Thomas Greanias - The Promised War

Deker watched Elezar haul himself through the window. He looked relieved to set his feet on solid ground until he saw the four Reahn soldiers behind Deker.

"Rahab's brothers," Deker told him. "We're good."

Rahab said, "They were all conscripted into the Reahn army as teens. Their uniforms disguise their hearts. We aren't all what we seem."

With a steely gaze Elezar asked, "How is this good, Deker?"

"They're going to get me into the fortress to plant the C-4," Deker said. "They know the weak spots in the wall. I'm going to plant two charges with timers-one short and one long-to blow the walls. Fortress wall first, city wall second."

Rahab translated what Deker was saying to the biggest and apparently the oldest of her brothers, who looked no older than twenty-four and whose rippling physique would have qualified him as a Mr. Universe contestant in the twenty-first century.

Ram, as Rahab called her older brother, looked at him intensely, with all the passion of an eldest brother. His unspoken warning seemed to say, Mess with my sister and I'll rip your head off. Then he turned to Rahab and said something in a deep, gruff voice.

Rahab said, "Ram knows the disbursement of troops in the city, the checkpoints and roadblocks, as well as the layout of the fortress, secret gates and guard shifts. But he wants to know what assurances we have, if we help you now, that your soldiers won't destroy us along with Reah?"

Deker glanced at Elezar and in English said, "Nice to know that at least they think I'll be successful."

"Tell her we gave her our word and that's enough," Elezar replied, going back to his original non-promise to her when she first helped them escape a week earlier.

"Thank God even Bin-Nun is more principled than you." Deker shook his head and turned to Rahab and said, "General Bin-Nun declares that you and all who are with you in your house will be spared on two conditions."

Rahab repeated this to Ram, who showed no change in expression, and looked at Deker eagerly with her dark, animated eyes. "Tell us these conditions and we will meet them."

"I will meet one of them for you now."

Deker was aware of Elezar's death stare as he pulled out his dagger, cut a piece of the red rope on the floor and moved to the open window. He found one of the bronze hooks inside the top of the window used to keep grillwork in place. He fastened the scarlet cord to the hook and then closed the hook with one sharp, soft blow from his axe.

Now Bin-Nun and his scouts would know from the start that she hadn't betrayed him and everything was a go.

"This is your blood on your doorpost, Rahab," he told her. "This is the sign for our angels of death to pass over your house when they storm the city."

Deker watched her eyes grow wide and mouth drop as she heaved a sigh of relief and wonder. Truly, she considered this an answered prayer.

"If this cord should be removed, however," he warned her, "we will be blameless in your deaths."

Rahab nodded profusely and repeated everything to her brothers, who glanced at one another and nodded tentatively.

"What is the second condition?" she demanded anxiously.

"You must bring your entire family into this house or they will not be passed over and will be slaughtered with the rest of your people."

"You mean my mother and father and brothers?"

"Yes," he told her. "They will be spared."

"What about my brother Ram's family?"

Deker could hear Elezar groan behind him as he answered, "Them too."

"And my girls who work for me?"

"Holy shit," Elezar said. "Enough, Deker. One whore is enough."

Deker ignored him. "All who belong to you, Rahab," he said. "Bring them into your house. But do not tell them about our deal. Simply offer them refuge in advance of the siege."

Rahab again repeated everything to her brothers, who finally began to ease up. Deker realized she had probably negotiated quite a lot on behalf of the family for years and they'd trusted her on more than one occasion to secure the best terms on the deal points.

"Remember," Deker warned her again, "whoever ventures outside the door of your house into the street, his blood-or hers-shall be on his own head, and we will be guiltless."

Rahab nodded slowly, and Deker realized the deal had hit a snag.

"Here we go," grumbled Elezar.

"We have a problem," Rahab said. "Ram can get his family inside the house before the attack. But he must take his post on the walls when called or he will be labeled a deserter and they will look for him and his family."

"Then what's he doing here right now?" Elezar shot back.

"His shift starts soon," Rahab said. "He'll have to leave."

Elezar was suspicious. "How convenient that all of your brothers happen to be off duty just when we happen to climb through your window."

"Oh, these aren't all my brothers," Rahab said. "I have six more on duty right now."

"Jesus Christ, Deker!" Elezar cried out too loudly. "This is why Bin-Nun takes no prisoners."

The tension was palpable in the room, Rahab and her brothers listening carefully to see if Elezar's bark had attracted any attention, however unlikely that would be from their location.

Deker lowered his voice and said, "You want us to be captured, Elezar?"

"We're all but captured already, Deker, what with you bringing half the city into our little operation."

"That's why Ram here is taking me into the fortress tonight," Deker told them all.

Rahab gasped. "Bin-Nun is attacking tonight?"

"No. I am. With these."

Deker pulled out his C-4 bricks.

Rahab and her brothers looked completely mystified.

"Go ahead, Deker," Elezar goaded. "Explain your magic mud bricks to her. See what big Ram thinks of staking his life on something you can't demonstrate to him until you actually bring the walls down."

"These bricks create fire to melt your walls," he told them all, neglecting to mention that such a feat normally required hundreds of small shots and far more than six days to prep, and that was with robust computer technology to control and time the blasts to the millisecond.

Rahab translated.

"How can this be?" Ram demanded. "You have only fifteen bricks and our walls contain thousands upon thousands."

"I only have to melt a section of a wall, not the whole wall," Deker explained. "It's like cutting down a palm tree to make it fall in a particular direction. If you can help me find the weakest part of the northern wall of the fortress, I can melt the bricks at the bottom. All the bricks on top of it will collapse and avalanche down the slope and maybe break through the lower city."

"So what you're really saying is that you're going to blow the walls tonight if you can," Elezar said, challenging him before Rahab and her brothers.

Deker said, "If Reahn security proves tougher than expected and forces me to plant one well-placed blast to bring down both walls at once, then yes, I have to take the shot."

"That's not the plan," Elezar said, careful not to tip off the six-day timetable to Rahab and her brothers.

"And Bin-Nun told you this when?" Deker asked. "I recall you missing the first half of my conversation with him out in the fields."

"It's in the bloody Hebrew Bible, you ignoramus. But I forgot. You don't read."

Elezar was standing by the window for effect, the pillars of fire in the distance, the threat of Yahweh's coming wrath palpable to Rahab and her brothers.

All Deker could think of right now was the bowl in his pack that Kane had given him, and the memory of how he had failed to save Rachel. He wouldn't fail Rahab.

Deker lowered his voice and spoke in English. "The longer we wait, the more we risk exposure and capture by Hamas," he reasoned. "It's use them or lose them with the C-4 bricks."