Between the Rivers

7

“I will come at once to your temple. I will come alone to your temple. I will obey you,” Sharur said, and he left his father’s house, the house in which he had dwelt all his days, and he walked up the Street of Smiths toward Engibil’s temple. When the god spoke in that way, a man could not disobey.

Engibil must have spoken to Ereshguna at the same time as he ordered Sharur to come before him, for Ereshguna neither exclaimed in alarm nor shouted out questions. Habbazu did both, but Sharur took no notice of Habbazu, not then. All he noticed was the god’s resistless command.

As he walked up the Street of Smiths, his own thoughts slowly began to return. His will, however, remained enslaved to the god’s greater, stronger will. He could not stop his feet from moving closer to the temple, one step after another. But he could be bitterly amused at his folly—and also at Habbazu’s. So the thief had believed, as Sharur had believed, Engibil to be a drowsy god, a sleepy god? Would they had been right! Now Engibil, not so drowsy, not so sleepy, had caught them plotting against him. What would he do? Whatever he wants, Sharur thought. Fear made him tremble—all but his legs, which kept walking, walking, walking.

The temple loomed before him. The priest Burshagga stood waiting in front of the entrance as he approached. Sharur’s mouth shaped words: “I am come at the command of the great god. I am come at the order of the mighty god.”

“This I know,” Burshagga answered. “I was commanded to wait here. I was ordered to bring you before the god the moment you arrived.” His voice was steady, but fear had a home in his eyes. He was used to obeying the orders of Kimash the lugal, not those of Engibil.

Without another word, he turned and walked into the temple. Without another word, Sharur followed him into the temple, as he might have followed—as he often had followed—Kimash’s steward Inadapa into the palace of the lugal. But he had never been so afraid, following Inadapa.

Through the forecourts of the temple they went, Sharur behind Burshagga. Other priests looked up from their tasks as the two men went by, as Kimash the lugal’s servants and slaves might have looked up when Inadapa led someone past them. Sharur tried to read their faces. He saw nothing out of the ordinary, but that failed to reassure him. He reckoned the priests simply took his condemnation for granted. No man could successfully oppose a god’s direct will. Kimash ruled by distracting Engibil’s will, not by opposing it.

Up the many steps to Engibil’s audience chamber strode Burshagga. Up the many steps to Engibil’s audience chamber strode Sharur after him. Down the steps from Engibil’s audience chamber strode no beautiful courtesan, not today. Sharur regretted that. He would have liked his last memories before the god condemned him to be of something beautiful.

His heart pounded as he reached the top of the stairway. He told himself that was because he had climbed one step for each day in a year. But he knew his heart would have pounded no less had Engibil chosen to meet him in the forecourt of the temple, down at the level of the ground.

Burshagga did not precede him into the audience chamber. He gestured to the doorway and said, “The god awaits you within.”

Sharur already knew as much; Engibil’s radiance, brighter than the sunshine, streamed out through the entranceway. Having no choice but to go forward, he went forward with the best show of spirit he could muster.

Inside Engibil’s house on earth, the god sat on his gold-wrapped throne. Sharur cast himself down before Engibil. He felt no shame in doing so; he should have done likewise before the lugal on his throne.

Rise. The word resounded soundlessly inside Sharur’s head. He could not have disobeyed even had he wanted to. Willing his limbs not to tremble, willing his face to show none of the fear he felt, he got to his feet.

“Great god, mighty god, god who founded this city, god who made this town, I greet you,” Sharur said. “Tell me how I may serve you, and all shall be as you desire. You are my master. I am your slave.”

“This I know,” Engibil said complacently. It pleased him now to speak like a man, to move his lips and let sound come forth. “I have been reflecting on your case, Sharur. I have been contemplating your circumstances, son of Ereshguna.” He folded his arms across his massive chest, awaiting Sharur’s reply.

That would have been easier to give, had Sharur had any idea how to answer. “Is it so, great god?” he said, temporizing as he might have done when a rival merchant said something unexpected and confusing during a dicker.

“Son of Ereshguna, it is so,” Engibil replied. “Hear now the judgment I have reached concerning you.”

Sharur bowed his head. “Great god, I will hear your words. Mighty god, I will obey your words.” What choice have I? he wondered bitterly.

“My judgment, then, is this,” Engibil said. “I have decided I held your oath in my hand too tightly. I have decided I held your oath in my heart too straitly. Thus I ease it; thus I loosen it. You have my leave to borrow from your father bride-price wherewith to pay Dimgalabzu the smith.”

“Great god, may I—?” Sharur had intended to try to talk Engibil into reducing whatever punishments he ordained. That was probably hopeless, but, being a merchant and a scion of merchants, he had intended to try. Now what would have been his protest gurgled into silence after a bare handful of words.

He stared into the god’s face. Engibil was, as always, divinely perfect, divinely awe-inspiring. Engibil also looked divinely pleased with himself, as if he had settled a problem to his own satisfaction. So, evidently, he had.

But it was not the problem because of which Sharur thought he had been summoned to the temple. He had to conclude, then, that Engibil had not been listening when he and Habbazu and Ereshguna discussed robbing the god’s temple.

As Sharur stared at Engibil, so Engibil stared at Sharur. “Are you not pleased, son of Ereshguna?” the god demanded. “Is not your heart gladdened? In my generosity, I give you leave to wed the woman you desire.”

He was indeed a lazy god. He could have searched through Sharur’s mind to learn why the man before him did not respond as he had expected. Sharur imagined coming before Enimhursag if the god of Gibil’s rival city needed to discover something. Enimhursag, if he saw anything out of the ordinary or suspicious, would have tom it from a man by force. But Engibil was content to ask.

And Sharur answered, “Oh, yes, great god, I am pleased. My heart is gladdened, mighty god. Truly you are generous, to give me leave to wed the woman I desire.” He spoke the truth there, nothing but the truth. He spoke it as quickly as he could, too, to give Engibil no chance to change his mind yet again.

The god smiled on him; beneficence flowed out from Engibil in waves. “It is good,” the god of Gibil said. “It is very good. Go now; son of Ereshguna. Go now, and give this news to your family. Go now, and give this news to the family of the woman you desire. May the two of you prove joyful together. May the two of you prove fruitful together. Go now. You have my blessing.”

Sharur prostrated himself once more before the god of Gibil. Then he rose and, with profuse thanks, left the god’s house at the top of the temple. Burshagga waited for him outside. “I gather you are a fortunate man, son of Ereshguna,” the priest said as they began to descend the great stairway.

“I gather I am,” Sharur agreed vaguely, being still too astonished for any more coherent reply.

Burshagga did not press him. No doubt the priest had seen many astonished men come out of the god’s house. Had he seen one more astonished than Sharur, Sharur would have been astonished.

“The god has blessed the son of Ereshguna,” Burshagga told the priests and temple servitors working in the courtyard while he and Sharur were walking out through it.

Ilakabkabu shuffled up to Sharur. “Are you worthy of the god’s blessing, boy?” the pious old priest demanded.

