

The Silver Cross

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Gayla Scot-Hays

Copyright 2013~Gayla Scot-Hays

All Rights Reserved

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, whether visual, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written permission of the copyright owner.

This story is a work of fiction. All characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to person(s) living or dead is purely coincidental.

License Notes:

This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're enjoying this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase a copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

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Dedication

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To the Friday Girls.

You taught me something I suspect Zero always knew: a blade is best honed against a stone.

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Chapter One

Geoffrey's daughter stared down at the evidence of her disgrace.

A pile of bread, the rounds heavily dusted with burned flour, sat in a heap at her feet.

They looked like camel's hooves.

She leaned down, snapped off a chunk, gnawed with her strong back teeth.

Tasted like them, too.

She spit out the bread, kicked down the stack, then slid the loaves under the coals of her small cooking fire with the tip of her toe.

She was hopeless. A girl of six could bake bread. She'd seen better than six plus six plus six again, so had no excuse for failure.

She breathed the aromas of baking bread and roasting coffee that wafted all around the settlement, called simply _Makaen Hadeed_ , the Place of Iron. The good smells mingled with the sounds that produced them; the slapping of dough between heavily veined brown hands, the whirring of coffee beans in the pan until the fire had roasted them deep and dark and full of flavor.

Bread and coffee meant the day was done.

She looked up into the surrounding hills, where the rises swelled stark and golden against the blue sky. The steep slopes were scattered with boulders and sheep, the sheep moving steadily down the hillsides toward the large pens behind the settlement's tents.

She couldn't see the shepherds, but she knew they weren't far behind. Lean and brown with their heads swathed in light colored _kafiyyehs_ , the shepherds would be striding easily across the rocky terrain, their fists gripped around crooked sticks they would wield with deadly accuracy if anything, animal or human, threatened the sheep. But for now, they remained hidden from view by groves of olive trees that cut across the peaks of the hills in irregular bands of grayish-green.

Unlike the shepherds, groups of young women clustered, as tradition demanded, in full view always. They marched along the paths that led to and from the wells, their chatter bright as birdsong, tall clay jars balanced on their heads.

Geoffrey's daughter sneaked a glance at her father.

He stood at his forge, his mallet in his hand. His famous tower, an imposing black iron spire crowned with a flaming torch, had led settlers to Makaen Hadeed for almost twenty years.

Today Geoffrey was not devising anything nearly as grand as his tower. He'd focused his full attention on the piece of iron, white with heat, he held between long black tongs. When the iron had cooled to red, he set the tongs against the anvil and swung the mallet, then swung and swung again, the blows hard, swift, precise. He lifted the tongs and examined the piece of iron.

A six inch spike, perfectly formed by three quick strokes.

But Geoffrey didn't smile; he never smiled.

He plunged the metal into a waiting barrel of water and silently fished out another chunk of iron, the next in line to be mastered.

Geoffrey's daughter took the chance to breathe.

Much of her life had been spent within sight of her father, watching him work. As a child she'd often run from the house and ducked into one of the animal pens, frightened by her father's ferocity, and although she no longer needed to hide when mallet hit metal, there were still times when _clang-chink_ , the sound of Geoffrey hammering the iron into submission, haunted her dreams.

She sneaked another glance.

The sun was setting. Her father would be hungry. And she had no bread for him to eat.

Then Geoffrey said only, "Cross."

Cross swung the heavy iron pot off the fire and bunched up her long shirt to grip the hot handle. She hurried past her father, into the house, as Geoffrey fished out the spikes he'd just forged. He threw them into the largest of three mounds heaped up against the house; one pile for spikes, one for nails, one for tacks.

Cross quickly laid the table in the fashion of some far off place, as her father always insisted. Two shallow bowls. Knives. Spoons and two tined forks with delicately braided handles, from his forge. Squares of linen, used for wiping mouth and fingers, at both places.

The rest of the settlement ate sitting on carpets in the shelter of the family tent, scooping up rice and onions and lentils with chunks of warm, soft bread. Men ate first. Women and children ate last, of the men's leftovers.

Sometimes Cross wondered... although only sometimes... why she and her father were so unlike everyone else.

Then Geoffrey stepped into the house, hands and black beard dripping. He ran his hands over his beard, shook them to fling off the last of the water, and stepped over the bench in front of the narrow table. The bench scraped as he pulled up close, flexed as he sat.

Geoffrey pushed his bowl to the cooking pot and Cross ladled the soup; lentils and barley, swimming in a hot salty broth flavored with leeks.

Geoffrey pulled his bowl close and began to eat as Cross filled her own bowl and sat.

"No bread?" Geoffrey said.

"I'm sorry, Father," she said, staring at the little green puddles of olive oil floating on the surface of her soup.

Geoffrey dipped his spoon, blew off the steam rising from the bowl, sucked in as Cross carefully slid a leg back over the bench.

Bread... I have to get bread--

But who would be willing to share it this time?

She slipped out the door and began scanning the settlement with eyes that moved too rapidly to really see. In the distance, she heard prayers being offered to the god it seemed only she and her father neither knew nor cared to know, so she was already too late.

She grabbed a handful of spikes and worked them into the waist of her breeches; five new ones, she noticed; they were still warm. Then she covered the spikes with her shirt and headed for the center of the settlement.

Geoffrey's house stood at the back of the camp, close to the goat pens. Radiating out, all across the valley, the tents of Makaen Hadeed honeycombed the land, enlivening the bleak plain with an orderly maze of fluttering tent flaps.

Cross hurried past tent after tent, absently returning the greetings offered: _misa' il kheer_ , good evening, _salaam alekum_ , peace be upon you.

She moved more quickly. She didn't need polite greetings, she needed bread.

Sharpening her focus, searching for the telltale slaps that brought forth the unmistakable scent of life, she'd wound her way through nearly the entire settlement when she lifted her nose, sniffed the wind and ran.

" _Sayeda_ ," she gasped, " _andik shrak?_ "

Seated cross-legged, an old woman motioned to a wide dome of black iron set over an open fire.

"Of course I have bread, you stupid girl," she said, quickly sliding a thin sheet of dough off the hot _sajj_. "Why do you run about in _bantaloon,_ _qumsaan_ ," she waved at Cross's breeches, her shirt, "and unveiled, with your head and hair uncovered? It's a sin! You're going to spend eternity in hell, girl." The old woman jabbed a finger. "Ten thousand years for every single strand! Don't you know any better?"

"My father... he is not Muslim, Sayeda."

"Muslim, Jew, no woman may be seen uncovered by all manner of men!"

"My father--"

"No decent woman, anyway."

"I'm sorry, Sayeda."

Sayeda Fadilah began to work another piece of dough, stretching and spreading it between her hands as she spoke.

" _Abu_ Jaffir should have done right by you! Married you a mother! A mother would have taught you properly. She would have you married by now and you would live honorably, a mother yourself. A girl cannot be tamed until she is a mother, a mother would understand that. She would not allow you to disgrace her, running wild like a--"

Cross stared into eyes as black as coffee beans.

"Like a what, Sayeda?"

Sayeda Fadilah draped the large circle of dough over the sajj, then waved her hand as if scattering flies.

"You are such an ignorant girl, I don't know what to make of you. No one does. I'm too old for this, I can't be bothered with you. I raised sons. Three, I have. Daughters, too." Fadilah held up four fingers. "All of them wives. All of them mothers. All of them righteous in the sight of Allah," she raised a flour dusted hand, fingertips to the sky, "the merciful, the compassionate...."

" _Alhamdulilah_ , Sayeda, praise the Almighty...."

"I have twelve grandsons... fifteen by summer... _insha'allah_."

"Insha'allah, Sayeda, as God wishes...."

Sayeda Fadilah softened. "You're not a bad girl...."

"No _,_ Sayeda."

"Just untrained." Sayeda Fadilah held up a finger and waggled her head, chuckling. "Comes a time the mare must be broken, eh, girl? Broken and ridden, eh? Eh?"

"Yes, Sayeda," Cross said, feeling a flush seep upward, against the laws of gravity, from her neck to her scalp. "Sayeda," she whispered. "The bread."

Fadilah yanked the sheet off the iron.

"Bread? You want bread? I have need of this bread! I have a large family, children and their children, running all about--"

"For my father, Sayeda. Please. Just a little."

Fadilah's coffee bean eyes sank deeper into her bread dough face.

"What've you got to trade?"

"I have nails."

"I live in a tent, you stupid girl. What have I to do with nails?"

"Please, Sayeda." Cross slipped her hand under her shirt and pulled out two spikes. "Please. For my father."

"I have no need of nails." Fadilah brushed away more imaginary flies. "Go away."

Cross glanced into Fadilah's tent.

A carpet, its wool shimmering, lay incongruous yet somehow contented against a coarse floor of rock and sand. On an embossed tray, complete with little legs, sat a tall brass coffee pot. Steam came from the long curved spout; a dozen little cups hugged the base.

Cross scratched between her shoulder blades, where her homespun shirt pricked her damp skin, then scrubbed the sweat from her face with her sleeves.

What need have you for nails, old woman? Why, you can do what you always do with them... barter them when the traders pass through, trade them for barrels of good, white flour you'll hoard until it's full of weevils and then, when there's no fine flour because the Haboob blows too hard for the traders to cross, you'll put the children to picking out the bugs and sifting out the webs and you'll trade your weevily flour to your neighbors for three times what it's worth--

"What are you looking at?" Fadilah said. "Are you thinking to rob me?"

"Sayeda," Cross gasped, wide-eyed, "no! I would never--"

Fadilah's eyes narrowed and her flesh seemed to swell, squeezing against the confines of her tight black veil like dough left too long to the proof.

"Wanton girl," she said, slowly shaking her head, "if you weren't Abu Jaffir's daughter--"

"Please, Sayeda!" Another flush stained Cross's cheeks, dyeing them the color of Fadilah's expensive carpet. "I came here only to trade the nails--"

"Then hand them over."

Cross laid two spikes across Fadilah's outstretched palm. The old woman turned to her pile of bread, rifled the stack, picked out the two smallest sheets.

"Five," Cross said, bobbing a bow, "Sayeda, if you will... it's only fair...."

"Two."

"Please, Sayeda! Two is not enough, the nails are worth--"

"Two nails, two shrak."

"But these are spikes, not nails! They're as big as tent pegs, they're worth--"

"Not to me."

"The two are worth three at least! Please!"

"One shrak, one nail."

"They're not nails," Cross said in a tiny voice.

"You call them nails." The old woman spread another sheet of dough over the sajj. "I repeat your own words."

Cross felt her body sag.

Of course Fadilah had spied the other three spikes, not so well hidden, beneath her shirt.

She brought out the last three, handed them over.

"Five, Sayeda."

The old woman smiled. Coughed. Rifled the stack of bread. Coughed. Picked out the smallest three.

"There you are, child."

Cross took the bread, carefully folded the thin sheets.

" _Shukran,_ Sayeda."

Fadilah raised her hand and grinned, showing a row of bright pink teeth.

Cross stared.

Why were her teeth pink?

Blood--

Fadilah coughed again and waved her fingers. "S _alaam alekum_ , child."

" _Alekum salaam,_ Sayeda."

Cross turned and ran. When she reached her father's house she leaned against the wall, between the heaps of nails and tacks, weak, dizzy, her breath scraping against her dry throat--

Sick, sick... Sayeda Fadilah's sick--

Cross looked down at the bread in her hands. She ran to the fire and glancing all around to make sure no one would see the sacrilege she was about to perform, shoved the bread under the embers that had long since consumed her own camel's hooves. As thick smoke rose in pillars from the fire, she dashed to the house, took the dipper from where it hung on a nail, then ran back to the water barrel. Pouring cup after cup over her hands, her wrists, her forearms, she scrubbed herself red, trembling, frightened--

Sick... sick... Sayeda Fadilah's sick--

She rushed into the house. "Father--"

Geoffrey had finished his soup, and hers. He shoved away from the table and said, "No bread?"

***

Cross knew that since her blanket was too short, her feet would poke out from underneath, but she pulled the blanket over her head anyway, trying to shut out the whispers.

She'd always had dreams... restless, unsettled things full of clang-chink lullabies, voices she didn't recognize, and achingly sweet music like none she'd ever heard men make.

But this dream seemed so real.

As her toes turned to ice, the murmurs outside the house became clearer and she was able to catch a few words.

_Sayed_ Zakiyyah, the husband of Sayeda Fadilah, speaking to her father.

_Ayena._ Sick. _Dam._ Blood.

Then Sayed Zakiyyah began to cry.

Maeyita.

She's dead.

Cross sat up, pole straight in her narrow bed.

Sayeda Fadilah's dead--

And then her father's voice, rising louder and louder as he barked out his gruff, plain Arabic, _"Kaem? Kaem? Kaem?"_

How many? How many? How many?

By dawn, only a few hours coming, too many.

***

Cross sat on the threshold of her father's house, her bottom inside the doorway and her feet resting on the ramp that led to the desert. She slowly wrapped her arms around her knees, her eyes fixed on the now empty road that led away from the settlement.

After two days, her father was finally still.

For two days she'd watched him shouting orders to men who scurried silly, like ants from a torched nest, trying to out-race death.

Special tents for the quarantine of the sick.

Barrels of boiling hot water to disinfect clothes, blankets, cooking utensils.

Kafiyyeh's wrapped to cover not only the head but the nose and mouth as well, the lower folds stuffed with garlic or mint to filter out the poisons in the air and the stink of death.

The dead buried immediately, or burned.

But it was all for nothing.

No one can outrun death; she knew that now. A dozen dead by noon; by evening, another twenty. The following morning, people crammed the narrow road winding up into the hills. Robed men drove sheep and asses and carts loaded with tents and goods and children. Women, most swathed from crown to foot in black _abayaas_ , walked behind their men, wringing their hands and weeping for the dead.

People were dying everywhere... in the olive groves, in the barley fields, on the hills while shepherding their herds. And Geoffrey's proudest achievement, Makaen Hadeed, was dying with them.

Many hours ago, her father had brushed past her in silence, to sit on the small bench that stood under the single window of the house.

Chairs were not the custom of the desert but Geoffrey, a bulky man, disliked sitting on carpets on the ground, so he'd placed stacks of books on each end of the bench to prop up his arms and used another short stack under his feet as a footrest.

"Are they all gone?" Cross had asked. "Is anybody left?"

Her father didn't answer at first. When he lifted his arm, it hung there motionless until, like a ripe apricot under the power of a gust, it quivered a little and fell.

"I--" He shrugged. "Fifty? A few dozen? Not even...."

And since then, since he'd sunk into his makeshift chair, the sun had traveled all the way up from the horizon to the peak of the sky, and all the way back down again. Now it was ready to hide behind the mountains for the night and still Geoffrey hadn't moved, hadn't spoken, hadn't made any sound at all.

Until he coughed.

Cross turned slowly.

"Father," she said, fear rising with the bile that filled her throat. "Father?"

"Cross--"

Cross jumped to her feet and went to him. "Father?"

"Get back!"

His voice sounded strange, the words garbled, as if trapped underwater.

She froze. "Father--"

"You've got that thing? For your hair?"

"My headdress? It's right here."

She touched the silver mesh that captured most of her hair; like fish caught in a net, curly black strands poked out here and there, struggling always to get free.

"The one I gave you... you've got it?"

"I've got it, Father." She faced away from him so he had a full view of her back. "See," she shook the bunch of hair and silver and ribbons she held between her fingers. "See? It's right here, in my hair."

His voice slumped along with his body. "I see ribbons."

"I... I put the ribbons. And some beads. To make it-- I thought it might be prettier...."

"You're such a stupid girl."

"I'm sorry, Father."

Geoffrey searched at his throat, then inside his shirt. When he found what he wanted he yanked, then dragged out his hand. A chain slid to the floor as he reached a closed fist toward Cross and jerked his chin.

"Take it."

She moved closer, placed her hand against his. His fingers opened and he pushed a piece of metal against her palm.

"Go into the desert," he said, holding her swimming eyes with ones full of blood. "Find the soldier. He was my brother in arms."

Cross stared at the shiny ornament in her hand.

Was the sickness destroying his mind?

"What soldier," she said, "what soldier, where? Where do I go?"

"The road... just follow everyone else."

"The road is empty! Everyone's already gone! How do I--"

"Do as I say!"

"Why? Why do I need to find him?"

"He knows the desert's secret."

"What secret?"

Geoffrey groaned.

The sound began low, down deep in his gut. A rumbling, churning noise and then, with a spasm that threatened to throw his burly body off the bench, Geoffrey vomited a bellyful of blood and slime that drenched his chest and legs and the floor at his feet.

Cross stepped back as the flood advanced, her eyes fixed, her voice lost in shock until panic broke it free, "Father!"

Choking on the blood that streamed from his mouth and nose, Geoffrey waved her off. Then he slumped against the wall of the house, leaned his head back and closed his eyes.

" _Agnus Dei, Agnus Dei miserere nobis--_ "

"Father!"

"Cross, get out...."

"Father, please," she said, struggling against Geoffrey's orders and her tears, "I don't want to go!"

Geoffrey finally found her with his distracted, bloody gaze.

"Do what I told you. Get out of here."

"I'm afraid! I don't know where to go!"

Geoffrey lowered his hands to his belt, and habit loosed the worn leather in an instant.

Cross ducked, lifted an arm, cried out, "Father, don't!"

Geoffrey heaved himself up and took one unsteady step nearer, the folded belt clutched in his upraised fist.

"Damn you, girl! Get out!"

Cross ran to the door. With her eyes still fixed on her father, she took a water-skin from one peg and a pack containing a veil and long outer robes from another.

"Father," she said, tears streaming from the corners of her eyes just as tiny droplets of blood squeezed from his, "I'm sorry about the bread."

"God damn you! Get out!"

Cross turned, stumbled down the ramp, and ran.

***

Geoffrey's daughter stared into the empty desert that surrounded her, her father's words echoing endlessly in her ears.

Go into the desert. Find the soldier. He was my brother in arms.

But she knew nothing of the wasteland. How could she possibly find this soldier?

She drew up her knees and laid her head against them.

She could make no sense of it. Just four days ago she'd been beating her father's olive trees with a long stick to knock down the fruit. She could still hear the voices of the other young women, cooing like rock doves, laughing as they worked under the smiling sun.

Somehow, the only voice she couldn't remember hearing was her own.

Now that same sun glared hot and angry. But what had she done wrong?

She had done everything wrong.

Squinting against the glare, she scanned the plain again.

No trails, no paths, no markers, no signs--

She could find no way out of this scorching wasteland.

Her father had given her just one task; find the soldier and bring him back to save what little remained of Makaen Hadeed. And she'd gone into the desert as he commanded, fear and doubt dogging her every step as she crossed the barrens with only one companion: a shrinking feeling that perhaps her father didn't really trust her at all; perhaps there had simply been no one else to send.

Still, Geoffrey had sent her to bring life back to the settlement, and all she'd brought--

She tore her eyes from the rocky terrain, rested them on the face of the man she'd killed.

All she'd brought was death.

Her empty water skin lay between her and the dead man. She raised it, shook it, for the hundredth, or maybe even the thousandth, time.

That thief, that ragged scarecrow, had stolen all her water and drunk it down, right to the last drop.

No one was in sight when she'd left the water to search for food. And she'd gone no further than the low ridge in the distance when she heard something that sounded like the voices in her dreams, or maybe it had been nothing more than the wind rushing past her ears. But when she turned and saw the thief with her water skin in his hands, she raced across the rocky sand, heart and lungs and legs pumping.

She screamed at him, " _Qof!"_

Stop!

But he didn't seem to hear.

With his grizzled head thrown back, he kept guzzling and gulping so she charged forward, plunging blindly, down, down, down, with her knife.

The thief gurgled a little and crumpled down dead.

Her knife still protruded from his neck. She closed her fingers around the hilt, jerked it out and stared down at the stubby blade.

Just days ago, cucumbers. And today--

How could it be so easy to kill a man?

Hand trembling, she poked the dead man's stomach with the tip of the blade.

There it was.

Her water.

Hidden inside.

Lost forever.

She would never find the soldier now. Never bring him back to the settlement to use whatever magic he possessed to defeat the sickness. Everyone who hadn't already left the place would die. Her father would die. And it would be her fault.

She wiped at the dry salt crusted at the corners of her eyes but managed to leave behind only more grit.

Would Geoffrey blame her?

No... she wasn't important enough to blame. He'd probably blame the bombs. She could see him now, puffing out his cheeks to explode air through his pursed lips with a big, booming _pow_. And although the bombs had fallen from the sky generations ago, her father still railed against them.

She smiled a little then; she had once asked to see the destruction because all she'd ever seen were tents and sheep and goats and grain and it all seemed normal enough....

Geoffrey slammed her into the wall with a hand as hard as the mallet it wielded.

Stupid girl! Civilization's been set back two thousand years and she wants to see proof--

She never again asked for proof.

But the image of her father slowly faded, paling before the conclusion that traveled in on a hard gust that scoured her sunburned cheeks with sand.

She hugged her knees with a groan.

I'm going to die out here--

She'd dried enough grapes to understand exactly what the sun was doing to the little pile of moisture that was her. What she didn't understand was the power it had to make her not especially care.

The sun cooled a little as a lone black form drifted into view, high above in the cloudless sky. The buzzard's slow dipping circles came lower and lower, and when she could see the wrinkled folds of its bald head, the wind began shrieking with a voice so shrill it forced her hands to her ears.

You're next... you're next--

So she buried her burning eyes under the slight protection of her arms, then wedged her ears between her knees. But she could still hear the wind, still feel the bird circling, with every shadow it cast as it slid past the sun.

She squeezed tighter.

Think about something else--

The olives would eventually be lost, lying there on the ground, because she hadn't gotten them to the presses or the brine vats. But olives hardly seemed important when there were so many things she didn't know and now, would never know.

A house of timber in a land of tents.

A table laid with forks and spoons in a land of bread and fingers.

A blanket too short in a land of sheep, and riches from a forge never bartered for any pleasures or comforts; just books. Books in languages no one seemed able to read.

She ran her hand along the back of her neck, under her hair.

Dry.

Not even a slick of salty wetness to lick from the tips of her fingers.

Her head throbbed, battered by too many questions and the sun--

Am I really going to die never knowing my mother's name?

She'd lost her veil chasing after the thief, so she worked off her long shirt, pulled it out through the neck of her robes, and wound it slowly around her head like a kafiyyeh _._ As she stared out into the desert, she tried to remember a face, any face, that could bring her peace.

She found none, being neither loving nor beloved.

She covered her nose and mouth with a wayward sleeve and closed her eyes.

At least I'll never have to face my father--

Then, sodden with sand and with not enough water left to cry, she stretched out in silence and surrendered to sleep. There, amid its cool darkness, death would eventually find and claim her.

Chapter Two

Every journey begins with a single step.

Or so Geoffrey of the Tower told himself.

He crouched down, reached back, and slid his arms around the source of his pride.

The anvil felt neither hard nor cold as he clamped his hands around it. No woman had ever yielded so fully nor so sweetly to his touch as had this heavy black iron, and so he'd loved her from the first. Through her, the Brotherhood had turned a hulking slug of a boy into a blacksmith and then a man, and that alone set the price of his ever silent, ever faithful companion far above rubies.

He waited a bit before tipping the anvil because the blood that covered his hands still felt slick. In a few minutes it would be drier, stickier, thereby becoming a useful tool for improving the grip he had upon his iron wife.

He lingered for some moments more, filling his lungs and brain with air, and then, with a mighty grunt that began at that inner forge from which he'd always drawn his strength, he leaned forward and took the weight of the anvil on his back. Bent nearly double, he staggered toward the sacred place he'd constructed, for it was there that his salvation waited.

When he was close enough, he settled the iron back down to the ground and collapsed beside it.

He could feel the blood bubbling.

When he raised a hand to his nose, it came away fresh red and wet, so he leaned back against the iron, closed his eyes and took a shallow breath.

Then another, shallower; a third, more shallow still.

Then he virtually stopped breathing.

He opened his palms to the sky.

Commanded his muscles... slack.

Shoulders, biceps, gut....

Thighs, calves, feet...

Heart... languid.

Brain... blank.

Melt to the moon as ice to the sun--

And it was done.

Geoffrey of the Tower rested for a long time as one dead, until the almost inaudible sound of footsteps fanned the spark of life he had so skillfully diminished.

He opened his eyes.

The moon shone so brightly he could see clearly all around, but the stillness remained undisturbed. And since he now perceived no threat, he allowed himself drift back at his leisure, his mind musing on the agility of the training given him by his Brotherhood... so quick to disengage the natural processes, yet equally quick to return them upon recognition of potential danger. Speed was key, although, if he recalled correctly, mastery of the technique had taken over a decade.

As he reversed the process he'd performed upon his body, he assessed his condition.

The hand he lifted to his nose came away dry.

The hand to his mouth: dry.

His eyes?

Only tears.

Had he outlived the sickness? Controlled the bleeding long enough to allow his body the precious hours it needed to launch the defenses necessary to defeat the threat that had invaded it?

Only possibly... with his body under duress, the blood still flowed.

But Geoffrey hardly cared. With his life's blood, his settlement, already sacrificed to the wasteland, he was more than ready to face judgment. But he couldn't leave this earth until he'd made tangible reparation for his falling away, for there had been times in his life... some very long times... when he hadn't loved his Lord.

He had, in fact, hated Him.

Geoffrey sat in the moonlit darkness gazing at the monument, the holy altar, he'd built with his own hands.

At first he marveled; even the sickness hadn't been able to stay its progress. But soon he realized; how could it? How could any earthly force, no matter how insidious or pervasive, challenge a man's paean to the Glory of God once he'd finally gleaned wisdom enough to raise it?

Although the altar wasn't yet complete, it was very nearly so; the last tall timber he needed to place lay beside him on the ground. And while daunted by the prospect of more exertion, he turned again to his staunch companion and, hanging on as if to a lifeline amid the raging storms of sand that scoured the wasteland, Geoffrey of the Tower hauled himself to his feet.

Behind the anvil lay a coiled length of rope. He hooked one end with its knotted loop over the anvil and drew it tight. Letting the rope out carefully, coil by coil, he tied it mid-way to the timber he needed to lift, then tied the end of the rope around a clay brick.

Aiming the missile and its attendant rope between the uprights, the two sturdy beams that formed a ten-foot tall **X** that spanned the altar, he threw the brick.

He missed.

He dragged the rope back and flung again.

The brick bounced off the very center of the **X** and dropped down to the ground with a thud.

"To Your Glory, Lord," Geoffrey sucked a deep breath as he bent to retrieve the brick, "supply Your strength. And Your aim."

As the moonlight dimmed, Geoffrey looked up at the darkening sky, where clouds drifted long and lazy in shades of gray, like smoke across the moon.

"I need Your light, Lord," he said. "I haven't time to waste. At any moment this foul red tide could turn."

But as he watched the sky, the last of the light extinguished like a feeble flame and Geoffrey of the Tower stared as one blind.

Without illumination from Heaven to direct or to guide, there would be no using the rope, the wedges, the pulley lodged at the crux of the **X.**

But Geoffrey would not be deterred; he lurched to the timber and crouched; dug his fingers under its rough sawn end. After he'd hefted the beam, he leaned it against his hip, then he hefted it again and ducked under, catching it on his shoulder.

The weight nearly laid him flat.

Panting weak and swaying, still Geoffrey stood, his captor itself imprisoned between his fore and upper arm.

He hauled forward with a growl.

"Lord, You carried a timber such as this. Have mercy on me, a sinner...."

Eyes on the altar, he pitched forward again, dragging the timber behind, and when he reached the platform upon which the **X** was secured, he rested the timber against its horizontal beams and slipped out from beneath.

Geoffrey of the Tower looked up, all the way to the top of the timbers that formed the **X** , then all the way back down to the weighty beam of wood that leaned poised and ready to take its place between them.

"To Your Glory, Lord."

He bent his knees, dug into the sand to gain good purchase on the end of the timber, and with a heaving, snarling roar, began to lift the wood into place.

An inch. A foot. A yard.

And then he stopped.

He could do no more.

Blood trickled from his nose, his mouth. His heart beat a wild rhythm inside his chest as he stood with legs spread, feet planted, but he wouldn't let go... not if he had to die here as he stood... he would not release the timber to the ground for only here, between his own two hands, was the means of his salvation--

For all the wrongs I've done for all the errors I've made for every wrong path I've followed and every crooked step I've taken through the sins of pride and envy through the blindness of anger and the lure of lust--

And then Geoffrey followed, with his eyes, along the deep furrow the timber had cut through the rocky sand.

The path wound like a lazy snake, back to the place he had just come from, and as he began to understand, his body began to shake, drops of blood squeezing from his heart--

Good Lord no--

My hammer--

My nails--

He'd forgotten to bring them. Impotent as spent seed, they lay in the dirt beside his anvil so now, even if he managed to lift the timber into place, he hadn't the means to secure it.

Like some animal deprived of its den, Geoffrey let out a keening cry, his face to the obscured moon--

"God!"

Then the darkness came alive.

Warmth radiated against his back; the weight of the timber lifted from his hands. He fell to his knees, mistrusting his own eyes; was the timber actually rising higher and higher to take its intended place as the centerpiece between the two crossed beams?

Geoffrey reached out his arms to the sky.

"Jesus!"

"Well, not exactly," came a voice from the night. "But nevertheless, hammer home, brother."

Geoffrey scrambled to his tools and rushed back to the altar. He set a ten-inch spike against the wood and drawing back a brawny arm, hammered until he'd buried all but the last joint. Then he did the same on the other side.

Blood mixed with tears as he worked, and when he'd pounded the third and last spike he fell to his knees again, panting. The wind gusted, he felt the soft wool of his benefactor's robes brush against his bloodied cheeks, so he dropped his mallet and clutched at the fabric, held it close as he wept, but when he looked down at the cloth between his hands, his eyes widened.

Brown wool.

He was sure of it.

Balthazar--

"Brother, can it truly be you?" Geoffrey whispered to the wool. "Have you ascended to Heaven before me and returned an angel? Come closer, so I can see your face before I die."

His benefactor laughed, took a step forward so Geoffrey could look him full in the face.

"Greetings, brother," the dark voice said.

Geoffrey dropped the robes and scrambled back.

He knew that voice; there could be no mistaking the voice of the devil.

"You!"

He shoved further back and hanging onto the altar, dragged himself to his feet.

"You!"

"Aye," the other said, spreading his hands as he rocked his head in a gesture that vacillated somewhere between acknowledgment and dismay, "it is I."

"Valentine, you... you are a brown brother?"

The tall man spread his arms, inviting inspection. "So it would seem."

Finding his spine, Geoffrey straightened.

"And how is this? Just days ago you were here swilling and rutting no better than the swine, and now you're masquerading in the brown robes of _Lux Perennis_? As if you knew anything about the Eternal Light that guides our Brotherhood!"

Snorting, he dislodged a thick clot of snot and blood.

"And I thought I was well rid of you, you and that miserable hag, I said good riddance to you both! And now you're back!"

Valentine smiled.

"This is hardly the greeting, or the thanks, I expected from my brother in arms."

"Get out! There's nothing for you here! Go leave your comfort in that old whore and leave me in peace!"

Valentine leaned against Geoffrey's altar and grinned.

"Old whores are often privy--"

Geoffrey howled.

"Old whores, young whores," Geoffrey's laughter forced him to rest his weakened body against the altar, only inches from Valentine's, "never has made much difference to you, eh, Valentine?"

Valentine tensed like a wolf that stiffens before it becomes dangerous, but then he shook the hood from his head and leaned toward Geoffrey, his long black hair blowing crazily in the wind.

"Mag's a whore unlike most," he said, his dark features lightening, "she regaled me, brother," he rolled his black eyes, "and such tales she told! Tits and tarts and treasure--"

Geoffrey took one step back. "Treasure? What treasure?"

Valentine took one step closer.

"Treasure that rightly belongs to our Brotherhood. Treasure required to re-equip our armies and restore our preceptories. Treasure you conspired with heretics and perjurers to steal--"

Geoffrey scooped up his mallet and lifted it high, ready to swing although Valentine stood fully a head taller than he.

"You malign me," he said, fingers white knuckled around the hammer, "I have no treasure, I have nothing but what I've built with my own hands! And I've done nothing, but what I was charged to do by proper authority!"

"Authority?" Valentine spit into the sand. "I see no legitimate authority here!"

"I am the authority here!" Geoffrey pounded the mallet on the broad flat of the altar. "By what authority do you dare challenge me?"

Valentine raised a fistful of brown wool. "By this authority, brother! By the authority of Lux Perennis!"

"Impostor!"

Geoffrey swung but Valentine threw up an arm, blocking the blow and knocking the mallet to the ground.

"Careful, brother," Valentine gripped the neck of Geoffrey's shirt to shove him back, "don't make it worse for yourself! Deliver the treasure and you might still come to Heaven!"

Geoffrey sagged.

"You could have come upon those robes any number of ways. You could have stolen them, killed for them--"

Valentine faced the sky and roared.

"Again, you dare deny me! Then defend your charge against me, Geoffrey, for if you do not, I will declare you apostate before God Himself!"

Geoffrey took one slow step back, slumped against the altar, tried to breathe, but Valentine, black eyes bright with moonlight, pressed in closer still, swallowing all the air.

He stared down at Geoffrey.

"Bend your knee, brother, and I will hear your confession. But if you will not yield... if you continue in your heresy by denying my legitimacy... it becomes my right to demand justice." He shook his shaggy head and spit again. "And you, so close to Heaven. It would be a shame to thus lose your grip upon it."

"Valentine... brother--"

But Geoffrey could find no air.

He sank down, gripped the thick planks of the altar as a shield against the awful heaviness of blood surging, swelling his lungs, his gut, his stomach so that if one were to touch it, it would burst like an overripe fig.

His voice came dull now, and thick.

"Valentine-- Brother-- I am unwell."

"So I see."

Geoffrey clutched his belly, panting.

"For the sake of God, then! Leave me to die in peace!"

"'Tis within your own power, to die in peace," Valentine stretched out his arms, "enfolded within the arms of our Brotherhood. You need only tell me what I need to know."

He crouched close, his words slow and deliberate.

"The treasure. You told the whore about a treasure. Do you remember?"

His dusky face blotched in shades of white and gray like ash upon a coal, Geoffrey nodded.

"Yes... yes."

"You told the whore you'd sent the girl to find it...."

"The girl? You mean the girl, Cross?"

"To whom did you send the girl? You told Mag the soldier had the treasure. You told her the solider knew the desert's secret. Now, Brother Geoffrey," Valentine took the coarse stuff of Geoffrey's shirt to draw him closer, "I would find this treasure. The sacred oath I have sworn to our Brotherhood demands I find this treasure. So what I want to know is... who is the soldier?"

Geoffrey stared, his glazed eyes swimming in a sea of blood and tears.

"I don't remember--"

With one hard thrust, Valentine slammed Geoffrey up against the timbers.

"Then let me remind you! You told Mag the girl had gone to find the Lamb... the Lamb of God! Now do you remember?"

Geoffrey rested his head against the thick wooden planks.

The blood was galloping; he could smell it on his breath. It had conquered his lungs and soon it would fill his gullet, spill out from between his lips--

Behold, angel of death, your quarry welcomes you--

Geoffrey stared into the sky. The clouds were all gone now and the moon again gleamed round and white as Valentine tightened his grip, his voice a blast of pain in Geoffrey's brain.

"The name! Give me the name or you'll burn, brother! As God is my witness, you'll burn for all time!"

Geoffrey gazed past Valentine into the radiant sky, moon shine in the middle and star shine all around, and he tried to laugh--

You're such a fool, Valentine...

You think a blacksmith who has spent a lifetime in one hell fears another?

It will be as nothing more than a home away from home--

"I remember--" Geoffrey coughed, spewing the pool of blood just behind his lips, "I remember the Agnus Dei. He's full of light... a bright angel--"

"Then it's Michael?"

Geoffrey began to weep.

Valentine again shook him by the blood soaked neck of his shirt.

"I know Michael travels this blighted land... did you send the girl to find Michael? Is Michael the Lamb of God?"

Geoffrey's ears began to bleed.

"I remember.... I remember...."

"You lumbering clod! What?"

"The girl...."

"What about the girl?"

Geoffrey smiled.

I remember her mother--

The girl's mother had white breasts more smooth, more soft, than any dove's--

And she held them in her own two hands, offered them as if bestowing a rare and precious gift--

And then she smiled, her eyes downcast as she trembled, docile, shy--

And at that moment, I wished that my hands were a woman's hands or a child's hands because the hands of a man, my hands, were too rough, too hard and callused to touch her satin skin--

But then she took my hand and slipped it between her legs--

Guided me into the wet warmth of her womanhood--

And then--

Geoffrey's eyes rolled back in his head.

Valentine snatched the knife from the sheath at his knee, held it before Geoffrey's face.

"You will not die... you will not die until you tell me!"

Geoffrey focused on Valentine's face.

And then you came between us with your sly blackness and your easy ways and nothing--

Nothing nothing nothing ever mattered, ever again--

Geoffrey choked out a laugh.

"Think you to kill me, brother? What will you use? That knife?"

Or your authority?

Geoffrey gulped a breath, threw all his weight forward, plunged his throat onto Valentine's blade, and as Valentine roared, stood, hauled Geoffrey to his feet by the knife still gripped in his fist, Geoffrey, flailing, flung himself toward the altar, forcing the blade to dig deep and slice long, from apple to ear--

And as the black blood streamed, Geoffrey's laughter gurgled as he reveled in his last conscious thought--

Ilana--

Chapter Three

The priest stood at the crest of the hill, scanning the low plain stretched out before him. An unremarkable length of stone and sand, it was as it had always been, both economically and strategically.

Insignificant.

And because of that, life in this lost little place had remained virtually unchanged for a thousand generations.

Not many miles away, unmarked and unassuming, lay the threshold to the whole rest of the world. That world had begun to plummet, shrieking, into history, when the first bombs had fallen a hundred years before.

To the west, the great pyramids of Giza were visible only as vast sweeping plateaus, the crevices between the piles of rubble long since filled by blowing sand.

Further north in Jerusalem, the western wall of Herod's temple no longer stood. As if heralding the last quarter of the twenty-first century, its stones had tumbled under the weight of war and they still rested, shoulder to shoulder, with tarnished shreds torn from the Dome of the Rock. With its air, water and land poisoned for eternity, the City of Peace was finally free and open to all.

The priest frowned as he stared, his eyes finally fixing on an amorphous spot out the barrens.

Something was not quite right.

A mound beyond arched a bit too high; it marred the artless symmetry of the rock-strewn plain. Dots of darkness sprang up and down all around the mound and as he watched, one of the dots stretched and took to the air.

_Buzzards_ \--

Light desert robes billowing behind, he swam down through the hills, his black booted feet plowing the loose sand. When he reached the flat ground he headed south toward the mound, his chin lifted to sniff the southerly gusts. His long strides abruptly stopped and he breathed deep, filling his lungs.

Mortuus caro--

Dead meat.

An invisible path stretched straight before him. Lithe and easy, he followed until he was close enough to his target, then, taking a hard left, he swung his arm to grip the hilt of his knife. Three cautious steps closer, another breath of rotten air, and he released the knife.

As he approached, the buzzards turned from their feast. Denizens of the desert since time began, they were all polite hospitality, acknowledging his presence by bobbing their heads as they offered to share. But they knew this one... knew his smell, his habits. This one did not partake, as some did in the wasteland. But still, he was of the desert and so of them, so there was no need to depart.

They continued to tear at the corpse until he brushed through their mob, his long legs sweeping the dust from their wings as he scanned the body.

Ragged robes... gaunt face... bare feet cracked to the bone and bloody, from contact with the burning sand.

His lips tugged into a quick frown.

Dead men were common in the wasteland. Like most, this one possessed nothing worth scavenging, but there appeared to be something valuable here--

He gripped a leather-covered foot peeking out from beneath the corpse and hauled out the girl.

"You." He nudged with the tip of his boot. "You dead yet?"

He set two fingers against the girl's throat and blinked.

Strong.

Or stubborn--

He took her left hand in his, turned it upward.

Long palm, sturdy fingers. Tiny benign splinters just under the top layer of skin.

It was a good hand; it had known hard work.

He bent lower, lifted the hand to his nose.

_Lanolin and olives-_ -

Some Bedou daughter, born of desert nomads?

No... this one was--

He saw it so clearly, suddenly.

He licked his thumb and rubbed a thin dusting of salt from an unburned spot beneath the curve of her jaw. There, the skin glowed smooth and luminous.

Satisfied, he smiled.

This one was a pearl.

But where had she come from?

As he gazed down at her, lying amid the scattered rubble, he had an odd sense she'd somehow washed ashore on this dry wilderness. And although logic told him she came from one of the nearby settlements and couldn't truly claim the water as her home, he also knew she no more belonged to the sea that surrounded her, where the waves were made of rocks and sand, than did a true pearl.

From the corner of his eye, he caught a gleam of light winking in her dark hair so he fished in her curls until he felt the smoothness of metal. After a few twists, the ribbon that held the metal to her headdress split apart, freeing it to his hand.

Blinking against its brightness, he ran his thumb over a forged silver cross. Large and lavish, each tip of the cross ended in a flared fleur-de-lis.

Catching the bit of frayed ribbon between two fingers, he planted a knee, hauled up the girl, cradled her in the crook of his arm, and popped the cork from the water skin slung at his back. Wetting his fingers, he quickly slid them over her lips, her neck, her cheeks. When he took his hand away, her head lolled slack on her shoulders, so he gave her jaw a light smack.

Nothing.

He eased her head back against his shoulder, wedged the skin between his chest and bent knee, slipped the tip between her lips and gave the sack a slight squeeze.

The water trickled down her chin.

"Come along now, little sister," he stroked her lips, her throat, "you've come this far... it's time to come all the way back."

He saw her eyes move a little beneath her lids so he burped more water into his hand and ran his dripping fingers across her eyes, under her nose. He rested his fingertips against her throat again, and after a few moments, he felt the muscles flex as she struggled to swallow.

It won't be long now--

Conscious suddenly of the closeness of his body to hers, of his eyes intent upon her face, he laid her down, stood, and forced his gaze to diffuse--

And after all, there's no need to infect--

Cross sighed.

Still resting under cool clouds of semi-consciousness, she squeezed her eyes more tightly shut.

Did I fall asleep under the trees again? I can't be under the trees, the sun's too hot--

But Father must need something or he wouldn't have climbed all the way up into the hills--

I'm getting the water, Father! I'm not asleep!

She drew in a slight breath.

A dipper of water would be nice--

She opened her eyes to thin slits. A shimmering vision in silver and gold pulsed, then bright awareness burst in her brain like the seeds of a juicy pomegranate between her teeth.

She grabbed the neck of the water skin, clamped her lips over the spout, and while one hand worked to tip the sack, the other reached for the knife strapped to her ankle.

As the man hefted the sack he settled a foot, pinning both the knife and her fingers beneath the hard heel of his boot. But she felt no pain; she felt only a warm river of life flowing down her throat, and when he tipped the skin again, she sucked another mouthful and drove it to her belly like a stone.

" _Kifaeya_ ," he said, lowering the sack. _Enough._ " _Ismik ay?_ " _What's your name?_

She didn't answer; instead, she clamped her fingers around the long neck of the goatskin.

He covered the spout with his hand.

" _Eich kor'im lach?_ "

Silence.

He repeated in Arabic, "Ismik ay?"

"It's Cross."

He smiled slightly.

English?

She is a pearl--

"Have you lost your mind, girl? What are you doing out here alone?" He glanced at the corpse. "Who's that? Your husband?"

She groaned, _no_.

"Where is he, then? Dead? Who do you belong to? Where are your people?"

" _Maya...._ "

Water.

He frowned.

First English, now Arabic--

He hardly shrugged.

This was, after all, the wasteland.

For generations, the desert had hatched thousands of polyglot eggs, products of those lonely places settled by pilgrims and thieves, scholars and soldiers, priests and slaves, drawn from every region on the planet. And with the undoing of two millennia of civilization as their only inheritance, all had been hurled against the walls of war and so, had spattered the land with their babies and their blood.

One hand still resting over the spout of the water skin, he elected to continue in Arabic.

"Where are your people?"

As Cross stared at the big scarred hand, she needed several long moments to accept that the hand intended to move exactly nowhere until she answered.

"Sick," she said finally. Her words, like her thoughts, came thick and slow. "My father...."

"How sick?"

"Dead sick."

The man freed the spout, steadied the sack as she gulped.

"Who's your father?"

She drank until she felt a tug on the sack.

"Geoffrey," she said quickly, inching closer to the skin, "Geoffrey of the Tower."

The man nodded at the corpse. "Who's he?"

She got her lips over the spout but he hauled back until her lips popped off like a suckling's from a teat.

"I asked, who's he?"

"He's a thief." Then she remembered. "The soldier--"

She groped at the webbed cage of silver in her hair; felt each shiny ribbon; touched each brightly colored bead strung in between.

When she raised her eyes, he opened his hand.

"This?"

Geoffrey's cross lay in the middle of his palm, captured strands of her black hair blowing along with a few filmy shreds from the torn ribbon. She reached, but he closed his fingers.

"Mister," she cried, "you can't--"

"It's not nearly enough payment for the water."

"But I need it! For the soldier! So he'll help us!"

Without another glance, the man tossed the cross.

Cross fumbled, scrabbled through the sand, and when she had the cross clutched safely in the fist she held close to her chest, she looked up.

The man was part of the vision she'd seen in silver and gold. His long hair was silvery gray, not unlike like the cross she held in her hand. Behind him stretched miles of gleaming golden sand.

As she stared, the sun's brilliance careened around him. Sharp and glaring, it pierced her eyes, but with a single step to the side he blocked the rays and a blessed coolness fell over her.

"Thanks, mister."

He said nothing.

"Who are you?" she began, but then, anything to escape the gaze that pinioned her as securely as the rays he'd just banished, she looked away. "The sun's high, it's the heat of the day... what are you doing out here?"

He slung the goatskin over his shoulder.

"I have the water, I ask the questions. Who's this soldier you're supposed to give the cross to? What's his name?"

"I don't know."

"Where are you supposed to find him?"

She just stared at the sand.

"Why do you think he's out here?"

"My father said."

"Said what?"

She slowly parroted words that had already taken on a misty, illusory quality.

"He said, 'Go into the desert.' 'Find the soldier.' 'He was my brother in arms.'"

"Nothing else?"

"He said, 'He knows the desert's secret.' Then he gave me this."

To tie the cross back onto her headdress, she searched for a leather thong because it would be stronger than a ribbon, but soon, distracted, lowered her hand.

Had her father said anything else?

She couldn't be sure; the memory had become a vague dream she couldn't trust, full of ghostly players and whispered groans, but slowly, a picture took shape in her mind.

Her father had pressed the cross into her palm. The silver was warm, his fingers were fire, and his full beard, iron black, was spattered with blood.

She raised her head, her eyes stung by tears she couldn't shed.

"Mister? I think maybe my father's dead. And I don't know what to do. Please, you've got to help me."

"You're not giving me a whole lot to go on, girl."

She lowered her head to her hand, unable to keep either from shaking as she rubbed her eyes.

"I think he called someone named Agnes. Then he had blood on his mouth and at his nose and he told me to go into the desert, so I headed out to find the soldier, but then he," she glanced down at the corpse, "stole my water." She looked up in appeal. "But I didn't mean to kill him! I just wanted him to stop drinking it! But I guess it was all gone already, anyway."

Just then the man seemed to smile.

New lines, tiny but deeply etched, appeared by his eyes, and with a slight sweep of graceful fingers, he dispatched her guilt like chaff to the wind.

" _Maa'lesh...._ It takes whatever it takes. That carcass bought you twenty, maybe thirty degrees. Don't ever be sorry for being alive."

His words somehow comforted her.

She couldn't find enough strength to move her limbs but her eyes could still move, so they waded through the thick dusty air to the face of the man standing tall and solid before her.

She found his eyes first.

They looked ancient, as if they had once been deep blue and years of sun and wind had faded them to their present pale color. Expressionless and impenetrable, like sand blown pieces of desert quartz, they gazed through her to something far off in the distance.

But his face was curiously young in contrast to the old eyes. His lips were firm and fine; only when they tugged for the briefest instant into an odd expression, neither a smile nor a frown but something in between, did they offer a fleeting glimpse into the man's thoughts by reflecting everything his eyes did not.

He didn't flinch under her steady gaze but neither did he return it.

"Mister," she watched as the wind drifted past his shoulder, rifling his hair with a lover's touch, "where are we?"

"We're north of Al-Barat. About two days south of Zo'ar."

"But... I mean... what's this place called?"

He rubbed his lips, sending little flecks of salt flurrying from the lower half of his face.

"I don't recall it being called much of anything."

Cross blinked, rose up a little on her knees.

"But, compared to where I was... where am I now?"

"Where you are, little sister, is out of your league."

She searched his face again, hoping to find the same concern reflected on his face that she knew she wore on her own, but it remained expressionless.

"Then what should I do? Listen, mister... if you help me find the soldier, I know he'll get us out of here."

"Us? I might be mistaken, but last I knew, I wasn't lost."

Knees gone weak, Cross crumpled to the ground.

He was right.

She was the one who was lost. She couldn't find water or the soldier in this miserable place.

For an instant, she wished this stranger had never roused her from her stupor; she would have simply continued to sleep her dreamless sleep and would have never woken up.

"There must be something I can give you...."

Jolted suddenly by the pinch of the cross inside her tightening fist, she opened her fingers, thrust out her hand.

"Here! Take it!"

"If I wanted it, I would have kept it."

"Wait! I have more!" She snatched the silver stick from her headdress, ripped the netting from her hair. "Take this, too," she held out a heap of color, the precious silver all but hidden under faded ribbons and cheap glass beads, "some of its even gold! Please, mister, take anything you want...."

Her grip weakened, the headdress thudded to the sand, and when her body swayed, he caught an elbow to steady her.

"If you don't want the silver...." Her voice dropped to a whimper. "Then I'll do anything. Anything you want."

Dizzy, she reached blindly for his arm.

"Please, mister. Take whatever you want. Just help me...."

He lifted her face with a single fingertip.

"Anything I ask?"

Eyes bright, she met his gaze and nodded, her free hand slowly moving to the open neckline of her robes.

He smiled.

"Good. I want--"

He focused on her slightly parted lips.

Curving delicately inward, like the inside of a shell, the color drifted from palest bisque to almost pink.

Long ago, as a child, he'd set an ear against lips such as these and heard the song of the sea.

He glanced away, but still, at the very edge of his vision, he saw her trembling.

He thought of rain.

But he knew he needn't look up at the sky; any errant moisture finding itself unexpectedly in this part of the desert evaporated in seconds, overwhelmed by the superheated air.

Rain hardly stood a chance. Neither did she.

He released her elbow and stepped back until her hand fell from his arm. Fixing his gaze on the horizon, he sighed.

"What I want you to do... is call me Zero instead of mister."

Hot blood flooded her cheeks.

"I know it's nothing special, but it's all I've got to give you."

He leaned closer, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper.

"I'm not interested in your offer... but maybe you can peddle that treasure you're so carefully guarding," he raised a finger toward the hand still clamped on the neckline of her robes, "to those men coming over the ridge behind you."

Eyes wide, she spun so quickly her body reeled.

Slowly, the dizzying vista of blue and brown sharpened under the intensity of the sun, and she managed to catch a breath.

What's he talking about?

There's nothing there--

Nothing but an endless blue sky, hanging heavy over the high plateau in the distance. But when she turned back to him, she saw his pallid gaze still following along the jutting blade of dry earth at the edge of the sky, apparently studying absolutely nothing.

She shielded her eyes, strained to see more than the several large boulders and the few drifts of scrub, colored more grey than green, dotted here and there along the cliffs.

She glanced at him again.

What does he see?

Something in the sky or on the hills or behind the stands of grass?

"Mister? I mean, Zero... there's nothing there."

"Look again."

Look again?

She turned just as four dark bodies appeared at the crest of the rise. Motionless only until they locked on their prey, they drew daggers with a howl and began thundering down the ridge.

Fixed the gleam of their weapons and the sound of their cries, Cross stared.

Renegades--

Where did they come from? How did I miss them? How had he seen them?

Ragged and uneven, her voice came breathless, "Zero, what do they want?"

He focused on her upturned face only briefly before returning his attention to the ridge.

"I suppose, what they want, is you."

Her jaw hung slack. "Me?"

He waved a finger, vaguely motioning to the area below her waist.

"Renegades can smell a woman's..." he paused to test the dozens of words that skittered across his mind before settling on, "scent... from miles away. I've come to believe it's a requirement for their profession."

She raised fluttering fingers to her lips but then, eyes darting all around, snatched her pack and made ready to run.

Zero caught her arm and yanked.

"Don't run! Run, little sister, and they'll down you like a dog! Never feed them with your fear! And perhaps you've noticed?" The lines beside his eyes deepened again. "There's nothing to run to?"

Knees surrendering again to the sand, she landed with a groan.

Zero reached over his shoulder and slid a long bow from the leather pouch that hung down his back. Carved of a rich red wood, he further burnished its glow by carefully stroking down the length of it. Then, with unbearable slowness, he hooked the bow around his ankle, drew it down, looped the cord over the end... and waited.

Fingers clutched over her pack of gear, Cross shot glances all across the rocky emptiness, but he was right.

Not even a bush to hide behind.

"Are we just going to stand here?"

"Yes."

"Then shoot them!"

He didn't waste a glance. Instead, he slowly brought the fingertips of his right hand to his left upper arm, then just as slowly, raised them to his lips.

Cross had no time to puzzle at the gesture; in what seemed like moments, the outlaws had raced across all but the last few meters of the barren plain.

She grabbed the long drape of Zero's sleeve.

"They're nearly on us!"

He didn't turn.

"Patience is a virtue, girl. And these arrows hold true for only a short distance."

"So you're not going to shoot them?"

"Not yet."

"But they're almost on top of us!"

He still stood, the long bow leaning against his foot.

"Zero!" she cried, "what are you waiting for?"

"Fifty yards."

A broad gust of wind rushed in from the plain, billowing Zero's long robes back toward her. She beat them down just as he kicked the bow up, wheeled it into position, nocked an arrow, positioned the fletches, let it fly. The lead man fell. He nocked another arrow and the next man fell.

As the last two brigands roared in, Zero tossed the bow aside. The first renegade lifted his dagger, Zero kicked it from his hand. Heavy but nimble, the outlaw circled behind, leaped onto Zero's back and locked on with two meaty paws as the next charged in, his curved blade raised. But as he lunged, Zero arched his back, sprung off the fat man and smashed his booted feet into the young brigand's face.

A loud crack echoed and he fell.

The fat one roared. He dragged Zero back down, close in, but Zero took advantage of the nearness; elbow flexed, he jammed it back into the soft hollow of the fat man's throat, the blows landing quick, hard, sharp, one after another after another.

After a dull muffled pop, Zero spun easily from the renegade's grip.

Staring, Cross dropped to her knees. As the brigand slowly sunk to his own, she watched his lips turning the same bloodless blue-white as his eyes. Bulging and blind, they seemed frozen in their sockets... until they found what they wanted.

Until they found her.

The outlaw heaved, threw his body forward. Cross slid back but he pitched forward again, one hand outstretched, his fingers curled and ready to clamp.

Crying out, she scuttled more quickly but her long robes twisted, heavy as shackles around her legs. Frantic with her breath coming hard, she kicked one foot free, twisted, made ready to run, but the renegade caught her ankle, flexed his beefy arm and yanked.

She screamed.

Too close too close too close too close--

"Zero!"

Crouched beside the young brigand with a reddened blade in his hand, he glanced back but didn't move.

"You have a knife," he said. "Use it."

"Zero!"

Another harsh grating wheeze, and the outlaw threw his body down on top of hers.

She cried out again, gasped, stretched a hand toward the knife sheath at her ankle, grunted as she reached but her fingertips just grazed the hilt.

Too heavy for her to shove away, the renegade kept her pinned, his body flaccid and apparently lifeless but for the hand working to jam itself between her legs. Slamming a fist against his head, she twisted, thrashed, strained again to reach the knife, wrenched her hips to try to lift her ankle closer to her fingers until, her stomach roiling from the fetid breath of death in her face, she arched her back, touched a finger to the leather wrapping of the hilt, dug in a nail and worked the knife, inch by inch, from the sheath. Fingers finally tightening on the hilt, she closed her eyes, clenched her teeth, and with a grunt, plunged the blade into the thick sinewy muscles of the renegade's back.

The outlaw jerked back, his huge bulk dragging the knife from her hand.

Cross stared into eyes scattered with tiny dots of blood, then she lurched forward with a cry, snatched the knife from the outlaw's flesh, and with the hilt jammed hard against her palm, plunged the knife down again and again and again, sobbing--

"Zero! Zero! Zero! Zero!"

He stalked to her side.

Face impassive, he planted his feet in a wide, solid stance. With deliberate slowness, he pulled a long sword from the scabbard at his hip, then curled his fingers around the grip.

Cross's eyes darted.

The outlaw's head still sagged heavy against her shoulder.

"Zero, wait!"

She shoved at the brigand's chest, kicked her legs to try to free them from the robes still snaked around them.

Zero lifted the weapon, positioned it beside his cheek.

"Stop!" she cried, lifting one hand, "don't! Can't you see you're going to--"

The blade flashed.

Kill us both?

The sword's voice sounded shy, not much more than a whisper. A fountain of blood gushed high in the sky and seconds later, pattering like rain, the drops fell back down to the ground, leaving little red dents all over the freshly scuffed sand.

Cross felt sun-warmed leather brush the tip of her nose, then the boot lodged against the renegade's shoulder and shoved.

The outlaw, far lighter less his head, slid onto his back, his neck spraying a sticky arc that puddled on the ground.

Cradling her face in her hands, Cross moaned.

She'd always had bad dreams, she reminded herself... dreams that often seemed more colorful, more vivid, than the dull reality of life in Makaen Hadeed. So she scolded herself, as so many so often did--

Wake up you stupid girl... it's just a bad dream--

But when she lowered her hands and saw the blood, her mind reeled--

This is no dream--

She touched her fingers to her cheeks, her lips, her eyes, her hair, all felt wet and stickyslick, and then she heard, coming from her mouth, odd, breathless, raspy sounds because--

Dreams don't bloody your hands and dreams don't bloody your face so am I dreaming or is this real it can't be real--

She brought her knees to her chin with a moan.

But soon the scents of leather and mint surrounded her, mercifully obscuring, although not quite overcoming, the metallic smell of hot blood that filled her nose and mouth and throat.

Silently, Zero reached down as instinct drove her arms up.

Exhausted, she slipped her arms around his neck, and after she'd gripped him as tightly as she could, he lifted her easily and hoisted her over his head.

She buried her face in his hair.

"Where are you taking me?"

Perhaps you've noticed, there's nothing to run to?

"What are you going to do with me?"

I have the water, I ask the questions.

Had she really spoken?

Had he?

Maybe not.

Maybe she was still lying under the corpse of the thief. Or maybe it really was a dream and soon she'd hear her father's voice--

Damn you, girl, now you've gone and left fucking olives lying all over the ground--

Zero hefted her higher on his shoulders, settled her more firmly across his back. When her arms and legs dangled awkwardly across his chest, unable to find purchase, she felt him circle them with his arms.

Cross sighed.

That was how the shepherd boys at Makaen Hadeed carried the lambs.

That was real.

She squeezed tighter, but just before closing her eyes, she caught a glance at the ground.

My silver--

Tensing, her fingernails scraped across his vest. He seemed to read her mind; he took the silver stick from the dirt, speared the headdress, dropped it on top of her head, dug in the stick to secure it.

As he grazed her scalp, she barely flinched; she just closed her eyes, nuzzling the soft spot between his neck and the hard curve of his shoulder.

Zero bent a final time, scooped up his gear and her little pack, slung it all over his shoulder, turned his back to the sun, and headed for the hidden thread that led to the Az-Amin road. And with their departing shadows, the buzzards began slowly to descend, floating down from the sky like angels with inky wings outstretched.

***

Cross breathed deeply of a fragrance she now recognized as his. It had drifted up from his robes all during the journey across the wilderness and she'd rested in both his scent and his strength until exhaustion, and the motion of his regular strides, had lulled her to sleep.

So if she could smell his scent--

He must be right here--

She awakened with a jolt.

Glancing down, she saw the source of the fragrance; his soft robes swathed her from neck to feet. When she sat up, little rivers of sand slid out from under the folds.

Then she glanced at her hands, _clean,_ brought them to her cheeks, _clean,_ brought them to her hair, _my silver,_ then felt for her father's cross--

A big hand reached across her line of sight, swept a leather thong hanging from her headdress over her shoulder

Geoffrey's heavy cross dangled from the end of it.

"Awake at last," he said.

Cross looked up.

He stood gazing down at her, his light eyes veiled by the same deepening dusk that had already shrouded the desert. He crouched down close, took a fistful of sand and poured it very slowly from that hand to the other. He didn't look at her when he spoke; he watched the sand instead.

"So tell me, little sister. Whatever shall I do with you?"

"Please, Zero, you've got to help me find the soldier... you've just got to!"

"I don't have to do anything. It's not my problem."

"But my father will give you whatever you want!"

"My guess is, your father is buzzard meat by now. And there's nothing I want, I don't already have."

Her voice shrank smaller. "Everybody wants something... don't they?"

He allowed the last of the sand to slip through his fingers and after a quick brush of his scarred palms, he sprang to his feet.

"Some people just want to be left alone."

He slipped off his leather vest and tossed it aside, hooked his thumbs under the waist of his breeches and began to pace.

Unwilling to disturb him, Cross scanned the small clearing where he'd made camp. All along the perimeter, scrub covered mounds rose unevenly, some high and peaked, some low and long. Centered well away from the thorny brush, a fire crackled, hung with the remains of a spitted hare. And while her starved senses clamored at the smell of roasted meat, she didn't dare ask if he might be willing to share.

He turned abruptly.

"Do you have any idea what made them sick?"

She edged forward. "The bombs?"

His lips tugged. "Who told you about the bombs? Your father?"

She nodded.

"No bombs fell here, girl... this place hasn't changed in seven thousand years. This thing's probably viral, carried by some trader out of Sinai. And this place of yours, this Makaen Hadeed, could still be deadly... do you really want to risk your own skin?"

"I didn't get sick... are you scared you will?"

He smiled.

"All things will be as they must be."

Knuckles to the sand, she pitched forward to her knees.

"So let's go! They'll all die if we don't help them! And all you have to do is help me find the soldier and he'll take me back to Makaen Hadeed!"

One brow lifted and he laughed.

"So that's all I have to do. Well, little sister, that shouldn't be too difficult."

Tension had wrung the very air from her lungs but now, in an instant, it disappeared.

He's going to help us!

Cross flung off his robes, quickly checked the silver in her hair, heaved to her feet and lifted her all but empty sack of gear.

"Ready?"

But after a few seconds, a hollow feeling began teasing at her stomach.

He wasn't moving for his gear.

"Let me... understand this," he said. "You want me to help you find some soldier, but you don't know who... who is somewhere, but you don't know where... to help some people who are sick with something, but you don't know what... through a wasteland swarming with outlaws and marauders... that's all you want me to do. Have I understood correctly?"

"Well... yes." She saw his lips tug. "You are going to help me," she cried, "aren't you?"

He just laughed.

She dropped her pack and held her hands to her cheeks to hold down the heat, but it flared up anyway, right to the roots of the curls that always worked free from her braid.

People were dying and he was just standing there--

Laughing--

"Then what am I going to do?"

He hooked his thumbs and turned away. "Do whatever you like. It's not my problem."

"But...."

"But what?"

"But... what's the matter with you? Don't you understand? My father's dying! They're all dying!"

"More likely," he spun to face her, "they're already dead. And you," he pointed at her face, right between the eyes," had better get used to it."

"Get used to it? I'll never--"

"Oh, you'll get used to it," he said, his soft voice coarsening, "everyone does. This is the wasteland. The dark angel is everywhere. He missed you today but he'll very possibly catch you tomorrow. So after tonight, some sick settlers and a phantom soldier are the last things you'll have on your mind."

She started to cry. Dropping down to the ground, she buried her face in her arms.

"Achhhh," he threw up a hand, blocking her from his sight, "don't make me sorry I didn't let Brother Death have his way with you after all--"

"I don't know why you didn't, either," she wiped tears from her cheeks onto the coarse homespun, "maybe you should have...."

Staring down at her bent head, his lips tightened.

I know why, little sister--

Because you wore a silver cross in your hair--

And because your lips look like shells and your skin, like pearls--

"Well," he said, rubbing his face, "I suppose I'm wondering that myself, right about now."

He strode to the fire, lifted the spit, and stalked back to her side.

"Take it."

She shook her head. "I'm not hungry."

"Take it. And make it last all night... it's all you're going to get."

She looked up but his pale eyes were vacant, nothing like a guilty conscience glinting out from behind.

So she slid the meat from the stick, broke off the forequarters to eat now, and shoved the rest into her pack for later.

He strode away, jamming the spit between the stones that ringed the fire as he passed. Then, thinking his own thoughts, he hooked his thumbs over his breeches at the small of his back and began another silent march.

In like silence, she tore into the meat he'd left on the bones.

She watched him pace. He moved like water, long muscles rippling; no awkwardness in his strides, no stiffness in either hips or knees. And although she couldn't forget her father and Makaen Hadeed, her eyes, irresistibly, locked on the man.

What kind of man was he?

Crisscrossed scars stood out white and red against his tanned flesh but they hardly disfigured him; rather, she found herself focused only on his long legs, his narrow waist, his bare chest shaped by strong, supple muscles.

What kind of man could survive... no, thrive... in this dangerous place, this wasteland?

The wasteland....

She had heard stories about it. At night, after forming a great circle around the fire, the traders would tell tales to the men of Makaen Hadeed... but only after the women had gathered up their daughters and hidden them inside the tents, lest their most precious jewels hear things so wicked as to undermine their virtue.

Kafiyyeh's blowing and leathery fingers waggling tiny clay cups to signal they finally had enough muddy black coffee, the traders told of dangerous crossings full of sandstorms and desperate thirst, and encounters with renegades and warriors and women whose black-eyed beauty drove their husbands to madness and to murder.

And she, breathlessly unbinding her hair so it could cascade to her waist and cover her like a mantle, would slip unseen into one of the sheep pens, her presence hidden by both billows of soft black wool and her kohl-colored hair. There she listened and watched and wondered--

Are these stories true?

And had this man lived those very tales?

Tense and waiting, she stared as he passed before her, his restless feet still scraping the sand as the rays of the rising moon broke on his weapons.

He wore so many weapons.

The long sword, now quiet and tame, rested at his left hip. A long knife hung nearly to his knee on his right. An ax near the knife, a dagger at his back, and two more knives, neatly tucked into each worn leather boot.

The long sheath containing his bow leaned up against the scrubby dune where he'd rested, creasing the sharp grasses that dotted it. She could see the head of a club, shot through with an iron spike, strapped to the outside of the leather sheath, and the curve of another blade, a spear or a javelin, gleamed from the top of the long pouch, looking fine and deadly even in the twilight.

Her arms slid down over her belly and she shivered.

She had truly never seen so many weapons on one man. But she'd also never traveled into the _hamada_ , the unfruitful, the deep desert that lay so far from the safety of her people.

"Mister? Who are you?"

"I told you. My name is Zero."

"But where do you come from? Where did you learn to use that bow and that sword? No one at the settlement had a sword, and even the traders-- I thought you would cut me, too, back there."

He said just one word. "Practice."

But she caught something then... was it the flicker of a smile?

Or just a twitch?

He looked too young to twitch. His face, smooth and shaved clean, had hardly any wrinkles at all, except by his eyes from the sun.

She shivered again.

The fire was small and the night was cold, but since he didn't seem to notice, she burrowed back under his robes to keep warm. Snugging them around her neck, she noticed that his robes, like so many other things about him, were different, too. They were made of rich man's wool, a tight, fine, strong weave, not the drafty homespun she was used to. And he wore no kafiyyeh; instead, from the neckline of the robe, hung a hood. Deep and long, it mirrored the robe's draping sleeves, sleeves so long that when he bent even slightly, the tips grazed the ground.

And that vest he'd flung carelessly over his gear... the supple leather rested there so easy, it spilled into the sand like bread dough oozing from a bowl.

She shifted.

Bread--

Her stomach complained, wanting badly for her to eat the rest of the hare, but fearing the disapproval she knew she would see in those finely drawn lips, she ventured instead--

"How old are you? You look too young to have gray hair. And I don't think I've known ten men in my whole life who were shaved."

He grunted. "Not in your whole life...."

"Do you live out here?"

He finally stopped pacing and rubbed his eyes. "I've been in the desert a long time."

"How long?"

"Do you know something, girl?"

"What?"

"You talk too much."

She jerked back. "I'm sorry."

"And you don't listen very well, either."

He swung his sheath of weapons over his shoulder, crowded it with his gear and two water-skins, and then, without a word, turned and skirted the shrubby mound.

She watched his bright hair disappear into the night and although she waited, leaning forward on her knees, he didn't reappear.

After a cloud had skimmed its foamy mass across the sky, from one corner of the horizon to the other, it occurred to her that she'd waited long enough. She followed his path and came upon him unexpectedly, all but hidden from view by an immense mound of drifted sand.

His eyes were closed. His feet lay on top of the sheath of weapons. Both water skins pillowed his head.

She approached quietly and crouched beside him.

Asleep? Already?

Leaning close and peering through the moonlight to study every detail of this strange, secret man, she noticed a mark just above the place where his fingers gripped his own arm. She inched a bit closer, thought she saw the shape of a cross, but his arms were so scarred it was impossible to be sure, so she extended one finger, barely set it against the mark.

His hand clamped onto her wrist.

"Let go!" she cried. Twisting her arm to break his grip, she suddenly stopped struggling.

It had to be the moonlight.

The barely blue of his eyes had vanished completely, leaving the black pupil to float, disembodied, in a pool of opaque white. Ghostly and glowing, his eyes looked like a dead man's.

He flung her away and she fell hard on her heels, stopping when her bottom hit the sand.

He fixed her in a colorless gaze.

"If I didn't know your smell you'd be dead. Go back... all the way to the other side. Stay there."

"But--" She wished his eyes didn't look so strange. "But--"

"What?"

"You didn't tell me what you're going to do with me!"

"I haven't decided what to do with you."

He stretched his arms toward the sky, twisted them with a grunt, then folded them across his chest.

"I've been thinking about your soldier. How is he supposed to save all these people?"

"My father didn't say how."

"Well, what is he, a soldier-physician, a soldier-magician... how is he going to perform this little... miracle?"

From deep inside, she could feel the unease bubbling up like a spring.

"I don't know! I wish I did!"

Zero frowned.

"So do I." He filled his lungs with air, then sighed all it all back out. "Well don't just stand there quivering, girl... I won't let the renegades get you."

She reached out to him, her hands spread, her eyes brimming tears.

"But what about my father?"

"I don't take prisoners and I don't keep slaves. You're free to find your soldier."

"But I'm afraid!"

"Aye." He nodded once, hard. "Well. You should be."

She began to cry again and he briefly clamped his eyes tight, as if to shield himself from the sound.

"Listen," he said. "Maybe we'll come across this soldier. Or maybe we'll find your settlement. Or maybe I'll get tired of hearing you work your mouth and I'll sell you to one of those slavers headed west for Egypt. Sometime during the night you'll likely make a choice... and either I'll find you here in the morning, or I won't."

He tucked his arms across his chest, his lids fell over his eyes, and the conversation, such as it was, was over.

She watched him for several seconds more, hoping he'd rouse, maybe even speak to her... but he didn't.

And she didn't dare speak to him, she didn't dare--

Anything--

She shambled back to her little sack of gear and fished out the last of the hare, her mind churning for a solution as she wolfed down every bit of meat she could nibble or scrape or suck from the bones. But there appeared to be only one solution to her problem--

Go back out into the desert and find the soldier herself.

Bones stripped dry, she tossed them aside and stood, slinging first her pack and then her water sack. The goatskin, apparently sewn from a very small goat, slapped against her back with all the weight of a sheaf of flaxen reed.

My water skin--

How could I have forgotten?

Water.

The stuff that filled the two skins that cushioned Zero's head.

The stuff still lacking from hers.

She just stood, staring into the night.

He'd played her for a fool. Realized that she'd forgotten what he hadn't... not for a moment.

And that choice he offered--

I don't take prisoners... you're free to find your soldier--

Any fool knew, anyone wanting for water wanted for choices as well.

He was her only hope. He knew it from the start and now, at last, she knew it, too.

She would wait, watching the path, until she could greet him with the first rays of the sun.

Chapter Four

She hated him.

"Where are we?" Cross shouted, her hands cupped to her mouth to raise her voice over the screaming wind.

Zero, marching many yards ahead, called back, "Where do you think we are?"

"When are we going to get there?"

He stopped and turned. Again.

"If you marched more and talked less, we'd be two days further along. Now move! You're lagging too far behind."

She hated him.

For two days, the man had led her through a tortured terrain marked only by its maddening sameness; blue sky above and a scrabble of dusty stone underfoot. So she had challenged him; insisted they were going in circles.

First, he pointed out grey rocks where there'd been mostly sand, and then later, yellow rocks where there'd been mostly grey. And then, just today, sharp spiny zilla were there had been no bushes at all.

But she was no fool; it was all lies to bewilder her, to break her spirit.

Even now, far ahead, he glided through the forge-hot blasts while she, far behind, gasped and wheezed and struggled with her gear. When he finally lifted a hand, ordering her to stop, she dropped to her knees and shrugged off her pack with a groan.

She couldn't move; she could barely breathe. But he, as lithe and agile as when they'd started out hours ago, set to breaking camp. He pulled from his gear what looked like a hopeless tangle of mismatched fabrics but soon a canopy wafted from the windward side of a rocky hill, screening out the final fierce rays of the sun. After stowing his gear under the canopy, he gathered a few shrubby sticks and set a small fire blazing with a quick clink of blade against flint. Then he settled down, crossed his ankles, flipped his hood over his head, tugging it low to shade his eyes, slipped his arms into the opposing sleeves of his robes, and fell asleep.

She truly hated him.

And suddenly she needed to tell him so.

She strode across the sand to where he lay; flung her pack against the hill he rested against.

It landed about an inch from his elbow.

"I'm sorry," she said. "Were you asleep?"

His lips tugged.

In principio erat Verbum et Verbum erat apud Deum, et Deus erat Verbum--

In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God, and the Word was God--

Sweat beads popped, pricking at her upper lip, and she dashed them away with a gritty hand.

"Where are we going, anyway?"

He covered his face with his hands.

_Et Deus erat Verbum. Hoc erat in principio apud Deum. Omnia per ipsum facta sunt-_ -

She kicked his foot.

"We've been going in circles for days!"

He lowered his hands and very slowly the corner of his mouth turned down.

Per ipsum facta sunt--

Quis est Christus?

He shoved back the hood, his gaze penetrating through her and beyond.

"You know you're always welcome to go on alone."

"That's what you always say! But you know damn well I can't go anywhere alone!"

He glanced over her, from her head to her toes.

You stupid girl, don't you know I could take you over my knee and snap your spine like a stick--

She kicked his foot again. "What did I ever do to you, Zero? Why do you hate me so much?"

"You are overly fond of that meaningless word."

"Stop treating me like a child!"

When he didn't answer and she couldn't think of anything else to say, she just stood, looking.

Lingering for many moments too long, she studied the high bones of his cheeks and how they flared from his narrow nose. His lips were fine, firm, but so often, when they dragged down, he wore such an expression of such desperate--

Sadness--

"Zero?" she twisted her first finger in her robes until the blood no longer flowed to the tip, "Zero? Why do you hate me so much?"

He gave an almost inaudible sigh.

"Listen. Save your breath for marching. Carry your own gear and your own water. Trap your own food instead of sniveling by the fire waiting for scraps. Try a little humility." He finally focused on her face. "You know, you're remarkably arrogant for someone so impossibly... ignorant."

She blinked at a sudden wetness in her eyes as he raised the hood and closed his.

"Does the truth hurt, girl?" he muttered. "Don't ask for it, if you can't bear to hear it."

She scrubbed at her cheeks although her tears, already drunk by the searing wind, had never fallen.

