Between the Wild Branches

by Connilyn Cossette

  “No. I did not know she was here when your father and I made our agreement.”

  Her brows furrowed as she waited for me to clarify.

  “Mariada, you must vow to me that you will not breathe a word of this to anyone else. It’s not only Shoshana’s life at stake if anything I tell you is revealed. Can you promise me?”

  She was silent for a long while as she studied me with the same sort of intense scrutiny I’d experienced from her father. Whatever she saw on my face must have convinced her of my sincerity.

  “You have my word, Lukio. I would not do anything to put her in jeopardy. She is . . .” She sighed. “She is my friend.”

  “Just as she is mine,” I said, almost relieved to finally be able to speak the truth to this impossibly kind young woman. “And I saw her for the first time in ten years the night I told you of our marriage.”

  Her mouth opened slightly but nothing came out, so I continued.

  “I met Shoshana when I was around eleven years old.”

  “But she was brought here only a year and a half ago.”

  “That’s true. But I met her in Hebrew territory, where I lived with a Hebrew family for nearly eight years.”

  Being careful not to disclose details about exactly where my sister and I had lived or why we went there, I told Mariada of the past I shared with her maid, how much I’d desired to marry her one day, and how I’d lost her to both her father’s greed and my own pride.

  “I’d not known she was here, not until that evening on the terrace when she brought you your wrap. But I’d already made a binding contract with your father. I had no choice but to follow through.”

  She was quiet for a long while, contemplating everything I’d laid at her feet, and then her posture softened and her gaze turned compassionate. “She told me of how much she loved you. And how the loss of you had never dissipated.”

  “When I lost her, it left a hole in me and no matter how many matches I won or how much wealth I accrued, that hole was never filled.”

  Tears trickled down her cheeks as she pressed both hands to her chest. “And here the two of you were kept apart by me and I did not even know it. No wonder you were so distracted yesterday when we were in your home.”

  “You could not have known. And I’d just told her good-bye for the last time.”

  “But why? If you would have told me the truth, I would have refused to marry you and you could have taken her as a wife.”

  I huffed a rueful laugh. “If only it all could have been so simple. Your father might have a thing or two to say about that. And of course there is her child to consider.”

  She nodded. “True. And Tela would never willingly give up the baby.”

  “No. She would not.”

  “But why did you say that her arrest was your fault?”

  I let out a heavy sigh. “Because she’s not the one who planned the scheme to retrieve the baby. It was me. And if my guess is correct, my cousin Mataro may well have been the one who caused Amunet to be suspicious of her, because I refused to bow to his wishes. She likely had Shoshana followed around the palace.”

  “You were trying to get her back home, weren’t you? With her child?”

  I nodded. “She has two other children there.”

  “She does?” Again, her jaw slackened as she looked up at me with surprise. How was it that Mariada knew of our childhood together but had been ignorant of such an important part of Shoshana’s life? Perhaps she’d guarded her children so deep in her heart that even talking about their loss was too painful to bear. I understood that well; I’d not even allowed myself to speak her name aloud until she appeared on the terrace the night she’d finally accepted the summons I’d delivered by seashell.

  “Yes,” I said, “and she is in far too much danger here. Especially after what happened to that other innocent Hebrew girl your father accused of treachery.”

  She flinched at the mention of that awful funeral. “What do we do? We cannot let my father kill her.”

  “I don’t know. Everything I’d set in place is ruined.”

  “Amunet said Shoshana’s accomplices had been arrested as well. Who did she mean?”

  Another jolt of regret hit me. It was not just Shoshana I’d put in peril, but her friends as well. “I only know they are Hebrews who work in the palace.”

  I could certainly not share what I knew of Jaru or he, too, would be in chains. I’d have to go to him next and let him know what had happened. And then decide what to do with the Hebrew men and Zevi while I figured out how to get to Shoshana. Perhaps we could at least get them to a safe place away from Ashdod tonight, and in the meantime I could—

  Mariada bolted upright, throwing her legs over the side of her bed with no regard for her mussed hair and tangled nightdress. “We must rescue her. Tell me what to do.”

  I rocked back on my heels, startled by her adamance. “No, it’s too dangerous. I have others I can ask for aid.”

  Her jaw hardened, and the same sharp-edged determination I’d seen in the king when he spoke of the Ark came into those blue eyes. “She is my friend, Lukio. And I will help.”

  “What about your father? And Tela and Amunet?”

  “My father will be livid, but my mother will soothe his ruffled feathers if I beg her. Leave that to me. As for Amunet and Tela, I do not care at all what they think. They’ve always bullied the rest of us, and Tela took Shoshana’s baby without a drop of remorse.” She frowned and crossed her arms. “I wish I’d been able to stop my sister.”

  “There was nothing you could have done, Mariada.”

  “Still, I should have tried to do something. I owe it to Shoshana to help her now since I was too weak and cowardly to do so before.”

  Compelled to set her mind at ease, especially since everything had now changed between us, I placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder. “I hope you understand that if things were different, I would have been proud to have you as my wife. Whomever you marry will be a fortunate man indeed. You are very brave.”

