Hannah nodded. “I would teach you.”
“You will have to work hard, but I think you can succeed.” Iris smiled, placing her hand on Hannah’s back, behind her heart. “I will be your sister.”
19
Iris proved a worthy teacher. When Hannah could not execute the movement of the veil correctly, Iris would demonstrate with an effortless ease that came with years of practice. Again and again they rehearsed the dance until Iris could begin to see Hannah’s natural grace emerge through her stumbling.
“Slow your steps. Good, now slow your breath. Use your eyes more. Yes, like that. Your thumb and middle finger should long for one another like two separated lovers. No, no. Let me show you.” Then finally, “Good.”
After the practice sessions were finished, sometimes well into the night, Hannah and Iris would sit in the cool grass and sing together. Iris had a plain but lovely voice, and seeing as she could carry a tune, soon they were able to practice some of the Pythagorean harmonics, sometimes singing familiar songs, but more often simply improvising together.
As the weeks ushered the isle of Pharos ever closer to the first day of winter, Iris could see that Hannah still fell far behind the rest of the priestesses in her dancing. She stumbled and tripped on her own feet more often than not, and then gave up quickly afterward. Iris insisted they meet every night instead of every other night so she could help Hannah work through her awkwardness, and sometimes they stayed in the tholos to practice for hours after sunset. The rehearsing coupled with Hannah’s regular workload proved exhausting. She struggled to stay awake in her afternoon classes and often collapsed on her bed in the evening without supper.
One moonless evening, Hannah and Iris met and worked on the movements as a cool rain shower burst down upon them and a flock of migrating white pelicans swept down from the sky and took refuge between the columns. The fatigued birds rested as the women pressed on well into the night. Hannah was learning the shimmy, and would not rest until she got her hips and shoulders to swivel and dip. The rain poured down her cheeks and her chest, wetting her arms, her belly. The costume she wore clung like wet petals to her skin and her breath fogged the air. Still she pressed on. The soles of her feet were bruised and her low back ached, but she was confident she could find the movement in her body before it was time for bed.
Blessed dance. It had helped her to forget her grief.
Sometime deep in the night after their practice session had ended, Hannah found herself walking through the garden, and then toward the temple. She tried the doors and found them unlocked. The anteroom of the temple, illuminated in candlelight, held an immense stone statue of the goddess Isis seated on a throne with her baby Horus on her lap, her lips curled into an almost imperceptible smile. Hannah brushed the smooth stone with her fingertips. The Egyptian statue was thousands of years old, and had been brought to Pharos from up the Nile. There was suppleness in her form, and energy in her limbs; even the baby seemed alive. For a moment Hannah felt she should not be there at all, even though the temple was open to worship even in the night.
As Hannah stroked the cold stone feet of the goddess, she decided she could be a Jew in her heart and still appreciate the beautiful traditions of all those around her. Perhaps God was looking on, guiding her even here, to this goddess. Perhaps he had a reason for her slavery, something she could not yet see. What could that reason be? The question troubled her, and she decided to pray.
Hannah lit a joss stick before the beautiful goddess and let the words of the Shema wash over her, bringing her peace. She had longed to spend time alone. Overhead the pocked moon, white and round, bathed the world in silver light. Her father had shown her the rabbit in the moon when she was a little girl, and when she asked him why God put a rabbit in the moon and not some other creature he had replied, “Because the rabbit is the only animal that can keep a secret, and the moon has many secrets to keep.” How she missed him.
So.
Hannah awoke in her bed to the sound of the surf pounding the north shore of the island. She had dreamed of Gideon and his dark, mischievous eyes, his kiss, the way his muscles rippled like a stallion as he moved. It seemed like so long ago, yet the dream made their time together seem so recent. She wondered how he was, and where Alizar had sent him to conceal the latest shipment of manuscripts from the Great Library. She wished he would write to her, but knew somehow that he would not.
“Kalimera, Hannah. I brought you some breakfast since you overslept.” Mira sat down on the edge of Hannah’s bed with a bowl of fruit and yogurt cupped in her hands. She seemed irritated about something.
