The Sighs of the Priestess Ch. 10

Out of all the hopeful adolescents, there were two who always excelled but most often found themselves at odds with each other at the same time when they reached their teenage years.

Ur-Nammu had always been friendly to everyone. It hadn't always worked for him, but it was the path which gave him the best chance at success. He'd always been large and exceptionally strong. Anything that required the application of a little muscle suited him, and if it required him to use his brain before he applied that force, it made him even happier for he was very intelligent as well.

But there was one problem, one person where nothing worked for him anymore, and he eventually gave up his attempts with a heavy heart. From their days together as children, he'd been drawn to Dimme, and they'd been close friends and playmates. But one day as they grew into young adults - and he could never remember exactly when it had happened - Dimme turned away from him, and would have nothing to do with him. He was hurt over it and felt the loss of her friendship very keenly, especially since he knew of no reason that might have caused any rift between them.

He'd even gone to her on several occasions offering his apology for something that he didn't remember doing, but she only told him to come back only if he could tell her what it was. After many tries, he just accepted sadly that their friendship had come to an end.

After that, he found her to be a vicious and relentless competitor. He was aware that he was much stronger than she was and soon learned that holding back out of a sense of fairness to her bought him nothing. If he won any event or skirmish and stood to be rewarded, he knew that he could always listen as he was honored, but if he focused his eyes out far enough, sooner or later, he'd see Dimme's face glowering at him in the distance. If he allowed her to win by holding back at all – even a little, she knew it and would refuse to accept the honor.

There had been a time when they were to run from one village and to another and back. Dimme and Ur-Nammu were a long way out in front of the rest and ran side by side without a word being spoken between them. At one point, Dimme stumbled and fell. Ur-Nammu stopped and walked back to her holding out his hand to help her up. She refused his help and got to her feet to begin limping. When he tried to talk to her, she ignored him.

"This is stupid, "he said, "you running this way, when you could easily run as the cat which you are and already be on your way back. Let me carry you until your ankle is better, Dimme. There is no one here to see, and then you can still win this."

His reward was four thin lines of blood along his shoulder.

"Perhaps I wanted to be the same as you are," she growled at him, "Perhaps I wanted to win on two legs and not four. And just perhaps I wanted to be the same as Ur-Nammu, the loved one cheered by all, only once." She turned away and limped off toward her home. After that, she was rarely seen as a girl by anyone.

When he was old enough, he began as a fighter in the army of his parents, working his way up through the ranks. It was expected of him.

On the edge of a battlefield outside of Bilbat, after a particularly bloody battle, Ur Nammu sought out a scout who had arrived to help him when up to that point, it had looked to be his last day alive.

He'd been alone and fighting for his life in a sandpit against more opponents than he could handle. Two of them were seasoned veterans and were telling the younger ones which angles to attack from. He'd been holding his own for a while, but they all knew that it was just a matter of time before he grew tired or made a mistake.

All of that had changed when a large cat flew over the rim of the pit and landed among them. The cat made no sound, other than her breathing and the men now had two foes there in the pit. Only the two veterans managed to make their escape. The rest of them lay dead.

When they were alone, Ur-Nammu turned to speak but the cat left him.

Hours later, he found the scout in the early evening standing hidden in a patch of tall grasses, looking toward the city. The walls were already burning and it was clear that the morning would bring its fall. He stood wondering how to begin when the scout spoke.

"You owe me nothing, fighter," she said over her shoulder, "I only did what was needed to save the best warrior for another day. Leave me be."

"I cannot, "Ur-Nammu said. "I once counted you as my dearest friend. We played in the dirt together when we were small. We were always together as we grew up. You turned from me one day and I have spent years wondering what I did wrong, what slight it was that I still break my head over trying to remember. You will have nothing to do with me. You shun me when I offer you help and now you save my life. And still I know not what I did to you to earn your hatred of me. I owe you my life no matter what you say, and I am here to thank you for it."

She sighed, "Then say your thanks and go. If you take too long with it, I will only try to kill you myself."

