by Beth Shriver
“There are matters of Ati’s death that need to be discussed, taken care of. It will take some time.”
Felicia nodded and stood to leave. He grasped her wrist with one hand and took the box with the other. He pulled her to him, causing her to lean over and her hair to spill into his face. He smelled the fragrance of it and let go of her wrist to stroke the tresses.
She cringed and began to straighten, but he held her head down while taking the necklace and placing it around her neck. She stood to leave.
“It is radiant.” He looked from the necklace to her face, knowing she would displace it at the first chance she had, so he added. “I want you to wear this always.” Their gazes locked for a brief moment, but before he could act on his impulses, she walked quickly down the long marble hallway.
Maximus pursed his lips and squeezed his fist tightly. He had much to accomplish. Felicia could wait, but the conversation with his father could not.
Chapter Twenty
A hot breeze blew over the low, rolling hills. The valley of Zayin held green vines along the sand walls that separated them from the village. The soft drops of rain finally slowed to a drizzle. The rainy season, pleased the farmers, but the brick makers cursed the skies. The mud pit held an imbalance of thin mud, and now that the rain had come to a stop, the women came to help gather more straw.
Most of the men were called to fortify the city. The wall was built with layers of dirt on a base of limestone. Their task was to rebuild the wall with bricks, and if they could not make the quantity needed, they would use stones from buildings within the village in the blockades.
The only way for the enemy to enter the village was by attacking the city entry where soldiers stood guard. There was one gate-tower which was built on the far wall against the foothills behind the village. This gave the scout a full view of all three directions far enough in the distance to warn the villagers. Tirzah wiped the sweat from her brow, and with a small grunt heaved the clay jar of water to her shoulder, then held another smaller one against her hip.
The water tossed around in the vessels as she made her way back to the work area. Men labored in a sandy plain. Some were carrying straw, others mixing water with dirt, and still others pressing the straw mud into square molds. She filled a sheepskin flask, emptying one of the jars and slipped the leather strap over her aching shoulder and lifted from beneath to ease the pressure on it.
“No more water.” Phillip held up his hands to Tirzah as she passed.
“I wouldn’t give you any, even if you asked.” Tirzah bantered, staring down at him buried to his thighs in mud as he stomped the straw.
Phillip dropped his bare shoulders splattered with sludge and gave her a forlorn gaze. “Not even for your own brother?” He held up his palms in false despair.
Tirzah grinned. It was nice to smile, to have something to smile about. The days that had passed since Enan’s departure were crueler than those in the past. This time he had gone to fight, not to train. She played with her mind, tricking herself into believing he was just a day’s ride from her, with Levi honing his skills. It succeeded at times, when she found herself lost in the daily chores of home and the tasks as water girl to the men performing their daily tasks. But at the end of the day when her physical labor was over and her mind was at rest, she would remember.
Tirzah’s evenings were busy, as well. She helped her father prepare medicines. He gathered the various roots and herbs needed, and she crushed them together. Others were liquid and needed to boil over the fire before they were cured.
The entire village had centered their time and effort to prepare for the impending siege. Farmers offered their fig crop. The flax and almonds would come shortly after the rainy season. Carpenters helped to build stronger gates, barricades, and catapults. Stone cutters and brick makers gave their bricks out as quickly as they made them. They were used to strengthen the synagogue that had been made into the safety shelter where all would gather together once their barricades and homes were broken into.
Tirzah made her way through the many mud pits on the western outskirts of the village, opposite of where the festival was held each year. There would be close to a dozen now, due to the recent moisture.
“Tirzah, will you help?” Anna, Enan’s sister, pulled on the end of a pack of straw she carried on her back. “There’s more on the cart.” Anna pointed behind her to her father’s wagon piled high with yellow straw.
“Of course, Anna.” Tirzah took off the flask, handed it to an overseer, and they walked to the wagon together. “Do you hear anything of Enan?”