Hannah sat up, still in a daze, the dream fading quickly. “Is everything all right?”
Mira feigned politeness. “Of course. Later today in the tholos Ursula, Renenet, Hepsut, Daphne and I are going to start choreographing a new dance. You should come.”
Hannah bit into a fresh fig and her lips spread into a smile at the sweetness. “When?”
“Just after dinner,” said Mira, getting up and going to the door. “And do not forget to bring your lyre.”
Mira’s footsteps echoed down the hall, and Hannah fell back onto her bed. Whatever was troubling Mira, she felt certain she was the cause of it. With cold fingers Hannah reached beneath her pillow and pulled out the white alabaster jar that held her family’s ashes. She stroked it, and then brought it to her cheek. The family she never knew. She wondered, were they rich or poor? Was her mother beautiful? Did she have sisters, brothers?
Hannah set the heavy jar on her lap, suddenly feeling guilty for not thinking of her father. Her Abba. He loved her so perfectly. But she felt so angry he had left her. But who could be angry with someone for dying? Hannah closed her eyes.
Anger.
The High Priestess had said she was angry when she first arrived at the temple, but she had been so full of grief she had not even noticed her fury at being left behind in the world. Alone. It was true. She had been angry with her father for dying. Hannah cringed as the compunction spread through her bones. She brought her hands together in front of her lips and kissed the cold white alabaster. She whispered, “Please forgive me, Abba. I love you. I love you always.” And then the bell rang, and Hannah slid the jar back under her pillow. She rose and put on a fresh white robe, tying the braided sash behind her back in preparation for a day of lessons and chores.
The tholos was dark and quiet as Hannah approached. Iris was already there, setting candles at the base of the columns and lighting a frankincense joss stick from them. Mira was also there with Ursula, Daphne and Hepsut.
“Hannah, I am glad you are here.” Iris gave her a hug.
Once several other priestesses arrived, they began to choreograph a dance that would highlight the beauty of the twenty-one women who would be participating in the ceremony for the new Kolossofia master.
“It is a terrible number, twenty-one,” said Daphne resting her chin in her fingers, contemplating.
“Not so terrible. We can start in three lines of seven and then spiral into a circle. I think it will be beautiful,” said Mira, practicing a movement with an aqua veil, drawing it in slow motion over her head where it floated, suspended like mist before it fell.
Everyone agreed and soon they had the basic pattern in place. There were questions of symmetry and how to pace the build so that the crescendo would come at precisely the right moment. They discussed drums and other instruments that would be used. Hannah tuned her lyre.
“Do you think he should have a chance to see each of us separately?” asked Ursula, shifting to her toes to practice a movement called the “camel”.
Iris nodded. “Since we will all be wearing veils, how else might he tell us apart?”
“That is precisely it,” Mira declared.
“Do you have any music for us, Hannah?” asked Renenet as she fidgeted with a loose tassel on her hip.
Hann
ah closed her eyes and drifted back to a bright morning sitting beside Naomi where she had composed a new song that carried a sprightly rhythm. The melody was right there waiting for her.
The priestesses began to explore the movements that the song inspired in them. When Hannah finished and opened her eyes the women stopped dancing and broke out in joyful applause.
“Oh, Hannah, it is simply perfect!” Ursula clapped her hands, excited as a child.
“It is your most beautiful melody yet, Hannah,” said Iris, beaming with pride.
“What language are the lyrics?” asked Renenet. “I love the melody, but I would like to know the meaning.”
“It is Aramaic, they—”
“Oh, I disagree completely,” Mira interrupted. “I prefer not knowing the meaning. We do not want anything to take away from the beauty of the dance. The music should compliment, not distract.”
As the priestesses fell into discussion, Hannah could tell that it was going to take hours to come to any definite decisions, and then more time to teach the other priestesses the dance, and still more time for practice. Yet Yule was fast approaching. What she did not know was that the monks in the Temple of Poseidon had been preparing their ceremonial details for an entire year. The dance of the priestesses was simply one strand in a tapestry of an ornate ceremony that would take three days to complete in its entirety. The priestesses were only to play a part on the last evening.
