across whole empires, and you don’t seem to have lightened your soul at all.”
“What do you want me to do? Count beads? Recite sutras? Ask Buddha for peace of mind, for the child-like apathy to ignore the monstrous evils that we’ve seen in the past, and that we’re no doubt going to see more of in the future?”
“If that will help, then yes.”
Asha sighed and nudged the horse onward and they rejoined the march of farmers and tradesmen heading down to the white oasis of civilization below.
But as they reached the edge of the plain level with the city itself, Asha saw a surge of people flooding toward the road from the south, pouring down from the hills carrying their children and sacks full of food. She nudged the horse again into a brisk trot and hurried down the road to the dusty intersection where the southerners were joining the rest of the traffic.
“What’s happened?” Asha called out.
The people continued past without sparing a single glance for the women on horseback.
“You, sir!” Asha leaned down to catch a man’s shoulder. He squinted up at her. “What’s happening? What’s wrong?”
His eyes widened for a moment as he looked at her, but then his expression dimmed and he shook his head. “The Damascena. Have you seen the Damascena? Has she passed through here yet? Have you seen her?”
Asha could only shake her head and the man vanished into the crowd.
“What do you suppose this Damascena is?” Priya asked in her ear.
Asha shrugged. “A woman from Damascus, I suppose.”
“A warlord? Could they be fleeing from this Damascena?”
“I don’t know, but I don’t think so.” Asha leaned down and caught the attention of an older woman plodding along by herself. “Madam! Please tell us what’s happening.”
The woman squinted up at them. “Get to the city, quick as you can, my girls. It’s terrible, terrible! A golden beast, a giant serpent, coming down from the eastern mountains. It’s larger than anything I’ve ever seen, racing through the highlands and destroying everything in its path. Quickly, get into the city!” And she shuffled on.
“A golden beast?” Priya said.
“It could be another steam train,” Asha said. “Maybe one full of soldiers.”
“But don’t these people know about trains? Wouldn’t that woman have called it a train if it was one, instead of calling it a beast and a serpent?”
“Then maybe it’s some other sort of machine, something new, something these people haven’t seen yet.” Asha rode on into the crowd, shouting questions and straining to hear the answers, but it was all more of the same. More vague descriptions of a golden serpent, more calls for the Damascena, and several shouts for the army to come and save them.
“Perhaps we should go with them,” Priya said. “They could have wounded people with them that we can help, and we might be safer inside the city with them.”
“No.” Asha turned the horse about and drew it to a halt just off the road. “I want to wait here a bit and see what’s coming.”
“You’re not afraid?”
“Not yet.” Asha reached into her bag and pulled out a sprig of thyme, which she began to chew. “If there is anything to be afraid of, I’m sure I’ll hear it coming.”
2
The tide of refugees thinned as the sun crossed its zenith, and a mighty horn blast split the sky, ringing out three high notes in quick succession. Asha turned to watch the company of armed men on horseback ride out from the city. They wore pale blue tunics under leather breastplates studded with steel plates, and upon their heads were conical helmets wrapped with white cloth at their bases.
The company rode swiftly up the road and soon passed Asha and Priya at the crossroads as they turned south and headed up into the hills.
“Shall we?” Asha tapped the horse’s flanks with her heels and set out after the men.
They rode through fragrant fields and orchards higher and higher into the hills above Damascus beneath a sky on fire with rippling sheets of crimson and amber behind endless waves of paper-thin white clouds stretching from horizon to horizon.
“Vultures,” Asha observed. “Lots of them.”
The huge black birds appeared in the distance high above the next valley, swooping and gliding in tighter and tighter circles, hundreds of carrion eaters swirling in to form a maelstrom of dusty feathers and blood encrusted talons.
For a moment the company of riders ahead of them disappeared over a small rise in the road. To her right, Asha could still see the white walls of Damascus far below them on the plain painted pink and gold by the setting sun. But closer in, only half a league away, she saw a small village amidst a small jungle of olive trees. And despite the great exodus she had seen on the road that afternoon, she could still see a few people moving about in the village.
As she gazed down at the tiny houses and the tiny animals, Asha heard a deep bass note reverberate through the earth beneath their horse. The low thrum made her wince and turn her head aside sharply.
“What is it?” Priya asked. “What did you hear?”
“That sound, the one from before in the cedar forest.” Asha shook her head. “The animal we never saw. I think it’s here.”
They trotted up to the top of the rise in the road and looked down upon the valley on the far side. The road wound its way down through tall waving grasses and bright yellow flowers all bowing before the stiffening breeze. Halfway down, Asha saw the company from Damascus riding past stone markers and wooden signs toward a village nestled in the fallen boulders of the steep ridge. But beyond them the road flattened out at the bottom of the valley and she saw a thick column of black smoke rising from a grove of lemon trees. The smoke twisted and turned in the funnel of circling vultures.
“There’s smoke,” the herbalist said.
“But is there fire?” the nun asked, smiling.
Asha rolled her eyes and continued down the road. As they reached the first turn, the soldiers were trotting out across the valley floor bearing straight for the smoking dust cloud in the lemon trees.
A cry rose over the valley like the trumpeting of a hundred angry elephants. Asha reined up to watch the soldiers reform their column into a wall of riders fifty men wide and two men deep, all with spears raised, all facing the dust cloud in the trees.
“What was that sound?” Priya whispered.
“Sh.” Asha clutched the reins in both hands and felt the horse beneath her dancing nervously in place.
The soldiers advanced on the lemon grove, toward the wall of dust and smoke and leaves and feathers rushing by. Asha flinched as the front half of a camel flew out of the whirlwind, toppling two riders and their horses.
The cloud roared again, now like a hundred tigers about to devour the elephants who had trumpeted a minute earlier.
A shout went up among the men and they charged into the lemon grove, spears lowered, spears flying, swords raised, helmets gleaming dimly in the last red light of the setting sun. The cloud roared again and this time the men screamed back. A tidal wave of earth and grass and men exploded from the grove, bodies and dirt and rocks flying back across the valley floor. The corpses thumped on the ground like hail stones.
“What on earth?” Asha yanked the reins and started the horse trotting back up the road.
The second wave of men charged into the cloud, mingling the shouts of men and the screams of horses with the roaring of the cloud itself. Again the earth erupted with a wave of dirt and flesh and steel flying toward the ridge. The vultures dove out of the maelstrom above to rip and tear at the bits of men and horses scattered across the ground.
