Returned

by Kimberley Griffiths Little

  Our skirts rustled when Naomi and I entered the quiet, windowless room. It was hot and stuffy, the worst room for a body recently deceased, despite the frankincense and perfumes she had been anointed with. We were past the summer solstice now, and the summer heat was becoming unbearable in the afternoons.

  “We must move her to a room with windows on both sides for a cross draft,” I said immediately. The words were out before I’d consulted with Lady Naomi first, but when I glanced at her she nodded her approval.

  “I agree, Lady Jayden,” she said, loud enough for the Sa’ba soldiers to hear. “Kadesh and Josiah will want to pay their respects tonight.”

  I lowered my voice. “We also need to discuss the future for her body. Do we have a funeral pyre as we did for King Ephrem?”

  “We don’t need to make that decision right now. Talk it over with Kadesh. You’ll make the correct decision on that course. For now, let’s focus on the queen.”

  A soldier stepped forward. “I’m the queen’s captain and I’d like to dictate a letter to the queen’s husband in Sa’ba and dispatch it immediately.”

  I shook my head. “No, I forbid you until we speak with King Kadesh. He is her cousin. He’ll write the necessary letters himself.”

  The man bowed. “As you wish, my lady. We’ll stand guard so that nobody has access to the queen until the King of Sariba directs us.”

  “Thank you. I’m grateful for your loyalty and discretion.”

  I stepped across the tiled floor toward the bier, emotion choking at my heart to see the queen laid out in death. I turned cold, my head reeling and my chest throbbing.

  Two nights ago, I’d scrubbed at the Queen of Sheba’s blood on my hands and clothes for an hour. Ever since, food had tasted like sand.

  I’d never forget the wounded expression on Kadesh’s face when he saw the bloody queen carried back to the palace after Aliyah had killed her. His mourning broke my heart into small, sharp edges.

  The small room was lit by candles placed on four corner tables. There were no overhead sconces or chandeliers. A table laid with finely stitched magenta-dyed linen draped to the floor in soft folds, overlaid with a snowy-white triangle.

  Lying in state was the Queen of Sheba in the finest dress she had brought with her. A dress meant to be worn at an elegant royal banquet. One she had never had the chance to wear. It was deep blue like the ocean, blue as the garnet jewels fastened to her neck and ears.

  The queen’s long black hair had been washed to a glossy sheen by Lady Naomi’s personal maid, an older woman experienced in life and death a hundred times over. Her hair was now overlaid with a net of amethyst and carnelian.

  She was as beautiful in death as she had been in life, her attire the scent of lilac and frankincense. Bouquets of roses and orchids lay in baskets about her feet, breathing some semblance of life into the mourning room.

  I reached out to touch the queen’s cold fingers, placing my palm on top of her folded hands. The gashes Aliyah had given her along her palms were still there, forever unhealed, but no longer bleeding.

  “Aliyah broke her sister bond to you, my queen,” I whispered. “My heart is broken for you, for all of us who will mourn you from this day forward. Kadesh will be kind to your husband and children who wait for your return.”

  A shiver crawled down my spine. I wanted to shake her awake, to see that serene smile one more time. If only I could beg her to come back to us. All the deaths I’d known my whole life had been sudden and unexpected. Beginning with Horeb’s older brother Zenos, dead after a raid with the Maachathite, leaving Leila lost without her betrothed. My mother’s dead babies, and then her own sudden death giving birth to Sahmril, Uncle Ephrem’s collapse at the wedding, and now a queen I admired. A woman who had been my friend. A woman I’d looked to as a role model and friend.

  “Oh, my queen, what is noble? What is right and wrong anymore?”

  “The same virtues that have always been right,” spoke Kadesh from the back of the quiet room.

  My head jerked up. The sight of him brought an onslaught of tears to my eyes. Tears I’d been fighting all day as I rushed across the room to fly into his arms.

  We embraced and walked back to the bier together.

  “Nobleness is love for your family,” Kadesh said. “Fidelity in your soul. The goodness of one’s country. Devotion to the true and living God. But sometimes, to protect the good we have to do away with tyranny and fight for freedom. Even if we lose our lives in the process.”

