Angels at the Gate (34 page)

The meal is mostly taken in silence. I signal Nami to settle in the corner. Lot concentrates on the food, scooping the greasy mixture of lamb and onions onto flatbread. Lila does all the serving. The small brand on her arm marks her as a slave of Lot's house. She keeps her gaze downcast, especially careful to do so when offering food to Pheiné. Thamma, I decide, is a whiner, but Pheiné is the one to watch.

Exhausted, I am happy to retire to our sleeping room, but I am confused when Lot does not follow me. I signal Nami to stay off the bed, and I fall asleep, believing Lot is merely up late, speaking with his family, but when I wake in middle of the night, he is still not beside me. I pull a blanket around me and push aside the curtained doorway hanging.

The courtyard appears empty, save for our pack donkeys and Lila, who sleeps curled around the smoldering fire pit with no covering. I move quietly into the courtyard, Nami a silent shadow beside me. Lot is not in any part of the house or in the back garden. I am perplexed until I hear low voices coming from the room the daughters share.

I move closer to the door, signaling Nami to remain quiet, an unnecessary precaution as she knows from my movements we are hunting, though what and why are beyond her.

At the door's edge, the voices are clear enough:

“Father, why did you bring her here?”

“She is the daughter of Zakiti and it was the wish of Sarai and Abram that I marry her.”

“You should have insisted!”

“Pheiné, I will not stand against Abram. He is the word of El!”

“And if mother's fate befalls
her?
”

A sharp intake of breath at that, which I attribute to Thamma.

“Quiet, Pheiné.” Lot hisses. “Where is your decency?”

A low sound I cannot quite resolve. “I lost it long ago—”

I step from the doorway and start to return to the sleeping room, then stop and go to where Lila sleeps, covering her with the blanket that draped my shoulders.

The butterfly counts not months but moments, and has time enough.

—Rabindranath Tagore,
Fireflies

A
S THE DAYS PASS, THEY
fall into a pattern. I awake early, because lying in the bed is painful, and I ache less when I move around. Taking care of Nami and Philot is my first concern. I want no one complaining about them.

I surprise Lila by assisting her with her chores and especially preparing the food. We cook everything in the cool of morning, spicing it heavily to ward off the flies. During the day's heat, camel dung or wild grass smolders to discourage the insects, but adding little or no heat to the house. Then, just before we sleep, we will build the fire again for the warmth.

Lila is a small woman, her skin a smooth walnut brown. She wears her dark hair in a loose braid. Her mother had been a slave from Elam, a land southeast of Babylonia. Captured in one of the battles against King Chedorlaomer, she and her mother were brought to Sodom by the victors, a spoil of war. Her mother died soon after Lot bought them. Lila speaks little, and it has taken prompting and questions on my part to get that much of her story. Her hands prepare food with efficiency, despite a missing finger.

Helping her is not all kindness on my part. The few times I venture onto the streets, I receive unkind stares and curses. I do not need my skill at reading men's subtleties to know their displeasure. Despite my attempt to cover my face, I hear more than once, “Leave our city!” I remember how the judge wronged Eliezer, Abram's steward, ruling he had to pay his assaulter for wounding him. Ishmael is right. This is not a city of justice or kindness to strangers.

Busying myself with household tasks gives me an excuse not to go out except in the early morning and at dusk to allow Nami to relieve herself. But I keep her close beside me, not wanting her to run off and be stolen or to mix with the scavenger city dogs. Lila buys whatever is needed at the Gate. She reports that most of the gossip is about the lack of rain, a subject Lot often brings up at the dinner meal. He is convinced it is a sign of El's disapproval.

Pheiné and Thamma spend most of their time in the company of their friends and at their brother-in-law's house. I have not been invited, and neither he nor his wife has come to pay respect to me as Lot's wife. Lot is away much of the day, conducting his business or seeing to the animals on his land outside the city. He rebukes my every attempt to let me live there or even go with him.

