Twilight in Babylon

by Frank, Suzanne

  “She who is fair as Inana, strong as Sin, and beloved of the court,” they sang. “Wake and greet the New Year, given to thee as a gift for a bride.”

  Puabi opened the door, naked and painted with gold. Shama bent at the knee and offered her the crown that was hers. For Puabi, a granddaughter of Ziusudra and the most highly cherished woman in Ur, was ensi, the elected leader of the temple.

  Inana in the flesh, she was the spiritual consort of the commercial leader, who was the lugal—another elected position. Puabi appointed the en, the high priest who guaranteed fertility within the city of Ur.

  Puabi put the crown on her head and smiled greetings at Shama. Because it was the New Year, she was sequestered until the stargazers proclaimed the New Year had actually arrived. Shama didn’t keep track, he was only her chamber keeper, but it felt like the New Year came late this year. Usually it happened on the spring equinox, but that had been almost a month ago. Easy to remember, because that was when the moon turned red and the Euphrates had drowned the northern villages and marshes.

  The floodwaters had sent rats by the thousands down the riverbed. Some detoured into Ur and were roasted on sticks and sold to those with undiscriminating palates, but most ran headlong into the southern sea. He guessed they either swam their way to Dilmun, or drowned.

  Of all things Shama hated, rats were the most despised.

  Puabi turned her back to them all, and they prostrated themselves again until her door was shut.

  The drums didn’t bother Shama; he was deaf to them because he’d lived in the temple since the Deluge. The beat of the kettledrums traveled up through his feet though, until he had to check that bugs weren’t on him. Shama hated bugs, too, especially the big black beetles that fell onto his bed in the night, and squished when he rolled over on them.

  Shama led the priests and acolytes, those perfect boys and men, into the depths of the temple. The statues were there, the graven images of Ninhursag and Enlil, Inana and Pazuzu, Shamash, Sin, and a half dozen others whose names he couldn’t remember. The only one who wasn’t represented was the leader of them all.

  The god of gods was too mighty for clay or gold. He drew his finger in the sky, he didn’t need priests and temples, he spoke to men directly. He didn’t confide in the silly gods of the storm, and the clouds, and the sun; they were merely his courtiers, his employees, and thus beneath him.

  Humans didn’t even know the god of gods’ name.

  Shama pointed out the newly woven clothes for each of the statues, the jewels they would wear, the tapers and votives that would accompany the statues as they were walked from their temples to Sin’s. Then he showed the priests their clothes.

  New Year’s, as far as Shama could tell, was just about noise and clothes. Everyone got new clothes. It was a conspiracy of the weavers’ karum, but he couldn’t prove it. And no one listened to an old man who remembered the Deluge.

  If he could remember the Deluge and talk about it, he probably would have pleased his parents and become a lawyer. Then people would listen to him, most assuredly. But the same curse that was laid on the crow for its greed had been laid on Shama’s speech: He stammered. He sounded like a stuck door. Consequently, other than the ritual words muttered once a year, he hadn’t spoken for decades.

  Perfect for maintaining the secrets of the temple.

  Even if he thought the gods were whining brats who needed discipline.

  Shama watched the young priests get to work. The big blond Kidu was Puabi’s personal project, brought in from the mountains, trained by her own hands. His was an insatiable appetite for food and procreation; already the females of Ur lined up for his services. The man’s mind was disproportionately small for his body, which made him a perfect, malleable vessel within the temple hierarchy. Kidu would be high priest, the en, next.

  Shama picked up his new fringed skirt and walked up the stairs. If he calculated right, he could take a long nap before he was required again.

  * * *

  The population of Ur danced in the streets below them. Ezzi didn’t hear their cries of joy or ecstasy. The blood had drained from his face, and he felt like he might be ill. “Bad?” he repeated. “It’s a bad star?”

  “Evil,” the stargazer said, his eyes closed. Was he speaking from the gods themselves? “The Tablets of Destiny proclaim blood must atone.”

  “Atone for what?” Ezzi asked.

  Another stargazer slapped the back of Ezzi’s head and knocked his basket hat askew. “Atone for anything. The gods don’t have to give you a reason,” he hissed.

