Between the Wild Branches

by Connilyn Cossette

  He led me by the hand up around the other side of our tree, where the deep shadows had hidden a small tent pitched on flat ground. The narrow gap between woolen walls revealed that a lone oil lamp flickered inside, and even in the moonlight I could see garlands of flowers decorating the outside with delicate and fragrant blooms.

  “Oh . . .” I breathed out, enchanted. “Oh, Lukio.”

  “Shoshana,” he said, holding my face in his strong hands. “I have loved you since long before I understood what that meant. And although we were separated by distance and circumstances, that desire to be near you, to just be in your sweet presence, has never waned. I tease you about your freckles being stars”—he smoothed a gentle finger over my cheek, my forehead, down my nose, and around my lips—“but you have always been the brightest light in my sky. My lior, my friend, my love, and—after tonight—my wife.”

  “You mean for us to stay out here together?”

  He nodded. “I have enough provisions for us to remain at least three days, maybe even more if I’m not ready to give up having you all to myself.”

  “But the children—”

  “Are fine with Galit. She knows where to find us if there is a problem. And when we are ready, we’ll fetch them and take them to our new home together.”

  I was stunned that everyone had hidden this all so well from me and wondered if Galit hadn’t been asleep at all as I tiptoed through our dark room, trying not to wake her and the children.

  “Well then,” I said, tugging at his hand to lead him into the marriage tent he’d so sweetly prepared and feeling the last of my shattered pieces coming together into one beautiful whole. “I’ve wanted to call you my husband for more than a decade. Let’s not wait any longer, shall we?”

  Epilogue

  Natan

  1050 BC

  MITZPAH, ISRAEL

  The Philistines were almost here. Fire still burned on the watchtower perched on the ridge high above us, the flaming signal set alight a few hours prior, when messengers had run from the Ayalon Valley to warn Samuel that our enemies had amassed a huge number of chariots and were heading this way.

  I was unsurprised that the Philistines had taken this opportunity to attack because, for the first time in twenty years, the Ark of the Covenant was in plain sight of the people. Removed from my cave, in which it had been hidden for the past two years, it had been carefully brought here by the priests so it would be present the first time Yom Kippur was celebrated corporately since I was fifteen and the golden box was nearly stolen.

  Only yesterday we’d been fasting together, the entire assembly calling out in repentance to the Most High at the behest of Samuel, who’d summoned all the tribes of Israel to come together here and worship Yahweh. Over the past few years, there had been an enormous shift in the hearts of the sons of Israel. And over this past week, during which Samuel spoke to the entire company, hundreds—perhaps thousands—of idols, amulets, and other graven images had been smashed and burned. And even when word had come in the middle of the sacrifices that the Philistines were on their way here, the people insisted that Samuel continue the offerings and plead with Yahweh to deliver us.

  Nicaro had not given up his quest to find the Hebrews’ treasured object. In fact, we’d heard many stories of the Philistines searching for clues to its whereabouts, some even drawing them close to Kiryat-Yearim, as Nicaro’s men chased down all the rumors of its movement throughout the territories. Elazar had even heard of a group from Ashdod that had been sent to seek it out in the land of Midian, near the mountain upon which Mosheh received the Torah from the mouth of Yahweh himself.

  But now, the king of Ashdod had no fear of this gathering of barely confederated and pitifully armed tribes. I’d witnessed the strength of his well-provisioned army firsthand and of the many iron-wheeled chariots that would plow over our paltry defenses without mercy. It would take nothing less than a miracle from Yahweh for us to stand against him today.

  I gripped my ax tight in my hand, wishing I’d not left the old one back in Ashdod two years ago. The one I used now was more than sufficient for chopping down trees, but the other would have made an excellent weapon.

