The Chronicles of the Kings Collection

by Lynn Austin

  Gasping and choking, he climbed out of the silo again, leaving the door ajar, and ran into the building next to it where the olive oil was stored. The earthenware jars stood stacked on their sides like cordwood, a taller pile of empty ones on his right, the full ones on his left. He took a torch handle from its socket by the door and used it to smash the full jars, spilling oil in a slippery stream around his feet. Then he tied his handkerchief around the handle and soaked it in oil.

  It seemed to take forever to kindle a flame with his shaking hands, but the spark from his flint finally ignited the torch. He ran to the doorway and touched it to the tongue of oil flowing behind him. He could feel the heat on his face as the storehouse erupted in flames with a loud whoosh.

  Joshua ran back to the silo and took aim at the open door halfway up the side. He would only get one shot at it, so he would have to make it count. He drew his arm back and threw the torch through the door into the bin, then he turned to run. A second later the force of the deafening blast lifted Joshua into the air, then smashed him into the pavement. He was already unconscious when the hail of bricks and grain showered down on top of him.

  Twenty yards away inside the booth, Hadad was knocked to the floor by the explosion. Dinah tumbled down on top of him. It was a moment before he realized from the screams and shouts outside the door that this was the diversion he had been waiting for. He scrambled to his feet, pulling Dinah with him.

  “Come on. We’ve got to run!” He had to force the door open.

  Outside, the Temple courtyards were in chaos. Most of the people were lying on the ground, stunned, as bricks rained from the sky. Hadad stepped over a guard who lay moaning beside the booth and ran toward the burning storehouse.

  “Hold your breath!” he shouted to Dinah. “There’s a gate leading out of the city on the other side!” He pushed her ahead of him into the blinding cloud of smoke.

  Hadad’s ears still rang from the blast, so he wasn’t sure if he really heard footsteps behind him or not. He glanced over his shoulder, his eyes stinging from the smoke, and saw a Temple guard quickly gaining on them.

  “Run, Dinah! Keep running and don’t stop!” he told her. Then he turned to face their pursuer. His own short dagger was no match for the guard’s double-edged sword, but Hadad took a defensive stance, praying that he could buy Dinah a few extra minutes of time to escape.

  As the guard charged, Hadad feinted to the left, then ducked right, anticipating the thrust of his sword. He heard the blade whiz past his head. The guard stumbled forward with his own momentum but quickly regained his footing to turn on him again. Hadad was ready for him. Quick on his feet, he dodged the sword a second time, infuriating his adversary. The third swing grazed Hadad’s shoulder as he dove to the ground and rolled away from him. But he could see the soldier coming toward him again and he realized he would never be able to scramble to his feet in time. Hadad knew he was about to die.

  Suddenly a darker shadow emerged from the dense smoke behind the advancing guard’s back. The man never heard Dinah as she ran up behind him and smashed the brick into his skull. His sword clattered to the ground, and he toppled to the pavement beside it a moment later.

  Hadad slumped back, weak with relief. “I thought I told you to run,” he said, grinning.

  Dinah smiled in return. “I couldn’t leave you, Hadad. I don’t know the way to Moab.”

  “What on earth was that?” Amariah cried as the explosion rocked the booth.

  “It was Joshua, distracting the guards.” There was no doubt in Miriam’s mind. “Come on, we’ve got to get out of here!”

  “That was one powerful distraction!” he murmured.

  “Take off your robe and leave it here.”

  “Why?”

  “Are you going to question everything I say, or are you going to live through this? Take it off!”

  Miriam opened the door and peered out. The courtyard was littered with bodies, most of them moaning and bleeding, some of them dead.

  Joshua. Was he among them? Had he survived the blast he’d created?

  People ran in all directions, screaming in panic as a dense cloud of smoke billowed toward Miriam from the priests’ storehouses. Most of the guards were running to extinguish the flames before the fire could spread to the Temple. She grabbed the nobleman’s hand and took off toward the southern Temple gate as Joshua had instructed. She didn’t waste time looking back to see if anyone was following them. She could lose their pursuers in the maze of alleyways near her home. Within moments they were running down the hill into the city, leaving the Temple Mount far behind.

