Chapter Two: The Child and the Letter
I did not know at first. Women learn to read their bodies the way scribes read scrolls—line by line, sign by sign, each mark a quiet revelation. Still, I tried not to see the signs when they came. I tried to fold my suspicion into the corner of my mind, to pretend the rhythm of my body would right itself with time. But truth has a way of insisting on being born. It was early morning when the world first shifted. I was kneading dough, pressing the heel of my hand into the soft mound, when a sudden wave of nausea rose like a tide from the pit of my stomach. I gripped the edge of the table, breathing through the dizziness, cold sweat beading along my hairline. Not now, I thought. Not this.
My hands trembled as I washed them, the water turning lukewarm under my fingertips. I stood still for several breaths. Something in me already knew. I counted the days backward, lips moving silently. My knees weakened. I sank onto a stool, pressing a hand against my abdomen—the small, flat space beneath my ribs. It felt different. Silent, but different. The world seemed to narrow to a single point: I am with child. And not with Uriah's. I closed my eyes, and a sound slipped from my throat—an animal sound, raw and low. Not a cry. Not yet. Something earlier than grief, earlier than fear.
Something like disbelief cracking open inside me. I told no one. Not at first. I carried the knowledge as one carries a burning coal in cupped hands—unable to drop it, unable to hold it for long without pain. Every night I dreamed of him. Uriah walking through the gate, dusty from battle, his armor dented, his steps tired but eager. Uriah calling my name. Uriah lifting me into his arms with the strength that always surprised me. In these visions, I ran to him. Except now, in the dreams, I stopped before reaching him. A gulf opened between us—wider than the courtyard, wider than Jerusalem, wider than forgiveness could bridge. My breath stuck in my throat. My hands could not rise to greet him. He looked at me with confusion at first. Then pain. Then understanding. I woke each time with my heart pounding, sweat dampening my neck.
Weeks passed in suffocating quiet until messengers from the palace came again. I felt my stomach twist as soon as I saw them.
"The king requests your presence," one said.
Not a request. A summons. I followed them through the same corridors, my palms damp, my breath shallow.
David waited in a private chamber, his expression unreadable. When I told him, his eyes sharpened—not with tenderness, not with horror, but with calculation. A king does not think in terms of personal consequences. He thinks in terms of lineage, optics, war, alliances, risk. As soon as I spoke the words—I am with child—I saw the machinery of monarchy ignite behind his gaze. He paced. He muttered. He ran a hand through his hair. He cursed under his breath. But he did not ask how I felt.
He did not ask what I needed. Kings do not ask. Instead, he said,
"Uriah must come home."
And so, the messages were sent. Orders traveled faster than rumors, carried by riders trained to cross dry valleys without rest. I sat at home, hands clasped tightly in my lap, knowing that a chain of consequences had been set in motion and that I was the chain.
When Uriah arrived, the city buzzed with excitement. Soldiers spoke of his valor; neighbors whispered praise. He walked with the sure, steady step I knew so well. But I could not greet him at the gate. I could not trust my face to stay composed. I watched from the window as he approached the house. His shoulders filled the doorway. His eyes softened when he saw me—a gentleness that nearly broke me. He reached for me. I stepped back before he could touch my belly.
"Bathsheba?" he asked, concern knitting his brow.
"I—I am tired," I lied, turning away. "It has been a long day."
He studied me, puzzled, but he did not press. Uriah rarely pressed. His calmness cut deeper than anger might have. That night he did not come home.
By evening, messengers from the palace arrived for him. David had sent gifts—wine, delicacies, the king's own favor. The meaning was clear: Go home to your wife.
But Uriah did not come. I learned this when I woke in the night and found his mat still perfectly arranged, untouched. My breath caught. Where is he? Before dawn, before the city stirred, I wrapped my shawl around me and slipped out. The streets were cool and quiet. When I reached the palace gates, I saw him. Uriah. Sleeping on the ground among the servants and soldiers. His head rested on his folded cloak. His sword lay at his side. He looked peaceful, honorable, so painfully honorable. I approached quietly. The guards watched me, but none interfered. One whispered,
"He refused the king's order. Said he would not go to his house while his brothers remain in the open fields."
My heart was clenched. Of course he did. That was Uriah—loyal beyond reason, righteous even when righteousness cost him comfort. His refusal was a shield. But it was also a sentence. I felt something cold settle inside me. A premonition. A chill of what David might do next.
The next day, David tried again. He summoned Uriah to dine with him, poured wine for him, spoke jovially, and urged him toward home. But Uriah left the palace and slept once more at the gate. When words of this reached me, I felt a strange mix of pride and despair. Pride: because my husband was a man of principle. Despair: because principle is a dangerous thing around a cornered king.
That night, I sat alone in our house, listening to the wind brush against the roof tiles. My stomach fluttered—the child reminding me of the future unfolding inside me, a future built on deception and dread. I pressed my palm against my abdomen.
"I am sorry," I whispered.
To Uriah.
To the child.
To myself.
The next morning, Uriah came home briefly, gathering his gear. He told me the king had ordered him back to the battlefield.
"But you only just arrived," I said, trying to steady my voice.
His eyes softened. "The king has his reasons."
He turned away, adjusting the strap on his satchel. A small, sealed scroll slipped from his pack onto the table. I reached for it without thinking, recognizing the mark of the king.
"What is this?" I asked.
"Orders for Joab," he replied simply. "I am to deliver it."
The room spun around me.
"Have you read it?"
He looked at me with quiet surprise.
"It is not my place to read the king's seal."
Of course not. Uriah's innocence was a blade that sliced cleanly through the fog of deceit. He trusted too deeply. He believed too fiercely. And in that belief, he was blind to the danger he carried in his own hands. I touched the scroll, feeling its weight, the weight of something unseen, something sharp-edged, something final. A dread settled in me that felt like a stone sinking in water.
Uriah kissed my forehead before he left. A small, tender gesture.
"I will return soon," he promised.
The words splintered inside me. I could not speak. I could not breathe. I watched him walk away, the sealed letter tucked securely in his hand, unaware that he carried death folded into wax. I knew in my bones—without seeing, without hearing, without reading—the truth: David would not allow the child to be born with the shadow of scandal hanging above his throne. And Uriah was in the way.
Days passed in a haze of silence. Each dawn brought new prayers I could not form. Each dusk brought fears I could not soothe. Then one afternoon, I heard hurried footsteps outside my door. A breathless murmur. A wail from a neighbor. And then—the knock. When I opened the door, Joab's messenger stood there, dust thick on his sandals, his eyes avoiding mine.
"I bring news from the battlefield," he said.
My heart seized.
"Uriah the Hittite…" He swallowed hard. "He is dead."
The world went soundless.
I stared at him, unable to comprehend the shape of the words. They floated around me like ash. Then their meaning struck with full force.
No!
No!
No!
A sound tore from my chest—raw, enormous, shattering. I fell to my knees. My palms hit the floor. My hair spilled around me like a shroud. The wail that rose from my body was not human. It was ancient. It came from the marrow of widows and barren women and mothers who bury sons. It shook the walls. It crawled across the floor. It pierced heaven. I pressed my forehead to the ground and screamed until my voice broke. My grief swallowed the room. But grief was not alone.
Inside it, curling like bitter smoke, was disgust—at myself, at the king, at the silence that had trapped me, at the lie that had grown inside my womb like a seed watered by sorrow.
I wept for Uriah.
I wept for the child.
I wept for the woman I had once been.
And the palace walls, though far away, seemed to lean closer—as though they were listening, waiting, already preparing to claim what was left of me.