Atretes snatched up a framea from the ground and threw it. It went through a warrior who was coming at Theophilus from behind. The man let out a harsh cry and went down.
As quickly as the attack came, it ended. The Germans melted into the forest and silence fell again.
Atretes was breathing hard, his blood on fire. He gave a jeering shout.
One of the young warriors Theophilus had dropped moaned as he regained consciousness. Atretes strode toward him, face flushed and sweating from exertion, his intent clear. Theophilus stepped in his path. “There’s been enough killing.”
“Get out of my way!”
Theophilus blocked Atretes’ gladius with his own. “I said no!” he shouted into Atretes’ face.
“They’re Mattiaci.” Swearing, he rammed Theophilus with his shoulder and made another swing. Theophilus blocked him again and hit him in the side of the head with his iron fist.
“I cracked your skull once,” he said as Atretes staggered. “God help me, I’ll do it again.” He clamped an iron hand on Atretes’ throat. “I didn’t come to Germania to kill.” He shoved him back. “Or stand by and watch you do so!”
The hot blood pounding in Atretes’ head slowed and cooled. Breathing heavily from the battle, his lungs still burning, he faced the Roman. “I should’ve killed you when I saw the Rhine,” he said through his teeth. He stepped forward. “I should kill you now!”
Theophilus slammed him hard in the chest, knocking him back. He took a fighting stance. “Go ahead and try if you think you have to. Go ahead!”
Caleb’s screaming penetrated Atretes’ haze of rage. Frowning, he stepped back, lowering his gladius. “Where’s Rizpah?”
“You told her to get down behind that log.”
When Atretes couldn’t see her, he strode toward it, wondering why she wasn’t seeing to his son. Was she cowering behind that log in fear? Had she run off into the forest, forgetting the boy and leaving him behind?
“Rizpah!”
Putting his hand on the log, he swung himself over. He landed with perfect balance.
Caleb sat in Rizpah’s lap. He was covered with blood and screaming. Atretes’ heart gave a sharp flip. “How bad is it?” he said hoarsely as he saw Rizpah touch the child’s face in an effort to calm him. “Where’s he wounded?” He stepped over and lifted his son from her lap.
It was then he saw the arrow protruding from her chest and realized it was her blood covering Caleb. The child was unharmed.
Theophilus heard Atretes’ guttural cry and left the two Mattiaci where they lay. He sprinted across the small clearing and came around the log where he saw Atretes on his knees, face ashen, touching Rizpah’s cheek tenderly. He was speaking to her in German. Stepping closer, Theophilus saw the wound. It was a mortal one.
“Oh, Jesus,” he said softly.
Atretes put his left hand against Rizpah’s chest, bracing her as he extracted the arrow with his right. In shock, she made little sound. Blood poured from the wound as he tossed the arrow aside. He pressed the heel of his hand against it to stop the flow, but it did little good. Gripping Rizpah’s white face with his bloodied hand, he pleaded with her. “Don’t die. Do you hear me? Don’t die.”
She rasped for breath, blood bubbling from her parted lips and trickling from the corner of her mouth.
“Jesus, O Jesus,” Theophilus said, going down on his knees.
“Rizpah,” Atretes said, stroking her cheek. “Liebchen, don’t . . .” Her eyes changed subtly. Atretes saw and knew what it meant. “No!” Fear such as he had never known filled him.
He was going to lose her. What would he do when he did? “Call upon your god!” he said raggedly, tears pouring down his cheeks. His fingers bit into her pale face. “Call upon your god now!” He had seen death too many times not to recognize it had come to take her.
Her breathing changed. The harsh and rapid rasping for air slowed and eased.
“I need you,” he said hoarsely.
Her hand fluttered as though she wanted to touch him and hadn’t the strength. She gave a long, soft sigh and was silent. Her body relaxed, and she was completely still.
“No,” Atretes groaned and put his hand to her throat. There was no pulse. “No!” he said in an agony of grief. German words poured like a flood from him, feelings he had kept hidden, feelings he had fought against. He cupped her face with both hands. Her eyes were open, dilated and fixed, unseeing, her lips softly parted. The blood that had been trickling from her mouth ceased. The wound in her chest stopped bleeding.