  “Wait . . . I can’t run anymore,” the man panted. He was dragging on Miriam’s arm, slowing her down.

  “Don’t stop now, we’re almost there,” she told him.

  “Almost where?”

  “Listen, my mother might be home, so just go along with whatever I say, all right? Do you have any money with you?”

  “Money? Yes, I—”

  “Get ready to part with some of it.” Miriam drew a deep breath, bracing herself, then opened the door to her house.

  Her mother sat at the table alone, with a skin of wine in front of her. Miriam could tell she was drunk. “What are you doing back here?” her mother asked. “And who is this?”

  “He’s my lover.” Miriam hadn’t thought to ask the man his name. She slipped her arm around his waist as she had seen her mother do with her lovers countless times. The man jumped, as if she had surprised him, then a moment later he gingerly draped his arm around Miriam’s shoulder. Her mother grinned.

  “My, my, you’re a busy girl, aren’t you? What happened to your soldier-boy?”

  “Mama, we need to use the house for a couple of hours, all right?”

  “I thought you had a room at the inn for that?”

  “The innkeeper wants too much of my pay. Wouldn’t you rather have the profit?”

  “Who is this lover of yours? He looks familiar. . . .”

  “Do you want the money or not, Mama?”

  She hauled herself to her feet, swaying, and held out her hand. “Sure, sure. Let’s have it, then.”

  Miriam had to nudge him. “Pay her.”

  The man fumbled in his silver pouch and laid two huge pieces in her mother’s hand. She closed her fist around them. “Hang on to him, honey. He’s a generous one.”

  Miriam pushed her mother out of the door and closed it behind her. Then she turned back to the man and took a really good look at him for the first time. He was as tall as Joshua but about three or four years younger, with curly reddish-brown hair and wide brown eyes. She could tell by his posture and bearing, and by the expensive linen tunic he wore, that he came from a very wealthy family. But as he gazed around the one-room house he had a dazed look about him, as if he had never imagined that people lived like this. And he seemed genuinely stunned by the transaction that had just taken place.

  “That’s the second time I bought you in the last hour,” he said.

  “And you paid way too much for me both times. Who are you, anyway?”

  “Didn’t Joshua tell you?”

  “There wasn’t time.”

  He looked a little embarrassed. “I’m Prince Amariah.”

  “Prince? You mean King Manasseh’s brother?”

  “Yes.”

  “Oh no!” Miriam remembered how she had been ordering him around and she dropped to her knees to bow to him. “I’m sorry, my lord. I’m so sorry. . . .”

  “Don’t do that, Miriam, stand up. I’m counting on you to smuggle me out of here. What do we do next?”

  She struggled to gather her scattered wits. “We’re supposed to take the road north to the Samaritan border.”

  “How will I get past the guards at the city gates?”

  Joshua’s instructions seemed ludicrous to Miriam now that she knew who Amariah was. She was almost afraid to tell him. “My lord . . . Master Joshua said you must shave off your beard.”

  “Why?”
>
  “I . . . I’m supposed to dress you in my clothes . . . and smuggle you out as a woman.”

  Amariah stared at her, then burst into laughter. “It took me a year to grow this beard!”

  “I’m sorry, my lord. It wasn’t my idea.”

  “Oh well, never mind. Where’s the razor?”

  “All we have is a flint blade.”

  “Ouch! Do you have any soap?”

  “Just the kind we wash clothes with.”

  “Great. How about a mirror?” She shook her head. “Well, if I don’t bleed to death, I should be ready to go in a few minutes.” He sat down at the table while Miriam brought the blade, soap and a basin of water. Then she dropped to her knees in front of him again.

  “My lord, I need to ask you something. Please don’t be angry with me. . . .”

  “What’s wrong, Miriam?”

  “It’s Master Joshua. I’m so worried about him, my lord. The explosion was terrible . . . so many people were injured . . .”

