Teri McLaren
Muni smiled implacably and raised his hand in farewell. "We will be here when you both return."
"I need a horse. Has the doctor left?" said Javin.
"Yes, but you can still catch him." Muni smiled.
Javin ducked out the back of the tent and ran for the river, putting the ruins between him and the sedans, hoping he hadn't been seen.
"I hope I have not let you go to your death, my friend," Muni breathed to himself.
In a few minutes and a thousand apologies to the puzzled physician, Javin was on the back of the doctor's old horse, trotting toward Sumifa. When he cleared the Lion gate, he let the horse have its head. He pulled his kaffiyeh close, held his throbbing hand inside his robes, and hoped the doctor didn't live too close to the Citadel.
He had nothing to worry about. In what looked like the worst part the Barca, on perhaps the worst street, the ancient horse stopped and refused to move another inch. Javin climbed down, searching the storefronts and hovels for anything that looked like a surgery. He had no time for this, but he had promised the doctor he would return the animal and get a better one in Sumifa. In the third doorway on the street, a young woman stood waiting outside, one arm cradled in the other, her face ashen with pain, favin brought the horse around up to the house. A blue crescent was painted crudely upon its door.
"Mujida, I am returning the doctor's horse. Is no one else at home?"
"He lives alone. I am waiting for him myself. My arm is broken. He set it last night, but it is aflame today. I need something for the pain. They have told me he was called out to the diggers. That is all that I know," she said wanly.
"How did this happen, Mujida? Is there no one else to help you?" said Javin, wondering why she didn't just take the pain-dulling shirrir, like everyone else in the Barca.
The girl smiled ruefully. "How can I request treatment at the hand of the Schreefa when she is the one
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who sent the one who broke it? The doctor will return soon. He will have something that will leave me able to look for work." She sounded a little stronger, her words full of anger.
"It is the fault of the diggers, I tell you. My man's work is uncertain, and now my work is gone, since the shop is burned. That young digger, the fair one, he has gone with my employer and a drunkard who pretends to guide them across the western erg on a treasure hunt. And all I have left is this." She held out a small bronze-bound book.
Javin could not believe his eyes. "Mujida," he said, his voice shaking, "where did you find such a book?"
"It dropped from the digger's pack in the fight. They were gone before I could give it back to him. But it is useless-the words are unreadable. The doctor likes antiquities, and it is clearly very old. I will use it to pay him. Should he ever return," she said miserably, eyeing the doctor's horse.
"Please-I would buy it from you, and you may give the doctor money for his efforts. There will be enough left over until you can find more work."
A moment later, for the price of two hundred kohli, Javin had the Collector's priceless Holy Book of the Confessors in his possession. "I have one more favor, please, Mujida," he said. "If you would tell me how the digger and his party travel?"
Vashki pointed west with her chin. "They are fools. They pass the caravan route. You will never see them again, and neither will I. But a thousand blessings upon you, Muje, for your generosity."
"It is I who have been blessed, Mujida." Javin bowed and left her with the horse for company, telling himself that the doctor would be there very soon.
He moved around the corner, sat down, and carefully opened the Book. A bright ray of light struck the pages and made the old words glow before his eyes, their hazy letters pale and red from age. But it was the Book. He closed his eyes and began the prayer that