“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.