This miserable place--

She hated it as much as she hated him. The plains were scattered with stone; the hills were hewn from stone. And his heart, if he ever had one, must have been carved from stone.

She worked her finger into her shoe and popped out a big chunk of gravel.

That's what he is--

She closed her fingers over the rock.

A stone in my shoe--

She flung the rock; eyes blinking open, he dodged it.

But still she needed to touch him, it didn't matter where, either the silken hair or the thick cords that stretched the long length of his forearm; she would touch him some way, somehow--

She slammed her hand against his face.

His fingers instantly flew across hers, hard and heavy despite their apparent grace.

He sighed.

"And the lesson contained in that inane exercise is... if you strike in the wasteland, girl, be prepared to duck."

She covered her face with her hands and cried.

"Zero, I'm sorry--"

I'm sorry for everything I'll carry the water I'll carry the gear but look at me just look at me please--

His voice came whisper soft. "You are overwrought. Rest."

She peeked through her fingers.

Over... what?

Rest?

With the hood of his robes again tugged low over his eyes, she didn't dare disturb him again, so she shoved over to the very edge of the light shade created by the gauzy screen, then wiped at the salty wetness stinging the corners of her eyes, where the wind had etched tiny cracks. The wind had targeted her lips as well, burning them raw, so she wiped there too and winced.

Above them, the scrounged canopy rippled in the breeze.

"Zero?"

She didn't want anything from him, really; she just wanted to hear his voice.

"Zero?"

He didn't answer. Instead, he rose, his gaze fixed on something far out in the desert.

Cross strained to see.

A figure approached from the wilderness, but nearly obscured by undulating heat waves and blowing sand, it appeared as sheer as silk, as nebulous as a finger of smoke.

Zero stretched his hand to the small of his back and touched the hard outline of the knife he always kept strapped there.

"Go back up the hill," he said, eyes narrowed, fixed, but not on her. "Go all the way up, to the top of the ridge. Stay there."

"Why," she rose slowly, "Zero, why?"

"Do as I say. Move." He reached back, took the collar of his robes, pulled them over his head and threw them down. "Now!" he whispered, although there was no one but them to hear.

She ran.

Heart pounding, she scrambled up the hill, skirting broad scrub and boulders until she made the crest. There, she crouched behind a low outcropping of rock, her sweaty palms leaving damp marks in the dust as she peered through the heat waves to where he stood alone.

The dusty figure continued to move slowly but inexorably across the desert as Zero stood motionless, his feet rooted in the sand, his arms relaxed at his side.

Cross squinted against the light and the heat, trying to see, trying to hear, but for her, there was only sun glaring off the sand and the sound of the wind.

***

Like a statue in tanned leather, Zero waited as the white apparition came closer. When it was almost upon him his face didn't change but he rubbed his palms, sticky with sweat, against his breeches.

"Brother Michael," the old woman said as a leer crawled across her blistered lips. "A kiss for your sweetie?"

Zero smiled. "Not for you, Mag."

She snorted out a thick wheezy grunt. "You used to beg for my kisses."

"That was a long time ago."

When your hair was the color of ripe barley. And your eyes--

Your eyes were as limpid as drops of dew--

"Cruel, cruel," the old woman cooed, "just like the old days."

Mag leaned her head back and something like laughter, rusty and corrupt, erupted from her mouth. She glanced at the billowing canopy, the ample sacks of water, then dropped her own water sack from one shoulder.

Zero caught a breath.

Polluted... perverse....

Unclean--

_Sweet Jesus, Mag, what have you become-_ -

Mag scanned the hill, ran her gaze along the ridge. "Where'd you send the little chicken? How is she? Any good? I'll put her to work... let her support me in my old age...."

Zero frowned. "She's an innocent."

"Ha! Aren't we all?" Then her eyes widened and she slapped her hands against her thighs. "You didn't break her yet!"

She waggled a knobby finger and snickered.

"You're slipping, Michael... a little thing like innocence never stopped you before! And you were so busy," she took a moment to drag in a raspy breath, "watching after that little girl, you never even saw me following...."

Zero's eyes narrowed.

I saw you at Tel Beer'Sheba and I saw you again when you stopped at the well at Khirbet Dhir, even though I prayed and prayed, if I just strung you out long enough you'd finally drop dead and spare us both--

But apparently not all prayers are answered--

"So you'd better watch out," Mag pointed a trembling finger, "or someone will have you soon enough."

Zero said nothing.

Mag cocked her head, peering through the stringy white strands of hair that blew across her eyes.

"Still miserly with your words, I see! Well I never was, so I'll tell you, you let your old Mag take care of that little desert flower! After all, you are supposed to be incorruptible!"

Spittle ran from her lips down her chin, the great glob swinging and shaking with the laughter that rumbled in her throat.

"Poverty, obedience... chastity! You hypocrite!" Wheezing, she shot a red glazed glance. "Speaking of hypocrites, I saw some of your so-called," she rolled her eyes, "brothers! Geoffrey and Valentine."

Zero stood silent.

"You're all the same," Mag brought her hands together and raised eyes and fingertips to the sky, "oh, God, save me from the devil and the evils of this world... tomorrow!" Laughter scraping hard, she leaned closer and winked, her foul breath hanging in the suddenly still air. "Well, priest? What've you got to say?"

"What can I say?" Head bowed slightly, Zero brought a fist to his chest for each confession, _"Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa...."_

Mag waved a hand and sneered, "Ach! Priests!"

But then she began to cough.

With her fingers tight on the thick stick that had supported her labored trek across the desert, she spat a thick red web into the sand, and then, nails imbedded in the sturdy wood, she sagged, her body corrupted and already abandoned to death and decay. But like wild things, somehow separate from the body, the eyes refused to die. With whites too crazed with red to be rightly called white at all, they reeled inside their sunken sockets, darting restlessly, sneaking glances, sweeping along the line of Zero's jaw and up to the high bone of his cheek. Skidding sideways, the eyes finally hit the cool blue wall of his gaze where finally, with a dizzying bounce, they lit.

"Priests," she said again, although with less vigor. "But you... you look the same as I remember." She raised a crooked finger to track from eye to eye. "So maybe, priest... maybe you were chosen by God, after all."

Zero laughed.

"Don't wax sentimental on me, Mag... it so little becomes you. I'm not interested in the past, I want to know about Geoffrey of the Tower. And Captain Valentine."

Mag leaned around her stick to see him more clearly and when she shivered, it was due to neither gusting wind nor waning heat.

"Do you remember all the pretty boys, Michael? The ones that marched to your banner? Imagine all those sour old buggers, feasting on that sweet young flesh! What was it you called yourselves? The Brotherhood...."

She closed her eyes, one dirty fingernail nicking the wood.

"I remember white flags all covered with crosses... there must've been a thousand silver crosses, all shining in the sun! I remember the marching and the drums, my blood would beat in time with the drums...."

Then her eyes bulged and she crowed, "The Brotherhood of the Knights of the Cross! You were going to save the world!"

She howled again. Jamming her stick under one arm, she began swinging both, her wide strokes beating some imaginary drum and soon, shaken loose by the motion, an ornate cross and chain swung out from under the grimy folds of her robes.

Zero jerked his chin. "Where'd you get that?"

"Oh, this?" Mag glanced up, uncharacteristically coy. She twisted the long chain between stained fingers until the big cross twirled. "A gift," she said, "a small token...."

"From whom?"

"Can't remember his name, Michael. Can't remember his face. Wasn't the sort I'd remember the face of... if you catch my meaning."

Zero smiled. "Confess, Mag. And if you're truly penitent the Lord will absolve you." He gestured with graceful fingers to the sky. "You might even go to Heaven when you die."

Mag let out another rusty laugh.

"Fuck heaven."

Zero lips tugged.

Or, perhaps not....

"Did you kill him, Mag?"

She grinned, "Of course." Giggling, her bony fingers hefted a small sack hanging from her belt. "How else could I convince him to give over his treasure?"

Mag's giggling gave way to cackles and then she began to cough. By the time the bloody spittle appeared on her lips and waves of blood streamed from her nose, only the fingers she kept clenched around her stick kept her from collapsing into the sand. Finally when the coughing stopped, she spit another clotted stream and raised her head with a groan.

"Am I dying, priest?"

Zero spread his hands. "Mag...."

"Well, then, and what the hell, 'in the midst of life we are in death!' You always told me that... who'd you say said it first?"

"Some say a monk--"

"Another priest? Did that fool try to save the world, too?"

"I don't honestly know."

"Well, if he did, he was a fool... just like you! Couldn't you see it, Michael? I could see it... it was time for the world to die! Everything dies in its time! You, me... even that little girl of yours! I was young like her once."

Swaying and shaking with every breath, Mag reached out to steady herself against him, but he stepped back, out of reach.

"You were my favorite, Michael," she said, still lurching forward, still groping, "I never forgot you. All those others, they meant nothing to me! Even now, I dream only of you! Even the wasteland hasn't dared lay a finger on you, you're as pretty as ever, and you've even let your hair grow long.... Call the girl back, Michael, I've learned a new trick or two, I can make us all happy, you'll see! Call the girl back, brother. Call her back."

Zero watched Mag shudder with every ragged breath she drew, so there wasn't much time.

He moved into her line of sight, captured her gaze and held it fast.

"Listen, Mag," he said, his voice smooth and cool and irresistible enough to stay the fog that threatened to envelop her, "tell me about Geoffrey. Tell me about my brother in arms."

A crimson smile spread across her face.

"Geoffrey told me! About the desert's secret! The treasure! What is it, Michael? Where'd you find it?"

"Geoffrey told you I'd found it?"

"Geoffrey said his brother had the treasure; his brother the bright angel who stood in the light of God! What's the treasure, Michael? Is it Solomon's gold? Is it the lost treasure of the Templars?"

"Oh, Mag, don't tell me you believe all that--"

"Is it diamonds?" Mag rose to her toes, her reddened eyes shiny bright. "Tell me it's diamonds, the fortune stolen from the Hasidim when--"

Zero's laughter rang out on the wind.

"You've been had, Mag! Don't you know better than to listen to the ravings of a madman like Geoffrey?" With one tanned arm, he swept the emptiness. "Do you see any treasure? Do I live like a man who'd found a treasure?"

A wrinkled lid covered one bird eye.

"But you were always the smart one, Michael! You always knew to hold your tongue! Not that I blame you, I wouldn't tell anyone if I had the treasure, I wouldn't let on! But it's too late now, Valentine knows, everyone knows--"

Zero ran his fingers through his hair.

Then they all know something separate from the truth because I've found no treasure--

But since there's no convincing you--

He stepped closer.

"Well, Mag, I suppose I should have known better than to try to fool you."

Mag ducked her head and simpered.

A rippling chill slid up and down, all along the bones of Zero's back, apparently unwilling to leave the safety of his skin, but he steeled himself with a quick breath and leaned into the noisome cloud that surrounded her.

"I need to know, Mag... when did Geoffrey tell you I'd found the treasure?"

"Geoffrey of the Tower," she squawked like an old white crow, "Geoffrey told me."

"I need to know when. Were you at Geoffrey's settlement? Was Geoffrey ill? When did you see Valentine? Was he there, too?"

Mag groaned, shook her head and waved him off.

"Too many questions, Michael! Now, Valentine... he was just marching through. That's what he said... 'just marching through.' We had a nice little talk, though.... He's a fine looking man, that Valentine." She cupped a hand as if weighing a big bunch of grapes. "Fine, fine--"

"Valentine was marching through, and?"

Mag's eyes rolled and she blinked. "And what?"

"Jesus, Mag, stay with me!"

Zero bent even lower, so they were face to face, but he couldn't bring himself to touch her, not even to shake her from her reverie.

"What exactly did Geoffrey tell you, Mag? Something about the treasure? Something about the girl?"

"Crazy, it was... people falling down dead, blood everywhere, and there's Geoffrey in the middle of it all, yelling and waving his arms," she waggled a scrawny arm at the sky, "trying to keep 'em all calm and haul in enough healthy men to burn the bodies! Ha! Why bother, I told him, let the fuckers rot! But I should've stayed clear, eh, Michael? I should have stayed clear."

"What about the girl, Mag? Do you know why Geoffrey sent her out here?"

"Geoffrey said he was sending her to find a lamb. Or maybe he said the lamb...." She sagged against her stick. "Oh, I don't know, Michael... why are you pestering a dying old woman? Geoffrey told me the lamb knew the desert's secret. Agnus Dei, he kept saying... the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world."

Zero's lips tightened.

Geoffrey, you're a fool, the Lamb's not coming to save the world--

It's over, it's finished, it's through--

Enough--

He realized, then, that his feet itched. And in the distance, behind the frenzied itch, he could hear Mag laughing but he couldn't seem to hear what she was saying, couldn't seem to see her face--

Get thee behind me Satan--

So he curled his toes inside his boots, scrubbed the soles against the gravelly stones, tried to pretend it was only sweat or the heat of the sand, searing, scorching, right through the heavy soles of his boots--

... _but why pretend, when you know I'm behind that itch--_

... I, the father of every lie you ever told and every lie you ever believed, I, the father of the anger you're powerless to control--

... _you can smell my hot breath even now, reaching up from Hell just to remind you, lest you ever even for a moment try to forget that your eternal home is here, with me--_

Get thee--

... _but in the meantime, I'll just watch you try to scratch that tiny itch, after all, I have all the time in the world! another twenty years of wandering won't relieve it and when you finally admit that trying to save a world that refused to be saved didn't buy you so much as a cool drink from... well... you know who I mean--_

... _that One--_

... _when you finally admit that all those years you fought and bled for Him were wasted--_

The Lord placed me here, my foot shall not be moved--

... _well, if He put you here maybe I should defer to His superior judgment and agree that you got what you deserve, life in a shithole full of sinners--_

He made me a priest to comfort sinners--

... _ah, yes, that's right, and I can see how well you've done with that!_

... but never mind all those little details! because you ask too much of yourself, son! stop trying to fight battles that can't be won! stop trying to save people that won't be saved!

... _Michael... Michael... my son..._

... _just let it go--_

... _and come home to your Papa--_

Mag grinned with a show of red teeth.

"What's the matter with my beautiful boy?" Her words broke like bubbles, up through the blood in her throat. "You look like you swallowed a brick."

"Fuck you, Mag--"

... _don't fight your nature--_

... _don't torture yourself--_

"Fuck?" Mag bawled. "Did someone say fuck?"

... _you're just a man--_

"Did anyone say fuck? Well, I'd be much obliged and thanks for asking!"

... _do you think you're something special?_

Zero clamped his fingers in his hair, squeezed hard until it hurt, until he could feel strands tearing free.

"Thanks to Geoffrey's insane fantasies, that girl could have died!"

Mag howled.

"Are we back to that little chicken you shooed up the hill? What if she does die? We were born to die! There's nothing special about death! There's nothing special about her! Her or her tight, fresh cunt!"

Mag bared her teeth and growled.

Bloody fingers curled like claws, she tightened her grip on her stick and hauled herself forward, but this time, because his feet itched, he didn't back away.

She took aim with one bloody finger.

"Don't let her out of your sight, priest! Don't turn your back or even close your eyes! I'll bring her along! I know how to bring all the little whores along!"

Zero's eyes narrowed and his voice went cold.

"Let it go, Mag. Do yourself a favor and let it go."

"Don't tell me what to do, you pious prick! You rotten fuck! When I'm done with her, she'll love it! She'll beg for it! When I'm done with her, she'll spread for a dog! A god damn dog!

"Mag." His voice came no louder than a breath. "Enough."

Then slowly, slowly as he gazed at her, she became almost sane. She moaned, stretched out her fingers to stroke his long hair and almost caught a strand before the watchful wind snatched it from her grasp. But because she was weak and he was tall, when she tried to reach up high, her arm fell suddenly limp to her side.

"Just a taste, Michael? Because we're friends? You owe me, don't you? Didn't I give you everything you ever wanted? Poppy? Coca? Whores? Even when no one cared about you? Even after your brothers left you out here to die, don't you remember how I loved you?"

"I remember, Mag. I remember everything."

Zero's fingers tightened on the hilt of the knife at his back. It gleamed for only an instant, then, in a quiet rush, it found its mark.

Mag stared down at her belly, watching as he jerked the knife up, across, down. Gazing at his perfect face as if looking to understand the inscrutable mysteries of the angels, her vision went abruptly black and she fell at his feet, her lips mouthing just one word.

"Priest...."

Chapter Five

Zero worked his knife under the old woman's belt.

The sound of the girl's breathing, running before her on the wind, reached him long before she did, but soon enough, she stood beside him, gasping in the hot desert air as the color in her cheeks, long past pink, rose to a blotchy red.

He didn't look up.

"Never run."

"I came when I saw her fall. What happened?"

His lips tugged hard.

Glistening red stains still oozed through the rough fabric of the old woman's clothes. They grew like living things, drawn by the wool of her robes, but when the blood stains covered the whole of her belly, they finally stopped creeping.

Cross stared at the old woman and then at Zero; his right hand, still gripping the knife, shone wet-red with blood.

"You killed her." Still breathless, Cross barely choked out the words, "Why did you kill her?"

"Don't question me."

"But Zero! She was just an old woman!"

He sprang to his feet and before she could step back or lift her arm or even speak a word, the back of his hand lashed her face.

"Don't ever question me. She was sick. She was dead already."

Fingers pressed against the rising welts on her cheek, Cross sank down in silence.

What kind of man would kill a sick old woman?

She stole a sidelong glance, her eyes half hidden by her fingers.

Filthy clothes, matted white hair... old, weak. helpless--

Maybe she had a weapon?

A short knife hung from a sheath at the old woman's belt, but still, compared to him, she was all but unarmed.

Zero stepped slowly around the body, his weapons, the long knife and longer sword, swaying ever so slightly. As Cross watched his gaze shift between the old woman, her water skin, and her walking stick, she sniffed--

Deciding what to steal first?

But she had to admit to herself, he didn't wear the face of a thief; she saw no excitement, no gloating... as usual, his face wore no expression at all.

Until his lips tugged down.

As Cross slowly drew her knees to her chin, she kept her gaze locked tight to his face.

Sadness there?

Always sadness there--

The only difference, from moment to moment, a matter of degree.

She glanced back at the dead woman.

The milky glaze over her eyes would come soon enough, but for now, she seemed to be watching the sky, as sharp-eyed as the buzzards already circling. And with her lips drawn tight, she almost seemed alive--

And laughing--

Cross ran a sleeve under her dripping nose, struggling to hold back the tears tightening her throat and scorching her eyes.

She turned a blurry gaze back to Zero.

He had to take her to her father. Her father understood things like life and death and right and wrong while she, always so unlike her father, didn't know anything, didn't understand anything--

"Cross...."

Her chin lifted--

He's going to say it... please say it, Zero... say 'I'm taking you away from here....'

He jerked his head. "Smother that fire."

"But--"

"Do as you're told."

She spun away from him, hands smacking the listless sand.

"Fuck you, Zero! And fuck your fire! I want to go!"

"Go?"

He almost smiled. He knelt and slit Mag's water sack and then he did smile, when barely a dipper oozed out to puddle underneath. He glanced up.

"Go... uh... where?"

She opened her mouth, closed it. After a moment she said, "Makaen Hadeed."

"Don't you mean home?" He stood and kicked lightly at the knife in the sheath at Mag's waist until he jarred it free. "Then, why do you not say, home."

And it became clear to her, suddenly--

He knows why I don't say home, it's because I have no home--

She lowered her head, fixed on the little mountain of pebbles that had scuffed up under the heels of the old woman's boots, but she still felt him watching.

But he always watches...he just never sees--

She swallowed hard.

Except this time--

This time, he was watching and seeing. And because of the look on his face... and because she wore no veil... she wished he'd slip behind his veil: the veil of his indifference.

When tears welled up she blinked quickly, but the wetness just gathered all together anyway, to spill down through the dust on her cheeks.

Just a few steps away, Zero still watched.

He rubbed his lips.

Sweet Jesus, the girl's like nothing of this world--

Tears sparkling as bright as diamonds, black hair glowing as red as ruby--

And tell me--

How can a girl who spent the whole of her life in this forsaken place have skin so smooth, so moist--

... _so succulent..._

Fuck you go away--

... _but I want to see, too--_

He refused to trust his eyes. He knew the desert too well.

The desert was artful. A trickster. So it had always been, in this land of opposing forces: progenitor of both the _Djinn_ and the One True God.

But he'd seen that sort of elusive glow before, in the starshine.

At first you see it clearly, from the corner of your eye, but try to train your gaze upon it and how quickly it fades to black--

... _well, aren't we a mawkish fool! you've been out in the sun too long, priest--_

It's not the sun, liar, Mag saw it too--

Despite waves of ebony hair and fathomless brown eyes, the girl radiated an aura of light, of innocence, that no amount of the world's contagion would ever extinguish... although he was sure that the natural world, offended as fully by innocence as vacuum, would hasten to try to alter her condition.

... _make no mistake, son, the hag had it right, the girl's a whore like all the rest..._

She's not like all the rest--

... _and for all your talk of innocence all you want from her is--_

I know I know what she's got between her legs I know--

... _who do you think you're fooling, priest? you can taste it! what are you waiting for? she owes you--_

Get thee behind me--

... _just look at her, she's shaking, thinking about all that hard heat you've got straining against the front of your breeches--_

... can't you smell her? she's gone wet just from thinking--

Shut up!

... _she wants it too--_

Cross buried her face in her arms with a whimper.

"Stop looking at me, Zero, please? I'll put out the fire, I'll do it right now, just stop...."

He turned away.

A kidskin sack dangled beside Mag's knife sheath. A quick swipe with his knife cut the thongs that had cinched it closed, and flashes of light burst from the pouch as he rummaged around with the tip of his knife.

Drawn by the brilliance, he buried a knee, and soon, the corner of his mouth turned down.

Diamonds, Mag? Really? What did they manage to buy you? A warm spot in the frozen wastes of Hell?

_As if a candle's worth of warmth could be bought so cheaply, so far from the light of God-_ -

Cross slid closer, craned her neck to look.

"What is it, Zero?"

He shifted to block her view.

"Zero?" She knuckled more wetness from her eyes. "What is it? Is it treasure?"

"Treasure," he murmured. "Again and always, treasure. Will your heart never yearn for anything more?"

She moved closer, trying to peer around his back.

"Is it treasure?"

"It's nothing."

"I don't believe you."

"Believe what you like."

Using his knife to scatter the heap of stones, he isolated with the edge of the blade a small vial filled with white powder. His left hand shot out toward the sack, but then, abruptly, it stopped. Paralyzed, he seemed unable to command the hand either forward or back.

Cross stared in silence.

What had she just seen? A moment of indecision? From Zero?

Never--

He'd never hesitated before; not for a minute, not for a moment.

What was in that sack?

She tried another glance, this time over his arm, but he reached over and slapped her lightly on the cheek.

"Mind your eyes."

She shoved back.

He palmed the vial, slid it into his vest, gave the sack's tie a quick tug to cinch it up, then wedged the toe of his boot under Mag's knife and flicked it in Cross's direction.

"Strap that knife at your back. Like I wear mine."

The heavy silver chain still circled Mag's neck. He caught it on his blade, wound a few turns and hauled. But the chain was thick; strong; it lifted the old woman's body off the ground until the links separated and dropped her back down.

Cross leaned a little closer.

"Are you taking that?"

Zero whirled the chain, watching as it curled itself, chattering, around his blade.

"It belongs with its rightful owner," he said. "Let the sand bury it the way it buried him."

He brought his arm across his chest, readying a powerful arcing sweep to fling the cross and chain out into the desert, but Cross cried out to him--

"Don't! If you're just going to throw it out there, can't I--"

Wordlessly, he spun on his heel, aimed the knife at her feet. The long chain unfurled and the silver landed in a pile between her knees.

She gathered up the chain, smiled up at him in thanks.

He didn't smile back.

"Now you've got your treasure," he said. "Will it finally satisfy you?"

Her smile slowly faded.

Satisfy me?

Did I ask for too much?

"Zero?" She slowly spread her fingers, dropped the chain. "Zero? Are you mad at me again?"

He didn't answer.

... _can't you feel the softness of her breasts? can't you smell that warm... wet... ahhhh...._

... can't you just taste it--

Oh, can't you just stop torturing me!

... _but that's my job, o pious one! you want it, don't you--_

For the love of God, I'm a priest not a fucking eunuch--

... _you deserve it, don't you? you gave her life--_

God gave her life--

... _God left her in the wasteland to fucking die! so just fuck her, who's going to stop you? can't you see she's no one? can't you see she's nothing?_

Zero strode to the ragged sun screen and kicked at the crooked pole that propped it up. When the stick splintered with a loud crack, he gripped the pole to steady it, his whispered words buried beneath the wind.

"'Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon the earth, where moth and rust corrupt, where thieves break through and steal....'" He took a quick breath, lowered his head to the fist clamped around the pole, "'but lay up treasure in Heaven... for where your treasure is,'" he pounded his head against his fist one, two, three times, "'where your treasure is, where your treasure is, there will your heart also be--'"

"Zero, should I not have asked for the cross? If you didn't want me to have it why did you give it to me?"

Another kick.

This time, the pole split in two. He yanked the bottom out of the sand, tossed both pieces aside, and as the canopy began easing down slowly, big, billowy, and silent as a cloud, he bunched the filmy fabric into the crook of his arm.

"We're moving! Now!"

Cross winced.

"You are angry with me." She lifted the broken chain, her hands trembling as she tied it around her neck. "And you won't even tell me what I did wrong."

"To what end? You never listen anyway."

She turned away so he wouldn't see her latest crop of tears.

I hate this place, this awful place--

He passed by so swiftly, he made a small wind that chilled the sweat on her nose.

"Smother that fucking fire," he said, stuffing the canopy into his gear. "And this time, don't touch anything... do you understand?"

She drew up her knees, rested her head against them.

No, I don't understand, I don't understand the death or the heat or the marching or the fear... just help me find the soldier because every minute we waste trudging through this desert brings my father another minute closer to dying--

She sniffed loudly and wiped on her nearest sleeve.

And why did you give me the damn cross if you didn't want me to have it? I'll take it off... throw it away... throw it out into the desert like you were going to in the first place--

Then maybe you'll stop looking at me like that--

She dragged the cross out from between her chest and legs, ran a finger all along the edges as she studied the faint markings hidden under a thick cover of black tarnish. But after she spit on her thumb and dipped in the dust and rubbed hard to buff up a little shine, she straightened--

It looks just like the one--

She fished in her hair, found her father's cross, pulled it forward and held the two crosses side by side.

A hammer and three long spikes decorated the center of her father's cross. And now that the surface old woman's cross was cleaner, she could see, darkly etched in the center, a lamb with its front leg crooked around a long stick.

"Zero," she called to his back, "did you see this? Her cross looks just like mine! They're both silver, they're about the same size, they're both fancy, all decorated, so maybe she--"

"Now!" He yanked his robes over his head, slung his gear over one shoulder, jerked his head toward the trail. "Move!"

"Would you just wait, Zero?" She rose higher on her knees, grabbed the strap of her gear to appease him, "Maybe she knew my father! Or the soldier! It must mean something!"

"It means nothing."

"What?"

Already several long strides in the distance, he pivoted on his heels, still heading forward by walking backward.

"It means nothing! Have you never heard of religion?"

"Zero! Would you wait?" She snatched her water, fumbled her pack, tripped over the hem of her robes, "Wait for me!"

Cross shot quick glances between Mag's graying face and the man driving headlong through the barrens. He moved amazingly quickly, when he marched alone. Already, he was very far away.

Gaze riveted to the corpse, she edged past Mag's body and was almost free when a hard gust of wind stopped her. She ducked her head, locked her knees and braced against the onslaught, but as she peered through slitted eyes, she saw the wind blow open the small sack that Zero had so hastily yanked closed.

She smiled, _he cut the laces too short so now it won't stay closed,_ and when the wind eased, she darted a look at Zero's back and moved in for the sack.

Once there, she knelt, rapt.

That bastard... I knew he was lying--

Still safely nestled in their soft leather pouch, a heap of diamonds glittered, flashing rainbows of blue and red and white hot light.

She could never forget those seductive stones.

Once a trader had come all the way from the Sinai, hoping to barter books for precious tools from her father's forge. And while her father pored over the books, the trader had entertained her behind the house with magic tricks and bawdy jokes.

He was the first man to kiss her.

His lips were smooth, slightly sticky with olive oil, and when he slipped his tongue into her mouth, it tasted of clove.

_A diamond for a diddle_ , he'd said, rolling the diamond in his palm to make the stone spit sparks. And she, so much younger than today and not knowing exactly what he had in mind to diddle, had said, _Deal_.

At that very moment, her father came out of the house holding a shovel, ready to trade. He caught them before they'd done any diddling at all and without a word, he beat the trader off her with the shovel before throwing the whole lot of them... the trader, the diamond, the camel, and the shovel... off of the place, without so much as a drink of tea.

He kept the books.

Cross smiled again.

But the trader's diamond had been so tiny. These stones were huge, as big as olives, some near as big as dates... and plentiful enough to ransom a caravan of sheikhs. A man could trade these for a lifetime of diddles; a palace full of useless old books.

The diamonds beckoned again and all at once, she needed to feel them, needed to see the endlessly changing display of color as she turned their perfect faces to the sun.

Fingers lifted and splayed, she approached cautiously as to a fire, slowly stretching out a hand and nearly touching--

"Damn you!"

Fingernails scraped the back of her neck as Zero hauled her back, ripping the sun-rotted fabric of her robes.

"Damn you!"

He lifted his arm, the back of his hand ready to fall, but Cross flung herself down at his feet.

How had he crossed the desert so quickly--

How had he moved so fast--

"Zero--"

"You were not to touch anything! Do you never listen, girl?"

"Zero, I'm sorry, I'm--"

"I know. You're sorry. How very... remarkable." His voice didn't rise when he spoke; it fell. "Listen, girl. I care not at all whether you are, or are not, sorry. I do care, however, whether you do, or do not, obey."

"But Zero! They're diamonds!"

His typically inexpressive face abruptly changed.

"By the Christ! You," he jabbed his first finger an inch from her nose, "are a stupid girl! But since your worthless father was obviously unwilling or unable to teach you anything of any value, let me enlighten you! Diamonds are rocks!" He clutched the rough wool at her neck, shook to punctuate every word, "They're nothing but fucking rocks!"

He flung her down, next to the old woman's body, then drew back his leg. Cross scrambled away just as his foot came forward, so close she felt the tiny wisps of hair blowing back from her face. His boot blasted the ground, exploding it into a scattered spray of sand and gems.

Cross stared.

Geoffrey... worthless?

Geoffrey was wise. Everyone listened to him and respected him. Her father had warm brown eyes, not like the frigid ice this one hid behind. Geoffrey was worth ten of the madman standing over her... more than ten, twenty--

Her jaw tightened. "I said I was sorry!"

He didn't answer; he just stood looking.

She could almost feel his gaze as his eyes moved along the contours of her jaw and lips; almost feel him tasting the sweat that slicked her cheeks when the tip of his tongue licked lightly over his lips.

She ducked her head.

"Stop looking at me."

He still looked.

"Zero, I'm sorry."

"No, you're not... but mark me, girl... one day you will be."

A slight tremor shook her voice.

"I am sorry! Why are you so angry at me? Because I wanted the diamonds? You could have traded them! My father would have kept them, he would have traded them for books!"

The icy blue of his eyes spread out between them, a vast, limitless sea, until its waves washed down upon her to wipe her mind clean of everything except for how tall he was, wearing a sword twice longer than her leg.

She lowered her head as if forcing him from her sight could force him from her mind, but when he crouched down, close beside her, he destroyed her defenses by nothing more mighty than the sound of his scabbard shushing through the sand.

"Listen," he began quietly. "A long time ago, when I was a young man, this was a broken, hungry land. I once came upon two children and their mother... they'd made camp at the _wadi_ that borders Tell Ba'Sharif. The children's bellies were all swollen up... big," he gestured, "like melons. I... mislike... to see children..." he took a breath and continued, "endure such suffering so I gave them the last of the bread I had so carefully rationed--"

He smiled briefly.

"In any case, a trader had come along just behind us and I suppose the _baya_ was hungry as well, because no sooner had I given the children the bread, their mother took it out of their very mouths. To trade for diamonds."

Cross looked up at him, her eyes wide, but his face had already regained its usual appearance, his eyes looking far into the past as he drew long, deep lines in the sand.

"Another time," he continued, "I met with two men who had marched all the way from Tell'Aviv to Al Quds. They begged to drink from my water skin and I gave freely, although in the callowness of youth I couldn't understand why they were so thirsty when their sacks were filled to bursting, like overripe grapes. I stumbled across them again, "he laughed a little, "quite literally, as there was no moon that night.... Both were dead. Thinking there would be no harm in replenishing my water stores from theirs, after all, the two had already faced the Lord and so, no longer needed earthly things such as water, I found their water skins stuffed with gold. So much so, they held enough room for barely a drop."

Cross looked down at the lines he'd made in the sand. Before he roughed them away with his fingertips, she recognized the angles of a cut gem.

He lifted his head.

"Gold... diamonds... they're the dead currency of a dead civilization." He smiled without humor. "But I no longer succumb to the errors of my youth. And I no longer share water with strangers."

"But--" Cross shook a little under his unyielding stare. "But you shared your water with me."

Her words seemed to summon a wandering gust of wind. Once it had darted under her torn robes, it swelled the gaping cloth to offer glimpses of smooth white skin, forcing her to squeeze her arms tight against her sides so the shredded homespun wouldn't slip down to her waist.

Still crouched beside her, Zero scuffed his foot in the sand.

"Well...."

... _take her, fill her, right now, right here in the dirt--_

... she'll thank you for it--

"Well," he began again, perusing her bare shoulders and the soft mounds of her breasts, "you're hardly a stranger."

Cross didn't move.

She didn't dare.

While he stared, he was still. While he was still, she was safe.

"I'm sorry."

He dragged his gaze away. "Cover yourself."

Cross worked at the torn threads of her robes, but the ragged threads unraveled even as she tried to knot them back together... ragged threads that mirrored the ragged thoughts she couldn't seem to stop thinking.

What did she hear in his voice, see in his eyes, that drove her back to the wiry trader with the brown face and the bright blue kafiyyeh _,_ offering a diamond for a diddle?

But he could have had that--

She'd already offered it, the very first day. And he certainly could have taken whatever he wanted, that day and every day since.

So he must be mad... after all, he just killed a harmless old woman--

But he also killed four renegades when he could have handed her over to them.

And would a madman share his food? Share his precious water?

She gave up trying to fix her clothes and dropped her hands to her lap.

If there were reasons for the things he'd done, they were as obscure as the paths they'd followed through the wasteland... paths that always ended nowhere.

"Zero?"

"Move."

"Please, Zero... please talk to me."

"Move your ass. You squander time the way you squander water."

He stood, ready to move past her, but she shot out a hand, her nails digging into the scuffed leather of his boot.

"Talk to me, Zero... look at me.... Please!"

She could feel his displeasure in the tension that coursed through him. But she could also feel the muscles of his leg, hard and strong, inside his boot. He smelled of leather and mint and fresh, clean sweat and as she held her breath his presence rushed over her like the winds that never stopped raking her body, bringing the softness of his hair and the firmness of his lips.

She swayed into the wind, her lids falling over her eyes, but then she shivered and shifted as a tightness stole in between her legs.

She knew he could see her with her lips parted, her chest rising and falling with deep, heavy breaths; she knew he could see everything.

She heard him laugh quietly.

"Well, well, little sister... speechless at last."

He slid his knife from its sheath and flipped it high in the air. The hilt made a solid thud when it dropped into his hand and she stiffened at the sound, tensed as he moved in close, but he simply singled out a leather cord from her headdress and separated it from her curls.

She jerked her head but he yanked back and snapped the knife through the cord. Gathering together the two sides of her torn robe, he poked the blade through the fabric, threaded the leather thong through the holes, then drew the scratchy wool up against her neck. Tugging at the knot, he appeared satisfied only when the cord, in surrender, squeaked.

He nudged with his foot.

"Do you understand?"

She didn't.

"You. Girl. Answer me."

She stayed silent, her cheeks livid, her brain mired between glaring seas of sun and sand.

She understood nothing... after all, there was nothing in the world but him, and he was beyond understanding.

So all she could do was give in. And try to remember to stop saying she was sorry.

"Do you understand me?"

" _Anaa 'afham." I understand._

He smiled.

"No, you don't... but you will. Now, on your feet, little sister. It's time to march."

He stood, swung his gear and strode away, smothering the still smoldering fire with two deft kicks as he passed.

His smooth gait had left a long furrow in the sand so she slogged inside it, following in his footsteps as the sun's struggle against the darkness finally ended and it slipped, vanquished, beneath the horizon.

***

Her robes were choking her.

Hands shaking, she clawed at the sweat drenched knot at her neck because if she couldn't get it loose she would die, here as she stood, because she couldn't get any air and unlike him, she couldn't breathe the sand.

She worked the tip of her knife between the coils of leather and finally the wet wool fell away from her neck. The night wind instantly dried the sweat on her shoulders but she needed to feel the icy gusts all over, cooling the hot blood that throbbed in her neck and hands and feet.

She slumped; right shoulder, left. When the fabric fell away she stood bare breasted and small, a willing offering to the frigid night although, like her eyes, the hands she pressed to her cheeks were still fever hot, despite the sun having long since set. Nor was there a moon to add even its small portion of light.

She could bear no clothes at all. She worked at the soggy laces that held up her breeches and when they dropped down she breathed deeply, aching to feel clean cold air all the way down in her chest. Another deep breath and her nostrils flared suddenly at the smell of sour sweat that surrounded her.

She held her breath.

Who's out here?

It couldn't be him; he never smelled of anything bad; just leather, salt, light smoke and... from standing downwind of the fire after he'd thrown on a big handful of the herb... mint, his vest and breeches loosened to better absorb the sweet fresh scent, his robes spread over whichever scrub stood most directly in the path of the smoke.

So she stared into the darkness, looking for the someone behind the smell, but she stared blind because there was no light at all. Even when she looked up at the sky she saw only darkness because the stars, usually as plentiful as pebbles, were obscured by a thick cover of cloud.

She lowered her head, closed her eyes, massaged the knots in her neck and tried to swallow, but when she choked on another whiff of the smell, she finally began to understand.

There was no one else out here.

That awful smell was coming from her.

She indulged a sob.

This miserable place--

She dragged her water skin through the sand, poured a little water into her right hand, brought it carefully to the left underarm, sloshed a little into her left hand and brought it to the right. Then she hefted the skin, dribbled a little water over her back, over her naked breasts, but she knew she would never be cool again... or warm... or cool... because there was no middle ground in this place... no balance, no truce, no parley, no peace, not between day and night, not between heat and cold--

She groaned.

Then, with a slick wet sound, the heavy strap of the water skin scraped across her palm.

She grappled, open mouthed, ready to shout, dug in her nails. A fingernail snapped loose against a strap, barely an instant passed, and her hands were full of nothing.

The water skin was gone.

But in the darkness, when she didn't look square at it, she saw the faintest glimmer of silver.

"It's only the desert purging you of the stink of civilization. You squander the stuff of life to soothe your vanity."

"Zero! Where are you?"

She snatched for her robes, needing to cover herself even in the darkness, but in a flurry of dimmest white, they were gone too.

"Give me my clothes!"

She flailed but encountered only empty air.

What is he, a man or a cat, seeing through the dark--

"Give me my clothes!"

She could see only that he held a dull shimmer of white spread wide between his two hands.

"Do you harbor some illusions, girl?"

"Give me my clothes!"

First she heard him laugh, and then came the dull pops of breaking threads.

"Here," he said. "They'll serve you better now."

She reached toward the sound of his voice and when then the rough cloth hit her in the face, she wheeled, one hand clutching her clothes while the other winged through open air. But it was just as before, only darkness and the wind.

Breathing heavily, she turned the garment end over end over end.

Breeches--

As she yanked them over her shaking limbs, her gaze locked on the impenetrable darkness. Still sensing his presence, she expected to hear his laughter, but there was only quiet and when she slowly turned to look over her shoulder she shivered, although she knew the icy fingers she felt on the back of her neck belonged to no one.

This awful place--

Even the emptiness is alive--

As she scanned the darkness, the wind gusted, long and sharp and icy cold. Somewhere in the sand lay her long outer robes so she bent for them, groping across the ground, shivering as the wind teased the drops of sweat that slid along the insides of her thighs.

At the odd sensation, she stopped searching for her robes. She had to feel it to believe it so she moved her hand to the crotch of her breeches, skimmed past the tickle of broken threads, slipped right in and touched the dampness--

There--

And then she shrieked. "You bastard!"

Struggling free of the torn breeches, she searched the darkness with her heart slamming hard against a chest that suddenly felt too small to contain it.

He was nowhere.

He could be everywhere.

But where was he?

"Zero!" She clamped her hands into fists and screamed up at the sky, "Zero!"

Shaking, she sank down in the sand, her arms hard clutched around herself as if frozen by the chill.

"Zero?" Even to herself, her voice sounded weak, a tiny child reluctant to intrude, "I'm sorry about the water... I'll make it up, I promise, from now on, I won't drink anything at all! Just tell me what to do and I'll do it, just tell me what you want!"

Silence.

She felt her throat tighten and her mouth go sour.

She felt afraid.

More afraid than she'd been when the thief had stolen her water.

More afraid than when the death angel had glided over her, cruising the hot currents shoulder to shoulder with the buzzards.

She laid her head against her knees, forsaken but not forgotten, the echo of his voice ringing in her ears--

They'll serve you better now--

Chapter Six

He had killed the old woman three days before.

Cross envied the old crone. They'd left her lying slack and still, unaware of the world around her and the world equally oblivious to her.

The world was too aware of Cross; the wind scoured her face with salt until it burned, then it whipped the sand into cyclones so fierce she couldn't fend off the grit that bombarded her eyes.

And while the wind's howl stabbed her ears, the sun beat down on her head until she was dizzy and glare-blind and longing for the blackness of night.

And then there was Zero.

He was of the wasteland and reveled in its harshness; they were of one substance and one mind. She weakened under the desert's aggression; he grew strong. She craved food and water and rest; he drank the sun and breathed the sand and thrived.

She longed for the days when his eyes were unseeing; for the nights when she would speak and he would wince, as if the very sound of her voice caused him pain. Now his laughter flayed her every nerve until they were bruised, and his taunts sounded endlessly in her ears until sleep retreated and came no more.

She raised her face to the sun.

Not nearly overhead.

The sun would gather force for several more hours before unleashing a suffocating onslaught that would descend like rain, bathing the desert entire in a paralyzing wash of heat.

Nothing would move.

No jackal, buzzard, scorpion, or snake.

Nothing but the wind.

And him.

The muscles in her legs cramped and she fell forward with a groan. Her face half buried in searing stone, she sensed him all around her, moving in closer, skidding lightly over the gravelly ground, his water skins and gear of no more consequence than a fly upon his back. When he finally stopped circling he kicked at her heels.

"Get up."

It wasn't a voice... not a human voice. It was the sound of the demon he'd invited to live inside him the day he spilled the old woman's blood into the sand.

"Get up. Get on your feet."

"I can't!"

"That's what you said last time. Get up."

She forced the scorching air down into her lungs and pushed herself to her knees.

"I'm up. Don't leave me here."

He laughed.

"Leave you here? I would never leave you here... there's a market for young--"

A hard tug of his lips stopped his words, but she knew what he meant to say.

She lifted a sweat-slicked face and stared.

He stared back.

His eyes were ice, ice in the middle of the desert, freezing her brain and body until they were no use to her at all.

And he offered no pity... pity was impossible from someone who didn't see the pain.

"Zero, let me rest for a little while. Or let me have some water, then I'll be alright. Please, Zero...."

Her swollen eyes followed as he swung his small water sack from his side and brought it to his lips. He drank deeply, then pounded the cork back into the spout with the heel of his hand.

"You drank all your water. Why should you have mine?"

She hung her head. "Please...."

This thing inside him was bad.

Dark visions slunk into her mind, furtive and unbidden: a band of renegades dead, a head in the sand, an old woman with her belly slit open, gaping and wet with blood.

There'd be no mercy from this animal, this animal that stalked in the body of an angel.

But still she couldn't move.

He growled suddenly, hauled her up, drove his fingers between the jutting bones of her shoulders. As her knees hit the stone underfoot, she threw out her hands to save herself from falling face first, but she couldn't save herself from the madness, it was right beside her, wearing a perfect face caked white with salt.

He crouched beside her, face lifted as he scanned the hills.

"Did you notice the sweetness in the air?" he asked. "The dates are ripening. Soon slave caravans will be traveling all along that road," he followed with one finger a narrow path that meandered, often hidden, through the sun blasted peaks above, "collecting human detritus to sell to the settlements further north. It's hot, hard work, you know... harvesting all that fruit. Although in your case, I'd imagine the slavers would have a rather more horizontal form of labor in mind."

She whimpered a little.

"But you needn't worry," he said, "for the most part, I've found slavers to be accommodating fellows. So this position you're apparently so fond of," he encompassed her kneeling form with a rotating finger, "no doubt, it'll serve their purposes just as well."

Her whole body shook.

I'm no slave! My father is Geoffrey of the Tower!

She dragged herself to her feet but within moments, a dull drone sounded in her head, she saw black, and collapsed.

"Bastard," she sobbed, "bastard!" She pounded the ground with a feeble cry and an even weaker stroke. "Go fuck yourself!"

He sighed.

"Little sister, your mouth will get you in trouble some day."

He took a big handful of homespun; turned his fist inside the robes. Hauling her through the gravel, he moved in a perfectly straight line, right for the edge of the ridge.

Arms and legs splayed, she began to scramble, and when the sheer cliff loomed, she threw her body back against his hand and screamed.

"No!"

Did he plan to fling her headlong, down the steep rocky slope?

"Zero, no! Don't!"

Adrenaline surging, she stood ready to fight for her life, and with fingers curled, she steeled herself against his next onslaught.

But he wasn't even looking at her.

Eyes fixed on something out in the distance, the only movement he made was to raise his hands and jam his thumbs under his belt.

Wide-eyed and panting, she slowly followed his gaze with her own.

Tents.

Sheep pens.

Terraced hills dotted with olive trees.

She spun to face him.

"That's it...."

She shook his arm and when he didn't turn she shook it again, color high and fear forgotten.

"Zero, why don't you look? That's it! We found it! We made it!"

She made ready to run toward the jumble of tents, but when he grabbed her arm, she wrenched and strained hard against his grip.

"Let go!"

He jerked her back from the edge.

"Will you not stop?"

"What? No! Why?"

"Can't you smell the death? Can't you hear it?"

"I don't hear anything!"

She gave one hard twist of her wrist and abruptly, he let go.

She ran down the steep ridge, slipping and skidding down the stony wave, then,, enveloped in a cloud of yellow dust that filled her eyes and mouth and throat, she ran until she reached the flat lands below. There, bent double with her hands on her knees, she stood nearly breathless, hacking on the thick, dry air.

She wiped the sweat from her face with the dusty hem of her robes and struggled to muster the energy to keep moving. Scanning far more quickly than she could run, she spotted the massive iron gates that stood just outside the settlement. Like two stands of onion, they seemed to have sprouted from the earth and moldered there, as if mutely reproaching Geoffrey for leaving their one mission, the security of Makaen Hadeed, incomplete. Unattached to a fence or wall or any other barrier, the gates kept nothing out, but since they conveniently stood ajar, she aimed right for them, trotted between, then made for the sturdy tower of black iron that stood at the outskirts of the camp.

Every night of her life, for as long as she could remember, her father had climbed the tower and lit its fires, beckoning settlers to his new world. And when she, as Geoffrey had for all those years, stood before the wide base of the mighty tower that tapered as it rose higher and higher to challenge the cloudless sky, she lifted a hand to shade her eyes before moving her gaze along each layer of supports that crisscrossed the horizon all the way to the heavens.

But now a buzzard sat at the very top, where the torch once blazed, its inky blackness usurping what had once been a roaring wash of flame.

As she looked up, the buzzard looked down.

Then it lifted its tail feathers, ruffled and settled again, content.

She stared, open-mouthed.

Geoffrey of the Tower's tower, a toilet for buzzards.

She gasped. "You're disgusting."

But then she realized that she had heard the sound of the dropping when it dropped, splatting on the strut below.

She struggled to control her ragged breathing so she could listen to the buzzard croaking up in its roost, listen to the thudding of her own heart. But for the buzzard and her own blood pumping, there was no other sound but the wind.

And then the wind shifted.

A grimace wrenched her face and although she bunched her robes up over her mouth and nose, the stench still managed to ooze through, and when she turned to look back, up into the hills, she saw that Zero still stood at the crest of the ridge, his bright hair shining, his long white robes gusting behind him like angel's wings.

You bastard--

He knew.

She didn't know how he knew, but somehow he'd known all along.

The small timber house she shared with her father stood at the farthest edge of the camp so she ran until her chest burned, and when she reached the house, she took a quick breath and slammed open the door.

Empty--

She darted her gaze to each corner, stayed it for at least a heartbeat, just to be sure--

Empty--

How could the house be empty?

She turned and ran again, harsh gasps mingling with her sobs.

Geoffrey—

Where are you where are you where are you--

She ran to every tent that still remained on the open plain, stumbled through the silence and the stink, stared until the smell beat her back and she fell away gasping, but each dwelling offered the same greeting; frozen faces with open mouths choking for air and eyes rusty with blood.

Dead all dead--

As she stumbled back toward her father's house, she wanted to cry out _, Father!_ but she needed her breath so she could keep searching. Half way to the house, she shot another glance to the top of the hill.

Zero no longer stood at its crest; robes likely stuffed into his gear, he was clad in leather breeches and brown leather vest and had begun making his way down the hill.

Cross's fingers clenched into fists.

Now you're coming, now that it's too late, you son of a bitch, you bastard, you lousy--

I knew I hated you--

Cross turned, ran to Geoffrey's house, stopped just a few feet away from the ramp. Filling her lungs with a long, shuddery breath, she dragged herself forward, climbed up to the door and paused for a moment, hardening herself against the vision that haunted her... that of her father lying in there, dead.

Could he have been in house and in her panic, she had somehow missed seeing him?

She flung open the door for the second time.

"Father?"

No answer.

But she hadn't really expected one.

As she stood staring into the house, she saw that the scavengers who had robbed the outside of the house of Geoffrey's valuable forged iron had obviously stripped the inside as well. Tools, forged iron pots, even the eating utensils were gone, but other than that, nothing had really changed since she'd left so many days ago.

Still, four rough walls and a smoke blackened ceiling; still, waves of sand blown over the uneven floorboards and piled into peaks against stacks of old books.

Still, the bench under the window, where her father always sat.

But he wasn't there.

Her throat tightened.

He wasn't anywhere.

She sagged against the doorframe.

Father, where are you--

If he had survived the sickness, would he have left Makaen Hadeed, the only thing he really cared about, other than his books?

Her father had been so unlike the others. Was it possible that he was lying dead even now, just like the others?

Her shaking legs could no longer hold her. A straw pallet still covered her rope strung bed, so she stumbled into the house and sank down without a whimper.

She needed to think.

She needed to cry.

She needed to cry so she could finally breathe, so she rubbed her throat, willing the tears, until the sunlight streaming through the door abruptly dimmed.

She looked toward the newly dimmed light, her gaze moving steadily upward from the floor.

Tall boots. Tanned leather breeches. A plain leather vest.

Zero filled the doorway, he and the torch he held in his hand. The hard muscles of his upper arms glistened under a thin layer of sweat, but the light from the flames didn't enliven his eyes.

Cross rose from the bed.

"What do you want? They're all dead, so why don't you go back up to your ridge or go to hell, I don't care where--"

"Get out. Unless you want to burn with it."

An odor drifted into the house.

Smoke--

Then along with the smoke came the sharp acrid smell of burning wool and another odor she knew so well, being the blacksmith's daughter--

Scorched flesh--

She ran past him, out into the daylight, but it wasn't just daylight, it was firelight, too.

Flames engulfed everything; they shuddered up the woolen tent walls; crawled like ants along the long tent poles. A dozen separate fires swarmed all across the settlement, and hungry as locusts, the flames devoured everything... the tents, the coops, the looms and leathers, until all, one by one, came crashing down with a boom and an explosion of sparks, to the ground.

She lifted her fists and screamed.

How had this rampaging firestorm begun? With that slyly flickering torch he still held in his hand?

Cross ran back into her father's house.

Zero stood at Geoffrey's bookshelf. He didn't turn, he simply let his hand drop from the binding of one of the books then touched it with the torch.

She lunged.

"Not his books!" She pounded Zero's back, tried to shove him away, "Damn you! Not the books!"

She grabbed the blanket from her bed and began to beat out the fire but he ripped the blanket from her hands and threw it down.

"Let it burn!"

"No!"

She pitched for the blanket again, ready to battle the sparks that still smoldered on the scuffed leather spines, but he yanked her arm, pushed her out the door, then left her reeling as he strode from the house.

After finding her feet, Cross followed, shouting at his back.

"You son of a bitch! You lousy bastard! Why'd you have to burn the place down?"

He jerked his head toward the blaze.

"There must be fifty back there to bury! That's days! And all the while you're wrestling packs of jackals for the privilege of dumping what's left of them into the hole! Who's going to do it? You?"

"Yes!"

"No."

He spun, gripped a handful of the homespun bunched up at her neck and shook her hard.

"No. We do it my way, little sister," his grip tightened on the coarse wool, "the battle is over. The wasteland has won. And all those little drops of pain, falling around like rain... a soldier commends them all to that great well of pain that is life. Then he torches the place and moves on."

He flung her down and headed toward the back of the camp where the deserted animal pens, bordered by narrow swaths of open land, stood at the base of the foothills.

Cross scrambled to her feet.

"Zero!"

She trotted after him, called his name, but he kept striding, eyes on the sky, the torch still clutched in his fist.

"Zero! What are you doing? Where are you going?"

He raised his voice over the low thunder of flame. "Where's Geoffrey?"

"He got away!"

Zero moved steadily forward. "What's back here?"

"Nothing! Just piles of rusty old metal! My father kept everything! Anything he thought he could use, he piled back here!"

Mazes of debris salvaged from the old world seethed under the heat of the sun. Dwarfed by stacks of iron pipes, twisted steel, girders and panels and crumbling concrete piers, Zero navigated the killing field, nimbly skirting the bones of the dead civilization.

Cross followed close behind, tripping on the backs of his heels, until he stopped abruptly, his arm flying up to bar her way as he scanned a blue sky already marred by billows of black smoke.

A buzzard emerged from the sooty clouds, swooping low then lower still, as if gliding along the invisible columns of wind that crisscrossed the sky.

Zero headed straight for the bird. Eyes fixed, with Cross still dogging his heels, he took a few long strides, rounded a glittering orange mound of rust, then pulled up short.

Wholly unexpected, the thing represented pattern from chaos, form from void, and as they watched, the buzzard, with a flourish of long fingered wings, landed on the highest point of the towering structure, its dark bulk punctuating the tall shaft it sat upon.

Supporting the shaft, two long beams stood crossed, forming an **X** that spanned a low platform made from timbers lashed together with many turns of hemp. Toe-nailed with thick iron spikes to the platform, both the massive **X** and the shaft reached high into the sky.

And high above their heads... from the **X** , from the shaft, from the platform they'd blanketed in black... dozens of buzzards gazed down at them.

Cross cried out, snatched a stone, threw it with a grunt, then she charged the mob, arms flailing through the thick and sooty air.

"You dirty things! Go away!"

Passive and patient, the brood abandoned the structure just as the last had approached it, wings beating silently as they floated back to the sky to circle and to wait.

But in their retreat, the birds left what appeared to be a pile of rags behind, and as Cross moved her gaze along the pile, she slowly made out the shape of a flaccid arm, then a blackened, awkwardly turned leg.

Fluid filled her mouth, rising all in a lump, but she swallowed it back down, gasping.

"That's a man...."

Zero's lips tugged.

"Not anymore."

Beneath the shredded clothes, the man lay face down on the platform. A few wide planks still leaned against the broad base of the structure, but they didn't hide the pools of blood that began beneath the body and streaked all the way down to the ground.

Cross forced herself to look away. Instead, she followed the trail of the tallest beam that centered the **X** , to where it rose dark and dull against a backdrop of smutty blue.

"Did he build this thing, Zero? How did he get that beam way up there?"

Glancing first here, then there, Zero shook his head.

"I'm not sure. Maybe the ropes... or the anvil...." He fixed on the center of the **X**. "Is that a pulley up there? Maybe...."

"That's my father's anvil," Cross said. "He must have stolen it, then died of the sickness after he built whatever this thing is...."

"It's an altar." Zero's eyes left the low structure that hugged the earth and like hers, strayed to the top of the timbers. "The tall ones represent letters. _Ihcoyc_... Jesus." He spoke so softly she had to lean toward him to hear, although the flames roared far in the distance. " _Xpictoc_... Christ."

"What?"

"Just stay."

Zero strode to the altar, wedged the burning torch between the corpse and the wooden platform. When he heaved the body on its back, a flurry of tiny sparks danced on the dead man's shirt.

Zero looked down into the face, then slowly traced a cross with his thumb over each blind eye.

"Kyrie eleison," he mouthed, marking the blood caked lips, "Christe eleison."

He crouched to examine more closely.

A brownish froth stained the corpse's mouth and nose, but that provided not nearly enough blood to account for either the spray that spattered the flat surface of the altar or the stream that drenched the front.

He leaned closer and his eyes narrowed.

There... under the beard--

A deep, ragged slice, from the middle of the throat, across the carotid, to the ear.

His own hand?

He scanned in an instant; no weapon hung from the flaccid fingers, no weapon lay anywhere near the body or on the ground.

By another's, then?

Zero fingers clenched, his fist twisted the torn fabric of the corpse's blood stained shirt, and although he forced his fingers slack, his jaw tightened and lips tugged down--

You fool, you could have died with your sword in your hand and His Name on your lips and angels would have flown you to His Holy Presence the twinkling of an eye but instead you had to convey yourself to Heaven under your own power as if building an altar with your dying breath is somehow equal to just loving Him--

And so you die, you sad pathetic fool, you die with your throat slit like a dog's--

And you were going to save the world!

You deserved worse--

Zero lifted his face to heaven and roared.

He gripped the wooden planks resting against the altar, dug in until splinters jammed up under his nails and then he shoved, the sound of the crashing timbers less violent than his cry--

"God!"

"Zero?"

He turned. Saw her shaking.

Had she seen? Did she know?

"Zero? What is it?"

He looked away.

She's afraid to come any closer--

That's good, and maybe that's the wisest thing she's ever done in her short stupid life, stay away and not come any closer--

"Zero? Tell me, what is it?"

He saw tears, as plentiful as sweat, stream down to slick her cheeks, and when he felt his lips slowly tighten, felt them move past a smile into a grimace, his feet began to tingle. He slid them through the sand, right then left, as if the rubble could somehow reach through the thick soles of his boot and relieve the mad itching that had begun at the point where he was rooted--

To this vile earth and soon it'll spread like a malignancy, a cancer, to swallow my soul and lead me commit offenses so foul--

"Zero, what is it? Who is it?"

Why can't I understand her words--

"Please tell me.... "

Why can't I see her face--

Ecce femina--

Zero stepped away from the altar and bowed.

"Lady," as he gestured to the corpse, one arm gracefully extending, the torch whooshed as the flames burned through the uncommonly still air, "may I present Geoffrey of the Tower? Although I believe you and he are already well acquainted."

Cross took one step forward, a crooked half smile on her face.

"What? What did you say?"

May I present--

She crept closer to the altar.

The dead man's eyes stared blind white at the sky, but his skin had gone as black as the wiry beard that covered the lower half of his face.

"Father?" she turned to Zero, hands outstretched, "Zero?" then she turned back to the altar, "Father?"

May I present Geoffrey--

When Zero touched the torch to Geoffrey's shirt, she lunged.

"Don't! You've got to let me bury him!"

Swinging the torch, he raised a wall of flame and hot black smoke to force her back.

"Don't touch him! The soul is gone! What does the body matter?"

"No!"

"Let it go, girl...."

Cross rushed in again but Zero stepped quickly to block her. He flung up a hand, caught her square in the chest, shoved her down to the ground, then wheeling the torch again, thrust it back between two heavy timbers.

Staring at the bright flames crawling up from Geoffrey's shirt to his beard and down to his breeches, Cross scrambled to her knees, the odor of burning flesh lodging foul in her nose and throat and belly.

Bent double, she retched, weeping, into the sand.

"Father, Father, I'm sorry...."

May I present Geoffrey of the Tower--

And then she clenched her fists and screamed, "You bastard!"

Stumbling up from the ground, she charged, hammering his face, his neck, his chest.

"How did you know it was him, Zero? How did you know?"

He dug his fingers into her arms, shoved hard to hold her off.

"How do you think I knew?" Lips drawn thin, he smiled. "Geoffrey told you to find the soldier, didn't he? Well, little sister, you've found him."

Cross stood staring.

"You bastard.... Why didn't you tell me? Why did you let me make such a fool of myself? I trusted you! He trusted you!" She lunged again, her fingers curved to tear his face, but he locked her wrists inside his fists and although she tugged and twisted, she couldn't shake free, so she lifted her face and screamed at the sky, "Why did you let them all die?"

"Why did I let them die? Who made me responsible for them?" He dragged her up until she stood on her toes, shook her until she couldn't breathe. "Your father wanted this! I never wanted it! I never asked for it!"

He flung her down in front of the burning altar.

"We tried to save the world once... did Geoffrey tell you that?" A low laugh shook him and his lithe body tensed, as if wrestling with demons visible only to him. "The Brotherhood of the Knights of the Cross, that's who we were," he said. "Monks and priests and scholars, up to our ankles in blood and brains and shit!"

Then a quietness came over him and he leaned in, one finger raised.

"Here is wisdom, little sister. Don't believe what the old ones say about blood to the horse's bridles... by the time the blood gets to your knees, you can kill and kill and kill again, and it won't get any higher. Kill the whole of mankind, and it'll never get even one fucking inch... higher."

Then he winked, the smile still frozen on his lips.

"If he ever loved you, he never told you. And while he was a fool to send you to me, I'm the bigger fool.... I should have left you where I found you."

Lips twisting, Cross looked for his eyes, "And let me die?"

"Aye. And let you die."

"You're a coward! A bastard coward! You're just afraid!"

His fingers clenched and she shrank back, expecting him to strike, but he just laughed.

"Oh, I'm afraid, Cross... I live with greater fear than you'll ever know, every moment of my life."

He bowed low and with another wide sweep of a muscular arm, he offered both Geoffrey's pyre and Makaen Hadeed, beset by eager flames.

"Sweet lady, don't let me stand in the way of your eternal salvation. You go save the world and find out for yourself... it's the last thing this stinking world wants."

Then he turned and left her.

As she sat all alone in the sand, watching him stride out of her life, the wind kissed his cheek and brushed his long hair away from his face.

He would never look back.

He would never look back, and she couldn't bear to let him go. The world held nothing for her but a tall man with blue eyes and gleaming silver hair, and she could find nothing within herself that was not simply a reflection, back from him.

She sprang to her feet and ran.

Her mind raced, trying to think of anything that would make him stay, even if only for a moment, and when she caught up with him, she shot out a hand and grabbed his arm.

"You can still do it! What you didn't do then, you can do now!"

She snatched Mag's knife from the strap at her back and thrust it at him.

"Here! Go ahead! I want you to! I'll die out here anyway! You're a soldier, aren't you? It's what you do, isn't it? It should be easy for you!"

She saw his eyes narrow but somehow, she couldn't move. She stood rooted, watching as he drew back his arm, and when his hand slammed against her face, she fell at his feet, cringing as he grabbed her up to her knees.

"Do you think you can manipulate me? Do you think you can play me, when I've held your life in my hands since the beginning?"

He shook her until she whimpered, until his fingers left blue marks on her arms, then he glanced at the dagger she'd dropped in the sand.

"You think that's how a soldier kills a woman? Priests wield that weapon in pity but soldiers have no pity!"

He brought the back of his hand across her face again and blinded by bright lights, she staggered down, stunned.

She felt him looming, she knew she had to get away but she couldn't move; couldn't breathe; he'd stolen all her breath away so she curled her fingers to scratch his face but she was too dizzy, a dark tunnel surrounded her and she couldn't see, couldn't crawl out to the light because the sand was shifting under her hands and she was drowning, her nose and mouth filled with salt.

He threw her onto her back and clamped one hand on her throat.

She felt him shove her robes up to her waist, felt the sun and the wind on her belly and her thighs, so she tried to yank the robes back down, tried to draw her legs up under the safety of the cloth, but when she heard the leather laces ripping through the stitched eyelets of his breeches, tears began streaming down her cheeks like cowards, running hot and scared.

He brought his face close to hers, the bones in his jaw jutting sharp despite a voice that sounded oddly soft.

"Do you recognize your soldier now?"

"Please, Zero, not like this, I don't want it like this--"

"You think this is about what you want?"

He jammed a forearm under her chin, centered a knee between her thighs. Her legs quivered briefly, sprang apart, and when he pushed up in between, she cried out, slammed a hand against his face, but he caught her wrist, held it tight, and when she struck again, he caught that wrist too.

He jerked both arms high above her head as she struggled against his battle tempered body, but he was too practiced and too strong. Twisting in his grip, she tried to lift her head off the hard desert floor because if she could just stroke his hair, lay her lips against his cheek, maybe she could stop him before he did this thing to her--

"Please, don't...."

"Shut up."

"Please--"

He lifted her by her wrists and slammed her back down, hard enough to make the breath blast from her lungs.

"I told you to shut up."

With dark spots blooming before her eyes, she tried to pull her knees together.

"Zero, please don't hurt me... please...."

He tightened his grip, his voice just a gasp.

"Don't be a fool. Can't you see it's too late?"

"Don't...."

She couldn't breathe. Struggling to hold onto consciousness, she squeezed her eyes tight shut against the sun but shafts of light still came to blind and weaken her, so she tried to wring her hands free to shield her eyes from the stabbing rays but he tightened his hold and soon she couldn't feel her fingers. She groaned, twisted her hips to hide what he had no right to see, but he shoved closer still, the leather of his breeches dark with the sweat it drank from the insides of her thighs.

She heard her ragged breathing rising and falling along with his; felt herself weakening as he beat against her and he must have felt it too, because he forced with one deep, hard plunge, and then he had her.

She turned from the pale gaze she felt fixed on her face and moaned.

He laughed softly.

"And still, still, you're trying to play me. Did you think I wouldn't know an innocent from a whore? Have you no pride, girl? Have you nothing of the Brotherhood in you? Nothing at all? But me?"

He spread her legs further with his own, drove in until he could drive no deeper, and while his thrusts blasted the air from her lungs and beat away her reason until she hovered helpless, glare blind and weak somewhere between sun's light and his darkness, her mind focused only on the hot, wild raging between her legs.

"No more, Zero... please, no more...."

The thrusts slowed, then abruptly, stopped.

He sat back on his heels.

Free from his weight on her body, she sat up, managed to loosen a wrist, but he just clamped tighter on the other. She struggled to wrench that wrist away, too, but achingly slowly, he twisted her arm behind her back and forced her face to the ground.

"Beg."

Eyes stinging with salt, she tried to turn to look into his face and although she could see nothing, she imagined everything... his hand clamped around her wrist, the slender bone in her arm, the sharp crack as it snapped in two--

Would he do it?

Was it worth it?

Was it worth it, for a word--

"Zero...."

He leaned close.

She spit dry sand. "Fuck you."

He released her arm.

One moment passed before she realized she was free; another, before she understood the chance he offered.

Chest heaving, she straightened, tensed her body, ready to spring--

Run away--

But then, caught by nothing stronger than the grip of his gaze--

Run now--

She sagged--

To where?

"Zero," she breathed, "I'm--"

Sorry--

He lunged.

Hauling her up by a wrist, he dragged her through the gravel, threw her up against a grate of rusting steel and moved in behind. He shoved her head down with one hand, slid the other arm across her belly and yanked her hips high.

Pinned against the hot metal by the weight of his body, she pressed her hands against the steel and pushed back against him to relieve the pressure on her neck, but with an implacable hand, he shoved her head down to her knees, jamming her closer to the steel.

She felt him hauling at her robes, felt his long, hard fingers grasping while her hands, sweaty and striped with rust, tightened on the bars, and then she sobbed aloud, _no_ , but it was too late; he'd gone in so hard and so fast and so deep that she had no voice to protest; no voice, no face, no name, nothing but a raw and swollen gash laid open, shameless and exposed, to a hot and pulsing sun.

She heard her own harsh breathing; heard herself grunting, like some animal, with his every thrust, but he still had a voice it and that voice came sweet and soft, through both the smoky haze and the roaring in her head--

"It hurts, doesn't it."

She moaned, her knees buckling, but caught by his powerful arms, she could do nothing but take more of him.

"You remember the pain," he said, his lips brushing against soft, wet curls that had plastered themselves to the outside of her ear, "you remember what I've done to you, the next time you're tempted to earthly pride. You're nothing in the wasteland. Understand that, then you can begin to understand all the rest. Now... from this moment on... we begin again."

He lowered his arms.

She crumpled into a heap at his feet.

Weeping softly, she inched a shaking hand to the robes bunched up around her waist, then tried to tug the dirty wool down over her bare bottom.

He leaned down, yanked the gritty hem to her knees, then, still in silence, he turned to walk away.

She threw out a hand, dug her nails into his boot.

"Zero...."

Do anything to me--

Add my pain to the well of pain--

But don't leave me all alone....

"My fault."

Her lips were swollen, uncooperative, so since speaking was too difficult, she touched her lips to the salt stained leather of his boot, smearing it with her blood.

He crouched beside her, set a shaking hand on the black curls that tumbled free.

"No," he said. "No. Shoulder your own sins, lady... do not burden yourself with mine. But you should not have made me the remember things I'd chosen to forget."

She stared up at him.

His tanned face had grown pale, just as his eyes had always been, and as she watched, he kept dragging his fingers through his hair. Where his fingers had been, the paths they'd traveled, long strands of silver were stained red with blood.

He looked away, then; the cool mask replaced something as raw and throbbing as a wound.

She saw it all so clearly, suddenly.

Something had hurt him, too.

Something had torn his strong heart from his chest where for years he'd kept it safe, hidden beneath layers of golden sand.

She felt so sad.

Was there nothing she could do to wipe that look from his face?

"I'm sorry."

"Don't say that to me again."

"I shouldn't have said... what I said."

He set one finger against her lips.

"'When I was a child I spake as a child.' But now you will put away childish things."

He lowered his head, lifted a hand to shield his eyes, but his breathing grew more and more labored as if the air had become too thick to draw into his lungs. A long time passed before he spoke again.

"What do you want from me, Cross? Tell me, if you know yourself."

She turned her face to the sand and when no more tears would come, exhaustion laid the blessing of sleep over her troubled heart.

Chapter Seven

Night had fallen by the time she opened her eyes. She heard a rhythmic grating sound she couldn't identify, then she saw Zero.

She felt a start in her chest, but there were no tears.

Maybe she'd finally used them all.

He sat bare-chested in front of the fire, drawing a blade along a whetstone; that was the noise.

He tested the edge with his thumb and satisfied, slid another knife along the stone, honing one side, then the other.

She watched him as he worked. The yellow light of the small fire accentuated the fine lines of his face and all at once, she realized how much she envied him.

And he had said he was afraid.

He could never be afraid, despite the bitter words he'd uttered under the raging desert sun. They were made of the same stuff, he and the wasteland. Wars had brought down mighty cities, whole civilizations, but the desert alone remained... unchanged and unafraid.

She glanced at him again and felt a tug in her chest.

He's here because it's what he is, it's what he's chosen--

I'm here because I have nowhere else to go--

A shudder shook her, and when she rose up on one elbow, she gasp softly with the pain.

His eyes remained fixed on his task.

"Hurt or just cold?"

She lied.

"Cold."

He wadded up the heap of robes by his side and tossed them to her.

"Come by the fire if you're cold. I won't hurt you again."

She dropped the robes over her head and inched closer, but settled far from the fire's warmth so her face could remain shrouded in shadow.

He shot her a look and she saw the corner of his mouth turn down.

Damn her vanity. Day would come soon enough and nothing could be hidden then, so she pretended she didn't care about the bruises and slid up close to the fire.

He pointed the tip of the knife he was sharpening at a bright white point in the sky.

"See that star? Polaris. Keep that one in front of you and you'll head north." He gestured to several other stars, "Pointers," then guided the blade across the sky. "Follow them to the pole star. We weren't going in circles, we were heading north."

"Oh."

"You left Makaen Hadeed by way of the Az-Amin road, the old trader's route, but you lost it in the wasteland. If you had known to follow Polaris you'd have picked up the Az-Amin again. It runs north-south along the ridge. I follow the ridge."

She shifted a little. "Oh."

"Give me the other knife. You keep your weapons too dull."

He stretched a scarred hand toward her, a hand that had known her with such painful intimacy, and as he did, the recollection of his earlier madness, vast and searing like the sand storms that screamed across the low plains, surged across her mind.

When she lifted her eyes to his, he met her gaze with quiet equanimity, his outstretched hand still solid, the fingers, flexed and dry.

Another long moment passed.

"You have a decision to make," he said finally. "Forgiveness is one thing... trust, quite another."

Slowly, she drew the knife from the sheath at her ankle and laid it across his palm.

He took Mag's knife from the file before him, flipped it hilt forward and offered it to her.

"Here's the other. Mind... it's far sharper now."

He drew the blade she'd just given him down the whetstone in long smooth strokes, and repeating the ritual of the stone, he thumbed the blade, returned the knife, and still in silence, picked up the next from the bright array fanned out before him.

Like loyal sentries with bayonets lowered against her, they served to guard the gates of his heart.

"Zero? How do you do that?"

He smiled.

"What did Geoffrey teach you when all the other little ones were learning to hone their knives and navigate by the stars?"

She frowned.

Those lessons were only for boys--

"He taught me to read and write."

"Really." Another small smile played on his fine lips. "Tell me. Have you read any good books lately?"

She felt the muscles in her neck tighten but his smile had traveled upward and made his blue eyes shine.

She leaned a bit closer.

"Did you know him, Zero? Did you really know my father?"

"I knew him." The smile slowly disappeared. "He was... an idealist."

"Is that bad?"

"Not in itself. But he should have taught you how to defend yourself against people who want to hurt you."

"I killed that man who stole my water."

"The walking dead don't count."

"Then you mean you."

"And others," he said evenly, "who haven't half my mercy."

He turned his attention back to the blade and soon the grating sound began again to echo off the high rock formations that surrounded the still smoking camp.

"Zero? Could he have taught me anything that would have helped me today? Against you?"

"No," he said after a long silence. "I lack charity."

"Charity?"

"Love. Love quenches anger."

He had just touched the knife to the stone when she set the very tips of her fingers against his arm. He darted a glance but she was resolute; she would not allow him to drift back to his solitary place, where she was not permitted to follow.

Not yet.

"Zero?"

"What?"

"Tell me about before."

He positioned the knife, so she touched his arm again.

"My father said that people always used to know the name of the day and the number of the year. They marked the time as it passed. And every year the people would feast, just to remember the day you were born."

He sat perfectly still and after a few moments she took her hand away.

"Another one of my father's dreams."

"No."

"It's true?"

He nodded and she suppressed a smile, because he didn't smile.

"Zero," she said, "do you know what year this is?"

He sat quiet for a long time, watching the flames.

She visualized his mind at work, bright and dancing like the strings of sparks that rose from the fire, each following each to mark a brilliant trail through the cold night sky.

"Anno Domini 21... 17," he said finally. "Give or take."

She stared, dumb.

Anno Domini 21, 17... whatever that meant--

Just a meaningless number, translated into meaningless words.

Her father had once told her that it had been a long, long time since he'd bothered to keep count, because it really didn't matter, after all.

She looked back at Zero.

He still hadn't plied the knife; in an impossible pose, it lay cradled in his slightly curled fingers, its point in the dirt as he sat absolutely still, lost somewhere beyond her.

What secrets lay behind his fathomless eyes? Behind those lips that spoke so little, yet seemed to tell everything?

