People of Babel (Ark Chronicles 3)

by Vaughn Heppner

  “Hold!” Magog said, standing, with his arms outstretched. His sons and grandsons snatched their weapons, ready to fall upon any that Magog indicated. “This is exactly what I mean. This is what I hate, and this is what I fear: The impulsive belligerence of the sons of Ham. They all seem like the Kush I knew as a lad, quick to anger and, as Beor said, swift to shed blood.”

  “Patriarch Magog,” Gilgamesh said. “Your father Japheth judged the case against Minos, fining him and his cousins, and their former wealth going to Beor. By your laws the matter is now closed, and it is Beor who opens old wounds, not us.”

  “Why did you come here?” Magog asked.

  “I have cheetah pelts I wish to trade,” Gilgamesh said. “And there are among us those who have heard of the loveliness of the maidens of Magog Village. Thebes has visited here before and, as a fellow Hunter, wished to guide his brothers of the spear. Knowing, however, that Beor and his Scouts lived here, Olympus and Minos thought it prudent to stand with Thebes.”

  “Brothers of the spear?” Magog asked.

  Gilgamesh dipped his head. “Nimrod the Mighty Hunter gathers fellow hunters. Perhaps there are those among you who have maligned his name, but Nimrod believes that those who hunt and risk their lives together are brothers. Whether one is a son of Ham or Japheth or even Shem is not the issue.”

  “Hmm,” Magog said. “What do you say to all this, Beor?”

  Beor had lowered his spear and nodded as Gilgamesh spoke. “Nimrod’s right hand man, I said, and now you see why. He is glib-tongued and smooth. I cannot match him word for word. This, however, I’ll say. I know them. I don’t trust them. Even more I suspect Minos the Snake, no son of Japheth he, but a child of the Serpent.”

  “Step forward, Minos,” Magog said.

  Minos warily did, as he cast worried glances at the spear in Beor’s hand.

  “You’ve heard Beor’s charge,” Magog said. “What is your answer?”

  “I come in peace,” Minos said, his smile oily. He glanced again at the spear, and words failed him.

  “Do you see?” Beor said with a snort. “In the light of day, his boasts shrivel.”

  Minos shook his head, but he’d grown pale.

  “Patriarch Magog,” Gilgamesh said, stepping beside Minos. “What man wouldn’t become nervous with famed Beor breathing death threats on him? Minos has paid his debt to Beor. We stand on your laws in that regard, and we’re certain that no foreigner, no matter how mighty, can shake or sway the righteousness of those laws.”

  “You club me with your words,” Magog said. “It is you who are trying to force me to act this way or that.”

  Gilgamesh bowed. “Patriarch Magog, Nimrod has a word for what you describe.”

  “Oh?” Magog said.

  “Duty.”

  Magog scowled. “What impertinence is this?”

  “A good man is duty-bound to stand by right,” Gilgamesh said. “The only way my words club you, as you say, is because you’re a man of honor and know that I speak rightly.”

  Magog laughed, incredulous. “You’re a bold fellow, and you speak straight to the point.”

  “May we stay in your village under your protection?” Gilgamesh asked.

  Magog eyed Gilgamesh and then Minos and finally those behind them. He turned to Beor. “Will you attack them? Will you break the peace?”

  Beor squinted. “If they stay well away from Hilda and speak no words to her and raise no threats against me, then I will avoid them as one does stepping into a steaming pile of cow manure.”

  Several of Magog’s grandsons chuckled, although Magog continued to look grave. “This is a serious issue. I want no wars here, now or in the future.” He studied Gilgamesh. “Very well, straight arrow of Nimrod, you and your brothers of the spear are welcome in Magog Village.” He turned to his sons and grandsons. “Will any put up the Hunters?”

  “We bear gifts,” Gilgamesh said.

  A tall man named Scyth with flecks of gray in his beard raised his hand. “I’ll take them in. Thebes and Olympus are sons of my wife’s brother.”

  “Then let there be peace in our village,” Magog said. “And whoever breaks the peace shall be bound and brought to my father Japheth for judging, even if it be my grandson Gog who breaks it. I have spoken.”

  9.

  Several days later, Hilda pouted at the table. She passed the peas and the platter of pork and poured water, never saying a word as the Scouts, Beor and the wives of the Scouts related tales of what the Hunters did that day.

