The Dovekeepers

Shirah drew the image of an eye on the wall with a piece of charred wood. She took a needle from the hem of her tunic, and while she recited an incantation she pierced the eye with the needle. The low, rhythmic sound of her voice drifted to where I was hidden. Although I didn’t understand the words, I guessed what she was doing. She was binding some man to be true, as I had done in the desert on the night when I drew the face of the lion in the dirt. Other men might stray, but this one would be bound to faithfulness as thread was bound to the stitches cast by a needle.

I shouldn’t have lingered. I could have easily returned the way I’d come before anyone saw me, but I was caught up in the spell. The chanting entrapped me, the singsong of Shirah’s voice winding itself around me as though it had the ability to bind me as well as the lover of the housemaid. Shirah turned to eye me as the scorpion glances at the mouse. I hurried away, yet still felt her gaze.

The following day I wore my scarf across my face when I went to work in the dovecote, hoping it would cause me to be invisible, much the way my father’s cloak hid his true nature. Shirah ushered me inside, a smile playing at her lips. I would have sworn she saw through my veil. When the others went to take their noon meal, cooking lentils and peas in an outdoor kitchen, Shirah insisted she needed my help. There was an errand we must attend to. I had no choice but to go. Like the housemaid who had come to her, I was only a servant.

We went into the fields, carrying our baskets. The sun beat down upon us.

“What I did at the wall, I was asked to do,” Shirah informed me as we passed beneath the lacy green shade of the almond trees. “It wasn’t love the girl asked for, merely decency.”

From where they sat over their lunch in the grove, the field women stared at us, whispering, save for one, the housemaid who was still gathering pistachios for her mistress. Pale petals were falling around us, half of them bitter.

“When the time comes and you want my help, I’ll listen to you as well,” Shirah said. “I’ll do as you ask.”

I blushed, confused. “Did I ask for anything?”

Shirah dumped the basket from the doves around the tallest almond tree, one that was abloom with a thousand flowers. It occurred to me that she could divine the truth even when it went unspoken.

“True enough,” she replied. “You haven’t.”

We began the walk back to the dovecote, side by side, past the mulberry bushes with their jumbles of black berries, past the pistachio tree where the housemaid was at work, stripping the pods from the branches. I noticed the young woman did not raise her eyes to us, even though Shirah touched her shoulder in a silent greeting. “Not yet,” she said to me.

IN THE HALLWAYS of the Western Palace atop the plateau, what had in the past served royalty now served us all. Wheat and grain were stored in what had once been elegant chambers. The tanners and bakers and metalworkers labored in a hall where the marble floors were as fine as any in Athens or Rome. To those who came from small villages, the glory of this place was astounding. Here, where there had been huge royal gatherings, we now worked in the service of the Almighty, not for our own greed. The rebels were pure in their concerns, yet the men were on edge, my father among them. He went to the synagogue built in to the western wall each morning, to pray and listen to the wise men talk about what the future would bring. I woke an hour before my father, to heat barley cakes in oil for his meal. I was his servant, his dog, and his chattel. His desires were my demands, his moods ruled my life.

The men met at the synagogue, worrying over the welfare of their leader, Eleazar ben Ya’ir, who had left our fortress several days earlier to rally support in desert towns throughout Judea. His followers were anxious for his return. In his absence, our peril was felt a hundred times over with only the unforgiving brim of the mountain there to protect us. When an old man at a public meeting demanded to know who would take Ben Ya’ir’s place if he should fall in battle, all the rest fell quiet. No one wanted to think about Masada without a leader, a body without spirit. Without Eleazar ben Ya’ir we were lost, at each other’s mercy, at one another’s throats. His band of warriors included my brother, and I was especially worried, for those who have recently been reunited should not be parted.

That very day, as if to answer any doubters, Ben Ya’ir—our rescuer and our redeemer, the man who had saved our people when Jerusalem had fallen—returned. He came at dusk. People went to the walls to watch as he and his closest companions climbed the path to God’s domain. There were those who believed he could speak with angels, that Raphael himself walked beside him, a gleaming sword raised to our enemies. We gazed over the cliffs that protected us and felt blessed to have such a noble leader.