David returned three days later but, when he summoned me to his bed the following night, he made no mention of Ishbaal's death nor of the traces of ash on my skin and hair. He barely acknowledged me at all, even at the height of our coupling, except to boast that he had secured the prize for which he’d striven so long. The Israelite tribes had acclaimed him king and would confirm his election at the next new moon. ‘My kingdom will extend further than your father's,’ he said. ‘I shall renounce my pledge to the Philistines and drive them back into the sea.’
The elders arrived in Hebron and, in spite of the worsening famine, David feasted them royally. On the third and final day, we gathered in the sanctuary, Mother and I wearing new crimson-edged robes woven by Rizpah. Abigail had recounted with awe how, when elected king of Judah, David had anointed himself. She had counselled him this time to defer to the high priest and, when Abiathar stepped forward with the sacred oil, I caught her expression of relief. At the same moment, Nechama, Maacah's newborn daughter began to howl. As if not to be left out, Tamar joined her, swiftly followed by several of their half-brothers and sisters. David's murderous glare at his children greatly enlivened the ceremony.
‘I don’t care for these new songs,’ Mother whispered to me, loudly enough to amuse those women who weren’t trying to quell the din. ‘Is it time to dance yet?’ she added, and I realised that she was back with her sisters at Shiloh, preparing to venerate the Ark. For all the pain it caused me, I knew that I should be grateful that Ishbaal's death had blunted the last of her wits.
The ceremony concluded, we processed back through the streets. The raucous cheers of the soldiers served to emphasise the silence of the townspeople, whose storerooms had been plundered to furnish our feasts. At the palace, we were shepherded into the great chamber, where the elders lined up to pay homage to their newly crowned king. As Eglah's father, first in order of precedence, knelt before the throne, David thrust out his foot, causing him to recoil. ‘Kiss it,’ hissed Joab, not only restored to David's favour but promoted to Abner's old command. Grey-faced, the Reubenite chief complied, setting an example that the others followed.
Returning to the harem, I remarked that my father had required men only to kneel at his feet, not to kiss them. Abigail sprang to David's defence, explaining that he had adopted the practice from the Philistines. Yet, even as he introduced their practices, he was shaking off their yoke. Achish, mistrustful of David's loyalty now that he was king of all Israel, summoned him to Gath. David defied him, trusting his spies’ reports that dissension within the Philistine ranks would delay the inevitable reprisals. In the meantime, he addressed himself to matters at home. According to Abigail, as ever our principal informant, his overriding ambition was to found a new capital. Spurning the Israelite sites that he might have procured peaceably, he had settled on the ancient Jebusite city of Jerusalem. Although it was only a few hours away from Gibeah, I had never been there. Faced with its impregnable ramparts, my father had maintained an uneasy truce with the king. David, true to form, set out to conquer it.
Any attack on the city would have to wait until after the harvest. It had failed for the past two years and large swathes of the land were in the grip of a devastating famine. Food remained plentiful in the harem, our sole privation being the rationing of water. For once I agreed with Ahinoam who, when Maacah raged at the loss of her daily bath, pointed out that, in Reuben and Gad, people were starving.
‘In Geshur,’ Maacah said, ‘the comfort of the princess counts for more than the stomachs of the people.’
‘No wonder they were too weak to repel our troops,’ Ahinoam replied, to the delight of Haggith and Eglah.
As the drought worsened, David offered sacrifices in Nob and Gibeon as well as Hebron, but still the Lord was not propitiated. The people grew restive and there were rumours that several agitators had been executed. As always, my own fears were fixed on Manasseh where, even in wet summers, our well was at risk of running dry and it was half a day's walk to the nearest spring. By suborning the harem servants, I received occasional news from Paltiel and gave thanks for his foresight in teaching me to read and write. He leavened his account of the parched land, withered crops and slaughtered beasts with stories of the boys: the excitement of Malkiel and Shealtiel, who felt vindicated in their disdain for washing, and the misery of Hillel, whom we had named the little Levite for his hatred of dirt. I laughed and cried, pressing the scrolls and committing the words to my heart.
