Brothers

by Angela Hunt

  “No!”

  As Dina screamed and threw herself in front of her husband, Shim’on dropped his lance and used his free hand to pull her away from the young man crouching beside the marriage bed. “Get dressed and rejoice that you are going home.”

  “Shim’on!” She screamed his name in a shriek he would never forget. “What are you doing?”

  “I am taking revenge upon the stranger who defiled you. He is not a fit husband for a daughter of Yisrael.”

  “But you promised! You and the others, you gave your word!”

  “A word spoken to a liar is not a lie.”

  He crouched and shifted his position, never taking his eyes from the man beside the bed. Shekhem’s eyes seemed to dim, then leaked little strings of tears as he shifted his gaze from Shim’on to Dina.

  Shim’on saw his chance and lunged forward, but Dina grabbed his hand, pulling the dagger from his grasp. Shekhem sprang forward, his weight toppling Shim’on. The younger, lighter man gasped as he kicked and threw an effective punch, but Shim’on brought his knee up in a forceful thrust, centering on his adversary’s vulnerability.

  With an agonized cry, Shekhem reeled away and coiled into the shadows of the room, releasing a tiny whine of mounting dread. Regaining his balance, Shim’on glanced around for his weapons, but saw only a stone in the doorway, a solid doorstop. Using both hands to lift the rock overhead, Shim’on brought the stone down and silenced Shekhem’s cries.

  “My husband!” Dina sank to the floor and keened the dreadful ululation of mourning. “Why? Why have you done this?”

  Shim’on rocked back on his heels, then brought the palm of his hand across his mouth, wiping a trail of blood from his face. He spotted his dagger and lance on the floor, and bent to retrieve them. “Find your robe, Dina. And hurry.”

  “I loved him! You killed him! I shall hate you forever!”

  She was on him before he could respond, scratching at his arm, struggling for his blade. A scream clawed in her throat as she grappled for the weapon, and for an instant Shim’on could do nothing but stare at her. Then he saw blood from her hands upon the silver of his dagger and realized that she intended to harm herself and die with the idolaters.

  “May God forgive you!” Without thinking, he drew back his hand and slapped her. Sobbing, she fell at his feet and pressed her hand to the red mark on her face.

  “You don’t know what you are doing,” Shim’on said, anger and pity twisting his heart as he stared at her. “You are a child, you know nothing of love. And I am taking you from this cursed place, so put on your robe and your shoes.”

  She did not answer, but reached for a pair of delicate sandals, turning away as she tied the laces. “You are the one who knows nothing of love,” she whispered in a broken voice. “Perhaps you never shall.”

  Ignoring her comment, he pulled her from the floor and led her from Hamor’s house. They had just stepped outside when a babble of familiar voices greeted them. “Ho, Shim’on!” Re’uven hailed him, his sword in hand and a smile on his face. “We have come to join you!”

  “You are all but too late,” Levi answered, grinning as he walked up. He reached for Dina’s limp hand and lifted it like a trophy. “We have our sister again! And every man in the city is dead!”

  “It seems the city is ours,” Yehuda said, looking around. “Rejoice, brothers, for whatever you see belongs to you. We have conquered this place today in the name of our sister, daughter of Yisrael!”

  His statement brought fresh weeping from Dina. Sighing, Shim’on caught Asher’s eye and told the younger brother to take his sister home.

  Asher’s gaze swept over the rich settlement as he took Dina’s hand. “Are you really taking everything?”

  “Whatever we can carry or drive out,” Levi answered. “Flocks and herds, donkeys, women, children and whatever wealth we find in the houses. The spoils of war, little brother, may be hard-won, but they are ours!”

  While Asher led Dina away, Shim’on moved through the buildings, helping his brothers herd weeping women and wailing children into the streets and alleys. One dismal-looking structure stood in an isolated corner of the city. Unable to recall if he’d visited this house on his killing spree, Shim’on carefully approached the sprained door.