  I did not want to fight, especially against an enemy whose blood flowed in my own veins, but I would not tolerate any threats to my family and would defend them until my last breath. It seemed that Gershom, Iyov, and Yonah felt the same, though since they were born Levites, they were not in any way meant to join a battle. The four of us remained in place, knowing that if the Philistines broke through the mouth of the valley, all of our wives and children who’d come with us to celebrate the ingathering feast in this place were devastatingly vulnerable.

  Although there was great panic when word came that the Philistines planned to attack this assembly, Ronen had suggested that all the women and children take refuge in Naoith, the community Samuel had built in the hills above Ramah. If the men of Israel were not able to hold back the enemy, at least our families could escape from Naoith north to Beit El.

  And so, with my insides tied in a thousand knots, I’d sent off my pregnant wife and our five children, praying that Yahweh would give us a victory today and I’d be reunited with them before the sun went down.

  “You can count on me, Abba,” Zevi had said as Ronen swiftly organized the group of our loved ones who needed to flee from what would soon be a battlefield. My son had been angry that I would not allow him to stay and fight, but I’d told him that I relied on him to escort his brothers and sisters, and his mother, safely to Naoith. He’d complied, eager to protect those he’d come to love. He was only twelve, but the warrior’s heart that beat in his chest grew larger every day. I watched him take the hands of Asher and Aaliyah as the group set off, with Igo trotting along in their wake, and wondered what battles he’d choose to fight in days to come.

  After passing one-year-old Jaru off to my sister, and talking Davina into remaining with her aunt Eliora, Shoshana had come to me with tears in her beautiful eyes and thrown herself into my arms. The slight roundness of her belly pressed into me, and even with war looming over us, I thrilled at the thought that the second child we’d made together grew inside her.

  “We have many more years together on our mountain, Lukio,” she’d said. “So, bring yourself back to me, unscathed.”

  Her kiss still lingered on my lips all these hours later, and I would do my best to obey her command. I would not let Nicaro and the Philistines steal all the peace I’d been gifted. I may not be the champion of Ashdod anymore, but I would not go down without a fight.

  With knives in hand, Gershom and Iyov stood on either side of me. Yonah had joined the archers and slingers up on the ridge. Every one of us would defend our families, and the Land of Promise, to the death.

  Blood pounded in my temples as a hush fell over those of us waiting in the valley. The few weapons of war among us had been passed from generations before, most in ill repair, and all of them far inferior to the wrought-iron swords of our foes. Some of us had no more than piles of rocks to hurl or makeshift stone spears, and those who were skilled with slings were at the ready. But instead of fleeing before the horde of Philistines that would soon spill into this valley, like Israel had done many times before, this time we would stand firm.

  And so, we waited, praying that the outpouring of confession and repentance that the tribes of Israel had offered to Yahweh was sufficient, and that today he would protect his people like he’d done in times past.

  A chorus of shofarim from the ridge above suddenly blew a call to arms. All eyes turned to the gap between the hills as the distant sound of hundreds of chariot wheels rolled like thunder on the trade road Nicaro had coveted so much. Without a doubt, the king of Ashdod himself would be at the head of the procession with his gleaming chariot and purple-feathered headdress.

  But just as the archers and slingers were given the order to let fly their missiles, a louder clap of actual thunder swallowed up the sound of chariots, one that grew and
expanded with incomprehensible force. The thunder seemed to be emanating from just above the ridge, where the Ark of the Covenant sat on a flat bluff near the watchtower, not too far from where Samuel had been performing the sacrifices in full view of the people below. Although the sky had been clear before, a column of cloud had gathered over that same place and was stretching farther into the air.

  My skin prickled, and a strange and heavy weight pressed down on me, a weight that I suddenly remembered with clarity. I’d felt that same feeling, as if the sky itself were falling, when Risi and I had followed the Ark of the Covenant from Ekron, and it had erupted in light and fire to kill the seventy Levites at Beth Shemesh.

  As the thunder began to recede, the ground beneath our feet began to shake and all of us braced against the tremors.

