by Sharon Shinn
The smile was back in her voice when she spoke. “Last year, we were traveling in Gaza. There was a farmer there, a poor man, but he desperately wanted to buy something in Hector’s wagon. Some farm tool, I don’t remember. He didn’t have any money, and nothing to barter with except some drugs. Apparently his wife had been sick the summer before, and he’d put out a plague flag, and an angel came down and prayed to Jovah for medicine. I suppose you understand about all that.”
“Oh, yes.”
“So the god sent these tablets down from the sky like rain, and the man gave them to his wife, and they cured her fever. But he didn’t need them all, so he hoarded the rest. And that’s what he traded to Hector for this farm tool he wanted.”
“And that’s what—you’ve brought to me today?”
“Yes. Jordan was sick last winter, but these pills made him well in two days. They’re really quite amazing.”
He managed a slight laugh. “Yes. I’m familiar with these particular gifts of the god. Last night, I was wishing I had some, in fact. But I didn’t have the strength to summon the god’s attention.”
“Let me give you one now.”
She handed him a small white lozenge, and he put it on his tongue, then he tried again to lift his head to sip from the waterskin. It took him a few sloppy attempts before he was able to swallow the pill. He lay back on the sand, panting and exhausted.
She sat beside him a moment, appearing to assess him. “It’s not good that you’re so weak,” she said at last.
“I agree,” he managed.
“I’ve brought some broth. I think that will make you stronger. Do you think you can sit up and eat some?”
“No.”
Another short silence.
“If I held your head up,” she said more slowly, “and I fed you, could you swallow some then?”
“I think so,” he whispered.
She rose and stepped around the fountain to the place where she had accumulated quite a pile of waterskins, linens, and other objects. He thought she must be one of those naturally efficient people who understood what was necessary and the simplest way to achieve it, and then didn’t make any fuss about getting it done. Unless it was something her mother had asked her to do, of course. But that came from youth. His guess was she would be quite a capable woman once she left her mother’s care.
When she came back, she settled on the ground even closer to him. “Here,” she said, and lifted his head so it could rest on her thigh. “How’s that?”
Immeasurably improved, in fact. It was amazing how any perspective higher than a completely prone one gave a person a better sense of control over his world. But that was not the only advantage. Now that he was actually in contact with her, he could smell the scent of her body, a mingling of sage and sun and sweat and sweetness. Through the mesh of her veil he could catch glimpses of smooth cheeks, wide eyes, curls of dark hair.
“It’s good,” he said.
“We’ll try a little at a time.”
Slowly, carefully, she fed him spoonful after spoonful of a hearty, meat-based broth. He couldn’t believe how hungry he was, how wonderful the salty liquid tasted in his mouth. After every five or six spoonfuls, she gave him another drink of the fruity mixture. He made no attempt to disguise how eager he was for another taste, and another. He felt like some kind of sightless, ravenous baby bird, snatching morsels of food from its patient mother, swallowing as fast as it could, and opening its mouth wide for the next offering.
“I think you shouldn’t have any more right now,” she said finally, laying down the spoon. “I don’t want you to get sick.”
“That was—that was so good. Thank you so much.”
“It’s just soup broth,” she said.
“It was wonderful.”
A silence fell between them, and he wondered if she would edge away and lay his head back on the sand. But she made no move to do so. He could not be sure through the veil covering her face, but he thought she looked pensively across the sand in the direction from which she’d come.
“This morning, Isaac’s mother was crying,” she said at last. “She went whispering to my mother, but I couldn’t hear what she said.”
“Do you think Isaac was unkind to her?”
“I don’t know. All the young men were gone to hunt before I came out of the wagon.” She hesitated. “She said Isaac’s name, though. I heard that much.”
“Well, maybe it was just an argument between mother and son. I’ve argued with my mother often enough.”
Now he had caught her attention; he could make out the shapes of her eyes, trained on his face. “Have you? About what?” she asked.
“Not anymore, of course. When I was younger. If she thought I was rude to my father or lax in my lessons or not as tidy as she would like or late or sarcastic, she would sit me down and lecture me. And I would cross my arms on my chest and say, ‘Don’t tell me what to do,’ and then she’d really start scolding. People are always telling me how charming I am—” He paused and smiled and went on. “You might not think it, seeing me in this condition, but I can be charming. But I owe all my manners and any gentleness I possess to my mother. A most gracious lady indeed.”
“And you are a good son to her still?”
“Well, I try to be,” he said with a grin. “Both dutiful and generous. She lives in Velora, though, so I won’t see her as often now that I’m living in Cedar Hills.”
“Why are you living in Cedar Hills?”
Because Gabriel asked me to befriend the Jansai. This hadn’t been exactly what Gabriel had had in mind, though, Obadiah was pretty certain. “We lost a lot of angels in the destruction of Mount Galo,” he said instead. “The Jansai weren’t the only ones to suffer when the mountain came down. So now the angels from two holds are spread over three, and there is too much work for all of us to do. And more hands—more voices—were needed in Jordana. So I’m here.”
“And will you be going to Breven often?” she asked.
