Naibe sat dreamily near Marai during the evening meal they were about to share, wondering what the night time would bring.
Marai noticed, and gazed into her eyes so lovingly that, she wanted to fall on him right then.
Beloved one...his thoughts had confirmed her own. You know in your heart of hearts that there is nothing I would rather do than lie in your arms...than kiss every part of you...Know that! My reason is the same as it always was, but now it’s so hard to live with that reason.
In the night, they nuzzled, caressed and kissed, just a little. If she whimpered in protest, he spread his hand out over her brow to calm her, until she slept. Lying silently, and no less frustrated, he sent his wish into the universe that soon he would find the remnants of the clan of Ahu or at least meet someone who had even heard of them.
The four “sojourners” as Marai and the women quickly learned foreign travelers were called, sought shelter in some kind of inn or livery each night in return for some small service. In this way they pushed south from town to town along east bank of the river.
Naibe and Ariennu traded some of the honeyed dates made from the wild honey the boys found on the journey. Almost instantly these sweets met with acclaim. Realizing they had come up with an idea that would only help their small spice industry, the women traded for extra honey and dates so they could make more. This kept most of the spice and incense the Children had created for them before they left the crystalline vessel from being sold too quickly.
While Naibe and Deka sold the dates as they made their way through each local market, Ariennu learned the needs of the women living in the area. Marai listened to the language spoken in each small village. If it was a new dialect, he withdrew a slight distance and practiced a few words of it until he learned a pattern of simple phrases.
The Children of Stone must have caught on to the idea, the shepherd (henceforth known as the sojourner) thought. Soon, he could converse in three or four dialects with ease. In each place, Marai asked if anyone had heard of his family. He said he was looking for sons of Ahu and Nima or his own mother, Liah. He asked about the family of Naim and the other people who had surrounded him in his childhood and his days in the wilderness at the foot of the Mount of Sin. He asked about Sheb, Houra and their sons.
Gradually, even though his heart told him to keep looking, he realized his worries had been valid. It would be almost impossible to find anyone in a city a large as Ineb Hedj after ten years. Maybe his family had died. It became more believavle to him that they hadn’t settled near White Wall, after all but had pushed on to the south or settled east where Kemet ruled. It would have even been posssible they went north to a border of Kina-Ahna land. Finally, after a week of fruitless attempts, Marai, Ari, Deka, and young Naibe-Ellit made their way to the east bank of the river.
In a slightly built up area across the river and southeast of the White Wall there was a sojourner’s neighborhood. It rose almost majestically from the smelly and brackish water’s edge where they had been warily selling their goods from their burden baskets. Although varieties of markets were spread throughout each neighborhood, people who had come from many foreign lands lived and conducted some kind of trade in this particular one.
So many residents had come south out of the Sanghir, and Shinar region or the Kinahhu kingdoms, that the village was called “Little Kina-Ahna”.
When Marai stood at the highest point of the rise between two sun-brick buildings, he saw the walls, the gaily painted royal palaces, and most of the temples that lay just across the river.
This is it! This is where I will live! he breathed, putting his arm around young Naibe and pressing her just a little. Even servants from the royal estates, he was told, came to make purchases here on rare occasions. The goods in this market were every bit as fine as those in the west markets, but a better bargain could be obtained here. Unfortunately, the actual nobility or members of the priestly classes, almost always sent servants to make the trades instead of coming across the river themselves.
Marai shrugged and decided to, at least temporarily, ignore his destiny. When the he stood at the top of the rise, he saw the city stretched out along the great river for leagues. This city was choked with people, sights, and animals of all kinds. In that way, Ineb Hedj reminded him of Mari, the Shinar city he barely remembered from his childhood.
Humble, one-or two level dwellings, made of sun brick, were slammed together in winding rows or grids. The residents of these neighborhoods lived in clans, unchanged from the days when they lived in the wilderness, or in other cities. Often filling up whole courtyards with their own kin, the tenants guarded these areas as jealously as they had guarded their water holes far away. In each building, families shared a stair to the second level and ladders to the roof where the cooking was done. In rare instances, a semi-sheltered privy was shared by three or four families. Some courtyards shared a communal well watered by a locked canal from the river.
Soon enough, the onetime shepherd turned sojourner from Sin-Ai met Etum-Addi, a Sangir herb and spice merchant. The merchant later told Marai that he had picked him out when he had seen him standing at the top of the rise near the building he owned. He had been struck by the shepherd’s appearance in a strange and almost familiar way he couldn’t explain.
“There you were, looking regal as a prince, but no announcement of your coming.” Etum Addi further remarked that Marai stood tall as one of the ancient giants, and appeared so strong and able looking. His silver and gold “tassel” hair made his appearance even more riveting.
The merchant, hadn’t been able to resist introducing himself. He came right up and started speaking about the need to find a reputable worker who could repair his building so it could be let to a tenant worker. He told Marai that this two-level building right behind them had been the home of a fairly wealthy family a long time ago when there had been an estate on this side of the river. The merchant had leased it cheaply because it had fallen into in disrepair some time earlier. He had been meaning to take on a tenant once the work on it was done.
