Crown in the Stars

by Kacy Barnett-Gramckow

  She watched as the men climbed the slope, surrounding Adoniyram and his men, “leading” them and their horses. Adoniyram was as smoothly handsome as ever, yet to Shoshannah, he lacked her Kaleb’s warmth and strength.

  Kaleb strode over to Shoshannah, kissed her, then possessively wrapped an arm around her shoulders as a silent warning. Three of Shoshannah’s tawny, wild-haired young sons, Khaziy’el, Eythan, and Zebul, joined them now, mistrustful of Adoniyram. Nine-year-old Eythan, in particular, glowered.

  Shoshannah nudged him. “Behave!”

  “Your son,” Kal muttered.

  Shoshannah gave him a look to match Eythan’s.

  Adoniyram noticed this interplay, eyebrows lifted. Shoshannah realized that he didn’t seem surprised to find her with Kaleb, or Demamah with Tiyrac.

  Smiling politely, he addressed them in the same dreadful chopped, garbled syllables that had frightened her so badly years ago. Even now, her stomach churned to hear him. It was hopeless; she still couldn’t understand him.

  Adoniyram felt a sinking despair. They couldn’t understand him. And he would never understand them—his own family. No uncles, no grandparents, no close cousins would ever perceive his words, much less behave as true kindred toward him. I’m alone.

  He subdued the longing to weep. He could never tell Shoshannah and Kaleb that he forgave their deception. That Shoshannah was still lovely and precious to him—though she was Kaleb’s. He couldn’t tell Demamah that he was glad to see her safe and obviously loved by her husband, Tiryac, who was guarding her against him as warily as Kaleb was guarding Shoshannah. He also couldn’t discuss their children and trade a father’s stories with them.

  Worse, he could not question the Ancient Ones, which he wanted to do more than anything else in the world. Tell me I will live to be as old as you …

  Noakh—the Noakh, and his Naomi—approached Adoniyram now. The young man stared, amazed that anyone could be so ancient, silver haired, yet dark eyed. They were living legends, warm, agreeable, and surely the most significant people he’d ever seen. Yet he could ask them nothing. He felt so frustrated and helpless. Thoughts stabbed him cold and hard: You are not the Promised One. And compared to these Ancient Ones, you are nothing but a man who will die with nothing. A mere man.

  The Ancient Ones embraced him, welcoming him with words beyond his comprehension. His journey, and his hopes, were futile. Already, he longed to leave.

  After visiting for only a day and a half—unable to communicate with anyone—Adoniyram rode off with his men. Shoshannah watched him leave. He didn’t seem like a great lord now. Only a bereaved man. She pitied him. Until she remembered the morning he had deliberately allowed his mother to die in the temple. He still wasn’t sorry, Shoshannah was certain.

  Demamah approached Shoshannah now, thoughtful. “I think he wanted to see all this for himself. He remembers your stories. And your warning of our foreshortened lives.”

  Shoshannah looked at her cousin, her dear friend. “And now what do you think? Did I lie to you or to him?”

  “No,” Demamah said slowly. “I knew you were telling the truth. And I’m sure Adoniyram knows it too—he looked so unhappy.” Sighing, she added, “After all this time, I can say that I’m glad to be with you now. And with my Tiyrac. Sometimes I miss my parents, but there was no mercy with those in the Great City. Or their Shemesh.”

  Pondering these things, Shoshannah approached her parents, Kaleb, Shem, I’ma-Annah, and the Ancient Ones, who were also watching Adoniyram leave. “Demamah and I think Adoniyram wanted to speak with you, our Ancient Ones,” she told them quietly. “He wanted you to tell him that he would live to be as old as you.”

  The Ancient Ones looked at her, then away, as if unwilling to discuss this hurtful subject. Her father was staring hard into the distance, beyond Adoniyram. Her mother put a hand to her mouth, clearly on the verge of tears. But Kal nodded in firm agreement.

  Summoning her courage, Shoshannah continued, “I want to tell you… before the Most High… however long I live, or don’t live… whatever comes, I’ve been happy.”

  “And so have I.” Kaleb wrapped his arms around her, but the others didn’t respond. Couldn’t respond. Shoshannah prayed they would remember.

  Remind them, O Most High.

  “Were you able to understand the Ancient Ones at all, my lord?” asked the priest, Ebed, as he walked down the tower steps with Adoniyram in the late autumn sunlight.

  “Oh, I understood them perfectly,” Adoniyram answered, sarcastic. “They told me that I’ll be immortal and loved forever.”

