The Meq

night. They were all there. I will never forget their eyes.

Daphne led us through an entrance hall and down another long hall flanked by stairs leading up on both sides. There were few lights along the way, but I could see the wide beams overhead, ancient and straight and still holding their weight in an even line. I could also see the sweat glistening on the faces of Eder and Nicholas as we carried them through.

Finally, we were able to lay them down on two separate beds in what Willie called his “quarters.” There was a large stone fireplace in one corner with a fire already blazing.

Opari said, “Strip their clothes and burn them. Wrap their bodies in wet sheets. We must try to break the fever.”

She moved quickly back and forth between the two beds, telling Geaxi, Nova, and me exactly what to do, then turned to Daphne and told her that she and Willie and Star and the baby had to leave — there was nothing they could do and it was indeed dangerous. Daphne agreed reluctantly and took Star and the baby upstairs. Willie said he would be in the kitchen and within shouting distance. As he was leaving, he asked, “Should I send Tillman for a doctor?”

Opari never looked up and said evenly, “No. I fear it is too late for that.”

For several minutes, Opari and Geaxi did everything they could to break the fevers of Eder and Nicholas, who remained unconscious and struggling for every breath. Their lungs were filling with fluid and getting worse. Their blood could not oxygenate, and as a result, once their clothes were removed I noticed their feet had turned black up to their ankles. Nicholas seemed to be hallucinating. His eyes would open and shut at random and his body jerked and convulsed. His breathing became more labored than Eder’s and I knew he was much closer to death. I tried saying his name over and over, hoping to wake him, but it was no use. Nova did the same with Eder, holding her hand and repeating in her ear, “Wake up, Mama, wake up now.”

I caught myself staring at Eder’s face and body. She was a woman in her forties, going gray in her hair and slack in her limbs. Her belly was rounder and her breasts sagged slightly to the side. The lines in her face were the same only deeper, more permanent. She was still a beautiful woman, but bore no resemblance to the girl she had been, to the Meq, to the child-woman who had lived for over two thousand years completely immune to the virus that was killing her now. It made no sense. There were three of us in the room, three Egizahar Meq who carried the Stone, and we could do nothing. This powerful, mystical Stone that could make animals and Giza change their minds, their reality itself, was impotent and unable to do the one thing that mattered— heal.

Opari stayed busy trying to make them comfortable. She mostly pointed and nodded at what to do, saying little and moving quietly. I did hear her whisper once to Geaxi, “Sailor should be here.” Geaxi only replied, “Yes, but this was never expected. Never.”

Just then, Nova turned and grabbed my sleeve with her free arm. “Where’s Ray?” she asked. I knew there had always been something between them, more than I’d had a chance to see in St. Louis and more than Ray had ever let on in Africa. Still, her question caught me off guard.

“I don’t know,” I said. “I mean, he was kidnapped, stolen, I don’t even know if he is alive. I’ll find him though. The Fleur-du-Mal knows where he is, I’m sure of it. As soon as. as soon as—” I stopped and looked hard into her eyes. “Where is Carolina, Nova? Tell me. Tell me now.”

Before Nova could say a word, the door to Willie’s “quarters” burst open and Star was standing there wide- eyed and trembling. I am certain no one had told Star the dying man lying in the bed was her father, but when she appeared at the doorway, unasked and unannounced, I knew at a glance she had somehow figured it out. What happened next is still a mystery to me. The Meq have a word for it—berrikutu—the “talking touch.”

Star had changed from her trousers and navy jacket to a long striped dressing gown, probably borrowed from Willie. Her hair was wild and tangled and slightly wet. She even held a towel in her right hand and it looked as if she’d run downstairs the moment the truth had struck her.

