PART TWO
BRIDE OF DESIRE
DELILAH
Three Years Prior to Amara’s Story,
in the Philistine City of Ekron
The god of ice sent his sign.
By noon, the elders sat together at the city gates of Ekron, clucking their teeth.
Ice fell from the sky, a wonder not often seen in my village. Each elder sat wondering what dangers it foretold. The oldest among them, a white-haired man named Selanius, told them the story of a Hebrew god, one that sent a plague of ice on the Egyptians many generations ago. He proved to be a strange and troublesome god, Selanius said.
I squinted, looking up at the sky to see the face of this god. I could not find him. I finished my purchase—a bit of kohl for my mother—and hurried home to see what Father thought of it all.
“Why do you care?”
My brothers looked up from their bowls and snickered. I had three brothers, though since all wore the same crude expression around me, it seemed that I had only one brother who was in many places at once.
The ice god’s message would be lost on my family. I felt shame for them, speaking ill of strange and marvelous gods, as they crouched behind closed doors.
“I’ll bring in the sheep,” I offered.
No one answered. The steaming porridge Mother had ladled into their bowls must have been especially good. No bowl was set out for me, of course. When they slept tonight I would sneak down the ladder and roll each foot, ball to toe, quietly across the dust and straw. I could move with a cat’s silent grace. When I reached the pot, with my fingers I would sweep the edges and bottom, and in the darkness, eat.
When you only have a little, a little can be very good. Were I given a whole bowl of stew to eat, I told myself, I could not enjoy it. Everything tastes the same after the fourth bite. My way, the way of hunger, made the pleasure of each tiny taste almost unbearable. If I was not so hungry, food would not taste so good. In this way, I feel sorry for my family, who probably never tasted Mother’s cooking the way I do. Already, I have riches they knew nothing of. I know how to find treasures in the ashes of this life.
I watched them eat. I may eat in darkness, but I taste the food and they do not. I breathe deep and easy at night, with no eyes upon me, no hands brushing me out of the way, no lashes across my back for disrespect and laziness.
Then, after tasting the bowl, I always stay down here below and sleep, right with the animals. They nuzzle me while I rest, their beating hearts a familiar old story passed between them in the dark. As I slept nestled between my two ewes, they wove my heart, too, into their moon tale.
This is how these ewes came to be in my story, and I in theirs:
The city had been quiet for weeks after the pinch-faced Hebrews came. They always came into the city after their festival of sleeping in tents. Their god drove them out of their comfortable homes to sleep in tents and get bitten by sand spiders.
I did not understand their devotion.
But as always, they had arrived, stinking, tired, and irritable (mothers with young children most of all) and bought up everything we had, except the meats. Hebrews didn’t eat what we did. They said we eat unclean animals.
Have they ever seen a clean animal? Every animal is unclean.
They came into our city, Ekron, which is a lovely place as I see it. There is an upper city and a lower city, which does not refer to a direction, but the height of each part of the city. One end is noticeably higher than the other. I don’t think that is much advantage, unless you want to spy on pale old women bathing on their rooftops. The lower end of the city collects more rainwater and has more fertile gardens.
We lived in the upper end, which was why my father often took his whip out after us. He had to drive us all, he said, even the land. He had one enormous problem. Me. I was born a girl. Father wanted to collect great wealth, and my brothers wanted to inherit great wealth. A girl was a liability, a little thief that stole food from the boy’s mouths until the day she married and the father had to give away even more of what he had saved for his sons. Every penny he spent to keep her alive, and to finally get rid of her, all went to another man and another man’s family.
“Did you see the field I planted today?” my brother—as I said, it matters not which one since they are all the same snot-nosed soul—had asked as we waited for a Hebrew woman to count her coins. She was buying a sash I had woven.
“Yes.”
“You sit all day, weaving, while I labor in the sun. And while I am sweating and hungry, all I can think about is that we’re going to have to pay to get rid of you!”
“It’s a dowry. It’s not payment.”
“Shows what you know.”
My brothers did well that day, as did I. They sold the Hebrews plenty of roasted grains to eat as snacks, plus honey for strength for their walk home. I was not allowed in the fields or gardens, as a girl with soft hands brought a better bride price. I obeyed in every instruction my father gave me in this regard, hoping he would weigh the coins in his mind and realize perhaps he could profit from me someday too.
So I worked with a loom and kept my skin smooth and pale. I brushed my hair every night and rubbed a finger over my teeth after eating. I did what I could for my looks, and I worked to sell the Hebrew women enough sashes to buy my father’s love. My hope came in the form of two ewe lambs, with fleece like you’ve never seen or felt. Their fleece was so dense and smooth, like running your hand through cream. I had spied the young ewes for sale at the market. Every day I had prayed that Dagon would keep them for me, and he did. I paid for the ewes and walked them home, head high.
“More mouths to feed,” Father grumbled when he saw them. I do not think he really meant it.
“Pigs offer nothing but meat,” I said, keeping my eyes on the floor. “Once you eat them, you’re done. But with this wool, think how much I can charge for my clothing.”
A sheep can give wool throughout its life, plus lambs, and you can eat lambs or sell them.
“I’m not going to feed them. I can barely afford food for you.”
I had thought of my entire plan. I was ready.
“I don’t need you to.” I ducked so he wouldn’t hit me, thinking I meant disrespect. I spoke faster. “You can have all the money they earn. I will do all the work, and you will have all the money.”
His face did not remain angry, so I knew I had won. Brother, however, glared at me. All of them.
One night about a week later, as I slept between my two ewes, I heard someone clumsy stumbling through the darkness inside the home. Moonlight blinded me for a moment, and I squinted to shield my eyes. What I saw was my brother opening the downstairs door to sneak out. He turned and walked toward my sheep and gave one a good kick.
