Delilah: A Novel (8 page)

I straightened, bowed to Uliliu. Seer-Priestess and High Priestess stepped back, and I took the last step and stood upon the brink of the pool. I bowed one last time, to honor Our Lady’s Children; knelt at pool’s edge. Seeing me there, the Seven Fish eagerly swam towards me, swift swirls of gold and bronze and silver.

Beside me, Uliliu tossed a handful of seeds into the pool. The fish swarmed about the food; Uliliu gazed intently at them as the fish gulped down the offering.

For a time the only sounds came from the light splashes of water as the fish struggled over the food. I remained on my knees beside the water, my head meekly bowed. I tried to bind my curiosity, but could not resist slanting a glance at the feeding fish. What the Seer-Priestess saw here determined what I would become.

Uliliu stood as if in prayer, her head bent and her hands outstretched. Three of the fish abandoned the quarrel over the food she had tossed to them and swam up to circle below her feet. She sowed the
pool with another pinch of grain; the golden fish Utu flashed after the prize and devoured most of it before the other fish could interfere.

It seemed to me that I knelt there beside the sacred pool for half the day, but it cannot truly have been more than a handful of minutes. It was, though, long enough for me to silently remember all my faults. By the time Uliliu spoke, I had nearly persuaded even myself that I had somehow offended Lady Atargatis, and the fish had unveiled this knowledge to the Seer-Priestess. I would never become a Rising Moon, let alone a Full Moon, never sit beside High Priestess Aylah as her dearest friend and counselor.

Uliliu is trying to decide how best to tell me that Atargatis rejects me. That I am not worthy to rise higher in the Temple. That—

A pinch upon my ear, sharp and hard, recalled me to my duty here.

“Listen, Delilah, and heed what Our Lady’s Children say.” Seer-Priestess Uliliu regarded me sternly; I forced myself to keep my hands still and not reach up to rub my ear. Uliliu had strong fingers and keen-honed nails.

“I listen,” I said, relieved I remembered the proper response.

Uliliu raised her hands over the Lady’s Mirror. “Grace and gold; the sun consumes life as the dance the dancer.”

I tried desperately to unravel these words, but even as I sought meaning in what she had said, Uliliu lowered her hands and turned to High Priestess Derceto.

“The omens are strong and clear. Delilah’s path is the Dance.”

After that, I was too excited to heed anything but the fact that I had been given my heart’s desire: I was to dance for Our Lady. That joy consumed me utterly—and for that one shining moment, I forgot even to wonder if Aylah, too, had been chosen for the Dance.

Of course I remembered to worry about Aylah the moment I left the Court of Peace. I walked out through the small gate behind the lemon tree that shadowed this private exit, to find myself awaited by two Rising
Moon priestesses. They smiled, and welcomed me, and led me to my new home: the Court of the Rising Moons.

I had forgotten, as I had waited anxiously to hear my future, that becoming a Rising Moon meant leaving the Court of the New Moons, in which I had lived all the years I could remember. For one terrible heartbeat, I feared I had lost all my happiness; that I would never again see Aylah, never again feel at home in this strange new world I had entered. To my surprise and mortification, tears burned my eyes.

But the two Rising Moons who escorted me saw my distress and stopped. One—I thought her name was Lezaht—put her arms around me and said, “Don’t be afraid to weep, little sister. You have undergone a great change today, and now all seems strange to you. But soon you will smile. Come and see where you now shall live, Rising Moon Delilah.”

I nodded, and blinked back my tears. I almost asked whether Aylah awaited me, but feared to hear the answer. So I walked soft and quiet, as I had been taught, until we reached the Court of the Rising Moons.

And when I entered my new room, I learned that Lezaht was right. I smiled. For Aylah stood by the window that overlooked the Rising Moon courtyard. All my fears fled, and I ran across the room and flung my arms around Aylah.

She hugged me close, and there was laughter in her voice as she said, “You see, Delilah? I told you the future as well as Our Lady’s Fish could.”

“Oh, Aylah—I am a Rising Moon now. And I am to be a dancer! To dance for Our Lady’s joy and glory!” I whirled away from my heart-sister and spun across the room, already feeling the weight of dancer’s bells about my ankles.

“Did you doubt it?” Aylah asked.

“I don’t now.” I stopped spinning and waited for Aylah to speak of her own oracle. “And you?”