“I gather I am,” Sharur repeated. “Engibil thought I was.”

“Be worthy in your heart,” Ilakabkabu declared. “Be worthy in your spirit. Deserve well of the god, and he will do well by you.”

“You give good advice,” Sharur said politely. As in a dicker, he feigned feelings he did not have. He feigned them well enough to satisfy Ilakabkabu, who nodded gruffly, let out a sort of coughing grunt, and tottered back to the wall hanging he had been straightening.

“For once, I cannot disagree with my colleague,” Burshagga said. “His words are true; his doctrine is sound.”

“Any man can see as much,” Sharur said. “Truly, I am blessed that Engibil chose to look kindly upon me. Truly, I am fortunate that the great god chose to grant my heart’s desire.”

Truly, Sharur had no idea why Engibil had chosen to look kindly upon him. Truly, he did not know why the great god had chosen to grant his heart’s desire. So far as he knew, he had done nothing to deserve anything but anger from Engibil. Anger was what he had been braced—so far as any mortal could be braced—to receive from the god. After all, when Engibil so summarily ordered him to the temple, he and his father and Habbazu had not been singing the god’s praises.

But Engibil had not known. Engibil had not even suspected. Gods were very powerful. Gods knew a great deal. But they were not omnipotent. They were not omniscient. Engibil had proved that.

Walking out of the temple, Sharur realized the gods of the Alashkurru Mountains had proved it, too. Had they been all-powerful, they would have recovered the cup in which they had hidden so much of their strength. Had they been all-knowing, they would have known some wanax or merchant might set the cup in a Gibli’s hands.

For that matter, when Enzuabu sent Habbazu to rob Engibil’s temple, the god of Zuabu had not known all he might have. He had not known the debt of gratitude his thief owed to a Gibli, or how that debt might affect Habbazu’s actions.

Sharur still did not know how that debt of gratitude might affect Habbazu’s actions, either. But Sharur did know he was not a god. Mere mortals were used to dealing with uncertainty.

When Sharur returned to the house of his family, he found Ereshguna and Tupsharru, Betsilim and Nanadirat all gathered downstairs, all of them looking as if they were about to begin the rituals for the dead. They all cried out together when he walked through the door. His mother and sister embraced him; his father and brother clasped his hand and clapped him on the back.

Habbazu was nowhere to be seen. “What became of the thief?” Sharur asked, when he was no longer kissing his parents and siblings.

“He saw you go out the door with the will of the god pressing hard upon you,” Ereshguna answered. “He walked with me for a few more moments, and then, without warning, he fled. He was around a corner before I had any hope of pursuing him.”

“Perhaps the power the god showed put him in fright,” Sharur said with a grimace. “He thought of Engibil as a drowsy god; he reckoned him a sleepy god. He discovered Engibil was not so drowsy, not so sleepy, as he thought.”

“It could be so,” Ereshguna said. “In truth, Engibil has shown himself to be more interested in the city, more interested in the world, than we might have wished him to be.”

“Engibil has shown himself to be more interested in this family than we might have wished him to be,” Betsilim exclaimed. “If not on account of this mysterious cup, why did the god summon you to his temple?”

“Why?” Sharur knew he still sounded bemused. He could not help it, for he still felt bemused. “The god summoned me to his temple because he is more interested in this family than we had thought him to be.”

“I am your mother. I gave you birth,” Betsilim said sharply. “Do not think to twist my words into jokes.”

“Mother, I was not trying to twist your words into jokes,” Sharur answered. “I told the truth. Engibil summoned me to his temple to give me leave to accept a loan from the house with which to pay bride-price for Ningal the daughter of Dimgalabzu.”

That startled his family into silence. He understood, being startled himself. Nanadirat broke the silence first, with a squeal of delight. She hugged Sharur again. Tupsharru spoke to the slaves: “Bring beer! No, bring wine! This news deserves better than our everyday drink.”

Ereshguna said, “This is splendid news indeed, news good beyond the wildest hopes I had when you left our home.” He frowned a little. “It is news so good, I wonder what caused the god to change his mind.”

“Father, I wondered the same thing,” Sharur said. “But, considering what I feared when Engibil summoned me before him—considering what we all feared when Engibil summoned me before him—I did not question him, nor did I question his judgment.”

The wine came then. The sweetness of fermented dates washed from Sharur’s mouth the taste of fright that still lingered there. He drank several cups. His head began to spin. His head had been spinning, one way and another, the whole day. He was still weak fromhis encounter with the fever demon. Meeting Habbazu the thief on the streets of Gibil had astonished him. When Engibil summoned him to the temple, he had thought he would visit his family again only as a ghost. When the god, instead of condemning him, granted him favor, he found himself amazed all over again.

Ereshguna kept frowning—not in anger, Sharur judged, but in continued perplexity. “Why did the god summon you?” he said again, dipping a chunk of barley bread in the honey pot. “Why?”

“Maybe Engibil decided he was wrong,” Nanadirat said. “Maybe the god decided he treated Sharur unjustly, and that he should make amends.”

Sharur laughed. He laughed and laughed. Some of it was the wine laughing through him. Some of it was relief laughing through him. And some of it was nothing but amusement. “My sister, justice for a god is what the god says it is: no more, no less,” he said. “Gods do as pleases them. They are gods. They can.”

Nanadirat pouted. Ereshguna said, “Sharur is right. Engibil will have had some other reason. He laid down a firm decree, and then he changed that firm decree. It is very strange.”

“But what reason could he have had?” Sharur asked. “You are right, Father. That he should change his decree is very strange. When I stood before him, I did not think on how strange it was.”

“You were thinking of what the god might do to you, not of what he might do for you,” Tupsharru said.

“So I was, my brother—so I was,” Sharur agreed. “Now that I am away from Engibil, though, I would try to understand why the god did as he did.”

“Why he did it does not matter,” Betsilim said. “Rejoice that he did it, as your family rejoices. Rejoice that he did it, as the family of Dimgalabzu the smith will rejoice when the news reaches them.” She looked sly. “Rejoice that he did it, as Ningal your intended will rejoice when the news reaches her.”

Thinking of Ningal rejoicing did make Sharur want to rejoice. Thinking of wedding Ningal made him want to forget everything else. Thinking of wedding Ningal made him want to forget Habbazu the thief; it made him want to forget the Alashkurri cup in the temple of Engibil.

“Who will take the news to Dimgalabzu and his family?” Nanadirat asked. “May we all go together? I want to see Ningal’s face when she hears.” .

“That is very forward of you, my daughter,” Betsilim said, sounding disapproving and indulgent at the same time.

Tupsharru leered. “Sharur wants to see Ningal’s face when she hears.”

The kitchen slave dared to speak: “It will be a happy time.” She would reckon it a happy time because, with Ningal come to the house, Sharur would not choose her to minister to his lusts even occasionally.

“Let’s go now,” Nanadirat said. “Bad news can wait. Good news should not.”

“Important news, good or bad, should never wait,” Ereshguna said.

