A River in the Sky

Brambles tugged at their clothes as they went on. David kept stubbing his toes on chunks of stone hidden by the rampant weeds and leaning more heavily on Ramses’s arm. He was weakening fast, or perhaps the medication had begun to take effect. Ramses got him inside the keep and lowered him onto the ground. He was out of breath himself. David looked as if he had lost weight, but he didn’t feel as if he had.

“Cozy, isn’t it?” he wheezed.

“Forbidding” would have been a better word. The walls of the lower floor of the keep were intact except for the gap through which they had entered. There had never been a door on this level; invaders would have to climb a steep narrow flight of stairs, under constant fire from the defenders, in order to reach the entrance. The stairs had slumped into a steep uneven ramp. The stairs inside remained, though Ramses hoped they would not have to use them; they circled the inner wall, but after seven centuries, give or take a decade, he would not have wanted to trust his weight to them. There were no windows on this level either. The only light came from above, through sections of the ceiling that had fallen in. The floor was littered with scattered stones, possibly the remains of partition walls, with bird droppings and straggling weeds, and with a grisly collection of bones. The bones, those of small animals like hares, were dry and brittle; he could only hope this was an indication that the predator had taken up residence elsewhere.

He cleared away bones, weeds, and rocks from a space behind a pile of stones and persuaded David to lie down, with one of the galabeeyahs under his head for a pillow. “Can you eat something?” he asked.

David made a wry face. “I’m not hungry, but I suppose I had better. What have we got?”

The answer was, nothing to tempt an invalid’s appetite; the bread was hard, the cheese pungent, and the grapes were withering. David forced down some of the grapes and bread soaked in water to make a tasteless gruel. “What time is it?” he asked.

“I forgot to wind my watch,” Ramses admitted. “Getting on for midday, at a guess. My message has been on its way for several hours. With luck we could be out of this place to night.”

His attempt at encouragement was a dismal failure. “Not bloody likely,” David said. “Don’t treat me as if I were a child, Ramses. I may be sick, but I’m not stupid.”

“You must feel better,” Ramses said, smiling. “Or you wouldn’t talk back to me. You’re right, of course. At best the messengers will take at least a day to reach Jerusalem. They won’t risk the main road, because it’s being patrolled by Turkish soldiers. Then they’ll have to track down the parents, who are notoriously unpredictable; God only knows where they’ve got to by now. It may take even Mother a while to figure out exactly where we are, my directions were necessarily vague, and even if they receive the message tonight, they won’t be stupid enough to start out in the dark. That’s the truth of the matter. I hope you like it.”

“You only left out one uncomfortable fact. The messengers may not get through at all.”

“That’s a possibility.”

“Then we had better get ready to move on our own,” David said coolly.

Ramses gave David’s shoulder a quick, awkward squeeze. “Thanks.”

“What for?”

“For not suggesting I leave you here and go to get help.”

“It would have been a waste of breath. You never listen to sensible suggestions.” He yawned. “Is there any more of that vile medicine left? It makes me sleepy, but it does seem to have lowered the fever.”

“Just the dregs.” He had put the cup, with its contents, into his belt pouch along with all the other evidence of their presence. He took it out and inspected what remained of the herbs. “I’ll try adding some boiling water, let it steep awhile. Go back to sleep, there’s nothing else to do.”

“Wake me in a few hours. Take it in turn to keep watch…”

His voice faded out and his eyes closed.

Ramses went back to the entrance and began gathering twigs and dried leaves for a fire. The thin smoke dissipated in the breeze, but he was afraid to let it burn too long; as soon as the water began to steam he stamped out the fire, taking care that no sparks reached the patches of dried grass. The water was running low, and had a distinct taste of goat. He’d seen a gleam of running water farther down the slope, on the side of the villages, but he was afraid to risk a sortie in case he might fall and break a limb. That would leave David alone and helpless.