Still seething with disappointment over losing Merav, I go on to moan, “He hates me, and so does Michelle! For her, any price is too much, but what her father demands of me is simply ridiculous.”
“Let me guess,” Joav narrows his eyes.”Are you to hunt a lion and tear it apart with your bare hands?”
“No—”
“Drag a leviathan to shore and cut open its belly?”
“No—”
“Slay a dragon?”
“I wish!”
“What, then?” Joav asks, but by the sly smile hiding under his mustache I suspect he already knows the answer.
“You playing with me?” I say. “I am to come up with a hundred Philistine foreskins.”
“Ha! Is that what a princess goes for these days?”
I answer by asking, “Can you believe it?”
Out of nowhere he pulls up a third knife, and without missing a beat throws it up. “Question is, how hard can it be to get it?”
I shrug. “At the time I still entertained the hope of reaching out to the enemy, obtaining what I need by diplomatic means.”
“Ha!” He catches the other two knives behind his back. “That doesn’t sound like fun to me, not at all.”
“I tried, really, I tried to talk sense to those infidels.”
“Let me guess: you told them all about the joys of converting to our faith.”
“How did you know?”
“Then you overstated the medical benefits of circumcision, and understated the pain.”
“I did.”
“No takers, ha?”
“None. Naturally I had no choice but to resort to military means.”
“By which you mean, slaughter.”
“Yes.”
Joav aims a knife at a target carved in the bark of the olive tree.
“I hope,” he shoots, “that the princess would love you for it.”
“She wouldn’t.”
“Forgive me for saying so, but her father is entitled to drive a stiff bargain, especially when he’s dealing with a commoner like you.”
I must admit, “Stiff it is.”
This is a quick paper cutout of a dragon, which I made yesterday,
and let loose in my library...
Who knows how high it will soar!
"The miracle of Uvi Poznansky's writing is her uncanny ability to return to old stories and make them brilliantly fresh"
★ Love historical fiction? Treat yourself to a gift ★
Historical Fiction with a Modern Twist...
Grady Harp, Hall of Fame reviewer
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