Finally, Idris ad Dawla, the Emir of Jerusalem, stepped out, and the Franks murmured among themselves. He had obviously fought on the ramparts, for his green satin sleeves and the tail of his bright turban were splattered with blood, and his face was sooty from the smoke.

He held his sword by the blade out in front of him, its ornate hilt tilted toward the victor , and he looked around to see to whom he should present it. Raymond of Toulouse stepped forward and received it with a slight dip of the head. With the brief surrender done, the last of the Saracens stood in the doorway, one woman in boy's clothing and another in a dark abaya carrying an infant.

* 183 *

Ludolf drew a sharp breath. It was the witches from the shepherds'

pool."Your Lordship." Ludolf was suddenly hoarse. "Would you grant me one small boon, for being the fi rst man on the wall?"

Raymond looked perplexed. "This is a strange time to ask, but all right. A boon. What would you have?"

Ludolf pointed toward the more voluptuous of the two, the one who carried the child. "I want the woman. That one."

Faaria blinked against the harsh light as she stood in the tower doorway. The blurred fi gures silhouetted against the low afternoon sun slowly came into focus. Soldiers in chain mail and tunics bearing the dreadful blood-colored cross stood in a semicircle around the door. One of them, white-haired and gaunt, and far too old to be in an army unless he led it, already held the emir 's sword. She did not know his name, only that now he held their lives in his hand.

She studied their alien faces. Under their unkempt beards, their faces were ruddy, at once pale and burnt by the sun. One of them, with yellow hair, stared more intently than the rest-and she recoiled.

It was the man who had attacked them at the pool of Siloam.

Behind her, Amhara seized her arm at the same time.

The Frankish leaders spoke among themselves and reached some agreement. Ad Dawla stepped back and laid his arm around Amhara, who clutched Reni closer to her chest. Faaria realized that they were being negotiated for.

The white-haired one said something with the wave of a hand, and the blond knight seized Amhara's arm. She jerked out of his grasp and he reached for her again. Husaam lunged at him, Sharif directly behind him, but before they could take more than a step, two arrows fl ew with a sudden sharp sound. One pierced Husaam through the back, the arrowhead jutting out through one side of his chest, and he twisted sideways. Sharif cried out as the second arrow pierced his upper arm.

Both men fell in front of her, Sharif to his knees and Husaam onto his back.Husaam lay between brother and sister, gasping in shallow blood-frothed breaths. He whispered "Remember me," and his eyes rolled * 184 *

Vulture's Kiss back in his head. Wounded himself, Sharif leaned sobbing over the merchant's chest.

The knight had once again claimed Amhara and held her by her hair. Suddenly something lar ge and black fl ew in his face. A vulture from the tower attacked him, curling its claws into his chain mail. It hung tenaciously for several minutes and pecked at his face.

Faaria and Amhara huddled together against the tower wall, awestruck. Someone shot the vulture with a crossbow and it fl ew away again, the iron bolt protruding from its body.

Then Faaria watched, paralyzed, as the knight reached in front of her face and snatched Amhara's baby by the arm into the air.

In a terrible long moment every perception struck her with crystalline precision: the orange afternoon sun, the acrid smoke that wafted up from the street, the distant savage sounds of the pillaging army, the closer voice of the Frankish commander that called out "No!"

and the sight of the terrifi ed baby dangling in the air over the battlement wall.

* 185 *

43.

Countdown He stepped out of the shower, his skin tingling pleasantly from the harsh scrubbing he had given himself. He dried his legs and feet so that he would not track water on the rug in the other room, then took another towel to fi nish the job in front of his bed. The clock on the nightstand read 10:30 p.m. He was right on schedule.

He glanced around as he toweled his back, making sure he hadn't forgotten anything. The room was spartan in the extreme, the way he liked it. That made it all the easier to scrub clean, which he paid extra to have them do every day. He hated dirt, which seemed to encroach on him at every unguarded moment.

He'd laid out his clothes on the bed and stood naked before the dresser mirror admiring himself. A real man's body-no doubt about that now. He was slightly aroused from the shower and from anticipation, and he knew he'd stay that way until the job was done. It would be his best performance. All three of them at once, if everything worked out.

But the fi rst two alone would be all right too. That would give him the chance to hunt the worst one of all, his prize, and she'd know the whole time that he was after her.

His clean socks and shorts emitted a faint scent of chlorine, reassuring him they were clean. It felt good to pull his shorts over his semi-erection, as if they were holding in his rage that he would soon release. He put on spotless khaki trousers, sharply creased, and a new white shirt. Tonight would be his tour de force, after all, and he wanted to look good.

He lifted his valise from the fl oor and emptied it of the tools he had used the previous night to break the lock on the iron gate. He replaced them with a fl ashlight, lengths of cord, paper, and pencil. Clean white paper. He debated for a moment whether to write the message himself.

