Chapter 9 #2
Because I don’t know how this magic works yet, she thought.
I have no talisman this time, and I cannot rely on divine intervention.
She thought back to her years of lessons with her tutor, lessons that covered everything from religion to taxes to history, and medicine too.
Her tutor didn’t go into depth about the wisdom of the priesthood, but she knew enough.
And she’d witnessed the physician-priests treat injuries and illnesses of all kinds at the palace.
Medicine is half method and half magic,” she remembered her tutor saying.
“Sometimes only one is necessary, but you often need both.
Method and magic, Sita considered, then came up with a plan.
“I need more linens,” she said. “Plenty more. And half a dozen thin pieces of wood, about three hands’ breadths in length.
If you don’t have any, cut down a tree and have the carpenter make them to those specifications.
I also need your sharpest copper needle and some strong linen thread.
Get them from the weavers. I’ve seen the girls using them.
Are there any red poppies growing by your oasis? ”
Elyas blinked rapidly, bewildered by Sita’s list of demands. “I believe so. Why?”
“Have someone gather the seeds of the blossom and boil them. Add some onions too. When it cools, bring the potion to me.”
It was then that Miri, Sami’s mother, and several others arrived with water and dismay.
Elyas quickly repeated Sita’s commands while she took up a bandage and used it to apply steady pressure to the wound.
Sami’s mother was crying, and Sita heard her ask Elyas, “You trust this stranger with my son? You think she can save him?”
Sita listened for the old man’s answer.
“I trust that the Lord has put her in our path for a reason,” Elyas said.
“A Khetaran?” said a man. “But they believe in false gods, sen. Why would the Lord bring one of them to us?”
Elyas shook his head. “I don’t know. But I feel great stirrings in my spirit telling me to trust this girl. I only hope they have not led me astray.”
The group seemed to accept this, and all departed to complete the tasks set out for them. Having managed to stanch the bleeding, Sita was using fresh water to clean the wound when Karim arrived.
He took in the scene before him and rubbed his stubbled face with one hand. “What are you doing, Sitamun?” he asked.
Sita faced him, her expression fierce and radiant with purpose. “What I should have done back in Thonis. What I neglected to do for too long.”
Karim’s eyes shone with an expression she was afraid to interpret. With a nod, he said, “I shall leave you to it.” Then he departed.
Alone with her patient, Sita put a hand on Sami’s chest and began rocking back and forth, chanting words that seemed to come to her on the breeze, from the heavens to her lips.
“You will be well,” she began. “You will survive this day, and you will walk through the streets with your people once more.
You will run to your mother, and she will lay a thousand kisses upon your brow. The word is the deed.
“The word is the deed.
“The word is the deed.”
***
Sita remained by the boy’s side, tending to his wound until the sun dipped below the horizon. When the work was done, there was nothing to do but wait. Exhausted, she lay down on a rush mat beside her patient and closed her eyes.
Sleep didn’t come.
Instead, she listened to the women who had assisted her throughout the day talk outside.
“She moved the bone back into his body,” one woman said. “And then sewed the wound shut like a hole in a dress!”
“That sounds like torture. What of Sami? How did he bear it?”
“That’s the strangest part. He was as peaceful as a lamb. The girl said it was because of the poppy brew she gave him; it takes away the pain for a time. Can you imagine? Sami lost a lot of blood, but she says if he survives until morning, he may recover.”
“What do you think of them? Sita and her Anen tribesman?”
The other woman sighed. “I think they bring changes with them, as all new things do. But whether those changes are good or bad, I cannot say.”
Sita stared at the makeshift splint she’d assembled with the materials they’d brought her. At Sami’s relaxed, sleeping face. There was still no color in it, but that would come. Isis willing, that would come.
She must have dozed off, because when she woke again with a need to make water, the infirmary was suffused with thick darkness. Sita stumbled to her feet and groped her way to the door.
“Oh!”
She nearly jumped out of her skin when she bumped into someone just outside the house.
“By Amun, you frightened me,” Sita said, putting a hand to her chest. She squinted at the face of the visitor and saw it was the tall gray-haired woman who’d caught her and put Karim on his knees when they’d first arrived in Perset.
The woman regarded her but said nothing.
She was a formidable figure, with steely eyes and simple garb designed for movement, not fashion.
