“Content?” Sharur had, so far as he was able, been holding in his temper in the presence of the Alashkurrut and their gods. Now, for the first time since he’d entered the mountains, it escaped him altogether. “Content?” His voice rose to a shout. “No, I am not content! I have fine goods to trade here, and no one will trade with me. I am going to face a loss, not a profit, because no one here will trade with me. Your gods have the foolish notion—your gods have the stupid notion—I have some sort of a disease of the spirit, and that I am liable to give it to you, and so they will let no one trade with me. I shall not have the bride-price for the woman I want, the woman who wants me, because no one will trade with me. And you ask if I am content? Would you be content, standing where I stand?”
He was dimly aware of the donkey handlers and caravan guards staring at him while he raged. What gossip they would have when they got back to Gibil! Most of his attention, though, centered on Abzuwas the smith, who, he had thought, was more like a Gibli than any other man of Alashkurru.
“If the gods made it plain to me they did not want me to trade, I would not trade,” Abzuwas answered. “The gods have made it plain to me they do not want me to trade, and I will not trade. Whether they are right, whether they are wrong, they are the gods. They are too strong to fight. I will not fight them.”
He was like a Gibli: he had come so far out from under the rule of his gods that he could see they might be wrong. And he was not like a Gibli: he accepted their rule nonetheless, on account of their strength, and did not seek to work around that strength with such strength as he and his fellow men possessed. Sharur did not know what to make of him, how to reckon him.
“What should I do?” Sharur asked the question at least as much of himself as of Abzuwas.
Abzuwas answered it nonetheless: “Go home to Gibil, Sharur son of Ereshguna. You cannot profit on every journey. In your heart, you must know this is so. If you do not earn the woman’s bride-price here, perhaps you will find another way of getting it. You Giblut are clever in such things, as in so many others.”
I cannot, not in this, Sharur thought. Kilt he had not fully shared his reasons for concern even with bis own father, even with Ningal his intended, and he would not take them up with a foreign smith, even with a sympathetic foreign smith.
Harharu came up to him. The donkeymaster chose his words with great and obvious care: “Master merchant’s son, if Abzuwas son of Ahhiyawas will not trade with us, no Alashkurri will trade with us. Is this the truth, or is it a lie?”
“It is the truth,” Sharur said dully.
“If none of the Alashkurrut will trade with us, do we not waste your substance, do we not waste your father’s substance, by persisting in this land where the gods hate us and the men obey the gods?”
“We do,” Sharur admitted, dully still. He let out a long sigh. “I understand your words, donkeymaster, however much my heart rebels within me at yielding to them. But you are right. Abzuwas is right, or partly right. We have failed here. We shall go home to Gibil.” He pretended not to hear the muffled cheers that rose from his followers.
The caravan had no trouble leaving the mountains. The Alashkurrut were willing enough to trade food for Sharur’s trinkets, even if they would engage in no commerce that meant anything. No bands of raiders, no wanax’s guardsmen (these two groups sometimes being difficult—sometimes being impossible—to distinguislu^ne from the other) beset him or tried to rob him of the swords and wine and medicines for which the Alashkurri great men refused to bargain.
That puzzled Sharur as much as it relieved him. The Alashkurrut sometimes plundered caravans for the sport of it, even when their gods were not ill-inclined toward the foreign merchants in their land. If their gods hated him so, if their gods hated all men of Gibil so, why not seek to wipe him from the face of the earth?
He pondered that as day followed day and bandits continued to stay far away from his donkeys. Nor was he the only one pondering it. As the caravan encamped one evening, Mushezib came up to him and said, “Why are they leaving us alone, master merchant’s son?” He sounded aggrieved at losing the chance to fight.
By then Sharur had devised an answer that, if not provably true like a question of arithmetic, at least helped him toward understanding this strange part of the world. “Guard captain, we know the gods here hate us.”
