nazir said it isn't safe for any of us to be outside we—"
"Ayesha, please!" she struggled to her feet, using the other woman as support.
…demand… payment…
She felt arms slide around her, and staggered step by halting step toward the entrance to the caverns, clinging to the other woman and trembling, trying to ignore the voice in her head… to shut out the warning…
There wasn't a part of him that didn't hurt as he lay curled into a ball against the cold rock wall of wherever it was they'd thrown him in the bowels of the temple. Time had blurred and now meant nothing to him. All he knew was the punishment his young body had taken at the hands of the man he knew to be an assassin.
"Assassin – from Hashashian – a sacred warrior sent by Persian kings to eliminate their most honoured enemies. The deaths made holy by the smoking of the fumes from the hallowed plant Hashish…" his mind sought escape from his discomfort and humiliation by making him recite aloud his lessons, but this man was no true assassin just a hired, cold hearted and cruel man – a killer – murderer – nothing more.
He should be dead. He knew that. He knew too that they were keeping him alive to ensure that the abomination they so prized could not so easily be destroyed or taken from them by his father's people.
Thoughts of his father and his family brought tears to his eyes. He saw A'ini, lying still and bleeding at the water's edge and whispered, "Please don't leave me, 'Ini."
He loved his siblings, his half siblings… it did not matter to him who the mother. They were all one blood and he had failed to protect one of the smallest of them. For several long moments the sobs he'd fought so hard to hold inside as a display of strength before his torturers took hold of him and shook his small frame, bringing him further pain… so be it. He deserved the pain. He forced himself to sit up, and to come to his knees. As he moved the room tilted and blurred.
The man raised a long curved knife and started toward his father's back. He wanted to cry out a warning; to tell his father to turn – defend himself – but something held him still, unable to move or speak. A girl close by, familiar and yet a stranger to him reached a hand to run her fingers through his hair. She leaned down to brush a delicate kiss against his cheek and everything swam into focus again.
The man raised the long curved knife and started toward his father's unprotected back, snarling – a sound of pure hatred. Still he couldn't cry out in warning, even though he knew he was in the same place… the same time. He reached out and the girl beside him took his hand and helped him to sit up.
The long curved knife slashed downward in the man's hand… a blur of movement beside his father… The knife in the man's hand punched forward again, and up… a woman cried out… and fell… his father turned, catching the woman as she folded, almost like discarded linen… blood on his father's hands as he brought the woman gently to the ground… whispered words as the woman's face finally swam into focus…
"Ume…!" he cried, though anything else he might have said was lost in the breath of grief that tore from his small body.
"Sometimes I think I'm insane." She trembled as she leaned against the tree as the two of them sat beside the water that reflected the darkening sky. "Not knowing who I am…"
"You have been through much," Ayesha told her, "you must not be too hard on yourself. You are worried about your husband… your children—"
"But to not know where or even when I am, Ayesha," she tossed a handful of pebbles into the water in frustration. "You can't possibly know how that feels."
"You're right of course, but Meiri, your gift—"
"Gift? Gift, Ayesha?" she turned from the water to fix the other woman with an almost desperate stare, "Why is it that those who have not one drop of sight in their blood always call what I have a gift?"
Ayesha shook her head apologetically, "Forgive me," she said.
Meiri sighed, "When I was little… when I knew nothing of this, but could see the energies of the land I thought my home; when I could see the creatures of the land and hear the voices as they sang to each other, then… then I would have called this sight a gift, but cousin, what I have is more of a curse. To see things of the future, to know before it happens that a child will be stillborn or will die in infancy; to know which warriors will not return from battle; to know things and to see things that would terrify most ordinary folk…"
She trailed off, shaking her head, before starting again just a few moments later, unsure even in herself of what she was trying to convince Ayesha.
"But the worst thing of all is knowing that even though you see what will be, there's nothing in the world you can do to change it." She held up her hand, knowing what Ayesha would say even before the woman opened her mouth to speak, "Before Ardeth died, I saw what would happen. I tried so hard to change things… made sure he didn't help me down from the ledge as I'd seen… walked in different places than I'd seen, but still, still nothing was different. He still died and they still blamed me for it and every other ill that has befallen the Medjai since. I know you can understand that pain."
Ayesha sighed.
"But Meiri," she said, "is it our place to change the things that God has decreed should happen to a soul on its journey?"
"Should we not then try to avoid the bad thing that sometimes might happen to us as you, yourself did?" she countered with a question and knew that she had struck home from the fleeting, shocked expression of pain that crossed Ayesha's face.
