Sitefnut hunted down Grrrbek, tracking him in the doorknob as much by scent as by remembering where the doorknob usually kept his rooms. She knocked on a door and heard the god's voice call her in. She took a breath and entered. She was trying to distract herself, and she thought a good place to start might be the small god.
"All right," said Sitefnut as she sat down in front of Grrrbek, "You had something you thought I should know. What was it?"
The badger god looked a bit disconcerted. Sitefnut noted this and wondered why, as the god was surely used to her bluntness by now. "Oh, well...see, you're already angry at me, and this news is really not going to improve your mood. I mean, I didn't have anything to do with it, but I don't want to be the messenger that gets killed." He shook his head. "I don't really fancy seeing you any more...tormented than you currently are. I am not sure if this information will effect you deeply or not at all. It is so hard to predict human reactions."
The mage frowned. "Well, is not knowing going to hurt me, later on? I've been bitten by my own ignorance recently. I'd like to avoid a repeat of that if I can." She gave the god a small smile and added, "And I promise not to lightning bolt you if you tell me. Er, well, I won't lightning bolt you if you don't tell me, either," she corrected herself as she realized that she sounded as if she were threatening Grrrbek.
The god threw his head back and laughed. Sitefnut rolled her eyes and waited for him to finish. "I'm not worried about your lightning bolts, little lady. I'm worried about your...feelings." He raised his muzzle into the air, striking a pose that she was certain he thought was heroic. "Grrrbek is not just the hammer, he is also the paint brush."
She looked away from him as she was suddenly reminded of the grief that had not yet even begun to abate. "That's an odd thing for you to be worried about," she muttered.
"Only odd because you don't' know me. Humans assume they know gods because of their trappings, but we are deeper than we look. We are archetypes, we resonate through levels of your own consciousness so deep that you've forgotten you have them." She looked back at the god, pain for the moment forgotten as she heard speech the likes of which she'd never expected to hear from him. His voice was low, and his eyes were intent upon her. "I ask that you weigh your curiosity against your current state of mind. If you still want me to tell you, I will. I don't think waiting a few weeks will matter one way or the other, but I will leave that decision up to you. You have had enough decisions taken away from you in your life. I don't want to presume to do the same."
She gave the small god a weak smile, checking the urge to rumple the fur on the top of his head affectionately. This was a side of Grrrbek she'd never seen, and she was charmed by it a bit. Almost, she regretted her decision not to become his priestess. She replied, "The problem with curiosity is that it gnaws at you. Yes, I want to know, and I'll accept the consequences of knowing."
Grrrbek nodded, conscience evidently satisfied. "I have been curious about all the links that have been occurring lately, as it seems you were long destined to do as you are doing now. When we had the scryers handy, since I don't specialize in sight spells myself, I asked them to scry your late husband." Sitefnut felt her eyebrows shoot up as she stared at the god in astonishment. Soren? But he was dead! Why scry on him?
Evidently, her thoughts showed upon her face. Grrrbek shook his head at her. "His death seemed too coincidental, knowing now what you were going to become. Only...he's not dead. He's alive, in a manner of speaking."
Sitefnut stared, her mouth falling open. Her hands shook, and she felt as if a great hand had reached into her chest and was gently squeezing her heart. "He's alive? But...how?"
"Sort of. He's in that gold fluid, the kind that suspends people. He has not aged since you and I last saw him. I don't know where, mind you, but if things go like they have been, I would not be surprised if we stumble across him." Sitefnut dropped her head into her hands, and after a moment she felt the god's hand on her shoulder. "I thought you should know, which is why I was teasing you about it. But I didn't know this would happen to Usi when I did that. Doesn't seem like all this should come down on you at once. Then again, might be best to just get it over with." She felt him take his hand away and then heard him rise, fur rustling softly.
Her mind was whirling, trying to make sense of what Grrrbek had just said. "We never found his body. I suppose it could be, but...why?"
"Abducted, perhaps, to get you to be more of an independent agent. Or maybe we're underestimating Soren. Maybe he has his own fate. People in our village were pretty closely related. Maybe he has a part to play in the hyena strangeness."
"Possibly. But...oh. Soren, back from the dead. I'm not entirely certain how to take this." Her voice was weary, and she lifted her head slowly from her hands, tears she was not shedding glittering in her black eyes. "If he's been suspended, I can only hope we never run into him. Because years have passed for me, and not a day has gone by for him."
She fell silent as she thought of her husband. They'd fought the morning he disappeared, she remembered. The argument was twenty years done and still she remembered the way they had shouted at each other, even if she no longer remembered what they were fighting about. Nafrini, their youngest, sweet, gentle Nafrini with her black eyes so much like her mother's had stood between them and screamed at them to stop.
Astonished, they had fallen silent, both staring at their daughter. Nafrini had her fists balled and tears streaked her face. She had a look of wild desperation in her eyes as she glanced from her father to her mother and back again. Nobody else moved, the moment frozen.
