Heavens Before

by Kacy Barnett-Gramckow

  Shem took Annah’s hands, whispering, “You’re beautiful.”

  I love you, she thought, recognizing his sincerity. With their fingers intertwined, they watched as Noakh descended the ladder, carrying the dove on his hand.

  “Our little spy must think she will build a nest here,” Noakh said. “Look what she brought us.” Opening his free hand, Noakh revealed a young, fresh, blade-shaped leaf.

  “An olive leaf!” Naomi exclaimed, delighted. “O Most High, thank You!”

  They gathered around, staring at the leaf, elated. Annah touched it, misty-eyed, longing to see the young olive tree itself.

  “This tree must have started growing beneath the waters,” Tirtsah said. Looking at Annah, she smiled. “Perhaps our children will be born on dry land after all.”

  “In three months.” Noah pursed his lips, thinking. “Perhaps.”

  Three months. Annah almost groaned at the thought. But she consoled herself by looking at the leaf again. Thank you, O Most High.

  “Tonight, we celebrate,” Naomi announced. No one argued.

  Seven days later, the dove did not return. “She has found food and a place to rest,” Noakh said, deeply satisfied.

  “I envy her,” Annah said, feeling the kicking of tiny feet within. “She’s free to fly up into the sky again. How I miss the sky!”

  “Soon we will see the sky again, daughter,” Noakh assured her. “The Most High will call us out at the proper time.”

  Do I have such patience? Annah wondered. Her child stirred, restless, agitated.

  Moving slowly, Annah scattered grain and straw within the long, communal feeding trough in front of the grazing animals. One of the females—tawny and black-hoofed—whickered softly, seeming to coax Annah to stroke her. Annah stared into the creature’s big, gentle eyes, empathizing; the young mare was also pregnant, as were many of the animals.

  “I know just how you feel,” Annah told her. “Those children and their kicks! But listen to me: Eat and rest, then later I’ll take you out of your stall and walk you around. You’ll feel better then.”

  “Ma’adannah?” Tirtsah called from the other end of the stalls. “We’re waiting. Are you finished?”

  “I’m coming.” Annah hurried to join Tirtsah and Ghinnah. It was time to help Naomi prepare food for their evening meal. A clattering, pounding racket greeted them at the top of the ramp. They all looked toward the far end, near the bird enclosure. Noakh was up on the ladder again, while his sons waited below, laughing and passing tools and pieces of wood up and down the ladder. Curious, the women went to see what the men were doing.

  Shem greeted Annah with a jubilant kiss. “The clouds are thinning, so we’re opening this section above the windows. We should be able to see the sky and perhaps freshen the stagnant air in here.”

  Noakh wrenched another portion of the covering away. Now, Annah stared up at the sky, confounded. The puffy white clouds were parting, revealing a sky as blue as the color in her precious shell carving. Clear, pale, brilliant blue.

  “We’re going to have these children here,” Tirtsah told Annah, obviously disgusted as she struggled to turn the great round grinding stone within the mortar.

  Feeling the now familiar contractions of her womb, Annah nodded in wordless agreement, holding her breath, waiting for the contraction to ease. When she caught her breath again, she reached for the wooden handle that protruded from the mortar. Neither she nor Tirtsah could turn the grinding stone alone now; they were too big and uncomfortable to stretch their arms across it for very long.

  It’s been three hundred and seventy-one days for this flood, Annah thought, watching her entire stomach shift as the child wriggled within her. But it’s any day now for this child.

  They worked until Shem approached Annah and kissed her. “It’s time to open the door, beloved, and release all these poor animals. Forget the grain; we need your help.”

  Twenty-Five

  “DON’T RELEASE the animals until the door is opened,” Shem warned Annah as they walked down the central ramp.

  “Do you think we would do such a thing?” Naomi huffed, pretending indignation.

  Grinning, abashed as a young boy, Shem said, “Forgive me, I’ma. Of course you wouldn’t do such a thing.”

  “But you believe I would?” Annah asked softly.

  Shem’s dark eyes were dancing, shining. “I’m going to help my father and my brothers, while I still live.”

