Between the Rivers

10

Sharur and Habbazu drifted out of the open area in front of Engibil’s temple. They neither hurried nor dawdled; they might have been—indeed, they were—a couple of men who had had enough of entertainment and now needed to return to the workaday world in which they usually passed their time.

“Now that we have this thing, what shall we do with it?” Habbazu asked, taking care not to name the cup. “Shall we take it with us when we return to the fight? Shall we secret it away at the house of your father?”

“If we take it with us, it may perhaps be easier for the god to spot,” Sharur answered. “The small gods of Kudurru told me there was little in it of power to be spotted, but I do not know precisely how much they knew, nor do I know how much power Engibil can put forth to seek the thing should he so will.”

Habbazu nodded. “Wiser to hide it, then. Shall we go on to the house of your father?”

“I have a better notion yet,” Sharur said. “Let us take it to the house of one of the smiths along the Street of Smiths. The power of metal, the power of smithery, make it harder for the god to peer into such places.”

“That is so.” Habbazu nodded again. “I have heard Enzuabu complain of it. What with you Giblut being as you are to begin with, it is probably even more true here than in Zuabu.”

“Engibil complains of it, too,” Sharur said. “If the gods had it to do over, I do not think they would let men learn to work metal. If they had it to do again, I do not think they would let men learn to write, either. But men have learned to do these things, and even the gods cannot have it to do over.”

“This is also so,” Habbazu said. “Have you the house of some particular smith in mind, a man whom you can trust with something as important as this? I would not—I do not—care to risk it with someone who would return it to the god or who would gossip so that its presence were noised abroad.”

“Nor would I,” Sharur replied. “I have in mind taking it to the house of Dimgalabzu, whom you have met.”

“But Dimgalabzu is in the north, in the army of Gibil opposing the Imhursagut,” Habbazu objected.

“So he is,” Sharur said. “But he is also the father of Ningal, my intended bride. She of all people may be trusted not to return the cup to the god.”

“I am glad to hear this is so,” Habbazu said. “But she is a woman. Are you certain you can trust her not to gossip?”

“More certain than I am that I can trust you not to gossip,” Sharur said, smiling to show he meant no offense. “You, master thief, I have known but a short time. Ningal I have known since we were both children getting filthy in the dust of the Street of Smiths.”

“Very well. A point.” Habbazu pursed his lips before continuing. “But can you likewise trust her kinsfolk? Can you likewise trust the slaves in her household?”

Sharur’s grunt was not a happy sound. “That I do not know. I do know that anyone who trusts a slave too far is asking to be disappointed.” Habbazu nodded once more. Sharur said nothing of Gulal, Ningal’s mother. From what he knew of Gulal, she disapproved of everything. That meant she would likely disapprove of his leaving the cup in the house of Dimgalabzu.

His silence gave Habbazu the answer the master thief needed. “If we do not leave the cup in the house of Dimgalabzu because people we can not trust are there, what shall we do with it?”

“Better then that we take it with us after all, I think,” Sharur replied, forgetting what he had said not long before. “Being in among a great crowd of men may perhaps make it harder for the god to notice it, or so we can hope.” If the god came after it and Sharur was close by, he could also try to break it. Again, he kept that thought to himself.

Habbazu laughed at him. “Since you say first the one thing and then the other, I judge that you are as unsure of the wisest course as I am.”

Sharur laughed, too, ruefully. “Perhaps I was wrong earlier. Then again, perhaps I am wrong now.” He wished he had thought of keeping the cup close by him earlier.

They walked past the house of Ereshguna. The house of Dimgalabzu lay a few doors farther up the Street of Smiths from Engibil’s temple. When Sharur turned to go into the doorway, Habbazu walked on straight for half a step before spinning on his heel to follow. “I am sorry,” Sharur said. “I forgot you did not know which house it was.”

“No harm done,” Habbazu answered. “Now I know which house it is. I shall not forget.” Coming from a master thief as it did, that was a promise Sharur would have been almost as glad to do without.

With Dimgalabzu gone to war, the smithy was quiet: no hammering, no scraping, no hiss of melted bronze burning off beeswax as it poured into a mold, no great crackling roar from the fires. Because the fires did not blaze as they did when Dimgalabzu was at home and working, that lower chamber was also cooler than Sharur ever remembered finding it. It was not cool—it was far from cool—but he did not at once begin to roast in it as if he were a chunk of mutton on a spit.

“Where is everyone?” Habbazu asked in a low voice that suited the dim quiet of the chamber.

“I do not know,” Sharur said. “A slave or two should be down here, if no one else. But slaves are lazy creatures. Perhaps they are lying on their mats instead.”

“Perhaps they have sneaked away to the entertainment you arranged in front of Engibil’s temple,” Habbazu said.

“Perhaps they have.” Sharur had not thought of that. He smiled; if the entertainment had distracted not only the priests but also Dimgalabzu’s slaves, so much the better. He also kept a close eye on Habbazu, not wanting the master thief to practice his craft in this house.

A woman’s voice came from upstairs: “Is someone down there?”

Now Habbazu eyed Sharur. Habbazu could not know whose voice that was. It could have been Ningal’s. It could have been her mother’s. It could have been a slave woman’s. Sharur would know.

Sharur did know. Relief filled him. Now he had at least a chance to do what he had hoped to do. “It is Sharur the son of Ereshguna, and a friend,” he called. Habbazu’s eyes lit up. He mouthed Ningal’s name. Sharur nodded.

But would his intended come downstairs by herself? Would Gulal, her mother, accompany her, as was customary? Would a slave woman accompany her if her mother did not?

She came down the stairs alone. Sharur’s heart leaped. Habbazu spoke in an admiring whisper. “You are a fortunate man.”

“I thank you,” Sharur whispered back. He raised his voice: “Ningal, I present to you my comrade, Burrapi, a mercenary of Zuabu.”

Habbazu bowed low. Politely, Ningal inclined her head. “Why do you and your comrade visit the house of Dimgalabzu?” she asked. By her tone, she meant, I’m glad to see you, but what is he doing here?

“I brought in to Ushurikti the slave dealer an Imhursaggi prisoner I captured,” Sharur replied. “Burrapi here accompanied me to help guard the man. Now we are going back to fight again. Before we go, we have something we need to leave with you.”

“What thing is this?” Ningal asked.

Sharur nodded to Habbazu. Habbazu opened the pouch he wore on his belt—a larger pouch than most men might wear, but nowhere near large enough to draw any special notice—and drew from it the Alashkurri cup he had stolen from the temple of Engibil.

This being the first time Sharur had set eyes on it, he stared with no small interest. But, as Habbazu had said, as the small gods Mitas and Kessis had implied, it was nothing out of the ordinary. He had drunk beer from cups like it many times in the mountains of Alashkurru. It was of yellowish Alashkurri clay, ornamented with twisting black-glazed snakes. The potter who had shaped it and fired it had been a capable enough man, but he was no master.

