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It was hot the day he fell through time. Sun poured endlessly out of the open sky and reflected off the sand under his feet with tenfold intensity, flooding the streets, inhibition burning away in the shake and swelter of heat haze. The heat pooled in shadowy corners and in the sweat-slick space between his chest and tunic and, worst of all, in the crowd.
That kind of heat -- arid, all-encompassing, crushing in its lightness -- was dangerous. It made people edgy, turned them sharp, set tension of all kinds cracking through the dry air. Wandering off their sand-blown camp on the edge of the desert, forgetting when he’d last eaten, possessed of a hollowed-out lightness that would one day carry him, unflagging, to the base of a redbud tree, he stopped in the market and tried not to faint.
Someone shoved him to the side and he went willingly, eyes closed against the greyness stealing into his vision. When he opened them again, he was staring into the drawn and sun-burnished face of Judas Iscariot.
The silver of the mirror was polished to a reflective shine, its frame ornately carved, the length inset with gems. Opulent.
He had never been vain.
And yet.
He held his gaze in the mirror, transfixed. The metal must have been of exceptional quality; his reflection was crisp and unwarped. He turned his face, running the pads of his fingers along the cut of his jaw. His skin was sun-darkened and clear, stretched taut over the hard angles of his face. He was thinner than he remembered being, any softness holding over from his childhood starved away during his three years of desert wandering. His hair put light off like satin, dark curls flaming almost auburn where the sun passed through. His eyes were dark, too, and expressive, framed by long, black lashes. He had been accused before of wearing kohl. He knew his own face and body, knew the length and breadth of himself, but now he wondered what it was that other people saw.
Did strangers think of him as skinny? Or lissome? Disheveled or wind-tousled? Sharp or striking?
Could somebody look at him and find him handsome?
Could somebody want him?
“Silver,” the merchant in the booth said, and Judas broke eye contact with himself to look.
“Genuine polished silver,” the man said again, pointing to the mirror. “You interested?” His dark eyebrows turned up in the middle, large, rough hands paused over the rest of his wares. Raised welts of pink, wet-looking skin cut across the tan expanse of his forearms, old and new burns patchworked over his blacksmith’s strength. His face was bright and young-looking, his beard full and dark, the angularity of his jaw not unlike that of Yeshua.
Judas clenched and unclenched a hand, the clammy damp of his palm sliding against his nail beds.
“You interested?” the man asked a second time, leaning forward.
“No,” Judas said, and watched a bead of sweat slide into the merchant’s neat beard. He wetted his lips and reconsidered. “Maybe.” He let his gaze flick, slow and obvious, to the man’s mouth, and then back to his eyes, ensuring he’d be understood. Stupid and dangerous, maybe even deadly in the strange stranglehold of the desert heat, but that was the appeal -- provoke someone to impassioned violence and leave bloodied, his restraint restored, or let somebody solve his problem more permanently.
He watched the merchant’s face tense, his full lips flattening.
Judas steadied himself on the edge of the booth, fighting off a rush of lightheadedness, and waited to see if he’d be hit, or simply driven off. He almost missed the subtle return flick of the merchant’s eyes, an interested little changing of lines in the sun-bleached brightness of the market.
“You have a lovely complexion,” the merchant said, idly lifting a fine gold chain. “Do you prefer silver or gold?”
Judas held fast to the edge of the table in nauseated confusion.
“I think you could wear both,” the merchant continued, draping the chain across the back of his hand, the delicate metal flowing like water.
Judas stood, wrong-footed and, somehow, hurting more than if he’d been punched.
The merchant shook his head, and changed the gold chain for silver. “You’re very warm. Maybe I should close for the day. Get you out of the sun for a while, friend.” The chain started to slip, but the man pulled it back into place, sweeping calloused fingertips across his knuckles. “Take a break from the afternoon heat with me.”
He glanced up, still cupping Judas’s hand, and smiled when their eyes met. “There, see? I think silver suits you best.”
Judas’s eyes clipped, abrupt and with magnetic satisfaction, to meet his own gaze in the mirror. His pupils were ink-black, blown wide, shocked and hungry, and he gasped, jerking away from the hyena staring back at him, straight into Peter, who only just managed to keep him from tripping into the sand.
“Easy,” Peter laughed, steadying him. “Just me. Lost you in the crowd.”
Peter’s hand on his shoulder burned even through the thick fabric of his simlah, and his vision went grey again. He felt his knees start to buckle, heard Peter’s low, surprised noise only distantly.
He allowed himself to be half-led, half-carried to a shady spot off the main road, and slid down to kneel in the sun-warmed dirt beneath a tree.
