by D. J. Niko
Nicaule was at his side, holding his bow. She was dressed in rumpled white linen with a golden sash tied at the waist. Her glossy black wig, the same one she’d worn during ceremonies over the years, was windblown and slightly crooked. Basemath shot her a somber glance, but there was no comprehension in her mother’s vacant eyes. Nicaule looked dazed, almost pitiful.
“Why do you give my men trouble?” Shoshenq asked.
Basemath answered without regard for her life. “I do not take my orders from heathen kings.”
The pharaoh narrowed his kohl-ringed eyes. “Is that so? Then take an order from your father.”
“My father is dead.”
Shoshenq dismounted and walked toward her. Nicaule followed. He stood so close that Basemath could smell the heavy musk of his perspiration and the garlic in his breath. “Solomon is dead, but your father stands before you.”
A chill traveled through Basemath’s body like an electrical current. Did she really hear the words? She turned to Nicaule. “Mother . . .”
Nicaule lifted her head, exposing the flacid skin connecting her jaw to her throat. “It is true.”
Basemath shook her head. “No. You do not know of what you speak.”
Nicaule stepped closer. “Years ago, before I came to Israel, Shoshenq and I lay together. I was already pregnant when I married Solomon. I bore you with Shoshenq’s seed.”
“Mother, no.” Basemath held up her right palm and pointed to the brown stain. “See this. It is the same birthmark Solomon had. It is the mark of the house of David.”
Shoshenq turned to Nicaule, his eyes probing her for answers.
“She lies,” Nicaule told him. “Solomon never had such a mark.”
Basemath did not know whether to be repulsed by her mother or to pity her. Had Nicaule convinced herself of this illusion to the point of believing it, or was she merely manipulating her once-lover to dramatize their reunion? She knew her words were for naught, but she could not keep silent. “Please, Mother. For the sake of Solomon’s honor . . . for the sake of your soul, speak the truth.”
Nicaule looked away, as she always did when she no longer wished to discuss something.
Shoshenq signaled to one of his officers, who stepped forward leading a horse by the reins. The pharaoh glared at Basemath. His face was tight, unyielding. “You will ride with Nakhti to Tanis. Go now.”
As Nakhti came toward her, Basemath reached inside her halub and with a swift movement removed Ahimaaz’s sickle-sword. She held it to her own throat and felt its tip puncture her skin. Warm blood trickled down and pooled in her jugular notch. “I will not do your bidding. I choose death.”
“Bring forth the prisoner!” Shoshenq’s urgent words boomed across the valley.
With shaking hands, Basemath kept the blade trained on her throat. An invisible hand held her back, delaying her self-execution. She felt her father’s presence.
A moment later, she knew why. A second officer emerged from the cluster of tents, pulling Ana by the elbow.
Basemath gasped. Her daughter’s gray tunic was ripped and stained with blood. Her eyes were as a feral animal’s, afraid and untrusting. The child’s innocence had been sacrificed at the altar of pleasure by the godless brutes who dared call themselves civilized. It sickened her to know Egyptian blood ran through her own veins.
Basemath tightened her grip on the sickle-sword and turned to Nicaule. Even the Lord’s commandment could not stop the wave of hatred that came crashing on the shores of her soul. “Was it worth it, Mother? Did your self-indulgent fantasy merit this wanton slaughter of lambs? Will you sleep soundly in your lover’s bed by the river reeds, knowing what destruction you have brought upon this land?”
You disgust me, she thought but held her tongue out of deference to her father. It would not have penetrated anyway; Nicaule had fallen too deep into a pit of iniquity and incomprehension.
Shoshenq turned to Basemath. “You are called upon to make a choice. If you stay here, alive or dead, your daughter will be executed.” He signaled for Ana to be brought to him. He placed his hands on the child’s shoulders. “But if you go, her life will be spared.”
Basemath’s eyes misted. “What will become of her?”
“She will be taken to Jerusalem this day, where she will live in the court of the lame Judean king . . . your brother.” He stroked Ana’s hair. “You have my word.”
Basemath met Ana’s gaze. Trembling in the hands of the barbarian, the child seemed spent but not defeated. Basemath recognized her own ferocity in Ana’s eyes. Like her, her daughter would weather the trials and be better for them—if only she was given the chance to live.
