A Wrinkle in Time Quintet (83 page)

Sandy nodded. The twins liked what Japheth had told them about Shem.

*   *   *

One morning Anah and Elisheba came with the food for the day. Anah, Ham’s wife, was obviously Tiglah’s sister, but her hair did not have the brilliance of Tiglah’s, and her eyes were not as rich a green. She was becoming flabby, with dimples all over, in her cheeks, her chin, her elbows,
her knees. She was softer than Tiglah.

Elisheba was like Shem, solid, muscled, kind. At home, in the twins’ part of the world, she would have looked comfortable in a flowered housedress, and she would scrub her kitchen floor every day, and shift all the furniture to sweep under it. There was something more familiar about Elisheba than about many of the other women, who had an Oriental strangeness.
Anah’s and Tiglah’s eyes were almond-shaped, their cheekbones high.

After the pot had been set on the stones, Anah put her hands on her rounded hips, looking in open admiration at Sandy and Dennys. “Another hundred years and you’ll be the most handsome men on the desert.”

Dennys looked at Grandfather Lamech’s wrinkled face and trembling hands, thinking that the old man, at any rate, was not
going to live for another hundred years. And even if the flood held off, he and Sandy did not have the life span of these tiny desert people. But he said nothing. He did not like Anah; Anah was Tiglah’s sister.

Elisheba picked up the empty pot from the day before, which the twins had scoured clean with sand. “I wonder if they’ll grow wings?” She tended to speak of Sandy and Dennys as though they
could not hear.

“I think they’re a new breed,” Anah said, “not seraph or nephil, but a completely different kind of giant.” Her gaze slid from one twin to the other, then back to Elisheba. “What,” she suggested, “would you think of having two husbands?”

Elisheba laughed. “One is all I can manage.”

“Thank you for the dinner.” Sandy turned away from Anah’s gaze, which was uncomfortably reminiscent
of Tiglah’s. “It smells good.”

“And please thank Matred for us.”

Anah put her fingers lightly against Sandy’s wrist. “You’re welcome to come eat in Noah’s tent at any time, you know that.”

Sandy was glad when she was gone.

*   *   *

The big tent was dark and quiet. Matred poked her elbow against Noah’s ribs. “What about Mahlah?”

“Humph?” Noah mumbled sleepily.

“Husband. It cannot have escaped
your notice that Mahlah is with child.”

Noah rolled over. “I have been very busy.”

“Noah.”

“It is time Mahlah brought her young man to our tent,” Noah said. “We will prepare a feast.”

“It is not a young man,” Matred said. “At least, it is not one of our young men, and I don’t think they’re young, I think they are old, far older than any of us, even Grandfather Methuselah.”

“Woman, what—or
who—are you talking about?”

“Mahlah,” Matred said impatiently, “and her nephil.”

Noah sat up. “What are you trying to tell me?”

“I am telling you”—Matred kept her voice low—“that Mahlah is with child by a nephil, and that she has had some kind of nephil wedding.” Quickly she put her hand over Noah’s mouth to stifle his roar of outrage.

“This is not how things are done.” He pushed her hand
away, but kept his voice under control. “There has been no wedding feast. No nephil has come to our tent.”

“The nephilim do not do things the way we do. Their customs are not our customs.”

“This is Mahlah’s will? She loves this nephil?”

“So it would seem. She sends messages by Yalith. She does not want to tell us these things herself.”

Noah growled. “It is the way of things to lose a daughter
to another man’s tent, but not without the proper formalities.”

“When Mahlah does speak to me”—Matred’s voice was heavy—“she keeps reminding me that times have changed.”

Noah sighed. “It is not what we would have chosen for our daughter, but after all, Oholibamah—”

Matred leaned against her husband, and he put his arm around her. “I would rather have it one of our young giants. At least they
are truly young, and I think they are good.”

“They fit in with us,” Noah agreed, “and the nephilim do not. It seems now as though our twins have been with us always.”

“The moons have slipped by,” Matred said. “Seven or eight of them, at least.”

“They have worked wonders in my father’s gardens and groves. It is hard work, and yet they never complain.”

“Perhaps Yalith—” Matred started, then
said, “It is time we asked them to take another evening off and come to our tent. I wish Mahlah had not been lured by the nephilim. They glitter, but I do not think they are loving.”

