The Orphan (2 page)

CHAPTER THREE

M
Y EYES BLINKED
open. I was on the ground. Facing upward.

I sprang to my feet. Where was he? Where was the guard?

I nearly jumped at the sound of his voice—but it was from the other side of the wall. I had fallen inside the Inner Grove. He could not see me, nor I him! “Hiding behind a bush—sleeping, Marcellus?” grunted the voice. I had to adjust it in my mind. He was speaking Judean. “I should report you!”

“But you won't,” another voice replied, “because I'll tell the king you called him a fish-footed lizard!”

The two guards laughed. But in truth, they didn't care. I suppose they disliked the king, too.

Most important, they hadn't seen me.

The air was damp and heavy. I glanced around. The king's Inner Grove was choked with plants, trees, shrubs, flowers, vines. I tried to feel good that I'd made it inside. There were places for me to hide, but my mind held only one thought:

What is hiding from me?

I saw shadows everywhere. I tried not to think about the Babylonian legends that passed in whispers at night. The Unspeakables. The monsters who were said to roam the grove at night, watching over Mother's Mountain—giant black birds with metal for skin, monkey-like creatures who spat fire—all were guarded by the biggest monster of all, the evil sightless Kranag.

Nonsense. Childish. Even when I was hardly old enough to carry a full water jug I didn't believe these tales.

I steeled myself, thought of Frada and how frail and near death she seemed, and I pushed forward, toward the Tree of Enchantment.

And then the dense brush ended abruptly, and there was the pomegranate tree. In the afternoon sun, its leaves seemed to dance with the passing breeze. I was no stranger to gardening. I had seen magnificent plants and trees before. I had coaxed dying plants into glorious life. But this was like a living, breathing being, as thick as clouds, as glorious as a song.

I drew closer, eyeing a half-dozen fist-sized fruits, right at my eye level. A tree that size should have carried dozens, maybe hundreds of pomegranates, but its offerings were few. Special and rare.

My fingers shook in the dappled sunlight as I reached out and pulled.

With a soft snap, the reddish-brown fruit came loose. I had it. The pomegranate was mine.

But before I could move away, I heard a strange, strangled sound. A hollow
Zoo-kulululu! Cack! Cack! Cack!
like a fierce roar forcing itself through a tiny slit. Whatever had caused it was inside the tree—behind a drooping branch in front of my eyes. What on earth could it be?

Run!
screamed a voice in my head.

I should have listened to my instinct. I don't know what made me reach out, pull the leaves aside. Curiosity, I guess. Or maybe insanity. But when I did, I was staring into a knothole.

And two inky black eyes were staring back.

I stumbled back, nearly dropping the pomegranate. With a flutter of wings, a black creature flew out of the tree toward me. It had the mask of a wolf and the body of a hawk. Its feathers were a black so pure that it shone almost blue in the light. As I dropped to the ground, its feathers grazed my cheek. And then, with another screech, it was gone.

My heart pounded. I had startled it. It meant no harm. But as it flew over the tree canopies, surely the guards would see it. Would they suspect an intruder?

I had to move. I placed the pomegranate in the pouch that hung from my waist and ran to the wall, crashing through the underbrush.

On this side, the wall was sheer, polished to a smooth white luster. I could no easier climb it than fly over it. I glanced around desperately for a tree close to the wall. Something from which I could launch myself. But I could no longer see the place where I'd come in, and there were no trees here. The king's architect had been crafty, making it difficult to escape.

I ran blindly along the wall, hoping for a rough patch. A place where earthquakes had caused a section of the wall to crack, perhaps. But all I saw was smoothness, until I reached the entrance to the Inner Grove. The door was thick wood, reinforced by a metal gate. Framing it was a huge archway carved deeply with figures of beasts—lions, bulls, and the ancient mushushu that looked like both a lion and a lizard.

Footholds galore. It was practically a ladder for me. I couldn't help but grin as I grabbed onto the carvings and hoisted myself upward.

I paused at the top and looked down the other side. To freedom. I was tempted to jump—but I knew if I did, I risked breaking an ankle. I looked around for something that would cushion my fall.

There. To my left, nearly thirty yards away, was a thin tree, fairly close to the wall. I could jump to it, and it would hold my weight. Then I'd climb safely down the other side.

As I shimmied across the top of the wall, I saw movement in the underbrush. I stiffened. A guard trundled out from under the tree. He was yawning, stretching, raising his face upward. In a moment he would see me. I flattened myself as much as I could. My heart beat so hard I feared it would shake the wall.

With an oddly high-pitched scream, the guard jumped backward. Had he seen me?

