Chapter 1: The Sands
The small girl lay awake on the floor, watching the roof. The stone above her head was illuminated by the moonlight creeping through the streets, breaking through every crack. She thought it was much lighter than normal, but she couldn’t be sure. She was less than a couple of hours old, after all—what did she know of these things?
A bird fluttered in the window, landing on the sill. The girl looked at the raven, a smile on her face, and watched as it turned into a woman.
Was this something that happened a lot in this realm? Was the woman a god, or was this a normal being?
Was she the girl’s mother?
The woman looked down at where the child lay, next to the body of the mother. There was no one else in the room, in the house. It was abandoned, and even her cries of hunger had not brought anyone forth to feed her.
“You poor child,” the woman said, her voice strange to the baby’s young ears. “Born without a mother’s touch…”
The young girl smiled again, and opened her mouth. Her lungs were sore from screaming, so she only managed a croak. The woman bent down and picked the baby up, holding her to her chest.
“What am I going to do with you?” the woman asked, patting the girl on the back. “Your mother’s dead, and it looks like your father’s abandoned you…”
She looked up quickly, examining the house around her. The younger girl, hungry, groped instinctively at Keridwen’s breast through her robe.
Keridwen sighed, walking through the house to the kitchen, where she sat down in a plain wooden seat. She bared a breast and let the child feed, examining the room around her.
Egypt had never been her favourite time of humanity’s development, but it looked like she may be spending some time there after all. She couldn’t let her carefully-laid plans go to waste, just because some coward had grown cold feet and abandoned the lynchpin of her plans.
Keridwen looked down at the child hungrily lapping at her breast, and sighed, leaning back and relaxing into the feeding. While she wasn’t a maternal goddess by any means, preferring war and magic to children, she’d had a few of her own over the millennia, each of them strong warriors that went on to found dynasties that lasted decades, sometimes centuries. She knew what she was getting into, but the question was, was she ready to become a mum again?
Keridwen looked down at the child in her arms, and then at the bare room they sat in. She could find someone else to raise the girl, but there was one flaw in the plan: she needed this child to be exactly right, to make exactly the right choices, if the plan she was enacting were to succeed.
And to ensure that, she’d have to make sure the child was raised properly. The easiest way would be to raise her herself.
Keridwen flicked her fingers, lighting torches in their sconces around the room, letting some light in. The child, finally satiated, let go of her breast, and she returned it to its place.
“Now, what am I going to call you?” she asked the baby, walking back into the room where the mother’s body lay, the babe cradled in the crook of Keridwen's arm. “I can’t just call you ‘child’ forever, people would notice. And you’ve got to have two names, that’s the way of things here. One for only us to know, and one for the world to know. Don’t want anyone setting a hex on you, do we?”
The baby babbled, and Keridwen lifted her to her shoulder, patting her back gently.
“So, for your private name…What about something significant. Sarah? No, too twentieth-century.” She looked at the body of the woman, lying on the floor where she died, and snapped her fingers. The rug the woman lay on wrapped itself up around her, concealing her bloodied and pale form from sight. “Ashnaht?” she asked the baby as the woman’s body sank into the sandstone beneath their feet.
The baby burped up over her back, and Keridwen sighed.
“No, you’re right, that is a horrible name.” She flicked her fingers at her shoulder, her magic cleaning up the milk. “I have it! Khepri!”
The baby stared at her, and Keridwen felt a bit unnerved. “What? Oh, right, too masculine.”
The girl closed her eyes, rocked gently to sleep by Keridwen’s movements.
“Snofret! ‘Blood of Ra’. The arrogant bastard will like that. As to your public name… Well, Key certainly fits, doesn’t it?” Keridwen looked down at the infant, but she was asleep and snoring, her face buried into her breast and one fist clenching her robes. Keridwen sighed, returning to her seat in the kitchen. “Well, Key, if I’m going to be staying in this beastly time zone to look after you, I am not living in poverty.”