"What is it that has you so disturbed, cousin?" the healer asked gently, her eyes full of sadness.
"We're not safe here, Ayesha. We have to go. We have to leave and I must take the sistrum to Ardeth."
Ayesha shook her head, "Meiri, even if you could find where he's gone. You can't leave the children, they need you. A'ini will need her mother when she wakes. Besides which, if we were to move Rashid now he would not survive the journey."
"Rashid will not die," the words flew out before she could stop them and Meiri looked down at her hands. She sighed and added, "I have seen him riding at Ardeth's side in battle. If I could not change Ardeth's fate by taking a different path that the one I had seen, we will not change Rashid's in moving from here."
"No, Meiri," Ayesha said firmly, "as a healer I cannot allow it. It will endanger his life."
"Haven't you heard anything I've said?" Meiri cried out the words and in frustration got to her feet and started to walk away. She heard Ayesha scramble to catch up to her and felt Ardeth's cousin's hand on her shoulder; allowed the other woman to turn her around.
"I understand you are afraid, and frustrated, and want to help," Ayesha told her tenderly, "but you must trust me, Meiri. I know injuries of this kind and if Rashid is moved it will kill him."
"You're wrong," she told her.
"No. I am sorry."
The ground behind Ayesha was packed earth with sparse green shoots of grass pushing up through a blanket of white; a room, decorated in warm shades of red, and a sweet, dark haired girl, swaddled in the blanket of Ayesha's unbound hair… and she wept.
Meiri blinked and tried, to no avail to fight the power that began to descend on her, sweep over and through her, subsuming her as its own.
"Your own journey is not over, daughter of Hamad of Ninth," the words poured of their own accord from her lips, low and not her own but from a greater source. She clamped her hands around Ayesha's arms. "You will leave the Tribes and bear a daughter in the cold of a land far from here."
"No," Ayesha fought to free herself from her grasp, her eyes wide with denial as she shook her head. "You wrong. Let go of me! I'll never let another man touch me… of the Tribes or not."
"You will not stop him," the voice from inside her said, almost with soft regret… almost…
"NO!"
Ayesha finally tore a hand free of her grasp and slapped her hard across the face. Meiri started, wakening to herself as the stinging blow freed her. She reached for the other woman, knowing how much the words would have hurt and frightened her.
"Ayesha I—"
"Don't. Don't touch me!" Ayesha backed away. "You're wrong, Meiri. So wrong about this… and you're wrong about Rashid."
Before Meiri could stop her, Ayesha turned and fled. She sighed, tears welling in her eyes. She'd hoped to gain her support, not alienate, and now endanger the other woman. Quickly, urgently she went back into the caverns to tell Nazir that Ayesha was gone.
"You cannot remain where you are. What must be done cannot be done without Her voice. The son… of the son I carry needs Usert's blessing, daughter and you must be the one to bring it. You and no other."
"Leave me alone," she whispered, "there's nothing I can do."
"You must… You and no other."
"I can't."
"You must try, Saffrah," the midwife told her urgently, "Push… push now."
Saffrah moaned, biting her lip and shook her head, "It's too soon."
"Soon or not, the baby is coming." The old woman pulled at the sheet she'd wound around the pillows that supported her back, compacting them and making her sit up a little. "Now push."
This time, though not at the old woman's insistence, Saffrah could not ignore the urging. Pain wracked her belly and her back as though someone were digging sharp knives through her to where her child should be resting, awaiting birth, not as now, rushing toward delivery. It was all wrong… it was all terribly wrong.
She'd come home from the market feeling so good about the charity she'd given… but tired, very tired, and so in the heat of the day had retreated to the bedroom to get some rest. And there she'd slept… and dreamed such terrible dreams…
It was a desolate plain, as like and yet unlike the desert outside il-Qahira as anything she'd known. She was hot, and tired and thirsty… and though she carried water in a small pouch hanging at her side it was rank and stagnant.
As she cried out for help for the sake of her child; for water and shelter they appeared… small wizened creatures with skin as grey as death. Goblinoid they were, with sharp teeth, hairless heads and eyes that glowed with a cruel inner fire. But for all their appearance, and the way they frightened her, they brought her fresh water… they took her hands and stroked her with fingers that were somehow softer than she thought they'd be. She went with them as they brought her aid.
The cavern they brought her to was cool after the burning heat of a sun she hadn't even known was there… and to a bed of rock that was cold and soothing against the ache in her back, and there she'd slept until chill touches against her wrists and ankles startled her to wakefulness.
Towering figures stood beside her… men with the heads of crocodiles and ibex… and with the hissing visages of snakes, all holding her as a woman as black as the darkest, starless night, came closer, carrying something that squirmed and spat in her arms.
