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XI. AND UNTO YOU, A CHILD
Gabriel closed his eyes and prepared himself to return to the Shepherd's Field, but when he opened his eyes again he was still in the vision. Rafael was not done tormenting him.
Herod's palace loomed before him like a monolith in the mid-morning light. The lancet arch of the main courtyard, the pretorium, yawned like a great hungry maw before the crowd which had gathered in the street. Gabriel thought there must be thousands here, all whispering fearful questions, clipped and sinister responses, in a chorus of sizzling anxiety.
"He disappeared last night, after seder."
"Was he not taken to The Temple?"
"James said Jude the Sicarri is behind this somehow. There was some money involved..."
"But his own brother?"
"Pilate's had him all morning. He must be dead by now."
"Hold your tongue! His mother is just over there."
Gabriel searched through the crowd. Mirriam was moving slowly forward towards the front of the throng with Joseph on one side, Lazarus on the other, pushing people out of her way. Ahead of them, Rock and James plowed through the dense mob like the prow of one of their boats.
Scattered through the crowd, Gabriel could see the others also bullying their way forward, only to be stopped by the Roman guards as they reached the front and stood, waiting anxiously before the palace of the dead Idumean.
Pilate appeared beneath the arch, dressed in splendid robes of white and solferino, a circlet of silver leaves round his wide, balding brow. He addressed them in his own tongue, with one of the Sadducees translating.
Gabriel was surprised how poor his Latin was, but then the man was only a soldier, not a scholar. The Imperial Governor said something about Pesach and the Messiah and made a tasteless joke, reminding them about their own law concerning false idols and all the trouble they'd given him over some incident involving the flags he'd tried to put up in the palace.
The priest did his best to soften the slur as he translated, but the crowd began to growl like a beast. Pilate signaled his soldiers and they brought a man forward into the arch. The man was also dressed in the deep, purple-scarlet of Imperial Rome, but the cloak was filthy and torn, and, instead of a circlet of silver leaves, he wore a crown plaited of thorny burnet.
Gabriel's shock at the cruelty made his mind wander. How had someone made the crown without shredding his hands? The spikes of the hedge shrub were sharp as nails.
The Jews drew ragged breath as the soldiers turned the man’s back towards the throng and Pilate pulled down the robe to display the marks of a vicious scourging. In doing so, Pilate had dirtied his hands with the man's blood. A slave rushed forward with a basin and towel.
The governor washed his hands and signaled the guards to turn the man back around to face the assembled Judeans. "Look at this man!" he shouted derisively. "Such a pitiful specimen of Judea's finest." Pilate's thin lips drew together in a malignant smirk. "I will give him back to you..."
The priest translated mid-sentence and the governor was forced to pause, throwing off the timing of his malicious joke.
"...if you can tell me one thing."
The priest repeated this and Gabriel felt himself withdrawing in sleepy incomprehension.
"Tell me who this is? This piteous wreck? Is he Jesus The King--?"
"...Yaoshua, Messiah?" the priest repeated the question.
Gabriel's mind reeled. He looked again at the bloody wretch standing beside the Roman governor and saw the face of his son. He searched reflexively for Mirriam and Joseph, but they had been pushed back into the shelter of the throng to spare them the awful sight.
Pilate waited for the translator to finish. "Or is he Jesus, a common man’s son?"
"...Yaoshua bar Abbas?" the priest translated, using Yeshua's self-given surname.
The assembly hesitated, looking to their leaders, for a way out of this malevolent trap. None of them knew the proper answer. They only knew that both possible answers were wrong.
James the Elder raised his voice, "Jesus Barabbas!"
Rock thundered out, "Jesus Barabbas!" and then throughout the multitude, voices raised up, "Jesus, give us Jesus Barabbas!"
Yeshua focused his tired eyes upon them and smiled graciously at their proclamation, as if it were balm to his pain.
Pilate raised his palms and their plaintive cries were silenced. He pretended to turn and look at Yeshua, but his eyes never left the horde at his gate. "I do not see a common man here. Alas, I have only this Jesus who says he is The King. Your other Jesus must be elsewhere."
Loud wails rose up as the priest translated this.
"This Jesus will be crucified with his two conspirators, Cestus and Didymus. As will all who dare to threaten your rightful King and Lord, Tiberius Caesar!"
The priest got only so far as the sentence of execution before the Jews screamed out as one wounded man. The shocked moans and shrieks of "Crucified?" ran through the crowd in vibrant, outraged disbelief and anguish.
Pilate felt the ardent hatred of so many people rush towards him like a storm and he ordered his men to clear the streets from the palace to the Gennath Gate.
