Warriors jeered.
“Deliver you?” Anomia laughed. “You’re going to be sucked down into the bowels of the earth, never to be seen again.” Stepping back, she spoke loudly to those gathered. “Listen to me and obey! Her name is never to be spoken among the Chatti again. Let it be as though she never walked the face of the earth.” They cried out their assent.
Atretes went to his knees, his lips moving as the Ionian’s had done. Anomia saw Rizpah smile at him tenderly.
“Take her!”
Rud grasped Rizpah’s arms.
“No, Rud,” Rizpah said, looking into his weathered face. “Let me go alone, lest you die as well.”
His eyes flickered.
“Do you listen to her or me?”
Rud’s grip tightened. He pushed Rizpah out onto a wide plank, but as he came near the end, his feet slipped. Releasing her, he tried to save himself. Instead, he lost his balance, and they both fell.
“Throw him a rope!” Holt shouted. Panic spread through the gathering as they saw their high chief in the bog, flaying for a handhold.
“Hurry!” he screamed.
A rope snaked out to him, but he was already going under.
Atretes shut his eyes tightly so he wouldn’t have to watch his wife drowning with his friend. “Lord Jesus, God of mercy,” he moaned, as men shouted. He heard Rud choking and crying out for help.
The men pulled and pulled and then fell back as the rope was released.
Silence fell, and then another scream rent the air, a woman’s scream.
“Look!” Freyja pointed, her face draining of all color. “Look! Do you see?”
Restraining hands dropped from Atretes as Chatti warriors cried out and fled or fell upon their faces in terror. Uttering a moaning wail, Anomia stared and still could not believe. And then fear such as she had never known filled her and she ran wildly, disappearing into the shadows of the forest.
“He brought me up out of the pit of destruction, out of the miry clay, and he set my feet upon a rock, making my footsteps firm.”
Rizpah kept walking until she was twenty feet beyond the place where Rud had sunk into the bog, and there she stood, in the middle of the bog, as though on solid ground.
Beside her was a man, tall and powerful, shimmering with radiant white.
The sun rose brilliantly behind Rizpah, and for an instant Atretes wondered if he had gone mad and was imagining what he thought he saw. “Rizpah!” he cried out, throwing his hand up to shield his eyes from the brightness, unable to see her. “Rizpah!”
Then suddenly, he saw her again. She was running toward him, the dazzling light still at her back. He met her at the edge of the bog and caught her in his arms, pulling her close, holding her tightly against him. He buried his face in the curve of her neck, his hands covering her shaven head, his legs buckling. She went to her knees with him.
Shaking violently, eyes wide, Herigast stared out into the swamp. Sunlight streamed through the distant trees, almost blinding him. He realized he was shouting and crying and laughing all at the same time. The white light faded into softer colors of morning.
Rolf rose from the ground where he had prostrated himself. The few who had remained rose with him. Most had run away.
Atretes rose, drawing his wife up with him. “Jesus is Lord!” he said, a joyous conviction ringing in his voice that hadn’t been there before. The sound of it echoed through the forest, driving back the darkness. “He is Lord of the heavens and the earth and all that is within it. Bless his holy name!”
“Bless his holy name,” Herigast said, awed, heart still pounding.
Trembling, Freyja rose from the ground where she had prostrated herself. She fumbled with the amber talisman bearing the runes of Tiwaz, removing it from around her neck. With a soft cry, she flung the pendant far out into the bog and watched it quickly sink from her sight. The fear and despair that had so often held her captive melted away.
Rolf waited, uncertain. Not until Atretes turned and looked at him would he would know whether he lived or died. In either case, so be it. Atretes released Rizpah and turned. When he let his wife go and walked toward him, Rolf lowered his eyes, feeling the heavy purpose in each step that brought Atretes nearer.
“Forgive me,” Atretes said hoarsely. “I was a fool.”
Rolf’s head came up. Tears filled his eyes. “Less than I.”
Atretes gripped the younger man’s shoulder. “It seems to be the failing in all men.”
“We must tell the others!” Freyja said, face shining.
But someone else had reached them first.
Marta burst from the forest, thrusting Caleb and clothing in Rizpah’s arms. “You must go. Take her quickly, Atretes, or they’ll kill you, too.”