Valley of Decision (32 page)

“Didn't want anyone to know I was here so I haven't moved around much,” Eggie said.

“Well, I've got sick and wounded who can't be tended in the dark.”

Their hands outstretched, everyone but Jaddah crashed about the shop in a terrifying game of blindman's buff. Maggie had never missed Barek more. If he were here he'd know exactly where to find the lights and what to do next. Kardide was the first to come up with a lamp. Tabari discovered a small jug of rancid oil and a flint in a cupboard. Iltani struck the flint, and a weak spark became a tiny flame that gobbled the dry wick. The place where Barek had grown up slowly materialized.

“Looks like Barek's family left in a hurry.” Eggie plucked a blanket off a small bed and draped it over the boarded window to make sure no light escaped.

“They moved in with my father after his conversion.” In the flicker of the oil lamp, Maggie could make out the remnants of Barek's past life.

Skeins of yarn, dusty and dry as everything in this city, hung from the rafters like a fading rainbow. In the corner near the only window, a loom was strung with a project that appeared to
be more than halfway completed. Maggie ran her fingers over the tightly woven threads, wondering what it would have been like to have a closely knit family, one where everyone lived in the same century. The tapestry was an exquisite garden scene similar to the one hanging in her father's atrium. On the opposite side of the room, near a door that led to the alley, the limestone tiles beneath a huge copper vat were splattered with multiple colors.

Maggie closed her eyes, breathing in the scent of people who had lived and loved within these four simple walls. She could imagine Barek chasing his father's dogs around the dye vat and stubbing his chubby little toe on one of the wooden feet of his mother's loom. She could hear Ruth's laughter as she reached out for him and drew him onto her lap.

No wonder Barek wore such a scowl now. He must have been so happy here.

“Let's see if we can't find something to get these iron bracelets off these ladies.” G-Pa's touch snapped her from her guilt-ridden fantasy.

Maggie went to the table beside the dye vat and retrieved a mallet and a piece of iron that looked kind of like a tent stake. “What about this?”

G-Pa smiled. “That's how they do it in Dodge.”

Barek's father hadn't brewed his famous purple dye in this place in nearly three years. Yet various shades of deep violet still ringed the empty dye vat the way her mistakes ringed her heart.

If Maggie had stayed home today, as her mother had asked, guilt wouldn't be closing in, pressing against her chest and making it difficult to breathe. Jaddah was definitely not well. They had no food or water. Every soldier in town was looking for them. And worst of all, her parents and Barek could be dead in a gutter because of her. Hadn't the sand dollar episode taught her the danger
of doing whatever she wanted? She longed to bust out the windows and suck in huge, cleansing gulps of fresh air.

Murex shells crunched beneath Maggie's feet as she jammed the tip of the iron stake into the lock on Kardide's wrist. “Hold your arm still.” She hammered as if she were driving a stake for one of G-Pa's excavation grids. Breaking someone out of chains was a lot harder than it looked on TV.

It took a few solid hits to the stake before Kardide's cuff broke open and her chains fell to the floor and raised a cloud of dust. Everyone gave a muted cheer. Maggie did a little victory dance, waving the hammer above her head like a tomahawk. Maybe God could redeem her mess after all. She freed the rest of her grandmother's friends with renewed strength. They all set to work quietly righting stools, clearing tools from the table, and searching the cupboards and storage crocks for anything edible.

“Everyone stand back.” Eggie gave the straw tick that had been on the small wooden bed frame a good shake. Spiders and dust flew everywhere. It took all of them to convince Maggie that it was safe for anyone to use the bed, let alone Jaddah, who seemed to be melting right before her eyes.

“We need water and a way to boil it,” Kardide ordered, sweat dripping from beneath her blood-stained turban.

“You need a fresh bandage and a good rest yourself.” Jaddah's deepened cough turned everyone's head. “Maggie, see if you can find some clean rags around here.”

