A few days later, Michal and Tirzah were weaving necklaces for themselves from supple vines, under Sarah’s distant but watchful eye. David and Jonathan were in a far corner of the meadow, tossing their javelins at a makeshift target. When the young men passed by, returning to the palace, David smiled at the little girls.
Michal gazed after him, then turned to Tirzah and said, “I hope I marry a man as comely as this David.”
* * *
The cart’s lurching startled Michal from her reverie and brought her back to the present. She took deep breaths to combat her rising fear. They could not yet have reached the crossroads. Why, then, was the column halting? Was this the moment of execution? She almost laughed with relief when she realized the soldiers were stopping to water their animals at the well located between Phaltiel’s compound and the crossroads.
Just as Michal was thinking what a fine idea a drink would be, Tirzah appeared with a skin of cool, sweet water. While Michal took several unladylike gulps, Tirzah leaned close, cupped a hand over her mouth and spoke rapidly. “Your father was killed in battle against the Philistines, along with Jonathan. All of your brothers are dead except Ishbosheth, who is now king. We are being taken to Lord Abner, at Bahurim.”
Michal’s eyes stung with sudden tears. She loved her brother Jonathan dearly. And the loss of her father, despite all that passed between them, made her heart ache. She sighed and returned the skin of water to her handmaid.
“The slave Joash helped me gather information from the soldiers,” Tirzah said. “There’s more. Phaltiel’s men are following us.”
Tirzah jumped as Captain Osh’s voice broke across the men and animals still crowding around the well. “Quickly!” he shouted. The men mounted their horses and reformed the column.
Tirzah’s information gave Michal much to think about. She never cared for her Uncle Abner. He was a gruff, burly man who spent his life as a military commander. Still, being taken to an Israelite—a kinsman at that—and knowing the kingdom was not in foreign hands made the situation infinitely better than Michal feared.
She hoped the things Tirzah heard were true. What purpose could there be in summoning King Saul’s daughter home? Was it possible her brother, now King Ishbosheth, belatedly developed some affection for his siblings? She dismissed that idea immediately, and tried not to dwell on a grim alternative. Given his suspicious nature, it was entirely possible Ishbosheth would eliminate the women who could produce legitimate male rivals for his throne. Of all her brothers, Ishbosheth was most like their father, with his changeable moods and unreasonable hostility.
Michal, like most of her family, always considered Jonathan the only one of her brothers capable of ruling the nation. How could her favorite brother’s dear life have been snuffed out so soon? Most of King Saul’s children feared their father’s dark moods. Jonathan, unlike the others, possessed the courage to challenge the king. Although Michal had been protected from the worst of her father’s behavior in her early childhood, she'd heard bizarre stories whispered in the halls of the women’s quarters. Once, the king almost killed Jonathan for eating honey. Only the intervention of his military officers kept Saul from using his sword to end Jonathan’s young life during that fit of irrational rage. Jonathan’s strength stirred the king’s jealous wrath in a way the weakness of his other sons never did.
Yes, Michal reflected, King Saul could accept qualities of greatness as long as they appeared in a deeply flawed man. Her Uncle Abner, for example, was an effective soldier. Yet he was irascible, unlikable. Men obeyed Abner because they feared the consequences of insubordination, but they hated him.
No one—not even Jonathan—provoked the king’s fury like David. When David came to the royal household as a musician, he was already a national hero because of defeating Goliath. The king developed the same intense love-hate relationship with David that he had with his own children. It seemed those King Saul held in highest esteem when in his right mind were the ones he loathed most violently during his dark spells. As David developed into a brilliant tactician, his military victories alternately pleased and infuriated the king.
On good days, King Saul reacted with irritation to a popular song celebrating David’s prowess in battle. On the worst days, merely hearing the tune could plunge the king into a sinister fury. As Michal grew older, her father’s dark times overtook him more frequently, and they lasted longer. King Saul raged bitterly against imaginary threats that lurked everywhere. He considered the strong friendship between David and Jonathan to be evidence of disloyalty within his own family.