  Shadows wreathed the single room inside. A small table near the door bore a handful of treasures, as if the owners of the place had been about to gather their belongings and flee. Shim’on lifted his shepherd’s sling from his shoulder and tossed the golden idols, earrings and silver trinkets inside. A richly embroidered garment hung from a peg in the wall, and he took that, too, tossing it over his shoulder. When he felt confident the house had nothing else to offer, he lifted his sling and turned toward the door, but froze when a soft gasp broke the stillness.

  A warning spasm of alarm erupted within him. Had one of the men escaped?

  His hand darted to the dagger in his belt. Silently he pulled it free, then turned in a quick move and knelt. His fear and anxiety tumbled out in a flood of curses when he saw a young woman crouching beneath the table, bright copper ringlets curled on her forehead and the nape of her neck. Her frail knees trembled beneath the hem of her tunic, and her dirty bare feet were delicate, completely unlike Dina’s.

  Something about her fragile innocence sapped the killing strength of his arm. “Come out,” he commanded, his hand dropping to his side. He gentled his voice and gestured to her. “Come out or die, for we will burn what is left of this city.”

  She crawled out then, a girl of about Dina’s age with tangled curls, fragile wrists and eyes as wild as a spooked horse’s. And when Shim’on lay with her under the stars that night and claimed her as his wife, he told himself the wrongs committed at Shekhem had finally been put right.

  In one morning Yaakov had gone from being one of the wealthiest men in the land to the wealthiest from horizon to horizon, but his face purpled in fury when his sons strode into camp, herding the flocks, women and children of Shekhem before them. Without a word he took Yosef’s hand and stalked to Rahel’s tent, steadfastly refusing to look upon his other sons.

  Shim’on watched him go, feeling the distance between them more acutely than ever. What had he expected, congratulations? A display of fatherly pride?

  Yaakov confronted them when they gathered to eat. “How could you do this?” he cried, his features contorted with shock and anger. “Without thinking you have rushed in lunatic flight toward destruction, both ours and Shekhem’s!”

  Shim’on looked down at his hands. Dried blood still darkened the crescents of his nails; deep smears covered his arms and legs. Levi and the others looked equally as gruesome.

  “You are all a shame to me!” Yaakov cried, pathos in his voice. “Adorned in jewels, and yet dripping with blood!”

  “We had to do something, Father,” Re’uven spoke up. “Shim’on and Levi were right to take vengeance for our sister’s cause. And you gave us permission—you told Hamor we would decide our sister’s fate.”

  “So we did.” Levi thrust his jaw forward. “And you should be proud. We have avenged our sister. We have brought you slaves and great riches.”

  “What did it matter if Dina married Shekhem?” Yaakov lifted his hands in despair. “The girl was happy. And I would not have allowed you to take women from that city! I wanted you to journey to your eastern kinsmen for brides, just as I traveled to Haran to find my Rahel.”

  Shim’on’s rebellious emotions erupted. “And your Lea,” he said, a thin chill on the edge of his words. His eyes glared into his father’s.

  Yaakov stared at him. “Yes, and Lea,” he answered. “But now you have taken the women of Shekhem by force, a worse crime than Shekhem committed, for Dina has confessed that she encouraged the young man’s attentions. You have brought trouble on me. You have made me odious among the inhabitants of the land. In fear for their cities, the Canaanites and the Perizzites will attack us, but we are few in number, and they are strong. Prepare yourselves, my
foolish sons, for they will gather against us. If God Shaddai does not protect us, we will be destroyed.”

  Re’uven stepped forward. “Should he have treated our sister like a harlot?”

  But Yaakov waved him away and turned toward the tent where Rahel and his beloved Yosef waited.

  The next day, Yaakov commanded the entire household to gather up the tents, animals, tools and shelters. “God has told me to go to Bethel,” he told his sons. “I am to construct a slaughter-site there to God-El, who appeared to me when I fled from my brother Esav.”

  A new and unexpected vigor radiated from his body, and an odd vitality rang in his voice. His gaze seemed to probe his sons’ souls as he looked at them. “You must put away the foreign gods you took from the houses of Shekhem. You must bathe and purify yourselves, and change out of the colored garments you took from the men of that city. Take the rings from your fingers and ears, and bring all the spoil from that place to me.”