Lot sleeps in our bed, but has never attempted to touch me with any intimacy, although he is not unkind. On regular occasions, however, he drinks wine to excess, and I have learned on those nights, he will stumble into his daughters' rooms and not return, unable to look upon my face, I presume, and passing out from drink.

At my instruction, Lila purchased a loom of the type the desert women use. It calms me to weave, though my pace is slow with my damaged fingers. I am making a covering with purple yarns. The dye is made from a coastal shell creature. Our caravan often transported purple cloth at great profit. It is costly, but what else do I have to do with my wealth?

Unfortunately, I can only sit still for a short while. I am not a weaver, nor a wife, but a wild beast, well cared for, but pacing its cage, longing for freedom—or in my situation, limping up and down the courtyard. My longing for Mika is a physical ache. It is not just the night in his arms, but his company I miss—his intense curiosity and sharp mind, his acceptance of me as boy or girl, his gentleness as a healer and his strength. I try to divert my mind from thoughts of him and from my father, but there are times when thinking of them is my only comfort.

I miss the green of the hills and air that is not tainted. Why does Lot insist I stay in this city?

And what happened to Hurriya? This question plagues me. Perhaps, if I were busier, it would not.

O
NE NIGHT
I awake, sweating, aware I have called out in my sleep. The house is quiet, except for the faint lap of the sea. Lot is in our bed. He makes a noise and rolls over. I wait to make certain he has returned to sleep and then rise and dress, but instead of taking Nami out the door for a night walk, I go to the window. From our house's position, I can see where the far edge of the city wall meets the sea. A section has fallen in, perhaps eroded from the bottom by the sea's occasional corrosive caress in high wind. Every day I have spent time at this window, and I have studied that wall.

Although my leg is weak, my arms are strong, and I hoist myself onto the window's ledge and drop the short distance to the rocky ground. Nami leaps up to the ledge and then down to join me, barely pausing to gauge the jump.

Carefully, we make our way to the edge of the wall. Perhaps, at the time it was built, it did meet the sea. In any case, the narrow spit of land beyond it could not hold more than one person at a time. A person in a boat could access Sodom anyway, so why worry about such a small breach in the wall? The king was concerned with the assault of armies, not a person or two. All cities I ever visited had such weaknesses that no one bothers to address. If I led a military assault against Sodom, I would send one or two people into the city who could open the gates for me. They would not have to find such a spot as this, but merely enter as merchants during the day. Gates and walls exist to keep out predators rather than men.

Once we are beyond the smaller eastern gate, with no more to show for it than a scratch on my shoulder and wet feet, we move toward the cliff, intersecting the path from the gate I followed so long ago. The trail winds up the face of rock, but it is steep. Nami bounds ahead of me, stretching her lithe muscles in delight, but I can only climb a small distance before my leg buckles from the pain in my hip. Only my staff keeps me from a fall.

I sit on the nearest stone and watch the water below stained with the moon's silver. Beyond the moonlight's reach shine the stars that witnessed my birth and the birth of my ancestors, back into the pitch dark of time. They are the same stars that watched me sleeping in my father's tent, that watched Mika and me dying in the wilderness and then ascending to heaven to grasp the future like a dragon's breath. What do these stars think of all our fumbling and grasping, of our insignificant lives that must be to them less than a crumble of salt in the sea?

Nami returns, her tail waving happily, her tongue lolling. No doubt she found something to chase.

O
VER THE FOLLOWING
moon-cycles, I am out the window almost nightly, leaving Lot snoring if he has come to our bed. Each night I make it a little higher up the cliff before I have to rest and return. I must reach the overlook. Somehow it will bring me closer to Mika to be in a place where we were once together. I have the irrational thought that if I stand there, he will know it, and wherever he is, we will be together.

Once, Nami started to jump out the window during the day, but I caught her and scolded her. She seems to understand. Though she often stares at it, she has not tried again unless I lead the way.

