But it was just such formless freedom that left her fearful now. Where was the structure, where was the purpose, what was the function of a life that expended itself aimlessly over the sands and Hills of a whole world? Should a man or a woman live and die having accomplished nothing, leaving behind no record, no deed, nothing but the daily acknowledgment in the joy of living? She had thought that would be enough—should be enough—but now, three weeks past the exodus from the Plain of Sharon, it seemed like an empty reason for waking in the morning. Perhaps, she thought, her joy was insufficient. She did not know how to be glad enough.
If she had her life, her whole life, to spend as she would, she wanted to make it matter. She wanted to build something, create something, endow something, leave something behind. She wanted to be a healer, like the wise woman in her parents’ village. She wanted to be a great artisan, like the flautist in Luminaux. She wanted to be a farmer, who tended the soil and brought forth food and oversaw the continuous, complex cycle of life.
What was she fitted to do?
She retrieved the covers she had thrown aside moments ago, turned once more on her pallet, and tried to find ways to shut her mind off from thinking.
They traveled slowly southward, following the coastline into Bethel, making by easy stages for Luminaux. When they stopped at the small shipping towns along the way, Rachel had learned, she was wise to cover her bright hair and never to volunteer to sing at any public functions. Everyone knew the name of the gold-haired woman who traveled with the dark Edori. And anyone who had heard her debut performance was unlikely to forget her voice.
These factors aside, it was amazing to find how popular the Edori were in the Bethel cities these days—indeed, although to a lesser extent, in Gaza as well. They were used to being tolerated in most of the larger cities, and often welcomed in some of the smaller trade-based communities, but they had for years encountered some hostility and disrespect anywhere they went. Suddenly, now, Edori were in vogue. Children crept up to their cook-fires at night, wanting to watch the tents going up and smell the strange aromas of the food. Merchants, craftsmen, goodwives, even politicians, found reasons to come to their camps, offer hospitality and inquire about the state of the roads.
Rachel had feared, at first, that such friendliness had been mandated by the Archangel—that he had sent a call through the whole province asking everyone to be on the lookout for the absent angelica. But none of the townspeople asked after her. None of them even appeared to scrutinize the Edori faces too closely, to ask significant questions, to remark that the Archangel’s wife had disappeared and did they think she had gone back to her Edori brethren? No, the cordiality was indeed for her sake, and all the Edori knew it, but it was not cordiality with an ulterior motive. These citizens were merely thankful that the Edori had sheltered the angelica in the days when she needed shelter, and they were trying to dismantle walls of animosity which had stood for generations.
So it was a good life, and everyone (except Rachel) slept trustfully in the parks outside each town and seaport. And they continued to move southward, and the questions continued to circle in her head.
She was not alone nearly so much as Naomi had feared. The Chievens were a small clan, fifty strong, and among their numbers were three young men who still lived with their families. One of them was wooing a girl who was capricious and willful; the other two, Isaac and Adam, had turned their attention to Rachel.
She had forgotten what it was like to be courted by an Edori lover.
Isaac reminded her just a little of Obadiah, though of course they looked nothing at all alike. Isaac was tall and a little slimmer than most Edori. He wore his black hair very short, though braided with gold and silver threads, and he liked to dress in colorful shirts and trousers. When he sang at night around the campfires, he performed humorous original compositions that made everyone laugh.
“He’s a fine boy,” Naomi whispered to her one night as they listened to Isaac’s comic song. “His mother was a Carallel.”
“Ah, that’s where he gets his voice.”
“Yes, but his aunt had the raising of him. His mother died of the black fever when he was little. He was better to his aunt than her own daughters.”
“I like him,” Rachel said.
Naomi watched her in the dark. “Do you?” she asked, and nothing else.
But she liked Adam better. He was a quiet, serious man a year or two her junior, and he lived with his parents and three younger siblings. His father had injured his leg in a hunt some years back, and Adam had assumed the headman’s responsibility for his family’s tent. He made sure they had plenty of meat, that the canvas was in good repair, that his mother’s handwoven baskets were on display when batterers came to camp, and that his teenaged sisters dressed properly instead of showing off their fresh new bodies to the visiting burghers.
His face was set in stern lines, and his eyes were uncommonly dark, but when he smiled he possessed such a sweetness of expression that he was utterly transformed. He smiled rarely. He seldom sang, and then in a fogged, rusty tenor that Rachel found infinitely attractive. His little brother followed him around the camp from sunup till bedtime.
When he had spare moments, he came to Rachel’s tent and offered to help. “I noticed a rip in your canvas,” he would say, as he arrived with his hands full of tools. He cut her a new tent pole when her own began to splinter. He brought her extra meat on the days his hunting had gone well. He was a man who provided for those around him.
It was impossible for Rachel to tell if he helped her out and came by to visit simply because she was a woman living alone and he was a man who took care of people, or if he was expressing some deeper affection, initiating the first steps in the circuitous dance of courtship. About Isaac she had no doubts. He had begged her to sing with him at the campfire, had bought her ribbons and scarves in the border towns; he had admired her hair, her face, her laugh. Adam had made none of these overtures.