I sat up and yelled. “What are you doing?”
“Shut up down there!” my father yelled down.
“You’re going to lose,” my brother hissed.
“What are you talking about?”
“You can’t be anything other than what you are.”
He turned and sneaked away, out into the night. He had money to spend from market. At night, very different wares were offered.
I sat back down between my sheep, stroking their soft fleece, whispering little encouragements. It was almost winter, and the nights were getting cold. I stared at the door, the moonlight searing through the edges and cracks. No sheep would live through a dark winter night out there.
As if Dagon himself agreed, a cat of some kind screamed in the night air.
“May my brother be eaten tonight for kicking my ewe,” I prayed silently.
I would make my father rich. He would love me and praise me. What did any man value more than money? I ran a finger through my silken black hair and wondered.
I fed my lambs whatever grains I could steal—and yes, I stole often. Every night, I slid between the moonlit cracks of the door, slipped across shadowed streets, sneaked into homes, and felt in the dark for barrels of grain. I held a hollow palm up in the darkness and filled it with the cool smooth stones of life, the emptiness of my life erased. I moved with ease as sweat beaded along my neck and forehead. No one ever heard me, and no one knew. Silence was my gift. My legs were no more than feathers sweeping across the dirt floors.
My ewes were hungry all the time, bleating when I returned before dawn. I fed them fast to keep them quiet. I did not know why a ewe would demand more and more food. During the day, I led them out into the low hills above us, but there was not much good grazing left before the harsh rains of winter. Sometimes, they slept instead. Sometimes, I did too.
I had to steal from more houses, and steal more than what fit in my palms. If only my father had offered to buy grain.
But of course I still had my sashes and my loom, and one afternoon as I fought to say awake, a god took my side in the battle. (I do not know which one.) I saw in my mind how a sash could be made into a bag, and yet still look like a sash. I could steal much more. I set to work at once to make it.
“It is good to see you work with vigor,” my mother commented.
She rarely said anything to me or anyone else, which is why I have not mentioned her before. She hid behind her hair and did not make friends with other women. Or me.
That night, as everyone slept, I once again slipped out the door. How fast my heart beat to see my sister the moon again! How blessed the darkness that holds all our secrets! I was not the only one with a shadow life. I heard others on some nights, caught sight of their robes as they disappeared into other houses, or the house of Sehna, our harlot. I even made a game now of watching in the market to see who yawned most in the afternoon. I began to suspect the most startling citizens—men and women alike—of living shadow lives.
But this is not their tale. Not yet.
That night, I crept into a home with many barrels. They would not miss what I stole. I was a kind thief, careful never to burden any one family. That’s what I promised myself and the god who watched over me. I thought my kindness would be rewarded.
I eased the wooden door open over the dirt floor only a few inches, as I turned myself sideways and slid like a moonbeam between the cracks into the home. I unwound my sash in the darkness and glided to the barrels, dipping a hand in and filling my sash. The sash could hold more, so I dipped my hand in again. Moonlight flooded around me, and I turned, trying not to cry out. A man with a shadow life had returned to his home and caught me.
I could barely see his face in the darkness. He stood there a moment, then walked to me, taking me by the hand and leading me out. He led me down the street and into an enclosed garden, where fruit trees hid all from view. Just before he turned to face me, I closed my eyes.
He did speak, of course. I shouldn’t leave that out, or you’ll wonder why I did not run or scream. He reminded me of the punishment for thieves. (My hands would be cut off.) He reminded me that he saw my face clearly, knew who I belonged to. He could demand restitution from my father, besides my hands. So I surrendered underneath the fruit trees, their bare branches hanging low.
I thought about those branches as I walked home afterward. I thought of nothing else, to keep myself from screaming. I forced my mind away from the blood smearing across my inner thighs, away from the strange taste of his mouth, away from the terror of being known. I thought of the branches. The fruit was gone. They were bent and brought low. But nothing should have stopped them from rising back up and finding the sun. Nothing but memory stood in their way.
I ground my teeth together.
That is why I can tell you so much and fly away from it all so freely. The earth has lessons to teach us all, if we but listen.
The sun began slipping away sooner every day, off to her own secrets. Winds caught women by the ankles, making them shiver and press their legs together as they sat at their booths in the market. Fish and pork had been salted and pressed, set aside for later sales and meals when women were too tired to prepare them fresh. The last of the fruits had been eaten or hung from the beams in homes to dry. Grapes were crushed, and each wife had set about making her own wine, boasting to her neighbors that her grapes had been blessed by Dagon, that her wine was the secret to long life and good teeth.
As I lay awake in the darkness one night, I heard heavy footfalls, the thump of something hitting the dirt outside our door, and fast, scuffling steps away into the darkness. I lay still between my ewes for the longest time, not knowing what to do. Everyone above me slept.
One ewe nuzzled me, sensing I was awake.
Above me, a great groan reminded me that others had their own bad dreams. Mine did not matter.
I crept to the door. Pressing my ear against it to be sure, I heard nothing. I rested one hand flat against the wood and pulled gently with the other hand, easing the door open.
A huge sack sat on the ground.
I poked my head out like a turtle, looking this way and that. The street was empty and quiet; I could hear no noises from the other homes. Creeping out and crouching down, I opened the mouth of the sack. It rattled, a sound like a snake redoubling on itself, the rasp of scale on scale. I jumped back, holding my mouth to keep quiet.
The sack did not move. I kicked it with one foot, and the mouth tipped open, the contents cascading in a little clicking stream on the ground. It was grain. A sack of grain. Worth a week’s wages, at least, if the worker was a strong man!
I looked up and down the street again. Nothing stirred. I reached out to grab the sack and saw a dark shadow lift from the wall of the furthest house and slink away into the night. His scent carried on the night wind.
