“Well…” Marai rubbed the gathering sweat from the back of his neck, miserably aware he had not bathed in a while. The dark draped room was close and airless and the heat of the day was starting to rise. “I’ll be gone at nightfall, so don’t worry. My great crime, as far as they’re concerned, is that I’m alive. The high priest of Djehuti wanted me dead.” He finished the bread and beer the young man had given to him, but already longed for the roast duck and exquisite creamed soups with mixed green shoots, the melons and the sweetmeats he had eaten at Wserkaf’s house, and the even fancier dinners he had been served when he had studied with Count Prince Hordjedtef.
“He thought he’d killed me, too,” Marai mused. “By now, he still may not know, but soon enough he’ll see I’m not so easily beaten down.” The big man belched quietly to ease the workings of the beer, hoping it wouldn’t cause him to suffer too greatly later. This beer, though… he thought, almost amused.
“And you don’t have to worry, Djerah bin Esai of Ahu. I have ways of covering my tracks that he hasn’t even dreamed about.” Marai yawned again, knowing the bigger part of his next adventure lay ahead and almost dreading to get started in a few hours.
“Why were you wanted dead? I don’t figure you killed or robbed anyone. Your wives said you were studying the mysteries and that they would soon be invited to do so, too.” Djerah took the plate from Marai and set it aside, waiting to hear the answer.
“Well, they discovered I knew far more than they wanted me to know, I suppose.” Marai’s face grew pensive as he remembered the weeks in tutelage that he had naively assumed were civil exchanges of ideas between men of two different lands.
“So that priest who followed you here…” Djerah asked. “You know he was the same one who came to take your wives to you and bring the message to Etum Addi that got him to move to Ra-Kedet. Was Etum Addi part of this too?” The young man, a little more agitated, got up to head toward the window.
“That priest was a friend, but not at first. He actually ended up saving my life. He has to protect himself from scrutiny, now. Etum-Addi’s been gone how long?” Marai asked, then thought to himself. If I had my ladies with me that’s exactly where we’d go… Ra-Kedet. If that place was still too busy with kings’ men, we might go on to Kina or Keftiu. Plenty of trades to get into there.
“My wife told me the spice man left two days after the women did and went out of here like demons were chasing him. He put our family in charge of the business here, and said he would be our supplier on the coast. Raawa and her sisters made the deal. I was across the river working with Happy Crew.” Djerah peeked out of the window where Deka used to sit, trying to see if anyone had begun to move around in the plaza. “It was rough at first but we’re doing better now.”
“Nothing in Kemet surprises me anymore, after what I learned on the other side.” Marai mused, but in another glance at the young man, he realized Djerah, despite his slight inherited gifts in sensing the unspoken, was either lying to himself or completely ignorant of his family’s situation.
Doing better, eh? When I was here, Etum Addi’s business was on the wings of a hawk and flying high. We both know it’s something else bothering you isn’t it?
The sojourner remembered one of the merchants referring to Djerah’s wife as a kuna – Ariennu’s favorite word for a promiscuous but otherwise worthless woman who was apt to peddle her flesh for advantage. Your son was a big one for an eight moon, unripe baby. And your wife sneaks out to meet the boy’s true father? Ari knew. The women helping her in the birth knew and kept silent. Ari said your Raawa complained the noise kept her awake when she was heavy with child, but she knew the woman and her family just didn’t want Djerah to know about the man.
Marai sighed. Even Houra knew. It’s why the woman railed at you about returning to work after you came to see the baby. She needed you gone before the child’s real sire arrived to see his son. Marai knew the only one who didn’t know or didn’t want to know was Djerah.
“We worked the spice until what Etum Addi left us ran out. After the tribute was paid, no one could afford to go to Ra-Kedet for more supplies and we never received any word back of him. We just went back to doing what we’ve always done: making baskets and totes like our savta taught us. I’m doing better paid work on the teams across the river now – not just hauling slag with the flood workers.”
Marai took another polite sip of the bitter beer while the young man continued.