The bare wall opposite her was suddenly covered in paintings, simple ones that would appear gibberish to normal people of Egypt.
“And I’m keeping an eye on the future,” Keridwen muttered as the house was suddenly furnished in soft, cheap furniture, including a rug under her feet. “Can’t be going into this blind, can I?”
The baby shuffled a little in her arms, and Keridwen sat down at the table, holding her to her chest. It was only a few hours to daylight, and then it was time to find herself some food.
But first, she thought, glancing down at her clothing. While it would work well in England, her native home, the black would attract the dry heat of an Egyptian day, and she wouldn’t survive the week.
Keridwen closed her eyes for a second, and the feathers of her robes turned white and changed into linen weaving. The dress hugged her form just below her breasts to the ankle, to denote she was a nursing mother of high standing. The feathers on her shoulders remained clutched in Key’s hand, so she left them there, liking the contrast against the undyed linen, and using a small spot of magic to ensure her nipples were never bared to anyone but the child.
Gods’ cursed revealing clothing, she groaned to herself, self-consciously rubbing her vacant breast and yawning. Give me a robe any day.
With a grunt, she realised that her red hair would stand out in this place, as would her fair skin. The last thing she wanted to do was draw attention to herself.
She closed her eyes, and her hair turned black, the colour flooding out from to roots until her entire head was covered. Her skin darkened as well, becoming the typical visage of an Egyptian woman.
Keridwen sighed, glancing at herself in the mirror. What I give for humanity…
The sun rose slowly over the East Bank, its light breaking through the open window and striking Keridwen in the eye. She blinked, cursing, and covered her face with her arm, trying to keep the sun from her skull. She’d been awake until very early in the morning, nursing the baby, cleaning the house and furnishing it with everything they’d need for a life in Egypt.
The babe was curled up on her chest, still holding onto the feathers of her dress. A cart rumbled down the road near the window, and a bull let out a low moan. Key woke with a start as a bang echoed through the house, and Keridwen swore as the baby started crying.
“What kind of moron is making that racket this early in the morning!” she yelled, pulling herself to her feet and sticking her head out the window. “There’s children trying to sleep here!”
The man outside the window gave her a sharp look, then tugged on the lead rope for the bull pulling his cart. The creature gave another low moan, his eyes wide, and Keridwen grunted. The man had tried to take the corner too tightly too quickly, and now the cart was jammed between her house and the next over.
Keridwen nestled the baby into the crook of her arm, trying to murmur soothing noises to ease the child’s cries, and made her way through the house to approach the man with the cart, swearing at the bull.
“For Ra’s sake, hold the baby,” she snapped, handing Key to the man and seizing the bull’s reins. “You can quiet her while I fix this.”
The man looked uncomfortable, holding the baby at arm’s length, trying to watch Keridwen. Key’s cries rang out again, louder, and Keridwen glared at him.
“She’s not diseased,” Keridwen snapped, laying her hands over the bull’s eyes, forcing him backwards at an angle to unwedge the cart. “Hold her to your chest, you dense idiot!”
The man did so, still uncomfortable, and watched as Keridwen pushed and bullied the animal into a straight line. The cart came free of the building, and she led the bull out and around the corner. The man holding Key ran after her, but found her waiting for him around the corner, the bull irritably flicking its tail.
“Next time, watch where you’re driving,” she snapped, taking Key from him and returning to the house. “And you’ll be fixing that wall!”
*
For the next week or so, Keridwen started the day with a light breakfast, mostly made of home-cooked bread and beer, which was the easiest, cheapest thing in the house, plainly made by Key’s mother only a day or so before she died. Fed up with the simple meals in the house, she fed Key and cleaned her dress, heading out into the market with the baby in a sling, strapped on her back, a basket over her arm and a large jar of beer strapped over her shoulder, away from Keridwen.
Keridwen browsed the stall of a young merchant, who had come into town with an assortment of vegetables to sell. The man was eyeing off her beer jar, but Keridwen ignored him, secure in the knowledge that the man didn’t have the guts to rob her.