The woman seemed an unusual choice for a warrior, but a warrior she was.
Sita vividly recalled running through the streets to find Behkai, when the woman dropped out of the air, soundless, effortless, and caught her with the ease of a leopard pouncing on a gazelle.
So much had happened over the past several days that Sita hadn’t thought about the woman since that encounter. Who is she, I wonder?
“Did you need something?” Sita asked.
The woman shook her head.
Sita waited for more of a response, but none came.
“Well then, how can I help you?”
The woman waited, as if Sita might make the connection on her own. When Sita remained confused, the woman made two fists and crossed them in front of her chest. She bumped her wrists together twice.
She doesn’t speak, Sita concluded, and tried to guess at the meaning of the gesture. “You’re…stopping something?”
The woman circled one hand, as if to say, Keep going.
“You’re protecting… Oh! You’re protecting Sami and me! You’re standing guard!”
The woman nodded.
There was something about her—perhaps it was her gray hair or her quiet strength—that reminded Sita of Nebet.
She thought of her beloved attendant back in Thonis with a pang of desperate longing.
A childlike desire for Nebet’s work-roughened hand on her cheek.
She thought of the grief Nebet must feel, not knowing if Sita was alive or dead, and wished she could send her a message on the western wind.
I’m all right, she’d say. I’m safe.
When Sita returned from relieving herself, the woman hadn’t moved from her post. Sita stopped to lay a hand on her arm before returning to the shadowy infirmary. “Thank you,” she whispered.
She slept soundly until morning.
***
When Sita opened her eyes, blinking into the bright sunshine, Sami was looking back at her from his mat.
“Hello,” he said. “Is there anything to eat?”
Sita scrambled to his side and lay a hand on the boy’s forehead. It was cool and dry. She checked the splint to see if the wound had bled through the padding, but it too, was dry.
“How do you feel?” she asked him.
Sami struggled up on an elbow, wincing as his leg shifted slightly. “Hungry.”
Sita smiled. She laughed. “You’re hungry,” she said, giddy. She stood and ran out of the infirmary in bare feet, her hair a wild tumble. She found the silent woman where she’d left her, and Sita enveloped her in a sudden embrace.
“Did you hear?” she said as the woman awkwardly patted her on the back. “He’s hungry!” She shouted the news to the still-quiet houses, to the sleepy faces that appeared to see what all the fuss was about.
Sami’s mother came rushing into the street, her face haggard with exhaustion. “Is it true?” she asked, fear and hope intermingling in her voice.
Sita nodded, and the woman broke into tears of happiness. Soon, others gathered and joined her in expressing their relief. The women from the bakery, Zev and Elyas, Miri and Aya all came to gawk at Sami, who was alive and awake and asking for his breakfast.
Sita had seen so much death, so many horrors.
But on that day, she had wrested a boy from the jaws of fate.
Pulled him back from the brink and into his mother’s arms. When she’d saved Karim, she’d wondered how much of his resurrection had been her doing and how much had been the machinations of the gods.
With Sami, she knew for certain her actions had saved his life.
The knowledge gave her a new and wonderful feeling. A joy borne of the marriage of power and purpose.
“The Lord has smiled upon our people today!” Elyas announced to the gathered throng. “Tonight, we celebrate!”
The people cheered, thrilled to be treated to a feast instead of a funeral.
Sita spied Karim nearby, leaning against the side of a building with his arms crossed, watching her. Their eyes met, and he grinned, then shook his head, as if to say, Princess, what will you do next?
***
The other young women came for her at sundown.
Already dressed in colorful robes and dresses, they pushed a protesting Karim out of the house he and Sita shared and deposited heaps of clothing onto the floor.
Laughing and arguing among themselves, the women went through half a dozen dresses before they found one that fit Sita to their satisfaction—a flowing henna-red gown tied at the waist with a black sash embroidered with geometric patterns.
Then they gave her a hairbrush and a pot of coconut oil to bring out the luster in her hair.
The air vibrated with excitement and good cheer, reminding Sita of the night of the Bast Festival.
Of being dressed by her attendants in her chambers at the palace, and the anticipation she’d felt as she prepared for the impending celebration.
She’d felt such joy that night! Such freedom!
She hadn’t felt the same way since. Mery had made sure of that.