The Celestial Gate by Avital Dicker (red white royal blue txt) 📗

Mor was lying unconscious several feet away. Yam helped Anise stand, and both them nervously looked at Mor’s leg, pinned down by a piece of concrete.

“Help me,” said Yam.

He and Anise grabbed the heavy mass from either side and, grunting with effort, managed to move it a little to one side.

Mor awoke with a scream of pain.

“Try to move back,” Yam implored.

Mor pulled his lower body backward. After several attempts, he managed to free his leg. Yam looked at the torn trousers and the deep, bleeding gash on Mor’s leg. “Can you put your weight on it?” he asked, worry apparent in his voice.

“Yeah,” said Mor. Fighting the pain, he struggled upright.

Now the shooting was more rapid than before, drowning out the guests’ terrified screams.

“This way,” Anise whispered hoarsely, “there’s an exit that goes straight to the rear courtyard.” Anise and Yam, supporting the wounded Mor between them, hurried to the service stairs on the other side of the roof. The three made their way down the stairs to the kitchen. Mor, shocked, stopped and stared at a waiter lying in a pool of blood on the black-and-white checkerboard floor.

“I’ve never seen a dead body before,” he whispered.

Anise was the first to pull herself together. “This way,” she urged them, and the three rapidly slipped out through the back door. No one was there to stop them, and in seconds they were swallowed by the dark.

Clinging close to the walls, they moved forward with great care. The embassy’s back gate was unmanned; they breathed a sigh of relief and hurried out of the burning building. But in the street, too, bullets whizzed through the air. A few yards away, a woman fell to the ground with a scream, blood welling out of the bullet hole to her chest.

Anise shrieked involuntarily. Mor quickly put his hand over her mouth.

They fled using side streets, putting distance between them and the inferno as quickly as possible. Anise cast anxious glances at Mor; he was breathing heavily with the effort of keeping up.

“We have to stop,” Anise whispered to Yam. He nodded in agreement, his gaze sweeping the street for a place to hide. He chose a covered parking place that stood empty between two tall buildings on the right side of the alley.

“OK. We should be able to rest here for a bit,” said Yam. The three squeezed themselves in behind a large green dumpster occupying one rear corner of the spot.

Mor was pale and sweaty. Anise had taken her scarf and wound it tightly around his bleeding leg when another explosion rocked the air. Panicked, all three sprang from their hiding place. Anise started to cry.

Shots were still being fired, and now a stream of people rushed down the alley from nearby streets.

“We have to keep going,” Yam whispered. Anise helped Mor stand and they started running again.

After a few minutes of hard running down dark alleys, they turned right onto a side street. The echoes of the shooting were now fainter. Mor felt as if his leg were on fire, and his mouth was hopelessly dry. He stopped moving and Anise and Yam stopped too.

None of them were familiar with the street they were on. They must have entered the Old City by accident, Mor thought. The street was empty; the doors on both sides of the street were shut.

Exhausted, Yam leaned against a wall. He was choking back tears. Were Anise not by his side, he might well have let them spill down his cheeks.

On the other side of the street, a heavy metal gate creaked open just a bit. A wrinkled hand beckoned them to enter.

They looked at one another. The wound on Mor’s leg was bleeding right through Anise’s improvised tourniquet. He was barely able to move. They knew they’d never make it far and staying outdoors was too dangerous.

They had nothing to lose. Whoever was behind that gate could already have shot them dead had he wanted to. And here, in the street, they were sitting ducks. All three shuffled carefully toward the gate.

Through the slight crack, Mor beheld the oldest and most wrinkled face he’d ever seen. He instantly felt better. The man didn’t look like a terrorist. The old man smiled, revealing gums hanging on to a few remaining teeth. Mor gazed into the deepest eyes he’d ever looked into and knew they were safe.

Their unexpected savior signaled them to move more quickly and all three pushed through the narrow opening. The gate quickly shut behind them.

With surprising speed, the man beckoned them down a narrow stairwell to the building’s cellar. He stopped before a door and opened it. After a momentary hesitation, they entered a small apartment. The old man hurried to lock the door behind them. The place was small but clean and neat. The old man wasn’t armed. For the first time since the initial blast, the three breathed easy. From the kitchen wafted gratifying smells of recently cooked food. The old man motioned for them to enter.

“Want to eat?” he asked with an Arab accent. Without waiting for an answer, he put down three plates with fragrant kebabs, pitas, hummus, and finely diced vegetable salad.

Despite their state, the three were ravenous and wolfed down the food, which tasted amazing. The old man smiled at the empty plates with satisfaction. The aromatic scent of cardamom from a small pot bubbling away on the cooktop now filled the kitchen. The old man poured coffee into small glasses.

“Please, taste.” He placed one of the glasses full of the hot black liquid in front of Yam.

Yam had never had any coffee. His mom had always been quite firm: he was too young. But, after the day he’d had, he didn’t think so. His childhood had been left far behind, along with the screams of the wounded and the shrieks of the bullets. He took a tiny sip. It was bitter, but he still took another taste, feeling the coffee grounds on his tongue. His body