A Stray Drop of Blood (8 page)

“
The master?”

Ester smiled. “No. A friend of his, who has long since returned to Rome. He was a brash and forward man, more of a boy, really. He approached me and started complimenting me, quoting some poem I had never heard. Needless to say, I was terrified.”

They shared a smile, and Ester chuckled. “All I could think was that my father would kill me, and that Jairus would never marry me if I was caught. But I have gotten ahead of myself, I have not even mentioned Jairus. I will go to him now instead.

“
I had known him for most of my life. Our families were very close, and it had been long understood that we would marry, although no formal betrothal had yet taken place. Jairus was years older than me, and I found him so intriguing. It had always seemed a bit unreal that I would someday be the wife of he who would someday surely be so powerful. Whenever I saw him I would try to hide my face and practice every virtue I knew to prove that I was worthy of him, but he would never allow it to last long. Inside of five minutes he would have me laughing about something, or engaged in a discussion of the Law. My father scolded me often, telling me that Jairus would never want a wife that spoke as a man. But if he did not, then I could not understand why he drew me into those conversations.”

Ester shook her head in the old confusion and took a sip of her camomile. “So, when I was faced with that soldier and frightened that I would anger the two men most important to me, I did what they both taught me to do: I tried to talk my way away. When the boy finished his little line, something, I believe, from Homer, I told him that his barbarian poet was a heathen and completely ignorant of all truth, as were all the philosophers his people so loved to dote upon.”

Abigail bit her lip against obvious laughter.

Ester sighed. “I thought he was going to strike me, he was so angry. And he may have, if it were not that Cleopas chose that moment to intervene. He had been listening the whole time at the next booth, but I did not notice him until he put a hand on his friend’s shoulder and said to him–I will never forget this–‘Did you hear her, Mannas? Finally, one who knows Truth, after all of those horrible dialogues we were forced to read. What luck to happen upon her here, and what fortune that knowledge has taken such a beautiful form!’

“
I, of course, took that opportunity to try to slip away, but Cleopas would have none of it. He caught up with me at the edge of the marketplace and insisted on walking me home. I ignored him, but he would not be put off.

“
As I had feared, my father was walking up the street when I returned, having just been at the temple, and he saw me with a Roman. I would not even look at Cleopas, I just hurried into the house. But he was brazen back then, Abigail, you would not recognize him. He did nothing then, of course, when he saw my father following me in. But I now know he left only to figure out who I was, who my father was.

“
My father was surprisingly silent all that evening. I had expected quite a berating but was relieved. I thought he must have known what had happened, that it was not in accordance with my will that a centurion was with me. Now I think he was probably just mulling it over all the next week, getting angrier as the days went by. His imagination had surely come up with something horrid, that is the only explanation that would partly justify his later explosion.”

She paused a moment for a breath and took a bit of the bread that Abigail had brought in on a tray and set nearby. “It was a week later when Cleopas came again. I was at home, my father away at the temple with Jairus, when I heard the knock. I assumed it was a neighbor woman, so I went to answer it myself. When I opened the door, Cleopas stepped in before I had a chance to respond and closed the door behind him.” She smiled at the memory now, although it had not seemed so humorous then. “I demanded that he leave at once, but he just grinned–you know his grin. So boyish and charming, though I was not charmed at the time. I was outraged. I gave him no time to speak, just opened the door again and tried to push him out.

“
My father was right there, Jairus behind him. I remember thinking how poor my luck was. Then I thought, ‘Surely he saw that he just came in a second ago.’ And he should have. I do not know how he could not have, but he was so angry that I was worried for a moment he might hurt himself.

“
He just pushed his way in and spoke in Hebrew, which he assumed Cleopas would not understand. He said, ‘Ester, I could have you stoned for this.’ When I asked him why, he looked at Cleopas and said, ‘That you would let a Roman defile you–’ I did not let him finish. We both knew, or should have known, how absurd his accusation was. I told him I had done nothing wrong, that I did not deserve his ire. He insisted that I had shamed myself and him and Jairus, and that now I would have to pay the penalty.

“
And then Cleopas spoke. In Hebrew, although not splendidly. He had apparently decided to pick it up when he arrived and had done remarkably well. He simply said, ‘Let not your daughter be hurt. I will marry her.’

“
That was the worst thing yet in my mind. I turned to Jairus then with my beseeching, begging him to take me as his wife as we had all planned, and if he was not satisfied with the evidence of my virginity then he could divorce me. I actually said it would be better to be divorced by an Israelite than married by a Roman. I do not know why Cleopas did not grow upset at that, but he did not. He just held his ground and remained silent while I wept and begged and made a fool of myself.

“
But my father thrust me away and turned to Cleopas. He said, ‘I am High Priest. No daughter of mine weds a Roman. But if you desire that wench, then she is yours.’ I thought I would die from the humiliation. I said that he could not disown me, I tried to say something about the heritage of our family, but he cut me off and offered Cleopas the family’s jewels if he would just keep me and my shame far from his home. The insult to me was awesome.”

Ester paused to take a long breath. “I was crying so hard by the time the conversation ended that I could not hear everything that happened, but it ended with Cleopas leading me from my father’s house with a box of jewels under his arm.

“
I am to this day not certain how Cleopas managed all that he did in that afternoon, but he somehow convinced the general to let him buy this house and take a wife. He paid for it with a few of the pieces from my dowry, that I know. We were married and came here for the first time.

“
The house was in disrepair, and we could not afford any servants so soon, but I was blind to it that night anyway. I was too busy being terrified to care about the state of the place. I did not know what to expect, or what to do. I did not know this man, and yet he was suddenly my husband. And strangest of all, I did not know
why
he had wanted to marry me. He did not know me, and though I was pretty, there were many more so. You, Abigail, are far more beautiful than I was.”

