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to the Ark.
    Ham stopped him. “When are they coming?” he persisted. “When will our wives be here?”
    “There will be no wives!” Noah replied.
    “What?” Ham was stunned and so was Ila.
No wives at all? No mates for any of the boys?
This didn’t make sense.
    “Why not?” Ham demanded. “You said the Creatorwould give us what we need!”
    “Help your brother,” Noah murmured. “Now!” He started up the ramp again, but Ham jumped into his path.
    Ila held her breath as Ham grabbed Noah’s shirt.
How could Noah do this
? she wondered. Ila dreamed constantly of becoming a mother. A mother who would do anything to help her children, and keep her family whole. What had made Shem’s father harden his heart? Didn’t he realize all the implications of this decision?
    “No. Listen to me,” Ham went on. “You can’t do this. You can’t make us leave without wives. How am I supposed to be a man?”
    “I said, help your brother!”
    Noah pulled away from Ham, but Ham grabbed him again. “You want me to stay a child!”
    Noah had clearly heard enough. He reached out and picked up Ham and then tossed him aside.
    “I am asking you to be a man by helping your brother. Now do it.”
    Ignoring his father, Ham dashed off the ramp and toward the woods.
    “Ham!” Ila yelled. “Wait!” She started after him. She had just reached the woods when angry voices made her turn around. She saw that Noah was speaking angrily to Naameh as he hacked away at a log with his hatchet.
    Naameh stood there, frowning at him as she listened. Then to Ila’s surprise, Naameh walked away. She waited until Noahturned his back, and then she tightened her scarf around her head and hurried off.
    Where is she going?
Ila wondered. But it was not her concern, nor was there time for Ila to linger. She had to find Ham, and find him quickly.
    * * *
    “Ham?” Ila called. She moved deeper into the woods, but there was still no sign of him. She kept thinking of how Noah had looked when he returned from Tubal-cain’s camp—spooked and distraught. After all these years of talking about the deluge, it seemed that it was coming at last. The thought terrified Ila.
    She kept walking through the forest. “Ham?” Maybe he’d gone toward the refugee camp in search of a wife himself.
    She stopped again to listen for his footsteps, but the woods stayed silent.
    She walked some more. Finally she entered a clearing. Hunting in the undergrowth was a bent figure. It didn’t look like Ham, but… She moved closer. “Ham?”
    It was an old, old man with long white wispy hair and a very wrinkled face.
    “Don’t be afraid, Granddaughter,” he said quickly.
    “Methuselah?” Ila asked. “Is that you?”
    He nodded.
    “What are you doing down here?” she asked. She had never known him to leave the mountain before.
    “I’m looking for berries,” he explained. “I had a craving. Come, help me look for them. My eyes are not as sharp as they once were.”
    He is acting so strangely
, Ila thought. She tried to explain to the old man about Ham.
    “Ham ran off. Noah believes that the deluge is coming soon, so I must find Ham.”
    “There will be time for that,” Methuselah assured her. “Come and help me find the berries now.”
    Not wanting to be impolite, Ila went to help him. She searched the ground, but she didn’t see any berries—only dirt and some undergrowth.
    Mystified, she turned back to him. “Grandfather, there are no berries here,” she said. “Why don’t I take you to Noah now?”
    “No, no need for that,” the old man replied with a strange smile. “You go now. It’s time to go.”
    She stood up uncertainly and then, giving him a wave, started off.
    “No, wait,” he called after her. “Wait.”
    Ila turned back to him.
    “Ten years you’ve lived with my own family. Ten years. And you love them. You love Shem.”
    Ila blushed in response.
    “And Noah?” he asked.
    “Noah saved my life,” Ila replied. “He raised