"Mother…" the woman whispered as she reached her side, "…bringer… opener of the way…"
The night-black woman put the wriggling bundle atop the dais she now knew was her bed and in horror she watched it crawl toward her body. She tried to moan in denial and move away, turn aside, but they held her fast… open to the approach of the creature.
She closed her eyes tightly as it reached her… refused to look but could not refuse the pain of their becoming one… a scalding agony that blossomed from her belly until it consumed her completely in its fever… as she felt her blood beginning to flow from her body…
And then there was light… great and blinding… like looking into the heart of the sun. The men-creatures holding her shrank away and even though she dare not open her eyes, she heard the ringing of battle from all around; the great roars that split the cavern that was shrill with the sound of her pain and terror until at last there was nothing but her own voice… and then she opened her eyes… into the leonine faces of those that now surrounded her and to the descent of a sharp and shining, golden blade…
She had woken with a start and an indrawn breath, but as she'd twisted aside from the remains of the dream the pains erupted anew in her belly. She threw back the blankets to find the bed soaked with the beginnings of her labour. Too soon… it couldn't be now…
"I had a terrible dream," she told the midwife, moaning and once more trying to stop from pushing her child out into the world, fearing what she would see.
"…just a dream," she heard the other woman say. "Push…"
"I can't," she whimpered.
"You must."
She gave an almost guttural cry; attempting denial even as her body sought to birth the child within. As the candlelight danced; as her vision blurred and swam with her effort she thought she saw, at the edges of the light, those same leonine figures… watching… waiting…
"Meiri?" Nazir's voice startled her, coming as it was from the darkness beside the entrance to the cavern. "Where is Ayesha?"
"She… I…" she stammered and felt him take a hold of her arm.
"What happened?" he demanded, "She should not be out there alone. Neither of you should have gone outside."
"I know I just," she laid her hand over his as he squeezed her arm, "I needed air, Nazir."
"Where is Ayesha," he asked again.
"I don't know," she confessed, "she left, she… I—"
He let go of her then and said, "Go inside. The children have been asking for you. Tell Abdul-Rahman that I have gone after the healer."
"Aiwa, Sayiidi," she breathed as she moved to obey. Then she turned back to him and called his name. "Nazir… I'm sorry."
He shook his head. "It doesn't matter now. Go to the others. Do as I have said to you. I will find her. She cannot have gone far."
Meiri nodded and turned again to walk further into the caverns. As she reached the room where her family sat anxiously, Badi'a gently placed a blanket around her shoulders.
"Come and rest," she said, "A'ini woke a little while ago, and asked for her Ume. We have given her a sleeping draught, and Ashna is with her, but I am sure that when she wakes again it will comfort her to see her mother sleeping beside her."
She allowed Badi'a to lead her across the room to where Ashna sat holding A'ini by the hand. She sat to take the other hand, refusing to give in to sleep while she felt so responsible for putting others… perhaps everyone into danger. She watched, recognising the fatigue in her sister-wife, as Ashna moved to her side of the pallet that held her daughter.
"You should rest, Ashna. You are still not well," she said softly.
Ashna shook her head, "I am not the first woman to suffer a miscarriage, Meiri, nor will I be the last."
"But after the twins—"
"I pray Allah almost ever hour that Tareef and Luloah will not be the only children I will bear," she interrupted and then sighed and said quietly, "And when I do not, I pray that they will."
Meiri was sure Ashna had not meant for her to hear, but she did and reached for the other woman's hand.
"Ash—" she started, and then recoiled as she watched the stain of blood spreading slowly through Ashna's clothes.
Ashna staggered; gasped and looked down… at last it happened; welcomed the pain… A woman of the Medjai, riding in secret from Al-Kharga, the horse's hooves wrapped against sound… She lay in state- amid a sudden blinding light through which Meiri could not see…
Meiri reached out to cling to Ashna as the vision turned and swam before her, as her soul twisted to take the place of another she could no more see than she could the face of the woman in the light.
Screams… madness… pain… her eyes opened and she cried out again, weeping as he sweated and strained over her… She wept as she reached up to touch the softness of his cheek, the thrill of the skin of his body against hers… and the warm drip of the tears he shared with her as they loved.
"Ashna," she cried, clinging to her as to shreds of reality, "help me!"