  Dusk descended upon the city. The fighting was over for another day. “But you’re here now,” I said, clinging to him. “You’re alive.”

  “I promised I would come home to you every night. And I intend to keep that promise.”

  “The Queen of Sheba lost her life trying to stop her sister. I fear Horeb will give me no other choice either.”

  Kadesh lifted my chin and gazed into my eyes with his bottomless pools of darkness. I leaned against him, falling into those eyes, into him. He pressed me close, and I wrapped my arms around him.

  “Jayden,” he said. “Horeb has already given us no other choice. He had many chances to stop the hate and war, and every single time he’s chosen oppression, greed, and power.”

  His words strengthened me while I took a deep breath and stepped toward the dais for the final time. Was the queen’s presence still among us? I hoped she was listening and hadn’t already moved beyond our world.

  “Good-bye, my queen,” I whispered, smoothing a hand along the rich textured fabric of her sleeve. She was younger in death than I had realized because she had been so formidable in life. “I will be forever indebted to you.”

  I bent over and kissed her cold cheek, tears slipping down my cheeks, and then I stepped back to allow Kadesh to say his farewells.

  27

  Another day of fighting passed and I was about to leap out a window from nerves.

  The loss of life was devastating. Every family had been affected, and the mourning in the city was an agony of weeping and wailing. I stood at the windows of the palace gazing down at elderly gravediggers walking up and down the city streets with their shovels and red-rimmed eyes.

  When Kadesh and General Naham arrived at the end of each day’s fighting, there were few words and little eaten or spoken between them.

  No matter how much I enjoyed playing with Sahmril and singing the songs of home, I couldn’t stay in the city any longer.

  I’d moved Sahmril into my room and slept with her curled in my arms. Thomas and Zarah, her adoptive parents from Mari, were right here in Sariba. Ready to snatch my baby sister away from me again. A letter had arrived after midsummer’s eve, asking for her, but I hadn’t responded yet.

  Each night when I pulled the blanket around her against the cool night, I fought my internal battle of not wanting to share her. “I can’t give you up now that I’ve found you,” I whispered against her hair. “If they take you, I’d never see you again. You belong with me, with your father. We are your family.”

  For the first time since I’d rescued Sahmril from Aliyah’s sacrificial ceremony, the little girl turned in her sleep and put her arms around my neck. Her dark eyes fluttered, half-asleep, half-awake.

  “I love you, Sahmril,” I told her. “I’ve loved you from the moment I held you in my arms on the day you were born.”

  She stared at me with those big dark eyes of my mother’s, and I didn’t know if she understood what I was telling her, but I suspected that she did.

  I tried to tamp down the memories of that terrible day. “Your mother is my mother. You and I are sisters, and I promised I would always take care of you.”

  Her eyelids closed, and she was soon asleep while the moon sank.

  Before the sun rose on the third morning, I instructed Tijah to dress me for battle. She had scrubbed the trousers and my black tunic so it was clean again. The previous evening I’d sent a message to Asher asking for armor. He had brought it reluctantly, his eyes conveying h
is unhappiness that I was planning on going to the battlefield that day.

  The armor he’d produced was crafted of thick cloth and sewn together in multiple layers. When I tied it around my chest, I realized that the pieces had seen previous battles if the tears and nicks were any indication.

  A knock at the door sounded and when I opened it, a palace guard held out a thick, woven helmet from the armory.

  “I wish I had boiled leather armor for you, my lady,” the guard said, his eyes roving over my newly sharpened dagger and sword, a magenta Sariba sash tied firmly to my waist where my sling hung.

  “Me, too,” I said, praying that I wasn’t making the mistake of my life.

  After kissing my sister and maids, I was surprised to pass Uncle Josiah on my way to the north doors. He stopped to take in my unexpected appearance, even as he bowed.

  “You recognized me so easily in my disguise as a soldier?” I asked.

