I had been thirsty many times, but I had never felt such a craving for water. My tongue felt too thick for my mouth and my throat was as dry as the sand. I found it unpleasant to speak through a passage so parched.
The eastern sky began to gray and still we had not reached the well. Except for the small thread of water left in Wabitu’s torn skin, none of us had taken water or milk since the morning before.
“Just there,” Judah said. “Very close now. Just over those dunes.”
“Don’t say it’s just there, when it’s never just there,” I said.
Judah looked wounded by my accusation. “But it is!”
I wanted to say that with him it was never just there unless just meant “very far,” but I didn’t have the energy to explain, so I remained silent.
“It is just there, Maviah. You will see.”
It wasn’t just there and so I did not see.
Saba finally stopped us by a grouping of rocks. These he pulled from the sand to bare their undersides.
“Lick the dew,” he instructed.
“Don’t worry, Maviah,” Judah chimed in. “This dirt can’t harm you.”
Though the dirty moisture we managed to lick off those sandy rocks might have filled only one nutshell, it was enough to stay despair.
We remounted and struck south again.
The sun rose over the horizon, promising to bake the flesh from our bones.
“Close now,” Judah promised, smiling. “There over that one hill awaits our salvation.”
And this time he was right. The moment we crested the dune, we saw the depression below, dug out over many years by men eager for the waters of life.
“The stars do not lie,” Judah said.
Farther north the Nabataeans were known for digging great cisterns and lining them with stone, then keeping these hidden from all but their own people. During the rains the cisterns would fill up, to be used when the less fortunate were dying of thirst. Indeed, these cisterns were rumored to be so large that many Nabataeans took to hiding in them when attacked, leaving the enemy at a loss, for their openings were very small and easily concealed.
But this wasn’t a Nabataean cistern. It was a well that might be dry.
Yet the camels knew, and already they were staggering down the slope, roaring.
“It’s a good sign, Maviah!” Judah cried, bounding behind me. “They smell the water!”
Saba scanned the horizon for any sign of Bedu. Ironically, there is no greater place of death in the desert than about a well, for all men war to control water. But today there were no Bedu nearby.
With water so close at hand, my thirst became intolerable. The moment I slid to the sand, I stumbled after Judah, who had reached the well and was peering down.
A single pole spanned two mounts over the stone lip of the Sidin well. A long rope dipped into the darkness below.
I knelt beside Judah and looked down, nudged impatiently by both camels. The musky scent that filled my nostrils spoke of moisture. Every bit of my shriveled flesh longed for but one sip.
Saba pulled up the rope and tied one of our empty skins to its end, then threw it over the pole and began to lower it. For a long time, the rope snaked downward.
We all listened for the telltale splashing of the skin.
Deeper. Even deeper. Still no one spoke.
And then we heard it.
“Praise be to God!” Judah cried.
“May it be pure,” Saba muttered.
He pulled the rope, hand over hand, hauling his draw to the surface. Then out and onto the ground, pushing aside his she-camel, who was nosing for the water.
Saba dipped his hand into the skin and drew some water into the light. It was the color of red sand, but it was wet, and I wanted to shove my head into that skin.
Bringing his hand to his lips, Saba took one sip, looked at me with his deep-brown eyes, held the water in his mouth for a moment, then spit it out.
“It’s spoiled.”
Unwilling to accept Saba’s conclusion, Judah thrust his hand into the skin and sampled a mouthful.
He too spit the water out.
“Bitter.”
“What do you mean?” I demanded. “It will keep us alive!”
I reached for the skin, but Judah pushed my hand away. “No, Maviah. This water is poison. You will surely die.”
Saba turned and offered the water to Wabitu, but with one sniff the she-camel withdrew.
“Even the camels will refuse this. What a camel refuses to drink, a man cannot.”
I stared at them, aghast.
“So, then, we have no water. And there are no other wells close enough to reach.”
“Yes. This is true.”
I looked between them.
“Then we die here?”
“No.” Judah looked at Saba’s she-camel. “Now our lives are in Wabitu’s udders. We will force her to drink this water. If it does not kill her, she may produce milk. If God wills it, her milk will save us.”