Humph, she thought. She’s the one Naa told me was his concubine, I’ll bet. He must have married her out of guilt when the princess died. She’s a commoner, though, like me. I don’t think I’d put up with a man who would shame me like that in front of all others; I don’t care what the riches were. I’d just be gone… leave him with his wealth and his ungrateful little bastards, her thoughts flashed. Wealth and title though, and a monster in the bedroom I hear? Hmmm… That thought brought her to Deka’s silence over the past weeks and to the thought of luring the prince away from both women again. I could handle him, she laughed. I’d have him on all fours and begging for a treat from me.
Curious again, Ariennu focused her eyes on the little family as they pushed past her and went into the women’s area. They appeared tired and already plagued by the evening. Ari sensed some heavy and screaming argument had made them late. They didn’t want to come, even though the party was going to be a great one. The little girl had begun to whine, the older boy and his mother looked as if they wanted to be anywhere else, and the youngest child, another boy, was already being carried in the nurse’s arms.
After a few moments elapsed and they had checked appearances and seen the children had been to the privy the family brushed by her again as if she wasn’t there and went out to the great plaza again. Ari waded through the crowd and grabbed Naibe by the hand. She decided to trail the prince’s family part of the way. The elder woman saw them looking around for empty cushions by the low tables. Eventually, they found a place to sit near Hordjedtef and his countesses.
“Little one…” Ariennu pointed out the alleged wife and children as she pulled Naibe closer, “notice something funny about them?”
Naibe’s big-eyed and wonder-filled expression told the older woman she didn’t understand, but then the young woman was so very innocent of any social norms. Naibe looked harder and then sensed the answer Ariennu wanted.
“A place wasn’t set for them?” she asked. “Did they not send word they were coming?”
“Right! If this man is such a high ranking prince, why is his family being ignored? I was wondering about that myself. This whole evening’s funny. Something’s not right.”
The two women gazed across the pool to the low tables where the elder wife of Great One sat. They saw her annoyed expression as she called for more seat cushions to be placed near her and then ordered the noble families nearby to scoot over and give the woman and her family some room to sit and eat. Oddly enough, Ari noticed that extra room didn’t seem to have two more places for the prince and Deka. Evidently, they were going to sit separately. Just as the king had chosen two young and pretty girls for his companionship this evening, it seemed this prince may have decided Deka would accompany him tonight. The family’s attendance was a mere afterthought.
After everyone had settled again, Ari and Naibe remained to one side to watch the festivities proceed. The prince still hadn’t appeared, and Deka hadn’t arrived either. Naibe moved into the entryway shying back into the women’s area for some unannounced reason. Some of the women and servants who were tending the smaller children were eating back in that area; servants were bringing plates of food to them there.
Ariennu shrugged, abandoned again. She didn’t want to eat in the back with the servants. Too much was going on in the plaza. She wanted to see the prince show up. Brown Eyes might be in a mood, tonight. As for me, though, the king has his girls and he looks as if he doesn’t need me tonight. Time for me to get out among the people and make a friend or two.
A thick swell of the crowd built up in the direction of the entry. A herald cried out the long-overdue arrival of the prince.
“Great Majesty and Father God. Lord of the Two Lands, His Highness, Prince Maatkare Raemkai Grand General of the Upper Lands comes, grateful of your mercy and your blessing in this Divine host!”
“Wa…” Ariennu began. She darted in to the women’s area to grab Naibe and to bring her out to see. The elder woman felt like a young girl again, excited at the appearance of a hero in a parade. She bobbed up and down in joy as she saw a flash of deep blue nemes with two single gold bands pass by within an arm’s reach. It was the prince. Even though she had met many princes and even briefly served as Prince Shepseskaf’s concubine, the sight of the passing blue head-cloth elicited a fury of passionate torment. Beside him walked a woman in a hooded black cloak. Her cinnamon-colored hand held it closed. Even though her skin color was common among women from Kemet, Ari knew it was Deka.
