<Cyriacus, in search of solitude, retires first into the desert of Nethupha, then to the inner desert of Rouba, where he lives on wild herbs and reeds. But even there he is sought out by people afflicted with diseases or demonic possession, whom he cured with prayers and the sign of the Cross.>
Then, unable to endure the annoyance caused by such a crowd, he left the desert of Rouba and retired to a place very lonely and hidden, where no hermit had ever lived. This site is called by the local people Sousakim: here the two wadis, of the New Laura and of the Laura of Souka, both most deep and fearful, come together. Some say that these are the rivers of Etham, about which David says in his glorifications of the Lord: ‘Thou didst dry up ever-flowing streams’ <Ps. 74:15>. After seven years in Sousakim, in the days of the great and terrible pestilence <541-542>, the fathers of the Laura of Souka, fearing the impending menace, descended in a supplicant procession, and, applying many entreaties, brought him back from Sousakim to the Laura …
(transl. Leah Di Segni)