Egyptian Tahtib: Black Water

And the waters kept rising.

Within minutes it was brushing the bellies of their horses, splashing and soaking the riders' feet and lower legs. Rose had lost all sense of direction in the moonless night, and was concentrating as hard as she could on just keeping her precarious perch behind Villefort's saddle. (He obviously didn't mind her tight hug around his waist, occasionally patting her hands reassuringly.) Their pace had slowed to a crawl as the horses struggled through the swirling, frigid currents threatening to sweep them off their feet at every moment.

And it kept rising still.

It had reached Rose's knees when sudden panicky shouts came from her left. She peered that way to see several of the horses had indeed lost their footing and were actually swimming, trying to feel the bottom, their riders clinging to their necks. They guided their mounts back to the right, where the rest of the party were still on their feet – barely.

And it kept inching higher.

Napoleon reigned his horse to a stop and roared a command for all to halt. A torrent of terse French followed from the General, accompanied by sharp gestures in all directions. Rose understood nothing, but watched as the men all around her formed themselves into a strange configuration: a large circle around their General, each facing directly outwards like spokes on a giant wheel. Villefort began to move into place, but another sharp word brought him (and Rose) back to Napoleon's side; apparently their horse was too heavily loaded for this maneuver, whatever it was.

And still the waters rose.

When the circle was complete, Napoleon barked a sharp order, and each man started moving cautiously forward, directly outward and enlarging the circle. Almost immediately, two horses side by side lost their footing and began swimming, and their riders brought them back, each moving over to walk behind a horse which was still on its feet. Twice more this happened in rapid succession, creating a large gap on one side of the circle, before Rose suddenly grasped the concept. They were feeling their way along, seeking out the sand bar that made the ford at low tide. As it became evident that the ridge they sought was to one particular side of the party, Napoleon and Villefort edged their horses in that direction behind the others.

And still the tide kept coming.

Another storm of shouts came from the edge, as a horse stumbled, and this time the rider was swept completely off the saddle. The man, a portly older soldier with a great deal of glitter on his epaulets, was immediately in deep trouble; he couldn't seem to stay next to his horse but was pulled several feet away in an instant, and the reins were ripped out of his hands. He was swept in the next instant against one of his companions, who grabbed the man's arm and held on with a mighty effort. Another Frenchman caught the reins of the loose horse, and they began reuniting man and mount. It wasn't until he swung his stump over the saddle that Rose recognized him and realized the problem: it was General Caffarelli, whose wooden leg had apparently been lost in the waters. No wonder he couldn't stay in the saddle when his horse went into the drink.

And that's when it hit her, with a chill as cold as the water that now sloshed across her thighs.

She turned her head slowly, her eyes involuntarily drawn to the famous Corsican general only an arm's length away. Was this what she was supposed to do? It would be so easy. Just slip off the horse as if knocked off by the waves and grab him on the way down. Pull him below the swirling waters and let the current take him.

Time slowed to a crawl, her breath coming in short gasps that thundered in her own ears, hours apart. Is this it? Am I supposed to drown him? And myself? For clearly she wouldn't survive it either.

The stars had trebled in intensity, their light dancing on his wet black hair. Wind whistled through her bones, turning them to ice. She shifted her hips, an inch to the side, loosening her tight thigh grip on the horse's flanks, and her hand drifted out towards Napoleon Bonaparte...

… and stopped. She couldn't do it.

As if he sensed something momentous, Napoleon's head whipped around, and he stared straight at her, through her, and the world froze on a single frame.

And then he glanced away.

Her hand sank down, and then numbly returned to grip Villefort's waist. He hadn't noticed a thing. "I can't do it," she sobbed quietly into his shoulder. "I can't."

"Madame?" Villefort asked over his shoulder.

"Nothing," she replied, a little louder, then dragged out the French word thin air. "Rien." He shrugged and went back to concentrating on helping his horse keep its footing.

I can't do it, she repeated to herself. I'm not a murderer. I can't.

There has to be another way. There MUST be!

The deep-water gap had grown to take up a third of the circle, and those riders had formed longer lines behind those still on higher ground. All at once, a shout rose from several throats, pulling Rose's attention out of herself again, and she turned to look. They were pointing out into the dark, and she looked to see a far-off glow. She squinted, and it resolved itself into distant flames. Someone had set a large fire somewhere on dry land.

Napoleon seized on the signal – inadvertent or not – and shouted at his men. All of them converged on the lines heading in that general direction, abandoning the other quarters. Not long after that, one of the leaders stepped onto a definitely higher level, his white horse's withers rising Venus-like out of the black water. Within a minute, the entire party was once again on the sand bar, making headway towards the light.

The waters continued to rise, but they had a destination now, and each of them rode with confidence and determination, their spirits soaring.

All but Rose.

She stayed a lead weight behind Villefort, her heart in pieces. Had she failed?

They scrambled up the bank onto dry land at last, just as the belated, waning moon at last began to rise behind them, and discovered the source of the flames: some of Napoleon's men left behind in Suez had set a house on the shoreline ablaze as a beacon to guide their beloved General safely across. A minor celebration took place, Napoleon thanking the men for their actions, and then tossing off some wry remark that had everyone laughing. Then they turned their exhausted horses towards Suez and slowly walked them the last mile back.

Rose still sat frozen. The entire adventure, which had seemed so easy at the beginning – the two of them could certainly pull this off easily! – had gone completely sideways. Jared was still missing. Tock was somewhere back on the other side of the rushing waters of the Red Sea. And Beta – home – seemed further away than it ever had, even when they had been struggling across ReichWorld.

Jared, where are you?

A/N: FYI, in case you're interested, Napoleon really did visit the Wells of Moses, he really was caught by the rising tide on his return, and he really did escape in just the fashion described, including the wheel-spoke maneuver and the house set ablaze by watchers on the shore. His remark was: "Had I perished in that manner, like Pharaoh, it would have furnished all the preachers in Christendom with a magnificent text against me." Likewise, the Red Sea tide really has been posited as an explanation for Exodus – if you believe it happened at all.