by Mesu Andrews
I felt a presence draw near and was certain it was Daniel, but curiosity forced me to peer behind me. “Go. Please. I’ll find water for your morning—”
“I’m glad you’re coming, but you don’t need to fear us.” His voice was kind, massaging my battered heart.
I sniffed back more emotion while stiffening my spine. “Thank you.”
“Will you look at me?”
Squeezing my eyes shut, I wiped the last drop of moisture away and turned to face my four masters. Daniel offered his hand. “What we’ve endured here strips away any pretense. Ashpenaz has assigned you to serve us, but you’ll also be our friend. Friends help friends.”
I stared at his hand as if it were a viper. He was young, but he was a man. If I gave him my hand, would he take all of me? I looked up, searching his face for trickery or deceit but found only clarity in those warm brown eyes. Nothing hidden, nothing held back.
Placing my hand in his, I felt his warmth seep into my fingers, my palm. All the way up my arm. I closed my eyes, letting the safety of his presence wrap me.
Since I’d shared the last of my loaf of bread with the women, perhaps serving these descendants of David could keep me on the path of Yahweh’s blessing when we left Jerusalem.
6
Some of the Israelites from the royal family…were to be trained for three years, and after that they were to enter the king’s service.
—DANIEL 1:3, 5
We lingered in the captive camp, waiting for the mercenary armies to sate their thirst for violence and fill their pockets with gold. I tended to my princes’ laundry, their hair, their nails, all the while searching every captive woman’s face for Ima’s features.
She wasn’t here.
After my chores were finished, the princes included me in mindless games to pass the time. Still I searched for her.
“Who are you looking for?” Daniel asked on our fifth day in camp, a stone poised in his hand. The other three princes waited eagerly to hear my answer.
“My ima.” I looked down at three smooth stones in my hands and tossed one into a basket twenty paces away.
A Babylonian messenger on horseback rode past us, kicking up rocks and dust. I choked and waved away the cloud. We paused our game as his horse skidded to a halt outside Prince Nebuchadnezzar’s white tent. The rider leapt off the horse and ran inside. A wrenching roar followed that sent a shivering dread through my bones.
Within moments, Crown Prince Nebuchadnezzar emerged with Ashpenaz and another man wearing the wide gold collar of a eunuch who looked even fiercer than the one I knew. The warrior eunuch demanded Nebuchadnezzar’s horse be brought immediately, and Ashpenaz marched resolutely toward the guardian of the princes’ camp.
Daniel exchanged a conspiratorial glance with Hananiah, and they wandered closer to a fig tree and hid underneath to eavesdrop. I followed my prince, taking our game basket so we could pretend to be picking figs. We arrived just as Ashpenaz explained the messenger’s news.
“King Nabopolassar is dead. Our crown prince is now King Nebuchadnezzar, but he must ride for Babylon immediately to ensure a smooth ascension to the throne.” The guard slammed his fist over his heart. Ashpenaz nodded his approval. “Arioch and I will accompany our new king with a thousand soldiers and return to Babylon in haste. King Nebuchadnezzar trusts you, Nebuzaradan, to lead the Judean seedlings home unblemished within forty days—or we’ll send out troops to find you. Is this understood?”
“Why am I not among the thousand returning to Babylon with Nebuchadnezzar?” Though Daniel and I saw only his back, anger singed the man’s tone.
“He trusts you—and only you—to deliver the best of Judah’s young minds with caution and care. Our new king will build an empire, Nebuzaradan, not simply destroy nations.”
Ashpenaz hurried away, and Nebuzaradan whirled to find us picking ripe figs behind him. “What did you hear?”
I fell to my knees immediately, but Daniel faced his fury. “Please accept our humble concern at the death of King Nabopolassar, my lord. We’ll collect our simple belongings and be ready to march at your command.” He reached for my arm, pulling me to my feet as we scurried away from the silent commander.