No, it would be much more convincing if the stupid woman wrote it.

Her own shaky scribbling would be a powerful lure.

He was pleased with his choice of location. Would she appreciate the irony, he wondered. A dawn sacrifi ce to both the sun and the Son.

* 186 *

Vulture's Kiss Too bad that everything would be wet from the pest-fi lled rain. He hoped he wouldn't catch a cold.

Last of all he laid his automatic pistol inside and zipped the bag shut. His shoes were polished, but he wiped them once more with a tissue before he put them on.

He left his room and bounced down the stairs with the light step of a cheerful man. The lobby was empty, he was pleased to see, except for the owner's cat, which jumped up on the counter just as he arrived.

It raised a paw, maybe to scratch him and maybe not; he didn't wait to fi nd out but swatted it with the back of his hand. The cat fl ew backward with a yowl and caught him with a single claw on his knuckle. A tiny bubble of red swelled from the puncture wound.

"Shit!" he yelled as the cat bounded away . Now he'd be of f schedule. He hurried up the stairs to his room again and kicked open the door. He took his shirt of f carefully so as not to stain it. Then he lathered his hand halfway up his forearm and held it under water as hot as he could stand. The last thing he needed was a damned infection.

Hurrying again through the lobby that was empty now of man and beast, he resolved to kill the cat when he returned. That would teach it.

* 187 *

44.

Ecstasy and Agony Valerie lay with her head next to Najya's shoulder and watched the rise and fall of her breasts as she slept. Stunning breasts, full and bronze, that swelled upward from the curve of her armpit and tilted outward, inviting caress. She studied the long muscle of Najya' s neck that extended up from the collarbone to her ear , holding the gorgeous head that faced away from her . A swath of jet black hair lay across it, individual strands of it quivering each time Valerie exhaled.

Awestruck, she recalled the moment before climax, when she understood the meaning of "blood like wine," for every cell of her had been intoxicated. Then the airless peak when she had no words or even breath, only the heart-stopping rush when fl esh seemed to ignite and all else disappeared.

But lovemaking had not stilled her desire, as it should have, as it always had before. It made her hunger more for Najya, for ever greater closeness, until she could inhale her, drink her in. Even now, after they had brought each other to ecstasy again and again through the hot night, she longed to press her mouth once more over the soft slippery places and to hear Najya moan with need and pleasure.

What was it then that percolated through contentment and still troubled her? How could a night of unebbing passion not make her happy, except that it demanded more of her than she was used to? It was as if something precious had been given to her , and now she had to guard against losing it. Something precious. Yes, that was it, she grasped in the last moments of consciousness. Her lips close to Najya's ear she whispered, or perhaps only thought, "Je t'adore" and slid again into the warm pool of sleep.

The fl uttering of wings penetrated her unconscious.

Then the sound of her name called out-unmistakably-in anger . She opened her eyes-and sat up abruptly, holding her sheet to her chest.

* 188 *

Vulture's Kiss "Nekhbet!"

The goddess took form beside the bed, so close that she had to look down. She was sheathed, as always, in a dress of countless minute black feathers that shimmered ominously. "You are ever following your appetites," she said coldly.

"And you are ever invading my privacy when I am satisfying them," Valerie countered. She glanced at the sleeping Najya, then questioningly at Nekhbet.

She shook her head. "She should not waken yet."

Valerie frowned. "Why not? Why don' t you reveal yourself to her? Then you'd have your convert. She already half believes." She looked again at the sleeping Najya, who lay facing her on the pillow , as if she listened.

"No," Nekhbet said a bit too abruptly . "The gods cannot live on revelation. Not even the One God does that any more." She watched Najya for a moment. "Only what comes from the believer with its own force can sustain us, not her groveling before a spectacle. But you turn me from my purpose."

"Your purpose? Would that be to explain why you've abandoned us?" She lifted her watch from the nightstand and saw it was a little after 10:30 p.m.

"I warned you to take them away from here."

"I did what you wanted. I convinced her to leave. But it takes a few days to arrange."

"A few days is not soon enough. Every hour threatens. You must get her to leave immediately."

Valerie saw Nekhbet' s glance travel down from her face to her exposed shoulders and chest. For two years she had hungered for just such interest, but now it confused her . "Why is Jerusalem any more dangerous than Cairo, where Yussif and Derek were killed?"

Nekhbet's expression grew cool again. "Because the Aton is all-powerful in this city. He can harm you only through his agents, but the worst of them is here. We do not know who that is, but we sense the malevolence that stalks you."

"You only sense it? Hell, I sense it too." Valerie snorted. "Y ou really don't know any more than I do."

Nekhbet's lips pressed together slightly, as if unwilling to release * 189 *

the distasteful words. "About your world, no. That is our weakness.

