Covenant of War (4 page)

Abner darted to the head of the column of retreating soldiers and ordered them to drop unnecessary equipment. Even the soldiers who had been left in the forest to guard the supplies abandoned their posts and fled with the rest of the Israelites.

After an hour of running, he directed his gasping troops toward a ravine nearby. They filed through it, grateful to be away from the noise of the battle. He ignored the pleas of some of the men to go back and help their comrades. Any who did, Abner feared, would die.

At the first bend in the ravine, he climbed to the top of a pile of rocks to see if any of David’s men pursued.

In the distance, a man was chasing them.

As he was always aware, Asahel was the youngest son. Not a day went by that he did not resent the overpowering shadow cast by his older brothers, Joab and Abishai. For a while he thought he could
maneuver his way into prominence by growing close to his uncle, David, but that had never happened.

He had earned his place among the Thirty by his will alone. He had trained himself to the same degree of skill as Joab and Abishai, and was superior to them in physical stamina and speed … but he was the youngest. As the youngest, he was always last by birth. He would have to perform some great exploit to win respect.

Which was why he had not wasted time killing Benjamites.

He had only one objective: to win wealth and fame by capturing or killing the great general Abner. So when the twelve fighters had slaughtered one another, Asahel had followed the Three into the battle initially, but he had slipped past the fighting to get to Abner.

When he saw Abner retreating with a section of his men, Asahel decided to chase him on foot, hoping to catch him before any of the other men from Judah — especially his brothers. Asahel was the brother who always got the last of the spoils, and he was weary of it. Never again.

That would not matter today.

He sprinted past the piles of corpses, avoided a slashing blade, intent on not getting caught up in the fighting with the foot soldiers from Benjamin. That was beneath him; he would not labor away on the field without notice anymore.

He would capture Abner when no one else could, and then his brothers would be forced to respect him. He searched for them in the fighting, did not see them, but it would not matter, because when he had Abner’s head mounted on his weapon they would pay attention.

Abner took several more steps and leaned against a tree to catch his breath.

“The rest of you keep moving up to the hilltop!” he yelled.

“Lord, we’ll wait with you. What if he defeats you?”

Abner laughed. “I have a few moves left in me. I will be fine. You need every moment you can to escape.” He looked up at the sky, took a deep breath. “But if I do fall, build your positions on that hilltop and wait for the other division of our army to arrive.”

“Who is it, sir?”

“Asahel, Joab’s brother. I have to be the one to kill him. I don’t want that on any of you.”

They left. He forced himself to move again, cutting through a stand of trees and climbing a small rise. He could see the pursuing soldier slow down before entering the woods, staring at the ground and looking for their sign.

Abner waved and shouted. The soldier’s head snapped up. Even from this distance, Abner recognized him.

Eleazar killed one more. The old man, who shouldn’t have been in the ranks, stared at him in anger as he died. Eleazar backed up and released his grip on his sword. The weapon clattered to the ground, as did the pike.

Eleazar knelt next to the dying old man. He put his hands on the sides of his face. The man had lived many years, had seen hope come to Israel at last — only to be killed by his own kinsman.

“Forgive me,” Eleazar mouthed. The old man’s eyes dimmed. He looked confused. Eleazar whispered again: “Forgive me.”

The old man died.

Nearby, Josheb and Shammah had struck down their last opponents. The vengeance-driven courage of the Benjamites broke at last, and what remained of their army turned and fled in the direction of Abner’s retreat.

The other two knelt in the mud near Eleazar to catch their breath. Joab trotted across the field to them and knelt as well. Abishai traversed the field, counting casualties.

“We need to chase them,” Joab said.

“Give them time to withdraw,” Eleazar said.

“They will regroup.”

“Let them escape!”

“They are northerners!” Joab shouted.

“Benjamites, and men of Abraham just like us,” Josheb corrected.

“Fine. All of you stay here, and I will cut them down myself. Where is Asahel?”

“I haven’t seen him,” said Josheb.

They looked around for a moment. Then they all stood to see better, but after searching, they saw that he wasn’t among the corpses.

Eleazar squinted in the direction of the fleeing Benjamites. Dusk was falling; they had about an hour of light left.

“He must be chasing Abner.”

Abner was not a young man anymore — not nearly young enough to outrun Asahel. But he was wise in the ways of war, and he used his knowledge of the terrain to his advantage as he listened to the young soldier chasing him through the brush.

Abner had guessed correctly. As soon as he saw him, Asahel had ignored the pursuit of the others and come straight in his direction. So he is after glory, Abner thought as he jumped over a fallen tree.

