Tomb : A Novel of Martha (9781451689136)

by Landsem, Stephanie

  But the pain in his chest, the weakness in his limbs, drove away the memory. What had happened to him? He’d been in the orchard. Then men, carrying him to the house. Simon, wringing his hands. Zakai’s worried face.

  Later—had it been days or just moments?—Martha and Mary talking about Jesus. They had sent for him. He tried to sit up, but his head was as heavy as an iron ball. They didn’t understand. It was too dangerous. If Jesus came, the Pharisees of Bethany would get in line to report him to the Sanhedrin. Jesus knew that as well as any of them.

  Jesus had told him he would understand when the time came, and he did.

  The hour is coming when the dead will hear the voice of the son of God. That meant him. The dead.

  He had failed at all of it. He had been so sure that Simon was the answer to his prayers, and now he was out of time. He would die, and Martha would be left without a husband, Penina and Zakai with no protection. And he wouldn’t be with Jesus to herald the coming of the new Eden.

  Sinister shadows—he knew them from his childhood dreams—waited in the corners of the room. Patient. Vigilant. Resolute. Like sentries, they were ready to take him away.

  He didn’t have long.

  Again, he tried to move, but his body was weighted with something warm and soft. He shifted to see Penina asleep beside him, her head pillowed on his shoulder. Her arm encircled him, as if holding him in this world. She wouldn’t let the shadows come for him. Not yet. He lifted his hand to touch her silky hair.

  Penina stirred and opened her sleep-clouded eyes. Her lids were red and swollen, and a fold in his tunic had pressed a deep crease in her cheek. She was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen.

  He’d been such a fool.

  He opened his mouth to speak, but his throat was like an arid desert, his lips dry and cracked.

  Penina slipped from the bed. Don’t leave. But she was back, holding a cup of water to his lips. A few drops trickled down his throat; most ran down his chin and into his beard.

  She wiped his beard with her sleeve, touched her fingers to a small jar, and smoothed sweet-smelling balm over his cracked lips.

  “Penina,” he whispered. If he could, he’d marry her today. Keep her beside him, like this, for the rest of his life—however long that would be. She looked away from his searching eyes and made the signs for Martha and Mary.

  He lifted his heavy hand and captured hers, the effort almost too much for him. “No.” His voice was not much more than a whisper. “You.”

  She eyed him warily.

  “I’ve been an idiot, Nina,” he croaked.

  Her hands curled over his. So small and yet stronger than they looked. Then she nodded.

  A laugh tickled his tortured chest. How could she make him smile even now? He pulled in a breath, scented with her, the smell of rainwater and lavender.

  Her lips trembled, and she blinked back tears.

  “I should have . . .” He waited for more air. “. . . married you.” He would still be leaving her, still be dying, but they would have had some time together.

  She let out a breath and nodded again, one tear spilling over.

  He smoothed the tear away with his thumb. His strength was ebbing. The darkness leaned in. Not yet. The Lord had given him Penina to comfort him in his last moments. And Jesus had given him strength, had told him that he would hear his voice and call him out of darkness on the last day. “God is good, Penina.”

  Penina’s mouth turned down, and she shook her head.

  He pulled her back onto his chest. “He is. Penina. He is.”

  She burrowed closer to him, resting her head under his chin, wrapping her arms around him.

  He wouldn’t give in to the shadows that beckoned. Not yet. This was all he wanted. To watch the last rays of the sun slant through the window and hold Penina in his arms.

  If this was dying, then he would die content.

  • • •

  WHEN HE AWOKE, the light pierced his eyes like arrows. The taste of iron filled his mouth, and pain lashed him to the bed.

  Penina still sprawled beside him, and now Martha sat on a low stool, her head propped against the wall, her eyes closed. She looked terrible. Her hair was dull and tangled around her face, her tunic stained and wrinkled as though she’d worn it for weeks.

  “He’s awake!” Zakai’s voice roused Martha and Penina like a trumpet blast.

  Martha swayed forward. She laid her cool hand on his cheek, set her lips to his forehead. “Stay with me, brother,” she whispered. “Jesus will come.”

