As she prayed, she grew excited in anticipation of seeing the crystal pools. She imagined they would be beautiful—shimmering and sweet, cool, refreshing water that revived the spirit as well as the eye. How large would they be, she wondered, and how many were there? Where did the water come from? Were the pools fed by waterfalls or streams or artesian wells?
Ulrika opened her eyes. Nothing was happening.
Drawing in a deep breath, she closed her eyes and began again, sending her thoughts out into the unknown, willing her soul to explore the cosmos while she held a vision of her inner soul flame. But after a while she was aware only of the hard stone beneath her and an aching back. Her mind wandered and she wanted to eat.
She would try again tomorrow.
27
ULRIKA," VEEDA SAID, "MAY I ask you a personal question?"
They were preparing breakfast while Iskander was in the brushy foothills foraging for eggs. They had been a month at the City of Ghosts, had built a comfortable camp in the ruins, and had observed the first dusting of snow on the distant mountains. Winter was coming. Soon, no caravans would be able to cross the mountain passes and the threesome would be trapped in this ancient valley.
They had fallen into a routine. Iskander went daily to his mountain pass to keep watch over his enemy, still camped on the other side. Veeda mended clothes or cooked with Ulrika, or went to the caravanserai where she was making friends among the girls who lived there.
Ulrika had kept at her daily meditations with no success. She should have received visions by now, if this was indeed the place where her life began. She should have learned the nature of the Divining and when to start on her destined path.
As she looked at the distant mountains dusted with snow, she knew she must soon make a decision: to stay and continue what was turning out to be a futile exercise in seeking answers to her gift, or buy passage on the next caravan that came through and could take her south. She had, after all, only the word of a stranger that this place was indeed Shalamandar. Zeroun had even said, "Local legend says that was the name long ago." But legends had a way of growing distorted and even completely wrong over the years. Ulrika wondered if she should return to Babylon and find another way to determine the location of the true Shalamandar.
"You may ask me anything you want," she said.
"Have you ever been in love?"
Ulrika looked at the girl's shy smile, pink blush. Setting aside her knife and the late autumn onions they had bought from Zeroun, she said, "I am in love right now, Veeda. With a wonderful man who is at this moment on his way to a far-off fabled land."
"And does he love you?"
"Yes." But, she thought, we have been apart now for a long time. Has he reached China? Does he find the women there exotic and beautiful? Perhaps irresistible ...
She missed Sebastianus so much it was like a physical pain. Every day she read his letter, spoke out loud the words he had written, ending with "I love you." She ached for his warmth and strength, yearned to feel his powerful arms around her, needed to experience the solidness of his body and the security of his embrace.
She touched the scallop shell that lay on her breast. "Sebastianus gave this to me. It connected him to his homeland, and now it connects me to him."
"Does it connect you to his homeland as well?"
Ulrika looked at the wide, questioning eyes, dark and filled with sorrow and hope. And it occurred to her that she had more in common with this tribal girl than she had realized. They both did not know were they belonged. "I suppose it does," Ulrika said. "I had never thought of it."
Veeda looked down at her hands and said hesitantly, "How do you ... how does a woman get a man to notice her?"
"Veeda," Ulrika said gently. "Iskander notices you."
The blush deepened. And Ulrika thought: should I tell her I suspect he feels the same way? But he is holding back. What keeps Iskander from expressing his feelings for her? The enemy on the other side of the mountain, waiting for him to come down ...
"When he goes up there," Veeda said, pointing to the mountain that loomed over the ruins. "I feel a hole here," and she tapped her chest. "When he returns, it is filled again. But Iskander will never love me."
"Why do you say that?"
"Because of Asmahan."
"Who is Asmahan?"
"She is Iskander's wife. He thinks she is still alive."
Ulrika stared at Veeda. "I did not know he was married," she said. And then she knew the truth: Iskander was not searching for remnants of his tribe, but for one woman. And it was not out of an ancient rivalry that he sat here and plotted the deaths of the men who camped on the other side of the mountain pass, but a need to take revenge on men whom he believed had killed that woman.
Ulrika was sad for Iskander. So much senseless killing. Iskander's tribe wiped out. Veeda's clan gone. And now Iskander wanting to erase his enemy from the face of the earth. When would it end?
"Caravan!" Iskander shouted as he sprinted up the stone steps to the terrace. "A caravan is coming!"
Ulrika turned to look back over the plain and saw, beneath the morning sun, an astonishing sight: hundreds of camels, horses, and donkeys, laden with packs and riders, slowly snaking their way across the flat plain. Lifting the spit from the fire—she was roasting a skinned hare, the fat dripping into the flames and causing delicious snapping sounds—she set it aside, rose to her feet, and shielded her eyes against the sun's glare.
The familiar, and welcome, sound of jingling camels' bells rode on the breeze that wafted over the royal terrace. And Ulrika thought anxiously: will this be the last caravan? Should I go south with it?
The three hurried from their camp, excited, wondering where the traders had come from, where they were going, what exotic goods and people they brought. The prior caravan to come through the valley had turned out to be transporting the Grand Vizier's personal library, and Ulrika and her friends had learned that the Grand Vizier kept his 117,000-volume library organized while traveling with it by training his camels to walk in alphabetical order.
As she neared the noisy gathering of camels and horses and men, Ulrika heard Zeroun the Armenian's booming voice fly up to the winter clouds. "I tell you, my friend, I understand your homesickness! It is something we all feel! I myself sometimes long for my homeland! Let me tell you, holding onto something precious and dear is the way to anchor oneself in a foreign land. It is the key."
She stopped and stared.
His voice rolled across the compound like thunder, rising above the noise of braying camels and shouting men. "Especially a man like yourself, sir, who goes out into the unknown, seeking for he knows not what. Oh, you can be very focused, you can be very attentive and concentrate very hard on your exploration, but if you do not hold tightly to something that has meaning for you, then you do not put your whole heart into that exploration. Something holds you back, does it not? No matter how hard you try?"