Queenmaker (12 page)
Authors: India Edghill
“I am Zhurleen.” An odd name, I thought, but sweet-sounding, like a silver bell. She touched the edge of her teeth to her lower lip. “I am one of King David’s concubines.” She looked at me slantwise; her eyes were rich and dark as sloes. Now that she was close to me, I saw that Zhurleen was no girl. Now I thought she must be almost as old as I. But her honey skin was smooth as butter; under that skin her flesh was round and firm.
“I suppose that is a great honor,” I said. “You are very beautiful; you must please the king greatly.” I thought flattery could do no harm; besides, I thought it must be true.
“The queen is most gracious. But the king has many women …” She shrugged, and coiled one long sleek ringlet in her hand. Dark-fire hair slid over honey skin; turn and turn about her patterned fingers. Waiting. Then she looked at me again with that slanting cat-gaze, as if she wanted something from me.
I did not know what it was; I had nothing. And so I asked. I saw no reason, that first day in King David’s house, that I should not speak plain and free.
“What is it you want of me? I am only a farmer’s wife—come to my husband’s farm, and I can make you welcome, but here—” I stopped, for Zhurleen laughed.
“O Queen, you are as clever as the serpent! Yes, I want something of you, if you will grant it. I would be your friend. You will find me useful, I swear it.”
“I am always glad of friends,” I said. “But I will not be here. I must go back to Gallim, and my husband.”
She laughed again. “King David’s queen, to dwell in farmyard dust!”
I did not laugh, but looked at her straight. “I am not King David’s queen.”
“The king says you are, and we all know the king’s word makes truth.”
“I care nothing for the king’s words. My marriage to David was set aside long ago—and set aside by a king, too, my father King Saul.”
“What kings make, kings break,” Zhurleen said, and shrugged, and spread her painted hands. “And so here you are at last, the king’s first love and first wife—wise enough to wait and take care, while the others grew old before their time.” She smiled, as if we shared a precious secret. “Now you come back to King David fair and straight, and still young enough to give him a son of the royal line.”
“Royal line?” I stared at her, and then laughed. “Where do you come from, that you speak so? It is Yahweh who chooses our kings.”
A pause; Zhurleen’s eyelids flickered, flashed jewelfire. “Ascalon,” she said at last. “My home is Ascalon, O Queen.”
Ascalon, queen of the sea-cities of Philistia. So that was why there were henna waves upon her smooth hands, and why her very words held the rhythms of sea upon shore. The great cities of the Philistines were guardians of the sea-coast.
Zhurleen waited as I stared, curious. A Philistine concubine—how did David’s so-proud wives like that? I thought of Abigail’s sour face and smiled; I could not help it.
Zhurleen laughed again, soft. “Yes, I am a Philistine; in our land we know how to value kings—and queens.”
“And so do we here in Israel and Judah.” I did not truly understand Zhurleen, nor she me. That day knowledge lay hidden between us, and we each thought our wisdoms spread plain before the other’s eyes.
Zhurleen coiled her ringlet once more about her supple fingers, and smiled again. “Yes. How long was it, O Queen? Ten years married to a farmer, and yet no child?”
“That is true; it is a grief to me.” I kept my words sweet; Zhurleen was a Philistine, after all, and her ways were not mine. “But children do not come only because they are wished for.”
“Wise women know that. But I am sure a king will give you
sons, O Queen.” Zhurleen leaned forward, close to me; I smelled spikenard upon her crimson hair. “And so because I am wise, and can see my future, I would be your friend, if you will let me. A queen needs eyes and ears, and mine are keen and sharp.”
sons, O Queen.” Zhurleen leaned forward, close to me; I smelled spikenard upon her crimson hair. “And so because I am wise, and can see my future, I would be your friend, if you will let me. A queen needs eyes and ears, and mine are keen and sharp.”
“I do not understand,” I said.
“I will be your faithful friend from this moment on,” Zhurleen said. “I swear I will serve you well. I ask only that you take me into your household. The king will forget me one day; I know the queen will not.”