I knew then who had left it, but I did not know why. I did not know what men felt about these things, what laws they lived by. A woman’s life was not a man’s.
My ewes would be hungry in the morning. I had no right to starve them because of my foolishness. I dragged the bag inside and tucked it in the corner where I kept my weaving supplies.
After this gift of grain, my ewes began to get fat. At first, no one noticed but me. They were so fluffy that no one could tell where their wool ended and their bodies began. But one night my father stopped eating, his hand in mid-air, the bread dripping juices back into his bowl, and he stared at me as I led my ewes back inside and to their stall.
“They have gotten big,” he said.
I beamed, and trembled, afraid to say anything. I was worth more to him than ten sons.
“Should they be that big?” He was frowning. “They’re too big,” he said to my brothers, who glared at us all.
That night, I understood his alarm. As I slept, my hands drifted across the belly of my ewe, and something stirred beneath my hand. My heart quickened, and I pressed my palm against the belly. Something hard rubbed against it from the inside.
“Oh no!” I gasped.
I rolled over quickly and pressed my palm into the other ewe’s belly. Nothing. Nothing moved. “Thank you Dagon thank you Dagon thank you,” I whispered, resting my forehead on her side.
Then something kicked against me from inside her belly, too. I bit my lips to keep from screaming. Oh, no, I cried in my heart, oh no oh no oh no. My ewes were pregnant. Both of them. Both of them would deliver in winter. But they were too young to mate, I knew. Too young! How was it even possible? I thought I had been so careful watching over them. I napped sometimes when they grazed, I admit, but I did not worry about them mating. They were too young. No male should have been attracted to them for another full season.
It was my fault. My bones turned to ice from the coldest fear yet. I pressed my palm into my own belly. I forced all the breath out of my body, wanting to feel only my belly, wanting to know if disaster had come to me, too. I felt nothing.
I did not sleep the rest of the night. In the morning, when it was time to lead the ewes out and make water, I vomited against the side of the house.
I thought it was dread that had made me sick.
“Why are you in a hurry?” my brother called out this morning. “The damage is done! What can you save now?”
I ran out without my breakfast. I did not want to wait until my brothers were done eating, and see what crumbs they left me. The smell of their breakfast, and their fetid breath, was too much for me. The room seemed very small and filled with hot, penetrating stenches, and so I ran out to get away from them all, the boys and the smells. If indeed one could separate them.
I heard my brother’s coarse jest as I leaned over, just outside the door, trying very hard not to heave. I hated throwing up this yellow fluid every morning, and I worried very much that something was terribly wrong. I had no one to ask.
I set out to graze my ewes in the flat areas just below us to the east. If I walked long enough toward the sun, I could get them to a sweet, quiet place where the only men were tired old shepherds who wouldn’t bother me. I walked with heavy steps, feeling old myself today. Old and tired, as though I had lived many more than my fourteen winters.
I wanted nothing more than to lie down in the soft green grass, with the morning sun warming my face and the cold winter air blowing against my cheeks, and sleep. I could sleep all day. If the shepherds were in a kind mood (and Dagon, please may it be so) they might leave me a bit of dried pork or fruit. Not all men were cruel. I seemed to have a special charm with the old ones, I noticed. They did not want to hurt me. They looked sad when they saw me, as if they saw something in me that I did not, and what they saw made them feel a great sorrow.
If I had the courage to ask, I would ask this: “What fault do you see that makes you sad?”
I had so many questions.
“Look how she swells.”
A man was gesturing to my ewes, as his wet lips parted as he grinned at me. My father threw his hands in the air. “What else could I expect? When a female is in heat, the men find her.”
Several men laughed, and I felt heat rising in my face, as if the conversation were not really about my ewes. I pulled at the side seams of my robe, trying to get it to fall straight to the floor. I did not want these men to see the outline of my body. I did not want them to know anything of me, not the length of my legs nor which places swelled like a grown woman’s body.
I wasn’t just getting breasts and hips, and quite suddenly, but I was also getting fat. My mother eyed me with distaste as I bathed now. I had to hurry to put on my robes and get out of the house. I had been leaving, leading my ewes out to graze, but Father was already out, talking with our neighbors near the upper well.
He was going to brag on me one day, the daughter who made him rich.
I realize I have not told you enough of Ekron. You know that part of it is raised, part of it is not, and that there are families, and men and women, and secrets, and we worship Dagon and have a market. But one principle attraction of our city was our prostitutes. Women were available for purchase on every corner, under every archway, in any booth. Not all men wanted to travel to Gaza or Ashdod, where the temples of Dagon stand and beautiful priestesses were available. To worship this way, with a beautiful priestess, costs much more, but my brothers whispered that the rulers of Ashdod and Gaza are more careful than other lords, making sure the girls do not cheat the customers and are always clean and sober. On the street here in Ekron, men took their chances but paid much less. For some, the gamble was worth the reward. Some men love their money more than their own flesh.
Everyone lived this way, and at peace, the elders said, until the Hebrews moved into our territories. They were always terribly uptight as a people. The wives hissed at the prostitutes who called out to their husbands, and the mothers swatted at the hands that wanted to reach out and touch the face of a child.
I wish the Hebrews weren’t so cold to those women. Hebrew women are always cold. Father hates them. I never thought much of it, except that this was the way of the Hebrews, but today I came to understand much of this problem.
After I tried to graze the ewes (and they refused, preferring to sleep, so eventually I led them home), I went to the market below us. As I wandered from booth to booth in the late afternoon, a beautiful woman watched me.
Each time I glanced up, her eyes were on me. I tucked my face down and smiled, wishing to show her that I was not a rude child, but neither did I have anything to say to her. Even at my age, all of fourteen winters, a girl could be shrewd and earn money. There was more than one way for women to prove their worth.
