Beneath the Lion's Gaze (14 page)

“Where did you go?” he asked, moving to sit by her.

Sara took in the place she now called home. It was large, a two-story house amongst the many one- and two-room mud homes that circled it. The rocky paths that led from one home to the next were well worn from years of countless neighborly visits. A large water jug, rubbed clean, leaned against one door. The residents of Hailu’s compound shared what they had, and trusted to get it back.

“I was at St. Gabriel’s,” she said. She settled her legs further under her skirt and tried to ignore the pain.

Dawit took her hand. “You look sad,” he told her. He followed her gaze around the compound. “I’m going to be very busy for a while.”

Sara sensed the electricity in his words, heard in what he said the power of those things he wasn’t saying. They sat together, warmed by companionship that asked no questions. Around them ran children’s footprints, scattered over once-muddied paths. Dawit’s dog lay sprawled over a bone, his head resting on top of Tizita’s make-believe castle. To their right, colorful threadbare clothes swung in the breeze like old flags.

EMAMA SEBLE LIVED IN
a single room behind a door painted the deep brown-red of sunburnt flesh. It swung open before Sara had a chance to knock. She was holding Tizita.

“Hurry up.” Emama Seble pulled her inside. She adjusted the black scarf around her head. “Give her to me.” Tongues of fire flickered above a melting candle in the center of the room.

“What are you going to do?” Sara asked.

Loose shadows swept over Emama Seble. “I’m going to help her.”

“I’m not leaving,” Sara said.

“I didn’t ask you to, now give her to me. I have hot water and it can’t get cold,” Emama Seble said.

The old woman took the shrunken girl to the courtyard, towards a large pot used by the women for boiling water. The thick scent of eucalyptus rose from the pot.

“What are you doing?” Sara asked.

“You should have brought her yesterday as soon as you came back from the church.” The old woman stepped closer to the pot. The fire at the base hissed and sighed under a mound of coal and wood, it was dying. Soft ash crumbled to the ground.

“Give her back to me,” Sara said.

“I won’t hurt her, I promise you.” Emama Seble’s voice was soothing. “Haven’t you tried everything else?”

Sara reminded herself that this was her last hope. Her daughter was still losing weight. She spit out as much food as she managed to swallow, her skin was tinged a dull gray, and her breathing was shallow. She’d lost the energy to do anything but sleep.

Emama Seble leaned towards the steam while Tizita slept in her arms, peaceful and calm above the heat.

“You’ll burn her,” Sara said.

Emama Seble closed the girl’s nostrils and forced Tizita to open her mouth and fill her lungs with the warm, healing aroma of eucalyptus. She let the little girl breathe like this, then massaged her stomach. She repeated the process, her eyes roving behind her eyelids, her face intent.

“There it is,” Emama Seble suddenly said. She stopped just below Tizita’s heart. “A knot. Right here.” Emama Seble pushed against the lump.

Sara’s stomach ached. Emama Seble pressed again, harder, and Sara doubled over, the sharpness of the pain taking her breath away. “What’s happening, Emama?” she asked.

Emama Seble put her whole hand over Tizita’s stomach. She held the girl in a strong grip and pushed. “It’s you,” she said to Sara.

Sara moaned, rigid from the pain in her stomach. Her body remembered this agony. It had visited twice before. She felt pressure building in her womb and shooting into her head. “I don’t understand,” she said.

“It’s your fault she’s sick.” Emama Seble’s stare was unflinching.

Sara curled a fist into her stomach. She felt something unwind like a spool of thread; she was unraveling.

“You took this child,” Emama Seble said, moving her hand away from Tizita’s stomach.

“She’s a gift, my gift.” It was hard to speak. Sara’s throat burned, her eyes were watering from the steam.

“Gifts are given. You’ve forced yourself into a space that doesn’t belong to you, and pushed everyone out. It isn’t right. You know what you’ve been doing, you’ve known from the beginning.”

“Give her back,” Sara said, holding out her arms but afraid to take a step towards the woman.

Emama Seble flicked beads of water onto Tizita. She grabbed leaves from the pot and followed the steam that rolled off the leaves and into the sky.

“You’re doing this to her,” Emama Seble said. “You’re suffocating the life that’s trying to grow. You’re too angry.” She turned to her house. “Come.”