She drowned in a sea of children paraded before her like clouds blowing across a desert sky… a girl-child, dark haired and beautiful, held in arms atop a snow white horse… Blood – a drop of blood falling, falling to stain white linen and a cry of pain – the bloodied head of child between risen thighs – being born – a dark head of curls…
Vaguely from somewhere she heard Ashna call out for Badi'a… Asiya…
Twin girls, dark hair and light eyes – seen through the haze of knowing they could never be hers; happier where they were… pain tearing through her belly – too soon – a grey head, shrivelled and cold – a cry of anguish… another pain in her belly, and a child born reluctantly from between aching thighs – light hair, light eyes – beautiful – emotional pain…
Trying to claw her way back to herself, away from the madness of nameless mothers and nameless children and all of them… she was, she collapsed against Ashna, weeping.
"Oh Ashna… Ashna, I'm sorry…"
"It's all right," Ashna's voice came to her from far away, "Everything will be all right…"
The rim of a cup was pressed to her lips and Asiya's voice told her, "Drink, Meiri… drink it all down."
"Please, Asi," Ashna's voice again, "give her enough so that she will not dream."
The liquid was bitter, and burned as she gulped it down, welcoming the promise of dreamless oblivion… of sleep.
Pain in her belly… and the wet weight of a child pressed against her breast – she opened her eyes – dark hair, dark eyes – precious child. Her last; her only…
"Sahar, born of Isis."
Her eyes flew open and she tried to sit up away from the child, but could not move against the gaze of the shining figures that surrounded her… that faded into memory as the darkness nipped at the edges of the golden light…
"Sahar," she breathed against Ashna's shoulder as the sedative Asiya had given her finally took her into blessed unconsciousness.
The midwife's heart sank as she saw the colour of the top of the child's small head; grey as though it had been lifeless for many days. She sighed, and had feared as much when Saffrah's husband had sent for her in a panic.
"Push now, Saffrah. We must get this out of you," she said sorrowfully.
"My child…" the woman moaned.
"I'm sorry," she said, "there's nothing can be done."
"No," Saffrah said, more a moan of denial than actually a word. "Please…"
"You child is already dead," the midwife told her, "Truly, I am sorry."
"NO!" the labouring woman screamed as the next contraction came, full of pain and grief and loathing… It brought her husband running into the room despite the midwife's interdiction against it.
"What are you doing to my wife?" he demanded.
"I am sorry, Sayiid," she said, "but the child is—"
"Allah haffad!" the husband's words cut her off as the infant… creature slipped into the world; twisted and hideous… gnawing at nothing as though it sought to be free of the very air itself, the blood of its birth pooling around it and running in rivulets through the room.
Saffrah shuddered, moaned and let out a final rasping breath, her life blood gone; a web of death around the room.
With no warning her features shifted in the candlelight… her face elongating becoming like that of a great cat, yellow fur sprouting on face and body alike.
The midwife recoiled from both the infant and the creature forming in the body of the woman she had been sent to help… the husband too, tearing at his clothing and hair in grief, scrambled away from his wife's body.
Sekhmet's new formed warrior tensed its muscles and in one smooth motion came to its feet. With an angry roar it brought its clawed foot down on the creature at the centre of the gory web, crushing it, to explode into dust… then it turned its fearsome visage to the eyes of the grieving husband and the midwife.
"Run," its catlike hiss formed the word from the very air itself. "Run."
"Healer," something about the tone in the warrior's voice held Ayesha as still as a startled animal, "you better have a good reason for being out past curfew."
She said nothing. What could she say? All she was doing was trying to get to the remains of her home, for she had no doubt that all she would find would be rubble.
"I was just on my way home," she told him, stepping to the side when he moved into her path.
"I don't think so," he said, reaching for her arm. "All of the healers were to stay in the Healer Hall."
"There were…" she tried to pull her arm free, "…supplies that I needed – that I left at my home before all of this started."
"Then you should have waited for morning," he told her, stepping closer and backing her against the wall of a nearby house.
"It wouldn't wait," she said, trying to sound both convincing and annoyed rather than terrified. She knew that look on a man's face. "Now let me pass."
She pushed at him, trying to put some distance between them even as he tried to close the space still further, and began to fumble at her clothing.
"You're mine now…" he rumbled against her cheek. She tried to twist her head away. "…to do with as I see fit, being as you're out after curfew and our First warned against it."
A scream started to gather in the back of her throat as his hands began to roam her body, seemingly fuelled by her struggles, which became more frantic by the moment.
You will leave the Tribes and bear a daughter…
Everything she was or ever could be came out in the scream that tore from her as she began to lose the struggle with the renegade warrior.
