“Go to noon formation without me. I have to take care of this fellow you saved.”
“This time, let’s skip formation, Commander,” Ithiel said firmly. “We want to hear who this man is and why you’ve been hiding him in the tunnels.”
“Go to formation!” Hadad said, but his decisive tone couldn’t quite mask a curious hesitancy. Now I was certain that he was just putting on an act.
The soldiers, too, must have sensed their commander’s hesitation, and they immediately joined Ithiel in his protest, demanding an explanation for my puzzling presence. They argued that there would be no harm in putting off the formation or even canceling it in light of the situation. The Mad Princess wouldn’t notice anyway. The derogatory nickname was spoken naturally, without a hint of embarrassment, as if they were saying, “Her Royal Highness the Princess.”
Eventually, Hadad had to use all the power of his authority to send his soldiers to their formation, but not before promising to tell them everything about me in the next few days.
Only after their departure did he allow the muscles of his face to relax. I asked him if we would be going back down now, and he replied that I could have used another six months in the tunnels, but now that everything was out in the open we had no choice but to continue my training in the palace. I was surprised to learn that it had been only half a year since the torture that Hadad euphemistically called training had begun.
The three servants led me into an elegant washroom, its walls made of shiny ceramic blocks and adorned with silken sheets. They scrubbed my skin with tiny grains of sand, washed me with warm water, and anointed me with lotions. I realized that I hadn’t felt the luxurious sensation of warm water on my body for two years already, ever since I had permanently left the home of the couple who raised me and joined the gang in Shiloh. I stood there, stiff as a statue, and thought to myself that they could just as easily have bathed me in melted ice or boiling water—I’d lost all feeling anyway.
It was only when they combed my beard that I paid attention to the fact it had been short and stubbly when I’d first entered the tunnels, while now it was thick and full, dark brown in color, just like my long hair, which flowed past my shoulders. When, for the first time in my life, I donned the uniform I’d so craved to wear in the past, a flicker of excitement ran through me, but I knew it was nothing more than a pale shadow of my wild emotions from the old days.
Hadad stared at me, wide-eyed. I thought I was going to get a compliment, but instead he walked over and felt my arm like a cattle merchant examining the goods. “Too thin,” he declared.
“For someone who’s spent the past half year eating only grass and bread, and sometimes, as a special treat, a young foal, I think I look pretty good.”
“From now on, you’ll eat like a king and put some meat on those bones.” He tried to laugh but instead said something I wasn’t expecting: “You’re the most handsome man I’ve ever seen.”
When we’d first met, I would have been willing to give up half my beauty in exchange for a compliment from him, but now I was indifferent to it.
About an hour later, his three servants walked in to announce that the Mad Princess was ready. I realized that I was finally going to meet her and tried to muster up a little curiosity, but what I felt was more like anger.
“What’s the rush? I’ve barely gotten used to daylight, and you’re already taking me to her?”
Only later, after my emotions returned, did I identify that moment as the turning point. I hadn’t yet realized at that time that it was my anger, more than a clean body or an elegant uniform, that heralded my return to the family of man.
“A rule is a rule, Shelomoam. Anyone who comes here must present himself before the lady of the palace.”
His voice was soft, so different from the commanding tone I was used to. It was strange to hear him call me by name. He’d called me kid before we got to the tunnels, and while he was torturing me he called me nothing.
“I’ve been here for half a year,” I said bitterly. “Now you remember?”
He hushed me sharply. “No one needs to know how long we were down there.”
“You promised the soldiers you’d tell them everything.”
He twisted his face in contempt. “The only soldier here is you. The others are nothing but toy soldiers.”
“Toy soldiers or not, they were able to uncover your tunnels, and now they’re expecting an explanation.”
“Don’t you dare tell them anything.”
“But—”
“Stop stalling. The Mad Princess is waiting for us.”