"Zero?" she again ventured the very tips of her fingers against his arm, "tell me about the Brotherhood."

He shifted and drew the knife along the stone. "That's all over now."

"Not for you."

"You know nothing of me!"

She jerked her hand back, as shaken as if he'd struck her.

Glancing down, he sighed.

"Cross...."

But then he faced her in surrender as the wind, which had seen it all and knew what he must say, caressed him with its breath in his hair.

"Cross, what can I tell you? Lux Perennis did not call the Knights to Mar Sada to be slaughtered in their beds."

"Lux Perennis?"

"Lux Perennis are the theologians, the mystics, of the Brotherhood. When they foresaw the coming collapse, they remanded every brother, from all over the globe, to the monastery at Mar Sada. There, the brothers reclaimed old ways lost for millennia, so we might prevail at Armageddon."

"The bombs."

"Aye," he nodded, "in part; they were among the beginnings of sorrows." He shook his head, smiled slightly. "The Brotherhood restored so much wisdom lost to the ages, but as we grew in knowledge and skill, so we grew in pride. Soon, we presumed to be like God... to know good from evil." He laughed. "What utter... folly! Only He knows what stuff a man is made of... what secrets he holds hidden, deep within his heart."

He took a slow breath.

"But dozens of decades had passed between the remanding and the time I made my vows." He looked up, nodded briefly to the unspoken question, "Aye, lady, your father as well."

She shifted suddenly, inexplicably discomfited.

"What vows did you take?"

"Oh, the usual..." he smiled again, "poverty, obedience, chastity. In fellowship, we covenanted as brothers and dedicated our lives to God. We trained as priests but also as warriors, determined to bow our knee to no man... only to the Almighty and to His Son, our Savior."

She locked onto the one familiar word.

"Zero, doesn't chastity mean--"

"Yes."

"Well, then how--" She looked away. "How did I get here?"

"Well, I wasn't there," he eyed her from under lowered lids, "but I would imagine it was in the usual way."

She pressed her hands to her cheeks, feeling the heat, but he just laughed.

"Lack of chastity is a very forgivable sin, Cross, especially when tempered by love. But the Brotherhood failed in many more important ways. Our mission was to serve mankind. But while Jesus, with sublime grace and perfection, is both master and servant of men, men are not so designed. When our enemy rejected our overtures of peace, we made war and vowed to bring their souls to God."

"But you were right," she said quickly. And then not so quickly, "Weren't you?"

The priest was unfailingly gentle; he didn't laugh out loud.

"Right? What is right?"

"Right is... right is right!"

He did laugh then.

"Ah... you believe in absolutes. Right is right and wrong is wrong and the devil resides in shades of gray. Tell me. Is it wrong to kill?"

She stared at his face, hoping to read the correct answer in the curve of his lips, or even in those unseeing eyes, but he bent his head and studied the scars that etched the back of his hand.

"Of course it's wrong," she said finally.

"You killed the man who stole your water."

"But-- He stole my water! If you hadn't come along, I'd be dead!"

"So it's wrong to kill... unless someone steals your water. Then God should wink."

"It wasn't my fault! He shouldn't have stolen it!"

"So he deserved it."

"Yes!"

"He'd have died without the water?"

"I suppose...."

"Would you steal water if you were dying for lack of it?"

The path he wanted her to travel was full of twists and turns but she followed on gravel bruised feet, the stony soil stabbing the tender soles of her conscience.

"I guess I would...."

"I see." His lips tugged. "But I know you. You wouldn't have stolen all of it, you'd have taken only a little...sip."

She squirmed, a butterfly impaled upon a thorn, until he looked up at her, his smile shining just behind his eyes.

"My Cross. I, too, believe in absolutes. And I, too, would have killed any man who dared steal my water. And I, too, would have stolen the water of someone foolish enough to leave it unprotected." He patted her lightly on the cheek. "Child of God. Welcome to the human race."

"Zero...." She pressured the throbbing pulse at her temple with her thumb, trying to stop the pain. "You're going too fast--"

"What I'm saying is that mankind is imperfect. We don't always do what's right... although not always for lack of trying. Hopelessly, desperately, often endlessly... trying."

He lifted her face, gently ran his fingertips along the bruised skin of her jaw.

"The old accuser is proud of his work, when men turn good into evil and evil into good. So it was with the Brotherhood. And so began our long descent away from the things of God, back to the world and the things of men."

"Oh, Zero... you mean you, too."

"Especially me. Flesh is weak. And mine is especially so."

She gazed at him again, trying to reconcile the flawless face with the eternally flawed soul. But too afraid to touch him although she wanted badly to, she settled for leaning so near that the teasing wind streaked her black hair with strands stolen from his silver.

He looked into her eyes but didn't take her in his arms; he just smiled that sad, far away smile that always sliced like a newly honed blade, down through to the core of her heart.

"Listen," he said. "You must have no illusions about me. You sought a savior but you've found just a sinner. I'm not sure when my turning away was complete... maybe when I drew my sword in anger, or when I raped the first woman or slaughtered the last child because I couldn't bear the terror in their eyes when they looked at me, or the sound of their cries. I can't seem to separate it anymore. But be certain of this, I am not the hope you sought."

Turning away, he fixed his eyes to the fire, his lips moving all but soundlessly, "I am not the hope you sought."

Cross brought her knees to her chin.

It was all true. Everything he'd said.

She knew it... felt it... in all the little twinges that deviled her bruised body when she looked at his hands.

And somehow, deep inside, she knew he hadn't told her the half of it.

"Zero? What are you going to do now?"

He spoke so quietly she had the feeling he was speaking more to himself than to her.

"I'll do what I've always done... lay my sins at His feet. Sometimes I wonder if I cling to them because only they can rip this prideful arrogance from my soul and drive me to my knees. And I do know this; He'll never abandon me... only I can separate myself from Him. So I will allow nothing to tear me from His arms. Not even my own sin."

Close and warm within the soft cloud of his robes, she watched as he fiddled with the hem. But when he lifted his head and moved his gaze over her face, she saw the tranquil lights slowly fade away.

"Do not wonder, Cross," he said, "you shall be avenged. But when I'm called to stand before Him... when I'm called to give account... whatever shall I say?"

The stillness hung heavy, the weight of his burden immobilizing them both until the musical voice of the priest came to free them.

"I see I have frightened you," he set a light hand over hers, "you whom I sought to comfort. Don't be afraid... the old book says that God so loved the world that He gave His only Son. So you see, His mercy endures forever. Even to sinners like me."

"Oh, Zero...."

It was all she could say.

She gripped her own arms because it was the only way to stop the shaking that had crept into her limbs. Then, with knees drawn close, she laid her head upon them and hid behind her arms, only dimly aware of his hand patting her foot.

"Do you know, Cross," he was saying, "after all that has gone before, I still do not understand His will. The Christ teaches, 'resist not evil.' So tell me this. How may a man, created in the image of a just and merciful God, turn away as innocents are slaughtered? If you conclude he must not, how then may a good man triumph over an evil one, without using the things of evil and thus, become defiled by them?"

She was silent.

"Well?"

She mumbled to her knees, "I don't know, Zero...."

"Ponder it. And I will pray for understanding, as I have for all these long years."

The wind gusted with a howl, rousing him to take up another knife and set it against the stone.

"Zero," she said quickly, before he traveled to that other world where she, and time, didn't exist, "I need to ask one more question."

"Enough."

"Please."

He drew the blade from bolster to tip.

"Ask what you will. I won't promise an answer."

"Did you wait to take me back here? Wait until you knew everyone would be dead?"

"Would you have marched with any more speed, just to have the..." his lips tugged, "privilege... of watching them die?"

"Yes... no... I don't know! Zero? Is your answer yes?"

"I made a calculated guess. So I suppose the answer is yes."

"Then why take me back at all? My father trusted you. You said he was your brother. Wasn't he your friend?"

He set down the knife.

"Zero? Why didn't you help him?"

He toyed with the hem of the robe.

"Zero, please...."

"That's three questions, Cross. You said one."

He slid his fingers between hers, suddenly clenched them tight.

"Try to understand," he said. "I answered my brother's request. He didn't send you into the desert to save them, but to save you. Remember what he said. Understand what he said, not what you thought he meant. He told you to find the soldier. He didn't say anything about bringing the soldier back to Makaen Hadeed."

He nodded and squeezed hard, as if pain would erase the tiny lines puzzlement had drawn between her brows.

"Your father had already done anything I would have known to do to save the settlement. He wanted you out of there; you were the one he was trying to save. And, at that point, the only one he was trying to save."

A tear ran along the side of her nose, ended its journey by slipping between her slightly parted lips.

"As for returning here" he said, "beginnings need endings, or they'll haunt you forever. That's the reason I brought you back here; the only reason."

"And the desert's secret? What was that? What did he mean by that?"

"I don't know."

"Then you were right! It was all for nothing! And now he's dead and Makaen Hadeed's dead, and I'm... I'm just--"

"Just what?"

"Lost. I'm still lost."

"All are lost, Cross. Until they are in Christ."

Knives honed at last, he arched his back, stretched his arms until the joints, welcoming movement, answered with soft cracks. Fully confident now and completely poised, he took the knives, each in turn, and snapped them into waiting sheaths of leather and steel.

Weapons secured, he touched her cheek.

Meeting his eyes, she was again struck by the cleanness of his features, etched in profile against the moon. She found some comfort knowing that nothing she could either do or say would ever shock him, and maybe that was the secret behind his eyes; they'd seen too much, although the youthful purity of his features would always belie that truth. His face reflected nothing of what he'd just described; she alone carried the burden of his many sins.

He read her thoughts as plainly as if she'd spoken them.

"My Cross. Forget them. They will heal."

She lowered her head, eased timid fingertips into the pulpy skin by her eyes and along her jaw, ran them gingerly along her broken lips to find he'd washed all the blood away. He'd also braided her hair, so tightly that it hurt, and coiled the braid beneath her headdress with a precision likely born of monastic restraint... apparently the same discipline that compelled him to slide a razor sharp blade over his cheeks and chin every morning, as if reluctant to have the infant sun bruise its tender rays upon his stubble.

But she needed to relieve the pain, so she pulled the silver pin from the mesh, but before she could loosen the headdress, he quickly snatched it from her hair and slipped it inside his vest. Taking the tail end of her braid between two fingers, he shook until all his carefully woven plaits had fallen out and her hair tumbled freely over her shoulders.

Still silent, he took the dark cascade in his hands. Spreading the long locks, he peered through them into the fire, watching the yellow flames, diffused as if by a gauzy curtain, sparkle like tiny mirrors that reflected the twinkling sky.

"Why do you bind it, lady?"

She shivered.

"The wind."

He looked up at the sky, his fingers still buried in billows of black silk.

"When I'm out here, all alone, I feel His mercy cover my sins with blankets of stars. Then I look at you and I realize how far my willful heart is from Him, still. It's easy to avoid sin when there's no temptation."

He dragged his fingers from her hair, laid one heavy hand on her shoulder, but when she shivered again, hunching away from his touch, he dropped his hand to the sand and sat back on his heels.

"There's another settlement... about six days further north." He rose nimbly to his feet. "It's a good place, the climate there is far better--"

She started as if singed by the fire.

"I don't want to go to another settlement! I want to stay with you!"

"No."

"Why?"

"You don't know what you're asking. And after what happened earlier, you must be mad."

"I do know what I'm asking! Please, Zero, I'll do anything--"

"I seem to remember that you made the same offer once before. My answer is the same."

When she looked up at him, trembling, he took her eyes.

"I can find that easily enough," his lips tugged hard, "when I want it."

He tucked his thumbs into his breeches and turned his stare to the fire.

"You can't march, you need too much water. You can't navigate or keep your weapons in order... your sense of smell is abysmal, and you're a woman."

She dug her nails into her scalp.

"Maybe I could do something about all my other faults but I can't help that one."

"I'm only asking you to understand. Women are trouble in the wilderness. They're nothing but possessions here, like food or weapons or water. Someone always wants them and they'll kill to have them. I don't want that. And you're too young to know it, but you don't want that, either. You'll be safe at the settlement."

Tears squeezed between her lashes.

"I'm surprised you let me come with you in the first place."

"Aye," he nodded once, "against my better judgment. And now my better judgment says to take you some place that at least resembles civilization."

"Somewhere you can get rid of me, you mean."

"Don't be so quick to abandon the only thing that keeps your body and soul your own."

"Oh," she said, hunkering down into the sand, "what are you talking about now?"

He turned away. "Ponder it."

She lifted her middle finger to his back.

"Ponder this."

She drew her knees to her chin, and when warm tears streamed down over her cheeks, she made no attempt to wipe them away.

She wasn't stupid; she knew what his answer would be.

The desert was the only companion he needed or wanted.

They understood each other.

She didn't understand him and never would.

His brotherhood might be gone, but he still lived by the vows he'd taken back when that small part of the old world was still alive... or at least he tried to.

Obedience. Poverty. Chastity.

His obedience belonged only to his god. He owned nothing but what he needed to survive. And he remained chaste.

She sobbed out loud.

And he remained chaste. He would never fully possess the desert and she... that vast, empty she... was his only earthly love.

But the other she--

The she that is me--

She wanted him. Needed him. Desperately.

Because something had happened to her.

After days of wishing for home and longing for home, she finally understood the last thing she wanted was the place she had once called home.

He must have carried her to this spot, to the very edge of the plain that surrounded Makaen Hadeed, after she'd fallen asleep. Any farther and he would have been forced to carry her uphill.

Her father's house stood well in the distance; the place where he'd shamed her even further away. He'd made camp outside the gates, as far from the settlement as he could get, and she was thankful for it.

With her jaw wedged between her knees, she felt the muscles tighten.

Makaen Hadeed.

Home.

But to who?

To girls whose full lips refused to even shape her name? To haggard matrons who, eaten by exhaustion and envy and endless swarms of noisy flies, scorned her dreamy questions, her naiveté?

To men who hid their faces, along with their natures, behind their beards... all the while staring, snickering, thinking, _always thinking,_ the word they didn't dare say because she was Geoffrey's daughter--

Whore--

Their home... and Geoffrey's home... but not hers. Never hers.

And now Zero wanted to bring her to another settlement.

She hugged tight to her knees, already filled with fear, the heavy kind that weighed down the chest and swallowed all the air. All in an instant, she smelled the stench of humanity, heard the unmistakable rattle, down deep in the throat, that preceded the awful quiet of death. She saw the ruin that life wrought in the faces of those still living, although, when she looked out into the desert, her gaze fell upon endless miles of pristine darkness.

She tried to breathe deeply of the cold night air but her own thoughts choked her.

No wonder Zero wandered alone.

He was right, he was always right.

People brought dirt and disease and death.

The desert brought sweet silence. And peace.

But she hadn't always felt that way about the desert so had he changed her, when he went into her? Planted some other seed along with his own... left some other part of himself behind?

Or maybe it had been in her all along.

Perhaps, in silence, her separateness had lain sleeping, recognized by others although not, until this moment, by her. And now, mindful at last, she understood why she so wholly needed to belong to him... only he carried within himself that same un-belonging, that same separateness, that enabled him to look into her eyes and never laugh and never judge.

She didn't hear him step toward her so she started when he crouched down beside her and brought his face close to hers.

"You're weeping again."

Pride was just another burden and now, after him, she had no pride.

"I'm scared! Damn you, Zero... damn you and my father and your brotherhood and your god! What's going to happen to me?"

He took her in his arms.

Her tears trickled unhindered down his bare chest, the muscles flexing hard beneath her cheek as he moved to touch her hair. Then, with a soft gasp, he spread his fingers and clutched a handful of curls.

She became aware of him all at once, as if his arms were lined with sharp daggers that had stabbed right through to her heart. And when she looked up to see his face, his perfect face, it was wracked with misery and longing.

He held her face tight between his hands, his thumbs beneath her chin.

"No good can come of this," he said. "Was your mother a witch, too? My brothers would have me take your life."

He pulled her to him, ignored her cry when he covered her mouth with his. He dragged the soft wool up over her head and after he urged her onto her back, he spread her hair into a dark halo around her head.

"God," he breathed, winding a lock around his fist, "God! How do you bind me? With a tear? With a tress?"

He stroked her breasts, lowered his lips to one then the other, the day's growth of beard scratching her tender skin. Slowly, he slipped his hands between her knees, spread her legs, and settled between. She turned her face away but he kissed her lightly, over and over, her neck, her cheek, her chin, and only when her tension eased at last, only when she parted her lips to the cool, sharp taste of mint, only then did he enter, riding gently.

Eyes blinded by tears, she clung to his shoulders and bore him as women had borne warriors since the beginning, her legs circling both his hips and the hard scabbard that still held his sword. In silence, she pleaded to the almighty power that owned him; let him accept the only thing she had to offer; let him claim and keep her as his own. But when he was sated and still she held him for only a moment before he pulled out of her grasp.

She choked down a sob, stretched out a hand to touch his face.

"What?" he said.

Empty now, and cold, she trembled as the wind leered at her nakedness, raking her body with its icy, invisible touch. So she drew up her knees and folded her arms over her head, weeping as the lost rhythms of childhood tried to rock her to peace.

Beside her, in silence, he stared into the night.

"Women are careless with their tears," he said after a long time. "You can't afford to lose so much water."

Body numb, mind numb, and all but dead inside, there was nothing left to do, but weep out the stuff of life.

Another endless second passed.

"Did I hurt you?"

She shook her head and he sighed, as if he already knew the answer to the next question he would ask.

"Did I hurt your heart?"

"My fault."

The wetness between her legs was the only proof she'd just taken his body into her own. He'd gone so far, so fast... but what had she done to drive him away, this time?

She touched his cheek, felt beneath her fingers the sharp stubble of beard that had just scratched her breasts, but he wouldn't allow her to turn his face to hers.

"Zero... tell me what you want. I was afraid, just now, but I can do better. I'll do whatever you want, I'll be whatever you want, if you'd just--"

He stared into the sky but the moonlight betrayed him; she saw his lips tighten.

"Zero, please talk to me. Tell me why you're always so angry with me. Please."

"Why do you think I'm angry with you?"

"I can feel it. I could touch it, if I was just quick enough--"

"Did you ever consider, I might be angry with myself? When a man enters into covenant, if he's a man of honor, he keeps his vow."

"So it's not me?"

"It's not you."

"But if it's not me, there's nothing I can do."

"There's nothing you can do."

With a soft whimper, she touched the livid mark on his upper arm. Tracing it with her finger, she felt the smoothness of the raised scar. And although it was obscured by other scars, the battles nameless, numberless, and long forgotten, she could still discern the symbol of the cross.

"This is from them, isn't it," she said. "I hate your brotherhood!"

"That may well be... but we are both its children, Cross. I was born in fire and steel, you were born in blood, but we are the same in this. Geoffrey knew that, when he sent you into the desert armed with nothing but a silver cross in your hair. And I knew, when I saw it, that I would protect you with my life."

"Then why didn't you tell me who you were? I would have understood! At least I would have tried!"

"Perhaps I'd chosen to forget who I was. Who I still am." He ran his fingers through his hair. "I have so much to confess, lady. I punished you unjustly, when the weakness belongs to me."

She shifted. "I pushed you...."

"You can't force a man to commit offenses he doesn't wish to commit. Any more than you can force a man to take vows he doesn't wish to take."

"Men do things all the time, say things all the time, things they don't mean--"

"Perhaps, then, we disagree upon the definition of a man. As for me, I will make my own choices, and I will bear my own sins."

She sat up spear straight.

"It's a sin to break a vow you took all those years ago? That was another world!"

"Oh, child. Same God."

He stood slowly, stomped his boots more firmly to his feet, and stepped from her side into the desert.

She would drag him back.

She would hold him with arms as powerful as his own, take him deep into her body and hide him there, at her very core, to break the hold the Brotherhood had upon him.

But he held her away himself, by the look in his eyes.

As a few scattered clouds drifted past the moon, briefly dimming the white light that illuminated the hair that lay like spun silver on his shoulders, she recalled a picture of a knight she'd once seen in one of her father's precious books. In her mind, she saw lines of those knights, all soldiers of the Brotherhood, clothed in robes of purest white.

More than beautiful now, how he must have looked then, standing there among his brothers with his tunic emblazoned with the crest of his only master, a master no less than the One True God.

What a fool she was.

Only a fool would try to tear him from those almighty arms.

She touched the warmth that still seeped from between her legs and curled her fingers into a fist, thinking--

Be content--

And when her hair, blowing wild, caught in her lashes and squirmed between her lips, she turned to her old enemy the wind, yielding at last to its undisputed power. But the wind, generous in victory, stroked the wayward strands away from her face and called to her with its breathy, secret voice hidden behind the driving rush, urging her to listen and to heed--

Be content--

Cross turned to where he still stood staring out into the desert, silhouetted against a canopy of stars and scudding clouds. Although he seemed to sense her gaze upon him, he didn't turn from the night.

"Sleep now, lady. We march again tomorrow."

"To that other settlement?"

"Yes."

She saw his broad shoulders bend under an invisible weight, then his head bowed slightly, as if he were very weary.

She pulled the abandoned robes over her chilled skin and laid her head on her arms, but since she couldn't close her eyes, she watched him for a long time, marking every line of his body as he stood motionless, the wind in his hair.

When the moon was high, he sank to his knees, crossed himself with a warrior's fist, hands clasped, fingers intertwined, then thrust his arms upward in an appeal to the ever silent Heaven--

" _Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa! Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi, miserere nobis! Kyrie_ _eleison! Christe eleison_!"

Chapter Eight

The sun, newly roused, had just climbed up over the ridge when it awakened Cross by stabbing her sore eyes with its first rays.

Her father was dead.

The recollection came suddenly and she realized just as suddenly that she hadn't shed a single tear.

Not for him.

Someday... but not this day... she'd begin to wonder why.

She lay awake a long time, her head cradled on her arm, but sleep wouldn't be coaxed back and the pain in her head wouldn't be eased, so she heaved to her feet.

She looked around, straining her eyes to peer through the grainy darkness, but found no sign of Zero.

He planned to take her to that other settlement, or so he said. But if he didn't want her, didn't want the one thing she had to offer--

Why ever would he bother--

She walked slowly, heading for the tall gates that, decorated with dagger-sharp points and curls of iron, framed the burned out ruins of Makaen Hadeed.

The gates still stood ajar and for some reason, as did virtually all travelers before her, she aimed right for them, going out of her way to slip between the gates rather than keep her path straight and pass them by.

She didn't need any extra steps; her head jarred on her spine with every footfall. Fingers listless against the unyielding iron, she smiled slightly as she squeezed between. _So why do it?_ To offer some proof of her humanity? To follow dutifully, unquestioningly, _blindly,_ those who had gone before?

Just like sheep--

As she trudged, she groaned. Thinking made her head ache even more, but she couldn't help thinking--

What would he have done?

Why, he'd have stayed on course.

If Geoffrey's magnificent gates had beckoned... if passing between had offered treasure and the delights of paradise itself... Zero would have taken the straight path and stayed on course.

She felt her stomach heave. The odor of burned flesh still wafted in the air, but maybe she was tougher than yesterday or maybe the smell wasn't quite as rank, because she managed not to gag as she headed toward her father's house, still searching for Zero.

Although she didn't know what she'd do if he wasn't in there.

Or if he was.

The place she'd shared with her father was the only dwelling still standing. With the sun hugging the ridge, she found it hard to see, but as she moved closer to the house she spotted a shadowy heap stowed against the wall, half hidden by the door.

His gear--

She lifted her eyes to the steadily brightening sky.

Thank you, Zero's god... whatever kind of god you are, if you made him stay, thank you--

She mounted the ramp, the door blew open toward her, and she stepped inside.

Zero looked up.

Crouched in front of the shelf that held her father's books, he had the biggest balanced on his knees.

"Bad climate," he said.

The thick volume fell open around his finger. He exerted a gentle pressure with his thumb and ground the yellowed pages to dust.

She shuffled to her bed and sat with a sigh.

"Maybe that's why he never let me touch them. Did many burn?"

"A few."

"How long have you been in here, in the dark?"

He shrugged and slid the book back onto the shelf alongside the others. But then, as if reluctant to abandon them, he stroked a few of the leather bindings, one after another, dislodging crusts of salt and dust.

Cross planted her chin in her hand.

"You know, Zero... you look like you belong there with the books. That's how my father looked; if he wasn't out there at the forge, he was in here, sitting in front of that broken down shelf of books."

She rubbed sharp grit from her eyes.

"I can't believe I didn't see it. You could be him. The face is different and he didn't have all those weapons hanging off him, but everything else is the same. I always thought he had such warm eyes, but you know... he never really looked at me either."

He wasn't listening.

She'd lost him again, this time to a pile of worm eaten books.

And something else--

She leaned forward as he pulled a plank of wood from between the volumes. Badly charred along one edge, black soot stained his fingers as he rubbed at the scorched wood.

She craned her neck to see.

"What is it?"

He blew loosened debris from the surface of the board.

She didn't want to move but she wanted to see, so, stiff and sore and with her head throbbing, she finally heaved off the bed and crouched beside him.

"What is it, Zero?"

"I don't know. There appears to be writing on it but I can't make it out, it's too dark in here."

"Why is it all bumpy? There," she pointed, "along the edges...."

His fingers caressed the rough board as if he could read its meaning through touch alone.

"I don't know. It reminds me of a topographical map."

"A what?"

"A map that shows terrain. Mountains. Valleys. We used them during the wars."

She jerked her chin at the shallow crater that dominated the center of the board.

"Why's there a big hole in the middle of it?"

"I don't know. You never saw Geoffrey use it for anything?"

She shook her head, reached for the blackened board, and after he handed it over, her fingers, like his, became similarly stained with black.

She shot him a glance. "Your damn crosses again."

"What?"

"I... I said 'your damn crosses again', but I didn't mean anything by it, I--"

"Where?"

"Here, along the edge."

He took the board, brought it so close his nose nearly pressed into the plank.

Cross shifted.

"It's probably not, Zero... it just reminded me--"

He explored.

"Reminded me of the scar on your arm," she said to no one.

Still silent, he pulled her headdress from inside his vest, whipped the leather strip from the bails of the silver crosses, then set one, with its flared, forked ends, up against a shallow notch carved along the edge of the large depression in the center of the plank. After he'd spun the cross to fit each end... top, side, bottom, side... against the notch, he butted up each end of Mag's cross...with its rounded, ornate flows and curls... just as he had the first, fitting it against a carved notch a few inches to the left of the first.

The crosses clearly fit.

Cross glanced at him but his face wore no expression.

"You need two more." She pointed at two other cuts in the old timber. "See those two grooves carved into the other side?"

"Yes."

"But even if you had them they'd slide," she said, "with that big hole cut out of the center, there's nothing to hold them in place."

"Yes."

He lifted the board, tempting the crosses to slip from position. They promptly did, skidding across the large hollow in the middle of the plank to rest against the other edge.

He looked up.

"Did Geoffrey have any other crosses around here? Not like these," he fanned the two crosses between his fingers, "a big Tau cross," he covered the tops of the crosses with his thumb, displayed their **T** -shaped form, "big enough to fill the space in the middle?"

She shook her head and as he fell silent, staring at the board, she continued watching until she finally sighed, "Zero?"

He didn't look up. "What?"

"My father called someone named Agnes when he was sick... remember I told you? Do you think that was my mother?"

He stayed focused on the plank across his knees.

"No. Agnus Dei means 'Lamb of God.' The Lamb refers to Our Lord."

"Oh...."

He did look up then, just as a wandering shadow fell across her face.

"And now you are sad," he said.

She shrugged, her lips dragging into a crooked curve. "I just thought... maybe... he loved her."

"Are you not proof of their love?"

She stared down, dug at the edge of her thumb.

"I think maybe he... they... were like...." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "You and me."

"Ah. I see." He touched her cheek. "Perhaps they were, or perhaps not. But they are dead now. Leave them to their place. And you keep to yours."

"Your god is dead," she cried, voice trembling, "and you don't leave him there! You carry him around all time--"

"Dead? How did you get that idea?"

"I know about your god," she said, "I saw a picture once, in one of those," she jerked her chin at the bookshelf, "he was hanging off a cross with nails in his hands and feet.... I can't imagine being much deader than that."

"Apparently you never read the end of the story."

"I couldn't read any of it, I only saw the picture, then my father--"

He caught her eye, questioned with a slow lift of his brows.

She dashed a hand at her cheek and shrugged. "Took the book away."

"I see. Well, in the last, the Christ conquered death."

"You mean he came back to life."

"Aye."

"Zero, you don't you really believe that, do you? Those are just," she lowered her head, shot him a sideways glance, "baby stories. Gods who die and come back to life."

"Not gods, Cross," he smiled slightly as he set the crosses back into the notches in the riddle board, "but the God. The one and the only... God."

"But Zero...." She searched for his eyes. "Why?"

"Why the sacrifice?" She nodded. "For love, lady. Perfect love."

"So my name... and those crosses...."

"Symbolize our covenant with Him. Yes."

She reached out and touched Geoffrey's cross, thinking of the man and that big piece of silver; it would sometimes fall free from beneath the collar of his shirt as he wrestled with stubborn pieces of iron in the heat of his forge, his face red and fuming under sweat streams that slid to the ground by way of his nose.

Then she studied the man sitting before her, her gaze moving all the way from the top of his head to his booted feet, although she knew she'd already committed everything about him to memory long ago.

But her memory proved accurate. He wore no cross.

"You don't wear a cross," she said.

"But I do." He touched the scar on his left upper arm, brought his fingertips to his lips. "Always."

She shivered. "Did it hurt?"

Brows lifting briefly, his lips tugged into a smile.

"Significantly less than spikes through my hands and feet, I would imagine. But I'll gladly suffer a little pain, to know Him. I'll risk hell itself, to know Him. There is much peace in our Lord."

"Peace? Are you at peace?"

"When one is at odds with His will, as you have seen, there is no peace. But when one walks in grace, nothing of this world can touch you. The Christ is all things to those of us who love Him. He is the Rose of Sharon and the Lily of the Valley--"

"He's a flower?"

He laughed softly at first, but his face, once lightened, soon transformed.

"Oh, child, learn to hear with your heart! He is the Bright and the Morning Star, the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last...."

And then he began to drift, so slowly that she almost didn't notice as he wandered away from her, his face tender, lost in love.

"He is the Comfort of Sinners and the Good Shepherd... the Good Shepherd who gives His life for the sheep. He is the Word, made flesh... and His Name shall be called Wonderful...."

His voice hushed now, he entered his solitary place and drew across eyes the heavy curtain that separated them.

She leaned toward him, but he was clearly oblivious to her, the heavy board still balanced on his knees.

He was in there somewhere, inside his skin, but she knew she would never find him, so she waited a moment before she whispered, "Zero?" But his reverie was deep, so she had to whisper again, "Zero?"

"What?"

He stood abruptly, the two crosses in one hand, the wooden mystery clutched firmly in the other. Between the toes of his boots lay the headdress he'd dropped to the floor when he'd removed the crosses.

She looked, but with his long legs, he blocked her with one deft step, scooped up the heap of silver with one finger and slipped it, along with the crosses, inside his vest.

"I like it loose," was all he said.

He strode to the door, then jammed the toe of his boot under its bottom edge to stop its aimless blowing. He did not turn to face her.

"We march again tonight. You'd best get your rest now."

She lowered her head, swallowed the tightness in her throat before it could summon tears.

She could not let him see.

"How far did you say it was?"

"About six days."

She sat digging at her bloodied thumb, but her resolve soon failed and when the first sob escaped, she lifted a balled fist to her lips to smother the next.

"I know," he said without turning. "I know."

He slammed the door out of his way with the heel of his hand and stepped out and down the ramp.

Cross sprang to her feet and caught the door as it swung, just to see him for one moment more. But her tears blurred the fleeting vision she wanted to savor; the sight of him as he strode away, his gait relaxed and graceful, the sun gleaming in his hair.

With a hiss, she slammed a hand into the thin boards of the door.

It hurt.

So she pounded over and over again, hard, until she felt shocks of pain dancing through her bones.

She hated the sunlight and the wind, hated the ax that dangled, smug and jaunty, from his belt. Hated the scabbard that brushed constantly against his thigh, burnishing the leather beneath it to a hard, smooth shine--

Hated everything... everything that touched him... when she could not.

Hand and eyes and throat and chest all burning, she sagged, her face against the wind weathered timber.

"Stupid girl," she said to the door, her lips daring the splinters that furred it, "you don't deserve him. You're nothing!"

Sore-eyed and weak and still clinging to the door, she turned to survey the house that somehow seemed even more desolate than it had just moments before.

Her thin pallet beckoned so she shuffled to it, and stretching out across the lumps of straw, she turned and rolled, rolled and turned. Restless and aching, unable to sleep, she flung both arms up over her eyes, then she forced Zero's face from her mind by imagining what she could no longer see; the armies of ants coursing, ever engaged, up and down the wall.

***

She spent the rest of the day in a stupor, battling devils that stole into her thoughts to transform harmless illusions into breathless nightmares. Hovering somewhere between wakefulness and sleep, she watched, paralyzed, as formless visions of Zero and Geoffrey melded together then wrested apart, each masquerading in the face of the other. They didn't wear their own faces until the image of Death appeared, his scythe sharp enough to split their masks in two.

Then it all began again.

When she felt a hard hand shaking her awake, she opened her eyes to see the light of the setting sun bursting through the open door, bathing Zero's skin and hair with the glaring colors of hell.

Something was wrong.

"Zero, what is it?"

She knew what it was... it was that pitiless thing that had taken her, in blood and pain, in the dirt.

He gripped the neckline of her robes, wrenched the tattered cloth. "Get these off."

She raised a trembling hand as if that could even begin to stay him.

"Don't--"

His tranquil face transformed, he yanked her from the bed and sent it skidding to the corner of the house with a single hard kick. She twisted her wrist, trying to get free, but he forced her to the floor.

"Twenty years," he said, his fingers tightening, "for twenty years, I've battled the length and breadth of this wasted land, my fingers clamped around the throat of that sharp tongued shrew I wear strapped to my side. Do you really think you can break the grip I have on you?"

She shook her head, unable to speak, unable to breathe, her mind a dizzy swirl, but then she heard his voice, echoing--

Never feed them with your fear--

"Zero," she said, "don't you remember? Last night? By the fire? You said you wouldn't hurt me again--"

His face changed abruptly and he blinked, as if he'd walked from utter darkness into raging day.

"Don't you remember," she said quickly, before her breath failed, "you said, 'from this moment we begin again--'"

"Aye, I did, I said that, I did--"

"You said--"

"I know what I said."

He released her wrist.

His lids slowly dropping to shield him, he took one long, deep, heavy breath.

"Christe eleison," he whispered, "Kyrie eleison, Christe eleison, Kyrie eleison...."

She inched back, trying for the shadowy corner, but his hand shot out and caught her again. He glanced up from under hooded eyes, his chest glistening with sweat.

"You use my own words against me. As well you should. You have no other weapon."

Then, with a groan, he lay back on the floor, one arm across his eyes, the other hand, white knuckled, still around her wrist.

He breathed deeply again, then sighed.

"Cross.... Talk to me, girl. Sing to me the song of your life."

"I don't know any songs."

His face relaxed a little, his lips turning down in a little half smile.

"Were you betrothed?"

She shook her head.

His arm still lay across his eyes but he read the silence plainly.

"Promised, then."

Another slight shake.

"In truth? Most women your age have weaned three and await the fourth. A veritable stable of young stallions must have been eager to overlook any prior... indiscretions... and surely Geoffrey had paid your bridal price and arranged a suitable--"

"No."

He slid his arm away to look at her. "You cannot have refused?" And then he asked, "Why?"

She shrugged again.

No one asked, damn you--

No one ever asked--

He lay the backs of his fingers against her bowed head, just above her brows.

"Too much here? Too many questions for a young man to answer? Or too much here," he slid the hand down along the side of her face and rested it over her restless heart, "more than a young man could ever hope to satisfy?"

She stared at his hair.

Thousands of separate strands... yet they were all the same color. None white, none gray, all streaming down together like a river--

Of silver molten moonlight--

"Answer me, girl. Have you never considered why you are alone?"

She shifted.

Down what mad path was he leading her now?

At least she understood the other. Or thought she did.

He lifted a lock and wound it around a finger, lost in its glossy depths.

"Do you understand why I ask?" he said finally.

"Are you going to fuck me?"

His head swung up and he met her eyes.

"Then just do it!" she cried. "Do it and get it over with!"

He laughed.

"Have you always been fucked? Have you never been loved?"

She stayed quiet because if she said anything, she would likely tell him to fuck himself and then he might hit her again, so she just sat.

He lifted her chin. "You've never even found pleasure with a man, have you."

Lips quivering, her mouth took a long, slow twist.

"Are you pretending that it matters to you? It never mattered to anyone else, it can't matter to you."

"Perhaps it doesn't matter, all things considered, to me. But it should matter very much, to you."

His touch gossamer light, he brushed the long black hanks of hair away from her shoulders then rounded her breasts with his hands.

"Cross. Most people follow one of two paths. They either share the pleasures of the body alone, or they share the body along with the heart. But you... you pursue neither path. Talk to me. Tell me what secrets you harbor, hidden so deep inside."

Dizzy, she stared at the floor.

He always made her dizzy. He always turned everything around.

He held the secrets.

He held the mysteries of life and death in those big scarred hands.

She held nothing.

And she feared... when trapped inside the vacant darkness that reigned only in the profound quiet of the night... that her heart was as empty as her hands.

And so, the only secret she harbored, hidden so deep inside, was how truly vast the void.

But his voice still came, so soothing, so soft, so gentle in her ear--

"Men have known your body, but they haven't known you. How could they, when you hardly know yourself. I once asked what you wanted from me. Perhaps the question was unfair, perhaps your response would have mattered not at all. But still, did you never wonder what your answer would have been? Or should have been?"

He glanced at the sand, shimmering in the sunset, just outside the door.

"Have you ever watched the sand? It's a creation of the wind... content to blow wherever the wind takes it. Did you never wonder what it would be like to pursue your own desire, rather than be swept about like so much sand?"

He took her hand and placed it on his hardness, held it fast, forced her to feel his strength.

"You are not alone in this," he said. "Women often deny their desires. Men, through their own inadequacy, have taught them thus... and, in truth, prefer it thus. Once one has subjected the self, submerged one's desire, it's easy to trade the body like a commodity for some chosen end. And once the trade is made, it helps to pretend the end was an initial desire. And it all wraps up so neatly... a tidy, circular, prison."

Head hanging, she choked out a whisper, "And what about you? Aren't you a prisoner too, to this god of yours?"

"Aye," he said, tracing a finger along the hollow at the base of her throat, left bare and unprotected by her ragged robes, "I am doubtless a prisoner, and I will never escape. There is nothing I haven't given over to Him... everything I ever loved, everything I ever wanted or possessed, my body, my mind, my heart, my soul... all for Him, my most ardent desire. But here we differ. It was my choice."

Presented with the side of her face that hadn't felt the force of his hand, he indulged himself in one long stroke, from the curve of her cheekbone down along the flawless line of her jaw.

"For what treasure did you barter your body? Protection in this wasted land? Or did you trade it for love, such as you understood that ineffable thing to be?"

She closed her eyes.

If she refused to look at him; he would stop.

But he didn't stop, although his voice sounded hushed and faintly melancholy, like the old ones speaking of their memories... memories so yellowed with age, they threatened to crumble under the slightest touch.

He brushed a long lock of hair back over her shoulder, away from her face.

"I think a moment of closeness was recompense enough for you. You let them go into you for nothing more than to feel warm arms around you, even if only for a moment."

Cross turned away, ready to crawl into the desert to escape him if she had to--

You're wrong--

You're never wrong, but this time you're wrong--

She heard him sigh softly.

"It's very sad, to lose your first love, but sadder still to never have known it. You have traded so much for so little."

He took her face between his hands and looked into her eyes.

"We will share something now, although it belongs properly to the one to whom you will eventually cleave in honor, as befits man and woman."

He gathered up big handfuls of wool and lifted her robes from her body. As she hunched to cover her nakedness, he raked the damp hair away from her skin, then brushed warm lips against the curls that had drawn inky whorls at the back of her neck. Then, drawing his fingers along her breasts, he slid them lazily down to her belly and thighs. Stroking gently, he slipped his hands between her knees but she drew her legs up, capturing his fingers between.

He slowly parted her legs.

"Do not hold your sweetness from me. I can't undo what I have done, or what others may have done, but from this place, perhaps you'll learn to find your way."

Tears sneaked out from under her lashes, so he kissed them all away before he kissed her lips. Playing up and down her body, his touch felt as warm and soft as the morning breeze, but she shivered again despite the warmth.

These were the same hands she dreaded. Hands that were awesome, lethal in their power.

His strength was undeniable, even in gentleness, and it still frightened her.

What kind of man was he?

He caressed the place between her legs then eased in a finger. She trembled, and when he withdrew his finger to paint her cheek with her own wetness, she moaned and pushed his hand away.

He smiled.

"Lady, this, too, is of God....Would you rid your mouth of its moistness? You can't deny what your body tells me is true. You needn't deny it, with me."

Again he took her face in his two hands, his fingers both cradling her and preventing her from turning away from the gaze that burned like a brand.

"I am going to go into you now. But know this... although I can promise nothing for tomorrow... right here, right now, my heart is with you."

He held her open with his hands and sheathed himself inside her.

She answered with a low gasp.

"Am I hurting you?" he said. "In truth?"

She closed her eyes, her mind reeling out of control.

Part of her wanted nothing but to bask in the warmth of him, the way the desert welcomes the sun after a long, cold night.

The other part of her battled the coldness in his eyes, and the way his weapons lay so comfortably in his scarred hands.

He tormented her; he confused her, she couldn't think when he was so close--

He's so close--

She yielded her conscious thoughts and they receded into the shadows, allowing her woman's nature to come with wisdom, bathing him in honey. As his rhythms lulled her with their primitive power; first absorbing, then transforming her fear, she moved along with him, expecting at every gentle thrust to feel him throb inside her. But he just laughed, reading her thoughts as he remained nestled strong and hard between her legs.

"A pleasing, though quite unintended, product of our training," he said. "How often the Lord must find humor in the frailty of men."

Her eyes widened, then she squeezed them tightly shut.

"Stop hiding," he said, again turning her face to his. "Do you think you can hide from life forever? Open your eyes and look."

She shook her head, _no._

"Now, how is this," he chided gently, "when you know nothing of Eden? Come, we shall go together, past these shadows as well...."

He placed his two hands against her thighs and lowered his lips to her warmth. She stiffened, pushed at his shoulders, strained against his fingers, but his hands held her open to him. He explored lazily, the rumbling deep in his throat as he laughed at her attempts to push him away. He brought his lips to hers with a quiet sigh and slipped his tongue into her mouth, her head again held between his two hands until she echoed his passion in the sound of her moans. Then, slipping his arms beneath her, he lifted her, lay back, then eased her down upon himself.

"Open your eyes."

Now, unable to resist his slightest request, she glanced out from under heavy lids and saw him smile.

"Well, well... she begins, at last, to see...."

Moving together, utterly united, Cross watched as his gaze travelled all along the length of her body, tranquilly seeking, and when he set his hands between her hips she covered them with her own, wondering dreamily if he could feel himself there, deep inside her, as if he was himself a part of her.

From between dropped lashes she saw him still looking, and as she watched his eyes, she became lost in the virtually absent color of them.

Drowning in those fathomless pools, she saw for the very first time that they were enlivened by fine wisps of azure, although silken threads of gray crowded the blue, muting the delicate color.

The gray shroud had been placed there, no doubt, by his god... but why? Because the angels needed to be reminded that he belonged to the race of men, rather than to their lofty ranks?

She brushed his long hair with the tips of her fingers, riding the waves of his might, when he lifted her suddenly.

She gasped. "Zero--"

"Look. Then tell me what you see."

She glanced down, moaned as he slipped back in, his boldness sheathed by warm lips that held him tight. Breathless, she glanced away.

"Woman... what do you see?"

"I see... you."

"Where?"

"Here." She gripped his strength at the place where they were joined. "Here, inside me."

"Aye... now our flesh is as one. And thus I am damned to hell's fire by no more force of arms than these," he slid his hands to her wrists, "arms I could snap between my fingers like twigs stripped dry by the sun."

He urged her down until they rested cheek to cheek, then rolled her on her back and set his lips on hers in a brief, hard caress.

"You must see, Cross, to accept what I must do. Tell me, do you understand?

She gazed into his face.

See what? Accept what? Understand what?

She didn't want to see. She didn't want to understand.

Arms stretched across his back, she set her lips against the silver silk that covered his shoulder, but he jerked back with such force he broke her grip.

"In truth, you understand nothing. Not a word I've said to you."

With a powerful sweep of his legs, he spread her wide and drove in until she could take no more of him. There, with no power of her own, she balanced breathless, poised between heaven and hell, resting on the head of a pin.

This was against her will.

She should hate the man who had filled her with himself without first asking her consent. She should hate him, hurt him, beat him till he bled--

But for the first time she understood the only beating she wanted him to feel was the beating of her heart, pressed close to his as he moved inside her, bathing her with his strength and the sweetness of his seed.

She would think later.

Maybe when she marched silently in his shadow, across the arid wilderness, or when she lay beneath his precious blanket of stars, unable to sleep. He was here with her now and she could feel her body gripping his with a desperate thirst only he could quench.

She heard him laugh, but when she looked into his face, there was no humor there, only pain.

"Keep watch, woman," he whispered, "watch your poor puppet burn, before your very eyes."

Clinging to him as he yielded to his desire, she felt the last droplets of dread melt away like dew warming to the dawn.

What were the words he had used earlier? When speaking of his god?

Sacrifice. And love.

Perfect love--

Driven by passion now and heedless of hurting her, he ground her beneath his desert hardened body, the skin of her shoulders scraped raw against the rough boards of the floor. But she closed her eyes, sanctified the pain by yielding herself to him and to the fountain of life she'd held between her legs so unthinkingly, uncaringly, until this moment.

She abandoned herself to him as he teased her to the brink of ecstasy again and again, and when he finally allowed her to plummet headlong, down into the abyss, he caught her to his chest and fell along with her.

***

When reason returned she was still clutched close to him, her arms and legs wrapped around his muscular body, her breath rising and falling together with his.

She wouldn't let him go. She would die holding him inside her, rather than let him escape to condemn her to a world of dull shadows.

But then her mind intruded on her heart.

The moments were stolen. He had taken them to show her, to teach her, but they didn't belong to her.

And neither did he.

Soon the light in his eyes would begin to dim; his jaw would harden and his lips would grow thin.

Two tears escaped but she choked down all the rest. For now, at least, he held her tight; his breath in her hair, his hand at the small of her back. For this short time, he was hers.

He touched her cheek.

"You still weep."

He caught one of the wayward tears on the very tip of his finger and watched it glisten in the fading light.

"I have my Lord, but what have you? Nothing. And no one."

Nothing and no one.

He was right. He was always right.

He still held her in his arms, but as the last rays of the sun retreated from the gaping door, his warmth ebbed along with the parting glow. The once imperceptible wedge between them grew and grew, and by the time the light was all gone he stood apart from her, working at the laces of his breeches, fully determined to not notice how her curls caressed the tips of her breasts.

"Hurry," he said. "We're moving out."

She wouldn't cry... not if her heart broke inside her chest. She stretched out a hand, but her fingers fell short of his leg.

"At least you were free for a little while," she whispered to his back.

He turned to face her.

"In truth, you understood nothing I said to you. Freedom and slavery... both are imposters. And both are in the eye of the beholder."

With his boot heels sounding empty and hollow as he crossed the planked floor, he kicked open the door and stepped from the house, leaving the door, now wafting in his wake, looking puzzled and somehow forlorn.

Cross lifted her eyes to the soot stained ceiling of the house. Although the ceiling stood between her and the sky, she knew his jealous god sat enthroned up there somewhere, in all his haughty glory.

She couldn't see him now and wouldn't see him later... surely never had and surely never would.

"You!" she cried. "I have six days! For six days, you have to share him! After that, I don't care what you do to me!"

But she'd hardly spoken the words when a warning tremor fell cold upon her heart. Would her challenge truly fly to the ears of that almighty and relentless power?

But then she heard something being dragged through the sand.

Zero had hefted his gear and now he stood waiting...for her... just outside the door.

She flung her hair back over her shoulders, worked her robes over her head, and went quickly to where he stood. She lifted her small pack and looked up at the hills they would climb to reach the top of the ridge and the Az-Amin road.

As she scanned the surrounding cliffs in the dim light of early evening, they appeared as the fingers of giants, reaching out, ready to crush her.

In those days there were giants in the earth--

Or so her father had always said when she, a small child, had been frightened by the rocky formations that protruded, always ready to snatch, from the sheer cliffs that rimmed Makaen Hadeed.

She slipped her arms slowly through the straps of her pack.

"I hate this place. I always have. I guess I just never knew it before."

She never expected him to turn.

"The Lord chose this place. His Son walked here, made His sacrifice here. This is a holy place."

"It's an evil place."

She scooped up a rock, just one from an aggregation as plentiful as the sand beneath, and threw it. The stone bounced harmlessly off the hand he flung up to block it.

"You see?" She hefted her gear a bit higher on her back. "You can't take a single step without tripping over a weapon."

His lips tugged but he said nothing as he turned, eyes on the sky, and took the first step toward the narrow trail that would lead them up through the hills to the Az-Amin road.

Following behind, she began counting every footfall.

The entire night lay ahead of them. And when day came, the sun inching higher and higher to further scorch the already seared road, she would rest, content, in the safety of his shadow.

They were leaving the giants behind. And for now, at least, she was not alone. Night would come soon enough, and bring him to her again.

Chapter Nine

The viper dozed, all but hidden under a telltale serpentine trail of sand. Too lazy even to whisper as Cross crept toward it, it sensed her with a flicked tongue, rippled slowly, then, almost ready to spring, warned her away with a hiss. When it finally shot up from the sand, her hand flashed and she had it.

Writhing in her grip, the snake's forked tongue moved in and out.

"You're too slow," she said. "But maybe I'll let you go, if you tell me where he goes. After the sun sets, after he fucks me... where does he go to hide?"

She brought the serpent close, examined the cavernous mouth, studied the sharp white fangs.

Her fingers tightened.

"He never kisses me anymore. He goes between my legs then leaves me all alone. Until the jackals come...."

Breath stilled, she closed her eyes, afraid to wander into that nighttime world where placid animal chatter rose to squeals and screams in the face of feral laughter and the scrabbled beat of dozens of paws charging through the sand. In that black region she found herself driven, along with the running prey, to shadowy places that echoed with fear. Body rigid, ears attuned, she sat listening to unnatural sounds that seemed to speak to the claims of magicians and the very old... that not all things that walk upon the earth are truly of it.

Death has a voice... she understood that now.

But Life has a voice, too.

The sound of his footsteps, when he commonly raised no noise. The sound of his sword scraping from its scabbard when he typically drew it all but silently. With the grate of metal against metal, wielded in warning to a world that had careened from silence into tumult all around her, everything drifted quiet again as if he had emanating from within himself the power of the light and the dawn so that things like fear, which took their strength from darkness, were powerless to stand against him.

His quiet voice would cut effortlessly through the rising din and with three simple words, _'I'm here now,'_ he'd banish dread to that desolate place from which it had sprung.

But when he leaves--

She closed her eyes again and caught her breath.

Don't think about that--

Not for a minute or a moment--

Just don't do it--

She drove the thoughts away. They fuelled weakness. They had the power grip her, hold her helpless, the way she held the doomed snake in her fist.

He'd always told her she needed to learn to think, but would he never understand that for her, thinking--

She squeezed, fingers white knuckled behind the viper's head, then snapped it like a whip and stuffed it into her gear.

Always led to nothing but more thinking--

She trudged under the weight of the catch sack until she reached the top of the massed hills that closeted their camp. Breathless, she slipped the bag off her shoulder and stopped to rest, but when she saw how quickly the sun was sinking below the horizon, she slung the gear across her back again. But she didn't move; not just yet. She needed her feet nimble beneath her, needed her eyes sharp for the hike over the rocky hills, so she stood motionless because her feet felt heavy and she couldn't seem to focus.

Because of him.

Because waking or sleeping, thoughts of him never let her rest.

Tonight would be like every other night, since they'd left Makaen Hadeed. She would huddle by the fire, watching not the flames but the darkness, waiting... wishing... begging... for him to step from the shadows.

And he always did... sometimes earlier but more often later, as if drawn by the moon. He'd kneel by her side and then, with a hand against her shoulder, he'd urge her down on her back, wordlessly begging for her obedience and her silence.

In return for those two gifts he'd use her body faultlessly, satisfying her need before abandoning himself to his own. But neither his strength nor his skill could satisfy the hunger in her heart, any more than she could fill that wild and desolate yearning she sensed in his.

Finally spent, he'd stand and step from between her legs. Drawing the laces of his breeches, he'd tuck a toe under one of her ankles and drag it over to meet the other. And after she'd watched him hide from his empty eyes the hollow place that had so failed to satisfy him, she'd turn her face to the sand and cry.

And she'd challenged his god.

He was right, he was always right.

She was nothing but a fool of the worst kind, having fooled only herself into believing that he cared for her... just a little.

She threw the sack from her shoulder with a grunt.

He cared about her as much as he cared about the catch that filled that sack. Oh, he'd skin it, gut it, spit it... but it was she who anxiously worried the fire, snatching at every roasted shred that curled away from the lick of the flames, spit flooding her mouth as she hovered, ravenous.

He ate hardly anything at all.

And as for hurrying back to camp, he wouldn't care if she returned earlier or later or not... he simply felt obligated, she'd gleaned from the little he'd been willing to share, to guide her to the safety of that nameless other settlement. But if she were to plunge from the top of these rocks right now... spatter, eyes popping, all over the bottom... he might be moved to nothing more than a vague sort of thanks for having been saved the long, slow trip north.

Her fate lay wholly, completely, in his hands. And so, each day had ended just as this one was ending now, with her ever-shrinking hope that his plans, always inscrutable, would continue to include her.

She wiped the sweat from her forehead and gazed across the plain that stretched out beneath the dry hills, almost expecting to see him striding toward the wasteland, anxious to leave the low hills, and her, behind.

Then her heart slammed once, hard in her chest, because something was down there, moving steadily through the dusty sea.

She lifted a hand to block the glare of the sun, but the heat waves rising off the superheated sand convoluted the figure into an unrecognizable blur, so she ground at her sticky eyes until the image came slowly into focus.

As she let captured air flow slowly from her lungs, she wanted to drop to her knees and cry--

It's not him, it's not him, it's not him at all--

She focused first on the camel, plodding in the way of all camels: resigned, stupid, and likely headstrong, despite the fancy tassels and swags of scarlet saddle cloths lavished upon it. And atop the beast rode a man, his long legs reaching well past the tall forked saddle horn. Feet resting against the camel's neck, the man sat easy, his back straight, his arms resting on his thighs as he controlled the reins. His long black hair, glinting gold, rode the wind.

Cross stared at the shafts of light glinting off the man's golden bracelets, and when she felt a sudden urge to run she surrendered to it, panic battling logic as she grabbed the catch sack and blindly bolted down the ridge toward the safety of Zero's camp.

She knew the man crossing the plain might be as much a kilometer away, but she somehow felt him close behind, felt his sweat-wet hand sliding over her skin, felt the heat of his breath on the back of her neck. So she stayed close to the massive rocks as she ran, arm outstretched and fingertips skidding along the boulders, except for when the gravel shifted beneath her boots to send her plunging nearly headlong. Skirting the high mound that sheltered the camp from the winds that blew up from the plain, she suddenly drew up short, pinioned by utter silence and two pale eyes.

With dust and fear clogging her throat, she scanned the scene in an instant.

The tip of his scabbard, buried deep in the ground.

The sword still sheathed, its ornate cross guard glowing under a wash of orange light from the setting sun.

The man himself, kneeling behind the scabbard, his gaze now focused back on the cross guard as he brought his clasped hands slowly to his forehead, his chest, left shoulder, right.

He gripped the hilt and stood almost awkwardly, as if he needed the steel to make up for strength he lacked in his legs.

Then she saw why; from ankle to knee, sharp bits of gravel had become embedded in the leather of his boots and breeches.

So he'd been kneeling... praying... since--

When?

Who knew when.

Just like the first time--

And somehow she knew, that just like the first time, it was all because of her.

"I'm sorry."

"Why?"

She shrugged.

He yanked the scabbard and began buckling it back onto his belt. "Tell me."

She shrugged again, but when she saw his lips tug, she answered quickly, "I saw someone. Out in the desert."

With a quick flick of his thumb, he guided a leather strap hanging from his sword-belt through a pair of parallel steel rings on the scabbard, passing over one, behind the next. Tugging to secure it, he took the next strap, threaded it through the next pair of rings further down the scabbard.

He darted a sharp glance.

"And?"

She fidgeted with the drawstring of her gear.

He took two long strides, snatched the sack and flung it against a heap of stone.

"I'm in no mood, girl."

She turned away but her feet remained as they had been, her body riveted by his gaze.

"I saw a man. I got scared."

"Why?"

"I don't know why. I'm sorry."

"Did he see you?"

"No."

"Were you hidden?"

"I was on top of the rocks back there."

"Well, if you weren't hidden, natural law says that if you can see him, he can see you, so we'll probably be treated to his company shortly."

"No! I don't want him to come here! Oh, Zero, can't we go now? I want to go!"

"We'll march when I'm ready."

Struggling with arms and legs that suddenly had no more vitality than those of the dead creatures jumbled inside her catch bag, Cross crumpled.

"Why can't you understand? Why can't you understand what it's like to be afraid?"

"Understand?" He crouched down in front of her, his elbows resting on his knees. "Understand your craven fear of men when you have no fear of God? No. That I cannot understand."

She lowered her eyes.

The men were here and now.

The god... the god was nothing but a myth.

She wiped tears and sweat from her cheeks with the backs of her hands.

"Zero, are you angry with me? Please don't be angry...."

"I'm not angry."

"You are."

When she saw his lips tug she snatched at his vest.

"I'm sorry... I'm sorry I'm afraid... I don't want to be, I just--" She caught a sob in her throat, pounded a fist against his chest. "Zero, please don't go!"

After a long moment, he set one finger against her cheek.

"How old are you?"

She sucked in another sob.

"What? I'm... uh...." She knuckled wet eyes, dragged a hand under her nose, wiped the wet off on her robe. "Twenty uh...."

His lips tugged.

He almost touched her hair, but then he dropped his arm and buried his knuckles in the sand.

"Did I say anything about going away?" he asked softly.

Strangled, she shook her head, _no...._

"Tell me what happened out there."

"I told you."

"Cross, you need to learn to think. Listen to your angels and work it through. Tell me what you saw."

She twined a finger in a loose strand of hair and when the fingertip flirted with blue, bulging from the cincture, he freed the finger and forced her hand down.

"Tell me."

"I saw a man," she began slowly. "He rode a camel covered with all these bright colored cloths. His hair was long and he wore bracelets," her fingers circled her elbow, both above and below, "here and here. They were gold. I could see them shining in the sun."

"And?"

She closed her eyes, her fingers moving to mold some invisible clay into something that would fully capture the subtle aura swirling around the man, but then she abruptly dropped her hands to her lap.

"That's all I know."

"Not hardly."

"But--"

Head cocked, he stared down, an instructor waiting to hear the correct answer... until logic forced him to accept that no amount of patience would obtain a response from the sand.

"A man possesses a valuable beast in the wasteland," he began. "What sort of man might such a man be?"

"A trader?"

"Or...."

"A slaver?"

"Or...."

She fell silent so he prompted again.

"Do traders and slavers travel alone? Do not traders and slavers seek the protection of caravans and bodyguards? Is it safe to travel alone, here in the wilderness? Wouldn't any brigand kill the man to steal the beast? Even an honest man might be tempted, were the mark easy enough or the treasure rich enough. Wouldn't anyone prefer to ride high above the heat and the sand? Wouldn't you?"

She nodded and he almost smiled.

"So tell me... what kind of man would so brazenly flaunt his treasures?"

He waited, pouring sand from one fist to the other as if measuring her innocence in handfuls of dusty gravel.

"A man like you," she finally whispered.

He lifted his head, his blue eyes flat.

"How so?" he focused on a single grain as all the sand slid through his fingers, "how so?"

"A man who could kill anyone who tried to steal the beast. Or the gold bracelets."

"And that is?"

"A soldier?"

A quick brush banished the last of the stubbornly clinging grains from his hands.

"No doubt he is a warrior. So you see, you had good reason to be afraid. Warriors are notorious for their rather poor treatment of women. But I needn't belabor the obvious to you."

Then he smiled. His demeanor had changed in moments, his face in an instant.

"I think perhaps I know this man. He may very well be my brother--"

"Your brother? You have a brother?"

"I do have a brother," he said, laughing as he gestured with a broad sweep of one bronzed arm, "in truth, I have hundreds of brothers, speaking every language known to this brutal, battered globe!"

She searched his eyes and the curve of his lips, although she knew that answers were never found there, only more puzzles, locked behind his smile. He laughed again, then caught and held her gaze.

"Well, lady? Will you never find what you're looking for?"

Touching her cheek as he passed her by, his long legs took him up and over the first rocky heap that nestled close beside the high hills that surrounded the camp.

She scrambled to her feet and called after him.

"Wait! Where are you going? When will you be back?"

"Lay the fire," he said just before he rounded the craggy rocks and disappeared from sight.

***

After the sun set, a strong wind barreled up the ridge from the flat plain of the desert. Urged on to impossible heights by the roaring gusts, the fire, overfed, spat and droned and popped.

Her belly full, Cross dozed despite the noisy fire, warm and content with twilight dreams as sweet as honey.

She dreamed of him.

He had kissed her tonight, before he went into her, and she shivered now, remembering, just as she'd shivered when he'd opened her and filled her emptiness.

And he hadn't left her to go off to his secret place but was still here, seated beside her.

She could hear him now, singing softly.

It sounded so sad.

With him so near, the image of the gaudy colors beckoning in the sun finally began to fade. She had almost forgotten her fear when she heard the sand squeak. She opened her eyes and when she saw him on his feet, she sat up quickly.

"What is it?"

He thrust out a hand, warning her quiet.

The wind gusted and shifted but when it blew true he breathed in its secrets, his eyes almost closed.

"Malodorous beasts, camels...."

He scanned the unrelieved darkness that enveloped the camp, then moved catlike to the top of the rocks, his fingers curled in the cross guard of the sword at his hip.

" _Gloria Patri, et Filio, et Spiritui Sancto_ ," he called out to the moonless night.

" _Sicut erat in principio, et nunc, et semper; et in saecula saeculorum_ , _amen._ "

The answering voice was similar to Zero's own, rich and well modulated. The owner of the voice slogged up the final few feet of the steep ridge and stepped from the shadows.

"Brother," Zero said as he took the stranger in an embrace, his lips grazing the other man's cheeks in the old way, right then left then right again.

"Michael," the man nodded.

"Brother," Zero repeated, smiling as he touched the other's shoulder. "You must be weary. Warm yourself and rest."

As the two moved toward the fire, Cross backed away from it, and when the flames illuminated their faces, she struggled to find her breath.

It's him--

Now at a short arm's length and in the black of night, the man looked even more the giant. From the broad toes of his black leather boots, she followed all the way up, past his long hair to the top of his head. He towered over her as a giant would; the whole of her reached hardly past the middle of him.

"Cross," Zero said, lifting one hand to motion her out of the darkness while the other still lay lightly on the upper arm of the stranger. "Cross, this is Captain Valentine."

"Good name," Valentine said, grinning as he bent to chuck her under the chin with one huge hand.

Rooted to the ground, she could only nod a dumb greeting.

She had never seen such a man. A wild mass of hair tumbled down his leather covered back, and long braids, plaited with golden chains and colored gems, hung on either side of his face. He wore sparkling earrings that swept his massive shoulders, the diamonds and rubies capturing the light from the flames to release them as brilliant flashes that stung her eyes. He still wore the bracelets she'd seen earlier; heavily etched and set with stones, they snugged up against the bulging muscles of his arms. His legs, long and hard as tree trunks, were covered by simple breeches of worn black leather.

"You must be hungry, brother." Zero gestured to flat rock he had placed close to the fire to capture its heat. "Come and eat. Cross...."

Cross still stared.

Despite all the gold and jewels, it was the eyes that mirrored the man. Glittering in the moonlight, they shone far brighter than the gems that studded his ears and hair.

"Cross," Zero murmured again. He motioned with spread fingers to the hapless snake that hung from a forked stick at the edge of the fire, its tail tied to where its head had formerly been, its deep red markings barely visible for the char.

Hands trembling, Cross lifted the reptile, managed to coil it neatly, and inched toward Valentine, who had settled in front of the fire. She hesitated then, hardly ready to feed the giant, but there were two pairs of eyes watching. So, still shaking, Cross brushed blown sand from the stone and set the snake atop it.

"Thank you, my dear," Valentine said, his red lips turning up in a smile.

Captured by the earrings that danced and swayed in the glimmering light, she didn't answer.

"The baubles please you?" he asked softly.

Cross felt the color rise in her face. But for the circle of light from the fire, shadows as thick as tent walls beckoned all around, so she turned to scurry behind, as was proper, but Zero raised one finger, aimed it pointedly down.

Sit.

She sat.

Zero turned to Valentine.

"Water, brother?"

Valentine grinned.

"Why, this fine meal deserves better!"

Hands moving to his belt, he made an elaborate show of unhooking a small skin from his belt and setting it near the flat rock as if laying table for a sheik. Then, from a sheath at his knee, he produced a knife and neatly slit the snake's belly down to the tip of its tail. With a loud murmur of appreciation, he wrestled out a big chunk of meat, popped it into his mouth, and began sucking loudly. When the bones were bare, he spat them into his hand and threw them into the fire.

He inclined his head with a smile.

"My compliments, lady."

Cross quickly lowered her gaze.

Is he talking to me? No one ever talks to me--

"Zero cooked it," she whispered.

"Well, I'm sure you have many other gifts," Valentine said, still smiling, "talents that far outweigh whatever you may lack in culinary skills."

Uncorking the wine skin, he lifted it to his mouth, but before drinking, offered the skin to Zero.

"Brother?"

"Thank you, Valentine, no."

Valentine's eyes widened. "Come, now, Michael! Even Our Lord took wine!"

Zero held up a hand with a smile.

"Thank you, brother, but no."

"Well. The lady, then. Will you allow her?"

"Cross may do as she pleases."

"How nice. My dear?" Valentine said, offering the skin.

"I don't know. I've never had it before."

She lifted a tentative hand, and Valentine pushed until her fingers curled around the thin neck of the spout. She glanced at Zero but he remained intent on the fire, so she looked at Valentine, but he was tossing chunk after chunk of meat into his mouth, working the flesh from around the small bones before spitting them back out. She looked again to Zero, whispered--

"Zero? Should I?"

His lips tightened.

"You are unaccustomed to spirits. What do you think you should do?"

The color rose in her face, she turned again to Valentine and held out the sack.

He pushed it back.

"My brother," Valentine said, one brow arching, "neglects to explain how one achieves maturity if one clings to the things of childhood."

Zero met Valentine's gaze.

As Cross watched, their eyes narrowed as their lips, in some like fashion, drew thin.

She shivered.

They're like water at the edge of a barrel, just waiting for a stone--

She swung the skin to her lips, tipped it, filled her mouth until her cheeks bulged, swallowed it down all in one gulp. The fumes rose instantly, assaulting her nose, scorching her throat, and when she gave way to coughing, her eyes streamed tears.

"Well, my dear?" Valentine smiled. "More?"

Still coughing, she blindly held out the wineskin.

Valentine took the sack and lifted it, swallowing loudly, over and over again.

Her head reeled.

_How can he gulp those spirits_?

She heard Zero's voice and with eyes still blurred by tears, she swayed toward the sound. When his voice came again, it sounded uncommonly sharp, but his words were lost in the sludge that clogged her brain.

She focused with effort.

"I didn't hear you--"

"Answer him!"

"I'm sorry," she turned to Valentine, eyes wide and wet, "I'm sorry, what did you say?"

Valentine laughed.

With the last chunk of snake displayed between his thumb and forefinger, he flicked it in the air, caught it neatly between his teeth, flaunted his skill for all to see with both his words and his smile issuing from around the plump wedge of reptile.

"I asked, lady, would you dance."

Cross's head surrendered to the trembling that had already taken over her hands.

"Oh, no, no," she whispered, "I don't know how to dance. And there's no music, no music to dance...."

"Michael shall sing for us."

Zero's face was expressionless. "You know I will not."

Valentine grinned.

"'Tis no matter," he began a restless patter with his huge hands, smacking and slapping the heavy leather of his boots, "come, lady... was never a woman in possession of all her limbs, could not dance. It would please me greatly."

Cross lifted her head, her thoughts as thin as _laban_ as she uttered a weak, "Zero?"

As Zero spread his fingers, Valentine's voice boomed.

"Michael, why do you allow her to address you by that ridiculous name? You are who you are!"

"Aye," Zero said with a small laugh, "and so, the name is quite appropriate."

Quiet for only a moment, Valentine laughed too, his face split by another show of white teeth. He began another rhythmic drumming and turned to Cross.

"On your feet, lady." He bowed his head just slightly. "I desire it."

Cross stood slowly, her body already sounding the same relentless tattoo that Valentine pounded out with such intensity. She moved timidly at first, remembering; women at the settlement had danced in the light of the fire, their arms held high like graceful branches, their eyes modestly downcast. But she remembered also the shivering plunges of the women's hips, remembered how their lips curved into smiles, full and wide and red with passion.

Geoffrey, watching intently, declared that he did not approve.

But Geoffrey was lost in a world of ghosts and she was lost as well, captive to this puzzling world of light and shadow, and as the driving rhythm dragged her deeper and deeper into itself, she swayed sinuously, rounding the fire again and again, weaving between it and the two men, her bare feet just a flash as her robes, lifting in the gusting wind, brushed the men's cheeks and wound around their heads.

She whirled and swirled and when she found herself behind Valentine, she leaned down and with teasing fingers, caressed his stubbled cheeks as she swept his snarled black strands, heavy with gold, back over his shoulders, and still, the beat rose, the climax threatened, she knew she was spinning them all into a tangle, but--

I don't know this woman--

This woman dancing isn't me, it's not me--

Valentine lifted both arms and roared, and beside him, Zero shifted.

"Cross," he said. "Enough."

The strength exploded from her limbs and she collapsed.

Burying her face in the sharp gravel with a moan, she waited for the mists to slowly, _too slowly_ , evaporate. When she heard Valentine laugh, she looked up... to where the two still sat... through the flames of the fire.

Their bodies seemed... strange. Curling, twisting, writhing, they changed before her eyes until she saw images of coiled serpents. Valentine with slitted black eyes; sly; cunning; his legs clothed in layers of ebony. And the other, the other was shining, a dragon in the sky, riding on the waves of the moon.

As she watched, their arms and legs turned to shiny mantles of sharp scales, and slithering against one another, undulating, inexorable, one would eventually turn and strike--

"No!"

"Cross." Zero's voice sounded dry and cold. "Stop."

"I'm sorry," she jammed her fists against her eyes, "you're crossed, one against the other--"

Valentine's laughter boomed again.

"Is she not correct, Michael? Can you deny it?"

"Deny it?" Zero shrugged."What you questioned, I accepted."

"And what I embraced," Valentine laughed deep in his throat, "you rejected. But I do recall, you did not always reject all carnal pleasures...."

He leaned in close, his voice low, for Zero's ears.

"In the beginning, I thought you the supreme hypocrite. So I hid, to spy upon you. I saw you on your knees between white thighs, but then I saw you afterward, all alone, speaking to the Father. You knelt for hours, where you thought no one could see you. But I saw you, brother... saw you worship first at the earthly altar and then, and all through the night, prostrate before the holy one of God. Do you know what else I saw, brother?" Valentine brought the wineskin to his lips and sipped. "Michael? Can you guess what I saw?"

Zero met his gaze.

"No, Valentine. Tell us. What did you see?"

"I saw your eyes. Your eyes were the same. Full of grief... full of pain. I knew I was witness to the nakedness of your soul, and it was a soul in torment. I couldn't understand that pain so I stayed hidden, trying to understand. If I could but comprehend it, I could bear the pain for you, and you would become serene and calm, my beloved brother once more. But you remained apart; all alone with your sin. And I still cannot understand why."

Zero lowered his head to his hand.

"Michael. Tell me why."

With a soft smile, Zero spread his hands, scarred palms to the sky.

"Why? Because we are priests. We are consecrated to no less than the Christ. How could we, who are so willing to suffer, to die, for one another, take such delight in torturing those women who struggled naked and defenseless beneath us? If priests are made of such as we--"

"Oh, Michael, are not priests merely men? Yet you expect from us something more! You separate yourself from your brothers, you do not allow us to share your joy, or your pain... what do you expect from us? What do you expect from yourself?"

"I expect better than I have given! Far better than I have given!"

"Our Father created us, with all our earthly faults! Does he create the sparrow, then tell it not to fly? Does he create the lily then condemn it, because it's robed in the very scarlet of His Son's own blood?"

Valentine glanced at Zero, his eyes narrowed against the smoke.

"Do you think to condemn me for my humanity, Michael? Do you dare?"

"I can neither accuse you, nor judge you. How could I? Am I not also guilty?"

Zero searched Valentine's face, his blue eyes wide.

"My sweet brother. I must know why His completeness has not been made manifest in us. The Christ said, 'be ye perfect, just as your Father in Heaven is perfect.' Tell me, how may we be saved by His grace yet remain unchanged, and so far from the Father's heart?"

"What you are asking, is why men sin! You may as well ask why the Almighty created the Satan to tempt Adam to his fall, and ask why He chose Judas to betray His Son, saddling that poor pathetic soul with the crime of the ages!"

Valentine slid closer to Zero, so close that he blotted out the sight of everything but his own black eyes.

"Michael. I can see by your face that you have already asked those questions. As do we all. But only you expect to find answers. Stop asking the wrong questions. There are questions that have no answers, and seeking answers for such these will only drive you to madness... or the kind of anger that can never be quenched, even by rivers of blood."

Zero stood slowly.

"Well, brother, if that's the truth of it... that sparrows must fly and men must sin... then I must ask questions. Whether there be answers... or no."

He rubbed his hands over his eyes, then fixed them on those sleepless ghosts that glowered, unquiet, in the darkness.

"I still see their faces, Galen." He turned back to Valentine, a thin smile on his lips. "I still hear their cries. I still commit the same offenses, with these two hands, over and over again. If I cannot get past these things, all my life has been a sham. 'Why call you me, 'Lord, Lord,' yet not keep my commandments?'"

Valentine jumped to his feet, first finger aimed.

"You misinterpret the Scripture, brother! Enemies of God must be defeated! And they were the enemy! Of the Brotherhood and of God! That is all, Michael! Will you never understand that? Must you attempt to explain everything with your philosophy?"

"Am I not my brother's keeper?"

"I am your brother!" Valentine struck his fist against the scarred breastplate buckled across his chest. "I am your brother! Me! Galen Valentine! Not some infidel whore!"

"Not all were whores...."

"All women are whores, brother! What does it matter if they sell themselves for a bauble or a joint of meat or a strong arm to keep them with their litters safe, all in the name of love?"

Valentine snorted, then continued breezily, "Not that I condemn them for that; their bodies are not their own, they are subject to the cycles of the moon and to the seeds that men plant deep inside their wombs. Do not arch your brow at me, Michael, I did not create them as they are, they were so fashioned by One wiser than we!"

Zero rubbed his eyes.

"And their souls? Are their souls not their own?"

"Being so subject, they're not free. Being not free, they're slaves. Being slaves, they're lesser beings and lesser beings possess a lesser spirit... rather like dogs. But I suppose it is their own," Valentine allowed with a smirk, "such as it is."

"You know you don't believe that."

"Oh, do I not? Now you pretend to know my thoughts as well as God's."

"I know I'm not hearing the words of my brother's heart, but those of the old liar who has deceived him."

"You're a fool, Michael! The clay does not question the potter! I am made of the same stuff as all men! The Lord took the clay in His hands and molded it; He formed it, He shaped it, He breathed life into it! I am His creation! You arrogant fool! I am His creation and so are you! You, with the face of an angel and the intellect of a sage... in prayer, the fervor of a saint; in battle, the heart of a lion--"

"You flatter me."

