Rebekah (16 page)

She nodded, telling herself once again that she had no need to fear. She felt Deborah’s hands lift the veil in place, and her breath caused little droplets to appear on the fabric. She had already been given the ritual cleansing. She did not need to grow sweaty beneath the clothes! But her nerves were in tatters, and she could not still the shaking.

“There.” The golden bridal crown rested heavily upon her brow, and she peered into the bronze mirror that Deborah held out for her. But she barely had a moment to examine her cloudy reflection before the music grew more intense, the beat of the drum picking up its pace. “It is time.”

“Yes.”

“You will be fine.”

“I know.” She believed it. She must.

She stepped from her tent to the crowd of people in Abraham’s camp. A striped red and blue canopy stood near the campfire, and she spotted Isaac standing beneath it. Abraham sat on a large rock near Isaac’s side, his weathered face beaming with pleasure. She slowly approached, Deborah at her side. She glimpsed Selima standing near Haviv and faintly wondered how long it would take for the man to ask for her hand.

But she could not think of that now, as the drum and the flutist drew her ever closer to where Isaac waited. When she reached his side, he took her hand in his and squeezed her cold fingers. His smile took her breath, and she longed to cup his cheek and touch her fingers to his bearded face. But she merely looked at him instead, wondering if he could feel the way her pulse jumped and soared at his touch like a bird in flight.

“My daughter, you do me and my son great honor this day by agreeing to become Isaac’s wife.”

Abraham’s voice broke through her thoughts as the music came to an abrupt halt. She turned to face him, surprised to see him standing so close to them beneath the canopy.

“As you have come without a male relative to grant you the blessing, and as I have been informed your family has already bestowed such a blessing upon you before you left to come here, let me just say a few words before you two are joined together as one.”

She bowed her head and felt Abraham’s hand, still strong despite his many years, rest upon her crowned head. Her chest lifted, but the sigh would not release.

“Rebekah, my daughter, and Isaac, my son.” He paused, his voice catching on Isaac’s name.

She longed to look up, to see what passed between father and son in that moment, but she dare not move with Abraham’s hand resting upon her.

“Be fruitful and multiply, as our God has commanded each of us. God has joined you together this day. His peace be upon you.”

She heard another catch in his voice as he spoke the last word and wondered if his voice was affected by age or simply the emotion of the moment. As his hand lifted from her head, she met his gaze, seeing the moisture in his eyes.

“Thank you, my father.” She smiled, though he could not fully see it behind her veil, and felt his approval in the look he gave her. Indeed, he was her only father now, and she prayed her actions would please him.

“If only your mother could have seen this day.” He directed his attention to Isaac, and Rebekah looked at her new husband, seeing him nod.

“She would be pleased with Adonai’s choice,” Isaac said, looking from his father to her. His smile melted what little fear she had left, filling her instead with a new sense of desire to please him as well.

“Thank you, my lord.” Her voice came out breathy.

Isaac squeezed her fingers again, and the music started up once more. “Come,” he said, bending close to her ear.

She turned to follow, her heart beating faster with every careful step. Isaac crossed the campground, leaving the rejoicing crowd, leading her to a large goat’s-hair tent on the edge of the ring of Abraham’s camp.

“This belonged to my mother.” Isaac lifted the flap and beckoned her to go ahead of him into the dark enclosure. He quickly followed, carrying a torch, then set about lighting two small clay lamps. He returned the torch to its post and let the flap fall, closing them in.

The tent was divided into several rooms, one of them a large sitting area with plush cushions scattered about. Her loom already stood in one corner, and as her eyes adjusted to the dim light, she saw that Isaac had taken care to have the items she had brought from home arranged in various places.

“I thought you would feel more at home here if you recognized some of the furnishings.” He waved a hand, taking in the room, and she glanced to where he pointed.

“You are most thoughtful. It pleases me very much.” She smiled, hoping he could see the pleasure in her eyes.

His look captivated her, and he did not move or speak for several beats of her already racing heart. What should she do next? Did he want her to pour him some wine? But she had no idea where to look for the flask.

“You are very beautiful,” he said.

Her stomach did a little flip as his hands moved to take the crown from her head.

“But I cannot appreciate your beauty with this between us.” He fumbled with the clasp holding the veil over her face, and in that moment she sensed he was as nervous as she.

She moved her hand to help, their fingers grazing, her breath growing still as he let the veil fall away. She felt her
pulse throbbing in her neck and watched his Adam’s apple move up and down. He traced a line along her jaw. “Yes, it is as I suspected. You are the most beautiful of women.”

His smile made her knees grow weak, and when he bent to touch his lips to hers, she lost all sense of time and place. She had traveled half the world to get here, and the journey had been worth every step. God had given her a prince unequaled.

As his kiss deepened, she wrapped her arms around his neck and gladly returned it.

Isaac rose up on one elbow, blinking at the light poking under the rolled-up sides of the tent. He shook his head, trying to remember when they had lifted the flaps, when he spotted Rebekah fully dressed and tying the scarf over her head. He smiled and wondered at the love that rose within him for this cousin, his wife.

Wife.

He liked the sound of the word and played it over for a moment, shaking off the last vestiges of sleep. He flung the covers aside. She turned, a dark blush filling her face as she looked down at him.

“You are awake, my lord.” Her flustered state at seeing him in only a short night tunic the day after their wedding night made him almost chuckle.

“It would appear so,” he said instead. “What are you doing?”

She was clearly dressed for a day’s work. He should have told her last night not to worry about such things today.