* * *
My four princes were the first in a line of captives that stretched farther than I could see. I counted our traveling days with small pebbles placed in a basket as we traversed mountains and valleys, rocks and plains, deserts and rivers. Our feet bore the burden. The servants bartered goose fat like gold, and I was grateful my princes had secreted small palace valuables in their pockets for trade. Three sets of earrings, five rings, and three bracelets saved my life and theirs with the goose fat they purchased.
Each night I mixed a small ceramic pot of goose fat with the olive oil we’d brought from Jerusalem and then massaged it into their feet to stave off blisters. Each morning I smeared more of the mixture on their lips to prepare for our day’s march in the unrelenting sun. I wrapped their heads with light-colored cloth, moistening the turbans with water to keep them cool. All this and more I did to save our lives, yes, but also because I wished for them to become my friends. The only family I now had.
The realization that we were nearing Babylon came when I first glimpsed the sparkling waters of the Euphrates.
“Look, Hananiah!” Azariah hopped up and down like a desert hare. “Will they let us bathe in it?”
Hananiah exchanged a wary look with Daniel. The two older boys then turned to me for an answer. I shrugged. How should I know?
Azariah, the smallest but boldest twin, looked at me with wide, expectant eyes. I didn’t want to disappoint him, but the thought terrified me. I’d kept my princes healthy and unmarked for the whole journey. What if they cut their feet? Were caught in the river’s current?
Thankfully, the decision was made for me. Our military escort was in too great a hurry to loll in the river. Instead, they loaded us twelve at a time into quffas, circular woven-reed vessels, flat bottomed and coated with pitch, the side walls bowing outward. The river was full of them, crossing over the mighty Euphrates with their human cargo and the livestock that had been driven with us for food. As those of us who crossed were driven south, Daniel spoke quietly behind his hand. “It would be easier to line up the quffas and walk across them to the other side of the river.”
I covered my mouth to hide a grin. The tedious process of crossing the Euphrates had exasperated our captors. One soldier had already been killed for whipping a young prince. What an odd people, the Babylonians, to kill one of their own to protect a prisoner. A child, no less.
For the next three days on our final approach to Babylon, my friends and I noticed everything about the country that would become our home for the next seventy years. Everywhere we looked, something new winked back, and my princes’ curiosity demanded answers. Hananiah, who was curious enough to ask a rock questions, approached a soldier whose missing front teeth made pronouncing the s sound rather comical. The poor soldier had no peace as Hananiah asked about everything from plowing and planting to the barrel-shaped reed houses lining the riverbanks.
Nearing the end of the third day, I’d used up nearly all the olive oil I brought from Jerusalem. “I’ve seen no olive trees, my lord. How can you live without oil?”
The soldier glared at me and turned his attention to Hananiah. “In Babylon we grow sesame seeds and use their oil. You’ll find it equally useful.” His tone said he was finished with our questions.
Farther south, the waters split into tributaries, and we followed the eastern branch, marching into drier, dusty terrain. On the final morning of travel, I counted forty pebbles in my basket and sighed with relief, thankful Ashpenaz wouldn’t be sending troops to find us. I woke before dawn and mixed goose fat with the last of the olive oil. Before mixing, I rubbed a drop from our last vial between my fingers and inhaled the pungent aroma of home. G
oodbye, Judah. I emptied the rest into the pot of goose fat and squished the mixture between my fingers, memorizing the sensation and wondering if sesame oil would feel different.
Too soon, the captive train was moving again, equal measures of hope and dread pulling our nerves taut in the stillness. Every day we had marched farther from the life we knew and closer to a life we must build. Today we would discover if it was better or worse.
By midday, the vague outline of a walled city appeared on the horizon, looming ahead like a vision in the heat waves. Exhaustion battled with apprehension, the eerie silence lingering over the captives in our caravan. Even my curious young princes remained speechless as the vision became reality.
