by Judith Tarr
“Ah,” she said. And nothing else for long enough that he despaired. She did not want to come. She wanted to stay here, where her brothers were, and the Mare’s servant, and the Mare herself. Of course. How not?
Then she said, “It’s a friend you’re wanting.”
“I’m sure I shall find one,” he said stiffly, “once I come there.”
“No,” she said. “No. I didn’t mean it so. I meant—”
She broke off', and hissed as if in frustration. “Are you asking me for something else?”
He felt the heat rise to his cheeks. “I wouldn’t presume,” he said.
“Wouldn’t you?” She was watching the mare again, and the foal. “What if I said yes? Yes to all of it?”
“All of it?” he echoed her.
“Everything you ask. What you let yourself think you want of me, and what your heart wants.”
His heart, at the word, thudded once, hard, as if it would leap out of his breast. “And yours?” he asked. “Does yours want this?”
“From the beginning,” she said.
He was afraid. That was the cold in his skin, the shiver in his heart. He had never been afraid with Iphikleia.
This then was a new thing. He did not like it. Not that it cared for like or dislike. It simply was. To love again so soon, after so much grief—even with the strength of his dream behind him, he could hardly endure it.
The gods had little patience with human maunderings. No more did Sadana. She advanced on him. He stood his ground, as indeed he could not help but do: the wall was at his back.
She trapped him there, with no escape. “Yes,” she said. “Yes, I will go.”
He had asked no less, and should be glad. And yet he said, “I can’t give you the whole of myself. I never could.”
“I know that.” Her finger brushed his cheek. “I don’t care.”
“You are worthy of more.”
“You don’t know that,” she said. “I’ll take what you have, and take joy in it. It will be enough.”
“What if it’s not?”
“It will be.”
He shook his head. He did not know why he was being so stubborn, but neither could he stop himself. “I’m sorry I asked. If you want to send one of the others, I’ll be content. You belong here. Maybe someday—”
“Stop that,” she said. “You asked. I’ve answered. I’ll go with you to the Bull of Re.”
“Will you go as my wife?”
That took her off guard. But not for long enough. “Yes,” she said. “Yes, I will do that.” Then she laughed. “Great goddess! Your kin will be appalled. First my brother and your cousin. Now—”
“I’m not taking you because she won’t have me. Don’t believe that.”
“Of course I don’t,” she said, as if amazed that he could think such a thing. “She’s never had eyes for anybody but Khayan. Some women are like that. Some dogs, too. And a mare or two. They only ever care for one man.”
“I had thought,” he said with an edge of bitterness, “that I was a man for one woman.”
“One woman at a time,” she said. “I’ll be content. Trust in that, beautiful man. I will be happy.”
She meant it. Her eyes were shining. He had never seen her so, with all the taut fierceness gone. She was very beautiful, beautiful enough to break the heart.
He touched her as she had touched him, the brush of a finger lightly down her cheek. Her eyes closed. She shivered.
He would have drawn back, but she caught his hand and held it. “Sometimes,” he said, “I’ll grieve. Can you live with me then?”
“We all grieve,” she said. “I’ll bring you healing.”
“I don’t want to forget,” he said with a touch of sharpness. “Don’t make me do that.”
“Never,” she said. “But the pain—that, I can take away. If you will.”
“I want the pain, too. For remembrance.”
“Pain you may have. But not to wallow in.”
He glared at her. And yet his hand was still pressed to her cheek, and hers over it, warm and strong as many a man’s.
“No wallowing,” she said. “Except in love. That’s the law I’ll make you live by.”
“And if I won’t?”
“You will.”
There was a silence. Kemni began to wonder precisely who had chosen whom.
She let go his hand. It slipped down of its own accord, to rest on her shoulder. She made no move to shake it off. “You really will?” he asked. “You really would go with me as my wife?”
“With great joy.”
And, he thought, no misunderstanding. She knew him, all of him, heart and grieving souls. Even what was missing, or what he no longer had to give. And she could still be glad, so glad that he could hardly bear it.
There was only one thing that he could do, and that was to be as glad as she. It was less difficult than he had feared. When he opened his arms, she came to them—rare gift in one so proud. She held him as he held her, a little shy at first, perhaps a little afraid. She had had pain, too, and fear, and long sorrow.
None of that would go away, not wholly. But even the deepest of wounds, if it does not kill, in time will heal. She, warrior that she was, would not care if there were scars.
No more did he. He was happy, after all; deeply and wondrously happy. Just as he had been in his dream—but with the prick of guilt, the welling of memory.
She felt his drawing back, and caught him, holding him fast. “Memory,” she said, “but no guilt. Never guilt.”
“I can’t promise that.”
“Try.”
He shook his head. Her hand stopped it, tilted it. Her lips met his.
There, however brief, was forgetfulness. There was healing, whether he would or no.
He would accept it, and the one who brought it. He would take it and be glad.