  He grinned in return. “I’ve lived a long time, my lady. If you insist on being with the troops, go with my blessings.” He laid his big, warm hands on my head, and the touch was a comfort. “Fight with your heart. Do not doubt your love for this land and its king. I will see you on the battlefield shortly.”

  When we reached the stables, Asher led me outside to the open-air paddocks. “Jayden, I don’t like this at all. If Kadesh learns I gave you armor he’d—”

  “It’s too late for that,” Kadesh said behind him.

  I cleared my throat. “I understand that the Edomites and Basim’s mountain men are going to be your shock troops this morning. I want to go with you and give them my support and gratitude.”

  Asher shook his head, his lips a thin line of unhappiness. We stared each other down for several long moments.

  “I can’t spend another day pacing the palace, knowing I could kill a few Assyrians,” I said, feeling rebellious.

  “I don’t envy the enemy who gets in your way,” Asher finally said, giving a brief tug at my sling before mounting his horse.

  Beside Kadesh, General Naham ordered the line-up of troops and horses. Dust rose as we left the compound and headed up the hills of the city.

  I fell in between Asher and Kadesh while Basim, flanked by two of his men, passed us to fall into formation on the left side of the Edomites. Basim didn’t appear surprised to see me. Rather, he tipped his head toward me, recognizing me as easily as Uncle Josiah had.

  An hour’s ride later, we were in sight of Horeb’s camp.

  Sariba’s army had left even earlier than the previous morning, hoping to catch Horeb by surprise. Dawn slanted across the valley in strips of gold and red.

  “Can you see anything?” I asked Asher.

  Nerves tore at my gut as we drew closer. I placed a hand on the hilt of my sword, running through various sword moves in my head.

  “Steady, my lady,” Asher said, as if seeing the panic on my face. “Horeb’s men are ready for us—as many as there were the last two days. His ill men must be healthy again, unfortunately.”

  He was right. “So many of them,” I whispered, observing the perfect formation of troops as far as I could see.

  He glanced at me. “It boosted our morale to not lose more men, but losses still take a toll. Many men are weary and grieving. Or overconfident in their eagerness for revenge, which can often be worse. That’s when mistakes are made.”

  “Asher,” I said, turning to stare at him. “What aren’t you telling me?”

  His eyes flickered away. “Horeb’s army has a secret weapon that we do not possess.”

  My chest rose. “Aliyah,” I breathed.

  “She was here this morning—with Horeb. She’s their talisman. Their hope. Their Goddess.”

  Kadesh spoke up, visibly reigning in his anger. “There was a ceremony this morning with the magicians from Egypt. Including a human sacrifice of one of his horse handler’s. A son of one of the captains.”

  Asher watched me steadily. “Yesterday, Aliyah rode out at Horeb’s side on a white horse. A sword raised in her fist.”

  His words painted a picture in my mind. I envisioned Aliyah in all her glory. Black hair flying in the wind, strands streaming across her face. A stunning dress billowing about her figure, luring the men to follow her. To die on their swords for her.

  “They’re trying to intimidate our soldiers,” I said. “Did she actually fight?”

  “Of course not,” Kadesh said grimly. “It was merely to show us that Sariba’s Goddess temple has sided with the enemy. General Naham is worried about desertions now. Or rather, our soldiers fighting for Horeb instead of Kadesh. After all the deaths our army has suffered, the citizens are even more afraid of angering the Goddess. They are beginning to believe that they sided with the wrong king and forsook the Goddess at their own peril.”

  “People should realize she’s a traitor to her own people,” I snapped.

  “She makes a pretty convincing traitor,” Asher said.

  I glanced at him sharply, but his face was sullen. He had accepted the odds against us, and the consequences, whatever they would be. A bite of emotion ate at my heart.

  “I didn’t mean for that to sound like—”

  “I don’t doubt your loyalty to Kadesh,” I assured him.

  “And my loyalty to Kadesh’s queen,” he added. “I would die for Edom and my people, but I will also die for Sariba’s sovereignty.”

  “And freedom,” Kadesh added. “Without the freedom given to us at birth, we are merely slaves to tyrants like Horeb and Aliyah.”

