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Ra gave away his light each day and regained it each night. At the end of each day, he forgot things. It was only natural. He regained the youth of his body, but time was sticky like honey. So he repeated what he was saying in an effort to regain it himself. This was very hard on the ones closest to him.
Ra praised Osiris' gifts to humanity to Sekhmet.
Sekhmet didn't mean to answer her father sharply. She loved her father. But she couldn't help but feel that if Osiris had been a bit more observant, a great deal of trouble could have been avoided and she couldn't keep those words from spilling out.
Ra praised Isis' cleverness.
Sekhmet didn't mean to answer her father sharply. She loved her father, it was her truth. She loved Isis. However, Isis had made a serpent from Ra's own spittle to bite and poison him. All so she could steal the secret of his creative words. To bring back Osiris. To save her son, Horus the Younger. Which was why Sekhmet's mind could forgive Isis, but in her heart it was hard.
Ra's words wore away at Sekhmet like sand in bread wears away even the strongest of teeth.
When he praised Set of the disordered heart for being strong, Sekhmet leapt off the boat in fury.
This happened during the week when all of upper and lower Kemet celebrated the birth of Osiris, Horus, Set, Isis, and Nephthys. This happened during the unlucky days in the hottest time of the year. When the waters of the Nile were very low. When Sekhmet felt low.
Sekhmet ran through upper and lower Kemet. There were temples full of statues of her crafted with incredible skill and great beauty. She was too angry with her father. All she observed were temples to Osiris and Isis. To Horus the Elder and the Younger. To Set and Nephthys.
She ran through the deserts that she had made. The wild places of stones carved by time. All she saw was desolation.
She went south as far as she could from the salt water that came from a widowed mother's tears. She went all the way to the mountains of Kush above the second cataract where she thought no one could see her sorrow. She was not a widowed mother to fill a wide water. She felt ashamed to be seen as anything but strong and sufficient in herself.
She roared to the hills and wept angry tears. Where her tears splashed, the ground grew hard and full of gold. From that gold came lions and lionesses, who followed her as her emissaries. As wanderers in the wild spaces. As killers of any who came to bother her.
The people of Kemet stayed far away in their river valley with protective deserts on each side. The deserts that Sekhmet had made.
Ra didn't understand why Sekhmet had left him. He only knew that he was full of sorrow without her. His heart felt as heavy as a bucket full of sand. He was so full of sadness that he was like a depression in the desert that holds water for itself. He told Bast, "Go find Sekhmet and bring her back so my heart can be lifted."
Bast could look into the eyes of the sun and not blink. She could have her own ideas. So when Bast set off, she did not go immediately to find Sekhmet. She wandered a little first.
She went to where Seshat was numbering in her house of books and she said, "Seshat, I need something that will help me in the wild places."
Seshat considered this. She pulled out a piece of fresh papyrus. She gathered colorful cakes of ink crafted with fire and care. She cut eight reeds into pens and placed them in the waiting slots of her wooden pallet. She drew the first hill that had risen out of the waters in a flourishing sweep. On that hill she drew a beautiful pavilion of brilliant red wool. Within that pavilion were comfortable couches and a golden carafe set with jewels. She wrote the word for refreshing next to the carafe. She wrote the words for cool shade next to the pavilion. She wrote the word for comfort next to the couches. She wrote the word for water next to an urn and placed a basin at the western entrance to the pavilion. She wrote the word for rest above it all.
Bast looked at what Seshat had drawn. She said, "It needs more. My sister needs the gifts that reveal love and lift the heart."
Seshat slanted Bast a look from dark kohl rimmed eyes. The malachite on her lids didn't move. After a moment, she looked down at the page. She refreshed her pens with sharp snicks of the knife she kept for that purpose. She drew women with flutes and stringed instruments under a second pavilion. She drew women dancing with belled girdles and hands lifted in movement. Lifted in the moment before the sound of a clap. She added golden bracelets. She laid out a fresh garment of fine red linen and a wide pectoral necklace of beautifully worked beads and precious stones on a table. She added a curved jar filled with perfume that evoked the memory of love.
When the page was full and dry, Bast went near where Sekhmet was in the wilderness. A place that was neither settled nor wild. She put down the papyrus and what Seshat had drawn was there.
Sekhmet heard the sound of the women's music. She came down out of the mountains to the first hill and saw the women dancing. She saw the pavilion with its brilliant red shade. She saw the golden carafe with its jewels that glinted in the light. She could smell the spices and honey. She went to enter the pavilion, but she stopped at the entrance in the west. She could not clean her own feet as she was. She became a woman again, though she kept her lioness face.
Bast rose from her couch of waiting. "Look at your hair, it's full of sand and grit."