“What’s wrong?” Peter asked, crouched and balancing his weight on a splayed hand.
Judas closed his eyes and shook his head minutely, watching the pink-white light on the insides of his eyelids shift. Somewhere nearby a magnolia tree was shedding petals, the scent of it so cloyingly thick he could taste it in the air.
“Are you sick?” Peter’s clothing shifted, a quiet coarse sound, and then, closer, he asked, “When’s the last time you had something to drink? Or eat? You look hungry.”
“Can’t remember,” Judas said, and ran his tongue along the backs of his teeth, testing the sharpness of his canines. Something cool touched his forehead and he whipped his head back.
“I think you’re sun-sick,” Peter said, pulling his hand away from Judas’s face. “You’re burning. I think we should get you home.”
“I have no home,” Judas said, blankly trailing his fingers through dust and magnolia petals.
“So you’ve said,” Peter acknowledged, giving him a careful, almost guilty look that Judas had never been able to interpret.
“I have no home,” Judas repeated, dizzy with heat and the desperate need to communicate his place in the world to Peter. “I’m a wayward son. No family, no home.”
That small, careful look again, and then, “Your home is with us.”
“No one else would have me,” Judas said, not a disagreement, falling back to lean against a wall. The white stone put off heat like a second sun, searing the back of his neck. He didn’t pull away when Peter touched his cheek.
“I’m going to get Andrew,” Peter said, passing his thumb across the thin skin under Judas’s eye. “We’ll take you back to the camp.”
Judas exhaled shakily, waiting for the dizziness to settle. It didn’t, and he let Peter take the weight of his head in his cupped hand. He felt wine-drunk, dizzy and sick, head hollowed out and buzzing. When Peter’s hand left his face, he heard himself make a short, wounded noise.
Peter immediately returned to his side, touching his hair, his beard, holding the back of his hand to Judas’s forehead. His brows drew low in concern. “I’m only leaving for a minute. Just to get Andrew.”
“I know,” Judas said, watching the side street fade in and out of shifting blackness. “Am I dying?”
That made Peter laugh, and Judas laughed too, terrified.
“You’re not dying. Just a little sick.”
Judas, blank with hunger and heat, turned and pressed his lips to Peter’s palm.
Peter didn’t pull back, didn’t hit him, didn’t lean in and touch his hand, either, only let his frown deepen. “You really are sick, aren’t you?”
Judas let his eyes drift closed. Peter’s hands left his face. Time passed strangely as he fought against rising nausea. His mouth watered and he swallowed harshly, twice then thrice, clapping a hand across his lips as his stomach kicked.
“Don’t know,” Peter’s voice said, suddenly close, and Judas startled. He forced his eyes open to see Peter and Andrew standing over him, heads bent together. “He stumbled, I caught him. Let him down here while I went to find you.”
“Friend,” Andrew said, crouching down as Peter knelt on his other side. “We’re going to help you up. Alright?”
Andrew’s hand hovered above his shoulder. When Judas silently nodded his assent, Andrew exchanged a look with Peter.
Judas was not known for his vulnerability. But now, sick and confused and dizzy, choking in the oppressive magnolia-thick heat, he thought it might be nice to let somebody take care of him. Just this once. Just for a little while.
Andrew looped his arm around Judas’s back, and Peter did the same. As one, they pulled him to his feet, steadying him when he swayed. Judas kept his eyes shut against the sun, the pinkish light burning through the skin of his eyelids already almost more than he could take.
“Are you going to be able to walk?” Andrew asked, still holding him upright.
Yes, Judas thought, but when he tried he buckled and nearly returned to the sand.
“That’s a no,” Peter said, gripping him around the ribcage more firmly. When he and Andrew crouched to take Judas’s weight, his feet dragging, he couldn’t even manage a token protest. Just tucked his face against Andrew’s shoulder and let himself fade out.
When he opened his eyes again, he was staring up at the sun-lit linen interior of a tent. The fabric slackened and stretched as the breeze moved through, cooling his naked chest and legs. Somebody had stripped him of everything except his loincloth and laid him out long on a mat, his arms positioned palm-up. A dog barked in the distance, and the heat-warped tent posts creaked.
Judas breathed slowly and took stock. He was distantly aware that his lower back ached, that his ankles were sore and sandal-chafed, but the pain in his head demanded the most immediate attention. It pulsed sharply, a lancing shock behind his eyes with every heartbeat, and he swallowed down a surge of nausea. He felt muzzy and slow, exhausted and sick as though he’d drawn too deeply from the wineskin the night before.
