The Wings of Ashtaroth

Chapter 15: Dreamers: Section IV: Qwella

Qwella: The Temple of Hazzan: Qemassen

Becoming the heq-Ashqat of Qalita had been a simple thing.

A wash in the temple baths and a ritual shave. A drop of oil on the forehead and a change of robes. Three days and three nights of fasting. A libation poured out before her goddess. An offering of the finest cut of ox, prepared by the temple butchers.

A few words, repeated after one of the Ashqata who everyone knew should have been standing in Qwella's place.

Everyone but Dansila, apparently. When Hima had insisted Qwella become heq-Ashqat, it was Dansila who'd sworn that Qwella had still been in Daana's chamber when the old heq-Ashqat had died.

How much coin Hima must have offered Dansila's family to ensure those words passed her lips.

It seemed not to matter to anyone that Qwella wasn't at all suitable, that she neither desired the position nor met the criteria for its assumption. Even Eshant had pressed her to accept with humility the great honour that had been bestowed on her.

And now, six days later, she was to become heq-Ashqat of the entire city.

Again, Qwella had been purified, shaved, anointed, fasted, and now she stood in a cramped chamber inside Hazzan's temple, surrounded by her gods, each one carved in stone or wood or ivory.

Earlier, she'd been made to profess her sins in the holy debir of Hazzan before scribbling her confessions on scraps of papyri and burning them in a brazier. This time, at least, the words were her own, and not those of the scribe who'd recorded the details of Qanmi's birth.

Whatever Qwella had done—and she had done much—Hazzan would now bear her burdens for her.

The goat god and his family stared at her. Statues of Abaal, Tanata, Adonen, Ashtet, Molot, Qalita, Leven and Pepet, and Hazzan ringed her. The heq-Ashqen of each deity stood beside his own god, clasping a cup or a dish in his hand. The Ashenqa were masked, so that it was impossible for them to stare upon the sacred images of the other gods.

These weren't public images, but the most holy of statues from deep inside the debira of the temples. Only the heq-Ashqen of the city ever saw all the gods so close. Such proximity to them was a rare privilege.

Before Qwella, the last person to have experienced this was Samelqo.

A chill struck her, as though the former heq-Ashqen would reach a spectral hand out of the air and scratch her eyes out for the presumption.

The heq-Ashqen of Abaal—the man who enacted Abaal's rituals in place of the king—stepped forward. Even though he couldn't possibly see, he walked straight and true, holding a dish in his wrinkled hands.

From the dish, a bream stared up at Qwella with dead, squishy eyes.

A day or two ago, at the start of Qwella's fast, she would have gobbled it down gratefully, but today her stomach clenched at the thought.

She swallowed and reached for the bream, which she was supposed to eat, when the heq-Ashqen spoke.

Qwella jumped.

Each of the priests was to recite something first. Qwella couldn't even keep the simple details of the ritual in her mind—how would she manage a whole city's worth of supplications and festivals?

"The blessing of crown and catch," said the heq-Ashqen.

"The blessing is accepted," Qwella answered, voice quaking. She reached out tentatively with one hand, but the fish head was comically large to eat that way and she had to use both hands to bring it to her mouth.