The Stones of My Accusers

by Tracy Groot

  Joab held the curtain aside for Jorah, and she stepped meekly past him into the room. He himself felt a wave of awkwardness. Alone in a room with a girl, a pretty girl at that. All night! His father would’ve laid out his hide like a—but he stopped short at the faces of Theron and Marina.

  They sat at the kitchen table with the most perplexing looks on their faces. They gazed at Joab and Jorah with . . . pure delight. They beamed. They radiated joy. He could have groaned out loud. What they thought couldn’t be plainer than a thump on the head.

  “Feeling better, Jorah?” Marina practically sang. Marina was never this sweet. She looked from Jorah to Joab and . . . sighed! Theron gazed with pride at them, as if he’d just given his blessing for marriage. Joab slipped a look at Jorah. What could she be thinking?

  “Yes, thank you,” she said to Marina. “It must have been a sun spell.”

  “Of course it was,” Marina crooned, and on her way to the kitchen she gave Jorah’s chin a quick caress. “Hungry? I have some bread and mashed olives . . . sit, both of you. You’re probably starving.”

  “Cousin Thomas . . . ,” Jorah said.

  “He’s fine. I told him you were fine, you’d had a spell and were resting. I told him you would spend the night here.”

  “Thank you,” Jorah murmured, and sent a furtive glance to Joab. No, she didn’t catch on. She didn’t know them well enough.

  She had no idea Theron and Marina had just paired her with him. Insane laughter threatened to burst from his throat. He swallowed it down and escorted her to the table, where Theron waited with that dancing, knowing look. Joab bit back the groan and went to take a seat across from Jorah. It was then he noticed what sat in the middle of the dining table. A silver box. Inlaid with lapis lazuli.

  Unwrapped. Open to the sight of its former owner.

  He could feel her eyes. He could feel her wonder, and her accusation. And he loathed her, then, because he could never explain why he took it. She would never understand, because he didn’t either. Flaming with self-consciousness, he reached for the cloth the box sat on and pulled it to him. He wrapped the box and tucked it under his arm.

  “I’m not hungry,” he muttered, and left the room.

  It was late morning, and the apprentice had not returned. Well, and when he did, he’d come home to another new apprentice.

  There was no place on earth like his workroom. More sacred than a synagogue. More comfortable than his bed. Here Theron lived and moved and had his being. Yes, Joab slept on the pallet in the corner. It made Theron put up a screen there for privacy. Theron’s privacy. He did not want to see a pallet in his workroom, it didn’t belong. To see a screen was better, it reminded him of a blank pavement waiting for a coat of mortar.

  “This is . . . this is . . .” Jorah was speechless.

  It delighted Theron to his sandal tips. Jorahs were few and far between in this business.

  She had unwrapped the four tiles he was bringing to the palace this afternoon and arranged them on the floor. Correctly, and he watched to see if she would. She stood back to gaze on them, hands clasped, the fever light in her eyes. The idiots who took themselves to his door did not have the fever light. They had the money light. They knew what a perfect mosaic went for. They knew the fame of the few. They knew nothing.

  “You like the design?”

  “Oh, Theron,” Jorah breathed.

  These were no ordinary tiles. They were his ribbon tiles. It was a pattern he had conceived of when he was a child and perfected along the way. He was waiting for the perfect place for installation, and a walkway could not have been more perfect. The design was as if a flock of children had run on ahead, each trailing a different colored ribbon behind. It was smooth, it streamed, it sinuously overlapped. It beguiled one along and would make the walker wonder where the ribbon trail led. Of course, he would have to add at least eighteen tiles for the length Orion proposed, but what was that? Only a chance for the walker to wonder some more. He only wished the walkway would turn a corner. What drama in that. He’d like to go to heaven like that, treading a mosaic of ribbon.

  He came next to Jorah to point out the golden ribbon in the design. “Because we are on the payroll of the Roman government, this will run throughout. A single thread of it through the entire walkway. You see the way it moves? Thin strips of lead will outline each ribbon. The tricky part is where the ribbons overlap. The intersecting strips will—”

  “What sets the little tiles?” She folded her arms and strolled around the mosaic.