Twelve
The old woman who sat across from me had a skinny neck and an unbent spine, and she wore her white hair in a tight bun. Her slim body was wrapped in a blue silk dress, and a delicate golden crown adorned her head. She was missing one thing, though: a sparkle in her eyes.
But in spite of her hollow gaze, the remnants of her beauty were still apparent. The woman who had once been considered one of the five wonders of the world remained noble and impressive in spite of her age and insanity.
I stood at attention, hypnotized by her vacant eyes. I waited for Hadad to introduce me, but he stood behind me and didn’t open his mouth. I turned to look at him and signaled for him to say something. His expression seemed odd to me, as if he were undergoing an exciting experience. He nodded and said nothing.
I turned back to the Mad Princess and knelt before her. “Your Highness,” I said, searching for the right words. “I am Shelomoam, your faithful and devoted servant.”
“Stop that nonsense,” Hadad grunted from behind me. “She can’t understand a thing.”
“Then why did you bring me to her?”
“Rules are rules. Now let’s give you a tour of the palace. Your new friends will be surprised to discover what a handsome fellow was hiding behind those rags.”
I felt a strange affinity for her, perhaps because of the remnants of her legendary beauty that were still apparent on her face, or maybe it was the way she held her neck. But that same night, as her horrifying screams echoed through the palace, my affinity transformed into revulsion. I buried my head in the blanket and tried not to listen to the insistent pleading of Ithiel, the redhead with the striking eyes who had led the group of soldiers that found me in the tunnels and brought me up to the palace:
“Come on out! You’ve never seen anything like it.”
“She doesn’t interest me.”
“You cannot live in this palace and not experience the spectacle.”
I knew what I was about to see, but it shocked me anyway. When Hadad had told me about the candles, I’d been sure he was exaggerating. I never imagined that one shriveled old woman could possibly light thousands of candles by herself, and I couldn’t comprehend how such a tiny body was able to produce screams like that.
“Why does she light them in groups of seven?” I asked, trying to shout over the deafening noise.
Ithiel shrugged. “Who can say what goes through the sick mind of a mad old woman.”
In spite of my feeling of revulsion, there was something captivating about her. I felt as though I was participating in some kind of terrifying ritual being performed by a witch who had risen from the underworld and was threatening to incinerate us all.
* * *
My days in the Palace of Candles passed pleasantly, though I didn’t like the training exercises we performed for the hollow-eyed Mad Princess every morning. Sometimes I felt like her gaze was focused on me, but when I looked back at her, I could see only a vacant stare. In general, I actually enjoyed the training even though I worked harder than most of the other soldiers. They were perfectly satisfied with silly drills and waving fancy weapons around in a theatrical manner, but Hadad trained me in actual combat, which often came along with some deep cuts. Only then did I begin to see the value in his torture. I found that I had complete control over my body, as well as my soul, and I was able to will myself into a state of icy calm. One mo
ment I was a normal person—living, breathing, feeling—and a moment later I was an insensate statue. My sparring partners lost their heads anytime a sword pierced their skin, while I would watch my blood trickling out of me and calmly fight on.
The only challenging partner I had was Ithiel. Hadad was chilly toward him and held him at a distance, but he had to admit that, compared to the pathetic toys all around us, this fellow was the closest thing to a soldier one could find in the Palace of Candles. His impressive abilities did not stem from natural talent alone. Most of the soldiers came here having grown up as peasants and never saw a sword up close before they were inducted into the army, but swords were commonplace for Ithiel. As a member of the royal family—the grandson of the previous king and nephew of the current king—he had received military training and learned to use all kinds of weapons. When I first found this out, I wasn’t sure what impressed me more—the fact that he was a prince or the fact that he was from Judah, the tribe I had been brought up to fear.
“Should I bow to you?” I asked the question in all seriousness, without a hint of irony.
“Of course,” he said, giving me his enchanting smile. “And preferably with your head all the way to the ground, like a slave.”
