Abraham Allegiant (Chronicles of the Nephilim Book 4) (25 page)

Abram pulled Sarai back behind him.

“How do I know you are telling the truth?” said Abram.

“Well, for one thing, that whirlwind move you attempted with sorry results? I created it.”

Uriel pulled out his two swords and held them close to him so as not to hit anything. Then he twirled in his signature move like a mini-cyclone and stopped on a shekel.

A gush of wind flowed over Abram’s and Sarai’s faces.

“And for another thing,” Uriel smiled, “I could have waited to introduce myself to you in the same manner as El Shaddai has done, when you were making love together, but I figured that is his prerogative and none of my business.”

Abram and Sarai never told anyone about the day and manner of Abram’s calling.

“What do I need to know?” asked Abram.

“Only as much as you need at the moment you need it.”

“We are getting used to that,” quipped Sarai.

“You are telling me,” said Uriel. “I get all the hand me down tasks at the last minute. In fact, I am only filling in for Mikael with you until he is taken care of some other pressing tasks.”

Abram and Sarai looked at each other with concern.

“You will find him more serious than me. And less fun.”

Eliezer stirred again. He was coming to.

“But now is not the time for humor. You have a duty of grief, so I will leave you be.”

With that, Uriel was gone.

Eliezer managed to croak out a question, “Where is Devorah?”

Outside Abram’s home, a group of neighbors had gathered in concern for the family. They had weapons and some of them were already climbing the tree.

But then the sound of Eliezer’s soul wrenching scream echoed through the forest.

The confederation of four kings from Mesopotamia had travelled the Euphrates then down through Syria to the King’s Highway. They were led by their suzerain, King Chedorlaomer of Elam, and included King Arioch of Ellasar, King Tidal of Goiim, and the newly installed King Amraphel of Shinar, whose previous identity as Nimrod had been replaced with his new identity as vassal king under Chedorlaomer. Both Amraphel and Arioch were giants, and they had a few units of giants with their traveling army of eight hundred thousand strong.

They first faced and defeated the Rephaim giants in Ashteroth-Karnaim. It was a district of Bashan, near Edrei. The Rephaim worshipped Ashtart and were among the fiercest of the giants. They had elongated heads reminiscent of their divine seed as well as the twenty four digits on their hands and feet, and two rows of teeth in their mouths.

The Rephaim fought in five organized defense units of fifty that killed a good thousand soldiers before Chedorlaomer’s forces overwhelmed them with sheer numbers and massacred them in a bloodbath of fury and revenge.

Chedorlaomer rightly observed that if they battled the strongest foes while their own forces were at their freshest and strongest, they would not only have a quicker more sure victory, but word may spread ahead of them and create a terror in others they planned to conquer.

That notoriety of terror is why Chedorlaomer impaled the fifty surviving Rephaim along with their fallen brothers on a small ridge just outside the town. It looked like a stripped forest of death. Vultures fed off the carrion for days.

The King of Elam had strategized correctly. By the time they travelled down to Ham and wiped out the Zamzummim giants in that township, their next target, the Emim in the Valley of Kiriathaim (Shaveh-Kiriathaim) had decided to surrender without battle.

They sued for peace and acceptance as vassal township, which Chedorlaomer immediately accepted. But he knew that if he allowed these giants to live, they would eventually be the ones he would have to fight later if they grew in number and rose up in rebellion.

So when they engaged in the ceremonial surrendering of arms by all the soldiers of Kiriathaim, instead of returning their weapons to the submissive giants with the suzerain blessing, Chedorlaomer had all two hundred of them slaughtered in a tidal wave of mayhem and gore.

On their way south near the cities of the plain, Amraphel was wondering if the female hybrid assassins he had sent long before had been successful in their quest to capture Abram. They did not cross their paths on the King’s Highway, but the professional killers would probably have avoided that main road for safety reasons.

Earlier in Ashteroth-Karnaim, he had inquired of the priestesses of the temple of Ashtart. They confirmed that the hierodules he hired as bounty hunters had passed through the town looking for information leading to their quarry. As hierodules of Ashtart, the assassins would find sanctuary in the temple chambers for rest until they continued on their journey. So it was in their interests to use the town as a way station on the way back.

But they had never returned. They were most likely still searching or dead.

