People of the Ark (Ark Chronicles 1) (13 page)

“
What’s she doing?” Laban asked.

“
They say Naamah left the Ark deeply impressed with Noah’s zeal. A terribly misplaced zeal to be sure, concerning a wicked view of Jehovah.”

“
Wicked in what way?” Laban asked.

“
I’m no philosopher or priest. But I can tell you this: Naamah has sent for the great Par Alexander. And she sent for Prophet Zohar. He’s to teach people the true nature of Jehovah. They say she’s decided that a fanatic shouldn’t show more love—in his perverted sense of Jehovah—than one who sees clearly. Thus, she has sworn to build temples on a vaster scale than the Ark, to show the world that Jehovah is love, not a vain and judgmental ogre. But the main point is that she needs skilled carpenters and that she pays well.”

Laban mulled that over.

“Did you get paid today?” Mara asked.

Laban dug out his silver shekels and slapped them on the table.

Ebal peered at the money, while Mara frowned. “Is that all?” she asked.

“
I had to give some of it to father.”

“
Whatever for?” said Mara in that scolding way Laban had come to loathe.

He told them about Ben-Hadad, his sling and the peacocks.

Ebal laughed, while Mara complained first about his father demanding money and second that Laban had actually paid when he knew she needed the money to buy that painting of Saul’s she so desperately wanted.

“
What painting is this?” Ebal asked.

“
‘Nudes on a Beach,’” Mara said. “It’s very provocative. Laban doesn’t like it, of course, but I think it would be lovely for our bedroom. Just the sort of thing that would add spice to—” She giggled. “—To Laban’s efforts.”

“
Consider it bought,” Ebal said. “As a gift—for the both of you,” he added, giving Laban a lewd leer.

Mara clapped her hands, smiling sweetly at Ebal.

“No, no,” Laban said. “We can’t have you do that.”

“
Of course we can,” Mara said. “After all, you don’t have the money to buy it. So why not let your older brother do us this little favor?”

“
It’s no problem about the money,” Ebal said. “Not with the wages to be had at Chemosh.”

“
Why don’t you work there?” Mara asked. “It would be much better than trying to teach others how to use that tiny weapon of yours.”

Ebal laughed
. “They say size doesn’t matter. That it is knowing how to use what you have that counts.”

“
Well, I don’t think that’s true,” Mara said. “Size does matter.”

Ebal laughed again, nodding in agreement
, as he slapped his massive belly.

Laban rubbed his forehead
—it felt as if an axe was going to split it. He poured himself another cup of wine. He didn’t know where he was going to get work next. As Mara and Ebal chattered, he pondered the problem. He wondered what this Prophet Zohar was like and what he had to say. What his family needed was some good influences. Maybe working at Chemosh would be just the thing.

“
Do you think it’s safe?” he asked Ebal.

“
Eh? What’s that?”

“
Working at Chemosh,” Laban said. “Do you think it’s safe?”

“
Brother, it’s the safest place on Earth. It’s holy ground, don’t you know.”

Intrigued, Laban began to ask more questions.

3.

A bell clanged.

Europa glanced out the window at the impatient old ink merchant. He was a withered ancient wearing color-stained garments and a floppy hat. He had several great-grandsons, one of them ringing the bell and the others holding spears, guarding his heavily laden donkeys with their leather jugs and glass jars.

She
’d had dealings with Wu for years, but that didn’t make him trustworthy even if he and his great grandsons were in the yard and field hands patrolled the parapets. Slavery had become the rage, with an inexhaustible demand for bodies. Even ink merchants might try their hand at kidnapping.

Europa chewed her lip
as she drew the curtain.

Ham scraped his breakfast bowl, looking around until Rahab slopped him more
. Impossible that the little orphan girl had succeeded where she, a king’s daughter, had failed. What did Ham see in Rahab he hadn’t in any of her sisters?

The bell clanged and
in his querulous voice, Wu called her name. For an old man he was quite impatient, and she was his best customer. It was due to her letter writing, to her brothers and sisters and to the captors who held the remaining few.

“
Europa,” Wu wailed. “I have arrived. I have ink.”

“
Ham,” she said.

He looked up, with porridge smeared on his mouth.

Rahab took the porridge pot back to the kitchen, glancing over her shoulder. In that brief instant, they both knew. Like a spark, the knowledge leaped between them. Europa never accepted defeat, not with her father’s lost kingdom and certainly not with Ham the marriageable prize.