  She shook her head with a sorrowful smile. “Anything I learned of bravery was from Shoshana. Now, what is the plan?”

  Twenty-Eight

  I pressed my back to the stone wall, willing my pulse to slow. I’d already dragged two corpses behind the stables, hoping no one came across the dead guards before I added to their number, nor that anyone had heard the short scuffle that occurred when I refused to comply with their demand that I not pass through the gate into the palace complex. Although I’d permanently maimed a number of opponents on the fighting grounds, I’d never purposely killed someone before. But when one, and then the other, came at me with weapons drawn, I’d not hesitated to defend myself.

  Thankfully, I’d had little problem finding my destination. Playing the part of spoiled royal daughter, Mariada had made good on the vow she’d made this morning to help with the rescue and demanded to see her maid. Although she’d not been allowed inside the storage room on the far side of the stables where Shoshana was being held, she’d been able to at least discern that the door latch and the hinges were flimsy, and that only two men were stationed inside—two more lives I would need to end in order to free Shoshana and her friends. But with their own lives in the balance, I could not take any chances.

  I’d gone directly to Jaru’s home after I left Mariada, making a loud show of demanding to see him under the guise of frustrations over crowd control during the first event of the morning. Although he’d been unable to reassign the guards Amunet had put in place, he’d at least made certain that no one else was patrolling this area around the stables and that our plans for the Hebrew men would fit the new situation we found ourselves in.

  Gripping the handle of my ax, its familiar weight a strange comfort, even if blood coated its edges for the first time, I used the same method I did before stepping into the fighting ring—slow breaths, measured heartbeats, fashioning my rage into a sharp blade so it did not interfere with my goal. I was here to save Sho
shana and her friends, not to take vengeance, so I must keep my anger in check or I would lose control.

  With my body and mind prepared, I lifted my ax over my shoulder and brought it down on the door with the same force I’d once used to fell trees. The hinge clanked as wood shards flew, the brittle bronze giving way to my iron ax, just as I’d hoped it would.

  A shout came from inside as I swung again, the second hinge cracking just as easily as the first. Then using the muscles I’d spent the last ten years building into weapons themselves, I ripped the door away from the frame.

  Two young guards stood at the ready, short swords in hand. By the bewilderment on their faces, they had in no way expected Demon Eyes to batter down the door.

  I took advantage of their shock and charged. The first one received a blow with the flat of my ax, which threw him into the wall, where he crumpled into a heap, head bleeding. The second man jabbed his sword at me, but I jumped back and spun in the same way I dodged a punch in the ring. When he stumbled, I grabbed his arm and yanked it back with a sickening crunch that had him screaming in pain. Then I elbowed him in the face, and he, too, fell to the ground, unconscious.

  I snatched up the one oil lamp that illuminated the room, noting the dice and tokens on the floor. They’d been so distracted by their game that they’d probably not even noticed the sounds of distress from the guards at the gate as I overcame them. At least Amunet had gifted me an advantage by assigning incompetent guards to imprison Shoshana.

  I made short work of the inner door, which did not even stand up to one powerful kick, its wooden latch splintering the moment my foot made contact. Weaving past a number of enormous jugs, pots of grain, and various dried goods that filled the storage room, I called Shoshana’s name, but everything was silent and still. Surely Mariada had not been mistaken about her location, had she?

  I pushed back farther, called out again, and was rewarded with a small voice that seemed to be coming from belowground.

  “Lukio?”

  “Shoshana? Where are you?”

  “We’ve been put down in an old well.”

  I took a few more careful steps and came to the edge of the well. Holding the oil lamp high, I caught sight of three forms huddled at the bottom, which wasn’t nearly as deep as I’d feared but was obviously being used as cold storage for the many jugs of beer that littered the bottom and the baskets of dried meat stacked against its walls.

  Shoshana’s head tilted up and her lovely eyes shimmered in the lamplight. “There is a ladder somewhere up there, I think, although they threw us down here without one.”

  Swinging my light around, I spotted the ladder and maneuvered it so that they could crawl out of the pit.

  “Come on up, Shoshana,” I said.

  “Galit is wounded. She needs to go first. I’ll help her get up the ladder. Get her to safety and then come back for me.”

  “Climb up after her.”

  “No, I won’t leave our friend down here alone. He’s in even worse shape than Galit.”

  Frustrated with her stubbornness but at the same time proud of her strength and concern for others, I reluctantly agreed. If there was anything I knew about Shoshana, she would always put others first. “But what of you? Are you hurt?”

  There was a slight pause. “I’m fine. I landed hard on my foot when they threw us down, but I don’t think it’s broken. Just swollen and tender.”

  After some shuffling and a quiet argument between the two women, Shoshana’s friend ascended the ladder, using one arm to pull herself upward while Shoshana aided her from below, and I reached down to steady her from above. The woman’s face was a mass of bruises, and one eye was a swollen slit. When she finally stood next to me, she swayed slightly, one arm limp at her side.

  “Can you walk?” I asked her, and she nodded but didn’t speak. Her jaw looked as though she’d just left the ring with a brute like me.