The king would have been even more jealous if he had noticed his youngest daughter’s affection for his enemy. Out of fear, Michal took care to keep her feelings hidden from her father. Yet by the time she was eleven, every woman in the palace knew the princess’s heart secretly belonged to David.
CHAPTER
FOUR
“WHEREFORE WHEN SAUL SAW THAT HE BEHAVED HIMSELF VERY WISELY, HE WAS AFRAID OF HIM. BUT ALL ISRAEL AND JUDAH LOVED DAVID,… AND SAUL SAID TO DAVID, BEHOLD MY ELDER DAUGHTER MERAB, HER WILL I GIVE THEE TO WIFE: ONLY BE THOU VALIANT FOR ME, AND FIGHT THE LORD’S BATTLES. FOR SAUL SAID, LET NOT MINE HAND BE UPON HIM, BUT LET THE HAND OF THE PHILISTINES BE UPON HIM.” I SAMUEL 18:15-17
In Michal’s mind, her childhood ended not long after Passover, the year she turned twelve. Merab was approaching her fifteenth birthday and anxious to be betrothed. The elder princess begged her mother to press her case for marriage with the king.
Ahinoam was subject to vague maladies and frequently took to her bed for long periods of time. Michal suspected her mother invented excuses to stay out of King Saul’s sight as much as she could.
Michal and Merab giggled and fretted over what to wear to serve dinner that evening, frazzling the patience of their servants.
“Both robes are lovely. Just choose one,” Sarah demanded.
“Yes,” Michal agreed. “Choose, Merab. I have to know what you’re wearing so I can put on something that complements it.” Michal hoped to wear yellow, but her sister eventually settled on that color for herself. Michal selected a brown, long-sleeved dress, typical of those worn by an unmarried princess on formal occasions.
A huge crowd of military leaders, government officials, and family were present, far more people than the group of close advisors who regularly dined with the king. Everyone was in a jovial mood. King Saul presided over his table in true royal fashion that evening. Michal and Merab joined the household servants, carrying food from the kitchen to the table, removing empty vessels, fetching this and that morsel to offer to their father’s most important guests. When they were in the kitchen, the girls compared notes on the snippets of conversation they heard.
“I saw you standing far too long near David.” Merab’s tone was that of the superior older sister. “Don’t make a fool of yourself, especially not with our lord the king watching you.”
Michal was indignant. “It wasn’t my fault. Jonathan had to look over every raisin cake before he chose one. Then he insisted I bring him a pot of honey to pour over it. I was only doing as I was told when Father happened to be discussing who Israel’s greatest soldier is.”
“And what did he say?” Merab’s high-minded attitude suddenly transformed into eager curiosity.
“He asked Jonathan who was the greatest warrior of Israel,” Michal replied.
“What did our brother answer? Tell me everything you heard. Don’t make me drag information from you.”
“Jonathan said, ‘Perhaps Joshua’. Father laughed and said, ‘I meant among the living, my son.’ Then Jonathan put his hand on David’s shoulder and asked, ‘Is there any fighting man alive more dedicated to serving Israel than this man, David?’ I was sure Father would be angry. Instead, he laughed again and said Jonathan gave the right answer. Then he started going on about how brave David is, yet how he must become ever bolder and more fearless in his service to God, the king, and the nation. Then grumpy old Uncle Abner said,
‘Away with you, child.’ I didn’t hear anything else.”
“How unlike our lord the king to be so—”
“Hasten, girls,” Haggia said. “It’s time to serve fruit.”
Merab took a large bowl of pomegranates and went into the great hall. Michal watched her sister walk from the kitchen to the opening in the center of the tables, which were arranged in a U-shape. Guests sat on the floor or half-reclined on cushions around the outside of the tables.