“
Won’t you join me?” Europa asked.

“
Where?” Ham asked, with his mouth full.

“
I’m dickering with Wu and have become worried about abductions.”

“
Take some hounds,” Ham suggested.

“
I prefer armed company.”

Ham sighed, pushing away the porridge bowl.

“You missed a spot,” Europa said, touching the corner of her mouth.

He wiped away the smear and brushed
it on his breeches.

“
I think I’ll join you,” Rahab said, popping back out the kitchen.

Before Europa could think of a reply, Gaea called
. Rahab hesitated, but Gaea called again and saved Europa from inventing some delicate subterfuge.

Linking an arm with Ham
’s, Europa marched through the house. “You’ve made a remarkable recovery,” she said.

“
Thanks to Rahab,” he said.

“
Hmm, yes,” she said, deciding not to directly insult the orphan girl. Men took up the oddest causes.

They stepped onto the veranda and Wu
’s petulant frown transformed into a twisted smile, exposing old brown teeth and a face mapped by a thousand wrinkles. He motioned her near and immediately began chattering about new inks and dyes as he fumbled examples off a donkey.

Out of the corner of her eye
, Europa noticed that Ham seemed bored. It distracted her from customary sharp bargaining.

She bought several jugs of cuttlefish and octopus ink
. When threatened by sea predators, the cuttlefish and octopus spewed ink from special sacs and then fled in the opposite direction. Cuttlefish gave brown ink called sepia, while octopuses produced a deeply black ink, most impressive when used on the finest papyrus. Europa saved the combination for her most important letters.

Ham
’s interest sparked when Wu explained a new synthetic ink. He called it
alchiber
. It was composed of lampblack, made by burning rosin and mixed with gum, honey, and pressed into small cakes. To use it, one merely added water.

Europa
shook her head. Cuttlefish and octopus ink, she’d stick to that.

Wu turned secretive, glancing about, hunching his thin shoulders
. The spear-armed great grandsons also loomed closer.

Europa signaled Ham as her stomach tightened
. The old coot was actually going to try kidnapping her.

Wu took out a piece of cloth of an amazing color, a deep purple.

It shocked Europa, leaving her mouth open. “What kind of cloth is that?”

“
It isn’t the cloth,” Wu explained, “but the dye.” He spoke about
murex
shellfish. It came from the sea-bottom, cut loose by dagger-armed divers. It was rare and costly.

Europa
shook her head.

Next
, Wu took out a square of paper with gold lettering that glittered in the sunlight.

Europa not
iced the shift in his eyes. Wu had her and he knew it. They haggled, but she simply had to have some gold ink. It would make impressive documents, new deeds for a new kingdom—her father’s restored kingdom.

Coins exchanged hands
. She implored Wu to stay and enjoy their hospitality, but he begged off, the young men helping him onto a donkey.

Europa
grinned as she showed Ham the jar of gold ink.

“
He cheated you,” Ham said.

She shook her head
. “Maybe he got the better of the dickering, but this ink, Ham… Do you understand what makes it so valuable?”

“
Words are words, Europa, no matter what ink you use.”

“
Oh no, there you are wrong. Noble thoughts must be expressed with noble ink.”

“
If you say so.”

“
Ham, the appearance of things is important. It sways people. It adds dignity.” A thought struck her. “Take for instance a man’s wife. A noble lady of noble lineage who looks the part gives grace and dignity to her husband.”

“
Like your sisters?”

“
Yes! Ham, I know you understand. I know that’s why you chose Naamah. She is evil, certainly, but her bearing is queenly. None can deny that. I fear that in being hurt by Naamah you have leapt the other way. Perhaps you punish yourself by going to the other extreme.”

He smiled
. “Europa, Europa… You don’t understand.”

“
Rahab is a fine girl. And she helped restore you to health. But you need to consider your future. Married to one of my sisters will make you royalty. And when our kingdom is retaken—”

“
—No,” he said.

The
finality startled her, so for a moment she could only blink.

“
Why bother with your father’s lost kingdom? The Flood will destroy it. Then all your scheming and hard work will have been in vain.”