  “Look!” someone shouted, and all eyes were drawn to the mouth of the valley. A huge crack had formed in the road, and the first few chariots that had been hurtling toward us pitched directly into the gap. Nicaro had once told me that my legacy would be swallowed up by the dust I would die in, but it seemed as if he’d prophesied his own end instead.

  A shout of victory went up at the strange sight and grew even louder when the remaining Philistine chariots made a chaotic attempt at retreat, their horses tangling together and some soldiers even abandoning their conveyances to flee on foot.

  “We can’t let them get away,” shouted one man. “Yahweh has given us this victory!”

  Before I knew what was happening, a large number of Israelites surged forward, brandishing their paltry weapons and chasing after the fleeing Philistines. But I remained in place, allowing the makeshift army of Israel to stream around me, until only my brothers and a large group of Levites remained.

  Since the moment the thunder began, the rest of Samuel’s words from so many years ago in that apple orchard had been circling around and around in my mind. They’d meant nothing to me at the time, and I could never have predicted their exact fulfillment would happen today, but now they made perfect sense.

  “And when you stand at the watchtower and hear thunder from on high, your knee will bow to the True King.”

  My eyes were drawn to the watchtower, from which Mitzpah itself had been named, and I fell to my knees in worship before the king who’d rescued his people time and again, who gave them this Land and all its blessings, even though they continually strayed from the Covenant, and who had graciously called two wild branches out of Ashdod to join with the root of his people. I’d seen up close what a human king was like and the corruption that filled Nicaro’s soul. No matter that many of the Hebrews screamed for an earthly leader to take over the reins from Samuel, I knew for certain from all I’d learned from my father that there could be only One True King of Israel—Yahweh himself.

  When I finally lifted my head, I found my brothers on their knees beside me as well. We stood together and headed toward Naoith, leaving the rest of the tribes to deal with the Philistines. My Tesi was waiting for me, and I’d made her a promise.

  A Note from the Author

  When I set out to write a duology about two Philistine children who followed the Ark, I had only tiny whispers in my mind about who those children might be. I saw a girl forced to grow up too fast in order to protect her brother and a rebellious boy who was angry with the world and with one eye over his shoulder toward the place he came from. And that was pretty much it. But what a delight it has been to get to know Eliora and Lukio and to dig into the culture that formed them.

  I, like most everyone, knew little about the Philistines and had no idea where their origins might lie. Discovering that recent DNA evidence placed those origins most likely to Crete (biblical Caphtor) gave me an excuse to gleefully explore as much as I could about the Mycenaean and Minoan cultures that we now know most likely gave birth to the Philistines and, later, the classical Greek culture with which we are most familiar. The art and architecture found at Knossos and other sites give us glimpses into the pre-Greek culture there and laid the foundation for part of the story line in Between the Wild Branches, namely, Lukio’s desire to be a famous fighter.

  There is a beautiful fresco from this era of two young boys, wrapped hands uplifted in a boxing stance and distinctive long hairstyles, which inspired Lukio’s desire to be a street fighter when he was a boy and gradually transformed into grown-up Lukio’s lust for power and wealth through fighting in well-publicized matches. Wrestling and boxing are ancient pastimes, and such matches were noted by the ancient Babylonians, Sumerians, and Egyptians. Since gambling is also one of the most ancient entertainments, they undoubtedly went hand in hand.

  The type of fighting that Lukio participates in is related to the later Greek style of wrestling called pankration, which was basically a free-for-all no-rules style of fighting that utilized chokeholds, kicks, punches, biting, eye-gouges, and whatever other techniques fighters could use to subdue their opponents. It regularly ended in broken bones and, at times, death, and the men who took part in these vicious matches were highly revered. Pankration was actually an event in the ancient Olympics, which also inspired Lukio’s position as the Master of Games in Ashdod. There was, of course, no such event to my knowledge in ancient Philistia, although it’s more than feasible that the Philistines brought things like bull-leaping and no-holds-barred wrestling with them from Crete, but we’ll just give Lukio credit for the idea that eventually formed into the Olympics, shall we?

