Isis Wept

by Stephan Loy

  Hathor sighed. Her eyes glazed. “Ah, a man smitten by Isis. An accident, no doubt. My prudish niece takes such pains to protect humans from their baser inclinations. Still, this man, whoever he is, will do anything to get to her. He’ll do anything, for anybody.” She focused again on those around her, just recalling their presence. “Where is this man?”

  “I can’t say, goddess,” the priestess said. “The information was overheard, from many sources, pieced together. There is much conjecture...”

  “Find him,” Hathor said, annunciating the words with an edge. She cast her demand among all those aboard, not at the priestess cringing near her feet. “Find him,” she repeated, “and lead me to him.”

  Nephthys felt herself fading again. Since taking refuge in the Fayum, she had lost what purpose she once might have claimed. She no longer owned the important if terrifying titles granted the queen of Abu Simbel. In Thoth’s palace she had no status at all beyond the privileges granted a guest. She had thought her son an avenue to purpose, but he had burst into the world as an independent being and spent little time in her company. He had moved his home to some isolated island in the eastern Delta marshes. Even now, while he visited the palace, he came to consult with Thoth, not to see his mother.

  So Nephthys existed in honored luxury. She suffered the polite ministrations of servants and the courtly attentions of her host and rescuer, but still she faded. From her point of view, she slipped closer to oblivion every day. Even the servants had greater purpose.

  The humans, at least, were part of the world. They lived, then died and fed the earth with their flesh. Before they fell, they created ... something. They continued a shadow of their lives through children, through what they built and what they destroyed. They chose their legacies, or chose not to choose. They were free.

  Since her imprisonment at Abu Simbel, Nephthys had thought much on the humans. She had little else to do. She thought she had some inkling of what Osiris had seen in their lot. She saw their industry, their organization, their tendency to form social orders even at the most meager levels. They had learned those habits from the god of civilization. They had learned so well that Nephthys wondered who had won when Abydos was destroyed. Set had thought Osiris weak. How weak was a god whose power persisted in others?

  For the thousandth time she considered the men who had died rescuing her from Set. Though they worshipped Thoth, they had learned from Osiris. They had learned and embraced sacrifice, giving their lives for the sake of their shipmates, for their god, and for her.

  She thought of Merferet, who had surrendered her life for the sake of love.

  What gods could claim such perfection of purpose, such selflessness? Not herself, Nephthys thought, cut by shame. Isis, yes, but then, she was Isis...

  A servant surprised her, knocking at the open door to Nephthys's guest apartment. He approached to announce a petition from Amnet. Amnet. Where had she heard that name? Then she recalled the high priest of Osiris, and ordered the man brought in.

  Her flagging confidence showed as she self-consciously arranged herself for a mortal.

  When Amnet arrived, Nephthys was poised on a soft divan, a platter of dates and a jar of wine before her on a low, stone table. The light through the windows shone on her, reflecting the white of her linens.

  “Amnet of Abydos,” the servant announced, and closed the doors as he left.

  Amnet stood before the goddess, not at all priestly in a worn, yellowed, linen kilt and a threadbare woolen cloak.

  “Would you care for refreshment?” Nephthys asked. “The dates are delicate and juicy, and the wine here has no equal.”

  “No, thank-you, goddess.”

  “Oh, well of course not. Drink not from the cups of untrue gods, and all that.” She poured herself a bowl of wine.

  “Forgive me, goddess. I meant no insult. It isn’t that at all.”

  “Then, what is it, Amnet, that brings me company in the priest of a long dead god?”

  “He isn’t dead, goddess. You said as much to Isis.”

  Nephthys flinched. She sloshed a few drops of red onto the linen draping her wrist. She peered at Amnet. “It was you,” she said. “Hapi told me humans would help her. He recruited you?”

  “Yes, goddess, he did. I’ve served the goddess Isis for the last several years. I come now with news.”

  News from her sister! “And, why does a priest of Osiris serve a different god?”

