"There are all kinds of resurrections, Pa." Derek shook his head as he followed Valerie out. "And you may have just ruined one of them."

* 78 *

Vulture's Kiss

19.

Books A lamp still burned in the alcove where Sharif guarded the most precious part of the caravan' s goods. Faaria slid back the carpet that covered the doorway and watched her brother. It comforted her to see him solitary, as she was. They were two of a kind.

He sat curled over one of the manuscripts that was open on his knees. Hearing her , he lifted his head slowly , as if loath to be drawn away from his private world. "Why aren' t you sleeping, little sister?

It's late."

"Why aren't you? You worked harder than I did today."

"I will soon enough." He glanced toward his pallet laid out in the corner.

"What are you brooding over like a big hen?"

Sharif waved her to his side with a slender hand. "Something wonderful, that passes from land to land and generation to generation."

She sat down next to him and leaned against his shoulder . "Stop making riddles, Sharif, and show me what it is."

"What it is...is science. Look." He moved the lantern over to her side of the open volume.

"Books? I have seen books before. Cairo is full of them. I myself have held a Quran in my hands."

"These are dif ferent. Qurans carry revelations, commandments, the way men want the world to be. But science is observation of what the world is. Let me show you." He turned back to the fi rst page. In large calligraphic letters was the title Canon of Medical Sciences. "This was written by a man of great learning, Abu Ali Ibn Sina. In the North, the Franks call him Avicenna."

He laid the medical volume aside and pulled one of the tassled camel bags closer. "And you must see these too." He withdrew two lar ge manuscripts bound in dark leather and tied together, undid the cord, and opened the fi rst volume. "These are called The Book of Strange Arts.

The fi rst part tells of celestial and the second of terrestrial matters. See, * 79 *

this one has a world map." He traced his fi nger delicately around the edge. "Did you know the world had so much water all around it?"

Faaria stared at the meaningless shapes, trying to fathom how water could surround the world rather than be in it.

Sharif had become animated. "But before science, you must have logic. He reached again into the camel bag. "Here is Al Farabi's Agreement between the Two Philosophers, Plato and Aristotle. Those were Greek men of science, who also turned their eyes away from heaven toward the world."

He opened another volume of vellum, covered with script and shapes and numbers. "And once you grasp logic, you can study this.

This is a translation of another Greek, Euclid. The title is simple, Elements.

But do not let it fool you. It shows that the shapes of things-circles, squares, triangles-are not random. They follow principles and work together through the art of numbers."

His eyes seemed to shine, even in the dim, fl ickering light of the oil lamp. "Science," he repeated almost in a whisper . "It shows that things are not present simply at the whim of God. There is an order to them, of and by themselves, and..." He paused dramatically and held up an index fi nger. "One can know that order. Science wants to know.

It is a hunger that increases as it consumes."

Faaria considered the alien concept-a study of the rules of things in themselves. It seemed almost rebellious, and she liked that.

"Amhara says," she blurted suddenly , "that there could be gods in all the things: the wind and waters, in the beasts and birds too. The father of her baby told her that. Is it allowed to even think about such things?"

Sharif chuckled. "Many people think about such things-and write about them too. And not just mystics or madmen. There is even a great mathematician who says them." He drew a slender volume from inside the camel bag, scarcely twenty pages of parchment, and leafed through it gently. "These are in Persian and Arabic." He held the oil lamp over the open page, then began to read out loud.

Men say I hold a loose and dubious creed And set my soul precariously on good deed But let this virtue my atonement be The One for many I never did misread.

* 80 *

Vulture's Kiss "Are you sure he's talking about religion?" Faaria was skeptical.

Sharif shrugged. "From what I know of this man, he only writes about religion, even when he writes of love. Umar al Khayyam he calls himself, the son of a tentmaker. Men hold him both in awe and in suspicion, for obvious reasons." He closed the manuscript and laid it between the two books of medicine.

"What's going on here?" Hussaam al Noori stepped into the alcove.