  “That accursed lion is the last to leave!” Naomi called out to everyone. They all laughed in agreement. To her daughters-in-law, Naomi muttered, “If I had my way, that wretched creature would never leave this place.”

  Unable to believe that this day had come, Annah watched as her husband picked up a hammer and a chisel and headed for the great door. Noakh, Yepheth, and Khawm were already pounding chisels into the sealed edges of the door, the iron splitting into the wood with loud, ringing tones. At last, when the men agreed that they had broken the entire seal, Noakh said, “Why should we strain ourselves further? Let some of the largest creatures help us open this door.”

  Annah retreated to the central ramp, wide-eyed as Khawm and Yepheth brought out the young elephant and its beloved, urging both creatures forward. At first, the two creatures seemed reluctant, tentatively exploring the door with their long, sensitive trunks. Then, as if suddenly concluding that their freedom lay on the other side of the wooden wall, both elephants pressed against it. The door creaked, then fell open with a crash. The young elephant and its beloved charged forward, clearly eager to leave. Noakh followed them, glanced around outside, studied the ramp, then came limping back inside, his lips pursed.

  “Work from the largest animals down to the smallest,” he called out, not looking at anyone in his family.

  Annah realized that her father-in-law was troubled. Perceiving her look, he said, “Daughter, go with your sister Tirtsah and release the birds from their enclosures. Cut the curtains loose if need be, but keep the doves and pigeons.”

  “I wanted to look outside!” Tirtsah complained as Annah propelled her up the central ramp once more.

  “So did I. But I’m sure the father of our husbands is right; we should release the animals first. I wonder if we’ll need to chase the birds out, or if they’ll go on their own.”

  “I think I will miss the birds most of all,” Tirtsah confessed.

  “We will see them outside.” Annah found two of Naomi’s cutting blades, and the two women set to work, slicing the mesh curtains apart at their natural seams.

  “It’s a pity to destroy these curtains,” Annah said. Just looking at the long mesh hangings, Annah knew that they represented countless evenings worth of work.

  “They are dirty anyway,” Tirtsah pointed out. “I’m going to cut that corner away at the top.” Despite Annah’s protests for her safety, Tirtsah climbed the ladder and cut all the cords and seams in the uppermost corner near the windows.

  As Tirtsah descended, the birds began to flutter through the gaping hole to escape through the high windows. The ground-loving birds picked and minced their way through the openings in the bottom of the curtains, then darted away, many of them finally taking flight up to the windows, following the others.

  Satisfied, Annah and Tirtsah went to the second bird enclosure at the opposite end of the upper level, where they repeated the process. Annah stood quietly, watching the birds escape, until Tirtsah called to her, “What about these?” Tirtsah was reaching for the doves and pigeons, held in their separate cages.

  Annah quickly shook her head. “No. The father of our husbands commanded us to leave them alone. They are for the Most High.”

  Lowering her hands, Tirtsah turned away from the doves and pigeons. “We’re almost done then. Let’s drive these last ground-loving ones down the ramp …”

  And outside, Annah thought, silently finishing Tirtsah’s sentence. Gathering baskets of grains, dried fruits, and the last of the white cakes of rendered fat, Annah and Tirtsah s
lowly coaxed the few remaining ground-loving birds down the ramp. As Annah stepped off the ramp, the birds screeched and squawked around her, then charged toward the brightness of the wide-opened door.

  Meeting them now, Shem said, “Let’s release these other animals and go outside.”

  Impatient as a child, Annah helped her husband unbar the numerous rows of stalls. Insects thrummed past their heads as they worked. The animals needed little urging. Even the night creatures seemed eager to go outside into the dazzling sunlight and fresh air. All of them—from the largest of the grazing reptiles and carrion-eaters down to the tiniest of the field-dwellers—scurried toward the great door as soon as they were freed from their stalls and cages.

  “It’s been easier to chase them out than to close them in!” Khawm called to Shem and Annah while they were releasing the last of the smallest creatures. Then there was a hush within the pen. Except for the multiple pairs of oxen, sheep, goats, pigeons, and doves, all of the stalls, cages, and enclosures were open and abandoned.