The uneasiness seeping into Maggie's bones wasn't worry about what they would eat or drink. It was how she was going to keep her grandmother alive. Not only did she lack the proper medications, she didn't even have the basics: Cool, clean water for sponge baths. Mild broth. And several gallons of the nasty rehydration drink Naomi pushed on everyone who had a fever. Maggie
needed more than her mother's medical expertise; she needed her mother.

“We have no way to clean this woman's wounds unless I find a well,” Eggie offered.

They all agreed the proconsul had probably added extra patrols. The risk of Eggie's being caught while moving around the city outweighed their thirst or injuries. Best if they waited until morning, when those who'd been denied running water were forced to trudge to the wells. Maggie found an old cloak in a trunk. Tomorrow she would disguise herself, hoist a water jug to her shoulders, and slip in the procession of women making their daily water runs. For now they should all try to get some rest.

Jaddah's friends made a pallet near the loom and curled up together.

Eggie, armed with a stained paddle he found in the dye vat, stationed himself by the door. “I'll take the first watch.”

“Thanks.” Maggie turned her attention to her grandparents.

G-Pa was sitting on the bed and doing his best to care for Jaddah. He looked old and tired as he concentrated on tending his wife's bloody knees. His trembling hands picked dirt and gravel from her wounds with the same care he'd used to soothe Maggie's cuts and bruises growing up. While he worked, he whispered assurances that eased Jaddah's breathing.

It had been so crazy these past few hours Maggie hadn't taken a moment to savor the sight of seeing her grandparents reunited in the same century. They'd waited so long to be together. They deserved better. She couldn't let her inability to help them ruin whatever time they had left.

“Tomorrow I'll figure out a way to get to my parents,” she told her grandfather. “Mom will have medicine for Jaddah and she'll know what to do about that tube hanging out of Kardide's head.”

Her grandfather pulled his attention from tending Jaddah's knees. “It's not safe for you to go alone.”

He was right, of course. Maggie hadn't thought through the details. How would she navigate the city and find her parents? For all she knew, soldiers had taken her father prisoner and her mother had died from that blow to her head. Maggie's knees turned rubbery. She'd been so focused on saving her father, it never occurred to her she could lose her mother. She joined her grandfather on the bed.

Her grandmother reached for her hand. “You're as brave as your mother, Maggie.” Tears spilled onto her rosy cheeks.

The constriction in Maggie's chest wasn't her normal anxiety from being trapped inside the small dye shop with no easy exit. It was the suffocating regret of her impulsive actions causing everything to fall apart. She'd felt it the first time she jumped into the portal after her mother. Then the night Ruth died because Maggie had gone in search of a doll. This time the squeeze to her conscience was ten times worse: her entire family was in danger because she'd come here to rescue her father without a plan.

She stroked her grandmother's trembling hand. “I don't think ‘brave' is the word Mom would use to describe what I did today or any day.”

Maggie's skirmishes with her mother usually weren't the knock-down, drag-out kind. Their disagreements were more civilized, always stopping far short of drawing blood. But that didn't mean they didn't manage to cause each other damage. Neither of them ever gained any ground, Maggie realized, because the truth of it was that she was not going to roll over, and her mother was never going to lift her iron fist or unlock her shackles.

Maggie had detected the familiar signs of war the first time she mentioned that she'd Googled her father and found out the truth.
“What do you mean, we're not going back to save my dad?” she'd argued. “They're going to cut off his head!”

“Don't you think I did everything I could to keep that from happening?” Mom had immediately shut down any more questions. The finality in her tone indicated the subject was closed.

Permanently.

Once Maggie learned the whole story about her dad she'd changed from the occasional strong-willed child to someone who couldn't leave the idea of time traveling alone. The rebellion growing inside her had blossomed into a raging inferno she couldn't douse if she'd wanted to. So she'd let the fight die down with her mother and secretly started counting the days until she turned eighteen. Somehow, some way, she was going to Africa. Once she got there, she wouldn't stop until she saved her father from his fate in the third century.

Funny, now all she could think about was how she was going to save her mother too.

