Noah (24 page)

“Bring Noah here now,” Tubal-cain ordered.

Ham hesitated.

Tubal-cain held up his knife, showing him how sharp the blade was. “He will not suffer. One thrust and it will be over. But just in case…”

He reached into his belt and produced a shiv, which looked small and ineffectual in his huge, gauntleted hand. He held the blade out to Ham, hilt first.

Ham looked at it, but didn’t take it.

“I don’t know if I—”

Tubal-cain interrupted him with a flash of anger.

“He killed your woman. And now he plots to kill your brother’s firstborn. Is that what you want? Do you want your sister to die on the seas?”

He saw the doubt on Ham’s face. His voice grew softer.

“A man is not ruled by the heavens. A man is ruled by his will. So I ask you—are
you
a man?”

Ham stared at him, a frown wrinkling his forehead. Slowly he nodded.

“Good,” Tubal-cain said. “Because if you are a man, then you can kill.”

Ham looked down at the shiv. He took it. Then he swallowed and looked up at the king.

“But how can I make him follow me?”

Tubal-cain smiled his terrible smile. “Every man is blinded by what he loves.”

Then, to Ham’s horror, he raised his knife and brought it savagely down on the neck of a spotted wolf that was sleeping at his feet.

* * *

The provisions were stored on the raft, and the shelter had been erected. Shem and Ila were ready.

Naameh was sobbing, her shoulders heaving—she
looked utterly distraught. Ila stepped forward and hugged her. With her swollen belly suddenly
she
looked like the mother, and Naameh the frightened child.

“Fear not, Mother,” Shem said. “We shall find each other in the new world.” But his words only made Naameh cry all the harder.

Japheth, standing behind Ila, suddenly said in surprise, “Father?”

Shem, Ila, and Naameh looked around, Naameh immediately swiping the tears from her eyes. Noah was standing at the top of the ramp, his knife in his hand, staring at them. He looked wild, his eyes darting from Ila and Shem—who had stepped forward to drape his arm protectively around Ila’s shoulders—to his wife. It seemed as if he was finding it difficult to reconcile the love that Shem and Ila clearly shared with the love that he had once had, and had now lost, with Naameh.

He clumped down the ramp toward them. The four of them took an instinctive step back. But the knife wasn’t for them. Ila’s eyes widened in horror as she suddenly realized what Noah’s real intentions were.

“No!” she shouted. “Stop!”

But she was too late. Noah stepped forward and cut through the restraining ropes of the raft before anyone could stop him. Shem rushed forward as it slid from its moorings and splashed down into the sea.

He glared angrily at his father, but instead of confronting Noah he yanked at the sleeves of his jacket, intending to shed it and jump into the sea, retrieve the raft, and haul it back to the ramp.

Before he could do so, Noah took a small cloth bag from within the folds of his tunic. He lit it with a
flint and tossed it almost casually onto the raft.

The tzohar ignited almost instantly, burning with a white-hot flame. Within seconds the fire was devouring the dry wood and spreading to the canvas shelter and the painstakingly secured stacks of provisions.

Shem and Ila watched in horror and disbelief as all their hard work went up in flames. Such was the destructive power of the burning tzohar that within minutes there was nothing left of the raft but an already dispersing layer of greasy black ashes, floating on the surface of the water.

With the insouciance of a man who had just performed some menial task, Noah turned and began to walk away. Shem ran after him, grabbed him by the shoulder and pulled him around.

“You bastard!”

“Shem, no!” Ila yelled, but Shem was already swinging a fist toward his father’s face.

Raddled and reduced though he was, Noah blocked the punch easily, and then, when Shem tried to kick him, he hooked a foot around Shem’s standing ankle and whipped his leg out from under him.

Shem crashed down on to his back, and Noah dropped on top of him, pinning his eldest son to the wooden ramp. Shem struggled, but his father might as well have been made of rock.

“How could you?” Shem yelled at him, almost spitting the words in his face. “I thought you were good. I thought that’s why He chose you!”

Noah shook his head. Though he looked ashamed, even anguished, he said, “The Creator chose me because he knew I would complete the task. Nothing more.”

