by Sharon Shinn
Dear Jovah, sweet Jovah, give him the strength to proceed without pause, to streak through the skies like some swift, mysterious comet. Let him not tire. Let him fly on and fly on.
He had spotted the plague flag early this morning, on his way back from a weather intercession as he planned to make a quick, unauthorized journey into Breven. He almost had not stopped. Almost had not stopped. He had flown on, past the small campsite, on toward the true heart and lodestone of his journey, but a sense of guilt and responsibility had made him swear and wheel around. There was little chance Rebekah would be able to see him, anyway, if he arrived in Breven this night. He might as well justify his existence by aiding these poor travelers, people who would be grateful for the attention of an angel.
And then—and then—
He had listened briefly to the rapid speech of the auburn-haired woman (familiar; did he know her?), registering only the words “Jansai” and “stoning” and “pregnant.” His first thought had been that, impossibly, Rebekah’s cousin had survived her expulsion from the city and had been found by strangers. His second thought had been that Rebekah would be joyous beyond measure at such news.
His third thought never took coherent form.
Rebekah.
He had not even paused to explain himself as he gathered up the frail, broken figure and swept himself to his feet. The other woman was still chattering, listing the drugs she had administered or the injuries she had catalogued, but Obadiah could not absorb any of her words. “I’ll carry her to Cedar Hills,” he said in a harsh voice, and took off without another word.
The men of her family had discovered her—found his bracelet in her room, or a feather, or some other small token he could not even remember dropping—or they had caught her, creeping from the house one night in the hopes of finding him secretly in the city. The thing he had most dreaded had come to pass, but he had not dreaded it enough; he had not realized the true nature of the punishment that might befall her. She had known—she had to have known—and after Martha’s banishment could have had no doubt remaining about the fate meted out to disobedient Jansai women. That letter she had sent to Zoe—that had been brave indeed, reassuring and unalarming—she had made him believe she was in no danger, that all was well. And all along, she had known how madly she flirted with death, how she courted him almost as assiduously as Obadiah had courted her. Had he known, had he guessed how much danger she was in, he would have landed in her stepfather’s garden one day and stalked inside the house, ransacked the rooms until he found and rescued the woman he loved.
What had they discovered? How had she been betrayed?
It was only about an hour into his headlong flight that he remembered what the other woman had said: “We think they must have cast her out when they discovered that she was pregnant.”
Pregnant.
Rebekah was carrying his baby? Rebekah was—great god of the limitless heavens—she had conceived his child, and she had not told him, and she had faced alone the great risk of discovery and censure. Why hadn’t she told him? Didn’t she trust him? Did she think he would reject her, reject the child? Or hadn’t she known she was with child? It had been nearly six weeks since they had seen each other. Had she just realized her condition? Maybe, and maybe that, more than Martha’s fate, had prompted her to write that letter to Zoe, with its veiled promise to come live with him in Cedar Hills. It had been a message, an invitation, and he had been too dull to read it. Or at any rate, too dense to understand its urgency.
“Rebekah,” he whispered, but the wind of his passage carried the word away.
He flew on even faster.
He did not want to, but he had to stop several times to take care of his own basic needs and hers. It was not an easy thing to tilt water down the throat of a woman who appeared totally unconscious, but Obadiah was patient, coaxing the mouth open, stroking the throat, making sure a little liquid was swallowed, and then a little more. As for himself, he gulped down both food and water, less from any sense of appetite than from the knowledge that he had to fuel his body or fall from the sky far short of his destination. Though he felt no lack of strength or ability. He was sure he could fly from the edge of the desert to the heart of Cedar Hills on fear and adrenaline alone.
Flinging himself back into the air—fighting for altitude, for speed—rushing forward so fast that he felt he outraced the spin of the world itself. He had lost all sense of time and distance; he could not calculate how long he had been flying or how much longer it would take before he reached his destination. All he knew was that the woman in his arms was still alive, for he felt the faint warmth of her mouth turned against the skin of his body. While she lived, he would not falter, and he would not fail.
The sky changed from the spring blue of morning to the summer gold of noon, and he flew on. Sunset streaked its autumn colors over the western horizon, and he flew on. Night, with its panoply of winter stars, and Obadiah flew on without pausing.
It was near the dinner hour when Obadiah came upon the lights of Cedar Hills. He dropped toward the ground, hardly abating his pace at all, and landed at a flat-out run. He had targeted his precise spot and was only a few yards from the doorway of the main building, the one that housed Nathan and Magdalena’s suite and so many of the functions of the hold. Many people were still out at this hour, both angels and mortals. A few stared at him or called out to him as he raced past them, up the path and through the door and up the first two flights of stairs to Nathan’s doorway.
He did not have a hand free, so he kicked at the door with his foot, calling out as he did so. “Nathan! Maga! Let me in!”
He was not here to see either of them, of course. He was not even here hoping to find that woman, that healer, who had haunted the place since Maga began having her inconvenient contractions. He was here, though he could not have said why, to see the woman who flung open the door, looking imperious and impatient and very short of sleep.
“Rachel,” he panted. “She’s dying. Help me.”