  Spurred by their father’s command and their own guilty consciences, Shim’on and his brothers gathered all the goods they had taken. They released the slaves and piled the pilfered goods into baskets. The girl Shim’on had claimed, however, refused to leave. “Nothing remains for me in that cursed place,” she said, her eyes as clear as the wide sky above. “You called me your wife, and so you shall be my husband from this day forward.”

  After all the goods had been collected, Yaakov led the train of treasure-laden donkeys to the majestic oak that grew outside Shekhem. There he and his sons buried the spoils. Shortly after returning to camp, the entire company set out for Bethel.

  The journey was tedious, the weather hot and dry. Whirlwinds spun and danced across the plains; the distant cliffs shimmered in the rising heat mirage. Dina and Lea rode in woven baskets that hung on opposite sides of a single camel’s hump and Shim’on noticed that Dina spent much of the time with her head hanging out of the swaying basket, her face as pale as death. On a camel in the rear, the very-pregnant Rahel curled into a similar basket opposite eight-year-old Yosef, who was too spoiled to dirty his feet on the trek.

  After reaching Bethel, where Yaakov built an altar and spoke with his God, the company moved on. They were nearing Ephrath, or Bethlehem, when a shrill cry halted the caravan. Yaakov’s face paled when Zilpa announced that Rahel’s travail had begun. The uncomfortable journey and the heat had apparently sapped her fragile strength, for shortly after giving life to a boy, Rahel died.

  Shim’on, his brothers and the servants sat in silence outside the hastily constructed tent, their ears tuned to the mingled wailing of a newborn infant and his grief-stricken father. After three hours of weeping in protracted grief, a strangely quiet Yaakov stepped out of Rahel’s tent and held the baby aloft for all to see.

  “His name is Binyamin, son of my right hand,” he said, his ragged voice breaking. “And she who bore him is lost.”

  Yaakov’s face had the withered look of a thirsty blossom. He sat in the shade of the tent, holding the baby on his knees, as tears rolled down his craggy face. One by one, mumbling excuses about tending the herds or erecting shelters, Yaakov’s older sons slipped away. As an act of mercy, Yehuda pulled Yosef from the tent where Lea and the maids prepared Rahel’s body for burial.

  Shim’on remained near his father, wondering if he should feel guilty for the relief flooding his soul. He had liked Rahel and was sorry for her death, but for his mother’s sake he could not mourn. So he sat across from his father and silently rejoiced that after years of suffering, Lea would finally enjoy her husband’s undivided attention.

  He breathed in the thick, oppressive air and watched the play of desert light and shadows on his father’s lined face. The baby mewed softly, seeking a life-giving breast, but Yaakov did not call for a wet nurse. He lifted the child in his hands and regarded the boy, an expression of mingled fascination and revulsion on his face. Then the baby cried in earnest, flailing its tiny fist. Yaakov pressed his lips to the child’s wrinkled forehead.

  Shim’on sighed, grateful for one small breach in the tent of grimness enclosing his father. Yaakov’s soul was heavy with grief, but in time he would come to cherish the child.

  “He is a handsome baby,” Shim’on offered.

  “Shim’on,” his father spoke without lifting his eyes from the baby in his arms, “I want you to know something.”

  “Yes, Father?”

  Yaakov looked at him, his face a stone effigy of contempt. “If you and Levi had not attacked the city of Shekhem, we would not be camped in this wilderness. And Rahel, who could not withstand the journey, would not be dead.”

  He said no more, but his meaning and intention were unmistakable: he held Shim’on and Levi responsible for Rahel’s death, and he would not soon forgive them.

  Shim’on said nothing as he stood and walked away. But he felt ice spreading through his stomach, frigid fingers seeping into every pore of his skin. The coldness, like fire, twisted and turned inside him, upending every belief, every dream, every hope, until Shim’on knew he would never be the same again.

  Chapter Twelve

  A pair of obelisks, called tekhenu by the Egyptians, rose up from the sacred city of Heliopolis at the site where the annual inundation of the Nile first began to recede. The city’s soil, fertilized by rich layers of silt and nurtured by the life-giving sun, received a full measure of all the gods had to offer. To the Egyptians the hallowed ground represented rebirth and creation, and Mandisa knew her mistress hoped the holy city would bless her womb and enable her to bring forth another son for Zaphenath-paneah.

