Twilight in Babylon (20 page)

“It’s dirt.”

“It’s part of a star,” Kidu said.

“It doesn’t look like a star,” Puabi said.

“Take it,” Rudi said.

“It’s dirty. Kidu, hold the star.”

He glanced at the piece. “It’s not a star, it’s just a piece of one.”

Shama looked at the
en,
then picked up pins and began to form the next pleat. The man was a man; quite a change from the overgrown boy of weeks ago. And the barbarian from years before that.

“Why are little pieces of star falling to the earth?” Puabi asked.

“That is the omen,” Rudi said. “Something has happened which caused a star to die, and a new star to rise in its place.”

They grew quiet.

“Then it’s even worse than Asa thinks?” Puabi asked.

Shama checked the felt to make sure it was wet, then he picked up the tongs and set the brick on the fabric.

“It’s been several different signs, all saying the same thing,” Rudi said.

Puabi glared at Kidu and Rudi. “I haven’t done anything.”

Rudi spoke. “It doesn’t matter, sister. You are the
ensi.
The gods require your sacrifice.”

“I’m not at fault,” she insisted.

“That matters not at all,” Rudi said. “You are the
ensi.
You are all of us.”

“You always did hate me,” Puabi said, turning away from her sister.

Shama picked up the tongs, removed the brick, checked the pleat for perfection, then set about folding the next one.

“She’s unreasonable,” the
en
said to Rudi.

“How dare you!” Puabi shouted.

He sighed, bowed to them both, and left. The scribes and priests who trailed him bumped into each other as they followed.

Shama set his tongs back in the fire. Rudi was right; it was Puabi’s responsibility. However, could the signs be good omens?

And what, really, had happened to Kidu?

*      *     *

“I must go,” Ningal said. “As a member of the council, it is my duty.”

Chloe rubbed salve into her shoulder. This chicken-wing style of writing fourteen hours a day was killing her arm. “What happens tonight?”

“We ratify the
ensi’s
choice of
en.
”

Chloe looked at her terrible writing.

“Do you wish to go with me?”

“I have homework.”

“Ah yes, lists,” Ningal said as he adjusted his basket hat. “What did you start with?”

“Derivations of human.”

“Quite a long list. Do you have any questions?”

“They mention the four members of the commonwealth: slaves, freedmen, clients, and gentlemen. Explain the differences?”

“As a council member, I am a gentleman. Which means I own property, I pay taxes, and I house slaves.”

“What’s a client?”

“He is in the other house of the council. A client is a male, free, who shows up and votes.”

“Then what’s a freedman?”

“Male, free, but he has no stock in the commonwealth. He can’t vote, he doesn’t own property. He carries on his business or trade, but he has no voice.”

“Which one do you have to be in order to have a seal?”

“Everyone who conducts business has a seal. Only criminals and slaves don’t, unless it states what they’ve done or whose they are.”

“What about slaves? Most seem to be, well, the same race as the Black-Haired Ones.”

“Slavery.” Ningal chuckled. “Slavery comes in several ways. Debt is the most common path. Anyone in debt can sell himself or a family member into slavery. Or any family member can be substituted for the debtor. And a slave can own slaves and property, have a business, a family, he just happens to be owned by someone else.

“Then there are the temple slaves, who aren’t actually slaves at all. They were conceived by the high priest of fertility, the
en,
and when the women of the populace give birth, those children are dedicated to a life at the temple.”

“They’re bred for slavery?”

“Don’t be so alarmed. Within the temple come employment opportunities, same as in the commonwealth. Those humans aren’t raised by their parents, that’s the only difference. Oh, and of course, if they are not perfect, they are adopted by someone in the commonwealth. Only the most beautiful men may serve the goddess.”

“What about the most beautiful women?”

Ningal cocked his head, then spoke after a moment. “Inana is a jealous goddess, so she protects her position by stocking the temple with… less than appealing females. Nevertheless, they are flawless. No scars, no disfiguring or debilitating marks, perfect senses. They just… aren’t the loveliest to gaze upon.”

Chloe flexed her fingers as she prepared to write. “So then, the council, composed of clients and gentlemen, meets and votes in the
lugal
and
ensi
?”