Anna’s lips curved. “I knew you’d ask.” She turned to Tirzah. “You always do, even though you know the answer.” Anna filled her pack with straw and handed it to Tirzah then filled one for herself.
“I can’t help it, Anna. There is always hope.” Tirzah’s voice lifted as she said this, and she pointed one finger to the skies.
Anna nodded. “What do you hear from your father? How long will it be, does he know?”
Tirzah was used to the questions. Her father being one of the elders, she was expected to know the answers, but she didn’t. No one did. All anyone could do was guess.
“No, Anna. There has been no word yet. The scouts are everywhere. When they do come, we will know.” Tirzah looked over the foothills that surrounded them. Could anyone penetrate their village tucked into the protection of a mountain?
After carrying one last load of straw, Tirzah shed her bundle and began the walk home. She glanced down the dirt road leading to the soldiers guarding the village. She wondered if she would see Nethan tonight. He made time for her almost daily. Sometimes for a while in the afternoon, but usually it was in the evening, when most were going to sleep. Tirzah was unsure whether he had permission, or was sneaking time away just to be with her.
Her mother stood on the porch with a broom in hand. Martha rested her weight on the broom handle, waiting for Tirzah to join her. “You are a muddy mess. Go in and clean up for dinner.” Martha tapped her behind as Tirzah stepped over the threshold of the door.
Tirzah jumped a little when the broom hit her backside. “Wait until you see Phillip.”
Martha groaned and reached for the tub that she filled with water to clean Phillip. Today he would need it even more than usual. Tirzah washed and changed her clothes and then helped her mother with dinner. She placed bowls for cheese and fowl boiled with onion, garlic, cumin, and mustard on the wooden table. Martha went about making syrup from the dates. Tirzah preferred grape syrup, but it would be a long while before the grapes would be harvested.
Phillip arrived as muddy as Tirzah had warned her mother he would be. He soaked off the dried dirt from his body, changed, and came to the kitchen famished and begging for food.
“How long does it take to boil a silly bird?” He stuck his head over the pot bubbling with bits of meat, vegetables, and herbs. Martha handed him some bread she kept on the window ledge, covered with a cloth to keep warm in the afternoon sun. “Only a small piece. Save your appetite.”
Tirzah’s brother David and her father finally walked through the door and talked while they waited for the food to be served. They sat together, and Andrew said a prayer. His tone was heavy and manner slow as he prayed. He ate quietly, listening to his family tell of their day. When he finished his meal, he slipped away behind his privacy curtain to work.
Tirzah went to help organize the medicines—some for healing; white willow, holly, and yarrow, and others made to ease death; bane berries, bitter dock tea, and slips of yew tree her father never let her use. No sooner had they disappeared behind the burgundy cloth than there was a knock at their door. David went to the door to find a man with tired eyes and sweat covered brow.
“I am here to see the physician. Is he in?”
“Come in. I will tell him you are here.” David waved a hand to the seat he had just occupied and opened the flap of the curtain and let it drop behind him. Tirzah peeked through the curtain at he
r mother for an answer. Martha nodded, and Tirzah went back with her father. She admired her father’s skills as a physician. Not only was he talented, but he also possessed great empathy for his patients—too much so, as he didn’t receive pay from some.
He knew they would pay him back in time. Some would bring him eggs, others milk or cheese, sometimes for months or even years after his services were rendered. He had sacrificed becoming a master physician to live in the small village and heal the people there, but still did better than most he treated.
When Tirzah asked him once if he had ever lost a patient, Andrew’s eyes misted at the memory of the small boy who came down with fever. Andrew couldn’t squelch the fire in the child, and he became consumed with it. It was that moment that Tirzah decided to learn as much as she could from her father, to be his helping hand.
“Tirzah,” Andrew sighed her name.
“Are you well, Father?” She drew closer to him and began arranging instruments with him. “No, none of us are, Tirzah.” He averted his eyes and kept at his work.