Ningal’s dark eyebrows rose as Habbazu handed her the cup. “What am I to do with this?” she asked.

“Keep it safe,” Habbazu answered. “Let no harm befall it.”

“Keep it secret,” Sharur added. “Let not Gulal your mother know you have it. Let not Dimgalabzu your father, when he comes home from the war, know you have it. Let not the slaves of this household know you have it. If the servants of Kimash the lugal come through the Street of Smiths searching, let them not know you have it. If the priests of Engibil come through the Street of Smiths searching, let them not know you have it, either.”

The eyebrows of his intended rose higher still, until for a moment they seemed almost to brush her hairline. “I had not thought anyone would speak thus of gold and lapis lazuli, let alone a common cup—except, I gather from your words, it is no common cup. What makes it other than a common cup, if one of outlandish style?”

Habbazu shot Sharur a warning glance. For his part, Sharur needed no warning. He said, “Better you had not asked this question. What you do not know, you cannot tell another.”

“If you cannot keep it thus, give it to us once more, that we may take it elsewhere,” Habbazu said. “For it must be safe. It must be secret.”

Ningal did not return the cup. “It shall be safe here. You have no business doubting that.” She looked indignant. “It shall be secret here. You may be certain of that.”

Habbazu glanced once more at Sharur, saying without words, You know her better than me, can we be certain of that? “If Ningal says a thing is so, you may rely on it,” Sharur said. He turned toward his intended and nodded. “It is good. Now we must go back to the fighting.”

“May Engibil keep both of you safe,” Ningal said. “May the god of this city hold harm away from both of you.”

“May it be so,” Sharur and Habbazu said together. Irony glinted in the master thief’s eyes. Sharur nodded, ever so slightly, to show he understood. If Engibil detected what they had done, he would neither keep them safe nor hold harm away from them. He would be far more likely to put them in danger and bring harm down upon them.

Gulal’s voice came from upstairs: “Who is it, Ningal?”

“A customer of Father’s and his friend, Mother,” Ningal answered. Strictly speaking, that was true, though what Sharur purposed buying from Dimgalabzu was Ningal herself. The words also gave Sharur and Habbazu the chance to slip out of Dimgalabzu’s house unnoticed by anyone but Ningal. She nodded to them both as they left.

While they were making their way up the Street of Smiths toward the northern gate of Gibil, Habbazu said, “That is indeed a fine woman you have as your intended. Not only is she good to look on, she has sharp wits as well. Over the years, you will come to value the second more than the first.”

Sharur made what he thought was a polite, noncommittal noise.

It must have been neither so polite nor so noncommittal as he had thought, for Habbazu burst into raucous laughter. “You think her wits will not matter so very much. You think on how she will look the night of her wedding, when you couple with her for the first time. You think of the pleasure your prong will know. Now, I have nothing against the pleasures of the prong—believe me when I tell you this is true. But believe me also when I tell you the pleasure you take in a woman’s good looks fades far faster than the pleasure you take in her good sense. I have more years than you; I know whereof I speak.”

Sharur considered the marriage between his father and his mother. Betsilim had been a beautiful young woman, nor had the years robbed her too badly. But Ereshguna relied on her now in ways he surely had not when she was younger. That was not because he had lost capacity, but because he had come to respect hers. Thoughtfully, Sharur said, “You may be right.”

“Ha!” Habbazu said in surprise, and clapped him on the back. “I did not look for you to admit even so much.” Side by side, they walked on toward the gate.

Men came south from the fighting as Sharur and Habbazu walked north toward it. Some led dour prisoners who would become slaves, as Sharur had done a few days before. Some were hurt themselves, too badly to let them keep fighting but not so badly as to keep them off their legs.

“No, no big fights the last couple of days,” one of the latter said. His right arm was bound tightly against his chest. When Sharur asked him how he had been injured, he looked sheepish. “How, friend? I tripped over a spearshaft in camp and came down on this wrist, which broke. But when I get into Gibil”—he winked—“I shall tell them what a hero I was.”

“It is good,” Sharur said, laughing. With a wave of his good arm, the man with the broken wrist trudged on toward the city.

Habbazu said, “It is good indeed. If we return to the army before it fights another great fight, no one can possibly blame us for having been gone a few days.”

“You speak the truth,” Sharur said. Lowering his voice, he continued, “Nor has there been any great hue and cry coming up the road from behind us. I take this to mean either that your theft has gone undiscovered or that, it having been discovered, the priests know not in which direction to search.”

“Either of those would suit me well enough,” Habbazu replied. “Better that the theft go undiscovered, of course, but not tracing it to me would do—will do.”

They reached the Gibli encampment the next morning. “Good you have returned, my son,” Ereshguna said. “Good you remain in the city no longer. The Imhursagut regain their insolence; Enimhursag regains his arrogance. They will, I think, soon come forth in battle once more.”

“When they do, we shall defeat them,” Sharur said confidently. He gestured; at his urging, Ereshguna and Tupsharru put their heads close to his. He went on in a whisper, and an oblique whisper at that, “Good also we went down to the city. We accomplished all that we hoped to accomplish. Duabzu the Imhursaggi captive is in Ushurikti’s hands. He will bring a good price or a good ransom. And ...” His voice trailed away. Some things he preferred not to say, even obliquely.

Tupsharru looked puzzled for a moment. Ereshguna did not. He asked, “And is it with you?” For obliquity, that was hard to match. Sharur shook his head. Tupsharru suddenly grunted, realizing what his father and brother had to be talking about. Ereshguna asked, “Where have you put it, then?”

Sharur hesitated. Every merchant’s instinct in him screamed that that had to remain as secret as it could. He glanced over at Habbazu. The master thief’s face bore no expression whatever. Sharur understood what that meant: Habbazu did not want the secret spread more widely, either.

Gently, Ereshguna said, “The Imhursagut, as I told you, will soon come forth in battle once more. May the gods decree otherwise, but, if you should fall, my son, and if Burrapi the Zuabi mercenary should also fall, who then would know where it is?”

“Ah,” Sharur said. He glanced over at Habbazu again. Almost imperceptibly, Habbazu nodded. Despite that nod, Sharur revealed as little as he could: “Ningal the daughter of Dimgalabzu would know.”

“Would she indeed?” Ereshguna murmured. “Would she indeed? But not Gulal, her mother? Not the slaves-of the household?”

“No, not Gulal, her mother,” Sharur said. “Not the slaves of the household, either.”

Tupsharru grunted again. “Burrapi the Zuabi mercenary!” he exclaimed. “Servants of Kimash the lugal were here the other day, asking about Burrapi the Zuabi mercenary. Since he was not with us, since we could not produce him, they were easily satisfied, and soon returned to the lugal’s pavilion.”