Ila was desperate to help Shem. Her instinct was to run across and haul Noah off him. But Naameh grabbed her, restrained her. Ila struggled to break free.

“Let me go!” she screamed. “
Let me go!
”

All at once she felt a shifting inside her, had the oddest sensation of something collapsing, breaking away. Then she heard a splashing sound, became aware that her thighs were wet. She looked down. Water was running down her legs. A lot of water.

She felt the baby move.

“It’s your time!” Naameh cried, her eyes big with both joy and alarm.

“Oh, no!” Ila wailed.

At Naameh’s words, Noah and Shem stopped fighting. They both craned their necks to look at Ila. Noah relaxed his grip on Shem’s arms and Shem squirmed out from under his body. Ila was sagging a little, her face contorted with pain. Naameh was doing her best to support her physically while encouraging her to go back inside the Ark.

Yet Ila was shaking her head, reluctant to do so without Shem. He ran to her side, clutched her hand with his, while putting his other arm around her for support. Then together he and Naameh half-carried Ila through the hatchway door.

I
la lay on a blanket inside the tent she shared with Shem, breathing rapidly and occasionally crying out in pain, one arm raised to cover her eyes as if she wished to hide from the reality of the situation.

Naameh knelt between her legs and reached beneath the blanket she had draped across Ila’s belly and thighs.

Ila released a shuddering breath, then reached down with the hand she had been using to cover her eyes and grabbed Naameh’s wrist.

“Please, Mother,” she whispered. “Please, keep it inside.”

Naameh’s voice was soft, her face sympathetic. “It’s coming, daughter. Don’t think about anything else.”

The words were barely out of her mouth when Ila went rigid, her back arching as a contraction hit her. She screamed out in pain.

* * *

Noah sat on the floor of his workshop, listening to Ila’s distant howls. His fists were clenched tightly together on his upraised knees, and his head rested on his knotted fists.

“A boy…” he murmured to himself. “A boy… a boy…”

Just then his head snapped up, a sixth sense telling him that there was someone close by. Ham stood in the open doorway, smears of blood on his face. He looked stricken. He held out his hands to show Noah. They were coated with blood.

“They’re awake, Father. They’re eating each other.” His voice was high, strained.

Noah was confused. He had no idea what his son was talking about. “What? Who?”

“The beasts!” Ham said. “Hurry!”

* * *

Ham felt sick. Now that the time had come, he wasn’t sure that he wanted to go through with it. He was in turmoil, wracked with guilt, torn between the instinctive love he felt for his father—whom he knew deep down was a good man, a man who loved the world so deeply that he was prepared to put aside his own compassion in order to preserve it—and his conviction that his father must be punished for the callousness and cruelty he had shown in carrying out what he claimed were the Creator’s wishes.

If his father remained alive, then Shem and Ila and their baby would be lost, perhaps forever. The death of Na’el, the girl Ham had promised—and failed—to protect, would go unavenged.

But for a son to lead his own father, however misguided that father might be, unwittingly to his death…

Ham’s stomach cramped with shame. Was there a more heinous crime?

Now that the wheels had been set in motion, however, he wasn’t sure how to make them stop. He couldn’t prevent his father from following him, couldn’t simply turn and fend him off with an excuse, tell him he had been lying, or mistaken. Nor could he confess the truth. And so, not sure what else to do, Ham kept running, scrambling down ladders which took them past the different layers of the reptile deck, hurrying along the main walkway, passing through corridors, hurtling down more ladders…

Until at last, feeling crushed beneath his terrible burden and trying to gulp back tears of shame, he came to a halt halfway along the main walkway of the mammal deck.

Only then did he turn to face his father. Noah, hurrying in his wake, was looking left and right, concern and bewilderment on his face. His eyes roamed over the vast network of compartments and hollows, and across the recumbent forms of the thousands of still-sleeping animals.

Ham knew what his father was thinking. Everything was quiet here. Where was the chaos that his son had described?

Noah turned his restless gaze on Ham. His restless,
trusting
gaze.

It was evident that it had never, for one moment, occurred to Noah that any of his sons might one day betray him. That fact was like the twist of a knife in Ham’s gut.

“Which way now, son?” His father’s voice was soft, puzzled.

