Shadow of the Storm

by Connilyn Cossette

  Kiya and I shuffled along with the crowd as we moved toward the collection baskets. I was grateful my mother had been willing to watch Dov and Ari today; it would have been too easy for them to slip away in the confusion.

  The leather pouch around my waist missed the weight of my midwifery oils. Its current burden, a gold and turquoise necklace, might be more costly, but it was the smell of myrrh and frankincense and the earthy tang of herbs that were priceless in my estimation. I should return the supplies to Reva, but I feared the disappointment in her eyes.

  The donation baskets were nearly overflowing with gold, silver, copper mirrors, linens, rich cloth, jars of spices, and various other offerings. As I slipped my hand into my pouch to retrieve the necklace—a gift that really was from my mother—Kiya held a gift of her own over the basket.

  “What are you doing?” I snatched her wrist. Dangling from her hand was her mother’s necklace, given to her by Kiya’s father—a token of young love carved from brilliant lapis lazuli into Hathor’s image.

  “It is all right.” She dropped the treasure into the basket. “The memories of my mother are carved in my mind. I have no need of a false god in my tent. Perhaps the Levites might melt down the gold to use in the Mishkan.”

  “Are you sure?”

  Tears brimmed in her honey-gold eyes. “I am. In a way it is my mother’s contribution to Yahweh. I know it is what she would have done, had she the chance.”

  I set my own mother’s gift on top of the pile of treasures, wishing I had something to give. I owned nothing, and the only thing I had to offer—my work as a midwife—had been ripped away. Talia snuggled closer, nestling her cheek against my chest. Even if it was a temporary arrangement, having this baby against my skin was like a balm.

  Kiya reached over and stroked Talia’s hair. “She is so content here, close to you.”

  Without betraying how much pain that simple statement inflicted, I could do nothing but force a smile.

  Kiya dropped her hand to her stomach with a caress so fleeting I almost missed it. I had seen enough pregnant women in the last few months. Reva had told me I had a knack for divining which women were actually expecting and which were merely hopeful.

  Kiya was expecting.

  “It has been three weeks. Time to come back.” Reva’s blunt command startled me but, truth be told, only surprised me in that it had taken so long for her to deliver it.

  I continued gathering tiny white pearls of manna from the shin-deep patch I stood in. Usually Reva’s demands were enough to make me tremble and capitulate, but the image of Leisha’s blood on my hands colored my vision red. “I’m not ready yet, Reva. I don’t know that I ever will be.”

  “Shira. Look at me.”

  I straightened, tugging my wool mantle closer around my body and inhaling deeply of the sweet scent of manna to steady my resolve. The pink sky at Reva’s back had already begun to retreat, giving way to a cold morning sun.

  Her wrinkled face softened. “I know it hurts, my dear. I have been present for many hundreds of births and almost as many deaths. Childbirth is dangerous. As much as we hope every infant will be born safely, you will lose some. And you will lose mothers. Such is a product of the curse.”

  “I thought I was strong enough. You convinced me I was strong enough.” The sharp accusation escaped my mouth before I was able to temper my tone. I inhaled and exhaled until I was able to compose gentle words. “But my mother was right, and Miryam was right, I am unable to handle the emotional toll of what you do, in more ways than one.” I clutched the handle of my basket with two hands.

  “What did Miryam say to you?” Reva leaned forward.

  “The truth. That I was not strong enough to deal with the realities of midwifery.”

  “That is not true—”

  “Like my mother says, I have always had my head in the stars. I talked myself into believing that Yahweh made me to be a midwife—”

  “So you will throw away the gifts you were given? Turn away from the path you were only beginning to travel?”

  “It does not matter what you say, Reva. I will weave with Kiya and my mother and care for Ayal’s children until he marries again. It was selfish of me to walk away from my duty. Selfish and thoughtless. I hurt my mother, I hurt myself, and Leisha might have lived had I not interfered.”

  “That is not true, Shira. Laboring mothers bleed to death sometimes. It’s an unfortunate risk to giving birth.”

