Sandy said, "But we"ll be glad to help you build it. We would like to do at least that much for you, because you"ve been very kind to us." Yalith and Oholibamah sat close together, hands clasped. Oholibamah said, "We still have time to be together. It will take at least two moons before the ark is finished and ready to stock. And because we have known each other, we can never be entirely separated."

j.a.pheth said, "As we can never be completely separated from Grandfather Lamech."

Yalith nodded. Pushed back tears. Sandy was safely back with them. j.a.pheth was wounded, but was going to be all right. This was no time for tears.

Dennys looked at j.a.pheth and nodded. "The night that Grandfather Lamech died-how long ago it seems-Higgaion and I sat out under the stars while Noah was in the tent, waiting for Sandy." He hesitated, then plunged on. "At the moment that Grandfather Lamech died, the stars held their breaths. And so I knew. And then, because he understood Higgaion and I needed him, Adnarel was with us, saying Fear not, and then he was back in the scarab beetle, on Higgaion"s ear, instead of off with the other seraphim, as he"s been so often lately."

There was a moment of silence. Then Noah opened a fresh skin of wine. "My love for all of you is too deep for words. Dear twins, we are glad that you have come to us. And now it is time for you to leave, isn"t it?"

Sandy said, firmly, "Not until we"ve helped you build the ark."

Sandy and Dennys stayed in the big tent, having been given sleeping skins and a place to themselves across from Noah and Matred. Higgaion and Selah slept with the little mammoth, whose ribs were beginning to fill out, and whose coat was beginning to shine.

Dennys woke up and the darkness of the tent was heavy. Around him he heard gentle snores, and the night sounds of the desert. He nudged Sandy. "Are you awake?"

"Almost."

"Now what?"

Sandy wriggled into a more comfortable position. "We"ll keep on helping Noah with the ark."

"And then?"

Fully awake now, Sandy moved so that he could whisper directly into Dennys"s ear. "We"ll take a quantum leap."

"And how will we manage that?"

"It came to me when the mammoth and I called the unicorn to be in that nasty little tent where I was in prison. The nephilim cannot leave this earth. But the seraphim can."

"More to the point," Dennys asked, "can we? Or, rather, can we leave this time and get back to our own? I wouldn"t want to miscalculate and land in the Middle Ages, or the year 3003."

"I"ll have to speak to Adnarel about it again."

"You already have?"

"Some. When we first got here. What I think would work for us would be to call unicorns, and ride them, and for Adnarel, or any of the seraphim, to go forward to our time, and then call for the unicorns to come back."

"Wild." Dennys whistled.

"Yes, but it worked when the three seraphim called me back onto the desert sands after j.a.pheth and Higgaion came to rescue me."

"That was s.p.a.ce, not time, and a small distance in s.p.a.ce, at that," Dennys pointed out.

"True. But experiments with photons, for instance, seem to show that they can communicate with each other instantaneously, and that means faster than the speed of light. And distance doesn"t seem to be a problem for them."

"But it"s time we have to worry about," Dennys whispered. Noah snored a very loud snore, and they could hear him turn over on his skins. Dennys continued, "If I understand Mother"s experiments, an observer is essential in the world of quantum mechanics. I mean, an observer seems to be necessary to make quanta real."

Sandy moved impatiently. "I don"t understand it. But Mother seems to, and so do a lot of other particle physicists. That"s enough for me. I"ll talk to Adnarel."

There was a heavy silence. Then Dennys said, "Anything seems to be possible. I hope this is."

Another silence. Then Sandy asked, "Do you think we could take Yalith with us?"

Dennys did not answer for a while. Then: "No. I don"t think so. We"re not supposed to change history."

"But she"ll drown."

"I know. I love her, too." At last. It had been said.

"But if we love her-"

Dennys"s voice was bleak. "I don"t think we can take her with us."

Sandy reached for his twin"s hand and grasped it. "A lot of people are going to drown. Would you mind changing history if it would save Yalith?"

Dennys said, "I wouldn"t mind. I"d be willing to try. To try absolutely anything. But I have a feeling that we can"t."

"I hate it!"

"Shh. I hate it, too."

Sandy whispered, "It"s going to be dangerous, taking a quantum leap."

"Dad obviously thinks such things are possible. After all, wasn"t he programming some kind of quantum leap, or tesser, when we messed around with his experiment?"

"So, if he believes in it, it"s not that wild."

"Sure it"s that wild. It"s got to be that wild in order to work."

Sandy gave a slightly hysterical laugh. "Our father was not programming unicorns into his experiment."

Higgaion jerked in a sleeping dream, whimpered. Selah made little murmuring noises, and Tiglah"s mammoth moved closer to the others.

Sandy asked, "What about the mammoths?"

Dennys stretched his arm out so that he could touch, gently, Higgaion"s s.h.a.ggy fur. "I wonder if they can swim?"

"It wouldn"t do any good. Not for forty days and forty nights."

Dennys closed his eyes. Listened. Heard the wind high in the sky above the tent, but the words would not come clear. He whispered, "Does-does Yalith know she"s not going on the ark?"

"I think so. I think Noah has told her."

"I understand that floods and other disasters happen. But if this flood is really being sent by El-"

Sandy said, "If it"s being sent by El, then I don"t like El, not if Yalith is going to drown."

The wind murmured. "We aren"t sure yet, are we?" Dennys asked. "I mean, it hasn"t happened yet. Yalith isn"t in the story, so we don"t know what happened to her. Grandfather Lamech truly loved his El. So we can"t be sure. Grandfather loved Yalith. She was his very favorite."