The words stung in her mind. He was referring to the council meeting he had come from before dinner. After a long wait, the time must be near. She pushed the thoughts from her mind and back to the problem at hand.
“Shall I bring in the patient for you, Father?”
“Yes, that would be fine.”
Tirzah brought the man in and sat him down on the pallet.
“Heat some water, Tirzah.” Andrew examined the man with his scrutinizing eyes. He felt him for fever and asked Tirzah to bring a cold cloth for his head. Then he asked many questions to diagnose him.
Tirzah dropped a few grains of dried lampblack into the inkhorn and added some water. She mixed it, then dipped her iron stylus into the ink and began to write on the wax tablet. “Your name, please.”
“Cham.” There was a knock at the door, drawing his attention. Her brother’s voice and a lift of the curtain let them know there was another patient, and a third one coming to the door.
Cham stared at Tirzah anxiously. “Do you always have this many patients?”
“Yes, especially lately. My father has been busy during the day and has to wait to take patients at night. What is bothering you, Cham?”
“Fever comes and goes. Have trouble keeping my food down, and I got this rash. I’m feeling weaker by the day. And you know as well as I do that we have much work ahead of us.”
Andrew finished with the herbs he was gathering and glanced over to Cham. Their eyes met, and Andrew slowly walked over to him. “Do you have a family, Cham?” Her father’s gentle way with the man stirred her admiration even more. His quiet questions and encouraging words helped the patient discuss his deepest fears and concerns for his family. Andrew treated each patient as an individual.
He pulled up Cham’s shirt. Red swollen welts extended down his belly and around his back. “Let me mix something up some five-finger balm for you. I think it might help heal that inflammation.”
Andrew returned to his blending table and placed a root of thyme and elderberry into a mortar bowl and ground the herbs with a stone pestle. Tirzah wrote the remedy given and asked Cham a few more questions while he waited. Andrew stirred the concoction into a dark liquid Cham’s pale face was now in a sweat, which was the desired response of the body to rid the body of unhealthy substances.
Tirzah handed him a cloth to wipe his brow. “Your body is working to rid itself of your ailments. Get some rest.”
Cham gazed down at his sweaty palms. “I don’t have the money to pay you for this. But I will.”
Andrew shook his head. “There is no need to worry about that now. What one man has is another’s with what we are about to face.”
Tirzah looked at her father with a heavy heart. Whatever had been discussed at council was burdening him greatly. Tirzah longed for him to be able to rest but knew he would not take any time for himself when there were patients at his door.
“Thank you. And I will pay you. I’m not a man who doesn’t,” Cham insisted.
Andrew nodded and smiled as Cham found his way out past the curtain and the two patients waiting. A woman brought in her child who was lethargic and unable to eat. The other was a woman who had a troubled mind and frequently visited Andrew. Her needs were a calm word and kind prayer, which helped more than any of his medicines could provide.
When they had gone, Tirzah helped her father clean the instruments. David walked past the curtain to see his father.
Andrew smiled at his youngest son and nodded to a stool. “Is there something on your mind?”
David quietly sat on the stool and put a hand to his shoulder. Andrew watched David grab his tunic, squeezing the material and releasing it. He took in, then let out a long breath. “What is it, son?”
David’s fingers turned white as he gripped his tunic again.
Tirzah set down the metal tool she held and came closer to David. “Father, he’s bleeding.”
Andrew took quick steps to his son’s side and pulled the tunic down around David’s chest. A four-inch slice crossed his arm and shoulder. There was minimal bleeding, but the cut was deep and had probably bled plenty when first made.
Tirzah knew what to do before Andrew asked. She poured hot water into a bowl and gathered strips of cloth and salve. Andrew’s eyes were fixed on David’s shoulder, examining the cut. He measured the depth of the injury and looked for signs of disease. Tirzah knew as well as her father what made this kind of cut—clean and deep with no jagged edges and slowly spreading to expose the bone.