There was a ravine ahead in the forest, and Abner headed for it, seeking the advantage.

Asahel readied his weapons as he ran. He would ram the javelin into Abner’s back, knocking him down, then finish him with a stroke to the neck.

Ahead, he saw Abner glance over his shoulder. The general was losing two steps for every step Asahel took.

“Asahel, is that you?” Abner cried out.

“It is I!” Asahel shouted.

The voice carried firm and strong despite the struggle of the chase and the density of the forest.

“Turn aside! Take the spoil from one of the young warriors!”

Asahel chuckled as he ran.
Begging for his life now
.

Another look told Abner that Asahel had closed the gap further; clearly, he had no intention of turning back. Abner would have to stand and fight the foolish young man, the last thing he wanted to do. Enough blood had been spilled today.

“Stop following me! Why should I kill you? How could I look at your brother Joab again?”

The plea was unanswered. Abner reached the ravine and leaped to the bottom. As he crashed through the undergrowth, he heard Asahel make the leap behind him — directly into a thorny tree that Abner, knowing it was there, had avoided. Asahel screamed a curse.

Abner scrambled up the opposite slope, holding his spear in one hand and pulling himself up with the other. He looked back — Asahel was cutting himself loose from the bramble, his body covered in scrapes. The maneuver was costing the younger man a few moments, and Abner used them.

He turned and ran back toward where he and his men had first entered the forest. Asahel was going to catch him eventually, and if Abner had to kill him, he would do so where his brother could find him.

He pushed his aching legs forward. Behind him, Asahel shouted as he escaped the ravine. Abner clenched his teeth and ran as fast as he could, but Asahel was closing in, his famous speed bringing him back within attack distance.

Asahel hated Abner more with every step. He readied his javelin, his legs gliding over the terrain as though he were flying, his speed carrying him close for the kill. He would be the most famous warrior in Israel. David would give him wealth and status; Joab would finally respect him —

Abner felt the rush of air around the body behind him and then jumped forward with a last effort, planting the head of his spear into the ground. At the same instant, Asahel slammed into the butt end of the spear. The shaft slid under the front of his armor.

Abner rolled out of the way as Asahel, impaled on the spear, vaulted headfirst and crumpled to the ground.

Abner knelt, staring at the dying man. Asahel was facing away from him, clutching at the head of the spear protruding out of his belly. The butt end had torn away his intestines and they hung like ropes on the shaft of the spear, sticking out of his back.

Asahel made a gurgling noise before finally shuddering. He lay still.

Abner’s eyes burned with tears. He crawled to Asahel’s body
and pressed his face into the man’s bloody tunic. He wiped his eyes on the cloth. Another waste, another waste, another Hebrew killed needlessly by a Hebrew …

He grabbed a handful of dirt, tossed it into his hair, and cried aloud. He tore away at the front of his tunic, reaching under his armor and ripping a seam in mourning.

After leaving a detachment of soldiers and the priest from the village to purify the corpses and give aid to the wounded, Eleazar and the others in Joab’s force took up the pursuit of Abner. Eleazar wished to allow the Benjamites to escape, but Joab was in command. They dutifully followed.

The setting sun forced them to move urgently before nightfall. Back at the pool, Josheb had seen a promontory on the horizon that he guessed would make a good rally point for Abner’s men, and as he suspected, the tracks of the fleeing troops led into the woods in that direction.

Eleazar pointed out where footprints led into the forest away from the main force, but they did not follow that trail, choosing instead to chase the main group. He tried to concentrate, but his mind was full of images of his dead kinsmen, fellow sons of Abraham who had wanted only to fight for their homeland and their ruler but were now descending into Sheol and its depths, killed by his own hand.

Joab ran in front of him, alongside Abishai. Eleazar saw them crest a slight ridge on the trail and disappear from sight. Then he heard them screaming. Eleazar sprinted faster and reached the ridge.

Below him on the trail, Joab and Abishai were crouched near the twisted body of their brother Asahel. Blood covered the rocks nearby. A spear shaft protruded from Asahel’s back, with the tip of the spear lodged in the top of his chest.

Eleazar saw what had happened. Asahel had been chasing Abner, foolish and eager to capture him as a war prize, when Abner had planted the spear into the ground as Asahel got close. Unable to stop his momentum, Asahel had run into the shaft.

Joab grabbed Asahel by the beard, crying out. Abishai knelt by his dead brother, weeping softly.

Then Joab stood, a murderous scream bursting from his throat. He bolted down the trail. Abishai cursed aloud and followed him.

“Joab!” Eleazar shouted. “He was defending himself! Let them go! Enough!”

