“Come on, Ethan, use your strength,” his father encouraged. “Pull harder!”

Ethan grunted, wishing there were something more fun to do than adjust the tent after last night’s sandstorm. Two weeks had passed since Moses’ climb up the mountain, and the whole camp seemed to be marking time with busywork, anxiously waiting to see whether the Israelite leader would return.

Ethan gritted his teeth, dug his heels into the sandy ground, and tugged at the goatskin strap as hard as he could. The tent flap barely budged. A trickle of sweat rolled down his forehead and into his eye.

The tent peg was right there. If he could just . . . stretch . . . the flap . . . a little . . . farther . . .

The muscles in his arms quivered, begging him to stop. He relaxed just for a second and then yanked backward with a loud “Aaauuuggghhh!”

The back of his hand brushed past the wooden ground peg. He fumbled to get the strap around it. Once, twice, three times he wrapped the strap around the peg and then tied it off with a double knot, just as his father had shown him.

“How’s that?” Ethan panted, looking up.

His father knelt next to the tent peg and gave the strap a couple of hard tugs. “No sandstorm is going to blow this knot apart,” he said with a smile.

A warm feeling grew in Ethan’s chest. “Now all we need to do is clear out the sand that blew in last night,” he said. He expected a surprised look from his father and got it. Ethan volunteered to do extra work about as often as he asked for second helpings of manna —which was almost never. But today was different. Today his father had given him a man’s job to do —busywork or not —and Ethan had done it. He tried to stop himself from grinning, but he couldn’t.

His father looked at him and then started to grin too. “If you’re that anxious to work, you can help me find a piece of wood to use for a new tent peg, something we can carve into a point.” He paused and looked at the tent. “But let’s get some water first. I think you’ve earned it.”

Ethan jumped to get the pitcher, but his father stopped him. “Stay there —I’ll get it.” It was Ethan’s turn to be surprised. His father fetched water about as often as Ethan volunteered for extra work.

“You have a lot of strength, Ethan,” his father called from inside the tent. Ethan looked down at his arms. He’d always thought they were scrawny, but the more he looked at them now, the more muscular they seemed.

His father returned with a clay pitcher and a cup made from a hollowed-out piece of driftwood, a souvenir from the Red Sea. He poured water into the cup and handed it to Ethan. Ethan wanted to gulp it down as quickly as he could, but instead he sipped it slowly, the way his father did.

“Your strength isn’t all in your arms, though,” his father continued. “It’s here.” He touched Ethan’s forehead. “And here.” He pointed to Ethan’s heart. “Moses has been on the mountain for two weeks now, and people are starting to get restless. Some might try to tell you what to think or do. Don’t let them. Use the strength inside you to resist them.”

Ethan nodded his head —not because he understood exactly what his father was saying, but because he knew it was the response his father wanted.

“The only guidance you need is the Lord’s commands,” his father finished.

Ethan stiffened. He knew “the Lord’s commands” was a fancy way of referring to the rules that made him feel like a slave. But this time he resisted the urge to roll his eyes and sigh. If his father was going to treat him like a young man, the least Ethan could do was act like one.

“I need to tell you something.” The words were out of Ethan’s mouth before he knew they were coming.

“What’s that?” his father asked.

I’m tired of doing what other people tell me to do, so Melki and I are going to climb up Mount Sinai, even though Moses said not to. I’m going to sneak out of our tent some night and meet Melki at the boundary marker. Then the two of us are going to follow the path up the mountain until we get high enough to see the lightning.

Those were the words that were coming. Ethan could feel them.

Melki’s going to kill me, he thought.

“Melki and I —” Ethan started.

“Father! Father!” Leah came running around the side of the tent. Her face was red, and she had little beads of perspiration on her upper lip. She struggled to spit out her message between gasps of breath. “Elizah the Judge . . . sent me to find you. . . . He said there’s going to be . . . trouble at the boundary marker. . . . He wants you . . . to meet him there.”

Ethan jumped to his feet. Trouble at the boundary marker? It had to be Melki. I’ll bet he tried to climb the mountain without me and got caught, Ethan thought.

His father handed the clay pitcher to Leah and then hurried off toward Mount Sinai without a word. Leah gave Ethan an excited smile and said, “I feel so honored. Elizah said he was giving me the message because he knew I could be trusted to deliver it.”

Ethan snorted but didn’t bother coming up with a reply. All he could think of was Melki being held prisoner by a mob of angry Israelites.

He shoved his water cup into Leah’s hand. “Hold this,” he said. “I’ve got to get to the boundary marker.”

He jogged after his father —not fast enough to catch up with him, but fast enough to keep him in sight. He was afraid that if his father saw him, he’d send him home. And Ethan had to know what was happening at the foot of Mount Sinai.

“Don’t get in trouble!” Leah called out behind him.

Don’t tell me what to do, Ethan thought. You’re not my master.