“True, and then the
ensi
appoints the
en.
”

“The freedmen and slaves are just stuck with the decisions.”

“True.”

“The women, too.”

His expression was wry. “Are you trying to win permission to join the council, in addition to being allowed in the Tablet House?”

“Females are in business all over town. What status are they?”

“In Ur, they are freedmen.”

“What if they own land, pay taxes, house slaves?”

“Still, they’re freedmen.”

“That’s unjust.”

“In truth, they influence the men who vote, so they get their words in, just not formally.”

“She who rocks the cradle rocks the vote?”

Ningal frowned. “Excuse me?”

“Nothing. Go to your meeting. If I go, it will just upset everyone. Especially my Tablet Father, who expects me to be able to read and write the forty humans on my list by dawn tomorrow.”

She watched him leave, and had a sudden, almost-hysterical- desire to go too. Her legs wanted to get up by themselves.
Will I stop at nothing to avoid this homework,
she thought, and crossed her legs firmly. Then she pounded her clay flat, eased her fingers around the stylus and began her list. Determined. “Human. Male. Human. Female.”

*      *     *

Ulu rinsed her mouth, spat on the matting, weighed the stone against her carved-duck mina-weights, sighed, then stretched.

“Stretch like that again, Ulu, and I’ll have to pay you even more,” her customer said, undoing the sash he’d just tied. “I’ll just be late for council.”

Youth had its accommodations, but she’d made enough currency for the day and looked forward to sleeping in her own apartments, her own bed, and completely through the night. Still, this customer paid well. Deliberately she rubbed her mouth. “Tomorrow, my dear. You’ve exhausted me.”

He laughed—he understood and acknowledged the graceful way she’d gotten out of it. Of course, grace and elegance was his way of life—except for needing her in the darkest of rooms in the daringest of ways. “I’ll plan on tomorrow.”

“I’ll be waiting, with your beer.”

“The courts are open late tomorrow,” he said. “I won’t be back before the double hour at midnight.”

Ulu’s fingers drifted over her breast as she pinned her dress. “As you know, it’s a business of supply and demand.”

He set another agate on the table. She moved it to the scale, weighed it against the carved duck, and smiled up at him. “A generous down payment. Your beer will be cool.”

“As long as you are hot.”

She blew a kiss at him as he walked out, then lay back on the bed after the door fell shut. Another knock almost immediately. “Not tonight,” she shouted.

Disappointed noises.

“Go away!”

Footsteps retreated down the corridor.

She knocked a roach off the scale—he weighed almost a half mina—and sat up. Another knock. “I’m finished for tonight!”

Guli poked his head in.

“Honeysweet!” she shrieked, sitting up, and crawling across the bed to him. “What happened to you?”

He stepped inside. “Let’s just say, I don’t believe in the gods.”

Ulu looked up at the mud-daubed palm fronds of the roof. “How can you doubt them?”

“I don’t think they care for us, then,” he said.

His face was wrecked. Split lip, one eye swollen shut, the other the color of raw meat in the marketplace. A gap in the front of his smile. His big hands were bruised, the skin split at the knuckles.

“No one said they cared for us,” she said. “But they’re our masters.” Guli sat down on the bed with a wince and buried his head in her bosom. “Is this the work of Viza?” she asked as she rubbed his head.

“Oh yes, Viza indeed.”

“The shop?”

“Ruined.” He sighed, and his hot breath burned her skin through the wool of her dress. “All the things I bought, to replace the ones they broke before. I can’t pay you back—”

“Hush,” she said, rocking him back and forth. “Do you have a place to stay?”

His arms went around her back and he hugged her. “I don’t need one.”

“What do you mean? Guli, what are you thinking?” He didn’t answer, so she moved his hair, to be able to see his face. “Don’t do something stupid.”

“I’ll have a home soon,” he said.

“No! I thought you said it would do you no good to sell yourself.”

“What do I have left?”

“Be a gardener,” she said.

He pulled away. “I hate gardening.”

“You have such a gift for it.”

“I want to be a hairdresser!”

“Apparently it is not what the gods want.”