Mushezib nodded emphatically. “All the more reason for wanting to be rid of us by hook or by crook, wouldn’t you say?” W
“They want to be rid of us, yes,” Sharur said, “but I think they fear us too much to try to slay us or despoil us. Perhaps they are afraid of what our ghosts might do if we were murdered in this country. Perhaps they are afraid of what the living men of Gibil might do if we were murdered in this country. So long as we are willing to leave their land, they seem willing to let us leave in peace.”
“Gibil is a long way off, and is only one city,” Mushezib said. “How could the living men of Gibil hope to avenge us against Alashkurri bandits?”
“Against Alashkurri bandits, I do not think they could hope to avenge us,” Sharur said. “Against Alashkurri gods, I think they might. The gods of Alashkurru fear the men of Alashkurru will slip out of their hands, as we Giblut have to some degree slipped out of the hands of Engibil.” He spoke softly as he made to his countryman the admission he would not make to the Imhursagut or Alashkurrut.
“How does that help the living men of Gibil avenge—?” Mushezib held up a hand. “Wait. I think I see. If many Giblut came here—”
Sharur nodded. “Just so, guard captain. Trading with us, talking with us, has already made many Alashkurrut much more like us than they were even a generation ago. If enough Giblut came and traded and talked, sooner or later a wanax would do what Huzziyas could not do, and would make himself into a lugal, a ruler in his own right. My guess is, the gods of the Alashkurrut believe that, if all the men of Gibil leave this land, if none has any reason to come here, Alashkurru shall remain forever as it has always been.”
Mushezib weighed that, then grunted. “Do you think they’re right?”
“What an interesting question,” Sharur said, and did not answer it. He thought the Alashkurri gods likely—almost certainly—wrong, but was not so rash as to say so where they could hear. “Shall we drink some beer, Mushezib?”
“That’s a good idea, master merchant’s son.” Mushezib always thought drinking some beer a good idea.
Two days later, in the valley dominated by the fortress-town of Danauwiyas, to the north of the valley of Zalpuwas (through which Sharur dared not go, not now), the caravan met that of the men of Imhursag, which it had left in the dust long before reaching the Alashkurru Mountains.
Sharur recognized the Imhursagut before they figured out who he was. He would have been angry at himself had it been the other way round. If a man from Gibil, a man who thought for himself, was not more alert than the Imhursagut, drunk with their god as they got drunk with wine, what point to being a Gibli?
Then he bethought himself that the caravan from Imhursag would have made a fine profit here in the mountains. He knew in his heart he would have made more even on the same shoddy Imhursaggi goods—if, that is, any of the Alashkurrut would have consented to deal with him. Since the Alashkurrut, as he had seen to his sorrow, would not deal with him under any circumstances ... what point to being a man of Gibil now?
“Pride.” Finding the answer, he spoke it aloud, and then addressed his companions: “Show pride, one and all. Do not let the Imhursagut know we are downhearted; do not act like slaves before them. Follow my lead in all I do. If the Imhursagut think we have done well here, it will confuse them. If they think we have made a profit here, it will confuse their god.”
Where nothing else might have served, that raised the caravan crew’s spirits. Putting one over on Enimhursag was sweeter to the Giblut than dates candied in honey, more satisfying than a great bowl of stewed lamb and lentils.
And so, by the time the men of Imhursag r
ealized the men and donkeys approaching them came from the city that was their hated rival, by the time they scurried around and readied themselves for a fight that might or might not come—by that time, Sharur and the caravan guards and the donkey handlers showed new life in their step, new cheer on their faces. Striding out ahead of them, Sharur marched confidently toward the Imhursaggi caravan.
An Imhursaggi came toward him, too: the same man with whom he had spoken on the road to Alashkurru. “Gibil and Imhursag are not at war. Engibil and Enimhursag are not at war,” Sharur said. “Let us by in peace. We shall let you by in peace. We are homeward-bound.”
The Imhursaggi cocked his head to one side, as if listening. Listening he was, to no voice Sharur could hear, to no voice Sharur cared to hear. Having learned the will of his god, he answered, “We shall let you go in peace. Go home to your city, Gibli; go home with your tail between your legs.”
