The Secret Book of Kings: A Novel

by Yochi Brandes

“More than half a year.”

  “Do your parents know about your gang?”

  “No.”

  “Do they know how you live?”

  “No.”

  “Do you love them?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  Had Tirzah accepted my refusals, we would have stayed together for many more years. She couldn’t have imagined that a casual comment, made one day almost offhandedly, would put me on a path of no return and change the course of my life.

  I didn’t understand its significance at first. I was enraptured in that fuzzy postcoital languor, and her statement didn’t register in my mind. By the time I returned to my senses and asked her to repeat it, she had already gone on to other topics and had difficulty recalling the words she had spoken only moments before.

  “What did you say?”

  “I said it’s a shame you don’t visit your parents. They must—”

  “No, what did you say about the labor?”

  “What labor?”

  “My mother’s labor.”

  “I said it was the most difficult one I had even seen before and is still one of the most difficult ones I’ve ever worked on.”

  “And…”

  “And?”

  “And you can’t believe that…”

  “And … oh yes, and I can’t believe it was her second one.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Her opening was narrow and smooth like a young girl’s. I’ve never seen a woman who had an easy first birth that didn’t even leave a scar be nearly ripped to shreds by the second.”

  It took a few moments before I could respond. “It’s exactly what happened to our matriarch Rachel,” I whispered, mostly trying to convince myself. “She gave birth to Joseph easily, but bled to death giving birth to her second child, Benjamin.”

  She scoffed. “I wasn’t present at the birth of Benjamin, so I can’t say what happened there, but I was present at the birth of your sister, and I remember that even the midwife, who was older and more experienced, said despairingly that the poor woman was about to die from her difficult first labor.”

  At this point, Tirzah still hadn’t recognized the degree of my horror and tried to distract me with the tales of our ancestors that I loved so much. “Who knows, Shelomoam,” she said, making an obvious effort to laugh. “Maybe your mother found you in a basket floating on the river? You told me you admire Aaron the Priest, but perhaps your story is more like that of his younger brother? Moses grew up as a prince, believing that Princess Bithiah was his mother and that the Pharaoh was his grandfather, and only when he got older did he learn that his birth parents were miserable slaves from the Land of Goshen.”

  Eight

  I spent the next ten days lying almost perfectly still on the mat. This time, I wasn’t suffering from debilitating headaches. On the contrary, my mind was more lucid than ever. I felt as though my eighteen years of life were passing before my eyes with cruel clarity, forcing me to examine them from the outside, as if they belonged to someone else. I kept asking myself how I could have been so blind. The answer had been right there in front of me all the time. How could I have missed it?

  Tirzah wouldn’t give my worried friends any details, only saying blandly that I’d discovered important information about my family and that they had best give me a chance to process it so that I could get on with my life.

  Get on with my life? I almost cried when I heard her say that. I didn’t know what to do yet, but I already realized, deep inside, that nothing would ever be the same again.

  A week and a half later, I managed to get back up on my feet and walked over to my beloved Aner, who was waiting patiently outside the tent. I was barely able to mount him. He seemed to have grown taller since I’d last ridden him. I inhaled the crisp morning air of early winter and rode away without saying farewell to my friends.

  My muscles ached as if I had been performing some sort of vigorous physical activity. My entire body had been placed in the service of my mission. I came to see that it took less energy to move my muscles than to stop them from moving. Emotions seem to come upon us when we need them least and impair our judgment. I mustn’t let them in if I want to reach my objective. I need to carry on like a lifeless statue, to freeze even more deeply the part of me that began turning to ice so long ago, when I left my home and my family and went out to search for a different life, far from the mystery that was driving me mad.

  Onward, Shelomoam, onward. Go back to your country, your people. Go forth to that familiar place. Only there will you be able to find what you have been searching for your entire life. Do not allow your longing to break your determination. Do not give a foothold to compassion. Keep riding up that mountain and ignore those old sights and smells. You did not come here to reminisce about your childhood.

