East of Ashes

by Gideon Nieuwoudt

  Come to think of it, the mere fact that he was still alive following the Harim raid in November was a miracle in itself.

  Lamech shook his head ruefully. Bohemond had taken his time closing the trap on the Caracens that day. But when he had, he had done a masterful job of it.

  Othniel told him afterwards that the Crusaders had come crashing down on the Caracens out of nowhere, just as Lamech had lost consciousness. They hadn't stood a chance against the Crusaders, who were riled to fever pitch upon seeing what had been left of their comrades, and the Caracen soldiers had been finished off quickly.

  Apparently Bohemond was as pleased as he could be with Lamech, Othniel and the others who had survived the rush of the camp, singing their praises and giving thanks to God for the miraculous victory.

  Lamech wasn't so sure what hand God had played in it, but he couldn't forget the whispering voice he’d heard just before losing consciousness. At the time it had left him badly shaken.

  As the memory of the experience faded, he tried telling himself that he had only imagined it, but deep down he knew better.

  He looked up as something whirred through the air and landed about 30 metres or so from his feet. He was sitting near the river in front of the walls of Antioch, just out of the archers’ range.

  Try again, he thought angrily, and spat in the dust in front of him.

  At least he hadn't been completely bored in the months following his injury in February. The Antioch garrison had seemed relentless in their pursuit to harass the Crusaders, who simply couldn't keep the holes in their siege line closed, allowing the city supplies to be continuously replenished.

  The arrival of reinforcements and material brought by an English fleet and the ensuing construction of the La Mahomerie stronghold in front of the Bridge Gate had helped matters some, but it had still left two gates unguarded through which the city could be supplied. The Iron Gate, high up in the mountain behind the city, had proved to be a particularly difficult hole to plug.

  We simply don't have enough men, Lamech thought.

  "You should change position every now and then."

  Lamech wheeled around to find a grinning Othniel standing behind him.

  "Why?" Lamech asked baffled.

  "Well, if you're going to offer them target practice, at least give them a moving target to shoot at. It's a bit unsporting otherwise," Othniel replied.

  Lamech couldn't help but laugh.

  "Take a seat and we'll make a team effort of it," he replied, his irritation of a moment ago gone.

  Lamech watched his friend with a smile as he sat down with theatrical grunts and pauses. Othniel is a man of contrasts, he thought: quick to make a joke and laugh uproariously, but equally ready with a word of advice and comfort.

  In the last couple of months, Lamech had grown to trust this man - and his opinion - more than he had trusted anyone in a very long time.

  Turning his attention back to the city before them, Lamech studied the walls crawling up on each side of the mountain, coming together at the top to encircle the citadel. Antioch had formidable defences and right now their siege of it was a joke.

  Othniel noticed his friend falling into a pensive mood again. He longed to encourage him, but he found it difficult to find much hope for a siege that was unlikely to succeed too.

  "If they're going to make a display of it, it'll be soon," he observed instead.

  "That's what I've been waiting for. When I heard about their capture, I came straight away," Lamech replied, then nodded his head emphatically when Othniel lifted an eyebrow: "I know, I know... I shouldn't give them an audience, but I couldn't help myself."

  Othniel nodded in agreement, having been drawn here himself. When he had heard the Caracen garrison of Antioch had captured a Crusader and an Arab maiden in an orchard outside the city walls, he had immediately known what would happen next - and how Lamech would react.

  It took a while for Lamech to finally open up enough to tell him about Leala. Othniel had tried to encourage him, but it had been too much, too soon. Lamech had clamped up and wouldn't say anything further.

  Othniel thought it unwise to press the matter and had left it at that, sensing that what was bothering him hadn't really had anything to do with Leala.

  "There they are," Lamech said suddenly.

  Othniel's head whipped up to look at the city walls. Sure enough, Caracen soldiers could be seen dragging a man and a woman to the top of one of the towers, in full view of the Crusaders.

  Lamech and Othniel stood up, dusted themselves off and watched the soldiers strip the knight.

  They didn't waste any time. The knight's head was forced down onto the edge of the wall, his arms held down tightly by a soldier on either side of him. One of the soldiers held the knight by the hair in an ironed fist. A third walked up to them and lifted his sword high in the air, held it for a whisper, and then brought it flashing down.

  The knight's head was severed just above his shoulders. The Caracen soldier that had held his head down kept his grip and prevented it from dropping to the ground below. The executed knight's corpse sprayed forth blood, splattering the wall crimson.

  The soldiers unceremoniously dumped the corpse over the wall but kept the head. Lamech knew what they intended to do with it, having witnessed the Crusader army doing the very same thing before.