The beautiful stranger bought a handful of dried apricots and held them out to me. I pressed my lips together. They looked so good, and I was hungry, hungrier than I had ever been, a new kind of animal hunger.
She smiled and held them further out to me. I refused, my eyes wide. I didn’t have the money to buy them. She held them out to me, nodding. There was no reason I could think of for such kindness.
My animal hunger did not care.
I grabbed and ate them in a rush of need and intense satisfaction. My teeth were thick with the orange meat as I grinned at her. She laughed and motioned for me to step closer. And then she did the most remarkable thing.
She put her arm around me.
My body stiffened to feel a gentle touch. I concentrated on keeping my back straight and to keep looking straight ahead, but really, I wanted to sink into her motherly touch. There was more than one kind of animal hunger. Tenderness was a need as real as any food.
“Your name is Delilah, yes?”
I nodded.
“I am Tanis. Do you know who I am?”
I shook my head from side to side.
“I am not ashamed. You can look at me.”
I stole a little glance. She was beautiful, even in the winter’s late afternoon shadows.
“I am Tanis, a priestess from the temple in Ashdod.”
I nodded in acknowledgement.
“Delilah, who has lain with you? Who has fathered your child?”
“I do not have a baby!” I even raised my empty arms, letting my robes fall back, to prove my point. She took hold of one hand and pressed it into my stomach. Though I looked around for help, everyone was ignoring us.
“What are you doing?”
“You have a baby in here.”
I felt something move under my hand. I cried out and pushed her away, pushed her arm away from me. She must have done magic on me. A man glared at us both, and she swept one arm back around my shoulder, leading me to a quiet, empty booth.
“You did not know?” she asked.
Tears were filling my eyes.
“Delilah, how could you not know? Has not your mother told you these things?”
I stared at the ground.
“I was going to ask you what made you so bold, walking around the market like this. But now I know. You aren’t bold. You’re ignorant. And Delilah, you are in great danger, my dear.”
“Why? From who?”
“An unmarried girl who is with child can be stoned to death. You are of no worth to your father, Delilah. He cannot marry you off, not for a good price. No man will want you now.”
“What do I do?”
“Find the father and insist he marry you at once.”
“I do not know who the father is.”
Her eyebrows rose, and I could tell this answer displeased her. I did not know why. I decided to tell her everything. And I did.
“I never saw his face, not really. Just a certain scent that I remember,” I finished. “He did leave me some grain for my sheep. I think it was him. Was I wrong to take it? Am I in trouble?”
She pulled me in and kissed the top of my head. I trembled from the effort of holding myself in, keeping myself from bursting into tears and curling into her lap. We sat there like that for some time, her soft, painted hand stroking my plain, unbraided hair. She smelled of myrrh and incense, of cinnamon perfume and cedar. For that moment, I wished she could have been my mother. I think she did too, for she was not eager to release me.
“Delilah, would you like to come and live with me at the temple?”
“As your daughter?”
She sighed. “No. A servant. Of sorts. You have known a man, so you can work.”
My mind led me to where her words pointed. I stood, smoothing down my robes. “I could never … I don’t mean to be rude, or harsh. You’re very kind. But I do not want to be a prostitute, even in Dagon’s temple.”
“I am a priestess, not a prostitute!”
“I am sorry.”
“There may be no other way for you. Not if you want to live.”
“You’re wrong. I own two ewes. They have the softest wool you have ever touched, a fine hand, thick and full and like cream. I will use their wool to make the softest fabrics. Plus they are due to have babies soon.”
“In winter?”
“It will be fine. I will take good care of them. And I will earn money, lots of it. My father will be pleased to keep me.”
“I am sure you are right.” She sounded sad.
“I will earn a lot of money. And money changes a man’s heart.”
“Yes, it does. But it can also make people do bad things, Delilah. Mean things.”
“You do not know my father. He will rejoice when he sees how much money I make for him.”
I turned to leave, but she called out softly to me, one finger rubbing her chin.
“Delilah, how much does your father expect to earn from the ewes?”
I stopped. I had not put a number to my dream before. I calculated, biting my lip as I held up fingers. “I think each lamb will bring in a drachma. And another three for the wool, come spring.”
She smiled, although there was no happiness in her eyes. “Five drachmas. Go on, then. And may Dagon bless your plans.”
When I returned home, everyone had eaten and climbed up the ladder to bed. My eyes adjusting to the darkness, I saw with dismay that my ewes had discovered the hidden sack. They were stuffing their faces down inside it, jaws chomping furiously.
I was overcome by hunger too, and stepped quietly to the pot left near the low table. Sticking my hand in, I was unexpectedly blessed. It was full! I scooped out a handful of porridge and smeared it into my mouth, then proceeded to sit down on my rump and pull the pot right between my legs, hunching over it and eating with snorts and swallows like a great ox. I heard something above and looked up to see my mother peering down on me. When she caught my eye, her face withdrew into the darkness above again.
I wondered if she had done this kindness for me, and why. There was no time to consider this mystery, however, because my fatter ewe stirred and stood. She had a panicked look on her face and glanced about, as if deciding on a direction to flee. I jumped up and tried to hold out my hands to her, as if to quiet her, but she gnashed her teeth at me. My calm and dear friend was overcome with something I did not understand, and she began wandering around, her head butting anything that stood in her way. I glanced above, praying she didn’t awaken anyone. As she trotted past me, I saw that her backside was distended and red, and I began to panic, too. Something was wrong, with her or maybe the lamb she carried, but I did not know what it could be.
