Other Earths (collection)

Giving away a piece of the Cross. She supposed that was sacrilegious. Even worse, it was unfair that some folks had so much while others had so little. It would be like her giving Bobsey away as a door prize because she had a whole crate of six-headed snakes in the attic.

It wasn’t right. The Holy City’s temples grew fat and fatter while the smaller stations along the traditional pilgrimage route faded away. The least they could do was send some of their spare relics their way.

The mixing spoon flew out of her hand and clanked against the sink.

Daddy called, “You okay in there?”

“Fine,” Em said. “I’m fine.”

Just struck by a bit of inspiration, was all. Though possibly not divine inspiration.

She came into the Holy City from the desert, sunburned, dehydrated, and nauseated. She’d walked the last mile, the van—full of pilgrims she’d hitched a ride with—having suffered a burst water pump, and Em had been too impatient to wait with them for repair. In retrospect, walking had been a mistake.

She’d been on the Strip for an hour, stumbling along on the verge of delirium. At least she assumed it was delirium, for what else could explain the obscenely lit spectacle around her? The lesser temples stretched into the distance ahead and behind her, flashing and dancing with neon lights so bright they turned the night sky a dusty orange. She staggered past the neon palm trees and Crosses and fish and halos that fronted the temples of worship and gambling. Her head pounded from the bright lights and from thirst, but as something of a professional in the business of drawing pilgrims, she could only admire the audacity of the Strip.

Her admiration was tinged with envy, for there were more pilgrims in her field of vision than would visit Oasis Town in a year, even before Via-40: parades of flagellants, retirees with white legs and sunburned faces, cripples looking for miracles, pilgrims looking for buffets.

The thirst, the noise, the midnight heat—Em realized with alarm that she was going to faint. And what then? She’d be trampled to death by pilgrims and freaks, right here on the sidewalk. She wished she’d left Daddy and Judd a note before she’d left or had managed to send them a postcard from the road. At least then they might take some comfort knowing she’d died in the Holy City. Though Daddy didn’t really go in for that sort of thing.

The world went gray.

There were steel bars digging into her back, and her flesh was burning on a griddle, just like Saladin during the Sixty-fourth English Crusade to take back the Holy Land. Em remembered learning those stories in Sunday school, and she wished she were back in Oasis Town now, with her crayons, coloring Saladin’s skin Indian Red.

Cold water splashed on her lips. She sputtered and opened her eyes to find herself staring up at a crinkly brown face.

“Now try drinking some,” the man said, putting a bottle of water in her hand. The glass felt deliciously cold, and the water felt even better when she took a good, long swallow.

She wasn’t being tortured like Saladin. The bars at her back were the railings of the gate she was leaning against, in front of one of the temples. The griddle was just the sidewalk, hot on her skin, even through her clothes.

She tried to stand, but the man put his hand on her shoulder and gently pushed down. “Don’t get up too fast. You got overheated. Desert heat’s nothing to take lightly. The Krauts found that out the hard way, didn’t they?” He winked and smiled beatifically.

With a wine-red felt tarboosh on his head and a billowing white shirt tucked into baggy sherwals, he looked like a Prohibition-era gangster. “Mark Yiska, from Queen of the City of Angels,” he said, holding out a huge, leathery paw.

His hand looked as though it could crush walnuts, but he’d probably saved her life. She gave it a weary shake. “I’m Em …from Oasis Town.”

She tried to get up again, and this time Mark helped her to her feet, not letting go of her hand until she assured him she wouldn’t fall.

“Bless you for your water and kindness,” she said, blinking through a wave of dizziness. “I should be going.”

Mark shook his head in disapproval. “Miss, you don’t look well. Let’s find you some shade to rest in. There are some nice palms outside Solomon’s Palace—”

“No, no, thank you, but I have to get to the Garden Tomb.”

“The Garden will still be there after you rest. What’s your rush?”

“I’m entering the raffle,” she said, her hand going to her money belt, but instead finding only empty belt loops. Thieves, when she’d passed out. Right here, in front of everybody, on a path full of pilgrims to the Holy City. She would not curse them, not here on the street. She would not cry.

Mark gave her a sad, knowing look. “You’re not the first to get robbed in front of the temples, and you won’t be the last,” he said with a sigh. “Besides, you know the odds on that raffle? You’d be better off playing dice.”