  “I know,” he said. “I’ve been wondering about him, as well.”

  “May I please go back and look for him? You can shave while I’m gone and change your clothes. I promise to hurry, and—”

  “Yes, go. I’ll wait here for you.”

  “Thank you, my lord.”

  Miriam never stopped running until she reached the top of the Temple Mount. Then she wove through the tangle of groaning bodies, turning over the ones that were lying facedown, searching for Joshua. The sight of so much blood made her stomach heave. This was taking too long. She had to find him. She had to get back to Prince Amariah. God in heaven, why didn’t Joshua tell her he was the prince?

  Miriam remembered that the blast had come from near the storehouses and decided to search there, first. She ran through Asherah’s courtyard, passing the toppled booths, and saw what was left of the grain silo. The roof and the upper two-thirds of it were gone, leaving only a low circular wall topped by a jagged ring of stones, like broken teeth. Beyond it, a relay team of Temple guards worked feverishly, bailing water from the brazen laver, trying to extinguish the burning row of storehouses. The ground was littered with fallen bricks and grain.

  Then, beneath the rubble, Miriam saw a man’s body sprawled across the pavement. His arms and legs were limp and twisted, like a straw man’s. He wore a military tunic and had black tousled hair, just like Joshua’s.

  Oh, God, please! I won’t ask you for anything else as long as I live if you, please, please, just let this be him! Let him be all right!

  She knelt beside the body and turned it over with shaking hands. He was limp and heavy, a dead weight.

  Joshua.

  Miriam recognized him, even though the right side of his face was destroyed, leaving nothing but blood and pulp where he had smashed it against the pavement. She couldn’t hear him breathing, nor could she see his chest moving beneath the tattered leather tunic. Fighting tears, she held her fingers to his throat and felt for his heartbeat.

  His life pulsed faintly.

  “Oh, God, thank you, thank you!” she wept. In that moment Miriam knew that Jerusha’s God was with both of them.

  Joshua moaned and tried to open his eyes. For some reason, he could only see out of one of them. His blurred vision was surrounded by stinging sparkles of light. A dark shadow bent over him. He tried to focus on it, and when he did, the pain in his head was so excruciating that he retched. The shadowy figure cradled his head, murmuring something he couldn’t hear. A loud roaring noise rang in Joshua’s ears, making all the sounds around him muffled, as if he were lying at the bottom of the sea. He didn’t know where he was or what had happened to him. His body felt both numb and pain-wracked at the same time, and his limbs seemed to vibrate as if a gigantic hand had slapped him. The last thing he could remember was trying to light a torch with his flint, but the reason he had been lighting it was a mystery to him.

  Someone pushed him into a sitting position. The shock of the sudden movement and the soaring pain he felt as he raised his head made him vomit again. He moaned and closed his eye, wanting nothing more than to lie down and sleep until the agony ended. But his tormentor hauled him to his feet, forcing him to stand on deadened legs, as weak as willow branches. He leaned against the shadow, nearly knocking both of them to the ground.

  “No . . . I can’t walk. . . .” he tried to say, but his swollen mouth wouldn’t work properly and his words came out in a jumble of sounds that even he couldn’t understand. The ground started to move—or else he started to move, he couldn’t tell which. He felt as if he was on board a ship in a wildly tossing sea. He wanted to stop, but on and on he plunged, with shapes and shadows he couldn’t recognize, whirling past him, sickeningly.

  Now the deck sloped sharply downhill. After a few steps, Joshua lost his balance and tumbled to the ground, pulling the shadow with him. He seemed to roll forever and his lifeless limbs and throbbing head came alive with pain. The agony didn’t stop when he struck a wall at the bottom and stopped rolling. He lay facedown on the ground unable to move, tasting dirt and blood in his mouth. Oh, God, end this, he prayed.

  But the torment didn’t end. Instead, his adversary rolled him onto his back and lifted him beneath his armpits, dragging him along the cobblestones. He lacked the strength to raise his head, and it bounced helplessly from side to side as he was pulled along.