“I am to be thrown out into the streets of Ascalon with no more than I came in, of course.” Aylah regarded me slantwise, and I laughed.
“You, too, are to dance! Oh, Aylah!” I twirled over and hugged her hard, and said, “We will be—”

“The best dancers the Temple has ever seen,” Aylah finished, but this time she smiled and her voice teased. “Yes, Delilah, I know.”

“Well, we shall be.” I had no doubts, not now. I looked about the chamber that now was ours. The room was larger than the one we had occupied as New Moons, and its walls adorned with spiral patterns, intricate knots painted in blue and yellow that reminded me of the turns and whirls of Our Lady’s Dance. I traced my fingers along the serpentine lines and heard Aylah laugh softly.

“You see, Delilah? Even this room was prepared for dancers—as if our fate were known before the Oracle revealed it.”

I stopped and stared at her. Something cautioned me not to question her, but I ignored the warning. “What do you mean? How could the room—”

Aylah laughed again, her laughter sounding oddly bitter. “You are the perfect priestess, Delilah; you doubt nothing. Do you not see that this room has been new-painted with Dance sigils? That our possessions awaited us here? All was foretold, all readied for us, before we stood by Our Lady’s Mirror and Uliliu stared at the fish. I told you the Temple would not squander such a treasure as you.”

On such a perfect day, I refused to heed her cynical words. “Or such a treasure as you, Aylah.”

She turned and set her hand upon the painted wall, traced the dancer’s knot with her fingertips, just as I had done. “Yes, I suppose the Temple knows my value as well as it knows yours. Come, let us arrange this room as we would have it. Your chest is over there; you had best make sure nothing was left behind.”

As she so often did, with a few words Aylah lured my mind into a different path, one simpler and easier to follow. I loved Aylah, but I did not understand her—not then, and not for long years after. I knew only that she was beautiful and clever, and that when I looked upon her, I saw what I wished to be.

I did not understand, then, that when she looked upon herself, she saw both less than I saw and more. Even new-come to Our Lady’s House, Aylah understood that fine words and solemn vows could not protect her from the fate that awaited her. She told me this at last, that first night after we had listened to our futures foretold by the Seven Fish, our first night as Rising Moons.

A calm night, peaceful; we lay together in bed, watching the shadows cast by the full moon’s light. Dark flames danced upon the wall—shades of leaves of a pomegranate tree in the garden beyond our window. But when I told Aylah that, she shook her head; her hair slid over my arm like an uneasy serpent.

“It is fire,” she said. “Black fire. Even here, I cannot escape the flames.”

Her skin pressed chill against mine; I put my arms about her. “They are moon-shadows, nothing more. Don’t be afraid, for nothing can harm you here. Our Mother Atargatis protects us.”

“Our Mother Atargatis will do what She must.” For a moment Aylah lay silent, then said, “Do you know why I am here, sister?”

“To serve Atargatis,” I said.

“Yes. To serve Atargatis.” Again she hesitated before she spoke again. “Fate sent me here. Long ago, a seer in my own land foretold that I would save the Moon if given to the Sun. That is how I am to serve Our Lady—I will be sacrificed to the Sun. I will burn, Delilah.”

“No, you will not. Our Lady does not ask for such tribute.” Other gods might, but not the Lady we served. I stroked Aylah’s shoulder. “That seer was wrong—or read the future badly. You are safe here.”

As if she had not heard me, she said, “I wish I knew when. That is all.” Her voice was flat, revealing neither fear nor grief.

I flung back the blanket that covered us, rose to my feet, and walked over to the window. For half a dozen heartbeats, I looked out upon the moonlit garden, at the branches troubled by the night breeze. Then I reached for the shutter and pulled it over the window.

“There,” I said into the sudden darkness. “Now there are no more shadows.”

I tied the shutter closed and padded back to bed, feeling my way cautiously. When I lay once more beside Aylah, I said, “No one will harm you, sister of my heart. We will find another seer who will summon a better future than the last.”

She sighed, and pressed her cheek against mine. “No good comes of trying to cheat the gods, Delilah.”

“I would never try to cheat Atargatis.” I spoke the words solemnly, as a vow. “And you are Her daughter. She will protect you.” I was always less wise and more trusting than Aylah.

“Atargatis may love me as Her daughter, but the Temple does not.”

