videos. She had to keep out of sight of the ISIS terrorists.
Once they could no longer see the village, Alex breathed a little more freely. Not that they were out of danger, but if they couldn’t see the village, the attackers couldn’t see them.
Ahead and to the north rose stony bluffs, shadowed by the angle of the sun hitting the ridge to the south.
Alex paused to catch her breath and study the bluff. Had she seen movement? She blinked and stared again at a dark patch in the rocky edifice.
A village woman slipped from the patch and climbed downward to where Alex stood with her little band of orphaned children.
Another woman followed the first, and then another. Soon five women were on their way down the steep slope to where Alex and Fariji stood. Each gathered a small child and headed up to what Alex realized was a cave entrance.
Alex, burdened with the girl on her back, started up the path, urging the other children to climb or crawl up the slippery slope. By the time she reached the entrance, she was breathing hard.
She slipped the girl from her back and eased her to the stone floor of the cave.
More than a dozen women and children emerged from deep in the shadows, their eyes wide and wary. They gathered around Alex, all talking at once.
“Where are the others?” Alex asked in French.
“Scattered among the caves.” A woman called Rashida stepped forward. “There are many caves. This is only the first one.”
“They will find us here,” a younger woman said. “We must go deeper into the hills.”
“We can’t,” Rashida said. She tipped her head toward three older women sitting on the ground, their backs hunched, their eyes closed. “The old ones will not make it. It was all they could do to come this far.”
Alex’s heart went out to the old and young who couldn’t move as fast or endure another climb up steep hills.
“None of us will last long without food and water,” the other woman argued.
“We can’t go back down to the village.” An old woman called Mirembe glanced up from her position seated on the ground. “We would all be tortured or killed.”
Alex didn’t want to argue with the women when the reverend and his wife were down there with no one to help or hide them. With the children safe in the cave, Alex couldn’t stop thinking about the elderly missionaries. She drew in a deep breath and made up her mind. “I need you women to care for these children.”
Again, the women gathered around her.
“Where are you going?” Rashida asked.
“Don’t leave us,” another woman pleaded.
“If you go back, you’ll be killed,” Mirembe predicted.
“I have to go back. Reverend Townsend and his wife stayed behind.”
Mirembe shook her head. “They are dead by now. They must be.”
A sharp pain pierced Alex’s heart. “I choose to think they are still alive. And I’m going down to see if there is anything I can do to help.” She glanced around at the women. “Will you care for these children?” she repeated with more force.
Rashida nodded. “We will look after them until your return.”
A tiny hand tugged at her pant leg. “Miss Alex, please don’t go.”
Alex glanced down at Kamaria, the little girl she’d carried up the hill. She had tears in her big brown eyes as she stared up at Alex.
Her chest tight, Alex dropped to one knee and hugged Kamaria. “I’ll be back,” she promised. “Until I return, I need you to help take care of your brothers and sisters.” She brushed a tear from the child’s cheek. “Can you do that for me?”
Kamaria nodded, another tear slipping down her cheek.
Alex straightened. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
Fariji followed her to the cave entrance. “It is not safe for you to return to the village. I will go with you.”
“No.” Alex touched his arm. “Stay here and protect the women and children. They have no one else.”
The gentle young man nodded, his brow dipping low. “I will do what I can to help.”
And he always did. Fariji was one of the most loving, selfless men in the village.
Alex hugged him, and then she left the cave and slid down the gravelly slope to the base of the bluff. She figured returning to the village would be dangerous, but she couldn’t abandon the missionaries. If she could help, she would, even if it meant risking her own safety.
Going down from the hills alone went a lot faster than climbing, carrying a child on her back and herding half a dozen more. Within minutes, Alex reached the edge of the village.
She hid behind the first wall she came to, pushed the scarf she wore down around her neck and listened, her heart beating so loudly against her eardrums, she could barely hear anything.
The gunfire had ceased, but men shouted. A woman screamed and vehicle engines rumbled.
The reverend’s wife had been in the home of a woman who’d given birth to a baby boy. The baby had been breech, complicating the birth. Both had survived, but were weak and unable to travel.
Mrs. Townsend had been caring for the two since the baby’s birth.
Alex dared to peek around the side of the hut. The narrow street between the dirt-brown mud-and-stick buildings appeared empty. She sucked in a deep breath and ran to the next structure.
A man shouted nearby. Footsteps pounded in the dirt, along with the rattle of metal against metal or plastic, like the rattle of a strap on a rifle.
Alex held her breath and waited.
Shouts grew closer. The sound of something smashing made Alex jump and nearly cry out.
She clapped a hand over her mouth and slipped farther back into the shadows.
Another man yelled, the noise coming from inside the building behind which Alex huddled.
Voices argued back and forth, and then...bang!
Knowing it was too late to change her mind about coming back to the village, Alex shrank into a dark corner and prayed the men in the hut didn’t come out and discover her there.
The home the reverend’s wife had been in was a couple huts over from where Alex hid. If she could get there without being seen, perhaps she could convince the missionaries to leave before the men found them.
Voices sounded