“My sweet wife works so hard to make the children healthy and strong, but she claims she won’t move to the worker’s village. Maybe one day my work will finish there, but it seems like the harder I work, the more dangerous the tasks get and the faster my earnings go. I just don’t know…” he answered and began to straighten up the apartment. He tugged forward some of the ragging in which Marai had slept and nervously began to shred it into strips.
Bothers you, thinking like this and knowing I know more about you than you’ve said. I’d better back it off a little, Marai thought.
He remembered Houra and other women of Ahu making rough wool into lumpy yarn and rag to make burden baskets. Taking up some of the fabric he began to shred it, but fell into the work so quickly, that Djerah paused for a moment to stare.
“How do you…” the young man started to ask.
“Oh. I learned it from your Savta Houra, same as you.” Marai slowed his shredding and finger-weaving from its magical pace.
The youth shifted uncomfortably again.
Marai knew Djerah still didn’t like the idea of being related to him or that his great-grandmother had known him. He shook his head, sadly. “If I didn’t have to go and find my ladies… if we could even have a life without scrutiny, I’d teach you the tricks I know and your people what I know about trading, that’s for sure. I taught Etum Addi everything he knew. He was barely scraping by as you are now, when we first came here.”
“So you never even knew the women were brought across the river,” Djerah’s face grew incredulous.
Marai knew the stonecutter hadn’t been listening. He’d already made time line errors in his story that were as large as the sky. At first he presented himself as the son of Marai. If Djerah and his wives had gotten to know each other, they would have presented him as the real Marai and not some fictitious son. He laughed inwardly. Ari, you said I was the worst liar ever and now it’s going to catch me in the throat if I keep talking to this man. I’ll be run off like a mad dog. For an instant, he paused, hoping she heard his thought, but continued because he knew better.
“No. Once they got them over there, the priests told them I was dead. I think they truly thought I was for a while. I was put in a stone box and forgotten for nearly three months.” He started, but saw Djerah already shaking his head No in dismay. The part about him being in Child Stone induced stasis hadn’t even registered.
“And then those bastards made concubines of them, didn’t they? To protect them, I’ll bet they said!” Djerah turned back from the door and sat facing Marai again. “I’ve seen it happen with the widows of the men on the crews,” he interrupted. “There was an older man on the high scaffold where I work. His family was grown and his first wife long dead. He had just taken himself a young and pretty wife. Anyway, one day he fell off. It was quick and even quicker the way she was grabbed up by one of the chief engineers! The good looking and sturdy ones with no families get picked up right away around here and mostly they are grateful of a fine and secure life.”
Marai contemplated that thought about Djerah’s wife and then realized another awful thing. They expected Djerah to fall that time, not some old man. His wife wants him dead so she can gain his pension and share it with her lover. I need to warn him, but if he doesn’t suspect it already, it’ll just anger him. He started to get up and go to the window himself, but Djerah stayed him.
“Moment ago, when I looked out to take the things down, I thought I saw some walkers,” the stonecutter said. “If your wives are not across the river
, did that priest tell you where they are?”
“Ta-Seti,” Marai thought about the room he had visualized in the well water. He remembered the reddish, green-eyed imp that had begun to attack him when he and Wserkaf used the Child Stones to find them. “– with a prince who goes there to gather their issues and to show a little of the king’s muscle to the distant sepats.” Marai settled again and continued twisting the ragging.
“Then I hate to say it, but you might as well forget about them!” Djerah’s expression and face narrowed. “It’s a hard enough trip for young men and no trip at all for a woman,” he scratched his head a little, muttering to himself. “I need to shear this mop I’ve grown soon. It gets too hot when I’m working.”
“I know that. Which is why I need to…” Marai began to get up, about to stride out of the apartment, peacekeepers or not, but the stonecutter interrupted.
“Let me tell you, though, I went up there twice when I was newly grown. My family thought I was good with a bow and so I thought I might become a paid warrior. Thank the gods of Kemet and my ancestors I found work on the Happy Crew during the floods. After what I went through, I know anyone who takes women up there doesn’t trouble themselves with bringing them back, especially not General Maatkare if he’s the one who is still in charge of that division.”