  I ushered her to the door and then gave her directions to find Zevi and Igo, who were waiting in the shadows between two buildings about a hundred paces down the street. I hated having only a boy and a dog to rely on during this rescue, but there was no one else. Jaru was busy organizing the Hebrew men, who’d hopefully already overtaken their captors with the weapons I’d left buried beneath their watchtower prison in my vineyard. I could only hope that instead of running off the moment they were free, they would keep their commitment to helping us.

  At least Zevi knew where to go if something went wrong. He’d insisted on helping once I’d informed him of Shoshana’s arrest, and I knew that even young as he was, he would do everything in his power to get Galit to safety. And as devoted as he was to Zevi, I trusted Igo to watch over them both.

  I kept my eyes on Galit as she walked down the street as swiftly as her broken body would allow her and then melded into the shadows. I would not let Shoshana stay down in that pit for a moment longer. She was coming up next, even if I had to carry her up the ladder. I’d deal with the wounded man once she was safe.

  But when I returned to the storage room, she was already emerging from the old well, her face pale and her eyes hollow.

  “He’s dead,” she said. “They threw Oshai down headfirst. I think perhaps he hit the stone wall. I’d hoped he would survive, but he is gone.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “What of your other friend? I thought there were five of you.”

  “There was. Avel died trying to protect Galit.” Her voice broke. “He refused to see her suffer, so he tried to attack, and one of the guards jammed a knife in his back.”

  I wished I could pull her into my arms and comfort her, but there was no time. There would be much to grieve later, and many questions to be asked about what had happened to them after their arrest, but for now I needed to get her to safety. I grasped her hand in mine and pulled her toward the exit.

  However, before we emerged from the storage room, I halted in the doorway, realizing that only one body remained where I’d left two. Sometime when I’d been helping Galit and Shoshana in the back room, one of the guards I’d knocked unconscious had awakened and slipped away. I cursed myself for not ending them both when I had the chance.

  “If something happens,” I said, “find Zevi. He and Igo are hiding between the fourth and fifth building on the left just down the street. Use his name to alert him to your presence. He knows where to go.”

  “But—”

  “Just in case,” I said, pressing a kiss to her forehead. There was no use frightening her by pointing out the missing guard.

  She nodded, and after snatching up my ax, I slipped my arm around her waist and led her out into the main room. She was limping for certain, her lips pressed together to stifle any indication of pain, but at least she was not nearly as battered as her friend Galit.

  Everything was still as we emerged into the deepening twilight, and I felt a surge of hope that perhaps we could indeed reach our destination undetected. But when we were only ten paces away from the door I’d knocked down, a group of men came around the corner, two with torches in hand. Leading the way was none other than Nicaro himself.

  I pushed Shoshana behind me and brandished my ax.

  “I wondered if you might show up here,” said the king, with a frown. “Although I’d hoped I was wrong.”

  “Let her go,” I said.

  “Amunet said you were obsessed with Mariada’s slave, but is she truly worth losing everything?”

  “Just let her go. You can deal with me as you will.”

  He tilted his chin, those blue eyes full of cunning. “I don’t think so, Lukio. You’ve betrayed me. And she’ll be the price you pay for doing so.”

  He gestured to his men, but before they could step toward me, I used the only tool I had to bargain with.

  “I’ll tell you where the Hebrews’ Ark is. Just let her go free.”

  “No!” cried Shoshana. “You can’t!”

  The king’s eyes were wide as he stared at me. “You know where it is?”


  I nodded.

  “Mataro said you were with the Hebrews and not in Ekron, but I didn’t believe him. He is a notorious liar, after all, and a spineless coward with a grudge against you.”

  Now his odd behavior toward me—trustful at times and suspicious at others—made sense. Mataro had attempted to weasel into Nicaro’s confidence, and when he did not succeed, he found his way into the queen’s ear.

  The king’s eyes narrowed on me and then flicked to Shoshana behind me. “But you’re lying about the Hebrews’ box for the sake of this slave. The gods only know why you’d bother when you had my daughter already in hand.” He shook his head, again gesturing to his men to take us.

  “I was there!” I shouted. “I saw you on the hillside at Beth Shemesh.”

  Nicaro ordered his men to halt. “What did you say?”

  “My sister and I followed the cow-drawn wagon in which you and the other kings sent the golden box back to the Hebrews. We hid up on the hill above you, where you and the others crouched behind boulders and waited for the Hebrews to see the wagon approach.”

  “But that was nearly two decades ago,” he said, incredulous.

  “Indeed. I was seven. But I distinctly remember that you were not in complete accord with the other kings. In fact, you tried to leave at one point, but another king forced you to remain until it was determined that the Hebrews would not be sending the wagon back here.”

  Nicaro’s jaw went slack as I spoke. I’d never seen him at a loss for words.

  “After you left, my sister and I were found by some of the Hebrew priests who were sent to deal with their box. We went to live with one of the families, where I remained until I was fifteen and decided to come back to Ashdod. And if you will let this woman go, without sending anyone to follow her, I will tell you exactly where it is.”

  I kept my expression very still as I waited for him to decide, but I did not relax my grip on my ax.

  “Fine, she can go,” he said. “And then you’ll tell me everything I need to know.”