  Amnet’s answer was a long time coming. His eyes glistened at the thoughts that clutched him. “Because,” he answered, “she is all of him I have left.”

  He sat beside her while she sipped wine and nibbled dates.

  “After we found him, we sailed for home. She felt her magic could only work in Egypt, that it wouldn’t be strong enough in foreign lands. Ideally, she would have returned him to Abydos, but that was too dangerous. Her confidence is low. She feels she needs help. That’s why she sent me for you.”

  Me? Nephthys thought. What would she want with a fading goddess? “Are you sure you won’t refresh yourself?” she asked to disguise her confusion. She fought for strength where she had none, but her lost tone betrayed her.

  “This mission is very important,” Amnet said, averting his eyes. “I’ve sworn to fast until it is completed.”

  “Oh. And, how may I help?”

  “She believes you can. She believes you might help in guiding him back from the west. Anyway, the task is too great for one god, and she trusts only you.”

  She trusts me? Nephthys almost said aloud, then choked back the words. This was a human, after all, not privy to the affairs -- or fears -- of gods. “I don’t know if I can help, but I owe her enough to try. Perhaps I should speak to Thoth. He’s the wisest of us, by far.”

  Amnet shifted in his seat. “She was adamant, goddess, that I bring only you.”

  A spark flared against Nephthys’s ego. Is he setting conditions? Then she realized her error. The human demanded nothing. He only delivered his mistress’s words. “I’ll go with you. Where is she?”

  “We go to the marshes west of Tanis. I can’t be more specific; she may have moved since I saw her last. Brothers will meet us in Bubastis and guide us in.”

  Nephthys nodded. She neatened the refreshments on the table. “Do we go by your boat, or mine?”

  “Mine would be less conspicuous, though I apologize for its lack of luxury.”

  “Leave your dock number at the door. I’ll join you in an hour.”

  “Yes, goddess.” But Amnet didn’t move.

  “Was there something else?”

  “Yes, goddess. I’d like to beg a favor...”

  “Yes?”

  Amnet fidgeted again in his seat. “Well, there’s this rebel, goddess, the very one you entrusted with Isis five years ago. He accidentally witnessed your sister’s ... full nature, and was driven mad. Isis won’t see him; it would only make things worse. I was hoping that, on the way to Tanis, you could pay him a visit, to cure him.”

  Nephthys sat still, her hands interlaced in her lap. Her few successful schemes in the past had hinged on no one taking her seriously. Now two hoped for her aid, the sister she had once betrayed, and this human who honored Osiris. Who did they think she was? “I don’t know what I can do,” she said, keeping amazement from her voice. “I look like my sister, but I don’t have her gifts.” She turned to Amnet and offered him a shaky smile. “But, what I can do, I will.”

  “Thank-you, goddess,” Amnet said, relieved. He stood and bowed to honor her. “They say great things of you in the world not owned by Set. The compliments hardly do you justice.” With that, he left.

  Nephthys remained seated a very long time, stupefied by this turn in her life.

  Someone needs me, she thought over and over again. Isis needs me.

  Isis trusts me.

  A servant came to collect the refreshments, and Nephthys sought out Thoth.

  She found him with Anubis in the palace garden. The two sat at
the edge of a long, rectangular pool -- a sculpted pond, really -- shaded by palms, cedars, and acacias. Flowers bloomed everywhere, and leashed peacocks strutted about as colorful ornaments on the green, irrigation-fed grounds. A small launch rested at dock on one end of the pool, large enough for four lounging passengers and the poleman who stood his post at the stern, ignored now by his betters. Servants waved fans above the loungers.

  Anubis casually dropped stones into the water. Someone, some time, would have to fish them out. “Mother!” he called when he noticed her approach. He stood and reached out to hug her.

  He was a tall, dark god, the image of his father, and thus his father’s killer. The sight of him drew both pride and guilt to the fore of Nephthys’s heart.

  Mother and son embraced. Thoth remained reclined against a tree at the water’s edge.

