The Dovekeepers

by Alice Hoffman

We had been wandering for so long I forgot what it was like to live within walls or sleep through the night.

As for Shirah, she only watched, the way one might keep a wary eye on a swarm of bees already in flight, when it was too late to wave them away or return them to the hive. When the damage had already been done.

had an errand and didn’t dare delay. I made a vow to get this man the one thing in the world he still wanted, the sound of his children’s voices, a reason to believe.

We caught each other’s glance, as a gazelle might gaze into the eyes of a hunter, although which was the prey and which the hunter I could not say. Quickly,

What might a baby dream of? Milk and love, the language of a mother’s care, the voice of a man who was born in snow? It is the sort of sleep we can never have again. Our rest is formed by our waking life and our waking life is formed by our sorrows.

Did they not take note of the unusual color of Aziza’s eyes? The shade was not unlike the Salt Sea, changing with her mood, now gray, now green, now dark as stone.

The bargain had been kept; still, anyone who trusts a serpent deserves its bite. The

This is the reason we are here, to give thanks to our mothers, who are watching over us in the place where we will join them one day, in the World-to-Come.