Gabriel struggled out of the dream and threw himself, shuddering and sobbing, face down on the ground. When he could speak again, he begged Rafael to stop, to spare him the death of his beloved son.
"Beloved Son?" Rafael said quietly. There was an edge of bitterness to his words which scathed his brother terribly. "The 'skew-shoulder buffoon' has become 'beloved son' simply by virtue of his beating and his dying?"
Gabriel lifted his head from the sod and turned towards Rafael. "No," he whispered. He rolled over on his back and pushed up on his elbows. "He healed Annas. He is The Messiah."
"Other men are healers. Many men proclaim to be The One," Rafael said.
"Why are you arguing with me?" Gabriel tucked his chin down on his chest and measured his brother's affect. Rafael was as enigmatic as the dark night.
"I know what is wrong with you, Gabriel, but it will do neither of us any good, if you cannot see it yourself. Open those bright eyes of yours, Brother, and finally see."
Gabriel sat up and crossed his legs. He picked up a stone and threw it down the hill. "I do not understand you, Rafael. I despise my son, and you are angry. I love my son, and still you are angry. I save Mirriam, and you are angry. You are exhilarated and enamored of my son, but you were angry with me that I gave him life. You speak of him with the same tones as you reserve for The Father, but for me, the actual sire, you have only threats and blows and vile disappointment. You say that you love me, but there is only hatred in your every deed towards me, your every word. You pierce me to the marrow with this grim vision of my son. Then you judge my suffering inadequate to whatever secret measure by which you have always found me wanting."
"1 must show you the rest. Gabriel." Rafael placed his slender hands on his brother's knees. "I thought it would be less wounding if you came to an understanding before--"
"What understanding?" Gabriel cried out in frustration. "What?"
"If you were not so badly crippled, then none of this could have been possible," Rafael said. "We all understand that now. Your friend, Joseph, told you none other could have saved him, because the rest of us are so frightening. In his way, he is exactly right. There is a reason you despised your son when you first saw him. There is a reason you did not recognize him. There is also a reason why you felt affection only after he was so badly hurt.
"There is a reason why we love you and you do not love us. And all of these reasons are the same, Gabriel. There is no longer any use to your incapacity."
"Stop it!" Gabriel pleaded. "I don't know what you mean. Let me go back to Mirriam and to Joseph. They need me. I can be of some use to them."
"It is rather the other way around, Gabriel. At least you will admit that."
"Admit what?" Gabriel felt a dull, thudding discomfort building at his temples.
Rafael's argent eyes closed tightly as if a sudden pain had gripped him. He began to say something, but he stopped.
"Are we finished with this?" Gabriel asked finally.
"I have one more hour until it is time to see to Mirriam," Rafael said, his eyes still closed. "In that hour, we will get through the rest of this, in one fashion or another."
Gabriel groaned.
"I will spare you as much as I can by returning to the vision beyond the worst of it, and merely telling you what happened before we begin again," Rafael said. "The Romans brought Jude and the Zealot out, while others went for the patibula. Jude wriggled away from his guards and ran to Yeshua, but he stopped short because the sight of his brother made him afraid. Yeshua had remained so quiet during the display and the sentence, it seemed he was in shock or insensate from the beating he had taken at the hands of Pilate's lictor.
"But Yeshua was fully aware. He smiled at Jude. He joked with him to reassure him that they were both still alive and constant, no matter the horror which pressed in on them."
"He joked?" Gabriel gasped.
"Let me proceed with this, Brother," Rafael said, clearly not wanting to elaborate.
"He's standing there bloodied from crown to heel and he makes jokes to his brother who is about to die with him. That's disgusting!"
"I found it poignant," Rafael replied indignantly. "I thought it would hurt you, so I declined to be specific before." Rafael related the moment with more clarity, speaking as if he were, first Jude, and then Yeshua.
"Hunch, what have they done to you?"
"It is all right, really. It looks worse than it feels."
"It must have been awful. What did you do?"
"Well, first I raised a racket worthy of a dyspeptic djinn, then I thought of something more helpful."
"Which was?"
"To pass out cold. I should have thought of that much, much sooner. Far and away the most sensible approach."
Gabriel was appalled. "I don't think that was very funny."
"Jude did, and that is what mattered. He began to laugh and then he fell, weeping, his arms around Yeshua's knees. He begged to be forgiven for leading Yeshua into a trap, but Yeshua refused to let him take the blame. Yeshua assured him it was His own stupidity that had brought them to this pass.