Hannah wondered when she would be able to speak to Mother Hathora to warn her of the Parabolani, and about not participating. They never had a moment alone together.
So.
The weeks before the ceremony passed in a wink. In the end, Hannah had not been able to convince Mother Hathora she should stay behind. Even insisting that the Parabolani might massacre everyone in the Temple of Poseidon was no argument. Mother Hathora insisted that where the Nuapar were, there was nothing to fear. Hannah mentioned that she was Jewish, and that the ritual went against her faith, but Mother Hathora laughed and encouraged her to enjoy it as an actor in a marvelous performance. “The ways of the Goddess are mysterious, child. Call her by whatever name you like, She is greater than your breath, greater than your thoughts, even greater than your ideas about religion and your own soul. Trust Her in all you do, and She will guide you.”
It was settled then, she must participate. Dreading the night before her, Hannah chose a swath of peacock blue chiffon silk for her veil and began to sew tiny glass beads along the hem and corners in an Egyptian design, but she kept making mistakes and would have to pull out a day’s worth of work and begin the pattern again.
Preparations for the ceremony consumed everyone in the temple. The most tedious and arduous of all the tasks, however, also proved to be the most enjoyable. The day before the ceremony, the priestesses filled an enormous tile bath beside the Garden House with water heated in large kettles over open flames. Since there was no wood on the island, a request was sent across the harbor for ten loads of firewood to be shipped from Alexandria. Hauling the firewood up the hill from the beach on their backs was a grueling process that took the women an entire day and a half.
Hannah and Mira filled the bath every hour, draining the cold dirty water and then refilling it again with hot clean water boiled on the fire. The sky outside was cold and damp, so standing beside the fire was not such a terrible duty to have. The sunken tile bath in the garden was large enough for three priestesses at once, so they sang songs and washed each other’s backs like mermaids in a warm sea. Even the youngest children delighted in the midwinter bathing ritual.
Finally Yule drew near.
The angel, so near to earth, grew heavy with anticipation. The door had been promised. The warrior would come.
On the first night of the three-day Kolossofia coronation ceremony, with their own part still two days off, Mira and Hannah snuck away to the hill behind the moon hollow to watch the bonfire on the beach in front of the Temple of Poseidon. Hannah felt delighted to be included in such an adventure, but she had grown a bit leery of her friend’s fickle kindness. She decided Mira might be the kind of person who warms to a friendship more slowly; Hannah hoped her capriciousness was no more than that.
Far off on the other side of the island, elder Master Junkar climbed to the top of a stack of wood and took a cross-legged seat, ready to let the flames consume his body, but they knew he was there. Hannah squeezed Mira’s hand, who squeezed Hannah’s in return as a fearsome wind picked up from the east, blowing wildly all through the night until dawn brought a profound stillness to the island, revealing the wind’s mischief in all the flowers and decorations strewn about the ground.
So.
Two days later, during the short daylight hours of Yule, the priestesses rose early and meticulously prepared themselves for the ceremony by making last minute alterations to their costumes and plaiting their hair with flowers, rehearsing the steps for the dances, smearing sweet smelling amber resin into their navels, and painting their eyes, feet and hands with henna.
At last they were ready.
The priestesses wound out the courtyard gate and down the side of the hill, a snake of light, the ching! ching! ching! of shiny bangle bracelets, anklets, earrings and other adornments ringing in the night. The air was cool and pleasant for the first night of winter, however Hannah noticed several grey clouds beginning to gather over the ocean. Occasionally there was the boom of distant thunder, and a flash of light across the water. Hannah could taste the approach of rain in the air, and hoped that they would reach the other side of the island before the storm.