The dirt roads on which we had traveled became packed and smooth. Farmland was marked in squares by perfectly dug canals that both nourished the soil and protected the crops from animals. City walls stood higher than the cedar trees we passed on our journey. Once inside the first wall, we saw more crops surrounded by canals. Barley, no doubt. Only a few houses dotted the sprawling fields before we reached a second, even higher wall that protected what I supposed was the city of Babylon itself. Soaring above everything else was a giant mountain of bricks, its peak rising to the heavens, higher than any structure I’d imagined men could make.
Daniel slipped his hand into mine, and only then did I realize I was trembling. “It’s the Tower of Babel,” he said. “There was talk King Nabopolassar had been rebuilding it. We’ll see if Nebuchadnezzar continues—or if Yahweh stops him as He stopped the nations so long ago.”
I couldn’t speak. Could barely breathe. The ingenuity of our captors was breathtaking.
The soldiers on horseback led the captives onto a bricked road. Inside the first wall of the city, we approached what appeared to be a huge tunnel. Above it stretched a platform for guards, running the whole width of the tunnel, which was broader than a house. The city’s second wall extended from both sides of the tunnel, and I wondered if the wall was that thick all the way around the city.
As we marched closer to the tunnel, a trumpet sounded from one of the mammoth parapets above us, the sound sending a shiver that worked down my spine. The clopping of hooves echoed off the walls, drowning out the pounding of my heart. I saw, deep inside the tunnel, gargantuan cedar-paneled double doors—each door the height of fifteen stacked camels. Every step took us closer and closer until finally we were swallowed into the belly of Babylon. The cedar doors swung open, each door hung with seven iron hinges, each hinge the size of a grown man.
The horsemen emerged into the light. I released my breath and slowed my steps, wishing I could postpone the first glimpse of the world that would swallow my past.
Daniel squeezed my hand, infusing me with his courage. “I’m sure what waits for us inside Babylon can’t compare to what we’ve endured outside it.”
I offered a half-hearted smile, reminding myself he had been raised a prince. When he was taken prisoner, it was to enter a three-year education and then a government position.
But what lay ahead for me?
7
Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves.”
—GENESIS 11:4
Inside the sanctuary of Babylon, hundreds of Babylonians poured from their homes to line both sides of the wide city street, shouting and jeering with upraised fists. Having learned bits of the Akkadian language in the forty-plus days of our captivity, I understood the denigration aimed at us and feared for those of us who weren’t royalty.
For the hundredth time, I wondered about the three women I’d met my first day in camp. I hadn’t seen them since being assigned to care for my boys. Had they survived the journey? Would they rather die than live as I’d seen them?
Resolving to ignore the angry citizens, I looked beyond them to the city I would call home. It was like stepping from earth to the moon. Everything glowed with subtle glory, yet a film of dust dulled its brilliance. Construction and progress infiltrated every detail of the city around us. Workers hauled wheeled carts full of bricks everywhere I looked, and I thought of Ima’s stories of Egypt and the brickmakers under Pharaoh’s torturous rule. Who made all these bricks that were placed in the streets below this wide, elevated avenue on which we marched?
Lovely villas lined the streets below us, where new canals were being dug to parallel nearly every one. Walls and buildings, all made of bricks, received a facade of tile in vibrant colors. Outside two-storied homes, at various levels of terraced gardens, men shoveled dirt from large wagons, creating a paradise for each family with plants I not only couldn’t name but also had never seen.
A sudden bump into Hananiah’s back told me fascination had overtaken my senses. The procession halted in a columned outer courtyard of what must be the palace. The engraved marble columns bore images of unimaginable creatures—half man, half beast.
Hananiah looked back at me while I continued gawking. “It’s a good thing Daniel has you to protect him.” He winked at his friend, motioning to our joined hands, and I ducked my head, pulling away from Daniel’s grasp.
“Immigrants of Jerusalem!” The familiar voice with its broken Hebrew saved me from further humiliation. Ashpenaz, Nebuchadnezzar’s chief eunuch, stood atop the tall, wide staircase, commanding the attention of both captive and captor. In addition to his wide gold neckband, he now wore a purple sash over his left shoulder, cinched at his narrow waist with a lion-headed broach. “Your journey is over,” he said, “and your true service to the empire now begins.”
