On the fourth day of the festival, a new noise filled the cave. It took me a moment to realize it wasn’t actually a sound at all, but rather the lack of one: the rains had stopped. Outside, the wind blew wisps of dark clouds across the skies far above us, but there was no hiss of falling rain. A stillness pervaded the cool, clean air down below. Two disciples rushed out of the cave, waving for me to follow. When we reached the sukkah, one dropped to his knee, and I climbed onto his shoulders—as the lightest one, the roof was my responsibility. The other disciple handed up the fallen branches one by one, and I laid them across the top, creating a roof thick enough to provide shade but not shelter. When we’d finished, I examined our rebuilt sukkah. The ground was soaked with mud, the walls were battered and barely holding together, and the waterlogged roofing dripped into the interior. Yet, I never felt happier to have a sukkah.
The one remaining servant prepared a feast, serving each of us individually, as he had since I returned. Midway through the meal, Uriel’s hand paused on the way to his mouth. He stood quickly without explanation, exited the sukkah, and strode up the hill that bounded the eastern side of the valley toward the road. The rest of us continued to eat, but our eyes followed the prophet. It wasn’t long until we saw what our master had sensed: a donkey trotting along the hillside.
The navi reached the road just before the rider passed, and he flagged him down. The man stopped, spoke briefly to Uriel, then continued on his way. There was a shadow on my master’s face as he dropped back into the valley, but no trace of it remained by the time he entered the sukkah. He stepped inside and, ignoring his meal, burst into song. The rest of us joined in, but though I knew the tune well, I struggled to harmonize. My master sang a bit too fast.
The break in the rain didn’t last, and we never returned to our sukkah. The eighth day that capped the festival marked the beginning of the rainy season. The ground was already bogged with mud and rain still fell in torrents, but Uriel declared that the prophets had prayed for rain at the end of Sukkot ever since Joshua led our people across the Jordan River, regardless of what the skies held. We gathered at the chilly opening of the cave, wrapped in all our clothing and sheepskin sleeping mats, to hear the prayers of the old prophet as he stood just outside the mouth of the cave, arms wide, calling out in a raw voice.
“Master of the World! For the sake of Abraham our father, who ran to bring water to the tired and thirsty, do not withhold rain from his children.”
A gust of wind stuck Uriel’s drenched tunic to his body and tossed his hair wildly. “For the sake of Rivka our mother, who ran to bring water to a stranger, and watered even his ten camels, do not withhold rain from her children.”
Uriel cried out each petition in turn, rain rolling down his face; at the end of each one, we all shouted, “Amen.”
“Holy One! For the sake of Moses our Teacher, father of the prophets, who stood before you forty days without water, do not withhold rain from his disciples!” The navi stretched his hands upward toward the heavens, and we drew in closer.
He clenched his hands in the frigid air as the winds rose to a howl. “May the rains come as a blessing and not as a curse!”
“Amen!”
“May they come for life and not for death!”
“Amen!”
“May they come for abundance and not for scarcity!”
“Amen!”
“Master of the World! You and only you cause the wind to blow and the rain to fall!”
“Amen!”
When he turned back from the rain, my master’s eyes were aflame. In that moment, I saw the wild dancer in the rain within the old prophet. Uriel pulled two disciples out into the mire and began to dance. The rest of us joined in, finally relishing the drops on our faces. For the first time, they tasted of blessing, not of bitter curse.
No sooner had the sun set that night, marking the close of the festival, than Uriel drew me aside.
“The first day we met, when I was entering Levonah, you were speaking to a boy leading a donkey. Do you recall?”
“Yes, Master.”
“There was an emblem on his saddle bag from the city of Jericho.”
“That was my friend Seguv. His father Hiel is rebuilding the city.”
“Yes, I know that Hiel of Beit El is rebuilding the city; I wanted to know if your friend was his son.” Uriel sighed, and his body again appeared as it had before the festival: heavy, as if every movement was an effort. “I’m sorry to tell you that Seguv died six days ago.”
Hot tears stung my eyes—they came so easily now. “Is that what the rider told you?”
“Yes, he was on his way to bring tidings to the King.”
Seguv told me the King had invested heavily in the rebuilding of the city—of course he would want to know that Hiel had lost another son. But I cared little now about the King or Jericho. My thoughts were on the warm smile, the friendly face that always stopped to greet me whenever he passed through Levonah, bringing the wider world into the small circle of my life. I wiped my cheeks with the back of my hand, “Why did you wait to tell me?”
“Sukkot is a time of joy.”
Blood rushed to my face. That’s all he had to say? He knew I’d lost a friend and held it back for…joy? “You should have told me,” I nearly spat out the words.
“I know it feels that way.”
Uriel’s words only made me angrier. “Joy isn’t always the right feeling. We need to feel other things, too.”
“Not on Sukkot. Don’t think joy is so simple—I’m not talking about the empty celebrations of fools. Real joy takes work, inside and out—more than any other emotion.”
I avoided his gaze, but the navi pressed his point. “On Sukkot, we attach ourselves to the Presence, which we can do only in a state of joy. We choose to rejoice even when we don’t feel joyous. That’s why there is no mourning on Sukkot. The mourning period for Seguv will begin now and last for one week. His family will receive anyone wishing to visit.”
Uriel paused, but I remained silent. “If you like, you may go.”
Now my eyes met his. “You said we would begin traveling immediately after Sukkot.”
“True. But I will wait for your return. The loss of a friend is a deep wound, and it must be mourned if it’s to heal.” Uriel let out another long sigh. “There is no time to go and return before Shabbat. If you go, leave early on the first day of the week. You may take Balaam to hasten your journey. You can let me know your decision in the morning.”
I walked to the back of the cave and unrolled my sleeping mat. I removed my tunic, laid down, and pulled it over me, not up to my neck as I normally did, but up over my head. Thoughts of death were nothing new to me, but this was different. I knew Seguv; I never knew my parents.
With Seguv there was no lockbox of memories—they all seemed to rise to the surface of my mind at once: Seguv and his brothers laughing as they led their donkey into Levonah; Seguv holding out the afarsimon oil; Seguv standing in the throne room, presenting the oil to King Ahav; Seguv lying on his back, his eyes dark and vacant.
Lying in the darkness, hidden under my tunic, I felt the pain of my open heart. Tears came, and I didn’t hold them back. They streaked my face with loss. The disciples could hear me sobbing, but I didn’t care. My tunic wasn’t over my head to hide me from the disciples, it was to hide them from me. I couldn’t bear to see pity in their eyes.
