Counted With the Stars (29 page)

T
he milky-white spray of stars above us witnessed a barely contained celebration. Hundreds of bulls were sacrificed at the foot of the mountain and the meat shared with all of us. Zerah had skewered our gift on a spit, the fat popping and crackling in the fire, and the mouth-watering scent of beef smoke drifted over the camp.

Between the sweet bread baked with manna, the tender flesh of the bull, and a few sweet onions purchased from traders that Eben and Jumo had encountered in the desert a few days ago, we feasted. However, my overstuffed stomach could not compare to the fullness of my heart.

Eben sang near the campfire until his voice was hoarse. He told me his fingers were numb as well, but he kept on playing, his joy spilling out into the language of music.

Jumo, too, sang in an unfamiliar and clear, sweet voice, in flawless Hebrew. His brilliant mind had absorbed every word in the long, unbroken months of listening as we journeyed toward this mountain.

We had spent the day together, knee to knee, absorbed in precious conversation, sharing stories of our mother, crying,
and adjusting to the absence of silence between us. He told me more of how Yahweh had called to him in a series of dreams, promising blessings if he would follow the Hebrews, and I told him of my surrender on the floor of Sayaad's tent and my conversation with Mosheh.

Jumo's heart bubbled over, his thoughts tumbling over themselves like the water from the rock. The exquisite pain of finally understanding the depths of my brother's heartbreak over his inability to protect our mother—and me—dredged up fresh grief. We cried, foreheads pressed together, until the sun passed into the underworld.

Now he played the drum—the one made by his own hands, under Eben's guidance—with freedom and dexterity. Sweat poured down his face and soaked his black curls as he worked out the complicated patterns. Exhilaration was painted all over his face. I laughed until my sides ached and my cheeks were sore and my heart did not feel quite so empty of my mother's presence. She was there in his face, the thickness of his hair, the flicker of his smiles as he enjoyed his own talent.

Although I would grieve for my mother, probably for the rest of my days, I was grateful for the pieces of her that Jumo carried. And after basking in the all-encompassing light from the mountain and grieving with my brother, the sharp edges of pain did not throb as deeply tonight as they had yesterday.

Zayna and Shoshana finally succumbed to sleep, their little bodies exhausted from dancing like butterflies all evening. Shira and I gathered bowls, scrubbed them with sand, and rinsed them with water from the nearby stream.

Jumo sat cross-legged in front of the fire as the remainder of the flames licked at the embers. I wondered what was going through his mind and was tempted to ask him more questions, but for now, I sensed he needed time alone to wonder at the restoration of his limbs and his tongue.

Arms went around my waist, and Eben's low voice tickled my ear. “Come with me.”

My pulse took flight. “And where am I going?”

“You'll see.” His breath on my neck affected my equilibrium. “I'm stealing Kiya, Sister. Are you finished with her?”

Shira lifted an eyebrow, pursed her full lips, and folded her arms. “Well, there are a couple more pots to clean . . .”

“Hmm . . . I'm sorry to hear that.” He pulled me by the hand with a mocking grin, and Shira's musical laugh floated behind us as he led me outside the reach of the firelight.

Shira had taken me aside earlier to tell me of her joy at the connection between Eben and me, and that she hoped she and I would soon be more than sisters of the heart. The thought of such a future lifted my hopes to unimaginable heights yet called attention to the delicate bond that could be broken by the truths in my past. Would Eben turn his back on me when I revealed such things? The burn of anticipation in my chest, and the conviction to tell Eben, grew the farther we moved from the campfire
.

I should be fearful, plunging into the night, following Eben up a hillside path with only a small torch to light our way, but with his strong hand wrapped around mine, and the memory of the light of Yahweh's presence, my lifelong fear of the dark had been completely erased.

When we finally stopped climbing, Eben guided me to sit on a flat outcropping high above the valley floor. I caught my breath. The campfires spread out below us were smaller and farther away than I'd expected. Echoes of distant laughter and music floated up to our perch.

Eben secured the torch in a crack in the boulder next to us and then put his arm around my shoulder, pulling me close. I laid my head on his chest and breathed in his warm scent, a mixture of sand, sun, and his skin. No exotic perfume could ever compete.