"No, Michael, all is true, I do not flatter. But still... though you tower over the ordinary clods of clay... still you are merely a man who must squat to shit! My poor priest. Accept that in His wisdom he created you man, not angel!"

"Have I ever denied it?"

"Deny it or no, you rebel against it as if it were in your power to change it! Perhaps, brother, perhaps that is why your anger burns so bright!"

"Stop fighting!"

The two men wheeled.

Cross jammed her fist, too late, against her mouth.

She'd been forgotten in their contest; would only she could be forgotten again.

The shadows beckoned, offering safety, so she rose and edged shakily toward the darkness, barely ahead of the glares that drove her.

"Don't be alarmed, my dear," Valentine called to the whitish glimmer of robes being steadily consumed by the night, "my brother and I have always disagreed thus."

Zero gave a short laugh.

"No, Valentine, we have not disagreed thus."

"Aye, we have... do you not recall?" Valentine smiled but his eyes stayed as black as the snaky locks that warred all around his head. "Michael? Don't you remember the night you betrayed our Brotherhood and turned to this wretched place?"

"I betrayed nothing," Zero said, his pale eyes steady, "and no one. You abandoned me to this place, when you abandoned covenant. You charged the Father with the sins we ourselves had chosen to commit. You denied that through our own free will we had chosen the world over heaven; you denied that the prince of this world had seduced you, just as he seduced me. Does my memory serve? Have I forgotten anything?"

Zero lay his hand on Valentine's arm and squeezed, his voice just a whisper.

"Aye... I have forgotten something. I begged you to renounce your blasphemy. I pleaded, I knelt before you--"

Valentine laughed.

"It was an excess of white powder, brother, drove you to your knees...."

"I implored you then, just as I do now. Lay your sin at His feet before all is lost." Zero's fingers tightened on the strong arm that lay beneath his hand. "Valentine, be reconciled--"

"Liar! Heretic! The blasphemy is yours!"

Valentine threw Zero's hand from his arm, lifted his own, but Zero clamped Valentine's wrist between iron fingers before the huge hand could fall.

"Do not strike me, brother," Zero's voice came slow and hushed. "Do not do it."

"Michael." Valentine's wine stained lips turned up in a smile, "If you will not bear a blow from your brother, how will you ever turn your cheek to your enemy? Isn't that what the Christ would have you do?"

Zero released Valentine's wrist.

"Brother... peace."

"In truth, then! Are you really so much better than I?"

Zero shielded his eyes with his hand.

"Peace, brother... I beg you. Let us have peace."

As if the word had finally managed to trumpet a truce, both sank down in front of the fire, gazes fixed to the restless flames. In time, Valentine spoke, his tone light.

"Speaking of women," he began, one eyebrow bent upward like a dark wing.

"Were we? I thought we were speaking of sin."

Valentine grinned.

"One and the same, are they not? Speaking of women, I was surprised to find you with one. I always hoped you would finally come to your senses."

"I hate to disappoint you, but I have not changed."

"She wears your mark on her face, Michael. Little incites you to such rage but your own sin, or more perhaps more precisely, your perception of it. Surely you don't think you can fool one of your own."

"An indiscretion. Nothing more."

Valentine laughed. "Which you heartily confessed. As always."

"Most heartily. As always."

Valentine poured a long stream of wine into his mouth.

"Poor child." He belched softly. "She finally finds a genuine man in this benighted wilderness and he's a fucking--" his brow bent again and he rolled his eyes, "pardon me, not a fucking... priest."

Zero sighed. "Brother, did you really cross this desert to talk about me?"

Valentine arched his back and stretched; a panther all in black.

"Geoffrey said you'd found the treasure."

"What treasure might that be?"

Valentine yawned and gave another stretch.

"Whichever one you've found."

"I have no treasure," Zero swept one of the earrings that swung from Valentine's ears, the red rubies again flashing with the fervor of the flames. "you mean, of course, these playthings you love so well. You know me better, brother."

Valentine barked out a laugh. "In truth, shall I believe you?"

"I don't dissemble."

"No, but you are clever, Michael. And Geoffrey, rest him, was not. I must ponder this. After all, people do change."

"Some do, but not all. Had I gold or diamonds or rubies, I'd gladly give up all to you. But it would not satisfy your desire."

"It's easy to surrender what you don't covet, just as I would gladly give philosophy and all my meager piety. But neither would they satisfy you, Michael."

Silence crept by with aching slowness until Zero spoke.

"You're right, of course. Such is man's nature."

"Aye. And so our paths have diverged. Yet run parallel."

Valentine sighed loudly then jumped to his feet, heavy muscles rippling under the broad leather bands that crisscrossed his chest.

"You know, of course, Geoffrey's settlement is burned. Your work, I suppose."

Zero shrugged. "The girl is his daughter. Geoffrey sent her into the desert," a wry smile turned his lips, "he told her to find the soldier."

"How convenient for you, brother!"

Quiet for a moment, Zero glanced up.

"Valentine, when last you saw Geoffrey... did he appear lucid?"

"I wouldn't say... exactly..." Valentine waved his fingers airily, "lucid. But as lucid as that madman could ever be."

"Then this supposed treasure I'd found.... Do you think he meant her? Do you think he meant his daughter?"

"Oh, Michael, really! You," Valentine jabbed the air, "and I always suspected it... are a hopeless romantic! The girl's pretty but admit it, Michael... in the dark they're all pretty! Beautiful, even! _Femina tota pulchra est_! But a treasure? Hardly!"

Like sudden thunder, Valentine's laughter rumbled.

"But wouldn't that be just like our Geoffrey? Try to turn that nothing of a girl into a treasure? Do you remember, Michael, how he tried to coax us to settle here, all those years ago?"

Valentine bent, snatched up some sand, twirled lightly on his toes, then flung the handful out into the empty wilderness, the pebbles and small stones making a staccato clatter as they fell.

"This..." he rolled his eyes, "void... was to be the new Eden! Ha! As if the Father would deign to even name such a blighted place!"

Memory recalling bonds between them as fragile, and inescapable, as spiders' webs, they both laughed, but soon, the laughter slowed then stopped.

Valentine sighed.

"I will partake of your hospitality, brother, and have that water now. My gear is with the camel and the ridge is steep."

Zero moved to rise but Valentine lifted his hand. He strode to the stowed gear and after fumbling with the water sacks in the darkness, he lifted the smaller bag and drank, jammed in the stopper, and set it back beside the larger.

He scanned the perimeter of the camp, where all was silent, then strode back to the fire.

"Where did she go?"

Zero waved a languid hand. "Wherever she wanted to go, I suppose."

Valentine groaned with a roll of his black eyes.

"Oh, good Lord, does this one have a mind of its own? Don't tell me she's a feminist...I thought we'd strung up the last of them before all the good rope ran out."

"She won't go far."

Valentine fixed Zero with a hard look. "You are careless, brother."

"I'm no slaver. She can go anywhere she wishes, anytime she wishes."

"How very democratic. But there is no democracy in Heaven, the Father is the head. And so, on earth, the husband must rule his wife."

"And I am a priest. Christ is my bridegroom and He is my head. I may not and will not cleave to any other. Let her husband, when she manages to secure one, rule her."

Valentine grinned.

"Ah, Michael, I have truly missed the company of my brothers! These desert clods, they have no souls, their hearts are lead. In truth--"

"I heard you laugh."

Cross shuffled toward them, her white robes blowing, her head and hands hanging. In a moment, Valentine sprang up on his toes and bowed, his bright grin flashing.

"Ah, beauty approaches!"

"I heard you laugh," she said again, her voice as light as chaff on the wind. Joints dragging loose as watery cheese, she shambled past him. "Are you friends again?"

She didn't wait for an answer; instead, she trudged to the fire, sat with a grunt, drew her knees to her chin and buried her head in her arms.

Valentine glanced at Zero, glanced at Cross, and then, broad hands open wide, he shrugged.

"Next time, she'll know better."

Lips tight, Zero grasped a handful of Cross's hair.

She shoved his hand away.

"Leave me alone."

"Wake up!" He gripped her shoulder and gave her a quick shake. "We're moving out."

Face planted, she pushed at empty air.

"Cross," he said, "get hold of yourself!"

She sighed.

Some voice kept buzzing in her brain like an angry bee.

"Go away, bee," she mumbled to her knees, and still she didn't move.

Zero shot a glance at Valentine but he was gazing into the night, his long hair whipping in the wind.

"Cross," he hissed, "Listen!"

The muscles in her neck slack, she managed to wave just one finger.

Go away, bee--

Thumbs hooked under his buckler, Valentine turned slowly from the night.

"She obviously doesn't want to go, Michael. And of course," his lips thinned to a twist of red, "since you allow her to do as she chooses, you will respect her decision."

"You're not suggesting I leave her here alone?"

Valentine spread his arms wide.

"Alone? Alone? Am I nothing?" Then he grinned, offered another quick flash of teeth. "Of course, if there was more between you than just... what did you so euphemistically call it? An indiscretion...."

A brief light flickered in Zero's eyes.

"There is nothing. I'm taking her to a settlement further north. She'll be safe there."

"Ah, yes," Valentine made a little noise to clear his throat, "the desert clods. I know you haven't confused innocence with ignorance, brother... certainly if anyone understands that stupidity begets in these mongrels no special virtue, you do.... They'll have her spread before you disappear over the ridge."

Valentine moved slowly around the small fire, his onyx eyes fixed on the flames.

"What a world we live in. A daughter of the Brotherhood, forced to breed with rustics and boors. But you mustn't shrink from the thought of her bearing the awkward thrusts of some illiterate cur... her belly swollen by some slack eyed idiot.... Such is woman's lot."

"She can't stay here."

"Of course not, not with you. But you said she might go anywhere she wishes, so let her choose. Let her choose, brother, between the clods... and me."

He crouched, set his hand on Zero's shoulder and squeezed gently, his voice borne like silk on a quiet rush of wind.

"If not you, Michael... who better than another of our Brotherhood? After all, I like women! Unless, of course, you've chosen to embrace your temptation. Although I do recall our Lord said, 'if thine eye offend thee, pluck it out, better one member should perish than the entire body.'"

Valentine's fingers tightened.

"Will you pluck it out, brother?"

Zero was silent, the muscles in his jaw working furiously.

"Michael?" Valentine whispered. "Brother? Will you pluck it out?"

Zero turned to Cross, twined his fingers in her hair to jerk her head up, but since her lids still closeted her eyes, he shook her hard.

"Listen! He wants you to stay with him! Do you understand? Do you want to stay with him or go to the settlement?"

Cross waved her fingers at her ears; the bees had again invaded her brain.

"Answer me! Do you want to stay with him? Or do you want to go to the settlement?"

Cross shrank deeper into her arms.

Damn these bees, buzzing in my ears, crawling through my hair, stinging, stinging, stinging everywhere--

"No... settlement."

She sighed.

And no bees--

"No settlement," Valentine repeated, a grin breaking free from between his tight lips as he sprang up from Zero's side. "Brother, your job is done! She and I will comfort one another, and you are free! Think of it, Michael! Free from this tedious responsibility, free to pursue God! Brother, I am heaven sent! I have possibly just saved your soul!"

Zero let Cross's head fall back to her arms, stood, and strode toward his gear.

Valentine followed just behind.

"Be encouraged, brother! We shall surely meet again... if not on this side of heaven, certainly on the other side in Hell!"

Zero lifted his water sacks to his shoulders and settled his gear on his back. Then, abruptly, he turned back to Valentine.

"You wear no weapons. Do you travel alone?"

Valentine grinned. "Well, not anymore!"

Zero's lips tugged.

He raised his hand in farewell and started over the rocks that led to the crest of the high ridge. From there, he would cross over the craggy pinnacle and begin winding down, snake-like, from the high desert to the dry salty sands of the wasteland.

" _Dominus vobiscum_ ," Valentine shouted to Zero's retreating back, already all but enveloped by the edgeless darkness.

Nevertheless, the response came floating back on the wind, " _Et cum spiritu tuo."_

Chapter Ten

Zero pressed hard into the waiting desert wilderness. He did not stop to eat and he did not stop to rest, but for the stray minutes of sleep that scaled his defenses despite his best efforts to halt their progress. A white stubble soon covered his jaw and chin and he absently rubbed at the itchy growth, but he refused to stay his odyssey long enough to whisk the hairs into the wind.

Days ran into nights and the nights back into days until day and night became one to him, like his waking and sleeping dreams. He plunged himself into a blind devotion to his God, his mind fixed on Him alone as his feet followed an unswerving and uncompromising path toward righteousness.

He embarked on endless contests with himself to test and tempt his fragile senses; he dreamed of the water he would ultimately deny himself when he stumbled over a single word in one of the passages of scripture he recited from memory, first in Latin, then in ancient Greek. He robbed himself of sleep when his daytime reflections ultimately fell to visions of the girl's body, the desert iris recalling her sweet secret place until impious thoughts rose up, invading with the infernal perpetuity of hell.

The slavers stared, peering down with sun scored eyes from where they sat perched on the brightly tasseled saddles of their camels, silent watching as he waded blindly across the paths of their slaves who, with their wrists lashed together, cut a ragged line across the desert. The slaves clutched at him as he moved among them, but their bloody fingers left no mark upon him, only indecipherable dabblings on his robes.

When he reached the dead heart of the desert, he finally stopped marching. His voracious soul satisfied at last, he lifted his head to gaze at the vast emptiness surrounding him.

There were no trees or bushes or grasses; no buzzards or jackals.

No signs of life; no signs of death.

He saw only the sun and the sand and beyond his own shallow breathing, heard only the voice of the wind. But now, now that he was finally surrounded by nothing, he allowed himself to think of something other than his all consuming god.

His throat was dry and swollen with desert salt because he'd sipped so sparingly from his small water bag, drinking only enough to allow him to continue his march toward holy salvation. Although that sack was now empty, the larger skin of water bulged reassuringly against his back.

He allowed his thoughts to revel in the water for a thousand seconds... for a lifetime... before touching his hand to the cork of the bag. He imagined the way the water would look and feel and taste; how it would flow down in waves of grace and love to wash the dust and salt from his throat, the way Jesus would wash the evil from the world upon His return. And when with the whole of his will he could no longer delay or deny his need, he yanked the cork from the spout and hoisted the heavy bag to his lips.

He smelled it instantly.

Stripped clean by days of consuming water alone, his honed senses screamed at the odor of putrid flesh. His heart pounded, battling with what his head already told him was true.

The measure of water he poured into his hand looked faintly rusty with the color of blood.

He stood absolutely still.

Exactly how many vermin had Valentine used to taint the water?

They must have been fresh killed or he would have smelled them and Valentine would know that--

Had he carried them in one of the pouches that hung from his belt?

I will partake of your hospitality and have that water now--

Ah, brother....

He smiled and sobered and smiled again, feeling his grin grow bigger and broader until it burst out of control and sent his laughter ringing out into the emptiness. He laughed for a long time and when he finally broke free of it, he shook, breathless and weak, in its wake.

"Oh, Lord," he said, wiping water from his eyes, "oh my sweet Lord, Cross--"

The desert, for days the source of his freedom, now appeared dismal and foreboding. He closed his eyes to shut out the sight of it but his legs abruptly delivered him to his betrayer, one knee slamming the rocky sand.

"I'm tired, Lord," he said. "I'm tired. God! I'm so tired!"

The wail echoed, returned again and again to mock him until, in a desperate scramble, he flailed his arms and legs to escape the hungry sand that held him fast. Then, with a low growl and a hard blow to his captors, he pushed himself off the ground and to his feet. He filled his lungs with salt and heat, ripped open his robes and then the brown leather tunic that gripped his body, heavy and black with sweat.

As the hot wind scalded the moisture from his chest, he yanked free the small pouch that hung inside the vest. As his fingers closed over the glass vial he'd taken from Mag's body just seven days earlier, he felt his lips tighten.

Just seven days since he'd delivered Mag to the tender embrace of whichever, angel or demon, had come to claim her soul.

Seemed like seven years.

He turned his back to the wind and hunched quickly over the hand he lifted to his face. He did not dare hesitate, lest a renegade gust steal away the tiny mound of false salvation he carefully shook onto the back of it. In a moment he'd sniffed away the powder and licked whatever precious dust might be left behind, and then, welcoming the euphoria that was, like all the false pleasures of the adversary nothing if not fleeting, he threw back his head to the sun.

He slipped the poisoned water from his shoulder and gazed again at the golden plain of the wasteland.

Geoffrey's settlement lay three days and nights away.

Pray he find wells before then... deep wells free of summer's drought... else the prospect of a three day march through the wilderness without water stretched before him.

He frowned.

If he were a gambling man, he would lay no treasure against these odds.

Hand trembling, he rubbed his face, but then he smiled at his folly.

He'd forgotten.

How was it possible, even for a moment, to forget?

He was merely the instrument of the Father, to be used as He willed.

The life of the innocent, and his own, was in the Father's hands.

As always.

With water, or without.

He breathed deep and straightened, clear eyes scanning the horizon.

"I'm going now, Lord," he said, glancing up to the sky where his Father's glory easily obscured the light of His creation, the sun." _Emitte lucem tuam et veritatem tuam."_

Send your light and your truth--

It was his last thought before he placed one booted foot in front of the other, heading back in the direction from which he'd just come.

He would return to Makaen Hadeed. Once there, he would study the wooden mystery.

Part of his mind clamored, visualizing the burned out plank in Geoffrey's house; eager to solve the puzzle, it locked onto the riddle.

But the other part of his mind, the part nourished by his faith, lifted his voice into the air. With tender longing it drifted upward, high and sweet and full of praise and thanksgiving, to the heart of his Father, " _'Veni Creator Spiritus, mentes tuórum visita, imple supérna grátia, quae tu créasti péctora....'_ "

Chapter Eleven

"Where's Zero?"

At the sound of Cross's voice, Valentine shifted but still dozed lightly, his eyes closed, his arms crossed over his chest, his fingers idly rubbing the smooth faces of the gems that sparkled in his ears.

Her voice came again, nearly a shriek--

"Where's Zero?"

Valentine grunted.

"Again, that ridiculous name." He opened his eyes. "If you're referring to my brother Michael, he's gone. You sent him away."

She stiffened. "I sent him--"

"From your own sweet lips, my dove, with two little words. No settlement. He's gone."

As she inched back, a cold cord of fear, long and ugly, slowly turned her stomach.

"I didn't know what I was saying.... What did you give me to drink?"

Valentine waved lazy fingers in the air.

"A little wine."

He reached out to stroke her cheek, but she jerked away and he laughed.

"Wine and a little opium... for which you, unlike myself, have not developed a tolerance. I had hoped for him but I will content myself with you, for now."

"You bastard...."

Valentine flung his huge hand against her mouth.

A sob welled up along with a bloom of blood, but she stifled both quickly with the hem of her robe.

"Now, none of that," Valentine soothed, reaching over his head with both hands as if to seize a cloud. "Let's not get off to a bad start, shall we?"

He sprang to his feet abruptly and strode to the crest of the ridge. Lifting a hand to his lips, he whistled in answer to a call she hadn't even heard, then strode back, seized her wrist and dragged her, her feet scrambling, to the edge of the high rocky cliff.

"What did I promise?" he shouted.

Wide eyed, Cross stared down the steep hill. Half-way up the rock face, a band of men, heavily armed, struggled toward them.

Cross cried out, twisted, tried to break Valentine's grip, her eyes darting between his face and the faces of the men. Valentine's voice boomed again, each word bouncing off the cliffs that rose up on either side of the dusty wadi below--

"What... did... I... promise?"

The men stopped climbing, turned their faces to the crest.

Valentine grasped the front of her robes and tore them down to her waist.

Cross screamed.

Digging her nails into Valentine's hand, she kicked, tried to bite, "Let me go!"

"No," Valentine said, laughing as he easily held her off. "What I can't make him suffer, you'll suffer. You hold his heart."

"Hold his heart? He has no heart!"

"Well," he winked, "this, we shall see."

Higher and higher, Valentine raised her up into the air, inch by desperate inch, until her feet swung clear of the ground. Then, arm extended, elbow locked, he held her out over the edge of the ridge.

Dangling in the air, buffeted by wild gusts all around, Cross stared dizzily down the stony cliff-side. No longer able to scream, she could only hang there, gasping, her free hand clamped onto Valentine's, her nails digging into his wrist just to hold on.

Valentine slowly lowered her from the edge of the sky, and when they were nose to nose, he smiled.

"There are things I understand about my brother," he said. "Things he has yet to understand about himself. As long as I hold you, I hold him."

He dropped her to the ground.

She tried to bolt, but he yanked her back by the hair. Slipping his hand under her torn robes, he squeezed her breast, the nipple beneath a roving thumb.

"Tell me, lady," he said. "Did my brother Michael teach you proper obedience? I would have you lay for my brave soldiers. They have warred long and hard and deserve some small comfort--"

"I'm no whore!"

She snatched at the hand still inside her robes, dug in her nails, lowered her mouth to bite, but before she could sink in her teeth, he easily shook her off and sent her reeling at the end of a heavy hand. Then he dragged her back again.

"Tsk, tsk, tsk!" he scolded. "Careful with those claws! So, you are no whore. Very well, I would see, then, what treasure my brother has bequeathed me."

With one flex of his powerful arm, he drew her close, circled her legs with one of his own, and swept her off her feet, taking her along with him as he sat.

With her legs pinned between one massive thigh and calf, he gripped her head with one hand and forced it down, while with his free hand, he flipped her robes back over her bottom.

Wrenching in this grip, she cried out, tried to pull away, but he rested his forearm across the back of her neck, leaned in with all his weight.

Thrusting a hand between her legs, he began working in as many fingers as would fit.

She began to cry.

Valentine clicked his tongue against his teeth.

"You lie," he still probed, "you, my dove, have borne more... dear me, how shall I put this delicately...." He scanned the sky, lips pursed, then brightened, "More bold ramrods than that of my brother alone!"

Face to the ground, she whimpered, writhed, but could free neither head nor legs from his vise-like grip.

"Not that I have contempt for those in your profession," he said, "after all, there are so few vocations available to women. They can be whores, or they can be...."

He withdrew his fingers and scratched his head.

"Well, I suppose there's something else they can be... but it escapes me just this moment."

Panting, she used all her strength to twist around to see his face.

"Why are you doing this to me?"

He let out a blast of laughter.

"Why... there is no more over rated concept! Why? Because I can. Why? Because I want to. Now, I'm sure you will feel satisfied for having had an explanation... you may think on it while you are taking my men between your legs."

Sliding his arm from her neck, he grabbed a handful of hair, stood, then dragged her to her feet by the hand clamped in her curls.

"I shall take the burden of your correction upon myself," he said, speaking to the air, "I shall chastise you firmly, yet lovingly, and soon you will accept your role, as is seemly. With proper guidance and instruction, you shall learn to serve me with my men quite adequately. Why, one has no greater obligation to one's fellow man, than to serve."

He fixed her with a grin and planted a hard kiss against her lips.

Lashed to the blackness in his eyes, she shrank away in silence.

Now forfeit, she was nothing.

She was no more.

She was his.

The first soldier climbed over the top of the ridge, and Valentine thrust her into his outstretched arms.

Cross pushed, ducked, tried to break free of muscles as solid as stone, but the soldier only laughed, his grinning face decorated by tattoos that crisscrossed his forehead and cheeks and chin.

Thoughts scattered, words as brief as sparks dashed across her mind--

Savages--

Jackals--

Please no--

Then the deep indigo that adorned the soldier's face melded with the color of the sky as he swung her into the arms of his waiting comrade. Then the crush was on her, swarming, grabbing; their voices rising as they tore at her breasts and clothes and hair.

She clutched at the robes they ripped from her shoulders as if the faded cloth could somehow protect her from their mounting frenzy, but the sun-bleached wool quickly turned to tatters that did nothing to hide the whiteness of her skin from their eyes. So she tried to beat off the hands but there were too many of them, pulling and prodding and snatching as her breath came hard as she struck out at in all directions, until one man snatched one wrist and another took the other.

She clenched her fists, tried to wrest her arms free, but when she managed to pull one arm loose, someone yanked the other, throwing her forward.

Her clenched fist slammed against a face.

"Ho, Simon!" a voice called. "The whore's drawn first blood!"

Panicked, she scanned the men's faces until someone grabbed her by the hair, and then the sour smell of sweat enveloped her and she gasped, frantic, gazing at a trickle of blood--

Simon? Are you Simon? I'm sor--

He plunged his fist into her stomach, exploding all the air from her lungs.

Quiet descended and she dropped to her knees as the soldiers came closer, their leathered legs the bars of her prison, their bodies subduing even the rays of the sun. She knelt inside the circle, waiting for the silence to break... if she could just breathe she would scream, she would scream forever--

Zero Zero Zero--

Simon drove his boot into her ribs.

Dimly aware that it hurt, she curled into herself, knees to chin, her arms covering her head as booted feet began striking arms, legs, anything, lifting her off the rocky ground.

Within the dark corners of her mind, faceless voices clanged loud warnings as her body floated in the thickening darkness. _Fight_ , the voices screamed, but since the air was all gone she could only drift, weightless, toward the blackness that hovered, waiting to fully claim her.

But then, slowly, like a coward, oblivion slunk away and in its absence, awareness came shrinking back. Slogging through mists of unconsciousness to the glaring light, she crawled unwillingly from under the heavy canopy of quiet, lifted her head, and moaned.

Valentine--

Body tense and lips curled in a snarl, Valentine's hand slowly tightened around Simon's wrist.

Body as taut as steel and as hard as the long sword at his waist, he hauled Simon closer, and when Simon began to shake, Cross's stomach heaved.

The air smelled of sweat, and the sweat stank of fear.

"Well, well," Valentine said softly. "It seems, Simon, you would rather kill her than fuck her. You have managed to surprise me. Perhaps then, like our Ned, you have come to prefer men?"

Knees wobbling, Simon stared.

"No, captain! No, sir!"

Valentine laughed.

"Shall I fuck you, then? Shall you be my woman?"

Valentine pulled his knife from the sheath at his knee.

Coaxing the blade under the thick laces of his lieutenant's breeches, he urged the steel forward until the laces began to part, one after the other, with bright, loud pops.

A rumble ran through the men as they glanced at one another, but not at Valentine.

"Well, Simon?" Valentine gripped the stained leather and yanked the breeches down, exposing Simon's limp manhood and swell of hairy buttocks, "Who shall fuck whom?"

"No!" Simon pulled at his breeches with one hand as he strained to free the other. "For god's sake, Captain!"

Valentine barked a laugh. "For God's sake? Sweet Christ, what balls you have!"

Head cocked, Valentine hesitated, flung Simon to the dirt, then turned to his men.

Snickers silenced, they wrestled themselves into a ragged line. Eyes cast down, they stood restless as Valentine strode along the file, watching, measuring, his tongue licking at wine stained lips.

When he finally stopped pacing, he offered a deep, long sigh.

"Gentlemen, gentlemen, gentlemen. You must learn to be more appreciative of the gifts I bestow upon you! I have detected an extraordinary carelessness in the treatment of my goods... although as soldiers of discriminating taste and vast experience, you must have noticed, the whore is young! A bit thin perhaps, but titties are ample... flanks quite adequate... snug enough, no doubt, for even our Neddie's tastes!"

Awed by their captain's grandeur and tamed by his overwhelming presence, the men shuffled and twitched until Valentine's voice again commanded their attention.

"Ah, men," Valentine gestured expansively, "in truth, when was the last time you had the opportunity to fuck one with all its teeth? Neddie, lad, I understand your aversion to teeth on whores, and although I quite applaud your determination to knock every one of them out, I pray you be sensitive to your comrade's sensibilities. How else may one reasonably expect one's whore to unlace one's breeches, especially with her claws bound behind her back?"

Valentine's march up and down the dirty line continued until his trunk-like legs came to rest at last. Hunched and still, Cross trembled beside bars of scuffed black leather.

Valentine dragged a handful of shredded robes from her body, the long tatters dancing, until he released them to the wind. Caught by a long gust, they fluttered over the ridge like doves, before swooping down to the valley below.

Valentine returned his attention to his men, a single finger lifted.

"I warn you, gentlemen... don't kill this one. Lest you wish to become reacquainted with your own fists. And mine."

Then he turned, ready to stalk away, but Cross caught his leg.

Face white beneath the blood and dirt that caked it, she leaned against his leg, her nails creasing the hard leather of his boot.

"He left me with you."

"Aye. And?"

"Please. I'll do anything. Whatever you want."

She gripped both his legs to drag herself up, fumbled clumsily at the front of his breeches.

"Please. Anything."

He took her chin and pulled her face up, searching her eyes as he followed with his thumb the lines of her lips.

Then, suddenly, he sucked a quick breath and blinked.

Do you love me, Galen?

Head cocked, he stood still for a moment, listening to ghosts.

Do you love me? Do you love me, Galen Valentine?

He blinked again, took another breath, forced the iron grip he still held on her face to relax.

"You are very...." He smiled briefly. "Like your mother," he murmured at last.

Cross stared.

My mother--

How did he know my mother--

"The lovely Ilana," he said, his voice hushed. "Aye. Very like."

Sticky with sweat, Cross's fingers dragged against the leather of his breeches as her knees caved beneath her.

So that was the name my father refused to say--

Ilana--

Behind her, she heard the men snigger, but she ignored the sound. Rising up on her knees, she rubbed her face against the hardness swelling beneath Valentine's belt.

"Please," she whispered, "please. I'm begging you. Don't...."

Eyes squeezed tight, she tongued the one of the laces of his breeches into her mouth, clamped her teeth down on the leather, and tugged.

Valentine laughed.

"Perhaps I have been a tad too hasty! And I am disinclined, at this moment, to reward these... ingrates! But be warned, lady, my favor does not come without its price."

"Anything."

"You will address me as my lord. You will speak to no one, unless I bid you. You will not speak to me unless I bid you. And whatever else I bid you, you will do. Yes?"

"Yes."

He nudged with his foot.

"Yes... my lord."

"Good! Now lay and spread your legs."

Her mouth dropped open. "No...."

He arched a brow.

"Where?" she said, banishing from her mind the men who still stood watching, only a few feet away, "tell me where."

"Here."

"In front of-- Here?"

Valentine swept the sand with his foot. "Here."

She sat in the swath he'd scuffed, lay flat on her back.

"Spread."

She whimpered.

Valentine's foot went between her knees to shove them apart.

She could feel the heat of the sun on the insides of her thighs, hear the men rumbling behind her, but since she didn't dare close her legs, she raised her arms and covered her eyes instead.

And when Valentine stepped between her legs, she knew it, for the long, cool shadow he cast over her.

"Lady, I am like iron," he said, kneeling, his voice oddly hushed, "such is the power one worthless whore has over a man... even a man such as myself."

He opened her with his thumbs, then filled her with one irresistible thrust.

She drew in a sharp breath, and with the dust, her throat began to close and her chest began to heave but she could get no air into her body--

No air just him and if he doesn't stop I'll scream but if I scream I'll die and I don't want to die not on my back in the dirt like a dog so maybe I don't want to die after all maybe I'm just afraid to live--

Able to hide nothing beneath her arms but her tears, she wept silent, crystalline tears that glistened clean and pure as the rays of the moon.

But then, in her mind, she found the silver of the moon in the hair of a man, as soft and smooth as the rarest silk. And then she found eyes, boring through to her soul, but they weren't as black and sharp as nails, they were as pale and calm as the early morning sky.

She gained her breath, the tightness in her chest eased, and when Valentine drove in again, she heard him gasp.

"Have you nothing to say to me?"

She squeezed her eyes more tightly shut, transforming the voice, holding fast to the dream.

"Have you nothing to say to me?"

Silently, she glanced to either side... then down, then up.

Valentine's great wide chest, encased in an old black buckler, lay just an inch from her nose; his arms, the biceps bulging, stood like bars above her head; his thick black hair, dragging in the gravelly dirt, hung down like a curtain to cover his arms and shoulders.

His huge bulk blocked everything from view; her body stripped naked beneath him, the band of men still watching, the very sun itself.

Nothing but darkness surrounded he and she and the blackness; nothing else dare intrude upon the fragile dream she'd woven around him.

"Have you nothing to say to me?"

She raised her arms, slipped them around his neck; lifted her legs, slid them over his hips, and then she closed her eyes.

"Yes, my lord, I have something to say. Thank you."

Chapter Twelve

The door of Geoffrey's house stood swinging in the wind.

As the gusts rose and fell, they coaxed odd sounds from the flimsy old wood... low groans when they strained at the gritty hinges, soft whistles when they crept in between the gaps.

Zero lifted his foot. As the door drifted toward him, he kicked it open and lunged forward, glancing in before quickly ducking back out. But as he expected, Geoffrey's house was empty.

He stepped inside and slid his gear from his shoulders.

Miserable place--

How had the girl been able to tolerate living here? How could any sensate creature willingly pass time in this wretched squalor, with the glory of the desert just outside the door?

He turned, leaned against the jamb, fixed his gaze on the slowly brightening sky and waited.

Soon it would be light enough to see and to search. The sun had just risen, warm and clear on the horizon as he finished his devotions, and as he breathed the odor of decay that wafted from the house he wished he were still there, on his knees, thanking God for His infinite grace, His infinite mercy.

After all, there was so much for which to be thankful.

The life saving weight of a newly filled water skin.

Peace throughout the long, hard march.

And finally, the blessing of breath for yet another day; a day dedicated to making amends for the awful wrongs he'd committed upon the innocent left to his charge.

He felt his knees weaken even now. At this very moment he could fall upon them, bend his head over his clasped hands and reclaim the peace that lasted only as long as he knelt in quiet submission. But he knew he didn't deserve that joy just yet, so soon after. He had too much work to do.

He turned from the desert and glanced around Geoffrey's house quickly, almost unwillingly. Thankfully, the place was so small he scanned the whole of it in an instant.

Looters had already carried off anything they could either use or trade. Geoffrey's most precious possessions, his blacksmith's mallet, tongs, grinding wheel, all were gone. And in the light colored stains that marked one wall, one shaped like a full moon and the other like a crescent, he recognized the place where a pot and scythe no longer hung. So, but for a few pieces of crude furniture, stacks of old books, and a badly dented tin cup upended in the middle of the floor, the house was empty.

Not surprisingly, the bed he'd kicked into the corner of the room was just as he'd left it, slightly upended and askew.

His lips tugged.

The bed--

Bed was such an ample word... conjuring images of warmth and rest and safety. But he was in no mood for generosity; this so-called bed was barely a cot by any civilized standard. And the pallet upon which Geoffrey had expected his daughter to find rest lay on the dusty floor, exuding the sour smell of decaying reed.

Filthy thing--

He stepped to the bed and kicked the stumpy leg nearest his foot. The bed righted itself and he smiled.

Such an accommodating and malleable world Geoffrey had created for himself. But since Geoffrey had been a metal smith, perhaps that was only appropriate.

His right hand moved down to his hip. He caressed the wrought grip of his sword, rubbing his thumb over the chased surface that Geoffrey had created so long ago.

The crosses worn by his brother knights, the delicately woven silver web the girl wore in her hair, all these, Geoffrey had created, and with those works of beauty and skill, the smith

had achieved the very pinnacle of his craft.

He felt his lips take another hard downward turn.

So perhaps he'd been too critical. Perhaps it was more loving to remember his brother as a fine metal smith, rather than a derelict architect.

But then he surveyed the house again.

No more than a single room, without even a curtain for privacy's sake. The most simple Bedouin tent had at minimum one section for family and another, finer, for entertaining guests.

He continued to search.

The bookshelf looked tired. It appeared to have simply given up trying to hold the weight of so many books and so had sagged, content to rest against the nearest wall.

The only window was cut in the old style, too high up the wall for even one of his height to look out, and too small to admit hardly any light at all.

The bench under the window held two stacks of books, with another, toppled, in front of it. The table, an anomaly in the desert, was made of two planks set on concrete blocks. Another narrow bench sat beneath.

A jumble of fur robes lay over Geoffrey's bed, but they were so mangy that apparently even the thieves hadn't wanted them. Caught under the leg of the girl's bed was the singed blanket she'd used to beat the flames from Geoffrey's books.

And the door, the--

Damn door is still swinging in the wind--

And why not, since it had no knob, no latch, no hook, no chain... the overhanging flap of a tent afforded more privacy from staring eyes, more protection from vermin and the wind.

The place was meaner than a soldier's barracks.

Had Geoffrey ever considered the sensibilities of the young woman he had expected to live here?

Perhaps... perhaps, before the thieves had entered, the house had been filled with fine carpets and shining brass trays, earthen jars full of sweet oil and flagons of wine....

But, he believed, more likely, it had not.

Because he knew Geoffrey.

Just as he now knew Geoffrey's daughter.

Knew the way she pulled up her legs and buried her face in her knees, trying to take up less space, breathe less air, because if she could just diminish herself enough, she could finally disappear and thereby correct the error of her birth--

He dragged his hand through his hair.

Yes, he knew Geoffrey's daughter. Knew her right here... in truth, on this very floor... the bare blades of her shoulders, for his pleasure, scraped from red to raw.

He closed his eyes.

Breathed deep.

Winced at the smell.

Forced his mind back to the reason he'd returned here.

The riddle board.

But that pallet... if he accomplished nothing else while he was here, that pallet would go up in flames.

He moved to the bookshelf, skirting the reddish brown stain that had seeped into the surrounding floorboards and dried there, and slid the board from where it he'd left it, wedged between the two largest books.

He would peruse the board outside, in the daylight, away from the stink. Then, thinking of the stink, the pallet crossed his mind again.

He kicked it from the cot with one blow and out the door with another. Another kick, and the bed was on its way to its former place, more toward the center of the room.

But something caught his eye.

In the waxing light of day, he could see that one board was slightly lighter in color than the others, one narrow end of it even lighter still.

He stood for one long moment, looking at the board in the floor.

Geoffrey had apparently replaced a rotten board.

The board had rotted through, and Geoffrey had simply sawed himself another.

He almost laughed out loud.

Before his knee touched the floor, his knife was in his hand. Shining hair sweeping the dust, he wedged the blade into the space where the old and new boards met. The new board, with its telltale newly sawn edge, gave way easily, exposing a gaping hole beneath.

Zero peered in, reached into the shallow opening, and carefully coaxed the hidden contents into his hand. Sliding from the hole a cloth covered scroll tied with a rough hemp string, he slipped the covering off and unrolled a parchment.

Eyes moving rapidly, he laughed softly.

A map for a man who refused to journey even a mile from his hovel--

The work was clumsy; the lines drawn by a hand so clearly plagued by violent shaking that the whole of it contained not a single clear stroke. The only annotation appeared to be five solitary points circling a star. No directional marks existed; nothing identifiable as major geographical features existed.

But there were letters... hundreds, maybe thousands, of tortured, twisted letters, written in the same excruciatingly small hand. Mostly Roman, with a sprinkling of Greek and a smattering of Arabic, they covered both the front and the back of the parchment.

Zero, on his knees, inched backward to bring the scroll into the beam of light that had begun to enter through the window, but he couldn't decipher a single word among the letters.

So he sat awhile, remembering.

He'd once been a scholar, before he became a soldier. He had no language he considered native; his brother Bethan, a linguist, had been his tutor as well as his earthly, though not biological, father. And thus, to him, as to the linguist himself, all languages were as native. Latin, Greek, Ancient Greek; Arabic, Aramaic, Hebrew; he'd been trained to take Bethan's place in the Brotherhood when the old man would eventually be called back to the Father's side, so he'd learned also from Bethan the languages of the previous centuries, of countries that no longer existed as such, on maps: English, French, German. Italian. Portuguese. Russian.

There was very little written, other than the Sino-Tibetan language family, he could not read or at the very least, through time and study, decipher.

But he could read not a word written on the parchment.

Encryption?

Possibly--

Madness?

More likely--

He turned his attention back to the map portion of the big scroll.

As far as maps were judged, quality being predicated on clarity and detail, this one was rubbish. But Geoffrey had gone through what would have been, for Geoffrey, great inconvenience to preserve this particular piece of rubbish.

He dragged the riddle board across the floor, up next to the yellowed parchment, and briefly studied them side by side. He touched the four grooves gouged into the plank of wood, recalling the two crosses secured in the leather pouch tied inside his vest.

What had the girl remarked?

You need two more--

He had already mentally tallied the crosses; he actually needed only one more, the fourth. The third, although the girl had no way of knowing it, had already been accounted for.

And the fourth?

He had no doubt regarding the identity of the brother in possession of it.

Valentine--

He looked back down at the two mysteries spread out before him.

There appeared to be no similarity between the scroll and the riddle board; no conspicuous pattern or other connection to enable him to decode either one or the other.

His head throbbed and he scrubbed his knuckles against his lips.

What was so valuable that Geoffrey had tried both to preserve, and obscure, it in this way? What thoughts had dominated his brother's brain, thundered in Geoffrey's mind just as they now thundered in his own--

The soldier, the desert's secret, the treasure--

He set his finger on the map, just below the faded, scrawled symbol that appeared to indicate the reason the map existed; the star within a circle.

He tapped lightly, murmuring, "Are you the desert's secret?"

Or are you nothing but the wild ramblings of a diseased mind?

He lifted his head and glanced around again.

There was corruption here. It was palpable. He could feel it. It made him shiver.

"Enough," he whispered, rising to his feet with the plank under his arm and the scroll in his hand, "enough."

He needed light.

He needed air.

Geoffrey had obviously been mad.

Mag was mad. Valentine was mad. And he, he was perhaps the maddest of all--

And the girl?

A soft groan left his lips.

That poor, poor girl--

Chapter Thirteen

"Hold!"

Valentine lifted one hand and hauled back on the camel's leather reins with the other.

" _Bibot, bibot_ ," he urged the beast, "slowly... slowly."

The camel wound in circles, one, two, three full turns. He allowed the animal its head, and it eventually ground to a stop.

Cross, trudging between the unruly camel and the band of men nearly so, sank to her knees. She licked her lips, but with her mouth so full of dust, her tongue dragged slow and sticky against them.

Valentine touched the camel with a thin switch. " _Koosh, koosh,_ " he ordered, and the suddenly agreeable camel snorted, knelt, spit. Valentine swung his long legs to dismount, then tossed the reins to a lanky man with brown hair that had emerged from some secret place Cross never saw.

"Welcome back, Captain," the man said.

"Thank you, Gideon." Stifling a yawn, Valentine arched his back and stretched. "It's been quiet?"

"Aye, sir."

"No visitors."

"No, sir."

Valentine gave a grunt, took his water bag from where it hung suspended from the camel's saddle. He drank deeply, then, stiff gaited still, sauntered closer to Cross.

He didn't look at her; eyes fixed to a brightly festooned tent that sat anchored on two sides by old olive groves, he let the water sack to slip from his fingers.

"You may drink," he said, then began striding up the narrow path toward the tent.

Cross swallowed in deep aching gulps; at any moment, Valentine might change his mind and take the water away. But he continued on, into the big tent, and soon she heard a woman's voice, clearly pleading, although she couldn't understand the words.

" _Pourquoi, seigneur, dites-moi pourquoi...._ "

With her fingers still clamped around the water skin, Cross started at the sound of a loud crack and then a woman's cry.

Eyes searching, her grip tightened on the skin.

What's she saying--

What's he doing--

Valentine emerged from the tent, dragging the woman out by her robes. He wrestled her to her knees, ripped the crimson mantle from her head, and after a few quick swipes of his knife, handfuls of yellow curls drifted down to his feet. The woman clenched her hands into fists and wailed, but Valentine slammed his hand across her face until her cries quieted to whimpers. Then, one hand on her head and the other on her silky red robes, he pulled her along with him down the snaky path, dragging her all the way to where Cross still knelt beside the camel.

Rising up on her knees, the woman twined her fingers in the leather straps that crossed his chest.

" _Seigneur, ayez la pitié sur moi...._ "

He yanked her hands free.

Arms limp by her sides, the woman simply knelt at his feet, her head hanging.

_"Je vous aime,"_ she whimpered. _"Vous êtes mon seigneur, il y a non autre--_ "

Trembling, Cross turned away, buried her face against the tightly twisted tassels that hung down the camel's side, listening to a voice inside her head.

Better to not see--

But then another voice came, lower, deeper, darker--

_Maybe better to see than to imagine-_ -

Valentine prodded with his foot.

"Look at her."

Cross didn't move so he took her head in his huge hand and forced it from the warm safety of the camel's hide.

"Look at her. You are responsible for this, you and my brother priest. And if life were fair, which of course it is not, he would be here as well, to see the woman who will die in your place."

The woman screamed.

Curling her fingers, she ripped at Cross's hair, her eyes, her cheeks, and when Valentine hauled her off, she attacked again until Valentine dragged her away by her robes.

The woman stopped struggling long enough to stare. Studying her rival's face, she let fly a mouthful of spit.

Valentine clamped one big paw in her cropped hair.

The woman writhed, trying to break Valentine's grip, but Cross knew it was useless; she had just seen him bring the brawny Simon to his knees. So she turned away again, wiped the spittle off against the camel's hide, winced at the sound of another blow.

This time the woman stayed quiet.

"Now," Valentine said, "look at her. Look at what you've done."

Slowly, Cross turned.

Valentine crouched, folded his thumb, took four fingers, blood wet, and wiped across the scratches the woman had left on Cross's cheeks; four fingers to the left, four to the right.

"This woman's blood is on you," he said. "She will die in your place. Honor her."

Despite a gaze blurred by tears, Cross could see the woman was beautiful. Even the blows and the blood and the dirt and the tears could not disguise her perfection: body, face, skin, hair--

It made no sense.

She stared up at Valentine, searched his black eyes, "My lord... why?"

He frowned.

"Again! That ridiculous... woman's question! This is a soldier's camp, not a..." he waggled his fingers, " _hareem!_ "

Cross's lips twisted. "Can't you just make her go?"

"Aye, and go she shall, _ma belle putain français_. Perhaps even to heaven."

Valentine glanced across the camp. The men were pitching their tent; a broad, simple shelter of canvas and leather.

"Hi," he called. "Hi, Simon! Ned!"

The first lieutenant shambled up, stuffing his shirt into his breeches as the second lieutenant trotted up too, just behind.

Cross edged nearer the camel as the soldiers approached.

"Captain," Simon said.

Valentine's voice came low, but Cross could still hear his orders over the camel's loud bellows and grunts.

"Allow the men to have their fill. Take her into the wilderness, the Az-Amin road. Choose a well trafficked place, a place where she will surely be found, and cut her throat."

Peering through the tangle of tassels, Cross stole a glance.

"Do you understand my meaning?" Valentine continued. "Simon? Ned? Do not use your own judgment, gentlemen... follow my orders exactly. Stray not a hair, neither north nor south," Valentine ran an index finger along Simon's throat, "the cut must be just... so."

Cross squeezed her eyes closed, but when Simon answered, she heard his voice shake.

"Aye, captain."

"You will follow my orders precisely, yes?"

"Aye, sir."

Valentine unfastened the buckles that secured a heavy leather bag to the camel's saddle, and pulled a jeweled dagger from the saddlebag.

"Use this," he said, tossing the dagger to Ned. "Leave it with the whore."

Eyes on the blade, Ned gingerly caught the knife, but when he looked closely its jeweled hilt, his mouth popped.

Valentine was in no mood.

"Leave it, I say!"

Ned worked the dagger under his belt. "Aye, captain."

"And Simon...." The first lieutenant glanced up; Valentine arched a brow. "No damage to her face. You will leave her lovely, yes?"

Valentine unfastened the water bag Cross still huddled against, yanked it away, and poured the water over the concubine's face.

The woman's eyes opened wide and she reached up, her plea just a gasp, but Simon and Ned each took a leg. As they dragged her away, she twisted her body, eyes to Valentine as she cried out, her scrabbling fingers leaving deep grooves in the ground, _"Seigneur! Ayez la pitié!"_

Valentine watched in silence, then turned and nudged Cross with the tip of his boot.

"You. Get inside the tent."

She wanted to go, wanted to obey, but she couldn't move, couldn't tear her gaze away.

With a little mewling sound, she shrank more closely to the camel.

They were all around the woman now, grinning and laughing as she struggled, screamed, and when they dragged her down, yelping like dogs, one at each flailing limb, Simon stepped over their arms and legs, into the center of the mob, one finger lifted to draw a circle in the air--

Wind the straps--

Cross gasped.

"Stop them...." She turned to Valentine. "Please! Stop them!"

Valentine jerked her up and shoved her forward but she grabbed the camel's harness.

"My lord! Please stop them!"

Valentine stared, his red lips thin.

"There's nothing I can do. Blood must pay for sin."

"Sin? What's she done?"

"She's done nothing. The sin is yours." His lips curled. "I thought I'd made that clear."

"Mine?" Cross clutched the harness more tightly as if that could stop the sudden roaring in her head that weakened not only her mind but her knees. "I haven't done anything!"

"Oh, but you have. You are a thief. You have quite stolen a priest's heart. And for that, he is obligated to take your life. But if he is weak, if he cannot raise his sword to the witch, his brothers, in love, must do it for him."

Valentine stepped close, then closer still, a hand on the saddle, the blackness of his clothes and eyes and hair looming over her, his long ruby earrings dripping, red as blood, in the sun.

Cross shrank back.

"I didn't do anything...."

"Oh, yes, you are truly guilty. But I will grant you a favor...."

She stared up into the hard, shiny pebbles that made his eyes, and he smiled.

"Imagine the power I am going to bestow upon you! You, a low, base whore... and soon you will hold, in these two..." he reached, lifted her two hands in his own, turned them palm up, and then he rolled his eyes, "rather dirty... hands, authority over life and death." He tossed her hands away. "Well? Would you save her?"

Cross nodded, whispered, "Yes."

"Good! Now, you go take your place there," Valentine pointed with a scrupulously clean finger, "just as you should from the beginning. Yes?"

"No...."

"No? Why no?" He made an elaborate show of lifting eyes, hands, voice, to the sky, "I give a whore the opportunity to raise herself up from the dung heap from which all whores are spawned and she refuses! Accept your just punishment, woman! Embrace sacrifice, even if it is for nothing more worthy than the life of another of your dissolute, fickle kind! Just say the word," he cupped a hand to his ear as the woman's cries, low and guttural, echoed all around them, "just say--"

"No!"

Cross crumpled knees to chin, arms wrapped over her head--

I don't care, I don't care who dies out there for my sins, let her die, let them all die--

Valentine laughed softly.

"Billy!"

He rummaged in his saddlebag, pulled out a small sack, leaned back against the wooden saddle and opened the pouch. He poked his nose in, sniffed loudly at the aroma of tobacco wafting up from the sack, then glanced toward the clearing.

"Ho, Billy," he cried again, "lad, come quick!"

Brows drawn, Billy hurried up the path. He was not often called.

"Aye, Captain?"

"The whore," Valentine aimed his gaze down, "seems to have lost the use of her legs. Good thing we're only interested in what lies between, eh, lad?" Valentine grinned and began to carefully drop fragrant shreds of tobacco along the length of brown paper he held between his fingers. "Bring her to my tent, will you, Will?"

"Sir!"

Billy circled Cross's waist with his arms and tugged, but she sagged slack and as weighty as stone. As Valentine began to roll, Billy tugged again, his eyes darting to the place where his comrades still swarmed, over, on, and in their prey.

Pink tongue flicking out to lick the long edge of the paper, Valentine looked too, then he surveyed his bulging handiwork and sighed. Attempting to smooth his creation, he placed the entire cigar in his mouth and drew it back out from between pursed lips.

Frowning at the cigar, he murmured to Billy, "Better hurry. Else you will lose your place."

"Sir!"

Heels dug in, Billy tugged again but made no gain.

Valentine sighed.

"Miriam really knew how to roll a cigar. Have you a spark, lad?"

Billy blinked, released Cross, felt for flint at his belt.

"Oh, never mind." Valentine leaned over to nudge Billy's shoulder with his own. "The switch, lad," he glanced at the thin rod that hung from the saddle with apparent wisdom born of experience, "use the switch."

"Captain!"

As Billy reached toward the saddle, Cross bolted.

Like a bird flushed to flight, she ran blindly up the path, stumbled inside the tent, scrambled into a corner and squeezed between some bulging canvases and the heavy woolen wall behind. She sat shivering, knees drawn up, and moments later, when the scent of tobacco filled her nose, she buried her head under her arms.

Valentine wandered through the vast tent, brushing past silks of red and purple and green and gold as sheer as a courtesan's veils, moving from the large area designated for eating, sleeping, and entertaining, to one smaller, for more private enterprises such as dressing and bathing.

When he re-visited the largest room of the tent, the fat cigar still clamped between his teeth, a small smile turned his lips.

Life was good.

A bowl of fruit on one table, a dish of almonds on another. A shining wooden platter stacked with loaves of soft bread; a golden goblet, and a golden plate on another, each waiting upon him should he wish to eat or drink after he'd stretched his long length across the richly patterned carpet, one muscular arm hooked over a pile of cushions. A tall brass _narghile_ , etched with trees and birds, sat nearby the pillows, its silver tip gleaming in the furtive light.

Valentine continued to roam, nibbling a fig here, a handful of almonds there, then stopped beside the heap of sacks Cross hid behind.

He shoved the biggest with his foot.

"Hungry?"

Cross rocked her head against her knees.

"How about a fig?"

Outside, the screaming continued.

Now it sounded like an animal's cries, the high keening wail far beyond anger, far beyond pain.

"What are they doing," she whispered, "what are they doing--"

"They're doing what soldiers do." Valentine delicately picked seeds from between his teeth with the rather longish nail of his smallest finger, kept sharp for that purpose, "I like figs, but these damn seeds.... Do you like figs?"

Cross began to weep.

Valentine crouched down.

"Do you prefer bread? Here," he ripped the round he held in his big hand, "have some bread. It's good. Fresh. Miriam just baked. Open."

Cross sobbed to her knees.

"Open, I say."

Cheeks painted crimson with the woman's blood and her own shame, she opened her mouth. Valentine placed a piece of bread on her tongue and like a good father, watched closely to ensure that she chewed.

***

Hours later, in the darkness, Cross held her breath.

Beside her, Valentine slept.

He lay facing her, his chest rising and falling, his hand tucked under his cheek. The sharp lines from his nose to his mouth, cut by the sneers that usually twisted his lips, were gone, while the lips themselves, as thin as the blade of his knife, appeared soft and full.

She suddenly saw a child.

Had he ever been a child?

Had he ever been human?

She doubted it.

She waited and watched and when he didn't move she carefully pushed the light sheet away and slid from the bed.

New linen robes, smooth and scented, lay in a heap on the floor. Not to risk rousing him, she quickly wrapped the robes around her body and slipped wobble-legged from between the walls of the tent as soon as the wind gusted free a gap.

The camp was quiet now, but for a faint restless tapping sounding in the distance. The rhythm came simple and constant; one two three, pause, one two three, pause. Breathing deeply of the night air, she tugged the robes up to cover her shoulders, wondering--

Is she dead?

Probably not; Valentine had said to take her out into the wilderness, and they had crossed the wasteland two days ago.

So what were they doing to her now? Were they baiting her, beating her... fucking her again?

She felt her lips tug.

No doubt, they were fucking her again.

The wind was unusually calm, just the occasional gust, but Cross shivered anyway, still thinking of Valentine's yellow haired woman being marched through the desert. Did she know what lay at the end of the march? Know that when they reached their destination, they were going to cut her throat no better than a dog's?

Today she'd held that woman's life in her hands, and today she'd thrown that life away.

She shrank, cringing, into her own shoulders.

And she had asked Zero to kill her, the day he burned Makaen Hadeed.

What a fool she was. She didn't understand anything about life or death.

He was right, he was always right.

And Valentine was right, too; she was guilty--

Not for having stolen the priest's heart, but for wishing I had--

"Halloo, missy."

Cross spun toward the sound of the voice.

"My, my, Cap's got another pretty one."

The man stepped closer, his dark skin melding with the night. His fists hung off each end of a length of purple silk around his neck, and as he spoke, he tugged first on one end and the other.

"Yes, yes, mighty pretty," he said, then he glanced up, flashing of two rows of perfectly even teeth.

"Evening, Cap."

"Argo."

Cross didn't move, she allowed only her eyes to move to where Valentine stood in the shadows. Silently, he stepped into the moonlight, bare-chested and bare-footed, golden chains and ruby earrings abandoned, his breeches loosely laced, his long hair gently blowing but for two narrow braids on either side of his face.

"Telling missy she's a pretty one, Cap."

"Isn't she, Argo?"

Valentine pulled on the thin brown cigar between his lips.

Cross noticed this wasn't one his own creations, but the 'veritable masterpiece' imported from a place formerly called Moro'co, or so he'd informed her.... He'd found it necessary to light the cigar in order to relax, considering the extraordinary amount of energy he'd been forced to expend in accomplishing his goal of pumping her overfull with himself... or so he'd informed her.

He had fallen asleep soon after, leaving her to watch the cigar's red hot cinder creep slowly toward his fingers until she mustered enough courage to slip the cigar out of his hand and pinch the ember off, where it sizzled in the drops of wine left in the cup.

She had carefully balanced the remaining length along the purpled rim of the cup and now, the tip again glowed red as Valentine, through a haze of smoke, fixed Argo in his shiny gaze.

"I told her the first night I saw her." Valentine smiled, rubbed the fading bruise on her cheek. "I said, 'Ah, beauty approaches.'" He turned again to Argo. "We will keep missy and her beauty intact, yes?"

Argo grinned.

"You bet, Cap. 'Night, Cap." He inclined his head to Cross but barely, "Missy."

"Good night, Argo."

Valentine fixed on the other's wide back until it disappeared into the darkness, then he turned to Cross.

"What were you doing out here?"

"I heard a noise."

"A noise."

"That... noise," she whispered, grateful to again hear the distant patter grow louder, then softer, then louder again, as it was carried on fickle currents of wind.

"Do you hear it?" her voice dropped slightly, "my lord?"

"Tattoo. It helps the men pass the time. You've noticed them, no doubt. The tattoos they wear."

She nodded.

The spicy sweetness of the cigar filled her nose as Valentine stepped closer, enveloping her as fully as did the smoke. She couldn't find the air to breathe when he was so near, but already up against the walls of the tent, she could step back no further so she leaned as far away as possible, her face turned from his.

"You still fear me," he said, the burning tobacco crackling softly as he drew on the cigar. "Don't. I like women."

He stepped closer still and her chest heaved.

"Well? Do you not believe me?"

She whimpered.

"Because of her? Because of Miriam? That was her name... Miriam. 'Tis a pity, the inconstancy of men. Even the novelty of wheat colored hair and sapphire eyes diminishes with time. But she was no longer any use to me; she could not deliver me the priest. You can. So you see, I sacrificed her for you, which makes you quite safe, at least until our fortunes change... as fortunes are bound to do."

Cross pulled more closely at her robes, although he stood so near she could feel his heat.

Valentine took a quick pull.

"Even now, my brother dreams of you. And of me... snug between your legs. It drives him mad and he hates himself for it. You are responsible for this weakness in my brother." He pointed with the glowing tip of the cigar. "You make him hate himself."

Her eyes widened. "I... I make him--"

"Do you understand him not at all? My brother Michael fancies himself a saint. Saints despise the world and women, bless them, are nothing if not creatures of the world. He hates himself for this weakness. Hates himself for caring so much."

Valentine took a long draught of smoke into his lungs and smiled down at her.

"But even I didn't guess that it would be so absurdly easy to convince him to desert you. He wants you far more deeply than he will ever admit. Or allow."

It was all too much.

She began to tremble, expected him to shove her, shake her, slap her, but he just took her into his arms and coaxed her head down against his chest.

"Lady... what troubles your heart?"

She shook her head with a tiny cry.

"Yes, yes, were I the very devil himself, you must unburden yourself... else your heart will burst. What would you have me know?"

"He won't come!"

"But he will."

"He won't! He doesn't care about me! He doesn't care at all! You don't know him like--"

He laughed, raised her tear streaked face, both thumbs beneath her chin.

"I don't know him like you know him, eh, sweetheart? You are correct, in that. I know him far better."

"Then you know--" Cross dragged her hands against her cheeks. "You know he doesn't love anything but his god. So if you think he'll come back... come back for me... you're--" Her voice dropped to a hush. "You're... mistaken... my lord."

Valentine laughed again, brushed the hair back from her forehead with his little finger, the cigar still caught between the first two. The pungent smoke swirled all around them, but through it, she saw his black eyes glitter.

"Silly dove," he brushed warm lips against hers, "I have never been mistaken. He will come, my word on it. You will see him again. Then, heaven help you both."

Cross's heart throbbed in her chest, the blood suddenly pumping too hard, so hard it made her head swim.

"What? Why? What will you do--"

He grinned.

"How your heart flutters in fear for him! Don't be frightened, I wish only help my brother redeem himself. If he confesses himself to me, much as you have done, it will be the means by which he is reconciled to his brothers, who love him. Do not fear, little dove... that is all I want. Nothing more." Smallest finger extended, he again lifted the windblown curl from her forehead. "I promise you. I want nothing more."

Reaching over her head, Valentine drew aside the tent flap, but as Cross turned to step inside, he suddenly blocked her with his arm.

"One other thing, lady. If you ever see Argo with his purple scarf turned round his fists rather than around his neck... you run find me as quickly as your two little feet can carry you. Do you understand?"

Valentine gave her a brief, hard glance.

"We do want to keep your beauty intact. Yes, missy?"

He took the last pull off the stub of the cigar, flicked it into the night, took her elbow, and led her back into the tent.

Chapter Fourteen

"Aieeeee!"

The man shrieked, his hands lifted to shield his face, his leathery brown skin decorated with spatters of his own blood. He ran blindly, forward and back, between the shade cooled oasis and his beleaguered caravan, somehow managing to elude the armed men that had come to kill him and steal his treasure.

"Aieeeee!"

He screamed again, his fingers scrambling to staunch the blood from the slit under his chin that had already soaked the heavily embroidered neckline of his fine tunic.

"Take the women," he cried, "take the spices! The beasts, the beasts... take it all! Just leave me alive," he shrank down to his knees, sobbing, "leave me alive!"

He groveled on his face, then as he rolled on his back, kicking and howling and bawling, he clasped his hands, appealing. He wept and begged until a heavy boot planted itself on his chest.

"Quiet."

The slaver opened his eyes just a crack.

Behind him, all was silent. Apparently the profusion of noise had come from his own very slightly slit throat.

Then Ahmed the camel snorted.

Zero took his foot from the slaver's chest, crunched long corkscrewed curls into the sand as he strode past, and when he reached the bank of the oasis, he opened his arms wide and fell, face first, into the cool water.

"Huhhhhh," the slaver murmured, rolling on his belly to see, "what is this?"

A huge gleaming grin slowly spread from ear to ear, rivaling the thin red slice that followed a similar path across his neck.

"I know you! You're the warrior! A hundred times I've seen you, crossing this wretched wasteland! Ha! You've killed the bastards, have you? Ha!"

The slaver heaved to his feet and danced. Bony arms lifted, he gyrated wildly, as if to push the heavy air up to the ceiling of the sky. The sleeves of his _jubbah_ slid to expose white elbows, then he lifted the striped fabric to uncover white knees. He scampered back and forth, where he had just scuffed the sand pleading for his life, and when he reached the water's edge, he, too, spread his arms and crashed into the rippling water, with a final triumphant "Ha!"

Zero rose up from the pool and waded in silence to the bank. He dipped one water sack, another, then made his way onto shore.

"Ho, warrior," the slaver called, "ho, stop!"

Panting and puffing, he gathered his waterlogged garments about him and struggling from the water, bustled onto solid ground, his leather sandals squishing.

"Wait! I owe you," he sputtered, still breathless. "My life! My fortune!"

Zero stared down at the little man.

"The dogs stood between me and the water. That is all."

Smiling, the corners of the slaver's eyes crinkled.

"All? Surely it was possible for you to approach from the other side."

"Possible. Not likely."

The slaver paused for a moment, his smile wavering, then he gave way to a brighter grin.

"Your reasons are your own, I care only for the result! And so," he set his fingers against his own striped chest, "I will repay my debt! No one can say Ibrahim the trader does not pay his debts!"

"I forgive the debt, slaver."

"Ibrahim, friend, Ibrahim. And you are?"

Zero stood unsmiling.

"Your name, friend?" Ibrahim ventured, tentative, "I would know it so I can raise it in prayer to my Lord Christ! Bless Him for sending my deliverer to me!"

Zero smiled a little.

"If I was sent by the Christ, don't you think He already knows my name?"

The slaver's eyes widened and the grin again dashed across his face.

"You are Christian?"

"Aye."

"Ha! Ha, ha, by the saints, I knew it, ha!"

The slaver bustled himself about, turned a merry circle before reaching up, after a short hesitation, to clap Zero on the shoulder.

"Now you must tell me your name, warrior, for we are brothers! Brothers in the Lord!"

"You may call me Zero."

"Odd name," Ibrahim cocked his head, "yet, I shall raise it none the less! Now you must stay and partake of my hospitality for you are truly my friend."

"I cannot."

"But why?"

"I cannot."

The slaver's face fell, every leathered line curving down toward the sand.

"This debt will lie heavily upon me," he said, shaking his head, "'tis hospitality I would extend gladly, even had you not saved my worthless hide. My slaves," he extended his hand to the group huddled together despite the heat of the sun, "though the finest in the wasteland, are poor company for a man of taste and refinement," his fingers did a little dance on his striped chest, "such as myself."

The trader glanced up, under his lids, but Zero's blue eyes only stared back.

The slaver shook his head again, droplets of water glistening in his long pomaded curls.

"In matters of theology they are hopeless." He sighed and spread his hands. "Not a Christian among them. So my latest interpretation of scripture goes untested."

A few moments of silence passed before the first peek from under lowered lids. A few more moments before the second peek, and at the third peek, he stood rewarded by Zero's smile.

"So. You are fond of interpreting scripture."

"Yes, lord, yes!"

"I have a question of my own. I would be most interested in your scholarly opinion."

The slaver paused, frozen, but then his whole body uncoiled, ready for action.

"Of course, of course! An honor!" He quickly reached up, gripped Zero's shoulder to direct him toward the caravan. "But first we will share a light meal, a little wine, a short snooze...."

He patted his robes, a brown hand disappearing in the folds to produce an enormous key, he scurried to his slaves, turned the key in the lock of their shackles, dragged the heavy chain out through the cuffs.

"Up, up!" he ordered, hands flailing. "Tend, tend... my tent, the fire... _besora'a,_ hurry!"

He turned to Zero, spit on the ground.

"My bodyguard," he jerked his head at one of the dead thieves, "a former slave, I took him from this," he waved behind him, "to a place of honor," he clapped his hands at the women, "and see how he repays me! Cook that goat! No need to waste! You," Ibrahim lunged, grabbed a scurrying man, "drag away those dogs! The jackals will have them disposed of by morning...."

He turned back to Zero and with a smile, brushed the labor from his hands.

"There now, now we will have a refreshment! You! Saracen! Egyptian! You, girl," he pointed, " _aywa, aywa_ ," he nodded, "yes, yes you, you worthless girl, come!"

Three women trotted to the slaver. They stood expectantly, feet shuffling, six hands smoothing hair and scant garments.

"Well?" the slaver asked.

Zero wore no expression.

Ibrahim took a short sharp glance before he scuttled toward the caravan, head aimed down to speed him, calling back with a bony finger raised, "Wait!"

He grabbed at cloth and hair, anything he could lay hand to, and shooed three more women toward the others. Then he trundled to his own wagon, stuck his head in the back and dragged a struggling girl out of the bright blue painted cart. He hauled her down, dragged her across the sand, and when they reached the others he gave her a quick, light smack and threw her down at his feet.

"Ah, the tenderness," he panted, "of my heart! I am far too generous, warrior! My slaves forget their place!"

The girl at Ibrahim's feet looked up.

Pushing masses of black hair away from her face so the golden tassels of her headdress, the mark of the slaver's favor, could gleam against the bronze of her cheek, her black eyes fell calmly on Zero's face, then even dared to peruse, until a cuff from her master sent her head snapping forward.

"Whores!" the slaver cried, but then he raised a benign face to his guest.

"Well, friend? I would be honored should you take mine own whore. Take them all, singly or all together, as you will...." He bowed slightly, one hand fluttering at his chest, "What belongs to Ibrahim the trader belongs to you, my friend."

Ibrahim held his breath, his eyes moving from woman to woman then back to Zero as his fingers, behind his bony back, counted themselves.

"Choose, choose," he grinned, "I have already made my wager, and I am always correct. 'Tis why I am a rich man today, by the Lord's grace."

The slaver stood watching, rising on the tips of his toes as the Zero paused in front of a dark eyed Saracen who wore only long curls over her brown breasts. But then his eyes suddenly widened as Zero moved to a woman who knelt all alone, staring into the sand.

Zero reached down and grasped the rope that secured the woman's wrists. His knife snapped through the thick hemp and her hands, now free, fell limply to her sides. He set the flat of the blade beneath her chin, compelling her head higher, higher, then higher still, then he took her by the elbow and silently commanded her to her feet.

Ibrahim sprang forward.

"No no no no no no no! Not that one! I should not have offered that one, lord, but in my haste--"

Zero turned to the slaver, his face expressionless.

"Not that I would question a man of your obvious taste," Ibrahim hunched nearly double, hands open to a long, graceful sweep, "but that one, my lord... she is damaged, lord."

"I see that."

The slaver clucked almost sympathetically.

"'Twas my good heart led me to the error." He stroked along the line that scored his own brown throat. "Lord, I have always had too large a heart for the whores."

The cut along the woman's throat screamed out ragged and red, running from ear to ear.

"She can no longer speak, lord," the slaver said.

"Can't or won't?"

The slaver's brows drew together and his eyes glazed.

"Blessed if I know. Never knew a woman could, that wouldn't. And didn't"

"It doesn't matter, either way. I value silence."

"Lord, wait! There is something more!" Ibrahim moved still closer, rose up on his tiptoes to bring his whispered confidence closer to its intended destination, Zero's ear. "I sample all me goods, lord... but for the virgins, of course...."

Zero's lips twitched. "Of course."

"Ibrahim the trader sells only quality merchandise! But this one, she will not comfort you, friend. I despair of what to do with her... what good is a whore with teeth between her legs? And she is disobedient," he motioned to the rope curled on the ground, "as you can see. This I tell you in truth, warrior. There is no love in this one."

The woman still stared out toward the oasis.

Zero extended his first finger, laid it alongside her cheek and turned her face to his.

"I would have my tent there," he gestured, "where I can watch the gazelles come drink in the cool of the evening."

He scanned the trader's small caravan and after his eyes fixed on a hot orange gleam, he rested one hand on the slave's shoulder and again directed her gaze with the first finger of the other against her cheek.

"And I will bathe in that tub. Prepare spiced wine, and prepare yourself as well."

Zero pushed her off with the single outstretched finger and as she slowly moved away, he turned to Ibrahim with a smile.

"Come, slaver," he propelled the little man toward the shade of the oasis with the same single finger. "We have the Holy Scripture to explore."

***

Finally there was no sound but the sighing of the wind. The women no longer danced under Ibrahim's goading, their dusty feet pounding the same rhythm as the goatskin covered drums the male slaves held between their splayed knees. And the fire no longer popped loudly; the goat's bones had long since left the spit with a crash and a billow of sparks and now the silent red round smoldered boldly, challenging the cool white of the moon.

Bellies uncommonly full, the slaves slept heavily under the starry sky as their master, wine soaked, slept without snoring in the back of his wagon, his greased head leaving a perfumed streak between his favorite's naked breasts.

From where he sat by the fire, Zero watched the wild desert goats approach the oasis, but this time the soft lapping sound they made when they lowered their heads to drink did not soothe his soul.

Weeks had passed, and the desert had yielded nothing. Valentine had managed to disappear, along with the girl, into the very grains of sand.

As he gazed into the black pool, watching the stars by way of their reflections glimmering in the still water, he saw only the tears that seemed always to glisten always at the corners of the girl's brown eyes, buoying them in seas of sadness.

His lips tugged hard.

Some women were born to weep.

But tonight--

Pray there be no women's tears tonight, for he was very, very tired.

He heaved to his feet and rubbed at his eyes as he slowly made his way up a slight incline toward the black woolen tent that sat wide and low, overlooking the water. Not quite ready to lift the overhang of fabric from the entry, he turned back to look out over the oasis one last time as the wind, rustling the fronds of the date palms, seemed to call to him.

He raised his eyes to the sky.

"I'm tired, Father." he whispered. "I have scoured the length and breadth of this wasted land and still the innocent eludes me. I wait upon Your Will...."

The wind soughed softly, again fluttering the fronds.

"Lord? Must she suffer so, for my sin, for surely this innocent has committed no sin that demands so harsh a penance. Father, I need to understand...."

The long fingered branches shivered.

"Father? Are You there?"

No wind.

"Father?"

More silence.

Jaw tight, Zero lowered his head.

He would not think of her now.

He could not think of her now.

He turned back toward the tent.

No more for now, no more for tonight, because--

If I think I'll hear her cries, and if I hear her cries I'll see her face, and if I see her face I'll see the marks I left along with those that jackal will surely leave, and then I'll die here, here where I stand, for having left her that way and if she's still alive she'll wait and watch for one who will never come and that would be the cruelest of all so I'm staying Lord but for just a little while to rest and to think I need to rest and think and pray--

He had to stoop to enter.

And although he made no sound, the slave turned toward the flap, rose from her crouch by the tub. She shuffled slowly until she stood before him, her gaze fixed on the sand piled up between her bare toes.

She still wore her faded dress, a tattered rag adorned only by streaks of dirt and grease. Useless against the sun, the fair skin of her face and shoulders showed red scales and blisters. The smell of sweat had permeated the rough cloth and in the closeness of the tent, Zero's nostrils flared.

He took the dagger from the sheath at the small of his back and ran it along the front of the dress, leaving a trail of frayed threads behind.

"Turn."

He slid the dagger from buttocks to nape, sheathed it, gripped the neckline of the garment and jerked hard. The two sides parted.

Better--

He dropped the filthy cloth, and with two long strides, swept it from the tent at the tip of his boot.

"Now, the wind will take it," he said. "And your master will be obliged to provide you with other garments."

He returned to where she stood and lifted his arms from his sides.

No words were required.

Eyes staring and blind, the slave fumbled with the heavy buckle which had worn a shiny groove into the thick leather of his belt, which had in turn burnished a similar mark on his vest. After she'd worked the buckle unsuccessfully for several seconds, Zero set a hand on each shoulder and pushed her down to her knees so her fixed gaze could fall on the object of her attention. When she'd finally freed the long strap and the belt came away from his hips, she staggered slightly under the sudden weight of the weapons.

"Set the belt near the bed," he said, motioning to a knee high pile of cushions, orange and green and gold tasseled with red. "Unsheathe the sword and lay it there," he gestured, "so it will be within reach of my hand."

The slave began moving backward toward the bed, her gaze now locked to the tip of the scabbard as it first dug a long line in the sand, then a light red one as it scored the thick layer of dust that cloaked the woolen carpet. When she reached the bed she pulled the sword from the scabbard with a loud scrape and set it down.

"To the left," he said, watching as she moved the sword further right. His lips tugged. "The other left will work just as well."

She moved slowly back to where he stood and knelt before him again, freeing each boot before peeling the soft leather from his hips. When she stood, he held out his vest and she took that too, moving away under the burden of the leather garments and his watchful eyes. When she'd folded each piece neatly and set them in together in a pile she paused, nude and hopeful, at the flap of the tent.

"You will bathe me now," he said, striding to the large basin that sat in the middle of the tent. "Bring the wine."

Both absorbed and reflected by the dull copper, the heat of the water drifted upward to scent the air with rose and violet and myrtle. Zero dipped a hand to skim the scattered petals that floated on the water's surface; white and yellow and purple and pink, they clung, like a possessive woman, to his fingertips.

He swung his legs over the edge and settled down gingerly as the battered copper tub, built for one much smaller, flexed under the power of his muscular body, but soon he'd settled himself and the slave approached, knelt, and held out a deep goblet.

The red wine exuded a cloud of spicy sweetness and Zero smiled.

"You were generous with your master's treasure," he said, taking the cup. "Well done."

Her face didn't change.