A flash of searing light blinded him as the tent-flap whipped open, and he groaned, closing his eyes against the onslaught.
“Sorry,” Peter said, closing the flap behind him. “I’m glad you’re awake.”
“I’m not,” Judas grated out, his voice hoarse and low. “I feel like a donkey kicked me in the head.”
Peter kneeled over him and set a small pail at his side. Its contents sloshed. “You passed out on the way back here.” He dropped a scrap of cloth into the pail and then wrung it out over Judas’s chest. Water splashed cool and clear over his skin.
“Feels good,” Judas said, tilting his head to watch Peter work.
Peter gave him a small, pleased smile. “Not sure what’s wrong yet, but I think cooling you off will help.” He wrung the cloth out again, the water skating over Judas’s chest and collecting in the slight hollow of his belly. “Do you think you’re up for trying to eat a little?”
His nausea spiked at the thought. “No. Can I--” Judas’s voice cracked, and he choked on a cough.
“Here,” Peter said, bringing the cloth to his mouth. Judas parted his lips obligingly and drank as Peter wrung the fabric dry. “Good?”
“Good,” Judas agreed, and then winced as his headache throbbed.
“Poor Judas. Lay still,” Peter said, and Judas did.
Peter’s care was practiced and gentle; he alternated between wringing cool water into Judas’s mouth and stroking the damp cloth over his feverish skin. He hummed a lullaby under his breath, something sweet and minor, and, against all expectations, Judas felt himself being lulled back into sleep.
“You are very good at this,” Judas said, as Peter ran the cloth down his right arm.
Peter’s lullaby trailed off, and he sat back on his haunches. “I’ve done it before,” he said quietly. “Often. My son was -- is -- prone to fever. I’d do this for him when he was sick.”
“Do you miss him?” Judas asked. The silence stretched long, and Judas had almost fallen asleep by the time Peter answered.
“I’m not supposed to,” Peter said, “but I do. Every day. He’d be a few years younger now than John was when he joined us.” Peter wrung the cloth into Judas’s hair, wetting his curls. “I miss carrying him on my shoulders. Miss reading to him. Singing him to sleep. I miss taking care of him. It’s nice to do this for somebody again.”
“I’m sorry.” Judas stifled a yawn. His eyes started to slip closed, and he blinked hard. “Sorry. Tired.”
Peter stared down at him with a sad, crooked smile. The cloth rested, forgotten, on Judas’s shoulder.
“What?” Judas asked, trying to keep awake. “Something wrong?”
“Nothing,” Peter said, shaking his head. He picked up the cloth and went back to his soothing. “It’s easy to forget how young you are.”
Judas let his brows draw together in confusion. He was hardly young; younger than Peter and Andrew, true, and Matthew and Simon -- and probably James, though he’d never asked, and of course Yeshua, but far older than John, their youngest, who just turned fourteen a week ago. Judas was twenty. Well into manhood. He tried to argue this point, but only managed a jaw-cracking yawn.
Peter laughed softly, and Judas opened his eyes yet again with monumental effort.
“It’s okay,” Peter said, passing a hand over his face. “Don’t fight it. Go ahead and sleep. Andrew went to find Yeshua. He’ll be here when you wake.” Peter dabbed his forehead with the cloth, and Judas let his eyes close.
The tent canvas thwapped elastically as the breeze stretched it taut. Water sloshed in Peter’s pail, and sand shifted under his knees. A fly droned unobtrusively near the ceiling of the tent. Peter hummed lowly, off-key, and then, as Judas finally slipped under, began to sing; “D’mak,o, d’ alyaa, aaniykh…”
He dreamed strangely.
Colors and sounds melded, sensation and thought pulling together until they were inextricable -- he had the distinct impression of unbearable pain and the thick, metallic taste of blood, frustration, a creeping guilt and oppressive heat, inevitability and the odd, pulling blankness that descended on him at his lowest. Something blue-tinged and smothering, his sense of self collapsing inward. Fractal-like, his lows becoming ever-lower, infinitely repeating the spin down into himself, a terrible, inescapable darkness landscaping his freefall until, with a horrible, hypnic jerk, he jolted -- the phantom of a rope still around his neck -- upright just in time to retch dryly into the dirt.
He kept his water down, but his throat burned. His lips tingled and he felt suddenly anxious. Sweat slicked his forehead. The sun was much lower than it had been the last time he was awake.
Every time he blinked, the world shifted and began to tilt. His arms were shaking, struggling to support his weight, so he laid down again. His vision greyed and then faded back as he settled.
