Steve Cash - The Meq

I lifted her head gently and she sighed again. She had been shot through the shoulder, probably knocked from the horse by the impact and then rolled into the brush. I wasn’t sure if she was conscious and less sure what to say to her. I had never thought about it in all the years I had been looking for her.

“Star?” I whispered.

Her eyes fluttered and opened about halfway, then found mine and opened wide. She tried to speak, saying something in Jisil’s archaic dialect, then fell back into unconsciousness, either from the sight of me or the pain of her wound, or both.

I dragged her out of the brush roughly. There was no other way. I pulled back her robe and looked at her shoulder. It was still bleeding, but I knew it would stop. The bullet had not lodged and the wound was clean. I bound it tightly with her veil and mine, then stood up and looked for Jisil’s horse. There was no chance of getting out to the south because of Mulai’s camp. The east and west only promised more desert. The only way of getting out was to the north and that would take a good horse.

I found him near Jisil’s body, still skittish and watching me as I approached. The wind tore at Jisil’s turban and stung my face and eyes with sand and grit. The animal was a chief’s horse and ignored the wind. To him, the wind had never been an enemy, only an ally, and that gave me an idea. I tore off the part of Jisil’s turban that was loose and blowing. I started walking toward the horse, deliberately, and wrapping the cloth around my own head at the same time, slowly. I stopped within five feet and waited. After a cautious snort and whiff of me, he lowered his head and shook his reins. I turned and walked back toward Star, not looking once over my shoulder. When I had almost reached her, I heard his hooves crossing the trail of crushed stones behind me. It was a gamble and I had been lucky, but Jisil’s horse, one of the finest Arabs I had ever seen, never questioned it.

I loaded and strapped my things on first, then with great difficulty, I managed to get Star on the horse and in the saddle behind me. I literally tied her to my back, even though she was taller and heavier. It was not her weight that gave me problems or concern. It was what I discovered when I first picked her up. It changed the way I touched her, moved her, and it had probably changed everything for Jisil.

Star was pregnant, very pregnant.

We traveled at a steady pace along the trail to Ghadames and the oldest of the caravan routes. Jisil’s horse knew the way when I didn’t. Star remained in a semiconscious state and only took water with the aid of my fingers.

Somewhere outside Ghadames, we rested near a grove of palms. It was midday. There were mounted and motorized patrols in the distance. What army for which country, I couldn’t tell. I found water and traded for biscuits, helped Star to a place in the shade, then sat by her and took out what I’d caught in the wind from Jisil, what I hoped was a map.

It was a map and a little more. Jisil had outlined the north coast of Africa from Tripoli to Tunis. He had marked two places on the coast by name and symbol. The one to the east was named Sabratha and marked with an X. I had never heard of this place. He also had a trail of arrows that headed west, avoiding Sabratha and ending in the other place, which he had marked with a circle. The name was Carthage. In the margins he had scribbled notes and several names, all in Arabic, except one—“Cheng.”

I looked over at Star and it came to me. I remembered Jisil’s two midnight rides a few days before. He had been making a deal. The new pieces fitted into the old puzzle. Jisil had fallen in love with a slave — Star — and was trying to save her and the baby from a deal that had been sealed long ago, a deal that Mulai would not break, a deal with the Fleur-du-Mal. I figured Cheng would be working for the Fleur-du-Mal or against him. Either way, he could lead me to him.

I had heard of Carthage and I definitely knew of Cheng. There was no choice but to take Star there. She needed to be free and safe to have her baby. Her shoulder I knew would heal. I could end the madness there, in Carthage, because Cheng would be expecting Jisil, not me.

I followed the map generally and asked directions occasionally. Sometimes I spoke in my rough Berber, sometimes in French, and once in English. I no longer cared about any pretense or disguise. Star continued to drift in and out of consciousness. I tried to stay behind her when she woke, so my presence wouldn’t startle her. She drank more water, but she was weak from the loss of blood. Without being aware of it, she often held her belly when she slept.

South of Gàbes, a day and a half later, we came out of the desert and the mountains. Birds circled overhead, and even though we couldn’t see it yet, we could smell the salt and the sea air of the Mediterranean.

We camped that night near a rocky outcrop on the high plain between Gàbes and Sousse. Star was pale and drawn and I couldn’t seem to make her comfortable. Her sleep was more delusional. I tried to think of what Emme would do. Sirius was as bright as a streetlight in the sky. Star opened her eyes once and stared at it, then mumbled something in the old Berber dialect and fell back into her restless sleep.

Then, as if someone had whispered it to me, I remembered something, something that had once been a pillow of dreams for this daughter of Carolina, something I still carried with me — my mama’s glove. I reached in my pack and pulled it out. Carolina had said she would never forget it. I unwrapped the old scarf with the drowning Chinamen and held it in my hand. I put my other hand inside the glove and pounded the pocket with my fist. Everything worked, everything felt good. I slipped my hand out of the glove and placed it under Star’s head. I put the scarf in her hands and covered her with a blanket. The rest would have to be magic. It was the only medicine I had. I had already decided that if she didn’t improve by morning, I was going to find a town and a doctor.

As soon as I awoke, I knew something had changed. Star was awake and staring at me. It was not hostile or even lively. It was as if she was searching for something underwater and couldn’t quite get the physics right, couldn’t quite reach it. But she was alert and conscious. I rose up and faced her, sitting cross-legged the way Carolina, Georgia, and I used to. Neither of us spoke. She saw Jisil’s horse not far away and, without taking her eyes from mine, nodded toward the horse. I slowly shook my head and she looked down once, but that was her only reaction. She reached one hand up from her belly and held it over her wounded shoulder, asking me with her eyes if I was the one who had attended to it. I nodded once. I showed her Jisil’s map and pointed to Carthage, asking her with my eyes if that’s where we should go. She nodded once. I smiled and she didn’t. She hadn’t decided yet if she trusted me, but she held on tight to Mama’s glove and the old scarf. I stayed silent and we traveled that way. The fact that I was still a child, still “physically” the same, was a blessing and a curse. It would help her remember her past, possibly, but never explain her present. I stayed silent and tried to let the present win her trust. The past would come later.

We rode overland and off the trail the last fifty miles approaching the ruins of Carthage. Only Jisil’s horse had drawn any real attention. Our skin color and appearance seemed to have little effect on the few people we saw. It was another world to the one in the deep desert. Star had to dismount twice along the way because of the pain, not in her shoulder but in her belly and back. We were walking with the horse between us when we stopped on a natural rise that opened up two views around us. It was twilight and the sun was setting in the west over what I assumed were the Atlas Mountains. To the north and east, in the long shadows, were the fields and pastures, roads and ghosts of roads leading to what had once been Carthage and the harbor beyond.