“I thought I would draw water and help prepare the morning meal.” Her voice sounded uncertain, and she glanced over her shoulder and then back at him again.

“There is no need today. Come, sit beside me.” He smiled at her confusion, but when he patted the sleeping mat where she had recently lain, she obeyed.

“There is a need to eat, is there not? I would do my part, my lord.”

He touched her cheek, stroked one finger down it. “I know you would, and you will. But this is our wedding week. We have seven days to get to know each other, and we are not allowed to leave this tent.” At the surprised lift of her brow, he added, “The women will leave food for us at the tent’s door, and at week’s end we will join the others for a final feast.”

“I see.” She looked beyond him, and he wondered if spending seven days in his company might displease her. “What if we want to go for a walk together?”

He smiled into her eyes. “If such a thing would please you, I think we can sneak away without attracting undue attention.”

“I would like that.”

The thought seemed to cheer her, making his heart light. He knew just the place he would take her first, a lush valley where the spring bubbled over rocks and the trees plunged thick branches toward the heavens, offering shade and seclusion. He would carve a flute for her and teach her to make music at his side.

He scooted into an upright position, studying her. She sat slightly rigid, her back straight, as though she did not know how to relax now that darkness did not keep them in seclusion.

“You will not be needing this unless we travel.” He gently pulled the veil from her hair and smoothed a hand along her dark tresses. “A married woman in the camp need not veil herself. Though you may tie your hair off your shoulders.” He coaxed her to look at him, and the blush he’d found so becoming the night before only endeared her more to him now. He leaned in and kissed her cheek. “Does this displease you—spending so much time with me?” He hated the need to ask it of her, but if she truly did not wish his company . . .

“No, no, of course not!”

Her smile reassured him, and he let out a breath, relieved.

“I only . . . I did not know. Our customs are not so very different—there is a marriage week to be fulfilled—it is just that I am used to a house of brick with many rooms and much work to be done.” She looked around, and he wondered how pale his mother’s tent must be in comparison to her mother’s house of stone.

“My mother’s tent is the largest in the camp besides my father’s.” His tone sounded defensive and he knew it. Was he a child that he should pout? He shook himself for having such a ridiculous thought. Wealth could be expressed in many ways; he need not compare one to another to please her.

She turned back to him, her look chagrined. “Oh no, my lord, I did not mean . . . that is, your mother’s tent is wonderful and large, and I am most comfortable. I just . . .”

He could no longer refrain from pulling her close, his lips tasting hers. “You have no reason to be sorry, Rebekah.” He spoke in her ear, his breath lingering at her throat. He heard her breath catch and watched her pulse throb in her neck as he loosened the robe from her shoulders and moved to kiss her again. “We have a week where no one will interrupt us or question us and with no work whatsoever to keep us occupied.”

“No work whatsoever?” She sounded incredulous, as though she had never experienced a day of rest.

“Only the work of discovery, of coming to know and understand each other.” He could spend a lifetime getting to know this beautiful woman, and he determined in that moment that he would have none other. She was his and he was hers alone.

She offered a pointed look at the rolled-up sides of the tent, then sifted her fingers through his rumpled hair. “Shall I lower the flaps, my lord?”

He noticed a mischievous glint in her brown eyes and nodded, smiling. Her hips held a purposeful sway, and she glanced
back at him as she pulled the ropes to lower the flaps again, encasing them in semidarkness.

She removed her robe, folded it gently, and laid it over a basket in the corner, then came to sit beside him. He took her hands in his and turned them over slowly, kissing each palm. “Tell me, my love, are you glad you came? Surely a woman as beautiful as you are could have had any man in Paddan-Aram.” He pulled her closer to lie beside him, settling her in the crook of his arm.

“Not any man,” she said, her voice soft. “If not for Adonai sending Eliezer, I might have pined away in my brother’s home until it was too late.”

He rose up on one elbow and searched her face. “Your brother would not seek a husband for you? What of your father? Surely he would have considered it long before his death.”

She nodded, but her dark eyes grew distant, and he wondered at the flicker of sadness that clouded them. But a moment later, she looked at him with affection, her eyes clear. “My father did consider a man in Harran, but he was poor and could not give me what my father had always given. My mother would hear none of it, and my father died before he could secure someone else. Laban, his heir, kept promising to find a husband for me, but the few he considered were unworthy—men who did not treat women well and who had no reverence for Adonai. I could never have married such a man.”

Her earnest tone and the smile in her eyes made his heart leap. Joy rose within him that Adonai had kept her for him, for surely she could have married years before if her father had allowed it.

“We are not so very different, my love.” He intertwined their hands, her palm feeling perfect against his own larger one. “My mother, God bless her, never gave me the chance to marry. She would not hear of me taking a Canaanite wife, as my father had done with Keturah, or an Egyptian wife, as my
father had done with my mother’s handmaiden, Hagar. I feared she would be accepting of no one unless my father demanded it, but even then, I am not sure she would have listened.”

The memories evoked a sudden sadness that his mother could not have been more trusting, that his parents could not have kept their love strong. Despite her faith, Sarah had struggled with fear, particularly fear of losing him.

“Your father has had three wives?” She already knew the answer, he was sure, but seemed to want to hear the response from him.

He squeezed their intertwined fingers and nodded. “My mother was his first wife and only true love. When my mother feared the promise would never come to pass, that she would never bear a son for my father, she gave him her Egyptian maid, Hagar, to be his concubine. Hagar bore him Ishmael. You might meet him someday.” He paused, briefly wondering how his older brother fared.