"Grandfather is dead," Sandy said flatly. "If we"re going to be any use building the ark, we"d better sleep now."

The wind wrapped itself about the tent. Sandy slipped quickly into sleep. Dennys lay on his back, listening, listening. The wind"s song was gentle, unalarming. Although he could not make out the words, he felt the wind calming him. Slept.

"Stupid. Stupid," Ugiel, husband of Mahlah, hissed. Rofocale"s contempt came out with a mosquito shrill.

"The idiots almost let the manticore get them."

"Tiglah would have done better by herself," said Eblis, who wanted Yalith.

Ertrael, sometimes a rat, demanded, "What do we do now?"

The nephilim were gathered in the darkness of the desert, for once conserving their energies. Naamah, still sounding like a vulture, went, "Kkk. Tiglah did not, in fact, do better than her father or her brother. She got no answers. The young giant did not listen to her."

Elisheth, of the crocodile-green wings, shimmered them in the starlight. "She tried. I would have thought the Sand would find her irresistible. Why did he reject her?"

"Yalith." Eblis"s beautiful red lips lifted in a sneer.

Ugiel wove his neck in a rhythmic dance, as much cobra as nephil. "You are right. Because of Yalith."

"But she has no experience," Rofocale shrilled. "She is still a child. Whereas Tiglah-"

"No," Eblis contradicted, purple eyes glittering. "Yalith is not a child any longer." He wrapped purple wings about himself.

"Could we have used her?" Estael, sometimes a c.o.c.k-roach, asked doubtfully.

"If Ugiel hadn"t married her, we might have been able to use Mahlah, Yalith"s sister," said Ezequen, whose host was the skink.

Ugiel hissed, "We all know she"s Yalith"s sister. And my wife. And the mother of my child."

Eblis wrapped himself in wings the color of the sunset.

"It is time for us to act. Us. Ourselves."

Rugziel agreed. "It is time we stopped using deputies."

Rumjal grimaced. "What do you suggest?"

Naamah stretched his neck, naked as a vulture"s, and raised his wings to their full span, standing in whiteness of skin, darkness of wing, his feathers the indigo of the bird who was his host. "The circle of extinction. Whoever we completely surround we control. Kkk. Let us surround the twin giants."

Ugiel hissed in agreement.

Rofocale shrilled in antic.i.p.ation.

Eblis suggested, "And let us surround Yalith, since she has foiled our plans."

"Kkk," Naamah reproved. "The giants first."

12 Neither Can the Floods Drown It Yalith slept at the tar end of the tent from the twins, but she heard them whispering, and when they stopped, she could hear the mammoths" triple snores. And she was wide awake.

She slipped out of bed and went to the desert. She saw neither lion nor dragon/lizard masquerading as lion, on the great rock. She chose a smaller rock and sat, wrapping her arms about her knees. She raised her face to the stars.

She heard them chiming, and there was no anxiety in their song.

Nevertheless, she shivered. She believed her father, believed that the rains were going to come. She was willing to die, if that was truly what El wanted.

But what about the twins?

What was going to happen?

The crystal chime of stars sang in her ears, "Fear not, Yalith."

The stars never gave false comfort.

She was less afraid.

They worked on the ark all day, taking time out in the heat to sleep. Then they worked again until it was too dark to see. Every evening Matred prepared a festive meal. Therefore, Shem was often out hunting, rather than busy with the ark. Sandy and Dennys worked along with Noah, Ham, and j.a.pheth. There were no hammers or nails or any of the modern tools to which they were accustomed. The boards had to be joined and pegged. At nighty they were tired and hungry, ate well, slept well. They were building an ark, but they did not talk of the rain.

Dennys looked at Elisheba, Anah, and Oholibamah. They were in the story, even if not by name. They would go with Noah and Matred and all the animals onto the ark. He looked at Yalith, her hair amber in the lamplight. He slipped out of the tent, feeling a little strange. He was the follower. Sandy the leader. And now he was off, without even consulting his twin.

He walked swiftly toward Noah"s well. His skin p.r.i.c.kled as he saw the vulture, huddled on the tall trunk of a long-dead palm, then looking up as Dennys approached, peering this way and chat, stretching its naked neck, staring at Dennys with hooded, suspicious eyes.

At first, Dennys saw only the dark bird. Then his eye caught a glimpse of white, and on a young fig tree near the well sat a pelican, its head tucked under its wing, so that it seemed no more than a bundle of white. Dennys heaved a sigh of relief. He had left the big tent to find one of the seraphim, and it didn"t really matter which one, but he was more familiar with Alarid than with many of the others. He went up to the sleeping bird. "Hsst."

The pelican did not move.

"Alarid!" Dennys shouted. "I need to talk to you!"

The feathers quivered as the bird shoved its head farther under its wing.

"Alarid!"

The feathers ruffled, hunched, indicating, "Go away. I have nothing to say."

"But I have to speak to you. About Yalith."

At last the head emerged from the fluff of feathers, and the dark bead of eye blinked.

"Please." Dennys indicated the vulture. "Please, Alarid."

The white bird hopped down from its perch, clumsy and c.u.mbersome.

The vulture was an ink blob of immobile darkness.

"Please." Dennys pleaded.

The pelican stretched its wings up, up, until the seraph appeared. Without speaking, Alarid turned from the well and walked toward the desert. Dennys followed. When they had left the oasis far enough behind so that the vulture was no longer visible, Alarid turned to the boy. "What is it?"