But first things first. ‘So all these golden keys she’s wearing …’
A tug at my roots – not painful, but alarming. Like a warning. From the corner of my eye, I see Agamemnon’s shadow looming nearer. ‘Ah, you noticed that!’ Helene’s voice is shrill. ‘You always were the clever one … Not everyone can see her clearly, you know. She shines so bright. Most of us find it easier to avert our eyes.’
‘I understand,’ I say, and it’s the truth. I understand that talking about Shepherd in the wrong manner, asking the wrong questions, brings the wraith closer. ‘I’ve only had a brief encounter … Please, sister, tell me more about our Goddess. So that I can serve her better.’
So that I can kill her better.
Helene finishes the process of applying pigment to my hair, and wraps my head with a red scarf. I want to ask her where my cloak is, if Shepherd – Seshat – took it. Later. When I’ve convinced her I’m harmless enough not to need these shackles. If the wraith lets us.
‘Seshat is the daughter of Thoth,’ Helene says, now refilling the water basin from a jug and bringing it in front of my feet again. Resigned, I submerge them. The water has gone cold. ‘You’ve heard of Thoth, the Aegyptian god of knowledge?’
I nod, non-committally. My court had many dealings with Aegyptians, but they were all commercial. Papyrus,fabric dyes, barley … The intricacies of their faith escaped me.
I had enough gods of my own to worry about.
Helene stands up and procures another chair from somewhere behind me. She sits daintily, a lotus flower gracing the surface of the waters. ‘Some say Seshat is Thoth’s first daughter, others say sister or first wife. But they all agree on one thing: she is equal, if not greater in power, to him. Her domain is stories: the written word, everything ever written down.’
‘You mean … carvings on clay tablets and palatial scrawls on papyri? That doesn’t seem like such an expansive realm.’ It certainly doesn’t explain all this. Skulls, skeletons, shadows … Is the realm of writing also the realm of death? Are words dead things, stacked upon one another?
Although, the tilting walls earlier – I’ve heard of the Aegyptian pyramids.
Could it be that we’re trapped inside one?
Helene shakes her head, the smallest of movements. ‘No, sister, you don’t understand. Seshat is the Mistress of the House of Books, of every word and story ever written – not just from our time, but from all times, from times well after our death. Stories and epic tales people have yet to imagine, to conceive, heroes and ruffians that will captivate audiences’ hearts … They all exist among us, in Seshat’s world. Each story in its proper place, of course.’
A shiver snakes up my spine – not only for Seshat’s own words being repeated by Helene, but for the implications of it all. ‘But we … Sister, you and I,him …’I point to the wraith with my eyes, this dark reminder that the justice Iconsidered served may have spawned new monsters. ‘We are not stories. We all existed. We are not tales to be retold and sorted, or discarded.’ Surely?
Helene doesn’t speak, only beholds me with a sadness worse than words.
My heart threatens to burst. I have to have been real; all my choices, all the blood spilled, all the pain I endured and meted out … What kind of madman would construct such tales for fun? What kind of twisted mind would come up with a father who would slaughter his own daughter to bring favourable winds, so that his fleet could go and slaughter countless other sons and daughters, all in the name of glory?
I need to get up from this chair. Wraith be damned, I need to find my knife and cut through this world’s untruths, through what must surely be Seshat’s fabrications.
Helene sees my struggle and she frowns. ‘Sit still now. I was tasked with getting you ready to meet the rest of us; with nice hair and a fresh dress and feet that don’t resemble a street urchin’s.’ She scrunches her tiny nose. ‘As long as you’re presentable and pliant, there’s no need for unpleasantness,’ she whispers, her eyes pointing at my shackles, then at the wall.
I cast a sideways glance under my eyelashes. The wraith has retreated so much that its shadowy form is gone, absorbed by the wall. Only its golden mask is visible – if I hadn’t witnessed otherwise, I would have thought it was merely an ornament, hanging from the wall. An ornament with Agamemnon’s face. So be it. I force myself to still, my posture to soften. This is like being at my court, with every word a snare that can entrap. I know how to pose as prey, sharpening my teeth all the while.
I sigh. ‘I hear you, sister. Of course, you’re right. This all is so much bigger than I had imagined. Please, tell me more about this Seshat’s realm we live in.’
I try not to look at the mask on the wall again, its golden eyes still watching us.
25. Anassa
I hold the thorny branches, waiting, patiently, for the girl who whispered to appear.
I find her eyes first, two orbs of blue flickering among flowers.
Then a face emerges, there and then not, as subtle as a trick of light. Fair skin, delicate features, framed by soft, ginger tendrils of hair. A quiet spattering of freckles on her nose and cheeks, like markings on the page hinting at vows untaken, at thoughts half-drowned in sorrow. The girl smiles, then disappears again, leaving dewdrops on rose petals in her wake.
I am intrigued – but I’m also very, very tired and my tolerance for games ended almost three life-threatening events ago. ‘Can you please stop doing that? It’s disorienting.’
A shy laugh, then she reappears, her hair amid the whiteness of the roses making her look like a reluctant sunrise over snowy fields. ‘Forgive me, my lady.’ She grabs a rose stem, and I notice her fingers – not marred by fighting shadows, like mine are, but pruned and pink and dripping water. ‘It can be so taxing to hold on when he’s not here to anchor me, to steady me.’
‘Whenwhois not here?’ Something about her words upsets me, but it is simply one more layer on my mountainof upset, the one rooted in that piece of half-torn paper, in these folio pages that upended and upheld my world.
‘My sweet prince, of course.’ She giggles, and it is such a lovely sound, like bubbles rising on a brook, and I so wish Claret were here to slap her to her senses. ‘Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads …’ the girl whispers, voice fading along with the rest of her until only the faintest outline of half-open lips remains.
‘No, no, no, don’t you dare!’ I reach out to grab her as she flickers once more out of sight. Under my touch, the teal-coloured brocade of her dress is cold and wet, covered in mud and cattails. Her sleeve hangs loose, an empty sack with only bone inside. Alarmed that my touch tells such a different story from the one reaching my eyes, I take my hand off her. I wipe it on my black cloak, unsure of what to do next. Is she a spirit, sent by Shepherd to unsettle me?
