“Lev!” a voice broke through the fog, but it was no longer my father’s. The last of the light disappeared, and I awoke in total darkness. “Lev!” I heard again. It was Batya, Ovadia’s wife.
“Coming,” I called back, but I closed my eyes again and burrowed deeper into my straw bed, hoping to hear my father one last time.
“Lev!” she called a third time.
I rolled myself out of bed, my back groaning. I had never been so sore. Not even when I stranded my flock on the far side of the nahal below Levonah as the rain fell in torrents and the dry gully became a rushing stream. I carried each sheep back across in my arms, as stones and branches driven by the water pounded me. My uncle called me a fool for trying to get back, saying I should have taken cover and waited for the rains to subside. I still remember the agony of getting out of bed the next day, but this was worse. At least then I’d gotten a good night’s sleep and had risen to Aunt Leah’s hot porridge. But how could I complain about rest to Batya, who worked later than the moon and rose to wake the dawn?
I climbed down the ladder to the kitchen. One touch to the oven told me it was still warm from the baking the night before.
“Fire the oven and get grinding.” Batya didn’t look up from the dough. “I’ve almost finished kneading the flour you milled yesterday.”
“How could you finish it?” I asked. “I must have ground for twelve hours.”
She snorted. “Each of them like a man. I’ll need you to grind for another twelve today, and this time do it proper, like a woman.”
“You said I’d get faster.”
“You have been getting faster, but five more prophets arrived yesterday. There’s more to do than ever before.”
“We can’t send it out to a miller?”
“We’ve been through this, Lev. We can send a little bit out, but any more and he’d wonder why we need so much. We can’t have any questions about what we’re doing.”
Ovadia had sent away his slaves and maidservants for the same reason, which was why all the work fell to me. Batya caught my gaze. “I can do some of the grinding today if you want to try your hand at the baking again.”
I scanned the burns on my fingertips from pulling bread off the red-hot oven walls. “No, no. I’ll grind.”
“Light the oven first, it needs time to warm.”
I stirred the coals back to life, laying splinters of wood on top. Once I saw the flames rise, I threw a handful of barley onto the lower millstone and dragged the smaller upper stone back and forth over the grain with as much energy as I could muster. My muscles protested, but I wanted to make as much flour as I could before the entire house became unbearably hot. There was a reason the rest of Israel baked outside.
“We can’t use the outdoor oven today?” I wiped the sweat from my face.
“We can do two hours. Any more and the neighbors might wonder why we’re baking so much.”
“And grinding outside?”
“Perhaps for another hour. Any more…”
“And the neighbors will wonder why we’re grinding so much,” I finished. I cursed under my breath as I lifted the grindstone. It was heavy, but only about as long as my foot and made from a hard, charcoal-colored rock that Batya said was common in the northern part of the kingdom. I held it in both hands and pulled it back and forth over the barley kernels, grinding them to dust.
Outside, the sun finally rose. It would be a cool, dry day, as all the winter days had been since Eliyahu brought the drought. Inside the house, the oven grew hot. Sweat dripped from my forehead and pooled under my arms.
In my family, Dahlia ground the flour each day before making the next day’s bread. The wealthier families in Levonah had their flour ground by their maidservants, or else would send the grain out to a miller, who let donkeys do his work. Only in Emek HaAsefa had I ever seen men grinding flour and baking bread, and they were slaves.
Ovadia sent his slaves away because he couldn’t trust them. Now I’d become the trustworthy slave. Still, if it kept my master and the other prophets alive, I should do it with joy. So I told myself, but the joy refused to come.
Late in the afternoon, we finally finished, and I loaded the bread into saddlebags. A knock came against the gate, four hard raps followed by one soft one. I recognized the signal, but nonetheless lifted the flap and peered through the peephole.
I unlatched the gate, and Ovadia stepped in, holding three vine cuttings. “Where did you get those?” I asked as I secured the gate behind him.
“From Shmuel the Carmeli, a local farmer who makes excellent wine. He was gracious enough to let me choose the vines myself.”
“What do you want them for?”
“For my orchard.”
“You’re planting an orchard during a drought?”
Ovadia’s eyes flashed a warning. I had spoken of the drought loud enough to be overheard. He opened the gate, glanced up and down the street, then shut it again with a sigh. When he replied, his voice was a whisper. “No, Lev. You’re going to plant an orchard during a drought.”
“Me?” Didn’t I have enough to do? “Isn’t that like pouring out water on bare rock? Nothing will grow.”
“Nothing need grow.” I felt the intensity of his eyes as he watched me.
“Why else plant an orchard?”
Impatience crawled up Ovadia’s brow. “Never forget how great a responsibility rests in your hands, Lev. You and I are like men on the edge of a cliff, one slip and all is lost. It is not enough to hope to evade discovery. You must anticipate discovery and prepare for it.”
Ovadia stared at me, waiting for me to understand. I put aside my annoyance long enough to think on his words. “The orchard is my excuse should anyone see me near the cave.”
“Exactly. Soldiers may question you, but as long as you have plausible answers, they will let you be.” Ovadia grabbed a shovel and a pick from the corner of the courtyard and strapped them onto the donkey. As he did this, he sniffed the saddlebags. “I don’t smell the bread. You waited until it cooled?”
“Yes.”
“Good. The smell could attract attention. If anyone examines your bags and sees the bread, what will you say?”
I shrugged. I hadn’t given it any thought.