  “Tesserae. The little tiles are called tesserae.”

  “Tesserae.” She tried out the word. “What sets them?”

  Lovesick, Theron sighed. “Between them, grout. Beneath them, mortar. Three layers of foundation.”

  “Which are . . . ?”

  “Vitrubius says, and I usually agree, the first layer is pebble. Gives a good solid base. The second is mortar mixed with brick. Third is a thin layer of finely ground brick with fine mortar—run from anyone who tells you differently. Into this layer, the tesserae are set. Joab is probably off looking for red right now. Said he found a cache of red rocks.” He peered sharply for any reaction at the name of Joab.

  But Jorah crouched next to the tiles and placed her palm flat on the surface. Didn’t move her hand, simply rested it there. Theron forgot Joab and watched in wonder. It was himself he was seeing, so many years ago.

  “I can’t thank you enough for letting me work here.” She glanced at him. “I have heard of you all my life, of course. I even visited here with my father when I was small, before you had the mosaic out front. I never imagined I would work here one day.”

  It had been a long time since he’d had a Jorah in his shop. There was that young Junius who came from Cyprus to study with him. Arrogant knucklehead. He had talent and he knew it, though that didn’t bother Theron. It was his presumption. Thought he could bypass technique and go straight for design. Cared more about popular pattern. Theron could not mash it into the idiot’s head, and God knows he tried, that technique was all part of it. Technique was the . . . roaring of the volcano, the fury and the flow. What was boring about foundation? What was boring about the consistency of mortar or the substance of a tessera? Part and parcel! Like it or get out of the business! Go lay bricks for all your talent is worth. You want to learn, then learn, and learn it all. Tear your nails digging for the perfect pebble. Bloody your knuckles. Starve to save every pruta you can to set sail and study with the best. The best, and if you settle for less you deserve it. Cheat and charm and commit glorious atrocity to learn the craft and own your talent, and if ever a thought comes to make money at this . . . if it ever enters your mind, then go lay your bricks and stop wasting my time.

  Sure, the money was nice. Theron liked money. But it usually came as a pleasant surprise, a vague thing at the end of it all. Many of the woodenheads saw only money, that and popular pattern to get the money. Only pattern, never technique, ninety-nine out of ninety-nine of them. But the way Jorah was looking at it now . . . she saw the mosaic entire. She saw surface and foundation at the very same time. By the bit of wildness in her eyes he knew how her brain was working—it was in a galloping fever with thoughts and ideas of her own. She gazed at the pattern, creativity crashing with creativity, and from the flying sparks would come brand-new marvels. She couldn’t wait to snatch a slate and a piece of chalk and sketch her own designs. A young Dioskurides is what he saw. A young Theron. He sniffed, and roused himself.

  “A denarius a week, to begin,” he growled. “We did not speak of terms.”

  She pulled her gaze from the mosaic to him.

  What was that troubled look? Did she wonder where her Joab was? What on earth did she see in him? He would never be a mosaicist. He nearly spoke this out loud, but Marina said go carefully. Not a word, Theron. He pressed his lips firmly.

  Jorah’s face, momentarily troubled, now cleared and she nodded. “A denarius. That is more than reasonable. It is . . . very gener
ous.”

  “You can expect it weekly.”

  Jorah rose. She looked at him uncertainly. “I don’t understand.”

  Theron went to get the mortar buckets. First lesson, mortar. He never forgot how disappointed Junius was when he pulled out the buckets instead of the pattern plates.

  “I will be paid weekly, meaning so will you.” Theron grinned at her. “Benefits of studying at the school of Sossus in Alexandria. It means they pay me however I want. I usually work it half now, half later, but I prefer a steady income. That doesn’t happen often in this business.”

  The maiden was still confused. He set the buckets on the table, glancing at her as he reached for the box with the stirring sticks. “What don’t you understand?”

  “You are going to pay . . . me?”

  Theron of Caesarea stopped rummaging for stirring sticks and lifted his head. He chuckled. Chuckled some more, then put his head back to laugh. He’d dance a jig if his gut didn’t hold him to the earth. When he quit laughing he wiped his eyes. Jorah was smiling a bewildered smile. He pointed a stirring stick at a bucket. “Lesson number one. Mortar.”

