Twilight in Babylon (31 page)

“You want a school?”

“Yes. I want it paid for by public funds, and I want any girl who has the capacity to learn to be free to attend. Regardless of her financial status, or family connections.”

Puabi couldn’t have been more at a loss. She stared at Chloe as though she were a speaking tree. “That’s… all?”

“Swear to me, Puabi.”

“Certainly. I swear.”

Chloe pulled out a document, densely written on clay, and Cheftu felt his world shift. Cuneiform! For the first time he recognized the writing of the pre-Babylonians. Was that the present, was that when they were living? The other writing he’d seen, it had used the same marks, but it had been written before the characters were turned on their sides, which is the way the ideograms would be read for the next millennia. The way he’d learned it. When did this turn happen?

“I don’t have my seals,” Puabi said calmly.

“You don’t have to. I do.” Chloe smiled. “Remember? I’m Puabi. You’ve already signed it, I just thought I would give you your copy. The Justice Ningal is acting on my behalf and will keep my copy. Of course, a third copy is already in the Office of Records and the fourth, well, should it become necessary to reveal its location, someone will.”

Cheftu felt like he was going to burst with joy. His Chloe, being as Chloe as ever.
Mon Dieu,
how he loved this woman.

Chloe smiled at Puabi. “You can go now.”

Puabi glared at Kidu, then took her tablet and walked to the door. Shama didn’t even open the curtain for her; she had to lift it herself. They heard her steps fade away.

“Is she going to come back with a knife?” Chloe asked.

“That would require climbing the steps again,” Cheftu said. “I doubt she has the breath for it.”

They stood, feet apart, looking at each other.

“You are really… tall,” she said. Her breath was light, a little ragged.

Kidu’s body—Cheftu’s body—raged. “
Chérie,
” he said and opened his arms.

*      *     *

“Why did you nominate me?” Chloe asked softly. He felt her breath on his chest. She was alert. “You could have told Asa no, find someone else.”

“It’s the only way I can have you.”

“Dead?”

“You’re not going to be dead. I’ve shown you the plans to the tomb. You know the way out.”

“If I survive the antidote, the nepenthe, and the poison.” She turned the goblet he had given her over. “The bottom is hollow?”

“Filled with sea sponges. Thus, when you turn it horizontal, the liquid will run through that tiny hole in the bottom and be absorbed by the sponges in the base. You will appear to drink but not actually consume anything.”

“Oh good. So all I have to worry about is the nepenthe and the antidote.”

“Do you trust Ningal?” He kissed her head.

“Do you?”

His arms tightened around her. “With all my heart.”

“Me too, though with all my body.” She kissed his stomach. “Speaking of, this new body of yours is quite, uh, nice.” Her hands touched him, ran over his skin with strength and purpose.

“As the
en,
I can’t marry you. I can’t be faithful to you. The only way out of this is for both of us to die,” he said.

She sat up and looked at him. One brown eye, one green. It should have been odd, but it seemed completely normal. It was an oft-repeated Egyptian saying, but the eyes were the windows to the soul. These travels had changed her; she was half-ancient, half-modern.

“Both of us?” she said.

“I’ll finish my responsibilities here, then appear to die. The populace will take it as a sign from the gods.”

“Do these people know about the real god, the big one?”

A change in the light caught Cheftu’s eye; he drew Chloe to his side, protectively. “Shama?”

The old man waved through the curtain.

“I must go,
chérie.
”

“Will you come back?” Chloe’s tone was calm, but her expression was alarmed.

“They will have sequestered you,” he said.

“Will I be here?”

“No, you’ll be in the temple complex with the other women.”

She handed him his skirt and belt. “Are you in there yet, in that body, Cheftu?”

He froze in the act of putting on his necklace. “I am, but part of me has become Kidu.” He looked at the clasp to catch it. “I can’t explain it.”

“I understand better than you think.”

“You know your way through the pit now, but,
chérie,
you must put a handmaid in your place. She must wear your coronet and jewels.” He took a deep breath. “You must be sure she is attended by two women. Do this all before I come into the tomb.”