It had been fourteen years since she’d seen her father’s face, and physically he had aged twice that, but she walked over to him and sat on the bed next to him and held his hand in both of hers. “Papa,” she said in the softest voice. “Papa,” she said again, then again and again as if the word itself had shape and weight and meaning beyond the sound. It was a word to her from another life, another self. It was a word she’d buried in order to survive, but used without speaking it aloud to protect her in Louisiana, in the camps of Mulai and Jisil, maybe even through our escape and the birth of her own son. It was her secret word, her magic word. “Papa” had power. “Papa” was the one word that kept her alive and the one word she never thought she would say again.

A single tear dropped from her eye and fell by chance on Nicholas’s dark blue lips. One more time, one last time, Star whispered, “Papa.” As if by magic, his mouth opened and his tongue went to taste the tear. His eyes fluttered and opened. He looked around wildly at first, then focused on Star’s face. I have no idea how he got his breath because his lungs were filled with fluid, but he opened his mouth a little wider and almost smiled, then spoke to her, or at least to the woman he thought she was.

“Carolina, honey, I knew you’d be here. I told everybody. I remember. I remember—” He paused and looked away, squinting and blinking, but his eyes couldn’t or wouldn’t focus properly. “Where are we?” he asked, looking back at Star. “Where are we, honey? I’m a little cold.”

Without saying a word, Opari handed Star a wool blanket. Star exchanged looks with her, then glanced at Nova sitting on the other bed and holding Eder’s hand.

“Carolina is your mother,” Nova said simply.

“And he is my father,” Star whispered.

The two women held each other’s gaze for several moments. One was not much older than a girl, yet had born a child herself, and the other was a woman nearing thirty, yet still in the body of a child. An “understanding” passed between them that was beyond age, gender, or species. A bond and trust were formed instantly through the timeless sense of love and the endless sense of loss.

Star turned and leaned over her papa and kissed him full and hard on his blue lips, not as herself, but as Carolina — the Carolina who was in his heart, his mind and memory, his last words. And she kept kissing him. No one stopped her. No one tried. She kept kissing him and crying and kissing him until it was over and Nicholas was gone.

Gently, Opari and Geaxi lifted Star away from Nicholas. I took the wool blanket and began to cover his body. Just as I pulled the blanket over his head, Eder moaned and coughed. She tried to speak and coughed again, only it did no good. Her lungs were too full and she was too weak. Her eyes were still closed.

“Mama,” Nova said, then leaned over and whispered in Eder’s ear, “do you know where you are?”

Eder coughed again, this time violently. Nova held her closer. There was nothing she could do. Then, suddenly, Eder opened her eyes and she was staring at me. She moaned again and her eyes fought to stay open, then somehow she began to speak, and while she could, she told me what she saw.

“I see your mama and papa, Zianno.”

“Where? Where are they?”

“Just ahead, oh, what is the name of that place, that old fort in East Africa?”

“I. I can’t remember.”

“Baju will know. He always knows where we are. Yes. Baju will know.”

Eder never closed her eyes. She left as quickly and thoroughly as Solomon had and I closed her eyes as I had his. Nova laid her down on the pillow and sat still by her side for several minutes, staring at her mother’s face and features. Behind me, Opari began a low chant that seemed at first to have no melody or words. I learned later that it was not Meq. It was older; a chant she had learned from her mother, who said the Meq had learned it from “others” during the Time of Ice. It was called the “Song of the Glacier.” Her mother said the “ancient ones” sang it together at the passing of one of their kind. They sang it to give shape and sound to the departing spirit, which was like a newborn at death and needed the strength of the still-living spirits to begin its infinite journey. They buried the “old” body of the “new” spirit in the direct path of an advancing glacier and chanted the song, or prayer, for hundreds of miles to and from their camps.

It was slow and beautiful, a song of mourning, but there was no time for mourning or ceremony. Circumstances would not allow it.

I left Willie’s “quarters” and found Daphne and told her what had happened. We both found Willie and his first concern was Star. Daphne assured him she would look after Star and the baby. Willie and Tillman Fadle then