Amraphel looked hardly better than when he was Nimrod the battered prisoner of Chedorlaomer at Borsippa. He was not eating well or sleeping. The malnutrition and insomnia was taking its toll on his body. He had shrunk a good six inches, and then another six from his hunched shoulders. He avoided fraternizing with the other
kings and kept to himself. He was often overheard mumbling arguments to himself, and even abusing his body by lashings with a whip and cuttings with a knife.

He was going mad, but he maintained a singular kernel of rationality deep down within that was rooted in his obsessive hatred of Abram and his god El Shaddai. He would not allow himself to slide into utter oblivion because he had his final act of revenge to accomplish. In fact, that kernel was the true controller of his madness. It dominated his every waking moment and provided him with cunning strategy for his every move.

That was because he was not going insane. He was simply becoming totally and thoroughly evil. The difference between his current being and what he was as world potentate was merely the exercise of power. With power, he could satisfy his lusts and anger momentarily, and therefore maintain a semblance of sanity amidst his growing depravity. But without power, the frustrated and obstructed schemes of evil twist and contort the soul into a bitter rage that turns inward and ravishes the self like a consuming disease. As emperor, he was an abomination of desolation. As demoted powerless vassal king, he was more like a shade of Sheol. A lost identity in a sea of insatiable unsatisfied hunger.

Amraphel stopped gnawing on his finger when he saw that he had chewed the flesh to the bone. He was in a required meeting with the other three kings. The pentapolis was aware of the Mesopotamian army’s approach and had sent a messenger to Chedorlaomer to proclaim their defiance.

When the king demanded to bring the messenger to his presence, they were surprised to see it was Ashtart herself, patron deity of the five cities, and allotted authority over Canaan.

The goddess of sex and war was not to be trifled with.

When she entered, she approached the four kings, but stopped half way and sniffed the air.

Her eyes rose in anger and she seethed. “I should have known you’d be slithering in the shadows of this conspiracy. Come out and face me, you cowardly god of piss and farts.”

It was her irritating insulting again. She demeaned Marduk’s storm domain of rain and wind into lowly human excretions.

All heads turned to Marduk, who stepped out from behind the shadows of the throne into the firelight. It was true that he stayed out of the limelight and chose to work more surreptitiously through human rulers since his humbling at Babel. But he was no coward. His form was bulging with obscene muscularity and his presence struck shock and awe into any created thing.

A confrontation had been brewing and Ashtart was calling Marduk out for contest. He was not afraid of her. He was the only god in the pantheon who could defeat her if it were possible. But over the years, Ashtart’s power had grown over Canaan. The inevitable face off was becoming more probable.

The kings became quiet in the presence of these Watcher gods.

Ashtart hissed at Marduk, “I know what you are doing here, Marduk. You seek to annihilate my Nephilim children and stop my rise to power. But it is too late. The Seed of the Serpent has filled the land like a weed. You may cut off one root, but another will grow to replace it. I have been waiting for this moment for too long, and I think its time we finish our quarrel.”

Marduk remained silent. He was not one for wasted words. And talking too much was a weakness.

Her attention was drawn to Amraphel, who had been trying not to be noticed.

“Well, well, well, what have we here?” she sang.

She stepped up for a closer look at Amraphel. His degraded figure and countenance made him look completely different from when she last saw him, but you cannot fool a Watcher. She knew who was sitting in that throne.

“Look who resurrected from the dead. Although, I have to say, you are looking less spritely and bubbly than I remember.”

Amraphel would say nothing. She could see he was a cowed vassal now. His past as the potentate Nimrod was distant legend.

“Apparently, our bad blood has been resolved decidedly in my favor. Thank El Shaddai.” She made a mock gesture and bow to heaven. She shook her head with disgust. He had spurned her advances when he was the mighty hunter-king of Uruk, one-third man, two-thirds god. He had maneuvered her away from his worldwide empire in Babylon. And now, he was an unshaven unkempt demented slave of Chedorlaomer, sitting in his own unwashed stench.

She crinkled her nose and dismissed him, looking back at Chedorlaomer with boiling anger, “This is my land. The five cities of the plain will not bow to the petty dictates of your puny armies. If you want war, I will give you war, unlike any you have ever seen. You will plead for mercy, but you will receive none. And what I will do to you will be so heinous, it will not be spoken of for a millennium.

Chedorlaomer swallowed with a dry throat. All four kings looked simultaneously at Marduk. And when he spoke, it was frighteningly malevolent and sure.

“I am going to bind you into the heart of the earth, bitch goddess. You will think on your failure for ten thousand years. And there will be no sea dragon to free you from your prison as before.”

