The Caleb Collection Read online

  Rebecca pushed herself from the sand and pulled him up by his arm. “I want to hear all about it, but first let’s walk. I’m tired of sitting around this camp. Aren’t you?”

  He staggered to his feet, off balance. “No, actually, I’m not really. We could talk to Miriam if you—”

  “No, let’s explore the rocks.” She pulled him and he stumbled after her. “Come on, a change of scenery will do us wonders.” She laughed, partly because the moment called for laughter, and partly because of the astonishment that lit his face.

  Rebecca eased back next to him, but she didn’t release his hand. Instead, she swung it in her own.

  She smiled and looked into his eyes. They were deep pools of green, and for a brief moment she imagined they were the ocean he had talked about.

  “I’m not sure it would be wise for us to go far,” he said, clearly uncomfortable.

  “What’s the matter, Caleb? You’re afraid to shine your light on my path? Don’t be silly. I want to hear your story. Tell me, where do you live?”

  He paused and they strolled towards the boulders. “I live in a monastery.”

  “Where is your monastery?”

  “Two days that way.” He pointed west.

  “And who lives there with you?”

  “My mother, Leiah, and my father, Jason.”

  “They know where you are?”

  “No. No, they don’t. I had to leave suddenly when bandits overtook it.”

  “Bandits! You’re not serious! You just left? What about your parents?”

  “Oh, they’re safe. The bandits were after me and will leave as soon as they realize I’m not coming back.”

  “How do you know that?” Rebecca asked, surprised.

  “Father Hadane told me.” He shrugged. “I believe him.”

  “And would you jump off a cliff if Father Hadane told you it was okay?” she asked in a biting tone.

  He smiled. “I might. If the ocean was down there.”

  Yes, of course, how could she not know. The ocean. They walked through a narrow canyon formed by two large boulders. The shade felt good, and Rebecca deliberately slowed the pace. He pulled his hand from hers and she let it go naturally.

  “And how long have you been in this monastery of yours?” she asked.

  “I grew up there. That’s the problem, I think.”

  “Living in a monastery?”

  “No. Growing up. Growing up isn’t a bad thing, of course, physically or spiritually. But to grow up spiritually means to mature in spiritual ways, not to bring human maturity to spirituality.”

  “Hmm.”

  He scratched his head with one hand. “I’ve grown up in my own wisdom, and now I know why Christ said that unless you become—not are, not want to be, but become—like a child you cannot enter the kingdom! I am becoming again.”

  Caleb seemed to have forgotten his shyness. “That’s what this is about!” he said, turning excitedly to her as if the realization had just dawned on him. “It’s a renaissance; it’s a rebirth! I’m beginning to walk where I once walked.”

  “Is that right? A renaissance? And what can a child know that a man can’t? I’ve seen your renaissance, and frankly, it makes me wonder.”

  He stooped, picked up a fistful of sand, and flung it into the air. “Wonder! Exactly! Wonder, that’s what a child sees better.” They’d come to a small pile of rocks and he jumped up on one, spinning to her. “And do you know what follows wonder?”

  She smiled. “Tell me.”

  “Belief! Ha!” He leapt from the rock. “Belief!”

  “Belief. Yes, but belief in what, that’s the question. I’m sure you expect me to believe that you’ve cornered the market on truth. No offense, but while you and your leader are jumping up and down like jack rabbits, the real world is finding a slow, painful death. Only the Messiah will change that.” She didn’t mean to inject her own beliefs, and she immediately chided herself for doing so.

  “The Messiah? The Messiah is here.” Caleb thumped his chest. “He is the ocean. That is the light Father Hadane has asked me to shed on your path, dear Rebecca.”

  He was taking the whole thing about light too seriously, and she decided it had to stop. She would do the influencing, not Caleb.