He nodded to the men on horseback, who had led us from Jerusalem with such care and respect. They dismounted, shouting orders and moving quickly into the crowd of captives, swords drawn. A wicked gleam appeared in the lisping soldier’s eyes. Daniel stepped in front of me, but the soldier shoved him aside. “You, girl. You’re going out the south gate.” He gripped my arm as if it were a twig he would break without remorse.
“Abigail!” Daniel reached for me, but a line of soldiers separated all the maids from their princes and ushered Judah’s young royalty up the palace stairs. I saw Daniel searching the crowded courtyard with the same panic I felt. Our eyes met for only a moment before the lisping soldier shoved me through a wooden gate and the sting of a whip kissed my back.
I’d reached the end of my protective custody.
A contingent of soldiers drove the worthless captives through the streets amid a hateful throng. I don’t remember the route. I know only the pelting of rotten fruit, the humiliation of spittle in my hair, and the blinding sun that assaulted us on our way to the quay. My body ached—but not like my heart. Would I ever see my princes again? Would they remember me?
“Wait here for your assignments.” We captives formed a line on the street along a canal. The smell of rotting fish convulsed my empty stomach, but I swallowed again and again, refusing to show my weakness. At the front of the line a short, plump eunuch wrote on a wax tablet and seemed to be assigning the captives destinations and placing them in quffas. I recognized none of the soldiers surrounding me and had only nightmarish inklings of what might be required of a nine-year-old slave girl.
The fat eunuch wore a purple sash like Ashpenaz. Could I somehow gain his favor? When the woman in front of me was placed in a quffa, I fell at the man’s feet, my hands outstretched. “If it pleases my lord, I would serve wholeheartedly under your protection.”
I heard nothing except his labored breathing and counted seven breaths before the handle of his whip slipped under my chin. Prodding me to stand, he removed the whip’s handle and inspected me with his small black eyes. “You will serve wholeheartedly or you will die, pretty one.”
Every instinct screamed to pull my sleeveless robe tighter around my neck, but I stood without flinching. The fat eunuch smiled, reminding me of a jackal I saw in the desert on our j
ourney. “You will serve well at the Esagila, the temple of Marduk. For now, you can empty the priests’ waste pots and scrub their floors. When you get a little older, you’re pretty enough to become a priestess.”
I dared not appear pleased, though emptying waste pots sounded better than other assignments I’d heard given out. The older girl ahead of me would gut and section animals in a butcher’s shop. The three women before her were sent to the limestone quarries in the Zagros Mountains.
“Thank you, my lord,” I said in halting Aramaic. “I am in your debt.”
He leaned close and lifted his brows as he spoke. “Indeed. And I’ll collect that debt from your earnings as a priestess.” His breath smelled of garlic and rancid fish.
He pushed me toward another guard who seemed happy to escape the quay. Tall and slender, my new guardian was younger than other soldiers I’d seen and not quite as fierce. His hand was gentle on my arm as he led me back toward the wide bricked street that seemed to split the city in two.
“This is called the Processional Way,” he volunteered. “The king, visiting dignitaries, or captives enter the city on this street.” I only nodded, hoping my silence would win his favor. But as we neared what Daniel had called the Tower of Babel, I couldn’t hold back. “What is that?” I pointed at the seven-level structure that nearly touched the clouds.
“That is the Etemenanki. I’ve heard your people call it the Tower of Babel, and your myths say a god confused the world’s languages when our ancestors built it.” He looked down at me with a condescending smirk. “Have you heard such nonsense?”
“It isn’t nonsense.” My response clouded his good humor, so I quickly added, “I mean, we believe the story is true, my lord, as surely as you believe the myths about your gods.” I smiled as I said it, hoping he would attribute my forthrightness to childishness.