“
I find that hard to believe.” Abigail turned her face modestly away. Ester smiled, since the action made her all the more beautiful, thereby proving her point.

“
At any rate, I do not believe that I had ever been so afraid as I was then. When he took me to the bedroom I thought that surely Jehovah would allow me to die then before subjecting me to a Roman’s bed.” She rolled her eyes at her past self. “Thankfully, he did not. But even though Cleopas was patient and gentle, I indulged in tears the moment I thought he was asleep. Only I was mistaken. He heard my quiet weeping but did not say anything that night.”

She sighed yet again, with contentment this time. “The next morning when I awoke, Cleopas was watching me. I know I must have looked a fright, what with red eyes and disarrayed hair, but he just smiled and said, in Hebrew, ‘Ester Visibullis, you are going to teach me the Law.’ I was shocked and could manage only a meager ‘Why?’ And he said, ‘Because I am a smart man. And I know that if ever I want to please my new and alluring wife, I must first please her God. Because any being great enough to invoke the worship of a woman like you is surely more worthy of praise than a statue in Rome. So you shall teach me of this God you say is the only one, and when I am convinced’ he actually said when and not if ‘then we will together teach him to our children.’” She smiled, even laughed a little. “Within a week I began to realize that God had, indeed, intended me to be the wife of this man. And within two I was madly in love with him.”

She looked to Abigail at the close of her narrative and found the girl with stars in her eyes.

“
That is very romantic,” Abigail said. “Now, anyway. I am certain it did not appear so beautiful when it first happened. Do you suppose I will ever fall in love so completely?”

Ester laughed. “I have no doubts, beautiful one. You will have your pick of husbands.”

Abigail sobered. “I do not see how.”

Ester said nothing, just took another sip of her camomile. And buried a grin behind it.

~*~

Jason was pleased that both weather and wind were with the large craft as it made the journey across the Mediterranean, the breeze strong and steady, filling the sails and promising a prompt arrival. There were a total of fifty soldiers on their way to assignments, replacing other men that had died or been called home to Rome. All were to become members of the Tenth Legion, although their tasks within that great force would certainly be as varied as the men themselves were.

He lounged with his four friends on the upper deck, basking in the sun for what they knew to be one of a very few days of rest. They were among the youngest of the passengers, having achieved the positions of centurions because of connections rather than years in the field, and it showed in their talk and comradery. Conversation had reached a lull as the sun achieved its zenith, giving Jason’s thoughts leave to wander to home.

His smile must have betrayed his musings.

“
Look at his smirk,” Lentulus said, only one eye partially opened in the bright light. “He is probably thinking of how he can use the advantage of his familiarity with the land to best us.”

Jason laughed. “Lentulus, my friend, you reflect your own ignoble goals upon us all. Why would I wish to humiliate you?”

The soldier shrugged. “So you can keep all the women to yourself.”

Jason laughed yet again. “I need not cast you down to do that; my natural charm should do the job.”

It was Apidius who rolled his eyes. “I expect that if Menelaus has anything to say, he too will have his share of company.”

Menelaus grinned. “While our good friend here pines over the love he left behind.”

“
Am I the only one pining? What of you, Titus? Surely you will miss your woman?”

Titus lifted an eyebrow. “And who would you be speaking of, my friend?”

“
You know the one I refer to.” Apidius wiggled his brows. “That beauty that we saw so briefly at your father’s house.”

Titus gave a breath of a laugh. “Women are to be enjoyed while you are with them. But she is only a woman. And even less: a slave. That is nothing to pine over.”

“
Is there a woman waiting for you in Jerusalem, Jason?” Lentulus asked.

“
Only my mother.” He stretched, grinned. “But then, I imagine she waits with more faithfulness than any other would have.”

The grunts of agreement settled again into silence. Jason closed his eyes just as the others were doing, but his mind did not fall into sleep. The closer he got to the land of his birth, the more vivid were his memories. At first, the clearest remembrance was of his intense desire to leave, to be free of the oppression of the Law that pervaded the land so thoroughly. But as his mind traveled further back, he also began to remember the more appealing things of home. Like the sweet taste of Dinah’s unsurpassed honey cakes, the wafting scent of burnt incense and offerings outside the temple, the sun glistening off the alabaster stone and fair sands of the city. And while it was difficult to separate reality from his own images in his memory, he had grown enough over the past years to know that life in his parents’ house with his mother’s faith had not been as bad as he had supposed. But then, his stay in Rome had affected him in many ways, and he knew too that he was now a Roman and would never be accepted by or even want to be a Hebrew. In childhood he had been seen as the son of a dissenter. Now they would view him as the enemy itself.

He opened his eyes wide enough to glance at his friends. They expected their positions to win them respect, fear, awe. Jason knew, though, much better than they, that more oft than otherwise it gained them only the loathing of those people they would not hesitate to crush if the opportunity arose.

He could not stop the sigh that escaped his lips. This homecoming would mix blessing with curse, he knew. But there was nothing to be done about it.

~*~

Andrew looked up from the parchment before him to find reproval waiting on his instructor’s lips.

“
You are not paying attention,” she scolded.

“
I am sorry, Abigail.” He offered her a small smile. “My mind continues to wander even when my will forbids it.”

The slant of her brow said she was unconvinced. “Perhaps if you willed to learn a little more you would not be subjected to such an internal battle every eve.”

Andrew grinned and pushed his parchment aside. “I do try, my friend; I am simply easily distracted from studies.”