Abner pushed the men hard until darkness. He managed to put the death of Asahel out of his mind for now. He hoped he could make peace with Joab one day.

At the top of the rally hill, known as Ammah, he directed the men to build fighting positions around the peak. They were too exhausted to keep running, and if they tried they would only be cut down in the open field by Joab’s troops. They would take up their positions here, and he would attempt to negotiate a truce. If Joab’s troops decided to attack up the hill, they would have to climb over a rock wall with defenders crouched behind it.

The soldiers trembled as they stacked rocks next to trees to make fighting positions. Abner watched one soldier vomit as he bent to
pick up a rock. The man coughed and spat. Then he knelt and put his head between his legs, vomiting again.

Abner trudged over to him and sat down. He placed his hand on the man’s back.

“Apologies, lord,” the soldier said.

“No need. At least you didn’t wet yourself like the first time I saw battle.”

The man glanced at him, surprised. Then he nodded.

“You all did well today,” Abner said aloud to the group now spreading across the hilltop.

“Lord, why did you order our retreat? Our brothers are back there,” someone called from the edge.

“We would all be dead if we had stayed. It wasn’t worth everyone dying over a well.”

“But our brothers are back there! We left them!”

“All of your life you will wish you had stayed on a battlefield where your brothers died. I have wanted to stay many times. But we are all that is left. Dying needlessly does not get your wife pregnant or bring your crops out of the ground.”

“I would rather my wife be a whore to the Philistines and my crops burn than run away!”

Abner nodded. He knew the feeling and did not have the heart to argue with the soldier.

The breeze was dying for the night. The soil in this part of the land was a mixture of purples and reds. The moon made dull the colors that shone so vibrantly during the day, and now it looked as though someone had dipped a finger in blood and swirled the ground.

Joab and Abishai were crouched on a boulder at the base of the hill of Ammah, each one pointing to a different attack route.

Eleazar jogged up next to them. “Joab, we need to pull back.”

“We are attacking.”

“We will be slaughtered if we go up that hill in the dark. Even though Abner’s men are green, if we attack now we will be cut down by swords and spears behind every bush. It’s not worth losing your men over. I grieve for your brother —”

“You grieve nothing for my brother! We are attacking!”

Josheb joined in as he walked up beside Eleazar. “If you order these men up that hill, I will kill you during the attack and tell David you fell at their hands.”

His tone was calm and steady. Eleazar tensed for the fight that had been a long time coming.

“Joab!”

The voice boomed down the hillside through the trees. They
turned and saw Abner, sword raised, silhouetted against the luminous stars at the top of the hill.

“Will the sword destroy us forever? Don’t you know that the end will be bitter for all of us? How long before you tell your men to turn from the pursuit of their brothers?”

They looked at one another. Joab was about to shout a reply when Eleazar pulled at his elbow.

“Joab, listen to him. These are
Hebrews
. How many more need to die tonight?”

Joab was about to lash out at Eleazar again when Abishai stepped between them. He took his brother Joab’s face between his hands and cupped his ears.

“Let’s go bury our brother. The sun has set.”

“But Abner!”

Abishai nodded. “Abner will suffer for this. But Eleazar is right. Enough mother’s sons have died today. Let’s go bury our brother.”

Joab winced. He lowered his face into Abishai’s chest. The two men held each other a moment. Abishai whispered a few words the others could not hear. Joab finally nodded with resignation.

Wiping his eyes with his wrist, Joab turned back toward the hill. The anger in his eyes had diminished, and now Eleazar saw a tired, grieving brother.

Joab called to Abner, “As Yahweh lives, if you had not spoken, the men would have not given up the pursuit of their brothers until morning.”

His voice trailed off as he reached for the ram’s horn at his side. Taking a deep breath, he blew the battle signal long and loud, the mournful noise resonating through the deep woods. The sound of the pursuing fighters of Judah making their way up the trail ceased. It was the signal to stop what they were doing and await orders.

Josheb shouted for the troops to return to the pool and then disappeared into the night. The sound of complaints rose, but Josheb
could be heard angrily quieting them. Some of the soldiers were upset that they would not be able to plunder their enemies. Eleazar watched as Joab and Abishai staggered away together.

When they were all gone, Eleazar leaned against Shammah for support. The big man put his arm around his shoulders and they stood in the quiet darkness, weary with grief.

“When will Yahweh just kill us all and be done with it?” Eleazar whispered.

There was no moon, only starlight, as Joab’s force filtered out of sight in the direction of Gibeon, but Abner sensed that they were gone, returning to the site of the battle to collect their dead and assist their wounded. Now he had to find a way to break it to his own troops that they would not be able to do the same.