“When I get home to Gibil, I shall thrust my tail between the legs of my Imhursaggi slave woman,” Sharur retorted. “Why do you mock me? Why do you insult me? May you make as much profit on your journey as I have made on mine.”
He knew how he meant that. He did not think the man of Imhursag would. He did not think Enimhursag would, either, when the god heard the words through the man’s ears. He proved right on both counts. Angrily, the Imhursaggi said, “Profit? How can you have made a profit?”
“Why do you ask? Don’t you know how yourself?” Sharur’s smile was easy, lazy, happy, as if he had just had the Imhursaggi slave. He knew how much effort holding that smile on his face required. By holding it there, he hoped to keep the man of Imhursag from seeing that effort.
And he succeeded. Swarthy though the Imhursaggi merchant was, he flushed angrily. “You cannot have made a profit in the Alashkurru Mountains!” he shouted. “You cannot! The gods of this country hate you. They know what Giblut are. They know what Giblut do.”
Sharur’s smile only got wider. With a shrug, he answered, “Enimhursag hates the men of Gibil, but we trade all through Kudurru, and make good profits. We do not trade with Enimhursag. We trade with men. We do not trade with the gods of this country, either. We trade with men.”
From dark and ruddy, the merchant of Imhursag went pale. He understood what Sharur was saying. Enimhursag understood what Sharur was saying, too. “You have made the Alashkurrut into Giblut—men who cheat the gods,” the merchant gasped.
“They will tell you otherwise,” Sharur said. “They will insist it is not so. They will deny they ever traded with me. They will sound as if you should believe them. But how will you know for certain whether they speak the truth?”
“You are worse than a demon of the desert places,” the Imhursaggi said, horror in his eyes—a horror that was a window into a place deeper and darker than the bottom of his own spirit, a window into all the fears Enimhursag felt. Putting the god of Imhursag in fear felt almost as good as making a profit would have done. Almost.
“We shall go by now,” Sharur said. “We shall go by in peace now. I told you once and now I tell you twice, man of Imhursag: may you profit here as I have profited here.” He wondered if Enimhursag would change his mind and order the Imhursagut to attack his men rather than letting them pass in peace. The merchant with whom he spoke evidently wondered the same thing, for he stood poised, his eyes far away, awaiting any orders his god might give. No orders came. The merchant slumped, ever so slightly. “We shall let you go by in peace. Go home to your city.”
As warily as they had west of the Yarmuk, the caravan from Gibil and that from Imhursag sidled past each other. The Imhursagut scowled frightful scowls at Sharur and his companions. At his command, his own guards and donkey handlers did their best to pretend the caravan crew from the other city did not exist. Not a word was said on either side.
Continuing east, back toward Kudurru, back toward Gibil, Sharur looked over his shoulder. Looking at him was the Imhursaggi merchant who led the other caravan. When their eyes met, the man of Imhursag flinched, as if from a blow. Quickly, he turned his gaze in another direction.
Sharur told his own caravan crew how he had confused both the Imhursaggi merchant and Enimhursag. His fellow Giblut laughed and cheered and clapped him on the back. Harharu said, “The only way the tale could be better, master merchant’s son, would be for our donkeys in truth to be heavily laden with copper and ore and the other goods of Alashkurru.”
“If the Alashkurrut were like us—if they truly were their own men first and took care of their gods to keep them quiet—we would be heavily laden with copper and ore and the other goods of Alashkurru,” Sharur said, from out of a strange place halfway between frustrated fury and amusement. “But they are not, worse luck. And so Enimhursag wins this game.” And so I lose it. That was even more to the point.
“But Enimhursag, stupid ugly blind fool of a god that he is, doesn’t even know he’s won,” Mushezib said with a scornful laugh. “He’s back there in his temple in Imhursag, hiding under the throne with his thumb in his mouth.”
Such cheerful blasphemy, aimed at a god Sharur despised above all others, was bracing as a draught of strong wine. And the guard captain was likely to be right; Enimhursag’s followers had been well and truly fooled, which meant, at such a remove from his own land, that their god was also almost sure to be well and truly fooled. That gave Sharur some consolation: some, but not enough.
