“Damn You!” Prince Maatkare cursed under his breath. “That should have hit you true.”
“Don’t bother wasting another, then,” Marai snapped his head around to see the prince examining his swiftly handled bow and Deka whispering frantically for him to let Marai see the others.
“You want to see something impressive?” He moved toward the opposing tent, starting to gesture the final release of time for the three people inside. “You give me a few moments alone with them, then you bring the Children… and Deka. You’ll see, hear, and learn more than you might ever deserve to know. Until then, don’t bother me and above all don’t try to kill me again.”
Turning away from the prince, he moved quickly toward the women’s tent empty-handed. He didn’t look at the prince or Deka but felt her inner trembling and that the prince grumbled for her to behave herself.
I let you think you took this one, sojourner Marai; and I can see what my grandfather saw and dreaded in you. But we’re not done. This is just day one, and I have a lot of life left where I can walk nicely beside you and look for the soft spots… a lot of life.
At that point the image of the skulking hound, obedient to a superior, but watchful master formed in Marai’s thoughts. It was a threat and a promise.
“We’ll see. Highness, we’ll see…” his hand reached forward to the flap of the women’s tent and parted it.
CHAPTER 21: THE CHILDREN’S EMBRACE
“Oh Marai, oh my sweet...” Ariennu leapt into Marai’s arms from her frozen place at the tent flap the moment his hand pulled the cloth open. She clung to him, sag-kneed and weeping, arms clawing at him as if she was drowning. “Oh please goddess, don’t let this be another dream.”
“I’m here, Ari, I’m here. I’m real. It’s really me,” his embrace lifted her from the ground for a moment. As he set her down and stared warmly into her heart, he knew so much about her had changed.
Ari? Has she shrunk? She looks so hard and sad now. It’s like we never shared love, or had any of those sweet times in Little Kina Ahna before I left. She’s no longer soft when I hold her… goes stiff like she wants my touch but… doesn’t. Marai kissed her eyes lightly, tangled his hands in her wildly scrambled hair and wished that one touch between them would be enough to sweep away everything that had happened to her in the past four months. Her eyes had grown old and wizened again. The brand of a beaten and temporarily subdued life showed in her Child-Stone-rejuvenated face, but that look showed him she had remained defiant, almost to the last.
Marai wanted to press her to him forever; to return her fire and to once again make her into the joyous, smart-mouthed concubine she had been, but at this moment they both knew there were more urgent needs. He felt her pull away to show him the back of the tent. Naibe-Ellit sat there. She cradled the young man’s bleeding, bound head higher than his chest and crooned a gentle lullaby in her multi-layered command voice.
Her too… broken. Little goddess knows I’m here, but she doesn’t even look up at me. Why? he crept toward her and in another instant, knelt beside her. All he had wanted to do was touch her eyes and lips so gently, but the sight of Djerah in her arms sucked the joy out of his return.
The young man’s once swarthy and pleasing face didn’t even look human. His shattered jaw and eye sockets appeared held together by a few shreds of unbroken skin that eased into a swollen purple and black mass that oozed blood and fluid. From the condition of his face, Marai knew Djerah was blind. A hole by his flattened nose and a gash above the lip bubbled shallowly as the stonecutter’s struggle to rasp air in and out of his failing lungs grew weaker.
Marai tore his eyes away. When he touched Naibe’s arm, he instantly re-lived the long, agonizing moments of the prince slamming at Djerah again and again with the mace-like glove for no sane reason. Maatkare had simply wanted to spend his rage and frustration on something. Torturing and killing the youths had not been enough to satisfy his hunger for brutality. The sojourner wanted to magically trade Djerah’s suffering to the prince and to rob him of his good health for his crime, but he knew it wasn’t possible.
“Why did he come?” Naibe half-sobbed, her eyes still ensorcelled by the Djerah’s pain. She focused so deeply on the easing of his suffering that she didn’t acknowledge Marai’s presence. He edged behind her to firmly rub her tired shoulders, then stared down at the tragic, beaten form of the young man again.
