by Allyson Bird
I placed the bread at King’s feet. He sniffed and ate it so fast I wondered if he even tasted the flavors. Then he announced it was time for me to advance my training. Today he was going to teach me how to steal from an adam. I told him I was already good at watching for when one dropped something or was distracted setting up his wares in the morning.
“You tasted the bread I brought you, wasn’t it delicious? The best baker in the old town.”
King turned up his nose and snarled. I jumped back, startled at the magnitude of his derision.
“Do you like meat?”
“Of course,” I said.
“The adam never drops his best meat, does he?”
“No.”
“And if he leaves it unattended, it’s only for a moment and you have to move as fast as a cat.”
I raised my jowl to reveal my teeth. I didn’t like cats.
“Well, then, are you brave and are you hungry?”
“Yes.”
“You don’t have to be afraid of the adam if you strike faster than he can pick up a rock to throw at you.”
King led me within sight of a butcher shop. In front was an adam dressed all in black and with a long mane of black fur hanging in front of his face. I stiffened, recognizing him as one who had yelled at me when I was simply standing across the street minding my own. But oh, the wonder of the meats that always hung outside his shop—some raw and others that had been smoked and seasoned! For me, raw was always the tastiest, but I would settle for either.
“I will run fast and bite his ankle,” King said. “While he is distracted, you jump up and grab some meat. I’ll let go, and you and I will run like the wind. By the time he has a chance to grab a rock, we’ll be long disappeared up there.”
King motioned with his nose towards an alley that led to another of the great gathering homes. I wasn’t scared of fighting other dogs—I enjoyed that—but my mother’s stories of how much the adams hated us dug deep into me, not to mention the times when I had narrowly escaped being hit by a rock. King was a formidable champion among our kind, but was even he taking on more than he could chew? Still, I was afraid of seeming a coward in front of King.
I stole another glance at the adam, who was now engaged with a customer—a female with long black hair in a light-colored dress that clung tightly to her body. The adam leaned in close to her, gesturing to various of the hanging meats. I assume he was describing them so she could select the one she wanted to eat, but his body language indicated he also enjoyed the way she looked.
“Are you ready?” King asked, not giving me a chance to object.
I wasn’t but I scratched my paw on the stone to signal yes.
King shot forward. I charged after him.
When I reached the cart, King’s teeth were embedded in the man’s leg and the adam was screaming in pain. The woman had backed away, her hand over her mouth. I leaped up and sunk my teeth into a juicy raw slab. It gave way easily, but as my paws touched back to the ground, King let go, spun towards me and butted his head into my groin. The surprise assault from my teacher startled me, and I dropped the meat. King seized it up quickly from the ground and took off. The shock of his betrayal made me hesitate just long enough for the adam to pick up a rock.
I barely made it a few steps when it grazed the side of my hip and my legs slipped from beneath me, sliding me sideways onto hard stone. Several other adams shifted quickly out of my way as I hit the ground.
I scrambled to get back on my feet, but my leg hurt and my hip wouldn’t cooperate so I had to just roll back down. I saw the adam bend to grab another rock. I growled but knew the adam had the advantage. Soon I would be gone to the place Ima went.
“Thief!!” shouted the adam, his cheeks flushed underneath his black beard.
But before he could hurl another weapon, I heard a loud shout.
“Isaac, no! Don’t hurt the dog!”
The female with the long dark hair grabbed the adam’s arm.
“But you saw what he did!” the adam protested. “He and his buddy stole one of my best beef shanks. Jerusalem would be better if all these mongrels were struck from our streets.”
“Please,” she said and waved him back. She turned towards me and then she crouched and stretched out her hand. I continued to growl. Again Ima’s words came to me—never trust an adam.
“Sweet, sweet,” she called to me.
The adam had backed away and was muttering irritably. Then she began to hum, her voice soft and soothing—the most beautiful sound I had ever heard. I stopped growling. Soon I was whimpering softly. She stroked my side. No adam had ever touched me, but her hand felt surprisingly nice. She scratched around my loppy ear. That felt especially good. I curled my front legs and rolled on my back. I don’t know why I did that but I wanted her to rub my chest. She did, and it felt better than anything else I ever remembered.
She pointed to herself and said “Cassilda,” repeating it three times slowly, lingering on every syllable. The pain in my leg had almost subsided, and with her help, I was able to stand. She took my head in her hands, placed her face close to mine, smiled and gazed in my eyes. If it had been anyone but her, I would have bitten, but I felt safe. I never wanted her to let go, to remove her face from mine.
Then she said: “Tsah-Hov.” Again she said it three times, her eyes locked on my own. And I knew that was her name for me.
Isaac yelled again, and I suppose he was warning Cassilda about me—how our kind can’t be trusted, how I would bite her. But I knew that I could never bite her.
She beckoned and I hesitated. I thought of my brother and my sister, and what they would think when they awoke, when like Ima, I just disappeared. I wondered if she had met her own Cassilda, but I knew that an Ima would never desert her children even for a Cassilda. Beyond the crowd in the entry to the alley, I saw King, glaring, the meat still in his mouth. I wondered if he was disappointed that I had found a savior.