  Special thanks goes to my editor, Jen Veilleux, for an important portion of this storyline, because Shoshana was originally a minor character in To Dwell among Cedars (with a different name) who disappeared after the first book. Jen’s suggestion breathed new life into the character and gave Lukio a heroine who fits him to perfection.

  Shoshana’s story is a good reminder of just how vulnerable women were in ancient times and why Torah law protections were so novel and necessary in this era of tribalistic and war-centric cultures who had no Judeo-Christian moral framework to rein in their base impulses. The entrance of the Word of God into human history began a ripple effect across the world, and the Word of God Made Flesh finished that earth-shaking, humanity-transforming work at the cross. I am certainly very grateful to be a woman born in this time and place, but we must remember that all over this globe there are women and children who are still suffering the same indignities Shoshana did, and that there are more slaves now than have ever been in history. May we fight for them on our knees and with whatever tools we have at our disposal.

  As usual, I must thank my family for their eternal patience with my chosen career path and for being my constant encouragers. I thank my father and mother, Don and Jodi, for adopting my brother and me and therefore living out the beautiful picture God gives us of being grafted into a new family by adoption and being offered the same unconditional love and rights as a natural-born child—a privilege given to those of us now joined to Abraham’s family through our Messiah’s blood. Being an adopted child is both a blessing and a challenge, but I am eternally grateful to both my adopted parents and my birth parents for choosing that path.

  I cannot pass over my writing sisters, Tammy L. Gray, Nicole Deese, Christy Barritt, and Amy Matayo, for helping me to plot this series. And thank you to Tammy and Nicole especially for their constant help with turning my crazy imagination into something that resembles an interesting plot with strong characters that readers can root for and for their gentle honesty when things just don’t work. How did I ever do this without you girls?

  Thank you to my beta readers Tina Chen, Ashley Espinoza, and Joanie Shultz. I can’t tell you how happy it made me to hear your enthusiasm for Lukio’s story!

  To all the wonderful people at Bethany House, including my editors Raela and Jen, and also to my agent Tamela Hancock Murray, thank you for continuing to champion my work and affording me the opportunity to keep writing stories that I love. And thank you once again to Jennifer Parker, who created the gorgeous covers for this series and far surpassed what I
had in mind when I requested some sort of mirroring effect and something that depicted the special bond between the two wild branches, Lukio and Eliora. I’ll never forget the moment I put the two covers side by side and saw how it all came together so perfectly.

  And so much love to my readers. Without you I’d just be telling stories to my cats (who are not really all that interested in ancient history). Thank you for your constant support and encouragement and for hanging in there with me for the last few months until the resolution of Lukio’s story was in your hands!

  May the LORD bless you and keep you. May he make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. May he lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace. (Numbers 6:24–25)

  Questions for Conversation

  Did Lukio’s journey resemble what you guessed it might at the close of To Dwell among Cedars? What surprised you the most about his story?

  Although he eventually comes to understand just who his cousin truly is, Lukio is heavily influenced by Mataro in his younger years. Have you ever been influenced by someone who had wrong motives? What helped open your eyes to the truth?

  For Shoshana to remain in Ashdod in order to stay with her daughter meant not immediately finding a way to get back to her two older children. Do you agree with this decision? What might you have done in her position?

  The sweet friendship between Lukio and Shoshana as children forms a foundation for their emotional bond, even after years apart. What are some of your favorite memories from childhood? Did you have any strong friendships that were formative to who you are now?

  At times, it is difficult to see ourselves and our weaknesses objectively. In what ways do Igo and Zevi contribute to Lukio’s introspection about his own choices?

  How do you think Zevi will be affected by all that he has experienced and witnessed? What do you think some of his struggles might be when his own story is told?