At that, Sharur turned his head to look at his father. He found Ereshguna looking back at him. Both of them had intent, thoughtful expressions on their faces, very different from the joyful ones Betsilim, Nanadirat, Tupsharru, and the slaves were wearing (though the slaves joyful countenances might well have been masks to please their masters, at least in part).

“Could it be?” Sharur asked.

“Have you got any better notion?” his father returned. “Have you got any other notion at all?”

“What are the two of you talking about?” Nanadirat asked impatiently. “When are we going over to the house of Dimgalabzu the smith?”

“Later,” Sharur said, also impatiently. “Father and I need to talk about this.”

But Ereshguna held up a hand. “No. Let us go now. We can talk about this later. If we go now, if we speak with Dimgalabzu now, and if the god is watching and listening, he will see he has accomplished that which he wished to accomplish. Later will be time enough to discuss the other. We have had the notion. It shall not escape our minds.” Sharur inclined his head. “Father, you are wise. As you say, let us go now. As you say, later will be time enough to discuss the other. The notion shall not escape our minds.”

“What are the two of you talking about?” Nanadirat repeated. Neither Sharur nor Ereshguna answered her.

Dimgalabzu was grinding a sharp edge onto a spearhead when Sharur and his family walked into the smithy. Seeing them all there together, the smith set the spearhead down on his workbench. “Well, well, what have we here?” he said in surprise. He took a longer look at his guests. A slow smile spread across his face. “What we have here is good news, unless I miss my guess.”

Ereshguna bowed. “What we have here is good news indeed, my friend,” he said. “Engibil has smiled upon my son. Engibil has smiled upon the union of our families.”

“Is it so?” Dimgalabzu’s smile got wider, but then contracted. “When last we spoke of this matter, there was a difficulty concerning the bride-price. Unless this difficulty has been eased, the union can not go forward.”

“This difficulty has been eased, father of my intended,” Sharur said. “The union can go forward. Today Engibil summoned me to his temple. Today the god released me from my oath. Today he gave me leave to accept from my family a loan for the bride-price to be paid for Ningal your daughter.”

“Is it so?” Now the smith sounded astonished. “How fortunate for you, son of Ereshguna. The god rarely changes his mind. The god rarely needs to change his mind. Why did he change his mind this time?”

“He said he had held my oath too tight. He said he had been too strait. Thus he chose to ease and loosen his hold on the oath.” Sharur answered with nothing but the truth, straight from the god’s lips. He did not look at his father.

The thought they seemed to share would have to wait.

“How fortunate for you, son of Ereshguna,” Dimgalabzu repeated. The broad smile returned to his broad face. “How fortunate for all of us.” He clapped his hands together and shouted for his slaves to bring beer and salt fish and onions for his guests. Then he went to the stairway. “Gulal!” he called. “Ningal! Come down! We have guests you should see.”

Ningal and her mother came downstairs. They both carried spindles; they had been making wool or flax into thread. They exclaimed in surprise when they saw Sharur and his family in the smithy. They exclaimed in delight when Dimgalabzu explained why Sharur and his family had come.

“Is it true, Sharur?” Ningal asked softly.

“It is true,” Sharur answered. Most of the time, his intended bride kept her eyes on the ground, as a modestly reared young woman was supposed to do in the presence of a man not of her immediate family. Every so often, though, she would look up at Sharur from under lowered eyelids. As he kept his eyes on her to the exclusion of all else, he caught the glances. They enchanted him.

Gulal, who stood beside her daughter, also caught those glances. She poked Ningal in the ribs with her elbow and muttered something pungent under her breath. Thereafter, Ningal glanced at Sharur less often and more circumspectly. But, to Sharur’s delight, she did not stop glancing at him.

In came the beer and salt fish and onions. “Let us drink,” Dimgalabzu boomed. “Let us eat. Let us rejoice that our two families are to be made one. Let us rejoice that the god has favored our two families’ being made one.”

They drank. They ate. They rejoiced. Gulal and Betsilim put their heads together and talked in low voices for some time. Every so often, they would look over at Sharur and Ningal and then go back to their intent conversation. He eyed them with considerable apprehension. Because they were only women, he felt foolish about that... until he noticed Ereshguna and Dimgalabzu eyeing them with considerable apprehension. If his father and the father of his intended worried about their wives, his own concern had reason behind it.

Dimgalabzu asked, “How did the god of the city come to release you from the oath he formerly held close?”

“If you mean to ask why the god chose to do it, father of my intended, you would have to enquire of him,” Sharur replied. Whatever ideas he and his father had on that score, he was not yet ready to share them with Dimgalabzu. “If you mean to ask how he did it, he summoned me to his temple, as I told you, and told me of his change of heart there.”

“How very curious,” Dimgalabzu murmured. “Do not mistake me, son of Ereshguna; I am delighted that Engibil changed his mind. I am joyous that the god thought twice. But I am also surprised.”

“I was surprised, too, when Engibil summoned me to his house on earth,” Sharur said. He had also been horrified, but the smith did not need to know that. He wondered whether he ought to tell Dimgalabzu about Habbazu. For the time being, he decided, the father of his intended did not need to know about the Zuabi thief, either.

Ningal and Nanadirat put their heads together, as their mothers had done. Watching them whisper and giggle and point at him made Sharur want to sink into the floor. He glared. They giggled harder than ever. Having nothing better to do, he dipped up another cup of beer.

Gulal spoke up in a loud voice: “It is decided.”

“Aye, it is,” Betsilim agreed. Between the two of them, they sounded as certain—and as irresistible—as any god Sharur had ever met.

Gulal went on, “The wedding shall take place on the day of the full moon of the last month of fall: not only a day of good omen, but also one on which the son of Ereshguna is unlikely to find himself away from the city with a caravan.” Sharur did not think he was likely to find himself away from the city with a caravan any time soon. No other cities of Kudurru, no other lands around Kudurru, seemed willing to trade with Gibil. Still, his guess was that his mother had won the concession from Gulal, hoping trade would improve in what remained of the better weather. He supposed he should have thanked her. Instead, he grumbled to himself at having to wait so long for the wedding.

Whatever else Dimgalabzu was, he was not a foolish man, and, if he was not a young man, he once had been. He said, “Let Sharur and Ningal embrace now, before us all, in token that this arrangement is agreeable to them.”

Gulal gave her husband a look suggesting she would have a good deal to say when she could speak to him in private. When Ningal stepped toward Sharur with a smile, Gulal gave her daughter the same look. Under Gulal’s glare, the embrace was perforce brief and decorous. But an embrace it unquestionably was.

Tupsharru clapped his hands together. Nanadirat whooped. That embarrassed Sharur enough to make him let go of Ningal even sooner than he would have otherwise. Dimgalabzu looked pleased with himself. Gulal’s expression said she was less furious than she had been before Sharur took Ningal in his arms.

Sharur bowed to the mother of his intended. His politeness made Gulal smile for a moment, till she caught herself doing it. Ningal saw that and smiled, too, at Sharur. He kept his own face carefully blank. A merchant often found it useful not to let the other side in a bargain see at a glance everything in his mind.