I turned away from King and followed Cassilda. Sometimes she would pause and pet my head. I trailed her down the familiar market streets to the great wall, where I sat and waited while she did as the other adams did—slipped a leaf inside it, touched it, bowed her head, spoke.
When she returned to me, she said, “Good Tsah-Hov.”
We continued out the giant gate—I had never traveled so far nor along such a wide street. In its center, giant mif’letzets rushed by us at speeds I could never run. I had seen such creatures before but never in such numbers. Finally we came to a building as tall as the gathering homes but so high that I could not see if its roof had a sun on top.
Cassilda held open the door then led me to a strange box. Inside it made a funny noise and shook slightly. The box opened and we emerged in a different place with many doors. She went to one of them and grabbed what looked like a paw. She twisted it and it opened into her home, my new home.
So that’s how the adams used all the cloths that hung outside the shops, I thought. They spread them on the floor to make it soft and warm, not like the cold hard stone of the streets. She led me into a small room that smelled of food and placed a bowl of water on the floor. I drank it eagerly. Before then I never had so much water in one serving except perhaps when it collected in a pot after a rain.
Then Cassilda coaxed me into another room and lifted me into a pond of bubbly warm water. At first, I didn’t like it, but she massaged me until I could almost faint with pleasure. Even Ima with her tongue had never washed all the street smells away from me. Cassilda rubbed me with more soft cloths, then blew hot wind from a paw she held in her hand.
When I was completely dry, she led me to where she slept and patted her hand on her bed. I leapt up onto a place softer than the cloths on the floor, soft beyond all imagining, so soft I jumped back down. But she tapped her hand again and I returned. She lay down beside me and I snuggled my back within her arms. Again she began to sing.
I had never understood what the adam had spoken before now, but I knew her word
s. Cassilda sang of the city, the city of the setting sun, the city of Gold, the city of Tsah-Hov. She sang of it as if it were my city, hers and mine and how we shared it with our tribes. Here it all began and here it would all end. The old city was lost but the lost has been found, and while we have our enemies, the city gives us strength and shall endure until a great King descends from the sky.
I saw a tear trail down her cheek. My eyes were full of tears, too. Until then I never knew that dogs could cry.
From then on I lived with Cassilda in her home above the streets, sleeping with her in her bed. During the day she would leave me, and sometimes I feared she would not return. But she always did, bringing bread and scraps of meat I did not have to steal. Before sleep, she sang to me the same song.
In the morning and evening, Cassilda took me for walks around her building. I marked my new kingdom zealously, but the only others of my kind I saw were clean like me, walking with adams. I had seen dogs with adams in the market before, but my brother, sister and I had laughed at them. She also took me to see the pricker-prodder for the first time. His house was full of many dogs and cats, some I saw and some I could just smell. Two adams had to hold me tightly when he pricked several sharp claws into my back. I wanted to bite him, and I wondered why Cassilda brought me here. But as soon as I saw her again, I forgave her.
Once a week she took me along when she shopped in the market. Sometimes I would see one like me who lived on the streets or a small pack. I sensed they were jealous of Cassilda and me. They knew I had found something special and different, even if they had no idea how it felt to lie on a soft cloth instead of cold stone or a bag of rice. I scanned the shadows for my brother and sister, but I never saw them. I only glimpsed King one time and he just turned away as if he pitied me. I dreamt of King nightly though, only now he wasn’t giving me lessons. Instead we fought. Each time he appeared more bloody and scarred, but he still always won, admonishing me that my fighting skills had become soft from living with an adam.
Then came the day Cassilda brought Shmuel home. He had no fur on his head at all. When he visited, he would always pet me quickly on the head, and then he would ignore me for the rest of the evening. She laughed when he spoke, they’d sit and eat together, and after that they touched lips. Sometimes he stayed all night and I no longer fit on the bed. They made groans of pleasure and emanated mating smells. On those nights, I slept on the sofa in the living room. The cushions were softer than the bed, but I missed Cassilda. I wished Shmuel would stop coming.
Shmuel visited more and more often until one day he just stayed. Cassilda grew bigger in her belly, and I could smell the little adam growing inside. Shmuel started taking me on my morning and twilight walks, sometimes after dark if he came home late. He didn’t talk or sing to me like Cassilda did. He just took me far enough to empty myself and then we returned home. I slept on the sofa every night now, King taunting me as we dream-battled about how I was afraid to challenge an adam.
The little male was born, and Cassilda called him Chanan. She seemed happy but always stressed. Though she no longer left every day, she had even less time for me, having to prepare his food and tend to him. Still, during the day she sang to both of us about the city, and while she sang, I did not feel replaced or alone.
Other days were not so nice. Chanan would cry and Shmuel would get a growl to his voice. One day he struck Cassilda. King’s voice shouted in my head, and I yelled at Shmuel, started to lunge. I barely got close before he hit me hard on my head. I yelped and jumped back, growled more. I wanted to tear him apart, but I remembered what Ima said about adams being bigger and stronger, even if I had teeth and claws and despite King goading me in my head. I also knew Cassilda loved Shmuel like she loved me, so instead I retreated to a corner, where I lay down to stare at him. She cried and Chanan cried louder, and now Shmuel was soothing her, stroking her hair, putting his lips to her cheek. Later she crept out of bed to check on me, placed her hand on my brow. She couldn’t sing because it would wake everyone in the house, but I could hear her voice.