This only reminded Sekhmet of her unsettled state. Wounded, she applied bitter words, "He's replaced both of us and grown new eyes. Now all he sees are these new gods. As if I don't labor every day to do everything to make him happy."
Bast tilted her head. "Do you like the music?"
Sekhmet grudgingly said, "Yes, it is fine." She very much wanted to have the dust off her skin. She very much wanted to be clean. She who always cared for others longed to be cared for, but was unable to see the way to accepting that care.
Bast poured water from the urn into a silver bowl. She said, "Let me wash away the dirt. I want to do this. It will make me happy."
Sekhmet arranged in her heart a way to allow Bast to be happy. A way to allow herself to accept the comfort that was being offered.
Bast settled Sekhmet into a stool by the door and washed Sekhmet's feet. As she did so, as the women played their music and danced in the farther pavilion, Bast began a story. "There was a king who had four sons. The fourth son, Setna, that boy was full of himself. Thought that he had what it took to be a great magician." Bast dipped the cloth in the silver bowl and stroked it across Sekhmet's feet.
Sekhmet groaned because the cloth was cool and pleasant on her skin. She could have said that she didn't care about some king's son, while simultaneously feeling the urge to protect him. Instead she looked out at her pride looking into the pavilion and with a word told the lions and lionesses to wait under the sycamore tree across the dried up river.
Bast said, "Setna is sent to study as a priest of Ptah, but he thinks he's better than the others. He wants great power quickly. So he decides to break into a tomb where it was said that there is a book of Thoth that contains great magic."
Sekhmet bared her teeth at this prince and his pride.
"Oh, don't worry. He'll get his. Anyway, he breaks into the tomb of a priest of Thoth and his wife, who was one of my priestesses. The spirit of the priest offers to play a game with the boy. If Setna wins, he can have the book. If he loses, Setna will have to leave offerings for his lifetime at the door of the tomb. Setna wants that book, so he agrees."
"I don't want the boy to win the game," said Sekhmet. "He should leave the tomb immediately. That would be the right thing to do."
"He doesn't win," said Bast as she wrung out her cloth in the silver bowl of water and resumed washing. "He thinks he's a good player, but he's merely a spoiled prince. While the priest plays, his wife explains that this book brings nothing but sorrow. That their entire family died because they possessed that book, and it should remain safe in the tomb."
Sekhmet groaned because by now, Bast had finished washing her feet and legs. Had guided her to sit in comfort on a couch. Was now combing the sand out of Sekhmet's hair. The air in the pavilion was cool after the baked heat of the mountains. The couch was comfortable after sitting on rocks. The honeyed beer in the cup that Bast poured was refreshing after brackish seeps of water.
"Setna hears all this, loses the game, but decides to take the book anyway."
Sekhmet opened her eyes and glared at Bast, who held up one finger as if to say, "Wait."
Bast resumed combing Sekhmet's hair. She said, "He starts reading the book, but he gets hungry and goes into the market. While he is there, he sees a beautiful woman. She has high firm breasts like little pomegranates." Here Bast cupped her own breasts. "She had rounded hips and a beautiful sex that could be clearly seen through her linen shift." Here Bast slid her hands down her own hips. Brushed a hand over her own sex.
Sekhmet eyed her sister thoughtfully and said, "And the wife of the priest, she was a priestess of Bast."
"Yes." Bast grinned with sharp teeth.
"Good," said Sekhmet, settling into the comfort of the couch. Into the comfort of being cared for by her sister.
"Setna is filled with lust for this woman. He sends servants to find out what the woman wants so he can have sex with her. The servants return saying that the woman is a high born woman and wants to negotiate. He must come to her home. He's sure that once she sees him, a prince, the son of a great king, she'll sleep with him immediately. But when he gets there, all he can smell is her sweet perfume. All he can see is her beautiful body. She repeats that she is a woman of high birth, but instead of respecting her, all he pays attention to is his own desire. She tells him that since he offers her sex and not marriage, she wants everything that he owns. That he must summon his family to witness it so there can be no going back."
Sekhmet's hair was now clean, but Bast kept running the comb through her hair.
"Of course, he agrees. He can think of nothing he wants more than this woman. His wife brings his children. His wife, who is the daughter of a powerful lord and brought a great dowry with her when she married him, tells her husband that before he has sex with this other woman and gives away all his property, she is divorcing him. She tells him not to even think that he will use her dowry to pay for sex. Off, she goes, leaving their young children to witness the loss of her husband's property and position."
Sekhmet chuckled and purred. She tilted her head as Bast placed a gold ring in her ear. She smiled at the beautiful bracelets that Bast wrapped around her wrists that made music when she moved.