He snorted, "Kill me then, at the least you will have to turn around to do it and I would welcome a last look at one whose friendship I have missed for so long."

He watched her ears flick here and there as she listened for movement in the grass while she listened to him as well. The end of her tail twitched nervously.

"Go," she said finally, "there must be maidens who await such a strong warrior tonight. I have heard that you will be a general soon. That will earn you many women."

"No one awaits me, other than a servant." he said, "I have no women near me when I go to war. You and I are the same here, Dimme. -"

"We are not the same," she said to the grasslands in front of her, "You have your own tent because you are already a leader. You have a servant because of that rank."

He shrugged though she couldn't see it, "He cares for my armor and my weapons. Now and then he brings food. You will be a leader soon, Dimme. I know this. I know of everything that you have done in every battle. I always ask about you when I can, and I know that you have your own tent."

She was a little surprised, but she didn't show it.

She snorted, "I have my tent because no one wants to sleep near to a cat. You have no women here, perhaps, but you have women at your home," she said. "There are ten of them. I have seen them come and go. When you become a general, you will win often as your father has always done. When that happens, you will be offered tributes, riches and women."

He corrected her gently, "You forget your own history, Dimme. They are a tribute from old Shahbek to use as I wish. I choose to use them as spies and guards, since they are deadly and I can trust them, and I earn their trust by never making nightly demands of them. They are free to seek their own lovers as they wish. Two are older than both of our mothers and I use them to keep order and for their counsel and advice. I love them dearly, every one, Dimme, but none of them share my bed there."

He looked down for a moment, "I have had slaves now and again. I have always treated them well and I sometimes took one to bed. But never if it was not dark, Dimme. If I could see her, then I could not pretend that she was another who I have never stopped wanting. After a time, I could not even pretend any more. I have not had a slave since."

He couldn't see it as her eyes opened wider for a moment, and then settled back to the lifeless expression that she held most often these days.

He stepped forward and she snarled as she tensed, but she didn't turn, and Ur-Nammu didn't flinch.

"Dimme," he beseeched softly from just behind her ear, "I meant it. You will have to kill me this time to drive me away. I owe you my life, so it is yours to take as you wish. I need an answer, and it is worth my life to me now. What did I do to lose the girl that I always hoped to have near to me when we grew up?"

"You will have to ask that girl," she said, "whoever she is. I am a cat."

"You are that girl," he said as he touched her shoulder. "By the gods, Dimme, tell it to me so that I can say that I am sorry and I will at the least be ready to die by your hand."

She snorted again, "That is a very good lie, Ur-Nammu. A fool might even believe you."

"Everyone loves you," she said, "I move through the crowds as we travel and I hear what is said of you. We crush armies and conquer cities, but long before we come, all of the women in those cities have heard of handsome and mighty Ur-Nammu. Half of them hold a hope to be bedded by you! Everything lands at your feet, including women who would throw themselves there gladly."

"That may be," he said, "but you move too far ahead. I listen and smile because it is expected of me, and I have even seen one or two fools who do as you say, but you do not see it when I step over them and walk on.

When did you ever see me do more than talk to anyone?" he asked, "When was it that you thought that another ever had my heart? Tell me, Dimme, for now I would know the moment when I lost you and knew it not. All that I knew was that I lost you before I ever had you to hold to me. If it means that I must die to know why, then please, let it be so. All that lands on me is nothing without the smile that I have not seen in years now."

She gasped quietly, "You cannot mean that. You have everything, or you will soon enough."

"Everything," he said. "A word that has no meaning. What I have is a lot of what I do not care about but it rains on my head every day. I hold out my hand and something falls into it unbidden. But I have been holding out my hand for another and that hand has not been there for me to hold in years, now that we are old enough.

If I cannot hold your hand, then I am poorer than any beggar and always will be. I do not want all of these women that you speak of. I have always wanted one girl."

