Deborah Calling
Page 1
Dedication
For Fiona with love.
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Dedication
Part One: The Punishment Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Part Two: The Slingshot Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Part Three: The Homecoming Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Part Four: The Long Game Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Part Five: The Trial Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Part Six: The Killing Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Part Seven: The Enchantment Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Also by Avraham Azrieli
Copyright
About the Publisher
Part One
The Punishment
Chapter 1
Deborah lay among the rows of sleeping men under the thatched roof of the pavilion. Every time she dozed off, one of the slaves would grunt, snore, or break wind, jolting her awake again. Her blistered hands and feet throbbed under the bandages, and her freshly shorn scalp itched against the rough straw mat, which did little to soften the hard earth. She had acclimated to the stench of the tannery during her first day of work, but the men’s body odors grew fouler in the still air of the night. Would she also reek like that once she had succeeded in transforming into a man? The thought made her smile in the dark.
Eventually, her exhaustion won over, and she fell asleep.
In her dream, Deborah rode an eagle through a flawless blue sky. The clear air caressed her face and filled her long hair, which fluttered behind her like an orange cape. She held on, her freckled arms as white as the feathers on the eagle’s neck. The wind whistled under the vast wings, which swayed gently. The eagle’s back was as soft as a pillow, yet firm underneath, supporting her weight with ease. She felt free and happy. She was safe.
A harsh bump jolted her. Deborah clutched the feathers while the eagle flapped its wings rapidly to regain altitude. They hit another bump, harder this time, and then dropped, pulled downward by an invisible force. The blue sky was gone, replaced by thick clouds. The rushing air no longer whistled, but became a hoarse whisper.
“Stay quiet, or I’ll kill you.”
Another bump from behind made the eagle, clouds, and wind disappear altogether. She was back on the ground among the slaves, lying on her side in a fetal position while someone clung to her from behind like a spoon. A heavy hand pressed down on her shorn scalp, the palm as rough as untreated cowhide. An arm circled her chest, pressing hard.
Deborah tried to speak, but couldn’t.
“You’re a pretty one,” a man whispered.
She strained to get free from his grip.
He threw a leg over, pinning her down.
She groaned.
“Hush, girl.” His lips pressed to her ear, exhaling rancid breath.
She forced the words out of her mouth. “I’m a boy!”
“I know what you are.”
She twisted her body to roll away.
He held her in a tight vise, making it hard to breathe, and his hand snaked down between her legs.
A scream crawled up her throat, but she held it back, fearing exposure and humiliation.
He grabbed her crotch and sniggered. “Where is it, boy?”
Deborah turned her head and faced him nose to nose. The faint glow of the torch from the far end of the pavilion illuminated a familiar face: One Eye, the Philistine slave who had tried to expose her earlier that day, when her menacing husband, Seesya, had raided the tannery, searching for her. Only the intervention of Petro, the slave in charge of their workgroup, had saved her from capture and certain death.
One Eye locked his lips onto hers and stuck his tongue into her mouth.
Deborah convulsed with disgust and bit down on his tongue.
His head jerked back, and he wailed.
Taking advantage of his momentary distress, she butted his nose with the side of her head. He cried out again, rolled off her, and punched the side of her abdomen once, twice, and a third time. She gasped for air, paralyzed with pain. One Eye got on top of her, locked her arms down with his knees, and struck her head with a clenched fist.
Awakened by the commotion, the slaves around them sat up to see what was happening.
One Eye landed another fist, and another.
None of the slaves interfered.
Her vision fogged up, darkness creeping over her.
The blows stopped abruptly, and One Eye fell over to the side. Petro’s face appeared in the fog over her. The group leader, who had introduced her to the tannery work that morning, said something, but she couldn’t comprehend his words.
One Eye lurched to his feet and punched Petro.
Deborah crawled away while more slaves hurried over to watch the fight. She reached one of the stone pillars that supported the roof of the pavilion and pulled herself up to a sitting position, her back against the pillar.
The crowd laughed and jeered as the fight migrated out of the pavilion toward the rows of soaking tubs, which were filled with a mix of river water, urine, and feces. Someone brought over a torch, and the slaves circled Petro and One Eye, egging them on.
Taking deep breaths, Deborah began to recover. She wiped her exposed head with the slack bottom of her sleeveless shirt. For a moment, she longed for her lush hair and its comforting softness.
The chanting died down.
Leaning on the stone pillar with her bandaged hands, Deborah rose to her feet shakily and tried to see what was happening.
The crowd hooted.
She stumbled forward, pain flaring up in her bandaged feet, and pushed through the men.
