The Lamp of Darkness, - [any book recommendations txt] 📗

Hillel said: If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And when I am for myself, what am I? And if not now, when?

Pirkei Avot 1:14

578 Years After the Exodus

The day before I was taken from my home, I grazed my uncle’s flock on a hillside overlooking the gates of Levonah. Sheltered from the early summer heat beneath a gnarled fig tree, I strummed my kinnor, the small harp that was my only valuable possession, while keeping one eye on the sheep and the other on the travelers approaching the town gates for market day.

This was before the breakout of war, when anyone could safely walk the King’s Road, regardless of their loyalties. Few travelers spared a glance for the young shepherd boy, and none stopped to talk until Seguv stepped off the shimmering road in early afternoon, leading his donkey up to my perch on the hillside. Seguv was only a few years older than me and spent half his time traveling the Kingdom with his brothers, selling their father’s dates from their estate along the Jordan River. They came to Levonah three or four times a year, but that day was the first time I ever saw Seguv alone. He approached me with a bounce in his step that told of news.

The sheep bleated—strangers spooked them. Seguv barely noticed. He untied one of his saddlebags and rummaged through a thick cushion of flax until he produced a tiny clay bottle. Its dust-colored exterior disguised the treasure within. His eyes sparkled.

“Is that it?” I asked, my eyes reaching toward the vial.

Seguv nodded.

I leapt to my feet. “Put just a drop my hands. I want to feel it.”

With a sly grin, he pulled the flask away. “A drop of this is worth more than one of your reeking sheep, and it would be worth my head if the King found out. I’ll let you smell it only.”

I reached out to take the bottle, but Seguv tightened his grip. Only when I dropped my hands, did he uncork it and hold it under my nose. The essence flooded my senses, overwhelming the smell of dry grass and stone with the sweetness of wildflowers. I closed my eyes and inhaled. Deeper notes of the scent—mineral, earth, spice—unfolded just as Seguv pulled the flask away. A hot breeze carried the sheep odor back under the tree, and I opened my eyes, confused. “If it’s so precious, why are you carrying it?”

Seguv’s eyes widened, “My father wants the first batch to go directly to the King.”

“But why are you taking it?” The roads were safe, and had been ever since the last civil war ended, years ago. Even so, who would send a kingly tribute with a boy selling dates, even if he was of age?

I could tell from the way he smiled, with his tongue flitting between his teeth, that he was waiting for me to ask. “It’s early.” He raised his thick, dark eyebrows. “This is the first batch of afarsimon oil ever produced in the Kingdom. The King isn’t even expecting a crop this year. My father says there’s no better time for my first appearance in Court.”

Only the most important men in Levonah ever went to the King’s Court—I’d never heard of a fourteen-year-old going to Court on his own. But of course, no family in Levonah was as prominent as Seguv’s was. “So that’s why you’re making the trip alone?”

“Hmm?” Seguv was hardly listening; his attention was focused on packing his precious cargo deep into its flax nest in his saddlebag.

“Is that why you’re making the trip without your brothers? To win the favor of the Court?”

“Oh.” Seguv closed the saddlebag, his hands fumbling with the straps. “I forgot you didn’t know.” His breath seeped out of him. “We lost Aviram a few months ago, and now Onan is too sick to travel.”

Aviram’s laughing face rose in my mind. Gone? I couldn’t help but ask, “What happened?”

Seguv’s teary eyes rose to meet mine. “It’s the waters in Jericho.” His chest swelled and collapsed in short bursts. “Many have died from them, but father says it won’t stop the rebuilding.”

Seguv tied off the last strap of the saddlebag as a fiery gust blew off the hillside, rustling the broad, handlike leaves of the fig tree. I wanted to comfort him but feared saying the wrong thing. Who knew better than me how easily a misplaced word could hurt? I reached instead for my kinnor—music had soothed my own heart so many times. I lowered my eyelids and quieted my mind. A slow breath filled my chest, and my fingertips found a nigun. I plucked the notes gently, passing through the simple melody a few times, and then opened my eyes—it was all I could offer.

The music filled the emptiness between us, its notes softening the silence under the tree. Seguv’s head dropped forward as one, two droplets darkened the dry soil at his feet. With a hitch in his breath, he mumbled, “Thank you,” and picked his way down the slope, drawing his donkey toward the town’s gate.

“Go in peace,” I called after him, then added, too quietly for him to hear, “and may the Holy One protect you from the waters of Jericho.”

I closed my eyes back into the melody, playing it louder now. Although it was impossible, I hoped that Seguv could feel the song even in Levonah and that it would bring him comfort there. Like a river, the notes flowed from my kinnor as my fingers swirled across the strings. The repetitive melody and the heat of the day settled down on me, on the road, on the sheep—like a dream.

I was still playing, when a feeling came upon me, a tingling across my back. I had felt this same pricking of warning two moons earlier when a lion stalked the flock in the early morning. Had I responded right away with sling and stones, I might have fought her off. But I had dismissed the feeling—the sheep were quiet. When the lion pounced, I was too late to keep her from making off with one of the lambs.

My back tensed up with the certain knowledge that something was behind me, but I didn’t open my eyes or stop playing. The first moment of facing danger was the most important. If only I could identify the threat, I’d gain some advantage. It couldn’t be a lion this time—lions almost never hunt at midday. And one wouldn’t come this close to the road, certainly not on market day.

I opened my eyes and spun quickly around, hoping to at least catch whatever it was by surprise. There was something there…someone there. I almost laughed when I saw that it was just an old man standing on the other