  Here is the cave you first set eyes on ten years ago. Just like then, it is wet from the first rains of winter. It hasn’t changed at all—the same wide threshold, the same spacious hall, the same little torches dripping incense, the same colorful rugs on the floor and walls, the same long corridor leading to the small cell, the one you could not take your mind off these past few days.

  Only the woman in the cloak is not the same. This woman alone, of all the cave dwellers, changes the face behind her mask from time to time. First she was a leper, then she was healthy, and now she holds the answer to the riddle of your existence.

  And just like then, she is sitting in the torchlight. Her body is wrapped, her face covered. Her two eyes blaze at me from behind the mask.

  “Greetings, Zeruiah.”

  I grind her name, foreign and strange, between my teeth with a tone of distant coldness. Her name evokes no feelings in me.

  Her body shakes beneath the cloak. Her arms, her legs, even her face. Just like then.

  “Take off your mask, Zeruiah.”

  She says nothing in reply.

  “Take it off. I have some questions for you, and I want to see your eyes so I can make sure you aren’t lying.”

  She remains silent.

  I bend toward her and reach for the mask.

  She flinches and grabs it with her covered hands.

  “Did you bring a knife?” she asks scornfully, teasing me.

  The wall I’d built around my emotions collapses like a sand castle. I am gripped by uncontrollable rage.

  “I can rip that mask off your face without a knife.”

  “Indeed, you have enough strength and savagery to get the job done. Nor do you seem short on cruelty. Go on, Shelomoam—tear it off!”

  I want to shake her, to roar my pain into her ears, to hurl the bitter suffering she has caused me back at her. But I am able to restrain myself. I mustn’t allow an outburst of emotion to disrupt my plan. My need for revenge will find its outlet some other time.

  “Is that what you think of me?” I soften my voice and lend it an almost ingratiating tone. “On what do you base such a judgment?”

  “On what do I base it?” Her mockery turns to accusation. “I base it on what you’ve done to your family—to your mother, to your father, even to your little sister.”

  “You know they aren’t my family.”

  She is silent.

  “What are you waiting for?” I ask, no longer able to hold my bitterness at bay. “I can’t wait to hear more of the imaginary tales I’ve been told ever since I was a little boy, especially that well-known legend of the difficult labor that Moth—” I stop myself before uttering that false word again—“that Bilhah had.” The name, barely coaxed from my mouth, rolls over my lips with an odd sensation of foreignness. “It’s been a long time since I’ve had the pleasure of hearing those thrilling descriptions of the blood running between her legs and the cord she cut with her sharp teeth. And most important, you mustn’t forget to note that the birth occurred in a wagon on the side of the road after the usual monthly visit of the heroine to the lep
ers’ cave. Without that information, the story isn’t complete.”

  She breathes heavily under her cloak. “All right, Shelomoam.” She speaks my name softly. “You’ve discovered what we’ve been trying to hide from you. Now what?”

  “Why did you do it to me?”

  “The king’s soldiers were searching for me everywhere. The cave was the only place in the world where I could feel safe. There was nothing I wanted more than to nurse you and hold you in my arms. Even right now, when you are grown and bitter and angry, I long to hold you, to lay your head in my lap and to caress your face. I felt such uncontrollable longing every time you came to visit me.”

  Her despicable outpouring goes in one ear and out the other. I spit questions at her in rapid succession: “Why didn’t you tell me the truth? Didn’t you trust me? Were you afraid I would betray you? Why did you give me up?”

  “I put you in the best possible hands.” She is almost in tears now. “Benaiah and Bilhah devotedly raised you and gave you—”

  “Lies,” I complete her sentence. “That’s what they gave me.”

  “How can you be so ungrateful?” How easily apology turns to accusation. “They love you like a son. Only because they loved you so much did you sense that something was wrong. Had Benaiah been a little less protective, the secret would not have been uncovered.”

