“Been chosen,” Abasdarhon, whose host was the golden snake, corrected.
“Accepted being chosen,” Akatriel, whose eyes were as round and wise and fierce as an owl’s, corrected further.
“—to stay with the children of humankind,” Abdiel continued. “Therefore, we have relinquished some of our powers and there is much that we do not know.”
Abuzohar, who was sometimes a white leopard, inclined his head, his face luminous as the moon. “As long as the One knows, there is no need for us to know.”
Achsah, with wings and hair the soft grey velvet of his mouse host, nodded. “They are innocent boys, for the children of men. Likable. And they speak the Old Language.”
Adabiel, orange wings vivid as the tiger, agreed. “Good in their hearts. And they brought out Noah’s goodness-Could that be part of the plan?”
Admael said, “We still have no real idea why they are here, or how they are to be returned to wherever it is they come from.”
Adnachiel, sometimes a giraffe, looked up at the stars. “We willingly gave up some of our powers when we chose to stay on this planet.”
“We do not have to stay.” Abdiel’s seraphim wings were as bright a gold as his bat ones. “We are free to leave at any time and to resume our full powers.”
Adnarel threw off light like the sun flashing against the scarab beetle. “It was our free choice. And now—I would not leave while they—the twins—are still here.”
“We may not be able to save them,” Aland warned.
“Then I will stay with them,” Admael said, for a fraction of a second looking more like a white camel than like a seraphim.
Eleven luminous heads slowly nodded in agreement with Admael.
8 Oholibamah, Japheth’s wife
Mahlah and Tiglah were waiting near Grandfather Lamech’s ancient fig tree. Mahfah’s belly was softly rounded. Tiglah was round by nature, all soft curves and delicate plumpness that had not yet run to softness, as Anah’s was doing.
The twins came from the garden, where they had weeded two long rows of plants which might have been forebears of tomatoes, and pulled off the suckers. Higgaion was in the tent with Grandfather Lamech. The twins did not see Mahlah and Tiglah until the two girls came to meet them. Tiglah walked slowly toward Sandy. She tossed her head so that her red hair flew about her face. She lowered the heavy fringes of her lashes. “I’m sorry my father and brother didn’t treat you better when you appeared in our tent that time.” She paused, and added virtuously, “They have to be very careful that strange men don’t take advantage of me.” Then she stopped. “Am I speaking to the right one?”
“No,” Dennys said.
Mahlah fluttered her small hands like birds. Her dark hair concealed her swollen belly. “But which one of you was guest in my father’s tent?”
Sandy stepped forward. “My brother Dennys. You’re Yalith’s sister?”
“Yes. Mahlah. But I am Ugiel’s bride and no longer live in the home tent.”
Sandy looked at her, thinking that although Mahlah was beautiful, it was in an obvious way; she had none of the subtle loveliness he associated with Yalith. Tiglah’s flashy beauty was almost an assault. He still didn’t know what to make other. “Tiglah?”
She giggled, so that dimples came and went on either side of her reddened lips. “Don’t you remember me?”
“You were talking to me the other day, before the griffin came.”
“Yes, and the silly griffin interrupted us. I think she was jealous. But she’s not here now. Would you like to come with us?” She turned from Sandy, to include Dennys in the invitation.
“Where?” Dennys asked suspiciously. His first encounter with Tiglah’s family had made him far more cautious than Sandy had cause to be. He did not trust her, nor, indeed, any of the small people who did not come from Noah’s tenthold.
Mahlah, unlike Tiglah, was not a giggler. She smiled. “We’d like to get to know you better. My father thinks the world of you. So let’s go for a little walk.”
Dennys looked at the sky, which was already beginning to shimmer with heat. “It’s too hot. Thank you, anyhow.”
Tiglah pushed her fingers through her curls, so that they glinted with gold in the sunlight. She, too, looked at the sky. “It’s not going to be really hot until the sun is above the palm trees.” She turned her dimpled smile toward Sandy. “We’d really love to show you around a little. You haven’t seen much of the oasis.”
