The Secret Book of Kings: A Novel

by Yochi Brandes

  Mother saw my distress and rushed to my aid. She took the leper’s hands and gently pulled them away. “It’s late,” she said. “We need to unload the food.”

  When we went back out to the wagon, I asked Mother if all lepers shook like Zeruah. She looked away and said pointedly that Zeruah hadn’t been shaking, that I’d only imagined it. I helped her unload the food without a word. We put the sacks of flour and the jugs of oil in a deep nook inside the large hall and placed the bags of figs and raisins on a high shelf.

  We got back into the wagon silently. I had so many questions, but I could tell that Mother was concentrating on the difficult descent from the mountain, and I didn’t want to distract her. When we had reached flat ground, I stated emphatically that I wouldn’t visit Zeruah ever again. Her name disgusted me, and she did too shake.

  I thought Mother would chastise me, but she said nothing. Her silence angered me even more. I repeated myself and asked mockingly if all lepers liked to name themselves after their disgusting disease.

  That was too harsh a statement to go unanswered. Mother finally opened her mouth and said, with restraint and without anger, that most lepers kept their real names, all that remained from their previous lives, but that Zeruah had decided to conceal her identity for the sake of her family’s honor. No one knows who she is, where she came from, what tribe she was born into. She appeared in the cave almost ten years ago, covered from head to toe, and said she had terrible lesions all over her body. She had decided not to reveal her disgrace to her family but rather to run away instead, so that her little sister could marry. Years had gone by, her sister was already married, but Zeruah continued to conceal her identity.

  I asked myself whether I would consider my sister’s happiness if something bad happened to me, and I felt ashamed of the harsh things I’d said about Zeruah. As penance, I quoted everything I’d learned from Mother about how God sends leprosy as a test for society, which is why the righteous are the ones plagued by it, because they are the only ones who are able to accept misery with love, like Miriam, the older sister of Moses and Aaron, who contracted the disease in the wilderness. Only after the Israelites showed concern for her and took care of her did God know that they were worthy of entering the Promised Land.

  I couldn’t see Mother’s face in the dark, but I knew she was smiling. I rested my head against her shoulder and felt the warmth of her cheek on my head.

  “You’ll be taller than me soon. You’re practically a giant.”

  Every year when I arrive at the field for the Festival of Harvest, people look at me with wonder and say that I’m the tallest boy in Ephraim. It makes Mother happy, but Father looks around with worry, as if the soldiers have nothing better to do than to capture tall children.

  * * *

  We got home after midnight. I waited patiently to hear Mother’s rhythmic breathing coming from the next room and then woke up Elisheba. She mumbled that it was still dark outside, but I knew she wasn’t mad at me. She knows that I have to tell her about my day before I can go to sleep.

  I started the practice the moment I first saw her. I vividly remember the day she was born, not only because I have a good memory. No one forgets the day he nearly lost his mother.

  I remember waking up to the sound of moaning, the strangest sound I’d ever heard. Father tried to reassure me. He said Mother would soon bring me a little brother, but Father looked even more scared and helpless than I was. I think that was when I first realized that it was better to live in a little shack within the bustling city, with neighbors all around, than in a huge, isolated house. Here, no one could hear us scream. But Father didn’t scream for help. Instead, he showed me how to place moist towels on Mother’s forehead and how much water to rub on her lips, then he harnessed the wagon and went out to get the midwife.

  Mother tried to smile at me, but her forced smiles often turned into long, frightful howls. When Father got back he found me in tears. The midwife asked in horror where the women of the family were and whispered to her assistant, a pretty girl with long braids and bright eyes, that only an irresponsible husband would leave a woman in labor alone with a little boy.

  Father blushed and started to explain that we had no female slaves or servants, nor any other women in the family. His wife had lost her parents when she was young, and he had only an elderly father who lived with his wives near Bethel, but the midwife cut him off impatiently and said that instead of rambling he’d best get the little boy out of the room, because, judging by the screaming, the baby could be born at any moment, and there would be no time to get her to the birthing stones. Mother would have to give birth on the floor.