  Rebecca walked up to him, smiling. “Enough of the ocean. It’s making me thirsty.” She reached up and gently pushed the hair from his forehead, allowing her finger to linger, but only barely. “I want to know about you. About your life. Tell me how you came to be who you are today. Tell me about the monastery.”

  Caleb instinctively looked away, uncomfortable.

  Not too fast, Rebecca. Goodness, listen to her! Not too fast, as if she, who had never even dated a man, somehow held the secrets to seduction. She was more accustomed to killing men.

  I am a woman. Seduction was born into my blood!

  She turned from him and walked a few steps with her arms behind her back, swaying just barely.

  “Tell me about yourself, Caleb,” she repeated. Was he even watching her? Was he seeing how she moved with such grace and stepped as only a woman can step? She turned slowly.

  No. He was staring off, thinking of how to answer her question.

  “I was left at the monastery as an infant,” he said. He began to tell her his story, exactly as she had asked.

  At first she just looked at him, still plagued by questions about how to best lure him. But as he continued, she found herself drawn into an incredible tale she would never have guessed possible. There was no rush— he was letting her into his world, and that alone would disarm him, she thought. So she encouraged him with a few questions, asking for details.

  Caleb sat on the rock and gave her details. They came out of him like water from a broken dam. It was as much self-reflection as telling her, she thought, but she was so taken by his story that she no longer cared.

  They talked for a long time, into the afternoon. Several times they walked, and each time Rebecca led them deeper into the boulders, away from the camp. Caleb had shed any sign of apprehension at her company. He relived his life with her, using animated gestures and laughing, and on two occasions, even crying. His tears did not concern her as much as the fact that she felt a few of her own gathering in her eyes.

  It struck her, after he told how he’d spent the last five years struggling with deep loneliness, that she liked this man. She at least cared for him. The notion of seducing him suddenly felt absurd.

  Stop it! It is absurd that you are allowing emotion to compromise your mission. That is what’s absurd!

  He asked her about her past, and she fabricated a story about archaeological studies in New York, where she met and married an American who later died in Jerusalem, the victim of an assassin’s bullet. She thought it would be good for him to feel what she felt about her own loss, so she wove it into a tale of true love. Now her talking was as much self-reflection as telling.

  They had worked their way deep into a canyon by midafternoon. Soft sand, not rock salt, covered the ground here. They had spent the last hour talking about small things, the kind of things old friends talk about. This was good. He had let her in. They had even laughed together in a way that Rebecca found genuinely pleasing. She was most definitely in character, she thought. It was time to teach Caleb that she was a woman.

  He was sitting in the sand, cross-legged, looking at the sky in reflection. Rebecca walked up and eased to the ground beside him with her legs folded to one side so that she leaned on her right arm.

  “It is amazing how people are drawn together,” she said, looking to the sky with him. She smiled. “Here we are in the desert, far away from our homes, two strangers, yet seeking the same thing.”

  “Hmm.”

  The desert air was hot, despite the shade. Rebecca was suddenly terrified to say more. But she did anyway.

  “I’ve been lonely too, Caleb.”

  For a long while she didn’t know what his response would be because she was afraid to look at him.
They just sat there, close, but still innocent. It wasn’t too late to pull back and suggest they return.

  “I think the worst kind of loneliness comes from not belonging,” Caleb said.

  Rebecca’s heart spiked. He wasn’t discouraging her.

  “You’re right,” she said softly. “I’m not sure I’ve ever belonged, really— not to a people, not to a country, not to a man.”

  “Then you understand my problem as well,” he said. “I feel like I’m stranded between worlds.”

  “I would give anything to belong.”

  He sighed. “Yes.”

  It is now or never, Rebecca thought. She slipped her left hand towards his shoulder. He didn’t move and she glanced up to see that he wasn’t looking. She touched him.

  Caleb might have flinched; she wasn’t sure. Natural enough.

  Rebecca let her finger run down his biceps. She turned toward him, so that her face was at his shoulder. She could smell his musky skin. He still didn’t move.