“Kimash and his men are no doubt curious to learn whether Burrapi the Zuabi mercenary and Habbazu the Zuabi master thief are by chance the same man,” Ereshguna said.

“What an absurd idea,” Habbazu said indignantly. Sharur, Ereshguna, and Tupsharru all laughed.

Tupsharru said, “If it please the Zuabi mercenary, he might now return to his native city, whither we would send him no small reward.”

Habbazu shook his head. “So long as I may do so, I would sooner stay. What we have done does not affect you only. It affects my god, it affects my city, it affects me.”

“What you say does not dishonor you, nor your city, nor your god,” Ereshguna said. Habbazu bowed. Sharur noted what neither his father nor the thief seemed to see: that Habbazu had named Enzuabu first, then Zuabu, with himself last, while Ereshguna, a Gibli to the core, reversed the thief’s order.

“Perhaps,” Sharur said, “you would be wise, Hab... ah, Burrapi, not to make your return to this encampment widely known. You might do best to stick close to our fire here.”

“Now this is good advice, prudent advice, and I shall take it,” Habbazu said. “A thief oftentimes needs to move in secret. A thief frequently needs to hide himself in plain sight.”

“What if the men of Kimash the lugal come searching for you again?” asked Tupsharru, who was inclined to worry and to borrow trouble.

“I am now forewarned against the men of Kimash the lugal,” Habbazu said. “Let them come searching for me again. Again, they shall not find me.”

“The master thief does not presume to tell us how to get the best price for an ingot of bronze or a pot of date wine of high-medium grade,” Ereshguna said to Tupsharru. “I, for my part, shall not presume to instruct him how best to manage his own affairs.”

“I understand, Father,” Sharur’s younger brother said, and hung his head.

“Has Engibil been active here along the border since Burrapi and I went down to the city of Gibil?” Sharur asked hopefully: the more active along the border the god was, the less interest he would have had in looking into his temple when Habbazu robbed it, and the less interest he would have had in looking into it after Habbazu robbed it as well.

Ereshguna and Tupsharru both nodded, which brought a smile not only to Sharur’s face but also to Habbazu’s. Ereshguna said, “Engibil has been active indeed. Yesterday morning, he and Enimhursag began screaming insults at each other. They were both so loud and fierce, we thought they would come to blows themselves rather than leaving it to the men of their cities to fight it out. In the end, though, they took it no further than screams, and I am just as well pleased at that.”

“Why?” Sharur said. “If Engibil slew Enimhursag, we would not have to endure wars with the Imhursagut every generation.”

“If that happened, you would be right,” Ereshguna agreed. “But what if Enimhursag slew Engibil? We do not know what would happen if the two gods did battle each other, and I am satisfied to remain ignorant.”

Sharur wondered if Gibil might not be better off were Engibil to be slain. Could a city go on with only a lugal and no indwelling god at all? No city in the land between the rivers had ever done such a thing. No city or town or fortress anywhere in the world had ever done such a thing, so far as Sharur knew. Maybe no one anywhere in the world had ever imagined such a thing before.

Of itself, his right hand slid down to cover the eyes of the amulet to Engibil. The god probably would not pick this moment to examine his thoughts. But he wanted to make as sure of that as he could. Having Engibil learn what he was thinking now would be ... disastrous wasn’t nearly a strong enough word.

“On this matter, I am also just as well pleased not to know,” Habbazu said. “Too much power, too much danger, were god to fight god straight up.”

Tupsharru said, “Maybe that’s why gods made men in the first place—to give them tools with which they could challenge each other without meeting face to face.”

“No one knows why the gods made men in the first place,” Ereshguna said. “Priests do not know. Sages do not know. Scribes do not know. Merchants do not know. I have heard it said that even the gods do not know, or do not remember. Whether this be so or not”—his craggy features crinkled into a smile—“I do not know.”

“My brother’s idea makes as much sense as any I have heard,” Sharur said. “It makes more sense than most I have heard.”

“This does not prove it is true.” Ereshguna and Habbazu spoke together. Master merchant and master thief looked at each other in some surprise, then started to laugh.

Ereshguna said, “Here we are, two older men, trying to restrain the enthusiasm of younger men. When we were younger men, the older men would try to restrain us.”

“Even so,” Habbazu said. “And when your two fine sons are older men, they, too, will try to restrain the enthusiasms of the young.”

He and Ereshguna laughed again. Sharur and Tupsharru exchanged indignant glances. Sharur did not think that, when he grew older, he would try to hold back those younger than himself. He wondered if his father, when a young man, had also doubted he would do any such thing. Looking over at Ereshguna, Sharur thought he probably had had those doubts. Despite them, Ereshguna had changed. Maybe that meant Sharur would change, too. He hoped not, but maybe it did.

Brazen trumpets roused the Giblut the next morning. Ram’s-horn trumpets roused the Imhursagut—a different sort of braying. Along with those harsh blasts from the Imhursaggi camp came the cries of Enimhursag himself, easily audible across the space between the two encampments: “Rouse, men of Imhursag! Today I lead you to victory over the liars and cheats of Gibil!”

Sharur smiled to hear the outrage in the god of Imhursag’s voice. Much of that outrage, he knew, was aimed straight at him. He had lied to Enimhursag, saying Engibil had run mad and the Giblut wanted a new divine overlord. He had cheated Enimhursag, getting him to invade the land of Gibil on those false pretenses.

Engibil’s voice was nowhere to be heard. Kimash’s bronze-lunged heralds cried out the lugal’s orders: “Smiths and scribes and merchants to the front! As we fought before, so shall we fight again.”

On went the armor of bronze scales over leather. On went the helmet, of similar design. Wearing both, Sharur felt as if he had been thrown into one of Etimgalabzu’s furnaces. Sweat poured off him, a river of sweat, a river that seemed to flow as powerfully as the Yarmuk.

“Forward the Giblut!” Kimash shouted. The army he led echoed his war cry: “Forward the Giblut!”

“Enimhursag!” the warriors of Imhursag shouted back. “Enimhursag!” As he had done on the first day of the fighting, the god of the Imhursagut towered over his men, huge, menacing—and, Sharur thought, less dangerous than he appeared. Along with the rest of the Giblut, he jeered at Enimhursag and reviled him.

Axles squealing, the donkey-drawn chariots of the Giblut began to maneuver against those of Imhursag. Kimash had more chariots with him than did the Imhursagut. Before long, Sharur was sure, the elite archers of his home city would overpower their foes and pour shafts into the opposing army from the flank. If it had happened so in the earlier battle, it was likely to happen again in this one.

But, he soon discovered, even Enimhursag, the champion of the old in all ways, did not always precisely repeat himself. The god of Imhursag could not advance beyond the frontmost line of his warriors. But that did not mean, as it had meant in the earlier battle, that he could exert no power beyond the frontmost line of his warriors.