"I know you didn't do it for me... it must have given you great pleasure to dip so heavily into your master's precious store of spice." He breathed deep, filling his lungs with the scented steam wafting from the drink. "Cinnamon, clove, anise," he drew the vessel beneath her nose, "the fragrance alone addles the brain, does it not?" He offered the cup. "Here. Drink."

She shook her head.

"Drink, lady. You must have great thirst. Drink."

She sipped slightly, then took one large gulp, wiped her lips with the back of her hand, and returned the cup. He drained it, held it out for her to fill again, and when he drained that cup too, she filled it once more. Then, elbows hooked over the sides of the tub, Zero finally sipped, his eyes half closed as he savored the uncommon warmth of water against his skin and wine in his belly.

He sighed.

"Your master has soap?"

She slid a small brown nugget from beneath the tub.

"Ah. So you thought to keep it for yourself."

She looked away.

"You lie, you did." His eyes appeared as slits. "Had you thought to take it for me, you would have taken a far larger piece. Your generosity with the spices has betrayed you."

She stared down at the soap, but he just laughed.

"Don't be afraid, your sin is as tiny as that bit of soap. I would not have you bear the lightest stroke from your master for so insignificant a thing. But you do expect too much, if you are waiting for it to jump into the tub and lather itself."

The slave jerked, quickly dipped her hands in the water, and rubbing the soap between her palms, raised handfuls of froth. The smell of sandalwood drifted around them and when she no longer dared raise more suds, she brought trembling hands to his chest and shoulders and neck, fingers massaging the hard, tight muscles.

Closing his eyes, he slid farther down in the tub, further elongating its oval shape, until the ends of his long hair fanned out in the sweet water.

Her hands moved more confidently now, rhythmically sliding up and down his chest, slipping along with the soap up over his shoulders and then, light as a breeze, at his neck and throat.

He sighed again, then his voice came soft.

"Your hands are gentle. They speak more eloquently than words ever could... never bemoan the loss of those fickle friends."

He opened his eyes and brought the cup to his lips, then, peering over the rim, brought a long dripping leg up out of the water and set it down on her shoulder. She didn't seem surprised; she soaped all along the length, up and down, and when the other came down, weighing heavy on the other shoulder, she soaped that one, too.

"I seek a lady very like yourself," he said. "She, too, has been disobedient... and she, too, has suffered far more than her willfulness warranted. But she is dark, while you are fair. And her breasts fill my hand. Yours are small."

He leaned forward, stretched out a finger, lightly touched the round, pink nipple.

"I think their flavor will be both tart and sweet. Rather like plums."

He took his legs from her shoulders and slid back, again deforming the metal basin, but although no longer captive, the slave simply sat, soap suds dripping from the tips of her breasts, her blue eyes staring while his still watched.

"Get in," he said.

She shook her head.

"Sweet Lord, you are as recalcitrant as a child. I said get in."

She slowly stepped into the tub, steadying herself against her own unseeing eyes by gripping the rim. Turning away from him, she sank down into the water.

"Soap." When he reached over her shoulder, she set the round on his palm. He dunked noisily in the water, then began soaping her sunburned neck.

"So. You are deciding, even now, that you will not submit your body to me. You plot and plan; how shall I escape my captor? The long sword is so sharp. And so near."

The bit of soap raised huge clouds of white foam. His hands moved with deliberate speed all over her body, the curves of her shoulders, each round, small breast, every hard knobby vertebra that stood out along her thin back.

As he soaped, her shoulders heaved just once.

"You wonder how the pursuit of freedom can be disobedience. And yet, we're all slaves to something, are we not? Although some of us are more fortunate than others... we're enslaved only by that which we love. But your master tells me there's no love in you."

The soap between his palms had all but melted away, so he dipped up handfuls of water and rinsed the froth from her body, speaking to her back.

"I think your master doesn't understand the depth of your pain. I can understand it. As well as your anger and your hate."

He lifted the cup from where he had placed it beside the tub, drained it, and when he reached over the rim to set it down, it fell from his suddenly slack fingers and rolled a short way across the carpet.

He leaned back and closed his eyes.

"Get out. Send me that Saracen slut with the wanton black eyes. And hurry. Before I change my mind."

The woman sprang out from the tub with a long under tow of water and a loud, wet splash. But after a few seconds, after he opened his eyes, he found her easily despite the flickering light.

She still stood at the very edge of the tent, her fingers tight on the blowing flap.

He didn't smile.

"Now the opportunity is lost. And it's too late to take advantage of the gift I gave you. Come here to me."

She shuffled toward him, stopped at the edge of the tub. He slipped a dripping hand between her thighs and when his long middle finger disappeared inside her, she gasped softly.

"There is a part of me you neglected to bathe," he said.

He drew her close, urged her into the tub, and then, with a hand on either side of her waist, eased her down, filling her.

He lowered his lips to the warm wetness of her breast, the single word all but hidden behind his sigh.

"Plums."

Chapter Fifteen

It was like paradise.

The winds blew soft, the air smelled clean, and the fruit hung so heavy, it dripped from the branches like honey from the comb.

It was like no place she'd ever seen.

It was paradise.

That morning, awakened by the sound of her own weeping, she'd opened her eyes to find her cheeks wet with tears. She remembered dreaming and in her dream, she'd been begging to stay here, under the shade of the olive trees, forever.

The sound had roused Valentine as well, and with the heavy arm that rested across her chest, he drew her more closely to him and kissed the air. Soon after, after he covered her, she spread her own legs and snugged them, high and tight, around his hips.

Now, at Valentine's feet under the shade of those same olive trees, she felt so sleepy she could drop off as she sat, her head on her knees, her arms circling her legs.

In a scarred camp chair, the back and seat made of faded carpet, Valentine sat silently. Again, his long hair was dressed with two narrow braids on either side of his face, and when the breezes came, rippling his loose cotton shirt, the hair hanging loose down his back tamed the rising billow just as his two hands, fingers splayed, calmed the rustling of the large map that lay across his knees. He continued to pore over the map, his body uncommonly still, unless an ash would fall from the cigar clamped between his teeth. Then, in an instant, his hand would be on it to brush the ash away.

Tired of listening to the birds bickering in among the fig trees, Cross closed her eyes and dozed, but jerked awake when a harsh shout pierced her drowse.

"You son of a bitch!"

And then another voice, sharp and more high pitched, "You fuck!"

Valentine wiggled at her bottom with the great toes of his bare feet. When she looked up he grinned and cocked his head toward the canvas tent the soldiers shared.

Ned and Gideon tumbled out, falling through the flap. Ned swung hard, his fist slamming into Gideon's jaw, but as Gideon went down, he tackled Ned's knees to crash them both to the ground.

Watching the fight, Valentine laughed, shook his head, but only for a moment before he returned his attention to the map. The men spilled out of the tent, cheering and goading as the two rolled and slugged, first Ned on top, then Gideon, then Ned, then Argo abruptly left the pack to stride up the worn path that passed by Valentine's tent.

As he approached, Cross lowered her gaze.

"'Day, Cap," he said.

Valentine nodded absently, "Argo," his attention still focused on his chart.

"'Day, Missy."

With a quick movement of his foot, he sent a scattering of gravel flying out from under his boot. The pebbles pelted her feet, and when she glanced up, Argo... left hand lifted with the thumb and index finger curled up tight... grinned. As she watched, he jammed the first finger of his right hand into the gap and whistled through his teeth as he worked the slit, _in and out, in and out, in and out, in and out_ \--

Valentine finally looked up, but Argo had already passed them by.

Cross laid her head on her knees.

And I dreamed this was paradise--

Valentine rolled the map, smacked her lightly on the head with it, then stood, arching his back with a grunt.

"They're restless," he said. "They're unaccustomed to such idleness."

He went up the path to his tent and emerged shortly, boots on his feet and a leather ball in his hands. He put two fingers to his mouth, whistled a sharp, insistent blast, dropped the ball, then skittered it down the path. When he was close enough to the men, he fired it into the pack with a hard kick.

Ned stilled his fist in mid-air, the band sprang apart with a whoop, and the game began.

Cross hugged her knees as she watched the soldiers and their captain, hollering and calling to each other as they ran back and forth after the worn brown ball.

With all their fights forgotten along with all their yesterdays, they played their game over the very spot where they'd brutalized Valentine's yellow haired woman. A few days ago Cross had passed through that same place, to pick Valentine some figs from a small tree that stood behind the soldiers' tent.

There were still spatters of blood in the dirt.

She spat to rid her mouth of the sour taste that had just flooded it.

Paradise--

Maybe she was stupid, just like Geoffrey always said.

In the open desert, jackals and buzzards and the sand itself devoured everything, virtually in moments and sometimes, virtually whole. So maybe the desert was truly paradise, a place where the past was past, often within mere minutes of having been the present.

Surely, he thought so.

Suddenly weak, she rested her head against her knees, determined to ignore the tightness in her throat as her heart raged in silence.

She would not let him, or the sorrow that seemed always to surround him, enter.

Not again. Not this time.

Weeks had passed. She would never see him again. Never see the rising moonlight in his hair, never feel his lips against hers, firm and hot and as insistent as a noontime sun.

His place wasn't like this place, full of sweet fruit and cool clear water. His place was the wasteland; the wasteland that swallowed things whole.

"Ho!"

She started, her reverie interrupted by the shout.

Argo rounded the big hill where the men kept night watch over the camp, and thrusting his arms to the sky with another hoot, he charged in to join the heap that surrounded the beleaguered leather ball, bald head shining and purple scarf swinging.

Argo's shout had managed to banish the thoughts she'd been unable to, so to keep them at bay, Cross heaved to her feet.

Now it was safe to go to the well.

She took the path up, that Argo had taken down. It wound past Valentine's tent, then around a trail of grapevine that twined up into an old dead tree, the gnarled vines studded blue with tiny new grapes.

Aged yet ageless and ringed all in stone, the well stood solid in the sunlight. It seemed to wait patiently for her to approach, having done no less for the countless souls that had gone before her. A leather bucket tied to a rope of woven goat's hair also sat waiting, and shortly after she dropped it in, she wound it back to the surface and poured the water into a tall earthen jar at the base of the well. With the jar balanced on her head, she made her way back along the path, set the jar near to Valentine's chair, went to the tent, and returned with a tin pitcher and a wooden bucket.

She emptied the jar into the bucket and soon Valentine came trotting up, his color high, his pristine white shirt damp with sweat.

He grunted with a quick nod. "Good."

He dipped the flagon into the bucket, poured it over his head, then jerked his head to whip the water from his hair.

Droplets spattering her face, she ducked slightly, hiding from the water and the smile curving her lips.

Valentine dipped again but this time he drank, errant water sparkling in the sun as it spilled past his lips to more closely plaster the thin stuff of his shirt to his chest.

"My lord?"

He eyed her from around the cup, grunted, _"What?"_

"Who won?"

He lowered the cup, dashed a sleeve across his lips.

"Why, my team, of course." He bent and chucked her under the chin. "'Tis the advantage of being scorekeeper."

Eyes on the men, he whistled them to attention, then moved to grip the handle of the bucket as she reached as well.

"My lord, I'll do it--"

His fingers just brushed hers as they tightened around the rough rope handle.

"I have it, lady."

He smiled. Then, gait jaunty and whistling an easy tune, he strode toward his men with the bucket swaying and water sloshing ever so slightly over the sides.

***

She was cold.

And now, fully awake, she realized she didn't much like sleeping in a bed. Beds were for sheikhs, or women like the one they called the Mother of All Whores...a lethal lady who once lived in a doomed place the old ones called Yerusha'ly'em.

Yet here she was, in the middle of the desert, sleeping in a massive bed that seemed nearly as large as the house she'd shared with her father.

And she was cold.

Squeezing her eyes tightly shut, she pulled the thin silk sheet up to her chin, then inched down until the sheet was up to her eyebrows. But it was no use, she could find no warmth, so she reached out, feeling for him.

The place beside her was empty.

No wonder she was cold.

Almost ready to rouse herself to find him, she stopped when she heard a low voice.

Valentine--

Then another, deeper, voice, and another--

_Simon, and Ned_ \--

Hardly breathing so she could listen, she opened her eyes but kept her back turned to the voices.

"Follow this route...."

Valentine--

"Due north, pass Kabzeel, pass Beth-pelet. Head west. The settlement is in the valley between Sharu'hen and Gerar. Reasonable farmland, I understand... that's good for them. Impossible to defend... that's good for you."

"Aye, captain."

Simon--

"We have a free hand in this?"

Ned--

"Free hand, Neddie; you may fuck up the ass anyone or anything that strikes you. I want only their priest. The treasure is yours... the gold, the diamonds, the poppy, the spices... it all belongs to you and to the rest of the men, I shall have none of it. Your obligation to me is this alone; drag out that priest. Alive."

Feet shuffling on the thick carpet; "Aye, sir... aye, Captain."

"Good luck, men."

She heard the sound of Valentine clapping the two lieutenants on their shoulders, heard a soft shush as the two shouldered past the gossamer panels that hung over the entry of the tent.

A couple of moments of silence, and she rolled over.

Valentine stood at the long table that, along with his bed, dominated the tent. The large map he always studied lay spread out over the top of it; candles in wrought gold holders flickered at each of the four corners of the map to both illuminate the scroll and keep it flat.

As she watched, he leaned over the map, peering against the dimness of the light. When his long hair spilled over his shoulder, down onto the parchment, he swept it back.

"My lord?"

He didn't raise his head.

"It is many hours until daybreak, lady. Go back to sleep."

"My lord?"

He looked up. "You dare disobey me?"

She nodded.

"Well, then. What must be said, that is so important that you risk my wrath to say it?"

"Do you know where the priest is?"

"No."

"But he's alive...."

"Damned if I know."

"But... I thought you sent them--"

"I did. In all probability, they'll fail in their mission."

"The treasure--"

"In all probability, there is none."

"I don't understand."

"Nor need you."

"Please tell me."

Valentine sighed. "Restive soldiers need diversion... and chastening. Else they run wild. Leave it there."

"My lord?"

He sighed again, deeply.

"Yes?"

"Why do you want the priest?"

Valentine came around the table. He rocked slightly on the balls of his feet, then stepped to the edge of the bed, his hands clasped loosely behind his back.

"This priest, of whom you are apparently so fond? He is a renegade."

He settled beside her and caressed with his thumb a tiny mark on her cheek, all that remained of the bruises that had once marred her face.

"This priest is apostate," he said softly. "He has betrayed his Brotherhood and so, has betrayed me."

"But why? How?"

"Little dove... how little you know of the world, beyond the puny dung heap upon which we presently perch! It's a vast, perilous world beyond the safety of this tent, and if our Brotherhood is to rise again, like a phoenix from the ashes of its destruction, the faithful among us must travel to the very ends of the earth in search of those sheep which are lost. And so... there are warlords to bribe, politicos to..." he rolled his eyes, "persuade! Our monastery is located at a place called Mar Sada. Mar Sada must be recaptured from the heathen who presently occupy it."

He laughed a little and chucked under her chin.

"Armies have requirements and we are priests, you understand... we can't steal everything we need! Even those who partake of the bread of life each morning have the simple need to partake of the bread of grain each night! Napoleon... perhaps you've heard of him...." He raised his brows in mock surprise, "No? Well, he once quite rightly noted, an army marches on its stomach."

"My lord... what's all that got to do with the priest?"

"Simply put, your priest possesses knowledge and will not share it. Knowledge leads to wealth, and wealth leads to power."

Unbidden, the words came quickly from her lips, "The desert's secret."

Valentine shot her a glance.

"But he doesn't know the secret, my lord! My father told me he knew it, and I asked the priest what the secret was, but he said he didn't know!"

"And you believed him. Ah, the blindness of one so in love. Well, lady, I don't believe he told the truth to you, or to me. And so, here we are."

Cradling her head in his hand, he set his lips briefly against hers. Then, face unchanging, he slammed the same hand hard across her face, over and over, until she cried out and collapsed, shaking, against the silken pillow.

Valentine rose from the bed, but his black eyes stayed fixed.

"Do not mistake me, lady. I am a man quite unlike your priest. You will consider, in future, the price one pays for curiosity... yes?"

She nodded, her voice muffled by the soft pillow, "Yes, my lord."

He took a lock of her hair, worked the curl around his finger, tugged to get her attention.

"Do you pray, lady?"

She rocked her face against the nubby silk.

_No_.

"Pity. If you did, I would suggest you pray my men do not find your priest."

She glanced up, eyes streaming.

"But they won't hurt him.... You told them, you told them to bring him alive--"

He rolled his eyes and sighed.

"Silly dove. Here, then, is our dilemma. If they manage, by some miracle, to bring the priest to me... what need have I of you?"

A slight frown on his lips, Valentine wandered back to the table. Once there, he surveyed the delights awaiting his pleasure: tobacco; wine; warm, soft dates filled... like a woman taken... by hard white almonds.

He chose to flip back the cover of a small gold box.

Fishing out a soft brown nugget, he jammed it into his clay pipe, leaned over the candle closest, sucked at the long stem to draw the flame into the bowl. When the resins began to smolder, he sucked in again.

"Go back to sleep," he said softly. "This darkness will be with us for some time still."

Chapter Sixteen

As the silver tip of the narghile loomed over Zero, the striped hose behind it undulated like a cobra dancing to its master's pipes.

Tiny points of light sparked off the metallic threads covering the hose. The lights were too bright; they hurt his eyes; so although his arm felt heavy, he managed to lift it and push the pipe away.

"Enough," he whispered. "Enough."

He was floating then sinking, the sweet musky scent of patchouli filling his nose.

It could almost but not quite, _quite,_ disguise the distinct odor of opium.

He narrowed his eyes, trying to see, but the tent was dark despite the flickering clay lamps scattered throughout. They provided no real light; instead, they toyed with the gold of the woman's hair.

He twined his fingers in it.

Soft and shining, it held the fragrance of flowers. And it had grown, in the time he'd sojourned here, so now it fell in loose waves all around her face.

He saw the gold glinting in the dim light but not her face; just the brightness of her hair, pulsing in and out. And then the gold receded until he could not find it at all.

He lifted his head slightly, searching, then he gasped out loud and fell back into the soft cushions.

"Sweet Jesus...."

He again clutched his fingers in her curls as the silky whorls tickled his thighs.

"Sweet... Jesus."

Something's not right--

His brain buzzed.

The slaver had guessed correctly.

This was valuable property, employing training as well as instinct. The training of a concubine lasted from early childhood through young adulthood and often beyond--

He felt his lips tug down.

Not unlike that of a priest--

Her fingernails, now grown, were perfectly manicured. Her teeth, white and well cared for.

And when she danced, for him and him alone....

He urged her up and pulled her face toward him so he could see more clearly in the dusky light.

He no longer trusted his memory; there had been so many women, so many throats slit in the wasteland, that at this very moment he couldn't be sure--

But there it was.

A gash that missed the carotid by a hair.

He felt his fingers slacken, felt her drift away.

By accident ? Design?

Because only a dog, not even a dog, would cut the throat of this kind of whore and leave her to die in the wilderness--

This kind of whore was just too damn expensive--

There was wisdom here, something he should see, something he should understand--

But I'll be damned if I can--

He sat up, reached and easily found her, maneuvered her onto her knees, gripped her hips and entered.

She sucked in a breath, moved along with him, slowly at first then, plunging hard, gripping tight, more and more rapidly. He read the quickening of her body and when it was time, he slid both hands down between her legs to hold her bound to him. She gasped, drove herself down onto his strength and lifting her head with toes curled, she arched her back, lips seeking his as her whole body shuddered.

They collapsed down together. He kissed her shoulder, rolled onto his back, but soon he felt her kneel between his legs. Slowly, almost gingerly, she took each of his hands in each of hers, turned them up and kissed one scarred palm and then the other.

"No..." he dragged his hands away, "don't. Not... appropriate...."

Not appropriate for a man and so flawed a man--

For such belongs to you alone, Lord--

And as we're equal in Your sight she deserves something some small pleasure and it is such a small pleasure, Lord--

Not that I'm questioning Your wisdom, Father, but why did you make them so weak and so soft and so easy to control--

And after all, even dogs have more freedom--

Still warm and wet, she straddled his hips, unfolded a small twist of linen and held it under his nose.

White powder.

His lips turned a crooked smile, and then he laughed, "What are you doing?"

He tried... failed... to sit up, fell back against the cushions.

"I'll never get free of this bed...."

Never, never get free and you'll have to fuck me forever and no matter how well your training has taught you to flatter and dissemble and hide behind your smile, you can't really want that--

And what about that poor slaver--

After I've wasted his stores, he'll have neither poppy nor coca to peddle--

Nothing left to sell but flesh--

He inched up on an elbow.

Well, enough then--

The slaver won't starve--

Setting a finger against his nose, he sniffed and jerked his chin at her.

The tip of her tongue dipped into the pile of white, then flit back into her mouth to suck off the powder. Her tongue darted out again, into the dented peak of the mound, but this time, she kissed him, slipping her tongue between his lips.

He sucked gently.

She tasted faintly of wormwood.

And then he sighed, because--

There was something else I needed to remember something else I needed to think about but I just can't remember--

And how can a man hope to ponder those things he cannot remember--

He groaned.

His body felt weighty, as heavy and hard as steel.

Just like the part between his legs.

She pressed him down again, onto his back, and sheathed him.

Moving slowly, rhythmically, her body felt as warm as a lullaby. Singing an ancient song, her fingertips coursed over his shoulders, across his lips, through his hair and for a moment he thought he could hear her voice in his ears, sighing like the wind, so he laughed slightly, aloud or possibly not, thinking--

Fool, she has no voice—

But he could hear it nonetheless

It said ' _forget.'_ And _' rest.'_ And _'sleep_. _'_

His bleary eyes turned upward, to the nearest peak of the tent.

There, at the very corner, he saw a tear; just a small rip in the black wool. But as the wind played the torn flap of fabric, blowing it in and out, he stared out through the small triangular hole and saw a wedge of blue and the gleam of the sun.

It was day out there and he hadn't even known it. He didn't know how long he'd been in here; he didn't know how many days had passed since he'd first encountered the slaver. He didn't know what he needed to do, but there was something he needed to do... except now he didn't know--

He gasped.

"Sweet Jesus...."

Anything--

He closed his eyes.

She was moving very slowly now, riding him so gently, rocking him to sleep.

Almost asleep--

But not yet, not quite yet--

" _Quia tu es, Deus, fortitudo mea..._."

The words had drifted so easily to his mind, so easily from his lips.

" _Quare me repulisti, et quare tristis incedo, dum affligit me inimicus?_ "

He breathed a groan, tried to lift his head off the pillow but she held him down by kneading the muscles that sculpted his shoulders.

So he sighed the words to the darkness, where all the little lamp flames had gone double and were busily spinning around his head, _"Emitte lucem tuam et veritatem tuam...."_

Here, as always, was the only place safe from the enemy. Safe from the sweet flesh of women, safe from wine and poppies and even the white powders that had the power to immobilize his mind and his body and his heart--

But not his soul.

Never his soul.

He dragged a numb arm to shield his eyes from the bits of light that still swirled and then, amid the deepening silence, he began again to pray.

Chapter Seventeen

Cross sat watching, just as she had since the sun was high in the sky. Now it hung low, a huge orange ball shivering, despite the heat, on the horizon.

And still Valentine hadn't moved.

She could see his chest rising and falling with deep heavy breaths that went all the way down the great length of his body to his toes, then all the way back up to his lungs. His hair hung over the side of the bed, making a murky puddle on the carpet, but not a single strand had moved in all the hours she'd been watching.

A large goatskin lay deflated by the bed.

Was it possible that it had been full, bulging, just the previous morning? This skin held his own special brew; this skin filled the sack he carried always, dangling from his belt.

To empty the small sack was not difficult for him, but could even he have emptied the larger?

She lifted the sack with her toe. She saw no wetness. She slipped her hand under it, brushed the patterned carpet.

Dry.

Can't be--

She felt the carpet again, ran her hand all around, then leaned forward, sniffed and stroked her lips against the pile.

Dry.

But why? And why now?

The soldiers had gone on to carry out their mission; they weren't here to guard her or their Captain's treasure. No Simon, who still seethed for having been rebuked and shamed before his comrades, all because of her. No Ned, who barely attempted to conceal his depraved desires. No grinning Argo, saying _'Halloo, missy._ '

She reached out, touched Valentine's bare shoulder, brushed the backs of her fingers along the length of his hair.

He didn't move.

But then, in a flash, it became clear.

It had to be now... there could be no other time but now.

Valentine could plunge himself into insensibility only when his men were far away; only when neither she nor he, himself, needed his wits and his iron fists to keep them both safe from those very same men.

She stared into his face, a massive hand tucked under his cheek, his dark features bland and mild.

What could he be running from? Or perhaps, to?

She'd never know... whatever his reason, it was lost to her, submerged along with him in the depths of an impenetrable unconsciousness.

But now she had no keeper.

She took the straps of the empty goatskin in her hand, absently thumbed the stiff leather, and rose slightly from her crouch.

Only to sink back again, remembering... the weight of the water bags on her back when she'd first left her father's settlement, and how they had chafed and cut her skin.

She relaxed her fingers but couldn't seem to let go of the straps. So she curled the leather around her fist and inched up, slowly at first then steadily back, away from Valentine, the empty sack shushing over the carpet.

Then she stopped.

What if he wakes up? What if he never wakes up? What if the men return and find him like this--

Helpless--

She studied the interior of the tent with new eyes; renegade eyes.

Bulky canvas sacks stuffed with embroidered silks, for women's robes and exquisitely tailored _tobes_ and _surwals_ and jubbahs and bantaloons. Chests full of gold and jewels stacked one upon the other, with leather straps securing them all into a high tower that reached well past her head. One enormous chest at the foot of the bed containing only weapons: their blades immaculate, perfect, deadly.

Her heart beat faster as she scanned more and more quickly.

Gold candleholders on the table. Gold plate and cup near the bed. His ruby earrings, caught under his chest along with the thick gold chain from which they now hung. Barrels of wine... ten, twelve, fourteen, nineteen--

She sat back on her heels, hugging the empty goatskin as if it could protect her from the reality that loomed as hot and angry on the horizon as the setting sun.

If Valentine's men find him helpless, they'll kill him.

And then they'll come looking for one last spoil of war--

They'll come looking for me--

And even if she hid, went up past the well and far into the hills, eventually--

"Valentine!"

She lunged, grabbed Valentine's shoulder, rocked him so violently that his own weight nearly toppled him from the bed.

"Valentine, wake up!"

She called to him again, pounded on his shoulder, his back, took his face between her two hands and shrieked--

"Wake up!"

Then she fell to her knees, her head against the bed where her only protector lay, as still as one dead.

"How could you leave me?" She hung her head and sobbed, fearful and weak against the bed. "How could you leave me all alone?"

Rubbing the wetness from her cheeks onto Valentine's precious silken sheets, she tried to think.

She had to get away. Now. Quickly. Before the soldiers returned.

But this time she wouldn't leave the water... not if the straps sliced through her flesh to the bone. This time would be different.

With the goatskin clutched firmly in her hands, she backed all the way to the flap of the tent, ducked out, and when she reached the path, she turned her back and ran.

***

Cross sat with her knees drawn up and her water skin wedged between her chest and her legs. As she gazed out through the tangle of scrubby sage she hid behind, she inched the skin to her mouth and drank.

The skin was two days lighter now, since two full days had passed since she'd left Valentine's camp.

Cramped and achy, she shifted but barely, then pressed her heels to the gravelly ground, trying to ease the muscles twisting her legs because she didn't dare stand, didn't dare make even the tiniest of sounds.

From her hilltop hiding place, she glanced at the setting sun, then back down at a small pool of water rippling beneath the shade of a dozen tall palms that shushed, as if warning her quiet, with each cool breeze that blew. She breathed deep of the freshened air as it skimmed past her fevered cheeks, but she couldn't calm the pounding in her chest although she knew the dusk would move in quickly now, to envelop all in blessed darkness... the oasis, the shallow wadi in the distance, the very hill she sat upon.

Dusk heralded the most ideal time for marching and yet, the small group of men surrounding the oasis didn't move off. They kept talking; lingering; laughing quietly among themselves.

Fists tightening into a stranglehold around the straps of the goatskin, she bit her knuckles until they bled--

Go... away!

Then she lowered her head to her knees and shivered.

Cold? _Yes._ Afraid? _Of course--_

But why? The men didn't seem threatening, didn't appear dangerous.

She remembered the day she first saw Valentine, driving his camel along the wadi, a day that seemed so long ago now, yet she remembered Zero's words clearly--

Cross, you have to learn how to think--

Maybe the men at the oasis were simply shepherds.

But even she knew that shepherds had sheep.

These had no sheep.

Or maybe they were traders, but traders had camels, traders had goods. These four had no camels and no goods, just small packs of gear. A pot for cooking; some sacks of grain and more sacks of coffee; carpets for sleeping and praying; goatskins for water--

Brigands, she knew, had weapons, yet these wore only long knives at their waists such as any man might wear, thrust beneath swaths of brightly checkered cloth, the same cloth that protected their heads and shoulders from the sun.

She leaned forward to peer through the advancing darkness, to hear over the rising evening gusts, because she needed to glean any bit of conversation, any shred of a clue as to whether she could trust them or not.

She never saw the sharp twig that poked near to her eye.

She jerked back, caught a breath, snapped off the offending branch, and then it was too late.

One of the men turned quickly, glanced up the hill.

Leaving the fire, he stood and stared, directly at the spot where she was concealed.

Cross stiffened.

The man watched for a few moments more, then turning back to his comrades, he made a gesture toward the darkness. They all laughed, dozens of white teeth shone bright in lined brown faces, as he settled down before the fire.

She moved one shaking hand to her mouth, needing to muffle even her thoughts--

_I hate them_ _I hate them I hate them I hate them--_

She needed water. The goatskin was nearly empty. What would she do if yet another night passed and they still lingered? Die up here, hidden in the hills, because she was too afraid to get the water?

But she could never approach the oasis; what if the men were brigands?

And she couldn't approach if they were traders, either; traders often became slavers when opportunity presented

Couldn't she approach if the men turned out to be simple travelers?

She, a young woman, marching into the midst of strange men, alone... unprotected... _unclaimed_.

The very thought was... unthinkable.

So if they didn't move off she would just have to sit until she died of thirst--

Behind these miserable scrubby bushes and I must have been stupid, stupid to have ever thought I could be out here in the wilderness, alone--

And lonely--

Always lonely--

She leaned forward again, the wind tangling her hair among the white spines of the zilla bushes as she strained to hear something; a comment; a scrap of conversation; the beginning, or even the end, of a story; anything--

Anything--

Anything to prove that she, too, was a human with a heart, a person with a soul--

But her woman-ness would always set her apart from them.

Her female-ness would always render her separate and somehow, less.

A man would stride down the hill, slip his skin from his shoulder, dip it the cool water. And one of the men, likely the eldest, would call to the newcomer, incline his hand, invite the stranger to share a story and in payment for the tale, they would share their fire, their meal, their steaming black coffee, their conversation.

A man... friend or enemy... any man... would immediately belong. It was simply the way of things. For thousands of years, this was how things were done.

But then, suddenly, she didn't care about their conversation or the aromas that had drifted up from their campfire to drive her stomach wild for the past two days; now, she cared only about a man who'd once said _'and you're a woman'_ because it had just become all too clear what he had meant.

He was right. He was always right.

And if he were here, his long legs stretched out beside her, she would ask him why she deserved to be so condemned through no fault of her own, through a mere accident of birth.

He wouldn't laugh at her; this much she knew... he'd just smile that sad, far-off smile and stroke her cheek and try to answer, as best he knew although he knew, as did she, the question had no real answer.

She lay her head against her knees.

The wind gusted unusually long and loud, bringing with itself the sound of a man singing, _as if that ass's braying could be called singing,_ and her throat tightened.

Because she once knew a man, a man whose warmth she had held deep inside her, who really knew how to sing. A man who, when he sang, could crack your heart clean, like soft stone too long in the fire.

Silent tears sprang up as they so often did when he sang, and when Billy sang, because Billy's voice was something like his.

And Valentine knew that about Billy's voice, too... she was sure of it.

How many nights had they spent around tall, narrow campfires with Simon sulking and Argo bragging and Ned leering, until Valentine would say, _'Billy drew short straw again, eh, boys?'_

And then, his voice soft, just this, _'Gideon....'_

First finger lifted ever so slightly, he'd nod toward the hidden place where the lookout was stationed, and Gideon would move off and a little while later Billy would arrive and Valentine would say, _'Sing for us, Will,'_ and Billy would begin to sing and Valentine would grow quiet, listening to the sweet, clear voice ringing through the empty night.

And then, weakened by denying her tears, she'd stretch out beside the fire and bury her face in her arms, and when her shoulders would heave with her sobbing, Ned always laughed and Simon growled and Argo snickered while Billy, unsure, kept singing because Valentine hadn't ordered him to stop, until finally Valentine would slide his arms under her and carry her to his tent and lay her gently on the bed and only after he'd kissed away every tear from the corners of her eyes and the curves of her cheeks, only when there were no more tears... then would he slip his hands between her knees and fill her, murmuring just as he always did, _'I know I know I know I know.'_

She scrubbed at the tight trails the salt had left on her face.

Valentine did know.

And some things she knew, too....

She knew why Valentine needed to go into her when Billy sang... and it wasn't for lust or power or any kind of feeling toward her... it was because only there, in her woman's place, could he find his brother who had gone there before and left some part of himself behind.

Only there, in the shelter of her womanhood, could the two share one another in love and be brothers once again.

Gusts stilled, she lifted her head.

Different sounds came from the oasis, now; the sounds of sacks and skins and feet scuffing through the sand.

Peering over her knees, she watched one of the men kick out the fire. The most senior, with a curly beard looking like a tight white cloud that had drifted earthward and settled on his chest, now wore his gear on his back: a signal to the others that they should do the same. But still, they collected themselves slowly, laughing a little and sighing deeply, as if to delay the inevitable.

After two long days, they were finally moving off.

But Cross still didn't move, not until the men had been out of sight for many minutes and she could no longer hear their voices or the sound of their feet as they herded rubble before them. Instead, she sat with her face on her knees, her cheeks stung by tears that continued streaming, hot and clear, over the salt bloom on her hands.

Finally she stood and in the darkness, eased her way slowly down the hill. At the oasis, she pushed the stubbornly buoyant sack under the water as she stared up at the sky, its blackness enlivened by few scattered specks of light.

After some short searching, she found his star.

Keep that one in front of you and you'll head north--

She would climb the hill again, and follow that star.

It had been at her back, but now it would shine full in her face as she left the oasis with its chill water and date heavy palms.

She would travel next through lush fields waving barley, then cross valleys filled with lily and dandelion. And after that, she'd climb high over hills dotted with flowering olive trees until finally, she'd swim through seas of wild grape, the pale green waves made of the tiniest buds on the vine.

She would pass them all again, just to return to the place from which she'd just escaped. And when she got close enough she would run, her feet marking the words she'd heard from her father so many times before, his hammer in one hand, a glowing iron in the other, his forearms so scarred that the thick black hair grew only in sparse little tufts--

Foolish... heedless... reckless... girl!

Chapter Eighteen

Hidden behind gnarled vines a few feet past the old well that sat at the edge of the Valentine's camp, Cross hesitated, allowing only her gaze to travel down the long, winding incline.

Nothing had changed.

Pennants flying, Valentine's tent still loomed the end of the path, surrounded by grayed olive trees. The soldiers' tent, low and ugly, still stood a few hundred feet beyond.

Both tents lay quiet.

Where Ned was, where Argo was, was noise... big, blustering, omnipresent noise. And Valentine, along with his men, always rose before dawn _'as soldiers should'_ despite the tranquility of the place, despite any drunken brawls that might have broken out the night before.

Were the men still away, then? After nearly two weeks?

And where was Valentine? Had he died inside that huge gaudy tent, just as she had feared?

The sun hadn't quite cleared the hills so she peered through the dim light to spy any signs of life, rising up on her tiptoes, leaning forward, stretching, straining, craning her neck--

"Halloo, missy."

She spun, saw a quick flash of purple, reached for her throat--

Argo, don't--

Too late.

She tried to pull the scarf away from her neck, tried to relieve the crushing weight on her throat, but she found no space for even the single finger she tried frantically to work under the cincture he'd wound so desperately tight.

Heels scraping in the gravel as Argo dragged her down the path, she heard high, wheezing sounds as she tried to breathe until slowly, slowly, all fell quiet... first sound, then breath, then light as she slipped into blackness.

And then she opened her eyes.

On the ground, hacking on the sharp swords of air trying to cut their way down the swollen column of her throat, she heard Argo laugh.

"Lookee what I found, Cap."

Shifting slightly in his battered camp chair, Valentine turned to face them. He pulled on the cigar between his lips, the glowing tip sparking his eyes.

"Well, well, well," Valentine smiled."Our wayward sister has returned. Well done, Argo."

"Thankee, Captain."

"You shall be rewarded," Valentine inclined his head, "especially since you exerted such admirable restraint. After all," gesturing, he circled the cigar, "the whore has such a little neck."

Argo grinned. "Aye, Cap. Thankee, Cap."

"Assemble the men. I will join them momentarily."

"Aye, Cap."

With Argo off, Valentine jabbed the last inch of his cigar into the unlit pile of kindling at his feet. Bracing his arms against his thighs, he leaned forward and blew gently until the dry grasses smoldered and the whitish twigs began to snap. With the fire high, Valentine lay on some thicker sticks.

Hand at her throat, Cross hung her head, trying to breathe, trying to think--

_So he'd been sitting here the whole time, in that creaky old chair in the dark-_ -

"The lads have just returned, as you see."

She nodded.

He eased in closer, his elbows still resting on his knees, and then he winked.

"Their mission was a dismal failure," he said softly. "They've nothing to show for themselves but two miserable camels. But I suppose it might have been worse..." he rolled his eyes, "they might've returned with nothing but asses. But they've no treasure. And no priest."

Cross fought the relief from her bruised voice, "Yes, my lord."

Valentine smiled a little.

"Look at me, lady."

Cross lifted her head, but kept her eyes low.

"I want to know why you returned here. You must have realized you were free."

She almost laughed.

Free?

She did look up then, into his face.

Smooth, unblemished skin, strong, even features, muscular, virile, energetic, confident--

But although she searched, she couldn't seem to find what she was looking for in those black eyes.

What was she looking for? Did she even know?

Sympathy? Understanding? Love?

No... something even more impossible, something even Valentine was powerless to offer--

The color blue--

"Well, lady?"

With his eyes so intent upon her, she needed to look away.

"I don't know why I came back."

Valentine leaned still closer, his voice now a whisper.

"Have you nothing to say to me?"

Still staring, he cocked his head in that odd way he had, slightly to the side, as if listening--

Softly, he gasped--

I love you, Galen Valentine, I'll never love anyone but you--

My dove--

But do you love me? Do you?

My heart, my love--

My Ilana--

He reached out, took her chin, turned her face to his.

"Nothing to say, lady? Nothing at all?"

Almost breathless, Valentine waited--

For the words that didn't save her but still might save you if you can but search your heart search your soul and find them waiting there--

Confused by his uncommon stillness, Cross opened her mouth, shut it again, trembling.

He, always so animated, so alive, now seemed unable, unwilling, to move until she gave him--

What?

What could he possibly want?

Hadn't he already had everything, absolutely everything, she had to give?

When he reached out and touched her shoulder, she forced herself to sit steady.

"Lady, if your heart could speak, what would it say? Tell me. Tell me in truth."

Bruised throat tightening, Cross drew up her knees and hid behind her arms.

In truth?

In truth I'm glad your filthy men didn't find the priest--

I hope he's far away where none of you can ever find him even if it means I'll never see him again never hear his voice or feel the touch of his hands even if I never have another thing to remember him by because I'll still have the sky and every morning after the stars disappear I'll watch and wait for those few seconds before the sun leaves us nowhere to hide and then I'll see him--

"I'm waiting, lady."

I'll see his eyes in the color of the sky--

She heard Argo laugh. Out in the clearing, surrounded by the men, he bellowed, the men roared, but when she glanced toward them, Valentine yanked her face to his.

"Look at me! Keep your eyes on me!"

A shaking hand raised, tears slid from the corners of her eyes.

"Please, my lord.... I'll tell you whatever you want me to tell you, I'll say whatever you want me to say--"

Valentine leaned back in his chair. After a long moment, he reached down, slipped the leather boot from her left foot and its mate from the right.

"You understand," he waved the little boots, "I must relieve you of these. And you must understand also, my patience is quite exhausted."

He tossed the boots into the fire and once the smoldering leather began sending an acrid black smoke into the air, he stood, stretched, then offered a hand.

He helped her to her feet, but when they reached the end of the path, Cross hung back, her gaze sweeping the clearing.

All the men were assembled, even Billy--

Who somehow never seemed to figure out the trick being played, when the same man drew short straw, night after night after night after night--

But now the night had gone, the sun had just cleared the hills, and Valentine stood tall and dark against the glowing pink sunrise, his earrings shooting crimson flames.

She noticed for the first time that his feet were encased in his tall black boots.

She shifted her gaze to her own bare feet and there, by her little toe, lay a spatter of blood.

She backed away, one hand lifted.

"No...."

Valentine nodded to Simon.

"Take her."

Cross cried out, turned to run, but Valentine took a step, blocked her flight as Simon caught a handful of hair and flung her down.

"Maggots!" he hollered. "Get her spread!"

Surrounded in seconds, hard hands reaching, grasping, everywhere, she tried to struggle to her feet, jagged thoughts screaming through her mind as Zero's words suddenly came back, hammering in her brain, throbbing in her heart--

You're nothing in the wasteland--

Understand that, then you can begin to understand all the rest--

Suddenly on her back with arms and legs pinned, she lay blind to the faces around her, numb to the thick leather straps being wound around her wrists and ankles. Hot tears burned her eyes but she couldn't cry; not when they lifted her legs to kick a roll of gear under her hips, not as the roar rose deeper, louder, as Simon approached, his grimy breeches unlaced.

Shooting a quick glance, Ned called to Valentine--

"Captain Valentine! Allow us the honor of following you!"

But Valentine had already returned to his chair by the fire. Eyes never leaving the flames, he lifted a hand and at his signal, Simon dropped to his knees.

Simon wrestled her robes up to her waist with one hand while working furiously beneath his belt with the other.

"Fat bastard," her words came sudden, sharp, from between clenched teeth, "can't you get that little thing hard?"

Growling, Simon slammed a hand across her face.

Her lower lip split apart. Gasping, she peered through blurry eyes--

Not enough but almost enough--

She puffed out a puddle of blood.

"Fat bastard...."

The men howled and so did Simon. Brawny arm lifted, he smashed another blow across her face that sent her head lolling on her shoulders.

She groaned.

"Fat... stupid... bast--"

His hand fell like a hammer.

Lights flashing, the blackness loomed, sweet darkness gathered, swirling, shifting, as dense as clouds--

Almost, almost--

But then she felt Simon's hands shoving her robes up over her breasts, felt his steaming bulk hovering over her. One sweaty hand clamped hard on her jaw, shaking her awake.

She opened her eyes and Simon smiled.

"A fat, stupid bastard would have beat your fucking brains out. But then you would have missed me. Cunt."

Simon clamped his hands on her bottom, rammed himself against her to fight his way inside. The men stood laughing, goading, cheering, _drive deep!_ _drive deep!_ as she lay with her eyes squeezed shut and sharp gravel cutting into her back.

When Simon was finally still, he spit and stood to take the straps from Ned.

Eyes burning as she gulped in the dry heat of the desert, her bare breasts shaking with every ragged gasp, she moved her gaze without really seeing--

D _on't count, don't count--_

And I should have stayed, I should have stayed and called him anything he wanted me to call him, I--

She saw Gideon swallow hard, then glance away.

Gideon why are you looking at Ned--

Panic surging, she strained against the straps, twisting, writhing, rubbing her wrists raw--

I should have stayed and called him anything anything anything he wanted me to call him--

Valentine I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry--

"Turn her over," Ned said. "Turn her over the gear."

No--

She felt wind against her face as Simon and Gideon yanked her up, spun her, then threw her back down over the canvas pack. When she tried to struggle up, Gideon locked a hand over the back of her neck.

"All yours, Neddie," he said.

Hands pinned, she clawed the ground, feeling other hands, hard hands, iron hands, holding fast to her ankles, to her wrists, chaining her to a mindless terror that grew and swelled and finally broke inside her. The scream started deep, spanning from gut to chest, and when the low galloping wail threatened to spill out between her lips, Gideon, kneeling beside her, clamped a hand over her mouth to stifle the sound.

Bathing his hand in spit and tears, she clenched her teeth, held her breath as Ned opened her, but when he began inching deeper and deeper, she thrashed like some animal and screamed.

When he spoke, he sounded so far away.

"It hurts, doesn't it...."

She could only gasp, the whole of her being fixed on a single point of fire.

"Say it!" Ned grabbed a handful of hair, shook her loose of Gideon's hand. "Say it, 'it hurts, doesn't it....'"

She whimpered.

"It hurts--"

Doesn't it--

Zero--

She writhed and wept until a final shriek welled up and she surrendered the last of her strength, praying, pleading, her pleas soft secret silent--

Oh god god if you're real if you're there please let me die please let me die now--

Then Gideon lunged, his hair falling over his face so there was no face, just his harsh whisper in her ear--

"Don't fight! Fight and this fuck will rip you apart! Don't be stupid! Don't resist!"

He gave her shoulder a quick, furtive pat, and when his words shot through the fog of pain, they tumbled unfettered until they converged, coherent, in some hidden realm that still existed inside her mind.

Don't resist, don't resist--

Don't resist what?

Evil. Resist not evil--

Who said that, someone said that--

Zero it was Zero--

The words played over and over in her brain, sparking and fanning the single remaining flicker of her will. The words were her secret now, hidden inside her, their unchallenged power honed so sharp they sliced the tethers that held her and set her spirit free.

In a single shining instant, her soul was loosed from the bonds that held her body hostage and then from the body itself. Her liberated spirit floated high above the ground, weightless and unhindered, like a rising cloud free to seek and soar.

Delivered from bondage, she reveled in this new sensation of distinct vision. She watched from the sky and saw her own fingers bite into the rocky sand, heard her own gasps mingling with those of the man who had, in his frenzy, bitten the skin at the back of her neck.

She could even see Gideon's eyes.

His earth eyes, like hers, were sightless and dull, but with glorious liberty her spirit eyes traveled unfettered, leaving behind nothing but the shell of her body to sweat and strain beneath the soldiers' assaults.

She was streaming, like light through clouds, and from the billowing white she saw a shock of color and black hands gripping her ankles. The tethers tightened for a touch that raged purple under the blazing sun but her being remained shielded, the rich violet transformed into a mantle that swathed her in softness.

Nothing could touch her now.

Her spirit soared, restlessly flying, riding the crests of wind that blew her hair away from her sweat stained face until, with undisputed power, her soul stole the color of Gideon's eyes and used it to summon the sky and the seas that were only tales once told in her childhood. Then her spirit recalled another blue, the color like a whisper, reflected in the eyes of another man.

Where she had seen those eyes?

They were his eyes... Zero's eyes. And her soul's revelation, pure with crystal clarity, showed her the place where they were born, like the stars, in a cataclysmic explosion of agonizing pain. In breathless excitation, her mind alive with insight, she used her spirit eyes to explore the image she'd uncovered from all perspectives and with consummate vision.

As she watched, she listened to the song of her spirit.

Where your body is now, where Gideon is now, that's where Zero is all the time.

This is where he lives, this is where he lies... day after day, hour after hour, naked in the dirt, leather straps binding him, his soul spread open and forced to bear the vile body of every man's sin.

In a world of so much pain, it's more pain than he can bear--

_This is the evil against which he wages war,_ the spirit voices sang--

T _he evil he once was, the evil he still is...._

Cross took a deep breath.

Zero's words had come true at last. From this moment on, they would begin again.

With perfect control, she pulled her soul back into her body.

The gravel felt sharp.

With nothing but the image of Zero's eyes before her, she shook her head so her hair could cushion her face as tears trickled down, stinging the cuts on her cheek.

Gideon dropped the leather straps that were no longer necessary to restrain her, and flexing his fingers, he rubbed at the bright red grooves scoring his hands as he knelt between her legs. Lifting her hips, he slipped in without a sound, his thrusts full and measured and dutifully precise.

"That water you wanted?" he said, his eyes fixed on his comrades' retreating backs as they sauntered away together. "I'll get it after I'm done. There's just me and Billy left."

But she never heard him; along with the birds, her soul already had risen to skim the restless currents, soaring high then tumbling through the undefiled blue of the sky.

***

Off in the distance, still sitting his old camp chair, Valentine rubbed his eyes. He knuckled hard, grinding them into black shards reflected nothing of his secret vigil.

He was well satisfied; his soldiers had done their duty. The slick smears that wet the girl's thighs and filled her secret places might be anonymous, but she would never belong wholly to herself, or anyone else, ever again.

And even the priest couldn't change that.

She sat silently now, with the animals, her head hanging, her bound hands limp in her lap.

He poked the fire with a piece of kindling, then jammed the charred remains of her boots under the burning sticks. The smoldering embers gave off a caustic smoke that stung, but he remained seated amid the smoky quiet as the deepening hush beckoned with seductive fingers, and he felt the hard beating of his heart finally ease.

Stretching his tight limbs, he sat watching through slitted eyes as his men broke camp. Soon they would be on their way, marching to another mission, as soldiers should.

He clamped the horned tip of his wine sack between his teeth and tipped his hand for mouthful after mouthful; one stream after another gushing down his throat until finally his mind began to drift to Geoffrey, to the girl, to the priest, to the wars, and then to the memories... memories that, when they came upon him too fast or too strong, would steal his sleep for weeks and condemn him to fitful dozing.

Resting his chin on his chest, he closed his eyes.

For a few moments, at least, there would be no more memories--

"Captain Valentine? Captain, sir?"

Ned crouched slightly, his fingers raising a loud, rough sound as he scratched at the short bristles that covered his shaved head. He flung his long braid over his shoulder, peered, and then, ever a student of experience, strode three long steps back, until he stood well out of reach.

He bent lower still, his gaze on Valentine's face.

"Cap?" he said softly. "All loaded up, sir."

Valentine's eyes opened over wide. He smacked his hands on the arms of the chair and heaved himself to his feet.

"Thank you, Edward."

The lieutenant took the chair, collapsed it down and strode away, the chair dangling off a single finger hung over his shoulder.

Fingers working the buckles of his leather armor, Valentine scanned the caravan.

All that could be transported had been loaded. As in the past, his tent, table and bed would remain behind. The bulging sacks of treasure hung suspended between the humps of the two stolen camels, but Valentine's camel... bred for both speed and the comfort of the rider... remained unburdened but for saddle, personal belongings, and the girl. Secured by a long rope tied to a ring at the base of the three pronged fork of the _térik,_ the other end of the rope ended in tight coils that had already bitten into her crossed wrists.

Content, Valentine nodded; all was as it should be.

Ned and Simon waited beside their treasure laden spoils; Gideon and Argo guarded the flanks; young Billy, smiling despite the imminent prospect of having to dodge camel flops, covered the rear.

"Ready, men?"

"Aye, sir."

Valentine turned, ready to mount.

Still motionless beside the camel, Cross stood silent. Her long hair hung in a loose tangle over her shoulders, and when the wind blew it across her face, she made no attempt to shake it back.

He couldn't see her eyes.

Valentine unhooked the switch from the saddle, spun, and whipped it down across her neck. Falling against the camel, she clutched for the stirrup, but no sound came from her lips.

Valentine laughed.

"A daughter of the Brotherhood, as hard as stone. Well. We shall see."

Swinging easily onto the térik, he lifted one broad hand.

"Hut, hut, up!"

Slowly they started off, Valentine rocking slightly to keep balance as the camel lifted from its knees and found its stride, but they had taken only a few steps before Valentine shouted back, "Ho, Ned! Argo! Come!"

Ned slid off his camel, Argo loped in from the side, "Cap?"

Valentine threw back over his shoulder, "Torch it."

"Aye, Captain."

Valentine unstrapped a quiver of arrows, tossed it as Ned, grinning, trotted past, heading for the trail. Halfway up, the soldiers quickly flamed the arrows, took aim, and sent the burning missiles whooshing through the air.

The arrows burst through the roof of the gaily striped tent nestled between the two groves of olive trees, and then, amid the soldiers' cheers and the smell of smoke, the small caravan moved off toward the waiting desert, leaving paradise behind.

Chapter Nineteen

"D'you think it'll be cool in Heaven, warrior?"

Ibrahim sat on a violet colored pillow edged with golden tassels. His favorite slave fanned him with a plume of peacock feathers while the black eyed Saracen waved away any flies that had a mind to light. The yellow and red striped canopy overhead hung limp, as if under a shower of wet rather than under the blazing sun.

It was not yet noon.

"Well, warrior? Will it be cool?"

Zero glanced up from where he lounged, his arm resting across a cushion puffed high with fluffy down. With one finger he idly circled the tassel he held between the fingers of his other hand.

"There's no weather in Heaven."

"No weather? No sun, no heat, no flies... nothing?"

"Only the Lord and His angels."

"No women?"

"No women as such."

"Well, I'm not sure I like your heaven," Ibrahim said, shifting. "I much prefer mine own."

The slaver sighed and flapped his open robes to make a breeze. As he scratched the sweat from between his legs with long strokes, his member wiggling like a mad white worm, the sharp eyed Saracen reached toward him suddenly, examined what she plucked from the nest of wiry black hairs, then promptly crushed it between her fingers.

"You would prefer my heaven, too, warrior," Ibrahim eyed the Saracen as he scratched his head and peered under his nails, "wine, women... all you desire."

"Heaven already holds all I desire."

"I don't know...."

Zero turned slightly, glanced toward the yellow haired slave who crouched, silently waiting.

He scrubbed his lips with the back of his hand.

The slave sprang to her feet, took the tall narghile from where it sat just beyond his grasp, and puffed, testing.

The resins still glowed so she knelt beside him, poised the silvered tip at his lips, but he lifted a hand.

It trembled just slightly.

She set the pipe down, her face impassive.

"No poppy in Heaven," Ibrahim yawned, "and no yellow haired slaves! Imagine, the whore dares raise her eyes to yours," he lifted two fingers and directed them toward his own wide eyed stare, "she sets her gaze upon whatever she pleases! She's shameless! You should beat her. She should be grateful."

"For what?"

"For everything! She could be out there," he jerked a thumb at the other slaves who huddled, melting and miserable in the sun, "instead of over here. With us."

Ibrahim beckoned and the Saracen conveyed the pipe. He took a deep draw and then, unwilling to relinquish his claim upon the smoke, struggled to speak.

"I don't understand it," he said, strangled, "the why of it, if you know what I mean. You can fuck any of them, the ugly ones out there," he jerked again with his thumb, "just as well as you can fuck any of these in here. The smart man..." he raised one sage finger, "what does he do? He pays for an ugly cook... but what does he walk away with, hmm? A whore who can cook."

"Hmm."

The Saracen smiled. Waving flies with one hand, she inched the other toward the fringe of blue beads that decorated the hem of the yellow haired slave's new garment. Still smiling, she teased a heavy tassel into her fingers, buried it inside her fist, then yanked, ripping a length of the fancy trim from the border of the robe.

Zero laughed quietly.

"I'm a business man," the slaver was saying, "I know I can get five times as much for one of these as one of those," he jerked his thumb a third time, "but I still don't understand it. So you see, warrior, she should be grateful," he peered around the Saracen's black head to frown at his yellow haired property, "grateful and smiling, instead of staring and thinking all the time."

Zero glanced at the slave.

Her master, ever intuitive, appeared to have assessed correctly.

She was staring.

And, very possibly, thinking.

He followed her gaze to where it ended; the symbol of the cross branded into his upper arm.

She looked away quickly and he conquered the urge to rub the long healed wound, as if her stare had seared his skin as fully as had the fire so many years ago.

Lips tugging, he turned back to Ibrahim.

"Perhaps she is grateful."

"Humph." The slaver scratched again. "She looks at you the way a man looks at a whore, right full in the face. You should beat her for that alone, and you have my blessing. I should have left her out in the wilderness where I found her."

"Why didn't you?"

"Oh, lord, I have too big a heart for the whores. There was I, on the Az-Amin road, hoping to avoid the rampaging scum, but one of them must've got hold of her. Only a dog would so misuse merchandise."

The slaver cleared his throat and shook his leg to dislodge the flies that tickled in the hairs, but the Saracen had turned away to massage Zero's feet.

"I figured then, the price was more than fair," Ibrahim shifted and coughed until the Saracen turned back to wave away flies that had already flown, "but now I wonder." He tittered a little laugh. "Maybe she thinks she has rights... that'd get her throat cut by anyone, even an honest man! But d'you know, the dog left his dagger. Gold, it was! With jewels! Unheard of! Leaving the dagger, I mean, not cutting the whore's throat.... What do you make of it, lord?"

"Where is the dagger now?"

"With me goods."

"Perhaps if you returned the item, she wouldn't stare so much."

The slaver's brows drew together as his lips pursed.

"Allow a whore to possess such a weapon, lord? T'would be unseemly, would it not?"

"Perhaps she looks upon it as a good luck charm. After all, the dog didn't succeed in killing her, and the Lord in His infinite mercy sent you, a man of charity and generous nature, to bind her wounds, wet her parched lips...."

"Aye, I did, I did! I fed her, too, and let her ride... the first day."

"Slaver, I look upon you as..." Zero spread his fingers and smiled, "as like the Good Samaratin."

The slaver sat upright, a brighter, broader smile crossing his face.

"I? Like the Good Samaratin?"

"Aye, slaver. When all the others crossed the road, only the Samaratin--"

"Bound the traveler's wounds! As did I!"

"Aye."

"Aye!"

"Ponder it, slaver. You may find that upon returning the item in question both she, and your own heart, become much unburdened."

"Lord, I shall consider it," the slaver nodded. "After all, as you can see, I have been much blessed in my business dealings and so, have no need of treasure with such...." Ibrahim's fingers waggled, searching, "Such...."

"Such an infamous history."

"Aye. Such an infamous history."

The slaver settled more firmly into his purple pillow. His favorite fanned, the Saracen waved; the favorite brought the pipe to his lips, and after he'd puffed, his cup. He sighed and then, despite the heat, he smiled.

"Lord, I have been truly blessed," he laced his fingers across his chest, "but alas, the world has not. The evil one always finds the weakest link in the chain, does he not? They ruined the world, you know."

"They?"

"Women. Abandoned the family."

Zero glanced at the yellow haired slave. "In truth, they certainly have paid the price, have they not?"

Ibrahim yawned.

"Poppy makes me sleepy." His favorite had stopped fanning and there was a giant fly perched on his penis, but all he said was, as his eyes shuttered down, "Still, you'd think she'd be more grateful."

Zero heaved to his feet.

"Depends on what you're looking for, I suppose."

The Saracen tilted her head, and eyeing him sideways from beneath black lashes, she smiled with a show of strong white teeth.

"For what do you look, lord?" she said, slowly dragging her words through the thick honey of her voice.

Zero looked down, and when he smiled, she shook her head to make her glossy curls dance.

A strand of hair caught between her slightly parted lips, and Zero slipped a little finger under the strand to drag it free, then he took her chin and urged her to her feet. After she'd drawn up straight, leaning back until her breasts, with a soft sucking sound, lifted high, she waited while he cupped both her breasts in his big hands. When he slid his hands down to her waist, she tightened the strong muscles of her belly and knees out-turned, licked her lips and plunged.

Zero smiled again. He set his fingertips against her back and when she glided forward with long, snaky strides, he ducked under the canopy and followed, his gaze fixed on the long fringe of her girdle, shuddering in the sun.

***

"Drop the weapon."

The yellow haired slave stopped creeping toward the fluffy mound where, in the dusky interior of Zero's tent, the Saracen sprawled face down across all five pillows, asleep. When the blade pricked against her back, she didn't turn; the point marked the place directly behind her heart.

"Drop the weapon."

The dagger fell with a thud.

At the sound, the Saracen's eyes opened wide. In a flash she was up and away; she dashed past the yellow haired slave, ducked under Zero's sword, and hid behind his outstretched arm. Toes digging in the pile of the carpet, she slowly rose up to peered over his biceps. She narrowed her gaze to a glare, put her teeth together, and hissed.

"Go." Zero dragged her from beneath his arm. " _Imshi!_ Go!"

The Saracen moved quickly, her brown body lithe, but before she went out she eyeballed the slave, drew her nude body up to its full height, and spat.

"Out," Zero said, the flat of his blade to the velvety skin of her bare bottom.

The Saracen slid from the tent and Zero planted the sword through the carpet underfoot.

"I would see the weapon."

The yellow haired slave retrieved the knife, then offered it up with trembling hands.

"So, here is the iniquitous dagger." He took the jeweled hilt in his hand and smiled. "I'm pleased your master has seen the wisdom of parting with it... after all, you paid for it with far more than blood."

He tossed the dagger onto the cushion nearest his foot.

"Well. What did you intend to do with it? Hmm?"

The slave studied his booted feet.

"Well? Did you plan to drive it into your rival's heart? Or mine?"

He scooped up a few dates from a bowl beside the cushions, popped one and chewed.

"I doubt you had murder on your mind... you didn't even look at the lovely Saracen when she ripped those lovely blue dangles from your robe. And you don't give a damn who I fuck; those in your profession understand men too well to ever expect, or desire, fidelity."

He took up the dagger again, ran a finger along the fine turn of its tip, and when he laid the cool metal against her cheek, she shivered.

"Still, why do you bring it here to me? I have no need of weapons and no interest in treasure."

He lifted her hand, laid the dagger across her palm, and closed her fingers over the hilt.

"Your master is a fair man, all things considered. That weapon will purchase your freedom many times over, now that he has agreed to return it to you. And he will be delighted with the trade," his lips tugged, "trust me in this."

But she offered the dagger again and when he didn't take it, she reached for his hand.

"Don't be a fool," he lifted his hand, fingers spread, "trade it--"

She threw the dagger at his feet.

He laughed. "Was ever a woman born, who was not an enigma?"

After a moment, the slave picked up the weapon and with her gaze locked to his, slowly drew the dull edge of the knife across her neck.

"I know," he said softly. "I understand."

She frowned and shook her head and lightly tapped his cheek.

When he glanced down, she raised the knife to the scar on his upper arm, then she traced the cross with the tip of the blade.

"The Brotherhood?"

Zero snatched the weapon and ducked out of the shadowy tent.

Examining the dagger in the strong light of day, he glanced up when the slave stepped from the tent, stared as she first touched his lips, then brought her fingertips to her ear.

"Tell you what? There's nothing to tell."

His lips tugged.

Liar--

Not true--

With his gaze locked to the steel, memory fixed him where he stood. Condemned always to remember, his mind held to the past until the slave placed her hands on either side of his face.

Soundlessly, she mouthed the words, " _Dites-moi._ "

Tell me--

Unwilling to shape his thoughts into speech, he sheltered in silence for a few moments more, then took her hands and pulled them away from his face.

" _Mon frère,_ " he sighed and fell silent, _Valentine--_

Had elected to lead a small party on a foray into an enemy encampment, but I, too besotted by diverse unnatural substances to find, much less mount, my horse, stayed behind to offer the prayers. As I recall I did pray for my brothers... for their resolute valor, for their decisive victory, for their safe return to the bosom of our Brotherhood....

They returned to camp three days later, flush with treasure and the hot blood of conquest. The thundering of their horses' hooves fairly cleaved my skull, as I was again under the influence of myriad unwholesome devices... and while Valentine and his company reveled in their hard-won glory, accepting the cheers and accolades of our brothers, I rolled off my pallet, stumbled from my tent and threw up....

Zero glanced at the slave but under the intensity of her gaze, quickly lowered his eyes to focus on little ridges of sand he'd scuffed up with the edge of his boot.

I bathed quickly; they were waiting for me, you see.... and dressed in white robes befitting my role as their priest, I draped a stole around my neck and wrapped a plain cincture, the symbol of purity, around my waist. Valentine and his party had already assembled inside the tent designated as our chapel, and after I entered, took my place at the head of them, I made ready to serve the sacred Host despite bleary eyes that refused, of their own volition, to focus.....

With the others, Valentine knelt, still clad in his leather armor. He looked up at me and smiled, looking like nothing so much as some young warrior-god, so immense was the power of his triumph, the force of his influence. But as he approached the holy altar and knelt before me, I saw his boots, encrusted with what I took at first to be yellowing curds of moldy cheese. But when I realized his boots were caked with dried clots of tissue, of brain, the tent... it suddenly felt too small, too close, as though the very presence of myself and my brothers had filled the place with an evil so pervasive, with a stench so rank--"

" _Je me rappelle,_ " he said aloud, briefly catching the slave's eyes, " _même maintenant, l'odeur du mal._ "

He took a short breath as if needing to cleanse his lungs of that same foul smell, then quickly surrendered again to memory.

But the sense was so strong... so inescapable... that I knew the evil taken root in the depths of our souls. And at that moment, although I stood with the means of salvation, the Bread of Life, in my hands, I realized I could not offer it. Not to Valentine, not to any of these men, my brothers. Nor, were our roles reversed, could they to me....

So I begged Valentine to suffer the redemptive power of Christ's Grace through confession. I implored him to lead his men by his own humble example so they, too, could share in the transforming miracle of the Body and Blood. It escapes me still, how a priest may scorn the confessional and still profess himself a priest! It's rather like a whore, is it not, who wheedles neither to swallow nor to spread....

Jaw hardening, he pitched the knife into the sand.

But make no mistake, I did not accuse him... not of pride or anger or greed or lust although I knew in my heart that he willingly harbored the stain of all of these... the scar of our all too imperfect humanity. But by my refusal to commit sacrilege, my refusal to defile the sacred Host, I'd angered him... no... I'd shamed him. So he declared me an unclean priest, accused me of being both hypocrite and renegade. I just stood there... numb... watching as he wrapped his fingers in the cross-guard of his sword, wondering--

Eyes searching the sky, Zero lifted his hands and laughed.

"How had we come to this?"

How had we come to this place, my most cherished brother and I? The others in his party quickly drew their weapons but still I urged him to confess that he'd abandoned covenant... pleaded with him to admit that no devotion to the laws of our Brotherhood, no matter how perfect the adherence, could supplant the allegiance we as priests owed to the God in Whose shed blood abides redemption for all humanity....

"I fell to my knees. And there, at his feet, I begged him to confess the truth of it."

... _the truth as you saw it..._

Zero glanced at the slave, thinking perhaps he'd heard her voice just as he'd thought he'd heard it so often over the last months when he'd been consumed by relentless, restless reverie. But it wasn't her voice, it was that of the old liar--

... _the truth as you saw it! Was not Abel's sacrifice of blood more than acceptable, more than pleasing? Perhaps not to you... but to God? Yet you pretend to know the Almighty's Mind, His Sacred Heart--_

... _how do you dare to even begin to know the truth, you petty, puny little man?_

"The truth as I knew it then," Zero gripped the slave's shoulders and shook, "the truth as I still know it, even now, today, to be!"

The slave began to weep.

Zero retrieved the dagger, swept the swath of soot-colored wool away from the entry of the tent with the gleaming blade.

" _Assez,_ " he said softly, his arm outstretched. _Enough._ "There is no more tale to tell."

After she entered the tent, he allowed the wool to separate them before turning to look out over the oasis where the palms shivered in the implacable heat of the _sharav_ wind.

No more tale to tell.

Perhaps--

Yet there remained much to recall.

Valentine had said, _"I abjure."_

Such an odd phrase, I abjure--

To this very day, he wasn't sure exactly what Valentine had renounced.

He took a deep breath, the vivid pictures still playing out in color and sound, and in his mind, it was as if the slave still stood before him, the mute recipient of mute words, thought but never spoken.

With the words, I abjure, Valentine twisted my stole around his fist. He took his dagger and with one quick slice, stripped me of the symbol of my priesthood. And although I took his wrist, as if by staying his hand I might stay his vow, stay my separation from both brother and Brotherhood, he easily tore out of my fingers because--

Zero rubbed his face.

I was weak.

As weak as a woman.

His lips tugged hard.

The white powders--

Valentine tossed my stole into the flames and as I crawled toward the fire, determined to rescue, if nothing else, the sign of my covenant, I saw the bright silver threads embroidered upon my vestment... saw them holding true to the shape of the cross against the fire. I snatched them from the flames but when I touched the cross, it fell to ash beneath my hand. And then I wept... I, a soldier of Christ, wept on my knees like a child until Valentine hauled me up and shoved me from the tent at the point of his boot.

Zero laughed softly, answered aloud a question that the slave, safely hidden behind the tent flap, could not possibly ask--

"How old? Twenty two, as I recall. We were both twenty-two years old."

And from that day until this, I have wandered throughout the wasteland... chastened, yes... aimless, certainly....

But I have never... never... abjured--

Zero again stared down at the weapon in his hands.

Now, in the daylight, there was no mistaking the deadly blade that, curved in the local manner, ended in an impossible point. Nor the steel, its circular pattern displaying an organic sort of randomness, like spatterings of blood. Nor the gleaming gems, although a small empty ring at the base of the hilt had been pried open and snugged back up, the two butt ends of the ring left slightly misaligned.

Two pearls, silverblack, had once hung there. Had they still dangled from the jeweled hilt, he'd have recognized the weapon instantly.

He smiled.

The slaver....

The pearls would soon adorn his favorite's ears... or more likely, his own....

Like great, ripe olives, the teardrop shaped orbs fairly glowed, as luminous as the moon.

Whore's tears, Valentine had always called them. And like the real tears, kohl-kissed, for which they'd been named, those two pearls had bloomed under the constant attention of Valentine's restless fingers.

That jackal--

Zero stepped back into the tent.

The slave stood, cheeks slick, waiting for him.

He stepped to the bed; carefully centered the knife on the topmost cushion.

"I was mistaken. Do not trade the weapon. Remove the gems. Trade them to your master for your freedom. Keep the steel. Trade it for nothing less than your life." He held her with pale eyes. "Nothing less, do you understand? Syrian steel is priceless."

Before he could turn away, the slave landed three quick blows to his chest, hard, in the middle, where his heart beat hard.

"I don't understand."

She took one of his hands and lay it against her own heart, mouthing words; covered it with her other hand, her lips repeating the words, over and over although she made no sound, "A _vez-vous l'amour, avez-vous l'amour, avez-vous l'amour... pour elle?_ "

"Do I love her? Is that what you're asking? Do I love her?"

She nodded, her lips slightly parted, her eyes bright.

He touched her cheek.

"What can I say? This woman... somehow... holds pieces of my heart the way one holds a puddle of cool water between one's fingers."

The tears that brimmed in the slave's eyes overflowed and spilled down over her cheeks.

"You weep," he said. "Why?" Then, every muscle tensing, he gripped her shoulders. "You saw her," he took her shoulders and shook her, "you saw her!"

The slave nodded.

"But I searched, anywhere, everywhere--"

Suddenly needing light, needing air, he strode from the tent--.

Of all the blind fools--

The blindest of all is the fool who deludes himself into thinking he sees--

He reached a trembling hand to grip the tent pole nearest.

There was one place he hadn't searched.

The very place where he'd groveled like a dog, on his knees. A secret place that, although surrounded by barren wasteland, stood fertile and peaceful and safe....

A refuge for fallen priests.

The place had had so many names, one for each of the conquering tribes that laid claim to its sweet shelter. But he preferred, by far, its Arabic name--

Al Fajr--

The Dawn.

He looked up at the rising sun and silently reproached it for not having burned the blindness from his eyes.

For he had thought that no brother would approach sanctuary with his heart set on abomination, his soul rotten with sin. He had thought no brother would so dare defile that place. But the jackal had dared, he knew that now.... the jackal, as always, fearing neither men nor God, had dared everything.

He went inside, to where the slave still stood.

"How long have you known it was she whom I sought? Since the beginning?"

She slid a hand up his arm, rubbed the mark of the cross with her thumb.

"Since the beginning." His lips tugged hard and then he laughed. "Tell me, how did you know I planned to leave here today? Is my frailty so apparent? That I'd find it impossible to not taste that little wanton before I left...."

The slave lowered her eyes.

He smiled slightly, lifted his gear, but then he paused.

"Woman, why did you bring that dagger here to me? Because if you hadn't, there would have likely been no end to my wandering."

She went to the table, gripped the handle of a squat clay pitcher, and with a crooked smile, poured a small measure of water into her hand. As they both watched, she managed to hold it for very few moments before all the water seeped between her fingers.

He set down his gear.

"Lady... lady, what can I give you, what can I leave you? How can I repay?"

In perfect silence, she reached up, curled her fingers in his hair, dragged him down and pressed her lips to his.

***

Ibhrahim leaned forward, the thin woolen web that covered the entry to the tent brushing against his cheek. He held his breath to listen, but now there was no sound.

He shook his head, his long curls swinging.

"Unmistakable," he whispered. "I'm not a rich man for nothing, I have a sense of these things. I'm no stranger to the songs of love."

Threading a brown hand between the thin panels, he craned his neck, searching.

Down on the fine woven carpet?

Or with those long-fingered hands splayed across her breasts, the wings of an eagle caressing the white breast of a dove?

Or perhaps from behind, that shapely bottom caught tight to--

Eyes adjusting at last to the dim light, he caught splash of bright yellow hair.

The bed!

How rare....

He moved nearer, the leather of his sandals squeaking coyly.

But where is the silver? The silver has to be here somewhere--

"Quiet. Don't steal her dreams."

The slaver whirled, his shoulders smacking his ears, his hands clutching the striped fabric of his loose robe.

Zero clasped his weighty belt around his hips, his dangling weapons swaying silently. He slid the sword soundlessly into its scabbard, reached past the slaver to sweep the tent flap aside, and crowded the slaver from the tent.

"Lord," Ibrahim stretched out his hands, "the Saracen--"

"Farewell, slaver."

"Lord, you cannot go!" Ibrahim scurried after the long strides, his perfumed curls bobbing. "I need your protection! I will pay handsomely! Whatever you ask!"

Zero's lips tugged. "I serve no man."

"Oh, I'm a miserable clod, lord," chasing after the leather clad legs, the slaver wrung his hands, "miserable! Forgive my insolence! But is it-- Is it because of the whore? If she has displeased you, I will beat her!"

Zero spun, one finger raised.

"Careful, slaver. Wrongly condemn one who has committed no offense and you condemn yourself."

Zero turned away but abruptly turned back, his face grim as he stared down at the skinny little man.

"Would you have my friendship?"

"Aye, lord! Yes!"

"I wish you, then, to free her. She has done me a great service and I am indebted. You are in a position to relieve me of my debt. Will you do this for your friend?"

The slaver's voice became a quavering hush.

"You, lord? Indebted to a whore?"

"I have said it, have I not? Yea or nay, slaver... will you relieve me of my debt?"

"It is an honor, lord, I will do it!" Ibrahim's eyes widened, triumphant, "In truth, lord, before the Christ, I have done it! And do not doubt that I shall convey her to a place of safety... my word on it! Ibrahim the trader always keeps his word."

Zero smiled. He clapped his hand down on the man's shoulder and shook him gently.

"My thanks, Ibrahim the trader. Salaam alekum. May the Lord be with you."

"Alekum salaam, warrior. _Allah ma'ak_."

Ibrahim smiled benignly at the sand, his fingertips at his chest, but then his body jerked and he scurried again to catch up.

"But you cannot truly go, lord! Just look at me! What shall I do? Where shall I go? I need your guidance! I need your instruction!"

"Let the scripture provide your instruction."

"Your companionship, then!"

Zero mounted the crest of the hill, then he turned and smiled.

"Ibrahim, my friend, take my advice...."

"Yes, lord... yes!"

"Get a dog."

Chapter Twenty

Cross hit the ground with a skid and a grunt. She lay on her face listening to the laughter that rocked the low tent behind her. She waited for a long time, not breathing, just listening.

It still might not be over, the voice inside her head warned; if the shouts became restless whispers, if the loud laughter quieted to a deep rumbling snicker, then it still might not be over.

Several minutes passed before a faint tapping sound drifted to her ears. She relaxed a little; _tattoo._ Then, from behind the patter, came another sound; a dull wallop.

