The Serpent's Daughter (27 page)

“Mohan,” she called in a soft voice. “What did you learn about the amulet?”

“You are fortunate,” he said. “I have spoken to someone who says he can help us.”

“Does he have the amulet?”

“No, but he may know where it can be found. Come. I told him I would bring you to him so you would hear this, too. I think he does not believe me. He wants to see you.”

Jade’s heart beat a little faster. If this man had reliable information, then perhaps her business here would be finished and she could take her mother to Spain and out of danger. It would be just as well. Right now she felt like she’d been bucked from a bronco. “Slow down, Mohan.”

Mohan didn’t slow down, and Jade was forced to again hasten her steps in the little heelless
babouches. How in tarnation does he trot in them?
By now both legs hurt, as well as her left elbow with which she’d jabbed her attacker in the gut.

He led her through the dried-fruit vendor’s market and past a crumbling mosque. Turning right into a narrow alleyway after the mosque, he slowed and came to a small cube-shaped building with a stumpy minaret on top. Whatever tiles had once decorated the saint’s shrine had fallen into disarray as the plasterwork crumbled from the walls. Behind it was an equally run-down building that probably housed whoever tended the local saint’s grave.

“This man has information?” Jade asked, wondering what the keeper of an Islamic saint’s tomb would know about an ancient Berber amulet. She bent down and rubbed her legs, easing the cramps and aches.

“Yes,” said Mohan. “If you go inside, he will talk to you.”

Jade started towards the low doorway, then paused. Why would this man welcome a Nazarene woman inside? Suddenly her general aches and pains dropped into the background as the pain in her left knee dominated.
It’s a trap
. She wheeled about to run, but two burly Arabs already blocked the narrow alleyway. Jade pulled the
fibula
pins from her pockets and gripped them in each fist between her ring and middle fingers, letting the sharpened points stick out.

“Just try it,” she said in English, backing away, scanning the periphery for an escape route. The low light made it difficult to tell if she stood in a dead-end passage or not, and the last thing she wanted was to get backed into a corner. She eyed the caretaker’s hut, wondering if she could reach the roof. From there she might be able to run across the rooftops and flee.

One of the two men made a dash for her and received a gash across his face for his pains. Jade recognized his crooked nose.
My prison guard
. He attempted another lunge. This time Jade sliced across his forehead. She knew facial wounds bled freely and hoped the blood flow would temporarily blind him. His partner, more wary of her, edged forward cautiously. Jade feinted a move to her left, then darted right towards the hut. With one leap she managed to get her right foot onto the ledge of the narrow window slit, but the second man recovered quickly and reached for her legs.

Jade kicked out at his face, but without stout boots the force was not enough to do any damage. When he didn’t let go of her right ankle, she hurled first one, then the second
fibula
pin at him. He dodged both, releasing her as the second one whizzed past his ear. In that moment Jade grabbed the low rooftop and scrambled up. Luck toyed with her. The ancient building’s walls were in no condition to support her. A chunk of mud-brick and plaster broke loose in her hand.

For a fraction of a second Jade hung between capture and escape. The sudden lurch backward as the wall broke startled her, and had she given in to the confusion, capture would have been inevitable. But she hadn’t spent the better part of a year dodging shell fire on the front lines in the Great War for nothing. Her finely honed reflexes kicked in, fueled by a combination of fear and anger. She grabbed for the wall with her left hand and hurled the dry mud-brick in her right at the man below her, aiming for his nose. Direct hit. Her attacker howled as blood poured out.

Jade didn’t waste any more time pulling herself onto the roof. A quick survey of the surrounding buildings showed her the surest route of escape, one that would put several narrow streets between her and the pursuers by the time they doubled back out of the blind alley. The last thing she saw before she leaped from the rooftop was Mohan digging something up behind the abandoned caretaker’s hut, muttering an incantation against the
jinn
guarding his prize.