He laughed suddenly. Sadana pulled back, breaking off the kiss. She was puzzled, and perhaps a little angry.
“No,” he said to that. “No, I’m not laughing at you. I’m laughing at myself. That I’ve been such a fool; and that it’s taken me so long to see what was in front of my face.”
“You weren’t ready to see,” she said.
He opened his mouth to say more, perhaps a great deal more, but she stopped it with her hand, then with her lips. When he could breathe again, there were no words left. Nor was there need of any.
Except one. “Beloved,” he said.
“Beloved,” she agreed. She bore him back and down. She was conquering him as her father’s people had conquered Egypt—but here was neither victor nor vanquished, neither captive nor free. Only the two of them, and the love that was between them, that had grown out of enmity and flowered in war. And now, thought Kemni with what little wits he had left: now, in peace, it would yield its harvest.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Until very recently, the people called the Hyksos were one of the great mysteries of Egyptology. Who they were, where they came from, even what they were called, was a matter of debate and of sometimes extravagant guesswork. Even the name that was given them, the “Shepherd Kings,” is a mistranslation. The word Hyksos, in Egyptian, means “foreign kings.” These unknown and perhaps Semitic people were thought to have introduced the horse to Egypt, to have conquered and ruled it for some hundred years, then to have vanished, with all memory of them expunged from the record.
In recent years however, excavations in the region of the Nile Delta have yielded a remarkable store of information about these mysterious people. They are now believed to have been invaders from Canaan, perhaps from Byblos. Their capital, Avaris, has been located at the site called Tell el-Dab’a, where excavations still continue, and have uncovered some great surprises—among them, a rich trove of frescoes in a distinctly Minoan style. Manfred Bietak, the archeologist in charge of the excavations, has postulated a Cretan alliance in the reconquest of the Lower Kingdom, secured very likely by means of a royal marriage. He and others have a
lso discovered that the older perception of the Hyksos as horsemen is not precisely correct. Their chariots for the most part were drawn by donkeys, and their caravans were donkey caravans. Horses were much rarer, and were in evidence in Egypt before the Hyksos invasion.
What the Hyksos did bring however was the chariot, that great weapon of Bronze Age war. Egypt appropriated it, hitched horses to it, and made itself a great power in that part of the world.
These new discoveries and perceptions of the Hyksos, particularly as found in Donald Redford’s Egypt, Canaan and Israel in Ancient Times (Princeton, 1992), and most recently and comprehensively in The Hyksos: New Historical and Archaeological Perspectives, ed. Eliezer D. Oren (Philadelphia, 1997), have shaped and to a great extent determined the plot of my novel. For the sake of the story I have taken great liberties with the culture and geography of Crete, as well as its political and social structure. I have been less freehand, as it were, with Egypt, but scholars will almost certainly take issue with some of my interpretations of the historical and archeological evidence. There was, as far as anyone knows, no son of the Pharaoh Ahmose by the name of Gebu, nor is there known to have been any plot against him. Of his Cretan queen, if she existed, nothing at all is known; but Queen Ahmose Nefertari most certainly lived, and was a woman of great power and influence. She did indeed claim to be the daughter of the god Amon, and was given the office and priestly title of Great Wife of Amon.
Also historical is the mariner Ahmose si-Ebana, who was so kind to future generations as to compose an eyewitness account of the fall of the Hyksos—which he witnessed from on board the fleet; he was never a charioteer; instead he states that before he was a sailor he was a footsoldier in the king’s service. King Apophis likewise is attested in the historical record, although Khayan (named for one of Apophis’ predecessors, King Re Khayan) and his family are fictional, as are Iry and all her kin, the Mare, and the Mare’s people—though there is some evidence that there was, in fact, a tribe or tribes of Amazons somewhere in central and western Asia. That evidence, however, comes a thousand and more years too late for this novel. And finally, the great storm that in the novel contributes to the fall of Avaris actually did occur in the reign of Ahmose, and was even more destructive than I have depicted it; but it had nothing to do, as far as we know, with the war against the foreign kings.
Copyright & Credits
The Shepherd Kings
Epona Sequence, Book 4
Judith Tarr
Book View Café June 16, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-61138-524-3
Copyright © 2015 Judith Tarr
First published: 1999
Cover illustration © 2015 Ashwin82 Dreamstime.com
Production Team:
Cover border: Texture Photoshop Wallpaper courtesy wallpoper.com
Cover Design: Pati Nagle
Proofreader: Sheila Gilluly
Formatter: Vonda N. McIntyre
This is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Digital edition: 20150510vnm
www.bookviewcafe.com
Book View Café Publishing Cooperative
P.O. Box 1624, Cedar Crest, NM 87008-1624
About the Author
Judith Tarr’s first fantasy novel, The Isle of Glass, appeared in 1985, and went on to win the Crawford Award. Her space opera, Forgotten Suns, has just been published by Book View Café. In between, she has written historicals and historical fantasies—including World Fantasy Award nominee Lord of the Two Lands—and epic fantasies, some of which have been reborn as ebooks from Book View Café. She lives in Arizona with three cats, two dogs, and a herd of Lipizzan horses.