  Ezzi, trembling, nodded and looked back at the great stargazer. “Who, whose… blood?”

  The great stargazer bowed his head. Like all priests and servers of the gods, he was a perfectly shaped male human. Ezzi knew that the stargazer’s hearing, sight, taste, and touch were to be without flaw. The gods declared who would serve them most closely by making them the most appealing of humans.

  Ezzi, as a boy, had been declared unfit because his left ear was a thumb’s width higher than his right ear. Across from him sat a worthy man, whose ears were perfectly symmetrical, whose eyes were almond-shaped and long-lashed. His eyebrows curved over his eyes and met in the exact center of his forehead, then progressed down his nose to stop exactly even with his eyes.

  Ezzi wasn’t worthy to even breathe in his presence.

  “I had hoped I was wrong, for I foretold many years ago this star would appear,” the stargazer said. Even his voice was perfect. Comforting and strong.

  “You, you, knew the star would appear?”

  The other stargazer slapped Ezzi’s head again. “He is the great stargazer, boy. Did you think you would see something he hadn’t?”

  Minute by minute, Ezzi felt more miserable. Hopes of a copper tub had faded; now he just hoped he wouldn’t be assigned corvée duty for daring to speak to the stargazer.

  The man shook his head, the curls of his beard black, glossy, and perfectly even. “It is a sad day for the Black-Haired Ones between the rivers. What we have done, what humanity has brought upon themselves, what the gods have chosen to take offense over, I cannot imagine.”

  “Will the earth be as blank clay again?” Ezzi asked. Had the flooding to the north been foreshadowing? Had that been the proclamation of the reddened moon?

  “The Tablets of Destiny do not say, boy,” the stargazer said. He opened his eyes, as brown as the mud of the city, and fixed them on Ezzi. He fought to keep the great one’s gaze. “It touches you personally.”

  “Me?” Ezzi’s voice was a squeak like he hadn’t made since his first years at the Tablet House.

  The great stargazer nodded. “You must seek out your personal gods and demons and see what service you can offer so the gods will spare you.”

  Ezzi didn’t speak to his personal god very often. He had an altar in his room with a Watcher statue, he poured libations, but more from force of habit; he didn’t even remember the name of his personal demon. Maybe that was the problem. Neglect. He wasn’t aware the big gods even cared about the little, personal gods.

  There were a lot of gods, if each person had his or her own god, his or her personal demon, add in the pantheon of demigods—about five hundred of them, and the court of big gods, which was at least another fifty. Maybe families shared personal gods or demons? He would have to ask his mother who were her personal gods and demons. But if offending any one of them could bring down the wrath of any other one of them…

  It was a wonder humanity hadn’t been destroyed more times than it had.

  Thirty thousand times two, plus five hundred, plus fifty… 60,550 gods could be offended.

  Ezzi needed to relieve himself. And he thought he should probably pray. A lot.

  “Come back to me in three days’ time, at the end of the festival,” the great one said. “I will intercede for you, see what can be done. Go.”

  Ezzi fled, raced down the stairs, jostled by people and desperate for his chamber pot. He probably sho
uldn’t relieve himself on the temple; one of those 60,550 gods might get offended. He paused by a palm tree—did palm trees have personal gods? Demons? Something could climb up his—he raced on, just in case.

  The streets were clogged with dancers and gymnasts, fire breathers and diviners. People were packed together like fish for sale.

  It was dark, it was crowded.

  He couldn’t help himself. He moved his cloak open and stood tight against the person in front of him. The relief he felt was almost spiritual. All the beer from the day, fermented with excitement, date-palm wine and holy water from the Euphrates, rushed through his body and out against the cloak of the person in front of him. He dried off, straightened his robe, and moved across the crowd, content to watch the street show.

  Chapter Six

  Chloe looked at the scratches on the clay in front of her. Morning light shadowed the deep marks in the clay, so they looked like wedges. “So you’re telling me the sign of the man’s head, means man.”

  “It could mean male human,” Kalam said patiently.

  “Or it could mean head—”

  “Or mouth or eyes or face,” he said.

  “Or, the phonetic rendering of lu.”

