Gate of the Gods: Book 5 of The Windows of Heaven

by K. G. Powderly Jr.

  “People, incompetence does not get any more incompetent than that. You’ve just heard me tell you what the heavenly signs are saying. Now, let me explain what that means for us practically. Even those of you who lacked opportunity to attend the Academy know that the Divine M’Ae promised there would never again be another Deluge to destroy the earth. The golden Tablets of Destiny said that, ‘While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, winter and summer, and day and night shall not cease.’ Most of you know these as ‘The Four Cycles of the World.’

  “Now, you might say, ‘Nimurta, what’s stolen tablets and bad heavenly omens got to do with the Four Cycles?’ Let me tell you. We all know that the spiritual world and the visible world are closely, some might even say ‘intimately’ connected—like a man with his wife in the tent; Father Sky to Mother Earth, and all.”

  The crowd around the eastern base of the ziggurat laughed. Even the Listener smiled, though he marveled at the stupidity of the comparison. Then a thought hit him that forever erased any smile from his face: What have I helped fashion here? How will history remember me because of it?

  Nimurta went on, “E’Ya can bless, and E’Ya can curse. That means there’s a connection between how we worship down here and how the forces of nature respond from up there.” He gestured dismissively at the sky. “En-Ki the Messenger of E’Ya, and El-N’Lil the Divine Wind, have spoken to the High Khaldi and to other priests and seers most urgently lately. Not only that, but our own sages—particularly those entrusted to study the sorcery and science of the Ancients—are troubled by a growing body of evidence that suggests the Four Cycles are breaking down.”

  The crowd murmured like indigestion. A couple of women, who seemed planted on opposite sides of the crowd from each other, began to shriek in affected terror. Even the Listener, who was not particularly devout, found the words of Nimurta blasphemous.

  Nimurta raised his hands, palms downward, and lowered them in small increments, as if the crowds were a frightened mob of children, each needing a reassuring pantomime pat on the head by a fatherly hand. “Now, I know how awful that must sound. After all, we’re used to thinking of those cycles as promises of continued stability—and they are. But we have a part to play in keeping that promise too. We can’t simply sit back and expect that E’Ya will bless our laziness, nor the kind of mismanagement that came during the end of the last government. No. We all have some work to do to keep the promised cycles going.”

  The Listener narrowed his eyes at the speaker in quiet rage, and an awakening sense of responsibility.

  “We have truly inherited a mess,” Nimurta said. “Just after the Deluge that wiped out the World-that-Was, the Four Cycles were in order. Our elders tell of first a warm period that lasted about twenty years, followed by an intense cold spell of an equal number of years. Cold and Heat were in a regular cycle of twenty years each. Since that time, however, for nearly three hundred years, the climate has grown warmer and drier. The grasslands on either side of the Great Rivers are turning into deserts. With the world’s population near six hundred thousand, the famines of Urartu are spreading.

  “Now, I know that some of you may think I’m being a bit hard on the Zhui’Sudra—may his days be multiplied—and on the M’El-Ki. Let me say that we owe our fathers, who rode through the waters of Primal Chaos that destroyed their world, a debt of gratitude for our very lives. However, new information comes to light weekly, as our sages study the writing on the obelisk from the World-that-Was. Fact is; we now have a new account that reveals another side to the story of our own history. There comes a time when a new generation must take its stand for the truth against half-truths!”

  The Listener began to move forward through the crowds, not entirely sure that he knew what he would do once he came to the base of the ziggurat stairwell. Everyone in the gathering was too young to recognize his face, and his own vigor was such that he could have passed for a man much younger than he actually was—as young as many present. He knew Nimurta would recognize him, however. It was impossible for him not to.