  “Why do they linger?” a Scout asked. “That’s what I don’t understand. Gilgamesh traded his cheetah pelts. Obed has failed in every endeavor to entice a girl and Minos and his crew have hunted the further fields. They’ve exhausted all they set out to do. Aaccording to them, Nimrod waits at the Euphrates for their return.”

  “The reason is obvious,” Beor said. “They haven’t accomplished their mission.”

  “You still believe that?” asked one of the wives. “That they came on a secret mission?”

  “Why pick Magog Village?” Beor asked. He thumped his chest. “Because I’m here.”

  “What’s their goal do you think?” a Scout asked.

  Beor shrugged.

  “Come now, Beor,” a different Scout said. “We all loathe Nimrod and his Hunters, but I think this time we may have misjudged their intent.”

  “No,” Beor said. “They have come with ill will, and that is why Minos, Thebes and Olympus joined them.”

  Hilda reached for the butter. Her elbow struck her wooden cup, spilling water so it poured onto her lap. She leapt up, crying in outrage, and she dashed to her room, slamming the door behind her as she fell crying onto her bed.

  In a few minutes, she heard the clump-clump of her father’s peg leg and then a light rap at the door. She wiped her cheeks and sat up. “Come in.”

  Beor squeezed through, pulled up a stool and sat near the bed. “I know these past few days cooped up inside have been hard on you.”

  “Oh, Father, Gog said he’d escort me wherever I went. So you needn’t worry about me.”

  “Gog is a strong lad and a keen wrestler. But with knife-work—”

  “Is that why you think they came?” Hilda asked, wide-eyed. “To pull daggers on us?”

  Beor frowned. “I don’t know why they came. All I know is that, in my bones, I feel uneasy whenever I spy Thebes or Olympus glancing at me. They look hungry, like wolves eyeing a deer. They plan mischief, those two, and Gilgamesh, for all his fine words, has no love for the sons of Canaan.”

  “I’m so bored, though, and I hear that Lilly and Dawn ply Gog with attention, knowing the field is open now that I’ve been tied down here.”

  “Remember what happened before. When I think of it…” He tightened his hold.

  “Ow!” Hilda said, jerking her hand away. “Why do you squeeze so hard?”

  “Forgive me, my darling.”

  “Oh, Father,” Hilda said, patting him on the shoulder. “I understand your worry. But please let me go outside tomorrow. I can’t stand sitting here day after day with nothing to do.”

  Beor smiled, although worry lined his gruff face.

  “Please.”

  “You must stay in a group or with several Scouts nearby.”

  “I will.”

  Beor sighed as he reluctantly nodded. “Now come and finish your meal. It’s getting cold.”

  “Yes, Father,” Hilda said, jumping up. “And thank you.”

  10.

  Two days later, Minos and Gilgamesh crept through a small forest of birch trees several leagues from the village. They held bows with strung arrows, crunching through snow and looking for rabbits to put into their host’s stewpot.

  “It’s taking too long,” Minos said. “People are becoming suspicious, wondering why we’re overstaying our welcome.”

  “Don’t you think I know that?” Gilgamesh said. “I’ve been unable to attempt it before now. Until the girl came out, the house w
as guarded like a treasure trove.”

  “She’s been out for two days,” Minos said.

  Gilgamesh nodded, and he caught Minos glancing at him sidelong.

  “You’re getting cold feet again, aren’t you?”

  “I’m thinking about my honor, if you must know. Do I stain it for mere gain?”

  “So that’s it,” Minos said. “You made such a fine speech our first day that now you don’t want to sully it. Well, that’s the wrong question to give yourself, if you ask me.”

  “Why would I do that? You wilted because Beor glowered. You became like snow before a summer sun.”

  “That will change,” Minos said, “believe me, it will.”

  Gilgamesh lowered his bow. “You say that as if you’re planning…” He squinted at the brother of Semiramis, the brother of the woman who hated Beor above all men. “What are you planning?”

  “Nothing.”

  Gilgamesh shook his head. “I’ve been so wrapped up in my own worries that I’ve missed the signs. You’re up to something—you, Thebes and Olympus.”

  “Nonsense.”