She knew what they were doing; she had watched them many times from one of the shadowy corners of the tent, where they would fling her after they were done with her.

One of them, probably Ned, had just thrown down a small carpet to hold the bets. The gamblers circled the special rug, their crossed legs knee to knee. Simon, the keeper of the cards, held the precious deck, watermarked and speckled with mildew from some place far from the aridity of this wasteland. Simon dealt recklessly and cards would be flying through the air even now, just as her thoughts were flying across her mind.

She took a breath.

The tattooing had begun; the card playing had begun. Soon they'd drink liquid fire and after they got tired of cursing and bragging they'd all fall into a stupor around the rug. Propped up against their raggedy sleeping rolls, they'd drop off to sleep one by one, lined up like little girls' dollies, the dog-eared cards still clutched in their dirty hands.

She pushed up from the ground, brushed the gravel from her palms, then rubbed any sticky wetness that remained onto her tattered dress.

Dirty hands... dirty bastards with dirty hands--

She drew her knees up to her chin, plucked a wiry hair off her tongue, and flicked it into the night.

Tonight, they hadn't thrown her into the corner, but out into the blessed darkness. None of the bastards wanted to feel Valentine's fists if he had to come looking for her like that other time.

So much the better for her. At least she had a few minutes of peace.

But it was so cold; she was so cold.

A fire blazed near to the entry of the soldier's tent, but she just tightened her arms around her knees. Better to be cold than near a fire, if the fire was near them. So she gazed into the night, into the sky, because the stars didn't know about their dirty hands or hers... they sparkled for her... for anyone... who cared to look at them, just the same.

All alone, with the stars, she could almost forget she sat chained like a dog; she could almost forget almost everything.

She lowered her face to her knees, trying not to think, but pain, blade sharp, sliced her stomach and she whimpered.

She was much hungrier than usual and when the pain came again, it took her breath into itself, so she tightened her arms around herself, gasping--

Go away... please go away--

When the sound of boots scuffling slowly through the sand came from behind her, she stifled her whimpers and inched her arms up over her head. Face jammed into her knees, she hid with animal wisdom, her body hunched and still, while inside her brain, she screamed--

It's over, it's got to be over--

Then an unmistakable sound came to her ears. The quick whip of laces, a long, low sigh....

She almost laughed.

Whichever one he was, he was peeing.

The torrent reduced to a trickle, then stopped altogether. The boots came closer, stopped close beside her, but she didn't lift her head to the thin blanket that dropped down over her shoulders, nor to the shove that followed it.

"This'll help."

Gideon crouched, stretched out a hand to offer a rude pipe, roughly carved from gray-green stone. Thin wisps of smoke oozed from the bowl, and whatever burned inside it smelled pungent and sickly sweet.

She shook her head.

"It'll help," he stared through bloodred eyes, held out the pipe again. "Go on."

"Don't make me, Gideon."

He shrugged. "Suit yourself."

Behind them, the tent suddenly blasted alive with voices and howls of laughter. Gideon shot a glance, then looked back at Cross.

"Mouth's bleeding," he said, first finger unwrapping from around the bowl.

Her cheeks flamed.

"Oh...." She pressed the edge of the blanket against the corner of her mouth, shrugged and blinked at tears. "My fault. Ned warned me--"

Don't scream don't scream don't scream don't scream but I went ahead and screamed anyway--

Gideon took another short pull, waggled the pipe.

"You sure?" His tone both wheedled and warned. "Neddie says he's still hungry."

She stared but he just laughed, his light brows lifting into the tousle of hair that covered his forehead.

"You know Neddie...."

With another glance over his shoulder, Gideon snatched her hand, pressed a small cloth wrapped packet against her palm, then staggered to his feet. Veering slightly left of straight, he shambled back to the soldiers' tent, misjudged the low flap of the entry, smacked his head, cursed softly, and slipped behind the heavy canvas wall.

She looked away.

Gideon... Gideon of the blue eyes--

The eerie paleness of another man's eyes wandered unbidden, as always, into her thoughts, but before she could chide herself, as she always did _, that was another world,_ a sharp gust, typically sudden, raised a wave of sand.

She ducked into the worn blanket, pulled it closer to her head and shoulders, but as the wind drove through to shake her spine, it also carried an aroma to her starved senses. Rising on wobbly knees, her fingers tightened around Gideon's steamy little bundle, wrapped neatly in a relatively clean piece of cloth. She lurched toward a dark place that hid like a secret between the two big tents, sat hard, opened the cloth oozing warm, greasy juices, and lifted her eyes to the sky.

He'd roasted her a little bird.

Saliva drenched her mouth and hands shaking, she sank her teeth into the flesh. With her eyes closed and her breath coming heavy, she forced herself to eat slowly, her stomach quivering while she chewed the meat to a pasty mash.

In the distance, a high howl echoed.

She hunched low over the bit of bird still held between her fingers, thinking, _jackals fucking jackals,_ and while she listened for the patter of paws, she drew up her knees and jammed the rest of the bird into her mouth. Cheeks bulging, she tongued the meat from around the bones, glancing all around and making ready to bolt should any glints of golden light come jouncing crazily out from the darkness.

But the only light came from the moon, teasing among the clouds.

Mouth overfull, she struggled to grind and swallow as she watched the light appearing and disappearing with every whim of the wind. But after another long gust hurried the clouds away, the moonlight shone brighter, sending bold rays to rest against the tips of her toes.

It was almost time.

In very few minutes the moon would be overhead, and then it would be time.

She stopped chewing, her dry mouth suddenly crammed full of dead meat.

Spitting out the mess with a spray of bones and half-chewed flesh, she watched the moon again reach out with silvery arms, and this time she shivered.

She lifted her hands to the cool, pale light. If only she could grip the rays that bathed her outstretched fingers, wrap them around her fists and haul herself up and out of this hell.

She almost laughed out loud.

What a fool she was, when even a fool's fool knew... it was almost time.

She rested her gaze on Valentine's tent.

While his tent at Al Fajr had been lavish, walls and lofty ceilings draped and curtained with silks and tassels and other costly fabrics, this was a simple canvas square, identical to the soldiers' tent but for sides that could be rolled all the way up in deference to the Captain's height.

A large water barrel stood beside the tent.

Aching, she pushed herself to her feet, and headed for the barrel. She smelled the sourness of the rank water before she even reached it, but still, after dipping her hand to skim the layer of scum from the surface, she sucked in. When she lowered her face to drink again, she felt a hand, fingers biting, grip her shoulder.

Under the heavy touch, she stiffened, waiting.

Ned--

But after several seconds there was nothing but silence.

Ned liked to talk, so it had to be Gideon.

Or maybe Billy... poor shy Billy, always late, always last--

Cross, can I please, f... f... f...f..., f... f... f... f..., f... f... f... f... fuck you?

In silence, she leaned over the low barrel, reached her arms across to the far rim. The water still held the heat of the sun so she didn't flinch when it soaked first the old blanket and then the front of her dress. She dug her fingernails into the wood, spread her legs to steady herself, locked her knees and waited.

A breathless second passed.

Whichever one he is, he must be very drunk--

"I have to go in to him," she whispered after another long silence, after he still didn't move. "Do you want him to come out of that tent? Do you need me to do it for you?"

She reached out behind, groping in the darkness, but when she heard a soft crunch of gravel, she froze.

Billy hadn't taken that long step back. Or Gideon.

Or any of Valentine's men, because--

I would have heard them long before--

She straightened slowly, water dripping from her hair, and when she spoke her own voice seemed too loud, although it was barely a whisper.

"Go away."

Zero took her shoulder again, wheeled her to face him. He glanced from her crown to her feet, the muscles in his jaw tightening.

"It's all right," she said. "It's not your problem."

How stupid that sounds--

He said nothing at all. Instead, he thumbed the marks that girdled her raw wrists, tracing every line, and when he released her hands, he followed the thick red scrape that coiled around her throat before wiping a thin trickle of blood from the corner of her mouth with his thumb.

"I remember now," he said. "His anger burns cold. Like ice."

"I've never seen ice." But then she remembered the touch of Valentine's hands and she shivered. "How did you find us?"

"After he took you from Al Fajr?" He shrugged. "Followed the camel shit."

She clung to the ragged blanket as if it could protect her from Zero's unseeing eyes that still, somehow, managed to see everything. Dirt caked her fingernails so she curled them into fists inside the blanket, and when she saw the same black crescents beneath her toenails, she buried her toes in the sand.

Why couldn't she just bury her whole body in the sand, like some slug seeking safety from the sun? Then she could just disappear from sight.

"Why did you come here, Zero? Why didn't you just stay away?"

"Why did I come here? I came to get you out of here."

"It's too late for that, isn't it?"

"Is it? You tell me."

She didn't end the silence.

"Tell me, Cross. Is it too late?"

She turned away, fixed on the moon's reflection in the barrel of scummy water.

"I don't know. I guess it depends on what I am. I don't know what I am anymore. If I was nothing before, what am I now?"

She glanced up and he met her eyes at last, the clear blue shining in the silver of the moonlight.

"You are who you always were," he said quietly, "in His eyes. In your brokenness perhaps even more... but certainly never less."

Then he smiled, gently touched the bruise on her cheek, and she staggered under the weight of his tenderness, the burden so hard and heavy it drove her down to her knees.

She quickly jammed her fists against her mouth--

The jackal mustn't hear--

"Tell me."

One knee to the sand, Zero circled her in his arms, but she held herself apart from him.

"You don't know what they did. And I let them do it. I let them do whatever they wanted."

"I know what they did."

"No, you don't." She searched his perfect face; the wide set eyes, the clean lines of his nose, his cheeks, the sculpted jaw that braved any hint of corruption, "You can't... not all of it. I am so...." She groaned. "Dirty."

He rested his head against hers.

"I know exactly what they did. Valentine and I schooled one another in many of the ways of war. Our Lord warned He would not be mocked; by His word, we must reap what we sow. Tonight I reap the fruit of my own sin."

He urged her head down onto his shoulder, brushed her forehead with firm, cool lips.

"Child of God. Don't you know that only evil that springs from within your own heart can condemn you?"

"Liar." Tears dripped down her cheeks just as the proof of her disgrace dripped down the insides of her thighs. "You can't bear the sight of me! I can see it in your eyes!"

"Perhaps you see a reflection... that which you believe about yourself. But that's all you see in my eyes."

Weak, she wrapped his legs with her arms and slid down to the gravelly ground. When her lips came to rest against one dusty boot, a memory, long forgotten, stole into her mind; she had marked his boot with her blood once before, countless tears ago.

"Zero? I want to be like I was before."

"Aye, lady." He stroked the hair that hung over her shoulders in thick, heavy clumps, like old hay gone black with mold, "All would overcome a world that swaddles us in nothing but shame. But to overcome it you must accept Him. Only in Him are all things made new."

"You want me to accept your god. A god I can't hear or see or touch--"

"Aye! Yes! It's called faith!"

He grabbed her hands, spread them before her.

"Listen! This is you," he gave her left hand a hard squeeze, "and this," he gently spread the fingers of the right, "is God. Hold fast to sin... allow it between you and His mercy... and it will separate you from Him." He moved her left hand back, one, two, three steps. "But put it behind you," he moved her left hand forward, one, two, three, four, five steps, "and the sins of the world will lift you, bring you closer to His light!"

She closed her eyes with a sigh.

How can he be so blind? There is no god--

She dragged her hands from his, a crooked smile twisting her lips.

"Priest.... I called your god. I begged him to help me. But he did nothing. He did nothing because he is nothing. Nothing, just like me."

Zero stiffened.

"You parrot the words of my apostate brother. I warn you, woman, there is no truth in him... he has no power over your soul, either in this life or the next. Only the Almighty can judge. And He will repay."

"Are you saying your god will judge them?"

"Yes."

"When?"

"When He returns."

"When's that?"

"I don't know."

"You don't know!"

His lips tightened a little. "I thought I knew, once."

"Then you need to listen to me, priest," she poked his chest with one dirty finger, "because there's something I know! I know that jackal will come out of that tent looking for me--"

"Stop."

"And he'll beat me and he'll fuck me, and then he'll throw me back out here like a dog to wait, until one of those other bastards wants to fuck me again! Damn you, Zero! It doesn't matter what I do or what I say, because this is my life! Don't you understand? For me, there is no other!"

He was silent.

She pushed at his shoulder but he absorbed the blow, pliant and unresisting.

"Say something, priest."

She shuddered, a single blade of grass in the wind, but he just crouched motionless, staring out into the desert.

"Say something, damn you!"

He blinked as if she'd startled him, then he smiled.

"So, woman... this is your life."

Blood had again gathered at the corner of her mouth, she felt the wetness there, but when she reached to wipe it away, he snatched her hand and held it firm, turning it palm to the sky. Scooping up a fistful of earth, he let the gravel shower down over her hand.

Most of it blew out into the desert, but a few of the larger stones fell true.

He found her eyes.

"If this is your life," he wiped the trickle of blood with his thumb, "if you truly believe that," he smeared a thick, faint cross on each of the smooth stones, "then His shed blood and yours, means nothing. It has done nothing more than sanctify these stones."

He curled her fingers over the reddened rubble.

"That is all your suffering has accomplished. And your life is crueler than any I have ever imagined."

He stood slowly, stretched out a hand.

He did not smile.

"Will you come?"

She just sat staring, the bloodstained stones clutched to her chest.

"And after we leave here, Zero? What then? The settlement further north?"

"Don't make me say things that will hurt you."

A tight smile curved her lips.

"I'm not the one who'll be hurt."

She slowly lifted her head, watched his face as she felt the anger slowly drain from her own, leaving only the sadness.

There are no words for this--

She drew her knees up and buried her face behind her arms.

"Cross? What is it?"

She ducked deeper but he pulled hard.

"Tell me!"

"There is no settlement. Not anymore. That jackal--"

"What happened?"

She threw off his hand.

"What do you think happened? He sent his men! He told them to find you! He said he only wanted you, they could keep the treasure--"

"Treasure?"

"And the spices! And the poppy! All he wanted was you!"

"But I wasn't there, he had to know that! Why--"

"I don't know why!"

"Oh, good Lord, Cross... the little ones. What happened to the little ones?"

"I-- They-- I don't know. They said... they didn't leave anyone. Anyone alive."

Silence raging, he lowered his head to his hand, his long fingers guarding his eyes, and driven by some reckless impulse, Cross grabbed his wrist and dragged his hand away from his face. Eyes wide, she watched as a single bright track of moonlight trailed down his cheek.

"Valentine," she whispered, staring at the drop of light that glimmered, now at the very edge of his jaw, "said it was for the best. They would have died slowly, all alone, out there in the wilderness...."

He looked up.

"Woman, how do you dare? How do you dare repeat his vile equivocations to me? You are either very brave or very foolish."

She shrunk back.

"I'm sorry."

Covering her head with her arms, she stared into his face by way of the eye she positioned to peer through the crook of her elbow. As slow seconds passed, she listened to the crackle of the fire burning outside the soldiers' tent and the cry of that moon maddened jackal, anything to keep from thinking.

But the thoughts would come.

He had wept for them, but not for her. His heart bled for them, but not for her. He'd held her in his arms for just one reason; to urge her to accept his savage, selfish god.

For himself, there was nothing.

"Did you have one of those women?" she asked suddenly. "Is that why you care so much about those children?"

As his right hand clenched, the fingers, unquiet, tightened in the grit. She saw, drew back, but he just laughed.

"The jackal has done worse to you than you thought, lady. He has torn out your heart."

She returned her head to her arms.

"No, priest. You did that."

He stood, turned his back and looked away.

"Enough," he whispered. "Enough."

Cross dug her nails into her scalp and driving her head down, sunk her teeth into the thick skin of her knee.

Enough, he's had enough, and now he's going to leave me here and I'm too afraid to run and I'm too afraid to die so I'll have to stand it forever and this truly will be my life and my life will be a hell--

"Cross." Abruptly, his hand reached across her line of sight. "Come."

She looked up; found only eyes as cold as clay.

"What's this? Your priestly duty?"

He stood motionless. His outstretched hand didn't waver but his skin appeared grayish, stripped of life, the long fingers curled like claws.

"Come now... or never. I will not ask again."

She looked away.

He would not ask again.

Scattering the blood stained rocks to the night, she placed her hand in his, and although he helped her to her feet, his gaze reached far past her to Valentine's tent.

"Zero?"

He didn't answer.

She stood listening again to the jackal, and to the gauzy walls of Valentine's big square tent snapping in the gusts, until she heard another sound.

He had begun scuffing the ground with his right foot, back and forth, back and forth, as if seeking relief from an itch he couldn't quite scratch.

And his face appeared different, somehow, than it had just moments ago.

She had seen him look this way before, she knew it... but where?

She froze.

Makaen Hadeed--

The day he tore out of me, my own soul--

She set a shaking hand on his arm.

"Zero, forget Valentine, forget--"

Everything--

It's over, it's done, you can't change it, Valentine's won, the wasteland has won--

And if not for your sake, then, for mine--

Just let it go--

"Zero?" She couldn't seem to control her shaking. "Aren't we going?"

"No."

"But you said--"

"Not yet. Not until I wind the chain I forged." He turned to her at last. "I need something from him. A silver cross like Geoffrey's. Like the old woman's. Have you seen it?"

Her eyes stung. She closed them, but found no relief.

He grabbed her face, shook her aware.

"Have you seen it?"

She shoved his hand away.

"I've seen it."

"Where? How can I get it?"

"I'll get it."

"Tell me where--"

"I want to get it."

"That'll be suicide and that may be what you want but it's not what I want."

A quick flash sparked her dark eyes.

"Fuck what you want! What are you going to do to me that hasn't been done already? Kill me? You're too late, priest! I'm already dead!"

She didn't have to bear his stony stare; she spun, the blanket slipping from her shoulders as she reached into the water barrel, elbow deep. She rubbed her wet hands against her face to cool her hot cheeks, her burning eyes, then she ripped at her hair until it shuddered around her shoulders like a sea of snakes.

Turning back to him, she locked her eyes on his face, took the hem of her dress and dipped it in the water. She scrubbed at the insides of her thighs, wrung out the threadbare garment then dipped and scrubbed, dipped and scrubbed, her breasts swaying under the thin shift.

"The sand," she said. "It sticks to it."

Then she dropped the soggy hem, but when she lowered her face to the barrel to drink, he yanked her arm to pull her back.

"Don't drink from the water you wash in."

"It's all he--"

Her retort died on her lips.

He had again fixed his gaze on the darkness, not on her, and suddenly she remembered the drop of moonlight streaming down his cheek, remembered Geoffrey, bearing down with all his strength on a beleaguered bit of iron. Standing all alone in the bitter wind of the desert, with memories, like Geoffrey's mallet, pounding her aching body, she wished, all at once, for only one thing; she wished she was dead.

"I'll get your cross for you, Zero," she said quietly, "but you can't come in. Whatever you see... whatever you hear... you can't come in."

"You don't have to do this."

Her lips tightened, barring the words.

What else can I do? It's all I can do--

Like an inhabitant of some netherworld, she shambled past him, toward Valentine's tent, and when he gripped her arm, she saw his ax in his other hand.

"Let me get those shackles off."

"He'll notice."

"Isn't he drunk by now? You have to be able to move to get out of there."

"He'll see. He sees everything."

Zero's lips curved down. He shrugged, flipped the weapon, slid the handle through its loop, moved his gaze to the soldiers' tent.

"Other than the one napping through his watch, how many in there?"

"Four."

"Any Brotherhood?"

"No."

He turned away and then, all in silence, brought his fingertips to his left upper arm before touching them to his lips.

Apparently forgotten, she stood as nebulous as a shadow, with nothing--

Nothing nothing nothing nothing more to say--

She took a long breath, shuffled forward, but turned back a few feet short of the entry to Valentine's tent.

The light from inside, filtered by her yellow dress, emerged dull and dirty to outline her legs, but it didn't reach to where he stood perfectly still, his body clad in leather, his fist curled in the hilt of his sword.

"Priest?"

"I'll wait. Whatever I hear, whatever I see, I won't come in."

Chapter Twenty One

Cross pushed at the gauzy panel and stepped inside Valentine's tent. Moving quietly, she took a clay jar from a table covered with a cloth of crimson silk. Hands trembling, she over tipped the vessel, releasing sharp fumes that rose with the liquor that sloshed over the sides of Valentine's goblet to drench the silk beneath.

With shaking fingers wrapped around the brimming cup, her fetters shushed softly in the sand until they fell quiet when she reached the thick pile of the carpet that lay beneath the bed.

Valentine lay sprawled amid a pile of cushions, one arm flung up over his eyes to block the light from a torch that flared on a stand near to his head. As Cross approached, he shifted but made no sound.

"My lord?"

He didn't answer.

She moved a little closer; breathed in the sour smell of stale wine.

"My lord?" She touched his chilled shoulder. "Lord?"

Valentine slowly lifted his arm from his eyes, the hard muscles of his chest rippling as he filled his lungs.

He surveyed her with a yawn. "At long last, here is our whore."

"I've brought you some drink."

He drew up on an elbow and after he steadied the cup in one hand, he smacked her mouth with the back of the other.

"I've brought you some drink, my lord," she amended in a low whisper.

Valentine took a gulp and his face twisted. Spraying out the mouthful, he flung the cup.

"Stupid bitch." He motioned with a quick jerk of his head. "Bring that."

The goatskin sat safely beside the bed. His dark eyes followed as she bent to fill the cup, but when she offered it, he knocked the cup from her hand, slid his fingers to the back of her neck and pushed her head down. Locking his gaze to the roof of the tent, he twisted his fingers in the tangle of her hair.

"Suck me."

She parted her lips and after a moment, he sighed.

"I should punish you for your tardiness," he said, his words never leaving the comfort of his throat, "but I am inclined, tonight, toward mercy." He hauled her head up. "Look at me."

She looked.

"You will do your best to please your lord, will you not, lady?"

She nodded, struggling to control the raging in her chest.

"You will not be slothful?"

She shook her head from side to side, a choking sob held prisoner, her eyes downcast.

"Good." He brushed unruly curls from her face with his broad, strong hands. "Obedience is so becoming to a woman. As is silence. Now you may spread your legs for me."

Her face was wooden but her body trembled as she maneuvered the chains to straddle him. Opening herself with her fingers, she inched down over his hardness and when he was fully sheathed, she clamped her eyes tight shut and began moving rapidly to his pleasure.

After only seconds, he took her hips and held her fast.

"Let me see your eyes."

She lifted her head just slightly, slowly opened her eyes to meet black ones glittering in the torchlight.

"Your eyes speak to me, lady. There's so much they wish me to know." He gently caressed the bruise on her cheek. "Are you too eager?"

Her breath held tight in her chest, she flinched under his light touch so she lowered her head, closed her eyes so they wouldn't, in fear, betray her again, and stray to where Zero stood just outside the tent.

Valentine lifted her chin, turned her face to the light.

"Are you too eager? Answer me."

She began to shake.

Bury it--

"My lord...."

Bury it now--

"Forgive me, my lord, I.... I was hungry."

Valentine growled, clutched the back of her head, forced her face down to his. He set his lips against hers then slipped his tongue into her mouth, tasting with luxurious slowness, inhaling the scent of her breath while she lay frozen like prey in his grip.

When he released her, his shiny eyes bore into hers until tears welled up and streamed down her cheeks.

"Forgive me, my lord. I'm sorry."

"Did I not forbid you, lady? Did I not explain how such... intemperance... only bolsters your will? Strengthens your insolence and pride, rather than fostering the obedience that will bring you to right standing with me?"

"Yes, lord."

"And still you chose to disobey me."

"Yes, lord."

Valentine slid his hands under the ragged dress, sent them casually roaming.

"Gideon indulges you with special tokens. He craves your favor, lady. You have quite stolen his heart."

She began to weep.

"Oh, no, lord, please... don't hurt him, it was my fault, it was my fault--"

"Aye, I know," he soothed, "of course it was. In truth, it's the way of things.... every soldier loses his heart to a whore. And every soldier moves on. But the whore.... Well, how shall I say it but plainly? The whore remains a whore."

He curled his fingers, dug his nails into her shoulders, then buried himself so deeply she couldn't find her breath.

"Who is inside you, lady?"

She gasped.

"You... lord."

He thrust again.

"And who will be inside you next?"

Panting, she could only whimper.

"Lady... I crave your answer."

"Lord... I don't know." Head swimming, sour bile filled her throat, threatened her mouth, "I don't know who--"

"In truth, you do not. Perhaps it will be Simon, perhaps our Ned. Perhaps even Gideon, my young stallion. But the young man will soon tire of his romantic notions, will he not?"

Struggling with her stomach, she choked out, "Yes, lord."

"If you do not see to it, I shall."

"Yes, lord," she whispered, the flames of the restless torch raging scarlet before her eyes.

Valentine sighed again.

"Ah, lady," he took both breasts in his hands, "I am a kind man. A generous lord. I wish only to give good things to my men, and wish all to partake equally, as is proper. Walk in obedience, as befits your place in the world, and I will be kind and generous to you as well. You will see. Now," he smiled, his thumbs tracing circles around her nipples, "you may fulfill your obligation to me, with all the devotion due your rightful lord."

The torch nearest the bed blazed as a gust roared through the tent, billowing the light panels that hung beneath the shirred canvas walls. Cross shot a glance through the gap in the gauze to where Zero still stood silhouetted in the moonlight, his face as pale as carved marble, his hand curled lightly in the hilt of the sword strapped at his hip.

She shook her hair to cover her face, dragged her thoughts away from the man who stood so silently watching. Willing herself to become one with Valentine, urging him to lose himself in the power of his own passion, she forced herself to focus to his response to the rhythm of her hips until cries in the distance began cutting through the walls of her concentration. She tried to ignore the voice but it grew louder and more urgent--

Argo--

Soon the soldier was close enough for her to hear his hoarse breathing. She turned toward the sound but Valentine raked his fingers across her face.

"Face me!" he continued battering with furious strength as he struggled toward deliverance, "face me when I fuck you!"

Onyx eyes fixed and hands clamped on her shoulders, Valentine drove in hard, again and again and again. Clinging to his forearms to steady herself for the few moments she needed, she lowered her head to his chest and with a deft, teasing tongue and warm lips, quickly worked the big silver cross that dangled from his left nipple into her mouth.

Soon Argo's shout echoed from inside the tent, "Cap! Cap, there's someone--"

Valentine's low growl riveted the soldier where he stood.

"Stay...."

"Lookee, Cap!"

"Stay...."

Endless breathless seconds passed before Cross felt the first wracking throb finally heave inside her. The fierce grip Valentine had on her shoulders weakened and when his fingers grew slack--

Now--

With his shuddering gasp of release, Cross crashed her teeth together and both the nipple and the cross came away in her mouth.

Valentine sat up with a roar. The back of his hand slammed against her face, and swept her from the bed.

Panting, Cross lost the silver to the carpet, tried to snatch it, but Argo grabbed the front of her dress and hauled her to her knees. Hands lifted against the sword Argo jammed between her breasts, she cried out as Argo stood ready to thrust at Valentine's order, but abruptly he released her, spinning on his heels.

Cross saw only a flash of light.

Another animate gleam drove Argo's hand from his wrist, and as the soldier's throaty howl filled the tent, the light flared a third time and Argo's voice fell silent.

But for the whooshing torch, all stood quiet until Valentine laughed.

"Neatly done, priest."

Zero nodded.

"So," Valentine swung his legs over the side of the bed, "you're here at last. I should be angry, you've kept me waiting."

Zero lightly struck his chest with a closed fist.

" _Mea culpa_ , brother. It seems I'd lost my way, but having found it at last, here I am."

"You know, Michael, it needn't come to this." Valentine padded to where his massive sword, unsheathed, leaned against the chests. He slipped his hand under the cross guard and gestured with the blade, "You want the whore, I want the treasure. Would life were always so simple!"

Zero smiled.

"I can't give what I don't possess."

Valentine frowned, his fingers tightening on the hilt of the sword.

"Now that is a pity."

Zero slowly raised his own sword, carefully positioned the weapon as Cross's gaze darted back and forth; blue to black, black to blue--

They're going to fight, they can't fight, it can't happen, it isn't fair, Valentine's too big, too strong, it can't be fair--

"No!"

She lurched across the carpet and clamped onto Valentine's blade.

Realization blasted in her brain, screamed, _let go!_ , but too late... her palms instantly felt the steel's bright kiss as Valentine drew the sword out from between her clenched fists. Stunned, she gasped, brought her still fisted fingers to safety under her arms as the two long swords, perfect in their unified effort to bridge the empty space, swung up and crashed together.

The clang of steel against steel split the silence as the swords slammed down again and again, the two warriors pushing at the boundaries of the tent as they circled within its confines, nimbly skirting barrels and chests and leather sacks filled with fabrics and weapons and jewels.

Valentine hammered relentlessly; fueled by wild roars, he brought his sword down again and again in mammoth surges of power. Zero feinted, swung, blocked, until, by the bed, he fell back under the weight of a blow, his lean body all but swallowed by the over-plump cushions.

Valentine raised his sword over his head but as he swung it down, Zero countered with his own thick steel, raising both sword and leg to Valentine's assault. With a grunt and a heave, he shoved Valentine back and sprang off the bed.

Fists still balled beneath her arms, Cross stared as Valentine strode forward, advancing, always advancing, then Zero countering, sharp eyed and nimble despite a chest that rose and fell heavily with exertion.

Still, the black eyes never left the blue, and when Valentine raised his blade with another howl, she pushed up from her knees and flung her arms around his leg.

Her weight barely slowed the onslaught; as Valentine kicked her off, he thrust back with the hilt of his sword.

The carved pommel caught her with a thud.

She crumpled, blow blind, but Valentine, off balance, lost precious seconds. He took Zero's foot under the chin then head snapping back, staggered for only a moment before he lifted his blade, but Zero had already pivoted and pounded his fist, hardened by the steel of his sword, to the side of Valentine's head. The blow bought Zero another instant; he dropped the weapon, grabbed Valentine's wild black mane and dragged him down, ramming his knee into Valentine's head over and over until the strength inside the big man lessened.

Zero loosened his grip but Valentine, swaying dizzily, still stood. Springing up from his toes with hands clamped together over his head and weight aloft, Zero gave a deep grunt and slammed his clenched fists down on Valentine head.

Valentine finally fell. He lay face first with his long limbs splayed, but still, within just moments, he stirred, shook his head, and struggled to his knees.

Zero snatched his sword. Clamping his hands around the hilt, he hammered down on the base of Valentine's skull until Valentine tipped backward with a sigh.

Zero lodged his foot between Valentine's chin and collarbone. Chest heaving, he leaned some weight against his foot.

"You drink too much, my friend...."

"Zero?" Cross reached for the closest of the misty clouds that drifted before her eyes. "Are you still here?"

Zero shifted more weight.

Fighting for breath, Valentine pushed and squirmed until his eyes, unseeing, darted briefly before they closed.

"Zero?" Cross began again. Rubbing her eyes only smeared them with the blood oozing from her hands. "I can't find you...."

"I'm here, lady. I'm here with you."

... and don't forget me...

... I'm here with you, too...

Zero took his foot from Valentine's throat to slide it against the soft carpet, but since the maddening itch would not, could not be relieved, he quickly crouched, drew the dagger from his boot and thrust his hand between Valentine's legs.

The cut was clean and exact.

He tossed the severed testicles onto the carpet by Valentine's head, then leaned in close.

"Do not think only on what I've taken from you, brother, but also on what I've left you. Use the breath I've left you to confess your sin against God and this girl... just as I will confess my offense against you."

Valentine's eyes opened suddenly, his red stained fingers scrambling for what no longer hung between his legs. And then he began to shriek.

"I'll kill you! You're a dead man! A dead man!"

Zero scooped up Valentine's cross with one hand and slipped the other under Cross's arm to haul her to her feet because she appeared to have no power of her own; her right eye had begun to swell and the other, drifting, seemed unable to focus. When her knees buckled, he had already ducked low, waiting and ready for her body to drape itself across his back.

He slipped quickly from the tent and laid her on the ground.

The cold night wind roused her.

"Zero, did you get it? Did you--"

"Aye."

He flashed the blood smeared cross, slipped it into the pouch inside his vest, planted one knee and reached, "Let me see those hands."

In seconds, high, frenzied screams began knifing the frigid air.

Valentine stumbled to the tent flap and sagging against the heavy canvas, hair and chest and the insides of his thighs dripping blood, he swelled his chest and howled like some maddened beast--

"The priest! The priest! Kill the priest!"

Simon and Ned burst from their tent, barreled toward them with long blades drawn.

Cross began to weep.

"Zero, go! Get out now!"

His face didn't change.

"Why?"

Then he stood and strode to stand between Cross and Valentine's soldiers.

He quickly slipped the spiked club from its sling at his back, clasped both hands over the heavy wooden handle. Simon took the lead Ned and as he drew his sword, Zero crouched, raised the club over his head, took aim and let it fly.

The club appeared weightless. It turned in perfect balance, end over end, and then, in perfect silence, Simon fell without a cry.

Ned approached more slowly now. Glancing at Simon, dead in the dust, and then at Valentine, slumped against one of the tall tent poles, he rubbed his head, licked his lips, raised tattooed palms and grinned.

"We can share it, friend," he said. "You finish carving up that giant fuck and we'll split the fucking whole of it, fifty-fifty, right and square."

Cross stared up at Zero.

"Careful...." she said, but her voice issued as nothing more than a harsh rush of air that died in a surge of frantic thoughts--

Careful careful careful careful careful of this one--

Shoving back through the grit, she began to moan.

Zero shot glances between her and Ned, and after he took one long step back, to shield her from Ned's view, she raised a blood wet arm and clamped his leg in the crook.

Ned scratched the stubble on top of his head, one lid covered a squinting, piggy eye.

"Now I see what this is all about! The Captain went and stole your whore! Well, take your half and your whore, too," he waved them with both hands, "and don't forget to give her a turn for me!"

Smiling, Zero slid his sword from the scabbard at his hip.

"Draw your weapon, dog."

Small lines drawn between his brows, Ned stared, but still raised both hands agreeably.

"Now don't go getting all irate, friend, before you see if she's not more to your liking!"

Zero positioned his sword, point to the sky. "Your weapon."

"Listen," Ned began, but then he shouted out, "Gideon! Billy!"

Cross looked up, searched Zero's face.

With his lips still turned in a smile, the little lights in his eyes reminded her of stars. But when he made one long scrape through the sand with his foot... hard, and deep, and slow... as if trying to scratch some insane itch, she knew--

The demon--

But when exactly had he arrived?

Somewhere between this hell and the last?

Zero's gaze never left the soldier.

"Cross, don't move. Stay right here."

And then he began to advance.

Leather covered legs moving in long, unhurried strides, he pushed Ned before him the way the wind pushes the waves of sand.

Eyes closed, Cross sat waiting.

She didn't hear Zero's footsteps but she knew when he'd reached the soldier; she heard the sound of the first blow, steel against steel, and after that, another and another and another in perfect rhythm, the sound that arm and sword can make only when they're one and the same; tireless, implacable, pitiless--

She had to see.

The next clang sent the soldier's sword flying from his fingers.

Zero nodded to the blade planted in the dusty ground.

"See to your weapon."

"Take her!"

"Your weapon."

Panting, Ned scrambled to his sword, but Zero stood relaxed and still.

Arms wrapped around her legs, Cross sat with chin planted and tears streaming through the blood her cheeks.

Stupid girl--

And you tried to warn Zero about Neddie--

When the demon... the demon will take care of everything--

She saw Zero striding forward again and despite the distance, despite the dim light, she still could see, so she sat wishing she had a veil or a kafiyyeh or even that dirty old blanket Gideon had given her--

So I could hide my face because I can't seem to keep from watching, can't seem to look away, although the priest in his pity doesn't want me to see, the priest in his pity wants me to not move, stay right here--

But what the priest doesn't know is that it's still not quite far enough away--

She lifted her hands to her ears to deaden the harsh metallic ringing that left her shaking, but she could still see Zero, nodding to a spot in the dirt where Ned's sword bobbed, still hear him saying--

"See to your weapon, dog."

Finally, the soldier fell.

Writhing in the dirt, his body seemed too heavy for him to lift although he tried, gathering his hands under his chest to push himself up to his knees, and when he'd struggled up almost, _almost_ , Zero planted a foot to his back and shoved.

Writhing in the gravel beneath the boot that held him fast, Ned lifted his head and bawled.

"I fucked your woman up her ass! I made your woman fucking bleed!"

Zero smiled.

"Really. Can you imagine what that felt like? I'd imagine it felt rather something like this...."

Zero lifted his arm and drove the sword.

Cross raised clenched fists to her eyes and screamed.

Time had always been her enemy, but never more than now, when it stopped.

She began to crawl.

Hands and knees scraping over a hard, gritty ground that shook, pulsed, with every roar, every howl, every scream the dying man made--

Why couldn't Ned hold onto his sword, Zero? Neddie always knew how to handle a sword--

... clearly, the dog had some trouble with his fingers--

Trouble?

... trouble with some demon who likely bit them off--

One by one?

... so it appears--

There's no demons here, just men and angels, just look at his face, it's beautiful--

... _stupid whore--_

... don't be a fool and don't be fooled--

She finally reached Zero's side.

"Kill him."

Zero stared.

"Kill him," she said, her ragged voice rising as she pummeled him with flaccid, bloody fists, "kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him!"

Zero lay a hand on her shoulder.

"Calm, lady, calm. The dog's already dead."

She shrieked.

"Kill him!" And when she managed to finally slam her knuckles against his face, the shock of pain left her only enough breath to scream, "Now!"

Zero's lips tugged.

"As you say, my lady."

Leopard-like, he strode the short distance to Ned's side. He slipped the knife from his boot and with a small movement, just a quick flick, the soldier's sobs were carried out with a great red flood until both they, and he, mercifully died.

Returning to Cross's side, Zero held the sharpened cross, with its reddened edge, before her eyes.

"Carotid artery," he said, his face expressionless. "Remember."

She just stared.

Remember? Who but a demon would ask me to remember?

The torches dotted around the camp did little to illuminate it, they were wholly unequal to the blackness of the night, but still she could his eyes glowing, seething, searing--

With what?

... the fires of Hell--

Zero scrubbed his lips with the back of his hand.

When he moved to touch her shoulder, she jerked back, an arm lifted to fend him off.

"Don't!"

His face changed then. She saw it in a subtle spark of life in his eyes, a tired tightening around his bloodless lips.

His hand disappeared inside his vest and he pulled out the small vial of white powder he had taken from Mag so long ago.

He popped the cork, sucked the blood from his finger and after he spat, stuck the finger in the vial.

The powder clung like grains of sweet sugar.

When the whitened finger came toward her, she skittered back, but he gripped the back of her head and slipped the finger between her lips, gently rubbing against her gums.

In barely an instant her breathing slowed and her lids began to drop over her eyes.

She mumbled around his finger, "What's that?"

"Cocaine."

Her eyes felt slitty now, and shiny.

"What's that?"

"Something so you won't care that it hurts."

He sucked the finger on the happy chance some dust had been left behind, deposited the vial, then dragged on the chain that shackled her ankles.

"You need to turn your face away."

She turned, he brought his ax crashing down on the links, the chain rang out, sprang apart.

"Where are your boots?"

"Boots? Valentine...." She fought the urge to laugh. "Burned them."

"You need boots."

And then he was gone.

With nothing but hard gravel stretching out before her, she saw low hummocks of grass and cushiony bundles of fragrant mint and rosemary calling out to her, inviting her, _partake_ , so she stretched out across the sand, watching as Zero moved quickly across the camp. But when she saw the faint gleam of silver at the entrance of the soldiers' tent, she struggled up suddenly, startled, knowing--

Gideon--

Zero, no--

She tried to wrestle herself to her feet, tried to call Zero's name so he'd turn; she still knew, still understood, turning meant stopping, but before she could even gather herself to her knees, she saw Zero leave the tent.

Barely a breath and he stood at her side, fresh sprays of blood glistening on his vest.

He dropped a pair of scuffed boots and a desert robe at her feet, then began ripping into strips a shirt he had tucked under his arm. Taking each of her hands in turn, he wound the fabric around her palms.

She dropped roughly bandaged hands to her lap.

"Billy too?"

His lips tugged. He looked pointedly at the boots.

"Put them on."

Blinded by tears that kept dropping big pink splotches onto the faded yellow dress, she fumbled with numb fingers until he snatched away the boot.

"You waste water. Weeping for dogs."

He landed a big glob of spit beside her in the sand; wrestled the second boot over the circle of chain around her ankle.

He held her gaze.

"I spared them any pain. What did they spare you?"

"One of them gave me food."

He gave quick nod.

"Aye. Not even jackals fuck the dead."

Fishing through the voluminous folds of the robes, he wrestled her head through the neck, her arms through the sleeves, then pulled her to her feet. Propelled by his hand, she shuffled forward until they reached Valentine's tent.

There, her feet turned to lead.

"You killed him...."

Valentine still sat up against the tent pole, his eyes rolled back in his head, his jaw hanging slack. When the wind blew his hair, the bloodied wisps etched tiny lines on his cheeks.

"You killed him," she said again. "He's dead."

"He's not dead."

She stared again at Valentine, sitting still and silent; eerie white orbs made his eyes, and his fingers, curled in his lap, grasped nothing but empty air. But for his hair blowing in the incessant wind, he remained completely motionless.

"Zero, he's not even breathing! And look at his chest! He's not bleeding anymore."

"He's controlling it."

"What?"

"The bleeding, his breathing, his heart rate... all of it. It's our training. Now save your breath and move."

Pushed by Zero's hand still clamped on the back of the robes, they moved steadily forward. When they came to Simon's body sprawled in the dusty earth, Zero kicked him over, rocked the iron club until it came free with a soft sucking sound. After wiping the hooked blade on the dead man's breeches, he slipped it into the leather sling at his back, again took the back of the stolen robe, and steered her to the outskirts of the camp.

There, tethered, sat the flea stung spoils of war. Swinging his sword to cut the leather reins that secured the first camel, he laughed softly.

"Let my brother relearn the proper use of his legs."

He sent the beast off in a gallop with a whack from the flat of his blade, cut the next tether and whacked again. As that camel disappeared into the darkness, he raised his sword to the tasseled térik, ready to free the third.

Cross sighed.

Hands limp, red had already begun to ooze through the bandages.

"I'm alright," she said, looking down at her feet, "I've got boots."

Zero turned, saw--

Those hands--

"Cross? Any spirits around here?"

She shook her head.

"I think I spilled it all... "

He frowned.

"Trying to steal this mangy beast is going to cost some fool his life."

She swayed, sat, hard.

"I'm all right."

His lips tugged.

All right until the coca wears off--

All right until the infection takes hold--

He clamped his fingers around the grip of his short sword, pulled from its scabbard as he found the blaze of the nearest torch.

But he couldn't take the step--

God I can't--

Not her hands, I just can't, there's not nearly enough coca left to deaden that--

Sweet Jesus, just give me two days just two days to get her back to Makaen Hadeed she'll fight she's young she's strong I know she'll fight I'll march all day and all night that's all I'm asking for I'm begging for please just give me something for once--

Just two fucking days--

He drove the sword back into the scabbard with a clang.

Still sitting at his feet, Cross wrinkled her nose.

"Zero? What's that smell?"

He turned to gaze across the camp. All still, all quiet but for the sound of the torches and the wind, it appeared the same as when he had first entered it.

But it wasn't the same--

... _of course not, for my son has passed through--_

Fuck you--

Papa--

"What smell?" he said.

"That... metal smell. I can smell my father's forge."

Lips tugging, he scooped her up, lifted her onto the saddle.

The smell is Salvation--

Purchased of blood--

He lied.

"I don't smell anything."

He unbuckled a saddle strap, dragged it free, and with a firm hand against her back, urged her forward until she rested against the forked saddle horn. Taking her arms, he brought them around the base of the fork, crossed her wrists and lashed them tight with the strap.

She stiffened.

"Don't, Zero--"

"It's just so you don't fall. Don't worry. Everything's going to be all right."

She sighed.

Her brain still buzzed but her body... right eye swollen shut, the left refusing to focus, her hands, had they a voice, ready to shriek with every throb... her body was spent.

Sagging like a blown carcass, she mumbled to the wedge of her arms--

"Where are you taking me?"

"Home. Makaen Hadeed."

"Will you stay, too?"

"No."

"Where are you going?"

Zero brought his leg back, slammed his foot against the tent peg driven deep into the earth to secure the camel's reins. The peg loosened, and as he kicked it again to free it, he felt his jaw tighten and his lips curve into something closer to a grimace than a smile.

"I'm going home, also."

... that's right son you're coming home actually I think you're already here and I can't wait for you to see the place I have prepared for you and you thought that other One had prepared a place for his own well now you see with your own eyes what he had waiting for you don't you dolt I hate to say I told you so but I digress--

... so, anyway, you just won't believe the surprises I have in store for--

"Will you never shut the fuck up?"

Cross's voice came dull and slurry.

"Sorry."

"Not you. Hut, hut, _gamal...._ "

Zero brought the switch hard against the camel's rump. The beast snorted, spit, and unfolded with stubborn slowness--

... _you! I always knew you'd come home I knew it from the beginning right from the start oh that little fantasy you played out at Mar Sada as if you could really fool anyone with all those prayers and all that piety after all I always knew you were mine and you always knew you were mine so how could you even think you could fool anyone especially Bethan when no one knew you better than Bethan aside from me of course but now that we're together really together you know like brothers and just let me mention you've always done your best work with your brothers so well what the fuck! kill that fatted calf for my son--_

... my son who was lost and now is found--

Zero snugged the reins up tight around his fist. Heading for the deep desert, he absently marked his every step with a smack of the switch against the leather of his boot.

Chapter Twenty Two

"I hear an angel."

She didn't realize that her lips had barely moved and from them had been no sound.

"Do you hear it?" she asked no one in particular.

She was floating on the clouds, all alone. The angel's voice was both sweet and strong; it bathed her in a pure, blessed calm until the pain came again.

Her eyes opened, darting all around, searching for the source of the pain, but everything was dim and there was no sound but the voice of the angel.

She tried to remember where she was, who she was, but remembering was too hard. So she closed her eyes again, resting in the song, until another wave swept over her.

She shivered and the angel covered her with more furs. She felt a little warmer, and as bright lights swirled and sheltered her, the angel slipped between the lights to touch another cloth, damp with cool water, against her brow and after a moment, against her lips.

She never would have guessed it.

Heaven smelled like rosemary.

She breathed in the scent and drifted weightless through the mist.

"Were you singing?" she asked the angel.

"Yes."

"Why?"

"I was asking God to have mercy on us."

"What did he say?"

"He said 'have faith.'"

Another rush of pain shook her. She cried out loud, and then everything changed.

There were no shining lights, no clouds.

Plunged into sudden darkness, she strained to study her surroundings.

Rough planks. A door with no latch, waffling in the wind. A single window.

So familiar...

On the floor, piles of books. On top of crumbling mud blocks, uneven boards toe-nailed together to make a table.

My father's house, at Makaen Hadeed--

How did I get back here?

She closed her eyes again, trying to slip away on the clouds, but it was no use, she hurt too much. So she turned scalding eyes back to the tiny window; to the ever-indecisive door, took in the whole of place, so plain, so small, so unbearably--

Close--

Yet it hadn't seemed that way to her, when she'd left. What about it had changed?

Nothing about it had changed. Only she had changed.

Valentine--

She groaned, her body shaking with a chill that ran from her shoulders to her toes.

A rag flaring in a cup of oil by the bed hardly lit the room, but she could make out a slight movement by the far wall. She found Zero's tall figure at the edge of the flickering shadows, but didn't hear herself moaning as she watched him drag a big wooden chest from beneath the bench that sat under the window.

Clay jars and little brown bottles neatly lined the bottom of the box. Zero sniffed at the herbs in the jars, nibbled a few of the dry dark nuggets but apparently dissatisfied, he continued to search, carefully uncorking the dusty phials that stood among the jars, sniffing each before gingerly touching his tongue to some of the corks. When he finally found what he was looking for he took the bottle, covered most of the rim with his thumb, and dribbled a few drops into a cup. He stepped to the bed and filled the cup with water from a cracked pottery jar that had oozed a halo of wet onto the dusty planked floor.

"I should have had this ready," he said as he slipped his hand under her back to raise her up. "It'll help you sleep."

He held the cup to her mouth and she sipped a little, tightened her lips at the bitter taste, but he kept the cup poised until she took more. When he was satisfied he took the cup away.

Cross sighed.

"I don't want to sleep. I want to talk to the angel."

"There is no angel."

"You were singing?"

"Aye, lady."

In the darkness, it was hard for her to find his eyes, but she tried.

"I thought I was dead," she said. "And I wasn't afraid. For once, I wasn't afraid."

He set the cup on the floor and with a single finger moved a strand of hair away from her face.

"You weren't afraid when you went into Valentine's tent."

"I didn't want him to hurt me anymore. And if he killed me, you'd feel sorry. Or feel something...." Her voice trailed off and a glimmer of insight took her. "Zero? Is that why you're never afraid? Because you don't care if you die?"

He smiled and stroked her cheek.

"When I die I'll see the face of my Savior. Sometimes I ache inside, just from longing--"

His lips tugged and he looked away.

A shallow basin sat on the floor beside him. He half filled it with water from the pitcher, placed it on the bed, took the rag from her forehead, dipped it in the water and wrung it out.

And wet it again, and wrung it out again.

"You think I can't understand," she said.

He laid the cloth across her brow. "Sleep. Heal."

"I don't want to sleep, I want to understand. Why do you always shut me out?"

"Shut you out?" His gaze lingered on the bruises that swelled her lids and marred the delicate line of her lips. "Don't be so eager, lady, to step from your hell into mine."

She watched his face. Although the house plunged from barely lit to virtual darkness with the fitful burning of the flame, she could see his pain clearly even through the haze of her own. And then she heard echoes of her own thoughts--

So much pain.... it's more pain than he can bear--

"Why are you looking at me like that? Am I going to die?"

He would tell her the truth. The priest never really lied to her, although the demon sometimes did.

"Your hands are infected." He brushed back that same stubborn curl. "The body fights back with fever, but it doesn't always win."

He smiled, lips tight, then abruptly his eyebrows lifted as if he'd just remembered something.

"Look at what I found." He scooped up a small packet from the floor, flipped back the edge of the neatly folded linen so she could see what he had, secreted inside.

She pretended to look but didn't pretend to care.

"It's honeycomb," he said, stating the obvious.

She wasn't sure why that was significant, but she didn't ask and he didn't offer.

"And someone buried a fortune in olive oil," he swiped a finger in the honey, sucked off all the sweet, "I found the jars hidden under one of the burned out tents."

Now she did smile.

Sayeda Fadilah. How she loved to hoard her treasures--

"So that's where you got the bowl."

"And the linen for the bandages."

"You didn't cut it...."

Old Fadilah would die all over again, if she knew that someone had cut her fine linen all to shreds--

"I did," he smiled as he held up a strip, "but I drew a thread, see how neat? Your father had myrrh, and yesterday I found lavender and the honey to make the poultices, so now we have another weapon."

Still smiling, he set down the packet, licked away the honey that had oozed from the linen onto his fingers, but then he sighed.

"Cross. You should have let me deal with Valentine. What were you thinking? What was I thinking?"

"It's not your fault. I had to do something, Zero... I had to."

His pale eyes flickered. "Vengeance is the Lord's."

"The Lord's? Looked to me like yours."

He was quiet for a few seconds, then he scraped his fingers through his hair.

"The two that slept." His jaw worked slowly beneath taut skin. "I've already asked the Lord to forgive my sin."

"And Valentine?"

The small smile that teased the corners of his mouth died before it had really lived.

"Are you worried about my soul, lady?" He took a short breath. "I wielded my knife in anger, I've confessed it, but I didn't kill Valentine... I didn't send my brother to judgment unregenerate and unclean. But he won't be satisfied. Not until there's more blood."

"I wish you had killed him. I hate him... I hate him, I wish he was dead--"

His face didn't change. "In truth?"

"In truth...."

But what is truth?

Is truth Valentine touching my shoulder, to wake me after I'd fallen asleep in that old scuffed chair, then kneeling down and sliding his arms around my waist and burying his face in my lap, his strong, wide shoulders shaking as he whispered something... a name , a prayer, I don't know... over and over and over before lifting me from the chair and covering my body with his own while his tears dripped onto my face and slid down into my hair \--

There is no truth, Zero--

There's only what you think you see--

She closed her eyes and sighed.

"Tell me what truth is, Zero. I don't think I know anymore."

Zero bent low. He folded back the fur blankets, lifted to his lips the hand nearest, and began to kiss each scratched and swollen fingertip that peeked out beyond the edge of the bandage.

"Here is truth, lady.... Love your enemy. Do good to those who despise and use you...."

"It doesn't help."

He leaned closer, brought his face just inches from hers to overcome the drug he'd just used to deaden both her pain and her understanding.

"Aye, it does. It's balm for the soul."

"You only believe what you want to believe."

"I know what I know. And so, I believe what I believe."

She tugged her hand away but he just took the wrist and began unwinding the bandage from her palm with a deft, wide whirl of pale linen.

He dropped the dirty bandage to the floor.

"You don't hate anyone."

"You don't know what I feel."

"But I do... I've been listening to the voice of your heart, without interference from your brain, for the past two days."

She shrank down slowly into the gray ticked furs, now brushed clean of dirt and smelling musty warm.

"Did I... say some things?"

"Aye, lady."

"What did I say?"

He unwrapped her other hand then set both in the basin of cool water, along with his own to keep them submerged.

"Your secrets are safe. Suffice it to say, your words betray hatred for no one."

"But I should hate him," she struggled to control the long trembling that suddenly seized her, "and I should hate you, too."

"Some would say so... yes."

Her voice was hardly audible. "But what do you say?"

"I say...."

His lips tugged.

That perhaps I put too few drops in the cup--

He smiled.

"I say only this. Hate is a poison. And its first victim is the soul in which it resides."

He lifted her right hand from the water and slowly separated the stained poultice from the yellowish crust that held it fast. After he replaced the dressing with a fresh one, sticky with honey, he began winding a clean strip of linen around her hand.

Despite the capricious light's willingness to disguise, she gazed at his face. Saw his calm expression, felt his patience reflected in the gentle fingers that began to carefully remove the dressing from her other hand.

Hate him?

Some would say so... yes--

No.

Not him... never him... not for a minute, not for a moment--

Despite anything his demon had done or would ever do, because just as he heard my heart I've seen his soul--

I'm seeing it now, his nose nearly buried in that foul linen, his lips tight because he's trying so hard to spare me every bit of pain when he knows, he has to know, that my whole body is aching throbbing screaming, so what difference could it possibly make--

He glanced up.

"Right one's worse," he said softly.

Hate him?

Could you hate the sun that burned your face when you'd made the choice to venture, far too long and far too close? When you yourself had chosen to shun the sober shade... longing for light, greedy for heat--

"Zero? I think there's something wrong with me."

"You're feverish."

"Not that... I think I'm different inside. I always have been. And everyone... my father, Sayeda Fadilah... they've always known--"

"Lady--"

"I feel like I'm missing something that everyone else has...."

His lips tugged again.

Aye... the essence of evil--

But all he said was, "So it seems."

He finally freed the last shred of the dressing, placed a clean poultice against her palm and began to carefully wrap a fresh bandage.

She leaned back against the pillow, closed her eyes.

"And you're different, too. All those years, alone in the wasteland... why aren't you dead? You should be dead."

"In God's good time."

She opened her eyes.

"Don't you ever wonder why?"

"I suppose, sometimes."

"But what do you..." focused on the length of linen circling her hand, she chased thoughts that seemed to travel a similarly circuitous route, "think?"

"I think," he deftly slit the loose end of the linen with his knife, "that perhaps I've been fortunate. Or not, depending upon your view of things. Now," he neatly knotted the bandage and set her hand down, "stop asking questions. Sleep."

"I can't."

"The drug." He took the cloth from her brow, wet it, touched its coolness to her throat, her cheeks, her broken lips, before replacing it across her forehead. "Sometimes it loosens the tongue just prior to freezing it."

She closed her eyes again but her mind refused to fall quiet.

"Do you hate him, Zero?"

"No."

"But I saw what you did to him. I saw."

"I don't hate him."

She opened her eyes, shifted. "Now you're lying to me."

"No."

"Yes."

"No."

The bowl clunked when he set it on the floor, and then he came close, his face and eyes as soft as the gentle kiss of silver that brushed against her cheek.

"Cross, don't you see? Valentine is my brother. We stood ready to lose our lives, one for the other, more times than I can recall. He doesn't hate me, he loves me. And I him."

His eyes were steady and guileless, perfectly truthful, and when hers widened he set a finger against her cheek.

"No, woman. We did not lie together."

"No, no, I know...." She looked away. "Maybe with others, but not you... never you."

Now she was tired.

It was all too much. She couldn't grasp it. She possessed no framework upon which to position this kind of love, love that masqueraded as hate.

She was so tired.

She leaned her head back, her heavy lids closeting her away to relive her nightmares behind curtained eyes.

"Do you know the worst of it, Zero?"

"Tell me."

"Valentine told me I made you hate yourself. I didn't believe him but now I can see it in your eyes. You hurt all the time. I know you were better off without me, all alone out there with your god, but I never wanted to hurt you. If I believed in your god I would swear to him on my knees. I never wanted to hurt you."

She jammed her fists into her eyes to escape him, but he was still there... outlined in the flickering shadows of the fire, in the flaming death of the sun.

"How stupid I am. How could I ever hurt you?"

"How indeed. You were just the pawn."

"The pawn?"

He took the cloth from her brow, and when he touched his lips to her forehead she felt him shiver. She could even hear the thudding of his heart when he bent over her, so she set her hand against the place where his heart beat, and even though the bandages were thick, she thought she could feel the throbbing, so she touched the very tips of her fingers to his chest, thinking to ease his pain, vanquish his demons, but the deep pounding beat just came faster and faster, repeating his words--

Just the pawn, just the pawn--

Until her brain fairly shrieked--

But what's a pawn?

He took her hand from his chest, set it down, held it against the fur blanket.

"Enough, lady. You must stop fighting the drug."

Then he knelt beside the bed.

She saw him stagger just slightly, as if burdened by some heavy weight.

She'd seen Geoffrey falter once, when he'd shouldered his hard, black anvil.

Zero's sin and the penance it demanded were as deep and wide and dark as her father's iron, but he refused to deny it or cast it aside... instead, he'd lashed himself beneath it as surely as she'd been tethered beneath Valentine's soldiers.

She would ask the question.

He was securely bound now, with demons all around him and over and inside him, so he had no chance of escape. Led by restless fingers, she snaked a hand across the fur robe, and when she tugged his sleeve, he took the hand in his own and pressed her burning fingers to his lips.

No... he won't try to escape--

"Zero? Why did you leave me?"

As gazed at her, his own hollow eyes seemed to look back at him.

"Jesus." He scrubbed his lips, glanced away, "God! I would rather face ten enemies then answer that question! How can I use words to explain what cannot be explained? For some things, there are no explanations, no words...."

"You have words for everything."

"There's only one word...."

The lamp on the floor drew his stare, and she could see the flames reflected in his eyes as if he carried within him, always, a tiny spark born during his time in hell. And then she remembered her own thoughts--

There are no words for this--

"Zero, it's alright, I don't want--"

He turned to her and on his face he wore a grief so pure, so perfect, that it blazed through with a fire that had already all but consumed the soul that had begotten it.

So this was how his demon was born... through some perverse alchemy that mated a warrior's strength with the fires that raged inside a priest--

She reached out, twisted a finger in the drape of his sleeve.

"It's alright. I don't want to... need to...."

Know--

He looked away.

"Lady, before the Christ, I didn't understand what he had become. If I had, I wouldn't have left you. I could never have left you."

She leaned back against the pillow, turned her face away.

I'm sorry--

From beside the bed, he picked up a charred bit of wool card, then lifted one of the locks that snaked across the makeshift pillow. He had washed the blood and dirt from her hair with scented water and worked out most of the tangles, but after lifting the curl to his nose to breathe in the scent of lavender, he began to smooth the already shiny curl around his finger with the comb.

"Lady," he said, "I would ask a question of my own. Why didn't you tell me about the baby?" He set down the comb, fixed her with pale eyes. "If you had, you would not have mounted that devil... your need be damned, he would not have gone into you."

Her face slowly turned a livid red beneath the bruises, and then she couldn't breathe.

"I didn't know... I wasn't sure... how can you be sure? I don't want it, I want you, not a baby--"

"You are such a child."

She tried to lift her hand, touch his face--

I'm sorry, I'm sorry for whatever I've done wrong, I'll beg, I'll beg, just don't--

"Don't leave me Zero, please...."

"Cross--"

"Zero, don't go!"

"I must go. You know that. Did I ever say I'd stay? Be honest, Cross, be fair, did I ever try to make you believe--"

"No, but I tried to make myself believe," she rubbed her eyes but the vision of him remained, a shimmering mirage she could trust only to disappear as she came closer to it, "I pretended that Valentine didn't lie, and I really did hold your heart. Zero, it was all I had--"

"He said that?"

She nodded, tears brimming until they found their freedom and escaped into the strands of her hair.

"I pretended you'd come back. Because no man can live without his heart... not even you."

He still held the dark lock in his hand. It stretched across her chest like a chain, holding her bound to him, so she lay quiet, resigned and still, until her chest heaved and she choked on her own tears, her voice broken with weeping.

"What if the baby's his, Zero? Or Simon's or Argo's? What'll I do then?"

"It's not."

"Zero--"

"Listen to me! I see my Father's hand in this; now I reap the very seed I myself have sown--"

"You don't know that, you can't--"

"I didn't mistake your sweetness and still I took you--"

"But--"

"Enough! By whomever... or whatever evil... this poor child was begotten, the child is innocent! The children are the hope of the world!"

"The hope of the world? Look at this world! Is this what you want for it? Am I what you want for it?"

"What are you saying? You are the child's mother!"

"I'm nothing! You told me that once, don't you remember? You were right, you're always right--"

"Not always right--"

She fumbled for his sleeve as he rose from her side.

"Zero, get rid of it--"

"Have you lost your mind?"

"Look in that box! My father did it, if he knew how, you must know how--"

"Stop."

"Please!"

"No." He slipped his arms into the opposing sleeves of his robes and held tight, as if holding himself apart from her. "Begotten of my sin or another's, if the Lord in His Grace allows you to live through this, you shall bear your child."

"Zero, please," her voice came no louder than the low hush of the flame, "please help me."

"I will not commit murder."

"Murder?" She pushed herself up from the bed, bruising the layers of wormwood and mint he'd used to construct it. "What are you saying to me? What about those renegades? What about that old woman? What about Valentine's men? Gideon and Billy... even poor stupid Billy! Everywhere you go, there's blood! You're up to your ankles in it, you said so yourself! What's the difference?"

"They were not innocent, Cross, that's the difference. They were not innocent."

He'd beaten her again.

He was right, she was wrong.

He was right, and she was nothing.

She clenched her teeth as her eyes, fever bright, glittered from inside their puffed and blackened sockets.

"You... all of you... I can't escape the flesh of men inside me! Never a time of my own choosing, never a word of kindness... you are so cruel."

He shrugged. "I've been called cruel before."

He took the basin of water from the floor, set it on the bed, folded back the right sleeve of his robe, carefully smoothed the crease. As she watched, he swirled the water with his fingers, gently scattering the clumps of herbs, but the sight of his hard, bronzed forearm reminded her suddenly of the warrior from whom pity was unattainable.

She inched her foot under the basin and upended it.

He did not offer even a glance; he simply bent and righted the bowl.

"It is a mystery to me," he said quietly, "how one can walk through the fires of hell and emerge on the other side the same willful child."

She turned toward the wall.

"Fuck you. I want this to be over."

He leaned down, his powerful arms just inches from her head as he gripped the sturdy sides of Geoffrey's bed.

"Well, lady, if you really want to die, be gladdened for if it's His will, you haven't long to wait before the dark angel claims you. Before the sun clears these hills, is my guess. You'll be gratified, I suppose, that your prayers will have been answered at last... and all my puny efforts will not have stopped your dying."

He straightened and began to pace, slowly at first, then faster and faster until, unable to adapt the length of his steps from the open desert to the confines of the house, the walls rushed up to meet him far too quickly. He struck the offending boards with his fist then turned back to face her.

"You claim you want to understand... then listen and understand! Life is the greatest of God's miracles. Mankind forgot that and despaired; they saw no miracles and so, no God. But He is here and the proof, even now, is growing," he set his hand between her hips, "right here. Inside you."

He knelt beside her, his light eyes shining.

"To deny His miracle is to deny Him."

As he spoke the rough timbers of the house shook and pulsed, as if his words had awakened some awesome power, so she scanned the room, her breath stilled, but then she smirked--

The wind--

Nothing but a dried up, drafty old house, its planks rattling in the wind.

He took her hand and when she glanced at him, he held her gaze with his own.

"Accept Him, Cross. Accept the gift of His grace. Do not deny your Father. Love the Lord your God. His love will be made manifest in you and through it, you will learn to love the child."

She looked at him across the soft gray pelts, she saw his blue eyes glowing with that light that blazed somewhere deep inside him, hot and sharp and strong... as always, when he spoke of his god.

Then she thought of all the days that had gone before, thought of those empty eyes so pale and far away, peering through her as if she were nothing more than a cloud of quaintly formed vapor, or of no more substance than a shadow, clogged thick with desert dust.

The recollection lodged cruelly in her chest, leaving no room for breath.

"You talk like a priest. All I know is I don't love god and I don't love the child. All I love is a man with silver hair, but he doesn't love me."

The challenge hung in the air, daring him to contradict, but he did not.

"You use the word love the way you use the word hate," he said finally. "But you don't understand the meaning of either."

"Maybe you don't."

He laughed, released her hand. "You cannot fathom the depth of my iniquity."

"You make excuses."

"And you understand nothing! You're still a child, ignored and despised! You don't know love from the twitch between your legs! You say you love me; you can't love me, you know nothing of me! I should have used your body for my own pleasure with no regard for yours, like all the other whores I have taken... then you would not say you love me!"

"Excuses! You make excuses, so you can leave me! Then go, and go to hell! And when the next Valentine comes across the desert, priest, say another one of your prayers! Do you have some magic words for a whore and her bastard? You have words for everything else!"

She dragged up a hand and struck him. But since the bandages and her own weakness allowed not a mark nor even a sound to touch his face, she worked up a mouthful and spat.

Slowly, deliberately, the thin spittle dripping, he turned to her his other cheek. She let out a cry, lifted her arm to strike again, but her tears overcame her, and when her arm dropped to the fur blanket and her head fell against the pillow of herbs, she wept with children's tears.

But they provided no comfort at all; the only comfort she knew was in him, in the strength of his arms and the warmth of his embrace.

In silence, he lifted the pitcher from the floor and poured more water into the basin. Retrieving the cloth, he dipped it in the cool water but before he could replace it on her forehead, she turned her face away.

He let the cloth drop from his hand where it floated in the basin, forgotten in its uselessness, then he stood then stepped back until he was all but hidden in the shadows.

"You're leaving," she said.

"No."

"You're lying."

"No. I will stay, and I will pray."

"Pray? For what?"

"For you, you improvident girl. I will pray you find your peace."

"My peace? You have murdered my peace. I'll feel the touch of your hands until the day I--"

She sank into silence suddenly, cowed by his strangeness.

He seemed drained of all vitality; a too thick ghost. When the small lamp flared she saw the lines on either side of his mouth had cut deep into his flesh. His skin, pale as ash, appeared almost translucent in the inconstant light.

He moved toward the door. The wind took it, as if clearing his way, but he hesitated before crossing into the night. When she heard his voice, she opened her eyes to see him with his arms spread, his palms open to her.

"Cross. What you want, what you need, is no longer mine to give. I cannot give to you what I have already given to my Lord. Of the little that remains, you have already had the best... and the worst. If I stay with you I'm lost."

"If you don't stay, I'm lost."

"I'll find a way--"

"I'll die, Zero. I'll die and the baby will die too. I talk about dying, I say I want to die, but I'm not like you. I wish I could be, but I am afraid to die."

"Don't you think I know that? Don't you think I've borne that burden since the day I first touched you?" He slammed his fist back, blasted the wayward door, "Not a moment passes when I don't search for a way to save you and aye... yes... myself! Do you know what you are for me, lady? You are the World! You have drawn me back to every weakness, every worldly desire and every evil, that exists within me! You are everything I have fought to overcome! You are my hell!"

She stared, shaken.

"Don't say that. I never wanted to hurt you; you are my life--"

"And you are my hell. That's why Valentine told you made me hate myself, you are the means by which I'm separated from the Lord I love more than my own life!"

He trembled before her bruised face, as if every tear that fell from her eyes heaped yet another burning coal upon his head.

"Cross. Am I not like every other man? Don't I dream of holding you in my arms, of burying myself in your sweetness, with every breath that quickens me? But these things are, and must remain, forbidden to me. Know this; if I seek your arms, in time, I will cease to seek His. I entered into sacred covenant with Him. I vowed to cleave to Him and to no other. I cannot, I will not, break faith with Him."

Silvered head bent, he began another relentless march before lifting his eyes toward the heavens, his thoughts shared as a prayer to his father, a petition to his god.

"Tell me what choice remains for me. If I don't protect you with everything I am, I've forsaken my sacred duty. I cannot hope to save my soul through the sacrifice of your innocent blood. But if I stay with you, if I return to the world and choose Geoffrey's way, I turn from Him and am again lost. And such a bitter solace for you.... Will I force you to bear my agony as I am separated, your precious face bloodied? For that is the hallmark of my sin...."

He stopped his fitful pacing and with a sudden breath, gripped the frame of the narrow doorway as if he stood by its power alone, his muscular legs bloodless beneath him.

"Your life, lady, against my soul. Unless I can find the middle way, if you live or if you die, I forfeit my immortal soul."

Cross shrank into the bed in silence, its freshly laundered linen cover soaked by fever sweat.

Had she caused this devastation within him?

Caused it with her love?

Then she saw only faded eyes, his empty eyes, exposing his frailty to the world. She moaned one last time before she buried her face in the welcoming softness of the furs, her mind too sad, too burdened by the drug and the still fiery pain, to think anymore or care anymore.

Quietly, through the thickening fog, she heard a dry, even voice.

"Stop fighting the drug. It will help you sleep."

There was no need to open her eyes for she had become wise. The voice belonged to the soldier, summoned to bear away the broken body of the priest, tortured nearly to his death.

"Nor have you any need to worry about Valentine, lady," the soldier continued, "I know him. Even now he plots his perfect revenge. But this time the coward won't wage war against a woman. I'll be right here. And I'll be waiting."

She wanted to, but she couldn't look at him; the lead that had first filled her legs and then her arms had finally overtaken her lids. Listening to the desperate pounding of her heart, she mutely obeyed the voice that came soothing soft and far away--

"Sleep."

Chapter Twenty Three

Zero waited.

He stood in Geoffrey's doorway, dominated its height and breadth until he heard Cross's breathing come deep and even. Careful to raise no sound, he crossed to her side with boot heels lifted as if the slightest noise would awaken her, although he knew that virtually nothing would.

The laudanum was potent and irresistible.

Her right hand lay on top of the fur blanket. He bent low and pressed his lips to the fine linen that bandaged it.

"Would it have been the greater kindness?"

He lifted the corner of the fur robe and tucked her hand beneath, then pulled his own robes over his head to spread a final downy layer over the furs.

"The sand would have blanketed you in its sweet embrace, and you would sleep tonight in the arms of the angels. My brothers would have left you to the Lord and chastened me for my weakness... for mine is a grave weakness."

He watched for several moments before scooping up the makeshift lamp up from where it sat on the floor beside the bed. He set the cup on the table as he passed, heading for the door, and as he stepped out onto the shallow ramp that led from the house into nothing but shifting sand, his boot heels hardly sounded as the pulpy planks flexed under his weight.

He smiled.

God rest his brother Geoffrey. A world of sun and sand and stone, and he in timber, long gone to dry rot.

Brother Geoffrey who, while neither architect nor carpenter, had still managed to leave a treasure of another sort behind.

He swept his gaze across the cloudless sky, and although the night felt still, serene, even the tranquil sound of the wind as it soughed by his ears could not keep his thoughts from mocking him. So he tried not to think, willing himself to be one with the natural world that surrounded him. He felt the wind blow through the silky hairs of his forearms, heard the crunch of the stony sand as it performed its obligatory shift beneath his boots. He saw the clear light of the moon coloring his skin with a bluish tinge and smelled the smoke from the oil soaked rag that still burned with a light so weak it barely seeped through the open door of the house.

He breathed deeply of the chill air, willed it to consume him both inside and out and thereby enfold him into itself, but the universe rejected the taste of his temporal flesh and he remained a slave, a captive, to his own battle scarred skin.

He was among them but not of them, and in ultimate rejection the heavens railed.

Summoning the wind to pelt him with waves of sand culled from the gravel underfoot, he turned, too late, his back to the blow. He spit to rid his mouth of the grit, then kicked the rocks at his feet, his fingers curling into fists.

How long had it been since he'd waged war with no weapon but bare knuckles? How long since he'd felt flesh split and bone shatter beneath his hand?

It had been too long.

He wheeled, roaring and eager to strike, but found only the nothingness of the desert. Once his source of quiet peace, it now taunted him with its very emptiness for there was nothing upon which to ply his clenched fists.

All alone in the silence, his determination to forget everything slipped away as the girl's words, along with the image of her face, crept into his thoughts.

He understood her fear, perhaps even better than she did herself.

He remembered countless dawns rising over the deserted desert, and his appeals for help answered by none but buzzards and jackals. He remembered the ultimate betrayal that came in the guise of a human voice in answer to his prayers, only to hear in its raucous laughter the jeering voice of the old accuser, mocking his pleas for succor and solace.

Truly, he understood her fear, but her doubts still chafed him.

Would she always see with only her eyes?

He could no more leave her now than he could have left her with Valentine, or in the wasteland with nothing but the corpse of a dead man and the vultures as companions, her leather shod foot the last thing to be swallowed by the sand.

Be they together or apart, they were inextricably entwined, he and she, for now and for always. And when the day came for him to leave her, either in life or in death, she would be set as a seal upon his heart.

He rubbed at the cross that scarred his arm.

In truth, his was a very grave weakness.

His head throbbed and his heart twisted in his chest.

Only his faith persisted, complete and unshaken; a safe place existed for her and salvation was still possible for him; he knew it as surely as he breathed. But his restless examination revealed nothing tangible, only ghosts hidden amid thick smoky mists, beckoning with maddening subtlety, crying out for discovery--

As it had begun with Geoffrey, so it would end--

That certainty, born of nothing but instinct, drove him again and again to the mystery of the silver crosses. They swarmed like angry ants in his fatigued brain, but he'd tried every combination of the crosses. Too much of the puzzle, if a puzzle at all, was missing. The crosses shifted without direction in the charred wood, just like the thoughts that now strayed across his mind. If there had ever been a message there, it had been lost.

He pulled the sword from his hip and with a cry, drove it in the sand.

" _Christus!_ " He fell to his knees before the sword, stretched his arms up to the starry heavens, his voice shattered as he cried again, " _Christus!_ "

The wind gusted hard.

He ducked down, breathed in quickly before the wind scattered all the air, but then he tensed, alert, because along with the wind had come the smell of salt and behind the salt he smelled another fragrance, a particular sweetness he'd nearly forgotten--

Roses--

He sat hard on his heels.

He'd met battalions of armies.

Phalanxes of blades.

Stood with his sword raised, his eyes clear, no shaking hand, no quivering lip--

And now, to be brought low by--

Roses--

He clutched his arms around himself, his body so bent his silver hair swept the ground _._

"Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Pray for us sinners...."

Pray for this sinner--

He let out a groan, gulped a sob, dug his fingers through the gravel all the way down to the dirt, struggling to control the fear that caused his body to tremble and shake--

_"Vergine Madre, Vergine Madre...._ Mother, I hurt so much inside that if I could just hear you or touch you--"

The strap of your sandal or a petal or even a thorn, I'd gladly yield up my ghost and die--

He lifted his face to the vast sweep of stars, where they'd studded the night with all their little lesser lights, but the moonlight touched his cheeks and glistened on the sacrifice of his tears.