  “I will not lie to you, people,” Nimurta went on; “hard decisions are before us. I will not let one man, or even one tribe, jeopardize our continued existence out of sentimentality for nostalgia…”

  The Listener stopped in his tracks not because he was afraid to die—even though he was. If he thought his own death could reverse this madness, or even cause people to think, he would have continued. What stopped him was the realization that Nimurta would simply have him killed on the spot, and removed, before the Listener could even make his identity known to the people. They would never have reason to think him anything more than a troublemaker who had stupidly forced the Lugal to make an example of him. Better to find out what happened to the others…

  Nimurta elaborated, “As you know, our world is still young, trying hard to recover from the catastrophe that destroyed the one before it. The recently-discovered obelisk at Eridu reveals that the Ancients had the power to prevent this cataclysm.” He paused, as if to allow the implications to ripple through the mob in muttering waves. After several long seconds, he said, “They had the power. What they did not have was the unity of purpose!

  “Only the Zhui’Sudra and his family, during their youth and strength, with the favor of En-Ki, sufficient wealth, some forethought, and with skills that, by our standards, were nothing short of magical, survived. Yet even the Zhui’Sudra—may his life be prolonged—for all of his wisdom, has grown old. It has been the unfortunate experience of many of us that our vitality and lifespans do not seem to last as long as those who lived in the blessed times before the Deluge. Some of you have fathers and grandfathers who are grey of head and wrinkled after a mere three hundred years…”

  The Listener muttered under his breath, “Not this old-timer, you arrogant young windbag…”

  “They’re forgetful, and easily tired. They don’t always think straight, as they did in their youth. It’s not their fault, it’s just that in this new world, the ravages of old age come sooner to many of us than it used to. We should think no ill of the failing vitality of our elders—especially of the Zhui’Sudra, who was already getting grey before this world even began. We should honor them. Yet, at the same time, younger, firmer hands must now step forward to guide the helm of this great ship that is our world.

  “I have re-built the city of Surupag, down south, to honor the Zhui’Sudra—the city he ruled during his youth, in the World-that-Was! You should all go down there and pay homage to him some time. I’m sure he’d be glad for the visit. It is my honor to provide for him and the other surviving Firstborn in this way—to give them a nice quiet township on the river to spend their twilight years in. For we who are still young, however, there’s hard work ahead of us—hard work, but also prosperity, as the fruit of our labors! It is time to build for ourselves cities of commerce and industry, lest we be scattered as wandering nomads across the face of the Earth!”

  The mobs erupted into thunderous applause all around the Listener, their eyes aglow with identical fire.

  Nimurta raised his hands in a gesture that showed he was not yet finished. “So what are the immediate dangers that face us? First…” He waited for the cheering to die down more. “First, that the irregularity of the Cold-Heat Cycle threatens to spread to the seasonal Winter-Summer Cycle, which would then quickly break down the all-important Planting-Harvest Cycle, until even day and night itself falls into chaos! We can deal with some irregularity in the long cycles of cold and heat. We cannot survive long if either the winter or summer solstice does not happen when it should.

  “Now some of you might say, ‘Why, Nimurta? Why would we not be able to survive?’ I’ll tell you. If the sun continues to recede into the south and no winter solstice happens, it is no different than the sun dying and going to its tomb in the Southern Ocean—at least as far as our crops are concerned. Winter would continue indefinitely—not as it did in the Wandering Years of the Great Cold for twenty
years, but forever.

  “Likewise, if the summer solstice failed, the deserts would grow, the heat would continue until the forests of the mountains caught fire—it would be the second great World-end of Fire predicted by the Seven Seers of old! With planting and harvest permanently disrupted, we would starve or burn, slowly and painfully—take your pick.

  “‘But Nimurta,’ you might say, ‘what can we do about such things?’ Well, I’ll tell you! Although the mismanagement of our limited resources under the previous government has made the heavenly Watchers so angry that some have even threatened to attack the Earth, En-Ki has assured us that if we straighten ourselves out spiritually, by practicing the correct rites and ceremonies to appease the Heavens, he can keep the others at bay.

  “Remember, what happens in the visible world affects the spiritual one, which in turn, affects our fates back in the visible world. In addition, we can embrace newer, better ideas about how to live and govern. En-Ki the Messenger of E’Ya, tells me we have made a good start with the Bab’Eluhar Initiative. Until now, we have not built a centralized infrastructure of townships around an accessible sacred city. But this is only a start.

