SAMPLE THE STORY BY READING CHAPTER ONE

BOOK ONE: The Book of Kharnos 

ONE

The temple of Ashtaroth in Ashkelon 

I stood before the woman, Delilah of Ashkelon. 

Beyond the stonework screen that looked out over the harbor waters of this coastal city of the Philistines, yellow lightning slashed a jagged web across a black sky. Thunder exploded with such violence that the tiles of the Temple floor quivered under our feet. Once more the forces of the upper air were waging battle with impassive mother earth in their eternal warfare. To my mind it seemed that the very ferocity of the storm was an omen, a portent to me and to this woman who was high priestess of Ashtaroth. 

Of good? Of evil? Only time would tell.

My name is Kharnos. Once I was a prince of Troy before the Greeks under Menelaus and Agamemnon-curse their names!—burned it down. Three years ago I had been blood brother to Hector, until Achilles killed him. More than a hundred men have died under my throwing spears and the long bronze sword which lies broken and useless in the dead, black ruins of Ilion. Once too, my name ranked with the great ones, with Ajax, with Ulysses, with Aeneas. 

Now I stood in this place, a slave to the high priestess, Delilah. 

Only the rag at my loins could I call my own. As my back was scarred by the marks of the whips, so was my soul scarred by this servitude into which the fates had plunged me. Bitterness twisted my mouth and was as ashes on my tongue. I who had commanded thousands must stand and wait while the eyes of my mistress studied my body, the rolling muscles and wide shoulders and big hands that were more used to the feel of weapons than to the handle of the grinding wheel that had been my lot these past few months in Ashkelon. 

At last she nodded, saying, “You should do. Golithal tells me you were a famous warrior in Troy. I have need of such a man. 

My lips were dumb. What need had I for words, who must be as an animal until commanded to break silence? Delilah smiled secretly, as if to herself. Perhaps she sensed this sullen resignation in me and sought to goad it to flaming life. 

Her plucked brows lifted. “Well, slave? Were you a warrior?

Apparently all the spirit had not been beaten out of me on the long sea road from Ilion to Ashkelon. Pride flared my nostrils as my head went back. “My chariot rode hub to hub with that of Hector when we went out to battle. My spears slew almost as many as did his, my sword even more." 

Delilah nodded as if content. 

She was a beautiful wench, I give her that. More lovely than Helen herself, for whom we men of Troy fought so long and so pitilessly with the Greeks. Dark hair was piled high on her shapely head, a thick ringlet falling to her bared shoulder. Her skin was dusky, akin to that of an Egyptian. Her eyes were black and limpid, her mouth like a ripe red fruit. Aie, she was lovely, this Delilah. 

And shameless. 

She wore only a thin chiton of transparent byssus, so that it seemed she walked naked through a white mist. My glance touched the thrusting breasts, the firm tapering thighs. This evening, with the tall candles casting shadows across her finely chiseled features as the trompa wind swept their flames back and forth along the stone Temple walls, she seemed not so much the priestess as a woman, nervous and unsure of herself. 

Her hands went to her temples where she massaged her dusky skin slowly. Lines of strain ran down from her nostrils to her mouth as indecision tore at her nerves. Without removing her rubbing fingertips she began to speak. 

“Which of them has a greater need for you, Trojan--the goddess Ashtaroth whom I worship, or the king of Ashkelon whom I serve?” She smiled a little at my expression. "Shall I name you consort to the goddess for a year--or put a weapon in your hand and ask you to kill a man?” 

In irritation at herself, she clapped her hands together. Her brilliant eyes, under lids tinted green by malachite, roamed around the chamber as if hunting inspiration. Again the floor tiles quivered underfoot as thunder burst overhead and lightning scratched the sky. The wind shook the red brocade drapes and blew out a few candles close to the stonework screen. 

Her eyes clung longest to the far end of the room, where a great ivory statue of a naked woman, her hands clasped under her heavy breasts to lift and offer them to the beholder, stood framed between two rows of pillars. This was Ashtaroth the fertility goddess who had different names in Egypt, Crete and mighty Babylon. She was the mother, the fecund one. A votive bowl held smoldering herbs which rose in a trail of gray incense about her so that it seemed her ivory hips had turned to living flesh, moving lazily and lewdly as though to tempt me. 

Delilah shivered. Her eyes came back to me, studying my body carefully. Suddenly she smiled and swayed toward me, walking with a gentle shifting of her hips. Her palm came out to rest on my naked belly, a little above the scant loincloth. I quivered under her touch as might an unbroken colt to the hand of its master. Her red mouth pursed thoughtfully as she regarded me. 

"How long has it been since you had a woman?"

"Since Ilion fell three years ago." 

"Once you were a man who made his own decisions. I have prayed to Ashtaroth for guidance but the goddess keeps her counsel. Mine is the responsibility for the choice, mine alone.” 

I waited, having learned during the past three years that it is the lot of a slave to wait, quiet and unspeaking. My lips may have hungered to shout defiance, just as my muscles trembled with the desire for revolt. Yet I stood like a dumb ox, patient and unmoving. 

Her hand was warm against me, faintly moist. The blood was beating faster in my veins at her nearness for she was naked under the byssus and perfumed with the aromatics of Punt and Sheba. If I put a hand on her it would cost me my life; and though I was a slave, I was too much the realist to waste it because of a wanton Philistine woman. 

As if she understood the temptation she made for me, she laughed under her breath and leaned against me so that now she could feel the hardness of my body. Her eyes and lips were upturned, inches from my own. Her warm breath teased my mouth. 