He sat up, his back to her. “Anyway, I was just telling you, in case you went by. Viza has taken the house.”

“Guli, wait. There must be something—”

“I could kill him,” he said.

“Then you would be back in the courts.”

“Ningal would love to see me hanged,” he said.

Ulu froze. She didn’t know the details about Guli’s life before she met him, but she knew he’d had a severe warning from a justice after serving two sentences for violent crimes. One more mistake, and Guli would be executed. “Justice Ningal?” He lived on her street.

“Yes.” He stood there, shaking his head like an ox, side to side. “I can’t prove anything against Viza; they destroyed the documents.”

“What about the public records?”

“I signed copies for them, but now that I know Viza’s business practices, I doubt they were ever filed in the Office of Records.”

“Do you want to stay with me tonight?” she asked.

He looked around the rented room, and she knew he saw the bugs, the stains of spit, and other splotches on the matting. She hadn’t even rinsed. Guli was fastidious, not with Ezzi’s superior manner, but in relation to beauty. Guli needed loveliness, craved order. He was repulsed by grime and stench and coarseness. Even though he’d lived in it for a very long time.

His nature was a gentleman’s, who was cursed with the temper of a scorpion.

Doubly awful for him to be sold into slavery and live in the marshes, drinking the same water the buffaloes did.

He pressed his lips to her hand. “Thank you, sweet, but no.”

She squeezed his hand; he held it for a moment, then let himself out quietly.

Ulu sagged onto the bed and watched the roach crawl across the scale. She didn’t even know what god to bribe on Guli’s behalf.

Cheftu left, following the aide back to his rooms. He’d been ratified; now he wanted sleep. He opened the door and moved through his dark apartments, into the bedroom. He shed his clothes, picked up a flagon of wine and his glass, then got into his bed. The small window let in the scents of the city and garden. It was over. He took a sip of wine and leaned back.

Against a naked torso.

The sensation was so warming, so confusing, that it took Cheftu a second before he leaped away—surrounded by women’s giggles. He lit a lamp and beheld them—three women, all undressed, all in his bed. Two he recognized.

“Chloe?” he asked the one he’d never seen, an older, rounded woman, and held the lamp higher.

She smiled, revealing blackened teeth.

“
Ma chérie
?”

Her eyes were green, but like the color of the darkest firs, not like emeralds.

“We brought you your green-eyed girl. This is Jesi.” The sneaky-looking blonde kissed Jesi and turned to him. “Are you ready, Kidu?”

Cheftu set the oil lamp down and stared back at the three women. They were certainly staring at him. “No.”

“No? We had an agreement!”

“I’m sorry, but the situation has changed.”

“How is that? This is an infringement on an agreement between two—”

He held up his hand to ward off her words. “There are grave omens,” he said. “I am the priest of fertility, and the barley ripens in the field. I can’t allow you lovely women,” he said, making eye contact with them all, “to deplete my strength. It would be unfair to the people of Ur.”

The blonde cursed. The three of them stayed in his bed, and Cheftu crossed his arms and leaned against the wall. “It would be dishonorable not to be concerned for the fields,” the blonde said. She spat the words. “Come along,” she said to the women. “We can’t stay here.”

Cheftu ushered them out the door, dodging their questing hands and greedy mouths.

“Our agreement is still in effect,” the blonde said before they left. “You are obligated to meet your side. Maybe not now, but as soon as the fields are in.”

“Bring me a different green-eyed woman,” he said. Then he endured her kiss and shoved her out the door.

His bed was ripe with the smell of the three women. He picked a spare blanket out of the trunk and threw it on the floor. If this was how Casanova lived, he had been beyond insane.

*      *     *

“Samana! Samana!”

The cry began at the city gates, and Cheftu’s eyes popped open. Rust.

In seconds, there was a pounding at his door. He was up and wrapped in his cloak by the time the acolyte opened his bedroom door. “
En
Kidu! There is rust!”

“Send runners to the
lugal.
”

“He is being informed as we speak.”

“Run tell the
ensi.
”

The boy hesitated, then bowed and ran out the door. Cheftu shut his gathering attendants in the outer chamber and took a moment to dig in his borrowed brain for details on rust.