“We will take the town from inside. A small party. Climbers. They will enter through one of the irrigation pipes that lie in the Wadi Kidron.”
“That’s what you meant when you said ‘Touch the tzinnor’?”
“Is that what I said? I don’t know what I said. But what I saw was the water, how it runs from under the city, through the rock, to a spring. . . . I saw a tunnel that has been cut in the rock, from the spring to a shaft. Climb the shaft, and you reach another tunnel. This one runs right under the walls. It’s how the city gets its water during siege. We thought the spring was defended from the fortifications above, but it’s better than that. They don’t have to go outside the walls at all. They have diverted the water to a pool inside the walls, for use in wartime.” I turned to Zadok. “Is that not so?”
Zadok looked stricken. He had hoped to bargain this information for a high price. Now I had given it to David for free. He might have been reflecting on the well-known fact that kings generally do not look kindly on the betrayers of other kings.
Yoav was pacing. “So one need only climb the shaft . . .”
“Only?” said Zadok, finding his voice. “It’s a vertical climb, half again as tall as this building. The walls are slick.”
“We’d be fully armed,” David mused. “If anyone inside gets wind of us, all they need do is drop a rock on our head and it’s over. Bad odds. A job for the brave or very desperate.”
Yoav stepped forward, and reached out to clasp David’s arm. “Someone like you were, King, the day you offered to fight the giant of Gath. You spared my life after Avner. Let me do this, in recompense.” The two men stood eye to eye for a long moment. Then David nodded. “So be it,” he said.
• • •
It was the season of reaping. The season when kings go out to war. David marched, in force, to Har Moriah, to the north of the city. It was the first time Israel and Yudah had taken to the field as one army, and it was an impressive display. David had ordered a night march. When the sun rose, the people of Yebus looked up toward a hilltop dense with archers, spearmen, slings.
At daybreak, Araunah played what he thought was his best tactic. Up onto the massive walls shambled a sad army of the deformed, the lame, the blind, the leprous. It was a sight to fill a heart with dread. A taunt, and an attempt at dark magic. Foot soldiers on the eve of battle are notoriously superstitious. Our men believe that to kill an accursed person—one afflicted by illness and disfigurement—is to invite the same curse down upon oneself. In that way, Araunah reasoned, these unfortunates were an effective defensive line. Even the blind and the lame can defeat an army that is afraid to shoot them. And behind that unhappy vanguard, he arrayed his true army, the archers and the pots of oil.
As the Yebusites looked north, I was already south of their walls, with Yoav and the small, handpicked force drawn from the elite warriors known throughout the army as David’s Mighty Men. I was their guide, using the details of my vision to lead the way to the tzinnor. Even in the dark, it was easy. I felt pulled to the place as if by a line of force. When we found it, we flung ourselves to the ground and covered ourselves with leaves and boughs so that no sentry on the guard tower could see us as the sun rose. We would have to wait for the water, as my prophecy had advised. In this season, the spring was most active, gushing forth five or six times a day in massive surges that could last for more than an hour. Only just after it abated would it be safe for us to crawl through the pipe, enter the tunnels and attempt to climb the shaft in the short time it took the underground pool to recharge. If we missed our timing, we risked being caught in a narrows during an onrush of turbulent water. We would be trapped and drowned.
Waiting was difficult. I could smell Yoav’s sweat. My own muscles twitched and ached with effort to be still. From the other side of the city we could hear the clash of spear butt on shield and the cries of the armies, taunting each other. We knew that a second, flanking unit was also on the move. David’s best fighters were circling from the west, to be ready to rush the Water Gate if our mission succeeded. A third force, mostly retirees and civilians outfitted to look like fighters, was moving to the east, their only role to confuse Araunah.
At last, I heard another, more welcome sound . . . of water forcing its way through earth. The stream, which had been flowing steadily, gave forth a massive arc of water, a surging pulse, followed by another, and another, for almost a full hour. As soon as we were sure the spate was over, we moved. Yoav went first, fast and low, positioning himself where he could see the Yebusite archers pacing the parapet on the tower above us. He was in a crouch, his own arrow nocked, ready to shoot if one of the guards caught sight of him. Fervently, we hoped that would not happen. We did not want to draw eyes to the western wall. Once Yoav was in position, he waited for the archer to turn, then gave a sign. Avishai crawled forward, as swift as a lizard, flattening himself to enter the muddy pipe. I went next.