It was that final word, that “son” that did it. Ham felt his resolve crumbling. He shook his head and looked beseechingly, apologetically at his father.

Noah’s eyes narrowed, and Ham saw the truth slowly beginning to dawn on his worn, bearded face. He saw his father begin to realize that he had been deceived, that he had been led here under false pretenses.

Behind Noah a dark, looming shadow slid out from behind a pillar.

Ham wasn’t sure whether his father sensed Tubal-cain’s presence, or whether he saw the subconscious flicker of a warning in Ham’s eye. All he knew for certain was that as the warrior king rushed toward his father’s back, knife raised, Noah, belying his recent physical deterioration, spun round, as agile as a trained fighter, and jumped nimbly out of the way of the downward swing of Tubal-cain’s arm.

The king staggered forward, dragged off-balance by the unconnected blow, even as Noah leaped away. However, of the two of them, it was Noah who fared worse. As he landed, his momentum caused him to stumble backward and trip over the outstretched legs of a miniature pachyderm. He went down, landing among a pair of intertwined apes, neither of which so much as stirred.

By the time he had scrambled to his feet, Tubal-cain was stalking toward him, knife raised once again. For his part, Noah gaped at his opponent, disoriented by the sheer fact of his presence.

Then Noah peered at Ham, who was standing frozen a little way away, his shiv clutched in his hand.

“You helped him?” Noah asked sadly.

Ham said nothing, but the way his face reddened with shame and embarrassment was all the answer that was needed.

Noah continued to back away, moving in a half-circle, carefully stepping over the bodies and trailing legs of sleeping animals, trying to find a bit of clear ground.

Tubal-cain had no such qualms. He stepped on smaller mammals as if they weren’t there, deliberately so in a couple of cases, his teeth bared in a sadist’s smile. He even stabbed his knife into the neck of a tapir-like herbivore, killing it instantly.

Noah stood his ground. He watched helplessly as blood gouted from the dead animal’s neck wound—but when Tubal-cain raised the knife to strike another sleeping creature, Noah sprang forward with a cry.

Even though Tubal-cain had been trying to goad Noah, he still seemed surprised by the speed and ferocity of the younger man’s assault. He stumbled for a moment, his injured leg scraping across the floor. But then he recovered, thrusting his knife at Noah as he lunged for him.

Noah managed to wrap his hand around the handle of Tubal-cain’s knife, just above the king’s own grip.

The two men came together, punching and gouging with their free hands, wrestling over the knife. They fought savagely, their faces contorted with the long pent-up hatred of sworn enemies.

Standing in the shadows, his shiv still clutched in his hand, Ham watched them with horror on his face, and wondered what he had unleashed.

* * *

Ila screamed with pain. Her eyes bulged. Sweat soaked her hair and ran down her face.

“I can’t…” she sobbed. “I can’t do this.”

Naameh was composed, a rock. She nodded gently but firmly.

“You can,” she said. “You will. You are close. When you feel you have to push, you push.”

Shem was kneeling at Ila’s side, clutching her hand, staring down into her face.

“I love you,” he said.

Ila tried to reply, but her body was wracked by another contraction. She screamed again.

“Push!” Naameh urged.

Ila pushed. She bore down, roaring, screaming, sobbing, her face turning bright red. Her heels dug into the ground. She squeezed Shem’s hand so tightly that he could feel the bones grinding together.

Just when it seemed as if her head might burst with the effort, she let loose a final, bone-chilling, primal howl—and suddenly, in a gush of blood and amniotic fluid, a tiny, purple, slithering bundle rushed into the world, and into Naameh’s waiting hands.

Its wail of protest at being ejected so abruptly into an alien environment cut through the air.

Shem looked at Naameh, a flood of emotions—hope, fear, joy, wonder—all chasing one another across his face.

Naameh looked at him.

“There’s two,” she said.

Shem gaped. This was the last thing he had been expecting his mother to say.

“Two?”

“Twins!” Naameh turned her attention back to Ila. “Push, Ila! Push again!”

The second birth was easier. Ila bore down, and almost instantly a second squalling, blood-smeared scrap of humanity was sliding into the world.

Naameh scooped them up, one in each hand, and examined them.