“General Maatkare?” Marai knew Djerah was searching his face for a reaction and stopped the sigh of dismay about to escape his chest.
“Nasty one he is, and vain, too. A prince, of course. They all are. Good commander, even when he was a boy, but he will kill his own men if they get unruly or oppose his orders. Odd that he would take women, though. The time I went with him he used any local woman who caught his eye as a pretty hostage. If there was no trouble, he paid her family. If there was…” he gestured the slitting of a throat.
The sojourner smirked in disgust, but then trembled, feeling the image of the war bull filter through his thoughts.
“Ummm… Sorry, I…” Djerah flinched, disturbed. “Didn’t mean to…”
Marai knew his angst was starting to soar out of control. Beyond the perimeter of the room where they sat, he sensed the familiar darkness circling and wanting to take hold. He’d managed to gain control of it by ramming his head and shoulders through Wserkaf’s perimeter wall three days earlier. Now, every time he thought of the prince and the way he might be abusing the women, he wanted to rush off into the day to find and kill him even if he was completely unprepared and unarmed. He knew he might go along the river on this side, creeping between buildings…
“You know the way to Ta- Seti? Is it just straight up the river? Maybe you can tell me the names of the sepats and the walking time between each,” he asked, looking around almost helplessly.
Djerah paused. Marai knew the young man was anticipating the next question and already deciding on his answer to it.
“This is the journey of a madman. There’ll be either thief, or king’s henchmen, or militia every step of the way. You might think it’s just up the river on one side or the other, but it’s not that easy. There are hills and rock and boiling waters… snakes… stinging things, sickness, and villages not likely to comfort only one man making his way.”
Knew that. Know you can’t take me. What other choice is there but to use what’s in here? And I’m not too sure that it wouldn’t fail after what’s already been done to me. My ladies have Child Stones. They should have been strong enough to get away from such a beast. Something else is going on. He rubbed the Child Stone under the skin of his forehead, feeling it purr as if he had given it a lover’s caress. He wanted to consult the eight stones Wserkaf had returned to him, but knew he didn’t dare do that in this young man’s presence.
In the quiet moments we have heard your cry
We would not desert you, Man of Ai
We are always here
Within soul
Within skin.
In the quicken’d night
Bear us to our destiny
Put on the cloak of legend
Face the stirring of the darkest wind
In the opening of the sky
We rise
Gentle voices of children filled him as they often did in his moments of doubt. It had been a very long time since he’d heard a full prophetic verse from them. The sojourner knew Djerah had at least sensed something of the Children’s words in his own soul. He even knew his Child Stone had partially emerged. The big man paused and crept to the drape in the window despite the younger man’s resistance. He didn’t want Djerah to see it.
Yeah. Thanks for speaking. I just wish you would make a verse about me being your sacrificial lamb? Am I? And by the way, why have you not protected my ladies?
In adversity they grow
As your metal of earth
Becomes true in flame.
So it’ll be another game of senet… only the stones are in our heads and the board we move around on is the black and red earth. Hmph. Sometimes I wish… Marai thought of how his life would have been for a moment. I would have come to Ineb Hedj with Sheb, Houra and the rest of Ahu’s clan. We would have found work. I don’t think we would have struggled as much as they did, unless the fever that came through took me too. I was pretty tough then… even before the Child Stone. Perhaps I would have re-married and sired a few children before I died. I’d surely be dead by now, though.
“Did you hear something out there?” Marai noticed a befuddled look on Djerah’s face. The young man had been staring at him, but dropped his gaze.
“A mark was on your forehead a minute ago. Now it’s gone.”
Oh, he hears the Children in his thoughts, alright. Houra had the skill and so did I. We used to talk to each other without words when she was a child. Marai’s hand went to his brow. The stone was flat again. It’s a gift from our ancestors, he stared at the stonecutter again and covered with a quick lie. All the magic I have and I can’t even tell a decent lie to save myself, he smirked. Ari was right about that.