"Then He reminded Jude how they had all expected this day, how, after John had been killed, they all knew their own lives would be in peril if they continued to preach in his name. Yeshua spoke of the decision they had made. 'Have you not died?' He asked Jude, reminding His brother of their ritual in Joseph's tomb.
"The ritual of being buried?" Gabriel tried to remember Yeshua’s explanation to Annas.
"Yes, Gabriel. Yeshua was not entirely truthful when he spoke with Annas. They were all so afraid of being killed, they could not find the courage to continue preaching. Yeshua came up with the idea of 'dying' so they could master their fear, so they could stop being afraid of losing their lives."
Rafael folded his hands, forcing himself into stillness. "He told Jude that Joseph was in the crowd, and that Papa would also be watching and they must acquit themselves as bravely as was possible, to spare their suffering. Jude rose unsteadily and Yeshua embraced him, whispering that they were especially blessed."
"Dear Lord, spare me such blessing," Gabriel prayed.
"No. Yeshua told Jude they were all going to die, just as they had expected. But He and Jude would be the only ones to die together. All the others would die alone, and most of them far away from the Holy City."
Gabriel felt the tears welling, stinging his swollen eye, his raw cheek. Rafael went on, but Gabriel had difficulty hearing all the hard sounds, the latin names for the measure of death which Pilate decreed.
The dismal images struck his inward eye with a precision he might have wished were otherwise. Stipes cruces--the ridiculously short uprights--hardly two heads taller than an ordinary man--made of rough-hewn common acacia and set in the rim of Herod's old quarry just beyond the Gennath Gate. Patibulum--the thirty-pound crossbeam with the deep mortis at its center where it would fit over the top of the stipes..and the shoulders of the prisoners as they were marched to their deaths.
It should not have mattered, but Gabriel had pictured the crux sublimus. the immissa, the tall cross with the intersecting beam, when Pilate spoke the sentence. But no, Rafael described the lesser tree, the crux humilis. They would hang his son upon the tau cross, the one they used for common thugs, not upon the greater cross whereon they were wont to display an honored enemy.
Gabriel saw the process in flashes of imagery: a knee on a forearm on a beam, the moment before the hammer descended, impaling the wrist onto the patibulum; the panting struggle of the guards, lifting the crossbeam and the man, sliding it up to nock on the stipes where it would be nailed onto the crown of the beam. Infamis stipes, they called it, infelix lignum. He pictured the soldiers scrambling to grab the calves and lift the legs, holding them sideways to the upright.
A man held a shake of olive wood over the feet and another knelt down and drove the third spike home, through the wood and the heels and into the beam in one dread stroke, finishing it flush with a second.
The Romans named it rightly, summum supp1icium, crudelissimum et teterimum, the cruelest and most terrible death, the more malorum.
Rafael paused in the telling, waiting for Gabriel to focus. "I have at least spared you the sound of it, the transition from standing to hanging, from adornment to nakedness, from living to dying. I will take you into the moment when the action has quieted, past the time when waiting has dulled the pain of the dying and the mourning, when the first terrible passion is spent."
Rafael moved closer to Gabriel and lifted his arms. Gabriel flinched, but Rafael drew him close in a firm embrace. "Whatever you feel for me, Brother, this cannot be endured alone."
Gabriel felt his heart leap. If this were dulled pain, then Rafael had indeed been merciful to spare him the preceding. He could not at first find it in himself to look at the crucified men. He knew that Yeshua hung in the center because Mirriam was standing there, in Lazarus' arms, as close to her son as the guard would allow. Her long, black hair was loose and uncovered, but her solemn and awesome grief forbade any consideration of shame. Her eyes were as empty as death, and as profound as sorrow could 'grave them.
Lazarus was numb, upright as the terrible beam, and just as indifferent. Beside him, Mary Migdal knelt, one arm outstretched around the guard, her fingers just touching the twisted feet. Her head was also bare, but in her case this imparted a sadly sensual ardor that was almost indecent.
Gabriel was dimly aware of an irritating noise rising and falling, a grating whine of weariness and wrath.
"They promised me," it whimpered. "I was to have my freedom if I brought them the rabbi from Nazareth. 'Bring me Yeshu,' he said. 'And you will go free. Look what they've done, these puking bastard kittim. They promised meee--"
It repeated again and again like a litany. Gabriel looked up.
He was suddenly grateful for his brother's arms around him--somewhere in the world outside this dream.
Set against the boiling grey sky, the stark imposition of the cross and his son 5 contorted body was unendurable. There was Mirriam's veil. She had placed it over his nakedness, trading her humiliation for his. Gabriel glanced to the right. Migdal had done the same for Jude.