A vision flashed in Basemath’s mind: Ana had grown and taken Rehoboam’s son, Abijah, to husband. Together they led a mighty resistance movement against Jeroboam’s rule. She wasn’t sure whether it was a message from her father, a revelation from the Lord, or a fool’s hope, but she swore it was real.
Basemath’s fate was etched in stone. All that remained now was to eviscerate the self and burn its remains on the altar of the greater good. Given the choice between her own peace and peace for Israel, she issued the only judgment she could.
She dropped Ahimaaz’s khopesh. “I will go.”
Shoshenq gave a crooked smile. He turned on his heel and walked toward his chariot.
Basemath called to him. “Wait.”
He stopped and looked over his shoulder.
“I need a moment with my daughter.”
“You shall have it,” he said and kept walking.
Basemath approached Ana. The two looked at each other for a long moment. Basemath choked back tears as she took her daughter’s hands. “The time has come to be strong, girl. We no longer live for ourselves. We live for the land of our fathers.”
Ana nodded. Tears pooled in her eyes. She blinked, and they rained down.
“The Lord has chosen life for us. There is reason to all things.” She pulled the ring out of her bosom and slipped the chain off her neck. She handed it to Ana. “This is your destiny. You must guard it to the end. Even if all testimony of the house of David is erased from the earth, let this be the one thing that survives.”
Basemath leaned down and whispered the secret of the ring into the girl’s ear. She stepped back and took one last look at her beautiful Ana. “It is the inheritance of our people. Keep it safe.”
With a piercing bray, the pharaoh’s horses reared. It was time.
Nakhti walked to her. She squeezed Ana’s hand and watched her child collapse into sobs. The Egyptian took Basemath’s elbow, but she snapped free of his grip. She went willingly.
He straddled his horse, and she mounted behind him. A breeze blew her raven locks across her face as she looked over her shoulder at Ana. “If your father lives, tell him I will not forget him.”
Nakhti urged his horse to a trot, and they fell into Shoshenq’s caravan.
Basemath lowered her head and closed her eyes. Memory was a tyrant, haunting her steps, tormenting her. All she had known—the glory of Jerusalem, the spiritual fortress of Yahweh’s chosen king, the impenetrable solidarity of her people—had fallen to ruin. What remained now? Only faith for the wise and despair for fools.
She offered a silent prayer, vowing to keep the lamp of the Hebrews lit, even against the wind.
She looked up, shielding her eyes from the shimmering light of the midday sun. They were riding west toward a hazy horizon. All was silent but for the rhythmic footfall of horses. The air smelled of almond blossoms both sweet and bitter, and she thought of her father.
When the silver thread is broken and the golden bowl shattered, when the bitter almond tree flourishes, when the birds cease to sing and there is no more music, when the doors are shuttered and only fear and madness dwell in the streets, when the strong men’s knees buckle and the maidens’ beauty withers, then remember the words of the wise: remove sorrow from your heart, and cast away evil from your flesh, for the dust shall return to the earth
and the spirit to its maker.
Solomon knew this day would come.
She inhaled deeply, branding the fragrance onto her olfactory memory. This would be what she would remember, the scent of duality: unification and division, joy and sorrow, virtue and depravity. A soft, warm breeze touched her back, urging her toward her destiny.
Author's Note
It seems obvious to state that historical fiction is based largely on facts, people, and events from the past, laced with just enough literary license to make the story more provocative and to explore possibilities by asking “What if?”
Because history, particularly the ancient kind into which I delve, often leaves us with many blanks, the novelist’s insertions—born first of thoughtful research and second of imagination—can illuminate events that were marginally recorded or bring to life characters that were deemed minor by the historians. This is what I hope I have done in The Judgment.
Let me explain. A few years ago, when I was researching for my historical thriller The Riddle of Solomon, I became fascinated with the stories about King Solomon, son of King David and ruler of the united monarchy of Israel and Judah. Everyone, regardless of nationality or faith, has heard something of the legend of Solomon: the king’s untold riches, his wisdom, his building of the first temple in Jerusalem, his affair with the Queen of Sheba, his hundreds of wives, his outsize passion, his ultimate fall from grace. King Solomon has become a cross-cultural symbol for wealth, power, leadership, piety, and insight—all universally desirable qualities.