No. He was looking downward. I saw a flash of orange at his feet—a lizard skittering across his toes. Startled, the guard muttered angrily and hustled away on his rounds. I waited until he was out of sight, counted to three, and shimmied quickly along the top of the wall.

“Zoo-kulululu! Cack! Cack! Cack!”
came a piercing shriek from above me.

The giant black wolf-bird landed on the wall, not ten feet away, blocking my path toc the tree. It bent its neck toward me as if examining some strange specimen. “Shoo!” I whispered, but that just made it screech again.

I heard the thumping of footsteps. The guard was approaching again. Instead, I aped the bird's song—
“Zoo-kulululu! Cack! Cack! Cack!”
—as loudly and shrilly as I could. It was startled for a moment, and I took the opportunity to push the bird aside and leap onto the nearby tree.

Half falling, half climbing, I made my way down the tree. I hit the ground in a roll and got immediately to my feet.

“You! Stop in the name of the king!”

The guard was tromping through the underbrush toward me, his spear twitching in his hand. Soon there would be others. Big, monstrous men with more strength than I would ever have.

But far, far less speed.

The pomegranate banged against my leg as I ran among the vines and trees. On the pathway I barged into the growing crowd of people who were leaving the garden to return home. The guard's shouts were growing distant now, causing a vague sense of confusion far behind me. My shawl fell to my neck as I bolted back through the outer gate.

And directly into the guard who had dragged the ragged man into the street.

“End of the run for you, street rat,” he said, grabbing my arm.

CHAPTER FOUR

H
OW HAD HE
known?

I swallowed hard. The man towered over me. He was a beast. If I tried to run, he would yank my arm out of its socket. “I—I can explain!” I pleaded.

“Running through the garden is a safety hazard, little wretch,” he said. “And it is against regulations.”

“Running?” I squeaked.

And it dawned on me—he
didn't
know! How could he? He thought I was just a girl running recklessly for no reason. How could he know what I'd done? He had been on the outside.

I knew this was a stroke of dumb luck that would not last. I bowed low and spoke fast. “Yes, kind sir, you are right, and I will never do it again. . . .” But he was holding tight, not budging.

Frada's wise words came back to me:
To loosen a guard's will, feed his ego.

“. . . O pillar of great strength,” I added. “And wisdom.”

The corners of the guard's mouth turned upward into a proud, gap-toothed smile. His fingers went slack. And I stepped away—walking, not running, until I rounded the next bend, out of the guard's sight.

A voice boomed out from inside the garden. “What are you doing, fool? You call yourself a guardian of the gate? There is a pomegranate missing!” Running at full speed, I disappeared into the throng.

Soon I could hear at least three, maybe four guards behind me. But I had the advantage in the streets. They were my home. I sprinted down the road away from the gardens, through the ceremonial gate, and into the city. I raced past lavish houses I could never dream of entering. Many people were sympathetic to a vulnerable, running child, but others shouted my whereabouts to the guards. I darted into the vast outdoor market, hoping to lose them among the vendors. My eyes darted from stall to stall, looking for anything I could use to my advantage.

I tried to avoid looking at the gaunt, screaming man in the wooden stocks in the center of the market. His wrists and ankles were nearly worn through to the bone, bound by metal clamps. His face was bloodied and swollen. He had been there for five days, left to die because he had not bowed sufficiently to the king. My stomach wrenched at the sight, but there was nothing I could do. I had Frada to save.

I escaped out the opposite side of the market, into the streets. But the streets had guards, too. To “keep the peace,” as the king labeled it. As they heard the shouts of my pur­suers, they came after me, too. “
Capture the street rat! It stole the king's property!
”

My three pursuers became four, then eight.
It
, they called me. As if I were a thing, not a person. That notion just made me run faster.

I headed toward an alley, but one of them had gotten there first. I darted back into the street but I'd lost time. Now another set of guards was emerging from the road ahead. They were behind me and in front of me.

I stopped. There was only one way to go now.

Up.

Grabbing the window frame of the nearest shop, I hoisted myself onto a balcony. The wall was cracked and full of metal hooks left over from old signs. I used them as handholds to climb up the wall.

“Careful, Daria!” a voice shouted. “They are close behind!”

It was another urchin, a girl I knew only as Shirath, who people called the sad-faced one. “Can you help me?” I shouted.

The girl didn't answer, but I knew the look in her eyes. In their expression I could read a kind of silent code shared only by street people:
I have your back.