The merchant looked haggard, though one would have had to know him well to notice his fatigue. He was a youthful fi fty, with a full head of graying hair , and his round face always gave him the appearance of prosperity. His beard, which had been regularly trimmed by his daughter and now by Sharif, showed almost no gray , though he had an old man's habit of stroking it when in thought.

"Is something amiss?" Husaam leaned forward and sat on one of the bales. It sagged with a crackling of fl ax fi bers under his weight.

"Not at all, sayyid. I thought to examine the vellum for vermin.

Faaria was simply curious, and I was pleased to show the books to her."

Sharif slid the pile of manuscripts carefully back into the camel bag.

"You will see, sayyid, these works are of great worth, both in coin and to the spirit of men."

"Value to the spirit of men, eh?" Husaam touched Sharif on the shoulder and let his hand rest there while he spoke. Like a father, Faaria thought, though she could not remember her own.

"I'm glad to know it," Husaam said. "But I have a business to run, so please calculate their value in coin so we can sell them. In the meantime you must disguise them. Wrap them in straw . The trade route is blocked, and we'll have to take a detour , which itself is a great risk."

Sharif slipped all the volumes back into their woolen bags. "W e aren't going to Damascus?"

"No. The caravan that arrived just after us and took half our rooms came from the Negev . But they crossed paths with travelers from the north. These people reported that the Frankish armies have taken Antioch and are moving south, seizing every town along the way."

"But they fi ght the Seljuk Turks, not us. Isn't it common wisdom that the enemy of my enemy is my friend?"

"The Seljuks are not my enemy . Not my friends either . I have * 81 *

contracts with them for goods. So these Franks can only keep me from my business."

"Where can we go then? Where is it safe?"

"Nowhere is safe. The Franks claim everything in their path, but some cities have been able to placate them and buy them of f." He squeezed Sharif's shoulder with his large hand. "I have a friend, an old and powerful friend in a great city. He has high walls and, if need be, a large and skilled army. If anyone can stand up to the foreigners, he can.

I have decided to go to him and beg the use of a warehouse and stables, rather than turn around with twenty fully laden camels and fl ee back through the Sinai."

"Who is this great man, sayyid?"

"Idris ad Dawla, emir of the city. We are going to Jerusalem."

* 82 *

Vulture's Kiss

20.

El Fishawy Allaaaah uakbar" sounded over the roofs of the Cairo souq and roused Valerie from her half sleep. It repeated three more times as she washed her face at the sink. Refreshed, if only momentarily ,.

she went out.

"Ashhadu an la ilaha illa'llah," the muezzin sang, bearing witness that there was no deity but God.

She descended the outside steps, not quite sure where she was going, just needing to move and shake off the looming dread.

"Ashhadu anna Muhammadan Rasululu'llah," the voice persisted, declaring that Mohammed was God's Messenger.

The musical call to prayer-like the muezzin and the minaret itself, a delightful medieval anachronism-didn' t evoke the usual nostalgia today, but only annoyance. Today the shopkeepers were all at the mosque instead of minding the store, and their piety kept her from her urgent business just as Reverend Carter's had.

Derek, to his credit, was spending quality time with his daughter.

Teaching her how to tap dance in her new shoes, probably . Valerie, on the other hand, was spinning her wheels in the sand, and she hated it.

At least El Fishawy was doing business.

The open air cof fee house-which was no house at all, but a row of chairs and wobbly round tables along both sides of a small closed alley-was in fact full of customers. Obviously , not everyone went to Friday prayers. She spotted a single table in the corner near the entrance and sat down.

Not until after the waiter had taken her order and moved away did she notice the two of them, and she felt a mix of pleasure and embarrassment. How many coincidences could there be?

At a long table at the opposite end of the cof fee house, Najya Khoury leaned forward listening intently to two men in headscarves.

She held a small metal box in her hand in front of her , no bigger than a pack of cigarettes. Presumably a tape recorder. A few meters behind her, her photographer was taking snapshots. What was his name?

