Tamar was appalled when I confessed it to her.

"Of all things? Of all men?" She started, nearly dropping the oil she was holding. I felt a scowl form on my face as she began to laugh. As she regained her composure, looking like a wrinkled old sow wheezing in the hot summer sun, she grabbed one of the tent's beams for balance. "You covet that?"

I stared defiantly back at her through my looking glass's reflection. "Yes." I stated firmly.

"Well, girl," She shook her head before spanking some of the oil out onto her meaty hands, and then began to stroke my slim shoulders. "I just don't comprehend you. You could have any man you desire, and yet you seek the one who's dedicated himself to Yahweh."

Reluctantly I leaned into her massaging. I knew what she said was true, as much as I detested it. And for maybe the thousandth time that hour, I considered Johanan again. He was indeed an odd choice for my fascination. His long face, rendered gaunt by a life of an Essene's strictness, held a large nose that had been broken many times by my stepfather's angry soldiers. Looking into his dusky eyes, which were flanked by even darker lashes, was like gazing into a great abyss. And for a fair reason, I supposed, as a prophet, he must have beheld so many things! And not just bloodshed, like most men that stood before me, who had been so hardened by violence that there was nothing left to them but their chiselled flesh. But it was Johanan's lips that most haunted me, full and pink, and set in a look of disapproval as he gazed upon my family, but still somehow begging to be kissed by my own.

But my hunger was one-sided. He only beheld me with a queer mix of pity and contempt, like a parent might a naughty child. He perceived something profound about me, something I had not even discovered myself. He knew, and furthermore, he did not like it. It wasn't disdain he felt for me, more of a detached sympathy. When I peeked at him from behind my stepfather's throne, he stared past me, uninterested. Other men ogled my almah form, salivating like dogs before dripping meat on a spit, but Johanan was different. Even when seized by Herod's soldiers, his face shone with a benevolence I wished to have radiant upon me. Oh, to connect the dots which freckled his tanned skin, to trace the musculature of his lithe form!

But no. He would not comprehend me. As a prophet, he was concerned only with the divine, and was uninterested in any-thing I had to offer him as a mere mortal woman.

I felt anger rise up within me. I shrugged Tamar's hands off and rose to my feet.

"Where are you going?" She asked after me.

"You already know," I responded coolly.