“At the same time that Yoav’s wife died, my wife left the world. By then, I had reached Jerusalem and did not know until I returned weeks later. My son was forced to bury his mother alone.”

Comprehension dawned on Shimon’s face. “That is why he left the Way and turned toward the Calf?”

“So he says. As you know, I spent my life traveling among the people. I was often away, and he resented it. He said that burying his mother alone was the final act that compelled him to leave my path. But even he does not know the full truth, that it was my curse that drove him from me.”

“But, Master,” I said, “You’re not from the family of priests that Yeravaum appointed to replace the kohanim, are you?”

Uriel shook his head.

Shimon explained, “This was during the Civil War. Remember what I told you about King Omri. He deliberated on the people’s reaction to each of his decisions. Having the son of the great prophet as his priest would increase his stature in the eyes of the nation and help him achieve the throne. When Omri learned that Master Uriel’s son Gershon had separated from his father, he moved quickly to offer him the position before King Tivni could win his loyalty.”

The prophet’s wail echoed from between his knees. “Three families destroyed on a single day!”

Hillel said: Do not believe in yourself until the day you die.

Pirkei Avot 2:5

19

The Final Journey

The full moon blazed like a beacon in the western sky when we set out from the cave. Three days had passed in silence, each of us lost in contemplation in some corner of the small cave. For me, the time was spent digesting Shimon’s tale, dwelling on the panic etched on my parents’ faces, the eerie sound of their voices, and the image of their brutal deaths—details I’d never before been able to recall. The rebound of Uriel’s curse upon his own family struck Shimon harder than I would have imagined. He no longer handled or even examined the captured sword while we remained in the cave. Nevertheless, when it was time to depart for our journey toward Dotan, he retrieved the sword and sheathed it around his waist.

Once on the road, we would just be pilgrims traveling home from the festival, but in the hills, we were potential prey. We trekked under cover of night to limit the risk of detection, but the cloudless sky and the moon’s silvery brilliance nevertheless exposed us to prying eyes. There was nothing we could do about that: the festival always fell at the full moon. Uriel scanned the hilltops as we walked. I likewise searched the dark horizon for the outline of a soldier, but saw nothing.

We stopped well before dawn, hiding a stone’s throw from the road in a thick clump of bushes. I lay down, my eyes heavy with drowsiness, my fears of discovery insufficient to hold off sleep.

A steady rumbling woke me; it sounded like the echo of a thunderclap off distant hills. I opened my eyes to sunbeams filtering through the thick branches above. “What’s that noise?”

“Horses,” Uriel replied. “Thirty at least, from the sound of it, being driven hard. The King and his escort.”

“Ovadia will be with them?”

“I expect so. You may go back to sleep; we still have a long wait.”

I sat up and pulled on my tunic. Anticipation had set in; sleep was no longer an option. The rumbling grew louder until the troop of horses thundered past, their dark shapes barely visible through gaps in the leaves.

Other horsemen followed the King’s escort, riding past in ones and twos; then those on donkeys ambled past in small groups. The sun hung mid-sky when a thin stream of hardy farmers, in a hurry to return to their fields, appeared. Before long, the road was thick with travelers, ranging from boys newly of age to old men, who passed by in waves, talking and laughing as they went.

Uriel finally broke our silence. “It is time.”

I crept out of the bushes, then circled around and sat beneath a tree on the roadside, resting my back against its trunk. A group of men passed, and when the last of them disappeared, leaving the road in front of me empty, I ran one hand over the strings of my kinnor.

Uriel and Shimon appeared beside me. Small groups of walkers flowed by as we ate our midday meal, appearing like three travelers stopping for a rest. When a large group of men appeared down the road, Uriel said, “We will let them pass, then join in from behind.”

The sun beat down as we fell into stride with the group. My hair stuck to my forehead and sweat pooled beneath the rolled-up sheepskin slung over my back. Images of the cool spring near my uncle’s house danced in my head, but Levonah was behind us—ahead lay Shomron.

We mingled in at the back of the crowd, moving past the very rear where we might stand out. My eyes flickered to the hilltops above the road, occasionally picking out a soldier stationed on a peak, but my breath remained steady. These were no longer the soldiers we feared—from above they would see nothing strange in this throng returning from Beit El.

The masses moving north on the road thinned throughout the day as men turned off toward home. In the late afternoon, we rounded a bend, and the road dropped into a long decline. We were close to Shomron now, the destination of most of those still walking. We approached a cluster of men stopped ahead, just before the shade of a large carob tree.

“What’s going on up there?” Shimon asked.

Uriel stood to his full height. “Soldiers.”

“Israelite or foreigners?”

“Foreigners.”

I glanced at Shimon, and my heart thumped in my chest. This was the encounter I was dreading. Would he seek conflict with the Queen’s soldiers? I was relieved to see no hunger for battle on his face. His expression was calm, almost serene. Learning of Uriel’s curse rebounding upon himself seemed to have changed Shimon—as if for ten years he’d hungered to hold the prophet’s power to curse, and only now realized its cost. He said, “A roadblock. Should we turn off?”

Uriel nodded toward the sides of the road. “They have soldiers stationed along the hillsides. They will be watching for anyone trying to avoid them. We are better off walking through.”

I followed my master’s gesture. At first I didn’t spot them—they were not like the lookouts sitting mounted on the hilltops. These watchers were further down, in the shadows, where they could see without being seen.

Shimon’s body tensed as he studied the soldiers bordering the roadside, and his eyes lost their quiet. His hand slipped under his cloak to the hilt of his sword.

I inched closer to him and whispered, “Remember, Master Uriel must reach Dotan.”

Shimon regarded his hand, appearing surprised to find it grasping the sword, as if his battle-hungry instincts had acted of their own accord. He released the hilt and placed his hand on my shoulder instead. “I know the plan.”

We drew closer to the roadblock. Uriel said, “There’s a priest as well.”

“What?” Shimon asked.

“A priest of the Baal. Under the tree.”

I craned my neck to see. Sure enough, I caught a glimpse of violet robes in the shade of the carob tree. One soldier stood on each side of the road, while a third blocked the path in front of the waiting men, forcing them to pass through the shade one at a time. A man in a gray cloak was waved through. He stepped under the tree, approached the priest, then dropped to his knees and pressed his forehead to the ground.

“Clever,” Uriel said.

“What’s clever, Master?”

“Izevel is most powerful in Shomron, but many are opposed to her, even there. So, she waited until all the men of the city left for the festival, then placed a Baal on their path home. Now she can see who will bow and who will resist.”

I peered under the tree, trying to glimpse the statue. “We must get through, Master.”

“I will not bow before the Baal.”

“Even to save your life?” The words rung hollow, Uriel placed too little value on his life. I changed tactics, appealing to his sense of mercy instead. “Even to save my life?” This too failed.

“Some things are more precious than life, Lev. We are commanded to choose death rather than bow to strange gods. Even you must be willing to die rather than bow.”

Shimon’s hand sought the hilt of his sword, not absentmindedly as before, but with the same blazing intensity in his eyes as when he first leapt out of the trees to save us the week before. “You see, Lev, I was right to prepare for battle.”

“There are three soldiers ahead and at least five more on the hillsides—you can’t fight them all!”

“Samson killed a thousand in a single battle. You heard Master Uriel, Lev. The spirit I received was the same as Samson’s.”