“I stopped Prince Maatkare, but now I don’t know if it was the right thing to do. Djee suffers so much. His Highness hurts people. He hurts them bad because he likes to take their life force from them; but in the end, when he is satisfied and full, he releases them so there is no more pain. It’s just his way,” Naibe whispered dully, still not acknowledging Marai’s presence. “I couldn’t let him do it. I couldn’t…” One tear started down her round cheek. Her chest lifted and fell in panting misery.
Marai kissed the back of Naibe’s neck through the dark thickness of her hair and read the memory of the way she grabbed the prince and flung him more than the length of a man, then dragged Djerah away to safety. She had suddenly and without warning accessed all of her the warlike aspect.
“He just kept beating him and beating him and beating, but Djee hung on.” Ariennu scooted over to be with Naibe and Marai. She tentatively put her arm around his back acting as if she thought he might vanish, then lay her head on Naibe’s shoulder. “And that bloodthirsty kuna Deka was smiling the whole time. She’s not the same woman any of us knew. It’s madness. She thinks he’ll make her into a god’s wife.”
“Shhh… Shhh… Ari, I know. It’s been so hard with me gone and you having to be the strong and brave one.” He knew she had buried everything inside her heart the same way she had done in the bad days before they were ever together. “I’m here now. You can let it go. You can rest,” Marai whispered by her ear. “I came to his tent first, just to make it safer for the rest of us.”
“She was something like that before she was with us in the wilderness and she kept saying she would be reborn only when her feet were on the ground in Ta -Seti. She wants her throne back and thinks Highness will get it for her. Goddess, Marai. It’s both of them. He made her drink the blood of the prisoners and she didn’t even fight it. She wanted it. She wanted more of it each time,” Ari babbled out the story that Marai had already sensed.
“Ari. Let those thoughts go. I need you here right now. Djerah needs you,” he breathed out gently and touched the places on Djerah’s face and head, to sense the scope of his wounds. The young man had begun a series of weak panting breaths. The cycle of death was entering its final loop. Marai knew he couldn’t delay and stroked the stonecutter’s blood-spattered chest to send warmth to it until the panting eased a little.
“Djerah, Djerah I’m here now,” he whispered.
The young man moaned and appeared to struggle away as if he fought the healing touch and wished to die.
“I wish I had left him in Ineb Hedj. I wish to the goddess…” Marai bowed his head and looked away, biting his lips. He’d never seen wounds so severe on someone who was still alive. He didn’t want him to suffer, and he wanted him to recover, but couldn’t think of anything more to do for him at that moment than warm and calm him with his hands. He touched the young man’s face.
“Marai is here,” Naibe consoled him even though she hadn’t looked directly at the sojourner the entire time he had been in the tent.
“I’m here, Djerah. I will heal you if it can be done,” Marai’s voice trembled because he didn’t think anyone could heal the young man. “If the goddess says no, then I’ll ease the hurts so you go to her in peace.”
Marai rose to help Ariennu tie up the right side of the tent so more air and light could be admitted. It was near the end of the day. He noticed Maatkare and Deka had secluded themselves in his tent again, but sensed they were talking about and already examining the Children of Stone like children who had been presented with new toys. At any moment, the sojourner guessed, curios
ity would overcome his royal foe. He would emerge to interrupt whatever healing they had started. For now, he tied the strap on the tent wall firmly and spoke over to the men working outside. A physician and assistant still tended a few of Maatkare’s men, patching them up from injuries received in the morning battle.
Don’t see me, he sent a thought toward all of the men in the open area.
“The prince has the Child Stones, Ari.” he turned; a grim tone in his voice. “I can’t use any but the ones the three of us have in our heads. Djerah’s beyond medicine though. The prince was very likely right.”