Yet he reminded her of Simon. Sweet Yovah, he reminded her of Gabriel. At night, she watched him, tickling his brother before sending him off to bed, and wondered if it would be a sin in the eyes of her god, her Edori or her husband if she seduced him.
The Edori were not usually so strict about conjugal vows. Well, of course, they did not believe in marriage, anyway. But she—there was no use pretending otherwise—she was different. Set apart by her race and her role. And the fact that she had a very prominent spouse. What they might tolerate, even encourage among other young women, they might view unfavorably in her.
Yet she watched him. And thought about how long it had been since she had lain with a man.
They camped for nearly a week outside of Luminaux. During the days, they went, singly and in groups, into the Blue City. Luminaux had always been a lure for the Edori. Here they were most welcome, here their goods brought the best prices or the highest-quality merchandise in barter. Well, Luminauzi welcomed everyone, but the Edori had always felt that they were especially liked here.
One day, Rachel took a load of weavings to the market and was extraordinarily pleased with the payment she was offered. She spent half the money on gifts for Naomi and the girls, and held back the rest of it, in case she ever needed it. She was annoyed with herself for doing so; that was an allali way of living, to save money against the future. Edori never saved, or worried about the days to come. Yet she could not bring herself to squander it all.
After she had made her purchases, she wandered around the city just for the sheer delight of admiring its beauty. She stopped by a huge, simple fountain, a slab of blue marble set almost perpendicularly into a pool, with water racing nearly imperceptibly down its smooth face. So silken was the water, so free of ripple or break, that she had to reach her hand out and touch the stone to be sure it was not just glistening in the sun. She flattened her palm against the worn, cool marble. The water frothed white at her wrist, then untangled into clarity again. She pulled her hand back.
“I d
o that every time I come to Luminaux,” said a sober voice behind her, and she turned to smile at Adam. “This is my favorite place in the city.”
“I never saw it before,” she said, drying her fingers on her shirt. “I like it.”
He took her bundles from her without asking. “You’ve been busy,” he said.
“Presents. I couldn’t resist. Naomi has done so much for me—I wanted to do something in return.”
He did not tell her that Naomi was glad to perform favors for her friends, lived for such opportunities. He merely nodded. “Have you eaten?” he asked. “It’s nearly time for dinner.”
“I’m starving.”
They went to an outdoor cafe, Adam carefully balancing Rachel’s bundles on one of the extra chairs at their table. They ordered wine and delicacies with names that neither of them could pronounce. Sunset drifted down, rose-quartz and aquamarine. Rachel continually glanced from her surroundings to her companion’s face. He did not seem to belong here. He was perfectly at ease, even smiling from time to time, but it was an incongruous picture, the somber Edori in the most sophisticated city in Samaria.
“Do you like Luminaux?” she asked finally.
He looked up from his plate, where he was carefully cutting a piece of meat. “As cities go. Yes,” he said. “I’d rather be on the open plain, or even in the desert. But there’s a—a wildness in Luminaux. A freedom. It’s not so confining.”
She could not help laughing. When he looked inquiring, she shook her head. “I have been in places so much more confining than a city,” she said by way of explanation. “This one feels very open to me.”
“You’re a half-child now,” he said.
Her hands stilled on her wineglass. “Half-child?” she repeated.
“Or maybe you always were.” He caught her expression. “You don’t know the word? A person who lives in two worlds, whose heart is split in two. It’s usually applied to Edori who have gone to live in a city or a town—who have fallen in love with some farm girl, maybe, or who become crippled in an accident and cannot travel with the others. They stay behind when the Edori move on—but they always miss the Edori.”
“But I’m back with the Edori now,” she whispered.
“Half of you,” he said.
She wanted to say, All of me, but she could not.
It was dark by the time they finished their dinner. Adam tied all her packages together with a piece of twine he got from a shopkeeper, then slung the whole together over his shoulder. They wandered aimlessly through the glittering streets, stopping first at one street corner, then another, to listen to musicians entertain. Adam bought each of them iced chocolate-flavored drinks, and they sipped these as they walked. The streets were filled with color, light and motion. Globes of gaslight illuminated every blue cobblestoned roadway, and hundreds of couples were out, walking and laughing and dancing, just as they were. Even the breeze seemed eager and excited, scampering from place to place.
A big crowd and a lifted voice lured them down one wide boulevard. There was a small, brightly lit stage and a barker bawling out invitations. “Sing for gold, citizens! Sing for gold! Who among you can pray like the angels? Just three coppers and you can try your voice against your friends’. Who’ll sing for me? Who’ll come show us how it’s done?”
There were already eight or nine takers standing on stage with him, jesting with each other and humming their warm-up notes. It was nearly irresistible. “Two more,” the hustler was pleading. “Another lady, another gentleman. Who’ll show us how good they are? You, sir—I’m sure you’ve got a fine baritone, now.”
“He sounds like a frog in midsummer,” a woman called out, and everyone laughed.
Adam nudged Rachel. “You should sing.”
“I can’t do that. It’s not fair.”
“It’s only three coppers. You’re the best singer in the crowd.”
“You can’t be sure of that.”
