You, your sons, and your servants are to work the ground for him, and you are to bring in the crops so your master’s grandson will have food to eat. But Mephibosheth, your master’s grandson, is always to eat at my table.” Now Ziba had 15 sons and 20 servants.

When David saw that his servants were whispering to each other, he guessed that the baby was dead. So he asked his servants, “Is the baby dead?”

“He is dead,” they replied.

Then Absalom said to his servants, “See, Joab has a field right next to mine, and he has barley there. Go and set fire to it!” So Absalom’s servants set the field on fire.

The king’s servants said to him, “Whatever my lord the king decides, we are your servants.”

Then he went to the king and said, “Your servant has just hired sheepshearers. Will the king and his servants please come with your servant?”

while all his servants marched past him. Then all the Cherethites, the Pelethites, and the Gittites—600 men who came with him from Gath—marched past the king.

Absalom’s servants came to the woman at the house and asked, “Where are Ahimaaz and Jonathan?”

“They passed by toward the water,” the woman replied to them. The men searched but did not find them, so they returned to Jerusalem.

So he won over all the men of Judah, and they sent word to the king: “Come back, you and all your servants.”

There were 1,000 men from Benjamin with him. Ziba, an attendant from the house of Saul, with his 15 sons and 20 servants also rushed down to the Jordan ahead of the king.

Then David summoned one of his servants and said, “Come here and kill him!” The servant struck him, and he died.