He and I may be alike, but I would never do what he did!
It was in that moment of defiance that Sita recognized where she and Mery diverged.
Mery had chosen to poison their father, to let Maet die, to massacre the innocent—and Sita had chosen to defy him.
Our stories are not defined by our demons, said the voice of her conscience or a goddess or both.They are written about the choices we make when we are left alone with them.
Choose, said the light.
Choose, said the darkness.
Is the truth a poison?
Or a cure?
Will you fight?
Or will you die?
Sita only had a few breaths left before her end. Only a fewmoments before the choice was made for her.
She gasped. “I choose to fight!”
The word is the deed.
Her next breath came a little easier.
The two cobras remained motionless before her, watching, waiting. The voices in her mind came as if from the serpents themselves.Tell us your name, child of Khetara!they commanded.
“I am Coward! I am Fool!” Sita cried, her body still glittering with pain. “I am the One Who Faces the Storm! The One Who Defies Death!”
Her legs returned to her, and she struggled to her feet.
“I am Betrayer, Healer, Lover!”
She lurched toward the sarcophagus, and the two cobras slid back, allowing her to pass. The flames in the braziers seemed to burn brighter.
“I am the Candle in the Darkness, and the Shadow in the Dawn!”
She reached for the wooden staff and closed her hand around it.
“I am Sitamun, Princess of Khetara—and I am not finished!”
With that, she swung the staff from its seat. It struck the floor with a thunderous boom that shook the earth around her.
Then, like two obedient servants, the cobras slithered up the length of the twisted wood, winding around it and each other until they reached the crest. There they froze, alive no longer, but sculpted of red copper and black iron, entwined as one.
Queen Anet’s staff was whole once again, and Sita herself—free of pain—felt complete for the very first time.
For she had many names, and she finally knew them all.
***
“Sena! I’m coming!”
The shouts were so muted that if the silence hadn’t been total, Sita never would have heard them.
Karim!she thought.
