Fa'tad al-Akla himself! Fa'tad the Eagle, commander of all the Dartarmercenaries, bloodthirsty as a vampire, merciless as a hungry snake. What washe doing? Making himself a target for the Living?
Of course not. Was he not supposed to know as little of fear as the desertwindstorms that brewed over the Takes and raged north over the KhadatqaMountains and beyond, to inundate Qush-marrah with dust and torment it with aferocious dry heat? Fa'tad al-Akla held the Living in contempt.
Aaron thought them quixotic at best. But he also believed they were going tokill Fa'tad, and he did not think it would be long before the dark angelbrushed the Eagle with the shadow of his wing.
Ahead, in front of the house, he saw Laella and her mother. They were notbereaved. His heart spread white wings. Then it soared as he spied Arif.
His son was all right! The nightmare had not come true!
Arif saw him coming and ran to meet him. He snatched the boy up and surroundedhim in a hug almost brutal in its intensity. Arif squealed, surprised. Peoplestared. It was not a culture that encouraged emotional display.
Arif wanted to tell him all the news but he had squeezed the breath out of theboy.
Aaron joined Laella and her mother. His wife had Stafa, their younger son, seated upon her left hip. Stafa was midway between his second and thirdbirthdays, and on his better days he was happy mischief incarnate. Arif was, by contrast, a quiet child, often seeming sad.
The younger boy reached out. "I want some Daddy hugs."
Aaron reached and let him monkey over to sit on the hip opposite Arif, grinning. Aaron told Laella, "I heard. I was afraid it was Arif."
There was pain and relief and guilt in Laella's eyes as she said, "No. It wasZouki. Reyha's Zouki."
"Oh."
Laella's mother watched Fa'tad with the fixity and dispassionate intensity ofa vulture waiting for. a corpse to cool out. "They went after him."
Aaron turned. "What?"
"The Dartar patrol. They were right here when Zouki was taken. Not much morethan boys themselves. The children screamed 'Bedija gha!' and the Dartars wentafter the taker."
She sounded amazed. As if so human a thing was beyond comprehension if done bythe villains of Dak-es-Souetta.
"And?"
Laella said, "Three went in Tosh Alley. And they caught him." She did notsound joyful.
"Something bad happened?"
"They were all burned when they brought them out. Not dead. Not really badhurt. But one of them's clothes was smoldering."
Aaron grunted.
"Aaron, something has to be done."
He grunted again. He agreed. But he did not know what could be done. There hadbeen talk among the men, but it never went beyond that. One could do nothingwhen one did not know which way to strike.
The old woman muttered something.
"Mother?" Aaron asked.
"The Dartars think the Living did it."
So. No wonder she was in shock. For her the Dartars had become the wellspringof all evil. And here they had tried to rescue a child, and thought the lastragtag remnants of Qush-marrahan partisans had done the grabbing.
"The children yelled 'Bedija gha!' Could that be it? Are the old godsstirring?"
Bedija gha sprang from an older form of the language. Today it meant "childstealer."
In Qushmarrah, as in all cities in all times and lands, there werepeople who wanted to buy children. For whatever reason. So there were otherswilling to harvest and sell. But before "child-stealer" or "kidnapper," in theold days bedija gha had had a more sinister and specific meaning, "collectorof sacrifices."
That had been in the time of Gorloch, cast down and banished by Aram longsince. The god's followers had been dispersed, his temples demolished, and hispriests forbidden human sacrifice.
He had not gone quickly or quietly, though. Superseded gods never do.
Aram the Flame had brought light to Qushmarrah but Gorloch had clung to theshadows and it was not till the coming of the Herodians, with their strange, nameless, omnipotent god, that Gorloch's last High Priest's time had ended.
Aaron shivered and glanced uphill. Nakar the Abomination. How he had deservedthat name, that dark sorcerer-priest-king unassailable in his citadel. BlessAla-eh-din Beyh and the Herodians for having laid that terror to rest.
Laella said, "No, it couldn't be Gorloch. They say Nakar was the last priestwho knew the rites." Her mother nodded agreement without taking her eyes offthe Eagle. "And the Witch never was a believer."
"There must be manuscripts that tell about the rituals."
"You're trying to talk yourself into something again, Aaron." Laella smiled totake the sting out of the admonition.
She was right. He wanted conspiracies to explain away his fear of something hedid not understand. Chances were there was no more child-stealing going on nowthan there had been at any other time. He was just more aware of it because heand his contemporaries were of an age to have children of an age to be atrisk. That and the fact that there had been a rash of kidnappings in the area, some as broad-daylight-brazen as this latest. A thing like that caused a lotof talk that led to more talk that maybe magnified the problem out of allproportion.
If it were not for the nightmares ...
He realized his arms were aching with the weight of the children. "All right, Stafa. Back to Mom. Arif, down you go. Daddy's arms are tired."
Stafa flashed his little white teeth and shook his head "Can't," he said.
"Yes, you can," Laella told him. "Come here. Your father's been working hardall day."
"Can't. My dad."
Aaron bent and let Arif down. Arifs feelings were hurt, of course, but he hidthat as he always did. He was convinced everyone loved his brother more thanhim, and no logical argument could reach his heart and convince it that asmaller child always needed more attention.
The firstborn are always the sad ones, Aaron thought, and felt vaguely guilty.
He always seemed to expect more of Arif.
He leaned toward Laella, who tried to pry Stafa off him. Stafa laughed anddeclared, "Can't! Daddy's Stafa!" He grabbed two fistfuls of Aaron's hair.
Aaron suppressed the usual flash of anger and impatience and played the gameout.
Laella finally peeled the boy off. The battle shifted ground. She wanted toput him down and he did not want to be put. Laella won. Stafa went into apout, declared, "I hate you, Mom!" He ran and clung to Nana's leg. But the oldwoman had no attention to spare.
Aaron grabbed Arif up and set him on his left hip, ignoring the ache in hisarm and shoulders. "Come on, big guy. Let's see what's going on." His reliefat finding Arif safe persisted. It left him feeling select and immune and moredaring than was his nature. He even managed to meet the Eagle's eye withoutflinching.
Bel-Sidek dragged his log of a bad leg up the slope of Char Street. It gotworse every day. His pride was under ever more severe strain. How long beforeit broke, he surrendered, and he became just another crippled veteran beggingat street side?
As it did every time, the thought sparked white-hot rage. He would notsurrender! He would not become a vegetable patch beside the thoroughfare, watered by the charity of Herodian conquerors whose generosity consisted of tossing back fragments of the ghosts of plunder ripped from the heart ofQushmarrah.
Bel-Sidek sometimes tended toward a dramatic turn of mind.
The leg did not hurt as badly, nor drag nearly so much, when the thought of acommander of a thousand begging at street side drove him into a fury. Dartarand Herodian had humiliated him and reduced him by strength of arms and rightof conquest. But he would not finish what they had begun. He would not degradehimself.
"They have not won," he muttered. "They have not beaten me. I am one of theliving."