Rising, Atretes spread his hands palms up, covered in her blood, and bellowed out his anguish. Over and over, he cried out while his son screamed, untended and forgotten.
Theophilus moved to Rizpah’s side and laid his hands upon her. While Atretes poured out his grief and hopelessness, Theophilus poured out his faith in prayer to Christ.
Nothing is impossible for God. Nothing.
No words came from his lips, no clear thoughts filled his head, but his soul cried out to God that Rizpah be returned to them. For the child. For the man still lost in the darkness.
Atretes stumbled away. He couldn’t get his breath. He felt as though someone was choking him. He couldn’t breathe. His mind filled with visions of every life he had ever taken, every loved one ever lost. He sat down hard, his forearms resting on his knees. Head down, he wept.
Theophilus continued to pray.
Caleb pushed himself up and toddled toward his dead mother. Flopping down, he put his head in her lap and began to suck his thumb.
When Caleb’s crying stopped, Atretes raised his head and looked for him. When he saw where he lay, he shut his eyes. How was he going to raise him alone? Theophilus was on his knees, hands firmly covering Rizpah’s wound. What did the centurion think he could do now? What good were his prayers?
“Leave her alone. She’s dead.” Theophilus remained as he was. “She’s dead, I tell you,” he said, shooting to his feet. “Do you think I don’t know it when I see it come?”
His angry words hung on the cold air as a sudden stillness fell over the forest. For a heartbeat it was as though all of creation had stilled, then came a soft whisper of wind. Atretes looked around apprehensively, his skin prickling as the wind whispered around him . . . and he began to shake, afraid of whatever forces moved around them.
A gasp drew his attention sharply, and his eyes widened in disbelief as Rizpah drew in a deep breath, her eyes opening wide as she looked beyond Theophilus. “Jesus,” she said softly in wonder, and Atretes was knocked from his feet. Clutching the earth, he lay flat, face down, trembling violently.
Theophilus lifted his hands from Rizpah and brushed her cheek lightly with trembling hands. “Praise be to God,” he said in a choked voice, overcome. He touched her again, amazed.
“He was with me,” Rizpah said, eyes shining. “I felt him touch me.”
Whatever force held Atretes down lifted as quickly as it had come, and he clambered to his feet. Heart pounding, he came closer, awestruck. “She was dead!” he whispered.
With a victorious cry, Theophilus stood and moved aside, excitement pouring through him. Laughing and crying, he gripped Atretes’ arms. “Tell me now Christ has no power! Tell me he doesn’t live! He was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be. Our God reigns!” He released the German and raised his hands in jubilant thanksgiving. “Lord Roi!” His voice rose, carrying through the dark forest, reclaiming it. “El Elyon, God Most High!”
Shaking, Atretes knelt down in front of Rizpah, unable to believe what his eyes saw. Swallowing hard, he reached out to touch her and then drew his hand back. The hair on the back of his neck rose, for her face was aglow as he had never seen it before and her eyes were shining. She was alive, more alive than he had ever seen her. A radiance shimmered around her.
Her eyes met his. “He was here with us.”
“I believe you.”
“Don’t be afraid,” she said and reached out to him. “There’s not
hing to fear.” She placed her hand tenderly against his cheek. “God loves you.”
His throat closed with emotion, and he couldn’t speak. He grasped her hand and kissed the palm, tears coming. He touched her face in wonder. He noticed then how her tunic was drenched with blood. He wanted to see to the wound lest the bleeding continue. Taking his dagger from its sheath with shaking hands, he cut the wool carefully. When he peeled the cloth back, he found her skin smooth beneath. Frowning, he searched for the injury.
Awestruck, he touched her skin, feeling gooseflesh rise over his entire body as he did so. The only evidence there had ever been a wound was a small circular scar just above her right breast, close to her heart. No one could have survived such a wound.
