Chapter Three, Part 1

Chapter Three

A slave came to light the torches. Bethena tried to pull herself from the memories and focus on her son. He had not been her first born. Her first born had been sacrificed to Baal. She went to the table and poured wine into a beautifully wrought silver goblet, added water and drank deeply. In a moment, warmth suffused her chest. Downstairs, she heard the slaves preparing the evening meal.
Melka, two years older and wise in the ways of the city, temple and palace had watched over her in the weeks and months that followed. Bethena drank again. It had been good with Melka. Later, in the days following her initiation, a few men had come to her and she’d learned to please and enjoy them in Astarte’s name, but it had never been as good as that first time with Melka. Melka knew all the men allowed to visit the inner-most court of Astarte’s Temple. She had lain with them herself. Four of them, all of the royal household had lain with Bethena. Atrim, father of Jabin, had been with Bethena most often; Melka counted 17 times. When Bethena conceived, Melka told her she was sure it was Atrim’s seed that had quickened in her.
Had Atrim, the over-king of all the Canaanite city-states, known she was his daughter? At the time, Bethena had been shocked by the idea, now, as she seated herself in the stiff-backed throne-like chair, she realized it had been an honor to be impregnated by her own father. After all, Baal and Astarte had been brother and sister, as had been Toth and Isis. It was the exception for the great mass of everyday people. But for the great ones, it was the rule.
They were at the very pinnacle of civilization, the intersection of the human and divine; far above the many others swarming in the streets around her suite in the palace. Bethena sighed, nodded knowingly and clapped her hands. Immediately, a handsome young male slave appeared and bowed deeply before her.
“Bring me a footstool and a table.”
“Yes, Mistress.” The slave obeyed, bowed low, and backed from her presence.
Bethena could have simply moved the furniture herself, but she hadn’t wanted to. Awash in the glow of power as she contemplated her divine heritage, Bethena had wanted to be waited on. She could even have made the slave be her footstool. He would have eagerly complied, she had used him as furniture before, but she was not in the mood tonight.
She admired the workmanship of the finely wrought silver on her goblet. It was a scene depicting an olive grove and oil press. We have a higher standard to adhere to, she thought. It is our mission to keep and extend civilization; to honor our God and his Goddess consort; to protect them from the ravages of the desert nomads and their One God.
What could they know of God? They had no temples, lived in tents, had no iron. While we have beautiful temples, fleets of trading vessels, caravans that travel to Cathay and the Indies and a system of justice sophisticated law resting on the will of the gods and on the divine power they have given to our priests and great ones.
The Haibrus were barbarians, nomads, threatening the roots of civilization. Bethena was proud of her general son’s service to her half brother the King. Together, they were waging a relentless war of attrition against the nomad invaders, the desert aliens and jealous god who challenged their way of life and the greatness of the gods.
Yet there were alternatives to force and violence and the Haibrus were not so stiff-necked and un-educatable as every one said. The handsome slave, for instance. He was a Haibru but under her tutelage had taken well enough to the worship of Astarte. Now he basked in his service to Bethena and devoted himself fully to her needs and pleasure, because she was of royal blood and a priestess of Astarte and to serve and worship her, was to serve and worship the Goddess.
But until they were tamed and trained, the Haibrus were fierce. Bethena feared for the life of her son and the lives of the brave Canaanites who fought with them. But it seemed that they had no alternative, no choice but to make war. Hadn’t they tried to live in peace? Generations ago, when the Haibrus had first come among them, the Canaanites had welcomed them; encouraged them to camp beside their cities, water at their wells, live in the city walls, even join them in worshiping Baal and Astarte in their beautiful temples. They were tolerant of the Haibru god. And what had happened?
Bethena shifted in her chair, removed her feet from the footstool and returned them to the floor. Some, quite a few at first, had adapted to the life of the city and gloried in the sensual worship of Baal and Astarte, though, Bethena swallowed hard, the sacrifice of the first born male had been hard for them. Still, many of the Haibrus became as their Canaanite neighbors.
But their One God - One God - Bethena laughed aloud, how silly, grew jealous of Baal and Astarte and caused his more zealous worshippers to attack those that had fallen away; and forcibly return them to His worship, or kill them. Now there was little commerce between the worshipers of the One God and those of Baal and Astarte. In places they tolerated one another, but for the most part, they lived in separate enclaves.
Bethena stood and paced. Shadows from the torches danced along the frescoed walls. Even this we tolerated, she thought. But they breed like locusts. Now there are so many of them they are pressing our most fertile territories in the Jezreel and in Samaria. It was only a matter of when Sisera would fight the great battle to rid their land of these vermin.
Vermin, Bethena, isn’t that a bit strong?
Lately, whenever she worked herself into a frenzy of hate, another voice, softer, deeply serene and gentle, came to her. It was something from her life before the initiation in the Temple of Astarte, a voice that sounded the way she remembered feeling when she was eleven wandering bare foot in the lush fields and playing with the lambs. Bethena stopped pacing and stood still, listening.
Aren’t they human, as you are? Do they not long for love, as you do; and worry for their sons and daughters? She nodded and felt suddenly drained. Walking back to the chair, she sat heavily.
“But are we – Jabin, Sisera and myself closer to the gods? Are we not the special and divine children of Baal and Astarte, with a mission ordained by them?’
Do you really believe Baal and Astarte are gods? Do you feel their presence?
“In the Temple, when I bow down before them. When we have the services to them, the rituals music, dancing; when I inhale the sacred incense…” Her eyes closed and she touched a hand to her genitals. “Yes. I feel them, then.”