She found a building whose upper rooms arched over the alley and connected to the building on the other side. Jade raced across the arch, putting one street between her and her pursuers. The next alley was little more than four feet across. Jade cleared it starting from a dead run across the rooftops, losing her slippers in the jump. Then the streets widened and she was forced to run along a row of buildings to put more distance between her and the men. She knew they would continue their pursuit, so she decided that doubling back behind them would be the safest course of action. Besides, her legs were starting to weaken.

She scooped up a handful of plaster and tossed it across the alley to the next roof, imitating the sound of her running and jumping along the roof. Then she dropped flat and lay still. She heard the two men race by, still shouting to each other. As soon as they had passed, she scuttled crablike in the other direction and dropped down into the side alley. The first thing she
wanted
to do was discover what Mohan had been up to. Common sense told her to find a hiding place first where she could safely spy on the area.

Jade limped back along the alley until she came to a cluster of shops two buildings away from the empty caretaker’s hut. The merchants here had already closed down business for the day after evening prayers, and no one loitered nearby. Jade huddled in the buildings’ shadow, listening for the sound of pursuit.
Silence
. Her ruse had worked. The pursuers were chasing her shadow now.

Slowly she crept closer, hugging the wall. The caretaker’s hut and the untended saint’s tomb stood before her. Again she waited to see if anyone had stayed behind or returned. Her sore knee told her to be wary, but she knew part of the danger was tied to her not being in hiding rather than in the proximity of attackers. She darted over to the hut, again pressing her back to the wall; waiting, listening.

The only sound came from the singsong yowling of the territorial neighborhood cats. No humans loitered nearby. Jade ducked into the hut and strained to see through the gloom. Her hand reached out and felt at the dirt floor and found a small hole. Mohan had dug something up here. The amulet? Which meant that Mohan, not Bachir, was the traitor. She’d have to find Mohan. Maybe he went back to the caravansary to retrieve the mules. It was worth a try, and besides, she wanted her boots and the dagger she’d tucked into the sheath.

Jade slipped out of the hut and headed back into the more open street where she felt safer. She hadn’t quite passed the old abandoned tomb when a hand shot out and grabbed her arm, pulling her inside.

CHAPTER 20

—The Traveler

INEZ DID EVERYTHING SHE COULD to speed up their progress, short of carrying her donkey. The little animals set their own pace and no amount of cajoling, coaxing, pleading, or scolding would change it. She and Bachir had started late enough to begin with, and night seemed to fall early in the steeper valleys where their path led them. Patience was not Inez’s strong point. Heaven knows it should have been after dealing with all of Jade’s escapades throughout the years. She’d prayed for patience often enough. Somehow she seemed to end up instead with only a tremendously large share of stubborn determination: the same stubbornness of Jade’s that drove Inez to distraction.

They made it halfway down the mountain the first day and now they were close to the foot of the mountains, trying to coax a balky little donkey to brave the Oued Issil. The river had risen from snowmelt, but had not reached anything resembling a dangerous flow. The donkey just didn’t feel like going any farther. Inez didn’t remember any of the animals going slowly on the way up the mountain. Apparently, this one liked going home, but didn’t care to leave it. She’d just have to convince him that the trip was in his best interest.

Inez rummaged in the saddlebags for the tea-making supplies. Bachir, thinking she was thirsty, offered his water bag, but Inez declined with a smile and adding her thanks with a
shukran,
one of the Arabic words she’d picked up from Jade. “Sugar,” she said.

Bachir shook his head, not understanding. “Sugar,” she repeated, and made the motions of making tea.

“Ah,” said Bachir. He nodded and grinned.
“Sūkkar,”
he said in Arabic, emphasizing the similarity between the two words. He reached into the supplies and handed over the sack of sugar loaf.

Inez thanked him and broke off several chunks, putting all but one in her dress pocket. She fed the other to her donkey. He took it greedily, licking the palm of her hand before nudging her for more. Inez handed the pouch of sugar back to Bachir, then gripped the animal’s halter in her right hand, holding it close to his head. Then she took out another lump of sugar and held it with her left hand extended as far as she could. The donkey’s nose quivered, and he strained against her grip to reach the treat.