I stared at her; she sat back and lowered her glittering dragonfly lids. She waited, but I could think of nothing to say
“Tell me how I may serve you, O Queen. I can braid your hair with pearls or paint your nails with gold—King David has said you are to have whatever you desire—and I can make those fish-brained maids behave as they should! I can tell you what you should wear, and how—you are wise, to dress simply until you have the best—”
She plainly meant each word; I was sorry that I could do nothing for her. But there was something she could do for me, if she would. I held my hand out to her. “Zhurleen, do you truly wish to be my friend?”
“Of course. Only a fool would not.”
“There is something I would have done, and I do not know who else to ask. It is a great favor, but it will bring you no reward.”
“Serving the queen will be my reward.” Zhurleen spread her hands and bowed; I could not see her eyes. “What would you have me do, O Queen?”
“I wish a message sent.” Suddenly I was weary even in my bones; it was hard to find the right words. “A message to Phaltiel of Gallim. Tell him—tell him his wife awaits him. Tell him to come to Jerusalem and take me home.”
Zhurleen sat quiet, then, and looked at me, her painted face smooth as a temple-carving. A graven image. Then her heavy lashes quivered; there was comprehension in her eyes, and pity.
She took my hand in both of hers and touched it to her forehead.
“Live forever, O Queen. I will do as you ask. But I tell you now, it will not work.”
“Live forever, O Queen. I will do as you ask. But I tell you now, it will not work.”
That night I could not sleep; neither my mind nor my body would let me rest. I lay upon the queen’s wide bed and heard again the day’s voices, an endless hissing, like sand in the wind. I felt again David’s hands upon my wet hair as he made me want him; I saw again that odd pity in Zhurleen’s black eyes.
I tried to think of homely things: the spinning I had left undone; how many baskets of figs I must dry after harvest; whether the rent in Caleb’s almost-new tunic could ever be properly mended. I tried to count the stitches that must be set. But what I told over to close the gap were the days that must pass before I saw Caleb again; the hours that must be counted before Phaltiel again held me close, and laughed.
At last I rose and went to the window. The opening was shuttered against the night by ivory carved until it was fragile as old bones. I set the ivory screen aside and looked out over Jerusalem.
The moon sailed high, just past full, spilling light pale over the city. From my window, housetops were flat shadows; streets wove between, dark as the bottom of a well. Even so late I saw lamps still lit. Far away, at the city gates, torches blazed high. I could see the torch-fires dance even from my distant window.
Jerusalem. King David’s prize.
King David’s city, calm and powerful as a lion asleep under the dreaming moon.
I stood at the window and watched the moon’s shadows grow long. The small bright flames of lamps went out, one by one. At last all that was left of light was the torches at the great gates, flaring harsh yellow against the night like wild eyes.
When all the city lay dark within its walls, I set the ivory screen back in its place, and went to lie once more upon the bed. I did not think I would ever sleep, not this night, in this room.
But I did, of course. And if I dreamed, I did not remember my dreams in the bright morning when David came to me again.
I was still sleeping when David came to wake me with a kiss, as if he were an ardent bridegroom. He was not pleased when I called him by Phaltiel’s name before I truly woke; but it was his own fault and I told him so.
“I am not yours, David, I am Phaltiel’s. Did you think I had lain these ten years in his arms thinking of you?”
His eyes flickered; I thought suddenly of my father. I did not know why, for David was nothing like Saul. But then David smiled; he had set aside anger.
“I have lain ten years thinking of you, Michal.” He reached out to stroke my hair.
I sat up, wrapping the linen sheet close around me. I was still half-drugged with sleep. The light through the carven screens fell in bright hot patterns; it must be nearly midday.
David smiled and leaned closer, into the window’s path; sun and shadow slid over him. He caught a strand of my hair up in his fingers and wove it through them, back and forth. “Ten years since our wedding night, and now at last we have our honey morning.”