My father muttered something above us. If he came down that ladder, we’d both get a beating. I did what I could, which was to open the door and let her out into the night, and I followed, closing the door softly behind. Instantly I regretted my haste, as the night wind had turned cold and sharp, cutting through my robe, even cutting through my thin legs to pierce my bones. I followed my ewe as she trotted in circles and began bleating. Something froze against my cheeks and I looked up at the sky, expecting to see ice, but there was none. I was crying, the tears freezing against my cheeks.
My ewe flopped to one side and bleated, and I stroked her head, praying. “Please Dagon. I don’t know what to do. If you are there (forgive me for my doubts!) please help me. If you are there, bless my ewe and me.”
She grew very still, almost as if she was dead, but her breath clouding out around her muzzle told me she was alive. A sack pushed through on her backside, and my mouth fell open. There were two legs hanging down toward the ground. Two perfect, white legs. I scooted around to her backside and witnessed such a miracle as I will never forget. Following the two perfect legs came a perfect white head, followed by the whole lamb. As she gasped again, she pushed the whole lamb out and I scooped the baby into my arms. There were fluids all around, pooling out from the mother’s backside, covering us all. Steam rose into the air, and we were enveloped in its white cloud under the silver moon. I hunched over, trying to keep the baby warm, my heart beating wildly with awe. My ewe had given birth!
That was the last moment of peace I would ever know.
The mother stood and trotted away, looking frightened by what she had just brought into the world—startled by its perfection, its miraculous entrance on a dark night in this cold world.
I did not know what to do. Shivering myself, I rubbed the lamb clean of the fluids, seeing the steam rising all around it, stealing the heat of its body. I chased the ewe, offering her lamb to her like I was holding out a loaf of bread at market. She had a wild look in her eye and refused to let me come near. But I knew this: she had enough fleece and enough fat, to last for several hours out here. The lamb could not survive this world without warmth. It had moments to live perhaps, though I could not be sure. I ran back into the home with it, nestling the newborn against the other sleeping ewe. The newborn bleated for milk.
I thought hard of our home, of what was in it, what I could use. I thought of nothing. I had to get the mother in here, nursing, or the newborn would still die. Bile was so high in my throat I could taste it. I wished I had not eaten so much. My first full meal became a curse for me now.
I decided to apply more force to the situation. I ran out into the night, to find the ewe and drag her back. Clouds rolled over the moon, making the way difficult. Stones cut into my bare feet, and I twisted my ankles against rocks as I ran, looking behind shrubs, running further from home, calling softly. I did not want to call a wolf or lion, only my poor scared ewe. I looked for more than an hour, I think. Maybe more.
A bleat came to me on the wind. I grew completely still, opening my ears, willing my whole body to do nothing but listen. Then I turned to my right, and walked in that direction. Parting a pair of low bushes, I saw her. She was on her side, her eyes wide and white, like two perfect moons. Her mouth hung open, her tongue hanging out, touching the ground, covered in sticks and dirt. She did not pull it back into her mouth. I think she recognized me. I don’t know. It could have just been her eyes widening as she died.
Behind her, steam rose to the heavens and departed. A dark pool spread around her haunches as I bit my lip to keep from crying. Edging forward, I looked at her. Hind legs hung out of her birth canal. A second lamb had been coming. She must have panicked when the birth became too hard. That is why she ran from me. She did not know how to have a baby. She did not want to have a baby, not in winter. Even a stupid ewe knows that is disaster, with no fresh grain to feed the mother, nothing for the lambs to graze on after they weaned. They had all been doomed to die. She ran from me out of fear and anger, I knew. I had done this to her.
“I am so sorry,” I whispered, reaching out to touch her muzzle.
A high growl made the hairs on my arm stand up. A cat was nearby, perhaps a lion or mountain cat. Blood was in the air, and everyone was hungry. No one waited for spring.
I do not remember walking home. I do not remember if I cried, but I know it would have made no difference. What would happen to me next was already written somewhere far above, where my cries could not be heard.
The newborn lamb was already dead when I returned. The other ewe had not known what to do with it. It froze to death, wet and hungry, surrounded by my sleeping family. If they had heard it bleating, they did nothing.
The next morning, when the sun revealed my stupidity, my father’s face was grey like ash from a cold fire.
“How am I to get money from that?” he said, gesturing to the lifeless lamb. I swallowed and looked at my toes. They were flecked with blood. He did not ask.
“And where is the ewe?”
“Outside.”
“Dead?”
“Yes, Father.”
“So she ate my grain, gobbled my money, and died. You let her mate before her time, before all natural order would have it, and now ewe and lamb are both dead.”
I said nothing of the second lamb, my third victim. Let the lion eat them both, before my father finds them, I prayed. Take away the evidence of my sin.
Father grabbed me by the robe and dragged me across the dirt floor until my face was just under his.
“You are a curse upon this house!”
I whimpered without meaning to. He slapped me.
I put a hand to my face and turned away, but he moved his hands to the center of my linen shift and tore it open. My swollen belly was plain to see.
I heard my brothers snicker above me in the loft. “No different than her ewes.”
“At least we can shave the ewes,” another replied, and they broke into laughter.
My father raised his hands to my throat, choking me, the anger in his face a mystery to me. My guilt felt a part of me, like a second heart. I went limp, willing my father to kill me.
“Shame!” he screamed. I meditated on that word in the darkness I swam in, as I lie dying on the dirt floor. I could smell my ewe, the surprising, sharp smell of birth and blood. Feet ran past my head, with a strange metal clapping between the steps. Stars fell all around my head, little bells that sparkled before hitting the earth.
Someone touched my neck, tenderly. Anger swelled up in my darkness. I did not want my death to be interrupted. Not all murder was sin! Some murders were grace!
“We had an agreement,” a woman’s voice said.
I opened my eyes, groaning. I wanted to stop her.