If Tirzah hadn’t known, the look on her brother’s face would have told her. Andrew remained quiet as he cleaned the cut and asked Tirzah for a needle and thread. David winced when the first prick of the needle poked through his skin.
Andrew stopped and asked only once, “Do you want numbing ointment applied?” David shook his head, numbing away the pain with his pride. Tirzah watched without saying a word. She and David waited for their father’s words that would only come when he was completely through with the procedure.
When they had finished, Tirzah went about cleaning up, and Andrew pulled up a stool beside his son. David’s color was coming back a bit. The pain from the stitching had taken a toll on him. He had been brave but had paid the price.
“You went against my orders.” Andrew’s tone was low but firm, without expression. His eyes stared deeply into David’s.
“Yes, I did.” David shot out his chin which surprised Tirzah and angered his father.
“Why?” Andrew’s question left David nowhere to go but to answer directly.
“Because I want to fight.” David moved forward and winced when he moved his shoulder. “Both of my brothers will go to battle, fighting for our people, our God. I want to be there with them.” He leaned back but kept his jaw firm.
Tirzah jumped at the sound of a knock at the door. She lifted the curtain to see Nethan entering the kitchen. When his eyes fell upon her, he smiled briefly but must have seen the stress in her face as his smiled faded.
“Nethan?” Andrew asked from beyond the curtain.
Tirzah answered, “Yes, it’s Nethan.”
“Bring him back here, please.”
Nethan walked quickly past Tirzah and into where David and Andrew were seated. “Good evening, Andrew.”
Andrew nodded. “It seems David took it upon himself to visit the guard stations earlier this evening.” Andrew looked from David to Nethan. “He was hurt in the process, a good ten stitches.” Nethan waited through the pause and let Andrew continue. “If you ever see David there again, I would appreciate you sending him home.”
David scoffed. “I am not a child. I don’t need…”
Andrew cut him off with a look. “Thank you, Nethan. You may go.”
“Yes, sir.” Nethan walked past the kitchen and stood behind Andrew. He opened the door and motioned to Tirzah follow him.
“I can’t believe David would go against my father’s wishes.” Tirzah was g
azing upward thinking aloud as much as speaking to Nethan.
“That is the problem,” Nethan said evenly.
Tirza frowned. “What do you mean?”
“Exactly as you said, your father’s wishes. David has wishes of his own.” Nethan looked up at the stars. He seemed to be unmoved by the anger his words caused her.
She scoffed, “I can’t believe you are siding with David on this.”
“I feel the same way David does. I want to be in on the fight as well.” His eyes were shining and his voice steady.
This was something she didn’t understand, couldn’t understand. She and her father were healers. Nethan’s instinct to kill wasn’t bred into them; theirs was to heal. Tirzah stared into Nethan’s eyes and realized the world needed men with this type of hunger in them, to protect and fight for those they loved.
“It is hard for me to understand.”
Nethan softened and took her hand. “I know.”
She led him to a bench in front of the house. “My father seems very worried.”
“He has reason to be.” He leaned back in the seat, silent for a moment. “The enemy is near.”
She felt his fingers slip around her shoulder. “How much longer?”
“A day, maybe less.”
“Shouldn’t the people be warned?” Tirzah didn’t understand his or her father’s lack of concern. This was life-threatening information, and everyone was asleep in their beds.
“We have done all we can do. Their army outnumbers ours by many. If they want our village, they will have it. Our best chance is if they find Josiah before they get here.”
“How can you speak so disrespectfully of Josiah?”
“It is not disrespect, but truth.”
Tirzah did not know what to do with the fear that claimed her. Nethan seemed to be so calm, and her father so sad. She felt an incredible urgency well up inside her, a desire to run through the streets and put people on their guard, ready to fight. But Nethan and her father both knew of what was to come and were calmly going about their business.