Both of them walked forward in even strides as if they had practiced parade steps. Deka held her head high and looked straight ahead, not adoringly at her prince and not respectfully toward the king. Tonight, it seemed, she had reclaimed the role about which she had once whispered and dreamed – Deka had become the reigning goddess. The announcement of praise had been for the young prince, but the Ta-Seti woman acted as if every bit of the glory had been for her.
Naibe gestured to Ariennu. Why is she…?
Ariennu sensed Naibe start to ask why Deka was cloaked and appeared to not recognize them, but didn’t answer. She stared with an even harder gaze than her open-mouthed younger companion. “I know, I know…” Ari stilled Naibe’s question. “Come in here with me. The night’s hot and she’s going to have to store her cloak somewhere. We’ll just get there first and get her to talk then. I want to hear all about that scrumptious thing who paid for her. I’ve heard all the stories and so have you! I want to know what he’s really like on his couch!” the elder woman towed Naibe back to the women’s plaza to wait for their old friend to enter.
“Well, we’ve had some times too, Ari. I just hope she’s happy now,” Naibe shrugged as they walked. Ariennu knew the girl was still thinking about their tragedies: about Marai being gone, Wserkaf being apart from her, Shepseskaf’s family being afraid of her, and now their being reviled by the other concubines in the royal house.
Deka didn’t come in. Long moments passed. In the distance they heard announcements of the accomplishments of the man being honored.
“Maybe she’s attending him while they speak of him, Ari,” Naibe sighed, bored. She began to loosen her hair, almost absent-mindedly.
“You’re not going to lie down, are you?” Ariennu stopped her.
“No, I know there will be dancing later. I thought I might dance for the king too. I want to see him smile, like the story of Old Ra’s daughter dancing to make her father smile. I know that’s what they wanted me to do at first, but then it hurt my heart too much. Maybe it’s time now.”
“Oh,” Ari shrugged again. “If the prophetesses don’t stop you, you should. It better be a special dance too.”
“It will be,” Naibe’s smile was misty.
Ariennu worried about that. Ever since she admitted she saw the spirit child this afternoon, Naibe had been in a strange mood. Ari hoped it wasn’t, but feared it was the beginning of some kind of madness taking her. She touched her brow a little.
Child stone.
What is this with my girl?
In a moment, Ari’s own thoughts whispered the same refrain.
It is as it should be
She rises high and is of the moon and star
Be watchful.
Something hidden waits.
Ari sighed and frowned, but decided to temporarily reject the message from her stone. Like a bunch of mothers. And Shepseskaf telling me not to have too much fun either. I doubt they know the meaning of the word, she laughed to herself.
Ariennu paced the floor in the women’s area. The food and feasting continued outside with only a few morsels being brought to the back. From time to time she went to the tube entrance to the main courtyard and looked out to see if she could see Deka. Soon, tired of waiting, Ari decided to go back into the outer plaza. As she emerged from the women’s room and moved through the covered passageway, the Ta-Seti woman passed her, but drew her cloak tighter as if she didn’t want to be seen.
Ariennu leapt for her. “Oh. Deka, oh
goddess, at last,” the elder woman embraced her old friend.
Deka tensed and instantly shot a look back at the Ariennu. She hissed before shaking herself free of the woman’s grasp. Head high, she moved into the women’s sleeping area and then stood between Ari’s and Naibe’s cots. She stared down quietly at Naibe’s upturned, astonished face. The Ta-Seti woman almost growled like a strange cat that no longer recognized its old litter mates.
“Whoa, what?” Ariennu turned, realizing she had actually been pushed away. “You didn’t just push off from me, raisin crotch.” She would have grabbed Deka and slapped her instantly, but the Ta-Seti woman held up a gentle hand as a signal she was about to explain. A zephyr-like wind issued from her palm. It was a different, but more keenly developed strength.
This night will be hard for us, Wise Mama. Do not make it harder now that our eyes meet again, her thoughts came through Naibe and Ari’s hearts in her low, musical thought-voice.