  “We were just discussing matters of science,” Anubis said as he fetched a chair for his mother. “We seem to disagree on the nature of humans.” He regained his own seat as Nephthys took hers. He signaled a fan bearer to cool her. “I contend that humans are aberrations of the basic physiology of gods. Since their essence -- that is, their combination of Ka, Ba, and Akh -- since their essence comes from Ra, the humans are obviously immortal in some sense, but their bodies are not very durable. If I’m correct, then we true immortals have an obligation to care for the essences that survive their mortal hosts, which means a more structured afterlife. It may also be important to preserve the body after death, so that the human essence may continue to use it.

  “Thoth, on the other hand, sees the humans as an expression of Ra himself, and therefore capable of godly stature, should they survive long enough to develop it. He also puts forth the somewhat odd notion that the mortality of their bodies is an improvement on immortality, that it compels the humans to build communities and a history that survives them--”

  “They are the tears of Ra,” Thoth insisted, running a finger along the water. “As tears of the creator god, they are part of him; they share his immortal essence. But, where Ra is born each morning, reaches adulthood at noon, and dies each night as he cedes the world to me, the humans stretch their lives into decades, though their pattern of aging is similar to Ra’s.” He paused a moment, watching two large goldfish investigate his finger. “And, whereas Ra is reborn each morning, the humans are reborn in the lives of their children, who possess improved facilities for survival, and learn from those who brought them into life. There is a distinct advantage.”

  Nephthys just sat there. She had no interest in science and thought both gods wrong in their theories. The humans came from Ra, yes, but hadn't they learned what they knew from Osiris? Shouldn't he have his due? Still, she could say nothing but what she felt. The logic laid forth by these scientific gods flew far above her ability to grasp. She knew about the Ka, that “parallel self” of men and gods alike. The Ba and Akh, or soul and life force respectively, were less clear to her, an aspect, she thought, only of mortal existence. She wondered if such concepts might take on a new, broader context now that a god had flirted with death.

  Still, she kept her thoughts to herself. These two before her would dismiss her opinions, for wisdom was not her power.

  “I had a visitor,” she pushed into a momentary lull. “Amnet, high priest of Osiris.”

  “Oh?” Thoth raised one eyebrow. “And, what would he want with you?”

  “He wanted a favor. Apparently a friend of his--” Briefly, panic gripped her. She couldn’t mention Isis. She had all but given her word. “--fell under Hathor’s spell. The poor fellow lost his mind, has been that way ever since.”

  Thoth snorted derision. “Hathor. She lays with anything that catches her fancy. I wasted much time cleaning up her messes.”

  “Then, you know a cure for his madness?”

  “Yes, yes. It took a while to devise. I was too intent on magic as the solution. But the real solution turned out to be good old-fashioned extreme sudden trauma, the mind’s equivalent of a slap in the face. That and castration. It works quite well on Hathor’s unfortunate lovers. Distracts them from their obsession, you see. Of course,” he hastened to add, “the procedure is performed without anesthesia.”

  “It sounds cruel,” Nephthys said, screwing up her face.

  “These are humans we’re talking about. Their whole existence is cruel. Also, they react best to extreme stimuli.” Thoth flicked the water and scared a couple of fish. “You see, the poor devil suffers from a drought of vital fluids to the heart, and a flood of fluids to the loins. The procedure I’ve indicated will restore his natural balance by bleeding off the excesses.”

  “I promised Amnet I would try to help his friend, but I don’t think I’m up to that.”

  “And, you shouldn’t have to be, mother,” Anubis said. “If you truly wish to help this human, I will do it for you.”

  The offer dizzied Nephthys with relief, but she recalled Amnet’s insistence that no one else come with them.

  Thoth sat up straighter. “Where is this human you wish to aid?”

  “I’m not sure. In the eastern delta, I gather.”

  “I can direct you to priests that I have trained in this procedure. You can take your victim to any of them, and they will know what to do.”

  “That would be wonderful.” Nephthys sighed.

  Thoth watched her, his eyes narrowed. “Nephthys, curing the sick isn’t your realm.”