“Why not, Trojan? Why should not yours be the tongue to pronounce the future? Play at prophet for a spell, knowing that you control not only your destiny but mine as well." 

"What destiny, priestess?" I asked hoarsely.

“Your own. Will you be consort to Ashtaroth--or a killer? 

As for mine--shall I remain high priestess or reign as queen in Ashkelon?” 

"All I ask of the future is my freedom,” I growled. 

Her thin brows rose derisively. "No matter what? Even if your bid for freedom must surely end in your death?" 

“Even so." 

“Hear me, then! Every year we choose a man in Philistia who spends that year as Baal, consort of Ashtaroth. He is fed the finest foods and is clad in the softest garments. No man living in all Philistia has lived as he shall live. Her priestesses are his wives to enjoy when and where the spirit moves him. Anything he desires is his. He has only to express the wish. You can be this man, Trojan." 

Well, now. This might not be so bad for a slave who had known only blows and kicks these past few years. For a while at least, I would revel in a life which might well be envied by Shepthazzah, who was Tyrant in Ashkelon. Food, wine, women, soft clothes to cradle my skin. Day in and day out, night after night, all these might be mine. For an entire year. 

And at its end--

“Then I die," I said. “As the ritual demands.” 

Delilah inclined her head. Excitement was flushing her dusky cheeks, firming her breasts into hard mounds against my chest. Her hands were clenched so tightly on my shoulders that the skin was white over the knuckles. This same excitement caused her to rise on her sandaled toes and teeter back and forth. I realized this woman reveled in the power she held, as high priestess. With her lips she could doom any man, any woman she chose. 

“Of course. But you'll die swiftly, without pain. For you'll be Kharnos no longer but the godhead Baal, who is born and lives only to die so that he may be resurrected.” 

I drew a deep breath. "What other choice have I?” 

"In Israel there is a man who is an enemy of Philistia. He must be slain. Should you decide to seek him out and kill him--the moment he dies you're free." 

My laughter grated in the stone room. "Are you mad? What man would refuse to go and kill the Israelite? Once outside your city walls, he could run whither he would, to Egypt or to Crete or even further." 

Delilah smiled. It was not a nice smile. "You ride with four companions, four picked fighting men of the royal bodyguard. All of you shall be disguised as wandering mercenaries. As such you shall come into Israel. There you will seek out this man and kill him." 

"Four men," I said slowly. 

"Whose duty it shall be to slay you should you turn aside from your mission. They are men devoted to Shepthazzah, who is king in Ashkelon. They have sworn on their necks to bring you back dead-or the news that you've done what you set out to do." 

"If I kill him, I'll go free?"

"You will."

“Then I choose to kill.” 

Her eyes mocked me. “Even if he himself will kill you? Almost certainly, this will be your end. He is protected by his god, Yahweh.” 

I grinned. “I don't believe in gods."

“Not even Cybele? I have been told men worshiped Cybele in Ilion. Or now that Ilion is no more, is Cybele also dead?” 

I shrugged. I was a warrior, more used to swords than incense bowls. The muscles of my body had grown thick on the field of battle, not soft and flabby before a temple altar. 

Delilah went on, with that faint smile which twisted her mouth so oddly. "There is no need to make your choice now. I only tell you alternatives." 

"I need no thought. My mind's made up already. A man does what he knows best. From childhood I was trained to slay. With the spear, with a bow, with a sword.” 

"Can you kill a god?" 

I scowled at all this talk of gods. Dagon. Tammuz. Osiris. Even this Israelite god, this Yahweh. All were the same, all demanded sacrifice and gave nothing in return. My eyes turned toward the ivory statue of Ashtoreth holding out her breasts. 

"I can kill a god," I said flatly. 

Delilah gasped, divining my intention. Her hand came out, her fingers closing on my wrist. “Fool! To raise your hand against the goddess would mean your death by flaying." 

Her hand still held my wrist and where she touched me my flesh seemed to burn, even as did hers. For an instant we stood eye to eye, scarcely breathing. 

“A god, perhaps," she whispered, moving away to pace up and down. "I send you to kill a man. For many years this man has been as a thorn in the skins of all Philistines. I have vowed to my king that he shall die. I have made sacrifice. I have fasted. I have asked Ashtaroth for this boon."

Now it was coming out. She wanted to do what no other Philistine could, to kill an Israelite with a charmed life. For this she would promise a slave from a dead city his freedom, if he could perform a miracle. To me it was proof of how weak are the gods that they must work through human slaves. 

"And if she grants it? If she guides my sword arm to the fatal stab? What then, Delilah?” 

Her tinted eyelids and long lashes lowered, then lifted. Greed burned at me through her eyes, and pride, and a deep, deep hunger for power. 

"I shall be queen in Ashkelon. Shepthazzah has pledged his word.” 

I nodded. I could understand a woman like Delilah wanting to be queen in Ashkelon. Had not Helen yearned to wear the crown in Troy? For her sake, men had died by the thousands. I wondered how many lives must end to satisfy the hungers of this woman. 

Her hands clapped together, imperiously. Dark shadows came to life near the heavy draperies hanging on the stone wall and pulled them shut against the fury of the storm. The shadows moved into the candle light, and now I saw that they were big Nubians, armed with bows. 

They would escort me back to the slave quarters. At the doorway. I turned and looked hard at the woman in the misty garment. 

"How do they call this Israelite?"

"His name is Samson." 

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