by Aidan Harte
Seeing her chance, Sofia leaped over the flames …
They didn’t stand a chance.
Only when they had all gone over the edge did Sofia notice her flag had caught fire. Rather than throwing it aside, she leaped back up onto the crenellations and waved it wildly, as if to ward off the night’s darkness, screaming, ‘Avanti! Avanti!’
The word might have meant nothing to the Ebionites, but they knew what courage was.
*
When dawn came, the kerak was in Sicarii hands. The victorious warriors prostrated themselves, facing south, and prayed, while Sofia watched them with frank envy. These were people for whom doubt was impossible. The adrenalin from the fight was ebbing now, and she marvelled at the danger she had thrown herself into. In her desire to revenge Arik, had she forgotten Iscanno?
No; it was just that her heart had always been quicker than her mind. She had felt it before, but she had only begun to understand when she heard about Arik’s death: this wasn’t a fight she was beginning. It was a war in which she must succeed, or die. And to win it, all of her – her experience, her skill, her passion, her faith – was required. It was a terrible vocation, but somehow it didn’t daunt her; perhaps it was easier to give oneself wholeheartedly to a cause in strange climes? Here in the desert there was poverty, pain and privations aplenty, but there was also perfect freedom.
Take it, a voice within her urged.
Old Bakhbukh saw her and bounded over, crying exultantly, ‘Join us, Contessa!’
‘It wouldn’t be right. I am Marian.’
‘Words are hollow things. You feel the sun’s heat, don’t you? Then your erroneous theology is irrelevant, and it is egoism to think your prejudices matter. What you believe counts not a fig compared to what you do. Come, pray with us.’
Bakhbukh led and as she added her voice to the responses, she considered why of all the world’s women, God had chosen her. There was no lack of virginal nuns in the world – but He hadn’t chosen someone tender and mild. Instead, he chose an impious brawler, and a Rasenneisi to boot, the most quarrelsome race in Etruria. Such was the tool He needed: a soldier, not a saint, and one who could bear His son and raise an army to protect him. This was the Handmaid the times called for.
Afterwards, while Yūsuf and the rest plundered the kerak, she and Bakhbukh sat looking south.
‘No offence, but why do you pray facing Jerusalem?’ she asked. ‘It didn’t exactly make me fall to my knees in awe when I saw it.’
He laughed. ‘What you saw was just a rock. You cannot see Jerusalem – it is not a city, it is wherever God is. And He is restless. Tomorrow we will face east.’
Sofia looked south a while, remembering the abandoned city and the Jinn that swarmed restlessly over it.
‘Somewhere out there,’ said Bakhbukh, ‘a lunatic preacher is wandering the land. His madness affords him protection, for no one other could wander the land unarmed and live long. A moon ago, he predicted rain, and he was mocked by all the nesi’im for it. They said he was stirring up the tribes to folly, but when the rains came, even they began to listen. I heard him myself and I believe he is a holy man – as well as a lunatic. It is conventional for preachers to call themselves John the Baptist or Elijah, but he says he is the one who knows the old names – the true names. The Old Man defeated the army of Gog some forty years ago, so that would make him a veritable Methuselah.’
‘But what does he preach?’
‘He says the Prophetess has returned to free her people.’ He turned to her. ‘They will say you are She, you do know that, don’t you?’
‘Then he must be mad.’
‘The Prophetess returned in the body of an infidel!’ He laughed at the absurdity. ‘I can’t wait to hear the Rabbis explain that!’ When Bakhbukh saw her grave face, he apologised. ‘I meant no offence.’
‘I know, but there’s something you must know: Arik ben Uriah is dead.’
He turned suddenly cold. ‘What is that to me?’
‘Are you not Issachar?’ She had been with the Sicarii long enough to know the question was more than impolite; the bandits’ code of omerta meant they never enquired into or mentioned each other’s origins. It was the only way that men whose tribes were feuding might live together.
With an abrupt sag of his shoulders, Bakhbukh’s frigid dignity departed, leaving only a sad old man. ‘I was Uriah ben Sinan’s counsellor – the one who advised him to take the queen’s peace offer seriously.’