Judas was -- somewhere. In a canvas-walled tent. On a mat. Sukkah? Chag HaAsif?
No. The ceiling was all wrong. Canvas, too.
So Judas was -- where?
At home? Sick from overwork? After his first time in the field --
Judas was thirteen. Old enough to answer for his own sins for the first time, father not taking responsibility for his wrongdoing anymore. Accountable only to himself. And to God. He took to the field with his father’s men in the early morning cool, straining to keep up with the rest. The youngest besides himself was over twenty, and he felt kiddish among them.
He swung his sickle awkwardly, wheat felling in a narrow swoop around him. His shoulders ached, and he fell a little behind, helpless frustration growing -- why couldn’t he be taller? He was a man, wasn’t he -- how long until he felt like one?
Judas swung the sickle again. The sun had risen fully, and the ground was steaming. The field stretched to the horizon, an eerie gold sea under a sky so blue it was nearly white. The men slightly ahead of him sang a song he didn’t recognize, and swung their scythes in time, carefully spaced so they didn't risk hurting each other with the long blades. He watched the flex-pull of their broad shoulders, the knotting of muscle in their thick arms, the twist and narrow shear of their waists. Judas swung the sickle again, and the blade caught in the dirt with a weighty thunk. Sweat beaded on his upper lip, and he licked it away.
He felt soft and small. Why couldn’t he look like the other men? Would he ever? He swung the scythe again, trying to fall into their rhythm, even as his shoulders protested. A man called Levi, nearest him, smiled encouragingly as he began to catch up. His jaw was well-defined, sweat catching in the coarseness of his dark beard, the sun setting him gleaming like polished topaz.
Judas swung the scythe again, but he was still off-time. Levi glanced over at him and then tapped his own lips before pointing to Judas.
A heavy blush spilled over his face, and he became hyper-aware of the oppressive heat. He swung again, and caught the blade in dirt.
“Sing,” Levi told him, swinging the scythe, taller than Judas, with practiced ease. “It helps.” He hummed the melody loudly until Judas caught on, and then went back to singing.
Judas hummed, swinging his scythe on the downbeat. He stepped forward, two three , wound up, four , and swung again, one . And repeated. The motion flowed smoother, his swing’s follow-through leading fluidly into his two-step forward movement. He grinned, and Levi grinned back. He was missing an incisor, Judas noticed.
He didn’t know the words to the song yet, but he was sure now he’d catch on.
And now he was resting. After his first day in the field. Wasn’t he?
Judas was thirteen.
No he wasn’t.
He was in his father’s home.
No he wasn’t.
He was sick. That much was true.
Sand shifted, and somebody stood silhouetted in the entrance of the tent.
“Dad?” Judas asked, blinking sweat out of his eyes.
A sharp intake of breath. “No,” the man said, dropping his gaze off to the side. The setting sun cut sharp across his cheek, and after a moment Judas recognized Peter. Somebody else stepped up beside him. “Just me. Yeshua is here, too.”
Judas startled and tried to push himself upright, but the blood rushed from his head and he got stuck halfway, propped up on an elbow.
“Peace,” Yeshua said, and crouched by his side. People had done that all day. It made Judas uncomfortable -- like he was some strangely fixed point, stuck in a way he didn’t understand. People came and went, left him and moved around him. He laid still, marking time, and the world turned around him. Dizzying. “How do you feel?”
Peter left, but Judas heard him pause just outside, hovering anxiously. “Bad,” Judas managed, looking anywhere but at Yeshua. He crossed his arms over his chest and belly, uncomfortable with his own near-nakedness. “Shaky. Dizzy. Awful.”
Yeshua hummed and stroked Judas’s hair back from his forehead. Judas cringed at the way sweat slid slickly under his palm -- he must feel clammy and disgusting. “Peter thought you were sun-sick. Among other things. He did a very good job taking care of you. I’m sure you’re going to be fine.” This last was spoken loud enough for it to carry to Peter, lurking outside, and Judas smiled as he heard the man move off at last, apparently reassured.
Yeshua stopped touching him briefly to reach for his bag. “Can you sit up?”
Judas shook his head, and groaned as the world tilted. “Not on my own.”
“That’s alright,” Yeshua said, and moved until he was sitting behind Judas. He gently eased Judas’s back off the ground and slotted his thigh into the narrow space, settling Judas’s head into his lap, propped at a high enough angle he could probably drink, but not so upright that his vision would go dark. Yeshua leaned over him to get at his bag again, the tender junction of his arm and shoulder passing close in front of Judas’s face.
