Nineveh's Child

by Gerhard Gehrke

  She spread-eagled, stabbing her rabbit stick into the dirt behind her. The stick helped at first, simultaneously braking her and acting like a rudder. She avoided the largest sections of rock, but then her foot struck one unyielding stone. She tumbled into the air, slid, and planted her hands into the ground to slow herself. She still hit hard, and there was no way to avoid the thick vegetation. After breaking through saplings and dozens of thin, brittle branches, she finally came to a stop.

  Ever so slowly she checked herself: legs working, arms working, nothing broken. More scrapes and bruises, and no deep cuts. Her club was gone, but she could make another one. She got to her feet. Her entire body trembled, and she felt sore everywhere. She pushed through more tall weeds and branches. She couldn’t see where she was heading, and she felt her way forward with her feet so her hands could ward off the twigs poking her in the face. Up ahead came the sound of running water, something she hadn’t heard in a long time.

  A small stream narrow enough to straddle wound around mossy black stones. Lush vegetation grew on either side, a sharp contrast to the dry forest. The air tasted cool here. Dinah had to resist the urge to start lapping up the water without filtering or boiling it. She took a moment to wash the scratches on her arms and face.

  She didn’t see anything edible as she followed the water upstream. This became an uphill climb, and soon the stream vanished. She was afraid it had sprung from some underground source and that she would have to go back down and scoop up some water to be boiled later. The next objective would be to find a spot to sleep, but the thick undergrowth presented few options.

  After what might have been thirty minutes, she came to some large boulders with a swirling pool beneath them. The pool overflowed, feeding the stream. She stood and stared in amazement. Such a find! A muddy patch on one end of the pool told her that plenty of animals knew of this place. Footprints marked the passage of birds, deer, and smaller game.

  She took off her boots and waded in to her knees. With both hands, she scooped up some water and doused her face. The pool had two blind spots: the boulders above and the wall of reeds to her rear. The giant bird or a mountain lion might appear, and she’d be helpless. But she couldn’t wait any longer. She drank and drank. The cold, clear water soothed her dry throat and numbed her swollen feet.

  She more carefully examined her wounds. Mostly abrasions, nothing deep. She washed her legs and elbows clean of dirt and blood. The water clouded where she stood, but the flow from the spring’s source brought the pool back to its clear state momentarily.

  The water not only felt refreshing but gave her hope that she might actually make it. She felt like a sponge. Her body took in what she drank and wanted more. Eventually she had her fill.

  She climbed from the pool to the top of the boulders and sat down. This offered a good vantage point of the hills and woods. Nothing could sneak up on her here if she kept her eyes open. Besides a slight breeze, the gurgle of the spring was the only sound. Had the bird stopped following? Was it too hampered by its ungainly shape and size to easily descend the slope? She was sure that it couldn’t fly. Its body was too chunky, and its wings too small. But it would be stupid to think that a predator like that wouldn’t be able to climb down a hill. She sat on the stones and waited, the water trickling down her wet legs to run in rivulets across the boulder.

  The bird never came, or at least it stayed out of sight.

  The notion of such a creature baffled her. She never had seen anything like that in Nineveh’s picture books or encyclopedias except for things from the fossil record. But she suspected the scientists of the old world could have made something like this, maybe for a zoo, or to flex their mental and technical prowess over the genetic remains of long-dead prehistoric creatures. Perhaps Nineveh had spawned it, a literal pet project that had grown too big for its cage.

  As the late afternoon wore on, she started to feel sleepy. She also wanted to jump in the water and take a bath. Her clothes were dirty and needed washing. But her stomach growled. She needed to set some snares, to catch something. It didn’t look like any fish lived in the spring. Too bad, but she would do some foraging here before finding a place to set camp. Some of the larger oaks nearby looked like they might provide a large enough branch out of reach of most animals. Hopefully the bird couldn’t climb. Sleeping on the ground was easier, and it precluded her falling out of a tree in the middle of the night. But the memory of what happened to the dog made the decision of where to sleep easy.