One evening after a good meal, when Lot has drunk enough wine to be in a good mood, I ask to speak with him in the privacy of our room. I know the daughters will be sure to hang about to hear, and I keep my voice low to frustrate them.

“Have you a complaint?” Lot asks, untying his sandals.

“No, I have a request.”

He squints in suspicion at me. “What is it?”

“I have brought my dowry to this house—”

“I do not need it,” he says quickly. “Do you think I married you for your dowry?”

I would dearly like to know why he married me, but I stay on the path I wish to pursue. “No, you are a wealthy man and well respected.” This is not true. The people here were once grateful to Abram for returning Sodom's sons and daughters, wealth, and food after the battle with Chedorlaomer. But now, they feel Lot has milked that gratitude to emptiness. His ranting about El is not well received, but taken as an attempt
to replace the city god … which does indeed seem to be Lot's intent. To Sodomites, El is an elderly, bearded god who drank too much and gave up his throne to his younger son, Baal.

Lot's chest expands at my flattery, and he smiles, pleased. “But,” he allows, “it is not an unpleasant thing to have a wealthy wife from a good family.” This is as close to praise as he has ever given, and I try to look pleased. He never takes me with him outside the house. I understand a wealthy wife from a good family does not balance an ugly, wounded face and limp. This is not a time to vent my anger or sorrow. This is a negotiation, something I have trained for all my life.

“What is your request then, wife? I hope it is not the same one of wanting to leave the city.”

“No, it is not that.”

The muscle in his jaw relaxes slightly.

“It is a small thing,” I say.

“So tell it.”

“Not something that would concern a man of your wealth, although worth a bracelet of silver to me.”

Now his interest is certainly piqued.

“What is it that is worth so much to you, but is such a small thing?”

“Merely a slave.”

He frowns. “I have many slaves, and they are obedient to you as my wife. Why would you want ownership?”

Of course, that is true, but his other slaves work his lands. When do they have an opportunity to be obedient to me? But I do not say such. I have thought long on this answer, and I make my words casual. “I have never owned a slave, and would like a handmaiden for myself. Of course, I could go out and purchase one at the Gate—” I let the words hang. He is happy I expose myself so little in public.

“No, you do not need to do that. Do you want me to buy you one?”

I frown thoughtfully. “It is most difficult to find the right girl for such a position. I cannot imagine your being lucky enough to find one I would like. Then you would have to sell her and try another.”

His fleshy jaw tenses again. He can see how this could require a good deal of his time and effort, and he is not happy about it. “I see.”

With a sigh, I say, “Of course, there is a simple solution.”

“What is that?” He yawns. Good, he will not want a long argument.

“I would really like to resolve this tonight. I have been thinking about it for a while, and I do not think I can sleep if it is not settled.”

Now he is agitated. “What is your solution?”

“Lila would be satisfactory.”

“But she is our cook and keeps the house—”

“She can continue that, of course. In fact, she has been serving me as handmaiden in addition to those things anyway. Was she not so for Hurriya?”

Lot flinches at his first wife's name. He has always avoided speaking of her, so now he will want to guide me away from the topic. He will be concerned that if he refuses, I may press him on questions of Hurriya. If he stalls for another day, he risks the possibility of my going out when he is not here and purchasing a slave myself.

“Very well,” he says irritably. “She is yours.”

“Oh, that is excellent.” I hold out the tiny, still-damp clay tablet I had Lila obtain earlier that day. “I knew you would be gracious, so I prepared this. It only lacks your seal.”

His brow raises, and then he laughs. “And I not even a silver bracelet richer! You are your father's daughter, Adira. I will give you that.”

I am Nature, the universal Mother, mistress of all elements, primordial child of time, sovereign of all things spiritual, queen of the dead, queen also of the immortals, the single manifestation of all gods and goddesses that are. My nod governs the shining heights of Heaven, the wholesome sea breezes, the lamentable silences of the world below. Though I am worshiped in many aspects, known by countless names, and propitiated with all manner of different rites, yet the whole round earth venerates me.