The blood that flows freely from the
wound, created by a ruthless cut, in which the flash of the blade draws a
second, crimson smile beneath the first, reminds me of the wine my
father uses to bury our dead in the family tomb. The sense of irony is
not lost on me. When no blood remains within, it must be laid about,
until the corpse floats freely on its own accord, as if mimicking some
River Styxx ideology will somehow transport the soul to the afterlife.
And although that’s taken from a Greek tradition, it’s what we believe
too. We are the Nabateans.
Not only does the spirit of
our kin pass from this world to the next on a hazy, slippery cloud of
succulents grapes-we also find our own spirits wishing for salvation
from a higher place the next morning after gorging ourselves on red, red
wine. Decreed by Dushara, God of the Nabateans, it would be
sacrilegious to disobey his orders. And so, we drink in the amber
nectar of the Gods as our relative ascends to join them.
But
instead of celebrating passing tonight, what I witness before me here
is a sacrifice. No humans are ever put under the knife here at Sella,
as for man’s blood to run here, only in combat with the enemy is this
honourable. As the animal struggles under expert hands the embers of
life are extinguished in short, sharp convulsions.
We are
peaceful, deeply religious folk, choosing to exist without quarrel with
our neighbours in Rome, or the silk and spice merchants who pass
through our kingdom by the King’s Way, heading for Damascus. All that we
ask is they pay us a tax for this journey, just as we offer this
sacrificial lamb up to Dushara to mark the pilgrimage of the many
Nabateans who have clustered, as moths to a flame, on the sacred High
Place at Sella.
These master craftsmen have travelled
for many, weary days across the desert to pay homage to our most revered
of subjects. A strange Nabatean force pulls them in, like the sand
devils that seem drawn to our caravans of camels, blinding us with
grains of distraction and carrying off our most precious cargo-gold.
The
Romans, those nomadic wanderers of the modern world, whose ambitions
grow far and wide, are masters of their own destiny. Something tells me
they are not to be trusted. Perhaps the wine we deliver to the Emperor
each year is not enough, even though we choose the sweetest tasting
drop. Just as water enables survival in the desert, and at Sella, so
our substantial gifts maintain a healthy relationship with the Romans,
for now.
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Our
water supply, the main artery to the hidden city, poisoned! They have
discovered our hidden means of transporting this elixir into the heart,
polluted it with hatred and and greed so, I fear, all is lost. Greed is
a rotten apple, and the worm that lives within, Rome.
Phalanx’s
appear as tortoise-shells, ridged and impenetrable. We are but
master-carvers; our knives are no match for spear and arrow and might of
the Roman Empire, which crashes down on us as if from the heavens
themselves.
In the flash of an eye, with the army
almost upon our tomb, I take my dagger, for so long creator of ornate,
beautiful carvings, symbols of peace and culture, and draw it across my
neck, reminding me of the lamb and it’s drip, drip, drip viscous blood
life-spirit slowly ebbing away, being absorbed, welcomed even, into the
light, sandstone earth below.
All the wine in the world could not elicit this feeling of delirium.