“Gather your things. We are leaving.”

“Lord, the bodies need to be purified. We need —”

“Our kinsmen will bury them and perform the ceremonies,” Abner said.

“The same kinsmen who slaughtered us today?”

“Our men were treacherous as well.”

“Will we have the chance to fight them again one day?”

“Unfortunately, yes,” Abner replied. He wished he could tell the young troops around him that this would never happen again, that all of Israel would be reconciled one day soon. But he knew otherwise. The heaviness in his words brought silence to the group. He heard weeping in the darkness. His own eyes burned.

They moved sluggishly, muscles cramped and sore from the exertions of the day. Abner felt the bones in his knees grinding against each other. This was common, but the pain was always worse when he had to run. He was old, far too old to be a warrior.

One by one, the troops filed off the hill into the valley, heading east. His plan was to cross the Jordan that night and reach Mahanaim, the capital city of the north, by midmorning.

“Lord, will there be anyone sent to retrieve our dead?”

Abner looked at the young soldier standing next to him. The man was holding his tears back bravely. Abner touched his ear and leaned forward, kissing the soldier on the forehead. He seemed to understand and nodded, then walked back to his unit.

Abner waited until the last soldier had moved from the hilltop, then trotted to the front to lead the way.

They marched all night. The river had ebbed from its high and the crossing was not difficult. Abner moved among them as they marched and made it a point to hug and kiss each of them on the cheek. He did not know how many hundreds of their troops had fallen. They would all receive mourning rites in the villages. All of the women would wail; the men would wear sackcloth and carry ashes to dust their heads with. Even their miserable king would mourn. Of that, Abner would make sure.

When they reached the city, it did not take long for the wailing to begin. Wives rushed out of the gates, looking for their husbands. Abner always hated this moment. Some of the women were ecstatic that their men had survived and wept with joy, while a hand’s breadth away another wife was finding out she was a widow and was now the property of the village elders until they decided what to do with her, usually giving her to the fallen soldier’s brother.

His own wife did not come to the gates anymore. That was for the young and the foolish. She was prepared for his death at any time, and to wait for him eagerly would only serve to increase her sorrow needlessly when the end came.

Instead of going home, Abner walked down the street lining the city walls. He would wait for the full report at the barracks. His men used to laugh behind his back at how he still kept a room in their barracks. His wife had kicked him out again, they would say. Mighty general Abner, able to spear enemies by the dozen, unable to keep a woman happy. But he knew they loved him for it. They loved that he loved them and wanted to spend time with them. He treated them as his own sons. He was stern but loyal. Willing to face the teeth of battle with them, willing to stay in front of them at all times.

Until Gilboa — and now again yesterday — when he had been forced to flee.

He would eventually have to go into the throne room and stare at the soft, sniveling boy in his extended family to whom he had sworn allegiance. Ishbosheth would demand to know what Abner had done, and Abner would give the report. He could see it all now, in detail, as though it were a stage play like the ones the foreigners brought to the markets. The king would shriek hysterically, Abner would calm him — and then go across the countryside finding more sons to be butchered by Philistines in the east and David in the south.

Abner entered his room and sat on the limestone floor near the blankets. The cold stones felt good on the backs of his knees. He stretched his legs out.

Somewhere in the distance he heard women screaming.

Somewhere in the distance he heard weeping.

Twenty of Joab’s men had fallen. He and Abishai oversaw the purification of their brother’s body by a priest, and they watched silently as the ashes of the red heifer were sprinkled over the corpse and
the prayers spoken. No one really cared about the ceremonies in the Law anymore, but today, with their kinsmen, it seemed appropriate. Only Shammah knew what to do to purify oneself after battles, when a man was considered unclean, and he was patiently instructing the troops.

Eleazar agreed to supervise the rest of the cleanup while Joab and Abishai slipped away to Bethlehem in the night to bury Asahel in their father’s tomb. The Philistine garrison that held the city would ask too many questions if they went during the day. David and his troops were still thought to be vassals of the Philistine rulers who held the lands of Judah, something David had been careful to keep them believing.

Eleazar found the elderly Benjamite who had died in his arms earlier. His face was frozen in the terror mask of death. His body had expelled the urine inside him and the front of his tunic was damp and smelled musky. Eleazar had smelled the blood and urine of the battlefield many times, but this time it nauseated him. He sat next to the old man and watched as Shammah paced around ensuring that the rituals were completed correctly. The priests from Gibeon had never presided over a scene of mass death before, and they lacked enough red heifer ashes to purify this many corpses. Some of the men would be ceremonially unclean for days. Most of them did not care.