Keeping one eye on his father and one on the mountain, he made his way through camp. As he’d done for two weeks, he studied each cliff and rock for a sign of Moses. As always, he saw nothing. Dark gray clouds still covered the peak; thunder still rumbled, growing louder as he got closer.

The scene at the foot of Mount Sinai was not what he’d expected. There was no angry mob holding Melki, or anyone else, prisoner —just a group of about forty men talking in low voices. Some looked excited, as though they couldn’t wait for whatever was about to happen. Others looked angry.

Ethan saw his father talking to a couple of men who had scowls on their faces. One was a small, white-haired man who kept pointing to the mountain with one hand and shaking his fist with the other. Must be Elizah the Judge, Ethan decided. His father was nodding in agreement with whatever the old man was saying.

Ethan crept forward as far as he dared, being careful to stay behind large rocks as he moved. Just as he got close enough to hear what the men were saying, they all stopped talking.

His eyes widened. They spotted me! he thought. Flattening his body against a rock, he tried to will himself to become invisible.

“Men of Israel,” a voice boomed out, “I stand before you today with unpleasant news.”

Ethan peeked around the rock and breathed a sigh of relief when he saw that no one was looking at him. Instead, all had turned their attention to the speaker, a tall man in a fancy blue robe who was standing next to the boundary marker.

Ethan noticed the man’s clean-shaven face. Uh-oh, he’s an Egyptianite, Ethan thought. Father’s definitely not going to like him. “Egyptianite” was the name Ethan’s father used to describe Israelites who he thought tried to look and act like Egyptians.

“It’s time to choose a new leader!” the man continued. “Moses has been on the mountain for over two weeks now —and for what? More rules? We have more than enough rules already! What we need is food and drink —and the land that was promised to us!”

Ethan gasped and then held his breath. He’s reading my mind! he thought.

“Moses speaks for the Lord,” called a voice from the crowd. “He is our leader.” Ethan couldn’t tell who had spoken, but from the way people turned toward the white-haired man, he assumed it had been Elizah.

The blue-robed man next to the boundary seemed to expect that response. “How do we know Moses speaks for the Lord?” he asked. “We all heard the same sound when the cloud came down the mountain, but only Moses understood it. Or should I say, only Moses pretended to understand it.”

Pretended to understand?

Ethan blinked, trying to make sense of the words. Was that what had happened? Was Moses . . . a fake?

But if Moses was only pretending to understand what the Lord was saying, how could he know for sure where to lead the Israelites? Ethan looked down at the dry desert sand. Maybe this isn’t where we’re supposed to be. That thought made his stomach seem to fall, fast. All of a sudden he felt very lost.

Hey, wait a minute! he thought. If Moses isn’t really speaking for the Lord, then the laws he gave us weren’t really from God. If they weren’t from God, there’s no reason to follow them. That would mean I’ve been a slave to rules for nothing! I’m free to do whatever I want!

Lightning lit up the sky overhead. What if he’s right? Ethan thought as he watched the man talk.

“The laws Moses has given us make no sense,” the man was telling the crowd. “He has us scared of this mountain for no reason. Nothing is going to happen if we cross this boundary line.”

The man took a step toward the mountain. Ethan watched, open-mouthed. From where he stood, the man appeared to be no more than a few inches away from the boundary line.

“Do not cross that boundary, Jeru!” This time Ethan saw that it was Elizah who spoke. “The Lord has given us His commands, and we will obey. If you cross that line, you will be stoned to death.” The tone of the judge’s voice made it clear that he wasn’t bluffing.

Jeru’s eyebrows rose. He turned slowly back to the crowd and glanced at a group of men on his left. They gave him some kind of hand signal that Ethan couldn’t see very well. Jeru nodded and then turned to where Elizah and Ethan’s father were standing.

“You are a respected elder, Elizah,” Jeru said with a smile that made Ethan think he didn’t really mean it. “So I will honor your request today. But since you are one of the leaders of our people, I will ask you to consider what I have said.”

Elizah said nothing. Ethan couldn’t see the old man’s face, but he could picture the judge staring angrily at Jeru. The Egyptianite stared back for a moment or two and then threw up his hands and walked away with six or seven men from the crowd. The rest of the group watched in silence before starting home themselves.

Ethan leaned back against the stone, his mind racing. What if Jeru is right? Are we following rules we don’t have to? Would the men really have stoned Jeru to death just for crossing the boundary line?

Ethan heard footsteps approaching and hunkered down. “This is just the first battle, Amon,” Elizah said on the other side of the rock. Ethan peered out just in time to see his father and the judge walk past. “I’m afraid things are only going to get worse around here until Moses returns.”

You mean if he returns, Ethan thought.

He watched as his father walked toward the camp. The back of his tunic was soaked with sweat, probably from running to meet Elizah.

In his hand, his father held a large, round rock.

When Ethan realized what the rock had been meant for, he shivered.