  “Forgive me. Obviously your journey wasn’t what you hoped it would be.” Pausing now, the priest said gently, “But you’ve been missed. Your people and your lady-wife have come here almost daily to offer prayers and gifts to Shemesh for your safe return. It would have pleased you to see it.”

  “You’re telling me to be satisfied with what I have?”

  “Others long to be you,” Ebed murmured. “You have everything they desire. And now you’ve had this adventure… visiting the Ancient Ones.” Kindly, the priest said, “Perhaps you and your men shouldn’t discourage the people with your own disappointments. Let them believe that you had a journey they can only imagine—it should be your duty as a king to give them such dreams.”

  Dispirited, Adoniyram smiled at him. “I’ll leave the dreams and storytelling to you; I’d rather forget this whole ‘adventure.’ Now, forgive me, but I’m going to go see my wife and children.”

  “And practice contentment?”

  “If I find it.” Adoniyram doubted he would.

  You are not the Promised One. You are nothing but a man who will die with nothing. A mere man. Bitter knowledge for a king.

  In the eighteenth year after the chaotic division of the earth, Ra-Anan led his tribe from a warm coastal beach up into a sultry, lush forest, teeming with colors, with water. With life.

  “This is the place,” Awkawn announced firmly, daring the others to disagree. “We can make a clearing and build a new temple nearby—a tower to the sun.”

  Everyone began to argue eagerly over campsites and food.

  Slowly, followed by his intrepid, dusky nine-year-old son, Nebat, Ra-Anan lifted a spear and moved into the lush, sultry foliage, staring, amazed… disturbed.

  “Father,” Nebat asked, hushed and respectful as Ra-Anan required, “are we going hunting? Is something wrong?”

  What is wrong? Ra-Anan asked himself, frowning. A brilliantly colored bird flew before them fearlessly from one rich-flowered tree to another, its elegant feathers tempting Ra-Anan to catch it for Zeva’ah. The bird was as dazzling as the flowers, the landscape, the river. It dawned on Ra-Anan then what was wrong. I’ma-Annah’s voice whispered to him in fragments, unseen.

  The earth was not always as you see it today, Ra-Anan-child. Before the Great Destruction, the trees were enormous—beautiful and fruitful. And the flowers—they were so sweet that we sometimes ate them! But even more wonderful, little one, were the animals in the world of that time. They did not fear people as predators and prey …

  He was seeing these exquisite things with his own eyes… glimpses of the creatures and the earth she had known. He was going to hear her voice forever in this lush place. He could see the hand of her unacknowledged Most High.

  He stared about in silence, haunted.

  Epilogue

  THEY WALKED TOGETHER, mother and daughter, through a cold, autumn-misted field near their homes. The daughter had the silver hair of old age, while the mother—still youthful in her middle years—supported her child.

  At last, Shoshannah set a frail hand on Keren’s arm. “I’ma… please, I am tired.”

  Keren paused, knowing her daughter wasn’t talking about this walk through the misty field. She was talking about life itself. She was tired. She was asking Keren’s acceptance. More than that, she was asking Keren to be strong and at peace with herself and the Most High.

  “I miss my
Kaleb,” Shoshannah sighed. Smiling wistfully, she said, “I’ve had a good life. A good life. I’ve been happy. But now I’m tired…”

  Aching, Keren held her daughter, kissed her, then walked her home.

  Inside their hushed, lamplit lodge, Annah studied her dear in-laws, who were sleeping, exhausted. Noakh’s spirits had begun to fail in the years after Kaleb’s and Shoshannah’s deaths. Naomi, too, lacked the vitality that had been so much a part of her being for as long as Annah had known her. Grief had struck them hard. But it was more than that; like Shoshannah, they were tired of this life.

  But I’m not ready to lose you, Annah thought, dismayed. It was terrible enough to lose Shoshannah.

  As she sat there, neglected sewing in her lap, struggling with this new torment, Annah’s beloved Shem sat down with her, taking her in his arms, kissing her cheek, despondent, whispering, “Beloved, I must send for my brothers.”

  His brothers and their wives were visiting nearby tribes, drawn together by their mutual languages. It wouldn’t be long before they arrived. For the first time ever, Annah dreaded seeing them.

  Weeping, Annah watched as her tearful sister-in-law Ghinnah knelt and placed a small, ancient, elaborately painted box in the grave beside their Noakh. Within the box were the mysterious sun stones that Ghinnah had given Noakh while they were living in the ancient ship during the Great Flood. It was best, they had all agreed, that the sun stones be buried with the ancient man, in a place known only to them.