“It's so quiet up here.” I let out a trembling breath.

“Yes, it is.”

“Everything seems too quiet now.”

He pulled back to look at me, eyebrows raised.

“What?”

“That was exactly what I was thinking.”

I laughed and put my head back on his chest. “After hearing the Voice in my head all day, filling my every thought, everything seems so hushed somehow.”

He sighed. “When the music stops, we miss the song.”

“Yes, exactly.”

The rhythm of his heart against my cheek filled a bit of the space, but nothing could ever compare to the euphoria of Yahweh speaking directly to my heart, not even my love for this man who had drawn me in against my will.

“Do you think Yahweh will speak to us again?” I looked up at Eben, and my question echoed across his expression.

He pursed his lips. “I don't know. I hope so. Extraordinary, wasn't it?”

I nodded. “Makes me feel like everything here is just a shadow.”

“How so?”

I straightened my back. “It's as if the Voice is the only thing that is real and this”—I gestured to the mountains and the camp below—“this is only an illusion.”

“Hmm. Intriguing thought. Yahweh is the creator of all that there is. He is the most real thing, the only eternal thing. Our hearts will stop beating, our eyes will close, the mountains may someday crumble, the trees will wither away, but Yahweh will always be.”

I considered that, but my frail human mind could not wrap itself around the concept of a god, a being, that was the beginning and the end of everything. I looked up at the stars, brilliant
lights created simply by his words—or perhaps by his song. Did they sing, too? A reflective resonance of the music begun by the God who sang the first note?

No longer under the illusion that their sparkle contained the souls of departed gods, I simply appreciated them for what they were: lights to tell the story of the God who made them and to point ahead to the coming of a Redeemer who would make all things new. Eben had told me that many people thought Mosheh was the One, for he had led us out of slavery in Egypt, but I knew now that only surrender to the pure fragrance and light of Yahweh himself could free my soul from the bondage to the idols I had served and cleanse my heart from the shame of the sins I did not even know I carried. My heart now resonated with the song Yahweh had sung over me.

“Who is Yahweh, Eben?”

He shook his head. “I don't know. I know he is the Creator, Elohim, and the God who took us out of Egypt. We know now what he expects of us, as his people. His instructions give me a glimpse of his character. But there is much left to learn about this God we follow.”

“I want to know everything.” I gazed up at the mountain. The Cloud of light still hovered there, and a faint remnant of the fragrance, so potent in the valley earlier, wafted by on the breeze.

“We are his people now, and as long as we follow him, cling to him, I think we will learn more.”

“Am I truly a part of his people? Even though I am Egyptian?”

He stared into my eyes, the burn of love and sincerity intense in his own. “You stood at the foot of the mountain and entered into a blood covenant with Yahweh. You may have been born Egyptian, but you are part of this nation now. Besides”—he caressed my palm and entwined his fingers with mine—“once I marry you, you will be considered flesh of my flesh and bone of my bone. Every right of my people will be yours.”

“You want . . . to . . . me?” My tongue tangled to a halt.

“Did Jumo steal your words and give you his affliction instead?” The sound of his musical laughter echoed off the rocks around us.

“But yes—my beautiful, brave Kiya . . .” He put his finger in the center of my forehead, slowly skimming it down to the tip of my nose. I closed my eyes to savor the sensation of his slightest touch rippling through me. “I want to make you my wife. I have desired it since the moment you told me you would sacrifice yourself for my sister.”

I peered at him. “When did I tell you such a thing?”

“You were prepared to offer yourself to the guard to rescue her.” He winced and exhaled. “It took every bit of self-control inside me to not pull you into my arms, right then and there. And walking away . . .” He groaned. “The next day was torture, knowing what you were planning. Every moment since then I have regretted that day.”

“Nothing happened. Yahweh protected me from myself.”

“Yes. He did, but it does not negate my choice to turn away from you. To let you—”

I placed my hand on his cheek, my thumb silencing his lips. “It is in the past. Lay it down.”

He met my gaze. “My life was nothing but scattered rhythms and dissonant notes before I met you.”

“I think Yahweh is creating something new from our broken pieces.” I slid my hand around the back of his neck and drew him close to me. “Perhaps he is writing a new song.”