The distance through the pipe was not long, but the rough rock tore at my greaves, so that my forearms and shins were raw and bleeding. I inched forward as fast as my strength would allow. The pipe was not of uniform size, and when it suddenly narrowed, I had to discipline my mind not to give way to panic. The water, between surges, was just a few inches of gently flowing stream. But I had to push away images of myself, pinned in the dark, unable to go forward or back as the stream swelled again into a mighty throb of water. It did not help that Avishai, ahead of me, was slighter in build, and might be able to negotiate a girdle of rock where I might be entrapped. I gulped the air when finally the pipe opened into the tunnel, and unfurled myself to stand upright. The tunnel was mostly living rock, a natural fissure, widened only where necessary by hammer and chisel. We felt our way along cool, moist stone, moving toward the telltale shaft of light that indicated the place of ascent.
It was a dispiriting sight—sheer curved walls of slick wet stone rising vertical from the man-made pool that was Yebus’s wartime water store. We did not speak, unsure if the tunnel above was guarded near the shaft, or only, as we hoped, at the tunnel entrance. Zadok had maintained that only a small, elite unit was entrusted with the secret of the pool, just men sufficient to provide a discreet guard in peacetime and to fetch the water during war. Our hope was that those few had been called to duty on the eastern walls.
Avishai pointed up into the dark. High above us, in the ceiling of the cavern, there was a ring of iron set into the rock. In wartime, when the pool was in use, a rope threaded through this ring, so that a large waterskin could be lowered to draw from the pool. Our plan for scaling the shaft relied on that ring. I hoped it was firmly set. Avishai had a length of strong, slender rope wound around his person. I helped him unspool it as we waited for the rest of the men. By the time Yoav, bringing up the rear, joined us, Avishai had the rope furled on the edge of the pool, and had attached the sturdy string, which he had sewn into one end, to the shaft of an arrow. He passed it silently to Ira of Tekoa, who was the best archer in the army. Ira nocked the arrow to his bow, aimed, took a deep breath, exhaled and let the arrow fly. It fell a hairbreadth short, so we had to retrieve it and try again. On the second attempt, it soared straight and true, carrying the rope after it. We all of us grasped the other end as Yoav began the ascent, hand over hand, his strong torso quivering with the burden of his own weight. When he was level with the rim of the shaft, he swung his body, using his weight like a pendulum, until he could reach out and grasp for the rim. On the first try, he missed his grip, and flew back out over the drop, his arm flailing. On the second try, he was able to grasp an outcrop of stone for a moment, but his grip was not firm enough, and again he swung out over the drop, swearing under his breath. Finally, on the third try, he strained to keep hold of the rim, and flung himself onto the ledge, where he lay for a moment, gasping like a beached fish. Then we heard him scrambling to affix the rope, so that it dangled over the edge, allowing the rest of us an easier ascent, able to brace our feet against the
slick wall as we pulled ourselves up, hand over hand.
I said “easier,” but I struggled to inch my way up the slippery rock face, my hands rubbed raw and my muscles quivering with the effort. I was shaking like a jellyfish when I finally made the lip of the basin and Avishai’s strong arms drew me safely over the edge. Luckily, depleted as I was, I had little to do with the rest of that day’s work. Yoav’s fighters surprised the two tunnel guards and dispatched them with short swords, swiftly, with no more than a grunt issuing forth as their last mortal utterance. When we came out into the light, we ran to the foot of the wall where the archers held the water gate. Their backs were turned, all their attention fixed beyond the walls to where David’s vanguard maneuvered, just out of range of their arrows. Ira and Shem, our two best archers, nocked arrows and took aim, thinking to shoot the guards as they stood. But Yoav, too honorable to shoot a man in the back, called up to them, so that they turned and were facing their doom as the arrows pierced them. Ira took his man through the eye. He crumpled in place and dropped out of sight below the crenellations. Shem struck his through the throat. He scrabbled vainly at the arrow through his neck and staggered forward until he reached the low parapet and fell. He landed in a crash of armor and a thud of broken flesh right at my feet, a red mist rising. I stepped through it and ran to help work the winches that drew back the big gates. David’s vanguard surged through, surprising the Yebusites from the rear as the main army then swarmed the walls. The town was ours by sunset.