Enimhursag stooped alongside a tiny canal only a couple of cubits wide. When he rose, his enormous hands were full of mud. As a small boy might have done, he shaped the mud into a ball—but this ball was more than half as big around as a man was tall. The god flung it at a Gibli chariot.

It hit the donkeys and knocked them kicking. The chariot itself flipped over, spilling the archers out into the dirt. Enimhursag stooped, rose, and shaped another ball of mud. He aimed and let fly.

This time, the mudball squarely struck a chariot. The car shattered. The donkeys ran wild, braying their terror. One of the men who had been in the chariot somehow staggered to his feet. The others did not move.

The Imhursagut cheered themselves hoarse. Enimhursag methodically began to form still another ball of mud. Advancing beside Sharur, Ereshguna said, “The god of the Imhursagut has found something dangerous to do. But he has not found out how to do it in the most dangerous way.”

As if thinking along with Ereshguna, Kimash cried, “Close with them! Let us meet the Imhursagut sword to sword, mace to mace, body to body! Close with them! Forward the Giblut!”

Forward the Giblut went, at a trot. Enimhursag threw at another chariot and missed. His curses were enormous. He threw again, and smashed a car to kindling. No Giblut staggered from that wreck.

Enimhursag needed longer to realize he was making a mistake than had either Ereshguna or Kimash the lugal. The Gibli army had almost closed with the Imhursaggi force before the god threw the first mudball into that crowded mass of men. It bowled over a dozen, maybe more, not far from Sharur. Some of them could still scream. Some would be forever silent. The men who were not hurt ran on, toward the Imhursagut.

Enimhursag let fly with yet another missile. smashed down another double handful of men. By then, though, the front ranks of the Giblut, Sharur among them, crashed into the armored nobles and priests and traders at the head of the Imhursaggi force. All the Giblut hurled themselves forward with desperate energy—the sooner they mingled with the Imhursagut, the sooner the god of Imhursag would have to leave off throwing balls of mud at them for fear of hitting his own men.

An Imhursaggi priest, crying out his god’s name, swung his ax at Sharur as if he intended chopping down a date palm. Sharur had to skip back; he had no hope of beating that stroke aside. “Enimhursag is my protector!” the priest shouted, drawing back the ax to strike again.

Before he could swing it a second time, Sharur slashed at him. The priest’s armor turned the first swordstroke. The next, which was aimed at his neck, he had to block with the handle of his ax.

Then a wounded Imhursaggi stumbled into him from the side, throwing him off balance. Sharur’s blade bit deep. Blood filled the priest’s beard. He toppled with a groan, the ax falling from nerveless fingers. “Enimhursag does not protect you well enough,” Sharur said. “Enimhursag does not protect Imhursag or the Imhursagut well enough.”

If Engibil was on the battlefield, if Engibil was even watching the battlefield, he gave no sign of it. If anyone was going to protect the men of Gibil, they themselves had to do it. And so they did, crying out Kimash’s name—and also Engibil’s—as they smashed into and through the Imhursagut.

Many men from Sharur’s city—smiths and scribes and merchants—instead of fleeing from Enimhursag, made straight for him. They stabbed and slashed at his feet and hacked away at his ankles with axes. Ichor poured from the wounds they made.

The god of Imhursag bellowed in rage and pain. He stomped several Giblut into the dirt. In so doing, though, he also stomped into the dirt several of his own priests. His most devoted followers did their best to place their own bodies between the god they loved and the ferocious Giblut. Destroying the priests in that way seemed to wound Enimhursag as sorely as anything the men of Gibil could do to him.

Sharur, too, fought his way toward Enimhursag. He knew the stroke he wanted to deliver against the god who ruled the city rival to his own. “The back of the heel,” he muttered. If he could cut through the tendon there, Enimhursag would fall, no matter how large he was. He would fall the harder, indeed, for being so large.

An Imhursaggi stood close by Enimhursag’s ankle. He blocked the way against Sharur—or he did until Dimgalabzu’s ax slammed through his armor and his ribs and crumpled him to the ground. “I thank you, father of my intended,” Sharur shouted, and hewed at the tendon that went up the back of Enimhursag’s enormous leg.

Enimhursag roared like a lion. He bellowed like a bull. His ichor, smelling of thunderstorms, splashed onto Sharur. It was hot, but it did not burn. Instead, it made him tingle and quiver all over. Under his helmet, his hair stood on end. It was indeed as if lightning had struck close by.

But the god of Imhursag did not topple. The god of Imhursag did not fall. Sharer was only a mortal man, and had not the strength to cut that mighty tendon through and through. The wound pained Enimhursag. It failed to cripple him.

“Let me have a try!” Dimgalabzu cried, and swung his ax as Sharur had swung his sword.

Enimhursag roared again. This time, Sharur thought he heard fear along with pain and fury. The Giblut were tiny next to the tremendous self he had chosen, but they had found a way of hurting him that might do real harm. He glared down at Sharur and Dimgalabzu, hate suffusing his face.

“Go back to your own city!” Sharur shouted. “Go back to your own city, and leave us Giblut alone!” He chopped at the god’s heel tendon again.

Had Enimhursag kept his wits about him, he could have crushed Sharur and Dimgalabzu under his foot, as he had crushed other Giblut. But he might also have crushed men of his own city—men who, like the fallen priest, still strove to protect him. And the realization that the Giblut truly might endanger him rather than being only nuisances must have struck terror into his outsized heart.

Instead of trampling the men who tormented him, the god turned and, in a few great strides, withdrew from the battlefield. Sharur sent up a cry of exultant joy: “Enimhursag flees!”

“Enimhursag flees!” Dimgalabzu echoed with a great bass shout. In a moment, all the Giblut took up the cry: “Enimhursag flees! Enimhursag flees!”

“Enimhursag flees!” The Imhursagut shouted it, too. In their voices was no exultation. Horror choked their cries. Dismay filled them. Fear made them quaver. “Enimhursag flees!” Perhaps the Imhursagut had not imagined such a disaster could befall them. When it did, they had none of the self-reliance the Giblut might have possessed with which to withstand it.

“Enimhursag flees!” The Imhursaggi line wavered as courage drained from more and more of the Imhursagut. If their god would not defeat the men of Gibil, how were they to do so without his aid? Most of them saw no answer to the riddle. Most of them ran away, too, howling their terror.

Here and there, a man or a clump of men still stood boldly. Here and there, a few brave warriors tried to stem the rout. The Giblut swarmed over them and cut them down. Even as Sharur slew a man of that forlorn rear guard, he knew a moment’s sorrow. The men who stood, the men who fought on after their god abandoned them, were the men most like those of Gibil, the men most fully themselves and least tiny reflections of Enimhursag.

He and the men of his city rolled over those partly emancipated Imhursagut and after the warriors who fled. This time, the men of Imhursag did not pause to defend their encampment. A few did snatch what they could from their tents, but only a few. More of those were nobles than Imhursaggi peasants: the nobles, of course, had more possessions over which to concern themselves.