  Noakh limped toward the door now, his face somber. He put out a hand, silently beckoning Naomi, who was just behind him. She took a deep breath, and they went outside together. Shem took Annah’s hand, and they followed Khawm and Tirtsah, Yepheth and Ghinnah, out into the bright, clear air.

  A cool breeze played over Annah’s face, making the gold talismans in her hair bindings dance against her neck. For an instant she blinked against the fierceness of the sunlight, then she halted on the ramp, too stunned to move.

  Nothing is the same, she thought, aghast. This is not the same earth.

  She had been prepared to see the remote, chilling, cloud-swept blue of the sky, but not this earth. Not these unbelievably high, awe-inspiring mountain peaks, the abruptly carved chasms, the sloping, water-scoured fields. All traces of the softness of the previous heavens and earth were gone. The low, tender, curving mountains, gently sweeping fields, magnificent trees, and lush vegetation and flowers that Annah had loved were replaced by coarse green grasses, tiny flowers, brutally battered stumps, fragile sprigs of trees, and countless scattered, water-smoothed stones.

  There was nothing familiar to cling to. Nothing except her family and the multitudes of still-docile animals, which seemed lost and bewildered as they milled about in the steep, sloping, stone-riddled fields surrounding the pen. Watching them, Annah trembled, and hot tears trailed down her cheeks. Ghinnah and Tirtsah stood in front of Annah on the door ramp, weeping softly as their husbands stared at the harsh landscape in dazed silence.

  Standing at the base of the door ramp, the breeze fluttering through his thick, silvering curls, Noakh lifted his hands to the remote blue heavens. Loudly, he cried, “We praise You, Most High, for Your mercy! Who are we that You have spared us from such destruction?”

  He turned to face them, and Annah saw his tears and his sorrow.

  “Come!” he cried to his sons. “We will build an altar to the Most High.”

  Exhausted and apprehensive, Annah stood before the stone altar with Naomi, Ghinnah, and Tirtsah, watching the men place the bodies of an ox, a sheep, a goat, a pair of pigeons, and two doves on the wood. Then, deliberately, Noakh took a cluster of dried cleansing herbs, dipped it in blood from the offerings, and whipped it high in the air, sprinkling them all with the blood. Annah cringed faintly as the droplets descended upon her, but she was comforted when Naomi took her hand, patting it kindly. They stood together with Ghinnah and Tirtsah, silent as Noakh took a glowing resin-soaked taper and lit the sacrificial fire.

  Nothing is as I dreamed it would be, Annah thought, numbed and bewildered. This desolate landscape, the cold sky, all these stones instead of sweet plants … how will I ever grow accustomed to these distant blue heavens and this terrible new earth?

  Then a sensing swept over Annah. O Most High, she thought, feeling His presence descend upon them, covering them all, loving, yet filled with undeniable, majestic, all-encompassing power. She dropped to her knees with the others, lowering her head, quivering. A quiet voice touched her, as if the Most High were standing directly behind her, His words full of blessings and warnings.

  Be fruitful and bear many children and replenish the earth. The fear and dread of you will fall upon all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air, upon every creature that moves along the ground, and upon all the fish of the sea; they are given into your hands. Everything that lives and moves will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything.

  Annah turned her head, gaping as all the creatures scurried away in every direction, terrified, as if scattered by an unseen hand. Annah felt their terror wash over her as well; now she was an enemy to all the creatures she had cared for throughout this past year. Grieving, Annah thought, They will be prey for my children, and my children will be theirs. But the Most High seemed to permeate her thoughts, His words quietly admonishing.

  … for your lifeblood I will surely demand an accounting. I will demand an accounting from every animal. And from each man too …

  Humbled and shaken by these stern promises of justice and judgment, Annah lowered her head, crying silently. But even in her sorrow, she felt reassured. For beneath these new heavens and on this new earth, only the presence of the Most High had not changed. She could actually sense Him; He was as she remembered Him from the earth before, when she had cried out to Him for protection in her fear. His voice beckoned her now, tender, consoling.