  “What is it, Minos? Why did you really come to Magog Village?”

  “To help you,” Minos said. “But if you’ve changed your mind again and lost heart…”

  Gilgamesh shot him a warning scowl.

  “Are you going to attempt it or not?” Minos asked.

  Gilgamesh hesitated, and that old and, by now, familiar lurch in his gut told him that he dearly didn’t want to. But if he didn’t— “Tomorrow,” he said. “I’ll do it tomorrow. You and the others go hunting far a-field where the path leaves the valley, as we agreed before. I’ll meet you in the evening, and from there we’ll return to Nimrod.”

  “With the necklace?” Minos asked.

  Gilgamesh swallowed, and he nodded once, sharply, wondering why he felt so wretched and dirty.

  11.

  That evening in their host’s guestroom, Minos whispered to Thebes, “We lure Beor out tomorrow.” They sat on a bench, sharpening daggers, with the hypnotic whir of bronze on sandstone. A flame danced in a stone oil-dish.

  “You’re certain cousin Scyth knows his part?” whispered Thebes.

  Minos grinned. “They’re sick of Beor and his Scouts just like we were in Javan Village. He knows what to do.”

  “Yes, but will he do it?”

  Minos set aside his sandstone and dagger, and from a leather pouch dangling from his throat, he withdrew a glittering ruby, one found in the Zagros Region and traded two years ago for sheep. Semiramis had given it to him for the sole purpose of winning Beor’s death. “When I showed our cousin this, I swear the ruby-light blinded him to ought else.”

  The door opened, and Thebes covered the ruby with his hand. “Put that away,” he said out of the side of his mouth.

  “What are you two whispering about?” Gilgamesh asked, slipping off his cloak and shaking off snow.

  “Nothing,” Minos said, as he slipped the ruby back into its pouch. “Just that it’s cold tonight. Don’t you agree?”

  “I do,” Gilgamesh said, as he hung his cloak on a peg.

  From the main room rang a bell.

  “Suppertime,” Gilgamesh said. “Good. I’m famished for some rabbit stew.”

  12.

  The next morning, with his hands thrust in his pockets, Gilgamesh strolled through village lanes, nodding to people and pausing to pet leashed hounds. The first few days, these same hounds had barked and growled. But day by day, he’d slipped them pieces of meat and held out his hand for them to sniff. Some of the owners and he had talked many hours about good dogs and worthless dogs. Folk now joked that he got along better with hounds than he did with people.

  Even though he smiled and remained outwardly calm, his stomach seethed. He’d hardly slept last night, and his eyes had become bloodshot.

  Minos and the others had left. Enlil waited several leagues in the woods.

  Gilgamesh knew his plan, had thought long and hard on it. Slipping in at night, with everyone in the house alert to strange sounds, seemed like the height of folly. Craft and guile dictated a direct approach. His stomach lurched and knotted and thoughts of his honor made his hands shake.

  “Opis,” he whispered. “Think of Opis.”

  He glanced around. An older matron stepped out of her house and shook a blanket. A man staggered down the lane with a barrel of beer perched on his shoulder. A dog gnawed on a bone.

  Gilgamesh swallowed. Beor and his Scouts hunted today. Hilda stayed with the maidens, who were entertained by Gog and his friends at the wrestling pit. Gilgamesh sauntered near Beor’s house. It was a big, rectangular-shaped building, built on a foundation of stone and continued with dark-colored fir. It was like a fortress, heavy, solid and long, containing rooms for all the Scouts and their wives. It reminded him of Nimrod’s Barracks.

  Gilgamesh knelt to check his sandal, slyly glancing right and left. He saw no one. That didn’t mean no one saw him. He drew a deep breath, rose and pivoted. In three steps, he opened the front door to Beor’s dwelling, stepping in and shutting the door behind him.

  His heart pounded so he heard the throbs in his ears.

  A long table filled the main room, a table decorated with slender, wooden vases, with colored rugs on the walls and many strewn on the wooden floor. He glanced about, studying the closed doors on the left side of the room and at the end. They had stone socket-hinges and each seemed to be latched. He yearned to call out, to see if anyone was in the other rooms. He had excuses ready if someone came in, but most of them sounded lame even to him. So he crossed the room in several swift steps, wincing as floorboards creaked.