  Snares first. The ground told its tale. The mud around the spring and some nearby soft ground was a main thoroughfare. She set the snares, trying to game out a path where a rabbit or other critters might return. She put dirt, moss, and grass atop as much of the wire as possible to break up the lines of the traps and to obscure her scent on anything she had touched.

  Something caught her eye up a tree-topped embankment. Thick and twisty brambles proved to be a blackberry bush. Most of the fruit was gone, and what remained was dry, but she pushed carefully through the thorns toward a few small clumps. While plucking and eating she saw that many of the berries had tiny bugs infesting them. If she had ever been squeamish about things like this, she couldn’t remember it. Her stomach demanded sustenance. She ate the berries, bugs and all.

  She put her pack down in the dirt near the top of one of the boulders above the pool. It would be warm enough that she wouldn’t need to wrap herself in her blanket, but she laid it out anyway. The ground proved the softest she had camped on in weeks. On top of the blanket, she could almost pretend she was sleeping in a bed. Add the gurgle of the spring and this place was almost perfect. If only her stomach were full. Sleeping in the tree could wait. It would serve as an alternative if any predators came around. She laid down, sighed, and fought the urge to instantly fall asleep. Her muscles ached.

  An early moon peered through some high oak branches. She had an hour before sunset, but her camp was already completely in shadows. The air remained hot. Just a quick dunk…

  “What the hell.”

  She stripped down and jumped off one of the boulders. The spring was deep. She didn’t even touch bottom and the pressure pushed at her ears. The water felt icy below the surface, almost numbing. She looked up at the crown of twilight piercing the water above her. All else was darkness. If she could stay under the water for a day or a week, she would. It would be a place to remain forever, an escape from the pain of what had happened to the farm and to Uma. But it took her only a few seconds to run out of breath. A few kicks and she was swimming through her own bubbles and breaking the surface.

  Chirrup!

  The bird was there in the mud patch, standing tall and blocking the only way out of the pool. And here she was, stuck treading water. The dark stone faces of the boulders were now walls hemming her in. At least the bird couldn’t reach her from where it stood.

  The monster was taller than any person she had ever seen. She hadn’t gotten a good look at its plumage before, but even in the fading light she could see it had mostly black and white feathers, with a band of orange on either wing. Its head and neck were gray. The giant beak looked like a flint axe blade or a pick, and she knew it was just waiting for her to come back to the shallows so it could break open her skull for the tasty treats within.

  It made the warble again, cocked its head, and took a drink. It appeared to be checking out its own reflection in the ripples on the pool’s edge.

  She swam to the opposite side of the pool. The boulders rose over the water like the sides of a giant vase. She ran her fingers and toes along the stone in search of someplace to climb but felt nothing but slimy rock. The bird continued to stand guard at the pool’s exit.

  She cursed herself for being so stupid.

  Her legs began to cramp. She lay back on the water to float, trying to relax her legs and let her arms do the work. She could keep this up for a while, but it was getting dark, and she was starting to shiver. Was the bird still there?

  War
ble.

  “Go away,” she said.

  The bird stepped into the pool. Dinah maneuvered to keep an eye on it and was ready to dive below the water’s surface. If this thing wanted her, it was going to have to get wet.

  It looked down and pecked the shimmering surface. It fluffed its feathers and squatted low, and began a crazy shimmy. Water flew everywhere. The bird stuffed its head in various places on its body and began cleaning one feather at a time. She guessed it was washing up first before eating her.

  She made her way along one side of the spring, bringing her closer to the bird but outside of striking range. Some of the rocks under her feet were loose. She grabbed one and edged closer to the bathing bird. She screamed. It ignored her. She splashed water at it. No reaction. She threw the rock.

