Zeus

Wagnimandua
Camp of the Chaldean Levy

West Bank Tigris, Sinjar ford, 27th Funfly 122

When the girl brought the water Wagnimandua woke in the half light of early dawn and stretched, luxuriating in the soft caress of the slik coverlet on her skin.

As she glanced through the almost closed entry to her tent she realised with a slight start that Abraham was sitting in the doorway of his tent, seemingly deep in thought, gazing over the valley.

How had she, the daughter of a line of chiefs, got here? She remembered the great migration set in motion by Mithradates ? she met him once when she was a girl accompanying her father to the Imperial court, and he had answered her na?ve questions kindly. Her marriage and the untimely death of her husband during their first winter ? he had always been a sickly lad, she should have heeded her mother?s words. Her brief fight to take his place in the Council and her rapid acceptance as a member then as their leader ? because she was worth it!

But now: that fool Wagwelix. Brave, able, loyal, honourable, and an uncouth stupid interfering fool, he and his agitating acolytes had roused that Galatians, even some of her own people despite her protests, and led them to disaster: so many needlessly dead. And that perverted Deputy Grand Whatsit (what is his name?) and his filthy guards; perhaps she should have swallowed her pride and stuck to her original intention to seek to preserve peace in Tikrit?s lands: yes, she had been wrong to seek cheap vengeance. She should have awaited Brahma?s return; a bit of an impetuous fool at times with his dreams of Iran rising again to glory. But he was fair, she would have had justice ? against the guards even if not against the DGW. And her people would have had peace, not death. Regrets don?t mend broken pots, as her old gran used to say.

But now what of the future? She looked again at kind courteous Abraham: she knew not his age but thought him older than his looks: despite this she wondered ? but no, such dreams were impossible. She knew only too well that she could not tolerate the life of a Chaldean lady, protected, pampered, cosseted, but above all, enclosed, unfree. The idea of a young widow ruling a clan would, indeed did, strike Abraham as an alien, even barbarian, concept. Why was it that only amongst the barbarians were women able to realise their worth, their potential.

She thought of her village north-east of Tikrit, a village which people had started to call Mandus. Mandus where the line of small sweet springs watered the land: the locals said that when the springs dried up it would presage the end of the world. Further east was the desert but Mandus was a place of calm and beauty, where so many came to visit: even Emir Brahma came to visit the village, but also to visit her, to discuss politics and philosophy, to recite his dreadful poetry. They must go back, there was nowhere else, not even amongst the bleak hills of Galatia itself. She would humble herself before Brahma: he would like that, but not unkindly. Yes she could persuade him that they should be allowed to return, he would see that it added to his power. They could bring him some of Arbil?s land: El Tanmud wouldn?t like it but that would add to Brahma?s pleasure. Yes, she was sure that she could persuade him, but she must tell Abraham of her plans: even though he had freed her and her people she must seek his permission: she owed him that and indeed much more.

But Brahma might well insist that she marry his son; could she live with that? Certainly not in his harem with his two wives and his other women. A partnership of equals? Not with that pompous dullard. She shivered, she had seen him looking at her. But if Brahma insisted then it must be so: it would be her penance, payment for that moment of angry pride.
Abraham had gone: in her reverie she had not seen him go. And with a twitch of conscience she realised that the girl, a slave in all but name, was kneeling by the water-pitcher staring at her, rapt; wrapped in her own thoughts. Wagnimandua stood and smiled at the girl: at least she no longer asked if she should shave the lady. Barbarians don?t shave!