  The shadows pulled at him. They were getting stronger. He fumbled for her hand, and her fingers found his. “Martha . . .” He didn’t have much time. The end beckoned like cool water—a deep pool free from pain.

  “Jesus . . . he is the Messiah.”

  She smoothed his brow as if he were again a child with a bad dream. “Yes, Lazarus, he’s going to heal you. Just like the lepers and the blind man. He knows you need him.” But her voice was thick with the worry that always laid so heavy on her. She didn’t believe in Jesus. Not yet.

  If he could ease her worry. If he could lift the burden of her secret from her before he left this world . . . if he could only free her.

  At least he’d seen the truth about Simon before it was too late. Thank the Almighty he’d stopped the betrothal. Simon would have made Martha’s life miserable. Still, what would she do when he was gone? Who would take care of her and Penina? Who would teach Zakai to be a man? Who would put up with Safta?

  The shadows pulled. A wave of pain clamped over his chest like an iron band. He was drowning. He wrenched his eyes open to see Mary, her face wet with tears. Martha’s, full of worry. Safta’s, reflecting his own suffering. “Penina?” He clutched at the air.

  “She’s here.” Mary moved aside. “Right here.” Penina slipped her hand in his. Zakai buried his head in Lazarus’s side, shaking with sobs.

  He pulled in a shallow breath, and a sharp pain followed. Martha held a cup for him, but as he put his lips to it, he smelled the bitterness of the poppy juice and turned his face away.

  No more. It was time to go.

  He held out his hand to his grandmother. She kissed it, laying her wrinkled cheek on his palm. “Go, my boy. Go where you need to go,” she whispered. Her eyes were filled with peace. Safta understood. If only Martha and Penina did.

  The room grew dim. “Marmar,” he breathed. I’ll take your secret to my grave. His childhood vow would soon be fulfilled.

  “I’m here.” Her face appeared close to his. She squeezed his hand, and her voice was tinged with fear.

  “Don’t be afraid.” Not for me. Not for yourself.

  Mary wept, her keening coming from the depths of her soul. “Lazarus, stay with us. He’ll be here soon.”

  Mary. She didn’t understand, but she would. Someday. Don’t despair, Mary.

  He reached out to Penina with the last of his strength, pulling her close. His labored breath seemed to ease as he felt her heart beat against his. He was so tired. So cold.

  Martha whispered in his ear, begging him. “Stay with me. My brother, my sweet boy. Please.”

  His vision darkened. The shadows would wait no longer.

  Penina’s cheek pressed on his face, her tears on his lips. Zakai called his name, his little-boy voice breaking. Lazarus reached out. One hand found Martha’s, the other Mary’s. They held tight, but not tightly enough.

  He couldn’t stay. Not for Martha or Mary, not even for Penina or Zakai. He must give them all up.

  Zakai. Give him a father.

  Mary. Comfort her.

  Martha. Free her.

  Penina. The scent of lavender . . . Give her faith.

  The light was gone now. The sounds of their voices, the touch of their hands . . . gone. There was nothing holding him back.

  Lazarus, do you love me? Jesus’ words whispered to him.

  Yes, Lord, I love you. And he sank into the depths of infinite dark.

  Chap
ter Forty-Three

  Her children rise up and praise her; her husband, too, extols her.

  —Proverbs 31:28

  DUSK DARKENED THE sky to the color of old ashes.

  Martha sat in the corner of the courtyard, her hair loose and uncombed, her tunic gray with the dust of the tombs. Mary lay crumpled in a heap beside her. The third day of mourning was ending, the third day without Lazarus.

  The courtyard, the meadow, every home in the village, was filled with mourners. Pharisees who had known Abba, merchants from Jerusalem, friends from Jericho and Emmaus. All to mourn for her brother, who had just begun to live. The mourning of shivah would continue until seven days had passed, and then, thankfully, the visitors would go home.

  Martha pushed herself to her feet and walked on legs as stiff and aching as an old woman’s. She felt nothing. She was a breath of air, as insubstantial as the mist that moved down from the hills into the valley, scattering at the whisper of wind.

