Shadow of the Mountain (Shadow of the Mountain Book #1): Exodus

by Cliff Graham

  “I learned the warrior arts from the Egyptians, as did Moses,” Caleb conceded.

  Othniel leaned forward. “Please. Tell me of it.”

  “Where do you want me to begin?” Caleb asked, settling into the cushions that were his only yield to comfort in his old age.

  “How you got to Egypt. How you met Joshua. Yahweh parting the seas. Everything.” He sat forward, as though unable to believe he had actually convinced the old man to talk.

  Caleb saw himself in Othniel’s expression. Long ago, when there were not cities filled with giants to attack, or aching bones that hurt even worse during storms.

  “I will tell you, on the promise that you will ensure the other young men will read of what the Lord God did.”

  “I will tell them. I promise.” Othniel pulled out a set of charcoal writing sticks and some sheets of parchment.

  Caleb eyed him. “You came prepared.”

  “I expected to win you over eventually. Perhaps a bribe if it came to it.”

  Caleb smiled. He let his eyes relax behind their closed lids and grew very still. Took several deep breaths. The rain continued to pelt the tent, and he concentrated on the sound. The memories were deep and hidden. They would emerge only if Yahweh allowed them to, and only to accomplish his purposes.

  Darkness. Rain. The musty, damp smell of the wet tent.

  His senses grew sharp.

  From deep within him, an image emerged. An image long lost, but one that grew bolder and clearer until he saw golden sand and piercing blue skies, and mountains made by man.

  2

  To the Land of Gold

  You will hear it said that I fight to live in peace. Nonsense. I fight so that our women and children can live in peace. You will always find me where there is battle.

  Battle is what we are here for. It is all we should know as men while we have breath. Give the enemy battle all of your life, and when you die, chase him into the afterlife and give him battle there. Perhaps then the Lord will give us peace. But don’t expect it.

  I will go to my grave with honor. It will be written that my woman loved me, my children admired me, and the enemy feared me.

  And yet I was not always a warrior.

  You must remember that it has been fifty or sixty years since much of this happened. My memory has faded. I will miss some details.

  But I remember a few things very vividly. The brotherhood I found as I trained in Pharaoh’s armies. The rattle of chariot riggings as teams pulled hundreds of us in a broad hawk formation, striking the purest terror into the hearts of our enemies.

  Then there were the ten times that Yahweh smote the Egyptians with his outstretched arm. A river of blood. Swarms of lice gnats and flies. Darkness. Always darkness. Endless, oppressive darkness. Death. The seas parting before us. The pillar of smoke and flame that led us by night. The taste of the manna and quail that we ate. The hot stench of blood and the metal of weapons glinting under the sun as we killed Amalekites. The endless fire of the deserts. All of those things are as fresh to me as you sitting before me.

  In the beginning, I remember the day that I left my village.

  I carved stone and wood and I was skilled. My hammer and chisel could draw out the form of any animal from the rock; my knife could bring life to any log.

  The other children would gather around me as I made small rocks turn into birds and whittled serpents out of branches. My father Jephunneh encouraged it as a hobby, believing it made my fingers strong and my mind sharp, but only when my chores were done, late at night.

  I was good enough to draw the attention of a man passing through my village on his way to Damascus, who said they hired men like me in Egypt to create the palaces and idols of worship.

  I had heard talk like this before. Living on the frontier of the Negev in those days meant you had to be near the trade roads. But when I told my father what they said, he would have none of it. The Egyptians were our enemy. But I never forgot those words.

  My birth clan was the Kenaz. Our lands were in the hills between the Negev and here. We were not concerned with many things other than our goats and how to stay warm in winter.

  My father was an elder. He was a just man. He would let me sit on the branch of a sycamore above the meetings of the elders and listen as they passed judgment on the members of the tribe brought before them. He was always careful to let the accused defend themselves, and widows were always met with mercy.

  I’ve thought about him over the years. I wonder if his home as a child affected how he judged. As I remember him, my grandfather was a hard man who treated my father harshly. My father never said as much, but I think it was a relief when the old man lost his powers of speech. When my grandfather finally died, my father wept for hours. I do not think they were tears of grief.

  Thereafter, my father loved me and cherished me. I never felt alone. He brought me into the village meetings even when it was protested by other men. He took me into the hills and taught me the flight of arrows and the sweat of a good day’s work.

  We trained for hours with the dagger, for there were no swords to go around in those days. He knew I must be able to protect my home from bandits one day and ensured that I was prepared.

  When I was old enough, he released me. I think it grieved him that I wanted to go to Egypt, but he could no longer forbid it.

  “They are wicked people,” he told me as we walked down the road outside of town.

  “I will return,” I answered, “with enough gold to buy cattle for a hundred years.”

  Father only shook his head and said, “Egypt draws many. She devours many as well.”

  I did not understand at the time, of course. I was young. To my thinking, Egypt was the land of exotic mystery, and the only place that traveling merchants failed to adequately describe because its wonders were so vast.

  I knew I could carve well and draw with charcoal sticks, and I was strong. Those would get me by.

