The Lamp of Darkness by - (most recommended books TXT) 📖

ordinary dreams are one-sixtieth prophecy. Each night you will discuss your dreams with a master to decipher their—”

“This isn’t for us,” Daniel whispered. “Come, we can speak in the musicians’ cave.”

I stood and reluctantly followed Daniel. I knew that prophecy could come through dreams—Jacob’s vision of the ladder came in a dream—but I had never known that my own dreams might contain prophecy. I longed to hear about unlocking their secrets, but as I followed Daniel away from the eating area, I realized that it didn’t matter much. Yosef said that to decipher your dreams, you needed to remember them. There was only one dream I really wanted to understand, but I could never remember the slightest detail of my old nightmare. Besides, if I ever could remember what the dream contained, I was pretty sure I wouldn’t need a master to help me interpret it—it felt more like an evil memory than a prophecy.

Pale blue light still filled the western horizon, but with the moon only a sliver, the trail was little more than a gray smudge on dark ground. Daniel led us, walking with the comfort of one who knew his way.

“Will they also wake us in the middle of the night?” Zim asked.

“No, they don’t need us until an hour or two after sunrise.”

“Good, because the second watch is when I normally go to sleep.”

Thistles snagged the hem of my tunic as the path narrowed at the foot of the cliff. It wound upwards, in some spots little more than a ledge bound by a sheer drop, widening out as we passed cave openings. We stayed close to Daniel, the darkness forcing us to rely on his position to avoid a deadly misstep.

“Why do you go to sleep so late?” Yonaton asked Zim.

“It’s when I play my best music—there’s a special energy to the night.”

“I wouldn’t know,” Yonaton replied. “In my house, we go to sleep as soon as we can after sunset and wake before dawn. My father says sleep is the body’s reward. I couldn’t get up if I stayed awake playing.”

“That’s why I never rise before the third hour of the day if I can help it.”

My jaw dropped. “Are you royalty?”

Zim laughed, “Why would you say that?”

“Whenever I’m slow out of bed, my uncle tells me that only princes sleep until the third hour of the day.”

“No, I have no noble blood. My father’s a farmer, and so was his. But farming’s not for me. I left home for good a year ago.”

The path flattened out, and we stepped onto a rock ledge at the mouth of the highest cave. The cliff face rose above us into the darkness. Even in the dim light, I saw a circle of boulders out front, surrounding a fire pit dark with charcoal.

“Then how do you eat?” Yonaton asked.

“My music.” Zim retrieved a drum from inside the cave, sat down on one of the boulders, and gently tapped the taut hide with his fingertips. Though hardly focused on his drumming, his sense of rhythm was excellent. “I’ve found enough work between weddings and festivals.”

“What kind of festivals?”

“All kinds. The best is coming up at the full moon in Shiloh—I never miss it.”

I swung my kinnor off my shoulder and straddled one of the boulders. “But you’ll still be here then, won’t you?”

“When Master Yosef hired me I told him I’d come only if I could still play Shiloh.”

“How about you, Daniel? Is that what you do too?” Yonaton asked.

“Me?” Daniel chuckled as he sat down, clutching his nevel, a standup harp twice the size of my kinnor. “No, I have a wife and three daughters; I can’t be running around to festivals all the time. It’s only while my wheat is drying that I can devote myself to music.”

“Isn’t it hard being away from your family?” Yonaton asked.

“Sure it’s hard, but my nevel is easier to work than my land, and copper doesn’t spoil.” Daniel began to pick out notes and tighten strings.

Zim cocked his head toward Yonaton, “First time away from home?”

Yonaton nodded, “I’ve never even slept away before.”

“How far did you come?” I asked.

“Not far. We live just on the other side of that hill.”

“So why not go home at night?”

“My father told me I can’t expect the prophets to send someone round to the farm every time they need me. Still, it’s nice to know I can run home if I need to, and my sisters said they’d visit.” Yonaton pulled a halil, a wooden fife two handbreadths long, from his belt. “How about you, Lev? Do you play festivals or do you also work your father’s land?”

I plucked the strings of my kinnor, feeling their eyes but not looking up. “My father’s dead. My mother too. I shepherd my uncle’s flock.”

My words killed the conversation. I knew this moment, having experienced it so many times in the past—the awkward quiet, the eyes turning away. Zim filled the silence with his drumming, increasing his pace and power. Daniel joined in, picking up Zim’s beat, with crisp plucks against the long strings of his nevel, the notes reverberating into the cool evening air. Only Yonaton remained silent. My eyes were dry—I learned long ago that tears would neither bring back my parents nor water the flock—but I was surprised to see that Yonaton’s reflected more of the night sky than my dry eyes ever could. I smiled and raised my kinnor, indicating that there was no more to say. Yonaton wiped his eyes across his sleeve, smiled back, and raised his halil to his lips.

The stars were already bright in the sky when I saw twinkling lights ascend the trail toward the caves. “What are those lights?”

“Lamps,” Daniel said. “The disciples are going to sleep.”