“By great El, I’ve come to hate him, the foul snake.” Ariennu hissed as she tied the rope that held up the flaps and dully stared at the two new grooms seated outside his tent entry. “And those new guards…”
“Ariennu,” Marai took a step toward her when he had tied his part. He clutched her tenderly, but firmly to his chest for a moment. “Don’t. Whatever you’re feeling can’t get in the way, now. You know it’s not even true, either. Go be mad at him later. Goddess knows I certainly want to hurt him, but we have to clear our thoughts of all the dark feelings if we’re to help Djerah at all. The Children didn’t understand our rage at each other and even our lust and the way it can twist even good intentions at first, but they do now. It’s why I couldn’t just drop him and his grandfather the hour I came to my senses back in Ineb Hedj,” he felt the woman nod into his chest, but knew her thoughts still drifted.
“You said he had the stones. I know he has the one Djerah brought and the box with the others and the Wdjat. I suppose Prince Wserkaf gave you the others, too?”
“No. Your prince has all of them now. I gave all of them to him. I was thinking of how to get them all back and stay on the task they gave me years ago, but then the Children told me it really didn’t matter in the short passage of days who had them. They’ve learned how to link and manipulate events in our world through being inside us,” he stared dully and almost deflated at the gilt-trimmed white, red, and yellow tent, then turned back toward Naibe and Djerah.
“What? Him?” Ari stopped him for a moment. “He can’t have the Children. It’s too dangerous with the heka he knows… and with Deka protecting him. She’s teaching him, too, but I know she can’t be in love with him. It’s not her nature. Must be heart-blind. And he can’t love anything but himself. Bed sport is all it is. The man has some crazy skills; and he’s not bad on the eye, but when you get with him, you see he really doesn’t have a soul. He’s full of ghosts and devils, just like Baby told me. He will suck yours out of you through the clench and make a meal on part of it then add it to his collection. I thought I was tough enough to take it” Ari gasped, winded at her own recitation. “I used him plenty. I just never thought I’d…” she stumbled, emotional. “Maybe I should have just been looking for a way to kill him,” she shuddered, rubbing her arms as if every erotic memory had suddenly become dirty and disgusting.
“Shh, Ari. Just stop beating yourself,” Marai dismissed her. “You do what you do. You’ve always liked men and you’ve damned any of them who tried to tie you down, even me at first. You needed to forget when you thought I was gone. But Djerah needs us now. We’ll sort the rest of this out later.”
Ariennu nodded as if she quietly understood, then tilted her head back and pecked at Marai’s nose once as if she was thanking him for his mercy.
“Love you, woman,” he whispered, but knew she had been flooded with the memory of Maatkare’s treatment of her. “Know that. Now, let’s go see about this.” He pressed her once then led her to Naibe-Ellit and Djerah at the back of the tent.
Naibe sat quietly, steeped in a trancelike attitude that told him nothing else mattered but the failing life of the young man in her arms. Any other time, Marai knew she would have leapt to greet him, cried, kissed every inch of him, then begged to be held and touched in return. He would have gone weak at the feel of her nuzzling deep into his strong arms. Her goddess nature wasn’t just about the sensuous side of her being. He knew she had given her all to stop Maatkare from delivering the ‘mercy’ blow. Now she was entirely focused on giving the young stonecutter life, even if he had to take it from her. It haunted him. One day, dear gods, one day, I hope not soon, or I will need to break time forever.
She whispered sweet promises to the young man that soon he would feel so much better. Her gentle hand which she had wrapped in a piece of cloth dabbed some of the fluids that oozed from his wounds.
Marai looked into her eyes once when she glanced up, but only briefly. She was hiding something from him. The happy and passionate, but strong young girl was gone. In her place a woman of unearthly beauty and grace smiled winsomely and knowingly up at him, then turned her gaze back to Djerah. She stroked his chest rhythmically, as if that would regulate his failing breath and heart.
The sojourner wanted to go to her… to pamper her and love her, but knew it would have to wait. He reached out to help Ariennu kneel by Naibe, then slipped behind both of them so the young woman could lean on him to rest a little. He buried his face in her hair, trying to see if there was anything left of her warmth or if the prince had drained all of it away as he had with Ari. The scent of her neck invaded him and lifted him out of his momentary feeling of helplessness.
