You would be my . . . agent? My go-between?
Something like that, yes.
You’ll be killed, sighed Umm Sahir—but she agreed all the same.
A few tried to rob her, at first. Scouts and warlords, spying a lone traveler, rushed her with rifles drawn. She put an easy hand upon the pistol at her belt, called out greetings—and to their astonishment they recognized the woman who’d once sat at their fire and talked politics. Would they be so kind, she asked, as to escort her to their encampment? She’d like to pay her regards to their healer, whom she remembered.
A Western woman, alone on the road in the noonday heat? It was shocking, bizarre. She knew their ways, but stood outside them; she ought to be dead, but she wasn’t. And so, in their consternation, they did as she asked—and were shocked, again, by the healers’ crows of delight when they saw what the woman offered.
She’d stay a few days, sharing their fire and food, and then be on her way again, to the next village—or else back to Damascus for more supplies, and for the powder that never warmed her, only made the cold more bearable. Once a month she went to the post office and mailed a postcard to her mother, the space for the message left blank. The card itself was message enough; and besides, she had nothing civil to say.
And then, a headline glimpsed in Marjeh Square: Archduke Franz Ferdinand Murdered by Serbian Assassin. To the watching jinniyeh, the words were meaningless, and yet they meant war.
Now the world changed. In Damascus, in Homs, in Jerusalem, men marched in the street while women stood nearby and wept. The prices in the markets began to climb, the Western tourists to disappear from the cities. The countryside was battening down, turning inward. But Sophia had nowhere to go except for the road.
Bandits grew more numerous, and soldiers, which was worse. She spent a week in an abandoned orchard at the edge of Homs, collecting fallen pistachios while tears wetted her cheeks. She traveled to the Jerusalem outskirts and bartered with the healers there, then hid behind a stall like an embarrassed child as Daniel Benbassa walked past, his new wife at his side. At night she dreamt of being dragged across an ocean and locked inside a marble tomb, of freezing slowly to death beneath her mother’s gaze.
The souk grew quiet. Men disappeared from their stalls, were replaced by wives and young sons, their faces anxious. Her familiar routes between the cities turned impassable as the army built barracks and training-grounds. She needed a foxhole, somewhere safe to hide. She thought of Palmyra, deep in the desert. Would they remember her there? If she brought enough supplies, would they shelter her for a week? A month?
She went to the souk, and Umm Sahir was gone.
In her place, a stone-faced man stood beside a rack of poorly tanned hides. Behind him, beneath the arch, other men sat on wooden crates, reading newspapers. Their bodies were well-fed. Expensive cigarettes burned in their mouths.
She turned around and walked away. None of the other vendors would meet her eye.
She put on her old Western blouse and skirt, walked to her bank, and withdrew the dregs of her savings. She bought food and ammunition for the road, and then sewed the rest of the money inside a belt around her waist. She thought of the Bedu girls and their dowry head-scarves, the coins that bought them a place in the tribe. She wondered if hers would be enough.
Her powder ran out on the road to Palmyra.
She made it over the pass before the evening grew too cold for her to sit upright in the saddle. She found a cave, fashioned a fire, and took stock. She’d go to the citadel in the morning, once she’d warmed enough, and make her offer. She didn’t know what she’d do if they refused.
She leaned against her donkey and closed her eyes . . .
When she opened them, it was noon, and she was walking through the Valley of the Tombs, thin grasses whispering beneath her sandals. Ahead of her, a tall, dark-haired woman stood beneath a tower-tomb. The woman was naked and holding a scythe. She ran a finger along the edge of the blade, then looked up at the tomb again.
I’ve never understood why you build these, the woman said. The stones will crumble, just as the bones will. So why go to the effort?
It’s simple, Sophia told her. We build them to tell the stories of the dead.
The woman glanced at her. What do you mean?
History. The tale of what once was, of people and civilizations come and gone. We read the past in what remains.
The woman shook her head. But the story will fade with the stones.
Not if we tell it well enough.
The woman raised an eyebrow, amused. The expression was familiar; it reminded Sophia of someone from long ago . . . The woman’s eyes were entrancing, as black and deep as wells. A distant flame glowed at the center of each.
A note of warning sounded from the part of Sophia that lay shivering in a firelit cave. But she ignored it. Here in the sun it was warm and lovely, and she didn’t tremble at all.
The woman smiled, and lifted a hand to Sophia’s cheek. Sophia turned her face into the woman’s hand, searching out the warmth of her skin. She wanted to stretch like a cat in a sunbeam. When was the last time she’d allowed herself to be touched like this? Not for years, not since . . .
The towers and tombs faded, the sun-warmed valley disappeared. She stood barefoot on the cold granite of her childhood balcony—and in place of the naked woman was a man, tall and handsome. He leaned down and kissed her with burning intensity. She drew him closer, the wall cold at her back; his hands slipped inside her
