Chapter Three: The Voice Among the Lilies
The days in Jerusalem began to flow together like poured oil, smooth and glistening, yet heavy with meaning. Makeda walked through Solomon's palace as through a living parable—every pillar, tapestry, and harp string whispering things she did not yet fully understand. She had come as a daughter of the south, bearing spices and questions, but she was awakening to something deeper than curiosity: a quiet, insistent call in her spirit that would not let her remain the woman she had been before.
One afternoon, as the heat of the sun pressed gently on the city's stones, Solomon took her hand and led her beyond the familiar gardens to a more secluded place. There, lilies rose from the earth in clusters, their white petals luminous against the deep green leaves.
"This," he said, "is where I come when I seek the voice of the Holy One."
His words fell softly, but they carried weight. Makeda stood still, the scent of lilies wrapping around her like incense. She had worshiped under the open skies of Sheba, calling upon God with the names her fathers had taught her, but here, in this quiet corner of Israel, the Holy One felt startlingly near.
"Your God," she began, her voice low, "He is not unknown to my people. We have seen His works in the rains that come unbidden and the harvests that rise from dry earth. But here, I feel not only His power, but His closeness."
Solomon nodded, his eyes thoughtful. "He is the same God who stretched out the heavens over Cush and Sheba," he replied. "Here, we know Him by the covenant He gave our fathers. Yet His love is no respecter of borders." The word "Cush" stirred something deep in her—a reminder that the land south of Egypt, with its tall, dark-skinned people, was not forgotten in the mind of God.
That night, Makeda lay awake, listening to the distant songs of Levites in the temple courts. Their voices rose and fell like waves, singing of a God who drew Israel from bondage and called them His own. She thought of her own people, of their long journeys and old stories, and wondered if this God was now calling her by name. A strange trembling filled her, not of fear, but of recognition—as though the One she had sought in the wind and stars had stepped into the light and spoken plainly at last.
In the days that followed, her love for Solomon and her awakening hunger for God became threads of the same tapestry. When Solomon whispered to her, calling her "fair among women" and likening her presence to a garden locked and a spring sealed, she heard in his praise something more than human desire. She sensed a reflection of the Holy One's own delight in His beloved people, a love that saw beyond dust and distance, beyond skin burned dark by the sun, to the soul clothed in grace.
Yet the awakening of her spirit brought unrest as well. Alone in her chamber, Makeda wrestled with questions too large for sleep. "Who am I," she whispered into the dark, "that a king should love me and that the God of Israel should draw near?"
The words of the Song came back to her—the words she had heard on Solomon's lips: of seeking the beloved through the streets, of being lovesick for a voice that sometimes seemed to withdraw only to be sought more earnestly. In those verses, she recognized her own heart, wandering the alleys of doubt in search of a Presence just beyond sight.
One evening, overcome with longing, she slipped from her room and walked alone through the palace corridors into the outer courts. The stars hung over Jerusalem like jeweled lamps, and the air carried the faint aroma of burnt offerings from the temple mount. She drew closer until she could see the altar from a distance, the priests moving like pale shadows in the torchlight. There, as she watched smoke rise heavenward, something within her broke open. She felt the weight of all her years, all her sins and silences, all the times she had doubted that she was more than her beauty or her foreignness.
"Holy One," she murmured, her knees trembling. "If You see me—if You know me as You know these people—then show me who I am in Your eyes. Not as Sheba sees me, not as Jerusalem sees me, not even as Solomon sees me, but as You see." The words left her lips like a breath she had been holding all her life. For a moment, there was only stillness. Then, in the quiet, she felt a peace descend upon her, deeper than any she had known—not the peace of answered questions, but of being fully seen and not turned away. When she returned to the gardens, Solomon was waiting. His expression was gentle yet searching.
"You have been near the temple," he said. "The fragrance of the altar clings to you." She nodded, her eyes bright with unshed tears.
"I went seeking your God," she replied. "I asked Him if there is a place for one such as me among His beloved." Solomon stepped closer, lifting her chin until their eyes met. "He answered long before you asked," he said softly. "When you were still beneath the sun of your homeland, He wrote your name into His song."
Makeda closed her eyes, and in her mind, the verses of love that Solomon had spoken took on new meaning. No longer were they merely the words of a man for a woman; they became the echo of the Holy One's own heart—a God who called His people fair even when they saw only their own darkness, who delighted in them as a groom delights in a bride. In that realization, her soul bowed low. She was not only the beloved of a king; she was a woman pursued by God. From that day, her steps in Jerusalem changed. She still smiled at Solomon's tenderness and thrilled at his nearness, but her gaze lifted more often toward the temple hill, where smoke rose like unspoken prayers. Love for the king no longer consumed her; it led her upward, toward the One who had fashioned both their hearts and written their story before dust had ever formed into man.
Her spiritual awakening did not pull her from Solomon—it deepened her love, purifying it, making it less possessive and more like worship. She began to understand that true love, whether human or divine, was not a chain but a door. And somewhere beyond the gates of Jerusalem, where caravans still moved between Israel and the lands of Cush and Sheba, a new story was already taking shape—the story of a black woman who had discovered that the God of Israel was not the God of Israel only.
One day, she would carry this song back to the south, her heart a living scroll, her life a testimony that the Holy One's love reached as far as the ends of the earth.