Free Wisdom's Daughter: A Novel of Solomon and Sheba by India Edghill Page A

own spindle to occupy my restless hands.
    Nimrah lifted the tangle of red silk from my fingers again; I looked down from the queens’ gallery to where my father sat upon the Lion Throne. The court was full of men richly clad, but my father outshone them all. As befit a royal bridegroom, he wore scarlet and purple fringed with gold. The wide crown of Israel, gold set with flawless emeralds, circled his head. In his hands he held a lion-headed scepter, a gift from the Scythian king.
    The high priest Zadok sat upon a stool beside my father’s throne. Zadok had been high priest long before I was born; he was an old man now, and standing long was a hardship to him. It was a measure of my father’s generous heart that he thought of Zadok’s comfort, and permitted him to sit when he held court. All the rest must stand—the king’s general and the king’s guard, the ambassadors, the other priests, the courtiers and the princes. Even my brother Rehoboam, who was my father’s heir, must stand before him. And even at this distance, I saw the scowl marring Rehoboam’s face; the crown prince was bored and didn’t care who knew it.
    My eyes did not rest long on my brother; gazing down like a hunting falcon, I sought more enticing prey. Ah, there he was, leaning against one of the polished cedar pillars, half-shadowed by the sham forest my father had created to ring the great court. His hair twined down his back in long curls; a ringlet coiled over one shoulder, spiraled down his half-bare chest, ebony against honey. He wore a kilt of soft blue leather sewn with golden bees, and a gilded leather belt two handspans wide clasped his waist. Upon Amyntor of Caphtor, such old-fashioned garments seemed oddly dashing. In contrast, the nobles of my father’s court appeared overburdened in their layers of rich cloth. And where they held scrolls, or tablets, or goblets of gold and silver, Amyntor held in his hand only a Damascus rose, red as blood.
    I admired Amyntor, who came and went as pleased him. Who gave, always, the impression that life itself amused him. As other men waited, frowning, for the king’s newest bride to arrive, Amyntor watched as if the king and all the court had been summoned only so that he might observe them. Yes, I admired his fearless laughter more than his handsome face—and I envied his freedom with an ache that sometimes made me wonder if I craved more from Amyntor than I wished to admit even to my mirror.
    As I studied Amyntor, he looked up across the court at the queens’ gallery, seemed to stare through the shielding latticework straight into my eyes. From so far away, I could not be sure, but it seemed that he winked at me. I know he smiled, and lifted the small crimson rose to his lips.
    Although I knew Amyntor could not see me, heat pricked my cheeks; I turned my eyes away from him, back to my father’s throne. I saw my father’s fingers absently stroking the lion’s head upon the scepter; my father, like my brother, grew impatient. For a moment, I wondered what he thought, as he awaited yet another wife. Then Nimrah slipped the web of red silk back upon my fingers, and in trying to keep the net smooth and taut, I forgot lesser matters.
    What was one more queen to King Solomon—or to me—after all?
    Solomon
    All women begin to look alike to me. Solomon knew this was unjust, but by now he had greeted so many royal brides, accepted so many bejeweled concubines, that one pretty painted face blurred into the next. Trade and politics bred alliances both of words and of flesh. What surer sign of submission to King Solomon’s power than the surrender to him of a woman of royal blood?
    And so here I sit, waiting for yet another woman, when forty more important matters await the king’s attention. But Solomon had sat waiting upon the Lion Throne to welcome each of the women given into his care; he could not cease the custom now without giving great offense. Although this princess will look just like all