  For three days, she’d felt Lazarus’s presence. In his clothes still hanging on the rosemary bush outside. His cup by the fire, next to the stool he used. The tools he’d left propped in the corner. She’d felt him, lingering. Perhaps his spirit had been waiting for Jesus as well, wondering why his friend hadn’t come. Now she didn’t feel him on the breeze or hear his voice whisper on the wind. Her brother was gone.

  Lazarus had believed in Jesus. Now Lazarus was dead. Mary had believed in him. Now her heart was as broken as Martha’s. Isa had believed in him, and he had been wrong. Now Isa must go, before anyone saw him. She must send him away before someone in the village realized who he was.

  She’d sent word with Sarah, warning him to stay away from the mourning, not to come to the burial. And she’d stopped going to the orchard, where she knew he’d waited for her every night. It was too late for them, just as it was too late for Lazarus. Tonight she would send Isa away forever.

  But first she would see to her family . . . what was left of it.

  She slipped inside the house, to the room where Lazarus had breathed his last. Penina lay in a ball of misery on the bed, her hand clutching the bedclothes as if Lazarus’s hand were still in hers, her eyes open but unseeing. She hadn’t moved since Lazarus had taken his last breath.

  That moment—an eternity ago—when he had left them forever.

  As though dead herself, Martha had sat beside Lazarus as his hands had grown cold and his face lost its color. Mary had keened, Zakai had sobbed into the bed, Penina had held on to his body as if she wished to follow him into the afterlife.

  Finally, Martha had kissed his face and closed his unseeing eyes.

  With Mary, she had washed Lazarus with clean water and anointed him with myrrh and sandalwood. They’d had none of their own, but both Elishiva and Chana had provided from their meager stores. They dressed him in his white tunic and his tallit. With her scissors—the ones she’d used to cut his hair since he was a baby—Martha snipped the blue tassels from his tallit, as the law required. Mary wrapped his face in the burial veil while Martha tied his hands and feet with cloth strips and wrapped his body loosely in a linen winding sheet.

  Word spread in the village.

  Josiah and Chana arrived with the children. Villagers came by twos and threes—some silent, some singing the plaintive songs of mourning. Elishiva and her quiet son. Devorah and Silva with their husbands. Simcha and his brother, who sat beside Zakai. Simon and Jael. They had been right; Jesus hadn’t saved her brother. Jael was probably biting her tongue not to crow about it.

  Martha brought each friend and villager to stand before Lazarus’s body. They lamented and tore their tunics at the neck. The women put dust in their hair. The men sprinkled ashes on their clothing, praying, “Blessed art Thou, Lord our God, the True Judge.” Martha touched his hands and ran her fingers over his face again and again, remembering him as a baby, a toddler, a young man.

  Her baby brother. So peaceful. How could he look so peaceful?

  As the sun rose high in the sky, they proceeded to the tomb. The low beat of a drum joined with the plaintive call of flutes. Songs of grief rose to the skies like the mournful cries of lost lambs.

  Josiah and Simcha carried Lazarus on a cedar plank. Mary and Martha walked beside them, Zakai following behind with Sarah and Adina. A few of the men carried Safta in a litter, her old legs too weak to make the climb. Martha had pleaded and begged, but Penina refused to see Lazarus laid to rest.

  At the tomb, three men pushed aside the slab of rock and laid Lazarus on the narrow stone bench inside. Martha and Mary knelt beside his body while the rest of the village gathered outside and mourned.

  Mary’s keening filled the enclosed space like a flood of despair, but Martha’s tears had run dry. She kissed her brother’s shrouded face one last time. Good-bye, my sweet boy. Since the day Mama had put him in her arms and with her dying breath asked her to take care of him, he had been like her own child. Now he was gone.

  Was it her fault? Had her sin poisoned him, as it had destroyed Abba? The thought turned like a knife in her heart.

  When the last rays of the sun filtered through the doorway, Josiah entered, lifted Mary to her feet, and led them out. The men rolled the stone over the mouth of the tomb, and they left him, their prayers of lamentation echoing over the hills.

  Now Martha stood numb and lifeless in the room where Lazarus had died, and Penina looked as if she was next for the tomb. Safta shuffled into the room with a steaming bowl of soup. “Eat something, my girl.”