I later asked Hadad why he was put off by Ithiel. There was nothing to fear; just because he was the king’s nephew didn’t mean he was an informant. Hadad seemed shocked by the question and insisted firmly that he had nothing to hide from the king. Everything in the Palace of Candles occurred with his knowledge. Besides, he feared only his god Qos and nothing else, certainly not a subordinate soldier, no matter what his lineage.
I knew Hadad was lying, but I preferred to pretend that I believed him. And contrary to his explicit counsel, I deepened my friendship with Ithiel. I had never had a friend before. I wasn’t truly close even with the members of my gang in Shiloh, whom I had called friends. They viewed me as their leader, not their equal. Ithiel had a power of attraction of his own. He didn’t need someone to look up to and to tell him what to do. For the first time in my life, I was able to form a bond of love and affection with a young man like me, and this made me happy and gave me a sense of confidence. I gave him much of the credit for the relatively rapid recovery of my spirits from my tribulations in the tunnels.
Nonetheless, there were things I kept buried deep inside. I told him honestly about leaving Zeredah, meeting Tirzah, and the shameful acts I’d performed as the leader of the gang of thieves in Shiloh. I didn’t even conceal my stinging defeat at the hands of the thugs at Gibeah. But his questions about my family ran into a wall of silence.
For his part, he kept nothing from me. I inhaled his vivid descriptions of life in the palace. Again and again, I asked to hear about the royal visits and glamorous balls. I especially enjoyed his amusing story about the visit of the wise Queen of Kush, who had tried to embarrass the king by presenting him with difficult questions and riddles designed to trip him up, but in the end she had declared that there was no one wiser in all the world.
My friendship with Ithiel filled me with pride. There I was, the helpless little boy who’d spent his life hiding in a thicket out of fear of the king and his soldiers, walking confidently through the king’s own palace and building a close bond with his nephew. I liked to imagine the faces of Bilhah and Benaiah when they found out where I was and with whom I was fraternizing. It wouldn’t be long before I would have a chance to see their horror up close, when I would visit them in uniform.
The love I felt for my new friend deepened when he told me about his parents. I asked him why he was wasting his military skills in the Palace of Candles, and he replied painfully that he wasn’t permitted to serve in the army like the rest of the princes because, prior to his mother’s death, the king had promised to protect his life at all costs. He’d been only a month old when his father was murdered at the altar by one of the priests, having come to the Tabernacle to offer a sacrifice to his God. The murderer was executed that very day, but that didn’t make things any easier for the young widow. Though the generous king had offered her a comfortable life in his palace, her grief for her husband had been more powerful than wealth, and within only a few months her agonized soul was returned to her Creator. Ithiel was less than a year old when he became an orphan.
When I heard his story, I felt both sorry for him and jealous of him at the same time. I was sorry for his orphanhood and his pain, but I couldn’t help but think about the sense of security that can be felt only by a person who understands his roots and knows where he belongs. I wanted to tell him how jealous I was in order to lift his spirits, but I realized that a too-hasty confession might prompt investigations and inquiries that would force me to pick at my wounds and reveal my secrets. I also didn’t know how he would react to the shameful revelation that the two people who’d given birth to me had participated in a foolish rebellion against his deceased grandfather. As a result, I had to make do with a tight hug and a few standard words of consolation and act as though this latest story meant nothing more to me than the rest of the stories of his life in the palace.