  I shook my head again. “No. I don’t believe you. Something happened. Perhaps if I had not shifted her—”

  “You saved that baby. Leisha would have died either way. Even the Egyptian surgeons, with all their knowledge, would not have been able to prevent her death. I could not have saved her either, the blood came too fast. There are only rare exceptions where the woman’s body compensates and the flow ceases. I cannot explain it, other than Yahweh wills it so. Only the giver of life has sovereignty over death.”

  “Perhaps that is true, but I won’t chance hurting another woman like that. Besides, Yahweh did not make me to be a midwife or he would have given me the ability to block out my emotions like you.”

  Anguish passed across her face, disproving my accusation and causing a swift dagger of guilt to wedge between my ribs. My words had wounded her. But she lifted her chin in defiance. “You may think that I am without feeling, my dear, but I have endured more grief than you can even comprehend. My husband died in the mud pits, suffocated in the muck after being caught under a wagon wheel.”

  She pressed a gnarled hand to her chest. “Within a month my two baby boys were thrown into the river by the Egyptians. My beautiful sons, two years old and six months, tossed to the crocodiles—” Her voice choked to a halt. But she recovered quickly, her spine straightening. “If I had given up, allowed the devastation to break me, Pharaoh would have won. Instead, it made me stronger, able to carry others’ burdens more easily on my own shoulders. And yet, it wasn’t until Miryam taught me midwifery that I fully comprehended just how strong I was.”

  Reva’s fine, silver hair floated on the morning breeze, making her appear almost as otherworldly as Mosheh. “There will always be storms, Shira. There will be loss in your life, sometimes devastating loss. But if you let the wind and the rain overcome you, then you will never fulfill the purpose for which you were born, the reason Yahweh gave you breath and brought you to this time, to this place. There will be times when there is nothing you can do but survive, to place one foot after the other into the driving rain.”

  Her thin lips flattened. “You can tuck your head under your wing for a while, Shira, and wait out this storm. But you will fly again.”

  23

  16 SHEVAT

  11TH MONTH OUT FROM EGYPT

  Side by side, Kiya and I worked the standing linen loom that Eben and Jumo had built from acacia wood. My mother usually worked it herself, her nimble hands fluttering across the warp threads like butterflies, but today her important task, weaving a long, intricate panel for the Mishkan gates, took precedence.

  My fingers ached. I stretched them wide, imagining how gnarled and pained they would be after a lifetime of separating fine flax threads to slide the shuttle through the gap, over and over again. The monotony of white on white seared my vision. I rubbed my knuckles against my bleary eyes and sighed. If only my fingers were more deft. Missed warp threads caused haphazard patterns, and I was forced to undo my stitches too many times, slowing our progress.

  “Do you need a stool?” Kiya’s patience with me was almost frustrating. I did not deserve it, especially when it was her body that was doing the work of creating new life.

  Shaking my head, I adjusted Talia on my back. At almost three months old, she was heavier by the day, and the sling dug into my collarbone. But determination was all I had to cling to today—I worked to absorb the pain instead of focusing on the burn and the jumble of questions that had followed me back from Ayal’s campsite.

  When I had gone to meet Dvorah t
his morning, I’d seen the two of them standing together, backs toward me, watching the boys play with a stick and a hoop. Dvorah placed a hand on his forearm, laughing over something Avi said. The movement seemed like a natural gesture, as if from a wife to her husband. Ayal did not flinch, but responded with a smile and a nod.

  I’d been trying to avoid my simmering resentment—and Ayal—since I had overheard Marah and Aiyasha discussing their marriage, but Dvorah’s gesture was like flint on stone, and my jealousy flared high.

  Ayal should not have even considered approaching me that day by the stream. Yet he had seemed so sincere in his esteem for me then, speaking of my bravery and his belief in my calling as a midwife. Had his words been true? Or simply the words of a man trying to seduce a stupid girl? A stupid girl still foolish enough to be jealous over a man who had betrayed her, a man who, according to his brothers’ wives, would soon be marrying another.

  If only I could end this fruitless fascination with the man whose low, gentle voice dredged up the memory of his kiss, along with fresh guilt, whenever I was in his presence.