Ningal said, “The end of fall is not so far away. Every day that goes by brings it one day closer.”

“You are right,” Sharur said loyally. Altogether too many days would go by to suit him, but he would not disagree with his intended before she became his wife—nor, he hoped, too many times after she became his wife, either.

Ereshguna stared down into his cup of beer, as if it held the answers to all the questions in the world. A torch behind him flickered, making his shadow jump. Outside in the darkness, a cricket chirped. Farther away, a dog howled. Those were the only noises Sharur heard. His mother and sister and brother had gone up onto the roof to sleep. The slaves slept, too, in their stuffy little cubicles.

Sharur looked down at his own cup of beer. He saw no answers there. He drank. If he drank enough, that was an answer of sorts, but not the one he needed now. He sighed.

So did Ereshguna. The master merchant sipped, then said, “Son, tell me what is in your mind: why, in your reckoning, did Engibil choose the moment he chose to release you from your oath concerning the bride-price for Ningal?”

“Did we not have the same notion at the same time?” Sharur asked.

Ereshguna smiled. “Each of us had a notion at the same time. Whether we had the same notion, I cannot know until I learn what your notion was.”

“That is so,” Sharur admitted. “Very well, then. I will tell you what my notion was.” Before continuing, he covered the eyes of the amulet to Engibil he wore on his belt. His father did the same with the amulet he wore. Whatever their notions were, neither of them wanted the god to know. As neither of them was sure about precisely how much good their precautions did, Sharur went on warily: “My notion, Father, is that the god chose to release me from my oath concerning the bride-price for Ningal to make me so joyous, I would forget about every other concern I had.”

“Thus far we walk the same trail, like two donkeys yoked together,” Ereshguna said. “But tell me one thing more. Do you think the god wanted you to forget every other concern you hold, or some concern in particular?”

“Father, your thoughts are as orderly as the accounts set down on our clay tablets,” Sharur said, and Ereshguna smiled again. “I think Engibil wanted me to forget some concern in particular. I think the god wanted to distract me from helping Habbazu the Zuabi steal from his temple the cup, the plain cup, the ordinary cup, from the mountains of Alashkurru.”

“Indeed, you are truly my son,” Ereshguna said. “The same canal waters your.thoughts and mine. That is the reason I also believe Engibil had for loosening his hold on the oath you gave him. I do not believe the god wanted Habbazu to go forward. I do not believe the god wanted us to help Habbazu go forward.”

Sharur scratched his head. “Do you think, then, that Engibil discovered the cup from the mountains was an object of power because he learned the Zuabi thief sought to steal it?”

“I do not.” Ereshguna sounded thoroughly grim. “I think the god knew from the beginning the cup from the mountains was an object of power.”

Now his thoughts had got ahead of those of his son. Sharur raced to catch up. When he did, he stared at his father. “You are saying the god knew this thing and told us he did not.” From there, it was but a short step to the full and appalling meaning of Ereshguna’s words: “You are saying the god told us a lie.”

“Yes,” Ereshguna answered in a voice soft and dark and heavy as lead. “That is what I am saying.”

His fingers were pressed over the eyes of his amulet, so hard that his fingernails turned pale. Rooking down at his own hands, Sharur saw their nails were yellowish white, too. “But why?” he whispered. “Why would the god tell us a lie? Why would he not speak the truth to men of his own city?”

“I do not know that,” Ereshguna said. “Ever since you returned from the temple with your news, I have pondered it. I have found no answer that satisfies me.”

Though Sharur sat inside with his father, he glanced toward the temple. He could see it in his mind’s eye as clearly as if all the walls between had fallen down, as clearly as if it were bright noon rather than black of night. He hoped Kimash had found some distraction for Engibil at this moment. Slowly, cautiously, he said, “Perhaps the god intends to let lack of trade stifle the city. Perhaps he intends all of Gibil to grow poor, so that all of Gibil will be glad to have him back as its ruler.”

“Perhaps so,” Ereshguna said. “This thought, or one not far different from it, also crossed my mind. It comes nearer to accounting for why the god is doing as he is doing than any other I have found. But I do not think it accounts in fullness for the god’s acts.”

“How not?” Sharur said.

“I will explain how not. I will set it forth for you,” his father answered. “What troubles me is that, if Gibil grows poor, Gibil also grows weak. If Gibil grows weak, what will our enemies do? What will Imhursag do? What will Enimhursag do? Will the god of Imhursag not believe Gibil’s weakness and Engibil’s weakness to be one and the same?”

“Ah,” Sharur said. “I see what you are saying. Yes, I think that is likely. Imhursag smarts from defeats at the hands of Gibil. Enimhursag smarts from defeats at the hands of Engibil. If Gibil grows weak, Engibil will also seem to have grown weak. The god of Imhursag and the Imhursagut will want their revenge.”

“Even so.” Ereshguna nodded. “This is why I do not understand why Engibil would seek to weaken his city, even to regain his rule here.”

“Ah,” Sharur said again. “Now I follow. Now your thought is clear to me. What could be so important to the god that he would sooner have his city humiliated than yield it?”

“That is half the riddle, but only half, and, I think, the smaller half,” Ereshguna said. “What could be so important to Engibil that he would sooner have himself humiliated than yield it?”

Sharur inclined his head. His father had drawn a distinction that needed drawing. Sharur had seen how Engibil could be indifferent to whether or not the folk of Gibil prospered. The god even wondered whether such marvels as metalworking and writing, which helped the folk of Gibil prosper, were worthwhile, because they infringed on his prerogatives.

But one of the god’s prerogatives was his standing among his fellow gods. If Gibil grew weak, Imhursag would defeat it. If Imhursag defeated Gibil, Enimhursag’s power would grow and Engibil’s would recede. The two neighboring gods truly did hate each other, like two families living in the same street whose children threw rocks at one another.

As Ereshguna had, Sharur asked, “What could make Engibil willing to take a step back—perhaps to take several steps back—before Enimhursag, with whom he has quarreled since time out of mind?”

“Whatever it is, it has to do with the cup into which the great gods of the Alashkurrut poured their power,” Ereshguna said. “Of that we may be certain.”

“Yes,” Sharur said. Dimly, he remembered the cup that had figured in his fever dreams. Part of him wished he could recall more of those dreams. The rest of him wished he could forget them altogether, as madness he was better off without.

Ereshguna went on, “But we may be as certain of another thing: that we do not know why Engibil has such concern for this cup, which holds none of his own power, and that it may be—no, that it is—very important for us to learn the reason for his concern.”

“Every word you say is true,” Sharur replied. In a whisper, he added, “This is more than can be said of Engibil in this matter.”

“So it is.” His father also whispered. “Well, I shall try to say one more true thing, and then I shall drink the last of my beer here and go up on the roof to sleep. Here is the last true thing I shall try to say: I think we need to let Kimash the lugal know a Zuabi thief is prowling his city.”

“My father, in this, too, you are right.” Sharur drank the last of the beer from his own cup. He doused all the torches but one, which he and Ereshguna used to light their way upstairs.

