Part Ten
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Nut is perched in the hills on the western bank of the Buranun River. In the distance, across the river, he sees Inni getting into a boat along with a dozen armed men and a pack of hunting dogs.
Nut runs. He runs through the night until he can no longer hear the dogs. He keeps repeating to himself: “They are faster, but they cannot run all night. Not like me.” He lopes along through the morning, always westward.
During the scorching heat of midday he buries himself in the sand. He wakes at sunset as the hearth-fires of the gods appear in the sky. He moves west, toward where Shamash the Sun goes to sleep. He keeps alive by digging roots and eating insects. He finds a dead rabbit and eats it raw in the moonlight.
= =
One morning he looks to the east and sees a distant column of dust rising in the desert air. He runs. He runs all day, yet the column keeps closing in with the sound of dogs. He runs all night. In the morning, the sky is clear. And quiet. He sleeps.
= =
He wakes in the noonday sun to the sound of dogs. He stumbles to his feet and runs toward rising foothills, and a breeze that smells of saltwater.
The pillar of dust follows, growing higher and wider.
Nut scrambles over gullies, through thick brush that claws at him. He hears the dogs closing in. He plunges headlong, hands and feet bleeding. He struggles to batter his path forward. Suddenly the thicket gives way. He tumbles onto barren ground.
Nut lays at the edge of a lifeless plain. In the distance is a cliff that is pocked with caves. He lurches to his feet and stumbles toward the caves. He does not look back. He knows they will be on him at any moment.
* * *
The captain of the soldiers stands at the edge of the thicket. He watches Nut hobble across the wasteland. He holds the reins to a donkey, and sitting astride the donkey is a woman. Her face is covered, except for her green eyes, that stares into the distance. “Why is it –uh– forbidden ground?” she asks.
“That is not your concern. You will not be harmed.”
The donkey jerks the reins and stamps its hooves. The dogs cower at the feet of their masters.
= =
Nut awakes to the smell of saltwater and the sound of pounding surf. He lies on his back and breathes. He runs his fingers through the sand. He rubs his dust-caked eyes. He sits up and looks around.
There — floating in the distance across a splendid bay — is a beautiful island. The beaches are creased with turtle crawls. Crabs scuttle across the shore. Fish leap in the spray. And, in the midst of the island, rising above a cluster of date palms, is a single immense tree that reaches to the sky. Its enormous fruits look like huge breasts. Luxuriant grasses sway in the cool breezes.
Nut sits quietly and gazes.
“Days like this are sad,” he says to himself, “because they make me want to live forever.”
He is quiet, then says, “I will regain my strength and build a raft.”
* * *
“What is he looking at?” asks a soldier. “Who is he talking to? There is nothing out there but sand.”
“It does not matter,” says the captain. He motions to the woman. “He will come to you without a fight. I assure you that he will not be hurt. We need him taken alive.”
She dismounts and hikes up her skirt.
* * *
Nut is taken back to the Land Between the Two Rivers. He is forced to dig a hole in the ground outside of the gates of the city. There he is buried up to his neck and presented as a lesson to those who would disobey the King.
As he dies, birds pecking at his eyes, all he can think is that the world is a cruel place and women are nothing but trouble.
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