He actually laughed. “Well, then, if you’re not, someone else deserves to win.”
“Adam, I—”
The sharp-eyed barker had noticed their arguing. “You, lady,” he cried, pointing to Rachel. “Your young man is begging you to try. I can always tell. Come up here and show us how it’s done.”
Adam pushed her forward, and while she turned to scold him, other hands tugged at her arms, pushed her toward the stage. Oh, why not, after all? She was angelica—the god stayed thunderbolts for her—but there had been no stipulations that only amateurs could enter this competition. And no one would lose more than three coppers. She laughed, let herself be thrust toward the stage, and dropped her pennies in the barker’s hand.
“Now we’ve got our ten!” the man called out. “Here are the rules. Each of you is to sing one verse of ‘River Cara,’ and the crowd will applaud as it sees fit. Whoever receives the most applause will win all the coppers. Does everyone agree to this?” Everyone assented. “Then you, sir! You shall sing first.”
The first two men and the first woman all had fine voices, nothing spectacular, but good to listen to on a warm night under the stars and the flaring lamplight. It was impossible to sing “River Cara” badly. The crowd responded favorably, laughing and clapping, calling out for encores.
The second woman had a thin, sweet soprano that gave a wistful turn to the lovesick lyrics, and her performance was greeted with even greater acclaim. The next three singers also received enthusiastic endorsements, but by the time the eighth and ninth singers stepped up to do their verses, the audience was starting to get a little bored. They sang well enough, but everyone had already heard these stanzas; the applause was polite but perfunctory. A few people on the fringes began to edge away.
Rachel was last. The barker pointed at her. “Come forward, lady,” he called. “You’ll have to sing your guts out to win over these tin-ears.”
A few laughs greeted this comment. Rachel stepped to the edge of the stage, found Adam with her eyes and smiled. She’d covered her hair with her scarf, and she checked to make sure the cloth was still in place before she opened her mouth to sing.
“We stood at the River Cam’s edge,
And vowed we would love forever.
I have been true to my lover’s pledge,
But you fled with the rushing river.”
The lyrics were so simple, they were banal; it was the music that made the song such a universal favorite. Rachel put her heart into it. No reason not to sing with feeling if you were going to sing at all. She extended her hands, palms cupped, as if river water dripped between her fingers. When she finished, she flicked her fingers at the crowd as if to shake the water from her hands. People in the first two rows actually stepped backward.
There was a moment’s complete silence before the crowd broke into wild, mad cheering. Even the contestants behind her were applauding noisily. Rachel smiled, a little embarrassed (surely she was above this, but actually she was enjoying herself tremendously), and shook hands all around with the others on the stage. She accepted the thirty coppers from the showman and bent forward to hear his voice over the still-cheering crowd.
“You sing like an angel!” he shouted into her ear.
She could not help laughing. “So I’ve been told,” she said, and climbed down the rickety stairs into the enfolding throng. It was a moment before she could locate Adam, pushing through the crowd to her side. He took her arm and looked down at her. He was laughing. She stretched up and kissed him on the mouth.
But something went awry after that. They rode back to the camp in near silence, Adam leaning over from time to time to touch Rachel’s arm or guide her horse around some obstruction. They had no trouble seeing, for the full moon lavished them with light. Now and then they smiled at each other, still saying nothing.
But something was wrong. They dismounted before Rachel’s tent, letting their reins trail to the ground. Adam stood close to Rachel, waiting; it was clear he was waiting. She was the married woman, it was up to her to give the signal. S
he lifted her hands to his shoulders and tilted her head back, surveying his face in the bleached, ghostly light. He looked so serious. He looked as if it would take no more than a kiss to make him fall in love with her.
She could not draw his head down. She could not put her mouth against his.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, and dropped her hands.
“Sorry for what?” he asked, his voice almost as soft as hers.
“For—” She could not explain. She shrugged.
“Rachel,” he said.
She smiled briefly. “I never make it easy on anyone,” she said, though he could not possibly understand what that meant. “Adam, you’re so sweet. I want to fall in love with you.”
“Then do,” he said.
She shook her head. “I’ve made a lot of mistakes,” she said. “I don’t want to make this one.”
“Rachel,” he said again, this time with a note of protest in his voice. She shook her head once more, pressed her fingers fleetingly to his lips and stepped away from him. The tent flap closed soundlessly between them. It was five or ten minutes before she heard him move away, his footsteps accompanied by the heavy shuffle of the horses’ hooves. She sat on her pallet the whole time, unmoving, waiting while he waited. Even after he left, she stayed motionless for some time, scarcely breathing, not allowing herself to think.
She was still sleeping the next morning when Naomi came in and woke her up. “Breakfast,” the Edori woman said cheerfully. “Time to get up and get moving.”
Rachel rolled over so her back was to the visitor. “Why?”
“Because we’re leaving this afternoon. You’ve got to pack your things and strike your tent.”
Rachel sat up. “When was this decided?”
“Last night. While you were out flirting in the city.”
Rachel gave her friend a hostile look, but accepted the tray of food that was handed to her. “What makes you think I was flirting?”
“Well, you came back with Adam.”
“And how do you know that?”