  We left the room, and Father told me to go play in the thicket. That’s when the pretty girl stepped out and said sadly that Mother’s womb was completely blocked. Her contractions were painful, but otherwise without strength. The midwife had decided to take her to the birthing stones on foot, rather than in the wagon, to help the contractions along. Father rushed back to the room and tried to convince the midwife not to take Mother on a hike midlabor, but she ignored him and walked Mother out without another word.

  I stayed home with Father. Though I was worried, I couldn’t stop thinking about how rudely the midwife had disrespected Father. I thought sadly that she would have treated him with more respect if he had had a big family, and consoled myself with the thought that he’d soon have another boy, and I would have a little brother and wouldn’t be alone anymore.

  The hours passed slowly, and Father just stared silently out the window the whole time. At first I thought he’d take a break from his silence at noon to make us lunch, but he kept on staring and barely moved at all. I was hungry, but I didn’t want to bother him, so I ate the remnants of the bread that Mother had made the previous day. In the evening, he finally broke his silence, saying that he was going to the birthing stones. I reminded him that men weren’t allowed there, and he whispered in a choked voice that the labor was taking too long, and he had to check on Mother and bring her some herbs that could strengthen her contractions. The tears I had held back all day almost burst out, but I managed to hold them back and promised him I wouldn’t open the door to anyone.

  I was almost asleep when a loud banging on the door startled me. Someone was calling out my name. I tried to ignore it, covering my head with the blanket, but then I recognized the familiar voice of Gera, Father’s loyal worker, and went to open the door.

  Gera apologized for the late hour, saying shamefacedly that he knew we didn’t want anyone coming in, but that he was going mad with worry for the lady. All of Zeredah was talking about the difficult labor. It was good that the master had gone to the birthing stones, Gera said. They might need him to go to the fields to gather fresh herbs. Gera said I should go back to sleep and that he would sit with me until Father got back.

  I was glad he was staying and slipped easily back to sleep. When I woke up the next morning, Father was home. I asked him if I had a little brother already, and he put his trembling arms around me and shook his head. I went outside to play and kept thinking of Rachel, who had died giving birth to Benjamin, Joseph’s younger brother, and about my grandmother, who had died giving birth to Mother. I didn’t want to eat or drink, but in the evening hunger got the better of me, and I went home to ask Father to heat up the lentil stew Mother had cooked two days earlier. He looked at me as if for the first time and said that was an excellent idea, but before he could even light the fire, the pretty midwife’s assistant burst in and stood before us with her head hanging low. Father dropped the candle. He gaped at her, barely breathing. I knew something awful had happened, but I couldn’t cry.

  The assistant whispered that she was sorry, but it was a girl. At first, Father just stared at her, but then he exploded with laughter and ran out to the stable with long strides, as if dancing in the fields at the Festival of Harvest. I ran to follow him, but he told the girl to take me home and keep an eye on me. I was glad to stay with her, so I didn’t pr
otest. I sat on the mat wordlessly, hoping she would figure out that I was hungry and heat up the lentils. It worked: she asked if we had anything to eat and suggested that we eat the stew cold because she was afraid of starting a fire.

  At first we ate in silence, but toward the end of the meal she smiled and said I could call her Tirzah, then added bashfully that I was a handsome boy and that she would tell me everything about Mother’s labor as long as I didn’t tell anybody, especially not Father. I was flattered to have a pretty, older girl talking to me as if I were her own age, and I told her that Mother had already explained to me how I was born, so it was no secret. Tirzah was surprised and said that Mother must be the only woman in the world who tells her young son such things, and in that case she really could tell me everything about the labor. But she suggested I tell her what I’d learned from Mother first, so no one could accuse her of teaching me things I wasn’t supposed to know.