  “Then whose realm is it?” Nephthys asked, insulted. “Of all the powers and provinces of gods, none exists to treat human maladies. Why do you think that’s so?”

  Anubis laughed. “Probably because there is no need! We’ve such an excess of humans, we can afford to lose a few!”

  Thoth joined in the humor. “And they have an excess of maladies!”

  Nephthys, stung, mumbled into her lap. “Well, I felt sorry for him. Amnet served my brother well. I could do no less in return.”

  “Fine, fine.” Thoth continued laughing. “Help your human. Have fun. What’s the point of life without a few eccentric excursions?”

  Nephthys stood, wringing her hands. They think I’m a joke, she thought. How dare they patronize me! “I’ll be gone a few days. I may visit with friends while I’m away...”

  “Good,” Thoth said, and turned back to his fish. “You can’t spend eternity bumping around this palace. It would drive you as crazy as that human of yours.”

  Nephthys stood there a moment, silent. She couldn’t imagine how to respond. Was that an attack, a criticism of her long bout of fading? But Thoth had been such a gentleman to her, so protective and caring until just then. And her fading was secret; she had given no hint of any concerns. She decided that he teased her, that he had no idea how his comments stung.

  “I’ll leave you now,” she said. “Please continue with your science debate.”

  When she was well up the walk, Thoth nodded after her. “She’s up to something,” he said.

  Anubis squinted after his mother. “She just seemed out of her element, I thought.”

  “Oh? She helped Isis escape from Set, who stole Osiris’s kingdom. Now she meets with the former high priest of Osiris, who happens to have a friend inflicted with a condition contractible only from Hathor -- or from Isis. What does that tell you, young scientist?”

  “Conjecture. I’m surprised you’d entertain such flimsily founded notions.”

  Thoth clicked his tongue. “Nephthys has always imagined herself a schemer, but she's more transparent than she knows.” He looked at Anubis. “Your mother is about to do something stupid. She was lucky in the past; she may not be again.”

  Anubis stared back with calculating eyes. “And, why is it stupid to aid Osiris’s allies?”

  “You don’t understand. Nephthys is not as devious as she thinks, but nor does she act in half-measures. You are proof of that. So is the death of Abydos.” He stood, and waved his hands to dry them. “This scheming avocation got her into trouble from which I had to extricate her. If S
et should discover she’s against him again...”

  Anubis rubbed his smooth chin. “Perhaps someone should watch her, keep her safe from harm.”

  “You can suggest someone for the job?”

  Anubis grinned. “It has to be only one?”

  Chapter Nine:

  Amnet poled along the confusing spider web of streams that brought the Nile to the Sea. He looked forward to seeing his brothers, to hearing their news and their stories. He even looked forward to their idle complaints about life in the swamp with its omnipresent mosquitoes and slimy trees, the only place in Egypt where trees, however decrepit, grew in abundance. Anything was better than traveling with Nephthys, who hardly spoke and acknowledged him only to give commands. This puzzled Amnet, for if Nephthys wasn’t affable, neither was she arrogant in her superiority to humans. She seemed defensive, unsure how to interact with men. So, she withdrew to godhood’s simplest role, the role of authority figure. Amnet carried most conversations, which meant long, uncomfortable silences as they pushed down the river in his normally cozy boat. He wondered at shyness in a god, but dismissed the thought in his ache for real companionship.

  It took four days to reach the eastern delta town of Akhribis, about fifteen leagues south and west of Tanis. The town wasn’t much, just a half dozen hovels of mudbrick and rushes, all built on tiny islands of high ground lost among the expansive, forested marshes. The place stank of swamp gas and the air felt musty. The townspeople had long ago moved away in search of a better climate. Only the Osirans lived in those hovels among lichen-smeared trees, they and Hordedev, their prisoner.

  “These will take us to Isis?” Nephthys asked, pointing toward the loinclothed men coming down from a house.

  “No, goddess. These are the men who guard my friend, the one who needs your help. There are others here who will guide us to your sister.”