Forbidden (24 page)

Now I understood why Leila treasured the figurine and carefully hid it in our mother’s wedding box. When I returned
it to the chest, I knew that I may never see my mother’s prized possession again either.

Pausing at the doors to the balcony, I hid behind the curtains to see if guards were still making their sentry rounds. I should have told Armana I was leaving. I should have officially asked for permission to leave after partaking of their generous hospitality, but there would be arguments and I didn’t have time or heart for that.

Peering around the temple walls, I thankfully saw no one. Even the torches were almost burned out. Clutching my old, worn cloak, I ran down the cold, stone steps of the temple and raced across the dark paths toward the distant hills.

I
met Kadesh near the city gates of Tadmur as dawn crept along the horizon. He was waiting for me with four camels: two to ride and two already packed with water and food supplies. The journey east to Mari on the Euphrates River was less than two weeks’ time.

As he and I rode in the opposite direction of the oasis, swells of dust billowed like puffs of smoke behind us. It appeared as though my tribe was on the move to follow the rains over the desert. It was hard to believe that we’d left the winter desert almost eight months ago now.

My head was filled with memories of home, my clan, and my cousins. I wondered if my father had survived the raids, and what his emotions were when he returned to an empty tent.

“What are you thinking about, quiet Jayden?” Kadesh asked when we stopped for a brief midday meal. He smiled as
he pulled me next to him.

I chewed my bread in small bites. “Wondering where Horeb is right now. Hoping he is still west of here in Damascus, thinking that’s where you are.”

“We can only hope,” Kadesh said as we shared a bowl of milk.

We fell silent as I wondered where Sahmril was and what she looked like after all this time. “I’m also thinking about how Timnath and Falail are doing—and my grandmother. I worry about her in her old age. I think about Hakak’s happiness and if she is with child now. How many camels my father brought back from the raid. If he despises me or thinks I’m dead.”

Kadesh held my hand in both of his. “I worry, too, but there’s nothing you can do to help them. The journey to Mari isn’t a hard one. We’ll be there in ten or eleven days if we ride hard.”

I tried to smile. “I had no idea the Euphrates was so close. I’ve never gone this far east. My tribe stays more to the west, along the range of mountains north of the Red Sea.”

“Once we cross through the crevice of those hills up ahead, we’ll be in the river valley.”

I nodded and paused. “I worry we could be in danger from warring foreign tribes in this region. Or if Horeb is actually ahead of us, searching for us in Mari. Constantly, I wonder what he’s doing, what he’s thinking, and what he’s planning.”

“There’s no reason for him to believe we’ve gone to Mari.
He doesn’t know our information about Sahmril. I’m sure he’s far to the west.”

A shiver came over me as we sat in the warm sun on a bed of flat rocks at the mouth of the mountain trailhead. The riverbed was bone dry after the hot summer. Soon the winter rains would come and this ravine would trickle with water.

I turned back. “Kadesh, I know deep in my soul that Horeb is looking for me. If he’s back with my tribe, and I’m not there . . . He would quickly learn from Judith or Falail that I’ve been living at the temple. If Horeb were to discover that I’m with you in Mari . . . He could have me executed, and everyone in the tribe would stand by him.”

“But you know the truth about Abimelech’s killer.”

“Nobody will believe me because I have every reason to lie about it. They all know I want to be with you. I’m a shamed woman. Horeb looks like a hero, marrying his poor, misguided betrothed, despite the way he ruined my reputation. The people of my tribe will hail him as a kind and most forgiving man.”

Kadesh came closer, but didn’t touch me, even as he kept one eye on the valley for other travelers in the distance. “You must put him out of your mind, Jayden. I promise you’ll never have to see him or deal with him again.”

Tears burned my eyes and I brushed a hand across my face. “You don’t understand. I don’t think Horeb will try to hurt
me
. He’s going to try to kill
you
. That is the one thing that will confirm his heroics before the tribe. He’ll be hailed for helping
to restore my good name. Please be careful. Please stay alive. I couldn’t bear to live in this world without you.”

We stood there, so close, and I could see the muscles in his jaw clenching with the effort to keep his distance. Finally I broke away and hurried to the camels, untying them quickly before I lost my mind with the longing to throw myself against him.