  We embraced once more. I felt his hug last longer than it ever had. When we pulled away, there were tears on the rims of his eyes.

  My last sight of my father was when I turned back before the road fell away again. He sat, alone, on a boulder near the road, the early morning sun making the land glow around him. I looked at the hills of my youth one more time. I felt nothing for them. But I knew I would miss my father.

  A caravan was crossing the Negev to Egypt only hours away from us, and I had to hurry to catch it. The day was terribly hot; they would be encamped at midday to wait for the heat to pass and do most of the travel by night. I would need to convince them to take me before evening, when they would set out again.

  I had enough to pay them for the trip if they were willing to negotiate. I even brought a few sticks of wood to carve toys for their children. This always worked at home whenever I needed to get out of trouble.

  I arrived in early afternoon. They were camped near a well that had been won by an alliance of clans in the last war, before I was born. It was now fiercely defended by a warlord named Bochba, who expected tribute when passersby filled their pouches and watered their camels.

  Bochba.

  Yes, he will enter my story again. Many years later, when our people had finally left Egypt, Bochba was there waiting for us. But that is for another day.

  I saw several of Bochba’s warriors, marked by their colors, reclining under the shade of a tent a short distance from the camp. The merchants must have been wealthy and paid quickly, since I had never seen Bochba’s men relaxing like this.

  It was disheartening at first. A man stood a better chance of convincing caravans to take him if they were in need of money. I would probably have to use my carving.

  My time to barter would be short when it came. I did not want to disturb their rest now, but I also had to barter with them before their camp was packed that evening.

  I picked up a piece of wood and stared at it, waiting for inspiration. A bird cawed overhead. It would have been easy to fashion a bird. I ha
d done many. But I needed to deeply impress them with this carving.

  Before leaving I had sold my remaining carvings for the journey. Even my lion, the best work I had ever done. It did not fetch as much as I was hoping, but I thought I had enough to travel until I found work.

  I pulled out a larger piece of wood. After an hour, I had fashioned a hawk’s head cane, hoping there was an aging or lame merchant in the caravan. I gazed at it, pleased and hoping it would be enough.

  It turned out that it was more than enough.

  Mathea was his name, an old Assyrian who was impressed with my skill.

  “Your work is astounding,” he said to me as he looked over my shoulder. I had positioned myself near the well where I could not be missed. “They would pay fortunes to employ you in Egypt.”

  “That is my ambition,” I answered.

  “I’ll give you passage in exchange for your first month’s take.”

  I had no idea if that was a fair wage or not.

  “How would I pay for my lodging and food? I only have enough to pay the tribute to Bochba.”

  “I know a man who will put you up. I will go to him when we arrive and make arrangements when we depart in a few nights.”

  “A few nights? We are not leaving this very night?”

  Mathea smiled at me. “Bochba wishes to pay a visit to the larger caravans in person. His men inform us that it will be a few days before he arrives. It is not wise to refuse him.”

  That night I lay down on my own at the perimeter. The other fires were spoken for, and there wasn’t room enough for me to lie beside them to ward off the nighttime chill. I did not relish the idea of being on my own when surrounded by strangers, but I managed to make a nice fire where I could put my feet near the flames.

  I scraped out a divot for my shoulder because I like to sleep on my side. Then I draped my cloak over my legs and lay down. The cloak was a gift from my father. I would never have been able to afford it otherwise. Its wool was new and thick, its brown dye still fresh, and it would mark me for theft so I knew I had to be careful.

  The flames warmed me, and I can still remember both the fear and satisfaction I felt before drifting off to sleep that night, my first on my own. I am a man now, I thought. I had bartered like a man, and now I would travel like a man. I stared at the endless stars overhead, the ones I had become so familiar with every night sleeping on our roof, wondering if I would still see them in Egypt.

  My eyes became heavy, but right before sleep they caught movement on the edge of the firelight.

  This was my first taste of battle, but it was also my first taste of treachery, for the well guards of Bochba I had paid off earlier that evening descended on me with terrifying speed, probably thinking I was wealthier than I had let on.

  I reacted just in time, their swords striking the sand where my chest had been. I managed to grab my bag as I rolled and threw it up at one of my attackers.

  I could not tell how many there were, only that they were attacking again, swords everywhere. My fingers found the dagger in my belt, and I scrambled to my side.

  A foot clamped down on my back, pinning me. I winced, expecting the killing blow, but reacting in pure instinct I plunged the dagger blindly behind me, hoping to hit flesh.

  I did, and the man screamed.

  I curled up, my feet under me, and leaped forward to gain distance. I landed and leaped again. My attackers were right behind me.

  After a third leap, feeling like a toad being chased by a jackal, I was able to turn around and face them at last. Four of them. I did not have time to speak before one of them threw a javelin at me.

  I ducked and rolled to my side, the dagger out. Hit and move, my father had taught me, hit and move.

  I lashed out with the tip after sidestepping a club. The dagger penetrated the first man’s face. Not pausing, not waiting to see what happened, I jabbed again and found a leg. As soon as I could jerk it free I leaped out of the way, then sprinted as fast as my legs could take me into the darkness, away from the firelight.