Sandy stepped forward. He had not enjoyed his brief excursions onto the public path, but if Tiglah and Mahlah were there to show them where to go, it might be fun. It was time to go farther than Grandfather Lamech’s compound and the nearby shops. “Well—“
“You go, if you like.” Dennys was firm. “I nearly died of sunstroke, and I’m keeping out of the sun.”
Sandy looked at his brother, noticing the still pinkly mottled skin. “I’m sorry. My skin’s all healed. I forgot—“
“You go, if you like,” Dennys repeated.
Sandy shook his head. “No. Grandfather Lamech wanted us to bring him some onions for his stew, and we were too busy weeding. We’d better go pull them before the sun gets too high.”
A great whirring of wings shook tne sky above them, and the griffin landed between the two boys and Mahlah and Tiglah.
“Go away, spoilsport.” Tiglah kicked at the griffin, and her green eyes sparked with resentment.
Dennys backed away in fear. The griffin looked to him as fierce as the manticore.
“It’s all right,” Sandy reassured him. “It’s a griffin, and she’s a friend.”
The griffin spread her eagle wings so that the two girls were screened. Opened her bill and squawked something like”0n-yons.”
“Okay, okay,” Sandy said. “We won’t forget.”
The griffin folded her wings. Her lion’s tail swished back and forth. Tiglah walked cautiously around her, and put her small hand on Sandy’s arm- “Later, then? You would like to come for a walk, wouldn’t you?”
Would he? Tiglah made Sandy feel very peculiar. She was both alluring and unsettling. And she was very different from Yalith, of the bronze hair and eyes and luminous smile. He would go anywhere with Yalith. But Tiglah? “I don’t know,” he said cautiously. “Dennys and I have a lot to talk about.”
Mahlah, too, skirted the griffin, asking, “Are you sure you are two separate people? My husband, Ugiel, can take different forms, yet it is always he.”
“We are twins,” Dennys stated. “Aren’t there any twins around here?”
Tiglah moved her fingers slowly up and down Sandy’s arm, and it prickled, so that the freckles he had acquired in the sun seemed to stand up. “Two look-exactly-alikes? No. Of course, we can tell you apart right now, because your skin”—her fingers caressed Sandy’s forearm—“is strong, and you are getting quite tanned, and you both have freckles across your nose. Whereas his”—she indicated Dennys—“still looks raw and uncooked.”
“But handsome,” Mahlah purred. “We don’t have any men on the oasis who are as tall and like gods as you are.”
The griffin cried again, “On-yons.”
Sandy had already turned in the direction of the vegetable garden when he noticed Dennys looking past the clump of trees to the public path. Yalith and Oholibamah were coming toward them, carrying a large kettle between them.
Mahlah drew her lips up in what was more a grimace than a smile. “Well, sisters dear, are you pursuing the twin giants?”
Oholibamah’s low voice was pleasant. “Good morning. Matred sent us with a meal- Grandfather Lamech is too old to cook for so many.”
Unheeding, Yalith looked at the twins, from Dennys to Sandy, and back to Dennys. “It is not just the difference in your skins that tells you apart.” She looked troubled.
“Let’s put the kettle on the fire,” Oholibamah suggested.
“You don’t have to go with them.” Tiglah wrinkled her nose in distaste as Yalith and Oholibamah started into the tent.
“Stay and talk with us,” Mahlah wheedled.
But the twins had turned their backs on the two girls and were looking after Yalith as she disappeared into the tent.
The griffin shrieked with pleasure and flew off, spiraling higher and higher into the sky.
Dennys had picked half a basketful of onions before he began to recount for Sandy, in detail this time, his experience in Tiglah’s tent.
“But it was her father and brother who threw you out, wasn’t it?”
“She was there.”
“But it wasn’t really her fault.”
“She didn’t even try to stop them,” Dennys said. “And even if it wasn’t her fault, I wouldn’t trust anybody who came from that tent.”
“Well.” Sandy picked up his basket of onions and hefted it to one shoulder. “I can’t say I blame you for feeling the way you do.” He did not add that, nevertheless, Tiglah was still the most absolutely gorgeous girl he had ever seen. Except Yalith. Who wasn’t gorgeous at all. Whatever Yalith had, it was better than gorgeousness.