My father spit in my face, his final good-bye. Strong arms went under my back and legs, lifting me to a woman’s soft chest. It was Tanis; the perfume of the temple gave her away. I could not look up at her face. I was dirty. I did not want to be saved dirty. I wanted to swim in the darkness, a little further, and disappear from everyone. But I was saved nonetheless. I closed my eyes, squeezing out tears. Everything I did was cursed.
Tanis carried me out and into the streets. She paused only once, setting me down in a doorway to remove the chains between her ankles. She caught me staring at them and shrugged.
“When I heard you were in trouble, I did not take them off. No time.”
“Why do you wear them?”
“The chains make me graceful. Men like women who sway with each step.”
Her ankles were red and raw. I wanted to cry for her. Why did I bring grief to everyone?
She patted my shoulder. “No one makes me wear them.”
“What’s going to happen to my other ewe?”
She studied me for a few moments, sitting on her haunches. “Don’t you want to know what is going to happen to you?”
“No. No. I don’t.”
“Your father will most likely kill the ewe and eat her.”
The sun rose over our shoulders to the east, casting a prim yellow light over us. I saw Tanis’s face clearly, the morning sun harsh on her kind features. Now I saw there were wrinkles around her eyes, deep lines, the scars of time, marring her beauty. I glanced up at the sun, hating it for touching her, for allowing me to see her this way. I closed my eyes and looked down.
“Everyone will be awake soon. We should go.”
I did not understand.
She stood, holding out her hand to me, her chains dangling from her other hand. I accepted her help and stood, and together we fled through the quiet stone streets, our feet making a soft beating noise as they landed against each stone. To me, it was like the sound of a heart beating in the stillness of the city. Tanis rescued me in my death, and a new life was given to me.
I did not want it.
“Is this Delilah then?”
A man sat upon a high-backed chair at the top of marble stairs with crouching lions resting on each stair tread, daring the unwise to approach. He was bald, with a stern face and broad shoulders. His legs were bare, easy to see under his robe as he sat. They were covered with coarse black hair. It made me uneasy.
Tanis nodded. We were dirty from the day’s walk, and my feet hurt terribly. I braced my knees to stand straight and proud.
“Go and sleep, Tanis. I will watch over her.”
Tanis nodded and bowed, exiting through doors that were rimmed in black and white stripes, with bold blue mosaic centers. Inside each center was a golden lion. The walls all around these doors were covered in the same blue tiles and rimmed at ceiling and floor with the same black and white pattern.
As the doors opened and then closed behind her, I peeked into the room. There were golden couches with lifeless forms of women draped across them. Beautiful fabrics covered the women, linens dyed for hours until they made your eyes dance. None of the women stirred. Tanis lay down on a couch, pulling a blue linen over her feet, and closed her eyes.
“So, Delilah. Welcome to Ashdod, and to the court of Dagon.”
“Thank you.”
“I am Hannibal.”
He stood, and I took a step back, holding in my breath. The room was shifting under my feet.
“You will make a wonderful sacrifice. I am sure Dagon will think you are tasty and ripe to eat. We’ll only have to roast you a short while since you are so young.”
“Yes.”
My knees were trembling. I pressed them together to make them stop, watching him as I did.
He cocked his head, grinning. “I’m making humor, Delilah. Tanis saved you for a reason. She has a good eye. She’s brought me most of my girls, did you know that? Any girl Tanis picks for me has served Dagon well.”
“I will be a good servant too. Should I start now?” I exhaled, hard, to clear my head, looked for a door I could run through and pretend to fetch mending or cleaning rags. Any door would be a good one. I had to get away.
“You are with child. I will not put you to work yet. Let me bring you some wine. And bread. Food is always good, yes? Food and wine, first thing in the morning, makes the whole day more pleasant.”
I did not know if this was a trap. Or a test. I did not know this man.
“No, thank you.”
He stopped and turned to look at me, as if I had admitted some great crime.
“Not eat? Not drink? Nothing?”
“I’m not hungry. Or thirsty. But thank you.”
“If I did not know your story, I would never guess you were lying. You are very good at lying.”
He clapped his hands, and a servant appeared. He whispered something to the servant, who looked at me and grinned before disappearing again. A moment later, the servant returned with two others, each bearing a tray stacked over his head with foods and wines. There were fruits (though at this time of the year, this surely was some magic trick), and nuts, and breads, and oils, and vinegars for dipping, and slices of meat, and raisins, and a bowl of milk large enough to bathe in. The servants set these down on a table near me and exited.
“Sit there,” Hannibal said, gesturing to a stool in front of the table. I obeyed, trembling. My stomach lifted and lurched, wanting me to bury myself face-first in the foods. I sat on my hands to keep myself strong.
I sat here, not moving, trying not to breathe and taste the foods in the air, until a single tear rolled down my cheek. Hannibal circled behind me, and his hand wiped the tear away.
“Do not lie to me again, Delilah. You are hungry. And thirsty.”
I nodded, my throat burning.
“Eat. Drink. There is no shame here.”
If he said anything else, I didn’t hear it. I was eating from a bowl, from a table, in the light, for the first time in my life. I could not believe how dazzling the wine looked, how pure and calm milk could be in a bowl, like a cloud had been caught! How the bread was brown and crisp and how the darker spots made it crunch in my mouth. My eyes had never eaten with me. It was a new world.
Hannibal sat across from me as my eating slowed, sooner than I wanted. My bulging abdomen sometimes left me no room for food, though my appetite raged unaware. I licked my fingers and laced them under my stomach, holding it up. Had I ever been so full?
I clenched my jaw to keep a yawn from escaping. I would not sleep yet! I did not want to close my eyes. The food was too beautiful. I wanted to clutch the bread to my chest like I saw lovers holding each other.