  With a start, I realized Kiya was scrutinizing me, the corners of her mouth pulled down. Sometime during my musings over Ayal, my hands had ceased their motion. I mumbled an apology and pulled the weft thread taut.

  She placed a palm over the fabric, halting my progress. “Why are you here?”

  I cocked my head, startled by her abrupt question and still disoriented by the meandering path my thoughts had taken. She lifted an insistent brow.

  “I . . . I am where I am needed,” I stuttered.

  “We don’t need you to weave.”

  Stung, I flinched and dropped the shuttle. It rolled down my leg, unraveling into a tangle at my feet. “I want to help.”

  “Sweet sister, there are thousands of weavers in this camp.” Kiya’s hand swept a circle in the air. “Your hands are not made for this. They were made for delivering babies. You know it, and I know it. You are miserable.”

  “I will be fine.” I rubbed a thumb into my palm, wincing at the roughness of my skin. Reva had insisted that I massage oils into my hands every day. A midwife with rough hands was useless. Now they were cracked and dry from the flax, the goat hair, and the hot water in the dye-pots, no matter how much animal fat I administered. I missed my soft hands. My clean hands. Somehow, no matter how many times I scrubbed them, they still seemed covered in blood.

  With a graceless crouch so as not to upset Talia, I retrieved the shuttle from the ground and brushed off the dust. Untangling the weft, I wedged the wood between the threads again. “This is my place. I may not have your talent for weaving, but this is where I belong.”

  “But—”

  I shook my head, ending the conversation. “Let’s finish this section before Talia wakes. She will want to stretch her legs soon, and we must prepare for Shabbat.”

  She turned back to her work with a shake of her head, but it was not the last I would hear of her thoughts. Kiya was not one to keep her opinions to herself. But untangling my emotions was more of a task than weaving, and I had strength for only one endeavor this afternoon. We worked in silence, our movements slipping into familiar tandem as the white cloth slowly took form, top to bottom.

  Talia awakened and, after devouring the manna gruel I made for her, was content to lie on her back near the loom and gaze at the sky. She kicked at her wool blanket, grinning at the clouds. A surge of pure love welled in me—a foolish pride in a child that was not, and would never be, mine. She was a universe of beauty wrapped in a tiny package. Her black hair stuck straight up on her little head. Her eyes were gray, a bit like my own, but I suspected they would transform into that peculiar hazel like her mother’s.

  Ari and Dov flew into the campsite, startling Talia to tears with their loud chatter. I comforted her, thinking to chide them for their thoughtlessness, but with tender kisses they soothed her upset, and soon her toothless smile stretched wide for her brothers. They had seemed to take my admonition to protect their sister seriously and doted on her.

  “Abba let us come with him to the Mishkan!” Dov tugged at my sleeve. “We helped him dig holes.”

  “Oh, did you now? That sounds interesting.” I brushed his wild bronze curls back from his face.

  He nodded solemnly. “It was. I helped lift a big pole and put it in the ground.”

  “Is that so?”

  “Yes. And pretty soon Yahweh is going to smash down and hide inside the big tent.”

  I suppressed a giggle at his simplistic description of the Cloud, although none of us knew exactly what Mosheh meant by the statement that Yahweh would live among us.

  I tweaked his nose. “When you are an old grandfather, all wrinkled and gray, you can tell your great-grandchildren how you once dug a hole for the Mishkan and what a great responsibility that was.”

  Ari elbowed his brother with a glare. “I helped too.”

  I laughed and kissed Ari’s forehead. “And did you use those enormous muscles you showed me before?”

  Ari’s face brightened, and he grinned. “They are even bigger now!”

  “I do not doubt that one bit.”

  “Boys, why don’t you go wash your hands? Eben has invited us to stay tonight and take our Shabbat meal together.” Ayal spoke from close behind me, his low voice sending uninvited flutters through my stomach. Tension tightened my shoulders.

  The twins cheered and ran to join Shoshana and Zayna at the washing pot. I followed without looking back, grateful for the escape.