“I will speak to Mahlah.” Noah pulled Matred down onto the sleeping skins.

“If she will speak with you,” Matred said.

*   *   *

The twins enjoyed their visits to the big tent, the noise and singing and laughter.
Once, at the time of the full moon, Noah’s married daughters were there with their husbands and children, and there was dancing and music and loud quarreling and reconciling.

“I wish Mahlah were here,” Matred said.

*   *   *

Less than a moon later, Anah and Elisheba, bringing a big pot of vegetable stew to Grandfather Lamech’s tent, again invited the twins to the big tent. “But you should feel
free to come more often,” Anah said. “You don’t have to wait for an invitation.”

Sandy felt her eyes inviting him. He turned away. “We don’t like to leave Grandfather Lamech too often.”

Higgaion, lying stretched out by the embers, swished his stringy little tail, raised his head, and put it back down with a thump.

Again Anah lavished her smile on Sandy. “You’re getting nearly as brown as one
of us, and you have freckles all across your nose.”

“The Den, too.” Elisheba’s smile was friendly. “I never believed he’d make it. Matred thought he was going to die. But Oholibamah is a healer. And Yalith was marvelous with him.”

Sandy felt a sharp twinge of jealousy. When Yalith came with the night-light or with the evening meal, she was careful, overcareful, he thought, to smile no more at
one twin than at the other. “All that was a long time ago.” He was surprised at how cross his voice sounded. “We’ve both been well for months now.”

“For what?”

“Oh. Many moons.”
Moon
and
month
did come from the same root, after all, but the people of the oasis thought of time in moons and crops and the movement of the stars.

“Yalith will be looking for a husband one of these years.” Anah’s
voice was suggestive.

Elisheba was brusque. “Yalith will make a good wife. But not yet.”

Anah’s eyes strayed from twin to twin. “Hmm.” She pursed her lips.

Elisheba jiggled Anah’s arm. “We’d better be getting back, or Matred will be after us.”

“She doesn’t scare me,” Anah said.

“Who said anything about being scared? There’s a lot of work to do, and she’s getting too old to do it all herself.”

“Too fat,” Anah muttered.

“Who’s talking?”

Still bickering, the two women left, taking the empty pot with them.

The twins went out to the vegetable garden, putting on Matred’s straw-woven hats. The sun was not yet high, the shadows still long. “We’ll stay just a little while,” Sandy said.

They worked hard. The weeds, it seemed, grew up as fast as they could clear them. Weeding was a never-ending
job. They did not mention Yalith. They had more than enough to do to keep them busy.

Grandfather Lamech no longer came out to the garden with them, but spent most of the day in the tent, drowsing. After the long afternoon sleep he would sometimes accompany them to the well, where they drew water, filling large clay jars, one for use in the tent. The others were for the garden, which Higgaion
helped them water, spraying with his trunk, which was almost as good as a hose.

“It’s good to be working in a garden,” Sandy said, “even if it’s not the garden at home.”

“Who do you suppose is tending to the garden at home?” Dennys asked. “It’s got to be at least harvest time by now. That is, if time there is passing like time here.”

“Everything is different here,” Sandy said. “People living
longer, for instance.”

“So maybe time is different, too. At home we had alarm clocks and those electronic bells at school, and here time just slides by and I hardly even notice it.”

“I don’t want to think about it, about time,” Sandy said. He looked at his twin. “We’re browner than we ever got at home. Anah’s right about that.”

“And our hair is bleached. At least, if mine is like yours, it
is.”

Sandy looked at his twin. “Well, your hair is lots lighter than it used to be.”

“I wonder what it would feel like to wear clothes again?” They were used to wearing loincloths. They were even used to no showers, no water for bathing. The smells of the tent were hardly noticeable.

With a strong green vine, Sandy was tying up tall, green-leafed bushes, giant versions of the basil they planted
between the tomatoes in the garden at home. Grandfather Lamech often chopped up the leaves to season his stews. “I’m not homesick anymore. At least, I’m not home
sick
.”

“I try not to think about it too often,” Dennys said, “except to remind myself that since I didn’t die of sunstroke, then somehow or other we ought to be able to get home.”

“We won’t be the same,” Sandy said.

