“To the wrongdoer, yes,” Dr. Hassan answered.
“Uh, how would they know if I was a wrongdoer or not?”
“Normal baboons wouldn’t,” he said. “But these are guardians who serve Babi, the alpha male of all baboons. He is a sentinel in the afterlife. You see, all baboons are aggressive, omnivorous, and territorial, but these ones are doubly so. They have been summoned to protect the resting place where I hid Amon’s brother. They will allow no one to pass who means him harm. I decided to take this precaution when Amon’s body was stolen. It is said that Babi will eat the entrails of the wicked, and these baboons are just as dangerous. We will proceed with caution, but each of us must present ourselves for judging.”
“And I thought college interviews were hard,” I mumbled.
Our horses stopped at the edge of the oasis, and the cacophony coming from the baboons suddenly ceased. Tree limbs jolted and dark shapes moved over the ground and through the brush until mounds of living flesh settled before us. Teeth, shiny and sharp, were bared and glistening eyes winked like little flashlights in the darkness.
“We must hurry,” Dr. Hassan said. “I will go first.”
Amon helped me dismount and dismissed the horses with a bow of gratitude. With a mighty leap into the desert, they were enveloped by sand, the only proof that they’d ever been there the hoofprints they left behind.
Dr. Hassan had arrived at the border of the oasis, where the horde waited for him. A large male raised himself up and hooted softly. Others returned the call, and as Dr. Hassan stepped onto the grass beneath a palm tree, several of the creatures darted back and forth, circling him. They pushed against his shoes and his legs and tugged on his pants. A baby climbed his arm and picked through his hair, then leapt off and clambered onto its mother’s back.
After this strange animal court was over, the noise died away and the doctor stepped through the mass to the other side. “Come, Lady Lily,” he called over the backs of the baboons, which now stood observing me silently.
Amon clutched my arm and whispered, “I will allow nothing to happen to you. Do not be afraid.”
I stepped into the horde feeling like a coward, and closed my eyes as the howling began. Heavy bodies shifted past me and I grimaced when one touched my injured leg, but gentle fingers brushed across the bandage, and when one reached out a hand, I took it. The sounds of the animals ceased abruptly, and a baboon pulled me with the lightest of tugs toward Dr. Hassan.
When Amon stepped into the oasis, the baboons stood transfixed and then, almost as one, they rushed forward and patted his legs and arms. After every primate had touched Amon, the big male gave a deep cry and all the creatures slinked back into the trees, disappearing as if they had never even existed.
Now that we’d been given clearance by the baboon guardians, we wandered deeper into the oasis, heading toward the sound of water. Dr. Hassan had begun running as soon as Amon had been let go by the troop. Amon helped me along so I wouldn’t get too far behind, and just when I was about to protest that my leg needed a rest, Dr. Hassan slid to a stop at a deep pool fed by a waterfall.
Circling the pool were stones of every shape and size, which wouldn’t have been that unusual except each stone had a hole bored through it. What perplexed me even more was when Dr. Hassan scooped up handfuls of the stones and began throwing them in the water.
“Quickly! Help me!” he shouted.
Amon bent down and gathered several stones, cupping them in his hands and then tossing them.
“What are we doing?” I asked as I tossed my own handful.
“Watch for one that floats,” Dr. Hassan said as he worked. “A true adder stone will float in water.”
“Adder stone?”