Emama Seble disappeared into her home. By the time Sara walked into the room, the old woman was already seated on a stool. Tizita was lying on her back on the table. The flickering candle sat on the floor, its blackened wick trapped in wax. A slow sun sent amber ropes of light into the room.

“Hold her by her feet so she’s completely upside down.”

Sara hesitated, overcome by the urge to take the child and run back home. Emama Seble waited. Sara lifted her daughter by her feet.

Emama Seble smoothed the leaves on Tizita’s stomach, then massaged. She started near her groin and moved towards her chest, firmly pressing the girl’s belly. She unrolled a
netela
and wrapped the white gauzy shawl over the girl’s midsection like a bandage. Satisfied, she leaned back, exhausted. She helped Sara set her down on the table. Tizita was still sleeping.

“Why didn’t she wake up?” Sara asked. She felt new panic rising.

“She’s okay. Leave the
netela
on for the next three days.”

“And then?”

“Let her father unwrap her. Not you. I’m tired.” Emama Seble got up and moved to her bed.

24.

THE ASCENT IS
a thrill that pushes itself from the secret spot between her legs and settles into a song. Selam sings with a fullness she can only compare to lust—shivering ululations that splay against the stars. It’s a freedom she’s never known, an unruly, sweet beckoning she can’t resist. Each sweep of her wings propels her onward upward skyward.

Then her name presses on her like a heavy hand; presses down again.

“Selam.” It is one voice, two, there are many. “Selam.”

The voice draws her to a path so dark she knows she’s reached
yealem beqayn
, the end of the world. She comes to a flat white building, to a space behind the building, to an area gilded by drying trees where the ground has been stripped of grass. Mounds of dirt piled high as anthills are caked in blood, patted down with shovels she knows once shook with guilt.

She sees scraps of finely woven cloth, broken glasses, a flung cross pendant.

There is the stench of betrayal and pain. She tries to fling herself up, away from it all. But the voices wrap their sorrow around her, and they repeat her name.

“Selam! Selam! Selam!”

I am struggling. Cannot move. Why this taste in my throat? What has become of sweetness and honey?

It is only after she’s nearly given up and given in to the downward pull of their grief that she realizes they aren’t calling her name but the meaning of her name, hurling it into the heavens for the angels to hear, and to act.

“Peace! Peace! Peace!”

Then, just as suddenly as they’d pressed against her, they let her go. Selam lets the momentum of her fear fling her farther into the sky than
she
’s gone before. She flies again, spirals towards stars that crackle with heat, weaves through the breeze, her heart so strong it sends flashes of red past her eyes, propels her deep into the comforting freedom of the dark.

SHE WASN’T BREATHING.

“Selam,” Hailu repeated. His mouth covered hers as he tried to breathe into her again. “Selam!” He pushed against her heart with flat palms, then listened for a heartbeat. Nothing. There was nothing. He felt Yonas grab his hand and Sara put her arm around him. Dawit was in a corner across from them, his eyes wide and frightened.

“Let her go,” Yonas said, tugging at his arm, pulling him away from the bed.

Hailu gripped his son’s hand, drew Sara closer, and searched the dark corner for Dawit’s eyes. With the devoted patience of a believer he waited for his wife to die.

But then there was a gasp. He was sure of it. Selam struggled for air and that was all Hailu needed to propel him out of his family’s reach and towards her bed. He took a syringe from his pocket and felt a stab of guilt so strong that his hands shook as he gave his wife an injection intended to stun her heart into regular beats.

Dawit began to sob and dropped his head in his hands. Yonas backed away and sank into a chair. The family watched the flat line of the heart monitor.

“You promised her,” Dawit said. “You promised!” He ran out of the room.

“I’ll get him,” Yonas said, his voice tight and small.

“Abbaye, sit down,” Sara said, her arms around him. “Please sit.” Tears ran down her face.

“Selam,” Hailu begged, refusing to be moved. “Selam.”

A gust of air from the open window swayed the curtains. The dull gray of moonlight broke into the room, slid over the bed.

“Abbaye?” It was Yonas, come back to wrap his arms around him. “Sit down, Sara’s right.”

“Close the curtains. Close them!” Hailu struggled out of his son’s embrace and leaned over to take Selam in his arms. “Help me,” he said, looking down at his wife.