  The stones were an enigma, a wonder that might be used in worship against the Most High. The Ancient Noakh’s grave, too, might become a place of unholy worship. It was best kept a secret.

  Shem, Annah, Yepheth, Ghinnah, Khawm, and Tirtsah covered the grave together, mute in their grief. And in their memories.

  I would have died as a young woman if you had not lived and loved the Most High, Annah told the ancient patriarch silently. And He was merciful for the sake of your love …

  Finished, they hurried back to the lodge to console their I’ma-Naomi, who was fading, overwhelmed by grief at being separated from her beloved Noakh.

  In the flickering lamplight, Shem gathered and perused the writings, the histories of all. The passing of ages—of precious lives—were griefs that seared like endless burns. Nimr-Rada’s story, for example, was too painful to record beyond the minimal facts. And even if he wrote the truth, Shem knew that other tribes, enemy tribes, would sneer and deride his words. He meant nothing to them now; only a few still followed the Most High. Mere handfuls among many. How merciful of You, O Most High, to allow these faithless rebels to live.

  “What will we do with these?” Annah asked, sitting beside him now, touching one of the leather rolls with a small, work-worn hand. How he loved that hand. Soothed, he kissed her fingertips and looked into her dark eyes, seeing the girl he had first loved in a marvelous world long since vanished.

  “We take them to someone who will listen to Him.”

  “Look at that,” Keren muttered to Annah, almost stopping her horse. Her pale eyes glittered with rage as she gazed upon their destination, a walled river city in the fertile northern plains.

  Annah was already looking at the object of Keren’s wrath, a huge brick mountain—a replica of the tower in the former Great City, now called Babel, the place of confusion. This city was merely an echo of the first. Nothing had changed for the children of her children here—sons of Arpakshad and Aram. “This makes me want to tear out my hair,” Annah said darkly. “The Most High must truly love us—being so patient with that.”

  Keren sighed heavily, aggrieved. Annah and Shem had invited her and Zekaryah to accompany them here for a needed respite from the mountains, from mourning their children. Instead, Annah feared this place would sharpen their sorrow.

  Even so, they covered their heads, dismounted, and entered the gates, then the marketplace, which offered gold, fabrics, honey, wine, and luxuries. Many of the residents wore delicate crescents and stars of gold—tributes to their god of the moon and other “rulers of the heavens.” Obviously Nimr-Rada and Sharah, in all their vile deified forms, ruled this place. Annah looked away from these disgusting ornaments as Shem and Zekaryah inquired directions, repeating the names of Arpakshad and all his descendants whom they knew of, ending with, “Terakh?”

  Some of the merchants looked at them strangely, but one gabbled at a rough-robed companion, who grudgingly led them through the dusty streets to a remarkably large house. Pounding on the wooden gate, he marched off, shaking his dark head.

  A servant opened the door, flashed them a well-trained smile, and bowed them into a brick-paved courtyard, motioning at two other servants to guard the horses.

  This can’t be the place, Annah thought, looking upward, amazed by the two-storied skylit courtyard and the wooden stairs and railing that led to—and around—beautifully timbered and arcaded upper rooms.

  A man appeared at the central upper railing now, middle-aged, neither tall nor short but with fine dark eyes and handsomely clad in light woolen robes. Seeing his visitors, he hurried down, his sandals clattering on the wooden stairs as he smiled and greeted them kindly. “Abram,” he said, in cordial, half-familiar accents.

  Shem questioned, “Of Terakh?”

  Abram nodded his head gently, sadly, indicating that Terakh was no more.

  Annah drooped with disappointment. But Shem persisted, tapping himself. “Shem. Shem, son of Noakh.”

  “No-akh? Shem?” Abram stared, shocked, retaliating with, “Arpakshad? Arawm? Elawm?” He was gripping Shem’s arm now, his warm brown eyes growing wider and wider as Shem nodded agreement with each name of his own sons.

  Annah thought the man, Abram, might faint. But then he laughed and embraced Shem, delighted, raising his voice, calling to the rooms above. “Sarai!”

  A very beautiful woman appeared at the railings above, clad in flowing linen robes; her luminous skin, dark hair, and eyes were as perfect as Annah could imagine. She seemed somewhat irritated, until Abram beckoned her and called to the servants authoritatively, sending them in all directions to welcome his guests.