Rizpah had been dead. He knew it as well as he knew she was now alive. And as well as he knew that Theophilus had not worked this miracle. Nor had Tiwaz. Only one god had done this. Hadassah’s God. Rizpah’s God. The God he had so confidently dismissed as being weak and ineffective had done the impossible.
Atretes took his hands from her and drew back. He did not understand the way this God worked, but he could not deny the power he had felt and seen. His voice was filled with certainty when he spoke. “Your God is a God of gods and a Lord of kings!”
Theophilus turned. “The only God, Atretes. The only God.”
Atretes looked up at Theophilus. All his animosity toward the Roman was forgotten in his wonder at what he had just witnessed. “I give him my sword!”
Theophilus knew such a vow to a German meant his honor and life. “As I gave him mine when I came into his kingdom.” He held out his hand.
Atretes grasped it. “Baptize me,” he said. It wasn’t a request, but a demand. “Baptize me so I can belong to him.”
Theophilus clasped his shoulder. “And so we begin.”
30
“I baptize you in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit,” Theophilus said, baptizing Atretes in the first spring they found. Atretes knelt. Giving the German support, Theophilus leaned him back. “Buried in Christ,” he said, submerging him, “and raised up in the newness of life.” He drew him up again.
Dripping wet, Atretes stood. Turning, he saw Rizpah standing ankle-deep in the water, holding his son, and made another decision that would affect the rest of his life. “I claim Rizpah as my wife.”
Rizpah’s gaze lost its dreamy haze. “What?”
“You said you love me!”
The look in his eyes as he slogged through the water toward her sent her pulse racing and made her want to run. She retreated from the spring onto the bank. “I love Theophilus, too, as I loved Timon and Porcia, Bartimaeus, Camella, Tibullus, and Mnason and—”
“You said you’d never lie to me,” Atretes said, his eyes pinning her where she stood.
“I’m not lying!”
He came out of the water and stopped in front of her, putting his hands out. “Give me the boy.”
“Why?”
“Give me my son.”
She did so with trepidation. Atretes took him, kissed his cheek, and set him on his feet. As he straightened, he smiled slightly. Her stomach dropped and she took a step back. Retreat gained nothing for he caught hold of her. When he drew her into his arms, she had only enough time to utter a soft gasp before he kissed her. It was a long time before he loosened his embrace, and by then she couldn’t think clearly.
“You love those others,” he conceded, equally affected, “but not the way you love me.”
“I’m not sure marrying you is a good idea,” she said shakily, alarmed by the power of the sensations he aroused in her. “For you or for me.”
Theophilus stood in the spring, laughing. “It will be a blessed relief!” He strode toward them, grinning. “Or have you forgotten God himself put the two of you together in Ephesus?”
“Not as husband and wife!” Rizpah said, trying to put some distance between her and Atretes. She needed time to think, and she couldn’t with him holding her the way he was. Was it proper to want a man so much? Was it Christian? She looked at Theophilus for help, but he seemed pleased.
Atretes had no intention of letting her go until she capitulated. “We’re mother and father to the same child. It makes sense we be man and wife as well. Say yes.” When she stammered, he cupped the back of her head. “Say yes. One word. Yes.” He kissed her again, as soundly as the last time.
“Theophilus!” she gasped when Atretes finally let her take a breath.
“Say yes, Rizpah,” Theophilus said, amused. “There’s one thing you should’ve learned a long time ago about this man. Once he makes up his mind, it takes an act of God to change it!”
Atretes held her at arm’s length, his expression somber as he searched her face. “Why do you hesitate?”
“What brought you to this pass?”
“What brought me? Your death opened my eyes. I need you, not just because of Caleb, but for myself.”
She couldn’t look in his eyes without weakening. Closing them, she prayed wildly, her heart crying out to the Lord. Is this what you want for us? Or is it our own flesh yearning?
It is not good for a man to be alone.
The words came so softly to mind she thought someone had whispered them.
She felt Atretes’ fingertips touching her throat tenderly and shivered. Opening her eyes, she looked into his and saw a softness and vulnerability she had never guessed existed. It wasn’t just desire that drove him to this decision. He loved her. Truly loved her.