Sofia knew she ought to leave it there. But … ‘That was foolish.’
He looked at her a while. ‘I remember my arguments very well. I told Uriah that the Akkans had long since ceased to be invaders – they acted just like a tribe, demanding tribute, throwing around their weight. I told him that the tribes quarrel ceaselessly, but peace is possible when both sides perceive their own weakness. The Akkans could continue to act belligerently in this land as long as regular reinforcements kept coming from their motherland – but Crusade died a generation ago. I told him – and I truly believed this – that the queen had finally realised that this was her home, so she must treat us not as adversaries but neighbours. I was wrong. Uriah’s death and what happened subsequently to the Issachar’ – he threw a handful of sand in the air – ‘was my fault.’
‘More foolishness. The queen is to blame.’
He was too proud to agree. ‘Only a fool blames a snake for biting his heel. I was Uriah’s counsellor, and it was my responsibility to see beyond stratagems, to argue convincingly. Alas, I was capable only of the latter. Yūsuf is foolhardy and vain, but after I failed his father, how could I abandon him?’
‘You abandoned Arik readily enough.’
‘He abandoned his own people!’
‘Because Yūsuf was preparing to kill him.’
‘Better that than the shame of serving the one who killed his father.’ Bakhbukh rose stiffly. ‘I am sorry that Arik died an outcast, but it was in accordance with the Law.’
CHAPTER 15
The Doc had taught Sofia how to handle the flag. His patient way of unravelling foes was another lesson, and one she now drew upon to devise arguments to convince the Sicarii that they had the means to defeat Catrina’s tyranny.
Yūsuf, ensconced once more in his fireside throne, was back to his old self. ‘God gave us a great victory, but He does not suffer wilful fools.’
‘That was not a “great victory”. It was a good start.’
‘Any nasi foolish enough to attack the cities of the franj has destroyed himself along with his people,’ said Bakhbukh sullenly.
‘I don’t propose storming Akka.’
‘What then?’
‘Cut their hamstrings. Make overland trade impossible,’ she said. ‘Cut their cities off from each other as completely as they’ve separated the tribes—’
Yūsuf slapped his thigh theatrically. ‘She is brave, but she remains a foreigner, does she not?’ He gestured up to the shelf where Jabari and the other children were listening raptly to the adults’ debate. ‘These dreams might sway the young ones, Contessa, but this is a council of men. What separated the tribes is the tribesmen. You cannot bat your eyelashes and unite us.’
‘Not yet I can’t. First we must make the name Sicarii glorious again.’
Bakhbukh chuckled. ‘I wondered why you did not let Mik la Nan get crushed. You want his help.’
‘The Napthtali are big enough to start an inter-tribal war – or they can be the core around which our army is formed.’
‘That scoundrel will not be swayed by patriotism,’ Yūsuf assured her.
‘What about glory, then?’
Yūsuf glared at the thoughtful faces around the fire. ‘Are you being taken in by this sorcerous witch? Unity is a children’s tale – a rallying cry, nothing more.’
‘I come from a country where the people considered unity a base coin. Now they are slaves, united in bondage. They call us homeless beggars, but that is to our advantage, is it not? Catrina must defend
her cities, her forts, her convoys – what have we to defend? Rocks? She hides behind fragile walls. The limitless Sands conceal us. We can be like the Jinn and fly on the desert winds.’
*
Early morning, and the main cave was empty. Sofia was sitting on the shelf with Jabari, now her constant companion, and the other children, watching the last lazy wisp from the extinguished fire and thinking about the tales Bakhbukh had told last night. The debate had prompted him to recite the story of how the Old Man of the Mountain had almost beaten the franj, and how, when a greater threat threatened to destroy the land, he forged an alliance with the franj to save it.
Her ruminations were disturbed by Jabari tugging at her sleeve. He pointed to a furtive pair of hands clambering for a grip on the edge of their perch, and she recoiled when Yūsuf’s bearded face appeared.
‘May I join you?’
‘By all means,’ she said, quickly covering her breast. She had no inhibitions around the others, but the unworldly piety Yūsuf affected made her uneasy.
