The Wings of Ashtaroth

Chapter 12: Freemen: Section III: Uta

Uta looked up at him, eyes wide. "Hate you? Why would I hate you?"

"You blame me for the prince's punishment, don't you?" His gaze held steady. Underneath it lay a trace of judgement, thin as the clean papyrus sheafs in the wooden box beside him. But no—Uta was wrong. It wasn't judgement. It was sadness or perhaps concern. The judgement she read in his face was all her own.

She swallowed. For the first time in her life since the night she'd lied to a young Aurelius about his fate, it was a struggle to conceal her emotions. "No. It was his own fault. It moved me briefly, that was all. It reminded me of something."

"Where you came from, perhaps?"

Every question felt like an interrogation.

"I never forgot where I came from." A sprig of hardness, to show them both that yes, she was herself.

Samelqo cleared his throat. "Just as well. You've travelled very far." He twiddled his fingers as though they'd fallen asleep. "I was a common man, when I was given to the temple. I was one of several boys in service to Tanata who hadn't earned his place through hereditary connection to the Ashenqa. Most of them were pathetic, mewling creatures who felt their wealthy parents had abandoned them, but I adored my lessons. Knowledge and mystery were my mother and father, reading and writing my brother and sister. I did well, and then I fought well, and for my efforts I became heq-Ashqen. A punishment of my own, of a kind."

Fought? It was an odd choice of words, and Uta couldn't imagine Samelqo meant that he'd thrown physical punches of any sort. It was that last thing, though, that gnawed at her the most. "A punishment?"

"Of a kind. The heq-Ashqen is not the soul of the city, as many would claim, but he is the caretaker of its soul. He strives, in all things, to serve his king and his people, yet he is merely a man after all."

"What else would you be?"

Samelqo smiled bleakly. "I waited a long time for the answer to that very question, and yet my position failed to bequeath unto me the certainty I sought, or the change I desired. Oh, it has changed me, of that I am certain. It is the nature of the transformation that disappoints."

The door lay firmly closed, and it was so still without the occasional shuffling of the guards' boots. Didn't Samelqo notice the quiet? He must be too lost in his thoughts.

"The change into an old man?" Uta asked, to lighten some of Samelqo's darkness. Soothe, soothe. She must soothe him before the dagger slipped between his ribs, like any good wife would.

"That, amongst other things. All things grow old, Uta, and I am young compared with most of them. This city is old. Sometimes I think her death lies dreaming, waiting to be woken, somewhere in the deep."

Such words from the mouth of such a man meant more than if an ordinary person had spoken them. Even Uta had to shiver at their weight. Samelqo had never been plagued with visions the way Ashenqa sometimes were, but their rarity only lent them a more prophetic air.

"The death of the city," echoed Uta. "You believe that it will happen soon?" It could be Zioban's rebellion he spoke of. With the rebels supporting a Lora invasion, Zioban's victory meant the death of Samelqo's Qemassen. But then, what did Uta really know of Samelqo's life beyond what he'd allowed her to see?

She let her gaze travel to the half-completed papyrus in front of the heq-Ashqen. An addressee of two consonants, in a code Uta couldn't read. She'd have time later, to pour over his secret labours unimpeded.

Samelqo collected his papyri and neatly set them just out of view. He'd noticed her looking. Uta was clumsy tonight.

"The seeds of the end germinate in the hearts of traitors and weaklings," Samelqo answered. "The slaves are only the most obvious of them, but there have long been poisonous ones close to the throne. Even the royal children—" He cut himself off. A rare thing. "I have done my best to disperse them. I fear the hour is too late."