  “Why did he need to protect me? You rebelled against the king, not me.”

  “The king…” She hesitates. “The king took revenge not only on the rebels, but also against their families. He…”

  “The king you rebelled against is long dead. Why did Benaiah continue to protect me all these years?”

  “Bilhah and I begged him to let you grow up naturally, with freedom like other children have, but his concern for you drove him mad. He loves you too much. That is his only sin.”

  “That is his only sin?” The stifled cry erupts from me in a roar. “Because of his anxiety, I wasted my childhood in a secluded thicket, and you did nothing. Your own safety was more important to you than I was. And your own fears are as baseless as his. You’ve been hiding in this desolate cave for nearly twenty years. Twenty years. As if the king has nothing better to do than search for an old woman who participated in some forgotten rebellion against his dead father ages ago.”

  She exhales heavily. “What do you want, Shelomoam?” I can barely hear her quiet voice. “Tell me what you want.”

  “I want to know who my father is.”

  * * *

  I’d said it. All my hopes and dreams in those six words.

  “To know who my father is.”

  The silence that followed proved to me that the information I sought wouldn’t come easy. I realized that I had been wrong to explode with anger. I tried to think quickly about how I might repair the damage I had done and persuade her to reveal the one missing piece.

  “The three of you made a mistake by allowing your exaggerated and unfounded fears to control you.” I chose my words carefully. “We’ve all paid a hefty price for that mistake. You are buried alive in a cave. Benaiah and Bilhah are grieving over my escape, and I wasted my childhood and my youth. But that’s all in the past. Now that I have found out what you have been hiding, we can begin to rebuild our relationship. Tell me who my father is, and I promise to come home and stop fighting with my … adoptive parents. I’m willing to still call them Father and Mother, if that’s what you want. You can take off that cloak and come live with us, or you can remain in the cave. Either way, I will stay in touch with you, and I won’t hold a grudge. Just tell me who my father is.”

  I spoke almost ceaselessly for the next hour, stopping from time to time to see if I’d managed to soften her up, and when she kept silent I started talking again.

  “I will only find peace if I know who my father is. Tell me who he is, and I’ll no longer be a wanderer. A person who doesn’t know his roots walks the world detached and anonymous. I have to know who my father is.”

  At some point I began to rock in place. My head was spinning. I couldn’t feel my arms and legs. I felt as if my body were starting to float in the air.

  Suddenly, without warning, she removed her mask. I looked away. I felt unable to look at her. Not now.

  “Look at me, Shelomoam.”

  When I had torn the mask off her two years before, the only thing I wanted to know was whether or not she was a leper. Now I truly saw her for the first time, and what I saw was too painful. I couldn’t help but notice the resemblance between us. It was so strong that for a moment I wondered if that was why she continued to hide her face.

  Only our sizes didn’t match. Even through her cloak, I could see the contours of her skinny body. My great stature didn’t come from her.

  “Look carefully, Shelomoam. Commit me to your memory. I’m the only root you have. You have no roots but me.”

  I gazed at her through expressionless eyes.

  “Is my father dead?”

  She sighed softly.

  I wanted to cry, but my throat choked up. I couldn’t produce more than a stifled whisper. I don’t know where I found the strength to go on, but I knew I couldn’t give up.

  “Tell me everything about him. What was his name? Who were his parents? What tribe did he belong to? People sometimes think I’m from the tribe of Benjamin. Was he one of them?”

  When I heard her answer, I lost my footing. I had never been so shocked in my life.

  “I don’t know.”

  “What … what do you mean?”