The workings of this age are...bewildering. We only know the past, in its vast depth, and in painful detail."

"Well then, you might have told me more about it. I had to fi gure out myself that we aren't the hundredth generation of the prophecy. We aren't, are we? Who were they, anyhow? When were they?"

A wave seemed to pass through the shimmering blackness that covered the goddess. "It is true. The prophecy has failed-repeatedly.

You are only the newest attempt. We no longer count them. But the hundredth generation was the fi rst attempt, and it failed in this city . It failed because of this city." She paused as the announcement sank in.

"If you have the stomach for it, I will show it to you."

"Show me? Oh, you mean the way you showed me Egypt once."

For a moment Valerie held Nekhbet' s glance and felt a shiver of excitement.

"With the god' s kiss, yes." She glanced again at Najya and her eyes darkened. "Though you seem to prefer the more carnal sort."

Valerie looked back and forth between goddess and the woman sleeping by her side. "You don't like her, do you?"

"She is nothing to me. Leave her for a moment and come here. I will give you the vision."

Valerie hesitated, then drew the sheet up on her chest. "I don'

t think so."

Nekhbet said nothing, but exuded exasperation. "Do not be coy .

This is a truth you must see."

Valerie pulled the sheet higher. "Can't you just tell me what they did wrong?"

"They did nothing wrong. It was my error, a disastrous one, born of the belief that revelation alone would be enough." She gazed out the window into the Jerusalem night. "It is not."

Then, astonishingly, Nekhbet knelt beside the bed. Valerie drew away. As much as she resented being abandoned, she also did not want to surrender again, to be emotionally overpowered by Nekhbet and hungry for her all the time.

"Please. Just tell me," Valerie repeated softly . She felt Najya' s shoulder press against her back, but still the other woman did not wake. Not even when Nekhbet's arms rose and the white-nailed fi ngers caressed Valerie's face for a moment. Then, with what almost seemed * 190 *

Vulture's Kiss like passion, the divine mouth pressed hers again urgently and without tenderness. Valerie felt sudden scorching desire rush through her like fl ame through tissue, and she slipped into unconsciousness.

She circled high overhead, held aloft on shafts of air warmed by the fi res below. She saw that the walls had been breached and columns of smoke were scattered throughout the city . The invading armies poured inside, fi rst through one opening and then from all sides. The blue or white tabards of the foreigners streamed like fl ecks of pigment along the narrow streets, confronted and then mingled with the motley colors of the defenders before advancing farther. The cries of clashing armies, of victory by one, for mercy by the other, rose up to her.

The smoke blew eastward and she dropped lower , sweeping in a wide arc over the western end of the city. Though the cries of slaughter rang from the streets below , on the Citadel walls there was a curious calm. A group of knights stood below a tower , and one of them called up to the defenders within. Soon they came out: eight men, their leader, then common folk: two men and two women with a baby.

She understood in an instant what she saw. It was the gods' Child, long prophesied and now manifest and surrounded by her family . But the gods had known too late of the malevolence that would sweep down from the north, and now the Child was caught in the sea of its rage. Did the invaders know what they had stumbled upon, or could the Child still be saved? Already a knight had seized the mother, but she resisted him. If he took her, both she and the baby were lost. Something had to be done instantly.

Surely, she could enlighten him as she had done countless dynasties of pharaohs. She was a goddess, he a mortal, no matter the force of his inspiration. She plummeted, catching her talons in his chain mail. The force of her fall drove him to his knees, and he thrashed until she found an opening to give him the god-kiss. It needed only the briefest touch of her beak. She showed him everything in a single vast landscape, letting the truth wash over him, and she knew he had the vision; she could feel him shudder with it.

On the one side wooded hills rose from a fertile valley cut by a river; on the other, savannah gave way to tundra and windswept dunes.

* 191 *

From one end to the other , the land teemed with life. Buf falos and gazelles grazed near spotted leopards, and even in the dry lands, rodents and reptiles crept among the tenacious brush. Overhead, birds swooped and cried out, their plumages of every color the eye could know , and below them, insects swarmed with their own melodies. Everywhere was sentience, and nature in its plenitude breathed welcome.

Framing the tableau like sentinels, the sister goddesses watched, the snake Wadjet and the vulture Nekhbet, each one with a woman' s face and each one upon her tree. Between them on the shore stood Rekemheb, and the Child in his arms grew from baby to radiant womanhood. She stood for a moment with open arms, encompassing all around her.

The knight shuddered again, and the vulture waited for him to grasp that she had shown him paradise. Yet he resisted and his spirit thrashed, and she could not fathom why.

Valerie saw through Nekhbet' s eyes and also through her own, tainted by the bitterness of the father 's line, and Valerie understood.