I see you my sweetest Marai. I know you are really here, really alive. Yet my heart is so heavy, my eyes can’t look at you.
Naibe. Sweet goddess, why do you suffer? his thoughts asked her.
The hushed whisper of one of the passionate Ashera poems she used to recite to him as they made love, filled his thoughts. He heard them echo through his memories of all of her passion in her multi-layered magical voice:
I am lifted beyond the sky to heaven...
I open for you,
To take in all of you.
You rule me completely until I have died a small
Death of joy.
I am not me and you are not you,
No self or time exists in this new place,
We have built with our love.
All is no more but divine bull of the sky and cow of the Earth…
I am lifted beyond the sky to heaven… oh yes…
I feel the sweet pulse of your seed bursting hot in me…
And I am transported…
My belly fills with stars…
Stars bursting out of my mouth and lifting me higher.
I die, I drift, I float, I know…
He felt her words stir in the bottom of his heart and stick in his breathless chest. An agony of desire and at the same time a keen misery that he had been gone too long welled up in him. His hands froze and his heart exploded with the rush of so many dreams and wishes covered by so many heartaches of how he had not been with her to learn at the same moment she had learned.
“What?!!” he choked, barely able to speak. “Naibe?”
Naibe-Ellit looked up and back. Her solemn eyes brightened a little and a smile tentatively started to curl her lips.
For Marai, nothing else mattered, not even Djerah dying in front of him. He knew she hadn’t looked at him at first because he would have sensed it instantly. His mouth found hers and devoured it as his hand slipped down to caress her rounded belly. She yielded for a glorious moment but then drew away.
Ariennu sensed their thoughts and grew miserable.
“So you figured that out, eh?” she started. “It’s not yours, Marai. There’s no way it can be. I told her how to get rid of it when we found out, but she wanted it to be yours so bad she kept it. She got her moon weeks after you left, just a day or two of it, though. We made the offerings to goddess for her to speedily get a child when you came home. Then, when we got pulled apart, I told her to take the seeds. She told me she didn’t have it in her heart to do that anymore; that maybe a child from another could help her forget. Outside this nasty bastard here, there was…” she started to indicate Maatkare, but saw Marai wasn’t paying attention.
Marai grinned all over himself, leaning aro
und her right arm.
“Oh Naibe-Ellit, my goddess. Naibe, Naibe…” Marai’s open mouth traced her face, eyes and lips. He didn’t want to hear about whose child it might be. He knew the child was his and in that instant knew exactly when it had happened.
“When this is over I’m going to sail us down the river to Per-A-At and kiss that man myself,” he wanted to run and scream for joy. Of course it was his child. “Wserkaf’s prank when he first met us. He used his wdjat and the sun to redirect our charm energy and scramble our thoughts.” He waited for her to nod, but she had returned her glance to Djerah. “You almost died that day, my sweet one. During the blurring of our thoughts from his spell, I knew we had been together.”
“Well, I wanted to die that afternoon because of what I saw, Marai. Even though being with you was my every desire,” Naibe whispered. “The darkness came for us like an evil shadow and I saw you lying dead, and there was Deka’s grinning face in the middle of all of it. The horrible storm darkness that sits on her shoulders called my name,” her head bowed. “See how it is now? It was prophecy. Maybe it was this poor one I saw lying dead,” she indicated Djerah, whose breath still rasped unsteadily. “Oh, see him take his last breaths?” she indicated how shallow the rise and fall of the man’s chest had grown.
Everyone silently agreed the young man was running out of time.
“Please Djerah, stay with us,” she lightly touched his bloated forehead, then looked back at Marai who reached for some more clean cloth.
A son, Marai reveled in the thought, though a little goddess would be no less a joy. He moved to her other side; his hands trembled as he sweetly cupped her chin.
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