The Tenth Saint (27 page)

“Where is he now?”

“Under surveillance in Mogadishu. He was reluctant to talk about his superiors. Wanted a new identity, a place in London, and two million quid in exchange for his confession. From what I gathered from your dad, he’s likely to get it, too.”

“Daddy says you’ve been in London. What are your plans?”

“I’ve been thinking about that. My bosses want me to return to Saudi Arabia pronto. We lost one of our key archaeologists, and everyone’s out there chasing their tails. Apparently the excavation in al-Fau has yielded a new set of frescoes detailing the tombs of a walled city and they need me to lead the charge.”

Reality suddenly stood like a concrete wall in front of Sarah. Their time together, however intense, had been a brief diversion. Now they would have to tend to old responsibilities and new assignments. Life in the trenches would carry on as it always had. She tried to be stoic about it. “Yes, of course. When will you leave?”

“I’ve put the trip on hold for a couple of weeks. There’s a small matter I must attend to before I go. In ten days, I’m scheduled to speak before the UNESCO archaeological panel in Paris. They want my report on the Aksum expedition.” From his pocket, he pulled out the memory card she’d given him when she’d thought she wouldn’t make it out of Ethiopia. “I need to know what you want to do about this.”

“I know exactly what I want.”

“I know you do. But I want you to think about something. That forum will be attended by all of academia, including your colleagues from Cambridge. Word on the street is they’re not very happy with you right now. This will only add fuel to their fire. Are you sure you’re up to it?”

“I’ve never been more sure about anything. Gabriel inscribed his message on the rock because he wanted it to be found. I can’t let it end with me. I need to be his instrument, to let him talk through me, whatever the consequences.”

Daniel looked at her tenderly. “You know something? When I first met you, I thought, here we go. Another overindulged, undersexed British ice queen who wants to own the world but never will because she’s got a chip on her shoulder the size of Kentucky.” He shook his head. “Boy, was I wrong about you. You actually have a passion for the work. You follow through on your convictions. That’s more than I can say about anyone else in this business.”

She tossed back her hair, letting her curls spill over one shoulder, and smiled wickedly. “You really thought I was undersexed?”

“You’re darn right I did.”

She leaned in and whispered, “You were right.”

Their eyes met, and he kissed her. She let herself be swept into the moment, but her father’s decisive knock and announcement that supper would be served put a rude end to it.

Sarah slowly pulled away. “You’d better go.”

“Guess you won’t be joining us, huh?”

“I’m not up to it. Besides, I don’t think he cares for my company right now.”

He kissed her hand. “You leave Sir Richard to me. I’ll see you in Paris.”

Nineteen

B
y the early light of day, the city of Aksum looked astonishingly progressive to Gabriel’s weary eyes. The town sprawled for miles, occupying a vast tract stretching from the town center to the distant hillsides. The houses away from town were the most elaborate, constructed with uniform square stones fitted with loose concrete mortar. Doors were made of heavy wood planks held together with iron studs, and windows were covered with shutters to keep out the cold. The wealthy inhabitants of the outer realms lived in compounds, with several buildings clustered together, each dedicated to a different function, such as cooking or washing or sleeping.

Gabriel walked past one such compound on his way to the town’s commercial core. Even at the dawn hour, the house was stirring. He saw three slave girls bent over a wood fire, preparing food for the families. The smoke was redolent of juniper, at once sharp and sweet: the smell of the mountains. A young man, possibly one of the sons, stood by the doorway thumbing a string of blue glass beads. He was dressed in immaculate white linen, his shoulders draped with a block-printed cape obviously imported from the lands to the east.

Gabriel tried to avoid his gaze. He knew he looked like a stranger with his overgrown ruddy beard, fair skin, and clothing identifying him with the Arabian peninsula. Wearing indigo to everyone else’s white, he stood out like a singular sapphire in a sea of pearls. Where the locals were scrubbed clean and neat of dress, he looked like a beggar. His Bedouin robes were tattered, and his face was black with a combination of grime, sweat, and guano. He smelled like he felt: filthy, beaten, old. He kept his head and gaze low and his arms tucked to appear meek.

The young man called to him.

Gabriel did not comprehend the language. He replied in the Bedouin dialect. “What is this place, kind master?”

The boy twisted his face into a look of contempt and uttered a few more words.

Gabriel did not want a confrontation. He waved and walked away, continuing the trek into the town center. He followed a cobbled path to the inner quarter, where buildings were modest and built so near one could hear the whispers of one’s neighbors. The masonry was rough, nothing like the dwellings of the gentry, and roofs were covered with thatch.

The places of worship, however, were impressive. The first building Gabriel came to was a magnificent church carved entirely of stone with keyhole openings for windows and a carved iron door. The structure was almost Byzantine with its clay-tiled dome roof crowned by a simple wooden cross. Its stonemasonry was near flawless and must have taken the craftsmen years to construct, considering their limited tools and resources. He could not resist the urge to go inside. Though he was known to no one and clearly of a different tribe, he suspected Coptic Christians would show tolerance and compassion for all souls, regardless of color or culture.