* 83 *

Harry. Right. When one of the men objected, he stopped and sat down beside Najya.

Valerie's waiter returned with the usual chipped enamel teapot and tea glass, and as he set it down, the hookah man-the same old man who had served her two years before-limped to her table with the water pipe. His boy dropped a large hot coal from his cauldron onto the plug of sheesha at the top.

She sipped the mint tea fi rst, gripping the hot glass with her fi ngertips at the top and bottom, then took a long pull on the hookah.

The water gur gled pleasantly in the pipe, and she held the sweet smoke in her mouth, letting it mix with the mint. She could understand why for centuries men had fi lled their idle hours doing just that-the soothing effect of sound and taste and inactivity made the world seem a friendlier place.

She watched the interview at the far end of the street. Sheer coincidence had brought her just at that hour, of course. But the pleasure she felt watching a beautiful woman who didn' t know she was being watched made her feel a little guilty.

How skillful the journalist was, deferential and yet assertive. As she listened to the men, the position of her head and the squint of her eyes subtly suggested either understanding or skepticism. She shifted position away from them when they were vehement, leaned forward again when they seemed to want to confi de, and always appeared interested. Valerie thought it must be a pleasure to be interviewed by Najya Khoury.

Harry, for his part, fi ddled with his camera lens, then his camera case, then a coffee cup. He shifted in his seat, said something to Najya, and got up to leave. As he passed Valerie's table near the entrance, he looked straight ahead and, to her relief, seemed not to notice her.

Valerie directed her attention back to Najya and felt her face warm suddenly when she realized the journalist had caught sight of her. Najya continued the interview, seemingly unperturbed, and Valerie wondered how she was going to explain her sudden appearance in the same place at the same time. Then she realized that it would make no difference.

She leaned sideways and took another long draw on the hookah, letting her eyes half close, and continued to watch. In a few minutes, the interview was over . Najya stood up, took leave of the two men, dropped her tape recorder into her bag, and swung it on her shoulder .

* 84 *

Vulture's Kiss As graceful as a dancer, she pivoted and glided toward Valerie.

It was a long walk down the center of the alley that was El Fishawy ,.

ten tables at least, and every step Najya took between them seemed to be in slow motion. Valerie watched the line of Najya' s body shift languidly onto each leg as she ambled and thought she saw the long hair lift slightly with each step.

Najya held her glance, as if pulled along by it, the dark eyes focused but expressionless. They seemed to begin a conversation without words, without even thoughts, for everything was still a question. Yet they already had a sort of understanding, the way a wave understands the shore it swells toward. And so she came, step by lovely step, until she was at Valerie's table. The expression that formed on her face was a piquant mix of surprise, pleasure, curiosity, and a hint of revenge.

"Don't tell me. Just another odd coincidence."

Valerie still held the mouthpiece to the hookah and allowed herself another puff. "Not at all," she parried. "I've been stalking you for days."

Najya smiled and Valerie realized what she had found so attractive before. She tended to smile from one side of her mouth, letting it curve upward and open slightly, which allowed a glimpse of teeth. An arabesque of a smile.

"All right. We're even. But now I'm allowed to ask what brings you here."

"Nothing really." Valerie shrugged. "I have business with a certain merchant, but his shop's not open today, so I'm killing time, or at least beating it up a little. You, I see, are working."

"Yes. Getting as much information as possible before I have to leave in a few days. And you? Are you in Cairo to look after your exhibit or for personal reasons?"

"Mostly personal reasons. The exhibit takes care of itself these days. I'm here mainly to help out a...uh...relative in the South, but he needs something I can only get from the souq."

"A relative? You have family in Egypt?" Najya remained standing, rolling a ballpoint pen slowly between her fi ngers.

The gesture reminded Valerie of herself, playing with chalk while she lectured.

"This one is a distant relative. A...priest, in fact." Why are you telling her this? Y ou can't possibly explain. "But no longer active.

* 85 *

Retired. Sort of."