“
Of course I agree,” Europa said smoothly, having had this argument with Japheth. “But remember that Noah has been building the Ark for over one hundred years. Why not another hundred? In the interim, you, Japheth and I can enjoy the privileges of royalty. We can—”

“
Listen to me. I learned one thing while being broken. My father is right. The world is doomed. So to build in this world is folly. It’s the next one I’m concerned about, and in that world, Rahab is the woman I want. She may not be as pretty as your sisters are, although in my eyes she’s more beautiful than a sunset. But her character is worth a thousand kingdoms and I know she loves me for me. If you think about it, you’ll realize that none of your sisters could ever match Rahab in those qualities.”

Europa bristled
. She didn’t see that at all.

Ham bid her goodbye and
strolled into the house.

Europa
gave herself a moment to recover from his slanderous accusations. Then she berated herself for handling that poorly. If only he could see, could understand the way she did. She spied Rahab then, hurrying across the yard with a basket, glancing at her, no doubt to see what was going on. Stiffly, Europa scooped up the first several ink-jugs and headed into the house to put them away. It was time to make a new plan.

4.

Chemosh was a surprise. It reminded Laban of an overturned anthill. There was boiling activity, furious movement, running here and running there, madness in motion.

The old stone walls had been demolished and the houses flattened
. Lumber, stone and marble from the ruins had gone into massive piles, almost entirely used up by the time Laban arrived. Now a pall of dust and smoke hung over the new city, over the entire vale. Chemosh was located in a bowl-shaped depression, with a ring of low hills around it. The dust billowed from legions of slaves as they dragged colossal quarried stones. Smoke funneled into the heavens from a hundred fires as men dried green wood into seasoned lumber.

Ymir had collected slaves,
driven by whip-wielding overseers and spearmen of Nod. Charioteers patrolled the low hills, while huntsmen tracked any escaped slaves. The poor wretches in the labor-gangs preformed grueling grunt-work, dragging and lifting massive blocks and setting the foundations for incredible plinths, obelisks and temples.

Performing the skilled labor were hosts of carpenters, stonemasons, bricklayers, sculptors and woodcarvers
. Keeping them tooled, supplied and content were numberless bronze-masters, metalsmiths, quarrymen, leatherworkers, rope-makers, bakers, brewers, actors, singers, storytellers, harlots and charlatans claiming to be able to cure any ill.

Through Ymir
’s conquests, silver and gold poured into Chemosh. Now it poured out in a torrent almost as fast, to pay all these workers.

A vast tent city circled the works, as if they laid siege to it
. In one of the tents, Laban stored his possessions. The second day, Ebal introduced him to his foreman, a freed slave. Thereafter Laban hammered on a gargantuan feasting hall for Ymir and his Slayers. It was a hall named Valhalla. It had many doors and arches. Sculptors and woodcutters had adorned it with images of wolves and eagles. Laban overheard that on completion Valhalla would hold thousands of shields, mailcoats and wooden beasts, representing the battlefield and the grave.

Not all his time went into construction
. He gawked at the sights and listened to many weird philosophies and new religions. Seen from Noah’s perspective, Chemosh was wicked. Sexual immoralities ran the gamut from fornication to adultery to homosexuality and even uglier. Worse, hundreds of slave-cultists worshipped Queen Naamah. She participated in the services and was known as the Harlot Mother. Shame was unknown at Chemosh, an alien concept. Lewdness abounded and passions ran amok.

To resist infidelity, Laban concentrated on work and
, surprisingly, found comfort in Prophet Zohar.

On the ninth day, as Ebal and he sat outside a booth, a skyclad (naked) old man with a skeletal torso and a long white beard shuffled past as he spoke with a spearman.

Laban snorted and almost spilled his soup. “Where do they dig up these people?”

“
That’s the Prophet Zohar,” Ebal said.

“
Him?”

Ebal slid off his stool, grabbing Laban by the arm
. “I’ll show you.”

Laban tossed a shekel onto the counter, and they followed the skeletal old man past the city of tents and to a huge old
, oak tree. Others also followed, trying to eavesdrop on the conversation.

The old man regarded them
, and the spearman fell silent.

“
He’s going to speak,” Ebal whispered.

Laban and he had managed to jostle to the front of the crowd.

Prophet Zohar faced ill-clad, temple harlots, slaves, slave-masters, spearmen and hirelings like Laban.