“I suppose you imagined it, then.” Well here’s the answer. But if I cast a spell to make him go with me… he’s trouble. I can’t pay him, or even promise his family he’d come home. He thought of Raawa and her sisters and their ultimate plan to separate from him. Then again, maybe taking him away from all of this might be merciful.
For a moment, Marai saw into Djerah’s memory, visualizing him barely out of boyhood, marching with troops through stinging grasses, sitting on dismal barges and waiting for orders.
As if he already knew what Marai was thinking, Djerah drew back in a wide-eyed, horrified gasp.
“Did you lose your sense while you slept?” The young man blurted but, thinking someone might hear him outside, he quickly whispered. “I told you I can’t go with you, not if you were my best beloved… which you’re not! We’re in enough trouble as it is meeting our tribute obligation, and besides, you’re not coming back if you go. None of you will. If that prince so much as thinks you’re about to take something he wants away from him, you’re done in the land of the living. Then, he’ll likely kill the women just because he can. Your coming up there to him will only make his life interesting. I’m staying here. The King’s dead and soon there’s going to be twice the work getting his temple finished. Yah dropped the work in my lap. It’s madness to walk away while the gods are still smiling on me,” his whisper grew more and more urgent.
“Then I’ll just wait until dark again and be off,” Marai almost wanted to grab him and explain to him that his dear wife was not faithful to his bed and that her family had likely decided on her other man as a better choice. The more he thought about the man, Marai visualized a tall but beefier fellow who was quite likely a peacekeeper moving up in the ranks. It was a much more profitable choice. Even though Djerah was gainfully employed, the separation while he worked across the river had already taken its toll.
Djerah quieted, having said his piece, then went to the draped doorway. When he looked back in, he added: “I’ll see if I
can find some bread and fish for you to take by dark. You just can’t stay here. That’s all I have to say.”
“I know that,” Marai backed away from the window and the door then sat heavily in the fabric scraps. He wasn’t that tired. If his situation had been any different, he would have gathered the shaggy brown servant’s cloak Wserkaf had given him, the eight stones, and a small basket of bread and followed Djerah down the steps of his old apartment, eager to be on his way to Ta-Seti by himself. Boy talks too much anyway now that I got him started. At least he hasn’t learned too much of me, the sojourner mused, or has he?
Djerah didn’t really want to form a bond with the sojourner. He’d allowed the man to hide in his storage area for two days, but every time he visited, thought about, or spoke to the big man something forced them into a clumsy companionship. When they met by accident that first day three passes of the moon ago, the big man said he was as the son of Marai Who Vanished. That legend had come from the wilderness with his family and had been discarded by everyone except his Savta who clung to it as much as she gave homage to the malak, or messengers of the god Sin.
Even if it’s true, which I’m not sure of… the stone-burnisher thought, I’ve already given him more than I owe him. Even Savta agreed his name had been banned from our lips, because he betrayed us in the hour of our greatest need.
The young man chuckled as he trotted down the steps to his lower apartment. He felt oddly compelled to look back up at the draped doorway. I’m sure feeling these spells he’s casting… he’s getting me to care.
Djerah entered his low apartment and saw his family had left. He shook his head and came back out, realizing most of the people in his neighborhood had been led by the peacekeepers down to the water’s edge to see what they could of the solemn procession across the water.
Mourning. I’m sad the king’s dead. He wasn’t bad except for being so drunk much of his last years. That’s nothing. This man, Marai’s own father, was mourning the death of his young bride for fifteen years and waiting on the old land’s Asherin -Ahna to scoop him up… now that’s some grief. Savta just wanted all of us to know the story of Marai, who had walked with his goddess Ashera one star-filled night when the light and singing rocked her dreams. Walked with a god, Djerah understood. It’s just a pretty way of saying a person vanished without a trace. This man said he was the vanished man’s son. No. True or not, I owe him nothing more. For a moment he thought of joining his family at the edge of the water to look at some of the procession across the water, but knew only distant glitters would be seen.
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