  She quickly moved to grab the bucket. “Mortar.”

  “A mosaic is only as good as its foundation, I don’t care what the pattern is. Pattern will—” He broke off suddenly and eyed her sideways. “You know what? Sometimes I dream in mosaic.”

  Jorah gasped. “So do I!” They grinned at one another until Theron felt ridiculous. He took the mortar bucket from her.

  “Don’t worry about pattern right now. Forget pattern. For the next few days you’re gonna slop mortar until you know each flavor blindfolded. You think I’m joking? An artist works with all his senses.” Her eyes were so wide, so eager, she’d be spooning into the first batch if he didn’t stop her. “I am joking. Do not eat my mortar.”

  “I won’t eat it.” Then, grinning, she said, “Can I taste it?”

  He laughed himself helpless until a mystified Marina peeked in at the curtain flap.

  “There’s someone here for you. He’s not a customer.” Kyria let the beads fall into place.

  Not a customer? Who would it be? Orion Galerinius? Rivkah snorted and dipped the brush into the charcoal mixture. She adjusted the bronze mirror and pulled back the corner of her eye. She lined her lower lid, dipped again and lined the upper. She paused as she considered who might be at the door; maybe another sent from Zakkai. He had an odd way of atoning for his sin—he tried to convert her from her own.

  Not that he had ever once shown up himself. And she wasn’t supposed to know these Zealots were from him. A year or so ago she had asked one straight out, “Did Zakkai send you?” The lad about choked on his tongue.

  Ah, it wasn’t their fault. Some of them were genuinely concerned. They had some sort of . . . mitzvah to try and change reprobates from wicked ways. She had fun with one and said, with much wide-eyed innocence, “But my little honeycake, I like what I do.” Then she gave him a pinch. He went crimson as a couch cushion and all but ran away. She had felt a weensy bit bad about that. He cared, or seemed to. And he was different from the rest. He was Zadok ben Zakkai . . . Nathanael’s own half brother. The irony was they had been friends since childhood. Neither knew common blood flowed in their veins.

  She sat back and gazed at the mirror. That was going to change. She had decided it one afternoon at Nathanael’s tree. Nathanael had to know, it was his right. It didn’t matter about Zadok, he was Zakkai’s concern. But why did it take her this long to decide to tell Nathanael? Why this need to protect Zakkai? Why did his sin have to be covered? It had taken a long time to realize she had been the one seduced. The realization brought at least a bitter comfort.

  She would tell him. Nathanael was smart, he may have figured it out by now. Or maybe he had been near his grandmother during one of her drunken slops. In a wine-soaked minute she may have let slip that the priest Zakkai was Nathanael’s father.

  “Rivkah! Get the door!”

  “I’m coming!” she snapped.

  She pushed through the hanging beads and went to the door, glaring at Kyria on the way. Kyria slouched on the couch, picking at a pastry.

  “You’re going to plump up like a ball of dough,” Rivkah sneered.

  “Shut up. Cat eyes.”

  Rivkah pulled open the door and groaned. Sure enough, he had to be from Zakkai. Real customers did not come at this time of day, late in the morning. She leaned against the doorway. She already knew the Ezekiel passage, better than he did.

  “You are Rivkah?”

  “Yes. Are you going to quote me Ezekiel?”

  “I—I’ve been looking for you for a long time.” The boy could not look her in the eye. None of them could. “Someone at the inn told me where to find you.”

  “You found me. Why don’t you do a little dance for me while you quote it, that would be new.” Maybe he was a customer, though small chance. She didn’t remember seeing this one at the tavern. If they were potential customers sometimes they hung about in twos and threes, observing her and goading each other to violate the tradition of their fathers. At least the Jewish ones did. Not many Gentiles had moral dilemmas over it. Except Orion.

  He had long scraggly hair, all one length, and didn’t wear a grimlet around it. She sniffed. Nathanael wouldn’t be found dead without his grimlet. This boy did not have much sense of style.