Nazir cursed as the tracks dissolved into chaos on the packed earth of the floor of Al-Kharga basin. He only had an idea of the direction she's taken when she stepped off the sand and from here she could have gone anywhere. With a sigh he chose a direction and slipped into the shadows… moving cautiously deeper into the main body of the oasis settlement and praying Allah to give him a sign that would help him to find the healer. Even as the prayer gathered in his mind, the chilling scream sent night and roosting bird alike into the air.
Anas woke from his light trance with a suddenness that he couldn't explain. His daughter was sleeping still; his wife quietly reading her holy book. Everything was as normal, and yet he felt that somewhere, something was dreadfully wrong. For a moment he wondered at waking Meren and asking her to see for him… but the girl was exhausted and needed to rest and furthermore, he felt that this was something he had to do alone.
Derro looked up as he got to his feet. "Where are you going?"
"I have to go out," he shook his head, and took her hand to gently kiss the back of it. "I'm needed."
"Yes," she agreed, "you're needed here."
"I won't be long, Derro," he said as gently as he could. He could feel the tension in her through the hand he held, "but a man such as I cannot ignore the call of Allah's prophets; peace be upon them."
"And if Meren wakes and asks where her father has gone?"
"Tell her to go back to sleep and rest until morning," he said, "I will be back by then."
Without another word he slipped out of their dwelling place, and let the canvass doorway fall closed behind him.
"In seeing that woman as the living embodiment of Usert, Isetnophret, you have murdered a nation and I cannot be certain that you and your kind will not attempt to do so again, in spite of your assurances otherwise, and even knowing that you have broken the Sistrum of Usert. It is not enough… and so with…" he faltered, cleared his throat and began again. "So with all power that is mine as First Medjai – as Sekhmet to Ra, so are we to Pharaoh – I make this decree and seal it before the Gods in my blood."
Suhayl moaned, "Sekhmet to Ra…" and turned in his sleep, the images and words floating around the figures that dominated his sleeping vision…
He drew a dagger from his belt and ran it, swift and deep across the palm of his hand, letting the red of his life blood fall to the hardened sand at Pharaoh's feet. "From this day forth, no man among the Medjai may place hand or even eye upon a woman of the Usertim. I forbid it. Pharaoh forbids it and the Gods themselves…"
"Wrong, Sekhem… so wrong… do not speak the words…" he pressed his hand to his chest as though it hurt him.
"By my life blood I swear that any Medjai breaking this interdiction will bring upon himself and his fellows the curse of ill luck in battle as in life, that his line will not survive…"
"We reap what we sow…"
"Know that this decision was not reached lightly… nor will there be mercy and nor will it be revoked until such time as the harm to our people brought by this act is undone."
"Cannot… cannot be undone in this world…"
Suddenly, uncannily aware of another presence beside his sleeping body, Suhayl sat up and rolled away, coming to a crouch, his hands reaching for weapons that were not there, only afterward regretting the motion as his body protested with waves of pain that flowed through him.
"Interesting dreams you have, little Medjai," the Abomination gave him a cold smile as she reached for him. His back against the rock wall, he could not move away.
"Get away from me," he said, instead slapping at the hands.
"Temper, temper," she said, and chuckled.
"You," he accused, still not quite fully himself, "you are the cause of this…"
"Oh, not I," she said, "but another."
"You, Aunt," he stressed the word to prove he spoke not to the creature Anck-Su-Namun, but to the Abomination that dominated the dead flesh, "you tricked them to believe."
"Aaaah," the sound was an amused exclamation of understanding, "I only allowed them to see that which they wished for; longed for…"
"Liar," he cried, "Abomination… lesser power of fading dreams and—"
Faster than a lightning strike her clawed hand struck and drew three sharp bloodied scratches across his cheek. Fully awake now he wept at the new pain, the salt tears stinging the cuts.
"Get up, boy," Anck-Su-Namun said as though nothing had happened between them, "It is time for us to leave."
"Where are we going?" he asked through the tears.
"To visit with an old friend of your father's," she said with a chuckle. "Come, little Medjai."
The man was so absorbed in the offence he was trying to commit that he didn't hear Nazir's approach which suited the Medjai warrior as Ayesha was frantic and he knew he had to move quickly. At last he was within striking range and with his knife in one hand he grabbed the man by the hair and pulled back, setting the cold metal against his throat.
The man froze.
"Let her go," he said, deadly calm and as serious as he had ever been, "or I will kill you."
He let go of Ayesha at once and she scrambled backwards, curling into a ball and sobbing into her knees. It took Nazir a few moments to work out that he had probably been in time to save her – fortunate for the man he still held a breath away from execution – so he turned his blade away from the man's throat and brought the pommel of it down hard against the back on his neck, dropping him unconscious to the ground, then he went to quickly crouch a few steps away from Ayesha.
