Page 41 of Unveiled Tamar’s Story (Mysteries & Wonders of the Bible #1)

Walking even more quickly, she passed a shop that sold mirrors and women’s clothes, with the door propped open to encourage a breeze.

She went inside to look at herself in the mirror.

Studying her reflection, she could see no physical change, although her countenance had an otherworldly glow.

Or was that just a trick of the light? Touching her face, she was relieved to find it warm and soft, the familiar face of a woman in her midtwenties, a bloom of health in her cheeks, her brown eyes bright and wide.

Her hair cascaded down her shoulders, neatly combed and oiled.

What was so frightening about her? Maybe the strange combination of a radiant face with a grave tunic and the smell of myrrh unnerved people.

Maybe something had happened in the city while she had been…

She couldn’t think of the appropriate word.

Dead? Sleeping? She had no vocabulary for a temporary death.

The shopkeeper came from the back of the store and stopped.

His nose wrinkled at something in the air.

He was a tall man with a terribly curved spine, so that one shoulder sat much higher than the other.

Shoshan’s heart immediately went out to him.

It looked like a painful malady to live with.

Lifting a hand, she wanted to introduce herself, thinking she might come back and buy a mirror here.

He needed the money for doctors, she was sure.

“By Jove!” Staring at her, he clutched the amulet on his chest. He was a Roman, then. Romans worshiped Jupiter, or Jove as he was also called, as the supreme god.

“I just wanted to—” Shoshan began.

“Get out before I call the guards!” the shopkeeper yelled.

People had gone mad. Was there poison in the water?

The shopkeeper lurched out of the store behind her.

“She is one of them!” he yelled, standing outside the shop, pointing back in at her. “She stinks of the grave!”

She pushed past him, exiting the shop. People parted from her, repelled away. Shoshan’s mind whirled. She knew the myrrh had a strong fragrance, but how did these people know she was…what was she? She didn’t even know!

A woman pointed to Shoshan and screamed in Aramaic. “ Koom !”

One who stands up again, a resurrected one . But it also could mean one who intends to fight.

Shoshan threw up her hands in protest. “I just want to go home!”

A Roman guard turned the corner. His eyes locked on hers.

The man was around her age, with light brown hair and brilliant green eyes.

Handsome, except for a scar that ran across his left cheek and down through his jaw, from a sword, perhaps.

The scar was raised and red, and it was hard not to stare at it.

It must have happened when he was very young, and it must have hurt very badly.

But she tore her gaze away from it as his hand raised to his sword.

His breastplate caught the glare of the sun and blinded her, and she lifted her arm to shield her eyes.

“I do not want to fight,” she called. Whatever rebellion was happening in these streets, she had no part in it. “I am on my way home!”

“Koom!” the woman yelled to the guard, still pointing at Shoshan.

The guard scowled and moved toward her, his hand still on his sword.

Rome executed people for insurrection, she knew.

The cries of “Koom!” did not stop, and the ground seemed to shake with every step the guard took toward her.

Shoshan turned and ran with a speed that surprised her, shoving people aside, cutting around corners, taking stairs to streets that led to shops, and then cutting through the shops to new streets.

People cursed her for knocking them down or out of the way, and no matter how fast she ran or which turns she took, she heard the calls.

Koom! She heard the stomp of Roman boots, the clang of armor as more guards joined the first in pursuit of her.

Turning a corner, she dashed into a darkened shop that sold Roman codices. In the darkness, she fought to catch her breath. Each shuddering gasp sounded so loud in her ears, and she clenched her jaw, willing herself to be quiet.

Would the guards think to look for a Jewish girl in a Roman shop? Hopefully not. The tread of boots drew closer.

In the darkness, a hand reached for her, landing on her arm. Before she could scream, another hand clasped over her mouth, and she was pulled backward into the shadows. She struggled to break the man’s hold on her, but he was stronger.

When she was released, she was in a tiny room filled with about ten other people, all strangers to her. They sat around a table, hands folded in their laps, or eating flatbreads. They looked up at her with interest then looked at her captor as if he would explain.

No one here was afraid of her. Curious about her, yes, but not afraid. Slowly, she felt her muscles loosen, and she was able to breathe.

An oil lamp burned in the dark room, and flickering light cast dancing shadows on the walls, distorting the faces that huddled around it.

Their faces seemed kind, though, as they squinted to look at her.

Had it been even an hour since she stumbled out of her grave?

So much had already happened. All she wanted was to go home, to see Antonius, to think that this was all a dream.

“Who are you?” she demanded, looking around the room.

The man who had grabbed and released her looked around at the others, his white bushy eyebrows jumping up and down as he chuckled.

“You are just in time,” he replied then patted her lightly on her shoulder. “We were just about to make our introductions.”

Was he crazy?

A woman who seemed familiar somehow to Shoshan, though Shoshan was sure she had never seen her before, shook her head.

“You owe her more of an explanation,” she scolded the man. “Poor girl is scared.” She peered across the jumping flame at Shoshan. “This man has been watching for us on the street, collecting us, one by one, pulling us to safety.”

“It was smart thinking to hide in this shop.” The shopkeeper smiled. “There are more guards on the streets every minute.”

