occupied with the distant palace of Phales, who would be king of Tyre no longer after this night. From the open sea behind the palace ships were moving in, low pentecosters with catapults hurling fireballs and mighty stones. Across the harbor other boats, filled with men armed with bows and quivers of iron-tipped arrows, were firing steadily at the palace walls, sweeping them clean of life. The palace quays held spearmen drawing back to give the bronze ram room to swing; its hollow poundings at the brazen gate made a booming noise which echoed and re-echoed across this corner of the city.
The rebels under Ithobaal would be a few hours at their fighting, Jehu knew. Phales would be unlikely to give up his crown without a battle to the death. If Ahab were intent on bedding a Phoenician harlot, the time to strike was now. His hand touched his swordhilt, then fell away.
“The temple will be well guarded,” he growled.
Ahab nodded. “I don’t want the temple. I want a woman. There’ll be ways to come at her. As a worshipper, if need be.”
Rael gasped at the suggested sacrilege, and was troubled. Although Ahab, like his father Omri, was no intimate of Yahweh as David and Solomon had been fifty years and more before, still he was heir to the throne of Israel. If word got out that Ahab had joined in the worship of Baal-Melkart, there would be trouble in Samaria, where the prophet Elijah was preaching these days.
He was about to protest when Ahab pushed away from the wall to slip the mail shirt over his head. As he tied the strings of his leather jerkin, Ahab said, “You two can remain behind. When I’m done I’ll find you at the inn where we’re staying.”
Rael looked at Jehu, who shrugged. Rael said, “We won’t desert you.” He would have stepped forward except that Jehu put a hand on his shoulder and held him.
“Let him go. He wants to be alone with her. We’d only be in the way.” Jehu whispered so that only Rael might hear him; aloud he said to Ahab, “Go, then. I’ll be busy myself this night. There’s a serving wench at the inn who caught my eye earlier, when we were eating.”
Ahab nodded, smiling faintly. He turned and was soon lost in the shadows, with only the swaying motion of his cloak to show where he walked. In a moment he turned the corner and was gone.
“If you think I’m going to . . .” Rael began.
Jehu silenced him with a fierce motion of his hairy hand. “Oh, we’ll follow him, never fear. But let him go first, and alone. He came to Tyre for adventure, where he isn’t known. Let him find it.”
“But a priestess of the god! Won’t the Phoenicians think it’s a sort of—well, sacrilege?”
Jehu snorted, “Baal-Melkart is brother to Astarte, isn’t he? And to the harlot goddess any sort of embrace is holy.”
Rael growled, “It’s a funny kind of religion that makes sacred the most intimate relations between a man and woman.”
“It goes back a long time, Rael, this worship of Astarte. You find her everywhere. They call her Ishtar in Babylon and Assyria, Ashtoreth in Philistia. In Egypt she’s known as Isis.”
“But why worship a harlot?”
“It isn’t a harlot they worship but the creative principle. As a physician, you should understand that.”
“Oh! Life and the generative powers of a woman.”
“And of a man.” Jehu’s glance was sly. “If you’d lived a little instead of burying your face in scrolls and medical texts, you’d understand even better than I the theory behind it.”
Rael grinned in embarrassment. “I understand the theory. Ever since man began to realize he was man, he realized that his safety and his comfort depended on having a lot of people in his tribe. As a result, that which gave him people—the phallus and the yoni—came to be sacred in his sight.” He added wryly, “The theory I know, it’s the practice that confuses me.”
Jehu nudged him with an elbow. “Come on, it’s time to go after him. But don’t let him see you. Let him think he’s completely on his own.”
They walked swiftly through the Phoenician night, cloaks up to shield their faces. Behind them the palace of King Phales began to glow with fire.
2.
Ahab paused in the shadows of the basalt pillars surrounding the mighty bulk of the twin temples of Baal-Melkart and Astarte, his heart hammering under his bruised ribs. There was an enchantment in the moon-drenched night, a sense of anticipation that ran like wildfire in his veins.
There, beyond the granite incense bowl!
Someone or something had moved a little. Moonlight flashed on metal, was quickly gone. He stepped forward. As if in echo to the slap of his boots on the paving stones of the pathway he heard another, softer footstep.
“Are you the priestess?” he called softly.
“Are you the prince of Israel?”
He grinned and moved forward confidently. He had been right about the wench. She wanted him just as badly as he wanted her. A spark had come to life between them; it was up to him to nurture it to flame.
She backed away from him slowly as he advanced. True, he could see her only as a shadow but his heart told him this was the woman who had posed naked before her god. His arm ached to enfold that nude white body. His lips itched to cover that smooth flesh with kisses.
“Wait,” he called.
“Follow me,” floated back her answer.
A door in a high wall opened. For a moment he caught sight of a garden enclosed by those walls, filled with statuary and with flowers, fragrant in the springtime night. The woman slipped inside and closed the door; he did not hear the sound of any bolt.
He ran, big and strong in the pride of young manhood, straight for that barrier. His hand went out for the latch. It lifted and the door opened.
Ahab went into the garden and closed the door behind him. His hand drew the bolt while his eyes moved this way and that, seeking out the Temple harlot. The garden could be a trap, he knew. Among the shrubbery, half a hundred soldiers might lie in wait. He did not see them, nor any twinkle of moonlight on a burnished helmet or spearpoint, however, and so his tension eased.
He moved along the path, away from the garden door. The heavy scents of mimosa and roses made the night swim in languor. An ache was forming in his middle as he moved deeper into the garden. Behind him was the Temple of Baal-Melkart, ahead the smaller Temple of Astarte.
Between the two temples and set like a jewel in the center of the walled garden was a small sanctuary, like a summer-house. It was the only place where the woman could be hiding.
Ahab slipped between the pillars.
She was lying on a low couch, wrapped about by a silken garment. Ahab paused, staring. The woman was different, somehow. More regal. Proud. Imperious. She wore a golden fillet in her hair from which dangled tiny golden hyacinth flowers, shaped like bells that tinkled when she moved her head. Her slim white arms were clustered with golden armbands. There were khalkhals around her ankles.
“What