When Sharur walked with Ereshguna to the lugal’s palace the next day, he felt more nearly himself than he had since the fever demon breathed its foul breath into his mouth. He looked up and down the Street of Smiths as he walked along, hoping he might spot Habbazu. But the Zuabi thief did not show himself. Sharur wondered if he had already crept into Engibil’s temple to steal the cup, and if he had escaped with it.

As they drew near the palace, Ereshguna raised an eyebrow. “Things are quiet here today,” he remarked. “Things are quieter here today than I have seen them for a long time.”

“Yes.” Sharur nodded. “Where are the donkeys carrying bricks? Where are the slaves carrying mortar? Where are the workmen building the palace higher and broader?” Only a couple of guards stood in front of the entryway, leaning against their spears.

Sharur and Ereshguna came up to the guards. One of the men said, “How may we serve you, master merchant? How may we serve you, master merchant’s son?”

“We would have speech with Kimash the mighty lugal,” Ereshguna answered. “We have learned of a matter about which he must hear.”

The guards looked at each other. One of them set his spear against the wall and went into the palace. When he returned, Inadapa followed him.

Bowing to the steward, Sharur said, “Good day. As my father told the guard, we would have speech with Kimash the mighty lugal.”

Inadapa bowed in return. “Master merchant’s son, I regret that this can not be.” He shifted his feet and bowed to Ereshguna. “Master merchant, I regret that your request can not be granted.”

“But the matter on which we would speak with the mighty lugal is both urgent and important,” Ereshguna said, frowning. “

“Master merchant, I regret that your request can not be granted,” Inadapa repeated.

Ereshguna folded his arms across his chest. “Why can my request not be granted?” he rumbled. “If I may not see Kimash the lugal, I whose house has always supported the lugals of Gibil, who then may? If he is sporting among his wives or concubines, let him sport among them at another time: what I have to tell him will not wait. Should he judge me wrong, having heard me out, let his wrath fall on my head.”

“He is not sporting among his wives,” Inadapa said. “He is not sporting among his concubines.”

“Well, where is he, then?” Sharur asked. “Why can he not see us?”

Inadapa took a deep breath. “Master merchant’s son, master merchant, he can not see you because he is closeted with Engibil. The god summoned him to the temple at first light this morning, and he has not yet returned.”

“Oh,” Sharur said, the word a sharp exhalation, as if he had been punched in the stomach.

“May he come back to the palace soon,” Ereshguna said. “May he come back to the palace safe. May he come back to the palace as lugal.”

“So may it be,” Inadapa said fervently. If Engibil chose to arise from two generations and more of drowsiness, the first the folk of Gibil would know of it was when he began looking out of their eyes and thinking their thoughts for them, as Enimhursag did in the city to the north.

“When Kimash returns, faithful steward, please do tell him we would have speech with him at his convenience,” Sharur said. That assumed Kimash would return to the palace as lugal, not as . .. as Engibil’s toy, Sharur thought. He had to assume as much. Anything else would be disaster.

Inadapa bowed. “It shall be just as you say.” He hesitated. “I hope it shall be just as you say.” More than that he would not say, any more than Sharur would.

Sharur looked in the direction of Engibil’s temple, though the great bulk of the palace hid it. Suddenly, in his mind’s eye, the lugal’s residence seemed transparent as clear water. If Engibil arose in his full might, how long would so great a building be given over to a mere man?

Ereshguna said, “When the mighty lugal returns from the temple, please send a messenger to let us know. We do have a matter of some importance to take up with him as soon as may be, provided ...” He shrugged.

“It shall be just as you say,” Inadapa repeated. He shook himself like a dog coming out of a canal. His big, soft belly wobbled. “May we soon come to live in more placid times.”

“So may it be,” Sharur and Ereshguna said together. Sharur did not think his father believed more placid times would come soon. He knew he did not think more placid times would come soon.

He and his father left the lugal’s palace and started up the Street of Smiths toward their home. Now both of them kept stealing glances toward Engibil’s temple. If the god took over the city once more, Sharur wondered whether he would leave those who had led Gibil’s search for more freedom for mortal men enough of that freedom to flee to some other town.

Then he wondered how much difference it would make. Nowhere else in Kudurru had the new taken hold as it had in Gibil. Still, even under the thumbs of their city gods, men remained to some degree men. Here and there across the land between the rivers, no doubt, were ensis who longed to make themselves into lugals. If they had at their disposal merchants and smiths and scribes from Gibil, perhaps they might succeed.

Perhaps, too, they would fall short, as Huzziyas the wanax had fallen short in the mountains of Alashkurru. But some sparks might still smolder, to be kindled again one day a generation from now, or two, or ten.

Ereshguna’s thoughts must have been much like Sharur’s. When they came to a man dipping cups of beer out of a large jar, Sharur’s father said, “Let us stop-and drink. Who knows how long we have left to taste beer with our own tongues? Who knows how long we have left before Engibil tastes beer with our tongues, sees the city with our eyes, thinks with our minds?”

That not only made Sharur want to drink beer, it made him want to drink himself blind. He bought a second cup from the beer seller, and was drinking from it when a large, burly man strutted up to the fellow and loudly demanded some of his wares. Having got the cup, the burly man turned to Sharur and Ereshguna, saying, “Can’t work all the time, eh, master merchant, master merchant’s son?”

“No, Mushezib, we cannot work all the time,” Ereshguna answered with a smile that seemed altogether natural and unforced. A merchant, after all, was trained not to show on his face everything he thought. Sharur admired his father’s skill at concealment.

“Not much work for guards these days,” Mushezib remarked. “Things are pretty quiet.”

“If we have good fortune, caravans will resume before too long,” Sharur answered. Caravans, might also resume before too long if the men of Gibil did not have good fortune, but those would be caravans where Engibil looked out through the eyes of merchants, guards, and donkey handlers. The Imhursagut sent forth such caravans. Sharur chose not to dwell on them.

Mushezib’s eyes brightened. “Is it so, master merchant’s son?”

“It is so,” Sharur said firmly, though he remained unsure whether it would be so. Then his eyes sparkled, too. He pointed to Mushezib. “And you are a man who can help make it so.”

“I?” the guard captain asked. “How is this so? How can this be so. I take no part in the affairs of the great. I take no part in the quarrels of the gods.”

“That is not so,” Sharur said. “Do you recall the thief whom Enzuabu sent to rob our caravan when we returned from the Alashkurru Mountains?”

“Oh, aye, I recall him,” Mushezib answered. “I would recall his ugly face even as I lay dying. With my last breath, I would curse him. You should have left his body in the bushes, a feast for dogs and javens. You should have left his body in a canal, a meal for fish and snails.”

Some of that, in among the bombast, was what Sharur hoped to hear. “If you recall his face, you will know him if you see him again?”

“Master merchant’s son, I will.” Mushezib spoke with great certainty. “Nor am I the only one among the guards and donkey handlers who would.”