As the veiled priestesses led by Mother Hathora reached the north shore of the island, their bare feet sunk into the soft white sand. All across the beach little wavelets spat incandescent green sparks upon the shore that flickered and danced, then disappeared. Hannah marveled at the beauty of the unusual omen. Before them stood the Temple of Poseidon, its pale blue spire rising up to heaven, bonfires lit all around its circumference, the scent of roasted meat filling the air. The thumping of the little waves seemed to grow louder as the priestesses approached, as if to announce their arrival.
Up ahead, the priests of the Temple of Poseidon filed onto the beach. The fifty or so men dressed in long black ceremonial robes made two long rows to greet the priestesses, who, as they had been instructed, averted their eyes from the faces of the monks as they entered the temple. Hannah let her eyes drift down to her painted feet and then flicker up to the enormous brass bowls of freshly slaughtered bull’s blood set in offering beside the temple doors, the dank metallic scent filling the air.
Inside, the adytum of the Temple of Poseidon was surprisingly warm and beautifully decorated in long murals that had been created by the monks to tell the story of the Nuapar legend. One radiant figure had been painted in lotus posture atop a funeral pyre and Hannah decided that he had to be Kalanos, the Indian mystic who founded the Nuapar. Beside him stood a tall, clean-shaven man reading a green tablet, who she thought must be Alexander the Great. The ceiling had been painted meticulously in the Egyptian tradition to depict Nut, the goddess of the night sky. In truth, the ceiling had been painted almost a hundred years earlier, but it had faded quite badly so the priests had decided to retouch it for the ceremony.
The priestesses were all invited to enter the grand hall of the temple and sit in the front row for the invocation ceremony, the monks filling the rest of the temple behind them. The energy in the room was charged with anticipation and the delicious forbidden pleasure of breaking the customary separation between monks and priestesses. When Hannah finally lifted her eyes to the podium where a giant shell rested open at the front of the room, she was pleasantly surprised to see a familiar face looking out over the sea of priests and priestesses that had gathered. Julian. The monk she had met in Hypatia’s study.
She inhaled sharply and looked away. Julian. Could he be the one they had come to dance for, the new K
olossofia Master? Hannah felt her heart flutter, beating like the fragile wings of a hummingbird in her chest.
So this was his coronation ceremony. She traced his body with her eyes, unable to look away. He looked more regal than when she had first seen him. His long black hair had been swept up into a topknot on the crown of his head, and his eyes were the same ocean green that she remembered. He wore a long black robe that pinned at the shoulder, meticulously tied with the wide red sash. He looked utterly serene standing beside Master Savitur, whose robes were identical to Julian’s except for two small details: Savitur wore a large emerald ring on the middle finger of his left hand, and there was a thin white sash decorated with Egyptian amulets that passed over the center of his wide red sash.
“Welcome, daughters of Isis, to our humble temple for the crowning of Kolossofia master, Junkar. I am Master Savitur.” The old man bowed. “Tonight we begin the coronation of our new master with three rituals. One, the conquest of his new name. Choosing his weapon, he must defeat me in a duel. Two, the tracing of our origins. Three,” Savitur bowed to the priestesses, “The Dance of Many Veils. Then our new master will be given his title and sealed with his chosen priestess in the lighthouse.”
Sealed. Hannah shuddered. It made it sound as if the couple would be entombed together. She stole a glance down the row of priestesses to gauge their reactions, but they all sat perfectly still, their kohl-lined eyes sparkling with excitement.
Savitur bowed, and the priests and priestesses all bowed in return. Then Savitur bowed again and his audience again returned his bow. Then Savitur bowed a third time and began to giggle. He was playing with them like a mischievous child.
“Come, to the Posidium,” he said, and then everyone rose and filed outside. They were led to several long rows of stone steps that jutted up from the wide courtyard encircled by columns, and invited to sit. Savitur strode to the center of the courtyard as a row of torches mysteriously lit behind him. From the other side of the courtyard Julian approached, his outer robes removed to reveal a sleeveless black tunica, his black Persian pants drawn at the ankles for freedom of movement, a staff in his strong hands. They faced one another and bowed again as a horn sounded from behind them.
Written in the Ashes Page 21