  “This new stairway connecting the Ten Heavens, Earth, and Under-world must have ongoing financial support, if we are to build an urbanized empire around it with the industry, comforts, power, and prosperity that our distant ancestors enjoyed in the World-that-Was. So now, I speak the Incantation of Nimurta before the Heavens, Earth, and Under-world; before E’Ya and the gods, I say, ‘let us build to ourselves a city and ziggurat, whose top gate shall communicate with Heaven, and let us make ourselves a name, before we are scattered as aimless nomads across the face of the Earth!’”

  The glassy-eyed crowd broke into mad cheers, jumping in place, shouting, “En’Mer-Kar! En’Mer-Kar! Ninurta! En’Mer-Kar!”

  The object of their praise stood, hands raised to receive their worship, a demigod titan risen from the deep to claim a new world.

  The Listener had heard quite enough. He was disturbed more by the mob’s apparent pliability in Nimurta’s hands than by the nonsense in the speech. It seemed unnatural somehow—as if the Lugal had cast a spell of servitude on them. Maybe the Listener had simply been away far too long.

  He set his face toward the south, and began his long walk to find answers at Surupag.

  30

  Palqui felt as if he stood on a shelf at the edge of a flat world.

  The tiny foothill campsite smoked with cooking fires in the red dawn peeking over the Mountains of Heaven’s Bull. The mountains, named for an astronomical epithet of the comet that shattered the planet Tiamatu before the Deluge, stretched into the distance both ways, northeast and southwest. Southward, the Shelf-lands began their steady descent from a rich green valley, into the torrid deserts of the Great Sink-lands, where a lifeless network of mineral-dense inland seas, thought to be shimmering gateways into the Realm of the Dead, drank the rivers joining in the grasslands below.

  Amur son of Khetta, Chieftain of the Amurru, was grandson to Khana’Ani the Accursed. Once, that might have mattered to Palqui, but not anymore—not since the one-eyed renegade had rescued him from a pack of highland scythe-cats three months after his escape from Arrata, now far to the east. Palqui had lived among the wandering Amurru since then, none of whom belonged to any “Imdugud dragon cult,” assuming such a thing even existed. Apparently, Kush and Assur had cultivated that myth to keep Arrata and the Council in fear; creating desire for the protection of an army they had actually levied to subdue Arrata.

  El Elyon—the God Most High—had increased the tribe’s meager herds to a respectable size since they had taken Palqui in. It shamed him how the Amurru—whom he used to think of as a band of degenerate runaway slaves—feared even to mispronounce the Divine Name—something the people of Uruk had slang-shortened with casual flippancy.

  “How long did your mountain runner say until they arrive?”

  Amur narrowed his single uncovered eye. “Ey, jus‘past sun-up there’bouts. Took a bit to get message north to the Iavannis, eh?”

  Palqui nodded. “Over a year. Your people still thinking of heading south after this?”

  “Uyup. Good forests, biggy lakes, and long valley for farming and such. Springs’n’rivers with much fish—like the Sacred Orchard of El Elyon almost, no disrespectings. We likes to winter down there, and I hopes to stay and build up me settlement there year-round.”

  “You have been the free servants of El Elyon in rescuing me, and of the M’El-Ki, who is my master—may he soon return. He did not intend that Magog, Assur, the Ghimmuraya, the Tukormags, and Kush should abuse you as they have done. Go southeastward to this valley in peace and liberty. It is not your land permanently however, for that is above my authority to grant—else I would; but you may keep a few settlements there in peace, as long as you welcome those to whom the M’El-Ki partitions the land, when he returns or until the days your children cease to honor El Elyon.”

  Amur bowed to Palqui and smiled. “Thankings be. I named the settlement Yerikho, if you ever want to make visitings. Spend me olding years fishing there, I thinks, and farming too.”

  Palqui laughed. “May your catches and harvests be full.”

  “They come now.” Amur motioned to the band of animal-skin clad warriors descending from the mountain pass.

  Only then did Palqui recognize the leader of the small band—a face he had not seen since he was a small child, before the Sun Ships departed.