“Lettuce,” she said, pointing at the vegetables, “gourd, celery, chickpeas, beans, oil and figs. Don’t be cheap,” she snapped, watching him. “I want the good ones. This is good beer.”
The man put the bruised figs back and leaned under his cart, reaching for the figs he kept hidden there. Keridwen watched the people around her from the corner of her eye, but they had very little interest in her.
“Ten,” the man said, pointing to the beer sitting at her feet.
Keridwen looked at the food he’d placed in the basket for her, and nodded. She handed the man the whole jar, making his eyes boggle. There was fifteen quarts in there, much more than he was asking, but she didn’t care. She was a Goddess of Magic—she could just conjure more, if need be. She hated conjuring food, though, as her memory of the food was what was created, not the food itself. She would have to refresh her memory every now and then to keep its taste and texture right.
Keridwen hooked her basket over her arm and looked over her shoulder to check on Key. While most mothers carried their children in slings around their necks, Keridwen saw the bent and bowed frames of women carrying two-and-a-half year olds, and decided against it. Key would be perfectly safe back there, out of the way and not giving Keridwen back problems as she grew.
“Excuse me? Miss?”
Keridwen looked around for the voice, and was surprised to see the cart man with the early morning bull problem standing beside her. “Yes?”
“I would like to invite you, your husband and your daughter to dinner, if you would be so kind,” the man said, bowing his head. “To apologise for the rude awakening.”
Keridwen glanced down at Key, and looked back at the man.
“You’re kind, but my husband is… gone,” she said, patting Key on the head. “It’s just Key and I now.”
The man bowed his head again. “Then I would invite you both to dinner. I live on the outskirts of town, in a large farmhouse, on the river. You can’t miss us.”
Keridwen nodded, shifting the basket on her arm. “We shall be there a few hours before sundown. Thank you.”
The man nodded and hurried away. Keridwen watched him go, his back glistening with sweat in the mid-morning sun, and frowned.
Humans were so strange.
The house wasn’t hard to find, being one of the few mud-brick places built on the flood line of the River Nile. Below the flood line, bushels of lettuce, barley and wheat grew, taking in the nutrients the flood delivered to the city six weeks before.
Keridwen shifted Key a bit, who nestled into her chest, asleep. She knocked on the door, and two thin, fluffy hounds came racing around the house to growl at her.
She gave the pair a look, and they settled down, instinctively knowing not to mess with a goddess.
The door opened to spill out a young woman, three young boys clinging to her legs. The oldest was six, maybe seven, wearing little more than the white linen kilt currently in fashion.
“You must be the bull-tamer,” the woman said softly, smiling at Keridwen. “And this must be your little one!” Her voice rose in delight as Key woke up, turning to look at the woman with a dazed expression on her face.
“Careful,” Keridwen cautioned, stepping inside the house. “She was only born a week ago, now.”
The lady put her hand over her mouth, then rounded on the boys. “You be quiet now,” she lectured, much to their amusement. “The baby’s only new, and she’s sleeping!”
“Sure, ma,” the oldest said, turning to look at his siblings.
“Yes, ma,” the pair said, identical grins on their faces.
“Go in and get your brother and father, tell him his guest is here.”
The boys scarpered, and Keridwen smiled at the woman.
“I have enough trouble nursing one child, I couldn’t imagine four!”
“Six.” The woman winked at Keridwen, waving her inside and down the short hall. “The older ones look after the younger ones. It makes life much easier once the oldest turns five, they want to help out as much as they can.”
Keridwen followed the woman inside, supporting the girl on her chest as she edged through a door, past the dogs. They took one sniff at her and wandered off to do some hunting in the lettuce fields.
“Hu!” the woman called, sticking her head out the door to call after her children. “Dinner’s ready!”
The woman helped Keridwen remove Key from her hold, then walked around the kitchen with the baby on her hip. Keridwen sat down at the table, relaxing, and watching the woman.
“My name’s Anairet, by the way,” the woman said, balancing a large dish on her other hip and bringing it to the table.