  As the jubilant Abram rushed to make them comfortable, Shem glanced at Annah, Zekaryah, and Keren, his eyes shining with joy, lifting Annah’s spirits. He had no need to speak; they had found the man they sought. Beside Annah, Keren wept.

  That night, while his wife and guests slept, Abram gripped the wooden railing of the courtyard balcony, exultant, staring up at the stars. He felt a need to see them. A need to be quiet and to wait for the Presence he had felt in the past. All his possessions, his wealth—they were nothing to the treasure he had been granted today: an answer.

  He finally had an answer. There was a plan. He could leave this idolatrous place. Abram smiled, contented. A breath of wind touched his face, and he felt as if he had been granted more blessings than there were stars in the skies.

  And he felt the Presence with him, whispering, I am the Lord …

  Glossary

  Abdiy (Ab-dee) Servicable.

  Abram (Ab-rawm) High father. Contraction of Abiyram (ab-ee-rawm), father of height.

  Achlai (Akh-lah-ee) Wishful.

  Adah (Aw-daw) Ornament.

  Adoniyram (Ad-o-nee-rawm) Lord of height.

  Ahyit (Ah-yit) A hawk.

  Annah (Awn-naw) A plea: “I beseech thee” or “Oh now!”

  Aram (Arawm) Highland.

  Ashkenaz (Ash-ken-az) Meaning unknown.

  Atarah (At-aw-raw) Crown.

  Awkawn (Aw-kawn) To twist; tortuous.

  Bariyach (Baw-ree-akh) A fugitive; i.e. the serpent (as fleeing).

  Becay (Bes-ah-ee) Domineering.

  Bezeq (Beh-zek) Lightning.

  Chaciydah (Khas-ee-daw) Kind (maternal) bird; i.e. a stork.

  Chayeh (Khaw-yeh) Vigorous; lively.

  Chuwriy (Khoo-ree) Linen worker.

  Dawkar (Daw-kar) To stab; [by analogy] to starve.

  Dayag (Dah-yawg) Fisherman.

  Demamah
(Dem-aw-maw) Quiet.

  Dibriy (Dib-ree) Wordy.

  Ebed (Eh-bed) Servant.

  Echuwd (Ay-khood) United.

  Elam (Ay-lawm) Hidden.

  Eliy’ezer (El-ee-eh’zer) God of help.

  Erek (Eh-rek) Length.

  Eriy (Ay-ree) Watchful.

  Eythan (Ay-thawn) Permanent; specifically, a chieftain, hard, mighty, rough.

  Ezriy (Ez-ree) Helpful.

  Ghez-ar (Ghez-ar) Soothsayer.

  Ghid’ohn (Ghid-ohn) Feller; i.e. warrior.

  Ghinnah (Ghin-naw) Garden.

  Ghiylath (Ghee-lath) Joy; rejoicing.

  Gibbawr (Gib-bawr) Valiant.

  Hadarah (Had-aw-raw) Decoration: beauty, honor.

  I’ma (Ame-aw) Derived from “Im” or “Em” and the syllable “Ma.” Mother; bond of the family.

  Kaleb (Kaw-labe) Forcible.

  Keren (Keh-ren) A ray of light.

  Khawrawsh (Khaw-rawsh) Craftsman.

  Khawm (Khawm) Heat; i.e. a tropical climate.

  Khaziy’el (Khaz-ee-ale) Seen of God.

  Khiysh (Kheesh) Make haste.

  Khuldah (Khool-daw) A weasel (from its gliding motion).

  Kuwsh (Koosh) Possible meanings: to scatter; confusion, chaos.

  Laheh’beth (Lah-eh-beth) To gleam; a flame, or the point of a weapon.

  Lawkham (Law-kham) To feed on or (figuratively) consume.

  Ma’adannah (Mah-ad-an-aw) Pleasure; dainty; delight. Also, a bond or influence.

  Ma’khole (Ma’khole) Dancing.

  Meherah (Me-hay-raw) Hurry.

  Meleah (Mel-ay-aw) Fulfilled; i.e. abundance (of produce or fruit).

  Meshek (Meh-shek) Sowing; also a possession; precious.

  Metiyl (Met-eel) Bar; in the sense of “hammering out” or “as forged.”

  Mithqah (Mith-kaw) Sweetness.

  Naomi (No-om-ee) Pleasant.

  Nashak (Naw-shak) To strike with a sting (as a serpent); to bite.

  Nebat (Neb-awt) Regard; to regard with pleasure.