Ashtart grinned and turned to leave, calling out behind her with a chortle, “Bring it to the battlefield, Lord Lettuce Head.” That was her personal favorite when she could not think of a fresh insult. “And do not leave your balls behind, because I am going to eat them.”

She was gone.

Chedorlaomer looked over at Marduk. “Can you defeat her?”

“I will break her in half,” said Marduk.

“Good,” said the king. “Because I have more giant clans to vanquish in the south at Seir, El-Paran, and Kadesh, before I finish up with these Salt Sea ingrates and their princess of pouting.”

Marduk smirked. It was a witty affirmation of the king to return Ashtart’s wordplay on Marduk’s behalf.

He offered his compliment, “A wise strategy, O king. Her pride will delude her into thinking we have run away. And arrogance is a most foolish blunder.”

The King’s Highway was on the Transjordanian plateau a good fifteen miles east of the Salt Sea and the five cities of the plain with their preparing kings and gods. Chedorlaomer’s forces simply passed by and resumed their trek down to the southern mountain range of Seir where the Horites awaited their destruction.

Devorah’s funeral was a solemn affair. Eliezer had loved her dearly, but so had Abram and Sarai. She would be sorely missed with her optimistic perspective on life and her dedication to Sarai. She had even been Sarai’s confidante in troubled times. They buried her just outside the forest and placed some dolmens, large marker stones, over her resting place. Eliezer made Abram promise he would bury him with her when he died. There was much wailing and weeping, but life went on without her.

After the attack incident, Abram moved his family back out into tents amidst the flocks and open air of a clearing near the forest. He built an altar of unhewn stone to El Shaddai where his family worshipped by an oak tree. By living in their tree homes, he felt too obligated to the Amorite Mamre and his brothers as well as their religion that was offensive to El Shaddai. He wanted them as allies, but he knew he needed to be separate. Assimilation would not be healthy if El Shaddai was yet to make a nation out of him. Though how that was going to happen became increasingly difficult to understand. He asked Uriel, but the angel was not privy to such details.

One day when Sarai and Abram were sitting down to eat dinner; they were interrupted by the arrival of Lot from Sodom. He was wearing his fanciest public service outfit as an elder of that city.

Abram and Sarai hesitated with mouths agape. They never thought they would ever see him again.

Then Abram yelled out with joy, “Nephew!”

“Uncle,” he replied and almost fell to the ground by Abram’s rushing hug.

“Where is your wife?” asked Sarai.

“She did not come with me. But that is a long story,” said Lot. “Better told with some beer in the belly.”

Lot hugged and kissed them both and they invited him to eat with them in hospitality.

Eliezer set out another place setting for Lot. They had plenty of boar with onions, radishes, and carrots to go around.

Abram smiled looking at Lot’s garish outfit. He wore an embroidered red robe over too many other cloaks. His hat was large and puffy as befits the royal class, and he wore jewelry and makeup that made him look a bit clownish.

Abram said, “I see your position in the city provides you with a wardrobe that matches your personality quite well.”

Lot smiled back. “For once, uncle, you are appreciating my affluence and highfalutin intentions.”

They had always tried to downplay their differences with subtle sarcasm.

Sarai could only shake her head, “You two.” Nothing Lot wore would sway her from her optimistic love for her nephew. “So tell us about your wife, Lot.”

Lot took a large gulp of beer before answering, “Her name is Ado. She would not come with me, or allow me to bring my daughters.”

“How old are they now?” asked Sarai.

“Two years. Twins.” He did not want to even get into Paltith and her ignominious death in the city.

He continued, “The first born is Ishtar and the second, Gaia.”

There was a moment of awkward silence. Abram and Sarai knew those were the names of pagan deities, which showed just how compromised Lot had become.

Lot tried to dismiss his responsibility, “Ado cared more about the naming than I did.”

It only made him look and feel more emasculated.

“What do you mean your wife will not allow you to bring her?” asked Abram.

Lot hung his head in shame.

“She has lived all her life in the city. She is afraid to leave it. Sodom is her extended family.”

“How does that make her the head of
your
family?” said Sarai with contempt. “A wife obeys her husband, not the other way around.”

“Sarai,” interrupted Abram, “please be more respectful.”

“My apologies,” she said.

“You have to understand,” Lot said. “I found Ado as a young orphan in Sodom. She has never had any family before marrying me. She is afraid of losing whatever family she has.”