As the caravan wound its way out of the mountains of Alashkurru toward the lower, flatter land to the east, eerie laughter floated down out of the sky. Sharur stared this way and that, but could not spy the demon.' Nevertheless, he shook his fist and cried out, “I curse you, Illuyankas demon of this land, by your name I curse you for mocking me. May you eat the bread of death for mocking me, Illuyankas demon of this land; may you drink the beer of dying. May your face turn pale, like a cut-down tamarisk, Illuyankas demon of this land; may your lips turn dark, like a bruised reed. May the gods smite you with the might of their land. I curse you, Illuyankas demon of this land, by your name I curse you for mocking me.”
Only silence after that, silence and the sound of the breeze sighing through saplings. “That is a strong curse, master merchant’s son,” Harharu said, “a strong curse, but one you shaped with care.”
Sharur nodded. “Yes. Not having seen Illuyankas, I cannot be certain that demon is the one whose laughter we heard. I would not lay a curse on a demon for something of which that demon is innocent. If Illuyankas was not the demon mocking us, the curse will not bite.”
As always, the herders who roamed the land beyond the reach of life-giving water from the Yarmuk and its lesser tributaries eyed the caravan as a hawk overhead eyed a shape on the ground, wondering whether it was a hare that would be easy to kill or a fox that would fight back. The guards carried their shields and their weapons and wore their helmets, suggesting that any of the wanderers who might attack would pay dearly.
The lean, fierce herders were persuaded. When they approached Sharur’s donkey train, it was to trade sheep and cattle for trinkets. “You will have nothing better for us than the scraps of your goods, not coming east from out of the mountains,” one of their leathery chieftains said. “It is always thus—the men of Kudurru gain more for their goods in the mountains than here, and more for the goods of the mountains in Kudurru than here. This leaves us with little but what we take for ourselves.” His eyes were bright and fierce and avid.
“If you try to rob us, what you will take for yourself and your kinsmen are wounds and sorrow,” Sharur said. Mushezib strutted by then, not quite by chance, looking as if even a hundred herdsmen might not be able to pull him down.
“It could be done,” the chieftain said. Sharur gestured with one hand, casually, as if to answer, Well, what if it could? The chieftain sighed. “As you say, it would cost us dear. Strange how those who have so much fight so hard to keep those who have little from getting any more.”
“As strange how those who have little think they deserve more without wo
rking for it,” Sharur returned. The herder showed his teeth, as a desert fox might have done. Sharur kept his voice elaborately calm: “By the will of the gods, we have with us a few finer things than usual. Would you see them?”
“Only if it pleases you to show them,” the herder replied, sounding as indifferent as Sharur. That was how the game went. “If it would be too much bother, you need not trouble yourself.”
“They might amuse you,” Sharur said, and the chieftain did not say no. Sharur set out before him date wine and medicine and linen cloth—the herders did more than his own people with wool. He also set out a few, a very few, swords and knives, as if to suggest that the Alashkurrut had acquired the rest.
“True, these are not things traders show us every day,” the herder chieftain said. He looked down at the ground to » disguise the eager glow in his eyes. But, tent-dwelling nomad though he was, he was neither a blind man nor a fool. “All these things come from the land between the rivers. Nothing comes from the high country.” He pointed first east, then west. “By the will of the gods, you say, you have these things to show us. Was it the will of the gods that you not trade in the mountains?”
The herders did not know gods well, or, to put it another way, the gods hardly found the herders worth noticing. The chieftain smiled as he asked the question. But the smile disappeared when, in a, stony voice, Sharur replied, “Yes, that was the will of the gods.”
“Ah.” The herder plucked at his beard. He had dyed red streaks in it with henna. Turning away from Sharur, he entered into a whispered colloquy with some of his own people. When he turned back, his face was troubled. Slowly, he said, “It may be that you are not lucky men. It may be that any who trade with you will not be lucky men. They are fine goods.” He sighed regretfully. “They are fine goods, but, as with robbing you of them, they might cost us dear.”
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