“Yes. And you, my bride-to-be, are the melody.” His lips brushed mine with exquisite tenderness, melting every thought but this man who would be my husband.

I pulled back and lifted a playful brow. “And you will of course plead with Jumo for my hand?”

“Already done.” He smirked. “It is settled. You are mine.”

I narrowed my eyes. “And was the bride-price exorbitant?”

“Oh, terribly. Something about a goat . . .”

Feigning offense, I elbowed him, and he laughed until I joined him. But the conversation my mother and I once had about Eben began to whisper in my thoughts.

“Aren't Hebrews supposed to marry only Hebrews?” The insults that had been hurled at us as we walked through camp seemed to follow us everywhere now. I had been accepted by Yahweh, that much was clear. But would I ever be accepted among his people?

“Yes, but you have chosen to serve our God. The traditions we have to marry our own kind are to protect us from the influence of other gods.”

A spark of mischief glinted in his eyes as he grinned and tilted his head to one side. “You aren't going to drag me into your heathen idolatry, are you?”

My mother's amulet was packed among her other belongings; it was no more than a thing to me now. Hathor was an illusion, like everything else I grew up believing. Only one God had ever listened to my prayers, even before I believed.

My answer was emphatic. “No. I serve Yahweh.”

“Well then.” He raised a brow. “There is no problem now, is there?”

Only one.
I sighed. I could not keep it from him any longer. I must surrender it all.

He lifted my chin and looked into my eyes. “What is it?”

My confession spilled out. “I am not pure. Akhum, the man I was betrothed to, we . . .”

He put a finger to my lips. “It does not matter.”

“But . . .”

“I already knew, Kiya. I was there, that night in the garden when that—” He paused and swallowed, a fierce expression on his face. “I came to make sure you were safe. I couldn't bear not knowing.”

He was there? When Akhum tried to make me his slave? I groaned, covering my face in my hands. How could he even look at me?

Gently, he tugged on my wrists, forcing me to meet his gaze. His beautiful eyes latched onto mine with piercing intensity.

“I was paralyzed, watching you sit there in the moonlight. I could not take my eyes off you . . .” He brushed his hand down my hair. “So when he came, I was trapped in the shadows, and I heard your conversation.”

“All of it?” The burn of shame in my throat squelched my voice. It came out in a tortured whisper.

He leaned his forehead against mine, his breath sweet with manna. “Shh. It does not matter. All the darkness the Voice uncovered within me today . . . there is nothing you have done or could do that would rival it.”

“You would marry me? Knowing this?” Relief flooded through my veins.

“What I know is that after the shame of being laid bare, when the Voice faded away, I felt as if my black heart had been washed clean. Don't you feel the same?”

I did. Clean. Free. And although I still mourned my mother, the weight of my grief seemed lighter, as if the rift were already healing. What grace I had been shown today—by Eben and by the One True God.

“I do not know how to follow Yahweh,” I whispered.

He faced me, the light above the mountain reflecting in his eyes. “Neither do I, my love. We will learn together.”

M
any wonderful books have been written about Moses and other main players in the Exodus story. But I am a simple girl; I know little of kings and less of political machinations. My imagination was sparked not by the glittering palaces and the powerful men who walked their halls—however fascinating—but by the inhabitants of the mud-brick homes that have long since washed away, the slaves who toiled beneath the lash of Pharaoh's whip, and most of all by the “mixed multitude” spoken of in Exodus 12:38 who made the choice to walk away from everything they knew to follow an old man and his faceless god into the wilderness. Out of my own personal curiosity into their motivations, Kiya's story was born.

Fascination with the world of Ancient Egypt is nothing new. For hundreds of years, explorers and archeologists have been drawn to divulge its secrets and piece together its mysteries.
When Kiya called to me from that distant land, asking me to tell her story, I knew nothing of Egypt, other than odds and ends from school, church, and popular culture. And as it is with most history, the deeper I delved into Egypt's past, the more I realized how little we truly know. So much of Egyptian culture—especially that of the everyday citizens—has been lost to the harsh climate, tomb robbers, and overzealous amateur archeologists, and confused by exaggerations and misinterpretations over time. Even Sir Alan Gardiner, the famous Oxford Egyptologist, said that what we have of the Egyptians is “merely a collection of rags and tatters.” Since it is only these rags and tatters that I had to work with, any imperfections in historical details are due to either conflicts of opinion between historians and Biblical scholars, or my own overactive imagination.