Sharur smiled. So did Ereshguna, who must have seen where his son’s thoughts were going. Smiling still, Sharur went on, “This is good new's, Mushezib, for I must tell you that this thief, whose name is Habbazu, has come to Gibil to steal from Engibil’s temple. I have seen him. I have had speech with him. But I could not bring him before the mighty lugal for justice, for he escaped me.” That he had not intended to bring Habbazu before Kimash for justice was nothing the guard needed to know.

Mushezib’s blunt, battered features grew dark with anger. “He is here? In this city? He has come to rob our god for Enzuabu? Master merchant’s son, I will hunt him down. I will put word of him in the ears of our comrades who also saw him outside Zuabu. When we lay hands on him, the scavengers shall feed.”

“No,” Sharur said, and Mushezib’s shaggy eyebrows rose in surprise. “No,” Sharur repeated. “Bring him to the house of Ereshguna, that we may question him as he should be questioned.”

“Gold awaits you if you bring him to my house,” Ereshguna added.

“Question him as he should be questioned, eh?” Grim anticipation filled Mushezib’s chuckle. “Question him with hot things and sharp things and hard things and heavy things, do you mean?”

“It could be so,” Sharur answered, not altogether untruthfully. He still did not know how far Habbazu could be trusted.

Mushezib bowed to him. “Master merchant’s son—” He also bowed to Ereshguna. “Master merchant, my comrades and I shall drop on this thief like a collapsing wall. We shall fall upon him like the roof beams of a house that crumbles.”

“It is good,” Sharur said, and Ereshguna nodded. Mushezib bowed to each of them once more and strutted off, a procession of one. By his manner, he expected to return momentarily to the house of Ereshguna with one large fist clamped around Habbazu’s skinny neck. Sharur hoped he or another caravan guard or a donkey handler would soon return to the house of Ereshguna with Habbazu in his grasp.

“Do not raise your hopes too high,” Ereshguna warned him. “Do not expect too much. These men saw Habbazu for a small part of one night some while ago. They may not recognize him even if he should walk past them on the street. And he is a clever thief, a master thief. He may not show himself at all, and he will surely be adept at escaping danger.”

“Every word you say is true, Father,” Sharur replied. “And yet—I will hope.”

“How not?” Ereshguna clapped him on the back. “You are a man. I, too, will hope—but not too much.”

Sharur was adding numbers on his fingers that afternoon when a man of about his father’s age came through the doorway. “One moment, my master, if you please,” Sharur said, as to any stranger. “Let me finish my calculation.” He looked down to his hands once more.

“Take the time you need,” the stranger answered, and Sharur forgot the calculation he had been making. The man’s voice declared what a hasty glance had not—he was no stranger. There stood Kimash the lugal, not in a lugal’s finery but in the rather dirty kilt and worn sandals a potter or a leatherworker might have worn.

“Your pardon, mighty lugal,” Sharur gasped, and began to prostrate himself before the man who had ruled Gibil for most of his life.

“No. Wait,” Kimash said. “Speak neither my name nor my title while I am here. Call me ... Izmaili.” He plucked the name from the air like a conjuror plucking a date from a woman’s ear.

“I obey.” Sharur wondered if he was not to call Kimash lugal because Kimash was lugal no more. Had Engibil stripped the man of his title and his power? Would a dirty tunic and worn sandals be Kimash’s fate forevermore?

Reading his thoughts as if they were syllables incised on clay, Kimash said, “You need not fear, son of Ereshguna. I still am what I.was.” He smiled at his circumlocution, then went on, “Barely, perhaps, but I am. No, a man who looks like me sits on my high seat in the palace. A man who looks like me wears my raiment. He drinks my fine date wine. He eats my delicate food. If he so chooses, he couples with my women—all but a few whose names I have not told him, and of whom I am particularly fond. If the god looks in the palace, he will see the lugal in the palace, doing the things the lugal does. I? I am Izmaili, a person of no particular account.”

Sharur bowed, acknowledging Kimash’s daring. “But,” he could not help asking, “what if the god should summon the lugal to his temple while Izmaili, a person of no particular account, walks through the streets of Gibil?”

“Then we have a difficulty,” Kimash said. “But I do not think that will happen, not today. The god and the lugal have already had a long talk today. Call your father, if you would.” He smiled. “Izmaili, a person of no particular account, was told the two of you would have speech with him.”

“It shall be as you say, my master,” Sharur replied, as he might have to any customer who came into the shop. He raised his voice: “Father! The ... a man is here to see you.” When Ereshguna came out, he recognized at once who the “man” was. As Sharur had done, he .began to prostrate himself. As Kimash had done with Sharur, he bade Ereshguna stop and gave the name by which he would be known and the reason he was wearing both it and his shabby clothes.

Ereshguna nodded slow approval. “This is a bold plan, Izmaili.” He hesitated not at all over Kimash’s alias. “This is a clever plan, person of no particular account.”

“For which praise I thank you—although why you should value the thanks of a person of no particular account is beyond me.” Kimash’s eyes twinkled as he went on, “Also beyond me is why the two of you would want to have speech with a person of no particular account.”

“Be that as it may, we do,” Ereshguna said. Together, he and Sharur explained how Habbazu had come to Gibil to steal the Alashkurri cup from Engibil’s temple, and how the Zuabi thief had fled when Engibil summoned Sharur to his temple.

Kimash listened intently. When Sharur and Ereshguna had finished, he said, “For one who sits on the high seat in the palace, admitting he was wrong would come hard. For Izmaili, who is a man of no particular account, it is much easier. Son of Ereshguna, in the matter of this cup and its likely importance, you had the right of it.”

Sharur bowed, saying, “You are gracious, Izmaili. We have men from my caravan, men who will know this Zuabi by his face, searching for him here in Gibil. Still, we do not know whether they will find him before he can enter the temple and seek to steal this cup.”

“You did well to put men on his trail,” Kimash said. “You did well to have men search for him. But, if he should enter the temple and steal the cup, is it not likely now that he would take it away to Enzuabu rather than setting it in your hands? He will be fearing that you have come under Engibil’s power, even as you feared I had come under the god’s sway.”

“That is likely, yes,” Sharur said, and Ereshguna nodded. “Then we shall have to warn Engibil’s priests,” Kimash said. “Better that our god should have this thing than that a rival god in Kudurru should have it.”

Reluctantly, Ereshguna nodded again. Sharur said, “What still perplexes me, Izmaili, is why the god should have denied any knowledge of the cup when we asked him about it.”

“This also perplexes me,” the lugal admitted. “I have no answer I can give you. The god lied for reasons of his own. What those reasons are, I cannot guess. I am, after all, only a man. I am, after all, only a person of no particular account.” He seemed to enjoy having escaped for a little while the stifling ceremony with which the lugals of Gibil had come to imitate the homage given the city god. After a moment, though, he turned serious once more: “If your searchers catch this thief, have him brought before me.”

A person of no particular importance would never have given an order in that crisp tone, a tone used by a man certain of obedience. “We shall do as you say, Izmaili... just as if you were the lugal,” Sharur replied.