  We went silent for the last half league, but my heart stuttered inside my chest. I hadn’t been this close to Horeb in months. His large camp was intimidating. When they caught sight of us coming up the final rise, we watched his army assembled into professional ranks almost instantly.

  “Despite our hope to catch them by surprise their spies already saw us, and reported,” Kadesh said, his voice rising with frustration. He shouted to his general, “We must go faster.”

  A signal came from one of the trumpets. The pounding of the horses’ hooves grew louder as we picked up speed. My belly tumbled with every second, and already I was dripping sweat inside my clothes.

  The Edomites broke into two formations, one going south and one to the north. General Naham sent two of his captains with the group to the south. I followed Asher to skirt around the north end of Horeb’s camp.

  All at once, Kadesh gained on me. “Please, Jayden, try to stay back. The Assyrians are twice your size and their hatred just as venomous. Despite our own losses, the army of Assyria lost almost as many. The poisoning we did especially incited their hatred for us.”

  I attempted a smile, shouting over the noise of the galloping horses. “So I’ll let you handle the Assyrians.”

  His long hair blew like a flag in the wind. “That’s why I love you. But if any of our enemies suspect you are Sariba’s queen, they will kidnap you, and I shudder to think what they will do to you.”

  I nodded, fully aware of the danger, and then our horses broke away. Fifty Edomites at full speed on their splendid horses was a sight to behold. I choked on the dust from the grinding hooves, despite the scarf covering my face.

  “Shock troops,” Asher yelled when we rounded about on our enemy’s archers. Lining up behind their shields, they began launching arrows in the direction of our foot soldiers. The sudden blood-curdling cries of the Edomite men when they charged was eerie and unexpected.

  The Maachathite archers were as rattled by the screams as I was, rallying frantically to get their first arrows up in the air.

  Kadesh wheeled about on his horse before the cavalry, galloping up and down the lines with a speed that overwhelmed me. “Draw your swords!”

  And then we were in the fray.

  “Stay at my side!” Asher yelled, drawing my horse close to his. “We’ll work together!”

  My sword came out of its sheath like water slipping over a riverbed. Its edge glinted in a sudden ray of brilliant dawn, and my heart
was in my throat at its deadly beauty. Sitting low on my horse, I swiped at one of the standing archers, giving him a blow that knocked him off his feet.

  With a single stroke, Asher finished him off, and the man fell to his knees, keeling over, a sheath of arrows spilling to the earth. The man next to him seized the arrows, crouching behind a shield.

  Before he could notch one of the tapered weapons into his bow, Asher and I took him out with a blow on either side of his neck.

  All around me came the clash of swords, the bitter grunt and cries of men fighting hand to hand. Many Edomites carried axes. Other Sariba soldiers were skilled in spear throwing, for which I was grateful when I found myself nearly taken down by an Assyrian warrior. After swinging about with our swords on our horses, a sudden slash razed across my arm. A heartbeat later, the Assyrian fell to the ground when a spear pierced his neck, but I had no idea who had just saved my life.

  After several more blows, my arms ached. My bones shuddered each time I swung the sword with one hand, gripping the mane of my horse with the other. After three more swings, I couldn’t stand the pain and feared I’d shatter into a hundred pieces. Straightening, I utilized both arms, but sitting higher on my horse also made me more vulnerable.

  “Stay down!” Asher ordered, delivering the death blow to another archer. “We’re pulling back now!”

  I clung to my horse’s mane while we retreated in a frenzy of men and animals and dust.

  Miraculously, the shock strategy had worked. Many archers were dead or wounded. A few arrows rained about us, but we deflected and galloped south in the direction of the city. At least the temple and the lower forest stood between the fighting and the city.

  When we pulled up at a safer distance, we turned around to stare over our shoulders. The shock troops to the north were having success, too.

  “There weren’t as many archers today,” Asher said, confusion in his face when he searched the horizon.

  The fields filled with foot soldiers now fighting man to man. Free from the threat of screaming arrows raining down from the sky.