  I enjoyed astonishing her with descriptions of Mother’s swift labor, how she gave birth to me all alone in a wagon on the side of the road, on her way back from her monthly visit to the lepers’ cave; how she tore the cord with her teeth and pulled the afterbirth from her body. Only after it was all over had two people walked by, noticed the lone wagon, and peeked in curiously only to find, to their amazement, a woman sitting on the floor of the wagon cradling a bloody baby. They couldn’t believe that a woman could look so healthy and happy, having just given birth all by herself, with no help, to such a big baby.

  Tirzah’s bright eyes widened. She’d never heard a five-year-old talking about cords and afterbirths as if they were things he saw every day. She also couldn’t believe that a woman who had such an easy first birth would have such trouble with her second. I was glad to be able to astound such an experienced, mature girl, and I explained to her that the second birth isn’t always easier. Rachel had died giving birth to Benjamin, while her eldest, Joseph, had been born without a hitch.

  Tirzah laughed and said I spoke like a little man. No one would ever guess that I wasn’t even five years old yet, she said, considering my height and the way I spoke. I laughed, too, but when she began telling me about poor Mother’s difficult birth, about how she had almost died, just like Rachel, my laughter gave way to tears, and everything I’d been holding back for the past two days erupted all at once. Tirzah was alarmed. Suddenly, without any warning, I felt her warm lips against my ears. She whispered softly that Mother wasn’t unlucky at all. On the contrary, she was unbelievably fortunate to have such a smart and handsome boy who understood everything, and a young, kind husband who wasn’t disappointed to have a daughter.

  I was so lost in her pleasant touch that I didn’t even hear the wagon. Then, suddenly I saw Father and the irritable midwife walking inside, carrying a large plank and laying it carefully on the bed.

  “Come here, Shelomoam!” I could barely hear Mother calling me from the plank. “Come meet your sister.”

  I looked at Mother from a distance. She seemed like a stranger. Suddenly I noticed that she was holding a bundle in her hands. I walked over to her hesitantly. The sight was disappointing. The tiny face between the sheets was scrunched up and blue. I’d never seen such an ugly creature before. I wanted to look away from this ugly baby, but all of a sudden the feeling came over me that I loved her more than anyone else in the world—more than Tirzah, more than Father, even more than Mother. I leaned in and ran my lips over her face. My cheeks burned with love. I held on to her tight fist and told her what had happened to me that day. Mother watched us silently. She had an odd look in her eyes, as if she was trying to solve some sort of riddle.

  * * *

  Now Elisheba twisted her black curls in that soft, indulgent gesture I love so much. I knew she was widening her eyes with curiosity, trying to see me through the dark, and that she had no anger or frustration over the sweet sleep I’d just ruined. I told her everything in order—from the moment I’d gotten onto the wagon with Mother to the moment we’d returned home. At first I tried to stick to the facts, barely embellishing at all, but when I reached the part where we rode up the steep mountain, I couldn’t resist any longer. She gasped at the detailed descriptions of the rickety wagon slipping down the muddy incline, and of the howling of wolves that accompanied us on our climb. I knew that I was scaring her, but I didn’t stop.

  My writing tutor once admiringly told my parents that I had a great gift for storytelling and that he thought I had a bright future ahead of me as scribe of the chronicles of the tribe of Ephraim, and perhaps of all Israel, as long as I stopped embellishing and learned to describe reality as it really was. Mother welcomed his opinion and remarked with a thin smile that embellishments like mine guaranteed my future as the king’s own scribe. The teacher gave a belly laugh and tried to say something witty about the cushy lives of court scribes, but Father cut him off and rushed to the window. In spite of Mother’s teasing, I knew that embellishments were bad, almost like lying, but I couldn’t suppress my need to spice up my tales with large helpings of imagination, because whenever I tried to stick to the facts, everything seemed routine and dull.