Kimash’s eyes widened. Then he caught the joke, and threw back his head and laughed. “It is good,” he said at last. “It is very good. Obey me as you would obey the lugal and all will be well. Now I will go back to the palace. I will see how much fine wine I have left. I will see how much dainty food I have left. I will see how many babies born next spring I will know to be a cuckoo’s eggs, and not sprung from my seed at all.” With a shrug of resignation, he left the house of Ereshguna and strode down the Street of Smiths.

“He is a bold man,” Ereshguna said when the lugal was gone. “He is a clever man. He is a resourceful man. He is the right man to lead Gibil and to keep Engibil quiescent while we—” He broke off.

While we mortals gather strength, was no doubt what he had been on the point of saying. Saying such things while Engibil was less quiescent than he might have been was unwise. In any case, he knew Sharur could supply the words he did not speak aloud.

Sharur did supply those words without difficulty. “He is everything you have said he is,” he agreed. “But, Father, is he a man before whom we want to bring Habbazu the thief if we lay hands on him once more?”

“You were the one who said we would do as Izmaili said, just as if he were the lugal,” Ereshguna reminded him.

“Yes, I said that.” Sharur shrugged. “What of it? If the god does not scruple to lie to me, should I scruple to lie to the lugal?”

Ereshguna whistled softly between his teeth. “Kimash may punish you for lying to him. Who will punish Engibil for lying to you?”

I will, Sharur thought, but those were words he would not say aloud. Instead, he answered, “If the lugal is warning the priests of Engibil’s temple about Habbazu, would not giving the thief over to him be the same as condemning the thief to death?”

“That is likely to be so, yes.” Ereshguna grew alert. “I see what you are saying, son. We want the Alashkurri cup stolen. Kimash, on the other hand, may well reckon that giving the thief over to Engibil for punishment, or punishing Habbazu himself, will gain him more credit with the god.”

“It will gain him credit with the god of Gibil, yes,” Sharur said, “but it will not help him or help us in our dealing with the other city gods of Kudurru, nor with the gods of the Alashkurrut.”

“I wonder how much Kimash frets over that,” Ereshguna said. “He is the lugal, the man who rules Gibil. Anything that helps him rule Gibil, he will likely do. Anything that gains him credit with Engibil helps him rule Gibil, so he will likely do it. He will think of the rest of us Giblut only after he thinks of ruling Gibil—so I believe.”

“And I.” Sharur’s mouth thinned to a bitter line. “In that, the lugal is much like the god, is he not?”

Ereshguna looked startled. “I had not thought of it so. Now that I do, though, I see that there is some truth in what you say.”

“We sometimes have the need to do this or that without the god’s knowing it,” Sharur said, and his father nodded. “If Kimash is much like Engibil, should we not sometimes have the need to do this or that without the lugal’s knowing it?”

“Yes, that would follow from the first,” Ereshguna answered. Before Sharur could say anything, his father held up a hand to show he had not finished. “You must also think on this, though, son: often, if we have the need to do this or that without the god’s knowing it, the lugal will help us shield it from his eyes. If we seek to hide from the god and the lugal both and we are discovered, who will shield us then?”

“No one,” Sharur answered, so bleakly that he startled Ereshguna again. “We Giblut have for long and long aimed to live as free as we could. If we are free, we are also free to fail.” He grimaced. “Except we had better not.”

Mushezib did not find Habbazu. The caravan guards who had served under Mushezib did not find Habbazu. The donkey handlers did not find Habbazu. Five days after Engibil had summoned Sharur to his temple and Habbazu had fled, the Zuabi thief returned to the house of Ereshguna.

One moment, Habbazu was not there. The next, he was. So, at any rate, it appeared to Sharur, who was searching for a particular clay tablet among the many in the baskets near the scales. When he looked up, Habbazu stood not three feet away, watching the search with sardonic amusement. “You!” Sharur exclaimed.

“I,” Habbazu agreed. He bowed to Sharur. “And you. Believe me, having seen you ordered to the house of your god, I am more surprised to see you safe among men than you could be to see me.”

“How did you come here without being seen?” Sharur asked.

“I have my ways,” Habbazu answered airily. “I am, after all, a thief sent forth by Enzuabu himself.” He said no more than that. Maybe it meant the god of Zuabu had lent him powers or enchantments to help hint escape notice. Maybe it meant he wanted Sharur to think the god of Zuabu had lent him such powers and enchantments.

At another time, Sharur might have spent considerable worry over the question of whether and to what extent Habbazu was bluffing. Now he had more important things on his mind. “The Alashkurri cup,” he said. “Have you got it, or does it still sit in Engibil’s temple?”

Habbazu lost some of his jaunty manner. “The Alashkurri cup still sits in Engibil’s temple.” He sent Sharur an accusing look. “The god of this city is not so drowsy a god as I was led to believe in Zuabu. The god of Gibil is not so sleepy a god as I was led to believe in my city.”

“As I told you, not everything about Gibil is as you may have been led to believe,” Sharur said.

“The god is alert,” Habbazu said. “The priests of the god are alert. This makes it harder for me to enter the temple, harder for me to reach the chamber within which the cup rests, harder for me to escape after I steal it.”

“With the god and the priests alert, can you enter the temple?” Sharur asked. “Can you reach the chamber in which the cup rests? Can you steal the cup?”

“I can do all these things.” Habbazu drew himself up with the sort of pride in his ability at his chosen trade that Sharur or Ereshguna might have shown over matters mercantile. “As I said, though, it will be harder for me. I will pick my time with care.”

“Indeed,” Sharur said, raising one eyebrow, “if you do not, you are liable to be captured, as the caravan guards captured you outside Zuabu.”

Habbazu looked miffed. “That should not have happened. That should never have happened. The caravan guards were lucky to set eyes on me, luckier still to lay hold of me.”

“As may be,” Ereshguna said, coming downstairs. How long had he been listening? Long enough—he went on, “Who is to say Engibil will not be lucky enough to set eyes on you? Who is to say Engibil’s priests will not be lucky enough to lay hold of you? They are alert, as the caravan guards were alert. Have you not noticed how often luck comes to those who are alert?”

“Oh, indeed, my master: I have noticed this many times,” the thief said. “And I do not deny my task would be easier if the god’s eye were turned elsewhere. I do not deny my task would be easier if the god’s priests were to look in some different direction.”

“Distracting the priests may not be too hard,” Ereshguna said. “They are, after all, but men. Distracting the god ...” His voice trailed away.

“A question,” Sharur said. “Habbazu, if you steal this Alashkurri cup, will you still deliver it into the hands of the house of Ereshguna and not into the hands of Enzuabu who sent you forth?”

“When Engibil summoned you to his temple, I repented of my promise,” the thief admitted. “Now that I learn he did not summon you to punish you for consorting with me, I see that, though he may be alert, he does not rule every aspect of every life in Gibil, as Enimhursag does in Imhursag. And so, though shaken as by an earthquake, the promise stands.”