She opened her mouth. “I’m going to have to move corpses? And you wisely waited until now to mention it?”

He continued to speak. “Go to the well, as we discussed. Wait there. It may be for a day, or it may be for several. Make sure the scene is complete. Priests might return. We want no cause for suspicion. Nimrod will come for you at the well.”

“And then?”

He kissed her, moving in a fluid instant motion, enveloped in her scents of sesame and pomegranate, his senses filling with heady heat, erotic memory, and passion. “We’ll build a life together, some other place. We’ll leave here, carefully. Mix in with the many who flee these gods and head for other cities.”

She nodded; he could still taste her.

The love that had grown to be the comfort of every day in Jerusalem—waking up together, making love before dawn, holding each other at night and finding each other in the dark—peaceful, rested, calm—now surged like liquid fire that threatened to inundate him. “You are mine. We’ll be together.”

“Yes,” she said, and captured his lips, devoured his mouth until he groaned. Cheftu’s hands clenched her bottom, caressed her legs, then he pulled away, set her aside.

“We’ll survive. Trust me.”

“Don’t I always,” she muttered, just as the curtain fell behind him.

Four double hours later, the drums rolled. Chloe opened the bottle, the antidote for the nepenthe, that Ningal had given her, said a prayer, and swallowed the stuff. It tasted like she thought petroleum would—thick and bitter—it coated her throat and stomach like milk of magnesia. That’s what it felt like, and what she imagined.

Eight hours, now. Four double hours.

She’d committed Ningal’s instructions, the blueprint of the tomb, with the placement of the grave offerings, to her memory. Now, the antidote would help her protect that memory. Nepenthe would make dying easy for the women—they wouldn’t care what was happening or why. Chloe had to remember what was happening and why, and act accordingly. She licked her lips, sure to get all of her liquid protection.

The very air of Ur was rife with tension. The drums filled the air, assembling the stargazers, warning the people. They would bang again in two double hours.

The antidote’s aftertaste was awful, but Chloe didn’t dare try to wash it away.
It’s your salvation,
she told herself. Salvation, often, was bitter.

*      *     *

The citizens of Ur watched the sky in silence. The sun still shone, but beside it they could just discern the shape of the moon. Children clutched at their fathers and sons stood braced, daring the future, challenging the gods. A smothered hiccup or swallowed sob rose occasionally from the crowd, but there was nothing else.

The drums tolled, the enormous kettledrums that needed two drummers, as the procession moved across the temple grounds.

The wealth of Ur, in oxen-drawn carts—golden vessels, inlaid furniture, bejeweled weapons—the finest the commonwealth had to offer, rolled forward. A last bribe for the gods.

The women followed, the loveliest of Ur’s wives and sisters, mothers and daughters, clad in robes of the softest wool, with woven diadems, stone-studded collars, and gold hoop earrings. Beads of carnelian, lapis, agate, and malachite hung from their necks. Beaded belts with fringed ends fell close to their sandaled feet.

Above them all, seated for her final journey, was the
ensi
who gave her life for the people, for the commonwealth. Puabi’s diadem was a wreath of gold leaves and flowers with a hundred narrow hoops hanging over her forehead. A spray of lapis blossoms arched over her head, and bobbed with every step.

The handsome priests and attendants wore the finest felted skirts, with gold woven sashes. Seals and cylinders had been left behind, for this was not their funeral; they were merely company. Their sacrifice was for all eternity. Not only leaving the sunshine for the gloom of Kur, but leaving behind their names and identities, to be buried as strangers.

The minutes clicked by as the procession passed.

The moon edged closer to the sun.

The shaft that led into the pit was lined with priests, their spears pointing toward the ground. As she passed into the earth, each woman was given a golden goblet. Rudi heard the rings on the women’s headdresses clink against each other.

The eclipse began; the moon nibbled a bite from the sun. The people squinted at the sky, or watched the reflection in huge pools set in the courtyard. The shadows on the ground were crescent-shaped, impressions of the gobbled-up sun. The procession sped up, the ground swallowing ten, then twenty, then forty—

Then the
ensi.

