The Pharoah Contract

Bhas was silent for a long moment, looking down on her, as if with fondness. Then he spoke, and his voice resonated with curiosity and pity, or so it seemed to Hashupit. “Hashupit,” he asked, “how is it that you’ve never mated? Never in these long eons?”

For a moment she forgot the pain, and she straightened her back into a haughty line. “How can this be your concern?”

Bhas seemed to grow taller, wider, darker. His voice rolled over her, suffocating her under its power. “You forget yourself, Hashupit. My concerns are what I make them.”

* * *

On the stage the torches fluttered faster, and from the orchestra rose a low discordant wail, a raw sound that scratched at Ruiz’s nerves.

* * *

The sons of Bhas sidled closer. In the tracks of Thethri, god of famine, tufts of withergrass sprang up, writhing with a spastic urgency. From the footprints of Menk, god of slavery, grew a rank tangle of corpsewort, and the perfume of that ugly flower rolled out over the audience, a musty putridity. The goddess rose and drew back, noticing the two for the first time.

“And these weirdlings, who are they?” she asked, with as much of a sneer as her trembling lips allowed.

Bhas touched her hand and punished her with pain, pain that seared up her arm and clutched at her heart. She fell to the ground, rolling from side to side, striking at her claw with her good hand, as if to punish the source of her torment. When finally the pain eased, she sat up and looked at Bhas with eyes that held no more rebellion.

Bhas smiled beneath his mask, and it was as if the black silk was disturbed by the scurry of maggots. “These are your choices, Hashupit,” he said, gesturing to his sons. “One will be your mate, the mate that was promised you when the world was young. As you were promised, lovely Hashupit, to us. Your father never told you of that bargain, did he?”

“No,” she said. She could not bear to look at the awful trio, but their godly emanations touched her like a hot dirty wind; the black intensity of Bhas, the empty greed of Menk, the hopeless desperation of Thethri.

“But it’s true, oh yes.” Bhas stepped to her side. Twisting his thin powerful hand in her hair, he jerked her to her feet. She was too weak to resist, or even to support her own weight, so she hung from his hand like a trophy. “May I,” said Bhas, “present my beloved sons?” He gestured with his free hand. “This is my firstborn, Menk.”

Menk executed a servile bow, as stiff as a reanimated corpse. Hashupit shuddered, and Bhas gave her a small shake of admonishment. “And this,” he continued, “is Thethri, the younger of my children.”

Thethri didn’t bow; rather, he stretched his arms out in a pleading gesture. Where the robe fell away from his arms, they appeared almost fleshless, bone covered with tightly stretched skin, and his fingers were talons.

Hashupit finally found the strength to stand, and Bhas released her and stepped behind, resting his elegant hands on her shoulders. “You must choose,” he whispered in her ear. “You have no choice but to choose. If you resist me you won’t die, but you will wish to. You’ll be forced to hide your hideousness in the deepest cavern you can find, lest those who once praised your beauty destroy you in a fury of loathing. Eh?”

Hashupit found it impossible to doubt him. “Are there no brides for your sons in Hell?” she asked, in a tiny defeated voice.

Bhas laughed, and his hands clenched on her shoulders, digging into her flesh. But the small pain was like a caress, compared to the agony of her hand. “Oh, perhaps there are,” he answered, “but the Hellmaids are hard and rough in comparison to you, ripe Hashupit.”

As if to punctuate his words, the pain in her hand flared, so that she almost passed out again. “Yes,” she said. “I will choose.”

* * *

Ruiz shivered in the increasing chill. He watched, completely absorbed, as the play progressed.

He watched as she chose Thethri. He watched as the gods unmasked, and Hashupit swooned yet again. In a swirl of blue glitter, the scene changed to the palace of Hashupit’s father. The action of the play accelerated as Hashupit allowed Bhas and his sons within the gilded halls, where sweet fruit hung from branches that grew from the cool white stone, where new wine flowed from every courtyard fountain. The conjurors performed marvels of deception, shifting the scene as deftly as in any pangalac holodrama, while the beauty of the phoenix grew ragged, pressed between pain and horror. Her face bleached whiter with each passing moment, her hair grew lank with sweat. The Dry God and his sons prowled the corridors and gardens, and where they passed, death followed, stilling the fountains and withering the blossoms.