  Next the soldiers brought the young woman forward. Her clothes were torn in tatters. Lamech could only imagine what horrors they had done to her. Her face was streaked with tears, but as they brought her to the edge of the wall, Lamech noticed that she wasn't crying now, clearly struck numb by shock.

  She was beheaded in the same way as the knight and her headless body was dumped at the foot of the city walls next to her would-be lover. The soldiers disappeared from the walls with the two heads.

  "Here it comes," Othniel said through tight lips.

  He had barely finished his sentence when two round objects were catapulted from inside the city over the walls to land at the edge of the Crusader army's camp. The act was followed by tumultuous cheers from within the city.

  Lamech had witnessed the Crusaders catapult the heads of captured soldiers into the city many times before. It had become a regular feature on both sides in this war, each trying to prove to the other that they would not give in - encouraging the other side to surrender before it was too late. There would be no mercy for the defeated.

  Every time it had happened Lamech was left numb. Never in his wildest dreams could he imagine armies, professing to fight a holy cause, engage in such brutality. The look on Othniel's face told the same story, although he had clearly become more used to it, though not desensitised.

  Seeing the face of that young woman had struck Lamech particularly hard. The image left him reeling and his legs suddenly refused to support him any longer. Othniel managed to grab his arm in time to stop him from crumbling to the ground.

  For the briefest of moments Lamech had seen the face of another, deathly pale with unseeing eyes, her beautiful hair matted against the side of her face.

  -------

  "You're quiet tonight," Othniel remarked that evening while they were sitting around the campfire, having just finished a meagre broth.

  Lamech, startled by Othniel's voice, looked up from the flames. He tried smiling, but his mouth was stuck.

  Othniel grunted, poured some wine into a mug and brought it around to Lamech's side. He sat down next to his friend and handed him the mug. Lamech thanked him quietly and resumed staring at the flames.

  "I don't know how you do it," he finally said. Othniel remained silent, waiting patiently for him to continue.

  "How can you continue believing in God when we see every day what we saw today; what is done in His name?"

  Othniel didn't reply immediately, but considered his words carefully. He decided his friend would appreciate the truth being given straight.

  "God's existence doesn't depend on what people profess to do in His name," he said
. "Either He exists, or He doesn't. What people say they do in His name is a separate matter. Besides, just because they say they're doing something in His name doesn't mean He told them to."

  Lamech thought about Othniel's words for a long time before he answered.

  "I guess that's true enough. And if I'm really honest with myself, there's enough evidence to support the likelihood that He does exist," he replied. "And I can't argue about how people use God's name to further their own agendas. But that confuses me even more!"

  "Why's that?" Othniel asked.

  "Look around us!" Lamech exclaimed. "Have you ever seen so much brutality, so much hatred, being committed in one place? Why doesn't God stop it? If He's a loving God as scripture says, then why does He allow this kind of evil to exist in the world?"

  "You have one thing right: it is evil," Othniel replied emphatically. "All this bloodshed is not from God - it has left me wishing I could leave the army and return to my home. But the Lord hasn't released me yet."

  Othniel laughed at the baffled look on Lamech's face.

  "Yes, I know - the obvious question is: ‘Why does He want me here?’ He's revealing it to me bit by bit each day, and I'm still working through it," he said. "But I believe this moment is part of it."

  "But to get back to your original question: let's take this Crusade as an example. Do you really think God told the pope to preach it? Do you really think God wants us to slaughter fellow human beings to liberate a city from... from what? Other people? Whom He also cares about?"

  Lamech pondered his question for a moment and then shook his head reluctantly.

  "No, I don't think so either," Othniel replied. "This Crusade is man-made. Man decided to embark on it. Man decided to kill his fellow man. Why? Power and greed."

  "Wouldn't you agree that blaming God for it is both extremely arrogant and ignorant as He had nothing to do with it? The state of the world is caused by our evil acts, not God's. We're trying to shift the blame to Him."

  "Fair enough," Lamech conceded, "But it still doesn't answer my question. Why doesn't He come and change everything? He surely has the power to do so?"

  "He can, and He will," Othniel replied. "But think of this: when Jesus comes back, if you're on the wrong side, it's going to be a very bad day for you. So He's taking longer to give people more time to choose Him out of their own. That's what real relationship is all about. God is not a puppet master - He wants to build relationship with us, but He won't force Himself upon us. You don't love that which is forced upon you."

  "On the day that He returns, however, everyone is going to want to get to know Him, to choose Him. But that will be false, because then suddenly there will be no real choice anymore. You'll have to be particularly far-gone to stand in front of God in all His glory and majesty and spit right in His face, choosing to go to hell instead of heaven. So He's giving people more time before that day comes, out of mercy."

  "But why doesn't He interfere in the meantime?" Lamech asked.