  She eased over so that her mouth was near his neck.

  “You are a very handsome man, Caleb.” Her voice sounded sultry yet innocent. “We are connected, you and I.”

  She was breathing steadily now, from her own uneasiness rather than desire, but he wouldn’t know the difference. He still did not budge. She couldn’t see his face, but she assumed his stillness was a good sign.

  “You have what I want, and I have what you want,” she breathed softly in his ear and leaned closer. She closed her eyes and let her lips touch his hot cheek. “You want what . . .”

  He suddenly jerked away and leapt to his feet. Rebecca nearly fell forward.

  “What are you doing?” he asked.

  She righted herself. One look at his round eyes, and she knew she had misjudged him. Blood flooded her face.

  “What do you mean, what am I doing?”

  “You . . . You were kissing me!”

  “Yes, I was kissing you. I was kissing you because you said you were lonely, and I said I was lonely, and when I put my hand on you, you encouraged me to kiss you.”

  He blinked, still stunned. “I didn’t encourage you.”

  “You didn’t move.”

  “I was frozen. I couldn’t move!”

  Rebecca scrambled to her feet, furious now. She had bared her soul to this man, and he was appalled by it?

  “What is wrong with you?” she yelled at him. “Don’t you have warm blood anywhere under that skin of yours? Haven’t you ever been kissed by a woman?”

  They stared at each other—he in shock, she in anger. She’d never kissed a man, but that hardly mattered. He was being unreasonable to resist her so easily.

  “No,” he said.

  “Exactly! That’s your problem! It’s time you grew up. This may come as a shock to you, but you’re not a child anymore! You’re a man. Men fall in love with women and kiss them and they have children and grow old together. They don’t hide away in the desert looking for oceans to dive into!” She had said too much.

  “And have you kissed a man?” he asked.

  His question took her off guard. “Of course! I was married, remember?”

  “You really were? I thought you were just making that all up.”

  He knew?

  Rebecca felt as awkward and embarrassed as she could ever remember feeling. He was impossible. She did the only thing she could think to do. She walked up to him and slapped him on the cheek.

  “You’re impossible!”

  She stormed off, horrified. What in God’s name had she just done?

  Other than make an utter fool of herself?

  That’s it, Rebecca. No more games!

  23

  The sun was already setting when the Hercules circled once over the Tower Oasis and fanned out for a landing on the salt flats. After two days of perfect silence, the turbine’s whine sent a disturbing chill through Ismael’s skull.

  A large man who walked with a Republican Guard gait (more like a rooster than a man) was the first off the plane. He strode towards Ismael. The others waited by the rear door, which was now lowering.

  The man stopped and saluted. “Captain Asid reporting, sir. Can I tell them to off-load?”

  “Yes.”

  The captain signaled to the men who immediately began leading horses out of the tail. His father had kept his promise to keep him in charge; that was good. For the first time in days, Ismael felt the familiar surge of power run through his veins.

  “What men and provisions do you have?” he demanded.

  “Ten men, all Republican Guard cavalry. Twelve horses and two Jeeps, sir. We have automatic weapons and enough explosive munitions to wake up the dead if you want us to, sir.”

  “What have you been told about our mission?”

  “Only that we’re in Ethiopia without authorization, engaging Israeli soldiers who are also here without authorization.”

  Ismael nodded. “Good.” Two Jeeps mounded with provisions rolled off the large prop plane behind the captain. “Where is the tracker?”

  “Hasam.” He spun and whistled over the engines.

  A thin man dressed in tan cotton pants, which were ragged at the heels, ran towards them. He made an awkward attempt to salute. “I am Hasam.”

  “You know this desert?” Ismael demanded.

  “Yes.”

  “Two days ago a caravan left these springs and headed north.” He pointed in the direction the tracks had led. “Unfortunately, the wind has erased their tracks. Do you know where they were headed?”