"I will not be the only one who heard your screams," he said to her softly and held out his hand as he would have done to a skittish horse, "Come with me. It's all right. You're safe now."
Wordlessly, obviously still terrified, she shook her head and moaned.
"Ayesha, listen to me," he still spoke softly, but urgently. "We have to get out of here."
"Nazir…?" she whispered his name.
"Yes," he said "I won't hurt you."
With a tiny sob, as though of relief, she reached out and put her trembling hand into his. As slowly and carefully as he dare he drew her closer until he could cup her elbows in his hands and draw her slowly to her feet.
"How very touching," the voice behind him was cold, calculating and drew a short scream of panic from the already frightened healer. "If I'd known you had a thing for the healer, I would have seen to it that I sent you to her charge a long time ago."
He turned carefully, letting go of Ayesha with one hand to draw his blade, and with the other tucking her hand into the sash at the side of his waist.
"We're not here to get in your way, Mohammed," he said more calmly than he felt as he saw the two other warriors at the Elder's side. "Just let us be on our way."
"I think not," Mohammed said, and gestured to the two warriors.
She was sore, terribly sore – he'd used her harder this time than ever – but she needed the money. What few traders would still sell to her charged higher and higher prices as they knew she had nowhere else to go.
She pressed the hot cloth against herself trying to soothe the ache while he slept, knowing that he'd want her again once he woke and not sure she could bring herself to allow his touch. She sobbed with the pain that first came from the heat of the cloth, and then from the relief it brought to her. It couldn't go on… there had to be another way.
"You might as well save washing until I'm done with you," the man's voice drew tears to her eyes. She thought he'd sleep for hours more yet.
"Please, I need to rest," she said. "You hurt me."
"I pay to hurt you, whore," he crossed the room and grabbed her hair to throw her down across the table, spread her thighs and buried himself inside her.
Rutting with her, moaning like an ornery camel with each move he made, and almost competing with her as she cried out her pain, neither he, nor she heard the increasing murmur that came from outside the tiny hovel.
From the shadow of a nearby home, Anas watched with mounting horror as the small army of civilians, all bearing torches, advanced on the singe roomed hovel that he knew was Miranda's home.
Intuition had drawn him here, and now he had to think fast if he were to save her. There was no way that he alone could head off the angry band, and no time to summon the watch. He and only he could be her salvation. Looking around him he quickly spotted the axe that was buried in the nearby log. Perhaps if he could get to the rear of the hovel, out of sight of the mob, and find a weak spot in the wattle and daub, he could break through and give her a way out.
Keeping her behind him and feeling her trembling against his back, Nazir moved… his blade a blur between them and both of the attacking warriors. This was nothing to do with Ayesha, he knew, but if Mohammed could kill him; leave the others leaderless and vulnerable to his sect… but he also knew that if Mohammed could rid himself of another relative of the Bay family, albeit by marriage, then he would. The Elder had truly lost his mind.
He had to get them out of there, and to safety; to where there would be witnesses to treachery that Mohammed could ill afford. Nazir was willing to bet that under such circumstances, the Elder would leave well alone.
A familiar and welcome sound came to his ears – as a horse whinnied nearby. Nazir gave a shrill whistle and listened hard, hoping against hope that the animal was not tethered. The sound of hoof beats was never more welcome, and he made a sudden vicious attack against the warriors meant to drive them back and give him enough time to get Ayesha up onto the horse.
Caught off guard, the warriors were pushed back, swords raised in defence, as they obviously expected Nazir to follow up the advantage he'd gained. Instead he turned suddenly and grasped Ayesha by the waist, all but throwing her up to the back of the horse.
He half turned again in time to catch the incoming attack, as one, if not the other, of the warriors recovered from the surprise tactics and moved up to strike hard and fast against Nazir. With one hand still holding the horse, the Horse Master parried each incoming thrust, moving faster and faster and turning parry into attack as he sought to build a momentum he could use to boost himself to horseback behind Ayesha.
Mohammed was obviously not fooled and could see exactly what he was planning. The Elder drew his own blade and advanced toward the melee.
"Imbeciles!" he yelled at his warriors, further distracting them.
It was now or never. Using the moment that Mohammed had given him, Nazir vaulted onto the back of the horse, and in the same instant that he found the stirrups with his feet, he pulled back hard on the reins he held in his hand.
The horse reared, dancing on its hind legs and turning toward the three warriors still on the ground, pawing at the air dangerously close to their heads.