  The howls of both wounded men echoed across the camp. I had been terrified, reacting like an animal, but now I was furious. The darkness was my ally. I could strike from the night and kill all of them.

  Battle lust came over me, the first time for that as well. That unknowable power in a man’s soul that bursts out of him, and all he can think of is spilling more blood and avenging himself.

  It made me sharp. My ears were alert to every sound, every skittering of a viper across the sand, every dung beetle crawling near the camels. I smelled the livestock, the sweat of men, saw with perfect clarity the merchants and their bodyguards rushing up from the camp, one of the two remaining well guards leaning over his comrades.

  One of two?

  I heard the other one approaching from the side, but I was ready this time. He swiped a long blade toward me. I sprinted away, leaving the wounded guards and drawing him out into the desert. Even at this point, long before I would be trained by the Egyptians or alongside Joshua, son of Nun, I knew that if you were unsure of the strength of your opponent, you avoided him, making him chase you, avoiding all of his strikes until you could seize the advantage.

  I climbed a dune, my feet digging into the soft sand. The guard was behind me and gaining ground fast. When I reached the top I turned, bent down for a handful of sand, and then leaped from above over his shoulder, watching his sword slice the night air toward me. I slapped him in the face with the sand just before he could finish the strike.

  He coughed and staggered. I landed, remembered my knife, and reacted again. I took two strides to reach him and shove the dagger into his gut. I pulled it out and struck him on top of his shoulder. When he uncoiled and exposed his neck, I sliced it open.

  He slumped down. I was panting, desperate for air, exhilarated, all of those feelings you get after a fight. But my fury had not abated, and I charged down the dune and back toward the camp.

  I saw the group of about twenty merchants and their guards standing near the watch fire, listening as the uninjured Amalekite waved his arms about and told them some black lie.

  I slowed to a steady walk, approaching unnoticed from behind them. I proceeded past the merchants and directly to the unwounded well guard. A merchant spotted me and held up his hands. “We demand to know what has happened. He says you attacked his men—.”

  Before anyone could react, I raced forward and stabbed my blade into the eye of one of the wounded guards, then pulled it out and did the same to the other. I was so very fast in those days, not like you see me now. By the time they could even raise their hands to stop me I had kicked the remaining guard’s torso, bending him over with agony, and then stabbed my blade into the back of his neck. He fell facedown without another noise.

  I whirled on the group, dagger up.

  “These men attacked me while I slept, like cowards. Who wants to question it? Who?”

  I glared at them, too full of hate to take heed that I was outnumbered by armed bodyguards ten to one.

  There was a long silence, then Mathea, the old merchant whom I’d bargained with, chuckled.

  “We don’t question it. Those men charged us twice the rate they normally do to use this well. Although I fear you have created an eternal enemy of Bochba.”

  My breathing slowed. He was right. It could never get out that I had done this thing to Bochba’s men or my town would be razed to the ground.

  Mathea shrugged. “I suppose we should be on our way early, then.”

  I tried to pay him more to compensate him for his trouble, but he refused. We set out at a fast pace as soon as the camels were ready. He off-loaded some of his wares to make room for me. I have dealt with many Assyrians, and they are mostly treacherous dogs, but I shall forever be grateful for Mathea.

  Egypt appeared after many days. I learned that the merchants were correct. It cannot be described. There is nothing similar you have seen in your lifetime.

  At my first sight of Raamses
and Pithom, I would not be able to speak for many hours. The buildings of dynasty were everywhere. Their temples were lush with gardens and columns, street after street and block after block. Throngs of people, thousands upon thousands, teemed along the Nile in their daily affairs.

  Barges crowded the great river. The ships of Pharaoh’s navy with their painted hulls and gleaming white sails rehearsed their battle drills. Fishermen picked their way into the marshes in narrow boats, watching one another like spies. When one boat would make a catch, the others would move in and make several while the finder struggled to empty his nets.

  Idols occupied every street. It disgusts me to think of it now. They worshiped false gods with the heads of animals and the bodies of men. An abomination.

  Abominations were everywhere! But oh, Othniel, how the world does not know the wonders of Egypt. If man worships himself, as the Egyptians worship their god-king, this is what he is capable of. Monuments to wickedness that dazzle the eyes. I could not comprehend the meaning of what I was seeing.

  Near Thebes were their great pyramids, burial tombs built by men that are mountains reaching almost to the stars. They were ancient even when our father Abraham was there.

  It became my prison, of course, though I would not know it for many years. Those same wonders were also the evil relics of a Yahweh-hating people. I shudder at the visions to this day and leave them to the realm of my nightmares. May the Lord be gracious enough to cleanse my thoughts of them forever when I am done with my tale.

  But I was astounded nonetheless. And when I finally arrived in the markets of Memphis and parted ways with my caravan, I realized how profoundly alone I was in this golden land.

  3

  Keeping Watch

  Caleb sat up, stretching his arms over his head. He gestured for the water pouch, and Othniel jumped up to grab it. Caleb took several long drinks. His throat was dry from so much talking.

  “I will continue in a while,” he said, wiping his mouth. “I have not had my morning meal.”