The scarcities increased and David, as discouraged as my father by the Lord's refusal to speak to him directly, was said to spend day after day with Abiathar, casting the sacred stones in a bid to discover the cause of the Lord's displeasure. In accordance with those who imputed it not to their own crimes but to his, I could have told him that it was for lying with his wife after she had lain with another man, and, worse, violating his wife's mother and murdering her son, but, chafing at my childlessness, he summoned me less and less at night. I saw him only when, along with the rest of the harem, I was required to attend the reception of foreign envoys or tribal chiefs.
Then came the news that confounded me. Whether in obedience to the Lord or acknowledgement of his misdeeds I neither knew nor cared, but David gave orders for my boys to be brought to Hebron. Abigail informed me and, at first, I failed to grasp the significance of her words, which felt as slippery as stones on a riverbed. Step by step, I allowed myself to trust them. I was filled with such ecstasy that, had David taken me to his bed that night, I would have opened my heart to him... I would even have beseeched the Lord to open my womb. My one worry was Abigail, whose sombre tone surprised me until I realised that she must be thinking of her own son, Chileab, who would never be restored to her. I resolved to ask one of the boys – either Shealtiel or Adriel, the closest to Chileab in age – to make her his special favourite.
I hastened to tell Mother, but the prospect of seeing her grandchildren meant little to one who had returned to her own childhood. Rizpah, however, shared my delight and, as she kissed my hand, I lamented once again that my pleas for her sons had held no sway with David, who’d threatened to hang them the next time I mentioned their names. Even that memory couldn’t cloud my happiness and I prepared for the boys’ arrival, wearing my brightest robe and asking Ahinoam to fashion my hair: not braided as I wore it in the harem but loose as it had been in Manasseh. At Ahitophel's instruction, I waited in the main courtyard and, although I would have preferred somewhere private, I was grateful not to have to explain the harem to the boys.
I sat and stood and paced the courtyard, watching in mounting dread as the evening shadows crept up the walls. I was less afraid that some disaster had befallen them along the way than that David had set out to trick me. Was this his punishment for my failure to conceive? Had his indifference turned to hatred as surely as my love? Abigail sought to calm me, but she was blind to his cruelty. Then, just when I expected Ahitophel or even David himself to admit to the subterfuge, a guard announced that the boys had arrived at the gate. Dishevelled, bedraggled and dragging their feet, they entered more like captives than princes. ‘Mother!’ Hillel cried in a cracked voice and tottered towards me. The others followed and I clasped them in my tightest embrace, first one by one and then all at once, struggling to make sense of the changes in them, from Penuel and Hillel's broad shoulders and Malkiel's whiskery chin to Shealtiel's long legs and Adriel's missing teeth. As I breathed in their pungent scents, I prayed that I might stay like this forever, locked in a heaving mass of cheeks and chests and elbows and backs. Then Adriel rasped that he was thirsty and, appalled by my thoughtlessness, I ordered a bondwoman to bring water, which the boys fell on as if they hadn’t drunk for days.
I ordered a second bondwoman to bring them a meal. But, in a voice as smooth as the clay with which he sealed his scrolls, Ahitophel declared that he would take them to eat in their chamber.
‘No!’ I exclaimed, chiding myself for startling Adriel. ‘No,’ I repeated, forcing my voice
to a lower pitch. ‘They’ve just arrived. They have so much to tell me. I want to hear everything,’ I said, rumpling Shealtiel's hair.
‘They’re exhausted, my lady. They have been travelling for days. Would you put your needs before theirs?’
‘Of course not,’ I said, fearing that in two years I had forgotten how to care for children. ‘I’ll come with you.’
‘We’re not exhausted,’ Penuel interjected. ‘Don’t let him take us away.’