Encircling the citizens of Ur, the sky took on an eerie violet color. The people whimpered. The pageant continued, as women progressed into the pit by sixty, then seventy, then five soldiers—

Rudi was astounded; the Khamite had actually done it. Given her life for the people. The stargazer’s eyes glassed with tears. May the gods bless the female named Chloe.

*      *     *

Chloe didn’t glance around; she didn’t dare. Nepenthe meant she was supposed to be blissed-out, unaware, unconcerned.
I just happen to be rigid, too,
she thought. The women who walked beside her moved calmly, evenly. Unlike them, Chloe wasn’t calm. But she was trusting. Cheftu was here. She would get out of this. He’d sworn it. Cheftu had never failed her.

“This isn’t some English playwright’s tragedy,” he’d told her in the giant’s temple. “No matter what you think has happened, don’t fear. You’ll be safe, we’ll be together, we’ll make a new life.”

She thought of the thousands of historians who would be thrilled to see this; protoliterate man, in action. But she doubted very seriously that any of them would actually trade places with her at that moment.

The women and soldiers and servants progressed down a long, steep tunnel, dark except for the torches, then down a ramp and into the main chamber. As she had been instructed, each woman paused in the doorway and dipped her cup in the copper caldron, then moved in an orderly fashion, into the room. The lutenists played, no one spoke.

Are you thinking of your family?
Chloe wondered about the woman who walked past her.
You think you’re doing this to save your children’s lives, to give them a chance to live in a better world.
Chloe knew this, she understood even, but she also fought against the modern knowledge that eclipses occurred regularly. Would the people of Ur always send a group to their death at an eclipse?

Puabi’s handmaidens, painted in ritual gold, just like Chloe was, walked through the antechamber and climbed down a ladder into the burial chamber. The rest of the women sat down on the mat-covered floor of the main room. The lutenist strummed, and the priests organized the front of the room to make space for the oxen-drawn sledge. Two more women climbed down the ladder.
I’m next,
Chloe realized, and fought not to cry out. She stepped from the sledge, and one of the soldiers helped her descend the ladder. Chloe would lie on the bier, the three maids by her head, feet, and side.

Chloe dipped her fake cup in the poison and walked to the bier. Carefully she stepped up and sat down. She would have to play dead until the priests came back and killed the oxen. After everyone else was deceased, Chloe would be alive.

Chloe watched the three handmaidens embrace. Already their expressions were vacant.
I’m so alone,
Chloe thought. Music flowed, muffling the noises of people sitting down, arranging jewelry and bodies.
Oh God.

“We are assembled, ma’am,” a soldier called to her.

This is my only line,
Chloe thought, and took a deep breath. “Drink,” she called to them.

The politicians and priests had spun the story so well that the people who were sacrificing themselves thought they were going on a cosmic caravan to the gods, not to death.
How do you do one and not the other?
Chloe asked herself.
Has anyone thought it through?

They drank, in one movement, then they all lay down. As Cheftu had promised, the cup drained away the poison.
Please let this all work,
Chloe prayed.
Please oh please, I’m not ready to die.
Cheftu was out there, praying the same thing, she knew. Ningal had said she would feel some narcotic effects, but she would be able to move, at least for up to a quarter of a double hour. Translated: thirty minutes.

After the eclipse had passed, the oxen would be slaughtered. Then the priests would seal up the tomb, a process that was going to take a few days and, depending on the outcome of the eclipse, possibly include a few more human bribes for the gods. Chloe had to be up and out of here before then. She was on her own until she reached the well beyond the western wall. She had to go through the original death pit, beneath this one, to get there.

The drug was taking effect on the others: One by one, the small sighs and sniffled tears, the whispers and words, then finally the lyre–players died out.

Chloe sat up, her heart pounding, her palms wet. The racket above would drown out any noise she would make. One of the maids was kneeling by the side of the bier. Carefully, Chloe took off her flower-studded crown and set it on the ground. She approached the girl. The female was still breathing, but barely. Her pupils were dilated, and her body was heavy.

Chloe tugged on her arm. Nothing. Chloe knelt and took hold of the girl in a fireman’s carry, then staggered the two steps over and laid her down on the platform.