Sandy made a face.
“Hey, I don’t like the way Tiglah keeps coming around. I don’t think I’m ready for Tiglah.”

“Tiglah,” Dennys said, “is what the kids at school would call an easy lay.”

“Except,” Sandy said, “there isn’t
any
body remotely like Tiglah at school.”

“She’s older.” Still, neither of them mentioned Yalith.

“Yeah,” Sandy said.

“The thing is—” Dennys paused. “Something’s happened. We’re not just kids
anymore.”

“I know.” Sandy bent over one of the plants.

Dennys pulled up a resisting weed with such force that he sat down. “We haven’t seen Adnarel lately. Or any of the other seraphim.”

Sandy finished tying the plant to a bamboo stalk. Images of scarab beetle and pelican, camel and lion, flashed before him. He always felt better if Adnarel was with them. When the seraph was in his scarab-beetle
form, he was usually near Grandfather Lamech’s sleeping skins, or on Higgaion’s ear. He gave Sandy a sense of security. “I think the seraphim like us.”

“But the others don’t,” Dennys said. “I mean, the other ones, the nephilim. I’ve seen them looking at us when they thought we weren’t noticing. And a mosquito kept buzzing around me the other day after Tiglah had been around. I don’t think it
was just a mosquito.”

“Rofocale,” Sandy said. “I heard her call one of the nephilim Rofocale.”

“They don’t like us,” Dennys said.

*   *   *

When supplies were needed, the twins left Grandfather Lamech’s and went to the nearby shops, carrying figs, dates, and the produce of their garden to barter for rice or lentils. On the dusty paths they passed many of the people of the oasis, who always
paused to look up at Sandy and Dennys, surreptitiously if not openly.

When they passed nephilim, with whom they could look eye-to-eye, brilliant wings quivered, but the nephilim did not acknowledge their presence, except in sudden reversion to the animal host, so that a tall, bright-winged man would vanish, and there would be a skink scuttling across the path, or a red ant, or a slug leaving
its slimy trail.

The women, at least the young ones, let Sandy and Dennys know that they were admired. Small hands reached up to touch them. They were bathed in lavish smiles. Tiglah seemed to know when they needed rice or beans or lentils, and would be waiting at whichever stall they were headed for.

The men and the older women were different. Sometimes the twins were cursed at, spat at. They
did not tell Grandfather Lamech, who would have been distressed. They learned to go to the few venders who treated them kindly and did not try to cheat.

Dennys said, one day, “Hey, Sand. If you want to go for a walk with Tiglah, don’t let me stop you.”

“I don’t want to.” Sandy turned his gaze from the side of the path, where a vulture was picking the flesh from a small carcass.

“I mean, just
because it was her father and brother who threw me into the garbage pit—I mean, I’m not stopping you, or anything.”

“No problem,” Sandy agreed.

They were careful with each other as they had never been careful before.

And still they did not mention Yalith.

*   *   *

Yalith and Oholibamah were helping Matred to clean the big tent when they were disturbed by the flap being pushed open, and a
lavender-winged nephil came in. He spoke without greeting. “It is nearly Mahlah’s time. She will need you to help with the birthing of the baby.”

Matred held the broken palm branch which she was using as a broom. “Do you not have one of your own kind to help?”

Ugiel looked at Oholibamah with hooded eyes. Flicked a long finger in her direction. “She will be of use. And Mahlah will need her mother
and sister.”

Oholibamah took a step away from the nephil. “How will we know when to come?”

“Tonight. At the time of the moonrise. I, Ugiel of the nephilim, tell you so.”

“We will come,” Matred pronounced. “I will not have my daughter labor alone.”

“Good. I will expect you.”

“We will come,” Matred repeated, “but you will wait outside.”

Ugiel shrugged. “Have it your own way. It is a woman’s
job to see to all the blood and mess of a birth.” He started out, then turned his burning gaze on Yalith.

She did not drop her eyes. Biting her lower lip, she met his stare.

“You cannot have them both, you know,” Ugiel said.

Then he was gone.

*   *   *

Yalith and Oholibamah spread skins over some low scrub palms. Some skins they would discard, if they were too soiled. Others they would scrape
and beat clean.

“What did he mean?” Oholibamah asked.

“Who?”

“Ugiel.”

“About what?”