  Even now, rather than soothe my little sister with stories of the cave as a pleasant and peaceful place, I made up all sorts of things. I described the lepers’ cave to her as I’d imagined it all these years and not as I had actually experienced it. The longer I went on, the more I embellished, and the story turned into a nightmare.

  Elisheba clung to me in terror. “How can they breathe in those narrow burrows?” Recalling her innocent questions makes me even more ashamed of my selfishness. She was only four years old.

  “They wheeze.”

  “What’s wheeze?”

  “It’s like … the sound he-goats make when you slaughter them.”

  “And then they die?”

  “No, but their entire body shakes under the cover.”

  “Even their faces?”

  “Especially their faces. Their masks bounce around because they shake so much, and when they try to speak all that comes out is crow screeches.”

  “But you said they only wheeze.”

  “They’re able to wheeze or screech, but they can’t talk.”

  “Then how does Mother talk to them?”

  “She’s learned how to speak in the language of screeching and wheezing. She’s the only one who can understand them.”

  * * *

  After the visits that followed, I managed to restrain myself and tell Elisheba the truth: the lepers can talk just like healthy people and don’t shake at all. Only Zeruah shook the first time we met, but now her body was steady and strong, and her voice soft and pleasant. “She loves me more than all the other lepers do, and she always begs me to stay in her cell until the end of the visit and tell her all about everything I’ve experienced over the past month. She wants to know everything: the new Egyptian words I learned, the new game I invented with Mother in the thicket, how I helped Father pick grapes, and what I told my sister each night.”

  Elisheba was very glad to hear that Zeruah took an interest in her and wanted to know everything about my monthly visits to the cave, but she refused to join us there. The horror story I had told her after my first visit still frightened her, and no subsequent reassurances could counter that terrifying first impression.

  Three

  After the Festival of Rain, Father was certain that his anxiety had finally rubbed off on me and that from now on I would stay away from men in uniform. He was right at first. The soldiers really did scare me, and I tried to avoid them, but I soon changed course completely and looked for any opportunity to get close to them. I told him that if a little boy like me had managed to trick so many soldiers, it meant that they were pathetic and that there was nothing to be afraid of. Or perhaps I was trying to deal with the fear head-on and prove to myself that the monster wasn’t so terrible. When I was ten years old, I decided to go to the house of administration by myself and pay the taxes for Father. I knew that I shouldn’t, but
I wanted to prove to him that I could handle the soldiers and didn’t need to be hidden from them all the time. Looking back, I know that this was no innocent act. It was a harbinger of my rebellion against my upbringing. Even back then, I understood that no child in Zeredah had been brought up like I had been.

  I was beaten badly for disobeying, but I gritted my teeth and didn’t cry out.

  “Promise me you’ll stay away from soldiers. No, a promise is no longer enough. Swear to me!”

  Had Mother not come to my aid, he might have injured me, he was so furious. Eventually, I forgave him. His expression looked to me like he was in such agony that I felt that he was the one who needed comforting. He held me tight, and his salty tears streamed down my cheeks and wet my lips.

  “I’m sorry, Shelomoam. My love for you gets in the way of my sense of proportion. Forgive me, beloved son.”

  He never hit me again. For my part, I stayed away from soldiers and went back to my routine at home and in the thicket. But three years later, I firmly informed him that I was now old enough to go along with him every summer on his weekly market excursions. He tried to change my mind with his usual arguments and reminded me that I hated crowded places. I replied angrily that if they had gotten me used to the company of other people, I would have enjoyed crowds like everybody else.

  That night I heard him arguing with Mother and told Elisheba that Mother was probably trying to convince him to give me more freedom. And indeed, the next day she announced that from then on, I would be allowed to go out to the fields not only during the Festival of Harvest, but also during the Festival of Love.

  “The Festival of Love?” Elisheba railed. “But he’s still little.”

  “He might be too little to snatch up girls”—Mother laughed—“but not too little to enjoy their dancing.”