They have not cared for centuries, Eleazar thought. Yahweh should have destroyed them long before now.

Eleazar motioned for a priest, who doused the old Benjamite’s body with the ash. Some of it splattered across the wrinkled face and gray beard.

Eleazar sighed. A man this old should not be fighting. He should be sitting next to a fire and giving council to stupid young fools trying to kill each other.

In another hour, the men were ready to leave. They carried the purified bodies of their brothers between them. The bodies of the
Benjamites — over three hundred of them — were left for the people of the town to bury.

The troops marched hard all night, barely slowed by the burdens they carried, anxious to get home. As they reached the point near Bethlehem where the trade road bends before descending into the lower hill country near Hebron, Joab and Abishai appeared silently out of the night. Eleazar did not exchange a word with them, and they continued marching.

Eleazar did not go into Hebron with the rest of the men. In the forest, he pulled out of the column unnoticed and made his way to the merchant camps. These were the foreigners from the caravans traveling the King’s Highway and other trading routes between Egypt in the south and the nations of the north. They brought many wares with them, including the unclean pleasures.

The city walls of Hebron loomed against the starry sky. Careful to avoid the sentries, he stumbled through the dark forest on the outside of the wall, shoving aside branches, his head aching from the tears he had shed that day.

He dropped his weapons next to a large tree whose roots had been undermined by a flash flood, leaving a deep cleft. He ran his finger along the edge of the sickle-sword blade. It was still dark with blood. Hebrew blood. He stuffed the sword under the cleft. He would never use the sword again. Surely it was cursed by Yahweh.

Eleazar continued his trek through the forest, intent on his destination but feeling his heart resist him. Thoughts of his nearby home came, and he hated himself. He was only a Sabbath day’s walk away, but he could not do it, could not go into the city where his home and his bed were. His wife, his children. Their faces were dark to him, wrapped in mist.

He kept moving, drawn by the call that so many men heeded. He wanted to release the violence of the day. He paused for a drink at a still pool. The warm water was foul to his taste, but he managed several gulps before he spat out the remnant. Images. The old man dying.

Eleazar glimpsed the camp of the Syrian nomads ahead in the clearing. For a moment, the tents and laughter repelled him, and he trotted away, shaking his head. He made his way back to the Hebron city wall. The night was cool and dark, and Eleazar felt his strength deserting him. He pressed his hand against the stone wall, then his face. He rubbed his face against the cold stone.

Eleazar stared down the city wall, his heart racing, his mind screaming black hatred at himself. Inside the city, he could hear shouts of reunion and of grief. Men had been lost, but others had returned. All would be looking to him for leadership and comfort — to him and Josheb and Shammah, the Mighty Three.

He turned his head toward the Syrian camp. They were the enemies of his people — one of a thousand enemies. He was too far away to hear the sounds of their camp now, and the forest was thick and dark. But it was there.

Go home, Eleazar
.

He heard it in the covering. His spirit melted.
I want to
.

Then go
.

He began to run, then ran faster, the branches cutting his arms and face. His chafed thighs burned, dirty and slick with sweat. He clawed at his eyes to clean the grime, but it was not good enough. Though he had cleaned away the dust and grit, they felt rancid and foul, and they were dry from the loss of tears.

Men of Abraham killing men of Abraham. Sons of Isaac and Jacob butchering one another.

He burst out of the woods into the Syrian camp. There was a large fire, and an unclean animal roasted over it. A split-hoofed
animal. A pig. David had forbidden such animals within the city; the foreign traders kept them outside in their camps. Three men prodded the meat with roasting sticks. The fat boiled and drizzled out of the flesh. A circle of tents surrounded the roasting animal, and in front of each tent were a rug and cushions where the women lay waiting for men such as him and times such as this.
Like desert vipers
.

The three men roasting the animal leered at him through the night, obscured by drafts of smoke, the flicker of the fire dancing across their features and making them look like fetid creatures from Sheol. One of them had a soiled bandage over his eye, caked with yellow pus from an infected wound. He had missing teeth and a twisted smile. He held out his hand.

Eleazar withdrew his money pouch and fumbled for several coins. He threw them at the ugly man, who laughed and pointed at the circle of tents.

Eleazar had never been here before; he had only heard of these places. Camps of pleasure. He caught the scent of cooking and olive oil. The smell of the roasting meat and the oil made his stomach growl and his heart pump faster in his chest. There was a tent in the back, away from the rest of the tents. He could not be seen there.