  “Look, lad, I have a relatively new policy. I don’t do anyone my son’s age or younger.” The boy went red as a berry. Rivkah sighed. “Quote me Ezekiel and leave.”

  Instead, he pushed a bundle at her. She took it in surprise.

  “What’s this?” she demanded. He was already backing away.

  “That’s for you. It was . . . meant for you.”

  She swiftly set it on the ground and kicked it to him. “No thanks. I don’t take anything from someone I don’t know. Another new policy.”

  The lad first stared, dumbfounded, then scrambled for the bundle. He held it to his chest, clearly unsure what to do next. She could not shut the door on him yet, this whole thing was just too crazy.

  She tilted her head. “Will you just quote Ezekiel and get out of here?”

  “What does it say?”

  “‘Repent and turn away from all your transgressions, so that iniquity may not become a stumbling block to you. Cast away from you all your transgressions which you have committed and make yourselves a new heart and a new spirit!’ You want me to say it in Hebrew?”

  His face changed. This lad was too young to look so bleak.

  “Those words are not possible,” she thought she heard him say. Louder he said, “That’s not why I’m here.” He looked down at his bundle. “I’m here to give you this.”

  “I don’t want it.”

  “You don’t know what it is. A treasure, such as you’ve never imagined.”

  “It could be poisoned. That happened to some women in Jerusalem, you know. They were given poisoned perfume for payment. Seven died. You haven’t heard about that? You could be a crazy out to rid the world of prostitution.” A smile twitched. She was enjoying this, because interesting things like this didn’t happen. The lad didn’t have crazy in his eyes, nor Ezekiel. Nobody came to give a gift and expect nothing in return.

  He unwrapped the bundle and held it out to her. Her smile faded.

  It was a silver box, a beautiful thing. It was inset with stones so deeply blue they could only be lapis. “That must be a bribe. Is Zakkai up for temple service?”

  “I don’t know anything about that.”

  “Invite him in,” Kyria called from behind her. “That will get rid of him.”

  “Shut up,” Rivkah said over her shoulder. She tucked her hair behind her ear as she turned back to him. The lad had a strange look on his face. It was . . . full. Saturated with something he felt deeply. Perplexing as the look was, it made her uncomfortable, and that made her edgy.

  Rivkah darted a glance into the street. The box gleamed in a bit of sunlight.
The young fool didn’t know this was the wrong part of town to flaunt a thing like that.

  “Nathanael—”

  Her eyes snapped to his. “What about Nathanael? You know Nathanael?”

  He was pale. He did not answer, did not look at her.

  The door went wider. Kyria was at her side. “What do you know about Nathanael?” she demanded.

  “This is from him,” the lad replied.

  Kyria went and snatched the box, glaring at the boy as she handed it to Rivkah, whose hands trembled as she took it.

  “Where is he?” Kyria asked.

  The question startled him. He pulled his gaze from the box. “It’s—a gift. From Nathanael.” He began to back away. “I’m sorry.”

  “What are you sorry about?” Kyria demanded. “Where is he?”

  But he turned and ran.

  “Wait!” she shouted. She started after him, but Rivkah grabbed her arm.

  “Kyria. It’s from Nathanael.” The cloth wrapping dropped to the ground, and she turned the box in every direction. She worked off the lid and looked inside, then replaced it. “It’s from my boy. A gift from my baby.”

  Kyria frowned after the lad. “What is he sorry about?” Then she moved to block the view of the box from any potential thieves. “Let’s get it inside before someone wants your baby’s gift.” She bent to snatch the dropped cloth, then they went inside and Kyria shut the door. “You ever see him before?”

  Rivkah shook her head, staring in wonder at the box. What a beautiful thing. What a lovely thing.

  Kyria frowned. “Nobody gives you a box like that. Nobody just comes to your door and says here, have this. All that lapis? It must be worth a hundred denarii.” She went to the couch and dropped to her stomach. “He says it’s from Nathanael, but says nothing about him. He runs away. What is that? Seven kinds of odd, Rivkah.” She cocked her head and one eyebrow came up. “I will say he was nice looking. You think you’re too old for him, but I’m not. Maybe he’ll be back. And you have charcoal all over your face.”