  Although visibly fatigued from weeks of working on the Mishkan, Eben, Jumo, and Ayal were relaxed and in high spirits before the meal. The three of them joked liked brothers, teasing and making light of one another, the promise of our weekly day of rest seeming to lift the cares from their strong shoulders. For slaves who had never enjoyed a moment of freedom in hundreds of years, the Shabbat was an invaluable gift, a beautiful reminder that the Creator cared for us.

  “I hope you didn’t hurt yourself again, stringing those harps,” Ayal teased Eben. “I know how grueling it must be. Those of us hefting logs and clearing boulders have little idea.”

  “And where do you think the wood comes from for those harps, lyres, and drums? I hefted just as many logs as you, my friend—with an injured hand.” Eben tapped a finger on his scarred palm for emphasis.

  “Perhaps.” Ayal scratched his chin, humor glistening in his light eyes. “But Jumo here—he truly endures the most back-breaking labor. All that painting and preparing dyes for the women . . .”

  Jumo stood behind Eben and Ayal, arms folded across his chest, which had grown in width substantially in the months since his healing. “I’ll have you know that I have a deep splinter from my paintbrush that refuses to come out, and my skin is permanently stained from the tekhelet dye.” He lifted his hands to reveal lavender palms.

  Ayal and Eben snickered, which provoked Jumo to slip his arms about their throats with a threat to throttle them both at the same time. Ari and Dov jumped into the fray, delighted that the men were tussling like little boys.

  My mother appeared, hands on hips and black eyes flashing in mock anger. “If the three of you do not go wash and quit acting like children, there will be no meal for you tonight.” She shooed them with fluttering hands.

  With the look of a chastened flock of sheep, they obeyed, but not without a few wayward elbows and insults.

  Ari and Dov, thinking my mother was serious in her rebuke, sidled close to me. Although I should have explained the joke and eased their concerns right away, I held them close to my sides for a few moments before doing so, memorizing the feel of their little bodies tucked under my arms, like a mother bird gathering her chicks close.

  How had I fallen so deeply in love with these boys? They were not my flesh and bone, yet it was as if they had been born from my own body. Cutting off my own hand would be a lesser pain than watching them call Dvorah ima.

  I was torturing myself by continuing this arrangemen
t, and possibly hurting the boys.

  For weeks after Leisha’s death, the boys had asked me where she was, as if not truly understanding what death meant. But even then the questions were strangely detached, as if Leisha was not a beloved mother, but simply a missing relative. As time passed, my suspicions about Leisha had grown. From her strange, contradictory manner during our first meeting, to the way Ayal’s family had outcasted her, to the apparent lack of mourning her children and her husband manifested—I wondered whether there had truly been something wrong with the woman.

  Regardless of the tight clench the boys and Talia had on my heart, they needed a mother. And if Dvorah was to fill that void, I must step aside. I had fulfilled my vow to Leisha and made sure that Talia was cared for. Dvorah was more than capable, even if she despised me. I would approach Ayal after the meal and tell him—tonight. The violent lurch of my stomach fought against my decision, even as the rightness of it settled into my bones. I was being selfish by not disentangling myself. I must snip the cords—now.

  Talia squawked from her blanket in the tent, awake after a short nap, no doubt demanding a change of swaddling. I rolled up the side wall and secured it, letting the afternoon sun spill inside. As soon as she was unwrapped, Talia waved her chubby legs and arms in the air, thrilled to be free. After wiping her clean, I left her unrestrained, content to watch her squirm and burble. Leisha was there in the shape of her eyes, the color of her hair, her creamy almond skin, the slope of her nose. I found myself searching for traces of Ayal and came up short. Strange to find no echo of her father in her features. Nevertheless, I hoped that he would see the beauty in this sweet baby and come to embrace her. Dvorah, brusque as she was with me, seemed to care for Talia. More than once I’d heard her whispering to the baby as she nursed, and I prayed she would love her, even if Ayal did not.

  Soon it would be Dvorah tending to Talia’s needs and finding joy in every subtle change of her face. I trailed a finger down that sweet face, singing a soft tune to distract myself from the thought. Talia rewarded me with a brilliant smile that twisted my decision into uncertainty. Another few days could not matter so much, could they?