Arim stared, overwhelmed. The Light of Blood, so offered, set the boy free of his obligation. Judah’s heart could not be questioned, though I suspected he wasn’t interested in being bound to any Thamud. Best put the incident behind. His wound would heal.
Arim scrambled to his feet, quickly stepped up to Judah, grabbed his bloody hand, and wiped Judah’s blood on his own forehead.
“The Light of Blood,” he said. Arim clasped both of Judah’s arms. “Before the eyes of Shams I beg you be a brother to me and my family.”
Judah hesitated. “I am a Jew who does not pray to Shams. How can I be your brother?”
“Ah? It is my debt to offer, not yours to refuse! I accept your mercy and now offer my life. I beg you not leave me in the depths of despair without honor. Do not discard me into the valley of misery, I implore you!”
“I have set you free!”
“And now I offer myself to you as your protector. Am I not worthy?”
When Judah didn’t return his agreement, Arim continued, speaking quickly.
“I care not if you are a Jew. My sheikh, the great Fahak bin Haggag, teaches that we are all from the same earth no matter the gods in the heavens, only some are wiser than others. Fear not that my people are wiser, for you will be my brother!”
While Arim made his plea for this blood bond, my eyes were on their water. We were but dust without it, and only Arim could offer it to us, for we could not otherwise honorably take it, even if it meant our death.
If Judah refused Arim’s blood bond, the boy would be deeply dishonored. At any rate, how could Judah refuse this plea for kinship while we were in such desperate straits?
I saw a faint smile on Judah’s face as he dipped his head. “Then I am honored,” he said.
A great relief washed over Arim’s face and he smiled like the dawning of a new sun. It was as if he, not we, had been offered life.
With half of my mind still on their water, I was deeply grateful when Arim, having been saved by Judah, immediately retrieved two smaller skins from the tent and proudly offered them to us.
“Now drink life, as you have given it to me,” he said.
There are no adequate words to describe the relief I felt as the sweet water slipped past my lips and wetted my parched throat. Water was indeed the lifeblood of the sands. I could feel my dried bones awakening as that water cooled my body.
Arim smiled at me as I drank. “You should slow, woman,” he said. “You will not find life by drowning.”
His words struck me in that moment. I had been drowning since the day of my birth.
I thought these things with the skin at my lips and then drank again. All the trouble that I had left behind did not exist in those few moments as life flooded my bones.
But once my thirst had been quenched, I remembered who I was, and whispers of dread mocked me once again, for I knew that I had been saved only to face death. If not tomorrow, then the next day, or the next.
CHAPTER NINE
ARIM, THE THAMUD boy of sixteen, proved himself to be a man in all manners, including his interest in finding a woman. After having established his blood bond with Judah, he set his eyes on me.
“She is your wife?” he asked.
“She has no husband,” Judah said. Then, seeing the curiosity in Arim’s eyes, he added, “Neither is she for you.”
This discouraged Arim only for a few minutes. I do believe that most everything he did thereafter was at least in part to impress me.
When I handed the skin to Saba, Arim encouraged me to drink even more, saying that water made a woman shine like the moon.
When he prepared the herb tea, he served Saba and Judah first but looked at me when he spoke of how it had come from Persia and was without doubt the finest tea in all of the Nafud. It was to be taken by only the greatest warriors born to vanquish all who would defy the noble Thamud.
When I was sent to collect our camels, he insisted on accompanying me so that I would know no harm, for he was highly skilled with the sword.
Judah immediately refused. I think he was jealous of Arim’s ambition, and I cannot say that I wasn’t intrigued by the small rivalry.
After we revived her with fresh water, Wabitu came to herself with only running stool to show for the foul water she’d taken at the well. By the high sun, we were mounted and headed toward their main camp.
It took us less than half the day to reach the Thamud, as Arim had said it would. Arim rode with his sister on one of their camels, having offered me their second. We carried their goat in one of our saddlebags, which I insisted be my own, as I was riding his camel. It rode behind me with only its head showing, for it was a small goat. I found it impossible to discourage the beast from nibbling at my cloak until Judah tied its mouth with a leather twine.