No one had seen to the mewling zealot traitor, who had changed his tune to one of denigrating all within earshot.
Gabriel felt himself drawn into the ponderously slow rhythms of their agony. Inevitably, the shoulders loosed their tenacious and tetanous knots, gradually succumbing to the inexorable pull of the earth. Abject exhaustion slid the torso slowly down the length of the stipes, finally depositing the full weight of the body upon the sundered heels. The sinews across the chest tightened and cramped, allowing inspiration only.
Then the starved flesh gibbered and fretted the will to save it, surging panic through the limbs and inciting the long climb back up the beam, tearing the wrists, pounding the heels, all for the surcease of a single, gulping breath, and then another, and another until the gradual fall began again.
Gabriel was utterly caught in the impossible misery and suffering as if it were his own. His own breath stilled with his son's. His heart jarred within his chest. His shoulders poised on the brink of manifesting wings and stayed there, started from their sockets, rending his neck and back in splayed torment.
The zealot, Cestus, stopped whining and began screaming, a hollow, terrified yowl which turned the heads of the other two towards him.
A woman rushed to a large earthen jar on the ground between the zealot and Yeshua. Gabriel saw her stoop over the jar and soak up its liquid into a sponge. She reached up and offered the sponge to the howling man.
Cestus pulled his head away, and cried out, "Let it be known this day, that I have set aside my wife, and my son remains my heir." Then he lunged his head forward and grabbed for the sponge with his teeth, slurping up the liquid greedily and demanding more.
Rafael? What was that about?
It is almost the third hour they have hung here. The exertion and dehydration begins to draw their muscles into unremitting spasm, exceedingly painful. The jar contains wine mixed with myrrh and willow resin. The laudanum and salicylic acid are effective analgesics, the wine a relaxant.
But what was he saying?
A man crucified is considered legally competent until the moment he partakes of the drug. Any statement which is to be legally binding must be made before he drinks. It is the custom for a man to divorce his wife, so that there be no hindrance to her remarriage. The significance is Cestus is readying himself to give up. His flesh may not agree, but he is willfully giving up his life and surrendering.
The drug will kill him?
No, it will only soften the torment It is more a symbol of capitulation, like his betrayal of Yeshua.
Gabriel heard Jude cry out next. The woman dipped the sponge and rushed to him. Jude stared through slitted lids at the drugged wine, his face a taut disfigurement of extremity. He shook his head and leaned back against the titular, the sign which proclaimed him a brigand.
"Oh, Hunch," he moaned feebly.
"Yes, Brother," Yeshua's deep voice was steady and tender.
"Tell me a story, Hunch."
And Yeshua proceeded to do exactly that. A wondrous story it was, all about the fabulous celebration that awaited them at Papa's table, the wine and the songs and--
Gabriel felt himself shaking apart in wracked, shattered fragments of unbearable grief. Something in the gentle tale, the kindness of his dying son, had burst and broken him and he lay scattered, trembling across the cold, blind earth.
And Rafael's quick hand against his face was the only thing which saved him from dissolving into the void. "Gabriel!"
The slap and his bruised face conspired to restrain him and he returned to Rafael's arms. There was no charitable woman waiting with the blessed sponge to ease the spasm which tore through him unamended by any benefaction.
"You might as well kill me," Gabriel said. "It would be more merciful."
Rafael stroked his head and settled him across his lap. "That simple little story about the feast broke us all, Gabriel. There is nothing to be ashamed about."
Gabriel looked up at his brother. Rafael was studying him, trying to decide whether they should stop.
"How much longer before we return to Mirriam?" Gabriel asked, wondering what possible use he could be to her in his present despair.
"Long enough," was Rafael's dispiriting answer.
The vision had moved forward in time. All three men still lived. The mourners had moved very little, as if they did not wish to mock the men imprisoned on the beams. The pit of the quarry was filled with respectful onlookers, praying softly, some of them weeping or comforting others who stared blankly up at the crosses or the sky or somewhere within themselves, away from this madness.
The sky was lowering and darkening, building up mountains of froth and steam and storm, dark heralds, all too fitting. The zealot was silent, the tide of his climbs slower and less high in each successive wave.
Jude hung low on his arms, mumbling incoherently about the feast, snaking his tongue out over his parched lips.
Yeshua was talking with his mother. Gabriel felt his chest lurch.
The woman with the sponge waited for him to finish. What could he be saying? He had no wife to divorce, no heir.
"Mother," he said, pinning Lazarus with his golden eyes. "Behold your son."
Lazarus jerked out of his daze and nodded fearfully.
"Son," Yeshua said to Lazarus. "Behold your mother."