Might the Blessed Mother, the only mother he'd ever known, appear to ease his agony? Emerge at last to catch him up in loving arms while the spirit of contrition was still upon his sinful heart?

He watched and waited, again stretching out his arms to the infinite above, but no sacred face appeared. Sand and lack of sleep clawed at his eyes, but his tears bathed their charges with gentle hands.

"Mother," he whispered, "pray with me? I don't dare approach our Father," his voice dropped low in a secret whisper of confession, "how can I tell Him that I can't help them? Because I can't even help myself...."

Another gust blew, the icy chill lingering to dry his tears before enfolding him in the fullness of itself. It carried him aloft, high above the desert, and he flew on the rush to a pinpoint of light that suddenly burst into being, blue and red and hot and gleaming. The light drew him, blinded him, sent him flying then falling, yet pulsing and alive, until he surrendered with a breath stilled by hope, his strong heart booming inside his chest--

Lord? Is it finally time?

The surge of light crossed the sky from the east, its trail a shining swathe as the star plummeted down toward the earth. He followed the path of the star until it fixed on the hilt of his sword, then he watched it recede, back and further back, to hang like a jewel on the canopy of night.

And he was deposited back.

His knees were still buried in the sand before the broadsword he had so recklessly planted.

He noticed, only now, that it was appropriately askew.

He lowered his head and covered his face with his hands.

Only a dream.

All illusion.

A fake.

Like my whole life.

Like my whole faith.

I couldn't live it before and I can't live it now because it's a lie and no man can live a lie--

He tried to speak, to shout, to curse... he would curse god and die... but the angels sang so sweetly, caught his words in his throat and shielded him from his own desperation until he beat down the specters that threatened his faith, his peace, his very soul--

Kyrie eleison, Christe eleison--

Lord, I've been weak, I've been blind, but if it is Thy Will, sharpen my eye, strengthen my arm, and I will do Your will--

Or die trying--

"Where is He that is born King of the Jews? We have seen his star in the east and are come to worship him."

What?

Glancing around, he felt all the tiny hairs spiking along the back of his neck.

Cross?

Dead and come to haunt him?

Then he held his breath because he knew he hadn't spoken the words, hadn't even thought the words--

Only silence.

Shaken, he needed strength to counter the weakness in his legs so he reached for his sword, gripped the unyielding hilt.

Through the palm of his hand, despite the imposition of his blood-rich flesh, the centered nativity star glowed white, and in that precious unquenchable light, he recognized the promise of salvation.

_"Deo Gracias,"_ he whispered.

He scanned the sky for the flame-blue star, but it twinkled anonymously now, somewhere among its countless brethren, so he yanked the blade from the sand and strode into the house.

He laid the sword across the table with the hilt over the edge, flipped his ax and brought it down quickly; two hard whacks on the big pommel that adorned the top of the hilt.

The pommel fell hard, bounced once, then began a long lazy roll across the uneven floor.

The other pommels soon followed and were still jostling one another when he brought the sword down across his knee. The fine steel rang out, the blade snapped from the hilt, and the pommels, as if startled, quieted at last.

He looked at the hilt for a long time. The symbol of the Brotherhood of the Knights of the Cross, the star which led the Magi to the Christ Child, formed the central motif of the elaborate grip. He held the heavy steel in his hands for another long moment before he lifted it to his lips.

"Father, this I ask in the name of Your Christ."

Breathless, he dragged Geoffrey's riddle board across the table and positioned the hilt.

The grip made a low thud when it claimed the cavernous hole in the hewn plank. He touched the board with his fingers, blindly reading the lines, and when they joined those etched into the hilt of his sword, he had to bend close and use his eyes because so many of the lines had been worn away by years of contact with his hand.

The star motif, which dominated the entire eastern segment of the board, instantly began shouting its secrets.

Fingers tracing as his mind raced, he smiled.

It's all here--

The Az-Amin road, Makaen Hadeed, Al Fajr--

The northern canyon of Nahal Zin, the great valley of the Aravah, midbar to the south, midbar to the east--

He poked a thumb and finger into the small pouch tied inside his vest, searching for the crosses caught inside, but then, impatient, he yanked the sack free and dumped the contents onto the table.

It was dark inside the house although the tin cup, ever valiant, still oozed a feeble light. Dragging it closer, across the table, he queued up the crosses to catch the faint glow from the flame.

Geoffrey's cross was first. Etched in the center was the flared wedge of a blacksmith's anvil. Above the anvil, a hammer; below it, three nails... Christ's nails.

Valentine's cross was next. The upright and the transverse were, predictably, centered by a heart. Twisted around the heart, binding it... plaited thorns.

The cross he'd taken from Mag was last. He slid the lamp still closer, close enough for him to feel the warmth of the weak flame on his face.

The engraved center depicted the Lamb triumphant, bearing the Cross.

Agnus Dei... the Lamb of God.

His lips tugged briefly.

Would any priest so presume?

He sat back, thinking.

Faces, voices, all sped across the pages of his memory as if before his eyes--

So many dead, so many dead....

So much promise lost or squandered, so much humility hopelessly perverted.

Although some brothers, he recalled, had never been humble.

The name and face of one man emerged from the shadows and he knew then, that only one man would adopt that sacred symbol, with its play upon his own name, as his own.

The cross had belonged to Balthazar Lamb. No doubt, it was he whom old Mag had managed to kill out there in the wasteland.

His lips tugged again, his face grim.

If only she'd managed to kill us all--

He shoved the crosses and the cup to the far edge of the table and buried his face in his arms.

Lamb had been unable to escape Brother Death approaching slyly, stealthily, in the guise of a dying old woman, but it seemed that he himself, who had cheated the dark angel a thousand times, had escaped almost everything.

Everything but the memories... the sounds, the smells, the pictures that moved endlessly inside his head.

He wrapped his arms more tightly around himself, barely stifling a sob.

He and his brothers had invaded some rich man's house. Confiscated his herds and his treasure. Murdered him... his sons... his male servants.

Had the sons, or the servants, managed to mount some sort of resistance?

That, he couldn't remember. But he remembered the girl. She sat at his feet, trembling. The coarse fabric of her black abayaa reeked of onions, and it covered her from head to toe but not her hands, and he could tell--

... always tell, by the hands--

Soft and white, they'd never felt the harsh summer sun that baked the fields that grew the onions, nor the inevitable slice of the knife against a finger while cutting those same onions.

So he knew it immediately, for some things were impossible to disguise, and this so hastily, so clumsily, done--

... _the sheik's daughter--_

She clutched the heavy gauze of the abayaa close to her face so nothing showed but her eyes... dark brown eyes, spilling tears.

She was young, he recalled. Barely a woman.

... _yes, yes, I remember too, virgo intacta--_

But why had she stayed there at his feet, like a dog?

Why hadn't she scurried off into the safety of the night after he'd used her?

Was there some uncle, some cousin, so anxious to sacrifice her to avenge the family's _sharaf_ that the man who had just violated her seemed the lesser evil?

... _you'll never know--_

... _so just forget about it, it wasn't your fault--_

She was still sitting there, his booted foot resting against her back, when Brother Lamb entered the house, the grayness of his eyes and lips and skin laying like a shroud over the rich brown robes of Lux Perennis.

Lux Perennis _,_ Eternal Light... the elite of the Brotherhood of the Knights of the Cross.

... _or so they claim--_

As Lamb wound his way slowly, past the languorous bodies and those heaving just the same, he left in his wake a miasma so inescapable that the most rowdy din fell silent as he passed.

And when Brother Lamb's roaming ended, his gray glance strayed to the girl.

Lamb said nothing.

He said nothing.

Then Lamb stretched out a thin-skinned hand and ripped the girl's veil from her head.

... _it wasn't your fault, you treated her gently..._

The girl looked back at him and he saw fear screaming from her eyes, saw her flinch, saw her raise an arm against Lamb although the brown brother had made no move to strike. Gray lips tinged purple now, Lamb seized her wrist while--

God, she was scared, she was so scared--

He just sat, wondering why she'd looked back.

Did she expect him to claim her? Defend her? Intervene? Lift his hand... _his sword?_... against a Brother?

Of course she had. How sorely she'd misjudged me....

... _indeed--_

Lamb dragged the girl across the floor into a shadowy corner, and with a hand on her throat, shoved her back over a wooden cask. The girl whimpered but when Lamb answered, his voice sounded dry... brittle... like the odd stick one might trod upon in the desert, saying--

Open your legs, you stupid girl...

... _yes, yes, I heard that too--_

And while Lamb fucked her, I watched them through the thin smoke that drifted from my pipe, thinking, bang away, brother, I've broken her just for you...

... _but it wasn't your fault, you treated her gently..._

... _you told her she was pretty, don't you remember..._

Get thee behind me Satan--

The opium was strong and sweet and soon he was floating amid clouds that swaddled him like a babe, fighting a smile, _as one dare not laugh at Lux Perennis,_ and counting each time her head thumped the wall behind--

One... two... three...

Fourfivesix--

And then, unable to contain himself because it was truly just too funny, he finally laughed aloud because there'd been only six.

With his vigor so quickly spent, Lamb shook his robes, smoothed his tool, turned his back and walked away--

His sword yapping at heel like one of those vicious perfumed mongrels courtesans like to keep--

... _but don't you remember, you left her alive..._

And when he saw her body, naked and blue in the thin light of dawn, it had been thrown on a heap of animal carcasses like so much offal.

But he just turned his head, forced his eyes straight, and continued to march--

To the next and the next and the next--

... _but it was her father, her brothers, her uncles--_

... their customs, not yours--

... _you treated her kindly, you told her she was pretty...._

Get thee behind me, liar--

... _so now you want the truth? here is truth! truth is, you said not a single prayer for the repose of her wretched soul!_

... and youdareyoudareyoudare still!

... to call yourself His priest--

My sins are under the Blood... under the Cross... under His Foot... just like you, serpent... and once confessed they're remembered no more--

... so why are you condemned to remember--

... confess it, always to remember--

... _unless the Christ's little mumbo-jumbo date with that fucking cross just didn't fucking take--_

... _priest--_

"God!"

Zero slammed both fists on the table as a deepening quiet crept in to surround him.

He hid there, behind his arms, waiting for the suffocating blackness that loomed behind the silence to consume him, inch by inch and sin by sin, but his soul, yearning to breathe, anxious to live, urged him toward the light, compelled him to embrace the warmth before the Adversary could use his guilt and his pain like fetters to haul him, without so much as a sound or a struggle, down into that cold and lonely pit.

He threw himself off the bench and stumbled fevered, unfocused, to the basin beside the bed. Dipping in the cool water with both hands, he bathed his burning eyes, his face, his neck--

Whatever you do unto the least of these you do also unto Me--

... _unto Me--_

Unto Me--

... _unto me--_

"Oh my God... forgive me, forgive me--"

His legs refused to hold him

Knees buckling, he fell against the bed, jostling the girl, and when he lifted his head to see, she hadn't moved, not a muscle, so he lowered his head to his arms--

"I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry--"

Lord, I won't abandon her again--

And then he rubbed his eyes, his face, his head, scrubbed away water already heated by contact with his wicked flesh, water already as warm as her tears--

I can't abandon her again--

He heaved to his feet and threw himself, still dripping, back down onto the bench in front of the table.

Would old bitch had managed it--

Would she'd managed to kill us all--

He snatched the lamp from the far side of the table and slammed it down before him. The oil sloshed, drenched the flame, obliged him to pluck at the drowning rag to urge the light a little brighter before he took the crosses with a quick sweep of shaking hands and began setting the ornate edges into the wood. He placed Lamb's cross with a snap, followed by Geoffrey's and Valentine's, and then he just sat looking, fascinated, by the bright silver pieces nestled in the charred wood.

He pushed his forefinger into the last empty space, and after a quick breath, reached down, took the silver dagger from the sheath in his boot, and set it on the table.

He thumbed the center of his own cross.

St. Michael the Archangel stood victorious, his sword aloft, his foot upon a grimacing Satan.

He felt his lips tug into a frown.

Would any priest so presume?

"Michael," he whispered, placing the cross in the plank. "Who is like unto God?"

He touched his own cross first. It did not completely fill its allotted space because he'd honed the edges to fashion the razor sharp blade.

He traced along the lines created by the hilt of the sword and the intersecting crosses, then ran his fingers down the center of the richly chased steel, moving from top to bottom, north to south, in relation to the motif of the star.

"The Aravah ridge," he whispered.

By pinpointing the star in the east, the entire region, as canopied by the night sky, was displayed in the elaborate carvings, and as he rubbed still more soot and dirt away from the map, he visualized the unmistakable relationship between the steel of the sword, the finely wrought silver crosses, and the stars twinkling high above.

"Here's the plain of Geoffrey's settlement, to the west of the ridge," he murmured softly, again following the irregular surface of the hilt, and as he traced down Valentine's cross and across his own, he came to the upright of Lamb's cross, gleaming like a river of light.

It ended at the shape of another cross, carved clean and deep into the rough board.

"And here," he tapped with his first finger, "here is the desert's secret."

He sat staring at the old wood.

Much of the work had been obscured by age and fire, but it was obviously ingenious.

More than ingenious.

Brilliant.

More than brilliant.

Inspired--

"Geoffrey, you were anointed after all," his fingers played over the board in something like a caress, "rest in peace, my brother."

One mystery solved.

But the other, the rolled parchment packed carefully inside his gear, could wait, because he needed to do something now that could not wait.

He went to where she slept.

Fever's sharp edge still ruled, so he retrieved the abandoned cloth from the basin and after wetting her lips, replaced it on her forehead.

He eased down to his knees, and after resting his head against his clasped fingers, he began to pray for her life and for that of her unborn child.

Chapter Twenty Four

The first thing Cross noticed when she slid into consciousness was the unquiet of the silence.

On the table, a ragged flame hissed from inside a dented cup filled with oil. Outside, something small and lazy scratched over the threshold while a shrill wind howled across the open plain, sending a shower of sand to hit the thin walls of the house with a scattered slap.

So she hadn't died during the night.

She dragged sore hands to her belly and rubbed the slight mound between her hips.

Maybe it would have been better if she had.

She peered through the darkness but could find no sign of Zero.

Nor could she find any hint of exactly how much time had passed. But it had apparently been long enough that Zero had kept busy.

As she breathed deeply of mingled scents, the sharp sweetness of mint and lavender, the warmth of coriander and wormwood, she noticed that he'd hung mats, woven from bundles of the herbs, over the smoke-stained walls.

Nor did her father's books sit in toppled stacks or on the floor; he'd stood them all up and formed them into neat rows against the four walls, their lavish bindings turned outward. He must have been reading at least a few, because she spotted several gaps along the orderly lines.

And the grit that had blown up against the piles of books... he'd apparently brushed away all the dust and sand with a broom he'd made from bunches of twiggy branches and a short, strong stick. The broom leaned against the bench by the window and she could see light colored specks, the tiny spent blossoms, still scattered along the stems.

And finally on a bare patch of wall, opposite the bed, hung a cross. Just two twigs, really, lashed together with a shred of wool.

Such a small and simple thing, that cross.

What could possibly have given those ordinary pieces of wood the power to so impact his life? And hers?

And now that he'd gone, would anyone ever be able to offer her an explanation?

Empty and weak, she turned dull eyes to the door.

That's how he'd left her, after the awful things she'd said to him; he'd gone out through that useless old door that didn't even have a latch to keep it properly closed. Geoffrey's people had wandered in anytime, daytime, nighttime, and she--

Bare-assed--

Kept apologizing as if they, not she, had the right--

To be--

And I shouldn't have stopped him from burning this one too and then there'd be nothing to remind me of my useless father and my useless quest and my useless life, and look at me now, used and useless--

The wind gusted again, racing hard, but the door, abandoning its usual in-out negotiations, just shook inside its frame with a hollow shudder and the soft jangle of metal.

Metal?

Cross glanced quickly toward the door as the lamp on the table flashed a bit brighter, urged on by a wayward breath of outdoor air that had sneaked into the house through a gap in the shrunken boards.

The sound of metal had come from a short length of chain, the piece of chain acting as a latch--

Of sorts--

She slowly inched her great toe along her left ankle.

It felt rough with scabs, but free of iron and when she tested the other ankle, she found the same.

Zero--

He'd pounded one of father's long nails into the door and another, a few inches away, into the wall. Both nails faced upward, wide ends to the roof. Then, with a length of chain apparently taken from her shackles, he'd hooked the ends over the nails and fastened the door.

She felt her lips curve at the thought; Zero on his hands and knees, splayed fingers sifting through the sandy stone all along the perimeter of the house, searching for any precious forged iron the thieves might have missed....

Just to make right, if nothing else, that offending door.

And now he was gone and she'd never get the chance to ask him how he'd gotten those chains off her ankles so he could use them to latch that damn door--

From the inside--

She moved her gaze to the tiny window.

Never, he could never fit--

She brought a shaking hand to her lips.

Zero--

His long body bent double with fingers loosely laced, he knelt still beside the bed, his silver hair shimmering through a blur of tears that stung her eyes--

She reached out and touched a single strand of his hair.

Moving to a crouch in an instant, he seized her wrist in one hand as the other, already gripping his knife, began a downward plunge.

She flung out her free hand, stalled the knife even as he flung himself, blind-eyed, away from the bed. His hand fell against nothing but empty air as he crashed back against the bench, and as the bench scraped under his weight, both bench and man skid until they slammed up against the thick blocks that formed the base of the table.

"Fuck!"

Pivoting onto his knees, he hauled himself to his feet and slammed the knife down on the old scarred planks.

He did not look at her.

"Sweet Jesus, woman! Days and nights imploring Our Lord in His mercy to spare your life, and I very nearly-- Don't you know any better than to wake me from within arm's reach? Throw a rock at my head, douse me with hot oil, do something.... I don't care how quick you are; don't ever... ever... touch me!"

"I'm sorry."

A shaking hand at her throat, she stared at the long knife on the table, gleaming smug and silent despite the faint light. She pointed with one thin finger. "Soldier...."

He ground his hands over his face, then worked his fingers to rub the stickiness from all the corners of his eyes.

"Aye," he grunted, "and I'll die the same. It's best you remember."

"I'm sorry."

He snapped the knife back into its sheath, then stepped to the bed and brushed his lips against her forehead.

"Praise God, the fever has passed. I felt the coolness of your skin when I took your wrist."

Despite the poor light, she could see sharp angles pushing along his jaw and for the very first time, a violent blue smeared from nose to cheekbone, under each eye.

She pushed at the heavy fur robes. "You're tired."

Slowly, his brow arched and he smiled.

"If I get in with you, lady, we shall neither of us sleep. And you must eat; the child is greedy and will take what it needs, so we must be sure there is enough for both. Then, when you've recovered your strength, we'll begin your lessons."

She stared. "My what?"

"You have many things to learn and little time in which to learn them. And make no mistake, you will learn what I have to teach."

She felt heat rising in her face so she pressed her hands against her cheeks and eyed him from under her lashes.

"I've learned enough. I don't want to learn anymore."

"Perhaps you didn't understand me. Eyes, nose, throat, balls... that's first. And when you've mastered that, you'll learn when to fight." His lips tugged hard. "And... when to submit."

The flush broke free and stained from her neck to the roots of her black hair.

"I already know how to submit."

"I didn't say how, I said when. You must be prepared to make it and you must choose correctly, you'll get no second chance. _Dum anima est, spes est!_ "

She lowered her eyes, her lips trembling at the rough tone of his voice.

"I don't know what that means, Zero."

"Marcus Tullius Cicero," he said, but then he suddenly softened. "It means only this, Cross.... 'While there's life, there's hope.'"

Gaze still averted, she felt his touch, his gentle touch, a single finger following along the curve of her cheek.

"Lady. I know what your woman's soul tells you. It cries out, in that first wretched moment when he fills you, that all is lost. But I tell you in truth; make the choice to submit today... only then can you choose your time to fight, tomorrow."

"Oh, Zero." She fell back against the pillow, already rendered chill and damp by the frigid night air. "Why can't you understand?"

He leaned in close.

"Live. Consider no other option. Live through the first night and the next and the next.... And then, when the time is right... when he's drunk, when he sleeps, when his breeches are down to his ankles and he's all out, balls to the wind... then you will take a knife into your hand. And you will kill him."

"I'm not like you--"

"You will kill him."

He looked down at her, hooked his thumbs beneath his belt, and laughed.

"By the Christ, woman. You're not foolish enough to think the blue eyed one would have saved you."

She glanced up and shivered; not because of the damp bedding, but because she'd caught his icy stare--

So Gideon had opened his eyes--

Saw a bright angel--

And then, nothing more--

Zero laughed again.

"Had your benefactor ever attempted to defend you against his comrades, had he ever dared such betrayal, you'd have eaten his testicles for your evening meal. Trust me in this."

She wanted to hide, wanted to bury her face in his robes, or wrap herself in the heavy fur blankets that lay beneath, until a sudden burst of anger roused her.

"Stop!"

"You think I'm trying to frighten you."

"Just stop! Can't you ever give me any peace?"

"No."

He dragged her face up, stared until it seemed that some darkness, from his heart or from his soul, had welled up and submerged his pale eyes in indigo and black.

"It's an ugly way to die, Cross. They take you far out into the wasteland, where there's no water and no shade. And then you bear all of them and everything, until your own life's blood is borne out like a glorious red sea against the golden sand."

She closed her eyes.

It was the only way she knew to shut him out.

How close the demon was still... ready to spring, ready to slice, ready to do anything to keep her from stealing back her breath.

He cradled her face, his thumb grazing the swell of one cheek, his smallest finger, the other.

"Your skin is as smooth as porcelain. Did you really think it was over? You are so young." He squeezed until she gasped.

"For you, it'll never be over... not until the day you die."

She stayed bolt still as the demon, like an evening shadow or the light of a weakened flame, flickered in the hard line of his jaw, the cruel turn of his lips. But when he finally managed to corral the devils that had escaped past his wearied guard, he took a slow, deep breath, then eased her back against the pillow

"You're quick," he said, "you're young and strong...."

... _blood will stain her hands--_

"You've got a chance. I'll teach you what you need to know to survive--"

But this time the blood won't be hers, she'll just rinse it all away...

... _yes, yes, my son, the blood will be gone--_

... _along with her much celebrated innocence--_

He tucked the weighty blankets more closely around her.

"You'll not prevail against me in this, lady. It's quite enough to survive, so that's all I'll ask, until He comes in glory. Just survive."

A familiar fear crept into her mind, and then her heart.

He would teach her all these things so he could finally leave her.

"Then you'll go away."

"Aye, lady."

She tried to swallow the tightness in her throat, tried to distract by twisting a finger in the laces of his robes which still lay over the bed.

"Where are you going to take me? Find some other settlement?"

He straightened.

"I don't know where I'm taking you, but I'll know it when I find it. I can't tell you any more, I don't know any more. So you must trust me. Will you trust me?"

She turned her gaze to him.

No--

She would cry instead, cry and plead and beg, beg him to stay with her now and tomorrow and for the rest of her life, be it one day or ten thousand days--

But then there was only silence and a dream, a bad dream... she in death's face and he, crying out, _'you are my hell!'_

She wouldn't burden him any further.

If she truly loved him, she would yield to his will; not the way she'd surrendered to Valentine, but in a way that would allow them both some small measure of peace.

He just stood. Waiting. Watching. Measuring the silence. Then he laid his hand against her face and gently stroked the sunken place beneath her bruised cheek.

"You do not weep, you do not beg. I'm grateful for that."

"You're grateful... to me?"

She took his hand, brushed her lips against his palm, traced a long scar that ran from his last finger to his wrist. Turning his hand, she set her lips against his knuckles.

He stiffened and pulled his hand away.

"Do not. It's not appropriate."

He strode to the door, lifted the chain, then his musical voice floated back as he passed through the doorway into the darkness.

"Remember, Cross. Lessons."

Chapter Twenty Five

The floor of the cave was littered with narrow strips of fabric. Bloody, dirty, frayed, they lay scattered like earthbound moths, their dusty wings crumpled and stained.

From her lap, Cross picked up a clean piece of cloth and set it against the tip of her second finger. Using her other fingers and her teeth, she tightly tied the little bandage to stem the flow of blood that oozed from her cut finger. Then, irresistibly, her gaze travelled out through the opening of the cave to where the sun, hovering low, was drenching the tops of the mountains with an angry red light.

He'd been gone for so long. Was it possible he'd been defeated out there, in that barren, hungry land?

Or has he simply left this cave, and me, behind--

She shivered.

Sometimes the fear surged so strong, she felt gutted like a hare with nothing left inside but a hollow emptiness no amount of reassurance could fill.

She shook off the feeling.

He was not dead. Nor was she deserted.

His mission was simply one for an angel, not a man.

But yet, so far, he'd somehow managed to prevail.

It had taken him days to find this cave because he'd insisted on perfection. Virtually invisible to an intruder, it had not only several exits but, at its highest elevation, a peek at anyone who might approach, long before they actually set foot near the most accessible opening. And, he'd informed her, this most ideal of hiding places even took advantage of a prevailing wind which quickly carried the smoke away... most of the time.

But, like all good things, the cave had come at a price.

Just as he'd spent many sleepless nights scouring the dry hills in search of this place, he'd spent as many restless days since, hunting for Geoffrey's secret. Now he wore those quests on his strong body the way he wore the scars of his innumerable battles, and dusky circles always shadowed his pale eyes and his muscles stood out in hard relief on his taut frame.

But he had said she would be safe here and true to his word, safe she'd been, for all the long days she'd spent alone while he combed the wasteland looking for the secret, and for Valentine.

She picked up another bandage and wrapped it around her third finger. She tied them rather skillfully now, far better than when her lessons had first begun. And if she could just stop slicing her fingers, even he might consider this one lesson, knife sharpening, a success.

Many weeks had passed since he'd freed her from Valentine... her burgeoning belly clearly told that tale. Yet it seemed not so long ago, when she had first rebelled against the training he demanded she accept, protesting--

"Why can't we have a fire? Why do I have to sharpen the knives in the dark? Why can't I do it in the light? You do it in front of the fire, in the light."

She heard his joints pop, and after he grunted a sigh and shifted, she had to guess that he had stretched and folded his arms behind his head.

She heard him laugh.

"Don't laugh at me, Zero!"

He laughed again.

"Oh, lady... the night is your friend; learn to view it as such. If you can wield your weapon in darkness and your enemy cannot, you've gained ten allies. Use the night. Use everything. Be prepared to do anything. Be prepared to survive."

In utter darkness and so, in utter safety, she rolled her eyes.

"Yes, my lord."

Risking a single finger, she located the knife, lowered the blade to the whetstone. After a few loud, grating scrapes, his quiet voice came again.

"The intent is to hone an edge onto the blade, my lady. At present, you're taking it off."

She shoved as far back as the closeness of cave would allow.

"Now, how do you know that? It's black as tar in here! I can't see anything! You can't see anything!"

"I can hear it. Make the steel sing, not squawk. Twenty degree slant. And if you do it right I'll help you bandage your fingers so you don't have to tie them with your teeth. Again, please...."

And so her lessons had begun, and as the memory of his words sounded in her ears, his image drifted across her mind.

She saw a muscled arm flexing before her, then, albeit gently, around her throat: _Chokehold,_ the enemy immobilized in seconds, dead in minutes.

And then this challenge: a small pouch dangling from his fingers with two figs, honey-ripe, hidden inside.... _Ballcrusher..._ if she could snatch 'em, she could eat 'em.

And when he returned one night with a heavy bunch of grapes--

Eye-Gouge--

She could hear him even now, laughter rumbling in his throat as she licked away every drop of sugary juice dribbling down his cheeks.

Satisfied with her progress, he seemed to refuse to understand or accept that she would... could... never be like him.

Kill quickly? Cleanly? Without panic or remorse?

No. Never.

Never--

No, all the lessoning in the world would be wasted if she were called upon to defend herself again... rather, it would be just like the thief who had, so long ago, stolen her water. The only difference: awareness sharp enough for her to truly pity any poor soul that might someday be chosen, by indifferent fate and that fickle god Zero so loved, to die under her rough and clumsy hand.

The cuts on her fingers throbbed.

Folding the fingers into fists, she sprang to her feet and went to the break in the cave wall to peer out into hills.

They still stood empty.

Her fists moved slowly to her belly.

As still as stone, the fists provided neither caress nor comfort to that nameless, faceless being that grew inside her. So she drove her gaze past the fingers and the swell and fixed on the rough sandals Zero had fashioned using Billy's stolen boots.

She concentrated on the strategically placed knots and weaves to distract her thoughts, but the sandals served only to remind her that everything served one purpose and one alone... to remind her.

She once shared her thoughts with him, or more accurately, her fears. Admitted that although she was afraid of someday being forced to kill, she was far less afraid of bringing death into the world than life.

Of his troubled trinity... demon, soldier, priest... it was the priest who had sought her eyes, his touch abidingly gentle--

Lady, if you are unable or unwilling to assure the former, you cannot possibly assure the latter....

And she laughed then, a frightened, humorless laugh, just as she laughed now, the bandages on her fingers catching in the strands of hair as she dug her nails into her scalp.

"He's right," she whispered to the dying sun, "he's always right. What a stinking world this is."

But then relief surged as she spied his slender form at the crest of a low ridge in the distance. She wrapped her arms around herself and watched from her hidden place in the craggy rocks as he glided easily over the top of the outlying mountains, his weapons flashing like mirrors, the strands of his hair a gleam of light, easily outshining the waning sun.

The salty taste of blood stung her tongue.

Something's wrong--

The bruises that had once marred her face had long since healed, but the deep cut on her lower lip proved stubborn, splitting open regularly, so she pressed the neck of her robe against her lips--

Damn thing is bleeding again but it doesn't matter doesn't matter doesn't matter because something's wrong--

She forced herself to breathe.

She needed to work it through, just as he taught her. She would enter shadow lands, searching and seeking until she found the source of her fear.

The sight of him returning to the cave never made her feel ill at ease, although she hated the heavy lines, newly drawn, around his mouth... hated the inch of paler skin that peeked up over the waist of his breeches because they slung that much lower on his hips, now that he'd lost so much weight.

Hated his recently entrenched habit of rubbing his lips with the back of his hand so that now they were sanded nearly raw--

It's his hair--

His hair, like his unsheathed blades, shone silver in the sun.

Brash, daring, robes abandoned, he strode through the wasteland with his weapons bright and beckoning, his attitude arrogant and defiantly reckless. Everything he'd taught her not to do and not to be. He had made himself the irresistible quarry, wordlessly challenging the hunter of human prey whose black clad figure still hid somewhere out among the hills, waiting and watching--

Oh Zero, no--

She sagged with a moan, cooled her raging cheek against the rocky wall of the cave.

She would ask her questions, when he returned--

Always the same questions--

And she would receive her answers--

Always the same answers--

He would shake his head and smile... that soft, sad smile that always knifed through the whole of her heart.

She turned back to the break, watched until he appeared at the summit of their safe place, and when he skittered nimbly down the wall that masked the cave's entrance and then into the cave itself, he touched her arm lightly before brushing past in silence.

She whispered to her feet.

"You didn't find it."

He shook his head.

"No sign of Valentine?"

"Never find him in these mountains. Not in a lifetime. Not until... unless... he wants to be found."

Her eyes widened.

"Then--"

"Then nothing. He'll never find you, either."

He stripped off his belt, heavy with weapons, allowed it to clatter down onto the stone, and when he peeled his leather vest from his sodden skin, it made a greedy sucking sound then a deep, soggy thud when he landed it beside the belt.

Silently watching his every movement, Cross felt her gaze fix and lock.

He stood naked to the waist so she couldn't miss the reddish brown streaks that spattered his arms to the elbows, or the dried blood that stained the craze of scars that covered his hands.

He quickly lowered a knee and scooped up handfuls of the sandy grit at his feet, scrubbing hard at all the red.

"Jackal. Did you check the snares?"

She nodded.

"Were you careful?"

"Zero--"

He bullied her into silence with his dead eyes, then stood and said only, "Catch."

In an instant he'd flung something toward her, to a spot well above her head. She scrambled back, gaze tight, and neatly caught the object with one hand.

"Good," he said.

She opened her fingers, _flint,_ while he, in silence, sank down, crossed each ankle to the opposing knee, and began rubbing the knots that twisted the muscles of his shoulders. Staring into the unlit fire, he groped blindly for his water sack and when he found it, he drank deeply then lowered it, only to raise it again.

Cross struggled with the spit.

Hung with three fat pigeons she'd snared in the rocks, she dragged the catch heavy stick to the fire, centered one end on the topmost of several flat stones she'd stacked at the edge of the kindling, and lifted the other end onto a second stack of stones.

She struck with the flint he'd just given her, sending a flurry of sparks into the dry scraps of wood and grass under the spit. But the flint felt too big in her hand; she much preferred the well-worn piece he had given her to use a hundred times before. She opened her mouth to ask the question; abruptly closed it.

He wouldn't answer anyway. Instead, he'd say--

Learn to think--

Work it through--

Inexplicably, the flint gave rise, in her mind, to a picture of him.

He was in Geoffrey's house, his hands gripping the frame of the narrow doorway, his face transformed. And then she heard his words; such awful words, she'd always kept them shrouded in memories so colored by drugs and pain, she could almost convince herself they were just part of a dream and had never been said at all.

But it was no dream; it was real--

Your life, lady, against my soul.

Unless I can find the middle way, if you live or if you die, I forfeit my immortal soul--

His soul was in the balance against her life. And he, in control as always, was actively tipping the balance. As she would rise, he would fall.

Thick smoke billowed up from the fire as grease from the pigeons dripped into the flames. She wiped tears from her cheeks with the backs of her hands, choked on them, coughed, gave the spit a quarter turn.

And when his voice would come softly, from behind her, she would say it was the smoke--

"Why do you weep, lady?"

"The smoke."

"I see. Then come away from the fire."

Turning the skewer again, she ducked to wipe off tears against her sleeve.

"Cross. I said come away."

She shuffled the short distance to stand before him. There, just as surely as had the smoke from which he'd just ordered her away, the sudden rush of his anger enveloped her.

"You've apparently become accustomed to the shackles worn by disobedient whores. Shall I arrange for them to be replaced?"

Lips trembling, she turned away.

He lowered his head and ran his fingers through his hair.

"I am weary, lady."

"I know."

"I lack patience. You must try to understand."

"I do understand. It's not that."

"What then? Afraid?"

"No! Yes! But for you, not for me! I'm afraid for you!"

She thrust out her hand and opened her fingers, the big black flint still in the middle of her palm.

"The jackal was human."

He looked at her.

"It was human! Wasn't it!"

"Aye, lady," he said evenly, "it was human... after a fashion. What of it? This is the wasteland."

"Do you think I care about some dead renegade out there?" She sank down slowly; halfway down, she set a hand on his arm to steady herself. "Don't you know I care about you. All I care about is you--"

"So you've told me."

"Don't you believe me?"

"Aye, lady... I believe you. But no good can come of it. No good has."

Her hands flew to her belly.

I'm sorry--

After long moment he reached out and touched her arm.

"That was unfair, and unkind. Unworthy of a knight."

"No," she glanced away, "no, you're right. You were in danger today, because of me. Valentine hunts you now, because of me. You were right, what you said before, when you told me you should have left me where you found me, you should have let me die. Zero, I wouldn't even have known it--"

"Stop."

"I would have slept forever and none of this--"

"Enough!"

"None of this would ever have happened! Oh, Zero, where is this all going to end?"

He turned his gaze to the fire.

"I don't know, lady. I don't know where it will end."

They both settled down into the quiet, the only sound the crackling of the fire, and as she watched his face, his light eyes, riveted by the dancing flames, hid his thoughts from her, as always.

"Are you hungry?" she said.

He blinked and shook his head ever so slightly.

"You never eat anything anymore."

He said nothing.

The kindling shifted suddenly and she jumped, startled by the sound, but he just sat, the noise engendering no more response than a quick, repetitive tapping of his first finger on his boot. The same sounds came over and over again, his single finger playing rapidly over the worn leather, the cadence precisely measured as his brain, engaged elsewhere, allowed the unattended finger to rap out the same steady rhythm.

Cross clutched her knees more tightly but her belly had grown so big she couldn't quite bury her head under her arms. So she shifted and shifted again, until she could no longer bear it--

"Stop!"

He stilled the manic finger mid-rap. "What?"

"That noise! Stop making that noise!"

"What noise?"

"That... noise! I hate it!"

"What are you talking about?"

Hugging her knees, she laid her head against them, then heaved the whole of herself away from him.

"It's nothing," she mumbled into her arms. "It's stupid. I'm stupid." But then the words tumbled out, all in a rush--

"Valentine's men... they always tattooed each other and when I hear that noise, I just--"

Slowly, she slid her right hand up her left arm to her biceps. Clutching tightly, she squeezed hard then harder still, until she felt sure the flow of blood had stopped. Then, if she was lucky enough, the whole of her upper arm might turn the dusky shade of tattoo blue, thereby obliterating any symbol, any sign--

"Cross, that's all over now."

She dug her nails into her arm, determined to leave marks, and hissed.

"My lady," he searched for her eyes, "it's over. You must move past it."

She rubbed her hands against her face, her smile crooked.

"I know. I try. But--"

Her lips twisted as a babble of voices rose loud and raucous in her memory.

Valentine and his men spoke not only Arabic but also languages she eventually came to recognize and even, in some small part, understand. These were the languages they were born to: Hebrew and Greek, English and African and Russian... or so Valentine had said.

And as her memories crystallized, she recalled how, especially in times of agitation, the men's conversation would come wild to her ears, no better than jackal-jabber, the sounds so barely recognizable as words that she always questioned--

With how they mangle every language but their own, how do they ever manage to understand each other--

She slowly released the grip she had on her arm.

They could understand, because at the last, they really did all speak the same language; a universal language, full of sharpened knives and hardened fists, and--

What the fuck do I care what I do to her face, I'm only interested in what she's got below her neck--

And then she found another question, voiced it in a language owned by her childhood and her captors, culled it from the cacophony booming in her brain to pose it in flawless, effortless English--

"Zero... what's a harlot?"

Brow lifted, he almost seemed surprised.

Whether at the question or the language in which it was asked, impossible to tell.

He laid the backs of his fingers gently against her cheek.

"A harlot," he said quietly, "is an unchaste woman. You would know a harlot as a whore."

"I always knew Ned wasn't nearly as smart as Captain Valentine." Smiling, she leaned her head to the side, forced her words to come lightly despite the trembling lips that formed them. "Captain Valentine would have known that that the word "harlot" begins with the letter 'H', not the letter 'Y'."

"Y?" He took her gaze. "What?"

And then he was by her side, the implacable fingers of one hand gripping her left wrist as he slid her sleeve to her shoulder with the other. He studied the outer curve of her upper arm, marked not only by four crescent shaped bruises from where she'd dug in her nails, but also the unmistakable indigo blue of a tattoo.

A tattoo in the shape of the Roman letter 'H'.

"H," he said.

She stared down her nose.

"Y," she whispered.

He was on his feet in an instant, crossed the narrow cave in three strides with phantom voices sounding in his ears--

He taught me to read and write--

Read any good books lately?

He returned with Geoffrey's scroll.

"Read it. Please."

She took the scroll hesitantly and slowly, gently, unrolled the large parchment on the cold stone of the cave floor. When the corner opposite her hand curled downward, he carefully straightened it.

"Cross. Quickly."

She glanced over the yellowed paper, leaned down to decipher the tiny letters in the dimming light. As she scanned, her breathing slowed, then caught, then stopped. She released the scroll and when it had coiled itself up, she pushed the parchment toward him with the very tip of her finger.

"I can't."

Watched for only a moment, his lips tugged down.

"You're sure."

"I'm sure." She nodded. "Yes. I'm sure. I'm positive." She glanced back down, then up at his face. "Zero, I'm sure. I don't know what it says."

He almost smiled. "Remember when I told you, you couldn't march?"

She eyed him from under thick black lashes. "I remember."

"Well. You can't lie worth a damn, either."

He stood and took a few steps toward the opening of the cave, then took the same few steps back to where she still sat.

She could feel his eyes on her so she covered her face with her hands.

"Stop looking at me."

He wanted to march.

She knew it; he wanted to--

March out of this miserable cave where he's trapped by stone and smoke and me--

And what stands between him and his freedom, between him and his peace, anyway--

Only me--

"I can't force you," he said, "I won't force you. I'm not Valentine--"

"Are you...."

"Am I what?"

"Are you...."

"What?"

"Are you going to leave me?"

"What?" He rubbed his face, scrubbed his lips. "Good God, woman, after all this... after all this--"

"Are you?"

"No. Not now. When it's safe, I will... I must... and you know that. But not now. Not until it's safe."

Her voice was barely a whisper.

"You're sure?"

Then she stretched out a finger, inched the parchment closer, unraveled the scroll, and began to read.

"Greetings from Hell. To Jesus Christ, Prince of Piss." She glanced up at him, but his face had not changed. "Savior of Shit, Brother of Butt-fuckers, Creator...."

"Go on."

"Creator of Cunni... Cunni... I don't know this word."

He bent, raised the scroll from the stone.

"That's alright. I do."

After carefully rolling the heavy parchment, flung it hard against the wall.

"I'm sorry," she said. "It's my father's writing, isn't it?" When he said nothing, she glanced away. "Zero, I'm sorry."

He shrugged.

The pigeons were on fire now, so he stomped the spit into the embers. The flames rose up with a roar and licked the leather of his boot.

"It's a simple replacement alphabet," he said. "A puerile, shallow, inane... cryptogram. And I didn't see it. I was so convinced that it represented no form of communication or thought, so fucking sure that it was nothing but a manifestation of his madness, that in the monstrosity of my ego, I never thought to ask you. It never even crossed my mind, to ask you."

"I'm sorry."

The hand he raised shook slightly, just before he slammed its heel to the wall when he turned to stare out through the break.

After a few moments, he turned back.

"There's more, Cross. Perhaps you can help."

He bent stiffly and again unrolled the scroll over the floor of the cave.

"I have something of this mystery solved, I think, but," he directed her attention to the drawings, "the meaning of this parchment still eludes me. The top portion appears to be a map, do you see? See these five diverse points and the star? But nothing else is indicated. Maybe they're settlements, maybe they're ruins, or even deep wells. Do you see any annotations anywhere, perhaps buried among all the drivel, to help identify these points? The name of a city or a wadi? A mountain? Or anything?"

Cross leaned forward, ran a finger over the tiny letters as she scanned the parchment.

"Nothing, just more of that other--" Weak voiced, she offered, "On the back?"

He turned the scroll and she bent over it again, her hair falling over the parchment until she took all the strands, gathered them together and twisted them into a thick rope.

"Anything?" he asked.

"Just more of the same." But then she pointed, her voice sharp, "Except here! Look! One hundred twenty one! And here," she pointed again, "and here! One hundred twenty one! Here again, and here at the bottom!"

"How many times?" His gaze darted all over the parchment, looking for meaning in the oblique and indecipherable text. "Five, in all?"

"Five. What's one hundred twenty one?"

"Five... five... five phrases on the parchment, five points on the map. One hundred twenty one... what?"

He hooked his thumbs in his breeches and wandered to the opening of the cave.

"Sun's almost gone," he said to the deepening dusk, then, turning away abruptly, he rubbed a hand against his lips.

Cross rose halfway to her feet. "I'll get your water."

He laughed briefly, his smile grim. "It's not water I crave."

He snatched his vest from the rocky floor, fumbled for the inside pouch, then slammed it, then his fist, against the stone.

"Christ!" he gasped. "Help me!"

_Help me help me help me help me_ , came the echo, muffled even at first, then softer and softer till it faded.

He pounded over and over, his whisper no louder than the sound of his flesh against the unfeeling stone--

" _Pie Jesu, pie Jesu,_ Lord God! Help me to see!"

Eyes pricked by smoke and tears, Cross lay her face down against her knees.

May as well ask for help from a jackal or a buzzard or a dog, Zero, for all the help your god has given you--

But you still ask, you still believe, and that's something I'll never, if I live forever, understand--

After all you've done and all you've seen, how can you believe in a god who's never shown his face, a god who's probably not even real--

But I can tell you what's real, Zero--

I can tell you what you really need to be afraid of--

"Zero? Do you think Valentine's out there somewhere?"

"Aye."

"What's he waiting for?"

Zero rubbed his face, the stiff bristles of the day's growth against his callused hand making a loud scratching sound.

"I suppose he's waiting for the day I lead him to this treasure, or this secret, or whatever it is he's convinced I know something about... which I don't. Would that I did."

He turned to her, his hands spreading wide.

"Cross, think. Before the day you left Makaen Hadeed, did Geoffrey ever say anything at all about the secret or the treasure or the soldier or the Brotherhood? Anything?"

"No."

"Not one single word."

She almost laughed.

"Oh, Zero.... He didn't talk to me."

She slid back against the wall, still holding the twisted rope of hair. She split the rope into three long strands, then began plaiting them into a braid that she quickly abandoned, half-complete. She pressed her hands to the small of her back and sighed.

"The child," he said. "It will get worse."

He went to his gear, slipped out a roll of leather, spread it out beside Geoffrey's parchment.

He'd painstakingly transcribed all the markings from Geoffrey's riddle board; being unwieldy, he'd left it behind; and now, on his knees, began comparing the two.

She watched from behind low lidded eyes.

"You've gotten so thin. You never eat anything anymore."

"Not hungry."

"You think Valentine's still out there?"

"Aye."

"Watching us?"

"The plain... the valley... they're open. Indefensible. But the hills obscure much."

"But nowhere is safe? Totally safe?"

He continued his perusal, his right index finger following the path of his eyes, moving slowly from one map to the other, one to the other.

"You're asking for a guarantee. So the answer must be no. No, nowhere is safe."

Her hands went slowly, unwillingly, to her belly.

Then where will you rest your head, poor baby--

I'm so sorry--

"You meant it, Zero? You really think it's yours?"

He glanced up, found her hands resting on her belly, looked back down at the maps.

"Aye...."

His lips tugged hard.

If it will give you rest, if it will buy for you any small measure of peace, then yes, yes, a thousand times yes--

"Aye, I do," he said.

"Am I bothering you, Zero?"

"No, lady."

"That... thing... my father wrote? I thought he was a good man."

"He was just a man. You expect too much."

"Then why are you sitting there, trying to figure it out? I'd say, fuck it--"

But he wasn't listening. She shifted, still trying to ease the ache at the small of her back.

I'd just say, fuck it all--

Out beyond the break, the sun had all but done its dying. As the cave dimmed, Zero pushed both the leather transcription and the parchment closer to the sputtering fire as if every flicker of light, every meager spark, might still serve to illuminate the dark mysteries before him.

As the flames died, the smoke got thicker.

Cross coughed and rubbed her stinging eyes.

"Where's the wind tonight?"

"God knows."

She scoffed.

"Again, with your god! Isn't he supposed to be up in heaven somewhere? My father used to say, 'In the old days there were giants in the earth.' Maybe we should blame them for this mess."

He smiled slightly.

"Aye. Nephilim."

"Nephilim? What's Nephilim?"

"Nephilim are," his voice fell, "are...."

Rubbish!

Accept it, Bethan, he displays the characteristics--

Characteristics? Don't waste my time! How does a living, breathing boy display the characteristics of a myth? I'm a scholar, a scientist, and dalliance with superstitious speculation goes against my--

You may be a scholar, brother, but you are first, I hope, a priest. And belief in Nephilim is an accepted part of the Brotherhood's doctrine. As a scientist, you must acknowledge the veracity of the body of texts that has led the Brotherhood to maintain the existence of Nephilim as an indisputable tenet of our faith. Indeed, if I recall, your own work authenticated a goodly number of those documents. And certainly, we of the Cross did not invent the notion... Genesis 6, Verse 4, yes?

I'm well aware of my role--

I think not, brother, in view of your unwillingness to embrace neither the Brotherhood's dogma nor my supremacy in the matter. But very well... the application of prayer and censure will, in time, correct your... misapprehensions. So let us focus upon those things we do agree upon. You are willing to admit the boy displays extraordinary abilities, are you not? I understand from other brothers familiar with this boy, that despite his youth, his instincts and maturity of thought are quite exceptional. Some of our more aged brothers have told me they've known few like him in their lifetimes. They speak of an aura of the preternatural--

Preternatural! This is absurd--

And Brother Thomas indicates an aptitude for weapons very remarkable in one so young.

Shhhhh! Brother, please, forbear! The boy lies abed, not three feet beyond this curtain!

Forbear? In the face of truth? I will not! Nor will I obscure that which even you, no doubt, can see clearly with your own eyes... bespectacled though they are! No, I'm proud that we of the Cross have been given the opportunity to nurture of this strong right arm of God! And you should be pleased, brother, flattered even, that the Brotherhood has entrusted you with the education and training of so precious....

Zero laughed softly. "Foolishness...."

Cross caught a breath against the onslaught of smoke.

"So, what a Nephilim?"

"It means...." He slid his hand over his face, as if needing to hide even in the darkness. "The literal translation is 'they who came down'." The Nephilim are the sons of God. We're told in scripture, 'the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them....'"

Darkness had enveloped the whole of cave now, the fire just a pile of red embers glowing dully. Cross tried to follow the dim outline of Zero's wide shoulders, his strong arms sculpted by hard muscles; tried to follow the motion of his hands with their deft, graceful fingers, but she could hardly see him.

"That's what you remind me of," she said. "One of those sons of God."

She knew he smiled.

"I thought you didn't believe in God. But you are still very young. And the young... well...."

Since it was too dark for him to see her face, she indulged her petulance. "Well, what?"

"The young are just... young." He laughed softly. "I assure you lady, I am neither a giant nor a son of God. I'm just a man who lifts his eyes to the mountains for help, as I do not dwell there. Someday, perhaps, I will teach you the words of Psalm one hundred--" His voice fell to a hush. "Twenty one."

He smacked the big parchment with the flat of his hand.

"They're mountains! They've got to be!"

One hand skimming the stone wall, Cross struggled to her feet.

"Zero, where are they?"

"Where? I have no idea where."

"Oh, Zero!"

"Have patience, lady. Have faith."

"Ohhh...."

She leaned back against the wall, slid down carefully, her teeth clacking together when she finally hit bottom, but suddenly, she wanted to cry.

Patience--

Faith--

She didn't have enough patience to twine her hair into plaits and as for faith--

I've never had any of that--

She sighed, gathered her hair in both hands and twisted it into a heavy coil.

"Zero, do you still have my silver?"

"Aye."

"Can I have it?"

Again studying the maps, he loosened the worn straps that cinched his gear, fished around blindly, then tossed the headdress into her lap.

She sniffed.

"You can't even see those maps."

"I can see."

She smirked and sniffed again.

Fingers spinning the beads tied onto the woven mesh of the headdress, she tried to remember Geoffrey's face the day he'd given her the precious silver. She found no image; none; like so many memories of her father, that one had also now faded to grey.

"It's all he ever gave me," she said. "You know?"

He didn't answer.

She fit the webbed cage over the twisted strands of hair and slid through the stick. After a moment, she heard Zero rolling the scrolls.

She smiled.

It is too dark to see--

He stood, took two long steps, and nimbly maneuvered his long legs to sit beside her.

"Your father was a very fine metal smith," he began. "A true artist. He made the crosses, the swords, worked the chasing on the hilts.... He made nothing else for you?"

She shook her head.

"Nothing else for his only child?"

"No."

He smiled slightly. "So what was the occasion?"

"I guess I don't know." She felt compelled to look away although her eyes, like the rest of her, remained blanketed by night. "I don't remember."

Zero's lips tugged.

"There you go again. Mankind has offered many eleventh commandments over the years, but this is by far the truest: thou shalt not lie to thy priest."

She couldn't see even star shine in his hair.

Listening to the deep pounding of her heart, the throbbing so filled her that she could find no place inside for blood or breath or bone, so she swayed toward him, weak, and when he took her in his arms, he cradled her face and urged her head down against his shoulder.

"Tell me."

"Oh, Zero. He must have forgotten to fix the bolt."

"The bolt on that ridiculous door?"

"He must have forgotten to fix it."

"What kind of bolt was it?"

"Black... iron, probably. It must have gotten broken. You knew my father... he didn't pay much attention to some things."

"Your father was a genius with metal, he could do anything with it. You're telling me he couldn't, or wouldn't, repair a bolt?" Then, after a moment, he barked out a laugh. "Tell me, Cross.... How exactly does an iron bolt get broken in the first place?"

She started to cry. Dragging herself from his arms, she buried her face in her own.

Zero lowered his empty arms to his side.

After a moment he stood and hooked his thumbs over the waistline of his breeches.

"Who was it?"

Her voice came muffled by her arms.

"He wore robes, a hood, it was night, I never knew."

"Hooded robes, not a kafiyyeh? Robes like a priest?"

"I don't know."

"Did he hurt you?"

She made a little mewling sound.

"When?"

"A long time ago."

"When?"

"I don't know! We already gathered the dates, but the olives still weren't ripe--"

"Over a year ago? Where was Geoffrey?"

"I don't know."

"What did he say when you told him?"

"I didn't tell him."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

She finally raised her face to search the darkness for his. "Why? Why should I?"

"When did Geoffrey give you the silver?"

"A little while later."

"What did he say when he gave it to you?"

"He said, 'Here's a little something for you.'"

"The hooded man... what he did he look like?"

"I don't know! It was a long time ago, he came at night, it was dark--"

"Damn it, Cross, think! What did he sound like, what did he smell like? Was he young, was he old, was he drunk?"

"He was thin. Taller than Geoffrey, shorter than you...."

"What did he say?"

"Say?"

"Say! What did he say to you?"

"I didn't do anything wrong!"

"I didn't say you did!"

"Then why are you shouting at me?"

Zero took a deep breath, crouched beside her.

"Cross. He must have said something."

"He said, 'Open your legs, you stupid girl'! That's what he said!"

Zero shifted his foot on the stone floor, put out a hand to steady himself.

Open your legs, you stupid girl--

Balthazar Lamb--

But all he said was, "What?"

Cross searched the darkness, looking for a face behind the disembodied voice, a voice that sounded so hoarse and hollow, just hearing that single word shrank her heart inside her chest.

"Zero? Is something wrong?"

"Are you sure? Are you sure that's what... that's all... he said?"

"It's the only thing he ever said to me. I remember exactly. Why?"

She heard him swallow hard; heard the spit fighting its way down his dry throat.

She began to shake.

"Zero, if I did something wrong, I'm sorry, but please, tell me--"

"You did nothing wrong."

"But--

"You did nothing wrong!"

He stood and walked slowly to the mouth of the cave, licked two fingers and stuck his hand out the break.

"We've got wind."

He heaved himself up through the break, snatched a handful of kindling, hopped back down.

"If I did do something wrong," she said to the shadow she could hardly see, "I'm sorry."

"You did nothing wrong."

His lips tugged hard.

You just found the wrong soldier--

"But--"

"Shhht!"

He lifted a hand to silence her because he needed to think and with that small, soft voice of hers booming in his ears, he just couldn't think--

Sweet Jesus, she found the wrong soldier, Geoffrey sent her to find the Lamb of God but the Lamb she was supposed to find was Balthazar Lamb, Lamb knew where to find desert's secret, Lamb knew where to find the treasure, she was supposed to find Balthazar Lamb out in the wasteland but Mag got to him first, so Geoffrey--

Geoffrey didn't send her to find me at all--

"Zero?"

But why? What madness were they pursuing--

"Zero?"

I've got to tell her--

No, don't tell her, it'll break her heart--

But this is insane, I must be mistaken--

Sweet Jesus, it had to be, whatever plan Geoffrey and Lamb hatched between themselves, she somehow managed to find the wrong fucking soldier--

He stepped to the fire, crouched down, threw on the bits of thorny scrub and blew gently to help them catch.

"Zero? Can't you just forget about it?"

"No."

"Then I shouldn't have told you! It didn't matter then, it can't matter now!"

He held her gaze through the nascent glow of the fire.

"Do you know that?"

"No, I don't know that! But I don't know anything anymore! Zero, please...." She gripped the sleeve of her robe between her palm and fingers to wipe at her cheeks. "Please tell me why it's so important to you."

"I don't know why. It just seems odd."

Cross lowered her face to the crevice created by her knees, and soon, sat listening to the sound of his boot heels thudding against the stone. With the rhythm so perfectly paced and measured, she knew he'd begun marching along the constricted alley that made up the cave, back and forth, back and forth.

Only the soldier marched; the soldier who existed shoulder to shoulder with the demon.

When the sound of his footsteps stopped, the tips of his boots but an inch from her own sandaled feet, she sensed him staring down at her bent head.

"He came back, didn't he."

She nodded to her knees.

"You can sell a woman as virgin only once... to the same man, at any rate. But he came back the next night, and the next, and the next. How many times? A month? Tell me at least a full fucking month; new moon to new moon."

When she made another tiny noise he laughed, but it sounded more like a snarl.

"Well? Did it take?"

"Take?"

"The seed, girl! The seed! Did it take?"

She slowly lowered her head back down to her knees.

"No," she whispered. "No. It didn't take."

With the heels of his boots grinding the little bits of sand underfoot as he stepped away from her, the lack of his presence created such a vacuum that all the elements of life... warmth and sound and quickening breath... seemed to depart with him. The desperate quiet lasted, pregnant, pulsing, until he finally spoke again.

"Thirty days is a long time." He drummed a meaningless little patter on the stone beneath his fingers. "Did you learn to love him?"

Cross lifted her head and stared.

Learn to love him?

Sometimes I hate you, Zero--

Sometimes I hate you, still--

He stalked the smoky darkness, jostled the fire to make it flare. His shadow loomed for the briefest moment, giant and black on the wall behind, then he moved slowly to the break.

"Cross, you know? That door...."

The moon had begun to rise and with it, weak beams crept into the cave to light his thin nose, the sharp bones of his cheeks. His eyes shone white, as always in the moonlight. When he spoke to her again, he didn't turn, he just kept watching the night.

"No bolt, Cross. And no Geoffrey. Just when you needed them most."

She struggled to deepen her short shallow breaths but her lungs felt so shrunken, she found it hard to speak.

"Zero, it just happened--"

"Just happened? Thirty times? Sweet Jesus!"

"My father let it happen?"

"Your father made it happen!"

She felt her lips twisting, the single word they struggled to form sounding hardly like a word at all--

"Why?"

"How should I know why? Why do you look to me to explain this... abomination?"

But she did look to him, as the moonlight scattered silver in her lashes.

"Zero, why would he do that to me?"

"Why would a man, a priest, not let his virgin daughter at least see the face of the first man to fuck her? By the Christ... Christ! I... don't... know!"

He crossed the cave in three long strides, snatched the silver stick from her headdress, ripped the wrought silver from her hair.

"I want no more of your mysteries, girl! Enough is enough! And I have had enough!"

He flung the headdress.

Cross cried out, reached for it as it sailed across the cave, and when it landed directly in the center of the fire with a jangle of metal and a rising cloud of sparks, she heaved up off the rocky ground but Zero stepped to block her.

"Leave it!"

"No!"

"Why?"

"Because!" Her shoulders sagged. "Because! It's the only thing I ever had that was ever really mine!"

She sank down to the ground as he rubbed his eyes, his face, the stubble on his chin; anything so he wouldn't have to look at her.

My God my god my god my god--

How can so transparent a soul have a life so shrouded in secrets--

He went to the fire, drew back his leg, blasted the headdress from the embers. Skidding across the cave, it stopped when it hit her feet.

"There. Now you have your silver."

Newly disturbed, the fire shimmered, adding its meager light to that of the moon as Cross stared down at the pile of metal.

"All the beads fell off," she said. "And the ribbons are gone, too. Everything burned."

His lips tugged.

"The ribbons were already rotten. From the sun."

He stared down at her shaking shoulders, her bent head, and felt his heart stumble a little in his chest.

His lips tugged.

What can I do?

Open my arms? Kneel at her feet? Hold her close, so she can rest against my shoulder? For I have nothing else to give, beyond a shoulder upon which to collect her tears--

But then he noticed, still heaped between her toes, the gleaming silver.

It looked so different now.

He nudged it with his foot. Spread it out, using the silver stick he still held in his hand. Patted it down, as flat as possible, with his toe.

Geoffrey's creation now appeared as the smith had designed it; the webbed cage decorated by a small silver medallion, a larger gold medallion, and a molten silver river that connected the two. The only other ornamentation consisted of five round rubies huddled close together beneath the shining gold.

Five small rubies; a piece of silver; and a piece of gold.

And the whole of it held together by a delicate asymmetric lacework of both linked and woven silver.

"Cross?"

Her voice came muffled from her knees. "What?"

"Moon's cleared the mountains."

He took the maps, threaded the still hot headdress onto the stick, threw the lot out the break. Powerful legs uncoiling, he caught his hands on the edges of the rock face and heaved himself up and out of the cave. He stuck his head back in for only a moment.

"Air's better out here."

Then his head disappeared as he pivoted toward the moonlight, the headdress held captive against the gravel while he pried open the links with his knife.

She called to him, "Zero?"

Silence.

She sighed.

There was no help for it, no help at all, so she pushed herself to her feet.

It's only a headdress--

Suddenly his head, followed by an arm, poked down through the opening.

"Come out here."

She found a foothold, took his hand, bounced as he hauled her quickly up and through.

When she looked down at the silver, she saw that he had stripped off the scorched leather laces and wedged his knife into every round link that fastened the sides of the headdress. With all the links removed, the piece lay flat; a large lacy square.

He handed her the parchment.

"Spread it out. Hold it flat."

She unrolled the scroll and held it down against the wind as he laid the headdress on the parchment. Smiling, he rotated it until the five gems and the five marks on the parchment aligned perfectly.

She glanced up.

Crouching beside her, he tapped the silver stick against the silver medallion positioned now at the top of the mesh.

"Kinneret," he said. "The Galilee."

Then he followed the thread of silver that wound down, squirming every which way.

"The Jordan. And this gold one," he hit gold, "the one that looks like the devil bit a chunk out of it...Dead Sea."

"What are the stones?"

"Mountains. And here, beside them...." He pointed to the mark of the star adjacent to the red gems. "Here is our secret. Or perhaps the treasure."

He unrolled the leather scroll, inscribed with the details of Geoffrey's riddle board, and laid it beside the parchment.

"Now, look closely." He touched each point in turn on the leather map. "Here we have the same... the Galilee, the Jordan, the Dead Sea."

Hooking the headdress on the silver stick, he slid it from the parchment scroll to the leather transcription, then realigned the silver medallion to the Galilee and the gold to the Dead Sea.

And there, on the leather, beside the five rubies on the headdress, was the mark of the cross.

He pointed again with the stick.

"Recall the location of the cross; it lays to the left of the southern-most ruby." He slid the headdress from the leather and again aligned the silver on the parchment. "Now look here, at the star."

Cross stared down at the square of silver lace, bright and gleaming even in the weak light. While the right arm of the cross had touched the left edge of the lowest ruby, the left point of the star now touched the right.

She glanced up at him.

"They're right next to each other!"

"Nearly so. I need to work out the scale, but I would guess they're within two miles of one another."

Slowly, she could feel the muscles in her neck tightening. Those in her shoulders soon followed. But he was smiling.

"Do you know these mountains, Zero?"

"I know them."

"Are we far?"

He tapped the southern-most ruby, then gestured toward the jagged peaks that tore, as hungry as wolves, at the night sky.

"You see the tallest mountain, there in the distance?"

She focused first on the mountain and then on his face, but he looked back with soldier's eyes; eyes that didn't really see her at all.

"We'll be there by morning," he said. "It's only a night's march away."

He covered the parchment with the leather map, sprang to his feet, then slipped down into the cave.

She sat back on her heels, her right hand still on the maps to hold them down against the wind.

Only a night's march away--

Away... to what?

Freedom?

She rubbed her throat with her left hand, because it felt tight, then she rubbed her eyes because they stung with smoke and dry tears as she gazed down at the charts waffling lightly beneath her right.

Galilee, Jordan, Dead Sea....

The names of those places had fallen with such ease from his tongue. But what had those places to do with her?

They had nothing to do with her. And so, they had no place adorning her little bit of treasure.

With a shaking left hand, she fished the headdress from beneath the leather map and tossed it in her palm, testing its weight. Then, turning her wrist, she let the mesh slither down where it created another precious mountain in the middle of his map: a mountain made by a heap of gleaming silver.

She glanced over her shoulder, suddenly feeling his eyes boring like a beetle into the back of her head all to read her thoughts, although she knew he couldn't really see her; he was in the cave, collecting the gear.

She was so stupid.

Her fingers closed over the edge of the leather map and tugged.

It moved easily, with just a soft whisper, no real resistance from the parchment at all. So she slid it all the way off, again glancing over her shoulder toward the cave--

I'm not doing anything wrong, I just want to see my father's marvelous creation--

As she stared down at the yellowed paper with all its tiny childish profanities, it shuddered with the wind and rustled beneath her hand.

So this was her father's final gift.

Geoffrey's legacy to the world, and to her.

She laughed out loud.

He's always always always fucking right--

What a stinking world this is--

And what exactly had she done to deserve her rotten little share of it?

When the sensation came, it was fully unexpected.

First a tickling, then a turning, then a swelling that thrust outward into an unfamiliar stretching, lopsided and off center, inside her belly.

She clutched with her hands to contain the feeling, then stood breathless and confused, until a flood of realization drenched her under a clammy shower of sweat.

Motionless, stunned, her icy fingers gripped like claws as the parchment, _I really have to remember to ask Zero to tell me what exactly I did to deserve it,_ now free of her hand, flexed loudly in the gusting wind.

Eyes wide, her jaw fell slack as the wind took the paper.

She tried to slap it down but it moved too fast. Lurching to her feet, she heaved her heavy body and ran, trying to capture it, but it flew up higher, danced on the shifting wind until it caught another gust and sailed even higher, up over her head and into the darkness.

She groaned.

"No! Please! God! Don't do this to him! You can't do this to him! I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"

"Cross?"

She turned, cold sweat streaming from her forehead to her knees.

With his brows drawn together over his light eyes, he moved quickly to her side. He bent quickly, pinched the parchment between two fingers, and took it from where it was curled at her feet, one corner caught tight around the hem of her robes.

"Are you alright?" Bemused, he smiled as he tightened the scroll. "What were you doing? You're all flushed."

Wide eyed, she gasped, "Nothing...."

She saw his lips tug as his eyes searched up and down and all around.

She glanced away.

"I felt the baby."

He stared at her belly, met her eyes.

"Praise God! I was afraid that-- Praise God, that's a good sign!"

He laid his hand gently against the swell, so gently she almost couldn't feel it.

"Are you pleased, lady? I know... before, you-- Are you pleased?"

She looked down at the ground.

Pleased?

"Are you pleased?" he asked again. "Are you happy?"

"Yes. I'm happy."

Taking good aim so she'd be sure to catch a big mouthful, the wind slapped across her face a sand-filled gust of grit.

All she could do was spit.

Liar--

***

Zero set down the newly filled goatskin, being careful to raise no sound.

He'd pushed too hard.

He moved a strand of hair back from her face and with the same single finger, traced through the dust on her cheek a trickle of sweat gone dry.

She didn't move.

What had he been thinking?

He had truly pushed too hard.

Her lips were so dry that saliva had crusted at the corners, so he spilled a little water into his hand and wet her lips before wiping each dirty cheek. Then he bent one knee to the ground to watch her sleep, because he couldn't seem to take his eyes from her face.

It had never before reflected to him a quality he saw in it now, a quality he had seen so many times in the past--

But only in the faces of men.

Men were valiant.

Men fought ceaselessly... disarmed, outnumbered, the bravery of their deeds too often unsung.

Men fell, but those who still stood pushed on and desperately on... to God, to glory, to treasure, to home--

To something--

But she marched to nothing.

No treasure beckoned, hidden amid the swirling sand devils. No glory awaited, its song obscured by that of the wind as it whistled past her ears.

She'd marched in his dust, dogged and silent, footstep after footstep, across the most barren of wastelands. Only when they reached the shelter of this cave did she slide down, asleep before she could lift to her lips the water sack she still cradled behind her thin arms. Just to reach these dry steppes by daybreak. Just to follow a mere mortal man, marching ahead on feet of clay.

Today he didn't see her weakness, her woman's frailty and fear; today he saw an odd kind of courage. And an awesome show of faith. Faith as strong as his own, yet so sadly misplaced.

He rose to his feet, slung his gear over his back, but after only moments he sank down again and let the straps slip from his shoulder.

He couldn't seem to leave her presence, as if should he as much as turn away, he would lose her forever.

His lips tugged.

Was today that awful day? When the Lord of all creation would, against every rule of nature, occupy second place in the heart of one He'd claimed for Himself?

Had it come to pass at last... just as he always feared it would?

No--

But she'd brought the impossible impossibly close. Closer than anyone had ever brought it before. Or, he guessed, would ever bring it again.

But why her?

Of all the countless women over these last wretched decades--

Why her?

"Are you a witch?" he whispered, wishing he could gaze into her dark eyes. "Only a witch could have stolen any part of my heart."

No, this was no witch... those voices belonged to his brothers, his grim, austere brothers with their shadowed eyes and their thin smiles, smiles that never touched their hearts.

This was no witch.

This was nothing.

Abused... degraded... despised of all men....

But of the Father's Heart begotten.

Clearly, this was nothing... and nothing less than--

" _Cuore di Dio...._ Heart of God."

He forced himself to look away and heaved to his feet.

The sun was rising. And their destinies, now so intertwined as to be inseparable, awaited.

He took one last look.

"I'll be back, lady. Then may Heaven help us both."

Chapter Twenty Six

How many caves had he explored, searching for Geoffrey's secret... Geoffrey's treasure?

Fifty?

One hundred fifty?

Zero pulled the stopper from the spout of his water sack with his teeth, spat it out and drank. He gulped loudly as the warm water overflowed his mouth and ran down his jaw and neck, mingling with his sweat.

It didn't matter how many, anyway, because all the caves were the same.

Empty.

Cool, dark, dry... and empty.

The riddle board was clearly marked; he knew he was close to the place indicated by the mark of the cross carved into the old plank of wood. But it just wasn't enough. He could wander these mountains and valleys for the rest of his life. Reduce his search to a single square mile surrounding the marker, crawl around on his hands and knees for years... and he still might never find the right cave, the right hill, the right well, the right treasure--

If there was a treasure.

Perhaps he'd been nothing but a fool on a fool's mission, chasing some splintered fragment of thought that had sprung, already perverted, from Geoffrey's diseased brain.

He scratched the stubble that covered his jaw, then nudged the small campfire with his foot to make it blaze.

The night was very black. Moonless, and unusually quiet. In the distance, no jackals quarreled over their bloody prey; no desert rats scampered over the rocky soil. Even the wind breathed soundlessly past his ears as the fire seethed in silence.

All in deference to his failure, or so it seemed.

He fit the heels of his hands into the hollows of his eyes and kneaded until they streamed.

The whole of the campaign had come to nothing... the girl's innocence obliterated and her safety jeopardized; Valentine, his brother, mutilated... and he, through anger and weakness and pride, the source of it all.

He couldn't even kneel to pray. He sat motionless, staring into the fire, frozen by fear that swept like floes of ice over his heart and mind and soul.

"Lord, how has it come to this? Sweet lord, tell me how... and how to make amends. Or let it end. I have been faithful, have I not? As faithful as so flawed a man can be. So send the dark angel to her, send my brother to me, and let me go to my rest at last."

Then his knife was in his hand, the very moment he heard the sound.

He felt his lips tug as he scanned the darkness; no man ever prayed for death with an eighteen inch blade gripped in his fist, lest it pointed toward his own gut. And this blade was clearly pointed toward the night, toward the sound, so which was genuine, against which would any man lay odds?

Any sane man would lay them for the blade and against the prayer, so among his many myriad frailties, he was a liar, too.

And to my Lord, no less--

As he steadied his legs beneath him he saw the light from the fire reflected in its eyes; two dim yellow beams gleaming out from the blackness. Then he heard some quick shallow breaths as it took his scent into itself.

As the animal loped along the perimeter of the darkness, avoiding the light, he felt the earth shudder under its long gait.

No jackal, this one. Too big, too heavy for a jackal.

Wolf--

He raised the blade, rotating his wrist so the long steel could catch the faint light. Then he stretched out his leg and jostled the fire. As the flames flared the animal bounded out of the night and Zero sprang to ready, knife poised, the firelight flickering orange and red over the sweat sheen that covered his face.

But the big animal stood steady at the very place between light and dark.

Zero took a breath, reached out a hand.

"Easy, friend. We have no quarrel, you and I. I'm not opposed to company, you're welcome to stay and visit... just be easy...."

The wolf padded a quick circle, round and round, and Zero followed the wolf's restless reel, his steel always directed at the beast's throat. Winding the turns together, the man watched, studied the animal, tried to read intent in its movements.

His gaze narrowed.

There was something odd about this beast--

Nothing very odd but clearly, something slightly odd....

And so familiar--

It appeared to Zero that the wolf was doing exactly what he was himself doing; watching, assessing, studying. And something else was curious.

And so maddeningly familiar--

The beast's jaw appeared a bit too heavy for a wolf. And the snout looked more broad, more blocky than was typical... rather like that of a dog.

He stilled even his breath.

You've seen this before--

Remember remember remember--

Michele! Afferri il collare! Grab the collar! Rapidamente! Quickly!

Si, fratello, lo ho... ma che cosa è questo? Yes, brother, I have it... but what is it?

Che cosa lo pensate siete? What do you think it is?

Un lupo... o un cane? A wolf... or a dog?

Che cosa pensate? What do you think?

Fratello... che cosa avete fatto.... Brother... what have you done....

Nonlo incolpi di, lo hanno fatto, li ho uniti appena, il maschio, la femmina, e questo è il risultato.... Don't blame me, they did it, I just put them together, the male, the bitch, and this is the result....

Madre di Gesu, Innocenzio... quanto più? Mother of Jesus... how many?

Oh, il solito, otto o nove.... Oh, the usual, eight or nine.... Michele, non dica a chiunque circa il mio esperimento, capite? Don't tell anyone about my experiment, understand?

Si, capisco. Già è dimenticato. Yes, I understand. It's already forgotten.

Ciò è giusta fra noi. This is just between us.

Selo fidi di... non un'anima. Trust me... not a soul.

Grazie, Michele. Bene, cosegni la bestia... Sono troppo grasso è fa caldo troppo per questo genero di eccitamento! Well, hand over the beast... I'm too fat and it's too hot for all this excitement! Siete affamati? Are you hungry?

No, grazie....

Che cosa è la materia con tutti voi uomini? Siete tutto il troppo sottile! What's the matter with all you young men? You're all too thin! Venuto... mangi. Come... eat.

Zero crouched as the wolf stepped closer. When the nostrils of its black snout flared to take a deep, long sniff, Zero's nostrils flared as well.

Water--

The beast positively reeked of it. No lean and dry denizen of the desert, this; the moisture caught between every hair of the wolf's dense fur fairly screamed its presence. Even the beast's breath was cool and hydrated.

"I would know your story, friend. There isn't enough water in a forty mile radius to so scent your coat. Where do you come from? What are you looking for here?"

The wolf pointed its overly wide snout to the sky, stretched its spine and yawned.

Vedete, Michele... più cane che lupo. You see, Michael... more dog than wolf....

Zero laughed. He counted three deep heartbeats, thrust his knife loudly into its sheath and, with his eyes never leaving the animal, lowered his hand and lightly slapped his leg.

The wolf stepped to his side, nestled down and took another toothy yawn.

Zero lowered a knee to the sand, circled the animal's neck with his arm and clutched his hand in its thick spiky fur, eventually working his fingers up to scratch the silky hairs on the back of one pointy ear.

"Where's the water, friend?" Zero released the wolf to dribble water from his skin into his hand. When the wolf lapped it up, Zero poured again. "You see? My water is old and stale. I will follow where you lead."

The wolf butt Zero's head with its own. When Zero pulled away, some shining strands of his hair remained caught in among the animal's ticked coat.

"This is madness... I wasn't serious--"

The wolf bobbed, danced a circle, crouched.

Zero laughed.

"So you're going to hold me to it. Very well, then, I'll come. I must be mad, but I'll come."

He kicked out the fire and rolled his eyes to the sky.

"Thank you, Father... I think."