Judas inhaled, tasting magnolias and the smooth backs of his teeth. “Sorry.”
“For what?” Yeshua asked, leaning back to look into his face. His tawny-brown skin casted gold where the light hit him.
Where the light touched him. Nothing hit him; raindrops caressed, winds stroked, sunbeams kissed. The world gentled for Yeshua.
“I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” Judas said, staring at the place Yeshua’s neck met his shoulder. He was sick out of his mind and dizzy and burning up inside, on fire everywhere Yeshua touched him. He was less man than starving dog, ready to launch himself mouth-first at the world: he wanted to sink his teeth deep into flesh and come away tasting blood, wanted to taste and lick and bite, wanted to bare his teeth and snap at anyone who dared approach what was his. The world gentled for Yeshua, with the exception of Judas, who wilds. “I think I’m dying.”
“You’re not dying,” Yeshua said kindly. “You’re just hungry.”
Judas choked on another wave of nausea at the thought of eating. “I’m not. I’m sick. I’m dying. I won’t -- I can’t keep anything down.”
“You can,” Yeshua said, with such certainty that Judas believed, too. “Open your mouth.”
Judas obeyed, keeping his eyes on Yeshua’s face as a small bottle was lifted to his lips. After a moment, thick, floral sweetness filled his mouth. Honey. He swallowed.
“Good,” Yeshua said, patting his cheek. Judas closed his eyes.
A few minutes passed while Yeshua searched through his bag. Canvas rustled. People moved outside the tent, sand shifting underfoot. Fire crackled, and there was a swell of distant laughter. Finally, a crisp, wet noise Judas couldn’t place.
He cracked an eyelid and watched Yeshua dip an uneven sliver of apple into the honey. He raised it to Judas’s lips, and Judas took it gladly. Half the apple went by before Yeshua handed him a waterskin. He drank desperately until Yeshua clicked his tongue and took it away.
“Careful. Too much too quickly and you’ll get shaky again,” Yeshua said, offering up a handful of shelled almonds. Judas took them, noting with surprise that his hands had indeed steadied. He sighed in relief, tilting his head back into Yeshua’s lap. Yeshua rearranged, supporting his neck, carding his fingers through Judas’s curls.
“Thank you,” Judas said, cautiously flexing his ankles, testing his tenuous wellness. He was steadier and the world had stopped tilting around him. His nausea was fading, quickly being replaced by a surprisingly deep hunger. His stomach growled as he thought it, and he shared a sheepish smile with Yeshua.
“Just hungry,” Yeshua said again, patting Judas’s hand where it rested over his belly. “Get dressed. It’s going to be cool soon.”
Judas scrambled to obey, still a touch light-headed, embarrassed again by his nearly-forgotten nakedness. As he pulled his kethoneth over his head, blushing, Yeshua cleared his throat.
“Yes?” Judas asked, trying to sound like himself as he pulled on his cloak.
“Remember M'lakhim, ” Yeshua said softly, and Judas ducked his head. Had he-- broken a rule? Done something wrong?
“You’re not in trouble,” Yeshua said, perceptive as always, catching Judas’s hand. “Just -- do you remember what the angel says to Elisha? After he flees into the wilderness.”
Judas shook his head, his palm burning.
Yeshua smiled. “‘Arise and eat; because the journey is too great for thee.’ Do you understand?”
Judas nodded, and then, after a beat, shook his head again. “Are you saying I’m -- too weak to be here?”
“No.” Yeshua squeezed his hand. “I’m saying it’s important you take care of yourself. No matter how good it might feel in the moment to give your food and drink to the needy.” Yeshua gave him a knowing look.
“I didn’t know you knew.” Judas looked at their intertwined hands. If feeding some poor leper starving in the street meant he went without for a meal or two, so be it. And if the number of needy following their rag-tag little band around grew to the point where there was always somebody who could use the food more than Judas, well, he had a strong will. He could handle hunger. At least he thought he could.
“You’re subtle about it,” Yeshua acknowledged, “but you’re also getting thin. Easy to put two and two together. I commend your kindness. But remember to be kind to yourself, too. Love given, even to yourself, is multiplicative. Yes?”
“I understand, teacher,” Judas said, and stared at his feet.
Yeshua stood and clapped his palms to Judas’s cheeks. “Sometimes I am convinced you are the best of us,” he said, and pressed a fraternal kiss to Judas’s forehead. “Now go find Peter and thank him for looking after you. He was very worried.”
Face burning, contact-high and flush, stepping into the gold of an Israeli sunset, Judas obeyed.