It was said innocently, and surely she meant nothing by it, but the question silenced him for a moment. He peered up at her, making no attempt to conceal the fact that he was trying to see beyond her disguise. “I might be,” he said slowly. “Cedar Hills has business with Uriah.”
“Next time you fly over the desert,” she said primly, “you might remember to come a little more prepared.”
“I wish you’d take off your veil,” he said.
She drew back a little, but did not, as he half-expected, shove his head off her knee and jump to her feet. “I’m not allowed to do that,” she said.
“You’re not allowed to be here. But you are.”
“I can’t.”
“I’d like to see your face. You’ve done so much for me, and I don’t even know what you look like.”
“I’m a dark-haired girl with brown eyes. I’m just ordinary.”
“I don’t think you’d look ordinary to me.”
“Then you’d be disappointed.”
“I don’t think so.”
“My family would abandon me in the desert if I showed my face to you—a man, a stranger, and an angel.”
“I would not for the world bring harm to you.”
“Then don’t ask me for such a thing.” She lifted a finger and placed it, gently, on the curve of his cheekbone. “I’m glad I got to see your face, though,” she said.
The touch was whisper soft, as vagrant and curious as a spring breeze. As he had last night, he shivered at the faint contact, and this time he was pretty sure it was not shock or trauma. Or, perhaps, both shock and trauma, but not caused by his severe wounding.
“How long will your family be on the road?” he asked, the words sounding tight and constricted. “When will you be back in Breven?”
She shook her head. She had finished tracing the line of his cheek and now she folded her hands back in her lap. “I don’t know. How long will it take Simon to find a branch to serve as his axle, how long before the wagon is
repaired, how long will we linger in Castelana? Anything could happen on the road. I hate to travel.”
“I imagine I will be back in Breven in a week or two,” he said.
She laughed. “You will be recovering in a sickroom in Cedar Hills—if you make it that far.”
He smiled. “No, no, angels heal very rapidly. You’ll see. I’ll be well enough to fly back tomorrow or the day after.”
“You can’t even hold your head up,” she said.
“I’d rather rest it against you,” he whispered.
She stilled all over, and suddenly the flirting girl was gone and the brisk matron was back. “Well, it’s true you should be resting for a while,” she said. “I’m going to give you another one of those white pills, and then I want you to sleep.”
“I don’t want to sleep. I want to talk to you.”
“You can talk to me when you wake up.”
“I don’t think I’ll be able to close my eyes. I know I won’t fall asleep.”
She made a well, now gesture with her hands. “But I won’t talk with you again until you’ve napped. You can lie here all afternoon, fighting to stay awake, but I won’t say another word to you until you’ve slept and woken again. So you’d be better off to sleep.”
He couldn’t help laughing. “Sounds like something you must have said to your brother when he was little.”
She didn’t reply, but he could see fragments of smile through her veil. She lifted his head and returned it gently to the ground. Instantly he felt a great lassitude steal over him, but he resisted it mightily. “I’m not tired,” he insisted.
She placed a finger on his lips to silence him, instantly achieving the desired effect. Rising, she stepped over to her pile of belongings, sought through them quickly, and returned with another pill in hand. He didn’t argue anymore, just swallowed it down with the water she held to his mouth. He closed his eyes just a minute against the brightness of the day, and the next thing he knew it was a couple of hours later and he was just waking up again.
He lay there quietly a moment, not struggling to sit up, not even trying to look around, wondering what he would see when he did take in his surroundings again. Would Rebekah still be here, or had he slept so long that she had refilled her water vessels and returned to camp? If she had already departed, she would have left him well-provisioned, of that he was certain: There would be waterskins close to hand, and the rest of the soup, and the container of juice. Perhaps a handful of the precious white pills, a small pot of salve, all within easy reach.
But he hoped she had not gone.
Moving slowly to avoid jarring any injured limbs, he stretched his body and craned his neck, looking around the small oasis. Rebekah was nowhere in sight. He felt a profound strike of disappointment, a clutch in the stomach so brutal it felt like nausea, but what had he expected, after all? She had done more for him than any Jansai girl should have—more than most any stranger might have done for a wounded wayfarer encountered by chance. Both his leg and his wing felt markedly improved since the application of the salve, and his fever had responded quickly to the medicine. He would be on his feet tomorrow, in the air and headed toward Cedar Hills by the day after that.
Cautiously he pushed himself up on one elbow, and when that did not cause him to swoon with pain, he fought to a sitting position. His head just fit under the low roof of the tent, and his wings spread out limply behind him, feeling twice their normal weight and completely stripped of glory. Grunting a little, he stretched his hurt leg out straight before him and poked around at the bandage. That woke a few shivers of agony, but the area of injury appeared to have shrunk to a smaller size, so he was clearly healing. Once he could stand and force the leg to take his weight, it would heal more quickly still.
He peered out from under the canvas to try to get a look at the sun and judge what time of day it might be. Late afternoon; no wonder Rebekah had left. He must have been asleep three hours or more. As he had suspected, she had left waterskins piled by his own canteen, all within reach of his hand. Thirst made him reach for the closest one. Water merely, but he drank it down as if it was sweetest wine.
