The Royal City of Uru — 531 BC

From some far-distant place, Ninsunu heard someone pounding on her chamber door. She rolled over on the bed, turning away from the sound, pressing the down-stuffed linen pillows against her ears, but the knocking continued.

From a far-off land, she heard her father’s voice, “I’m here with a guard, Ninsunu. If you do not open this door, he will break it down. I give you until I count three.”

In her faraway dreamland, Ninsunu smiled softly. This was a funny game her father was playing.

“One,” he shouted.

She hummed a little tune to herself.

“Two. Last chance, Ninsunu. Believe me, this is not my choice.”

Now his voice was getting distracting. She pressed the pillow tightly against her head.

“Three!” her father shouted, and Ninsunu heard a loud crash from some far-off place, and there was her father, stern and oh-so-perfect in his deep blue robes and coiffed hair and beard, and a guard in a simple wool tunic and woven breastplate, standing among the smashed timbers of her chamber door.

She sat up on her elbow to get a better look at them, feeling her head sway gently from side to side.

Her father hurried to her bedside, grabbed her shoulders and shook her. “Wake up,” he called from somewhere still far away, though now it sounded a bit closer. “Please.” The warm softness of everything was starting to sharpen, and she didn’t like that, not one bit.

He glanced down at the bed and saw the bronze goblet lying next to her, still stained white with the dregs of poppy’s-milk — joyplant, as everyone had called it for as long as anyone could remember.

“Take that away. Now,” he said to the guard, who retrieved the cup and left the room.

Her father took a few deep breaths, calmed down, and began to stroke her hair, like when she’d been a little girl. “Why do you do this, Ninsunu?” he asked softly. “Is your life so miserable?” He waited for an answer, but she only pouted at him, her head still swaying like that of a snake, eyes not focusing. “What is it that you lack? Name it and I will have it brought for you.”

“Sleep,” she said, soft and slowly.

He leaned in closer. “What’s that?”

“I lack sleep,” she murmured. “Let me sleep.”

He hit her then — not hard enough to knock her over, but hard enough to sting, even through the joyplant in her veins. She wobbled back and forth for a moment, then began to cry.

“Why did you do that, Daddy?” she asked.

“Because, Ninsunu,” he said, “though I love you, and I would do anything to make you happy, you are a selfish, ungrateful child. You could have been a priestess; I would have spoken to the temple elders and made it so. You could have married any man; an army captain, a governor; I would have met with his family and arranged it for you.”

“But I don’t want those things, Daddy,” she said.

"You want nothing!” he cried. “I would bring you the whole city of Uru on a platter, and you lay here gulping down joyplant like a cheap barmaid–”

“That’s enough,” came her mother’s voice from the doorway.

“It’s mother,” Ninsunu muttered, and smiled drowsily. “Oh, hello, Mother.”

Her mother came and sat next to her on the bed, as her father stood up to look down on her.

“Your father shouldn’t speak to you that way,” said her mother, stroking her hair.

“Father,” said Ninsunu. She took a long, deep breath, then finished, “–is cruel.”

“Your father is afraid for you. He has seen what happens to those who drink the joyplant as you do. Their lives are not long or happy.”

“No one’s life,” she sighed, “is happy.”

Her mother sighed. “That isn’t true, dear. Many people are happy. And you, of all women in this city, could have any happiness you desire–”

“I have,” said Ninsunu, “all the happiness I desire.” And she began to lie down on the soft bed again.

“Now, Ninsunu.” Her mother took a sterner tone, whose sharpness Ninsunu did not like. “Your father and I have discussed this, and–”

“It’s time for you to choose a path,” said her father. “A real path in the world.”

“You can do anything you wish, dear,” said her mother. “If you don’t want to take a husband, don’t take one. But become a priestess, then, if you like; or a scribe. Several of the schools take on female scribes now; it’s all very modern.”

“I don’t want any of those things,” Ninsunu murmured.

Her mother nodded. “We know, darling. But we can’t let you continue down this road. We won’t sit by and watch it happen; not in our own house.”

“Look, Ninsunu,” said her father, “You’re a grown woman and I’m telling this to you straight. You’ll either stop the joyplant now, today, or you’ll leave this house.”

“What your father means, I’m afraid,” said her mother, “is that if you will agree to stop taking this draught, we will do everything in our power to help you, and to nurse you back to health. You’ll have the very best physicians. But if you will not listen to reason, darling,” she sighed and furrowed her brow, “we can no longer–”

“We cannot allow you to remain here with us,” said her father. “For your own good, or for the good of this family. I’m sorry, but that’s the Gods’ truth.”

