The Binding

Chapter Seventeen

I followed Ezra through Dalaman airport, weaving my way past towering glass walls and stone pillars. Every airport looks alike. Some are ragged and worn, but all attempt to both help and baffle tired and anxious passengers with a labyrinth of passageways, gates, and bridges. Shops, restaurants, and cafés peddle their wares, clamoring to each passerby in desperation. The same signs and symbols swing overhead, pointing the way to a needed destination, whether it was a restroom, baggage claim, or taxi stand.

   Each airport's personality speaks through its art. Some art is clever while the rest is droll. My personal favorite was the tower of luggage, balancing precariously one on top of another to the ceiling at Sacramento International Airport— both witty and charming. The personality of Dalaman Airport wasn't either of those things, but sleek and modern, a monument to steel and glass.

   Ezra led me toward Passport Control as we passed a luggage shop. I never understood why airports sold luggage. I know it coincided with the general theme of travel, but wouldn't everyone who arrived at an airport already have luggage? I envisioned travelers with plastic garbage bags and the eventual messy baggage claim. Ezra glanced over his shoulder at me as I chuckled to myself.

   When I arrived at passport control, I told myself to relax and not hold my breath. For the first time in my life, I felt like a criminal. Ezra insisted I travel with the Canadian passport. His protective streak had peaked in the past few days and turned into an overprotective streak. Since the attack, he had been on full alert. The rational part of me understood the need to travel incognito. The rest of me was just annoyed. I handed my passport to the clerk and waited, trying to look bored.

   A young, thin man eyed me for an uncomfortably long time from behind the glass before opening the cover. "What is your purpose in Turkey? Business or holiday?"

    "Both, I guess," I answered. "My husband is Turkish. He has business here." The man eyed me as I nodded toward Ezra, waiting by himself.

   The man smiled, "Ah... you are very lucky. Turkish men make great... husbands." He waggled his eyebrows suggestively in a way that made me want to step away from him. He made several more vaguely lewd comments.

   Subtlety was wasted on him. I smiled and nodded back politely as he ran my passport through the scanner and waited. Then he pressed the stamp down over the self-adhesive visa on the page. He handed the passport back to me and leered.

   Ezra shifted his weight several times as I walked toward him. He glanced behind me at the clerk and scowled. His hearing was extraordinary. He hadn't been any happier with the clerk's behavior than I had been.  

   Halfway to the baggage claim, I stopped suddenly. Along the wall on my left was a mural, radiating in dark and light browns. In the foreground was a brightly colored hot-air balloon suspended in front of a spectacular vista of wind-carved stone. The hills in the distance folded on top of each other, melted in gentle waves. Closer were dozens of smoothly rounded stone pillars, worn away one grain of sand at a time by wind and rain.

   I had seen this before. I remembered fierce howling, the wind screaming at me. Ezra stepped closer to me and looked at the mural.

    "I know this place."

    "That's Cappadocia. North East of here, in the middle of the country."  

    "I was there," I said. "When I was dying... or dead. There was wind everywhere... and a man with a boy."

Ezra looked thoughtfully at the picture. "That's why you were speaking Hattic."

   "I was speaking what?"