In a very short time, Rachel had organized everything. She had put Rebekah in her own bed, summoned the medic, cleared the suite of everyone but necessary personnel, and elicited the entire story from Obadiah. This was why he had come to her, he realized that now—because never, at any point in her tumultuous life, had Rachel been at a loss. Whereas he had been at the end of his own strength and invention. He had not known what to do next. But Rachel could always initiate the next action, no matter how drastic. She was never brought down by indecision.
And Rachel would not let harm come to anyone he loved. She had told him that once, and now she had the chance to prove it.
He would not leave the room where the healer labored over Rebekah’s scarred body, though Rachel had drawn him to the far corner and bade him speak quietly. So he had recited the tale—as much of it as he knew or had pieced together—and she had nodded from time to time or asked a quick, pointed question.
“Did we get to her in time? Will she live?” he asked, over and over, but the healer was too busy to answer.
“Yes,” Rachel said, every time he asked.
“But how do you know?”
“Because otherwise Yovah would not have led you to her side at all.”
“But how could this have happened? How could I have let such things happen? How could Jovah?”
“It was the god’s will, perhaps, that the two of you be brought together. Maybe to create this child she bears, maybe for some other purpose.”
“But the god could not have wanted her to suffer so much! What kind of divine plan is that?”
“Everybody suffers,” she said in a low voice. “Sometimes it is to no purpose. But this time, I believe, it is.”
“Will she live?” he demanded.
“Yes,” the angelica replied.
The door opened, and an angel stepped through, her wings folded forward over her shoulders as if to protect the item she carried. In the dim light of the sickroom, Obadiah needed a mom
ent to identify Magdalena, cradling an infant in her arms.
“How is she?” Maga whispered.
But Obadiah was staring at her. “You—Maga—I have only been gone three days! Is that—”
Dire though the situation was, both women were smiling. “Yes,” Maga said happily. “A boy. Perfect.”
“An angel,” Rachel said dryly. “The real reason she thinks he’s so perfect.”
“I did not say that!”
“But he has come too early,” Obadiah said. “Has he not?”
“Earlier than he should have,” Rachel conceded. “He is very small, but he seems quite healthy.”
“And everything went smoothly?” Obadiah asked.
Maga grimaced as she came to sit beside them on a low stool. She did not sit entirely still, but rocked back and forth with a slow, absent motion, as if she could not help herself, as if she did not even notice. “I am assured that my labor and delivery were no worse than anybody else’s, but sweet Jovah howling! It was painful. I thought I was dying. And you don’t even want to hear about the blood.”
“No,” he said earnestly. “I don’t.”
“But I’ve recovered—mostly—and this little one is such a miracle of delight that I am trying to convince myself I don’t remember any of my pain. Everyone tells me I’ll soon forget it. Though I don’t think so.”
“Congratulations,” he said. “I am so pleased and happy for both of you.” And he leaned forward to drop a kiss on her cheek and then on the fuzzy dark head of the baby in her arms.
“Obadiah is to be a father soon,” Rachel observed.
Maga smiled, a luminous expression in the dark. “So you said! Though I still cannot believe—” She shrugged. “Any of it.”
“I am having trouble coming to grips with it all myself,” he replied.
“And this Jansai woman? Is her child angelic?”
“That doesn’t matter!” Rachel exclaimed.
“I was just asking.”
Obadiah shook his head. “I don’t know. I don’t care. I don’t even—Jovah hear me and understand—I don’t even care if the baby lives or dies, so long as Rebekah lives. She is all that matters to me.”
“She will live,” Rachel said solemnly. “I swear to you.”
Maga gave the angelica a doubtful glance, as if wondering how anyone could make such a promise, and then turned her attention back to Obadiah. “How did you meet her? How does this story go? And how could you not have said a word to me for all this time?”
So he began the story again, editing it a little this time. Maga nodded and tried not to look disbelieving, but he could see that the romance of the tale appealed to her less than it had to Rachel. She was roused to real horror, though, by the twin tales of Martha’s exile and Rebekah’s stoning.
“How can such things happen?” she murmured, shaking her dark head and drawing her son closer to her body. “How can anyone have the power to so abuse someone else, someone so powerless—”
“The Jansai have long been abusers,” Obadiah said grimly, his gaze resting on Rachel. The angelica knew firsthand how ruthless the Jansai could be. “They have imprisoned and mistreated their women for centuries.”
“I’ve sent for Gabriel,” Rachel said.
Obadiah shook his head. He was starting to feel wearier than he ever had in his life, the strain on both body and heart finally making itself felt. “It is the Jansai way. There is nothing Gabriel can do.”
“Oh yes,” she said, her eyes smoldering with all the righteous triumph of a zealot who finally, finally, had a tool shaped to suit her vengeance. “Gabriel can do anything.”
About an hour after she had arrived, the healer smoothed the sheet up to Rebekah’s chin and came over to confer with the others in the room.
“How is she?” Obadiah demanded before the woman could speak. “Will she live?”
“Here, Mary, have a seat,” Rachel said, drawing a chair over. Few mortals would sit in the presence of an angel unless invited, but Rachel had never had much patience with protocol. “How is she?”