  “If they headed due north, then they would either stop at the Manessa, an outcropping of boulders one and a half day’s journey, or beyond at the Tagasal Springs, three days’ journey. Or they may have gone west, headed for—”

  “They didn’t go west. I said north. If you were going north, where would you stop?”

  The Hercules revved up, screaming over the man’s response. Ismael waited patiently while the transport taxied through a U-turn and then lumbered over the sand and into the air.

  Ismael looked at the tracker and raised his brows.

  “I would always look for a watering hole,” he said. “But if I were in a caravan leaving from here, I would probably have water—”

  “Please, the answer to my question will do. They left from here and they were a caravan. I told you that. Where would they go?”

  Hasam glanced at the captain who stared ahead. “To the boulders for a few days, until my water was low, then on to the spring.”

  The men led groups of horses towards the boulders. Both Jeeps blazed along the flats, spewing salt behind. “Have your men water the horses. We’ll eat and leave by midnight, while it is cool,” Ismael said. “I want to be in their camp before the sun sets tomorrow.”

  Sleep had come hard for Rebecca. Her failure with Caleb loomed in her mind like a laughing monster. She’d first considered going back out to collect him and then drag him back to the monastery with her, but doing so would be impossible without the tribe’s help. And there was the small problem of Caleb himself. She knew that he would never respond to force. He would probably choose death over anything she demanded of him. Especially now, in light of her seduction.

  She finally decided that there was only one way to resolve the problem. The most difficult part would be approaching him again after making such an idiot of herself.

  No one knew where he was the next morning. She searched the rocks and found him on a sandy shelf above the camp. He stood with his arms spread and his chin tilted up, dressed in the same tunic he’d worn last night. If she wasn’t mistaken, he’d spent the night out here.

  She approached him from behind. “Good morning.”

  He didn’t move. This was not a good sign.

  She leaned back on a rock, crossed her arms, and watched Caleb’s face. His eyes were closed. “You are supposed to watch over me, or did you forget?”

  “Good morning, Rebecca. Did you sleep well?”

  “Yes. And you?” />
  “Yes, I slept wonderfully.” He smiled, opened his eyes, and lowered his arms.

  “You slept out here?” His eyes seemed greener than she remembered. His dark, wavy hair hung to his neck, slightly disheveled.

  “Yes.”

  “You look refreshed.”

  “I’m seeing clearer, I think.”

  Rebecca raised an eyebrow. “Does sleeping on the sand always make someone see clearer?” He didn’t seem at all affected by the episode yesterday. It was all slightly unnerving.

  “No. But being with God does.”

  She nodded. “I have to ask your forgiveness—”

  “Done,” he said. “Never happened.”

  She looked at him and decided he was right. They should pretend it never happened.

  “So what have you been doing all night? Really.”

  “Staring into the eyes of God,” Caleb said.

  What an odd thing to say. “And what was he doing?”

  “Staring back into my eyes.” He turned and faced the desert, hands limp at his sides.

  He was both intoxicating and frustrating at once. Intoxicating because the way that he looked at her made Rebecca want to stare into God’s eyes with him; frustrating because she knew that the notion was absurd. Surely there had to be a thread of reason left in him.

  “And what does God tell you when you stare into his eyes? What are you accomplishing out here, Caleb?”

  “God tells me nothing, Rebecca. We enjoy each other’s company. I think it’s why he made me.” He twisted his head to her and his eyes flashed mischievously. “What could be better than to enthrall the mind with the eyes that blinked you into existence?”

  She swallowed and forced herself to continue down her line of reasoning before she gave it up altogether. “Yes, but to what end, Caleb? While you’re here enjoying God’s company, the world is coming apart at the seams somewhere. My people are being killed. Is that what the Nazarene ordered?”

  He was beyond reasoning. It was time to bring Caleb into the real world.

  She looked out to the desert. “I want to tell you something, Caleb. A part of my story that I omitted yesterday.”

  Caleb looked at her, amused perhaps.