“All the same, Your Highness, never have there been so many signs from so many prophecies: the temple rebuilt, the cities of Judea born anew, the crowds in Jerusalem for the census. All that remains to be seen is a light in the east.”
“And what would you have me do? Would you have me go and tell Augustus that he should fear a child who may or may not exist? That Rome should recall its mighty armies from Gaul and Germania and lay siege to the town of Bethlehem? Do you have any idea what a fool he would think me?”
“The prophecy is clear, Your Highness. The Messiah shall topple all the kingdoms of the world. Even yours.”
There was a loud crash. The sound of something being knocked (or more likely kicked) over. Something metal. From the sound of the impact and the resulting smaller clangs, Balthazar guessed it was a table, from which several chalices and serving platters had fallen.
A considerably longer silence followed. Balthazar caught a few of the Judean soldiers trading nervous glances.
When Herod finally spoke again, it was to issue an order:
“There will be no more talk of Messiahs.”
IV
A cry went up through the town of Bethlehem, reverberating through the torch-lit houses in the village and the caves that had been carved into the hills above it many thousands of years earlier. It was brief and sharp, and it came from a small stable on the north side of the little town. A stable that was unremarkable in every way — except for the star that shone directly over it in the high heavens, brighter than any in the eastern sky. A star that hadn’t been there an hour before.
Joseph and Mary felt like every innkeeper in the Upper City had turned them away. Every house had been full to bursting, every room taken, every patch of bare earth spoken for. With Mary’s contractions growing more frequent and Joseph’s fuse growing shorter, they’d given up on Jerusalem and taken the road south to Bethlehem — where, rumor had it, there were still a few spaces for smaller families.
But Bethlehem had proven every bit as full, and they’d been turned away from the first two places they inquired. With the sky growing dark, Mary no longer able to ride or walk, and Joseph ready to throw up his hands and curse every man in Judea, an old shepherd and his sons had taken pity on them. And though the shepherd’s home — like all the homes in the area — was packed with boarders and relatives for the census, he’d offered them the cramped stables behind it. After laying out some fresh straw and water and hanging a small oil lamp, he’d left them alone. The birth of a child was a sacred, private affair. No place for men or strangers.
And there they were. Surrounded by the stench of animals. The glow of a single flame. A fitting place for the birth of a king, thought Joseph.
If they’d been in Nazareth, Mary would have been attended by the women of the village. She would’ve been comforted by familiar faces and voices and surrounded by those with years of childbearing experience. But here she was utterly alone. A fifteen-year-old girl, lying on hard straw and the few blankets they’d carried across the desert, sweating and pushing her way through the worst pain she’d ever known.
There had been times — many times — throughout the night when Mary had been convinced something was wrong. It’s not supposed to be this hard, this painful. It’s not supposed to take this long. I must be doing something wrong. And there had been times — many times — throughout the night when Joseph had been close to rushing in. But he couldn’t. It was forbidden. He couldn’t lay eyes on her in such an indecent state. He couldn’t touch her when she was unclean. And so he’d done the only thing he could — he’d shouted words of encouragement to her through the stable walls, and prayed.
The infant had cried at first, an announcement of health. A cry that had echoed across Bethlehem. A voice that shall be heard the world over, Mary thought as she held the baby to her chest. And then it had been silent. Calm. It had looked into Mary’s eyes for a moment. Not the all-knowing look of an all-knowing God, but merely the quizzical look of an exhausted infant. Then it had slept.
Mary and Joseph lay beside each other, watching the baby sleep as the sun peeked through the slats in the stable walls, and the animals around them began to stir.
It was tradition that a male child’s name not be spoken aloud until its eighth day. The day of its circumcision. But there was no need to speak.
The angel had told both of them what to name the child.
V
The doors to Herod’s throne room were finally opened, and Balthazar was ushered in to meet his punishment, with Captain Peter proudly leading the way.
The throne room was every bit as symmetrical and rectangular as the rest of the palace grounds, with the doors on one end and the throne on the other, so as to make guests walk the maximum distance for added dramatic effect. But unlike the lush paradise he’d seen outside, Balthazar found the interior cold and drab by comparison. Stone columns lined both sides of the narrow passage. Daylight filtered in through the windows behind those columns and from the large, square opening in the center of the ceiling, some forty feet above. At night, the torches and lamps mounted along the length of the room would provide ample light and heat, although Balthazar guessed that Herod didn’t spend much time in here after dark. Why would he, with a whole pleasure palace waiting across the courtyard?
As they neared the throne, Balthazar saw slaves hurriedly cleaning an overturned table to its right and the chalices and platters that had been knocked off of it. And as he silently congratulated himself for correctly guessing that it had, in fact, been a table overturned, his eyes turned back to the throne itself, and the figure slumped in it.
Balthazar had seen a lot of gruesome things in his twenty-six years. But nothing he’d seen had prepared him for his first glimpse of Herod the Great.
There had been whispers that the king had been sick for years. He didn’t venture out among the people anymore. He no longer came to supervise and bask in the glory of his construction projects. Even the lavish private box at his beloved theater had been empty for years. Some speculated that he was dead. That his sons were secretly sharing power and using their father’s feared name to their advantage. But Herod was alive… if you could call it that.
He was hunched forward, his spine twisted. His eyes were yellowed, his teeth blackened, his pale flesh covered with open sores. His sunken eyes and cheeks barely looked strong enough to support the weight of his wispy, graying beard, and his robes hung off of him like sheets from a clothesline.
This was the mighty Herod? This shriveled little man? This wisp? This was the King of Judea? He looked less like the man who had rebuilt Jerusalem and more like one of the lepers begging blindly on its streets. In contrast, his throne was grand, its white marble seat embellished with gold accents. But while it had been designed to inspire awe, it only served to make the tiny man sitting in it look that much smaller.
Peter stepped forward, his captain’s helmet under one arm. He snapped his heels together and — just like he’d rehearsed on the way from Bethel — addressed his king. “Mighty Herod! It is my honor to present to you the Ant — ”
“Yes, yes,” said Herod with a wave of his hand. “Leave us.”