If you listen closely, sometimes you can still hear the old stories whispered. Legends about Trnava and the people who lived there, about the great forests that once surrounded the town. There are tales of red-haired mountain men and women who could work miracles, of a people who could trace their lineage all the way back to the great King Solomon himself. Tales of a people who kept to themselves, who lived in a tiny quarter of the city of Trnava where they built their own house of worship. They say that on the ceiling of their synagogue there were a thousand tiny stars.
There are stories told that the congregants who worshiped in the synagogue could work miracles; that the oldest among them could fly cloud dragons in the sky. It is said that when the Black Mist spread over the kingdom of Hungary, these people were the only ones who fought and didn’t flee.
But the real story is much more complicated than that. It is the story of a people who forever lived at the edge of others’ kindness and yet still found a way to thrive. It is the story of a family that survived, and of three girls who, when faced with unimaginable tragedy and impossible odds, did what they had to do even though it wasn’t what was expected of them.
Some say they were just an ordinary family who lived in an extraordinary time.
But I know the truth.
This is the story of the Black Mist which swept through the Carpathian Mountains on the wings of a black dragon. Some say they can still feel it when they touch the trees, in the rich black sap that runs down to the roots to the rot that’s buried under the ground. Despite the beauty of the trees and the crystal-clear waters of the lakes and the incessant babble of the rivers and streams, the mist still carries its echo. The animals feel it in their bones.
It could return at any moment.
Once, Trnava was a village like any other village. It was made up of brick houses, a town square, large wooden churches, a small synagogue, a fortified wall that surrounded the town, and a river, named the Trnávka for all the thorny bushes that lined its banks. Once, there were three different forests around the town of Trnava: the ?enkvicky wood, the Král’ovsky wood, and the ancient Satu Mare which once stretched all the way through the Kingdom of Hungary until it reached the Sinca Veche forest, right on the border of Wallachia. Strange things happened in these forests, things that nobody liked to talk about, but everyone did. There was a saying that was popular in the region once, and some still whisper it, even today. “Do not speak of the forest, for it will remember your name.”
But that is another story, for a different day.
Sarah
It’s just after sunset. I can still see the bare oak branches, black against the deepening blue of sky, that make up the forest beyond Trnava’s wall. Eema takes a coin out from her pocket and clears her throat. “Girls, candle lighting,” she says. I look away from the window and my heart skips a beat. It’s time.
Eema kisses the coin and says the word “esh,” and to me, it seems like the word crackles and hisses like flame. She puts the coin in the box that sits on the windowsill. Then she transfers fire from her lips to her fingertips, then to the wick of the candle that sits atop her silver candlesticks. “The soul of man is a lamp in the darkness,” she says as I watch the flames she sets on the windowsill—a sign in our window for all those who are lost and weary, and I hear the echo of my father’s voice in my head, the benediction he says over each of our heads on Friday nights—“Only light can hold back darkness. We are the children of Solomon, children of the light.”
Every week, I stare in awe at how my mother does it. She weaves a prayer of words in the air and turns the strands she weaves into fire in the same way my father manipulates air. Eema lights a candle and suddenly everything is brighter. Abba raises his hands to the sky and the clouds lift and clear. “This is the law of Solomon,” Eema chants. “Man and woman, ish and isha: without the yud and the heh, they are esh—fire.” She places a coin in my hand. “Here,” she says. “Now it’s your turn.” The coin is warm—like her hand, like the fire.
It’s my turn. I’ve waited a long time for this moment. I am twelve now, a bat mitzvah, a daughter of Solomon, blessed by his commandments. I am a part of it now. A part of everything. A wielder of the flame of Solomon— like my father and mother and grandmother and all those before me leading back all the way to the great King Solomon himself. I hold the coin in one hand and twist a dark red curl around one of the fingers of my other hand.
Eema opens a small prayer book and hands it to me. She doesn’t need it—she knows the prayers by heart. I’ve been mouthing the words along with my mother and Nagmama and older sister Hannah as they said them together each week. This is the first step. The beginning of my journey into the world of my ancestors. There is so much I have yet to learn.