  “Truth.”

  “Or the determinative, to let me know someone’s—a male human’s, in this case—name is coming up.”

  “Yes.”

  She looked at the complicated symbol—five marks to make one word? And he had to write with his elbow sticking out so he wouldn’t ruin the symbols he’d made already. “How many signs are there?”

  Kalam scribbled something on the clay.

  “What’s that?”

  “The number showing how many—it’s approximately seven hundred.”

  “Each one has all those different meanings, so you need to remember thirty-five hundred different things to be competent.”

  “Yes.”

  “Is eleven years, from dawn till twilight, enough time?”

  Kalam looked at her, suspicious of ridicule. “The wine clouds your head yet,” he said slowly. “Either that or the urine,” he said as he elbowed her.

  “I only hope I can get that dress clean!” she said. One of last night’s revelers had relieved himself on her. A Mardi Gras ancestor, the voice in her head said.

  “Are you ready to try?” he asked, holding the handle of the reed stylus toward her.

  This isn’t going to be the way it was before, she thought. More like memorizing art than learning an alphabet. Those are just syllables and pictures. Writing in this place and time is a rebus.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked; Chloe had torn at her head, her hair, rubbed her ears fiercely. “Are you ill?”

  Don’t tell him you hear voices. Even in this day and age—whenever it is—that’s a bad sign.

  “Just… my head aching,” she said.

  “Do you need some nourishment?”

  “No, no thank you.”

  “You are becoming quite pale, I mean, for a Khamite.” He stood up. “I am going to the tavern to wait for Ningal. You should rest.”

  She nodded. “I should.”

  He’s being awfully pleasant, the voice said. What’s up with that? Chloe smiled weakly at Kalam, then hurried off to her apartments.

  “Chloe?” he called.

  She turned back. “Yes?”

  “Who is your personal demon?”

  “Pazuzu.”

  “Ah, good choice. And your personal god?”

  Music, unlike a song she’d ever heard before, beat in her head. A man sang in a rough voice. “Your own, personal—” “Jesus,” she called.

  “Just one? Well, do you need an altar for him? her? I’m sorry, I don’t recognize the name. A god of the marshes?”

  “Of shepherds.”

  “Ahh, I see. Do you have a votary? A statue? A watcher?”

  The song continued to play in the background of her mind, words she didn’t know, but understood conceptually. The marsh girl knew that votives, statues, and watchers, substitutes for the devoted one, with enormous eyes and fervent expressions, were used to feed the gods’ need for attention. Humans were merely slaves before divine owners. “A votive would be nice,” she said. “I never thought about it.”

  “It will be my New Year’s gift to you,” Kalam said, then waved.

  “Kalam,” she said, turning to him. “Instead of writing so awkwardly straight down the clay, and right to left, why not write across it, left to right, so you don’t smudge the marks as you go?”

  Kalam stared at her. Speechless.

  “Anyway,” she said. “Tell Ningal hello from me.” She left him standing in the doorway as she climbed the steps to her apartment. The pounding of the kettledrums was past, but the noise in her head had grown a thousand times louder. Voices, thoughts, and pictures. Her mind ached just being awake. Chloe went to her room, took off her clothes, and crawled into her palm-frond bed.

  “Jesus,” she said softly to her personal shepherd god, “I think I’m losing my reason. Help me be good, to do the right thing. And please make my head stop aching.”

  She closed her eyes and willed the voice to sleep, too.

  * * *

  Shama peered through the darkness, to the tangle of bodies. The smell of opium was thick in the room. He held up his taper and looked at the mass of barely conscious worshipers. Kidu, the mountain man–cum–high priest in training, was flat on his back, with three women curled around him. He was snoring; they were bleary-eyed and drugged.

  He shook Kidu’s leg.

  “Sleep,” one woman said. “He’s useless.”

  Another woman demonstrated his uselessness. “Opium,” she slurred out. “We took it, too, since he did.”

  Of course, if the high priest of fertility were unable to perform, why should his followers be frustrated. Shama sighed in disgust. With the flat of his blade, he swatted Kidu’s thigh.