Thirteen
Ithiel invited me to join him and spend our time off together celebrating the Festival of Freedom in the king’s palace. The thought of personally meeting members of the royal family was so exciting that I could barely wait for the moment to arrive. But Hadad found out about the plan and forbade me from accepting the invitation. He argued vehemently that I mustn’t meet the king before I was ready for the examinations, and that if I tried to take shortcuts I might end up out of the army. Thus, instead of enjoying a dinner of unleavened bread and roasted meats at the king’s table, I found myself in the crush of a crowd, standing with Ithiel in the Temple courtyard. Whenever I caught sight of the Temple, the splendor of it pained me just as it had the first time I’d seen it, even though I knew the brainwashing I’d gone through as a child was a disease. I was surprised to hear that Ithiel was under the impression that the laws of the king were obeyed throughout the land, and that all tribes took care to offer sacrifices only in Jerusalem. Amused, I described the speed with which the tribal priests would dismantle their altars before the king’s soldiers arrived and reassemble them when they left. When I saw that Ithiel was entertained by my description, I told him that the people of Ephraim did not celebrate the Festival of Ingathering.
“Why not?” he asked in shock.
“Because it’s a Judean holiday. Each tribe has its own special holiday.”
“And when is the holiday of Ephraim?”
“On the fifteenth day of the eighth month.”
“What holiday is that?”
“The Festival of Rain.”
“Sounds nice. How do you celebrate?”
I was about to correct his use of pronouns and point out that I wasn’t a member of the tribe of Ephraim, but I suddenly felt my false tribal identity returning to take hold of me and speak for me. At that point, I realized that if the conversation went on any further, we might arrive at the one subject I didn’t want to discuss with Ithiel or with anyone else, not even myself. But instead of being evasive, which was my specialty, I allowed myself to be pulled into reminiscences from childhood. In the blink of an eye, I was once again that little boy dancing in the fields on his father’s shoulders, feeling totally secure in his sense of belonging.
“We aren’t allowed to celebrate the Festival of Rain,” I said, surprised by the bitter tone in my voice. “Your uncle has banned the unique holidays of each and every one of the tribes of Israel.”
“He wants the nation of Israel to become a unified people,” Ithiel said, as if quoting a slogan that he himself didn’t believe.
I laughed with open contempt. “He wants the nation of Israel to become the nation of Judah. That’s what he wants.”
Within a few hours, Hadad had heard about our conversation. Grave faced, he led me into his room and ordered me to sit down opposite him. I could tell that I was about to be given a long lecture. And indeed,
he started with an insulting rebuke over my lack of self-control and demanded that I stop chattering about my childhood and keep my tribal opinions to myself. I was getting tired of his patronizing attitude and goaded him further by declaring that Ithiel was my good friend and that I intended to discuss anything I wanted with him.
“Not good,” muttered Hadad as he glanced quickly around, as if someone could hear us in the closed room. “I thought you were smarter than that. Just a little more chatter and all our work will be as good as gone. Instead of the army, you’ll find yourself in prison. Do you think the king will appoint an army commander who bad-mouths his laws and reminisces publicly about the holidays of Ephraim? Promise me that from now on you will keep your big mouth shut and stop yourself from pouring your heart out to anyone else.”
“I don’t want to make that promise. I like pouring my heart out.”
“Then eliminate that pleasure from your life. I’ve given you a special power that only a chosen few can ever experience. You have complete control over your body, over your desires, over your thoughts, and even over your pleasures.”
“Ithiel is the only person I can trust. Before I met him, I never had a true friend in the world. Everyone I ever trusted betrayed me. Everything I ever believed was a lie. Even you weren’t honest with me. You promised to take me to the Palace of Candles, but instead you buried me in the tunnels. Had it not been for Ithiel, I’d still be there today. I won’t give up our friendship.”
His high forehead was covered with perspiration. His fingers were trembling. He held his head in his hands and said nothing. All of a sudden he got up, walked over to me, and brought both his hands up. I thought he was about to squeeze my face between his hands, like he used to do in the tunnels. I was preparing my body to go into its frozen state when I felt a tender touch, not intense pressure, against my cheeks. The only thought that went through my mind at that moment had to do with the strange sense of security I felt when I was around him. Even at our worst times, in the initial days of the torture, before I’d learned how to freeze my body, even then, I never doubted his love for a moment.
The Secret Book of Kings: A Novel Page 10