He saw my longing and grabbed the bread, pressing it into my hands. “You might as well sleep with it. If you don’t, you’ll wake up and miss it.”
I giggled, partly drunk with food and partly drunk with wine, and he broke into a wide grin.
“I have one thing I must do before you sleep here.”
He reached into his belt, a wide sash tied at his waist, and retrieved a small dagger, its blade no longer than his palm. It glittered in the morning sun that was illuminating the chamber from small openings above. His hand reached out for my neck, and I whimpered as his other hand closed in. I felt a tug at my scalp then he stepped back.
He was holding a lock of my hair, its edges cut clean and smooth.
“Good girl. Now get some sleep. Everything will be all right now.”
I could not look back up and meet his eye.
“I am very sorry,” he said.
“For what?” I glanced up and around, for a clue as to what he was going to do to me next.
“For everything that brought you to me. Tanis did not bring you here to hurt you. She saved you. She has nothing but good plans for you. In time, I hope you will begin to heal.”
My throat burned and knotted. I tried to bear my neck down, to push the painful lump back down. I could cry when I was alone.
Hannibal did not move any closer to me but gestured to the door that Tanis had slipped behind.
“Go and rest. We do not rise until after the noon hour. You will feel better after you sleep. Then I will tell you more of your new life here, yes?”
I started to nod but stopped myself, forcing myself to look up and into his eyes. “Yes. Thank you, Hannibal.”
Hannibal’s expression changed, first a frown, then a wide grin. He gestured toward the lion doors, and I went. I needed both arms to open one, but it was silent as it swept over the cool tile floor. No one stirred within. Soft breaths hummed in the air, like invisible wings beating all around us. Several couches along the sides of the room were empty. I spied Tanis sleeping on hers, and walked to her. Lying down on my side, I curled my knees up and tucked my hands under my head, preferring to sleep on the floor beside her than sleep in comfort apart from her.
As I drifted to sleep, I felt her hand reach down and stroke my hair.
When I opened my eyes, I was alone. I sat up and stretched, blinking my eyes. The shadows in the room were thicker now; it was close to the time of the evening meal. But these women did not count time the way my family did. I did not know if they had evening meals here.
I stood and saw that one other woman still slept. She had long blonde hair, a rarity for our people. I wondered where she had come from to have such light hair. She might have come from some land far away, a land without sun, so that her color drained away. Sometimes fish that live deep within the water are pale like this. I’ve seen them at the market, stacked one on top of the other, glistening like a bed of pearls.
I crept out of the sleeping chambers without making a sound.
Tanis and Hannibal were arguing. I pressed my back against the door, thinking they might not see me. I knew they had not heard me.
“You defend her?” Hannibal said.
“She pleases her noble. He gives us ever better sacrifices. That is not a defense. It’s truth.”
“She disrupts our lives. She has no respect for our gods. She has no respect for any of us. It’s a poison.”
“She never had a family, Hannibal. She does not understand how to please us.”
“She doesn’t want to please us!”
“Because she sees no value in it. The more we love her, the more she will understand. You will be glad she is one of us.”
“Tanis. She will never be one of us. That is truth too.”
Tanis cocked her head, as if catching a scent. She turned and spied me against the door. Widening her arms, she waved me to her.
“Come here, little pet.”
I ran to her, and she wrapped me in an embrace, letting me rest my head on her chest. Stroking my hair, she whispered to me.
“Did you sleep well?”
I nodded.
“Good. Are you hungry?”
I nodded faster.
Hannibal laughed. “This one eats like a gladiator.”
Heat rose in my face, and Tanis shushed him. “She’s too thin. She needs to fatten up.”
“So we can sacrifice her.” Hannibal wiggled his eyebrows at me, and I gave him a little smile. Tanis laughed and pushed me toward the table that still sat below the marble steps, off to the side.
Hannibal clapped his hands and conjured a servant. (That is how it appeared to me. The servant must have been waiting in a nearby room, waiting for this command.) My mouth watered at the sound of Hannibal clapping. A plate was soon at my mercy, and I ransacked it like the gladiator I was, leaving no survivors. I burped loudly and out of habit threw my hand over my mouth, glancing up to see if I had awoken anyone. Hannibal was sitting on his high black chair, guarded by those blind stone lions, and he laughed at my reaction.
“Seeing ghosts, are you?”
I smiled, having no understanding what he could mean. But I thought on it as I lifted the bowl and let the juices run into my mouth before holding it up to the light just to see that it was empty. Nothing was left. I glanced back up at Hannibal, and then I understood. My family was gone forever. I knew they lived, but they lived elsewhere, in a different world. When I crossed the threshold into the temple of Dagon, I had entered a new world, like one who died and entered the afterlife.
Hannibal clapped, and the servant returned. I hoped he would bring more food, but he wanted my empty bowl, and I gave it to him with much sorrow. Hannibal rose, scorn lighting his face, and I turned to see what made him so angry.
The blonde one had come out from the sleeping chambers. I got a good look at her now. She was tall and lean, with a square-shaped face that called attention to her high sharp cheekbones and full mouth. She had blood-red eyes that were probably blue if she slept well. She was a strange beauty.
Pressing her palms into the hollows of her eyes, she groaned and sought a place to sit. Noticing the chair next to me at the table, she stumbled over and slumped down as she sat, resting her head on the table. I thought she smelled like fresh-cut cypress wood. I was very sensitive to smells these days. I wondered if that man who put the baby in me hurt me some other way, making smells sharper to my nose.
“Why did you send someone to wake me? You know I’m ugly at this hour.”
“You missed prayers, Parisa.” Hannibal was still standing, his face pinched and dark. “And the noon meal.”
She took a sack from her sash and tossed it on the steps below him. “Horace!” she called, wincing at using her full voice.