The guards followed, but they were slow and clumsy, weighted down by armor. I climbed to the roof and glanced in either direction. The shops were connected, so I could make it from building to building, easily jumping the difference in heights. This—this!—was the fastest way to move through the city. The breeze flowed freely through my thin tunic. With nothing but the distant towers and ziggurats in my line of sight, I felt swift and free.

“Halt or I will shoot!” a voice thundered behind me.

I turned. One of the guards had reached the roof and was aiming an arrow at my head. I knew in that moment that he really meant
Halt so I CAN shoot.

So I shot first. With my sling.

I caught him square between the eyes. He let out a cry, arched backward, and fell. I cringed as I saw his body drop through the space between buildings—and land with a sickening splat into a pile of sheep manure.

He would live. But he wouldn't be bothering me.

With an effortful groan, another guard clambered onto the roof. I reached into my belt pouch to take out another stone.

I found nothing. I'd used the last one I had. Dropping the sling back into the pouch, I turned and ran across the roofs, leaping from building to building.

The guard was laughing. Taunting me. “
The lion gets the rat!
” he shouted.

I knew if he didn't catch me, he'd shoot me in the back. On an instinct, I darted left, across another row of rooftops with patched tiles and cracked surfaces—a poorer neighborhood.

A neighborhood I knew well. Very well.

As a small child, I'd lived in an old, abandoned place close to the city wall. I needed to get to it. Now. It was my only hope. It would save me.

I felt an arrow whoosh past my ear as I jumped from a higher building down onto the old shelter's roof. I landed near the wall shared by the two buildings. Carefully I walked sideways across the roof's edge. It was the last building on the block. If I jumped, I would be seriously hurt.

The guard appeared at the ledge above me. His chest heaved with the effort. When he saw I was trapped, he grinned.

“Nowhere to run now, thief,” he said, leaping down toward the roof.

It was a strong leap. It launched him far forward. In midair, he drew his sword with a dramatic flourish. He landed with a loud thump, in the center of the roof.

I sidled farther along, my eyes on his feet. I knew that section of the roof well. It was rotted and patched with clay and netting. Unless, of course, it had been repaired.

“Please,” I said. “You must hear me out! You're a father, are you not? Haven't you ever had a sick child?”

“You dare compare yourself to a child of a royal guard?” he replied, charging toward me. “Prepare to meet your maker, street raaaaaa—”

Just like that, he was gone.

Through the roof.

His shocked scream echoed upward as he fell down two stories of rotted wood onto the earthen floor below. Getting as close as I safely could, I peered through the hole into a silent, rising cloud of thick dust.

From far away came a muffled sound of commotion. I looked into the street. It was empty. The guards had taken another turn. In the confusion, they'd somehow been drawn off course. Unless . . .

Shirath
. She must have done something to confuse them. Pointed the guards into another alley, perhaps, or sent them into a different quadrant. This was her way. I knew it in my soul. This was how we protected each other. In the absence of power, you had to use brains.

With no one chasing me now, I could lower myself over the edge of the wall, grabbing onto holes and window ledges. I landed quietly in a dark alley.

Alone at last. My chest burned. My body cramped. I stood with my back against the wall, trying to calm myself down. I'd eluded the guards for now, but I had to keep moving, just to be sure. Commotion had a way of shifting. Guards had a way of finding their prey.

As I rushed through the dark alley, I twisted my tunic until one arm and shoulder were bare and hung out through the same hole as my neck and head. It was a small adjustment, but it changed my silhouette. I spotted an old basket on the ground and picked it up as I passed by. Finally I wrapped the gray shawl back around my head, tucking my hair carefully inside.

By the time I walked into the sunlight, I looked nothing like the thief who had been fleeing over the rooftops.

I hummed as I made my way through the streets, trying to ignore the thumping of my heart.

The shops became more and more run-down as I walked, the lanes grimier. After a while, I was hit with the familiar smell of sewage. I breathed deeply and smiled. My worry fell away.

I was in the slums.

I took one last look over my shoulder before disappearing into an alleyway between two sturdy buildings. Near a dead-end, I turned into the area behind the buildings and came to the door I was looking for. I knocked softly.

A small voice came from inside, that of a boy pretending to be much older than he actually was. “Go away. We are not accepting deliveries today.”

Nico.

“It's me,” I said.

When I heard a click from the other side, I pushed the door in. Startled, Nico stumbled backward. The sight of his gangly body, his shocked face with its shadow of a mustache someday to be, made me laugh aloud. Despite bright sunlight outside, the room was silent and dark, lit only by two small lamps, a place that held secrets. I closed and latched the door in a single motion, then collapsed against it, letting out a long breath.

Home at last.