The problem with getting a tenant, he stated, was that any able bodied man had already crossed the river to work on the Kings monuments and temples during the flood. At other times they journeyed back to their regular work on their farms. At the moment, the lower floor was being used as a stable for the pack donkeys and a few goats. The roof of the upper floor had been damaged in a sudden rain the year before, and had partially collapsed.
Etum Addi told Marai, if could repair it, he could sell his spice at a square next to the Sangir’s own stall and live in the large, open upper room once he finished the work.
When he first surveyed the rooms and the condition of the roof, Marai thought to himself:
Life here is going to be a little bit of paradise. A large room on a second level was rare enough. This one had a big open window which overlooked its standard foot porch. The view extended down to the narrow, guttered street, where it widened into a space for the shared courtyard well. That meant a much easier time for the women. They wouldn’t have to walk far down to the river and through the reeds to get at clean water.
The man lamented that the water at his well was so good and clean and the area so free of pests or rogue crocodiles because it had been a private well at one time. Now women came from all over the area early in the morning to draw water from it for their daily needs.
That Marai traded for and brought in the support beams, wattle, brick, and finely sifted plastering earth all by himself was stunning enough to his new neighbors. That he sang very boisterously to the very goddess they remembered from homelands far away while he set about making a new roof almost single-handed, set the rest of the area talking.
From the moment he began to work on the roof, a knot of people lingered at the well below, always watching him. A nest of whisperers were always commenting that the women were far too pretty to work at making bricks and smoothing plaster. That was soon replaced by murmurs of the women a
mong each other that speculated why Marai, who certainly appeared healthy, had no children with him and didn’t appear to have impregnated any of his “wives” as he now called Ariennu, Deka, and Naibe.
Marai gathered some of the young men lingering in the area to balance some rather high priced cedar timbers more suited for a royal estate into slots in the brick upper walls. Calling on his memories of Houra’s basket making, he taught Ariennu to weave wattle to go over the framing so it would support more plaster. After another row of smaller cross beams were laid in, Marai set down the brick and tile to form a dry ceiling strong enough make a kitchen and hot season sleep area.
Naibe and Deka busied themselves “unsewing” and shredding the black tent, now faded to a rich wine brown. They converted the large pieces into a dividing wall to separate a sleep an personal area, a drape for the large window to keep the heat of the sun out of the room during the day, and a flap for the door to the steps.
After everyone moved in, Naibe-Ellit, Ariennu, and Deka spent the evenings making more confections of dates, honey, nuts and spices to sell in honor of Ashera. Naibe insisted they say that dates were the Lady’s favorite food, and such a sweet, they insisted, might promote romance.
Ariennu traded for various medicinal herbs to ease a score of female miseries or to speed the progress of a difficult labor. She truly became a “Wise MaMa” in her element, selling a charm to bring a young man to a forlorn girl or another charm to release him.
Deka decided to make cosmetic and paint from the natural minerals and powders being sold nearby. When she developed and sold her many-hued malachite and gold colors for the eye, she heard whispers that she was indeed a foreign, perhaps royal Ta-Ntr, princess.
Marai laughed a little when he heard her say that, but secretly realized the pain in her eyes.
“Ta-Ntr...Ta-Seti...these names I know...” Deka reflected, the second evening at supper in their new apartment.
“Like Ta-Te...” Ariennu remarked, but the look in Deka’s eyes grew so cold that Marai changed the subject and began to speak of the marketing plans for the next day of business.
The sojourner had never stopped thinking about his family. After much meditation, he cured his doubts that Sheb and the remnants of Ahu’s clan came into this very city. Sheb and Houra were to sell her baskets while the others would join the hundreds or thousands hiring out to odd jobs and farm work, until their former patriarch could find a partnership in the running of an inn or tavern. Because he had run a wadi station, such a line of work seemed the most logical to chase.
Even though he was certain they had come here, no one in Little Kina-Ahna had heard of them. Some of the settlers in the neighborhood were even from the Sin-Ai. They thought a clan with the name of Ahu held a station somewhere near the foot of the great mountain once, but none of them recalled meeting that family in their neighborhood or knowing that any of them had even come to Ineb Hedj.
For now, Marai knew he would have to save his searching for nighttime and through spirit journeys. His newly built roof became the “porch outside the cave”. It was his new place to sing to his goddess, except he didn’t have to sing for her to come to him anymore.
That Naibe-Ellit tempted him beyond all sanity, kept the Marai from thinking about the whereabouts of his family too often. She wrapped herself around him and caressed him, luring him up to the quiet of their room at any given hour of the day or night, as soon as the thought of being together inspired either one of them. Although the Children’s reaction to human lovemaking was not as strong as it had been the first night at the well, the enthusiasm they had for each other didn’t dim a bit.
When business at the market slowed in the day’s heat, the young woman would get up from her bench and come to him, shamelessly throwing her arms around his waist or laying her head on his back while he argued prices with a customer. She would run her fingers through his hair, teasing him to the point of almost mindless arousal, then merrily trot away with a pert, innocent over the shoulder glance.