Merab placed the bronze bowl in front of King Saul, who sat at the center of the head table. After Merab returned from serving the king, both she and Michal once more entered the great hall bearing additional pomegranates. Michal walked beside Merab. A few paces in front of their father, the girls bowed their heads while angling in opposite directions. Merab placed her bowl of fruit in reach of the honored guests to the king’s right. Immediately afterwards, Michal sat her pomegranate container before the men to King Saul’s left. The sisters came to the center of the room, bowed again to the king, and withdrew to the kitchen. They'd practiced repeatedly when they were younger, learning the proper order of service and how to move in perfect harmony. The unison became second nature to them. Minimal effort was required to turn in a flawless performance, not that anyone outside the kitchen appeared to notice.
On occasions when the guest list was extensive enough for both girls to be pressed into service, they lingered after dinner with the kitchen workers. The young princesses sat quietly in a corner and listened to the servants gossip about the important people in the great hall. As a small child, Michal learned people talked freely around her as long as she pretended to have no interest in their conversation. When they were younger, she and her sister sat and played a game that involved arranging the smooth stones Merab carried in a pouch tied around her waist. As they grew older, they worked on the needlework skills their mother insisted they learn.
That evening, like many other evenings before, Michal and Merab sat in their corner of the kitchen, listening to the music that wafted gently from the great hall. Michal’s eyes were on the embroidery she was making to grace the hem of a tunic for Jonathan. Merab worked on yet another dress suitable for a married princess, something she must set aside and save for the time when she had a husband. Around the corner, kitchen workers chatted, oblivious to the familiar presence of the mouse-quiet princesses.
“If you want my opinion, our lord the king wants to see David dead,” the baker Jacob said.
“Would he kill him with praise?” a young helper asked.
“Listen carefully to the words of praise,” Jacob continued. “The king fairly dares the young man to put himself into ever greater peril. Perhaps King Saul wants the Philistines to finish what he started when he hurled his spear at Lord David. ”
“Take care!” the kitchen maid, Haggia, warned.
Michal took a long strand of leaf-thin gold and worked it into the design of her embroidery. She trembled to think how near her father came to killing David several times. Within the royal household, such erratic behavior was accepted, even expected, during King Saul’s bad moods.
Occasionally, Michal was afraid for David. She was constantly anxious for her brothers, her sister, her mother, and herself as well. She remembered her humiliation a few evenings earlier when the king, in a rage, flung a large bowl of figs at her. She could not guess what provoked the outburst. In accordance with the accepted standards of the royal household, she showed no emotion. She quietly picked up the metal bowl, retrieved the fruit that was scattered on the floor, bowed to her father, and walked back to the kitchen.
No one mentioned what occurred. Without the verifying presence of the ugly bruise on her arm and shoulder the next morning, she might have thought she imagined the entire incident.
Michal longed to please her father, but she was uncertain how to accomplish that objective. She felt both guilty and grateful that she was the target of the king’s explosive rages less often than her sister. As Merab’s figure became more womanly, their father grew increasingly critical of everything his elder daughter said or did. On many evenings, Michal lay in bed listening to Merab’s sobs. She thought how much happier she and her sister would be when they had fine husbands and no longer lived in the palace.
Sounds of cheers coming from the great room interrupted Michal’s thoughts. The usually sedate Sarah rushed into the kitchen. “Come with me immediately, girls!” she spoke sharply.
“Why?” Merab asked.
“What happened?” Michal said at the same time.
Sarah laid a hand on the nape of each girl’s neck, fairly pulling them to their feet and pushing them out of the room. “We must go right away and share the good news with your mother.”
“What news?” Michal asked.
“Mother will be asleep.” Merab struggled against Sarah’s grasp. “We want to stay.”
“Merab is betrothed.”
Both girls squealed and giggled, while demanding more information. Sarah pushed and dragged them up the stairs and along the passageway that led to the women’s quarters.
“Finally I am to be married!” Merab exulted. “Think of it!”
“Tell us, who is to be the bridegroom?” Michal insisted. “We must know.”