“And they carry their own lamps?” At my uncle’s house, lamps were reserved for holy times—olive oil was too precious to burn during the week.

The disciples reached their caves, and the lights went out. “I’m glad I’m not one of them,” Zim said.

My hand dropped from the strings of my kinnor, and I stared across at Zim. “Is it really so hard to go to sleep early?”

Zim laughed and leaned into his drum. His right hand tapped out higher-pitched notes on the drum’s edge as his left palm pounded the center with a booming bass.

And then it suddenly occurred to me: there could be only one explanation for his lack of interest. “You’ve never seen them taken by prophecy, have you?”

Zim met my eyes without breaking his rhythm. “No. Have you?”

“Yes.” That one word was enough to silence Zim and draw the stares of Daniel and Yonaton, but I wasn’t done. “When you see it, you’ll understand—”

“Don’t envy the prophets, Lev.” Daniel let his hands rest on his nevel and our song unraveled—only Zim kept up the beat.

I turned on Daniel, “What’s not to envy?”

Daniel sighed, “Theirs is a path that will lead you nowhere.”

“Why nowhere?” Yonaton asked. “Look at the masters—”

“Yes, Yonaton, look at the masters. Take Master Uriel. Where do you think he’ll be come harvest time when our backs are bent with labor? Out in the fields with us?” Zim snorted, and Daniel turned to me. “Can you imagine him chasing your sheep over the hillsides?”

He leaned over his nevel to press his point. “I’ve been playing here for twelve years. The first day, there’s always a musician or two who dreams of becoming a prophet; but soon enough they learn that’s all they are—dreams. And you’ll learn too.”

I recalled my last conversation with Dahlia, how she said that there was no telling where my future would lead. “But even dreams can come true—can’t they?”

“Not this one. It’s as King Solomon said: Wisdom is good with an inheritance.”

I winced at the word inheritance. “What does that mean?”

“It means that it doesn’t matter how wise or holy you are, Lev, you’ll never become a navi. Look at the bnei nevi’im: servants prepare their food, they light lamps to walk back to their caves—some even arrived on their own horses. They don’t dress like you. They don’t smell like you.” Zim chortled. Yonaton quietly sniffed his tunic. “Most of the disciples study for years before receiving navua, if they receive it at all. Who do you think watches their farms or their flocks while they’re searching for the Holy One?”

I shrugged.

“You have to be rich to become a prophet; there’s never been one that wasn’t. As far as I can tell, it’s part of their Way.”

I opened my mouth to respond but shut it again. What could I say? Uncle Menachem always told me that the smart man learns from his mistakes, but I never seemed to. When would I stop falling into the trap of clinging to dreams that could never come true? I was like the fool in Eliav’s favorite story, the one who sat by a pool of still water, the moon reflected in its surface. Such a beautiful stone, he thought, if he could only get it for himself, he’d be a rich man. But when he grabbed for it, his hands plunged into the cold water and the moon disappeared. He cursed himself for his stupidity, but when the water calmed, the moon reappeared, and he thought that perhaps this time he’d be lucky.

Daniel watched me closely. “Don’t look like that. You have a surer path open to you.”

“What’s that?” I asked, daring him to tout the joys of shepherding.

“The nevi’im use your music to lift themselves beyond this world. You may not reach prophecy, but it can uplift you as well. You just need to learn to play properly—start with this.” Daniel leaned his nevel against the boulder, came around behind me, and laid his hands over mine. He pulled my left hand further down the front of my kinnor and placed it in an unfamiliar hold. He twisted the angle of my plucking hand, my right. I didn’t like the feel of his hands on mine—after what he just told me I would have preferred to be left alone—but I didn’t fight him. “Grip it like this, firm up your left hand, but loosen your right. Now listen.” Daniel plucked the highest string, and the kinnor let out a crisp, clear note.

“It feels awkward.”

“You’re used to doing it wrong. Give it time—you’ll bring out the full voice of your kinnor. It’s a fine, fine instrument.”

Yonaton pulled his halil away from his lips. “They don’t smell like us?” Daniel laughed, “Sniff one tomorrow. They’re obsessed with purity. Most bathe at least once a day.” He returned to his nevel and picked up the melody again. “The way I see it, how much do they really have to tie them to this world? That must be why they can rise above it so easily.”

“It’s not so easy,” Zim said, drumming now with his fingertips so as not to drown out his voice. “They need us.”

“Just the disciples—the masters don’t need musicians.”

“But Master Uriel did.” I sat straighter now that I knew something that Daniel didn’t. “The day we met, he came to me for my music. That’s how I was hired.”

Daniel inclined his head to the side and stared at me again, then turned his eyes away and shrugged. “I’ve never seen a master use a musician before.”

Zim waved off our words with the back of his hand. “Enough of this. We may not be prophets, but we know what we need.” He stepped up his playing, and the rest of us followed his lead, bringing the conversation to an end.

The music indeed was unlike any I’d ever played. Few in Levonah had the time or patience to play instruments