One Eye had somehow forced Petro down to his knees, facing away, bent over, his right arm twisted behind his back. One Eye used his weight as a lever to bend Petro’s arm further. It was obvious he was trying to break it, and the pain must have been awful, but Petro didn’t utter a sound. He pressed his free hand to the ground in front of him as an anchor. One Eye shouted a string of curse words while pushing forward with great effort. Petro put his head in, chin to the chest, and straightened his legs abruptly, rolling forward. One Eye fell on top of him. They became a tangled web of arms, legs, and jittery hands hitting, scratching, and clawing.
The crowd cheered, the circle shifting left and right to give the two men room to tumble this way and that. At one point, Petro managed to hold on to One Eye from behind in a manner not much different from how Deborah had been held only a short time earlier. One Eye tried to wriggle away, but Petro had him in a headlock, blocking his airways. One Eye tried to wrench off Petro’s hold, but couldn’t. He was suffocating.
The crowd shouted and clapped as the fight seemed to reach its climax.
In a fit of desperation, One Eye stood up, his legs carrying the combined weight of both men. He stumbled backward, his foot caught on the lip of a tub, and the two men fell in.
No cowhides were soaking in that tub
at the moment, but it had been filled up in preparation for the next day. The nasty brew of human waste did wonders for softening animal skins, but for the two submerged men it must have been horrific. The spectators roared with laughter when One Eye’s head popped up, his face smeared with feces. He wiped his face, spitting and cursing as he tried to stand up. Petro emerged a moment later, leaped onto One Eye’s back, and the fight was on again. Whereas all the male slaves crowded around the tub, none of the women came out of their pavilion, which stood at the downstream end of the tannery.
The two men in the swirling tub water punched and kicked each other, but their blows were mostly off target as they repeatedly lost their footing and plunged underwater. Splashes of water and human waste sent the spectators jumping back with cheerful howls. Glancing at the gate, Deborah expected the guards to rush inside and impose order, but the gate remained closed, and there was no sign of the guards.
As the vigor of their assaults declined, One Eye managed to land a hard fist on Petro’s forehead. The group leader clutched his head, tumbled back, and sank yet again into the grimy water. Deborah expected One Eye to jump in and finish off his opponent, but he waded to the side and grasped the lip of the tub. The slaves booed while he attempted to climb out of the tub.
Petro emerged from the dark liquid, wiped his face, and saw what was happening. He hopped onto One Eye, who held on to the lip of the tub for another moment, before his fingers slipped off. The two men fell back, sunk in briefly, and reappeared with Petro on top, pushing One Eye’s head underwater.
The slaves chanted, “Petro! Petro! Petro!”
The group leader’s wet face was taut with resolve as he held his struggling opponent underwater. Only One Eye’s feet were visible, kicking frantically.
“Petro! Petro! Petro!”
Suddenly, the slaves’ cheers fizzled out.
Voices from the back whispered, “Master is coming!”
A hush fell over the tannery, broken only by the splashing of One Eye’s feet.
Deborah turned to look.
Kassite approached from the direction of his house, which stood on stilts near the riverbank upstream. A night robe covered his lanky figure, and his bushy white hair stood out in the darkness.
The crowd of slaves parted, letting him through, bowing their heads.
His leather boots pressed into the wet sand with uneven squishy sounds, produced by his limping.
Petro looked up from the tub. One Eye’s bare feet thrashed, raising a ring of brown foam.
The slaves watched in rapt silence, gazes alternating between Kassite and the tub.
With a flick of his wrist, Kassite made his wish clear.
Petro lifted One Eye out of the water and dragged him to the edge of the tub. Several slaves pulled One Eye out and pounded on his back until he quivered and let out a projectile of vomit, followed by a fit of coughing.
Kassite’s eyes searched around the circle and found Deborah. She realized that he somehow knew she had been the cause of the fight.
Petro climbed out of the tub and bent over, panting, while mucky water dripped from his sleeveless shirt.
With another flick of his wrist, Kassite sent all the slaves back to the pavilion, where they lay down on the straw mats and closed their eyes.
Deborah stayed put.
Kassite limped over to the riverbank at a spot halfway between the two pavilions, where the light of the torches barely reached. Petro supported One Eye as they hobbled over and stood before Kassite. Deborah followed them, walking cautiously on her bandaged feet.
“You broke my most important rule,” Kassite said. “Do not fight!”
“I’m sorry, Master,” Petro said.
One Eye only grunted.
“He attacked the new boy.” Petro pointed at Deborah. “When everyone was sleeping, he hit Borah.”
Kassite looked at her, and she nodded.
“I had to protect Borah,” Petro continued. “You put him in my group.”
“That is correct,” Kassite said. “Group leaders are responsible for their men.”
One Eye sat down on the ground, coughed hard, and spat. “Borah is not a boy,” he said.
Kassite looked down at him. “What did you say?”
“Borah is not a boy.” He spat again. “Borah is a girl.”
There was a long silence.
“A girl?” Kassite chuckled. “What gave you this idea?”