"Then the woman tells Setna that she doesn't trust his sons and daughters not to want revenge later for the loss of their inheritance, so he must kill them."
Sekhmet's eyes narrowed at Bast who spread her hands wide as if to say, "Trust me." Who urged Sekhmet to stand up so Bast could wrap the new red dress around her. Place the wide pectoral necklace around her neck.
"Setna is so filled with lust, he does it. Kills his sons and daughters. He signs over everything he owns. He has nothing now. Nothing but his lust. As soon as the papers are signed, he doesn't even wash the blood away before he has his hands on the woman. For her part, she opens her thighs and welcomes him in."
Sekhmet growled.
Bast laughed. "For all of one moment, and then the house and the woman disappear. Setna is standing in the middle of the market with his phallus stuck inside a clay jar. He is covered in goose shit, and the clay jar itself," Bast drank a swallow of fruity beer from a golden cup, "is full of salt. So Setna's phallus is on fire and as dry as a mummy's. Also, his father, the king, has come down to the market to find out why Setna's wife, the daughter of the ruler of a wealthy district, has divorced her husband and taken their children with her." Bast winked at Sekhmet.
Sekhmet burst out laughing and sat back down on the couch. "It was an illusion."
"The divorce was real enough, but not the murders. I couldn't let him kill his children. That very day, Setna returned the book. But that's not all."
"What more could there be?" asked Sekhmet. She curled up her legs on the couch and smiled at her sister.
"I had Thoth find the spirit of the greatest wizard who ever lived. Horus-son-of-Paneshe. I had Set steal the spirit for me in a golden vial."
Sekhmet's eyes grew wide. "I remember that." Sekhmet leaned forward. "Why did you do that?"
Bast chuckled. "When the king found his son a new wife, one with less prestige than the first to be sure, Setna was blessed with a son, who grew faster in wisdom than a child had any right to do. Because he had the spirit of this great wizard."
"How is blessing Setna with a powerful son a punishment?"
"I blessed Setna with a son who would surpass him in every way in the subject where he most wanted to be great."
Sekhmet sat back on her couch and drank the sweet beer that Bast had brought her. She sat in comfort and her anger left her leaving only ashes.
Bast said, "Come back with me to the black lands."
Sekhmet felt the heat of embarrassment. "I ran away."
"So, run back," said Bast.
"I almost killed all the humans." It hurt Sekhmet to say that. To remember the bloodlust and rage. "It's why they fear me."
"You didn't kill all the humans." Bast drank from her cup. "When you come back, you will have the title Honorable one. You created a desert that protects the people of Kemet better than any wall or shield ever could. When you came back with me, men and women will play music in your honor. There will be dancing. The only music and dancing here is what I brought when I came to find you. Sister, you are loved." Bast sat down next to Sekhmet and put her arm around Sekhmet, who then leaned into the embrace.
Sekhmet followed Bast back down out of the wild places. She looked at the desert that she had made and said, "I made this desert." She smiled at it and found what she had made to be beautiful and fierce. Where the sun gleamed off sheer red stone. Where the sparkling dunes shifted as much as any salty sea. A place that reduced the world to silence and wind swept sound.
While all along the shores of the Nile, the people were gathered and the din was enormous. It was like a wave greeting Sekhmet as she came home.
Their instruments were beautifully decorated with images of the gods. Sekhmet's paws held the plucked strings of many lyres. Bast peered out of thousands of carved beads clacking in thousands of merry hands. The blazing eye of the sun was painted on hundreds of tambourines. The goddesses danced together on the tight drawn skin of drums slapped in a steady beat.
The craftsmen had been busy in the work of delighting the gods.
The dancers leapt in joyful dance. They bent their bodies close to the earth. They looped arms and spun each other in the complicated patterns of sunlight on water. In the steps of lionesses on the hunt. In the joy of embodying the goddess on her way home.
Everywhere were huge urns full of beer. The people of Kemet filled bronze cups to the brim. They raised them up and praised the honorable goddess. They praised the gleaming one. The beautiful one. The lady of intoxication.
With their singing and dancing, they welcomed Sekhmet back home.
Sekhmet came to the river and danced among the people. She danced with her sister by the banks of the river.
Ra saw and was delighted. He saw and he remembered. Ra's youth was in the deep places, but that day he moved to the rhythm of the joyful dance with his daughters. Time was like honey and sweet. The dance filled the hearts of the ones who loved him with beauty.
Ra said, "Sekhmet, you are the beautiful eye that gives life to the land."
Bast spun and ruffled her own skirts. "This is what I've been saying."
Sekhmet turned in the dance and laughed. "I see what you're saying is true by looking in your eyes." Sekhmet lifted her hands and was the giver of joys.