  Martha’s stomach roiled at the warm scent of garlic, and she shook her head. How could she eat? How could she eat when she would never again see her brother’s smile? “Give it to Penina.”

  Penina turned her face away.

  “Lazarus wants you to keep up your strength, both of you,” Safta said.

  Something had happened to her grandmother with Lazarus’s death. It was as if she didn’t understand. She spoke of him as if he were still alive, as though he had only journeyed to Jerusalem for a few days. More than once, Martha had found Safta looking down the road toward the Jordan as if she was still waiting for Jesus to arrive.

  Was Safta losing her senses? Didn’t she understand it was too late? Perhaps she, too, was not long for this world. Martha rubbed a hand over her eyes, surprised to find them wet with tears again. They couldn’t lose Safta, too. How could Zakai lose another person he loved?

  Penina signed a word and pointed to herself.

  What was Penina talking about? Martha’s voice rose. “You can’t die. That’s not what Lazarus would have wanted.” Martha reached to touch her friend, but Penina shrank back and closed her eyes. She made another sign and the one for Zakai.

  Alarm rose in Martha and with it, anger at her friend. “Penina. I will not take Zakai.” Because Penina could not give up. She must be strong so that Martha could be strong. They were all hurting, and they must face it together. “Please,” she begged, “don’t leave us. I can’t do this without you.”

  Penina turned her face to the wall and didn’t answer.

  Was it possible, what Penina wanted? To die of despair?

  A sob built in her. How could Penina desert her like this? “Grandmother,” she choked out, and leaned on Safta. “What am I to do?”

  “Give her time,” Safta murmured. Her hand, surprisingly strong, closed over Martha’s and tugged her out of the house and through the courtyard. She brought her to the gate and looked down the road into the deepening evening gloom. “He will come. And you must be strong.”

  Martha’s heart ached for her grandmother. The loss of her daughter in Jerusalem, then Sirach, and now Lazarus had broken Safta’s aged mind. Martha turned back to the courtyard and led her shuffling grandmother to the warmth of the fire. Mary was there, her mantle pulled over her head. She hadn’t spoken to anyone since the burial, not even Josiah. She’d been so sure of Jesus, even to the last moments of Lazarus’s life. Now she’d lost both her brother and her Messiah.

  Mar
tha put more wood on the fire, her heart sinking as Simon and Jael came through the gate. Could she not have one day of peace?

  Jael swept toward her. “The souls of the righteous will find mercy, my dear. We must depend on that in your brother’s case.” Her voice was a whisper, as was proper in a house of mourning, but her words were as harsh as sand scraping against a wound.

  Martha’s ire rose to choke her. What did Jael know of mercy? If she had any mercy, she would leave them alone in their grief.

  Simon cleared his throat. “I pray that your brother will rise again on the last day, Martha.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “But now we must talk of our wedding.” He kept his voice low enough so no one in the courtyard could hear, but Safta’s head bobbed up.

  “Now is not the time for that,” Safta said.

  Jael raised her brows. “It is the time. She has no father, no brother. She must be married immediately. Who do you think is going to take care of you all?”

  Martha straightened and took a long breath. Jael was right. Lazarus would have wanted that. And the betrothal had been his last act. She could do no less than honor his wish—to see her married to Simon quickly.

  Simon bowed stiffly. “I made the announcement at the city gate today.” His mouth twisted. “It is better for everyone if we marry quickly, is it not?”

  Martha understood his unsaid threat. Quickly . . . before she had a chance to dishonor him again. “You are right, of course, Simon.” She wouldn’t shame him. She would abide by the agreement she—and Lazarus—had made. She would be the perfect wife—never dishonoring him, and never welcoming Jesus into Bethany again.

  Chapter Forty-Four

  MARTHA MURMURED AGREEMENT as Simon and Jael whispered details of the wedding feast that would take place when the thirty days of mourning were done. Although the law required a year’s mourning for a parent and only thirty days for a brother, Martha knew she’d mourn Lazarus for the rest of her life. Finally she breathed a sigh of relief as darkness and a chill wind sent Simon and Jael back to their home.