  “I don’t know who your father is.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “You’re a grown man now, Shelomoam; it’s time you understood such things. Life doesn’t always follow the customary patterns. It was a different time. We lived in the rebels’ cave. Just imagine: hundreds of young men and a few girls spending a great deal of time together in a crowded cave. They eat together, train together, bathe together, and sleep together. I was with many men; I can’t even remember how many. Was he from the tribe of Benjamin? Perhaps. Most of the men in the cave were from Ephraim and Benjamin, but there were others, too. The fact that you’re tall and handsome means nothing. Most of them were big and strong. That’s how it goes; thin, weak men prefer to live quietly and not get involved with rebellions. I remember one giant from the tribe of Dan. We called him Samson the Hero, after the ancient giant from the same tribe who fought against the Philistines. There was another giant of a man, let me try to remember … he was from Gilead. Did you know that the men of Manasseh are also tall and handsome? But they say the most impressive men come from—”

  I don’t know whether I screamed or held my tongue. I plugged my ears to stop her words from continuing to cut into my body. I had no idea where I was. I tried to flee, but my feet got caught on the rug.

  She got up from the bed and reached out her hands. I shoved her, and she fell on her back.

  I grabbed the wall and walked toward the doorway. Before I left I turned to face her one last time.

  “Whore,” I stretched out the one syllable, spewing it out like vomit. “Whoooore! I won’t let you touch me with those impure hands.”

  Nine

  Once again, I was alone in the world. But as opposed to when I first left my family and felt like I was suffocating, this time I felt no need of the company of others. I wanted to be alone, which seemed to be my natural state. The whole ride, I was lost in thoughts of rage toward the woman who birthed me, toward my adoptive parents, and even toward Elisheba. Now that I had discovered that she wasn’t really my sister, I actually felt even deeper embarrassment over my feelings for her. I tried not to think of the friends I had left behind either. They should feel indebted to me for everything they learned from me, and I owe them nothing more. Only Tirzah still aroused searing guilt and agonizing longing in me, but pleasant thoughts about the army dulled the pain.

  A few hours later, I reached Gibeah, the capital of the land of Benjamin. Continuing on to Jerusalem in the dark would
be difficult, so I decided to stop for the night. I wasn’t deterred by the frightening stories spread about the city by the Judeans. Bilhah, the woman who raised me, told me those stories throughout my childhood so that I would learn not to believe them. She was especially angered by the story that depicted the dwellers of Gibeah as bloodthirsty wolves who once demanded that a kindhearted man from Ephraim surrender to them a pair of guests who had taken shelter in his house. The man did his best to protect his guests, but the wolves of Benjamin grabbed the woman, a Judean woman, and tortured her all night long, until she finally died.

  “Stories are more dangerous than swords.” Bilhah repeated this statement every chance she got. “Swords can only harm those standing right in front of them, while stories determine who will live and who will die in future generations. The Judeans want us to loathe Benjamin and think of Gibeah as Sodom so that we’ll stop longing for our first king.”

  I was angry with myself for failing to wipe away these memories from my childhood. I need to look ahead and stop dwelling on the past. Tomorrow I will be standing at the gates of Jerusalem, opening a promising new chapter in my life as a strong, independent, formidable man, and my troubled childhood will disappear like a fleeting dream.

  * * *

  The first guesthouse I saw at the entrance to Gibeah looked fairly derelict, but I decided I shouldn’t be picky. All I needed was some feed for Aner, a warm meal for myself, and a bed for the night. I greeted the owners, an elderly couple, and asked them to set their price in advance. I didn’t want any surprises. I negotiated aggressively and only after we reached an agreement did I tell them to take Aner into the barn. The year and a half I’d spent with the gang had made me a suspicious and assertive man, someone that nobody would dare cheat. I liked that about myself.

  “I thought you were a local,” the woman said, trying to make conversation as she served me my dinner. “Until I heard your sh.”

  I chewed in silence. I didn’t feel like being friendly to anyone.

  My bed was comfortable and clean. I fell asleep instantly. When I woke up, the sun was already in the middle of the sky, but I didn’t care. I’d needed that rest. I would be in Jerusalem in just a few hours presenting myself for the army examinations, and I needed to be at full strength.