“Forward the Giblut!” Kimash shouted as his own men swarmed into the camp the Imhursagut were abandoning. “Forward! Later will come the time to loot. Presently will come the time to plunder. Now comes the time to finish the foe. Forward the Giblut!”

Most of the men of his city obeyed him and kept on pursuing the Imhursagut. Some, however, stopped and stole whatever struck their fancy. The Giblut, for better and for worse, were their own men first, men of their city second.

Habbazu, in this regard, also proved to be his own man first. When Sharur had gone, to swing his sword against Enimhursag’s heel, he had lost track of the Zuabi master thief. Now Habbazu, catching up to him, glittered with gold and sparkled with silver, having festooned himself with necklaces and armlets and rings. Grinning at Sharur, he said, “I have made a profit on this day that any master merchant would envy.”

“See that you do not purchase this profit at the cost of your life,” Sharur answered. “If you make your arm so heavy with silver and gold that you cannot lift it either to attack or to defend, then bronze may be your end. You would wish yourself better served by it and less well by precious metals.”

Habbazu answered by swinging his own bronze sword in Sharur’s face. The blade had blood on it. “Fear not,” the thief said. “The Imhursagut will bear witness that I am not too burdened to battle. Several of them will bear witness only to those who knew them well enough in life to hear them moan and complain as ghosts.”

“Good enough, then,” Sharur replied, and slogged on after the broken army of Imhursag.

No more than the men of his city had Enimhursag lingered at the army’s encampment. The god of Imhursag fled ahead of his warriors toward the broad canal that marked the border between the territory of Gibil and the land he ruled. He crossed the canal in a couple of enormous strides; the water bore his weight as readily as land had done.

Once back on the soil his city ruled, the soil he ruled himself, he turned back toward his army and shouted in a great voice: “To me, my children! To me, my chicks! Back to our land—to the land of the pure, to the land of the good, to the land of the honest. Away from the land of Gibil— away from the land of serpents, away from the land of scorpions, away from the land of liars.”

“Away from the land of Gibil!” the Giblut jeered. “Away from the land of warriors, away from the land of heroes, away from the land of men.”

But the Imhursagut could not cross the wide canal without wetting their feet, as Enimhursag had done. They had to wade in and flounder across. Gibli archers gleefully plied them with arrows as they waded, as they floundered.

When those arrows were aimed at men who were more than halfway across the canal, and more particularly at men dragging themselves up onto land on the Imhursaggi side, many of them went wide or fell short—more than could be accounted for by bad shooting.

“Enimhursag protects them,” Ereshguna said as he came up alongside Sharur. The older man looked and sounded very tired; he was breathing in great panting gasps. But he still thought clearly. Sharur could not remember an occasion on which his father had failed to think clearly. Ereshguna went on, “Now they are on Imhursaggi land. Now they are on land Enimhursag possesses as his own. The Imhursaggi god has greater powers on land he possesses as his own.”

“And yet land Enimhursag once possessed as his own is now Gibli land,” Sharur answered. He stamped his foot on the muddy ground near the edge of the canal. “This land we stand on now is land Enimhursag once possessed as his own. He possesses it as his own no more; it is now Gibli land.” He pointed north. “If Kimash the lugal wills it, we may make more land Enimhursag once possessed as his own into Gibli land. Once more, we have beaten the god and his folk in war.”

“Once more, we have beaten them,” Ereshguna agreed. “If Kimash the lugal wills it, I shall go on into Imhursag. I shall go on into the land Enimhursag possesses as his own. But the fighting there will be harder, for it is land the god has held for long and long, land he has made his. I hope Kimash will decide routing the Imhursaggi army and humiliating the god of Imhursag are punishments enough.”

“And I.” Sharur nodded emphatically. “We have other things with which to concern ourselves.” He said no more than that. Engibil might be listening. Engibil might come to the northern border of the land of Gibil to jeer at Enimhursag over his failed invasion. Or Engibil might come to the northern border of the land of Gibil in search of the stolen Alashkurri cup. If he did come in search of the cup, he would come in wrath. Sharur wanted to do nothing that would draw his notice.

Kimash came up to the banks of the canal. Donkeys in gilded harness drew him in his chariot, which was likewise adorned with gold leaf. With his armor and helmet also gilded, he glittered almost—almost—like a god. Cupping his hands before his mouth, he shouted across the canal: “Go home, men of Imhursag! Go home, god of Imhursag! You are not welcome here. You have seen you are not welcome here.”

Sharur cheered. So did the rest of the Giblut drawn up along the canal. Mixed with the cheers were jeers for the god of the rival city, and also jeers for the men who fought at his command.

“You Giblut are mad!” Enimhursag shouted back. “You should be slain like mad dogs, lest your madness infect all the land between the rivers.”

“We have beaten you,” Kimash replied. “If you dare set foot on Gibli soil once more, we shall beat you again.” The Giblut raised another cheer. Enimhursag shook his great fist at them, but remained silent. The lugal went on, “Stay on the soil that is yours, and we shall have peace. You may ransom prisoners we have taken; those not ransomed will be sold as slaves in the usual way. The booty from your encampment is ours, of course.”

Enimhursag’s scowl was fearsome, but still the god said nothing more. Ereshguna murmured, “Kimash, it seems, does not wish to cross over into Imhursaggi land. It is good.”

“I suppose so,” Sharur said, “though, thinking on it, Engibil might be happy and busy and distracted if he had to begin to rule new lands we had won for him with spear and sword.”

“He would not do the fighting, though,” his father replied. “He would not battle alongside us as Enimhursag has battled for the Imhursagut. He would merely enjoy the benefit of our labors. As I say, I am contented with the way things have gone.”

“Perhaps you are right, Father,” Sharur said. “And whether I am contented or not, it is the way things have gone, and I must accept it.”

No sooner had he said that than Enimhursag turned his back on the land of Gibil: the god also accepted the way things had gone, whether it contented him or not. Recognizing that, some of the Giblut cheered. Others jeered again, loudly and lewdly. Enimhursag’s great shoulders slumped.

Suddenly, the god’s gigantic form disappeared. Some of the men of Gibil exclaimed in surprise. “Has he perished?” someone near Sharur asked.

“No,” Sharur said in a loud voice, so many could hear. “Usually, the god sees and speaks through one of the Imhursagut, picking the man or woman best suiting his purpose at the time. The rest of the Imhursagut will obey such folk, knowing Enimhursag inhabits them. That he no longer wears the great body proves he intends to fight no more.”

“It is over,” Ereshguna agreed. “It is over, and we have won the day.”