Kadesh ran after me, catching the reins as I climbed onto the camel’s back. “Jayden,” he said. Before I could stop his impulsiveness, he gripped my hand. “I promise I will stay alive. I promise you that one day you will be with me at my home in the frankincense lands. Do you still have the nuggets I gave you all those months ago?”

I nodded, keenly aware of the secret bundle hidden beneath my dress.

“Then let’s get to Mari as quickly as possible and find Sahmril. Focus on that, because there’s nothing you can do for Leila or your father anymore.”

Kadesh swung up onto his camel, double-checking our leather bags of water. He kicked at his camel as we headed for the narrow, rocky trail, and his dark brown eyes met mine. “Our future together cannot come fast enough, my lovely Jayden.”

A strange, tender joy filled my heart as his camel took off, and I urged my own animal into a gallop to catch up.

Our pace soon slowed as the hills grew steeper. When we stopped after sunset that night, we built a small campfire and ate quickly.

I headed straight to my blanket, staring up at the
never-ending stars in the black bowl of sky, focusing my thoughts on finding Sahmril.

After a week we progressed through the mountains, and then days of desert sands and saltbush later, we galloped down the final slopes into the plains of Mari.

“It’s breathtaking,” I gasped, drinking it all in as we approached the valley. The world before us stretched like an expanse of gold silk, the Euphrates River wide and thunderous as it wove through harvested lands of grain and corn, orchards of fruit trees and vineyards of grapes.

“Have you been here before?”

“Of course,” Kadesh said, smiling at me. “I know a safe inn where we can stay, if we don’t find Dinah and her husband right away.”

Our camels stood side by side as we stared out at the enormous valley. In the very center was the city of Mari, like an enchanted mirage before my eyes. The city had been built in a circle with high stone walls surrounding the entire perimeter, and the river winding through the center.

“On either side of the wall are two sets of gates,” Kadesh said, flicking his reins to start our camels up again. “That straight line of water cutting the city in half is a canal. They’ve built levies and retaining walls to steer the course of the Euphrates directly into the city for easy access. No need for digging wells and creating cisterns. No going outside the safety of the city to get water. Brilliant, isn’t it?”

I nodded in awe, steering my camel over a patch of rocks
and back onto the trail as we hit the sloping foothills. “It looks quiet, not like there’s a siege going on at all.”

“From a distance, it can be deceiving. But do you see those camps?” he asked, pointing to the north. “Those are the troops of Hammurabi.”

“Why did he invade? My father told me once that Mari’s King Zimrilim and Hammurabi of Babylon were allies, so this war makes no sense.”

“That is all in the past. Now Hammurabi wants to control the entire state of Mesopotamia—and Zimrilim isn’t strong enough to keep him out. Just like his father, who was assassinated in a coup several years ago, King Zimrilim underestimated the need for a bigger army. He spent more time building his palace than his protection.”

Kadesh pointed down below. “See those shining pools of water and the maze of stone walls surrounded by the biggest cluster of trees—right in the middle of the city? That is the royal palace compound.”

Our magnificent view disappeared as the trail descended out of the hills and we drew closer to the city. All I could see now were the high walls and battlements and the specks of soldiers surrounding the fortress city. “What if we can’t get in?” I asked softly.

Kadesh’s face appeared calm, but I could see a touch of worry in his eyes. “Even though Mari has been under siege for several months now, it appears as though people are beginning to move in and out more freely.”

When we approached the gates, I made sure my face and
head were covered and didn’t speak a word, but I caught the grim tension of the soldiers as they examined our camels and inspected our packs of food and supplies. When they questioned Kadesh about our business, their tone was brusque. After telling them we were visiting relatives, the guards fell silent when Kadesh supplied them with coins. The massive wooden gates, studded with brass, finally opened, and we entered the occupied city of Mari.

As we rode through the streets, an edgy atmosphere filled the air, giving me an unsettling sense of trepidation. Street after street was filled with shops and inns and drinking houses. The marketplace bustled with people and trading, just like Tadmur, but the neighborhoods were much more subdued, as though people were afraid of being stopped and questioned.

“Mari has always been the biggest trading post along the Euphrates,” Kadesh said quietly. “People come from up and down the river, from as far south in Babylon, or from the north beyond Nineveh to buy, sell, and trade goods and animals.”

Even as he spoke, I watched scraggly chickens and mangy dogs roaming the poorer alleyways. When the streets narrowed even more, Kadesh and I climbed down from our camels and walked beside them, holding tight to the halters.

