“Eh! Terese!” the woman cried out. “The one here wants more lentils.”

Within moments, her neighbor gimped over dragging a full sack. When she arrived, she poured what she had onto the scale.

“So the explorers did not buy all you had?” the first woman asked her friend.

The neighbor shook her head. “Not of these. But they took every leaf of tea I had.”

The first woman turned and spit. She then set the weights on her scale. “This one here wants to know why they are searching the northern areas,” she said, tipping her head toward Solomon.

The neighbor tossed her hand and let out a grunt. “It is the priests,” she said. “They are the ones riling everyone up.” She tightened the cinch on her sack. “They come visiting our villages, telling the men they need to root out the pagans and heathens and barbarians. It is they who have the men running about like chickens without their heads.”

Solomon frowned. “But why search an area where even the crazy ones cannot survive?” he asked.

The neighbor shrugged. “I only know what I hear,” she said.

CHAPTER 15

Somewhere within The Narrows outside ancient Palestine—20 A.D.

Anna scaled the narrow precipice and teetered along its crumbling edge. Above, the noonday sun cast its baking heat downward. Her tenuous route took her past several caves. Their ragged mouths gaped to her left, exhaling icy air that lifted bumps along her flesh. Having spent countless hours exploring the area, she had discovered all of its secret cave systems and had ventured inside every one. Though she had found nothing of particular interest, aside from occasional evidence of rodents, she had noted that each cave faced a slightly different direction and was therefore useful for providing shelter from the sun at certain times of day. Such was the ideal place she was seeking, as her flock drifted along the valley floor.

Once she had selected her spot, Anna set down her staff and opened the linen cloth inside which she had wrapped her afternoon meal. As she nibbled on the hunks of cheese and bread, the cave’s chill tingled the sweat along her back. Anna liked to have her meals in this particular place as it allowed her to observe not only her flock, but the Sisters’ caves as well. And it was from this vantage that she had begun to decipher repeating patterns in the women’s activities.

First, Mother Susana would rise, well before the sun, and depart from the main entrance. Dipping into the far valley, she would set off toward an elongated slope of craggy rock. Anna had tried to track her on several occasions, but despite her advanced years the elder woman always managed to disappear, leaving Anna breathless and unable to discover her final destination.