  "When believers ask Him to interfere in a particular problem of theirs - and firmly believe that He is both capable and willing to interfere because He loves them - then He usually does. Sometimes He doesn't, but in those cases it's not because He doesn't love us. On the contrary, it's usually because He has a much clearer picture of the situation and knows that the solution you're asking for is not the best one for you or those involved. In those cases He might not be answering your prayer exactly the way you asked Him to, not because He doesn't care, but because His ways are better, higher than ours."

  "Besides," Othniel continued, "we often pray and tell Him how He should solve a particular problem - almost as if we know better than He does. What arrogance! Faced with the glory and power, wisdom and insight that God has, who are we to tell Him what to do? It should be the other way around!"

  "Instead we should approach Him with respect, asking Him for help and to intervene in our situation. He's loving and merciful and wants to intervene. If He doesn't intervene, it's not because He doesn't want to. In fact, I think it must hurt Him profusely when He has to hold back for a time. But He does so because He knows the outcome will be better than if He had to intervene right now."

  "You really want me to believe that He's a loving God?" Lamech asked. "And that He's involved in man's doing - in a good way? That's very hard to believe when you look at all the brutality being committed in His name in this war. I know, I know, you already said that's because of man, but still..."

  "It is, you're right. But when you look at the characteristics of God as taught by scripture, and by what is gleaned if you walk in a personal relationship with Him, then you see that it's very different to that which is taught by the church today. Then you see that the pope is merely using God as a tool to further his own agenda. I am convinced that the pope doesn't know God at all. He knows about God, but he doesn't know God. If he did, he'd be crawling on the floor, begging for mercy. Because he's using God to manipulate people."

  "And the same goes for many so-called Christians today. Most of them don't really have a personal relationship with God. They say they're fighting for God in this war, but really they're here for the bounty - and to try and buy God's forgiveness, thinking they can earn forgiveness and salvation through a so-called 'penitent holy war'."

  "But it doesn't work like that. You don't gain salvation through the work of your hands. It's a gift, offered freely by God to us by sending His son Jesus to die for our sins. We have to accept that gift, accept Jesus as our saviour."

  "But when we do, we give up the right to live only for ourselves. We can still choose to, but that will be counter-productive to our relationship with God. Most people don't want to give up control - they want to remain in charge of their lives. But what they don't realise is that when you give up control, give the reigns to God, then you begin to discover a depth and power to life that you never knew before."

  "And I'm not talking slavery here - I'm talking about real life; life to the full," Othniel concluded.

  His words immediately brought Leala and Joash to mind. Lamech instinctively knew this was something they had clicked a long time ago. He now understood why their faith was so alive: they did what Othniel was talking about. They accepted Jesus as their saviour - and not just as a religious figurehead. For them, being a Christian was more than just going to church and doing all the right religious things - it was life.

  It was evidently also the reason why they possessed so much peace.

  But they hadn't done what he had done.

  "I'll be honest with you Othniel. I know your real reason for talking to me, for telling me these things, is because you want to see me become like you. I appreciate it. Really, I do. And part of me wants to have that - the life you speak of resonates with me, fills me with hope. But you don't know what I did," Lamech said, dropping his head in anguish.

  Othniel placed his hand on Lamech's shoulder to comfort him.

  "Then why don't you tell me?" he said. When Lamech didn't reply, Othniel looked down at his face. He was surprised to find silent tears streaming down his cheeks.

  "I was married once," Lamech said softly. "It was long ago. We married in secret because her father didn't approve of me. Oh, she was so beautiful - her presence would light up a room."

  Othniel held his hand still on his friend's shoulder, afraid that if he moved it Lamech would stop talking.

  "I was speaking to my father - a bishop at our town's cathedral - when news arrived that they had found her... murdered," Lamech whispered, his shoulders shaking as years of tears locked up behind walls of rage finally began to pour through the cracks. He took a deep breath and willed himself to continue.

  "At the time I didn't think much of it, being too overcome to think coherently," he continued, the words now coming like a river, "but later I found it odd that my father didn't seem too shocked. Almost as if he’d known already."

  "Which he had. But I guess I'm getting ahead of myself," Lamech smiled bleakly. He wi
ped the tears from his cheeks and then continued.

  "It didn't take a lot of investigation to find out who was responsible for her murder. He was a prominent figure in our town and it was no secret that he had had his eye on her. He had a wife but thought to take mine as his mistress. Apparently he discovered the day before that we had married in secret and confronted her in a jealous rage. Things didn't go the way he had wanted them to - and... she ended up dead."

  "I went straight to his house, sword in hand. I would have killed him on the spot if my father hadn't followed me and stopped me. To be honest, I was actually relieved that he did. I guess even in the midst of my grief and rage I knew deep down that if I had given in to it, it would have consumed me."