  The leader of the men from the north stood taller than the rest, his golden-brown hair in braids down to his heavily muscled shoulders, and a bronzed beard full of silvery streaks like dancing lightning, caught in a frozen moment of storm that moved only with his mouth. He held a powerful oak staff with a clan emblem carved into its top; the stern head of a giant cave bear with a pair of fiery inset topaz crystals for eyes. The Leader’s calm brown eyes surveyed the Amurru encampment, until they fell upon Palqui. The silver lightning of his beard crackled when he spoke.

  “You are the exiled Khaldi.”

  Palqui bowed. “Yes, Lord Iyapeti. My name at birth was Napalku, but the Messenger of E’Yahavah, who delivered me from Arrata, has named me Palqui, because he said that in my days the Earth shall be divided.”

  The bronzed giant said, “I would speak with you alone.”

  Amur took his cue naturally, and lost much of his thick brogue. “I bring refreshments for you and your men, Lord, if your men will follow me to the cooking fires.”

  Iyapeti dismissed his companions with a curt nod, and moved off with Palqui onto an outcropping of marble that overlooked the fringes of the endless basin desert, opposite the green valley.

  “What happened at Arrata?”

  Palqui waited for the patriarch of one third of the human race to sit down on a convenient rock and then did likewise. “Kush and Nimurta have engineered the downfall of the Ensi Council by somehow faking the robbery of the Divine M’Ae. They had help, and conspired to do this for some time.” He then told Iyapeti all that had happened since he had seen the Eridu Stone with Qe’Nani until his escape from Arrata and rescue by Amur.

  Iyapeti folded his huge hands and stared off into the basin salt flats. “Do you know what became of my grandson, El’Issaq? His father, Iavanni, wants us to go to war immediately.”

  “I’d hoped he had escaped north to you.”

  “His caravan was found massacred, but his body was not among the dead. I’ve been fighting a mobile border war for nearly two years now. Thuras, Iavanni, Rhodan, and all of their clans, along with that of El’Issaq, are with me, but many of my own sons are with the Betrayers. I’ve made Khetta son of Khana’Ani a clan chieftain, and freed his children from servitude in return for their support and war bands. Most of the Khittai are slaves of Magog’s tribe, the Tukormags, and the Ghimmuraya. They resent the rebel bloc for the harshness of their brothers’ servitude under them.”

  Palqui nodded. “That will go far in winning the Amurr
u’s friendship. Amur is also a son of Khetta by another woman. His clan escaped similar mistreatment under Assur.”

  Iyapeti said, “There’s more. Captives have told me that Nimurta has somehow rebuilt Surupag, and that my father, the remaining Revered Mothers…” a brief emptiness filled his eyes, “…and all still loyal to my brother and me in the South, have been gathered there as hostages. That is the only reason I have not marched south with my armies. Neither side would fare well in an all-out war.”

  Palqui said, “I had not heard of this. Did any of those you’ve rescued say if my wife Lomina was taken to this ‘Surupag’ place?”

  “I’m sorry, my Son, but I did not know to enquire at the time.”

  “It’s okay; just figured I’d ask.”

  Iyapeti the Elder reached out one of his enormous hands and clasped Palqui’s shoulder. “I’m sure she’s fine. My heart goes with you, though. I lost my wife young, and I know the ache you must feel to return to her. Try to be hopeful. They have no reason to kill her; she’s more valuable to them as a hostage. I believe that my brother—and your father—will return. Then, somehow, with E’Yahavah’s help, we shall set things right.”

  “I had thought to go north with you, but now I’m uncertain. The call of the Seer is strong upon me, and I fear I must return to confront this abomination at Bab’Eluhar and Eridu—alone if necessary. Did you know that one of the Sun Ships briefly called in just before I left Uruk?”

  Iyapeti looked up. “What was said? Do you know which one?”

  “There was no real exchange, just momentary contact; enough to know at least one ship survives. We didn’t discover which.”

  “If so, you must go back, in secret at least, and keep watch by the Abyssu. If my brother returns now, he’ll sail right into a trap.”

  “Nimurta has promised to welcome them.”