I moved away. “Yes—ten years since you left me because you needed someone to raise the rope again so that you would not be caught. I wanted to go with you, David. I loved you then.”
“And now you hate me for leaving you.” His voice was slow hot honey pouring through the warm air between us.
I laughed and shook my head. That bright morning I thought myself much wiser than he. “No, but I do not love you for it either. Oh, David, all that was long ago—let us forget it now.”
“Yes, let us forget it now.” He smiled in the way that once had made my bones melt with love, and lifted my hair to his lips. “Now that your patience and faith have been rewarded, and we are together once more. As we should be, Michal. Now we shall found a house of kings to rule over Israel and Judah both.”
“My brother Ishbaal is still king in Israel,” I said. “As for your house of kings—I have been ten years married and have no child. I cannot give you what you want, and you have a dozen sons already. Do not be foolish, David.”
“You will get sons with me. Yahweh has given me so much, he will not withhold that.”
“Has Yahweh given you a sign to say so?”
“Everything I have done is a sign of Yahweh’s favor,” David said. “See, I am king in Judah—I, who was born the last son of a humble man, am king. I have risen high when others who were greater are brought low.”
He moved again, closer still, and put his arm around me. I sat very quiet, like a bird before a snake. “I have Jerusalem, and I have you, King Saul’s daughter, and soon I will have the sacred Ark as well. Is that not sign enough for any man?”
“The Ark?” I stared; I could not believe it. The Ark held graven in stone the words Yahweh had given long ago to seal the covenant the god had made with our people. But the Ark had not been seen since before my grandfather’s time. The Philistines had won it away during a long-ago battle; no living man knew where it now lay.
“Yes, even the Ark of the Lord will be mine, to rest here in Jerusalem in all honor. Yahweh. has revealed it to me. At the right moment it will be revealed to all the people. Who could ask for a greater sign of favor?”
David waited, smiling, but I could think of nothing to say. That would be a wonder indeed, to see the holy Ark. At last I said, “Yahweh indeed loves you, David. When will you bring the Ark to Jerusalem?”
“Oh, when the time is ripe.” He said the words carelessly, as if the Ark of Yahweh’s covenant were no more than a cartload of melons to be brought to market. He shifted his arm, stroked my shoulder. “So you see, I will have all—with Yahweh’s blessing.”
I would not move under his hand; that he would not have of
me again. “If you have all that,” I said, “what do you need with me? You have wives aplenty.”
me again. “If you have all that,” I said, “what do you need with me? You have wives aplenty.”
“But none of them are King Saul’s daughter,” David said. “None of them are the princess I loved so dear. None of them are the woman I waited ten years to hold again within my empty arms.
I thought about what David had said, but his words only sounded like foolishness to me then. And we both knew he had not waited even one year with empty arms, let alone ten.
“Oh, David, you believe your own songs now! This is not Moab, or Egypt—any man can be king here, if Yahweh wills it. Look at me—I am a farmer’s wife, and no princess. Who in all Israel or Judah now cares that I was once a king’s daughter?”
“I care,” said David. “You will be queen of my house and my heart for the love I bore you, and Jonathan—yes, and even for King Saul.” He leaned to kiss me; I drew back.
“No,” I said. “I am married, and not to you. Do not touch me, David. It means nothing to me but pain, and I know how much it means to you. Go to your own wives, if you lust. You have women enough without me.”
For a heartbeat I thought he might force me, to have his way. But he did not.
“This is all new to you, and strange,” he told me at last. “You must have time to become accustomed; you shall have time. You shall have whatever you wish, my queen. You have the king’s word on it.”
“Truly?” I said.
“Have I not said it?”
“Then I wish you to send me home,” I said. “Send me home to my husband.”
For a moment David did not speak; I sat and waited while the sunlight danced hot upon his hair.
“I am your husband,” he said at last. “You have waited long and patient for me, and now you will be rewarded, as I promised you. Now you will see what it is, to be King David’s queen.”
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