  I now establish my covenant with you and with your descendants after you and with every living creature that was with you … never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth … I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth.

  As one compelled, Annah looked up at the eastern sky and saw a many-colored arc of light glowing among the clouds—the first truly beautiful thing she had seen in this new earth. She stared at it, amazed, some of the ache in her heart ebbing away.

  Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life, His voice promised them all, the voice of a Father soothing His precious children.

  Annah wiped her eyes and listened, at peace now, feeling the stirrings of the new life within her. O Most High, You have not changed, she thought, gazing at the rainbow. The heavens and the earth have all been swept away and replaced, but You have not changed. Even now, You care for us, and You will fulfill all Your promises to us; this is the comfort I will need more than anything else in this new life.

  “But to eat animals’ flesh? I don’t think I could,” Tirtsah moaned as they were sorting out the remainders of various foods from the pen. “If we have enough grains and fruits and seeds—surely we won’t need to eat flesh.”

  “You will have no choice, daughter,” Naomi answered quietly. “Look around you at this rugged earth and that cold sky; there is no mercy here. Food may not be as easy to obtain, and what we do find may be less nourishing than what we had before.”

  Listening to their conversation, Annah dumped the remainder of a basket of dried berries into a larger basket of dried sweet afals. The dried berries would give the pale, thin-skinned afals a pretty, rosy color when they were cooked together.

  “We may as well add these,” Ghinnah told Annah, passing her a basket of tiny, deep brown, dried vine-fruits.

  In time, they would have vine-fruits again. Noakh had stored cuttings of some of his favorite plants in the darkest reaches of the pen, and now he was planning to establish a vineyard in the lower hillsides.

  “If we are careful, there should be enough fruit to last us until we find other fruit-bearing plants,” Annah said to Naomi.

  “But what if there isn’t enough?” Ghinnah asked, her pretty eyes wide, apprehensive.

  Naomi actually laughed. “Daughter, if the Most High has chosen to save us from the terrors of the flood, I think we may depend upon Him to meet our needs with a few bits of fruit.”

  And with the grain, Annah thought, eyeing the remaining baskets. Shem
, Khawm, and Yepheth already had decided to begin clearing fields and planting various grains. She watched as her husband and his brothers descended from the slopes above, bringing the final cartloads of tools and hides down from the pen, which loomed on the hillside like a dark husk emptied of its seeds. Annah thought it looked permanent, indestructible.

  “What shall we do with this?” Ghinnah’s tone demanded the other women’s attention. She held a broad, deep basket filled with the last bits of dried meat from the pen. “Shall we put it out for the carrion-eaters?”

  Naomi frowned and shook her head. “It seems that the carrion-eaters have enough food for now. We need this meat more than they do.” Then, as if to console them, she added, “If you find any remaining blood cakes, you may throw them away.”

  “Gladly,” Tirtsah muttered, and the others laughed.

  Annah woke, feeling as if she had been struggling in her sleep. Taking a quiet breath, she looked up at the sturdy reed-and-hide roof of the small room she shared with her husband. They had removed some of the partitions and stalls from the pen to build their lodge, and this room. With its hewn-wood sides, low-sloping hide roof, and windows here and there, the lodge was not beautiful, but it was reasonably warm and comfortable. It would serve their purposes until after the fields were planted and this first crop of children was born. Moving her hands over her stomach now, Annah felt another contraction. A false one, she thought. But she caught her breath, suddenly struggling against genuine pain.

  Gradually, the pain faded. Unable to lie still, Annah pushed off the warmth of the fleece covers and reached for her long-sleeved overtunic. Softly she made her way outside into the first gray hints of a clouded dawn. She went to the wall-enclosed waste pit just beyond the lodge, then washed her hands in the rushing water of a nearby spring. Another pain struck, making her gasp in deep breaths of the cold morning air. When she could move again, Annah returned the lodge and sat near the banked hearth, silently bracing herself against pain after pain while she waited for Shem and the others to awaken. Soon, she thought. They’ll be awake soon. They were so tired last night; I should let them sleep as long as possible.