Other Titles by Judith Tarr
The Epona Sequence
White Mare’s Daughter
Lady of Horses
Daughter of Lir
The Shepherd Kings
Avaryan Rising Series
The Hall of the Mountain King
The Lady of Han-Gilen
A Fall of Princes
Avaryan Resplendent Series
Arrows of the Sun
Spear of Heaven
The Hound and the Falcon Series
The Isle of Glass
The Golden Horn
The Hounds of God
Novels
Ars Magica
Alamut
The Dagger and the Cross
Forgotten Suns
Living in Threes
Lord of the Two Lands
A Wind in Cairo
His Majesty’s Elephant
Collection
Nine White Horses
Nonfiction
Writing Horses: The Fine Art of Getting it Right
BVC Anthologies
Beyond Grimm
Breaking Waves
Brewing Fine Fiction
Ways to Trash Your Writing Career
Dragon Lords and Warrior Women
Rocket Boy and the Geek Girls
The Shadow Conspiracy
The Shadow Conspiracy
The Shadow Conspiracy II
About Book View Café
Book View Café is a professional authors’ publishing cooperative offering DRM-free ebooks in multiple formats to readers around the world. With authors in a variety of genres including mystery, romance, fantasy, and science fiction, Book View Café has something for everyone.
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SAMPLE CHAPTER: WHITE MARE’S DAUGHTER
The Epona Sequence, Book 1
Sample Chapter
Judith Tarr
www.bookviewcafe.com
Book View Café Publishing Cooperative
January 28, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-61138-356-0
Copyright © 1998 Judith Tarr
THE SEEKER
I: HORSE GODDESS’ SERVANT
1
From far away she heard them, echoing across the steppe: the drums beating, swift as a frightened heart. The voices were too far, too thin to carry above the shrilling of the wind, and yet in her belly she knew them, deep voices and high, strong and wild.
Blood and fire! Blood and fire! Fire and water and stone and blood!
They had made the year-sacrifice, one of many that they would make in the gathering of the tribes. On this day, from the rhythm of the drums, it would be the Bull. Yesterday, the Hound; tomorrow, the Stallion, with his proud neck red like blood.
She laid a hand on the Mare’s neck. In the rolling of years it would be white, like milk. Now it was the grey of the rain that had fallen in the morning, shot with dapples like flecks of snow. The Mare snorted lightly and tossed her head. She could smell the stallions. It was her season, the strong one that waxed with the moon in spring, and would wax and wane slowly with each moon all the summer long, and in winter sleep.
She snorted again and pawed, impatient to be going. Her rider eased a little on the broad grey back, freeing her to spring forward. The wind tangled in thick grey mane and silver tail; caught the long thick braid that hung to the rider’s buttocks and sent it streaming out behind. The pounding of hooves blotted out the drumbeats. They raced the wind then, swift over the new grass, into the westering sun.
oOo
The gathering of the people spread wide in a hollow of the steppe, where a river ran through a cutting that deepened
with the years. Winter’s storms brought down the banks nonetheless, and the herds of horses and cattle made broad paths to the water.
The herds were the girdle that bound the camp. The center, the soft body, divided into circles of camps, each with the staff and banner of its tribe: black horsetail, red horsetail, spotted bull’s hide, white bull’s horns, and three whole handfuls of others; and in the center, in the king-place, the white mare’s tail catching the strong wind of spring.
Agni was on his way to the king’s circle, but taking his time about it. The dancing, that had begun where the hill of sacrifice rose dark with blood, had wound away toward the river. He had been part of it when it began, before the king’s summons brought him back in toward the white horsetail. His father was entertaining the chiefs of tribe and clan in the feast of the Bull, and had called on Agni to stand at his right hand. Rumor had it among the tribes that the old man was going to name an heir at last; and he had called for Agni, the avowed favorite of all his sons.
Agni was sensible of the honor, and of what it meant—how could he not be? But he dearly loved the dance, and the delights that came with it. He was none too eager to forsake it for the dull dignity of the elders in their circle.
As he made his somewhat desultory way past the tents in the center, a hiss brought him about. Someone had lifted the back of a tent. A white hand beckoned from beneath, and a slender arm heavy with ornaments: carved bone and stone, beads strung on leather, and one woven of horsehair that he knew very well.
His breath quickened. Completely without thinking, he dropped down and slithered into the tent.
It was black dark to his day-accustomed eyes, heavy with scents of musk and sweat and tanned hides. Strong slender arms circled his neck. A supple body pressed against his. Warm lips fastened on his own. They fell in a dizzy whirl.
She was as naked as she was born, slick with sweat, white glimmering body coming clear in the gloom; and her hair, her wonderful hair, like a pale fall of sunlight. He could drown himself in the stream of it.