Mirriam nodded knowingly, mustering a charming smile for him and drawing Lazarus closer to her side. Yeshua tasted the sponge with his tongue. His face screwed up, cracking the dried blood, and he laughed.
This will surely kill me, Gabriel thought. He heard his son complaining about the wine's being sour.
"For all the fine grape I have had on my tongue," he said. "This vinegar would be the last."
Then he drank deeply and his features relaxed.
Joseph ran up to Mirriam, breathing heavily. "It is done! Pilate agreed. Cleopas is on his way with two carts."
Where has Joseph been all this time?
Buying a favor from the governor.
Joseph acknowledged Yeshua. He spoke with the guard and they allowed him to approach Jude. Joseph ran his callused hand over his son's thigh and spoke with him so quietly, Gabriel could not hear.
Then he turned back to the center cross and bid farewell to his adopted son. Yeshua nodded wearily and looked to his mother. Joseph returned to Mirriam's side and took her hands in his, bowing his head towards her and preparing her for what was to come.
Yeshua closed his eyes and lowered himself down the full extent of his long arms. He took one last deep breath and surrendered with such will and grace that Gabriel looked away and watched the reflection of his son's last act in the mirror of his mother's face.
Joseph waited until Yeshua was dead, then he called an order to the soldiers. The commander summoned one of the soldiers and the man turned his lance point down. He looked back at Joseph and hesitated.
Joseph pointed out his son. Then he bent forward and lifted Mary Migdal up and turned her away from the crosses.
There was a sickening crack as the soldier struck hard across Jude's lower legs with the shaft of his lance. Jude screamed out as the break angulated and he fell, awakening from the drug and his dream of the feast, to the horrid, strangling end.
Mary Migdal writhed in Joseph's arms, but he held her fast.
They finished with the zealot, who was too nearly dead to make any sound at all.
The commander would have broken Yeshua's legs as well, but Joseph handed Mary to Lazarus and prevented them. Above the scuffle and din of the many people climbing out of the pit and hurrying for the gate and the city, Joseph argued with the Roman that Yeshua was already dead, why mutilate his corpse before his mother's eyes?
The commander finally grabbed the lance from his soldier and whirled it over, point first, jabbing Yeshua's body, looking for some indication of life. There was none. He pointed the lance at Yeshua's left side and drove the spear home. There was a gout of thickening blood which splashed down on Joseph and the centurion. He gave the spear back and marched his men off towards the Gennath Gate.
Five grey-robed figures, their faces hidden in the shadows of their cowls, separated from the departing crowd and made their way to the crosses.
Who are they?
Do not look at them for long, Gabriel. It will make you ill.
Gabriel watched three of the grey figures begin to work at Yeshua's cross. Two went to Jude's. One of them placed his hand beneath the chip of olive wood at the heels and pulled out the iron spike. The long legs unbent and his feet thudded to the ground.
Mirriam groaned and swayed in Joseph's arms.
Yeshua was so tall he could have stood upright with his wrists nailed to the patibulum. All that kept him from standing, from breathing, from living, was this thin sliver of iron not quite two hand-spans long.
The grey figure turned away from the cross and presented the nail to Mirriam. She stared at the insignificant bit of metal which had taken her world away. She took it in her fist and her eyes began to burn with dry fury.
The other two grey-robed men rocked the patibulum free from its tenon and lower it onto Joseph's and the third man's upraised hands.
Gabriel finally recognized himself in the robed man who drew the nails from the wrists and helped to straighten the arms.
He saw himself aged and beaten, bent over the body of his dead son, passionless and impotent.
Look away, Brother. Do not stare at yourself or the dream will catch you
Gabriel shifted his sight towards a horse cart rumbling their direction, Cleopas driving.
"We will barely make it before the sun goes!" Cleopas replied breathlessly as he descended the cart and approached.
"Where is the other cart?" Joseph yelled.
"Rabbi Eli upended it and broke the axle. We could not get another this late."
"But there is hardly room for one body," Joseph said. "And there is not time to make the tomb and then return."
Joseph looked at Jude's body and then he looked over to where Mirriam knelt, cradling Yeshua's head in her lap, washing his face, talking to him soothingly as if she could comfort him in death. "Put Yeshua in the cart," he said to the angels. "I will remain here and see to--" but his voice was too unsteady to continue.
Joseph walked over, straightened Jude's legs, and lifted him up. He walked silently towards the cave where he had stabled Mirriam's disagreeable jenny, so long ago--when this dead thing had been his dearest child, the last legacy of Lydia upon the face of the earth. "You will at last be with your twin," he said.