Cassilda started taking Chanan for walks in a cart that she pushed. I danced when she indicated that I could come along. She gently calmed me, I suppose afraid I’d jump on the fragile baby, though she should know I would never harm him. She hummed to us as we walked down the old familiar path to the market, where she filled a bag with food from sundry vendors, and I filled my nose with all the old smells. I even thought I caught a whiff of King near the gathering house where we used to meet.
On the way back, a large clap seared into my ears and the ground shook with such anger that both Cassilda and I almost fell over. Adams screamed all around us and a cloud of dust enveloped us. Cassilda began to cough and run pushing the cart, Chanan crying at the top of his lungs. I sprinted after her. Everyone was running and yelling. When we finally got home, she locked the door quickly behind us, took Chanan in her arms and sang more loudly than I had ever heard her sing. I could hear both love and fear in her voice as she lamented that the city had enemies jealous of its beauty, enemies who also thought it holy. Even I knew that some adams didn’t like others in the same way we didn’t like the scent of all of our kind—and what had happened was rooted in an enmity so ancient that it might as well have always been.
Shmuel came home early. He held her like the old Shmuel had courted her. They talked for a long time in great seriousness. In the days that followed, I only walked with Shmuel and I saw the first signs that my life was about to change. Objects disappeared from shelves and closets, boxes and crates piled up in the living room, and King and I no longer fought in my dreams—he just raised his jowls and made a sound that I had never heard any of us make—laughter. Then one day adams came and took everything away.
Shmuel brought a large crate with bars like the cell I am in now. He placed a big beef-bone in my bowl, pushed it inside and called to me. The savory aroma enticed, but I didn’t trust to enter a place so dark and narrow. Shmuel yelled at me, but Cassilda shushed him. When she stroked me and coaxed me, I couldn’t deny her. Once I was inside, I heard a snapping noise behind me and began to whine.
Cassilda spoke to me through the bars, repeating my name “Tsah-hov,” and from the gentle tone in her voice, I knew she did not want me to be afraid. I stopped calling out and lay down. I was more afraid than even when the adam was stoning me, but for her I would do anything.
The crate was shoved into one of the great street beasts, and then unloaded at a place full of terrible rattling noises and people yelling all around me. Next I was moved to a dark place with many cases reeking with the odor of adams. I felt a sensation like being lifted—as if the very ground was rising. I cried loudly in the near-dark but no one even shouted to silence me.
I finally fell asleep, and all I remembered of my dreams was Ima’s stern warnings, and King opening his mouth to reveal too many sharp, pointy teeth. A heavy thud shook me awake, and I sensed I was on the ground again. Adams pulled the case out into the sunlight, but I knew I was no longer in the Gold City. Even the adams smelled different. They lifted me onto another mif’letzet. Then finally the creature stopped, its canopy lifted and I heard Cassilda excitedly calling my name.
“Tsah-Hov!”
She opened the bars and I jumped all over her in joy. She didn’t scold me but hugged me. I could see Shmuel behind her holding Chanan, his sneer revealing he would have preferred to have left me. As Cassilda quieted me, I realized the ground beneath me felt like soft cloth under my paws.
And so I arrived at my new home, not a building with many homes but one place for just us with many rooms and stairs and what Cassilda called a “yard”—covered with the soft rugs in the back. I knew we must be faraway from the City because the only thing I recognized was the sun. This place was not the color of the sun, but different colors, colors that resembled shadows to me and for which I had no names.
At first I admit I was a little excited by my new home. Cassilda would take me and Chanan on long walks i
n his cart. The streets were smooth like a single stone, and I did not have to step carefully to protect my feet. The city of Gold had few trees, but trees were everywhere here, towering above. And the houses were big and separated from each other by yards. An adam family lived in each house and there was no market street. Cassilda and Shmuel would ride instead inside one of the mif’letzet and return with food. Sometimes they took me, and we would emerge to walk in different places, places even softer and filled with more trees. Or they took me to see another pricker-prodder, a female who tried to soothe me with a gentle voice and crunchy food, then stabbed me just the same. At night though Cassilda still sang the boy to sleep with the song of the City of Gold, and I would listen. She put on a mask of contentment, but I could sense we both were lost now. I still dreamed of King, but we did not fight and he was silent.
Many like me lived here, but unlike in the City, they came in more sizes, shapes, and colors. Their smells didn’t tell many stories because they spent their nights in the houses with adams. Some would yell at me from their yards behind fences—and others would strain their leashes. I now had to wear a collar around my neck and walk on a rope like them. I hated both, but the others seemed not to mind, as if they accepted whatever the adams bade them do. Sometimes when Shmuel walked me, I would shout back and once when he took off my lead on a dirt path with lots of trees I even attacked a big prissy one of my kind whose long fur resembled a horse’s mane and tale. When I walked with Cassilda however, I mastered an innocent stare that only seemed to infuriate my foes and make them shout louder at me.