Sitefnut had knelt and opened her arms, and Nafrini had wobbled to her, clinging to her mother. Over her daughter's head, Sitefnut exchanged a look with her husband. Nafrini was a girl, a child of eight. She could not be expected to understand.
Then again, Sitefnut wasn't quite sure herself why they were fighting any more. It seemed a habit, something she did because she could not help herself. She would pick at Soren until he snapped back, and they would be off again, with the occasional piece of crockery broken by their rage. She was tired of it, so bone-achingly weary with the work of her life, this life that she'd never wanted in the first place.
And somewhere in her heart was a glimmer of something that twenty years later she would come to realize was acceptance. They had been married for fifteen years and in many ways they were still strangers to each other. It was the first time she had ever caught herself wondering if the fighting was necessary.
He had left her holding their daughter without a word, heading for the boat. He had not come home that night, and she thought with perhaps a little regret that he might be staying with his latest lover. She tolerated Soren's affairs, no longer even bothering to confront the open secret between them. It was too bad, she'd thought. She'd found herself wanting to apologize, and the urge was so novel that she'd almost decided to act on it.
But the next morning, her brother had come to the door to tell her that Soren's boat had been found, smashed to pieces, his long black hair caught in the planks.
She wondered sometimes what her life might have been like if he'd lived, if that little bit of acceptance she had felt would have blossomed into something more or if it would have died as stillborn as her last child. She remembered him as having kind eyes and hands that could be gentle when he was in a good mood. He had adored their children, and until the day he had died they never wanted for anything.
It was strange, though. She'd expected to be approached after Soren died by one or more of the women he had kept company with while he was alive. None of them ever came to her door, and after a time she accepted that they never would. She hadn't bothered to find out who the latest one had been, and it seemed that whoever she was, she grieved alone. She'd hoped that, whoever she was, she'd loved Soren. It seemed like someone should have.
Sitefnut wondered sometimes if he'd liked her even a little, the difficult wife his father had saddled him with, or if he'd resented her as much as she had him. She'd hated being married instead of becoming a mage, and had mistaken her resentment of being married for resentment of the man she'd been married to.
She had spent a lot of time hating, when she was younger. And now the news that Soren was alive brought it all back. For him, it was probably still close to that afternoon that he had disappeared, on the day their youngest had stepped between them and demanded that they stop fighting. And she was twenty years older and in love with a god, grieving her familiar, and grandmother to a royal wife.
Quietly, she said, "Well, at least I might get my chance to apologize to him."
Grrrbek nodded. "I would not say you should consider him the same man. I think him being away this long nullifies your marriage. He's the age of your daughter now."
She chuckled. "I should say so. I was widowed twenty years ago. That my husband has returned to life does not change that." But in the back of her mind, a worry ignited--he probably believes we are still married. What if I have to convince him we are not?
Not only that, but if they found him, she was going to have to tell him that their sons were dead. Dread curled around her spine, and she wondered, If I hated him so much, why am I afraid of hurting him?
If she didn't hurt so much, she would be laughing at herself right now. But grief left an ashen taste in her mouth, and she could not laugh. She excused herself and wandered away, intending to find a quiet place.
She found a hidden corner, the doorknob providing a secluded spot with a wooden bench, and said aloud, "So, my husband's still alive and held in suspension. Did you have something to do with that?"
Imhotep appeared beside her as if he had been waiting for her to address him, which she supposed he might have been. "Nothing at all. I was kind of hoping that it would never come out, though. But the odds were against me." The smile on his lips was a wry twist.
Sitefnut passed a hand over her eyes, which burned with exhaustion. "I haven't decided how to feel about this yet. Overwhelmed, I think."
"I would be too." He became material slowly, and then sat down beside her. Grateful for his presence, she leaned on the god. "One death, one dead that has returned to life. An even exchange."
"It's probably uncharitable of me to say that I'd have preferred Usi alive and Soren dead. But I would." Her voice was hollow as she let down the facade that she had been wearing with Grrrbek.
"I am sure that you might have. But now that you know, what do you do?"
She heaved a sigh. "Leave it for the moment. When I'm in a better frame of mind, I'll look into figuring out where he is and who has him. From what Grrrbek said, he doesn't even know that time's passing."
"He sleeps for now, unaging and waiting." Imhotep pressed a kiss on the top of her head, and she shifted, relaxing.
"I suppose hoping that he'll stay that way is probably useless, isn't it?"
"Odds are against it."
"Damn." She sighed again and caught his hand in one of hers, drawing her fingers down the creased center of the palm. "Not that I have anything against the man, honestly. But as far as I knew, he was safely dead."
Imhotep turned then, putting his back against the wall that the bench they were on ran into. "Come here," he murmured, and pulled her closer against him. "He was captured and detained."
"Any ideas by who?"