Once she tormented him so much that he calmly put down his things and lunged for her. Failing to get her on the first try, he chased the squealing woman in the direction of the apartment. Delighted with the newness of the game, she dove into a stranger’s booth only to dash away again in great delight as soon as he drew near. The nearby merchants and some of their wives joined in the game, cheering her on and offering Marai coarse suggestions as the romp worked its way around Little Kina-Ahna. That day, they were lost in each others arms until deep in the night. He knew even Paradise would never compare to those days.
Reluctantly, however, either out of a vague sense of guilt, or from the internal nudging of the Children of Stone, Marai began to think of the real reason he had come to Kemet. It stared at him every day from across the mighty Asar River. Every time he took a nighttime prowl along the waterfront to see how high the river was getting, he would see the shapes that resembled mountains. He had seen one mountain in his dream-vision long ago. Now when he stood on his new roof, inspired to sing to the goddess he loved to hold in his arms, he picked out the two largest ones, under the shining face of the moon and stars. The plaza torch lights about them seemed to salute their immensity.
On some nights, a pulse of lightning drew toward and lit the topmost points, causing awe-inspiring light, like the ray of the sun’s power at night. Light arced and cascaded down the smooth, flat faces to the canals and causeways below. The third, a smaller shape, which was just a cleared area of square pits and a temple of massive stones in his dream, was nearing completion. He saw the giant lion in the sand. Now its face had now been chiseled into the image of a god or goddess. Was that the “lions in the dust” the Children had mentioned in the last coded message they left? Despite his best efforts to bury all of his nagging ambitions deep inside Naibe-Ellit’s ripe belly, he knew he would soon be unable to avoid being called to those places. It was an irrevocable destiny.
Marai became as well versed in the Kemet tongue as a native of Ineb Hedj. He learned the names of the gods the people worshiped here by listening to the constant neighborhood chatter and by watching the grand festivals which celebrated these deities almost every day of the year. Many of the gods were so much like the ones his own people worshiped that he wondered if the gods of Kemet might be other forms of the same deities.
That Naibe evoked his goddess was unmistakable. She reveled in the sensual aspects of being like Ashera, or Inanna, but seldom expressed her warlike aspect, beyond a snappish comment. As a youth he had wanted to be Dumuzi. He got his wish much later in his life at the wadi station well, but now the actuality of being the youthful lover was slowly transforming itself into something new, but no less passionate.
He learned that each city along the great river was ruled by a particular god. Although there were temples to the major gods in each city, the greatest temple to a particular deity would be in only one city. Ineb Hedj, the city of White Wall belonged to the god Ptah, patron of artisans.
Priests and nobles kept larger estates near their political appointments, but also had apartments or small estates near the royal palaces, so they could be within easy reach of the king. All of those estates were across the great river and surrounded by the whitewashed high wall. The place he needed to go was close to his new home, but in many ways it was still a world away.
Many nights Marai would stand on the rooftop. Clearing his thoughts from the business of the day, he tried to think of the task the Children of Stone had given him but his thoughts always came back to his overwhelming love of the young goddess Naibe-Ellit. When he was finally able to clear his spirit enough, he took a deep breath and stretched out his arms to the sky. He breathed a thought or two into the air and sent word-thoughts aloft in his search for his destiny.
I, Marai the shepherd of Sin-Ai, am here...see me...
His thoughts picked up the constant pulse of energy in the multitudes of cavernous passages beneath these edifices and the surrounding temples. They ente
red in at the tips of the mountain structures and settled far beneath the garden-filled plazas and boatlined causeways. These buildings were old, some parts having been tunneled out by both nature and man and perhaps even a race of gods long before the giant stone works above had been erected around the inner structures.
Most nights he would sigh after a while, sit cross legged near the edge of the roof and try to drift to the source of that energy he had once felt when he had visited “Djedi”, long ago. He sent his spirit aloft the way he had sent it when he had sung to his lady-god in the nights when being with her had been just a dream.
Passing, in his spirit body through the lamp lit darkness, he saw priests, white-garbed sesh, and novices chanting and moving back and forth as relentlessly as bees working a hive.
There were so very many temples. He assumed that Djedi’s assistant, if he was anywhere near, would have sensed his presence on the journeys he made, but nothing ever indicated such a formidable magician had felt him. Only one or two men looked up from their tasks at hand, as if startled by his presence. He almost snickered in realization that the women and the oracles were more sensitive to his spirit when he traveled. They paused in their musical dancing and praying, reflecting on what they felt. Then, with softer smiles, they picked up the rhythm again.
In the meantime, Marai was becoming quite notorious across the river and inside the city walls of Ineb Hedj for other reasons. More and more, noble servants would come to buy the spice he and the Sangir were selling.
By the time two months had passed, his trysts with Naibe-Ellit had also become the stuff of legend. More than a few of those living in the Little Kina-Ahna whispered that the two of them did seem like gods on some sort of secret holiday a among the mortals. They were obviously so in love that it was believed the joy they shared was translating itself into prosperity for the entire market. The image of youthful shepherd Dumuzi was replaced by boisterous brother Shamash the Sun
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