Ayesha let out a startled cry and snatched at the air near the horse's mane. Nazir wrapped her securely in his free arm, drawing her close against him so she would not fall as he wheeled the horse around in the opposite direction, and bringing all four hooves to the ground at last, urged their equine saviour in the direction of the waterside caverns.
The heat was unbearable and the smoke, like hands about her neck, choked her… once again she clawed ineffectually at the door which had been barred from the outside as yet another burning brand was thrown in through the window, and yet more thatch fell to burn painfully against her back.
She glanced again at the burning beam that had fallen onto the man that had pinned her against the tabletop as he took his pleasure from her. Whether the fall of it against him, lengthwise onto his back and his head had killed him or simply knocked him into senselessness didn't matter any more. Dry as tinder, the table and the beam itself had soon caught alight and burned as hot a fire as had driven him to abuse her time and again… he was little more than a charred corpse now… as she would be if she could not find some way of escape.
She cringed and threw herself sideways as the sound came from behind her… as though another beam had fallen… and could bring to her the same fate as her nightly visitor. It was only her name, called quietly amid a rasping cough that made her raise her head from beneath her arms and look around.
"Mr Anas…" she gasped, barely able to breath. He held out his hand, snatching it back as a patch of burning thatch fell to singe his flesh, only to hold it out again a moment later.
"Come. Quickly," he said, "And as quiet as you can. Stay in the shadows when you get outside."
She needed no second urging. Dodging the falling thatch she crossed the room and wriggled her way through the hole that was barely large enough, into the cool, clear air outside.
His arm came around her waist as soon as she was through and he pulled her away from her home into the depth of the shadows further out in il-Nihaaya. He didn't stop until they were on the very edge of the desert itself. When he did, she shivered uncontrollably. He took a robe from around his shoulders and wrapped it around her.
"There now," he said, "Insha'allah and all his prophets we are safe now."
"Nazir what happened?" Abdul-Rahman asked as they reached the caverns, thundering in on a barely slowed horse.
"There will be time for explanations later," Nazir said, carefully handing her down into the arms of the younger warrior, "for now see that Lady Ayesha gets to one of her fellow healers."
"Aiwa, Sayiidi," Abdul-Rahman started to lead her away but she fought against him.
"Laa. No… I do not need a healer." Even as she spoke her voice trembled.
"You should let us judge that," Badi'a voice came tenderly from beside her as the woman slipped her arms around her and took her from the warrior's embrace. Asiya came to the other side and together they led her into an unoccupied, smaller cavern.
"You're in shock, Ayesha," they told her as they sat her on soft rugs and tenderly began to deal with the cuts and scratches on her hands and face. "Can you tell us what happened?"
"He… he attacked me," she whispered, barely aware of her words.
"Master Nazir?" Asiya asked in horror.
Ayesha shook her head, "No… he saved me. It was another. One of Mohammed's men. He tried— He—"
She couldn't finish, but she didn't have to. Badi'a gently cupped her face between the palms of her hands and brought their eyes to meet.
"Did he hurt you, Ayesha?" she asked softly.
"Nazir came in time…" Ayesha gasped, lost in the pain of a memory, another time, "He… only… tried."
Badi'a nodded, but did not release her from her gentle hold. "Asiya will warm some water, and then you will bathe and we will soothe you with gentle balms… and bring you to sleep."
Ayesha nodded, tears filling her eyes. "All right," she said at last… wishing she had it in her to tell someone of all the terrible things that were lodge there in her heart; a torment of knowing that the Medjai warriors were not all what others believed them to be.
She could barely breathe, and spilled most of the water he offered to her, then sat as still as a little child as he wet a cloth he had in a pouch at his belt with the water they had left and cleaned her face and hands, dabbing at the burns that were red and angry there.
"Why?" she asked at last.
"They are blaming you for the death of a young woman and her child; for the strangeness that has happened here of late." He stopped speaking when she sobbed.
"Then I deserve it," she wept as he drew her head against his shoulder, "it is my fault."
"How can you say such things, my child?" he asked softly.
"Once," she said, "before I came her to work with the lost of Cairo, I served Nephthys, goddess of—"
"I know who she is," he said quickly, interrupting.
She nodded and continued, "The sect I served attempted to manifest the Goddess and her husband in this realm. I came to understand how terribly wrong it was… tried to do right, but…"
"Poor Miranda… always so used…"
She glanced over at the woman still bound on the dais… was it her voice she just heard…? Did any of the others hear it...?