And then he could say no other thing for the weight on his arms, the sorrow in his throat.
The vantage of the dream left Joseph's mourning and turned to the cart and the too-long body, propped and bent in the bed, bouncing wildly as they sped around the outer wall of Jerusalem, racing the sun and the threatening storm up the Kidron road towards Beit Ani and the tomb they had practiced dying in.
Mirriam rode in back with her son, oblivious to the jouncing, the imitation of life which jerked and flopped Yeshua's limbs as the cart rumbled and pitched. She ripped off her cloak and wrapped it round him like swaddling, holding his shoulders, propping his head against her breast. In her fist she still held the spike, though she had already forgotten it.
She focused on The Temple, rising above the eastern wall. Her emotions were too complex and tragic and profound to fathom yet, but the Debir vexed her for no reason she could name. All the long and rugged ride her vexation grew. When they had at last arrived and the rain began, Mirriam despised the Holy Tabernacle as if it were a living, evil enemy.
Cleopas and Lazarus hurriedly took the body into the tomb and laid it on the stone bier. Mirriam followed them distractedly, leaning against the golal's edge, trying to understand what had happened.
She watched them wash the body and cover it, wondering where Yeshua was and why he had not come to help them do this dreadful chore. It was so late. Where could he be? Surely he did not mean to miss Passover.
Mirriam was not exactly angry with her son, but the Temple had irked her so, and she needed to talk to him. He was gone too long. She missed their cheerful gossip. He would be so distressed to hear about the crucifixions. Doubtless he was off comforting the families. That was his way. She should not be jealous.
But it was so late, nearly dark. He would have to come soon.
"Mother?"
Ah, here he is. Mirriam looked up and saw Lazarus' face. In that instant she heard Yeshua's proclamation, his giving her to this stranger, and she felt the full weight of her son's death.
She ran screaming from the tomb, out into the storm.
Down into the valley, across the river, up Mount Moriah, and through the low arch above the Temple storage rooms, she ran mindlessly, raving and railing. On and on, she never swerved from the path of her assault.
The few priests still on the esplanade stood well out of her way. Mirriam was a ferocious presence, wild eyed, misery-knotted, mud-spattered, rain-drenched, blood-stained--fury incarnate.
The one Levite in the Holies ran out howling a demon was loose in the Debir.
Mirriam saw none of them. Heard nothing of their anxious cries.
She stopped before the Veil, recognizing her work, remembering the day at the loom when Gabriel had brought her this wondrous son who was no more.
The rage filled her emptiness with fulminant malevolence. Mirriam looked down at her hands and saw the nail. Her anger detonated deep within her. She raised the spike like a blade and rent the Veil of The Temple.
Then she collapsed to the marble floor. Rocking in the clenched circle of her empty arms, she wailed, "Oh, God, that I had never been born!"
I should have killed her that Beltane.
No, Gabriel, look again.
Mirriam and the Debir were gone. Gabriel peered into the darkness, seeing nothing at first.
Where are we?
We are in Joseph's tomb.
Gabriel saw the dim form of the bier. The surface was bloodied here and there. A pile of linen lay, folded, at the head, but otherwise it appeared the same.
Where have they taken the body?
No one has entered the tomb since Cleopas and Lazarus sealed it last evening.
But that surely can't be right. Look, the stone is rolled aside. There is light coming in from the door.
Look again, Gabriel.
Gabriel looked at the bier. Rafael was lying. Someone had been in the tomb, removed the wrappings, folded them, and laid them here in a neat stack. And he would have the proof of Rafael's lie in a moment. Yes. Leaving the tomb, Cleopas would have swept the floor with a palm branch. The culprit's footprints would be marked on the floor.
And there they were! A man's bare feet had marked the thin dust of the floor in a straight line to the door of the tomb. He must have lifted the body off the stone and carried it out after he was done stripping it.
See there! I told you someone took the body.
Look again, Brother.
Gabriel looked again, at the bier, at the door, at the incriminating prints. He was not mistaken. Someone had come into the tomb--.
But there were no footprints coming in.
Only the one set walking out.
Only the one set.
Walking out.
Gabriel opened his eyes. He could not think what to say.
"The Kingdom is Come," Rafael said. "Welcome, Brother."
Gabriel heard his brother as if he had never heard him before. He saw the flock below him, the boy, the lamb, as if they were newly created in this awesome instant. Yeshua had said the Kingdom was upon the Earth and they had only to enter. If his son could know this, then he would know this as well, not by willing it, but simply by being.