The interesting thing about Solomon, however, is that most of what we know about his life is written in the Old Testament, in the books of 2 Chronicles and 1 Kings. Aside from a few references in the Kebra Nagast (the Ethiopian book of kings) and in the Qur’an, mainstream theological literature does not reward us with a lot of detail. Worse, archaeology has produced theories but no hard data confirming his existence and the breadth of his empire.
It took a lot of digging in rabbinical literature—the Midrashim—and discussions with rabbis to find answers to my questions: Who was this king? How did he build an empire of epic proportions in a time when such wealth was notably absent in the Holy Land? What was his relationship to Egypt and other neighboring nations? Why did he marry an Egyptian woman (and, subsequently, other foreigners)? Why did he falter in his faith? Was it that lapse that led to the spectacular collapse of the united monarchy after Solomon died in 930 BCE?
In the course of that research, I learned that Solomon likely wrote (his authorship is disputed) the biblical books Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Solomon. I had not read these texts before, but absorbing them in the context of my research for The Judgment proved to be particularly rewarding. Reading one’s writing often opens a window to that individual’s soul, and that is certainly the case here. The sage aphorisms in Proverbs, the philosophical questions pondered in Ecclesiastes, and the explicitly erotic passages of Song of Solomon paint a picture of a multifaceted, perhaps even troubled, man.
It was a privilege to tell his story. I chose not to use Solomon’s point of view, opting instead to use the voices of three people who knew very different dimensions of him: Zadok, the high priest of Israel in the tenth century BCE and Solomon’s spiritual adviser; Nicaule Tashere, the pharaoh’s daughter and Solomon’s first wife; and Basemath, one of the king’s daughters with Nicaule. All of these individuals are historical figures, though information on their lives is scant.
From the Bible, we know Solomon married “a pharaoh’s daughter”; no name for her, or for the pharaoh, is given. Through other research, I learned her name was Nicaule and found contradictory theories about who her father was. The assumption that she was the daughter of Psusennes II was my own, based strictly on the timelines of the two kings’ reigns.
The Bible also tells us foreign women, and in particular the Egyptian wife he loved with such gusto, caused Solomon to be permissive toward the worship of other gods. This was the main reason (there were others, such as the taxation of his people) for the legendary king’s downfall in his old age and the eventual division of the monarchy by his disgruntled lieutenant, Jeroboam, who eventually became king of Israel.
Jeroboam’s betrayal is well recorded, as is the massive invasion of Canaan land by Psusennes’ successor, Shoshenq I. The fictional part is Shoshenq’s love affair with Nicaule and the conspiracy among the two of them and Jeroboam to bring down Solomon’s empire.
A word here about Basemath: since history grants no insight to her life, I took some liberties with her character. With her unwavering piety and personal strength, Basemath became a symbol for faith, sacrifice, and the future of Israel.
Toward the end of the story, Basemath recalls the final meeting with her father. To meditate and repent, Solomon had journeyed alone to the Judean Wilderness. After forty days, he called for his beloved daughter. In what probably is the saddest, and yet most hopeful, scene of the book, Solomon tells Basemath that enemies are at Jerusalem’s gates and he fears the temple of the Lord will be destroyed. In planning for such an eventuality, he gives Basemath his royal ring and divulges a secret.
Though this ring is documented in the mystical texts, the secret is a fiction inspired by messianic prophecy, which states the Jewish messiah will trace his lineage to the house of David via the Solomonic bloodline. In the book, Solomon’s secret is his provision for the temple to be rebuilt by one of his successors in the way God had intended. It symbolizes his atonement for faltering in the eyes of God and of his people. (A modern treatment of this mystery is found in my 2013 thriller, The Riddle of Solomon. The Judgment is a sort of prequel to that book.)
As a final note, I’d like to point out that the descriptions of ancient Jerusalem, Megiddo, and Tanis are authentic. To educate myself on those long-ago worlds, I read countless texts and studied the work of biblical archaeologists and Egyptologists. I believe details such as architecture, diet, wardrobe, hygiene, and, of course, language make all the difference in reader experience.
I hope you’ve enjoyed this journey as much as I’ve enjoyed bringing it to you. If you have, please consider reviewing The Judgment or recommending it to a friend.
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