“What the hell!” Kenan snapped his gun back up to follow the pale cloud as it glided across the intersection and vanished into the side of the house where Aker slept. “What the hell was that?”
“I don’t know. A ghost, maybe?” Shifrah crept quietly up to the peak of the roof where she could sit more easily.
“Do you have any friends of friends who are ghosts? Because I sure as hell don’t.”
“I don’t know!” She frowned at the house, and then at Kenan. “So you’re ashamed that you love me, eh?”
“I’m not ashamed of anything.”
“Then you just love me?” She grinned.
I don’t know if anyone has ever loved me before. Certainly not Aker or Salvator. Maybe Omar, but not like this.
“Shut up or I’ll tell him to read your body language.”
Shifrah shrugged, but she also squared her shoulders and straightened her back and legs as she stood at the peak of the roof, watching the house across the street. “Do you think he’s in there right now, killing Aker and getting the sword for us? And if he does, do you think we should pay him or something?”
Kenan shrugged back.
The wind shifted abruptly and now it blew back toward them, buffeting them in the face. Shifrah blinked and raised one hand to shield her eye, but between her fingers she saw a pale haze fill the air just in front of her, and sudden the black man was standing before her, his golden bands and beads shining in the early morning light and his staff planted on the tiles beside him.
“The man you seek is sleeping on the ground level of the house, two windows to the left of the front door. He has placed his sword on a small table at the end of his bed, just below the window. Break the window and you will be able to reach the sword,” he said.
“Why should I believe you?” Shifrah asked. “Why should I trust you?”
The man blinked, and then gestured to Kenan. “You want to be with this man so badly that you have fantasized about bearing his children. You want an apology from him, but you know he will never offer one. And so you will forego the apology as soon as he makes even the slightest overture toward reconciliation.”
“All right, stop, stop!” Shifrah swallowed. She felt her heart rebounding against her breastbone.
How the hell is he doing that? And he’s wrong anyway. I never fantasized about bearing any children. I just wondered what we might name our daughter…if we ever had one…someday.
Kenan was grinning and trying to keep his shoulders from shaking. “I think we believe you. At least about the window and sword.”
“The mercenaries are moving in this direction,” the stranger said. “You must be quick. Do not attempt to kill El Deeb. Only take his sword. He will follow you to retrieve it and you can kill him at your leisure. After you take the sword, you must follow this street due west to reach the rail yard.”
“Escape on a train? Works for me. Got it, thanks,” Kenan said.
“Then my task is complete.” The stranger lifted his black staff.
“Wait! What’s your name?” Shifrah asked, staring into the man’s eyes.
“Anubis,” he said. He struck his staff on the shingles and a blast of wind tore across the roof, scattering his body like smoke in the cool morning air.
Shifrah shook her head. “Definitely not a ghost.”
Kenan crept to the edge of the roof, his back to her. “There’s a ledge just below us. We can get down to the street right here. And then I think we just run for the window. Unless you’d rather bear my children instead.”
She knelt down beside him. “I’d rather throw you off this roof.”
He shrugged. “Maybe you’ll be in a better mood when we get home.”
Before she could respond, he slipped down off the roof and climbed down to the street. She scowled and followed. They paused a moment in the shadows and then dashed straight across the intersection toward the house where Aker slept. Kenan grabbed the lip at the bottom of the second window on the left of the door and nodded at her.
While he swept the street with his revolver, Shifrah leapt up and smashed her arm through the old wooden rods that barred the window. The rods splinted into pieces and she hooked her arm over the sill. She felt Kenan shoving her thighs up and she half-fell inside the room. The sword was lying on the table right in front of her, just as the stranger had described it. Shifrah grabbed the heavy scabbard and shoved herself back out of the window. As she fell back to the street, she caught a glimpse of the man in the bed and the young woman lying beside him.
“Run.” Kenan dashed to the left and Shifrah dashed after him, clutching the heavy seireiken in both hands.
After a bit of fumbling, she got the strap of the scabbard over her shoulder and let the sword bang and thump against her back as she ran. “Did you see them? The bounty hunters?”
“I heard them.”
“Are you sure?”
A gunshot ricocheted off the wall above them.
“Pretty sure,” Kenan grunted. “We need to lose them before we get to the rail yard.”
“So we’re trusting this Anubis person with our escape plan, too?”
“He was right about the window and the sword, wasn’t he?” Kenan bolted left down a long narrow alley.
Shifrah tore after him. “Do you have a plan for losing the bounty hunters?”
“Run really fast?”
“I didn’t think so.” Shifrah tried to picture the city in her mind. It had been so long since she had had to escape from anyone on the streets of Alexandria, but a few old memories swam to the surface. “Follow me.”
She pulled ahead of Kenan and led him down the next street. Their own footsteps echoed along the empty corridors of the city, and a low shout echoed from behind them.
“Where are we going?” he asked.
“Back to the arena.”
“Why?”
“We need the high ground.”
“This isn’t mountain warfare!”
“It is now!” Shifrah turned another corner and the arena came into view ahead. A quick glance over her shoulder showed her one of the tall Bantu hunters less than twenty yards behind them, and another figure in the distance just rounding the corner.
Shifrah sprinted into the long dark tunnel of the arena, speeding by the empty stalls and stairs, her footsteps multiplied a hundredfold by the close walls. The end of the tunnel was a spot of bright morning light in a sea of darkness that grew steadily larger with every step.
“Move-move-move! This is a shooting gallery!” Kenan hissed.
I know, I know.
Shifrah raced out of the mouth of the tunnel and veered to the left as the first bullet whistled out of the darkness. Kenan ran out behind her, ducking his head. She wheeled about and ran up the steep stone steps, climbing the rows of empty seats two at a time, and she waved Kenan down. “Shoot them when they come out!”
“Shoot them?” He drew his matte black revolver. “That’s your plan?”
“Just do it!” She clambered up a bit higher before crouching down in the seats to watch. The stone benches stretched out around the arena like the wings of a great bird, dotted here and there with a sleeping body. She took the seireiken off her back and waited.
The first Bantu ran out of the tunnel just as they had a moment ago. A large rounded pistol gleamed in his hand. Kenan’s first shot snapped the pistol out of the man’s hand, and his second shot shattered the man’s knee. The bounty hunter crashed to the ground, groaning.
The second man, however, was far more cautious. After a moment’s pause, a head and a pistol popped up over the lip of the tunnel and he fired at Kenan. The shot struck the seat in front of the detective, and he fired back. A splash of red leapt from the bounty hunter’s hand and he fell back down, out of sight.
Shifrah was up and running. She leapt up the steps as fast as she could, her legs already burning from the long sprint across the district. “Kenan!”