“Yes, Sarah.” Merab sounded breathless. “Who will be my husband? Is he the son of an important king? A rich nobleman’s first son?”
At last they reached Merab and Michal’s bedchamber. Sarah sank onto a large cushion and held her bowed head in her hands. “The king has betrothed Merab to David, the son of Jesse,” she said without looking up.
Shocked silence sucked the air out of the room. Merab’s hand flew to cover her mouth as she half-sat, half-fell onto the bed. Michal stood motionless, unable or unwilling to absorb the hateful information.
“That cannot be,” Michal whispered when she found her voice. It was not like Sarah to tell such an appalling, easily disproved lie.
“I have spoken the truth,” Sarah said quietly. “The announcement was made just now, in the great hall, before a host of guests.”
“But David is not high born,” Merab protested. “His father is a farmer, and he freely admits he grew up tending sheep! He cannot be the king’s son-in-law. The very idea is ridiculous.”
“He himself said almost those very things to your father this evening.” Sarah’s face was filled with sadness.
Michal did not trust herself to speak. She was angry at Merab for speaking ill of David. Even more, she hated the dawning thought that her sister would be the wife of the man she wanted for herself. She despised her father for choosing David to marry Merab. She was furious with Sarah for bringing the news.
“I won’t do it,” Merab wailed. “Does Father think I will go and live in that stupid village of Bethlehem where everybody’s a farmer or a shepherd? A place no one has ever heard of? He expects me to marry a common soldier who came to the palace with nothing, and even wore Jonathan’s old clothes. And worst of all, I’ve heard David’s great-grandmother was a foreigner, from Moab.” Merab crumpled her headdress and tossed it toward Sarah. “No, I will not go through with this marriage!”
The old woman calmly folded the discarded scarf and sighed. “You will obey your father and king, Merab. Surely you have always known he would choose a husband for you. Yours also, Michal, in due time.” Sarah stood and chewed her lip. “I will keep everyone away from you tonight. Tomorrow morning, both of you will show how delighted you are with this news, particularly in the presence of our lord the king.”
For a long time after Sarah left, both girls were silent and motionless. Michal was stunned to her marrow by Merab’s outburst. Nevertheless, she swallowed hard and heard herself say, “David is very handsome, Merab. And brave.”
“What difference does that make? He’s nothing, a nobody. Sooner or later he will lose favor. Then what? His family has no wealth, no standing, no estate. When I’m an old woman I’ll have no home. I’ll have to sell my jewelry and live in a tent.”
Merab cried herself to sleep that night. After her sister’s sobs faded into deep regular breaths, Michal allowed her own tears to flow.
CHAPTER
FIVE
“AND DAVID SAID UNTO SAUL, WHO AM I? AND WHAT IS MY LIFE, OR MY FATHER’S FAMILY IN ISRAEL, THAT I SHOULD BE SON IN LAW TO THE KING?” I SAMUEL 18:18
The morning after the announcement of Merab’s betrothal to David, Michal awoke feeling ill. Her head hurt, and she did not want to get out of bed. Merab was already up, dressed, and studying her reflection in the smooth depths of a highly-polished brass disk.
“I don’t feel good,” Michal said.
“Neither do I.” Merab sounded matter-of-fact. “But I will comport myself as befits a daughter of the king. So will you, little sister. We have no choice.”
Only then did Michal remember the events of the previous evening. She sighed and struggled to sit up, slowly becoming aware of something wet on her inner thighs. Throwing back the blankets, she stared in shock at the fresh bloodstain on the bedclothes. “I’ve started my bleeding at last!”
For more than a year, Michal fretted that she had no monthly flow of blood like the other girls her age. She worried she was abnormal. Would she never begin her periods? She feared she would never be able to bear children. Merab went regularly to the women’s confinement room for her monthlies. Tirzah started last summer.
Michal lay down again as a wave of nausea swept over her. She stared at the ceiling. She previously longed for this day to come. Now that it had arrived, there was no longer any reason to be a woman. Merab, not she, would be married to David.
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