‘What a pleasant nest you’ve built! A woman’s touch can work such wonders.’
Jabari glared at Yūsuf like a cornered cat.
‘Boy, you’re being a nuisance to our guest.’ Yūsuf was still at pains to pretend that Sofia was here by his permission. ‘Go and play.’
Jabari waited for Sofia’s nodded assent before he left the perch.
Yūsuf watched him go benevolently, then turned to her. ‘Jabari’s father was a fisherman. The drought that swallowed Galilee took him too. We discovered the lad nursing the corpse of his baby brother and took him under our wing.’ He smiled. ‘You see, we are not total jackals.’
Sofia nodded noncommittally. She had heard a different version from Jabari.
‘I came to say all’s ready. We ride out in an hour.’
‘You’re still sceptical about my strategy.’
‘I don’t doubt your sincerity.’ He made a face. ‘You seek to hurt the franj by hurting their property. It’s hard for me to know if it’ll work for I myself care nothing for material possessions.’
Yūsuf’s appetite for loot was no secret; it was as fierce as any condottiere’s. But Sofia played along. ‘What would you suggest?’
‘No tribe can hope to breach Akka’s walls, but one Sicarii with a knife can enter the city at will. Send a new knife every night, each with a new target.’
‘Such tactics would only make the Small People rally round the throne. I want to isolate Catrina.’
‘Yes, and you want to unite the tribes!’ Yūsuf scoffed. ‘I tell you it would be easier to herd the Gaderene swine.’
‘The Old Man did it.’
‘The Old Man had no tribe. He came from nowhere and disappeared without a trace. Don’t believe Bakhbukh’s bedtime stories – trust me, he sometimes gets it wrong.’
‘Time will tell.’
Yūsuf let Iscanno tug his beard for a while, then said casually, ‘Tell me, Contessa: how did you and this fine fellow survive the Sands?’
‘I knew one who knew the Sands as mariners know the sea. He taught me your language too.’
‘One of the Sown?’
After Bakhbukh’s reaction Sofia had decided that it was probably best not to mention Arik, but the desire to wipe away Yūsuf’s cloying smile was overwhelming. ‘Your brother,’ she said softly.
‘I have no brothers,’ he stammered.
‘You did your best to see to that, and finally it’s true. Arik’s dead.’
He gawped, visibly grief-stricken, before pride reasserted itself and he growled, ‘So perish traitors.’
‘He was fighting to survive, as you are doing.’
‘I fight to restore the Radinate and I live like a beggar to do so, while that traitor grew fat at the queen’s tit.’ He slipped off the shelf, muttering, ‘Be ready, or we leave without you.’
Sofia stayed her tongue as he walked out. Telling him that his men would not leave without her might be the truth, but Yūsuf probably wasn’t ready for that.
*
The Akkan convoy trundled through the spare expanse of the Jezreel Valley, riding in an almost square formation of six rows of five – long trails presented too tempting a target to those always watching in the hills. Their dust cloud trailed immensely behind them. Their destination was deep in the Wilderness of Paran, far to the south, and their path was obstructed by a ridge of Mount Carmel jutting inland. There were other, more roundabout routes, but the Wadi Aruna which sliced through the ridge was the most direct. In ordinary times they might not have risked it, but they had a long journey ahead of them and they needed to make haste.
As the cliff’s shadow fell across the first caravan, shrill cries made them all look up, then over their shoulders.
The bandits came pouring down the side of the foothills, mounted on camels and screaming, ‘Illa – illa – illa!’
There was no room to turn back, nor any point in doing so, nor had they time to count how many bandits were behind them – but it hardly mattered. They were on their own, and their best chance was to get deep into the wadi and find a narrow pass at which they could make their stand.
The Sicarii were not about to let such a rich prize escape. Soon they were riding alongside the convoy, their slings spinning – then suddenly the caravans slowed and parted, revealing what was concealed in the centre: a troop of mounted Lazars.
‘Every man for himself,’ cried Sofia, and the Sicarii took fright and scattered into the wadi’s depths.