It was the first time I saw the pearly moon rise over these walls, where the rough-hewn siege ladders leaned all askew in the aftermath of the battle, some rungs splintered under the rush of the ascent. David stood on the ramparts, bathed in starlight. He was leaning on the walls, his arms outstretched on either side of him, the blood and dirt of the fighting crusted on his skin. The night wind lifted his sweat-dampened hair. His face was smeared with grime and flecked with blood, but it was radiant. He turned to me, smiling. “Here, it begins,” he said.
I thought of him a few years earlier, prone in the ashes of Ziklag with his outlaw band about to mutiny. If that was the lowest pit of his existence, then this moment, on the ramparts of the city he had made his own, might mark the summit. I stood there, and breathed in the night air, and tried to take in every detail.
From below us in the town came the sounds of soldiers carousing, their wine-drenched voices rising in tuneless victory songs. While there was weeping and keening from the houses of the fallen, there were no screams, no shrill cries of pain and fear. David had ordered restraint, and his army was obeying him. There would be no rapes this night, no wanton killings. He had already renamed the town. It was Ir David now—the City of David. It was our home, the heart of our nation, the seat of his kingship. He intended to bind up the wounds of the defeated, not lay them open. All who surrendered had been allowed to go to their homes, Knaanite and Hittite alike. He had spared even the life of Araunah, allowing him to retire from the city, unarmed and under guard, and go to his farmhouse on the mountain above the town.
I wish I could write that this night marked an end to the bloodshed. It did not. As soon as word of our victory reached the Plishtim cities on the coastal plain, they mobilized their several armies and marched on us, thinking to attack before David’s power in the new capital could be consolidated. I had a vision—debilitating, painful—exhorting him to go out and meet them on the plain. So that is what we did, fighting and routing their armies piecemeal before they could join forces and come at us as one. Even after that, they remained a thorn in our side, refusing to quit the harassment of our settlements in the Shefala. But over the years, we pushed them back, and farther back, until all that was left of once mighty Philistia was a handful of shrunken towns that could barely support the fighters to guard their walls. By the end of it, many of their best men came to us, begging David to hire them into his service. We have a unit of their mercenaries who fight for us now.
There were other victories. I have no wish to relive each of those battles, when we marched out of Ir David to subdue Moav, or Edom, or the Ammonites. But even though I wish to forget those years, I cannot. In dreams, the images come to me. Muwat says I sometimes cry out, in nightmares from which I cannot wake. Other times, I do wake, my heart racing and the sweat standing cold on my brow. On those nights, the dark is full of the cries of the dying and my only relief comes with the rising sun.
Whatever it takes. What was necessary. Ten violent years, and then, at last, our vassal states stretched from the border of Mitzrayim to the edge of the Two Rivers. Finally, we were notorious enough to give our enemies pause. They looked at the heavy cost of warring against us, and came suing for peace. The plunder from the defeated—their gold shields, their horses—enriched us. Treaty seekers offered gifts of gold, of alabaster—fine vessels such as we had not seen. There were cups of chased metal and swords inlaid with ivories. We were no longer a collection of impoverished herders and farmers, but a people whose trade thrived and whose friendship was bid for and highly prized.
David drew to him everyone who could help in this making and mending. He did not care about tribe of origin, or even if one was Ivrim. Our high priest, Aviathar, the only survivor of Shaul’s massacre at Nov, was given to understand that he would share ritual duties with the Yebusite Zadok, and that devotions and sacrifices would retain any elements of their style of worship that did not conflict with our own. Yoav was allowed to fulfill his ambition, to be general of the army of Israel, but David brought up one of Avner’s promising young lieutenants, Benaiah, to command the growing corps of foreign recruits and mercenaries. David was impressed, in particular, with the men who came to us from across the sea, from an ancient island kingdom where youths trained for war by vaulting bulls. This was a dangerous sport, requiring great athleticism, speed and courage. It was from among these strong and graceful young foreigners that David selected his handpicked bodyguard. This proved wise, as it showed no favoritism to the men of Yudah or of Benyamin.