“Let’s find a place near the canals to water our animals,” Kadesh said. “The plaza should also be close by, within sight of the Temple of Inanna. We’ll get information about Mari’s citizens more easily at the plaza. If Dinah is here, we’ll find her. And Sahmril.”

Kadesh’s instincts were right. While I watered the camels
at the wells, dragging bucket after bucket up with the hand crank, I watched him under the hood of my cloak as he made careful, guarded talk with the older women who came to the canal. Women who’d lived in Mari their entire lives, and knew their neighbors and all the gossip.

The soldiers on horseback marching the streets made me uneasy. Guards and sentries were posted along every corner, watching the citizens for any uprising.

Babylon was rumored to be the largest and most dazzling city of the ages, but no one knew how ruthless King Hammurabi might become to achieve his goals of total Mesopotamian domination. Mari had become a tense and dangerous place.

I sat on a stone near the well as our animals drank. Kadesh disappeared into the crowds. A chill crept over me and I tried to focus on the camels, petting their noses, keeping them out of trouble.

“Kadesh,” I whispered, terror striking at me when he didn’t return for an hour.

Trickles of perspiration dripped down my face. He’d probably stepped into one of the shops, but it was hard not to panic. I pulled at the camels’ tethers, trying to get them to obey me, but they were stubborn.

“Come!” I yelled, finally getting them to move from the well. I stood with them for nearly another hour in front of a rug and brass merchant, trying to ignore the patrolling soldiers with their swords and clubs.

I felt the edge of my own dagger under the belt of my skirt, and my gut tightened. Kadesh had told me that the citizens’
arms had been confiscated with the invasion.

He was suddenly at my elbow, and relief flooded me. “Where have you been?”

“I think I’ve found them,” he whispered.

Instantly, I went still. “Are you sure?”

“My stores of silver are dangerously low. I’m nearly broke from all the bribes I’ve been passing out.”

“Looking for someone?” the merchant suddenly said behind us, shrewdly studying the signs of Kadesh’s clan on the decorations of his camel. “I can help you. Business is slow.”

“Thank you, sir, but I believe I’ve found my long-lost aunt and cousins.”

“That girl your sister?” the man asked, staring hard at me.

I pulled my shawl closer and didn’t say a word. My accent was different from Kadesh’s and would give me away.

“Yes, sir, she’s been ill. We lost our small herd to raiders and have been searching for our relatives, who headed this direction at the end of the spring season.”

The man pursed his lips and spat on the ground. “If you need anything, just ask for me, Romuel. My price is good.”

“Thank you for your kind offer.” Bowing his head, Kadesh clucked at the camels, pulling them to a crossroad of streets and alleys. I was careful not to look back.

In the midst of the crush, I said, “Tell me! What do you know?”

Kadesh kept his face forward. “Nothing’s certain yet, but one of the women at the well took me to her sister, who has a neighbor who knows everybody. There’s a section of town
for new immigrants. Within that area, there’s a group of tribal people. That’s our best chance of finding Shem and Nalla and your cousins.”

After we found the neighbor of the sister, Kadesh asked about the newer residents. I stood again with the camels, closing my eyes against fatigue, swaying on my feet.

“I’ve got some leads,” Kadesh said when he came out of the door of the tiny house. I crept closer, tired of the crowds, weary after two weeks of travel, and worried that we’d come all this way and learn that Shem’s family had fled the city before the siege.

It was twilight when Kadesh knocked on the tenth door, each one leading us closer and closer, but never quite the correct house. “This is the last for today. We need to find a place to sleep.”

A platoon of soldiers clattered down the street, swords clanging. They were yelling something I couldn’t understand, so fierce I wanted to jump out of my skin. “What’s happening?” I cried softly.

“There’s a curfew,” Kadesh said. “We need to get off the streets or we’ll be arrested. Come this way!”

We darted down another alley, and I lost count of how many twists and turns we’d made. At last, Kadesh knocked on a door at the end of a row of single-story buildings with low roofs and sagging doorframes. Two soldiers spotted us and galloped forward. Kadesh knocked harder and the door finally creaked open.

“What do you want?” a woman’s voice muttered. “It’s after
curfew. We’ll all be arrested—go away!”

Kadesh’s voice was strong despite the nervousness of the woman. “I’m looking for the house of Shem. It’s urgent that we find him.”