He quickly grabbed his gear and with worn boots scraping through the sand, he trotted to catch up with the animal that had already disappeared into the night.

***

After slogging throughout the night, following the track of his guide's paws over the rocky ground, Zero stood at the entrance to the cave.

Or what he supposed was a cave.

He could see nothing but a monument of stone protruding from a craggy mass of rock. But the scent, the taste, of fresh water was palpable.

The wolf teased him, regularly disappearing behind the crevices that edged the big boulder, then reappearing periodically as if urging him to follow. So there had to be something, a cave or a grotto, behind the great stone, although after many long minutes, he still could find no entry.

The spaces around the stone, so accommodating for an agile beast, were not so for a man; narrow, convoluted, he'd manage to squirm in an arm only to be caught at the elbow; he could work in his head, but his shoulders were impossible.

Zero leaned his full weight against the stone and heaved.

No movement at all--

He caught a foot in a hollow and hoisted himself up, thrusting his arms through the gaps on either side of the huge stone, trying to rock it, but it was solid. And apparently impregnable.

He leaped down and with the edge of his hand, swept the sweat from his face.

"Fuck me," he muttered, staring at the stone until the sun's rays, veering around it, drove his head down. Catching quick glances through watery eyes, he quickly gauged the size of the rock... about ten feet high and, with about a foot on either side of his outstretched arms, better than eight feet at its widest point. He estimated its depth then quickly calculated the stone's likely mass.

"Shit," he groaned, wiping more sweat from the back of his neck. "That's it, I'm fucked--"

Layers of perspiration streamed from his body so he settled down against the rock and dragged up his water skin. He tipped it and drank but stopped abruptly in mid swallow, eyes and ears suddenly alert.

What growled?

Zero slowly set the water down, his hand cautiously moving toward his knife, but the growl got louder, forcing his hand still.

His guide did not growl.

He breathed deep.

The animal's scent was everywhere, but where was the animal?

When the growl came again, bouncing off the cliffs and caves and even the gravel at his feet, he glanced all around; left, right, up--

Up--

It was huge. Impossibly huge. And as the beast leapt off the ledge stones above his head, he had time for one quick thought--

Jesus--

He sprang to his feet, fist raised, knife ready, just as the wolf turned and faced him with eyes narrowed and teeth bared.

It was a bitch, the largest he'd ever seen. Although everyone knew, bitches weren't supposed to grow this damn big.

Un altro esperimento, Innocenzio?

Poor odds, here; if he flung the knife, she'd still have enough strength to reach and tear him; if he waited for her to charge, he'd drive the knife into her heart the very second she ripped out his throat.

"Jesus...."

He stood as solid as the great stone behind him, staring into the wolf's bronze colored eyes. Then, without thinking, he tossed the knife to the ground. His fingers went quickly to his belt and soon that, too, dropped down, the weapons clattering.

"Satisfied?"

The wolf growled.

Where there was a male and a bitch, there were likely cubs. His robes joined his belt, his vest joined his robes.

"Now?"

The wolf growled.

He was on his bottom, long legs crossed. Right boot. Left boot. He jumped up, spread his arms.

"Hmm?"

The wolf growled.

He stood still for a moment, then his hands moved slowly to the laces of his breeches.

"You bitch."

The breeches fell at his feet. He stepped out of them, kicked them onto the heap and stretched out his arms.

"Now?"

The wolf padded up, wuffled between his legs and brought out its tongue for a warm wet lick.

"Lady," he stood shivering, the color rising in his cheeks, "we've only just met!"

The wolf went silently to the rock, bent, arched her back inward, concave, and wiggled through a slit where the great stone didn't quite meet the earth that supported it.

Zero eyed the opening.

A gap of barely a foot stretched from the bottom of the monument to the gravel strewn earth... but apparently something about the terrain or the cave itself had allowed the bitch to wriggle through.

And if that huge bitch had fit--

The gravel felt warm and hard beneath his feet as he knelt and dug with his bare hands. Some of the dry soil slid away, scuttering down behind the giant rock; some he took away in handfuls that he cast off to the side or behind him.

He thrust in an arm.

Still impossible.

He fished his ax from the pile of gear and hammered with the pointed end until chiseled pieces of stone flew in all directions. When he'd opened the gap as much as possible he lay down on his back, slipped his hands into the crack, and pulled himself toward the opening. With the crown of his head resting against the stone, he turned his face to the side and inched under the rock.

His scalp scraped, tore; the blood trickled down into his eyes, but still he fought his way through, inch by ragged inch. The rough stone, both above and beneath, ripped the skin from his cheekbones and he gasped, cursing, but continued on, knees bent, heels dug in. With a final gash along the line of his jaw, his head went through.

He glanced down then, alongside his nose. His shoulders were wedged beneath the massive rock and he could feel sweat dripping from his chest into his armpits, from his armpits down along his back--

Good, good, slick--

He still had a bit of space and slowly, slowly, tense and breathless with his heels pushing against the dusty desert, his body scraped with a soft shush between the ground and the stone. One strong, heaving pump, and his shoulders went through.

He flexed his legs, wiggled, coaxed his buttocks through, and he was in.

The bitch immediately approached, padding heavily. His hands went quickly between his legs but suddenly, inexplicably, indifferent, she passed him by to nestle with her cubs.

The cubs were sleeping. He couldn't see them yet but he could hear them, yipping and wheezing softly.

After a few moments, his eyes adjusted to the dimness of the den.

Wolves were everywhere; gray wolves, black wolves, wolves as white as doves. Scattered among them were toothy skulls and bones the color of barley, unbleached by the sun. The joint ends of the bones, where they'd been gnawed hard, were splintered and sharp. Scraps of cloth were strewn from wall to wall; the bitch and her cubs huddled on a particularly fine kafiyyeh, its black and white checked pattern well woven and distinct.

But he didn't particularly care about the valuable fabrics or the bones; the smell of water was driving him mad. He'd probably lost a liter just trying to get in.

Zero scanned the perimeter of the cave, to the depth that the dimness would allow.

He saw nothing.

Closing his eyes to allow his ears full reign over his senses, he soon detected a faint drone.

"Friend?"

The huge bitch approached.

"Are you the wife? I still can't see the water."

She wuffled him, padded away, so he followed her route, tripping on loose teeth scattered like so much desert gravel beneath his feet. Deep in the cave, beneath a naturally formed arch, the bitch bent, lapped, then moved off, her nails clicking against the stone floor.

He took one step forward and was up to his ankle in wet.

He knelt quickly and began raising handfuls of water to his mouth. It was icy cold and he knew by its feel, its smell, that it was as clean and clear as dawn. His eyes began to ache but he didn't care, he drank and drank and when he was finally satisfied he raised numb hands and bathed his head and face and neck, shivering.

And then he sat exhausted, as drunk as if he'd taken alcohol.

This is it, I know it, I feel it--

The desert's secret--

He knew all the maps, knew them better than the scars that crisscrossed his palms and the backs of his hands. This place didn't exist on maps... he scanned the wolves that filled the cave, busily doing what wolves do when they're not tearing human intruders to bits... and was it any wonder?

He yawned, trying to get enough air into his brain to dispel the heaviness that held him, chained like Samson, to the stone.

I can't sleep, I have to go, go and get the girl--

He heaved to his feet but weak and dizzy, he swayed, spun, caught a hand to the stone to keep from falling headlong.

His body tensed, and he stared at the rock wall under his hand.

It's coming from the other side--

Vibration tingled through his fingers like rumbles of thunder coursing through the rock, and when he slid his hand up high, well over his head, he leaned his head back as if to see what he knew could not be seen, but only felt--

The water's surging somewhere behind this cave--

And by the feel of it, it's tumbling, crashing, barreling like a fucking avalanche--

Water where there should be no water at all--

Endless water. Living water. The fount of life everlasting.

Water--

He sat heavily, rested his back against frigid stones throbbing with life, and fell asleep.

***

Hours later, he woke with a jerk. He threw off his disorientation in an instant.

Go now and get the girl--

He strode toward the entrance of the cave, his eyes now accustomed to the darkness, but then he stopped abruptly, shaken by an icy chill that had nothing to do with the damp coolness of the air.

Two... six... twelve--

In a niche along the eastern wall stood twelve tall vessels, all clustered together and crafted of silver.

They looked almost liquid, not hard at all, as metal was wont to do in gentle light.

All twelve were decorated with a unique style of chasing he would now recognize had he had no eyes with which to see, had he only blind fingers with which to read the author's name.

He approached slowly, removed the lid of the nearest vessel, and reached in.

A dozen containers; a dozen scrolls.

Go now... quickly... get out and get the girl--

He unrolled one turn of the small scroll.

With the dawn, light had already begun finding its way between each and every gap that edged the great stone that blocked the entrance of the cave. As it illuminated the old parchment and its faded letters, Zero turned toward the light, swallowing hard.

The girl--

Zero dropped the scroll with a groaned curse and charged forward, his bare toes encountering fur at every step.

"God," he gasped, stepping on and around the wolves as they yelped and growled at his clumsiness, "sorry, sorry... God!"

The narrow mouth of the cave drew him up short.

His eyes darted all around, looking for something to use as a tool.

Here, there--

There--

He snatched up a long bone, a femur, and thrust it out between the stones, into the desert. He scraped and peered, scraped and peered.

"Stupid!" he hissed over and over again, "stupid!"

Then it caught.

Ever so gingerly, he pulled the bone in.

Lost--

He poked the bone out again, dragged it slowly toward him, bent and looked, threw his arm out, felt, used the bone, used his arm, stretched to the limit of his reach, the limit of his strength, gasped with his head wedged under the mammoth rock, his face crushed against the stone until, with a grunt, he dragged himself back into the cave, his vest clutched in a dusty fist.

He yanked at the inside pouch, worked his fingers between the cinched cords, and when he touched what he was looking for, he caught his breath and dropped the vest at his feet.

He gingerly worked the right wire bow of his spectacles over his right ear, the left over the other, then retrieved the scroll and returned to the front of the cave, where the sun had laid upon the cave floor short, narrow carpets of light.

The wolves were all around him now, now that he'd disturbed them. He sat and leaned back, resting against the warmth of his first friend who was steadfastly loyal although his mate, _the bitch_ , still had no use for him. A cub climbed into his lap and he scratched behind its ears.

"Did I step on you?" His eyes moved rapidly, scanned the scroll, right to left, right to left. "I'm sorry... I'm sorry."

***

"I am too old to fight and too tired to lie; one lies to save one's life, not to lose it. I have devoted my life to the translation of ancient texts; I have transcribed the words as I saw them. Not one jot have I added, not one tittle have I subtracted. I will plead my eyes, for sometimes they fail me in the darkness of the night. I will plead my brain, for now it seems to linger where once it danced. But to the charge of heresy, to the charge that I deliberately deceived my brothers, to these I do not plead. Let my accusers plead their own cases when they face His Glory; I go to the stake full of a fire brighter and hotter than their flames could ever be, as I am already ablaze, today and forever, with the sweet bright light of His Truth.

"If my friends are unsuccessful you will never read this letter nor the texts that necessitated it. But should they come some day, by His Grace, to your hands, I pray you read them with sound mind and clear eye, as I taught you. If you should find that my translations were indeed correct, forgive them. And if you should find that I was mistaken, forgive me, for I am just an old linguist with no brain for politics, no heart for war--

"I hear boot heels ringing on the stone... they march so quickly to take me! Bless you and farewell, my young brother. I am yours as always, in His Love, Bethan."

Bethan.

His teacher in all things, save those of war and death.

He pulled the bow of his spectacles from around his ear, letting it dangle, and rubbed the hot wetness from his eyes.

Bethan--

Burned alive--

Rubbing his face, he closed his eyes with a sigh. Exhaustion weighed hard on every muscle in his body and he wanted to rest, he needed desperately to sleep, so he folded his arms across his chest, the spectacles still hanging, but in his mind he could still see the writings strewn all around him.

Original texts, written in Aramaic, Hebrew, Latin, ancient Greek.

And still between his fingers, Bethan's letter and the translations that had cost him his life.

Had Geoffrey managed to decipher Bethan's translations?

That was a virtual impossibility; he felt certain Geoffrey hadn't known the meaning of the writings. He had simply slid Bethan's work and the other scrolls, along with a scroll of beaten silver, into the containers he'd crafted.

Acting, like a good soldier, under orders.

Whose orders?

Bethan's?

Another member of the Brotherhood?

He opened his eyes.

Lamb?

Lamb had been Lux Perennis and as such, privy to the inner circle of the Brotherhood, so perhaps Geoffrey had been directed by Lamb--

He closed his eyes.

Stop thinking--

Although he had consumed liters of water, his eyes still felt parched and gritty. He knew he needed to rest them so he gripped the muscles of his upper arms, ready to make another attempt to summon sleep, but one finger insisted on tracing the brand of the cross that scored his tanned skin.

He opened his eyes.

He had to read the scrolls... read them all, from beginning to end, from first to last.

He lifted the dangling bow and worked it over his ear with a sigh.

***

The raisins were sweet, the almonds, bitter. The dried barley, soaked in icy cold water, tasted as fresh as newly harvested grain.

Bless the wolves for not scattering the sacks of food he'd found among the bones of their erstwhile visitors, and the cubs had even abandoned that fine kafiyyeh so he could drape it over his head and the lower part of his face to save a bit of his heat.

He read during the day. At night he pondered the texts, dozing and dreaming in the dark. Now the food was nearly gone and the stacks of scrolls beside him reached nearly to his shoulder. He pulled his spectacles down and rubbed his eyes.

After his guide approached quietly and settled down beside him, he reached an arm over, hugging the he-wolf, and worked his fingers down into its fur.

"I have just completed 'The Life of Jesus,'" he told the wolf. "I have also completed chronicles concerning His wife and children. The Magdalene bore Our Lord three children." He scratched absently. "A daughter, Mirit, and two sons. Jesus and Joseph."

The beast yawned with a yelp.

"I have traveled this territory before," Zero rested his bloodshot eyes beneath closed lids, "since I was a boy. The same old stories, the same tired legends, offered up like pieces of the True Cross by dusty old scrolls." He smiled slightly. "I studied them in the library at the old monastery of Mar Sada. With Bethan," he knuckled his head, "trying to drive something useful into this thick skull of mine. I've seen tractates like these before." His eyes streamed suddenly. "I honed my skills on them."

He leaned down, buried his face in the wolf's neck, and when the wolf pulled away to lap the salt from his cheeks, he wiped wolf hair from his eyes.

"Problem is, friend... I can find no errors in these. The grammar, the syntax, they're linguistically unimpeachable. They've none of the classic historical anachronisms. None of the convenient scriptural inferences. Together, Bethan and I debunked tens, hundreds, of false gospels and counterfeit prophecies. It was sport for us... 'listen, Michael,' he'd say, 'refute these chronicles by Saint Childebert, here, and I shall release you at the explication to Brother Thomas. You shall have Weapons from Nones til Vespers! There, there's a smile, you're far too serious, my son! But use your brain first... just as I've taught you. Exercise the mind first, then the muscle.'"

He laughed a little, remembering.

"But these documents.... These are impeccable."

He leaned back, closed his eyes again.

"Yet, it's been a long time... many, many years since I've approached ancient texts. Perhaps my mastery is diminished, or my skills are blunt. Might I be unduly influenced by Bethan's conclusions? Do you think?"

The wolf stood, stretched, and padded away to nuzzle his mate.

Zero laughed.

"Only one more and you shall be rid of me," he said, rubbing the sticky film from his eyes before replacing his spectacles. After stretching his shoulders, he leaned forward and gently unrolled a section of the scroll of beaten silver before him, saying, "This is the last."

***

It began as a history; a descent from Jesus and Mary Magdalene, through their children and their children's children; three hundred thirty four years of begats.

The history, prepared by Quintus Augustus as prefect apostolic to Emperor Constantine the Great and his esteemed mother Helena... and first First Master of The Brotherhood of the Knights of the Cross... then took the form of prophecy. It purported to list the female descendants of Our Lord from that present time, Anno Domini 334, until the Holy Hour of His Glorious Second Coming.

Zero lifted a small skin to his lips, sipping at an infusion of mint and rosemary he'd prepared from the stores of the hapless thieves.

His head pounded, but the sweetness of the rosemary soothed him somehow.

Rosemary for remembrance.

Although he didn't want to remember; remember was the last thing he wanted to do.

But his eyes, his burning, bloodshot eyes, still wandered, drifted irresistibly, to the fourth name from the last in the nineteen hundred year long list of anonymous females.

Crux Dolorosa, it said. Cross of Sorrows.

And below that name, _Rosa Sancta Chalybs_ , Saint Rose... Rose of Steel.

Then the daughter of Rose, _Elishiva Sancta_ , Saint Elizabeth, Consecrated to God.

Then finally her daughter Mary _, Maria Sancta Benedicta_ , Saint Mary the Blessed.

Then no more women, no more daughters, simply the symbol of the Alpha and the Omega, along with the words _Jesu Christi, Verbum Caro Factum_.

Jesus Christ, The Word made Flesh.

The Second Coming--

He sucked the weak tea from the narrow spout of the skin he'd found, breathing in its minty fragrance.

No less than this, as prophesied by the founder of his Brotherhood. No less than the Second Coming of the Christ.

His gaze fell again upon the fourth name from the bottom of the list, the name of a woman of sadness who would, in the maturity of time, bear from her womb a saint.

He leaned back and drew the kafiyyeh across the whole of his face, as if hiding.

It could mean anything.

But it meant only one thing--

He was weary. Wasted. Overly susceptible to suggestion... imprecise and indiscriminate.

It could be anyone.

But it wasn't just anyone--

It wasn't some Sarah or Rebecca or Rachel out there in the wilderness, bearing such sorrows as to be afforded such a title. It was a woman named Cross.

He sipped again, remembering.

I'm different inside... I always have been... I feel like I'm missing something--

Aye, the essence of evil--

It could only be her and she didn't know, couldn't possibly understand, the role she would play in history, the role she would play in the Life of the World.

He sat bolt upright and threw the kafiyyeh from his face so he could breathe, because suddenly he couldn't breathe.

And Valentine and I used her as a pawn in our low little game, never dreaming that she was already a pawn in a game of infinite proportion--

And our brothers, Geoffrey and Lamb, who'd also used her to intrude themselves into the Almighty Plan, as if He hadn't already chosen His players, as if they were somehow necessary because the cast of characters in the Divine Drama had gone a' begging... as if He, Which had chiseled the corridors of time from the stone of the ages... Which had populated the seas with their appointed grains and the deserts with theirs... needed any help impregnating one lone girl to bring forth the next stem in the long branch that would realize renewal for the whole of humankind...

"Lord Jesus, you said the humble shall be exalted--"

Unless the prophecy was wrong--

It could be pure fabrication. Misinterpretation. Fantasy.

But Bethan had died for it. Bethan had translated it and testified to the truth of it, unto death.

And he knew Bethan. He understood Bethan. Bethan believed it.

But Bethan was old--

The very best scholars made errors all the time, especially when they wanted, with all their hearts, so desperately to believe--

And what of Geoffrey? And Lamb? If they couldn't read the prophecy, and he felt confident neither had the mastery of language to read it... how had they become aware of its implications? Unless Bethan shared his translations before his death, how had they gleaned enough knowledge to deliberately plot--

Mysteries... no more mysteries... they'll have me swimming in quicksand... have me prodding a hornet's nest with a short stick... why don't I just smear olive oil on my asshole and bend over to pick lint from between my toes--

Could he believe it? Did he want to believe it?

No--

But Bethan--

Men had died before, and for lesser lies--

He pulled off his spectacles, gently folded the bows to slip them into leather pouch tied inside his vest.

Believe the Christ would put aside his godhead a second time? Return to earth again, a mortal child born of woman... possibly to suffer, possibly to die?

This wasn't Mankind's fate, as revealed in the Book of Books. This doctrine had never been offered by theologians of his Brotherhood.

Where were the eyes as flames of fire? Where were the crowns?

Where was the sharp sword issuing from His mouth, and the vesture dipped in blood?

Where was the throne of the Almighty from whence the dead, both great and humble, would be judged according to their works? And at His Right Hand, standing ever staunch, Knights of the Cross... who, by the sacred blood that ran in their veins, blood they'd willingly spilled upon the earth in defense of His Holy Name... rightly warranted their elevated position as they affirmed their inheritance as true Sons of God?

He looked down at the silver scroll.

It lay spread across the floor of the cave, gleaming, silent, yet demanding he believe that it was all going to culminate in nothing more than the birth of a child.

As if the human race, having gotten it so horribly wrong the first time, could somehow be trusted to get it right. Could finally understand that the kingdom of God is truly within us, encompassed by nothing more mighty than the tiny hand of a child.

Was it possible?

The great and glorious Second Coming... reduced to the Second Chance?

And to what purpose?

The sacrifice exemplified sublime perfection. His Precious Blood spread over all sin, for all eternity--

... _unless it wasn't so perfect--_

Get thee behind me, Satan--

His head throbbed so he raised the heels of his hands to his temples and squeezed, just trying to ease the pain.

He was no theologian; he was just a poor linguist. He didn't fully understand what to make of the scrolls, but he knew they implied one thing.

Where was the justice?

He wanted to weep.

There's no justice here.

Only mercy--

And how could one tell of such a mercy?

A desert from every grain ever taken by the wind? A galaxy from every star twinkling in the nighttime sky? An ocean from every tear ever shed?

He'd lived the whole of his life imprisoned by an ineffable blackness that drank the light from his soul the way the sand drank the blood of the dead. And now, in the chill darkness, he wondered if even He could suspend His own laws of nature and demand concord from Justice and Mercy, those two equal and opposing forces. Could even He impel His Infinite Mercy to surmount, and ultimately transcend, His Perfect Justice?

Tears rolled down his cheeks.

He certainly hoped so.

He stood and carefully replaced the scrolls in their silver vessels, then slipped off his vest, bundled it under the great stone, and used the femur to stuff it through to the other side. Then he lay down on his back, his mind surging.

He felt the stone scraping his face, felt sharp pain and blood trickling as the scabs tore from his cuts. There was no need to look at the sky; the sun provided welcome warmth on his nude body when he emerged on the other side, and after pulling his breeches over his hips, he wondered dimly how much weight he'd lost because he'd gotten through so much more easily this time--

And then he had to remind himself to keep moving, lest his thoughts paralyze him where he stood.

Put on the vest, the breeches, buckle the belt, now the boots, just don't think--

Bethan intended the documents for me, not for Lamb, I can't hide from this, I can't pretend, that letter was clearly for me--

But why me? How did Bethan know I'd find the documents?

And that girl... no one should've found that girl! A blast of rotten wind gusting a bit more east or west and I'd have missed her altogether and the wasteland would have sucked her dry, just like it does the piles of camel shit--

And tell me this, just how did that little nothing of a girl manage to last so long out there, anyway? If not under the shadow of the Hand of God?

Oh, just shut the fuck up and march--

But, can I believe it? Can any sane man believe it?

No, no, no--

Crux Dolorosa. Cross of Sorrows--

Cross of Sorrows.

Chapter Twenty Seven

"It looks like the angels are crying."

Zero squeezed his lids more tightly closed.

Crying?

"You mean weeping."

"Crying... weeping... I know what I mean. You know what I mean."

"Then say what you mean."

"You're always correcting me."

"I'm instructing you."

"You need to wake up."

"I have nothing else to give you."

"So why are the angels... weeping."

"Their hearts are broken."

"Like mine."

"Aye...and mine. Broken heart's a good thing. Holy Spirit can't touch a hardened heart. But give Him just a crack and He'll mange to creep in, so it's a _berakah_... a blessing... to weep."

"Are you awake now?"

"Stop being afraid. All things will be...." He tightened his arms around himself, settled his chin. "Sleep."

"I can't sleep. Please wake up."

"Don't worry. All things...."

Will be as they must be--

"Zero, you need to wake up, it's--"

Zero opened his eyes and leapt to his feet.

"Raining! Cross, get the fuck out of here!"

Water had already filled the sloping perimeter of the cave.

Zero grabbed Cross with one hand and swung the gear with the other, heaving first the girl and then the gear out the small opening. Then he gripped the edges of the rock face and with a grunt, thrust himself up and out into the wall of water.

The valley was alive with wet. Torrents crashed down from the hills; vast herds of wild goats turned and tumbled, screaming, swallowed by waterfalls of water until no sight or sound of them remained. The deep dry gorge of the wadi had become a teeming river, full of the stuff of the wasteland, the dead gushing down headlong with the living.

Cross gripped Zero's arm but he didn't turn to her; he threw off her hand and staring up into the clouds, roared with clenched fists raised to the black and swollen sky.

"You gave no sign! By the Christ! Why did You give no sign?"

"Zero!"

He grabbed her shoulders, rain sheeting off the smooth planes of his face.

"There was no sign. I would have seen it. I know this place, I understand this wretched place. I would have seen it!"

"It's not your fault!"

He looked up at the sky, where the black clouds roiled as they fought for supremacy in their limitless arena, and he raised his fists again.

"Whose fault is it then? He owns the heavens, He can make them do whatever He wants! So God damn--"

"No!" She clapped her hands over his mouth, eyes wide, voice hushed. "Don't say it, don't even think it! You'll be sorry, sorry for the rest of your life--"

He groaned. Wrapping her in his arms, he twined his hands in her sodden curls and held her close to his chest.

There, behind the meager shelter afforded by his arms, she heard his heartbeat, even through the roar of the rain, heard his soft whisper, although the words were lost to the wind. But she knew what he was doing; he was using the words only he understood, the words he used when he spoke to his god.

When his prayers stopped, he lifted her face and wiped rain and tears from her cheeks with the rough pads of his thumbs.

"Enough of your weeping, lady. Don't you think there is quite enough water here already?"

"Oh, Zero--"

He drew her close again and lifted an arm over her head to keep some of the stinging drops from buffeting her face.

"Zero, what are we going to do?"

Eyes narrowed against the onslaught of rain, his gaze traveled upward, toward the peak of the mountain.

"The only thing we can do. Go up."

"Up?"

She stole glances at the mountain, level by level, to gauge its treacherous grade, but made it barely half way to the peak before the rain drove her head down again. Shrinking into herself, she clutched her hands over her belly, already knowing what she needed to know.

Up was impossible.

The rock face was sheer. Difficult dry, it was hopeless wet. They would both crash down to their deaths.

She turned to Zero.

"You go."

"We both go."

"No! You can come back for me!"

"Use your eyes!"

He drove the heel of his boot into the stone underfoot, the rock they stood upon. Three hard blows and the surface crumbled, coming away in thin plates.

"The rock is porous. When this is done, there won't be anything to come back to. Take my hand."

She fixed on the hand he stretched out to her.

"We can't make it up all the way up there!"

"We'll make it."

"I can't!"

She watched his gaze move from her face to rest on the mound beneath her breasts, anything but disguised by her sodden robes.

"We'll make it," he said, "because it's His will that we shall. Lady. Take my hand."

She slowly reached out, slowly slipped her hand into his, and when flesh touched flesh, he quickly locked her fingers with his own, lest she change her mind. He ripped from her gear the long leather thong that cinched it, then wound the leather around their wrists, over and through, over and through. He yanked the leather tight with his teeth, then he took his axe into his other hand.

She twisted her wrist.

The leather was strong. There would be no escaping it. If she slipped, if she fell, she would drag him down and they would both plummet to their deaths.

So now it was all on him. On his strong hand, clutched tightly to her own.

How many times had he touched her with that hand?

She would remember them each, gathering the hard touches here, the gentle there. She would allow his hand to be the only thing in her mind; only that hand, crazed with scars, gripping hers and drawing her up the steep rocky slope, step by single step.

"Come, lady," she heard his quiet voice, his whispered urgings, even over the deluge, "come along with me."

She would go with him anywhere, anywhere he wished, heaven or hell.

And she could, because she'd learned to fly. She slipped from her body and swooped up past the tops of the peaks and then through the clouds, until the storm raged no more. The sun was shining and there was no noise but the wind, and she smiled, looking down, and reached out a hand to the two tiny figures, climbing up and over the mountain of rain.

They moved steadily higher and higher still, a foothold here, a handhold there, all the while moving closer to the heaven that thundered black and angry all around them. And when their nails snapped and their fingers bled, from gripping the sharp rocks for their very lives, she watched the rain wash away the red because it was not yet time for them to lose the hold they had upon their souls.

***

"'God is our refuge and strength...'"

Cross lifted her head. "What?"

"'Therefore will not we fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea.'"

She felt her body shaking, all four limbs shuddering. She couldn't focus her eyes for the trembling of her head.

Zero knelt before her, solid as stone. And she was on her knees, too, because her hand was still lashed to his, the three hands clamped together into a fist.

"'Though the waters thereof roar and be troubled, though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof. There is a river, the streams whereof shall make glad the city of God...'"

"'... the holy place of the tabernacles of the Most high,'" intoned another voice.

She turned to the voice, but found no body behind it.

Zero didn't seem to hear anything.

"'The heathen raged,'" the two voices continued, each answering each over the drone of rain, "'the kingdoms were moved: he uttered his voice, the earth melted.'"

"'The Lord of hosts is with us. The God of Jacob is our refuge.'"

"'Come, behold the works of the Lord, what desolations he hath made in the earth...'"

"'Be still and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth...'"

"'The Lord of hosts is with us...'"

"'... the God of Jacob is our refuge.'"

Zero lifted his clenched fist, moved it slowly, along with her hand, in the sign of the cross. Then he took his knife, slit the leather that bound them together and stood.

"Fine weather we're having," the dark voice said. "It's managed to flush all the rats from their holes."

Cross's eyes widened. Staring, she rose slowly to her feet because imagining--

Imagining is always worse than seeing--

Valentine grinned, blew her a kiss. Then he looked at Zero.

"Now?"

Zero gave a short nod.

At the sound of Valentine's drawn sword, she felt her knees weaken.

"No... Zero, no...."

Zero took her by the shoulders, brought his face close.

"Go over behind the rocks. Take the javelin. It will give you a good four--"

"No!"

Cross ducked from under Zero's hands and ran. She clutched the straps that crossed Valentine's chest and fell down to her knees.

"My lord, please, please, don't fight him, please--"

Valentine took her wrists and yanked her hands from his buckler. She broke them free and clamped onto his belt.

"Please, my lord, please let me go with you! I don't want to be with him, I want to be with you, I'll do whatever you want--"

Valentine rolled his eyes, his lips a curved red scar.

"Lady, you clearly do not understand the obligation I have to my Brotherhood! Should I encounter a renegade priest, I must perform my sacred duty! But in view of your earnest offer, I promise you, I'll cut his throat before I cut out his heart. That way, you won't have to hear him scream."

She screamed, _No_! yet no sound came from her throat, the only noise came from the rain, pounding their skin and the air and the stone all around them.

Zero strode to where she knelt, pried her fingers off Valentine's belt and with a hand clutched on the back of her robes, herded her to a spot a few feet away.

"Listen to me! All will be well! Go over behind the rocks and wait for me there."

"Oh, Zero, no...."

"Do as I say, Cross."

"Oh, this is so tiresome," Valentine said, patting his lips as he feigned a yawn.

"Zero, you can't fight him, you--"

She never saw it coming.

Zero pivoted on his heel, hen his right elbow caught the side of her head.

By way of his left arm, already extended to catch her when she slumped, he lowered her limp body to the ground while behind him, Valentine crowed.

"Ha!" He crossed to Zero's side and clapped him on the back. "Here is the brother I always loved so well!"

Zero rolled Cross to her side to keep some small part of the rain from her face, then he stood, lips tugging.

"Was it necessary to frighten her half witless, Galen?"

Valentine grinned.

"Ah, women! Whole-wit, half-wit, no-wit at all! Better a slit than a wit, I always say!"

Zero turned away.

"I often think, brother, that we are the witless ones...."

Valentine's face abruptly changed; his smile disappeared and his features darkened, mirroring the storm that still pummeled them.

He grabbed Zero's arm.

"Only you suffer lack of wit, Michael! You betrayed me, for some mindless infatuation you felt for this girl!"

"You betrayed yourself. If you had come to me--"

"Come to you!"

"Aye! Yes! Had you come to me in love, as my brother," Zero laid his hand on Valentine's shoulder but Valentine flung it off, "could anything, or anyone, have broken the bond we'd forged?"

Valentine lowered his gaze to the muddy ground, fixed on the tiny rivulets of water streaming along the sides of his boots.

"You always had a way with words, Michael. But the time for reconciliation has past. The opportunity for forgiveness is lost."

"Is it lost, brother? You know I have found Geoffrey's treasure."

"Aye. Naught there to interest me."

"Then you've seen it?"

"It wasn't necessary for me to see it, brother... you spent four days in that cave, Michael! When I found your gear and even your clothes outside that den and realized you were bare-ass naked in there... Lord Jesus! I half expected you to come bounding out like some lunatic," he waved his finger airily at the sky, "a' howling at the moon! Had there been something in there to interest me, you'd have departed within the quarter hour."

"Then you know I did not deceive you."

"Deceive me? Perhaps not. Still I stand here nutted, like a dog, for a whore."

Zero spread his hands, appealing. "Our brother's daughter."

"Oh, Michael! Do you truly believe our brother Geoffrey fathered that girl? Just as I suppose you think you're responsible for that swell in her belly! Ha!"

He shook his head, laughing softly.

"My poor Michael. Your naiveté, or your arrogance, is truly without limit. The girl's a whore. She no more knows the sire of her brat than did her mother before her. You've lost everything... everything... for a whore and her bastard."

"My child or another's, the fault was not hers."

"Aye, it was hers! So God damn her, and all the others who are molded just like her! Chastity, Michael, chastity! Our chastity, our cleanness, is the weapon that made the Brotherhood invincible!"

"You speak to me of chastity? You can't be serious."

"Broaden your scope, priest! Chastity of the body is for women, though bless them, they can't conceive it! What I am speaking of is chastity of the soul! Of the mind! Of the heart! I am speaking of the power we had as brothers united! By God, Michael, we were strong! And free! And safe! Safe from the wiles and wheedles of women!"

Zero spread his hands again. "What can I say?"

"Say the whore bewitched you! Say you broke your vow to our Brotherhood! Say you broke your vow to me! Say this! Valentine... brother... I will kill her--"

"No."

Valentine snatched the knife from the sheath at his knee and held it before Zero's face.

"Say you will kill her. Do it for me. Then, at last, you will be free. And I will be free."

"The Lord delivered her to my charge--"

Fists clenched, Valentine lifted his face to the sky and roared.

"I delivered her, to her rightful place in the world! And for that, you unmanned me! Me! Your brother! You broke your vow, Michael, and with it, my heart!"

Valentine snatched Zero's hand, forced the clenched fingers open and jammed the grip of the knife against the hard, scarred palm. Then he closed Zero's fingers over the hilt.

"Show mercy, priest... for I will show none. Use the knife."

"I can't."

Shaking, Valentine lifted his arm and brought the back of his hand crashing down against Zero's face, first one side then the other, the sharp cracks humbling the low rumble of the thunder.

"Do it!"

Zero sank slowly to one knee.

"I have erred, I confess it, I have strayed...."

Towering over him, Valentine shouted down at his bent head.

"Do it!"

Valentine crouched quickly, brought his face close, his hand to Zero's shoulder.

"Michael, listen to me. Just for once, will you listen to me?" Zero met his eyes, and Valentine squeezed. "Michael, I want you to come back with me to Mar Sada. You need to come home."

Zero smiled softly.

"I have no home."

"You do... and it is with your brothers, as it always has been." Valentine squeezed again. "Remember your vows, priest. Remember your duty. Do what must be done and then come home, Michael... for the love you bear God and our Brotherhood. For the love you say you bear me. Use the knife."

Zero's fingers tightened on the hilt.

He touched the knife to Cross's throat, where the pulse beat ever so gently. Under the razor sharp blade, a thin line of red appeared.

What had he once said to her?

Priests wield that weapon in pity--

But soldiers have no pity--

He rotated the blade, turned it perpendicular to the first cut, touched the blade again to her throat. The two cuts formed a small cross that survived for only a moment before the still teeming rain washed all the blood away.

Beside him, Valentine's voice came gentle.

"Good brother. Trust her to heaven."

Zero slipped the knife back into the sheath at Valentine's knee.

"Will you never shrink from shedding the blood of innocents, Galen?"

"And will you never stop playing God? Why don't you leave the work of judging souls to Him, yes? Judge not lest ye be judged--"

Zero glanced up.

"Oh, I'll be judged," he searched Valentine's dark, narrow stare, laid a trembling hand against his upper arm, "and I'll be found wanting. But what I have done, I have done. It cannot be undone. I asked the Lord's forgiveness then, and I beg--" Zero lowered his other knee to the muddy ground, "I beg your forgiveness now. Let this cup pass from us. Let us be again as we once were."

Valentine threw off Zero's hand, sprang from his crouch.

"I will never again be as I was! I offer redemption, but still, you are willing to sacrifice nothing!" He spit on the ground. "You are no longer the man I once knew, or the brother I once loved! I renounce you!"

"Don't say that," eyes averted, Zero shook his head, "and I will not believe that. You are still a priest," he reached up, pounded a fist lightly against Valentine thigh, "I know you have not forgotten... didn't the Christ forgive, even upon the cross, those who delivered Him to it?"

"I'm no Christ, brother; I don't so presume and I can't so forgive. But I will weep for you, for once I truly loved you."

"Just as I loved you. Just as I still do."

Valentine stepped back, drew his sword, positioned it beside his cheek.

"Make ready, brother."

Zero stood slowly. Face grim, he reached for Valentine's blade and eased it aside.

"Will you give me a moment? Before we do what we must do?"

Valentine frowned, but he lowered his sword.

"As you wish."

Zero walked to the edge of the ridge. He gazed at the vast expanse of desert spread out before him, looked out over the deep valley where the wadi's were impassable for rivers of rain. Lifting his eyes to the sky, where the rolling clouds still raged and thundered, he crossed his arms over his chest and dropped to his knees with a groan.

"Father...." He caught a sob in his throat, took a quick breath, "Father, for all I have done and left undone, and for all, absent Your Grace, I will yet--"

He lowered his head with a gasp then quickly ended--

"In the sweet, holy name of our Lord Jesus Christ, I beg forgiveness and pardon."

Valentine shifted his weight from leg to leg, huge drops bouncing off the thick straps of his leather buckler.

"Oh, Michael! Will you never stay off your knees long enough to fight me? Although I suppose, were I you, I'd prepare myself for certain death. Surely you can't believe you will defeat me."

Zero touched his fingertips to his left upper arm, brought them to his lips; then he stood to face Valentine.

"As you already observed, He will call us both to judgment, each at our appointed time."

Valentine laughed.

"You arrogant bastard! You must know that you'll be the one to fall!"

Zero bowed slightly.

"His will," he smiled with a graceful flourish of his long fingers, "on earth as it is in Heaven. We are but His instruments."

Zero unbuckled his belt and threw it down, stripped off his vest. His ribs stood out over the concave hollow of his belly, and left the waist of his breeches gaping.

Valentine's gaze swept top to toe, and he clicked his tongue against his teeth.

"Good Lord, look at you! You're as wasted as some medieval monk! If the Father has chosen you to be His instrument, He has surely chosen poorly! Poor Michael. Poor Cross. What shall she not suffer, when I am through with you!"

Zero leaned down, drew the long knife from its sheath on his belt.

"Come, brother, get on with it."

"The leather is some protection, Michael. Are you in such a hurry to meet your Lord?"

"Clearly you stand in fear of yours, or you wouldn't still be standing there talking."

"I see now why you no longer wear the long sword! You can't heft such a weapon!"

"You," Zero directed his weapon at Valentine as he scanned the blade, assessing its sharpness and its strength, "are making an assumption."

Valentine threw his long braids back over his shoulders.

"Ha! I know too much prayer atrophies the muscles."

"As does too much drink. But if you're concerned about lack of parity," flipping his weapon, Zero watched it soar upward, turning end over end before plunging down to meet his open palm with a deep, solid thud, "perhaps you'd prefer a somewhat more intimate contest."

Valentine sliced the air with his blade.

"No, I think not."

"Well then." Zero's lips tugged as he saluted neatly with the knife that reached barely to his knee. "What we must do, let us do quickly."

Their eyes locked and Valentine grazed his long blade ever so slightly against Zero's cheek.

"How is it, Michael, that after all the years you've spent in this dismal place, no man has dared mark your splendid face! When I have killed you, I will mount your head upon a board so I may forever enjoy your beauty!"

Zero rolled his eyes.

"You know, Valentine, you have always loved the sound of your own voice. Now, at long last, I think I finally understand why you became a priest."

In response, Valentine advanced.

Zero blocked with a loud clatter of steel, but Valentine, quick despite his bulk, soon forced him to dance back to elude another slash.

"Valentine," Zero's glance darted between his opponent's face and the teasing tip of the heavy sword, "forgive my weak jest and tell me true... what was the reason? Why did you become a priest?"

"Same reason as you, Saint Michael. To die for my Lord."

"Not to live for Him?"

"Live for Him? How?" Valentine pointed his blade, marking Zero's pale eyes. "'And I saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse; and he that sat upon him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he doth judge and make war....' But heaven didn't open, Michael. He was neither faithful, nor true. He didn't come. Tell me why He didn't come."

Zero tapped Valentine's sword with the flat of his knife.

"Are you so determined to die a heretic? You know no one may know this."

"You know."

"I know nothing."

"You lie! I saw His spirit in you! I felt His power surging through you! None could touch you! Your eyes blazed with His glory, you tasted His favor, you stood like steel, His strong right arm!"

Valentine let out a roar and hewed the air with his sword, first down and then across, the sign of the cross like a shriek of pain.

"'A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand, but it shall not come nigh thee!' He denied me, He left me to rot in this wasteland, did he deny you as well?"

"Brother, don't--"

"I gave everything for Him! I rejected the friendship of common men, I scorned the love of women... I ground their hearts beneath my heel... for Him!"

The blades grappled frantically, the steel beating a mad rhythm while the rain-glazed faces behind them grimaced, nearly cheek to cheek. The muscles in Valentine's arms bulged as he bore down, forcing Zero's knife to skid down the length of the sword with a grinding of metal against metal. Balance lost, Zero plunged headlong, rolled before springing up breathless, arms spread, blade poised.

Valentine moved in quickly, his sword raised, and Zero lifted his knife to deflect the blow, but it didn't fall. Valentine lifted his blade again, high, ready to bear down, and again Zero crouched to counter, buying the feint, his breath hard and heavy, his right arm trembling, but again, the blade didn't fall.

"Fight, you fuck," Zero cried. "Fight!"

"Michael... it was all for Him. Could I have killed any more for Him?"

"Fight!"

"Tell me. Was I not vigilant enough? Was I weak? Tell me true. If I had killed just one more man, would His promise have been fulfilled?"

"Oh, you are such a fool!"

Zero swung, teased, thrust, trying to reach past the long sword, but Valentine held his blade horizontally before him, easily eluding the futile attacks.

"Priest! Tell me!"

"By the Christ, can you be so blind? The blood of only one man mattered!"

Valentine growled, both hands clamped in the cross guard of his sword.

"What, more of your lies?"

"Only His Blood, Valentine! Not your blood, not my blood, not the blood of the thousands we murdered--"

Valentine shrieked.

"Perjurer!"

He bore down, hacking wildly, the heavy steel sliding down the blade of the long knife to pass the guard and gash, at every slice, the bloody hand that held it.

Valentine let out a roar.

"Then I shall dispatch one more man! Not any common man, but His favored one! Is that why He tarries? Is he waiting for His bright angel to lead His battalions of saints?"

Valentine came closer, the long sword ready.

"I shall send you to Him, and you shall bring Him to me!"

Gaze darting, Valentine lit quickly on an opening.

Long and narrow, Zero's lean frame was already scored there, at that very place, where the trace of an old scar almost obscured the kiss of one even older.

Here was weakness... chronic and inescapable.

Valentine thrust into the exposed flesh but at the last instant Zero twisted his torso. The heavy blade scraped across his ribs with a loud pop of broken skin and a whispered gasp of pain. A long red ribbon of blood welled up like a beacon in the thundering blackness, rising and falling and rising again with each icy sheet of rain.

Looking down at the wound, Zero smiled. Standing solid one step too close, for one moment too long, with his arm lifted one shade too high, he watched the rain take the trickles of blood along with itself, down along the curve of his waist and under the stained leather of his breeches.

Valentine took the opening again; ran a parallel line of red through the hard marked torso to graze the ribs and punch through to the other side.

Zero sucked in a soft breath.

Stepping back, he stumbled on the slippery rocks then sat heavily, his knees splayed, the long knife held loosely in his right hand, his own blood dripping from a dozen cuts down the front of his boot.

"On your feet!" Valentine shouted. "Get up!"

Zero was silent.

"Take dominion over the wound, priest, I've seen you staunch those far more grave! Then get on your feet!"

Zero shook his head. "Not yours, not mine, not that girl's--"

"What are you babbling about?"

Zero touched his side, held up four reddened fingers.

"Blood. First blood."

Head hanging as the wind snarled his rain drenched hair, he took a deep breath and sighed.

"Valentine, have you seen the Beast?"

"What madness is this, Michael?"

"I have seen him."

"You're a liar! Show me the Beast, if you can! Show me Antichrist!"

Zero laughed, pitched forward onto his hands and knees and began to crawl.

"All your years in the wasteland have made you no wiser, brother. Look here," he lifted his first finger, muddy and bloodstained, to his own face, "right here."

Valentine looked.

"We are the Beast, Galen Valentine. We are Antichrist. We are the negation of Life. We are nothing."

Valentine answered with his foot.

Zero fell back but then, with a deep grunt, he heaved himself to his knees, his head shaking to dash the flashes of light from his eyes.

"We are Antichrist," he said dully. "But look, and I will show you my poor imitation of the true Christ."

Fingers still white knuckled around the hilt of the knife, he raised the weapon high, aimed it up toward the heavens, then he flung the blade out and over the edge of the ridge.

With most of the sound drowned out by the rain, the knife fell with only a soft clang, but as if at that signal, Zero dug his fingers in the wet gritty earth and began dragging himself closer to Valentine.

Valentine flung his sword away and beckoned with both hands.

"That's it, dog! Crawl! Crawl to me on your knees! Now I'll kill you with my bare hands!"

Zero's voice was barely a whisper.

"You were right, brother, I have seen Him, and I can bring Him to you. But you must be reconciled."

"You're finished, Michael!"

Valentine drew his leg back then threw it, with all his weight, forward, his booted foot catching Zero under the chin.

Zero's head snapped back, but with another grunt, he shook off the blow and began again to crawl toward Valentine.

"Reconcile, brother. Say the words."

Valentine kicked him down again and this time, Zero rose up more slowly.

"Say...." He gasped. "The words."

The heavy boot came down again, smashing Zero's face into the ground.

"Say," Zero caught his breath in a hush, "the words...."

Pushing up from the ground, he sat back on his heels. He slowly raised his head, rain streaming over his face, his blue eyes beckoning like light shining through the storm.

Valentine guided his foot to the light.

Zero let out a low hiss, crumpled, swayed, but with one last surge of strength, he flung himself forward and wrapped his arms around Valentine's legs.

"Say--"

"I can't!"

Valentine gripped the crimsoned silver, yanked Zero's head back, his black eyes staring down into the bloody mask.

"I can't! I don't remember the words!"

Zero's head fell heavily against the slick leather of Valentine's breeches.

"You big... stupid... fuck."

Sighing, he mumbled to the leather.

"Do you renounce Satan and all his works? All you need say is... yes."

"Yes."

"Do you confess your sins?"

Valentine groaned. "Yes."

"Do you accept the Lord Jesus Christ... as Son of God, Savior?"

"Yes."

Hanging on tightly with his left hand, Zero slowly moved his right to trace a bloody cross on Valentine's leather clad thigh.

"In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti... ego te... absolvo...."

Valentine lifted a trembling hand to Zero's hair.

"You always were a better scholar than I, Michael. Is it done?"

"Aye, it's done." Zero slid down and sprawled onto his back, his elbows in the dirt. "Done and done."

Valentine glanced up into the raging sky then turned quickly, his eyes wide.

"Michael, look!"

"At what?"

"Look at the sky!"

Zero worked himself up to his elbows.

"Is the sky supposed to be red?"

"Take the blood from your eyes!"

Zero wiped, but since his hand was bloody too, he leaned farther back so the cold rain could wash the blood from his face. After a few moments he blinked, but blood and water still pooled in the hollowed sockets, obscuring his vision.

Valentine sank down, his hands rising then coming together, the fingers clasping slowly into a tight, hard fist.

"Oh...."

"Valentine? What is it? What do you see?"

"Oh...."

Zero squeezed his left eye shut, lifted his right shoulder and wiped his face against it, tried to focus his right eye, but the sky was still a mass of warring clouds, tumbling and churning while thunder crashed and the earth rumbled beneath.

"Michael! Quick! Look! Do you see?"

"See what?"

Zero stared at the sky.

Beyond the red, all he could see was a gleam of silver shining along the edges of the clouds. A thin ray of light broke through, sparkling among the rain drops, but then the black clouds shifted again, obscuring the beam and dominating the sky.

Valentine sighed.

"I saw it, Michael! I saw His face! God! It was so... oh, God! It was so... beautiful...."

Zero's lips tugged.

He rested for a moment under the frigid rain, then rolled to the side, pivoted onto his knees, and pushed with hands to struggle to his feet.

"I know, Galen," he said softly. "I've seen it, too. In dreams."

Valentine still knelt staring at the sky, even after the dull sound of metal on earth came once, then twice; nor when the long, low scrape came for a third time.

Stumbling through the sodden stone and sand beneath his feet, Zero took one last halting step, the hilt of Valentine's sword clutched in his fist.

Valentine lifted his head, fixed on the sword, and then he smiled.

"I love you, brother," Zero said.

And when you come to your place in Heaven, intercede for me, who is left behind....

Valentine bowed his head and Zero swung the sword.

Chapter Twenty Eight

The side of her face hurt and at first, she didn't know why. Gentle probing found the swelling and as she massaged the soreness, all in a rush, she remembered Valentine.

And a look she'd never seen before, in Zero's eyes.

She sat up slowly, her dull mind centered on a tall man with silver hair.

She buried her face in her knees and held her breath, a grain of hope against a galloping fear; when she opened her eyes, she would see the mountains rising from the plain, and Zero's slim figure outlined in the red rays of the setting sun.

But just as she feared, she saw no sun, and no Zero.

Don't be afraid... all things will be as they must be--

Throat tightening, she smiled.

She didn't know where this was, but she knew what this was; this was the desert's secret.

Although the cave was underground it was as light as dusk in the desert. Tiny fissures in the rock bed overhead captured narrow streams of light, just pinpoints, to reflect them off the shiny surface of the cave's walls. The walls themselves were rough and craggy, made of layer on layer of mica. Black and silver, they glowed with reflected light like the moon.

He had laid her on the banks of a quick, narrow stream where succulent plants grew, their thick foliage a deep orange that reminded her of the desert sun at the end of the day. The plants were covered with tiny white flowers that gave off an elusive perfume, spicy yet sweet, like nothing she'd ever smelled before.

The fast moving water had eroded small, rounded pockets all along the stream bed into which fugitive trickles, as if needing to find solitude and rest, had puddled. She could see through to the bottoms of the still pools, and when she reached in, silvery fish, their fins whirring, darted away from her fingers.

She dipped her hand again into the cool water and wet her dry lips.

Had he wanted, when he laid her here, for this to be the first thing she set her eyes on? Had he thought to ease her mind with the endless supply of water, her burdened body surrounded by sweet perfume?

She heard a distant roar and instantly thought of the wind. She followed the sound into the chill of a narrow tunnel, following as the air turned frigid and moist. The tunnel gave way to a massive cave and she cried out at the sight; the noise wasn't wind but water; a raging waterfall of icy white. Never, before the furious storm she'd just lived through, had she seen so much water in one place. When she cried out again, she realized she couldn't hear her own voice above the rushing of the water.

Feet shuffling over the undulating floor of stone, she moved through the thickening mist until, standing well out of the way of the wall of wet as it thundered past, she stretched out a finger to touch it. She became braver then, plunging her arms to the elbows into the waterfall. It shoved her easily out of its path, moving steadily down and out of the tunnel as it fed a rocky stream bed that ages of erosion had carved into the cavern floor.

Oddly exhilarated, she moved closer to the very edge of the frigid column, plunged in again, spray spattering her robes until both breasts and belly stood out, round and firm and hard, the wet cloth accentuating their ripening weight.

But then, her elation quickly died as she stared down at herself, suddenly struck by the changes wrought by the child she carried. Limbs leaden, she let the over-large robes slide easily from her shoulders, then stepped full into the shower of liquid ice. It battered her neck, her head, but the dull ache that began behind her eyes threatened less than the swelling of her belly. She clutched both hands into a fist and pounded once, hard.

"I don't want you! I want him! I want Zero!"

But the child was all she had of him.

The only proof that he'd ever touched her with those strong, hard hands, or raked his long fingers through her hair.

Cries poured from her throat as she shook under the freezing spray, although the rushing water drowned out the sound. Weak now, and cold, she sank to her knees and wrapped her arms around the child that grew inside her as if she could somehow hold its father in her arms... protect him from the haunting visions she couldn't banish from her mind.

There would come a time when his face would be lined and gray with the burden of age; a time when there would be too many men and too many knives, even for his skill. With his silver hair grown coarse and dull, he would look upon the setting sun for the last time, and then he would die alone, with no one to mourn him, and no one to mark the place where he fell.

She raised clenched fists and sobbed, and when the numbness finally crept all the way upward, from her feet to her chest, it finally stilled the ache in her heart. She slowly stepped out from under the icy water, her long hair dripping frigid tears that tickled the backs of her legs, but her eyes were as hot and dry as the desert wind.

She shuffled back through the tunnel, to the place by the stream where he had laid her.

Two long ruby earrings, bound by a leather strip, lay on the debris strewn cavern floor. Even in the dim light, they glowed red, like coals.

Now she understood.

The jackal was dead.

She curled, catlike, on the cold stone floor of the cave, then took up the tokens the priest had left and brought them close to her chest. Naked and small, she listened to the drone of the water, her treasures clutched close in her fist, her eyes far away. Then she drew her knees up to her chin, the woman without protecting the child within.

***

"Martha, where are the children?"

The quick tapping sound of Cross's footsteps echoed through narrow cave, and as she approached, the young woman crouched by the fire looked up, a soft smile on her lips.

"They're where they always are," the woman said.

When Cross reached Martha's side, she wrinkled her nose at the oily smell wafting up from the meat.

Unlike Cross, Martha was clever with cooking and always sat surrounded by the good aromas she coaxed either from the vegetation that grew freely in the cave despite the dusky light and rocky soil, or some meaty catch from above ground.

Stomach gurgling, Cross sniffed.

They're where they always are, so....

"So..." she prompted, "where's that?"

"Seth is above ground, with Merit," Martha soothed with her small hushed voice, "and Zev is playing over by the waterfall." She giggled a little. "Don't you know, Cross, that boys... and men... never stray too far from the food?"

Cross felt her jaw tighten, but with Martha's pale, plain face looking up at her, she forced herself to smile back.

Martha was happy here.

She couldn't remember the last time the other woman was above ground; Martha didn't miss the sight of the sun, or the way the dry sand slid between one's fingers to leave them, all at once, dusty with salt and glittering like gold.

But with Martha's man, Merit, it was different. He loved the open desert, and craved the feel of wind in his hair. But Merit was a man, and--

Cross felt her lips take a hard downturn in a gesture so like Zero's.

And that makes all the difference--

Unbidden, a quick vision flashed. Martha speaking to Merit; her dull dress enlivened by a shock of red; her light brows drawn together and her voice, as nearly always, just a whisper--

Why does the lady cry like that, Merit, as if her heart has broken? The babe is well and strong--

"Cross, what is it?"

One hard blink and the vision vanished.

"It's nothing. I was lucky to find you. Merit, and you."

Martha shook her head.

"We were the lucky ones, Cross. The day we found you."

Cross shot her a glance.

"Found me? No...."

Her voice trailed off, following memories.

Hadn't she followed Merit for days? Watching, waiting, wondering--

Can I trust him?

And she didn't trust him... not until she tracked him to a cave where he'd hidden his most precious treasure... his Martha.

But remembering those frantic days before the birth of her eldest, Seth, Cross had to accept that she'd been so burdened by foreign flesh and fear that maybe what was surprising was that she managed to remember anything at all.

And it didn't really matter, who had found who, because hadn't Zero always said--

"Cross? What are you thinking about?"

Cross frowned.

"Zero."

Zero, always Zero--

Zero in her head, Zero in her heart; Zero with his unflagging faith; Zero with his abiding love--

For none but his jealous, bloody god--

Why wouldn't he ever stay in his place?

"What about Zero?"

Cross shrugged. She didn't like to share him.

"He was right. He was always right. He often said all things will be as they must be but still, it's hard for me to--"

She fell silent.

Believe--

Looking down that long dark tunnel into her future, had Zero seen Merit and Martha? Had he seen Nathan whom Merit, with uncharacteristic generosity, would bring to the cave to share the desert's secret?

A twinge of fear entered her heart now, just as it had the day Merit struggled down the steep funnel that led into the cavern with Nathan's emaciated body slung over his wide shoulders. Martha cooled the stranger's feverish body with cool, wet leaves and shortly, with the resilience of youth, the stranger grew strong.

As the old nagging fears returned to prick her, Cross rubbed at her eyes.

Zero would know what to do, he always knew what to do, but since she didn't, she needed to banish the thoughts from her mind.

"What did you say, Martha? Where's Zev?"

Martha laughed an anxious little titter. "He's by the waterfall."

Frowning, Cross glanced back over her shoulder to where the cave tightened to a tunnel that curved, snake-like, out of sight.

Martha kept a closer eye on Cross's children than did Cross herself. And while part of Cross wanted to be angry, she realized it was no use; Martha was born to be a mother.

A good mother.

Martha belonged here.

While I belong--

Where?

Cross leaned down quickly, lightly touched the heads of the two sleeping infants strapped to their mother's back, then set her hand against the long plait of yellow hair that hung over Martha's shoulder.

Martha reached up, covered Cross's hand with her own.

"You're going away again."

It wasn't a question.

Cross wore three sharp blades; one strapped to each wrist, and at her back.

"I hear you sharpening your knives at night," Martha said, "in the dark. You always do that, sharpen them in the dark, just before you go away."

Cross crouched, searching for Martha's eyes.

"You'll take care of them?"

The words sounded foreign and suddenly, frightening.

How can I leave Zero's sons?

She shook Martha's arm, whispered her secret as if less volume would make it less true.

"He doesn't want me, Martha. Not the way I want him. He wants me to stay here. Where I'm safe. And he's safe. From me."

"Cross, that's not true."

"It is."

Martha looked away, fixed on the hare.

"Then maybe," she began slowly, "maybe you should stay here. You always say, 'Zero's right, he always right,' so if he thinks you should stay here, maybe you should just listen--"

"I don't care if he's right! I won't stay here! I can't!"

"But what about...." Martha lay branches on the fire and soon the smoke drifting up came green-sharp and sweet, "What about Nathan?"

"Nathan?" Cross drew back. "What about Nathan?"

"Don't you see--"

"See what?"

"Don't you see what's in his eyes?" Martha's voice got softer and tinier as she shriveled down, her nose nearly buried in the rosemary smoked meat. "That look didn't used to be there before, when he first came here. Don't you know, Cross? Can't you see? What he's after?"

Lips curving down, Cross sat back on her heels.

See it, by the Christ, of course I see it, only a dead woman wouldn't see it--

And that's as much as you know--

Above ground, as if strengthened by the sun, Nathan became more brazen, more defiant. With his arrogance bolstered by the heads of five marauders, his hand rested far too easily on the hilt of his knife.

And at night, when he watched from behind the narrowed slits of his eyes, when he listened to the drone of the waterfall and the sounds it softened but couldn't fully mask; soft intimacies only Merit and Martha shared....

At night, when both he and Cross tossed restlessly, resting as many yards apart as the confines of the cave would allow, their bodies enslaved by thoughts of warm, sun-kissed flesh....

Cross beat down a shiver.

"He's just a boy."

"Not anymore. Maybe he's not a whole grown man like that other one, but he's no--"

Cross waved a hand, "Pfff...."

But in her mind, Zero's words echoed.

Women are trouble in the wilderness--

They're nothing but possessions here, like food or weapons or water--

Someone always wants them and they'll kill to have them--

Cross closed her eyes but she could still see Zero as clearly as if he were sitting right in front of her: biceps taut, knife and flint ready to spark the fire, pale eyes steady--

You have maybe a year--

Her face didn't change at first, but inside her head, her brain began to rage--

Someone always wants them--

She felt her jaw tighten and her teeth clench--

So they'll take them--

Beat them--

Fuck them--

And then she wanted to scream but instead, words came spitting out on a rasping rush of breath--

"Damn Merit, damn him for bringing him here, tell me what else they said!"

Martha shrank away but Cross grabbed the loose fabric of her dress.

"Tell me!"

Martha pulled away, eyes streaming.

"Merit said he wouldn't let you go! He won't let you go because Nathan doesn't want you to go!"

"He won't let me go?"

"Nathan told Merit that if Merit wouldn't or couldn't stop you--" Martha let out a sob. "Nathan will stop you himself!"

Weak and reeling, Cross could only echo dumbly, "Stop me? Nathan will stop me?"

Then she felt her whole body pulsing; head, throat... her heart in her chest and even the insides of her wrists... every inch of her, thundering with Zero's words--

_You have maybe a year before you have to fuck him or kill him. So reconcile yourself, woman. Fuck him... or kill him_ \--

Martha wiped tears from her cheeks.

"He means it, Cross. If you get away he'll find you."

Cross laughed a little.

"If I get away, Martha? Did you just say, 'if I get away'?"

She had to get out.

She couldn't get any air.

She had to get above ground where she could breathe because she couldn't breathe down here, buried alive--

"Merit's been teaching him," Martha was saying, "so he can track almost as well as Merit now."

Cross sprang to her feet.

"Fuck him. The bastard won't find me, I'm a better tracker than he is, I'm a better tracker than Merit. I had a better teacher."

"But it's dangerous above ground! It's dangerous for a woman!"

Cross's face flushed to a wet and angry red, and she clenched her fingers to keep from yanking Martha's hair.

"Well, I suppose you know all about it! So what do you think I should I do, Martha? Stay here in this hole like some fucking rabbit? Smile and be happy to spread for Nathan, whenever he wants to fuck me?"

Smacking her hands against the hard stone floor, she lurched forward and shouted into Martha's white-lipped face--

"That is what you think, isn't it! You and Merit and Nathan!"

And Valentine. And Geoffrey. And Zero--

Especially Zero--

Still tucked tight between my legs, his silver head resting between my breasts, his usually silent prayers whispered because he thought I was all asleep--

Thy will be done, Lord--

But if it is Thy will, let this babe hold her heart and keep her close--

Please, Father, let this one keep her close and safe--

Cross sat back, her chest heaving.

"Isn't it."

Martha crumpled slowly, stopping only when she came nose to flank with the spitted hare.

"Stop hiding!" Cross cried. "Stop!"

But it was no use; Merit's woman always preferred to hide.

Cross turned her fist in the loose neckline of Martha's dress and drew her closer until Martha raised round wet eyes to her captor.

"I want you to tell that bastard something from me," Cross said. "You tell that fucker, if he ever tries to touch me, I'll cut off his balls. Tell him I'll cut off that little piece of his and shove it down his throat. You tell him I'll tear out his fucking heart and feed it to the buzzards, if he ever tries to lay one fucking finger on me. You tell him that, from me."

There was no sound but the rushing of the waterfall. Even the droplets of grease hanging from the hare simply shuddered in the firelight, like tears too frightened to fall.

Cross sat back on her heels.

"What's the matter with you? What are you looking at?"

"Cross, what--" Martha swabbed her cheeks with her sleeves, her whispery voice now just a breath. "What did they do?"

"What are you talking about?"

"My God, Cross, what did they do to you?"

Cross stood slowly, her gaze as stony as the ground she stood upon.

"No one did anything to me. Remember to tell that bastard what I said. Tell both those bastards, what I said."

Cross turned her back on Martha and on the ghosts still swirling like smoky devils in her mind.

She headed for the winding tunnel that led to the waterfall. Ducking to enter, she quickly followed the close path to where the waterfall surged.

A wayward stream of sunlight had a habit of taking refuge in the coolness of that part of the cave, and beneath the sun shower grew huge plants with waxy leaves as big as camels' feet, the foliage translucent white and deeply veined in red.

She had taken Zero's advice long ago and now no longer searched for the obscured source of light; she simply accepted its existence. Now, under the blessed ray of sun, she leaned down and rifled the lush foliage until, her slender arms devoured by the leaves, she found her younger son.

"Zev?" With a hand under his bottom, she lifted him in her arms. "Haven't I told you to leave the snakes alone?"

The boy thrust out a fist.

Two small snakes squirmed around his fingers, their little forked tongues sniffing with the barest of interests. Using the ancient eyes of an old soul, blue eyes that always held her at arm's length, Zev looked at his mother.

"That's where the snakes are supposed to play, Zevi," Cross's voice came soft and small because with him, as with his father, she had no strength, no firmness at all, "not little boys."

Zev struggled in her arms, kicked his long, strong legs. When she didn't release him, he landed a fist on her nose.

Tears filled her eyes but she managed plant a quick kiss on his cheek before he scrambled out of her arms, running into the maze of tunnels that made up their home with the two tiny snakes still gripped in his fist.

Cross watched as Zev became lost in the darkness and the odd stream of light dimmed; a signal that above ground, the sun had already dropped low in the sky. Merit would be returning Seth to the safety of the cave even now, before brigands and jackals began crawling across the wasteland, along with very darkness itself, looking to devour.

Cross turned and went quickly back through the tunnel to the main part of the cave.

When she emerged, Martha, unsmiling, glanced up but said nothing; then, as a deep voice rumbled, Martha stood and left her place by the fire.

Merit was back.

There was no sight or sound of Nathan.

Laughter boomed off the shining rock walls as Merit strode into the cave. He refused to wear long robes in the desert so his skin had colored to the same deep gold of new bronze as the windswept hair, unhindered by any hood or cowl or kafiyyeh, that fell in disarray around his shoulders and down his back.

As Martha reached up to him, he grinned in his warm, open way and swept her to him with one arm for a brief, hard caress.

He carried Seth, Cross's first born, on one shoulder. From the other hung a long stick, a knife lashed securely to its end. Smiling, he propped the weapon against the wall, then set the boy on his feet.

"Seth, show your mother the catch!"

As Cross approached, the boy silently presented the sack.

"He's a real soldier, Cross," Merit said, "I'm proud of him! How old is he? Five, six? Wait till you see what he took today, with his own knife! He'll be an honest warrior, you'll see!"

Cross loosened the ties of the catch sack and peeked in as Merit leaned over the fire to pinch a piece of meat from the spit. He raised both the morsel and singed fingers to his lips with a murmur of deliciousness, then tested the bloated water skin that leaned against the rock wall with the tip of his boot.

"Nathan going somewhere?"

Cross met his yellow eyes.

"I am."

"Oh, no, you're not." Merit lay his hand on Seth's shoulder, rifled the boy's sand laden black hair. "It's too dangerous."

Cross hefted the heavy water sack, slung it over one shoulder.

"It's up to me, Merit, not you."

Merit spun on Martha, his big hands spread wide.

"What about her children? How can any woman leave her children?"

Cross settled the thick straps more firmly over her shoulders.

"I know you'll take care of them."

Words hung in the air, as heavy as the smoke rising from the fire, but since Cross wouldn't speak them, Merit did.

"I'll take care of them, all right! And do a damn better job than you do!"

Cross edged nearer to the craggy wall to feel the relief of its icy cold stone beneath her flaming cheek, but Merit followed. Towering over her, his words sliced like knives.

"Why do you chase after this man, no better than a whore? Are you too stupid to see that if he wanted you, he'd keep you? Or stay here with you?"

Her shoulders drooped. "Shut up, Merit."

"Just tell me what makes you do it! Just make me understand!"

"How can I make you understand what I don't understand? But I'll tell you this, if you didn't love my sons, you'd have no right to say these things to me, I'd give you no right--"

"Do you want more sons? Nathan will give you sons, fine sons, if that's what you want!"

"It's not sons!"

"What then? Do you need a man? Let Nathan be a fucking man to you then! He's fucking willing enough!"

"I don't want a man! I want him, and that's all I want! We've been through this all before!"

Merit slammed his huge hand against the wall beside her head.

"And we'll go through it all again!"

She needed to be free.

Free from Merit's disapproval; free from the cave; free from the heaviness in her chest, more weighty the over full water sack slung over her shoulders.

She started toward the tall fissure that split the stone wall; behind that crack, another tunnel snaked its way for well over a kilometer before finally funneling out into the bright plain of the wasteland. But Merit stepped in front of her, his tall frame blocking the narrow path.

Cross crouched slightly, her fingers curling to fists.

"Damn you, let me by."

Merit shifted just slightly. She tried to go past him but he blocked her way every time, left then right, left then right.

Her brain reeled, numb.

She didn't want it to come to this, not with Merit.

Gold eyes shining, Merit rocked lightly on the balls of his feet and beckoned with his big, square hands.

"You bitch, who do you think you are? Come on! Go by, if you think you're good enough for the wasteland! Let's see what your soldier taught you!"

He tapped her lightly on one cheek then the other, but soon his hand fell harder and harder until her face was all but hidden behind a mask of red and white.

"Come on!" he cried. "Fight a man, not some half dead beggar!"

With his palms still falling against her face and her teeth jarring with every blow, she still offered no resistance; instead, she followed the movement of his hands, the rhythm of his body, swayed along with him; he the piper, she the snake.

Merit howled.

"Well, I guess he taught you how to fuck! There's a soldier for you!"

A single sharp cry cut through his laughter.

Cross dodged and ducked under his arms, then his tanned throat lay creased beneath her blade.

In an instant, Merit slammed a knee to her belly.

Her breath shot from her lungs, the knife clattered down, and with one quick thrust of his arm, he had her slammed up against the wall.

"Never give quarter to an enemy! God damn you! Never!"

Bent double from the blow, Cross fought to find her breath.

"That's what..." eyes bright and crooked smile strained, she dug her fingers into the cracks in the wall to keep to her feet, "what he always told me. I guess I've got my friends and enemies confused. But don't worry, Merit... I won't make that mistake again."

"You won't make that mistake again?" Merit stepped closer, reached out a strong, long arm, "Well, what about this mistake? Or did that itch between your legs make you forget all about it?"

He gripped the neck of her robes, wrestled the fabric away from her throat where a ragged scar swiped down like a scythe, from her collarbone to the tender flesh of her breast. Despite Martha's healing skill, the scar remained livid and puckered.

"Do you remember now?" Merit shook her until she sagged, breathless, and her head lolled on her shoulders, "Do you remember now, what's waiting for you out there?"

Her robes tore in Merit's fist and as the sound ripped through the cave, Martha screamed, but Cross just swayed in silence, her hands lifted to her ears.

Knees weak, she eased against the wall.

Suddenly too many noises came, all in a jumble, too many voices too loud for her to hear, too many words too fragmented for her to understand; men's voices jeering, taunting, laughing, and then a woman's screams, born of a wrath so red and savage--

Paralyzed, she didn't feel the hammering of her heart or the sweat, slicking like rain, down her neck and face; all she felt was simple, blinding rage, tearing the tender flesh between her legs.

Breathless, she forced air into her lungs.

Drove it deep; deep enough to flood her brain.

There, it could summon other memories; roars of surprise and disbelief and anger; then, memories earlier still; pale eyes boring into hers, iron fingers clamped on her jaw--

Breathe, damn it!

If you can't breathe you can't think if you can't think you can't fight if you can't fight you can't fucking live and you will fucking live--

Now breathe!

Chest heaving yet now, somehow, clear headed and calm, she found herself staring at her boots.

Men's blood had once left a red pool around those very same boots.

And if blood could sink into the sand, out of sight--

So could memories--

She lifted her head.

"But I did make it back, Merit. And I'll make it back the next time, and the time after that."

She couldn't search for his eyes.

"Will you stand aside, Merit? I know you're bigger, but I'm quicker. A lot quicker."

"Merit." Martha touched his shoulder. "Leave her alone. Just let her go."

Merit held his woman in his yellow eyed stare.

"Have you gone crazy too?"

Martha took Seth by the shoulders, steered him into the safety of her skirts.

"I'd do the same as her," Martha said softly. "If it was you, out there."

Merit moved his gaze slowly; first, to Martha's face, then, to her breasts, outlined by the two broad woolen straps that secured her infants at her back. Then, finally, to her belly where their newest child, still unborn, nestled safe beneath Seth's averted face.

Merit laughed.

"You'd do the same? By God, woman! Do you think you would ever have to?"

He lifted his hands as if to make one last appeal, then he dropped them abruptly, as if in surrender.

He stepped away from the fissure.

"Merit?" Cross began, "Merit, please be my friend in this. Not for my sake or his, but for Seth's sake, and Zev's? Don't you know," she smiled slightly, her eyes suddenly star bright, "in all this world, there's only one other man I'd trust with his sons...."

Merit leaned in, so close she smelled the salt in his sweat.

"And if you do make it back this time? And the next time, and the time after that? Sooner or later, your luck will run out. You do know that, don't you? I wouldn't want to be you when it does."

"Are you trying to scare me, Merit?"

Merit slammed the wall again.

"You're acting like a whore! And a fool, which is worse! You're risking your life, and for what? He'll never come back with you!" He jerked a thumb over his shoulder, toward the black and narrow fissure, "That wasteland out there... that fucking mess is in his blood! He means to die out there, and if you keep going where you don't belong, where you're not wanted... you'll die out there, too!"

Cross leaned down and hefted her smaller water sack.

"God!" Merit clenched a fist, roared, landed it one last time against the wall behind her head, "Fuck! Why can't I get through to you?"

Cross smiled.

Merit wore his man face, a face she knew... and hated... so well.

But she'd always recognized sadness when she saw it, and there was so much--

She felt a familiar tightness in her throat.

Sadness there--

She wanted to tell Merit it was all right.

Wanted to tell him she understood.

Zero could no more rid himself of the wasteland than she could rid herself of him.

She wanted to tell him that Zero was in her blood, just the way the wasteland was in his.

But she didn't say anything; there really was nothing more to say.

She heaved the water sacks up higher on her shoulders, went through the crack, and disappeared into the darkness.

***

Cross breathed deeply of the desert.

She cleansed her nose of roasted hare flavored with sweet herbs, and her lungs of the stale air of sanctuary. The moon lit her way as she slogged through the loose sand, and the wind kissed her cheek, welcoming her as a friend with soft caresses and playful sighs.

High above, the stars twinkled their greeting as she called them by name: steadfast Polaris; Sirius, the bright Dog Star; Algol the prankster and restless Arcturus; proud, red Betelgeuse and the blue-white giant, Rigel.

She smiled often.

Marching arm in arm by the stars with her former rival the wind, she headed south, where the ridge waited silent and silver in the moonlight. When she'd counted fourteen different sunsets, she settled by the downward slope, enveloped in the new moon's darkness.

She drew up her knees and hugged them with her arms, then breathed in the ripening sweetness of the berries she'd brought from the cave to tempt him.

She would use the berries and her body, anything she could, to lure him away from the god who owned not only his soul but also his heart. And although no longer foolish enough to try to possess the soul, she prayed, with simple words and fervent pleas, that perhaps they could find a way to share the man with silver hair.

She watched the wind tease the loose sand into glowing molten rivers, watched the desert mice play across the glittering floor. She counted the stars and the grains of sand on her fingertip, anything to keep from counting the seconds that passed spitefully slowly into minutes and then hours. Finally, she raised her chin and breathed deeply, again and again, as the perfume of the fruit mingled with the moist, sweet scent of her body.

When it was time, she loosened her hair from its thick braid and allowed it to cascade over her shoulders in ripples that echoed the silken plains, and then she closed her eyes, already feeling his callused hand on her shoulder and his fingers twining in her hair to cradle her weary head. And then she held her breath, waiting for the sound of the sand squeaking its greeting beneath his heavy boots.

She had tracked him through many long nights and for endless miles, and he was just about ready to find her.

‡