“You want the sugar?” Inez asked in a soft, gentle voice. “Go get the sugar.” She took a step towards the riverbed, and the donkey followed, his tongue extended as he tried to reach the treat. Step by step they went until they reached the bank. When her donkey balked, Inez fed him the sugar. Then she repeated the process, slowly but surely luring the animal across the stream. Bachir followed with his less recalcitrant beast and the pack mule.

When they made the other side, Inez’s tattered dress was soaked from the hips down. The sun hadn’t yet set, but already the air was chilling, and Inez began to shiver. Bachir hobbled the animals and started a fire. Reaching Marrakech and finding a mule-headed daughter would have to wait until tomorrow. In the meantime she needed some way to communicate with Bachir. She’d picked up some of the Moroccan Arabic already, matching repeated words with Jade’s translations; words such as “amulet” and
“kahina,”
which played a role in this adventure they’d found themselves in. Others such as
“souk”
she’d learned from Jade earlier. Now, with these rudiments, she attempted to form a plan with Bachir. What words she didn’t know she’d try to supplement with pictures scratched into the dirt. If that failed, maybe some of that Indian sign language she used to use with the old Navajo on their ranch would work.

Underneath her anxiety and fatigue she felt a new sensation: excitement, the thrill of being alive. Her pulse quickened as though she were a sapling coming to life in the spring, ready to burst forth into leaf. She hadn’t felt this invigorated since she and Richard had ridden to what had become her new home in New Mexico. The thought of her husband brought a smile and a warmth to her face, quickly followed by a pang of regret as sorrow for lost opportunities rose to the forefront.

How many times had she passed up taking overnight trail rides with Richard because she had to entertain some new lawyer’s wife or a territorial representative who might assist her husband’s ranch? She’d taken pride in her role as a wife, doing what she could to further her husband’s prospects.
I did all of it for you, Richard
. But did he know that? Or did he just see their worlds taking them in different directions?

I have to get home to him
.

“Quiet. You’re in danger.” The voice came out in a husky whisper with a faint trace of an English accent. The grip on Jade’s arm pinched like a vise.

Jade pulled back, but the grasp tightened. “Tell me something I don’t know,” she said. “Who are you?”

“Shh,” admonished the hidden speaker. “They may still be near.”

“Mr. Bennington?”

“The same.” He moved out of the little bit of twilight that reached this alley. “We must stay out of the light so we won’t be seen. Is your mother safe?”

“How do you know about my mother? What are you doing here?”

“Not so loud,” Bennington cautioned. “We should go someplace else to talk.”

“I’m not going anywhere until you let go of my arm,” said Jade. The hand released her. She stepped back a pace and locked eyes with his. It was difficult to do with his dark glasses. The man matched Jade’s height as she stood before him in her bare feet. His face was immaculately shaven except for his impeccably groomed blond mustache.

“Sorry,” he whispered. “I needed to get your attention. It’s rather a long story.” Seeing Jade wait with her arms folded across her chest, he took a deep breath and continued. “As you already know, I was looking to engage a nurse in Tangier, someone to take my Aunt Viola back to London. I should never have let her talk me into bringing her out here on this trip, but I’d hoped the ocean voyage would be good for her. And selfishly, I wanted a chance to see the world.”

“Go on.”

“I was coming back to the hotel when I overheard Patrido de Portillo talking to the Tremaines. Common sort of people,” he added as an aside. “Never did like them. Mrs. Tremaine especially. Always mocking my aunt, and de Portillo struck me as the sort who preys on older women. I felt he was looking for hints as to how well-off your dear mother was financially.”

He shook his shoulders as if to pull himself back on track. “They were planning what I thought sounded like a rather childish joke on your mother,” he said. “They were going to leave a note for her purporting to be from you. I believed they had seen that you and your mother tended to be, er, at odds with each other and simply wanted to play on that. I got the impression that you had angered them somehow at breakfast. ”