  Kidu attacked him. Shama had no defense. In a second he was in darkness, his throat constricted. Growling, shouting, pleading tones—Shama couldn’t hear clearly. But Shama felt Kidu’s hands around his throat.

  To live so long and end up killed by a barbarian. Shama’s head was hot; perhaps his brains were going to explode from his ears.

  “Let him go,” he finally heard someone say to Kidu. “You’re going to kill Shama, then the ensi will kill you.”

  Kidu dropped him, and Shama fell to the floor, landing on some soft woman. Everything went black. When he awoke, the three women were fanning him, perfuming his wrists, and praying. Fervently.

  Kidu stared at him balefully. Shama had met oxen with far more wit. The drugs had melted his brains like beeswax. This wild man had embraced the worst civilization had to offer—and Shama was almost sorry for him. As long as he pleased Puabi, though, he was free to do and be anything he desired. If he didn’t, then like so many of his predecessors, he would be removed.

  “It’s the ensi’s chamber keeper,” one of the women told Kidu, massaging her words into Shama’s skin. “Puabi must be requesting you.”

  “Puabi?” Kidu repeated. “Puabi wants me? Now? Now?”

  Shama nodded, and Kidu stood up on the bed, repeating his sentence. Puabi wants me? Now? Now? He dragged Shama up. The old man winced as he felt his bones rub together.

  “Be careful,” one of the women said. The other two proceeded to wish the mountain man a long, fond farewell.

  Shama watched Kidu with the women and as his head cleared he realized the barbarian was aroused again. At least Puabi wouldn’t be disappointed. As for Shama, he was going to order a long, hot bath in a copper tub. With mint beer.

  * * *

  Kalam sat back from his beer tube. In his right hand he held the parcel of Chloe’s gift, her votive. Before him was a clay tablet, with the symbols written as she suggested although it was easier to make them sideways from the changed angle. Writing them had been more comfortable, and Kalam was amazed at how quickly he’d been able to write when he didn’t have to
hold his arm up, away from the clay.

  A female human, an ignorant Khamite, couldn’t have thought of this. Where did she get it? Who else had she told? He tried to not think of how honored he would be if he made the suggestion to his former Tablet Father.

  Kalam rubbed the clay smooth as Ningal took a seat, kissed his greeting to the ale-wife, and ordered wine instead of beer, much to her dismay. After a swat on the bottom and promise of double payment, the two men were left in relative privacy.

  “How is Chloe today?” Ningal asked. He’d been visiting today, exchanging New Year’s blessings with friends and cousins.

  “Complaining of headaches.”

  “How did your first lesson go?”

  Kalam’s gaze met his employer’s. “You were correct; she was nonplussed when I explained how the signs worked. She was astounded when she learned how many different ways they could be read and interpreted.”

  “Sometimes with female humans, it is best to give them what they think they want. Or, in this case, a sample of it.”

  Kalam sipped some beer. “I have never heard you doubt a female before, Justice.”

  He shrugged. “A lawmaker learns about people. You’ll see someday.”

  Kalam’s gaze froze over Ningal’s shoulder. “You won’t believe who just walked in,” he said. “An old acquaintance of yours. Don’t turn.”

  Guli halted when he saw Kalam; Kalam watched his gaze fix on and recognize the justice who had put him in the canals. Guli braced his wide shoulders, waved to the ale-wife, and came over to their table. “Greetings of the New Year to you, Justice, and you, Kalam.”

  “Guli!” the justice said. “I assume you are staying out of trouble, since I haven’t seen you in court.”

  Kalam looked at the man’s waist; still no seal. Some people never did anything with the chances they were given.

  “I have my own shop,” he said.

  Kalam exchanged a dubious look with Ningal.

  “I am a hairdresser.”

  “Greetings, Guli,” a red-haired, voluptuous beauty said, her long fingers trailing across his shoulders. “Greetings, gentlemen.” Her gaze was frankly admiring of Kalam and the justice. Ningal ignored her, not to the point of rudeness, but because he had no use for women other than priestesses… and Chloe. Kalam smiled at the woman, but his thoughts were arrested. Chloe? Was the justice keeping the Khamite woman as a concubine?