The reader will note that I do not name the Pharaoh anywhere in this book. I have two reasons for doing so. First, I believe, unapologetically, that the Word of God and its histories are true. Because the chronologies, built upon the writings of a third-century Egyptian priest named Manetho and accepted by most secular Egyptologists, do not fit with the Biblical account, I hold them highly suspect. When anything conflicts with the Bible, I will always defer to the Word.

There is, however, exciting new evidence being brought to light by archeologists and scholars that does support the Biblical timeline. I would encourage curious readers to look into the recent documentary called
Patterns of Evidence: Exodus
, which highlights these interesting discoveries.

Secondly, in Ancient Egyptian culture, names were very important. A person's
ka
, or spirit, was symbolized by their name. If that name was chisled off a written account on a tomb or temple wall it, in effect, erased that person from history—thereby destroying their rewards in the afterlife. Many historical figures, such as Akhenaton and Hatshepsut (the famous female
Pharaoh), were treated thus by their enemies, and it has taken hundreds of years for their histories to be rediscovered.

I believe that God purposefully chisled Pharoah's name from the Word, and therefore, history. The names of the kings that Moses interacted with will never be known for sure, so their achievements are unknown as well. But conversely, take a moment and read Exodus 1:15–21. Whose names are written in the Word of God, for all posterity? Shifrah and Puah—the brave midwives who stood against the most powerful man in the world and, out of fear for God, lied to Pharoah's face to protect Hebrew lives. The Pharaohs of the Exodus account are nameless. Yet these courageous women are honored for eternity.

Although I began the journey into Ancient Egypt and Kiya's story alone, there are many people who have traveled with me. I would like to inscribe their names into the “wall” here and acknowledge them for their help along the way.

Thanks go first to my sweet husband for his support and willingness to let me put aside other things to pursue my passion. And to my beautiful children, who are my greatest cheerleaders and put up with their post-late-night-pre-coffee mama on a regular basis. I love you to the moon, my precious family.

I am so grateful for my mother, Jodi Lagrou, for being my endlessly patient sounding board and for her insights and wisdom into the Word. Thank you, Mom, for praying for me, encouraging me, and letting this book-a-holic check out giant stacks of books from the library. I am sure I still owe you lots of late fine money.

Putting a story out into the world is a scary proposition for any aspiring writer. I have been blessed with so many people who read my scribblings and saw potential in them. Without their support and encouragement, this book would not have been published. With her kind words, Adina Schenkenberger, my first reader, gave me the courage to show others my work. After
enduring my trembly-voiced readings of my first drafts, Lynne Gentry, Kellie Coates Gilbert, Janice Olsen, and all the rest of the lovely Brainknockers gave me the confidence to pursue publication. Susan May Warren, Rachel Hauck, and everyone with My Book Therapy floored me with their enthusiasm for my story and generosity with their expertise. My awesome agent, Tamela Hancock Murray, took a chance on this newbie and found the exact right home for my stories. Thank you to Charlene Patterson, Raela Schoenherr, and everyone at Bethany House for catching my vision for this story and to Jennifer Parker for crawling into my imagination and designing such a beautiful cover. Juli Williams and her brilliant daughters, Anni and Cassi, were some of my first “fans.” Thank you, Juli, for reading my ever-changing drafts, sharing your honest opinions and insight, and being my Personal Image Consultant and a sister of my heart. Ami Trull, my talented friend, made me look all “author-y” with her gorgeous photography. My lovely beta readers, Misty Hunt, Karla Marroquin, Kristen Roberts, Brenda Jeter, and Jennifer Traugott, have helped me immensely with their suggestions and support. And finally, thanks to all the prayer warriors, including Melissa Tabor, Heather Hardin, Heidi Thedford, Aamanda Bragg, Laura Kanaykina, and my Remedy Church family, who faithfully keep me and my writing before the Throne. If I have forgotten anyone, please forgive me—but know that your names are written on my heart forever.