Sharur and Ereshguna took no part in the plundering of the Imhursaggi camp on the way back to their own. “I would sooner not quarrel with men of my own city over trinkets,” Ereshguna said. “Let others squabble over them; chances of finding anything worth trading or keeping are not good now. I would sooner return to our own encampment and drink dry a pot of beer.”

“It is good,” Sharur said, and went on with his father.

Tupsharru and Habbazu went in among the abandoned tents to see what they could find. In addition to the precious prizes he had already gained, Habbazu came back with a gilded helm, a fine bronze sword, and a dagger with a hilt inlaid with silver. Tupsharru carried an ax with a handle similarly inlaid back to the Gibli camp.

“Perhaps we were wrong,” Sharur said to Ereshguna, eyeing the plunder with admiration.

“Perhaps we were,” Ereshguna said. “But I have beer in my belly. I have bread in my belly. It is not perfect, but it will do.”

Habbazu, who was dipping up a cup of beer for himself, bowed to Ereshguna. “ ‘It is not perfect, but it will do,’ ” he repeated, cleverly mimicking the master merchant’s intonations. “There speaks a man who has lived in the world and taken its measure.”

“I have lived in the world,” Ereshguna said. “Whether I have taken its measure is for others to say, not for me. What I will say is that, over the years, the world has taken my measure: taken my measure, aye, and cut and trimmed and pounded me to serve its purposes.”

“That is the way of the world.” Habbazu glanced over toward Sharur and Tupsharru. “Your sons, I think, are still too young to agree in fullness.”

“Likely you are right.” Ereshguna also glanced toward Sharur and Tupsharru. His gaze was affectionate, not calculating.

Sharur said, “What I think is that Burrapi the Zuabi mercenary should disappear from this camp, and disappear soon. I think someone who answers to a different name should go down to the city of Gibil and take up lodging above a tavern or with a family that will let him use a room for pay. I think it would be best if he did this before the servitors of Kimash the mighty lugal come asking questions concerning that mercenary.”

Habbazu inclined his head. “You may be young, son of Ereshguna, but you give good advice. I have seen this before. I now see it again.” He drank down the beer, got to his feet, and bowed again to Ereshguna and then to his sons. “I shall not wait a moment. It shall be as if Burrapi the Zuabi mercenary had never been. With the loot Burrapi the mercenary has won, someone who answers to a different name will take up lodging in the city of Gibil. In Gibil, a stranger will call on the house of Ereshguna. Perhaps, though, he will seem somehow familiar.” He bowed once more, to all the men of the house of Ereshguna together, and then went off whistling the tune the fluteplayer in the square in front of the temple of Engibil had played as an accompaniment to the dancing girl’s lithe swaying.

“That was indeed a good notion,” Ereshguna said. Sharur beamed, pleased at the praise.

How good a notion it was, Kimash showed within the hour. Two of the lugal’s largest and burliest retainers appeared before the tent Sharur, Ereshguna, and Tupsharru shared. The bigger of the two growled, “Kimash the mighty lugal requires the immediate presence of the Zuabi mercenary named Burrapi. No excuse will be tolerated.” To emphasize that, he set his right hand on the hilt of his sword.

Ereshguna said, “I must offer an excuse nonetheless: he is not here. I have not seen him since the battle ended.”

“He was seen in the battle,” Kimash’s guardian said. “He was seen after the battle, plundering the tents of the Imhursagut.”

“If he found enough booty to satisfy him, he is likely to be on the way to Zuabu by now,” Sharur said. “He fought for gain, not for love of the city.”

“Did he ever speak of a man named—?” The first guard turned and whispered with the other, then nodded. “Named Habbazu, that was it.”

Solemnly, Sharur, Ereshguna, and Tupsharru shook their heads. The second guard spoke for the first time: “His silence proves nothing. The two Zuabut could have been plotting together, plotting for the benefit of Zuabu, plotting to harm Gibil and the interests of Gibil.”

“I had not thought of that,” Ereshguna said, solemn still. Kimash’s conclusion was close to the mark, but not on it.

“That is why Kimash the mighty lugal rules Gibil,” the first guard said. “He is a man who thinks of everything.”

“No doubt you are right,” Sharur said. Kimash’s retainers spoke of him as if he were a god. Even Inadapa, steward to the lugal, spoke of him that way—and Inadapa was clever enough in his own right to understand perfectly well that Kimash was a man like himself. Most rulers in Kudurru either were gods themselves or were men through whom their city gods spoke. To rule in his own right, Kimash had to ape divinity.

His guards, though, did not seem to think he was aping it. The first one said, “The mighty lugal will send pursuers on the Zuabi’s trail. They will drag him down like the dog he is. The mighty lugal has said he desires the Zuabi brought before him, and so the Zuabi shall be brought before him.” He might have been stating a law of nature.

“No doubt you are right,” Sharur said again, in the tones of polite agreement he would have used had an Alashkurri wanax come out with some obvious absurdity that would not ruin a dicker.

Kimash’s retainers swaggered away. Ereshguna said.

“Son, you were indeed wise to send Habbazu down to Gibil as quickly as you did.”

“I thought Kimash would link Habbazu and Burrapi in his mind,” Sharur answered. “He did not link them in quite the right way, but with Habbazu in his hands he would soon correct his mistake.”

Tupsharru said, “I wonder when Engibil will realize something out of the ordinary has happened.” He went into no more detail than that; no telling if the god was listening.

Perhaps Engibil did hear him, and went searching to discover what had happened that was out of the ordinary. Or perhaps the god, having seen that Gibil’s northern frontier no longer faced danger from Enimhursag and the Imhursagut, returned his chief attention to Gibil and, in Gibil, to the temple wherein he dwelt.

His voice was a great deal more than twice the size of a man’s. It might have been articulate thunder crying out: “I have been robbed!”

Sharur wanted to run. Sharur wanted to hide. Running from Engibil was futile. Hiding from Engibil was useless. By their expressions, Ereshguna and Tupsharru felt exactly as he did.

Since running from the god was futile, since hiding from the god was useless, all three of them stayed where they were. Through lips likely as numb with fear as Sharur’s, Tupsharru whispered, “Engibil has ways of squeezing the truth from a man even the torturers of Kimash the lugal cannot match.”

“There is truth, and then again there is truth,” Ereshguna answered, also in a whisper. “Remember it. Give as little as you can. We are in danger. We are not yet lost.”

Tupsharru and Sharur both nodded. Sharur’s younger brother knew little directly concerning the stolen Alashkurri cup, and could truthfully deny questions assuming such direct knowledge. Sharur knew his own position was riskier. He knew too much, altogether too much.

And Engibil knew he and Ereshguna knew too much, altogether too much. Telling Kimash that Habbazu was in Gibil had been a mistake. The lugal, seeking to shore up his own shaky position, had warned the god. He had not said who had given him that news, or Engibil would already have descended in wrath upon, the house of Ereshguna. But, should Engibil enquire of Kimash, Sharur was sure the lugal would appease the god with him and his father and brother sooner than facing Engibil’s anger himself.