  If the bird had been a rabbit, it would be dead. She could hit a weaving bunny and knock it silly. But the bird somehow knew which way that rock would go and it ducked. The rock went sailing into the gloom beyond. The bird’s neck craned high and it let out a hiss. Dinah didn’t recoil, although she had to bite down hard to keep her jaw from spasming as shivers racked her body. What was that advice Karl had once given her? Never run from a predator. Dinah charged.

  Maybe the bird wasn’t expecting that. It beat its useless wings furiously and jumped backward and out of the water in three massive strides. Dinah followed it. As she came up onto the mud she stumbled, but kept moving forward. She screamed again at the top of her lungs, a wild sound, the roar of a mad wolf or a banshee.

  “Get out of here!”

  Water sprayed as the bird flapped and retreated into the darkness. But then it stopped. Dinah could see its eyes catch a glint of the moonlight as it turned to glare at her. A high-pitched peep came out of its beak, then another hiss. Dinah didn’t press her luck. She ran across the mud and scrambled to the top of the boulders. When she turned to look behind her, the bird still stood motionless in the same place.

  She grabbed her pack and clothes and found a long stick. She then clambered up a nearby tree, knowing in her heart that the thing could no doubt climb and see everything that she was doing as she found a large branch to take shelter upon. She wanted to kick the tree in frustration but feared losing her balance. The night below congealed into complete darkness, and the bird was down there somewhere, watching.

  5. Before: The Farm

  No matter how tight food could get at Uma’s, Dinah never starved. And sometimes food was plentiful.

  The cheese glistened with sweat that morning, but she put a big a piece of it on her split biscuit anyway. She was especially hungry. Her muscles were sore from the prior day’s work. The cheese tasted creamy and slightly pungent, and it helped with the tinder-dry breadstuff. She eyed some berries on the kitchen counter as she chewed. The reconstituted berries Nineveh served didn’t hold a candle to the real thing. Rosalyn saw her looking, and her expression said it all: just try it. The berries would be for something later, maybe dessert, maybe the next day’s breakfast. Dinah wanted them bad, but she would wait.

  Karl and Rosalyn were already finished eating and pulling on their boots.

  Uma came downstairs. “Still eating?”

  Dinah chewed, pushing the rest of the biscuit into her mouth.

  “Stop being melodramatic.”

  She would have to look the word up later after chores. Uma wouldn’t tolerate reading when there was work, which was just about always. Dinah got up from the table, food still stuck in her throat, and pulled on her own boots.

  ***

  Handling livestock had gotten easy with time, easier than putting up with the children at Nineveh had been. A dozen does stared at her from inside the goat pen. Their eyes were droopy and their ears hung at the sides of their heads. Several of them twitched, as the local fly population was also up and buzzing about.

  “Good morning, ladies,” Dinah said.

  They bleated their response, an overlapping soft cry, as they crowded the gate. She pushed in through them, went to the hay tender, and grabbed a couple of armloads of dry grasses for the does’ breakfast. This all went into the feed trough. She then took a bucket and a stool and set herself up next to a tan-and-white doe.

  “Hello, Hazel.”

  Dinah worked her first set of teats. This took hand strength, endurance, and patience. She spoke softly as she worked, as it relaxed the goats. Hazel bahed, bapped, and berred, but allowed Dinah to milk her without any hassle. It was always best to start with the troublemakers. The other ladies gave her no problems even after the hay was all gone. While they munched, she worked quickly. It would take Rosalyn thirty minutes per goat, and she’d get less milk than Dinah would.

  Hay wouldn’t suffice as their only meal, as the farm didn’t have enough. If they wanted milk, the goats needed more food. Dinah would take them out foraging after putting the milk away.

  Uma came and took the bucket of milk once Dinah was finished. She would make cheese and butter and take the extra to sell and trade with the neighbors.

  “Check on Billy,” Uma said.

  “Billy’s mean. Let Rosalyn do it.”

  Dinah got more explanation than she expected. “Rosalyn’s helping Karl at the fog collectors.”