Maggie kissed her grandmother's forehead, cringing at how fiery it felt beneath her lips. “Let me sit with her, G-Pa. You won't do her any good if you get run down.”

His mouth gaped in a yawn. “I'm good.”

“Liar, liar, pants on fire.”

He looked at Jaddah. “And you thought you wouldn't recognize her.” He kissed Jaddah's weak smile, then turned his attention back to Maggie. “You'll wake me if there's any change.”

“I promise.”

Her grandfather was too exhausted to keep up his arguments. He rolled off the bed, dropped to the floor, leaned his head against the wall, and closed his eyes.

Maggie checked the room one last time. If she weren't scared out of her wits, she'd rank spending the night with both of her grandparents under the same roof right next to having both of her
parents in the same century. She blew out the lamp and slid down the wall beside her grandmother's bed. Every muscle in her body ached and her head hurt from the questions demanding more brainpower than she had available.

What if Barek didn't show up? She'd led everyone to an abandoned shop with no food or water. How was she going to keep them alive? She didn't know that Barek could come up with a solution, but it had been Barek's quick thinking years ago, when he cut through the Tophet carrying her and his mother's burial urn, that had saved them from being caught after curfew. At the very least, if Barek were here he'd know how to escape before they were discovered by the troops scouring every inch of the city.

Enough
, she told herself. Her brain was so full of questions that adding one more worry would make it explode. Eyelids heavy, she let her head fall back against the bed. She'd just started to drift off to sleep when a noise outside the shop whiplashed her upright. She grabbed her stick and joined Eggie in a defensive stance at the door. Behind her, she could hear the others doing their best to silently surround Jaddah's bed.

Someone outside was fumbling with the latch. Her mother would have planned for a possible invasion—slid something in front of the door for protection. A barricade of furniture might not have stopped the army of Rome, but it would have at least slowed them. With the windows boarded over, they weren't even able to peek out so they'd have an idea of how many soldiers to expect.

The latch lifted. Maggie braced herself and poised her stick the way a Little Leaguer crouched over home plate would. The door creaked open. Someone stepped inside. She reared back and swung for the fence. The intruder groaned, doubled over, staggered into a stool, and then hit the floor with a thump.

“Drag him in,” she told Eggie.

She and Eggie secured the intruder under the arms and hauled his limp body across the threshold. Kardide closed the door. Tabari lit the lamp.

“Maybe we should tie him up,” Kardide offered.

“He doesn't look like he's going anywhere anytime soon.” Maggie prodded the guy with her foot. When he didn't respond she bent down and rolled him over. “Oh. No.”

E
GGIE RIGHTED THE STOOL
Barek had toppled when Maggie turned him into a foul ball. “Sorry, my good man.” He dusted the seat with such skill no one would have ever guessed Eggie was third in line for the throne. He eased Barek onto the chair. “Are you hurt?”

Barek rubbed his stomach and scowled at Maggie. “I think she broke a few ribs.” He was mad. But for now, she didn't care. Barek was safe. He was here. And having him close enough to touch settled her.

“I'm sorry.” She dabbed at the gash Barek's fall into the stool had left on his head, pressing a little harder than necessary so he wouldn't be able to detect her tremble of relief that he had lived. “Where have you been?”

Barek stayed her hand. “Saving your backside.” His gaze grabbed her and held on as tightly to her wrist. “I managed to get in a lick that dropped the redhead. Then two other soldiers started for me. I was outnumbered and underarmed. They would have taken me down and come for you.”

“So you ran?” Maggie asked.

“I decided to provide a diversion. So I set out in the opposite direction of the Tophet.” Barek drew a painful breath. “Didn't give that zealous soldier boy the slip until I reached the docks. Had to
spend the afternoon holed up in the skiff I've borrowed a few times from the groom in Titus's stable.”

“And a worthy vessel it is,” Eggie added with a smile.

Maggie could feel her pulse beating against Barek's hold. “Do you think he's still looking for us?”

“He and every other soldier stationed on African soil. Not only did four condemned prisoners fail to arrive for their executions, someone burned down the theater.”