The blessed servant who had been feeding me nodded. Why hadn’t I thought to ask his name?
“Yes?”
“Take this money back to Lord Marcos. Tell him I won’t be seeing him anymore. I am needed here for prayers at dawn.”
Hannibal crossed his arms, staring at her as Horace swallowed once with great effort and glanced between the pair.
Hannibal caved first. “You have no grace. You walk like an ox.”
Parisa turned her back and stared at me, seeing me for the first time. “Who is this? And why does she get to eat at this hour?”
Hannibal came down the steps toward us, picking up the bag Parisa had thrown down and tucking it into the sack at his waist. “Tanis brought her in.”
“She’s a little big to be a foundling.”
Some women left their babies in fields at harvest time, when they were sure to be found. I gave her a small smile.
She sneered at me and leaned over the table. “Stand up. I want to look at you.”
I stood, and she leaned back in her seat, laughing at my protruding belly. She did not sound happy. “Tanis amazes me.”
I looked to Hannibal, unsure what to do. I wanted to leave the room, but he gestured for me to sit. I did not want to sit down again at this table with this woman.
She grinned at me. “Do you know what she has gotten you into?”
“I know everything I need to know.”
Hannibal raised his eyebrows.
Parisa narrowed her eyes. “Really? Everything?”
“I know that Tanis is good and kind! I know that she saved my life and I trust her and I know that you are a mean, hard woman!”
I jumped up and rushed from the table, running out the doors at the far end of the hall. My head was swimming with angry words. My heart was frantic, pounding fast and sharp, pushing away the awful things I had just said, the fear of what that woman might do next.
My feet hit warm stones, and I turned my face up from the ground to see a purple sky with no clouds or stars. People were milling about all around me, some leaning against an almond tree that had just put out its early blossoms. Some strolled arm in arm with women I recognized from the sleeping room, disappearing around corners, laughing or deep in discussion. The women often stroked the arms of these men—and the others were almost all men, I saw—encouraging more words, more time. Tanis should be here, with the others.
A few couples stopped when they noticed me, very different looks on each face. The men were curious. Curious and surprised. The women were surprised and unhappy, so I pushed my way through them quickly to find Tanis. I was a stench in the nostrils of some women here, and I did not know why.
I turned round a giant limestone pillar to my left and saw Tanis sitting with a finely dressed man in linen robes. She held his hands in her lap, leaning in to listen to him. As she accepted a kiss on her cheek from him, she saw me. I do not know how to describe what I saw in her face at that instant. Anger, perhaps, or fear. Those two are too similar to tell apart from a distance. She stood and yelled something in a language I did not know, as a guard moved toward me.
I ran out, straight past them all, into the busy main street of the city. I looked for a place to sit and unleash all these tears blurring my eyes, but where could I go? I ran toward the back of the temple. My belly began to ache, the baby inside pressing down, making it hard to stand. Using my left hand to brace myself against the wall, I edged along and around the side of the temple, where at least I was alone, if not comfortable.
Something else twisted inside me, something dark and painful. I hated myself. I bit at my nails, wishing I could bite all the way through my skin, destroy this whole miserable creation that I was. I wished I were a roaring lion, stalking the stupid little Delilah through a dark forest, knocking her down with one strong paw, then ripping her up and eating her until not a drop remained. I wished I were that lion. I wished I were anything but me, the girl so clumsy she was caught stealing grain, so stupid she did not even know what to do when that shadow man reached for her, so cursed that a baby sprang up in that same space …
I might have made a longer list, but Tanis found me.
I couldn’t look at her. I only knew it was her by the voice.
“Delilah? Are you all right?”
I wouldn’t reply, so she came and sat by me, lowering herself to the ground, her back against the wall like mine. We sat side by side until my breathing slowed and my body became flesh again instead of cold stone.
“I am sorry, little pet. I thought Hannibal was with you.”
“He was. I ran away.”
“Why?”
“It doesn’t matter. I don’t belong here.”
“Are you a seer?”
“No.” My tone sounded like an angry child.
“Then you don’t know that, do you? I would say you know very little at all, Delilah. That is one reason I had to save you.”
“What’s another reason?” I knew she was going to say that she needed a slave. Or that Hannibal did. Or some noble. I didn’t want to be stupid anymore. I wanted the whole truth, right then. All these things I didn’t know were what hurt me. About men, about ewes, about lambs.
“I like you.”
I turned to face her. “Don’t lie to me, ever, ever, Tanis.”
“I’m not lying!”
“Then why did you save me? What must I do?”
Her face grew still, her eyebrows coming close together. “You must eat. And sleep. And then when you are strong, you must have a baby.”
“And then?”
She sighed, settling back against the wall but putting an arm around me. “Those are big enough tasks for any woman, much less a girl your age. You cannot take on any more than that for now. Promise me.”
“Tanis, I said something awful to the blonde woman inside.”
“Parisa?” Tanis laughed. “Did her face puff up and go red?”
“I don’t know. I ran away.”
“Don’t provoke her. She’s still a slave in her heart. Small and cruel. I think the gods must have set her eyes backward in her head. She doesn’t see a big world with all its wonders. She only sees what she does not have, all the little joys she is denied.”
“Did you bring her here too?”
“No. Parisa was brought here by a slave caravan five years ago. We saw her at an auction. She had passed through so many owners. I did not want her brought in, but Hannibal insisted.”
“But you defended her to him.”
“He has grown to hate her, but he needs the money she brings in from her lord. I only want peace for my girls, so we may work without distraction.”
Tanis stood and turned to me, extending her hand. I accepted and stood up, not without some grunting, which made her grin. She rested her hand on my belly, and I saw a shadow of great sorrow pass over her face, like the shadow of a bird flying above, going to a land I did not know.