He was just recapping the container when Rebekah strolled into his line of vision, holding a handful of bushy objects before her.
“Good, you’re awake,” she said. “How are you feeling?”
He was so happy to see her that he smiled like an idiot. “I thought you’d left!”
She made a little sound. “I’m not going back there till the sun goes down.”
“You’d better be careful,” he said seriously. “There was a mountain cat around here last night. If you go back after dark—”
“It won’t come after me,” she said serenely. “They only go after small game and helpless big game.”
“Well, be careful anyway.”
She came close enough to drop beside him and sit cross-legged on the ground. “How are you feeling? You look much better.”
“So much better. I think the fever’s gone. And the pain is almost nothing now. Just an annoyance.”
“I’d still be careful for a day or two if I were you. Don’t try to fly off to Cedar Hills tonight.”
“No. Tomorrow or—more likely—the day after.”
She held up a handful of leaves and some long, snaky tubers. “I’ve been out foraging. I found some marrowroot not far from here and some reskel roots. The reskel roots don’t taste like much unless you cook them and season them, but you can eat them raw, and they’ll fill you up. So that will get you through tomorrow, I think.”
“I’m starting to feel hungry again.”
She nodded. “I’ll give you the rest of the soup before I go, and I brought some bread. But you’re probably going to be really hungry in a day or two, since you’ve missed so many meals. I can’t do much about that. Sorry.”
“So I won’t see you again tomorrow?” he said, trying to sound careless and wholly failing.
“I don’t know. If Simon made it back this afternoon and fixed the axle, we could be on our way at daybreak. If he’s still on the road, we might be here another day. Or two. But I would expect him to be back tonight or early tomorrow.”
“So when you leave today, that will be it. Last time I see you.”
“Yes. It might be.”
A silence fell. She sat there, apparently at ease, but Obadiah felt awkward and eager, wanting to say more, knowing he should not. There was no hope of any kind of lasting friendship between a Jansai girl and an angel, even an angel renowned in three provinces for the gift of charm. They were companions of chance, need, and kindness, comrades of the desert, and once he flew away from this precise spot, he would never see her again.
Not by his choice, however.
She spoke suddenly. “I’ve washed your shirts out.”
“What?”
She gestured to an array of white tacked down with small stones on the other side of the fountain. “Your shirts. They were so dirty. I washed them out so you’d have something clean to change into.”
He couldn’t keep himself from leaning forward as if to stare behind the face scarf and look into her eyes. “You did not have to do any more chores for me. You have done so much already.”
She laughed. “All part of caring for an invalid. Making him more comfortable.”
“If only there was something I could do for you in return, some way to thank you, or pay you—”
She shook her head. “Nothing. I was glad to do it.”
“But your family—you took such a risk.”
“Oh, that’s one of the reasons I wanted to help you! It would make Hector so mad if he knew! I sat in the wagon last night, and I watched him and Reuben at the fire, and I couldn’t stop laughing. If they knew where I had been all day yesterday, where I was today—”
“I don’t think that’s why you helped me,” he said quietly. “I think you did it because you have a kind heart.”
She was silent a moment. “A willful heart,” she sai
d. “Don’t think better of me than I am.”
He smiled. “Very well. I will believe that you are willful, and stubborn, and hard to please, and impossible to control. But you are also kind. I have known willful women before, and not all of them would have stopped on the roadside to aid a stranger.”
“I’m sure you know a lot of women,” she said lightly.
His heart quickened. Was that just the merest hint of jealousy? “Angels and angel-seekers, Manadavvi heiresses and Bethel farm girls, Luminaux artists and the daughters of Semorran merchants,” he agreed. “And not one of them is half so amazing as you.”
The smile was back in her voice. “I feel certain that you have said something very similar to all those farm girls and heiresses, angelo.”
He put a hand to his heart as if it, too, had been wounded by a bolt of fire. “You think I’m a flirt?”
“I think you are—a man who knows how to be delightful to women.”
“And you know so much about men! Perhaps they are all like me.”
“Silly and funny and kind and complimentary? I don’t think so. Not my uncle or my father or my cousins or Hector or the men who are married to the women I know. I can’t imagine all angels are just like you, either. No one has ever said very flattering things about the Archangel, for instance.”
“No, Gabriel is not silly or funny, I have to admit, although he can be kind and complimentary when he chooses. And Nathan can be quite charming upon occasion. Now, he’s an angel you would like, I think.”
“Oh, no. I’m not interested in meeting more angels. It’s been adventure enough to meet you.”
He smiled. “An adventure so shocking you can’t even tell Martha about it.”
A giggle. “If you knew Martha and the things she’s done . . . I can’t think of anything I’d do that could shock her.”
“It’s good to have a friend like that.”
She tilted her head as if to consider him. He would swear he could feel her gaze drifting across his face, touching his cheek as lightly and as curiously as her fingertip had touched him before. “I wouldn’t think you would need friends who weren’t shocked by your behavior,” she said slowly. “I wouldn’t think you’d done too many shocking things.”