Coughing some more, One Eye pointed at Deborah. “Her husband came here today, when you were away. I tried to tell him, but Petro threatened to poke out my eye.”
Kassite turned to Petro.
“I had no choice, Master,” Petro said. “He wouldn’t stay quiet, and if the Hebrew men had noticed our argument—”
“Borah is a boy,” Kassite said. “That is it.”
“I felt her breasts.” One Eye pantomimed grasping Deborah’s chest. “They’re small, but she has them. And I also know what she doesn’t have.” He patted his crotch and smirked.
Kassite held up a hand. “Have you told anyone else about this?”
One Eye shook his head.
“No harm done, then. Now, are you two done fighting?”
“Yes, Master,” Petro said.
One Eye shrugged.
“You stink like the latrines.” Kassite sniffed and twisted his face. “Go in the river and clean up thoroughly.”
Petro supported One Eye, who got up slowly, groaning. As they entered the water, Petro glanced over his shoulder at Kassite, who pointed a thumb down.
Venturing deeper into the river, Petro stepped behind One Eye, put a lock on his neck, and hopped onto his back, forcing him underwater. They disappeared in the dark water.
Shocked, Deborah stepped closer to the river’s edge and pointed her bandaged hand at the water, which boiled up with their struggle. “Master!”
“You started it,” Kassite said. “Go in and help Petro finish it.”
She took another step, the water lapping at her toes, and stopped. In her mind, she heard the Hebrew boys reciting the Ten Commandments at the small temple courtyard back in her hometown of Emanuel, and the words emerged from her lips without forethought: “Do not kill!”
After what seemed like a long time, Petro’s head appeared above the water while he continued to hold One Eye below. Their battle sent circular waves that spread in quick succession on the surface of the slow-moving river.
“Go help him,” Kassite said.
“Do not kill!” she repeated.
A bare foot jerked out of the water, and the heel kicked Petro in the head. He yelled in pain and dropped sideways into the water.
Kassite gestured, urging her into the water.
“God forbids killing!”
The two men rolled several times, alternating for quick, desperate gasps of air.
“Does your god allow girls to become boys?”
The question confused Deborah. “He said nothing about that.”
“He made you a girl.”
The underwater rotating ceased, and neither of the men was visible.
“He forbade killing—for girls and for men, it’s forbidden.”
“A man kills when killing is necessary. Go!”
Deborah took another step into the water, which by now had completely soaked the bandages on her feet. The boys’ voices kept ringing in her head: “Do not kill!” She wanted to proceed, to obey Kassite as she had vowed to do, to show him that she could muster the will to act as a man, but her legs refused to move forward.
Kassite sneered.
The surface of the river gradually calmed down.
Deborah watched with growing alarm. Were they both dead?
Petro’s head appeared, and he turned to face Kassite, nodding once.
A moment later, One Eye’s motionless body surfaced, facedown. The lazy current carried it downstream.
Petro came out of the river, breathing heavily. He bowed before Kassite and walked to the pavilion.
> Her hand pressed to her mouth, Deborah stared at the river, where One Eye’s body dissolved into the night.
“It was necessary,” Kassite said. “He could have told other’s about you.”
“Do not kill,” she whispered.
They stood in silent, looking out at the dark river, now completely quiet and still.
“He lost his eye while building my house.” Kassite gestured at the stilts-supported house up the riverbank. “Another slave dropped a hammer on him. Took a month to recover, almost died, but he went back to work without complaining.”
Clearing her throat, she said, “I’m sorry, Master.”
“Me too,” he said. “I will not kill another worker because of your failure.”
“It won’t happen again.”
“If a man with one eye saw through your act, how long before others do?”
She hung her head. Kassite was the mythical Elixirist, and after all she had gone through to find him and obtain his agreement to help her become a man, here she was, less than a day later, disappointing him.
“The Male Elixir I gave you yesterday,” he continued, “will help you transform only if you do what you’re supposed to do in order to change. Remember my advice?”
“Yes, Master,” she said. “Imitate until you mutate.”
“Then imitate better, or you’ll never mutate.”
Kassite walked up the riverbank back to his house. Deborah went to the men’s pavilion, where all the slaves were already asleep. She lay down on her straw mat, relieved to take the weight off her burning feet, and closed her eyes.
A moment later, she opened her eyes and checked that no one was sneaking up on her. She trembled at the memory of One Eye’s coarse lips pressing against hers, of his bare feet writhing in the tub, and of his motionless body floating downriver, shrouded by the night. Had other slaves sensed her femininity? Was someone lurking in the dark right now, waiting for her to fall asleep, preparing to attack her?
Deborah glanced over her shoulder and met Petro’s gaze. The Philistine slave pointed at his eyes and at her to indicate that he would be watching over her. She felt better, remembering how he had defended her against One Eye. It was comforting to know that someone was ready to protect her.