  She checked on Billy. Billy stayed in a pen on the opposite side of the house under a big oak. She plucked a thick thistle from the ground on the way over, a gift for the savage beast. She leaned on the pen and called out.

  “Billy!” She made a clicking noise with her tongue and waited.

  The goat had a roofed enclosure within the pen. It was all shadows in there. She imagined she could hear his raspy breathing from within.

  “Billy?”

  He didn’t answer. Maybe he was sleeping in. She checked over her shoulder in case he was inexplicably behind her. She waved the thistle to and fro like an offering. Wasn’t this enough to fulfill Uma’s request? She had checked on him, hadn’t she? She had other duties. The ladies needed to be led to pasture. But inside Billy’s pen, she saw his food trough was empty and his water bucket knocked over. She put a hand to the gate, touching it cautiously as if it might be hot. A moment passed.

  “Billy, I come in peace, and you need hay and some water. And I’ve got some lovely treats for you.”

  When she opened the gate, Billy charged. He was a shaggy gray goat, a real brute, and he came out of his shadowy lair like a cannonball. He made it to the gate and screamed. He snapped at her hand. She smacked him in the face with the thistles. He tried to bite the thistle bouquet, but she pulled the treats back.

  “Not until you behave yourself. Now back off!”

  Billy snorted.

  She took one sprig from the thistles and handed it over. Billy snatched it and wolfed it down. He backed off, but his devil eyes kept staring at her.

  “I’m here on a mission from my people. A mission of peace. Don’t you want some water and hay?”

  He snorted again.

  She gave him more thistle. He ate it. She opened the gate and went inside the pen. His attention was now on the rest of the bouquet instead of her. This would work if she could ration the treats while she refilled his water and put out some fresh hay. Billy barked, a dry throaty chuff that summed up his surliness.

  “Gesundheit.”

  She never turned her back on him as she ministered to his fleshly needs for food and drink. When she was all finished and closing the gate behind her, he went for the last stalk of thistle in her fingers. She managed to save her fingers, but the stalk fell to the ground. Billy pushed his nose as far through the pen as he could, his tongue searching for the last of the treat. Everything else within range of the enclosure had been already eaten.

  “This is only because I’m not Rosalyn.”

  She picked up the thistle stalk and handed it over. He slurped it down. Rosalyn had cared for Billy, had tended all the goats at one time. But Uma had assigned it to Dinah in her first weeks at the farm. She was never sure why she had gotten this job over some of the more menial
brain-dead work. Maybe Rosalyn had grown out of caring for the goats and was more useful with other chores. Maybe she was just too mean. Dinah wondered if Billy was taking his Rosalyn hate out on her for some suffered evil.

  Or, if Karl was right, Billy just wanted the harem of goat babes on the opposite side of the house. Billy got to have his way with them once a year when it was time to make more baby goats.

  “Billy doesn’t miss his mark,” Karl had once said.

  “Ugh,” Dinah said aloud just thinking about it.

  Apparently, enough of the neighbors’ bucks fired blanks that Uma was able to charge for visits. Billy seemed to know when it was time to go studding. On those occasions, he behaved like Rosalyn did on pie day.

  Billy watered and fed? Check. Stitches needed? Zero. This day was going swimmingly. Except that she was drenched with sweat, and it wasn’t yet noon. She returned to the doe pen to let them out.

  The ladies knew which way to go, and they passed Dinah when she dawdled. These biological eating machines would consume thorny vines, poison oak, exposed roots, and young, defenseless saplings. She took them to one of the nearby meadows where they could terrorize the entire plant kingdom with their voracity. While they ate, she explored the outer limits of the pasture, scanning for anything new.

  After a while, Karl and Rosalyn appeared, emerging from one of the wooded paths that led further uphill. Rosalyn was dragging her feet and carrying a toolbox in both arms. The heat of the day appeared to rest heavily on her. Karl seemed to carry his own atmosphere of comfortable air with him. He smiled when he saw Dinah at the perimeter of the meadow picking herbs.