Mary looked troubled. “I think the chances are very good that she will survive,” she said. “Her bruises are extensive but not severe, and she has only a slight fever. And that is fading fast. She has suffered some dehydration, but, again, it’s not severe. Whoever found her in the desert acted quickly to give her drugs and water, and it is to those people that she truly owes her life.”
“She looked so familiar,” Obadiah said. “That woman—”
Rachel was watching the healer. “And yet?” the angelica asked.
Mary shook her head. “I don’t know. She hasn’t regained consciousness. She hasn’t spoken or indicated that she—that her mind is engaged. In times of great trauma, I have sometimes seen this. A person withdraws into himself, hides inside his own head, or so it seems. As if the pain he suffered was so great that he cannot bear the idea of opening his eyes and enduring it again. Pain of the body,” she explained, “or pain of the heart.”
“How can we get her back?” Obadiah asked.
“Sometimes it’s just a matter of time—a few days—the body begins to heal and sends its signals of safety on to the brain. Sometimes it takes more, as if you have to push that person out of the closed door of his mind and into the crowded hallway of common life. Sometimes that requires that you talk to the sick person, draw him back to you by the power of your voice, by the memories you evoke. I have seen recoveries prompted by the scent of flowers brought into the room. You don’t always know what will fire a person’s desire to reenter the world. Or what will show him the way back. Sometimes I think it is not so much the will to return as the way. Someone like this woman, who has been hurt so deeply and gotten lost so completely inside herself, might not remember the path back out.”
“Then what can I do?”
“For now, let her sleep. A day or two. I will be back as often as I can. Give her the medicines I leave with you. Make sure she takes in food and water. And talk to her. Remind her of who she is. Who you are. Reassure her that she is safe.”
“What about her baby?” Magdalena asked, rocking her own.
“As far as I can tell, the baby is strong. If she lives, her child should live as well.”
Rachel leaned over and took Obadiah’s hand. “Then they will both survive,” the angelica said.
Pain and darkness. Pain and darkness. Fear. Pain and darkness. Terror. Pain and darkness.
Color. Voices. Light. Nothing sensible, nothing tangible.
Pain and darkness.
Swirls of light and motion. A cool hand against the skin. Words, incomprehensible. The sounds of stress and worry. Tones of reassurance. Water held to the mouth, a chemical taste against the tongue.
Sleep. Nothing.
More light, more motion. Whispers, questions, emphatic replies. Nothing that made any sense.
Where was this place? Who were these people? A struggle to sit, to think, to remember, to care. Then a swift, indifferent submission. Too hard to try. No energy. No volition.
Darkness. Sleep. No thought, no remembrance. No self.
“Nothing? No word? No response? None at all?”
“I told you. Sometimes it takes days.”
“It’s been days!”
“Or longer.”
“But she is better? Her body is better? And the baby?”
“She is healing. Just be patient.”
“I do not have this much patience.”
“There is nothing you can do.”
“But I love her. . . .”
Words again, sentences that went on an on. Stories told, pictures painted of a world, a place that had no meaning. People that could not be remembered. Names, over and over, until they were just syllables, a collection of sounds, something a bird might chirp or a cricket might rasp out.
Rebekah . . . Rebekah . . . Rebekah . . .
Hands on her face, her forehead. Damp cloth against her skin. Again and again, the cup lifted to her mouth,
the water eased down her throat, or the juice, or the broth. Trying, now and then truly trying, to open her eyes, to focus, to see who ministered to her, who repeated those meaningless words. But the strain was too great. The muscles went slack, the brain grew too lazy to try.
Obadiah . . . Obadiah . . . Obadiah . . .
Light and darkness, sound and silence. Nothing else.
“She’s still no better?”
“Mary says she is almost healed. It is just—”
“She hasn’t woken up.”
“She’s awake. I know she is. Her eyelids flutter and sometimes—sometimes—it seems as if she’s focusing on me. Or trying to. And then she loses interest. As if it’s not worth the effort. I don’t know how to reach her. I don’t know how to draw her back out.”
“Maga is worried about you.”
“I can’t help that.”
“I’m worried about you, too. I think you have to spend a day somewhere outside of this room.”
“I’m not leaving her alone!”
“I’ll stay with her.”
“You? Of all the people I picture sitting at a sickbed—”
“Don’t be rude. I can take care of her.”
“I can’t. I can’t leave her.”
“Gabriel’s here.”
“What can he do?”
“He wants to talk to you. Go visit with him. Then go spend some time somewhere else—alone, or with Nathan, or anywhere but here. You look dreadful.”
“But I’m so worried.”
“What can happen to her while I’m at her side? Now go.”
Light, fading slowly from gold to gray. Silk against the fingertips, droplets of liquid against the lips. Simple pleasures, easy and undemanding. Luxurious. No pain, no fear.
A woman’s voice. Is it that you don’t want to come back or that you don’t know the way? No sensible words. Drowsing, eyes half shut against the slanting sunlight. Dark soon, emptiness to follow. There was no difference.