"...always to open herself, to give to others… to give him a child – murdered at a whim because he saw a better way… tricked into raising the infant Nebkhat as her own…"
Fear was starting to rise inside her. How could anyone know that? She had only seen it when the Priest of Osiris had taken her to the mirror and made her see for him…
…Yes, she had seen his visions… but afterward… trembling and filthy with the pleasure she had taken from it… from him… new visions showed her she had never been anything but a tool; something to be used and thrown away.
A cry of alarm made her jump, made her aware that these might well be the last moments of her life. She felt the push of his hand in the middle of her back, and the command came like a gunshot.
"Fight, my women! Punish the intruders!"
She rebelled. Her own knife remained still sheathed.
"The time is coming when you must choose on what side you will stand."
"Hold!" she cried out, raising her hand to stop the other women. They faltered, but in the end they fought. They fought and died. And there, with her back to the dais, she fought to give the intruders time to save their own… to give them all the time she could…
The child… Nebkhat
…Tiny steel blades cut deep gashes across Miranda's thighs, and she hissed in pain.
"So it has come to this?" Nebkhat said coldly, circling her.
"You brought it to this," she said, "brought it to this with what you became. It cannot continue."
"And you think you can stop it?" the child mocked. "A shrivelled up, dry husk of a woman contend with the will of Nephthys. I think not."
The child struck again, meeting the same parrying blow as Miranda tried to harden herself against the words – words that stung far more than the gash on her leg.
"Will you stand there and deny that you enjoyed whoring for your master? For our cause…? I know what you have felt, the pleasure you have taken, for I have felt each and every one of your insignificant moments of fulfilment. Felt and taken them for my own… added them to my power; your pain too. I have revelled in it."
"Ungrateful little bitch!" Miranda finally snapped and lunged toward the diminutive figure of evil, striking and striking hard… only to be parried and slashed across the forearm, her attack ineffective in the temple to the child's goddess.
"Now we come to it," Nebkhat sighed almost in pleasure…
"I gave you life." Miranda spat, "I gave you the strength of my body to let you live--"
"You thought me your own, of course you did."
"Oh, I already know the truth. Do not seek to wound me with it now. Some other woman bore you, and you were brought to me, because then you could be raised as Ananiah wished, well… no more. No more…! I deny you!"
The child, Nebkhat flew at her… her needle tipped fingers but a breath away from Miranda's eyes.
"Turn back, Miranda," Nebkhat said then, almost kindly, gently. "Be the mother you always were to me… and save yourself. Would you like to know what I have seen…? What I would keep from you…?"
Miranda did not have a chance to answer; found herself falling into the dark pits that were Nebkhat's eyes…
She rocked back and forth, weeping… wailing in pain… being rocked in the arms of the child… comforted… loved… seeing wildness in her own eyes… She felt as if she had walked into a huge black wall… pulling… pulling at the filthy robe that covered her swollen body… A painted man grabbed her by the hair and threw her… naked and screaming into a pit that crawled with figures… "Give me back my son…!" pain… Hands gripped her shoulders… shook her… "I cannot give you what I do not have…That which has never been mine…" such pain in every part of her…
"No!" she screamed, and ignoring the blossoming fire in her cheek where the fingertip blades slashed her, she pushed at the creature in front of her, sliding round the pillar.
"Liar! Queen of lies!" She scrambled backwards… knowing she could not stay… knowing she could not submit to the terrible things this child would bring to her… "You would do this."
"And she did… Every night I dream and I am there… in the pit I saw, and the creatures… twisted things that follow me back into this world to do terrible things. I see them. I saw one of them go to the pregnant woman in the market after she had given me such charity. Everyone I touch…" realisation dawned on her and she tried to scramble away from him, but he held her fast.
"No," she struggled in his arms, "You have to get away form me. I won't let it happen to you. You saved my life… I can't—"
"They cannot harm me," he told her calmly, "for I walk in the shadow of the Prophets and I am protected. For this very task I think; for your salvation – though I do not understand why."
For a long time she wept, shamelessly against him, then suddenly she said, "There's a man… who flies on the wings of a hawk… he comes into my dreams… he comes to try and save me only… there's another… a white dove that tells him it isn't time."
She looked up at him as he listened, saw an understanding there that she had not expected to see.
"You know," she said almost fearfully, "you know what I'm talking about."
"My daughter sees," he told her, "and though I do not understand all that is occurring here, I believe I know the ones that we must bring this to if we are to have a chance of saving ourselves from the apocalypse that I believe is at hand.
"Who?" she asked, trembling as she stared out into the darkness of the desert, knowing exactly what he was about to say.
"We must find the Medjai," he said, confirming her fears. "They will know what to do."