He could be Annas, or he could believe--believe what? Gabriel remembered the sensation of God's Grace which he had known after the conception of this miraculous child. He opened himself to the Kingdom which was everywhere, always. He felt the crippling flaw within himself and saw it as a simple misunderstanding. Well, not so simple, but he saw it, nonetheless.
A delirium possessed him and he saw.
He did not even feel his fear depart or the intense and incendiary power which ignited his soul and lit the hill around him for ten strides every direction.
"Finally," Rafael said, beaming himself.
"I understand," Gabriel said. "Why could I not see something so obvious? Papa loves me. I must be worth His Love. My own son angered me because he mirrored the one I despise: myself. But my despite was only false imaginings."
"No, Brother, it was the necessary flaw which made all the rest possible, the skewed shoulder which makes divinity palatable, the gentle humor which drives the revelation straight to the heart.
"Come with me, Gabriel. It is time."
Michael met them half-way up the hill and led them hurriedly to the cave. They entered to find Mirriam in strong labor, crushing Joseph's hands as the contraction peaked, and laying back exhausted when it was done. Gabriel hurried to her side, taking one of her hands, reaching across to hold one of Joseph's.
Peniel brought a cool cloth over and Gabriel wiped the sweat from Mirriam's brow. He felt Mirriam's constancy and great strength, Joseph's sensible childishness and good nature, and his own self-deprecation, coming to grand culmination in the birth of this child, this kingdom.
Rafael spoke quietly with Mirriam as he washed his elegant hands. He reached beneath the covers and checked on the baby's progress. When the next contraction was done, Rafael sent Michael to search for Sama and the medicines he was late bringing. Mirriam's eyes watched Rafael's every move, reading the concern he was trying to hide.
"Should they leave?" she asked steadily, indicating Joseph and Gabriel, hovering over her like brooding hens.
Rafael closed his silver eyes and nodded.
"Go," she said simply. There was not time to say more. The pain took her breath and shut her eyes, drawing her lips back from her teeth, making her grunt and moan.
Rafael pulled Joseph back and knelt beside Mirriam. "Gabriel, take your friend out of here. She is very young and the baby is large. This is going to be difficult. Honor her request and leave. Now!"
Joseph had to wait until the contraction was through before he could move well enough to make it out of the cave. Rafael's words were not encouraging. He remembered the bad time he'd had with Lydia's last child, Jude.
Joseph lowered himself to the ground and caught his breath, trying to accept the possibility of death and loss, even as he readied himself for the promise of creation, the miracle of nativity.
Joseph stood the next pain alone, his knees drawn close to his chest, his hands clenched together. Gabriel stopped it for him, almost as surprised he could do it, as Joseph was grateful that he did.
Then Mirriam cried out. Without thinking they grasped each other in a desperate embrace and fought through their portion of Mirriam's travail together.
They were a long time locked together on the cold hill above the Shepherd's Field, riding the terrifying waves of Mirriam's suffering. They were shaken and helpless, but they were not alone, and that made it endurable--just.
Somewhere in the wracking course, Gabriel thought to tell Joseph that Mirriam and the baby would live, that he had seen it in Rafael's vision. Joseph wept with relief. Gabriel blubbered shamelessly on Joseph's shoulder, though it was not out of relief. Gabriel was no longer innocent. He knew too well the penultimate purpose of this treacherous night.
Rafael cleared his throat and waited for them to discontinue their convincing impression of conjoined twins. "He has come," Rafael said.
They scrambled back to the cave. Joseph thought it odd that he heard no crying. He was relieved to see Mirriam smiling. She was pale and her dark hair matted in ratty tangles round her sweet face, but she was all right.
Joseph and Gabriel came forward awkwardly. Mirriam stroked the baby's cheek and he turned away from her breast. She lifted him up to Gabriel.
Mirriam smiled and bit her lower lip to keep from laughing at the angel's sudden consternation as he clumsily maneuvered the infant into his arms.
Gabriel finally had the squirming little one laid across his hands. "This child is given by God the Father to you, Joseph." He gave the boy to his friend. Giving the child up hurt Gabriel more than he expected.
Joseph gathered the baby in his arms with the expertise of his many years of fatherhood. The mason's eyes sparkled as he gazed down on the babe and asked the ages-old question. "Are you the One?"
The tiny newborn--the blood not quite cleaned from its birthing--waved its fists and kicked and smiled. He did not actually say, "Yes," but the pallor on Joseph's face could not have been more pronounced had the infant done so.
"Yeshua," Mirriam's tones were gently chiding. "Stop that, you are frightening them." She took the baby back and returned to nursing her son.
Rafael nudged Peniel who was standing transfixed staring at the mother and her child. Peni apologized and ran to get Mirriam some water so her mouth would not be dry with the nursing.