“Keri,” Keridwen answered, taking the bowl to help the woman. “You’ve definitely adapted to having a baby on the hip quite quickly.”
“I still do, her brothers are taking care of her.” The woman smiled, returning to the counter and bouncing the baby a little. “Is this your first one?”
Keridwen smiled. “No, my third.”
“Ah, well, congratulations. I take it the others are old enough to be at school now?”
“You could say that,” Keridwen said, accepting Key back as the baby began to wake. “They left home years ago.”
“Ah, well, if you need any help with this one, feel free to come to me.”
“Thanks, I—”
“Oh, good, you found the house.”
Keridwen looked around at the cart driver, who was followed in by a gaggle of children, a baby in the arms of the eldest. Only two of them wore anything close to clothing—a kilt like their father’s—the rest of them eating naked, to remain cool in the heat of the day.
“Hu,” the man said, holding out his hand. “I take it you’ve met Anairet?”
“Keri, and I have. Six kids! I don’t know how you manage.”
“She’s only ever had one at a time,” Anairet explained to her husband as he kissed her on the cheek, pouring himself some water from a clay pot in the corner.
“You lucky thing, you,” the man said with a grin, sitting at the table where the rest of the children were gathered, piling up their plates. “How did you manage not to get pregnant? Merhoot?"
“No, I just avoided sex,” she said with a smile, undoing the material around her chest so Key could feed while she ate. “Not that hard to do, when your husband works… Well, he’s never really around much.”
The children began eating, sending their water and bread across the table. Hu chided them to slow down, but Keriden could tell the man didn’t mean it.
“So, I heard you met little Apos a couple of days ago,” Anairet said, accepting her youngest from her son and nursing her as Keridwen was Key.
“Apos?” she asked, chewing on some bread.
“Our bull!” the youngest boy called, bouncing in his seat. “Daddy said he got stuck between the houses, and that you managed to get him to back up!”
“No one makes Apos back up!” another child called up the table. “How did you do it?”
“Are you magic?” the three-year-old asked, tugging on her arm.
“Oh, yes. And if you’re not careful, you’ll find yourself turned into a bull, like Apos,” Keridwen said with a wiggle of her fingers and a smile, liking the boy. He was very perceptive.
“You shouldn’t mock the gods,” Hu said warily to Keridwen.
“I’m not mocking them,” Keridwen said, gently resting Key over her shoulder to burp. “I happen to know a fair few of them. Some of them are good friends.”
The pair looked at each other, the children’s voices rising in a clamour.
“You do?”
“Who’s the nicest?”
“What’s Anubis like?”
“Is Sobek—”
“So,” Anairet said, a little shaky, glancing at the children and quelling their questions. “What were you doing in town today? Hu said he saw you with a large jar of beer on your back?”
“Just shopping for food,” Keridwen said with a smile, sitting back with a stick of celery hanging from her mouth. “I have a large supply of beer, and I find it rather easier to trade than food or clothing.”
Keridwen found herself liking the family, even if they were a little sceptical of her claims. By the time the sun set and she was ready to leave, she was sure she’d managed to find a few new friends.
“Say goodbye to the lady, kids,” Hu said from the kitchen table, his hands folded over his belly.
“Bye!” they chorused from the door to the kitchen, then giggled.
“Oh, I forgot,” Keridwen said, reaching behind her back. She conjured a pot of beer from thin air, just small enough to hide behind her back, and handed it to Anairet, who was dumbstruck. “Have a good night.”
“Wait!” Anairet called as Hu fell off his chair. “How did you do that? You didn’t have that jar when you got here!”
Keridwen grinned, stepping out into the night, lifting a white hood up over her head, carefully hidden in the folds of her feathers. “I’m magic, remember?” she said, and wiggled her fingers at the children with a grin. They laughed and called out to her again.
Before either adult could answer, Keridwen waved to them and set off up the road towards home. She had a large smile on her face, and felt like nothing could get better that night.