So it proved. The god of Gibil did not immediately visit the tent wherein Sharur, Ereshguna, and Tupsharru rested, but neither did he long delay. He appeared without warning: one moment, he was nowhere nearby; the next, air blown out by his arrival stirred Sharur’s hair and whiskers. “Men of the house of Ereshguna!” he boomed. “Was it you who told Kimash of the coming to Gibil of a certain Zuabi thief? Answer with the truth.” He pointed to Sharur, Ereshguna, and Tupsharru in turn.

Engibil was a drowsy god, but a god nonetheless. Sharur suddenly found himself incapable of lying: an awkward predicament for a master merchant’s son. He answered with the truth: “Yes, we were the ones.” He could have done nothing else.

“How did you know this master thief when you saw him?” Engibil demanded.

“He had tried to rob my caravan when it was passing through Zuabu,” Sharur said. “He failed—my guards were alert—but I knew his face when I saw him again in Gibil.”

“My guards were not so alert,” Engibil said petulantly. “Why did he want to steal whatever it was he wanted to steal?” Having denied that the Alashkurri cup was anything out of the ordinary, the god did not care to mention it now. Sharur noted how unspecific he was.

He answered, “Great god, he wanted to steal it for Enzuabu.” That was true. Habbazu had later changed his reasons, but Engibil had not asked about that.

“Do you know where the thing that was stolen is now?” Engibil asked.

“No,” Sharur replied. As Ereshguna had remarked, there was truth, and then again there was truth. Only Ningal knew exactly where the cup lay. If Sharur interpreted Engibil’s questions literally enough, he could evade most of the strictures the god had set on him.

Engibil rounded on Ereshguna and Tupsharru. “Does either of you know where the thing that was stolen is now?”

“No,” Sharur’s father said. Sharur’s brother shook his head. They had both interpreted the question as Sharur had done.

“You can not lie to me,” Engibil said. “I know you can not lie to me. Even if you are less firmly in my grip than I might like, you can not lie to me.”

“That is so, great god,” Sharur said—truthfully. His father and brother nodded. Like him, they had given Engibil the exact truth, or what they could construe as the exact truth.

The god frowned. “This is not what I had been led to believe by others,” he said. “I had thought you would know more than you do.”

“Perhaps, mighty god, it was those others who were mistaken,” Sharur said. The truth was that Engibil was indeed a lazy god. He asked only a handful of questions and then, when the men of the house of Ereshguna succeeded in evading them, decided not to bother asking any more. He could easily have found questions Sharur and Ereshguna and Tupsharru would have been unable to evade—or, for that matter, he could have tom answers from their minds by force.

He did neither of those things. He said, “Perhaps they were. They also told the truth, or what they thought to be the truth. But a man may be honestly mistaken, as a god may be honestly mistaken.” He tried again, in a way, asking Sharur, “Do you know where this Zuabi thief is now?”

“No, great god, I do not,” Sharur answered. Habbazu was surely somewhere between the encampment here and Gibil, but where? Had he stopped to rest? Was he buying beer in a village? Sharur had no way of knowing, not when the thief was out of his sight.

Engibil asked the same question of Ereshguna and Tupsharru in turn, and received the same reply. Then, as much to himself as to the men of the house of Ereshguna, the god said, “I shall watch the western border. If the thief tries to take the thing that was stolen back to Zuabu, I shall learn of it. If he tries to take the thing that was stolen back to Enzuabu, I shall know.”

And then he was gone, as suddenly as he had appeared. Sharur, Ereshguna, and Tupsharru looked at one another. As one, they sighed. As one, they turned toward the pot of beer. Ereshguna happened to be standing closest to it. He dipped up cups for himself and his sons. As one, they drank.

None of them said anything for some time. Engibil had gone, but they could not tell whether he had left behind some small part of his presence to listen to whatever they might say. Sharur quickly emptied his cup of beer, then filled it again.

At last, Ereshguna broke the silence, saying, “I am glad the god has realized we know so little about this theft and about the thief.”

“As am I,” Sharur agreed, and Tupsharru nodded.

Ereshguna went on, “I hope Engibil will have some sharp things to say to those who told him we knew more than we proved to know.”

“So may it be,” Sharur and Tupsharru said together, speaking to a listener who might or might not be there. Sharur added, “I hope the great god does keep a close watch on the western border, that he might capture and punish the thief if he tries to take the thing that was stolen back to Zuabu.”

He could lie once more—he felt that—but he spoke the truth there. If Habbazu stole the cup from the house of Dimgalabzu, Sharur would sooner have seen it in Engibil’s hands than in Enzuabu’s.

Now Tupsharru and Ereshguna said, “So may it be.” No matter how reliable Habbazu had shown himself to be, trusting a Zuabi came hard.

Sharur said, “I hope Kimash the mighty lugal will soon permit us to return to Gibil. Now that we have forced Enimhursag to flee, now that we have plundered the Imhursaggi camp, we have no great reason to linger near the border with Imhursag. We who dwell in the city can return to our homes. We can return to our trades. The peasant levies who fought alongside us can return to their villages. They can return to their fields. We can be assured we shall have a good harvest, and food for all.”

“That would be good,” Ereshguna agreed. “That would—”

Before he could say anything more, Engibil reappeared. “You!” the god said, and pointed straight at Sharur.

“I serve you, great god.” Sharur dropped to his knees and then to his belly, though he doubted whether the forms of respect would do him any good. Engibil had to have learned something to return to the encampment of the Gibli army. Sharur resolved to give the god as little as he could, knowing how little such resolve was liable to mean.

Engibil said, “You were outside my temple when the thing that was stolen disappeared. You were outside my house when the thief dared rob it.”

“Great god, I had gone down into Gibil to put a prisoner into the hands of Ushurikti the slave dealer,” Sharur said. “Mighty god, while I was there, I put on an entertainment for the people left behind in the city, and especially for the priests who serve your house on earth.” Unless Engibil forced it from him, he would not admit he knew exactly when the cup disappeared from the god’s temple.

“It was during this entertainment that the thing that was stolen was raped away,” Engibil said. “What do you know of this? Tell me the truth.”

Sharur had to obey. “Here is the truth that I know, great god,” he said. “I know that, while the entertainment was under way, I never once set foot inside your temple. I never entered your house on earth. Your own priests, your own servants, saw me in the open space outside your temple. They will say as much. I never saw any thief enter your temple. I never saw any thief leave your house on earth. When I left the open space outside your temple, the entertainment was still going on.”

Every word of that was the truth. Every word was as misleading as he could make it. Engibil frowned, again not receiving the answer he had expected or hoped for. “Do you wonder, son of Ereshguna,” he said gruffly, “that I ask these questions of you when you had seen a Zuabi thief and when you were close by my temple when the vile thief struck?”