‘Where are they going?’ I asked, as four guards approached in response to Ahitophel's signal.
‘They’ll be safe with their uncles.’
‘What uncles?’ I asked, as Jonathan and the twins’ faces flashed through my mind and Ishbaal's severed head stuck there.
‘The sons of your father's courtesan.’
‘In the gatehouse?’ I asked, my horror transmitting itself to Malkiel and Shealtiel, whose favourite story had been Joseph in Pharaoh's prison.
‘I want to stay with you, Mother,’ Shealtiel said, clinging to my waist.
‘It's just for one night, till they find us somewhere together,’ I said, unclasping his hands as if it were a game. ‘Now make sure to get some sleep; we have so much to do in the morning.’
As they were led away, I felt that I was drowning but in air not water, having fallen into a pit deeper than Sheol. It was only when Abigail held out her arms to steady me that I realised I was falling in earnest.
‘What's happening, Abigail? Tell me! I know that you know.’
‘Not here. Let's go back inside.’
‘I won’t take a step until you tell me the truth.’
‘I should have told you before, but I didn’t want to alarm you.’
‘I’m calm now. See how calm I am.’ I gripped my left wrist with my right hand to stop it trembling.
‘The Lord has revealed the reason for the drought.’
‘When? How?’
‘Through the sacred stones. I know that this will be hard for you, but it's because your father killed the Gibeonites.’
‘My father vanquished many of the nation's enemies; I don’t remember them all. Why should the Lord object?’
‘Because they’re not our enemies – at least they shouldn’t be. When Joshua conquered Canaan, he promised them eternal protection in the Lord's name. The Lord now stands with the Gibeonites against his own people.’
‘My father has been dead for nine years. Why should the Lord punish him – no, us – now?’
‘I can’t answer for the Lord any more than you can. It just is. Please, let's go back to your chamber.’
‘You still haven’t said what this has to do with my boys.’
‘Only the Gibeonites can entreat the Lord to lift the drought. The king summoned the elders to hear their demands. They insisted that Saul's blood guilt be requited.’
‘How? No!’ Not needing an answer, I ran through the gateway to the inner courtyard, up the stairs and into David's chamber, where he sat eating with Joab and Abishai. As I entered, Joab jumped up and brandished his sword. ‘Yes, go ahead,’ I said. ‘If my father's blood guilt must fall on anyone, let it be me.’ I approached the blade, allowing its cold tip to scratch my throat. Joab looked shocked at the bead of blood, lowering his sword even before David gave the order.
‘Michal... oh Michal,’ David said evenly. ‘Must you always be the one to disturb my peace?’
‘Yes,’ I replied. ‘Even when we’re dead and descended to Sheol, unless you tell me why you’ve brought my children – ’
‘Your sister's children – ’
‘To Hebron.’
‘Have you forgotten how your father slaughtered the innocent priests of Nob?’
‘No, of course not. Never. But who was it who drove him to it? Who was it who lied to the priests and ate their consecrated bread? Who was it who brought my father's wrath down on them?’
‘I am not to blame for his sacrilege!’
‘Besides, the priests were Levites, not Gibeonites.’
‘The Gibeonites served them. And Saul's man killed seven of them. Now the Gibeonites demand that seven of his descendants be executed in exchange.’
‘Which seven? There are only five boys.’
‘And two by your father's concubine.’
‘Whom you’ve kept locked up for years. Why? Were you waiting for just this moment?’
‘Don’t sneer at me! It's not my will but the Lord's.’
‘How convenient that the two should coincide!’
‘On the contrary, it is to be expected since he chose me to rule his people.’
‘The truth is that you want all of my father's heirs dead.’
‘Give me a son!’
‘Never! I’d rather take hellebore; I’d rather take silphium; I’d seek out every wise woman the length and breadth of the land to cleanse the infection from my womb.’
‘Shall I carry her back to the harem?’ asked Abishai.