Sarai said, “Nephew, I think I do understand what it is like to be an orphan. And then to marry without the ability to have a family.”

“Forgive me, Sarai,” said Lot. “You have suffered much as well. But Ado is a good wife. She has a fierce devotion to her children because she is afraid of losing them as we did our first born.”

“Oh, I am so sorry,” said Sarai.

Abram added, “Our sympathies go out to you, nephew.”

“Thank you,” he said. “Can we go for a walk, Abram? You and I?”

Abram and Lot took a stroll out under the moonlight and stars.

Abram knew there was more going on than Lot let on.

“Why are you here, nephew?”

Lot took a big sigh. “A confederation of four kings led by Chedorlaomer is descending upon the pentapolis with eight hundred thousand men. He means to crush us.”

Word had gotten out. Abram knew that Chedorlaomer had been sweeping Canaan clean of giant clans along the King’s Highway and in the southern regions. But this was news.

Abram said, “Those numbers seem exaggerated.”

Lot replied, “They probably are, but they express the fearsomeness of Chedorlaomer’s power, and that is no exaggeration.”

“Why do you not get out before he attacks?”

“Ado will not leave. She says she would rather die at the hands of barbarians than leave her hometown. She will not listen to reason.”

“Sarai is right,” said Abram. “You have lost that leadership I have always known you to have. You seem dominated, brow beaten.”

“It is not just that,” said Lot. “I sold everything and released all my household to live in the city. I have put down roots and built all my wealth there. If I left Sodom, I would lose it all. I would have nothing. Where would I go?”

“You could come live with us,” said Abram.

But they both knew Lot would not be able to place himself back under Abram’s authority again.

“I was wrong, uncle. The city seduced me, and now I am a slave to it. I thought I might have an influence on the wickedness, but now I realize it was just a rationalization to justify my selfish ambition. Sodom is a cesspool of decadence and depravity. It has beaten me down with relentless oppression and has changed me more than I have changed it.”

Lot paused after his self-revelation. Then he added, “But my family is everything to me. I will not leave without them.”

Abram placed an understanding hand on Lot’s back.

“What about the law?” asked Abram. “Are you not an elder in the gates?”

Lot said, “Law is a tool in the hands of power. And when the wicked rule, they make wicked laws. Every single judgment I make is overruled by a dozen judgments of others, or they just ignore it and refuse to enforce it. What is going on in the pentapolis is so dark and evil, I cannot even speak of it.”

Abram mused, “Sodom’s judgment draws near.”

“Uncle, the reason I came to you is because I wanted to ask you a favor.”

“Anything, nephew.”

“If something should happen to me, if I am killed, would you see to it that my wife and daughters are taken care of? Ado would not want to leave the city to live with you, but if you could check in on them every once in a while, make sure they are all right.”

Abram said, “I will do everything I can to make sure your wife and children are safe.”

Lot took a deep breath of the cool crisp night air and chuckled to himself. “It is funny. I remember when I could not wait to get away from the smell of goats and cattle. Now, I miss it. It seems so fresh out here, so — natural and pure.”

Abram thought of Arba and the assassins and the famine that razed the land. “I assure you, nephew, corruption and atrocity fills all this land; in city, village, mountain, and forest. But one day, El Shaddai will cleanse it, and set up his family among the nations.”

Lot said, “It seems impossible.”

Abram said, “With El Shaddai, all things are possible. Even to make a nation out of a barren couple.”

“I have always been inspired by your confidence and faith, uncle. But I think sometimes it has gone to your head and made you a bit crazy.”

They shared a laugh.

“Maybe so,” said Abram. “Maybe so.”

Their parting was bittersweet. Sarai hugged Lot, cried and would not let him go. She would always think of him as the spunky little child back in Ur who would never stop getting into trouble with his curiosity and hunger for more.

She sniffled and pulled him back to gaze at him. “Look at you. I remember when you were only ten like it was yesterday. You tried to start your own teraphim business to compete with your father. Those little lumps of clay were so cute, and you had that beaming bright determination. Thank El Shaddai you could not sell them, or you might be a successful idol maker today.”

“I am not sure you are entirely right, auntie,” said Lot with a sad stare. “I am residing in a city of idolatry and I feel as if I am complicit.”

Abram and Sarai knew there was nothing more they could say.

“Please pray for me, for my family,” he said, and he was off back to Sodom.