She felt rather than saw his smile. "Give you one guess."
"My favorite person, Menes."
"See, no augury needed." His hand brushed her holy symbol, sending a tingle through her chest.
Sitefnut shook her head. "It makes no sense at all. All right, he's one of the hyena people, to be sure. But there wasn't anything really special about him, as far as I knew."
"Except that he was the husband of Chosen."
"The semi-estranged husband, to be sure, but husband nonetheless. I guess I'm confused as to what Menes is going to do with him. Holding him as a hostage wouldn't work, really. If he walked back into my life after being dead for twenty years, I'd be very suspicious."
"He has other plans." Imhotep's tone told her that that was all he was going to give her, and she didn't really feel like pushing.
She shifted to a more comfortable positing, leaning her head back against his shoulder and closing her eyes. "I'd guess. Things were complicated enough as they were. Now this."
Imhotep tightened his arms around her gently. "One thing at a time, love. Except for the grieving." There was a raw note in his voice, and Sitefnut without thinking covered his hands with hers. "What is there left to do for Usi?"
Sitefnut pressed her lips together, thinking. She felt as if someone had flayed her insides with a very small, sharp knife. She didn't want to think about final arrangements, but think about it she must. "Find somewhere to bury what's left of him. Make sure the collar's completely destroyed. Hope he passed the feather test." She did hope fervently that he had, but she would not, could not ask. She would know, some day after she had died, and that would have to suffice. "Am I missing anything?"
He shook his head. "No. If you give me the collar, I can get rid of it."
"In a minute." Sitefnut tightened her hands on Imhotep's. "Let me bide a bit, here. Let me rest." It came out as a plea, a prayer. She was too worn for her usual protests, too battered by grief and the unexpected knowledge that a piece of her past had come unexpectedly back to life. I'll have to explain to Soren, she thought. Introduce him to Mayet. Explain that I've been twenty years a widow, that our children are grown, that I am finally what I was always meant to be. Explain that there's someone else in my life now. He'll probably be relieved. Nobody wants to be saddled with a wife older than they are.
But a doubt niggled at her. Menes had him, and so it was unlikely that whenever they met again it would be under friendly circumstances. She might not get a chance to explain, to apologize. Can I kill him, if I need to? she wondered. I never liked him much, but that wasn't his fault. And like it or not, we did have six children together. There was that intimacy, a shared lexicon of glance and motion, and other intimacies besides, though those she usually hadn't enjoyed.
She remembered the look that Pepy still sometimes got on his face, a look of painful contemplation. He still sometimes thought about the possibility that he was going to have to kill Xeres again, she thought. Just as she was contemplating the possibility that the man she had been married to for fifteen years might end up on the side of this war opposite her.
She didn't know if she could kill him. Throw crockery at him, she had no trouble with. But call lightning into her hands and send it to still Soren's heart? She didn't know.
And if it came to that, could he--would he--attack her? This is Menes, she thought grimly. Anything is possible.
Imhotep's voice broke into her dark meanderings. "Ssh, Sitefnut. Leave the worrying for another day. Don't chase your tail about this quite yet."
I concur, agreed Isu, who had just come around the corner. Stop borrowing trouble before you need to. The hyena laid her heavy, blunt head on Sitefnut's lap, and the mage stroked the bristly hair on her neck. Since Usi had died, Isu had been much more physically affectionate, seeming to need a certain amount of touch that her hyena packmate was no longer there to provide. Sitefnut could feel the wild loneliness in her, the void that nothing could touch, and her heart ached for Isu. She wished there were something she could do, but she rather thought that time was the only thing that could heal that would.
If she only had a mate, she thought in a very small and quiet part of her mind. Having Imhotep's made this easier for me. She doesn't have anyone like that, as far as I know. Her mind flashed back to a night back when Usi had first acquired her, when she'd flushed ruddy at the thought of him finding a female hyena to keep company with, of the awkwardness of potentially being able to overhear what went on between them--as Usi and Isu could both overhear what she did with Imhotep. Isu blatantly enjoyed it and often teased her about it, and Usi had never spoken of it to her once way or another.
The hyena opened one eye, glancing up at her with an expression in that liquid eye that Sitefnut could not read. Sitefnut scratched her low on her neck, and Isu closed her eye again in pleasure.
The mage left off her eternal worrying for a few minutes and simply rested, safe in the arms of her love, with her Rememberer at her side. Despite everything, she thought, I think I am well content. Despite the grief, despite the fear and worry...I need nothing more than this, I think.
It was one glowing thought in the midst of a vast darkness, and she clung to it, hoping that perhaps by doing so she could weather what was ahead.
Consider me a widow, boys, and I will tell you why
It's not the man but it's the marriage that was drowned
So i walk the walk and wait with watchful eye up to the sky
looking for a kind of vessel i have never found
--Suzanne Vega, "widow's walk"