I hugged Aylah hard. “Everyone in the Temple loves you, Aylah. They do.”

For a moment she said nothing, then she kissed my cheek. “You are a true sister to me, Delilah. Now promise you will tell no one what I have told you. Leave my fate in the hands of the goddess.”

Glad to hear that Aylah trusted in Atargatis, I promised to keep her secret. That vow I kept, although I forgot the first.

“Now the children of Israel had done evil in the eyes of their god Yahweh, had forsaken the old ways that had brought them safe through all peril.”
Safe enough words for listeners; not even Hebrews could object to Orev singing what the great prophet Samuel himself had railed against.
“The children of Israel forsook the old laws, until every man did what was right in his own eyes. And so in those days, the Philistines ruled over all the land, and no man could stand against them.”

Another raid upon the outlying farms—and what am I to do about it? Will Sandarin send armed men at my bidding? No, if I ask for City soldiers to protect Temple lands, he will smile and say that so rich a Great House must surely be able to provide for itself. As if Our Lady deals in swords and spears!

Sometimes Derceto longed for the days when she had been only one of the Temple’s most favored Full Moons. On truly bad days, she wished she were a little New Moon again, a child to whom nothing mattered beyond Our Lady’s Gate. But she was High Priestess, and must confront the world beyond the Temple—an uncertain, changing world that even Temple walls could not deny forever.

The Five Cities had ruled the Sea-Lands of Canaan time out of mind. But the Five Cities no longer reigned unchallenged. A dozen lifetimes ago, a new people had fled bondage in Egypt and sought sanctuary
in the sweet land of Canaan. At first the new tribes had dwelt peacefully enough at the borders of Canaan, in the hills and far valleys. But two peoples cannot share a land both covet. The Hebrews began to raid the lands of the Five Cities, claiming they belonged to them, a gift from their god. People already dwelling in Canaan meant nothing to these fierce men, who scorned all gods other than their own.

But in truth, it did not matter that the Hebrews scorned all gods other than their own. Perhaps the gods and goddesses had quarreled with the Hebrews’ god; if so, prudence dictated that mere mortal men and women remain aloof from heaven’s battles. As proof, historians offered up the examples of the Swan Court and the Horse Court.

Their kings and queens meddled in the affairs of the gods—and what remains now of gold-proud Mykenae and of windswept Troy? Naught but ruins
. So the Temple records told.

The Bull Court had suffered the same fate; its king chose to deny its queen-goddess her desire, and her anger had moved Earth Herself. The Bull Court now lay buried in rock and ash; only those who had fled before the final cataclysm had survived. The Five Cities held all that remained of Knossos, Queen of the Seas. The Five Cities, the Bull Court’s children, wore new crowns of empire, unchallenged until the Hebrews took up arms against them. The Hebrews regarded Canaan as theirs, and would brook no opposition.

For all the long years that the Hebrews had harried Canaan, the warriors of the Five Cities had restrained the worst excesses of these foreigners. And the Lords and Ladies of the Five Cities had chosen to turn veiled eyes to Hebrew settlers in Canaan, so long as the newcomers remained peaceful.

Nor did the Five Cities care that the Hebrews had conquered cities beyond the high hills between the plains of Canaan and the lands to the east. The Five Cities looked to the sea, not to the land, for their wealth.

We of the Five Cities should have looked to our mines, our metalworkers and swordsmiths
. Derceto wondered if it were too late for the Temple to claim the
same right to smelt iron and manufacture weapons that the City owned. Armed clashes between the Hebrews’ fighting men and the Five Cities’ warriors had suddenly become commonplace. The warriors of the Five Cities won, for the most part. The Hebrews still worked only in bronze, while the Five Cities owned the art of creating weapons from a new metal.

Iron.

Bronze blades and spearheads had taken men down the Dark Road to judgment for a thousand years. But bronze could not stand against cold iron.

The gods had bestowed the secret of forging iron to the Five Cities, and that secret was cherished. Only the people of the Five Cities might possess or work iron. Once the rulers of the Five Cities and the Great Houses of the Gods had believed that holding the knowledge of this new, deadly metal for themselves alone would keep the world as it had been before the Hebrews came to Canaan. The Five Cities armed their warriors with iron-bladed swords and iron-tipped spears, and forbade any other people to work the dark hard metal. The only smiths who possessed the knowledge of forging iron were subjects of the Five Cities.