He pointed to the entrance of the cave. Three men knelt there.
"You are rather a little past any useful time, Lord Samael," Gabriel said.
"Forgive me." Sama rose and bowed. "But Herod set the guard on us and--" He shrugged. His robe was torn, cut, in several places and there was a long bloody stain down the right side. "The Idumean thought he might like to keep Baal in the dungeons until he confessed where the new king was."
The elder mage pushed up and bowed. "Forgive our late arrival, blessed lady." The third man stood, Rabbi Eli. "Mirriam, wife of Joseph, blessings on you and your child." He stepped forward and laid a wooden crib at Joseph's feet. "Simeon wanted to come himself, but Sama said he was too young to be flying, so he made me promise to give you this. He said God had restored it after he broke it to prove his new brother was going to be all right."
Joseph ducked his head and grinned into his beard.
Mage Baal came forward and opened his hand to Mirriam. On his pale palm rested a golden bird, surrounded by a ring of flames. "This is a Simurgh, Lady Mirriam, the patron of children. It is said to consume itself in flames, to consecrate the birth of its young."
The strange glow in the cave got suddenly brighter and Gabriel bowed his head, self-consciously.
Samael changed into a new robe and joined them. "Here is the laudanum and the levonah and the wine. Forgive me, madam, that I was too late with these to ease your travail."
Mirriam forgave him graciously and suggested they should see to the wine. Peniel brought bowls and poured, while Joseph finished cleaning and swaddling his son.
"Did you notice his shoulder is a little crooked?" Joseph remarked as he laid the babe in Simeon 's crib.
Gabriel placed his finger to his lips and pulled another blanket over Mirriam. She was sound asleep.
Joseph stayed with Mirriam and the baby.
Eli took Baal outside to finish the wine and continue the intriguing discussion the mage had begun about the stars.
The five angels walked down the hill, crossed silently through the flock, and ascended to Rachel's tomb.
Sama took Gabriel aside. "As soon as Mirriam can travel they must leave Judea. Herod is insane. He is talking about killing all the children born in this area, just to make sure he destroys any possible rivals. The priest on the Dates' Council, Cleopas, told him he had nothing to fear, but he kidnapped Baal and we were lucky to get him out of the palace alive."
"Stop that chattering," Rafael complained. "We have something important to do."
Gabriel indicated that he would attend to Joseph's family.
The five brothers formed a circle on the crest of the hill. They turned their backs to the center of the circle and reached for each other's hands.
Peniel spoke first, "I will take Masharif."
Rafael said, "I will take Jerusalem."
Michael spoke next, "I will take the Olive Mount."
Samael said, "That does not leave me anything to do but ring the peaks of Gerizim and Ebal."
Gabriel snorted, "Which leaves me nothing at all. I will take the hill across the way where He lies sleeping."
"It is settled then?" Rafael started his part tentatively, searching for the note that would resonate the Holy City. He found it and waited for the others to tune to their points. Then he hummed the chord and they joined in, part-by-part, building the vibrations up to the proper volume.
"Wait!" Rafael stopped them. "Someone is off."
Gabriel shook his head. He could not ring the cliff correctly without shaking the cave and his caution made him flat. This simply would not do. He searched for another sounding board, but his brothers had all the available geography spoken for. He threw his head back and aimed for the lights in Pisces.
Rafael jerked his hand. "You cannot ring the stars, Gabriel. It is impossible!"
Gabriel's new light shone out from his face and warmed them all. "Nothing is impossible."
Rafael shook his head and started them again. Jerusalem began to thrum a middle-range, bright melody. The high lookout to the north trembled into a driving counterpoint, and the twin peaks farther north drove the bass notes, thrilling the valley. The Olive Mount began to feed in its sweet, sad refrain.
And the song built, the hills sang out the birth of The King in the stone-moving melody of the angels.
Very quietly above the harmonic waves came a second melody weaving round Rafael's main line, piercing and shimmering, expanding the plane of their chorus into the perpendicular, manifesting their glorious caroling in it fullest dimension, lifting it from the hills to the heavens.
The boy stirred in his sleep and the lamb struggled in his arms. The shepherd's child gaped at the light and the sound of the beings on the Eder. He picked up his lamb and ran down the valley with a swiftness partly excitement, partly sheer terror.
"Father, Father," he shouted.
"What is it?" The shepherd rolled over and opened one eye, silently cursing this stupid son of his.
Then he saw the boy's face, shining, and he was afraid. "What is it?"
"Father!" the boy gasped. "I have heard the angels singing!"