Something about what her parents were saying seemed as thought it might be important — almost important enough to cut through the warm softness of her dreamland and make its meaning felt to her. What was it that might matter?

“Do you hear your mother?” her father asked. “This is not our choice, but if you won’t quit the joyplant today, you’ll be out of this house by tomorrow. That’s a promise.”

“Out of this house,” Ninsunu muttered. “Where will I be going?”

Her mother’s lip was trembling. “That would be up to you, dear. But please, we beg you, do not force us down that path. Choose to stop this. Choose to stay here with us.”

“I choose,” sighed Ninsunu, then forgot what she was going to say. “I choose to sleep,” she said at last, and closed her eyes and fell back into the warm soft place.

Next morning, it was the headache that woke her first. Then it was the stomping of feet and the opening and slamming of the chests around her bed, that brought her out of half-wakefulness and made her sit up and see what was happening. Three of her father’s servants were clattering around the room, opening her heavy wood clothing chests and packing her dresses and jewelry into smaller travel boxes.

“What are you doing?” she cried.

Then a memory — fragments of a memory — came back to her from last night. If you won’t quit the joyplant today, you’ll be out of this house by tomorrow. What had she said in response? Was it tomorrow already?

“Mother!” she screamed, racing out the door and down the stairs. “Father!” But they were nowhere to be found — not in the dining room, or in the central courtyard with its pools and fountains, or in the study with its stacks of scrolls and clay tablets, or in their bedroom, or even out in the foyer.

She ran back up the stairs to her chamber. “Where are mother and father?” she demanded of one of the servants.

“They have departed, my lady,” said the servant. “I have orders that you and your essentials are to be gone from the house by the time they return.”

“What?” she screamed at him.

His face remained impassive. “I’m sorry, my lady. That is all I know. If you’ll excuse me, I will escort you outside once we have packed up your essentials.”

“Escort me–” she half-gasped, half-laughed, but the servant had already returned to his task. He stood at her dressing-table, carefully packing her gold mirrors and combs into a small, daintily painted box.

A few minutes later, she stood out on the street in front of her family’s townhouse, watching the servants load her boxes and chests onto a donkey-drawn cart. The cart had a sort of palanquin on top, with ornately stitched curtains drawn around it.

“If my lady would kindly embark,” said the servant.

“Where are you taking me?”

“It pains me to say, my lady, that I am not at liberty to say. If my lady would be so kind as to embark, however, she will soon see.”

“I want to talk to Mother,” she demanded, but the servant only shook his head.

“I’m afraid that is not possible, my lady. However, your mother has promised to come visit you at the earliest opportunity.”

“Visit me where?”

“As I’ve explained, my lady, you will find out presently, if you would kindly embark.”

He held out his hand to her, and stayed in that pose until she finally made an exasperated sound and took his hand and climbed up onto the wagon, and sat down on a small padded chair inside the palanquin. Another servant climbed up and drew the curtains tightly around the palanquin and tied them shut, and she heard him cry “ha!” as he tapped the donkey with his riding-stick, and the wagon jerked and began to roll forward over the cobblestones.

It was a long, winding, very bumpy ride, and it made Ninsunu’s growing headache ten times worse. She felt a sick feeling in her stomach, and a tense cramping in her bowels, and all her limbs seemed to ache down to the bones. By the time they reached their destination, she’d begun to shiver, though she felt hot.

One of the servants opened the curtains around the palanquin, and helped Ninsunu down from the wagon, which was parked in front of a small door in a narrow street next to a tall, sheer wall.

The only walls this size she knew were the one surrounding the entire city, and the one surrounding the base of the temple precinct. She looked up and saw, at the top of the wall, the flat courtyard; and atop that, the blue-and-gold walls of the Great Ziggurat, towering so high they seemed to scrape the clouds.

The door in the wall opened, and a small women peeked out. She was dressed simply and neatly, in a clean white dress; her black hair pulled back into a tight bun.

“You must be Ninsunu,” said the woman.

“Lady Ninsunu, to you,” said Ninsunu.

The woman smiled gently. “We’re all ladies here, Ninsunu, no matter where we come from. I’m Iltani. Welcome.”

“Welcome to what?” Ninsunu asked.

To be continued in the book…

Next Chapter: The Surprise Attack