As the wars dwindled to skirmishes and our strength grew, David was able to spend less time with military commanders and more with the engineers and overseers who were fanning out through the land, digging cisterns, making roads, fortifying, connecting and generally making a nation out of our scattered people.
It was a time when any man could seek and find justice. I think that David’s own experiences as an outlaw, a falsely accused man, had made him resolve to deal justly with his subjects now that he had the power to do so. In those years, he never tired of hearing suits, and would listen for hours to all sides of a grievance, taking pleasure in teasing out the threads of a dispute and weighing all the evidence laid before him. Any who felt dissatisfied by the decisions of the elders at their own town gates could appeal their matters to David himself, and know they would be fairly heard.
He composed some of his best music at this time, training choirs to praise the Name in musical rites that drew great crowds to worship. He would join with the choirs at such times, his soaring voice carrying the melody, enriching the harmony, his face lifted up to the heavens and lit by the ecstasy of his ever-renewing bond with the divine. As word spread, musicians and singers—men and women both—flocked to his service. You could not walk the lanes without hearing delightful sounds issuing from nearly every casement: lutenists and flute players, singers and drummers. The life of the city moved to the rhythms and melodies of an ever-changing musical score.
There was, as well, the percussion of the building trades. The hectoring scrape of massive ashlars across the ramps. The tolling of iron hammers ringing on reluctant stone. The roar of forges, burning all night to make good the day’s wounded tools.
King Hiram of Tyre sent David cedarwood—the fragrant, prized timber of the northern forests—and craftsmen skilled in stone dressing to build for him this fine house. David chose the site, high on the spur, even though at the time it stood outside the wall of the city. This w
as a bold move that showed his confidence and his vision. Ir David, he declared, was to be double the size of Yebus. He would fill in the gully and push the city west, to the very top of Har Moriah. And there, he said, he would build a shrine for our ark, and bring it home at last to the city at the very heart of the Land. As soon as the first stage of his palace was complete, he gave the order that this be done.
When word came that the ark was within a day’s march, we did not sleep, but went to the Gihon spring to purify ourselves. We dressed afterward in fine linen garments that David had ordered for the purpose. These were simple tunics that resembled priestly robes, yet were made more plainly, with no dyes, borders or adornment. David would wear no purple cloth, no symbols of his kingship, when he went to greet the ark. In its presence, we were all of us servants.
We waited at the city gates as the ark approached. It was sohorhim, the hour of light, when the outriders came into view, cresting the Mount of Olives. The olive trees had turned their leaves so that the bright undersides shimmered. David gave a great sigh of longing, almost a groan. And then, in a wincing flash of brightness, the sunlight caught the gilded wingtips of the cherubim atop the ark itself. The people cheered. David gave the sign, and the choirs he had assembled burst into song. Cymbals, systrums, flutes, lyres, drums—every musician the city possessed—and there were hundreds—had been called to raise a joyful noise to the heavens. Soon, the procession was in the valley, the curtain that shielded the ark rippling in the warm wind. We could hear the voices of the singing men and women, chanting the words David had composed for the occasion:
Give praise, proclaim his Name,
Proclaim his marvels to the nations,
Sing to him, sing praise to him . . .
David, standing just in front of me, could not keep still. He held his arms out from his sides, his fingers stretching down to the earth, quivering as if some great energy were passing up and through them. He was breathing fast and deep. Suddenly, he raised his chin, and gave a cry—like a paean, but higher, sweeter—rich notes that filled every heart with gladness. Then he was loping down the hill, as wild as a boy, as ardent as a lover, sprinting toward the ark. When he reached it, he cast himself down in full prostration, his arms stretched out as if in the widest embrace. It was a lover’s moment, between him and the Name, the great One who had blessed him, kept him and brought him to this moment. I knew how he prayed: I had felt its ardency. Now all his people felt it. I could hear the sighs and the cries all around me, as the power of it moved and stirred the crowd. When David rose to his feet, he did so as if lifted by strong and tender arms. Then he began to dance.