That part of Deka hadn’t changed. She possessed the same regal aloofness the princesses demonstrated. No one had ever been able to humiliate that demeanor out of her. Even when Chibale, the failed Kush conjurer, hauled her into N’ahab-Atall’s camp in the wilderness eons ago, she had been no different. It didn’t matter that Ari had beaten her into a kind of complacency. Bone Woman, as Ari had called her then, had come to stay in the thieves’ camp. She wouldn’t be traded out to other owners for a price when she was there. Ari had watched as the dark woman had bedded the men in the camp with a silent enthusiasm that seemed almost mechanical. In those old days, she seldom smiled and never spoke. It had not been until young Naibe arrived two years later that Ari and the Ta-Seti woman began to tolerate each other. It was a harsh testimony to the reversals of their fortunes.
“Ah back to the old shrivel pus, I see. All Marai’s changes gone now because he died for these bastards,” Ariennu snapped in guttural Kina.
Every bit of Deka’s cold, imperious nature had returned. The woman put down her raised hand. One of the handmaidens for the room, struck by Deka’s goddess-like beauty, rushed up to her with a mirror so she could see herself in it. Deka quietly let her hood fall and then removed her dark cloak, placing it over Ariennu’s bedside basket.
Tonight she was dressed in dramatic finery: a slim red kalasaris with gold metal beads and red cloth ribbons interwoven to form the breast straps. A little circlet on her head bore a golden disc that reached down over her forehead, almost covering the place where her stone lay.
“Deka. It’s me, Little One. Don’t you know us anymore?” Naibe’s voice wound up, sounding as if she had suffered one heartbreak too many. Ari came to her, sat on her cot, and held her, a snarl for Deka edging her lips.
“She’s too good for us now, Baby. If Marai could see this,” Ariennu began.
“I know well enough who both of you are,” Deka continued quietly in the Kina tongue she had learned in the thieves’ camp, eyes lowered and not making contact. “How have you been?” She asked, along with more questions, but she was clearly uninterested in the answers she would receive or in any pleasantries of conversation. Moments later, she returned the mirror to the handmaiden, bowed gracefully to give Naibe a still little hug, then edged out of the women’s area. When Deka stepped into the plaza with a forced, bright smile, her eyes danced again. The look behind them was colder than the snow of a wilderness winter.
“Damn her,” Ariennu cursed dejectedly, “something’s bad wrong there. You see that? Like she doesn’t even remember us now. I don’t know how she did it, but she broke the Children’s link between us.” The elder woman stood, rubbed her brow, and sensed only a void that followed Deka as she left. “That does it. I’ll make that piece of maggoty fish stink pay for that. Put on that manner around me? Lost her wits, she has!” Ariennu once again became the hardened slave-trainer in N’ahab-Atall’s camp, ready to punch and kick the Ta-Seti woman into submission.
Naibe-Ellit shook her sad head. It’s her new way, Mama Ari. It’s something she has to do to keep the madness away. I can feel it inside her like a fire burning. Just let her go for now, the young woman shrugged, once again preoccupied with her loosening her hair.
“Know what?” Ari pushed her lips around, got the mirror Naa had loaned her, then checked her eye and lip paint. Tossing the mirror onto her bed, she straightened her wide shoulders and moved to the tunnel entrance to the main plaza. “I think I’m going to get a drink, several maybe. Let’s just see how many this useless rock in my head will let me suck down. After that, well, we’ll just see what happens!” she turned quickly in something of a huff and left Naibe-Ellit alone in the sleep area.
CHAPTER 26: THE DANCE
Naibe didn’t hear the rest of Ari’s rant as the older woman left the room. She had turned her attention to the dance garment she was putting together. Even though she knew the king would be sitting with Irika and Suenma tonight, and that the prophetesses were scheduled to dance praises for him, she wanted to do her own dance. She had noticed him looking down from his rear porch that afternoon while the children played. He had smiled at her, and in response she had raised her arms into part of her dance pose for him. For a moment she had thought his general smile at the children might have been meant for her. Perhaps it was time to do a better dance for him. She would leave him feeling happy and renewed enough to enjoy the attentions of the girls at his feet.
Naibe-Ellit missed Marai tonight, more than ever. Seeing the vision of her dreamed-of child had been especially painful today. Ari saw him, she almost laughed. I thought of him so much I made him appear. Even he tried to make me feel better.
