cloth of Chin mask immediately. The face was ablaze. Then her hair. She ran shrieking around the room.
Casca strained at the ropes. They were breaking — but taking, it seemed, an eternity. The flimsy clothing of the three women at the table was now ablaze, and the women were screaming. One rushed toward the window. Another, blinded by the flames, rushed straight into the wall. The collision of her burning body with the wall hangings set that material afire. In seconds the whole room was aflame, and now the women who watched were also screaming.
The screams of the women brought the eunuchs. Casca was not yet free, and he could see the head eunuch coming for him, a huge scimitar in his hands.
But he could also see the set, determined face of the little Jewish slave girl, Ruth. He could see her push over the huge amphora of oil so that it spilled into the path of the eunuch. The eunuch slipped, and the scimitar fell from his grasp and hit the tile floor, its clatter lost in the rising screams of the harem women.
But Casca was now free. He tried to get over the edge of the table, but pain and weakness held him back. He, too, was afire, the ropes that clung to his bloody flesh, the oil spilled on him, both burning.
'Please, help me!'
The little Jewish girl was calling to him for help. The third harem torturer, though dress afire, was heading toward her, dagger in hand.
Casca yanked the knife from the breast of the screaming Jasmine Lady and threw it. The blade turned over twice in the air, and then the point buried itself into the back of the neck of the woman, and she pitched forward, falling just short of the young girl.
The effort gave Casca a second burst of strength. He managed to get off the table and get the scimitar. But he was still bent over when the second eunuch was upon him, swinging a sword. Casca pulled the scimitar upward in a sweeping circle, somewhat ragged because of his weakness, and slit the eunuch's throat. Not expertly, but it did the job. Then he slashed the first eunuch across the face and saw blood, and then saw the nose disappear.
He was losing consciousness, and his eyesight was going, coming back only in short, blurred bursts. He had a vague image of eunuchs with swords slipping in the blood and oil and tangling in a burning, twisting heap as the oil caught fire and blazed up, but it may have been only a wish, a dream.
All dreams.
He was gone now.
'Come, stranger. Come. There is a secret way out.'
This dream, this voice seeming to sound in his brain, was even stronger than the others. He could even imagine a touch — that he was holding the hand of Ruth the young slave girl.
But, again, he had slipped into darkness.
Still, ragged pieces of dreams, like ravenous birds, bit at his mind. None of them made sense. There were moments when he had images of cold stone walls. Of dampness. A tunnel? None of it mattered. It was only the breaking up of a dying man's brain.
Then there were no dream pieces.
Only blackness.
The strangest dream of all.
No images.
Only words. He heard Ruth call out the name Miriam. Then another voice. Miriam the whore? 'We'll have to carry him.'
Then only the merciful darkness. The silence. The nothingness..
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
'You ready to wake up, son?'
Casca opened his eyes.
The face bending over him was that of an old Arab — or was it? The face was fully-bearded, and the beard was gray. The eyes were world-weary but kindly. And the voice was gentle.
If I'm dead, wherever I've gone, the people here sure don't fit the descriptions given out by any of the religions I've known.
He was going to close his eyes again and start this dream all over when he saw beyond the man leaning over him the faces of two women — the grinning, redheaded Miriam, the whore from the Cafe of the Infidels; and the shy, smiling Ruth, the slave girl from the Sultan's seraglio.
'What-' he began, but the old man put gentle fingers on his lips.
'No. There's no point in you asking the questions. It's obvious what you want to know, and it won't take long to tell you. But, first, lie quietly and listen. Your healing still has a long way to go.' The old man's voice was soft, but it carried a great deal of authority. Casca's first reaction was that it was a very clear, rational voice. Then it suddenly dawned on him that what he was thinking must have shown in his face, for the old man smiled slightly and said, 'Yes, Latin. I can use Arabic if you wish. Or Aramaic. Or any of half a dozen other languages you prefer, but in your delirium you were crying out in Latin, a language neither of these girls speak, so they called me. If Latin is your native language, why then we will use it, though of course that means the two girls here will not know what we are talking about.'
The old man sat down on a stool beside Casca's bed, and it was then that Casca realized that he was in some kind of very narrow bed, in a very, very small room. There was something extremely odd about the room, but he couldn't tell what it was.
What he could tell, though, was that under the soft covers, something bound him to the bed.
Again the old man anticipated him and smiled. 'For your protection. To keep you from thrashing about and reopening the wounds. I think the girls can take them off now, but perhaps we shouldn't be in too big a hurry. Agreed?'
Casca nodded. Somehow he trusted this old Arab… though, come to think of it, the man might not be as old as he seemed. And there was something just a little non-Arab about the structure of his face.
This time the man laughed aloud. 'You are perceptive, aren't you? All right, then, we'll satisfy your curiosity by starting with me rather than with where you are. I am the Sheikh Faisal ibn Said, a partly-senile, partly-addled old Bedouin who has a small, poor team of the best Arabic calligraphers in all of Islam. Wood, stone, metal, parchment — you name it. If you want the letters of the Koran written with style and flourish — and pious devotion, of course — why, wait until poor old man Faisal shows up in your neighborhood. And, he works cheap.'
The glint of amusement in Faisal's eye was as impish as that of a small boy. 'So you're liable to see Faisal almost anywhere. Harmless old fellow. Even has a small harem, as any good Muslim should.'
Casca grinned. He suddenly remembered what Mamud had told him long ago about the caravan they had passed on their way to Baghdad, the one with the calligraphy on each cart bearing an ancient quotation from the Koran. Faisal again touched his lips.
'No. Now you are anticipating me. And, yes, there is another Faisal — though the name is not Faisal, the race is not Arabic, and the religion is not Islam. I am a Jew. Every drop of blood in my body is Jewish blood. Religion? The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Occupation? Well, yes, I am a good calligrapher. The best, as a matter of fact. It is true, however, that I also have a sideline, a small personal interest of mine that I have practiced for a number of years now without getting caught once. Well, I probably shouldn't brag about the once part. Once is all it would take. Even suspicion would be enough. My sideline? Why, my Roman friend, very simple. I believe in freedom. Freedom for all men — and women. And dignity. If one's idea of the Deity doesn't make his life richer and fuller, why, my friend, I would say his idea is wrong. But enough of religion since I am what is known as a 'liberal' in these quarters, and who the hell wants to listen to a liberal?'
'Well, now. My sideline. All abstract words. Of course, a calligrapher lives with words, so that shouldn't be considered unusual. But the trouble with abstract ideas is that you can't feel them or touch them or taste them or see them — or do anything constructive with them until they are translated into concrete acts or things. So my sideline was long ago translated into one very concrete act. The Arabs have enslaved many a daughter of my people, so, whenever I get the chance — and I get chances, my Roman friend — I steal the daughters of my people from their slavery and take them where they can be free. That's the reason for all the trappings of this caravan.