  They had enjoyed a week’s visit with her lady’s parents, but now Asenath wanted Mandisa to rise before dawn each morning and accompany her to the sacred temple of Khnum. Her mistress wished to greet the god as he awoke in hopes of impressing him with the earnestness of her desire.

  “Perhaps,” she whispered one morning as Mandisa applied kohl to her lady’s sleep-heavy eyelids, “the god will think I have remained in his temple all night, attending to him without even stopping to sleep.”

  Mandisa lifted a brow, but did not answer. If a god could be so easily fooled, how could he be a god? For many months she had watched Zaphenath-paneah, and she had to admit that his great and invisible God seemed more powerful and logical than any Egypt had to offer. His God was all-seeing and all-knowing, she had heard the master tell his sons, so nothing a man did could trick or sway the Almighty One. God Shaddai knew every individual’s name. He even knew the secrets of a man’s heart.

  Apparently Asenath had never placed much faith in her husband’s lessons. “Khnum is the divine potter. He fashioned the other gods, the divine kings, and all mortals on his potter’s plate,” she murmured as Mandisa completed her toilette. “He will not fail me.”

  Mandisa answered out of simple politeness. “Why is this god special, my lady?”

  Asenath let her bare head drop forward onto her folded arms. “He knows the secrets of creation. His priests taught the ancient Pharaohs how to mix water and clay to create the living stone of the pyramids. His breath turned a handful of reddish-brown clay into the first mortal man.”

  “And you think this god of clay can create new life in you?” Mandisa slipped her mistress’s wig from its stand and waited until Asenath opened one eye and lifted her head.

  “He will,” the young woman answered, “for I have my father’s prayers to support me. He has dedicated himself anew to the worship of Khnum, and he is a powerful priest. Today we are to join him and beg the god to think favorably of us.”

  Mandisa slipped the wig over her mistress’s shorn head, then jerked it downward for a tight fit. For Asenath’s sake, she hoped some good would be accomplished. She missed her son, she missed Thebes, she missed Halima. May the gods help me, she thought, patting Asenath’s shoulders. Though I was happy to leave the responsibility of his care behind, I might even miss the noise of the obnoxious captive in my lord’s house.

  Potiphera, high priest of On, clapped in ap
proval when his daughter stepped out of her litter at the temple. As shriveled as an old fig, he wore the white kilt of the priesthood and had shaved his entire body, including his eyebrows, lashes and whatever sparse hairs might have grown on his chest. A paunch bulged over the waistband of his kilt, advertising his prosperity and his secure place in Pharaoh’s favor.

  Mandisa lowered her gaze as she followed her mistress out of the litter. The sight of Potiphera, glowing and bald in the torchlight, lifted the curtain on memories she had tried to forget. Idogbe had fancied himself a priest of Sebek, the crocodile god who represented the destructive power of the sun, and had shaved his massive body in a similar way. Once he had tried to become a lay priest at the temple in Thebes, but because he kept insisting that Sebek desired human sacrifices, the chief priests dismissed him.

  Mandisa shook her head as if she could dislodge the disturbing memories. Once, long after she had been safely installed in Zaphenath-paneah’s house, she had asked Ani about the Egyptians’ sacrificial rites. He told her that women slaves were often sacrificed at the graves of their dead masters during the first dynasty, but no one now would consider such a barbaric practice. In the enlightened eighteenth dynasty, a few temples called for animal sacrifice on special occasions. But only the cult of Osiris, of whom Pharaoh was the principal figure, incorporated human sacrifice into worship. “The only human life worthy of sacrifice,” Ani had said, “is the divine king’s. Because he is god and man, he alone has the power to bridge the gap between the gods and mankind.”

  Asenath tugged on Mandisa’s cloak, jerking her back to reality. Potiphera was leading them into the rectangular enclosure surrounding the innermost temple, so Mandisa lengthened her stride to keep up. When they had entered the gate, the old priest pressed his hand to his daughter’s cheek and took his leave of them. But Asenath knew what to do. Pressing her hands together in front of her bosom, she walked toward the god’s habitation, her eyes wide with expectation.