The church interior was divided into small chambers, each decorated with murals of saints and the Christ, their eyes gleaming in the soft yellow light of the candelabra. The stones were polished smooth and smelled faintly of smoke and incense. Encouraged by the fact that he was alone, Gabriel kneeled before the altar in gratitude that he had come this far. He prayed for nothing, for it was not his custom to pray. He believed in the divine unseen, that which he called God, but he did not tie his faith to an accepted method of worship or to scriptures. He trusted only what he felt, and at that moment he felt the presence of God inside him.

And he felt loss. A dull ache from an old wound that had never healed right. He inhaled deeply and let the sensation fill him. It wasn’t sadness anymore, just an awareness of the impermanent nature of all things. The divine order that his contemporaries had tried at all costs to manipulate and vanquish and that he had come to appreciate only when everything had been stripped from him. He sat with his palms open and pointing in the direction of the sky, ready to receive whatever would come.

The Aksumites were an industrious but fraternal people. They knew prosperity, for trade flourished in their kingdom. Though they could only grow wheat and tefF in the granite mountains of the highlands, they had the means to buy what they lacked and the skill to make the rest. The biggest benefit of being at the heart of the world’s most important trade route was that they came in contact with Romans, Arabs, Egyptians, and Nabateans and brought away something from each.

Prosperity had carried with it greed and a class system Gabriel had not encountered on the east side of the Red Sea. The nomad societies were different in that regard. They coexisted and respected each other and the laws of the land. In this place, the class societies of the West were taking root and, with them, the conflicts and injustices bred by inequality. But there was also charity. Those with plenty hired and fed those who had nothing. Gabriel didn’t know whether to attribute that to the Christian faith these people had embraced, but he was thankful for it.

The local blacksmith, Hallas, took pity on him and let him work at his shop, shoveling iron filings into the cauldrons and hammering molten metal into everything from spears to cooking pots in exchange for a plate of food. More importantly, he taught him enough of the local language that they could communicate.

After a day’s hard work, Gabriel sat down to a meal with Hallas and his sons. The blacksmith spooned sticky millet porridge onto a tin plate and topped it with two chunks of overcooked sheep’s meat. “It’s not as good as my wife made, but it fills the belly.” Hallas guffawed. His laughter turned to a nasty cough, likely a side effect of years of inhaling fine iron particles and soot.

“Where’s your wife, then?”

Hallas didn’t bother to stop chewing before speaking. “Dead. Died when she gave birth to this one.” He pointed to his youngest son, a wide-eyed boy of about twelve.

“I’m sorry.”

The blacksmith shrugged. “It’s life.”

At the end of the meal, Hallas offered his new worker a straw bed next to his sons’. Even though it was the warmest bed in town, Gabriel declined politely. He did not want to take advantage of the blacksmith’s generosity, and anyway he craved the time alone. He bade his hosts good night and started the long trek up the hillside to the cave that had given him shelter the first night.

When the bats left, rising by the thousands from their granite womb like souls departing, he entered what he had come to know as his sanctuary. Warming himself and meditating by the meager flames of a campfire, he found peace among the stones. Even the wolves’ cries had come to feel familiar, like long-lost friends calling him home.

On the long days of winter, Gabriel was most grateful for his work at the smithy. The copious fires of the furnace and the exertion of manipulating molten metal drenched him in sweat while frosty winds howled outside. On one of those dreary days, the messenger of the king came. The crimson-robed captain on horseback summoned Hallas, and the blacksmith kneeled before the noble visitor.

Without dismounting, the captain delivered his decree. “Now hear this. Ezana, king of kings, most pious and just ruler of Aksum, calls upon the blacksmith Hallas to forge armor for five thousand men who have been called to war. It must take no longer than the end of winter to complete this task, for on the first day of spring the king and his army ride for Meroe to battle the great enemy to the north. You will make the archetype of this armor and bring it to the palace. If it pleases the king, you will be paid two gold coins and, when the king returns from war victorious, twenty more.” He raised his right arm to the sky. “Praise be to God. Long live the king.”

“Long live the king,” Hallas repeated. “This humble servant of the king is honored to be appointed with so important a task and pledges to serve His Lordship dutifully.”

The captain rode toward the palace, and Hallas whooped with delight. His sons gathered round and lifted him off his feet in congratulations.

Gabriel observed them, smiling. Twenty gold coins was a lot of money, enough for Hallas to retire and his sons to marry very well.

Hallas proclaimed an end to the workday and ordered his younger son to fetch wine and tobacco, two luxuries reserved for only the most important occasions. The blacksmith beckoned Gabriel to join them in celebration of their fortune.

“Tonight, we drink to the king,” Hallas said. “The great and generous Ezana has smiled upon us.”

“To the king,” his sons said in unison.

Gabriel raised his glass. “And to the man who won the king’s favor.”