Yonas raised his mother so Hailu could put his arms around her. She felt light and fragile, her arms swung loosely in his grip.

“Help me carry her to the hallway,” Hailu said.

Dawit’s sobs echoed in the corridor. It came from deep within him.

“I’ll get blankets and a pillow,” Sara said.

Hailu and Yonas lifted Selam off the bed, her head cushioned against Hailu’s chest. Her skin cool to his touch. “Is a window open?”

Yonas shook his head. He couldn’t meet his father’s eyes. “Why do you want to take her out?”

“Open the door,” Hailu said. “Open it.”

DAWIT SAT ON
the floor in the hallway doubled into himself, his hands locked into a tight fist. The bright lights pressed on his head like an unforgiving sun.

“Dawit.” Hailu stood at the door, his wife in his arms. “Stand up.” He looked next to him, to his elder son. “Come here, both of you.”

Hailu had prepared himself for this moment, had thought carefully of his last words to Selam, of the way he would hold her and ease her breathing until she slipped away. He’d put on paper the verses he’d share with his family after it was all over, which priest from Entoto Kidane Mehret he’d call, who he’d get to inform the rest of their friends and distant relatives of her death. He knew which blue embroidered dress he’d insist she wear for burial, which wedding photograph he would send with her, which of his rings he would put on her finger. Hailu had thought of it all because he knew that leaving one detail unplanned would render him paralyzed. It was in not knowing what came next that Hailu felt at his weakest.

So he didn’t know why he’d never imagined Dawit next to him when Selam died, only Yonas. Sara behind them felt natural. Dawit’s presence was a detail he had to take into account and he wasn’t prepared to do so.

“You have to look at her,” he said to Dawit.

He wanted to hide the fact that his son’s presence sent a wild panic through him. Dawit reminded him too much of Selam, he had her nose and forehead, the tilt of his head was hers. Hailu could accept a dying wife, he could continue to hold this slowly cooling body for as long as
he
needed to, but he couldn’t cope with the living traces of his wife in his son. It reminded him of what he would always miss.

“Help me put her down,” he said.

Sara unfolded a blanket and laid a pillow on the floor. Down the hall, a young soldier watched in uncomfortable sympathy.

“If you don’t look, you’ll never be able to forgive yourself,” he said to Dawit, praying that his son didn’t realize he was talking to himself.

“Don’t turn away.” Hailu forced himself to look at him and try to let go of the familiar. “Look.”

The family knelt around Selam’s body. Hailu reached across his wife to grab Dawit’s arm and squeeze it. Their hands settled on her chest.

“She’s gone,” Hailu said. He kept his focus on Yonas. “She’s left us.”

25.

ONCE, I WAS
beloved of god, the King of Kings. I was the Conquering Lion of Judah, a descendant of King Dawit. My blood, rich and red, is kin to that other King of Kings, the most Beloved. I ruled my kingdom in honor of His. We were as we were because He was. In this kingdom of men, angels walked amongst us, flesh and spirit side by side, fiery swords next to spears. Wings beat back bullets, bent Italian rifles, flattened tanks. Under a poisonous rain dripping from warplanes flying as low as insects, we have run and triumphed, shielded by feathers, our skin still whole and splendid under the sun. Abyssinia. Saba’s blessed children multiplied, scattered into hillsides and castles, buried in obelisks and caves, mummified as perfectly as pharaohs. Ethiopia, the most loved of the Beloved, do you hear the drums above the clouds? Do you know that angels approach, and they come for you? Mercy will be no more for this blasphemy against us. There will be the day, Beloved, when we will rise again, and a divine rage will pour itself on you and we will not stop the tide, though you will beg. And after the storm, after the cleansing, we will open our arms again, and you will come, eager once more, and angels will guide our next steps, and we will move together.

IN HIS PALACE,
time moved in swoops, curled seamlessly from one hour to the next. He woke at six, met with officials at nine. He had afternoon tea at four, dinner with his family at eight. Every minute was accounted for, every need anticipated by invisible bodies who tiptoed in and out of his presence noiselessly, their swallowed thoughts escaping only through their eyes, discernible if he’d been concerned enough to notice. But he hadn’t been. We did not see the beast, he whispered into the endless quiet punctured only by the guard’s whistle. It stood before our eyes, but we did not see.