  “Stop . . .” he groaned. “Stop . . .” He was going to be sick again. But the noise he uttered didn’t sound like words. It didn’t even sound like his voice.

  Finally the movement stopped and he was rolled onto his side and shoved into a depression in the street. It was dark inside and cool. The shadow hovered over him for a moment, then vanished.

  Joshua couldn’t move. The pain in his head was trying to crush him, extinguish him. He wondered where his torch was and what had happened to his flint. He had to light the torch. He remembered that it was important, but he couldn’t recall why. Maybe if he went back to sleep he would remember. Or maybe he would wake up in paradise and the pain would be gone. Joshua closed his eyes, welcoming unconsciousness.

  When Miriam burst into the house, out of breath, it took her a moment to recognize the tall woman standing beside the hearth. Prince Amariah’s disguise was perfect. He wore her mother’s old, tattered robe with her own blue-and-white shawl over his head. A lock of his curly brown hair fell across his forehead. He had swaddled one end of the scarf around the lower part of his face to help hide all the nicks and scrapes on his chin.

  “I found Master Joshua!” Miriam blurted. “But he’s hurt, and I can’t carry him by myself.”

  “Where is he?”

  “I hid him in a drainage ditch at the bottom of the Temple Mount—not far from here.”

  “Let’s go.”

  “Wait, my lord . . . I think I know of a way we can all get out of the city. If you give me some money, I can buy a shroud and rent a funeral cart. We can wrap Master Joshua up and carry him out of the city as if he were dead.”

  “That’s an excellent idea, Miriam. Joshua told me you were good at this.”

  “He did?”

  “Here’s my silver pouch. But hurry, before the guards spread the word that I’m missing.”

  Miriam didn’t bother to haggle with the cloth merchant over the price of a shroud or bargain with the owner of the donkey and hearse. She simply paid the first price they named and hurried on her way. Joshua lay in the ditch where she had hidden him, unconscious.

  Prince Amariah paled when he saw him. “Are you certain he’s still alive?”

  “I made him walk part of the way. And he was moaning.”

  “He needs a physician, Miriam.”

  “I know, but there’s no time. Help me take his uniform off.”

  “It’s fortunate he was wearing it, or his whole body would look like his face does.” Amariah removed the flint blade from under his robe and cut the leather guard’s tunic and leggings off Joshua’s body. Then he lifted him up so Miriam could
wind the shroud around him.

  “Can you weep, my lord?” she asked the prince.

  “Can I what?”

  “You should be weeping when we get to the gate, like women in mourning do.”

  Amariah smiled. “You think of everything, don’t you? Very well, I shall do my best to weep.”

  She let Amariah carry the weight of Joshua’s upper body, while she lifted his legs and feet. Together, they loaded him on the cart and headed toward the graveyard across the valley near the Mount of Olives. But first they would have to pass the guards at the Water Gate. When Miriam pictured Joshua’s ravaged face, genuine tears sprang to her eyes. She wept softly. The noise Amariah made behind her sounded fairly convincing.

  The guards stopped them at the gate. “Who’s inside the shroud?” one of them asked.

  Miriam wiped her tears. “Our brother, my lord. He died in the accident at the Temple.”

  “What was his name?”

  “Nathan, son of Maki.”

  “Let’s see him.”

  “He’s dead, my lord. Have you no respect for the dead?”

  “I need to look at his face.”

  Miriam turned Joshua’s head to the left, praying he wouldn’t moan or move, and parted the shroud to reveal the mangled right side of his face.

  “I’m sorry,” the guard said in a hushed voice. “You may go.”

  She covered his face again and hurried down the ramp out of Jerusalem.

  23

  “Please . . . I need to rest,” Dinah said. “I’m sorry.” She collapsed on the grass alongside the road. The steady downhill descent for the past hour had made her knees shaky. She saw the concern in Hadad’s eyes as he knelt beside her.

  “When did you eat last?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. . . . Yesterday, I guess.”

  “I need to find you some food. And another pair of shoes. I don’t think yours were made for walking very far.”