The Abyssinian Proof

44

Two Weeks Later

The first snow of the season drifted over Sunken Village. Kamil, Hamdi Bey, and Ismail Hodja sat on stools in the Melisite prayer house in an unobtrusive spot where they could see past the worshipers and follow the ceremony unfolding at the front. Kamil could see Amida’s disappointment as he watched the proceedings from his wheelchair, Courtidis hovering nearby. Omar had decided, as he put it bluntly, to live and let die, and not arrest Amida on any charges.

The hall was packed with villagers of all ages, dressed in their best. Earlier, to a wild crescendo of drumming and a steady undercurrent of prayer, an ox, a ewe, and a she-goat had been sacrificed and their blood poured into the pillars by the door. A blood-spattered peacock feather lay in the snow before the sacrificial stone.

After the ceremony, Courtidis had told them, there would be a feast in the hall and the community would dance and sing. Kamil noticed that he looked happy and relaxed and that his clothes were clean and neatly pressed. He wore a fashionable suit and a new fez. He slipped Kamil a small tin box, which he tucked into his pocket.

Suddenly, all conversation ceased. Kamil saw Saba enter the room. She was dressed in a magnificent linen cloak embroidered with gold. Two fillets of gold-embroidered linen fell on either side of her face. She looked like an empress. Kamil could feel the powerful impact her presence had on the people in the hall.

The crowd opened a path before her. In her hand, she held the scepter, now innocent of Malik’s blood. Near the front of the hall waited a stout old woman in a red robe. Her face was split from nose to ear by a wound, not entirely healed. Two apprentices dressed in red stood on either side of her.

When Saba reached the front of the hall, she turned, raised her arms, and led the congregation in prayer.

Ismail Hodja whispered to Kamil, “Fascinating. They’re praying in Ottoman, but they use terms like Adonai. That’s from the Tawrat. It means lord. I’ve only heard Jews use it. And watch their hands. The motions are like a tour of all the religions.”

Of them all, Ismail Hodja had been the most philosophical about the disappearance of the Proof of God.

“In an odd way, the disappearance reaffirms my faith,” he had explained to Kamil. “It’s as if the Proof is traveling in the world incognito. It won’t settle and reveal itself until humanity is ready to hear its message. We’ve been enormously blessed that it allowed us a glimpse before returning to occultation.”

Ismail Hodja’s renewed faith was of little comfort to Kamil. Stealing the Proof was cheating humanity of peace, he thought, regardless of whether or not you believed in its divine origin. Malik would have understood. As he might have pointed out, this was a city that ate the soul of the past.

The woman in red came forward and placed Balkis’s ring, engraved with a crescent and disk, on Saba’s right forefinger, then bowed her head and retreated. Saba turned away from the congregation and faced an iron gate decorated with an angel that led, Courtidis had explained, to the Holy of Holies.

“Behold Saba,” the woman intoned loudly. “Behold the Proof of God, Container of the Uncontainable. Behold the Key to all religions.”

“Adonai, help us,” the congregation responded. “Virgin of Chora, Container of the Uncontainable, keep us.”

Saba let her cape slip from her shoulders. A collective sigh of astonishment rose from the congregation. Kamil felt the hair on the back of his neck rise.

Saba wore a backless white robe. From her waist to her amber shoulders was a pair of powerful tattooed wings. They were the wings of a bird of prey, a falcon or a hawk.

“Behold the Proof of God,” Saba announced in a voice that carried to the back of the hall.

She took a key from a gold chain around her waist, unlocked the angel gate, and stepped inside.