The white-bearded prophet raised rickety, scabby arms
. He had crazed eyes and a piercing way of staring. He began by speaking on the wonders of love, the rhapsody of harmony and peace. “Each person,” he said, “comes to Jehovah in his own way and through his own merits and understanding. Some don’t even worship Jehovah, but they sense the beauty of nature and the harmony of life. They too are blessed. For Jehovah is love. He breathes love. He gives love like a farmer tossing grain. Upon everyone, Jehovah showers goodness. Therefore, my children, don’t judge. Don’t weigh others in the balance. Accept one another as children of Jehovah and you shall be blessed.”

People whispered among themselves, nodding.

Laban waited for more. But Zohar turned to the spearman and together they strolled away, holding hands. Those gathered around also drifted off.

“
That’s it?” Laban asked. “Jehovah is love? Don’t judge?”

Ebal made up for Zohar
’s lack by pontificating the rest of the evening.

Laban found that according to Ebal he shouldn
’t judge those who acted in ways he thought of as wicked. He retorted that neither then should others judge him for remaining faithful to his wife.

On that score
, they had a running debate. Because of all the lewd sights he witnessed during the day, Laban had confided in Ebal that he was tempted to visit a brothel.

“
A Temple of Love,” corrected Ebal, “not a brothel.”

In any case, Laban resisted such
‘worship,’ even though Ebal never tired of telling him that a man should conform to his surroundings. “When in Uruk one should do as those of Uruk do,” was an ancient proverb. Ebal insisted that the sexual pressures and tensions that built up inside a man would after a time cause him to go mad unless he relieved them.

Days later, Ebal added a new twist
. He hinted that Laban wasn’t as virile as others were. “That’s why you always practice with your short sword. It’s to prove your manhood in the only way left you.”

Two weeks later Laban heard Par Alexander
. The philosopher was a tall, stoop-shouldered man with short, silver hair, huge, staring eyes and wore a disheveled toga. He spoke in a rich, persuasive voice.

The philosopher climbed a wooden platform after supper and soon a crowd gathered
. Merchants stood in their splendid robes, together with spearmen and learned elders from some of the nearby clan compounds. A long barracks made up the background, and as Laban glanced around, he realized this was the practice square for the mercenary soldiers from Nod.

“
How do we know anything?” Par Alexander began. “Through our senses is the common answer, through our eyes, ears, nose, tongue and fingertips, through these we filter the world. So everything is obvious, is it not? A tree falls because you see it and hear it crash. A wall exists because your foot hurts when kicking it. Watermelons taste sweet because that’s the sense you gain on eating it. Thus, everything is known. Even a fool knows that much. Isn’t that right?”

Laban found himself nodding with everyone else.

“Ah,” said Par Alexander, holding up a gnarly finger. “Wait a moment. There is a problem. In a dream one runs with all his might and yet gains no ground. Sometimes you leap skyward and fly like a bird or a pterodactyl. You ‘know’ the dream to be true, or you think you know, because you feel the dream-wind blowing on your dream-face. Then you wake up, blinking, aching to go back to sleep and relive the sense of flying. Now the problem is this. In the dream, you understand it to be true because you see, smell, taste and touch. And in life, you understand it to be true for exactly the same reasons. Yet in one instance the five senses play you false and in the other they are true, correct?”

Laban squinted at the stoop-shouldered philosopher, trying to understand what he was getting at.

Par Alexander fixed his wise, sad eyes on them. “Listen, my friends, how do you know when you’re dreaming and when you’re awake? Please don’t tell me because in your waking hours you see, touch and hear, because I’ll tell you that’s exactly how you ‘know’ things are real in your dreams. But people say dreams are not really real. My first question is, ‘How do you know the dreams are false?’  The answer of course is that you can’t know. So if you can’t know by resorting to your eyes, ears and nose, then how do you know you’re awake? Ah… I see some of you blinking and scratching your head. You must realize by now that you can’t say, ‘I know because I see you flapping your lips and I hear your nonsense words.’  So if we can’t use our senses to tell us, then we can’t know. And if we can’t know, then at this very instant we could be dreaming. If we could be dreaming… well, everyone knows there is no good or bad in a dream, there is just what you like and dislike. Therefore, friends, since you could be thinking all this up—or dreaming it—whatever you decide to do is neither good nor bad, just simply what you decide to do. So I tell you plainly. Do whatever you please. That is the only logical course to take.”

After that, Laban almost headed to a Temple of Love
. In the end, he remembered that he was going to Ham’s wedding and would soon see Uncle Noah. He didn’t want the old man to know his guilt just from looking at his face.