eyes narrowed. “Was your land that of your ancestors, land given to your people by The Holy One?”
“Yes.”
How strongly my father’s scowl resembled Lev’s.
We met men heading in the opposite direction, on their way out of Galilee. They, too, had been farmers, but, after losing their land, had left their families behind to migrate from estate to estate surviving on seasonal fieldwork. Others were heading to Caesarea Maritima to search for employment on the building projects there. Some were sharecroppers on the very land they used to own. They seemed to be the fortunate ones.
The afternoon sun shone harshly as we crossed our sad, beautiful land. The soles of our feet ached from the heat and the hard paving stones though only Naomi complained aloud about this. Passing carts raised a dust that lodged in our nostrils and wedged between our fingers. Dirt and perspiration clung to our clothes. We longed for shade and rest.
As we approached the town of Beit Yerah, an oak grove in the distance promised refreshment. Father said it contained a well and a space where we could spread a mat, eat some loaves and figs, and rest. However, as we drew closer to the grove, an odor of decomposition fouled the air. We slowed our steps. As we entered the grove, all was eerily silent. Women and children should have been drawing water, washing clothes, and gossiping there.
And then we saw them. Lashed to several of the smaller trees were the corpses of four crucified men. Their limbs were tied in grotesquely twisted positions, as if mocking their inability to flee their ghastly fate. One was postured against a tree trunk with his right knee raised and his left leg behind him like a runner’s. The arms of another victim were tied to a tree’s spreading branches and mimicked a bird’s wings. Rats and dogs ravaged the naked corpses. Some of the beasts slinked off as we approached, but the vultures remained, hovering above the treetops, jealously guarding their food. The flies and maggots did not stir from their hideous work.
A board proclaimed in Latin and in Greek, “REBEL BANDITS. ENEMIES OF ROME.” Lev. One of these putrefying corpses could be Lev! I closed my eyes and burrowed my head into Father’s chest. Naomi shrieked and clutched him too. “It’s not Lev,” my father whispered over and over as he pushed us past this horror.
A short distance up the road, upwind of that grove of death, another beggar squatted and reached his hands imploringly towards us. Father extracted a loaf of bread from a pack on the donkey’s back. “Why has no one from Beit Yerah buried those men?” he asked the crippled man whose eyes sank deep into their sockets
“The soldiers forbid it,” said the beggar. “The rebels must stay on the trees until their bones are picked clean by the beasts, they say. The Romans swear they will return, and, if the crucified have been cut down, they will take innocent men from the town as replacements.”
Father gave the man a loaf, and he tore into it ravenously. He looked like the starving beasts ripping into the corpses. Naomi and I fled, choking on our tears. Father hobbled along as best he could. Even the normally reluctant donkeys bolted ahead of us.
Eventually we caught up to a group of about fifteen refugees from Cana, a village not far from ours. Like us, they had stumbled onto the atrocity in the oak grove. Mothers and fathers held their children in their arms, even those far too old to be carried. We joined the stunned villagers from Cana and staggered on, mute with horror, until we reached the pebbly shore of the Sea of Galilee. The vast blue lake welcomed us, and we rushed into it, removing our head coverings, ladling cool water on our necks and faces, washing the images of death from our eyes, and calming ourselves until our exhaustion overcame our terror.
We dried off and set up a camp. From the donkey packs, I pulled out extra mantles for warmth and reed mats for ground cover. We didn’t want to attract attention with a fire, so we ate stale barley loaves. I chipped a tooth on the hardened crust of mine. Darkness fell. I let Naomi put her mat next to mine, even though she kicked at night, and I held her until she stopped trembling. A line of clouds rolled across the moon; my eyes finally closed.
* * *
Sometime that night, before dreams had formed, I was awakened by fingers clutching my throat. A torch flared in the darkness. A faceless voice announced, “Give me your food, and I will not harm her.”
Naomi whimpered beside me. Most of the group woke up in a daze. But Father stood up, fully alert, and fixed his gaze on the man who held me hostage. “Shalom, Judah ben Hezekiah,” Father said calmly.
Judah ben Hezekiah, the leader of Lev’s rebel band? Though one of my captor’s hands was clasped around my neck, I could turn my head enough to see a red curl flashing out from under the man’s head covering. It must be Judah ben Hezekiah. Lev might be close by!
Father opened his palms in appeasement. “We are poor people fleeing from Nazareth and Cana, driven from our homes by the threat of Roman vengeance. We’re happy to share what food we have, though we don’t have much.”
Judah released me to draw his sword on the circle of people tightening in around him. He kept the torch in his other hand and ordered me to bring him the food. I fetched a sack of raisins, cakes of dried fruit, and a bag of barley flour. When I approached him with these, I could see his eyes in the light of his torch. A few nights ago from a distance, his eyes had seemed hard as stone. Tonight they looked like softened clay. That emboldened me, as did Father’s presence right behind me. “Where is Lev ben Micah of Nazareth?” I asked.
Judah spat on the ground. “Lev deserted, the coward.”
I remembered Judah’s foot in Lev’s stomach. “My brother is not a coward! You were cruel to him.”
“How do you know?” Judah said. “Ah, so you were watching us that night?” He smiled in a way I didn’t understand. He had all his teeth, and they were white and straight. “Lev told me he had a little sister with courage and dreams of being a revolutionary.”
Then he softened his voice, speaking to me as if I were the only person there. “I disciplined your brother only that one time. He left my band after our attack on a Roman supply convoy. Some of my men were killed during the ambush. A few were captured and crucified by the Roman dogs.” His eyes filled. The skin in the half moon below his lids was raw.
My hands shook as I held out the food to him. “We saw them at Beit Yerah.”
But he turned from my offering and lowered his sword. “Since you are Galileans, you have suffered enough. Keep your food.”
I knew then that all his men had deserted him. If he had troops to feed, he would have taken the food for them. Pity crowded against my anger. “What will you do now?” I said.
“Gather a new band and continue. I will not stop until the Lord’s Kingdom has been restored to Israel. I have been chosen for this.” Judah’s voice was strong and heavy with conviction. So he, too, had been chosen. The Holy One had entrusted him with a special task. He was favored.
To me alone he whispered, “Maybe you should replace your brother.” The soft rustle of his breath stirred through my hair. “In any camp, there is women’s work that needs doing.” His lips pulled out into a wide smile, revealing the long, sharply-pointed teeth farther back in his mouth.
Judah both attracted and repelled me. I couldn’t determine whether he was a hero or a devil. An anointed one or a murderous brute. His suffering eyes said one thing; his hands around my neck another. A chill crept up my spine, but stopped at the spot on my throat where his fingerprints still burned. From there, a flame flashed through my entire