“You are a god,” Sharur said. “How can a man wonder at anything a god may choose to do?”

“You can not,” Engibil said. “You must not.” And then he was gone once more.

“I am glad you told the god the truth that you knew,” Ereshguna said. “I am glad you were able to tell the truth with such ... precision.”

“So am I, Father,” Sharur replied, still shaking a little. “So am I. Has that beer pot yet gone dry?”

Kimash the lugal made the Gibli army’s return to the city of Gibil into a triumphal procession. At every village along the road south from the Imhursaggi border, men dropped out to return to their usual labor in the fields. At every village, Kimash made a speech praising the warriors, praising the people of Gibil as a whole, and praising himself.

At every crossroads along the road south from the Imhursaggi border, men turned off to the right or left to go back to their villages. At every crossroads, Kimash halted the whole army so he could make another speech. Again, he extolled the warriors, the Giblut, and himself.

The speeches were not quite identical, one to another, but they were similar. After a while, Sharur stopped paying close attention to them. “I wonder if he can find anything new to say when we finally get to Gibil,” he remarked as the army started moving after yet another halt.

“More likely, he’ll simply run all of these speeches together, for the men and women of Gibil will not have heard them,” Tupsharru said.

“And then, once he has done that, he will go into the south and make all these speeches yet again,” Ereshguna said. “He is not a god like Enimhursag, to speak into the ears of all his people at once. Naturally, he wants all the folk of Gibil to know he has driven back the Imhursagut. If he wants them to know, he must tell them himself.”

“And tell them, and tell them, and tell them,” Sharur said with exaggerated weariness. Ereshguna tried to send a reproving look his way, but broke down and laughed before the expression was well formed.

Although the lugal’s endless bombastic oratory made the march down from the Imhursaggi border seem to take forever, the baked-brick walls of Gibil, and Engibil’s temple and Kimash’s palace towering above them, at last came into sight. Kimash halted the army outside the north gate to the city and ordered the warriors who had armor to don it and those who had only weapons to carry them.

“He does indeed wish to make the bravest show he can,” Sharur said.

“Only one sort of show is worse than no show at all,” his father said, “and that is a poor show.”

Kimash left himself in no danger of making a poor show. As his fighting men entered Gibil through the north gate, a great-voiced herald cried, “Behold! Mighty Kimash returns in triumph, having made Enimhursag flee!” Riding in the chariot all adorned with gold, Kimash waved to the men and women lining the narrow, winding streets of the city.

And the people cheered. Not all o£them, no doubt, loved Kimash. Some surely longed for the dayS when Engibil did much of their thinking for them. But no one in the city of Gibil could possibly have longed for Enimhursag to do much of their thinking for them. The rivalry between their city and that of the vanquished god was too deep and went back too far for any of them to have hoped he won. Beating Enimhursag was the best way Kimash could have chosen to make the Giblut think well of him.

Into the market square marched the warriors of Gibil. The men and women who had not fought crowded in with and after them. Servants brought a platform from the lugal’s palace. Kimash climbed up onto it and looked out over the crowd. He was wise in the ways of men, and proved wise enough not to do as Tupsharru had said he would. Instead of stringing together all his earlier speeches, he kept things short and to the point: “Warriors of Gibil residing in the city, I release you to your families and friends for the praise you so richly deserve. Warriors of Gibil dwelling south of the city, I bid you stay this day before resuming your homeward journey. Let this day be a day of feasting, a day of drinking, a day of revelry, a day of celebration. I, Kimash, lugal of Gibil, have spoken. I, Kimash, lugal of this city, have declared my will.”

Again, the people of Gibil were glad to follow where the lugal led. Those who had gone to fight and those who had stayed behind all shouted and clapped their hands. Warriors embraced their fathers, their brothers, their wives, their mothers, their sisters, their children. Some headed for taverns. Some headed for brothels.

Sharur headed for home, along with Ereshguna and Tupsharru. They had not gone far when they met Betsilim and Nanadirat. Sharur hugged his mother and younger sister. He looked around hopefully, to see if Ningal was sofnewhere nearby. On a day of revelry, a day of celebration, he might with propriety hug his intended, too. But, to his disappointment, he did not spy her.

He also looked around for Habbazu. He did not see the Zuabi thief, either. He did not know what that meant, or whether he should worry. When Habbazu chose not to be seen, he was not seen. But he also might have fallen into the hands of Engibil, or those of Engibil’s priests, or those of Kimash’s servitors. He might even have escaped to Zuabu in spite of Engibil’s watching the border.

Ereshguna and Tupsharru were also looking this way and that. Ereshguna smiled sheepishly when his eyes met Sharur’s. He said, “I suppose it does not matter,” and Sharur had a very good notion of what it was.

“I suppose the same thing,” Sharur answered. “I truly hope it does not matter.”

“What are the two of you talking about?” Betsilim demanded.

“Nothing very important,” Sharur answered. He could not remember the last time he had lied to his mother, but he lied now without hesitation. He did not think he had ever lied to his mother in his father’s presence. Ereshguna heard him lie, and let it go without contradiction.

While Betsilim and Nanadirat went out, the Imhursaggi slave woman had labored in the kitchen. The returning men of the house of Ereshguna sat down to a feast: roast mutton, roast duck, a salad of onions and lettuce and radishes, fresh-baked bread with honey for dipping, and wine and beer to wash everything down. Sharur ate till just this side of bursting.

So did Tupsharru. Despite that, though, he eyed the slave woman in a marked manner. After a while, he and the slave disappeared. “He is intent on conquering Imhursag again,” Ereshguna said dryly.

Sharur laughed. Nanadirat giggled. Betsilim gave her husband a look that said she didn’t think the joke was funny, or maybe just that he had better not try to reconquer Imhursag in that particular way.

Presently, Nanadirat and Betsilim, both a little wobbly on their legs, went up to the roof to sleep. Tupsharru had not come back. He’d teased Sharur for taking the slave woman twice after coming home from his trading journey to the mountains of Alashkurru. Now, coming home from the war, Tupsharru seemed to be imitating his brother.

When Sharur got to his feet to go upstairs, too, Ereshguna held up a hand. “Wait,” he said. “The thing you left behind ... when do you plan to get it back from where you left it?”

He picked his words with obvious—and necessary—care, not wishing to draw Engibil’s attention to them in any way. Sharur answered with similar caution: “My father, I do not know. As I have said, and said truly, I do not know just where that thing is now. I will have to go to the person to whom I entrusted it to get it back.”

“I understand,” Ereshguna said. “That may not be so easy, not when others have returned to the house. But I hope you will do it as soon as you may. If we do not take it back into our hands, others may take it into theirs.”

“I shall attend to it,” Sharur promised. He yawned. “But not tonight.”

“No, not tonight,” Ereshguna agreed. He and Sharur both got to their feet and went up to the roof to sleep.