"I am a – "

He spun her around and they saw each other's wet eyes then. He also saw the deep gash on her arm and the blood which covered her hand below it. His eye went to the blood on the ground momentarily, hidden as it had been by the tall grass.

He stared at what he saw, "You save my life and would do nothing for your own. Why? You threaten me, but you would not turn so that I would not see that you are hurt."

She struggled to form a glib answer, but none would come.

She tried to be sarcastic and that failed her as well.

Ur-Nammu saw the one that he'd grown from childhood with as she stood weaving slightly and weeping while she tried to raise her other hand in a weakly threatening gesture. He wanted to curse, but he shook his head in a sad and determined way.

"If you have the strength for it, Dimme, try to kill me now. I care not, but I will carry you to my tent even if you try. That wound needs to be tended, no matter how hard your head is."

Before she could protest, she was in his arms as he strode to his tent and when he got near, he bellowed for his servant. Dimme tried to protest then, but he said that now she had to wait until she was healed to kill him. She wanted to argue the point, but he only smiled in a grim way and told her to shut up so that she might save her strength, she could rail at him when she was better.

He laid her down on his bed and told his servant to bring two metal bowls of clean water. He arranged some of the bedding on her so that he could work.

"This scout was wounded hours ago, "Ur-Nammu said, "Give me your stitching needles and thread. Then bring me the cleanest singlet of mine that you can find and lay it aside." The man nodded and ran.

Ur-Nammu knelt beside her, holding his hand above the wound. She felt the gash begin to tingle.

Dimme's eyes opened wide at how fervently Ur-Nammu prayed the whole time.

"I have never seen this done before by anyone but priestesses."

He stopped reciting one prayer, but his hands kept working on two others. "This wound is hours old. The edges are long- dried and the cut was opened in battle. I fear for my old friend, even though she hates me and will not tell me why."

He shook his head.

"What has happened to you, Dimme? You watch my house enough to count the guards, but you forget who my mother and my father are? Did you think that I spend my time only learning to fight? You have spent your time poorly if you think that all that I do is try to fuck with the ones who guard my home or the ones who make offers to me for it. You should either watch more closely or try to spend your time in better ways." He pulled his singlet over his head and looking for the cleanest parts, he tore strips from it as she watched him.

The servant came in carrying two bowls of water. He told the man where to place them and Ur-Nammu put the needles into one bowl. The strips went into the other bowl. The servant stood by and Ur-Nammu was about to yell at him out of his frustration, but he knew that it would serve no purpose.

"Go and ask the leader of the group of scouts to come here, if he will." The servant nodded and ran out of the tent. Dimme stared at the bowls as they steamed and boiled with nothing to heat them. He passed his hand over them and carefully washed the wound with a strip from one bowl.

"The water is cool," she said, "How?"

"I do what I need to help you, "he said, "I hope that your stubbornness left with the blood that was lost. You will stay with me now until this has healed. Maybe by then, you can tell me why we cannot be what we once were at the least." She watched as he threaded one of the needles.

She hissed in a bit of pain when he began, but Ur-Nammu passed his hand over her flesh and after that he took the pain himself instead. Dimme didn't notice it at first.

"I am a cat!" she tried to shout at him, "Are you blind? You talk as though you do not know this. Why do you think that I am always like this when I am near to you? I am a cat."

He worked quickly and she saw that he grimaced a little, so she asked.

"You tense when the needle goes in. I will do a better job if you are calm and not waiting for the pain of every stitch. I take your pain until it is done."

"Why?"

He looked up from his efforts, "Because you are a cat, and I am a fool if I caused you to turn from me."

He kept working as quickly as he could. "Once I thought that you were a girl who could be a cat. But now I think that you are a cat who is really an ass." He chuckled, "Surely the prettiest ass in all the world, but an ass all the same."

She said it very quietly and it came out of her as almost a whisper, but he heard it nonetheless, "I do not hate you."

She almost smiled weakly when he smirked at her as he did his best, "Then at the least my life has some small meaning at last."