‘Or throw her out in the street?’ asked Joab.
‘No, she's my wife. The world will see how David honours her, no matter the provocation.’
‘You say that my father broke an oath, an oath made all those years ago. But what of your oath to my brother, to protect his house? Don’t my sons – Merab's sons – belong to his house? Wouldn’t he wish you to protect his orphaned nephews?’
‘I’ve kept my oath,’ he replied, his blush showing that my reproof had stung him. ‘Jonathan has a son, Meribaal.’
‘He's dead. Captured by Amorites along with his mother.’
‘No, he's alive. Cared for by his nurse's nephew. I’ve received regular reports from one of your father's old servants. Do you think you can deceive me that easily?’
‘He's lame. Please let him live. He can do you no harm.’
‘And I can do none to him. I made an oath to my brother Jonathan.’
‘My brother; your...’ I lacked the word to complete the charge.
‘But if the Lord required it, I would yield him to the Gibeonites. An oath made in the Lord's name supersedes all others. That's what your father failed to understand when he spared the Amalekite king. Mercy is meaningless when it defies the Lord.’
I walked through the palace, unable to feel the ground beneath my feet; unable to feel my feet; unable to feel my feelings. Sheol wasn’t the only kingdom of the dead: I was dead and I returned to the harem; I was dead and I entered the chamber where Rizpah sat, haggard, alongside Mother; I was dead and I listened to Mother gabbling gaily as she fed the air between her fingers to the children in her mind; I was dead and I fell asleep, waking the next morning to find Rizpah wearing sackcloth, smearing ash on her face. I was angry at her show of mourning. What was her loss compared to mine? She had two sons; I had five. She had seen her sons grow to manhood; Penuel, my eldest, was just eighteen and Adriel, my youngest, not yet ten. But my anger was misplaced. Grief wasn’t a well from which the more she drew, the less there would be for me, but an ocean in which both of us could drown. I clasped her to me and felt her heart thrashing in her chest like a bird in a snare. An ash caught in my eye, mocking my tears.
‘I went to see Ahitophel,’ she said.
‘When?’
‘You were asleep.’
‘You should have woken me.’
‘I didn’t want to wake you. I begged him to allow me to accompany my sons on their journey. He spoke to the king who, to my astonishment, said yes.’
‘Accompany them where? Are they leaving?’
‘For Gibeah.’
‘Why?’
‘Saul's guilt is to be expiated in the heart of his kingdom,’ she said quietly. ‘David wants there to be no doubt.’
Was Saul's daughter to do less than his concubine? I knew that I had to go with her, and with them. I had to derive my courage from my father and brothers; I had to derive my dignity from Merab, when, as the last member – the last able-bodied member – of our house, I bore witness to its destruction. But all I wanted was to seal myself wit
hin a tomb and never set eyes on another human face. If Paltiel himself were summoned to comfort me, I would refuse to see him – unless it were to denounce him as a coward. Why hadn’t he slit the boys’ throats and spared them the shame of their public deaths? Why hadn’t he drowned them in the river and spared them the need to atone for the guilt of a grandfather they had never known?
Yet I was the real coward. When I appealed to Ahitophel for the same permission as Rizpah, there was a part of me that was relieved when he refused, explaining that David was afraid that my presence in the Benjamite capital would provoke insurrection. He warned me that the convoy was to leave for Gibeah within the hour and, in a remark so inapposite that I must have misheard, reminded me of his promise that the boys would spend no more than one night in the gatehouse. He assured me that they had no inkling of their fate, having been told only that they were to return to their grandfather's house. One of them – whom he didn’t name but I knew must be Penuel – had thanked him for restoring their birthright.
‘He would have made a fine soldier,’ he said pensively.
I heard myself shriek and saw myself claw out his eyes. But when my senses cleared, he was sitting at his table, with the same mirthless smile, and I was standing stupefied in front of him.
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