Lord God, don’t let me be a stumbling block. Don’t let him be one. Help me light his way. You know how my tongue gets away with me.
Again, the soft whisper came.
Trust in me with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.
She took his hand. “Not for Caleb only, Atretes, but for myself, I will marry you,” she said. Tears filled her eyes when she saw joy leap into his. Did she really matter so much to him? She had never thought it possible for this hard, violent man to have such tender feelings and deep needs.
More the fool I, Lord. Will I ever see him through your eyes and with your heart?
Theophilus came out of the spring and walked toward them. When he reached them, he held out his hands to them both. Atretes took his right, Rizpah his left.
“Lord God, we stand before you this day to join Atretes and Rizpah in marriage. Be with us, Jesus, in the making of these bonds.” He looked at Atretes. “In a Christian marriage, Atretes, the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is the head of the church, he himself being the Savior of the body. But as the church is subject to Christ, so you will be subject to Christ, and so also Rizpah will be subject to you in everything. Love her, just as Christ also loves you and gave himself up for you. Sacrificially, willing even to die for her. Love her as you love your own body. Sustain and protect her in all circumstances.”
“I will.”
Theophilus looked at Rizpah and smiled. “Be subject to Atretes, beloved. Be subject to him as to the Lord. And respect him as your husband.”
“I will.”
Caleb stood in the middle of their small circle, looking up at them as Theophilus brought his mother’s and father’s hands together over the child’s head.
Atretes clasped Rizpah’s hand possessively. Theophilus put one hand over theirs, and another beneath. “Be subject to one another in fear of Christ. There is neither male nor female; for you are one in Christ Jesus, called to live according to God’s will and not your own. Remember our Lord Jesus Christ who died on the cross for us and arose on the third day. Our God is patient and kind. He is never jealous nor boasts nor is arrogant. Jesus never sought his own nor was provoked nor took into account a wrong suffered. The Lord never rejoices in unrighteousness. Christ Jesus bore all things and endured all things for our sake. His love never fails.
“Therefore, beloved, remember and follow in his way. Walk as children of light. Cleave to one another. Submit to one another in the love of Ch
rist, and live in a way pleasing to Jesus Christ our Lord.”
Releasing their hands, he asked them to kneel before God, then did so with them. Quiet and wide-eyed, Caleb hugged Rizpah’s side as Theophilus laid one hand upon her head, the other on Atretes’.
“Lord God, creator of all things, creator of this man and woman, I ask your blessing upon them as they go forth as man and wife.”
“Please, Lord,” Rizpah said softly, head bowed.
“May they raise up their son Caleb to praise your name.”
“We will do so,” Atretes vowed.
“Put angels around them and protect them from the enemy who will come against them and try to drive them apart.”
“Please protect us, Lord,” Rizpah murmured.
“Give them children to raise up in your name.”
“Sons and daughters,” Atretes said boldly, and heat filled Rizpah’s face and body.
Theophilus grinned and then went on. “Lord Jesus, may Atretes and Rizpah serve you with gladness and come into your presence daily with thanksgiving, knowing you alone are God. You have made them in your image and have a divine purpose for their lives. You are their shield and their strength. May they never lean on their own understanding, Lord, but trust in you, acknowledging you in all their ways, so that you will make their paths straight.”
“May we please you, Lord,” Rizpah said.
“Lord Jesus,” Theophilus said, “in whatever circumstances may arise, may your infinite grace and mercy be extended to others through each of them. Amen.”
“Amen!” Atretes said and stood, drawing Rizpah up beside him. His blue eyes were alight and he was shaking. Heat poured into her cheeks. She was afraid he was going to haul her into his arms and start kissing her right in front of Theophilus again.
Instead, he lowered his head to kiss both her hands, then released her. “You should wash the blood out of your tunic,” he said and hunkered down before his son. “Come on, boy. You need a bath.” Lifting him, he stood and tossed the child high in the air. Caleb squealed with thrilled laughter. Atretes caught him and ran into the spring, while Rizpah stared dumbfounded after him. Disappointment and relief warred within her. She would never understand the man. Never!