Since she had been at the palace, she had become more confident and almost happy. The reason the king had not asked her to entertain him was because he sensed she was still grieving, even though she covered her pain with much greater skill. Perhaps if they were together soon she might feel his comfort, or someone’s.
My Asar, little star, my sweet child, where are you now? Naibe cried out for the vision of the shadowy child she had seen in the garden. She sat on the edge of her bed, feeling oddly weak. My sweet son who will never be, my life that is forever gone, I wish there was a miracle I could call down so you could bring me the shade of my Marai to lie with me once more and give you life. Tonight, even with all of the festivities going on, she felt only rising tears.
Mother, don’t cry, a little voice spoke and the touch of a hand met her arm. I said I would always be with you. I am with you now. I will help you dance tonight. I will help you bring greatest joy to another who is sorrowing.
Naibe reached for the little hand but touched her own naked shoulder; the child wasn’t there. Maybe he hadn’t been there at all, she thought. Maybe he was part of some kind of spirit madness; a little dream voice that came to console her.
Naibe knew through the intelligence she gained from the Children of Stone that the women of her birth land danced for Ashera in tribute of her descent into the underworld. It was a darker and dustier place than Kemet’s “Land that Loves Silence” but otherwise not too different. It would be the completion of the spirit dance she had begun at Shepseskaf’s house on that moonlit night. Tonight her dance would be so much more beautiful, she felt. In part it would salute Marai’s memory, and in doing so she would mark the end of her mourning time. Her heart would say: I am becoming my own, now. Tonight is my first night alive since my heart of hearts died. She would draw the energy down and combine it with the goddess spirit burning inside her and the spirit of the impossible child beside her. Her dance would be a gift for this king, because he had been compassionate.
Naibe fastened the belt of serpents Wserkaf had given her over seven pinned and draped linen wraps. These she had wrapped loosely so that the belt could tinkle and chime beneath the fabric when she danced. She re-fixed the flower garlands on her shoulders and her arms, loosened her hair, and combed the melted perfumed oils from the last bit of the scent-cone through it. Pressing a simple circlet on her head she unfastened her hair so
it flowed loosely to the top of her hips. The task of dressing complete, she slipped quietly back out to the plaza.
Ariennu wandered through the crowd, watching the assembled populace enjoy the feast set before them. The encounter with Deka had made her too angry to eat. What Naibe had tried to explain didn’t matter. Deka had become haughty. Haughtiness wasn’t the same thing as grief.
The guests reclined on cushions around the pool and throughout the large open plaza. Woven wicker platforms had been set on brick risers in front of them. The wealthiest guests, who sat closer to the throne area, had polished wooden table boards placed on carved marble blocks. People didn’t rise to get their food; instead, servants wandered amid the lounging groups, tending them like bees tended flowers. From time to time a face turned up to notice her as she ambled by.
Ari didn’t want to find a place to recline among the guests, unless it was beside the king. She mulled over the idea of making her way to the place where the dark woman was sitting to levy another series of insults at her, but Deka was seated with old Hordjedtef’s extended family. Ari didn’t want to get that close to the old sorcerer. If she went to Deka and started something, the old man would simply have her taken out of the party or find a way of making her even angrier. Such action by him would mean nothing short of a riot. No, the old man Hordjedtef is the one who really needs a killing, but his death I want to save for later. I want to see that bastard suffer.
“Ssst… Here… you can sit with us,” A woman in a light, leaf-green kalasaris tugged on Ari’s hem. It was the first sign of true friendliness she’d seen in the palace. Usually, the kindness was civil, artificial, and polite.
“Thank you” crept out of her mouth even though she tried in vain to see what Deka was saying. The old man was speaking to her. She was nodding but didn’t look pleased to hear what he said. The people tugged Ariennu’s skirt again and she eased down beside them. The woman shoved a plate of sweetmeats in front of her that sizzled with honey and crackling fat. Chicken? And Honey pepper? She dipped her fingers in the flower-water bowl and pressed them into a common linen towel that was near the tray. This far away, she couldn’t tell what was going on any more.
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