  He depressed the latch to Hilda’s bedroom, holding his breath, stepping in and shutting the door behind him. Dizziness threatened. He clenched his teeth and forced himself to study the room. A bed, a rug in the middle, an ivory figurine of an elephant that had to be a gift from Ham—guilt pounded now—a wooden chest, with a pair of sandals beside it. He lurched to the chest, knelt, opened it and moved aside articles of clothing and a dagger. He drew out a small box. He swallowed and lifted the box’s lid. His eyes widened, and he blinked repeatedly.

  On black cloth lay the three beads of priceless amber, with a tiny fly embedded in the middle bead. His hands trembled as he picked it up and shoved the necklace into a soft deerskin pouch that he stuffed inside his tunic. He closed the box’s lid, put it back in the chest and moved to the door, putting his ear to it.

  His heart raced, for he heard the main door bang open. A woman said something, something about it being in her…in her bedroom! He shrank against the wall where the door would hit if it were opened all the way. Footsteps pattered across the main room. Closer, closer, if he was found out… He wrapped his fingers around the bone hilt of his dagger. Could he stab a woman?

  A different door opened and moments later banged shut. “I have it,” the woman said, obviously not Hilda.

  Air slipped out of him. He sagged in relief. Footsteps sounded and then the main door opened and closed again.

  Gilgamesh waited. He found himself drenched in sweat. Swallowing, forcing himself to move, he opened the bedroom door and walked across the main room. He hesitated at the outer door, then flung it open, stepped outside into the cool air and shut the door behind him. His shoulders tightened as he waited that half-second for someone to shout, to accuse him of thievery. Although he yearned to sprint, to run for the village gate, he strolled in as normal a gait as possible. His heart raced, sweat still oozed from him, and the amber necklace tucked in his tunic seemed to burn against his side. Unbelieving that he didn’t stagger and lurch and laugh aloud like a madman, he nodded to the man on guard and then sauntered through the gate.

  I did it. I have the amber necklace.

  He hurried through the fields, finally breaking into a jog for the woods in the distance. As he ran, he felt relief, vast, flooding and giddiness. That lasted about two leagues, for the amber necklace seemed to burn hotte
r and hotter against his side. His mouth turned dry as he realized that he was a thief. No, more than that, he had perjured himself. He had spoken fair words and then done violence to his words. He shook his head, telling himself that was nonsense. But by the time he reached the woods, the guilt of his theft overwhelmed him. He hung onto a small tree, with sweat stinging his eyes.

  “I am thief,” he said. He hated the sound of it. He thought of the person who had stolen his fish-eyes. Loathing filled him. Oh, he wanted Opis, but he didn’t want to throw away his honor.

  He wiped sweat out of his eyes, and he found himself walking back to Magog Village. He broke into a jog and then into a sprint. Air wheezed into his lungs. His side exploded with pain. He slowed to a walk and let the sweat dry on his face before he reentered the village. He waved, but the person on guard didn’t wave back, but seemed to watch him.

  “Don’t panic,” he told himself. Remain calm. He approached Beor’s house. It was a little before noon. Hardly any time had passed since he’d stolen the necklace. Yet the house seemed sinisterly quiet. He wouldn’t go into the girl’s room. No. He couldn’t risk that. He’d just lay the necklace on the main table. Let them figure that out. He smiled, took a deep breath, hurried across the lane and opened the door.

  Beor, standing by the head of the table, whirled around.

  Gilgamesh stared stupidly at him.

  “Come to rape my daughter?” Beor asked.

  Gilgamesh shook his head.

  “Ah, I see,” Beor said. “You saw me and came running to speak with me, so excited that you barged into my house unannounced and without knocking first.”

  Gilgamesh swallowed.

  “Well, come in then,” Beor said.

  Gilgamesh licked his lips, hesitating.

  A scream came from Hilda’s bedroom. A moment later, the door swung open. White-faced, Hilda blurted, “Daddy, my necklace is gone. It’s stolen.”

  Gilgamesh went pale as Beor studied him. A grim smile stretched across Beor’s face. Gilgamesh tried to back out the door, but a man shoved him hard in the middle of his shoulders, sending him staggering near Beor.