He worked at pulling the ends to knot them. "There will be a line on your pretty arm. I cannot help this. But it is closed now and we will have to wait to see if there is a fever from it." He washed the blood from his hands and wiped the closed wound gently. When he was done, he recited three prayers for her at once while she watched him. His servant returned and said that Dimme's leader was coming. Ur Nammu nodded and asked for food and water for them.

"I know that you are a cat, "he said, "I have known you since we were too young to speak. I still have thin scars on me somewhere from your first lessons to me as we played. What has happened, Dimme? I have always known this about you. I still do not understand. What made you turn from me?"

She spoke through her tears, "I am a cat, and you are a man who will be mighty one day in more than skill at arms," she sobbed a little, "You might even be king."

She sighed, "But I am a cat. You cannot love a cat. You cannot take a cat to wife if you are a general and might be a king."

"I still ask the same thing," he said, "What has happened? You speak as if this is something new. Your father is a man – who loves a cat, when your mother is not a woman. Why can I not love you?"

"Because of who you are – or will be one day. I thought of this and I wanted you to find a real girl for yourself."

He stared at her in disbelief. "Why?"

She sobbed a little, "Because as you become important, you will need a wife, not a cat." She hid her face with her other hand, but he gently pulled it away.

"Dimme, ... You can say what you like, but all that I have heard from you are words that you use to try to push me away as you have for so long. I am not one who seeks anything for myself but your friendship. I always dreamed that you might love me. I am the son of the Priestess and the Warrior-Priest. I have a part that I must play, but there is still some small room in it for what I want. You should have spoken to me."

He shook his head as he blamed himself, "No, I should have known. You always think of how things must go behind the show when important people meet. You always told me what was happening behind the meetings. I have missed this from you for a long time. This is why?" He lowered his head and looked into her amber eyes. "This is why you drew away?"

She sniffled as she nodded, "Because of who you are."

He looked at the ceiling of the tent, blinking hard for a long moment. It didn't help. She saw the tears roll from his cheeks.

"Try to eat something if you can," he said, pointing at the food, "and I will tell you what I will do with who I am.

I will make certain that my fighters are where they need to be in the morning so that my part is done to make the city fall. I will post a hundred men around this tent if I must so that you stay here while I am gone. I will speak with your leader to tell him that I have you here and you are injured and in my care.

No one will oppose me because of who I am."

A minute later, the leader of Dimme's group stood in the tent. Ur-Nammu rose to his feet and looked down on the wiry scout. He had always gotten along well with the man and he explained what had happened.

Dimme was released from duty instantly. "I have heard of how you can heal, "the man said, "do what you can for her, Ur-Nammu, I have no one like her." He left after getting some of Dimme's version of the story and Ur-Nammu knelt beside her again.

"I am sorry that I did not see what you thought to do for me. I see now how you think about this. It could have been avoided. When this is over, I will take you to see the healers in the keep to see what might be done about the scar. I will take care of you because of who I am."

She watched two more tears fall from his eyes as his closed fist thudded against the center of his own chest. "I am a man who loves you, Dimme, and I am one who wants nothing more than to sleep very near to a cat. I am in your debt and if I have my way, I will always take care of you and hope that one day I might have your love. And if I am lucky enough for that, Dimme, I will go to your parents and ask for your hand, because THAT is who I am."

She stared at him, "You - you still love me?"

"Now you are the fool," he sighed, "I have always loved you,"

Ur-Nammu smiled, "I have never stopped loving you all of our lives. If I must be a general, I can do that. If I must be a king and think for the people, I can do that as well. But I will be nothing if I cannot have your love because of these things that I am expected to be. I want none of it then."

He moved a little and he took her face in his large hands. "I cannot think that I have ever said one thing to make you think that I was not your friend, or ... maybe I should have told you how I felt before. I only wanted you. I care not if there are any who think that it is wrong that we are together. If I go higher than this, what does it matter what anyone thinks?"

She shook her head, "I thought that it would not be seen to be right, being with me when you rose to claim what will be yours."