Shoshan stared at her, then at the shopkeeper, not understanding. She had only chosen this shop because it sold Roman codices. No one staging a rebellion against Rome would be shopping for those.

“Did you wake up in a grave?” the woman pressed.

Shoshan swallowed, the noise audible in the tiny room. How did this woman guess that?

“Do not worry,” the woman replied, “we all did.”

“I did not wake up in a grave,” an elderly man said.

“I woke up in a vegetable patch. A rabbit was tugging on a radish when up I popped. I do not think the poor thing will ever eat radishes again.” He grunted, suddenly dismayed.

“My grave was not tended to. Someone sold it for a garden. Such a thing should not be done.”

“Let us all think,” the woman said. “How long have you been dead? Does anyone know?”

No one spoke.

The woman tried again. “What is the last thing you remember?”

“David was dancing through the streets.” The elderly man spoke first, his face transformed by the memory. “The Ark had come to Jerusalem. What joy! We feasted and sang until dawn. I was eighty years old. Glory to God.”

His face cleared suddenly. “Where is the Ark now? Did David finish the temple he planned for it?”

“The Ark is not here,” Shoshan murmured. Her mind was doing the math, trying to comprehend his statement. “And Solomon, David’s son, is the one who built the temple. David was dead by then.”

The man clicked his teeth. “I knew that, somehow. How did I know that?” His gaze fell to the floor, away to his right, as if searching his memories.

“Wait,” one woman across from Shoshan interrupted. “I remember that I was bringing bread to the workers at the wall. King David had been gone for…well, you are right, he was dead. Had been for generations. Jerusalem had fallen. But we had no temple, no king.”

Everyone fell silent, staring into the flickering light. Jerusalem without a temple? Without a king? No wall to protect it?

“The wall still stands,” Shoshan said quickly, mentally going back through the stories she knew. “And the temple was rebuilt. Nehemiah led your people, yes?”

The woman nodded vigorously. “And a king?” she asked. “Who is the king?”

“There is a man called the King of the Jews. His name is Jesus.” Shoshan took a deep breath. “He is the Messiah.”

“Yes,” everyone murmured, a sound of joy, like water in a fast-moving brook. It was as if Shoshan was reminding them of a name that had been on the tip of their tongue, just out of reach. But how could they know of Jesus? They had been dead when He was born!

Not Shoshan though. She had spent many afternoons following Him, listening to Him teach.

Antonius was not interested in the new teacher roaming the countryside, especially because the teacher was a carpenter and construction worker like Antonius.

They had probably worked on the same building projects together.

Still, Antonius had never stopped her from leaving to hear Jesus, not even when she was…

Her hand flew to her abdomen. Not even when I was pregnant and close to delivery.

She leaped to her feet and lurched toward the door, but the older woman jumped up and caught her by the arms. Shoshan struggled and raised her voice until the shopkeeper placed his hand over her mouth again.

Everyone looked stricken with fear now, their faces distorted, and she guessed they had been hunted too.

She nodded, indicating that she would not scream, and he released her.

“I was pregnant,” she gasped in the tiny room, trying to catch her breath as the memories crashed in. “I was in labor, and the midwife was yelling for someone, or something. That is the last thing I remember.”

A different kind of silence fell over the room. No one would meet her eye. They guessed something she did not. She could see that in their eyes.

“What happened to your child?” asked the woman who brought bread to Nehemiah’s workers.

Shoshan closed her eyes, thinking. “I do have one memory.”

Opening her eyes, she looked around at their faces. They were all so beautiful, the joy radiating from them as if they carried a bit of heaven. Fear had looked so unnatural on them.

“I held her in my arms, and she laughed. Oh, she has dark lashes, so very long! And such delicate fingers. I think she might become an artist or a weaver. When she laughed, her eyes danced.”

Shoshan shook her head lightly. “I was so happy that I thought my heart might burst, that I had no more room to contain so much joy. I have never felt anything like it.”

The women in the room exchanged glances again then smiled at Shoshan.

“What is it?” Shoshan demanded.

The oldest woman spoke, her voice soft. “Newborns do not laugh. They cannot.”

“I heard her laugh. I saw it,” Shoshan responded, indignant.

“I know! I am not doubting you,” the woman replied. “But it could not have happened. Not on earth.”

Shoshan heard the shopkeeper clear his throat.

All her strength left her, and she slumped down, her hands pressing into her abdomen.

Her memory was real, but it was a memory of another place.

Jesus spoke of a place called paradise. Others called it heaven.

She had been there with her daughter, hadn’t she?

The shattered pieces of her memory came together at once, the story making sense now.

“I died in childbirth,” Shoshan said quietly. “I think my child did too.” The women gathered around her, pushing the men aside, putting their arms and hands on her to comfort her. But Shoshan was confused more than stricken. She had seen her daughter, and her daughter was very much alive.

But had she seen a little body in the grave when she awoke? Shoshan tried to remember but couldn’t remember anything past the little bedroom where she had been in labor. Antonius had been there, she remembered that, but did he know she was dying? Did he have a chance to say goodbye?

He must have been devastated. Utterly heartbroken. He lost his wife and daughter in the same day.

She knew that she must return home at once. Antonius needed to see her and to understand that miracles were happening.

He needed to know that anything was possible.