The Sand Martin

In The Deadliest Lie, the first book in the Miriam bat Isaac Mystery Series, Miriam sees sand martins in flight as she accompanies her twin brother on the first leg of his journey to Capua to train as a gladiator. She tell us about that ride:

I was diverting Binyamin with a story when, distracted by a flock of twittering sand martins on wing to the beach, I peeked through the litter’s curtains to see that we’d already passed through the agora. Spotting the sprawling emerald lawns of the Caesareum ahead, the vast cityscape that dominates the Great Harbor, and hearing the sea thunder and hiss against the rocks, I realized with a bile-swirling jolt that our jaunt was almost over, that the present was sliding toward the future all too quickly.

Soon enough, thrusting his arm through the undulating curtain to signal the bearers to stop, he said in a flat voice, “I have to go now, Sis.”  Before his words could melt into the warm breeze, the bearers had lowered us to the curb. Grabbing his bag and bolting through the curtain, Binyamin began a run toward his pier while I stayed to listen to the rhythmic jingle of the clasps on his travel bag and watch his figure become a minified silhouette in the fading daylight and then disappear.

Like the sand martins, Binyamin was in flight, escaping from a childhood in which his father blamed him for his mother’s death. But his life hardly gets better in the arena. To find out what happens, click here.