Basilius, gleeful that his ruse had worked, led the chase, crying, ‘Follow me, Lazars!’ even as a hefty stone from a sling bounced ineffectually off his armour.
The wadi divided, and though some of the Sicarii went straight, the majority veered left, closely followed by Basilius, who found himself riding though a steep, narrow ravine. Just as he started to get claustrophobic, the ravine opened out into a large arena-like space. His men, following close behind, watched in amazement as the Sicarii abandoned their camels and started clambering up the sides of the cliffs on ropes lowered from each side.
Basilius chortled and whipped out his throwing axes. ‘Target practise, lads,’ he called.
As his men’s laughter echoed through the arena, Basilius noticed something uncanny: the space was dotted with five immense circles of lush grass. The abandoned Sicarii camels had also noticed, and the Grand Master’s glow of triumph faded in an instant.
As the animals crossed onto the grass, each circle buckled and transformed into a sinking vortex. Where the grass and horses vanished, spindly plant limbs exploded and Basilius watched, frozen with fear, as one of his men was lifted from his saddle by two tendrils and pulled apart before his eyes. Persuaded that it was wise to be elsewhere, Basilius whipped his horse into a gallop. He guessed the way behind would be blocked by Sicarii bandits – he didn’t even bother to look behind to confirm that, or to see if any of his men were following him. Most of them weren’t: they were ripped to pieces or swallowed before they had begun to realise the horrific threat they were facing.
Only a handful of Lazars managed to brave the flailing forest of death and survive to tell the tale in Akka.
*
The driver’s nose was bloodied, but he did not flinch. ‘I was simply providing for my family.’
Sofia and her gang were still aloft, waiting till the ground was stable before descending to join the rest of the Sicarii who were already busy stripping the caravans, hooting joyously as they smashed barrels of the prohibited wine, drunk on vainglory. Bakhbukh sat watching uneasily. Yūsuf had evidently sampled some of the loot and was simply drunk.
‘I did not ask for your justifications.’ He tapped his riding stick against his leg, irritated by the man’s bravery. ‘I asked if you took silver from those who make an idol of the Prophetess. The question is simple. Yes or no?’
‘I don’t understand politics, master.’
Yūsuf said sympathetically, ‘That is irrelevant. Your actions have ramifications, w
hether you committed them in ignorance or not. I am the leader of the Sicarii – the renewer of the Radi-nate – and so I am burdened with terrible responsibility. I have one final question for you: which hand committed this crime against God’s people?’
The prisoner made a half-hearted attempt to bolt, but Zayid held him down as Yūsuf, trembling with righteous anger, cried, ‘Tell me which hand or I’ll take both – and your family will suffer the same fate!’
‘I need both to work, master! If I cannot do my job, my family will starve. I’ll give you anything—’
‘Anything I want, I’ll take. Choose!’
The man broke down and proffered his shaking right hand.
‘What is this?’ Sofia was covered in dust from the chase and weary from the climb.
‘A trial.’
‘He’s a driver. That’s no crime. Set him free.’
When Zayid dropped his sword, Yūsuf barked, ‘Pick that up. They are collaborators.’
As greatly as the Sicarii loved plunder, they loved argumentation more, and raised voices drew them like molasses draws flies.
‘So you’ve already passed sentence?’ Sofia said scornfully. ‘Some trial.’ Then, so that everyone could hear, she said, ‘Akka and all the Oltremarine cities are full of Ebionites who survive by working with the franj. Will you punish them too?’
‘If they are guilty – yes!’
‘Then you’re a fool.’ She glowered at Zayid until he released the driver. She helped him stand, then turned back to Yūsuf, ‘I’ve known people like you all my life: always making examples of other people, never being one. I was that way once, until someone taught me better.’
‘It is the Law, Contessa.’
‘Bakhbukh, punish this man and you persuade ten like him to seek Catrina’s protection. Pardon him, and you recruit his family and friends. We have an army of potential allies in the cities of Oltremare. Give Catrina sleepless nights and she’ll drive them to us with her cruelty. This is how we’ll win.’