“It is good,” Sharur said. As he and his father and Habbazu spoke of the difficulty of distracting, so Engibil no doubt wondered how successful his effort to distract the annoying mortals would prove. He had succeeded in making Sharur happy by releasing the promise he held.

“As your father said, distracting the priests of the god may not be too hard,” Habbazu said. “How, though, how do you propose to distract the god himself?”

“That will not be easy,” Ereshguna said. “You may indeed have to prove how gifted a thief you are.”

“To distract a god from watching over men and the concerns of men,” Sharur said slowly, “it may be best to involve him with gods and the concerns of gods.”

“This Alashkurri cup has involved Engibil with gods and the concerns of gods,” Ereshguna said. “Without it, he would have been a drowsy god. Without it, he would have been a sleepy god. Without it, we could have gone on living our lives as we desired.”

“There are other gods than the great gods of the Alashkurrut, other gods over whose doings Engibil has concerned himself for long and long,” Sharur said. “If he were again to concern himself over their doings ...”

“Enzuabu and Engibil do not squabble over the border between their lands,” Habbazu said. “Zuabu and Gibil have gone on for many years without strife between them.”

“That is so,” Sharur agreed. “But if Engibil were to look to the north and not to the west, what would he see? Engibil and Enimhursag hate each other; Engibil and Enimhursag have long hated each other. In every generation, Gibil and Imhursag go to war against each other—often twice in a generation.”

“In the past three generations, in the time while the lugals have ruled Gibil, we have beaten the Imhursagut in almost all these wars, too,” Ereshguna said. “In the latest one, we beat the Imhursagut so badly, Enimhursag had to humble himself to beg for peace.” He spoke with no small pride.

Habbazu said, “Strange how, though the power of your god in your city is less than it was, the power of your city among its neighbors has grown greater.”

“Men matter, too,” Sharur said: that, if anything, was the motto under which the Giblut had lived since Igigi became the first lugal. Sharur went on, “If Enimhursag were to believe Engibil’s power badly weakened, though; if the god of the Imhursagut were to believe the Giblut divided by factional squabbles ... would he not seek to regain what we have taken from Imhursag over the years? Would he not think he could but stretch forth his hand and what he had lost would be his once more?”

“But what would make him believe such a thing?” Ereshguna asked. “It is not so. If anything, as we have seen, Engibil is more active now than he has been for some time.” “Suppose a Gibli were to flee to the land of Imhursag,” Sharur said. “Suppose a Gibli were to speak these words into Enimhursag’s ear. Suppose a Gibli were to beg Enimhursag to arm the Imhursagut and come down into the land of Gibil and restore order, order that has been lost as water is lost when the bank of a canal breaks.”

“What Gibli would be mad enough to do such a thing?” Ereshguna said.

“I would,” Sharur answered.

Habbazu stared at him. “You would set your city at war with Imhursag. You would set your god at war with Enimhursag?”

“I would,” Sharur said. “If Engibil’s eyes travel north to the border with the land Imhursag rules, how closely will the god watch his temple? How much notice will he take of a certain skulking thief?”

“Ahhh.” Habbazu let out a long breath of praise.

“But, my son, you would not go to speak to another merchant,” Ereshguna said. “You would go to speak to a god. You would go to speak to a god who rules a city in his own right. You would go to speak to a god who can look deep into your heart and learn whether you speak truth. You would go to a god who can punish you terribly when he learns you are speaking lies.”

“I would go to speak to a god who rules a city in his own right,” Sharur said. “I would go to speak to a god whose own people fawn on him. I would go to speak to a god who will very much want to hear the words I speak into his ear. I would go to speak to a god who will very much want to believe the words I speak into his ear. Gods, like men, believe that which they want to believe. If he believes what comes from my mouth, he will not look deep into my heart and learn whether I speak truth.”

Habbazu bowed. “Master merchant’s son, no one will deny you are a man of courage. No one will claim you are a man without bravery.”

“A man should be brave,” Ereshguna said. “A man should not be foolhardy. A man should be wise enough to know the difference between the one and the other.” By the way he looked at Sharur, he did not think his son passed that test. “If you are wrong in this, if Enimhursag goes through your mind like a man going through his belt pouch, all is lost. If you are wrong in this, you are lost.”

“How better to distract Engibil than to embroil him with Enimhursag?” Sharur returned. “And Enimhursag is a foolish god. He is a stupid god. We have seen it in the way the Imhursagut fought the men of our city. We have seen it in the way our caravans constantly outdo those from Imhursag. We have seen it in the way I went into Imhursag and came out safe again. What I have done once, I can do twice.”

“Enimhursag is a foolish god: true,” Ereshguna said. “He is a stupid god: true. But he is a god, and he has the strength of a god. Remember this. You went into Imhursag and came out safe again: true. Enimhursag nearly slew you, though you disguised yourself as a Zuabi merchant. Remember this, too.”

“What’s this? A Gibli pretending to be a man of my city?” Habbazu exclaimed. “I am insulted. Zuabu is insulted.” His eyes sparkled.

Ereshguna ignored him, continuing, “If you go to Enimhursag this time, you will go as a Gibli. If you go to the god of Imhursag this time, you will go as a man of the city he hates. Why should he not slay you out of hand?”

“He will hear me first, Father,” Sharur said. “When has a Gibli ever fled to Imhursag? That alone will make the god of Imhursag curious enough to hear me. When has a Gibli ever begged Imhursag to strike against his own city? That will make the god of Imhursag glad enough to do it without looking too closely at why a Gibli might say such an outlandish thing.”

Slowly, Habbazu said, “Master merchant’s son, though the risk is real, as your father has said, I think your words may hold much wisdom.”

Ereshguna was not yet ready to give up: “Son, would you start a war between Gibil and Imhursag without leave from Kimash the lugal?”

“I would,” Sharur replied without hesitation. “Kimash the lugal has alerted Engibil and his priests against us.”

“You would go to Imhursag, knowing you are now free to wed Ningal?” his father enquired. “You would throw away the chance to do what you have longed to do above all else?”

That was a stronger question than any Ereshguna had yet asked. Now Sharur did hesitate. At last, though, he said, “I would. Engibil tried to disrupt my wedding Ningal over this cup; what other reason could the god have had? Then, again on account of it, he reversed his course. We must have it. I shall return. I shall wed Ningal.”

“I see I cannot dissuade you,” Ereshguna said with a sigh. “You are a man. You have a man’s will. Go on to Imhursag, then, if that is what you reckon you must do. I shall stay behind, and pray all follows as you hope.”

Pray to whom? Sharur wondered. No one in Gibil but Imhursaggi slaves would pray to Enimhursag. Engibil would hope he failed. The great gods of the Alashkurrut would hope he failed. Very likely, the great gods of Kudurru, the gods of sun and moon, sky and storm and underworld, would also hope he failed. That left... no one. Sharur felt very much alone.

“Good fortune go with you,” Habbazu said. Sharur wondered if he meant it. The thief would have done better for himself, would have obeyed the orders of his god, had he never encountered Sharur. Whether they were sincere or not, though, Sharur gladly accepted his wishes for good fortune. He would need as much as he could find.