Day 1 of the reign of Setenet Ahit-Kau
Apui passed the day away impatiently. From her seat on the edge of the courtyard pool, feet dangling in the water, she could hear the festivities outside. There must have been a great many people for her to hear it so clearly from inside the estate. There were firecrackers and joyful tunes played on the lyre, and more than once she heard a drunken cackle. Lord Constort Piaa came into the courtyard holding Apui's youngest brother, Isi.
Piaa walked into the water with the child, both of them completely naked. Piaa waded around for a while, bouncing the baby in the water and cooing lovingly. Apui watched with a smile as the little boy started to giggle and splash at Piaa. When Piaa began to walk towards Apui, though, the baby started splashing at her instead.
"Isi stop!" Apui laughed, getting up and standing on the edge of the pool. Piaa chuckled.
"Ohh Isi, don't splash your sister, that isn't nice," Piaa said, bouncing the baby again. Isi babbled something incomprehensible then reached for the nearest lily pad floating on the water and stuck it in his mouth.
"Lord Consort Piaa, don't let the baby eat that,"Apui warned him, "Lilly pads will give him cramps. Besides, Lady Kemmes loves those water lilies," Apui said, sitting back down, knowing that sometimes Lord Consort Piaa rubbed Kemmes the wrong way, especially when it came to the raising of his children.
Piaa quickly pulled the pad from the child's grasp, "Thank you, Lady Apui, I wouldn't have known." He tilted his head down slightly in an almost-bow. Apui had long sensed that Kemmes wanted complete parental control over all of the children, including those fathered by Piaa. Apui remembered when she was a child and Piaa wanted to play with her Kemmes would often swoop in and have Apui play with Kemmes and her children instead. That is why Apui ended up with such a strong relationship to her half brother, Hasra.
Kemmes has willingly entered into the marriage with Apui's mother, Lady Nestem, and because she was of lower rank and she moved into Nestem's house that meant that Kemmes would never be allowed to have her own consorts. It was her own choice but one did get the sense that she resented being the less powerful woman of the house.
"Why haven't you and the boys gone to join the celebration in the town center?" Apui asked Piaa, referring to her brother Isi and her slightly older half brother Tenb, who was probably somewhere terrorizing a servant.
"Lady Nestem wanted us to stay," Piaa said in a sweet voice as if he was addressing the baby.
"Why?" Apui asked. Piaa looked at her softly.
"To keep you company," He said.
"You are as bad a liar as I am, father," Apui said with a smile.
"You're right. I wanted to stay," Piaa said, still rocking in the water, holding the baby who was now playing with his father's two low sloping horns. "I know you will leave soon, and it is my duty to send you off, but I will miss you Apui. And once you go to live in the temple you know I will never be able to go visit you. And it won't really be proper for you to come home to visit. So I may not see you for years, or at least until you have a child of your own. I can only hope that when that time comes you will choose to spend your maternity here with your mother and her wife."
Apui nodded and she was reminded of something: "By the way, do you know when Hasra is coming home next?" She asked
"I think next month, why?"
"Htuabi said I should join the temple in a few days. And if I did, I wouldn't get to see Hasra," Apui said.
Piaa nodded slowly. "Well I would wait until Lady Nestem comes back tonight, and discuss it with her. I know she is eager to see you rise to your station, but she has been understanding of your apprehension. She is wise, I think you should talk to her about it."
"But what do you think?"
"I wouldn't know until I heard Lady Nestem's thoughts."
"Father I want your opinion," Apui said, frustrated. Lord Consort Piaa's brow furrowed, and he switched the baby to his other hip.
"It is not my place to say, Lady Apui," He said with a sigh. Apui resigned herself, knowing her father was the kind of a man who wasn't likely to speak up for himself, being a product of aristocratic good breeding had taught him to keep his opinions silent. She stood up and started to wander away before the Lord Consort Piaa spoke up, "If you do leave in a few days..." Apui looked back at him, "Hasra will miss you." Apui nodded at him and walked upstairs, into the study.
After a few hours, once the sun was beginning to set, Lady Nestem, Lady Kemmes, Htuabi, and Htuabi's young daughter Hiset came home and began to shed their layers at the door. Apui came to greet them and said, "Welcome home. How was the ceremony?"
"Beautiful," Kemmes spoke up, undoing Hiset's horn wrappings "I wish you could have at least seen how beautiful the young Empress was. She was as bright as the sun reflecting off the Tobu river."
Apui smiled politely. Taking her mother's head shawl, she asked, "Not too sunny, I hope?" Nestem shook her head. "Well the servants are about done with dinner, should be ready to serve as soon as you all have settled and cooled down a little. Should I ask for some cool beers to be brought out?"
"Yes. How thoughtful, Apui," said her sister Htuabi.
Apui went to the back of the estate, passing the well in the backyard and going into the deathly hot kitchen. She asked the servants to bring in a pitcher of cool beer and have someone to fan the ladies. On her way back to the courtyard she passed her father who had put on his formal Shendyt kilt to greet the women.
For a while the evening passed with the women recounting the supposedly beautiful ceremony, how the Empress looked so confident and powerful, who they saw there and who they didn't. After Hiset had a quick dip in the pool to cool off, the grand table was brought in and dinner was served.
It was spit-roasted pork tonight, the most expensive meat you could buy for such a celebratory dinner. The whole family was there, minus Hasra, and the night took on a very jovial mood. Htuabi and her mother had an intense political discussion, surmising what must and must not be the goals of the new Empress, and they also talked about what they had heard were the weaknesses of the Empress.
"Yes, she certainly will have to gain some grounding," Kemmes said, chewing a mouthful of pork, "Everyone knows the Empress is insatiably curious and has been educated beyond her years because of it, have you not heard that said, Nestem?" Nestem nodded. Kemmes continued, "Yes but with such a big base of knowledge, some people tend to get bogged down with the details and then forget to see the grand picture, which is the health of the Empire."
"They become impractical," Htuabi elaborated. "That's why she will need good advisors and friends who have the people's best interests in mind," Htuabi looked to Apui pointedly, "People like you, sister."
Apui looked to her mother and asked, "Do you think I am ready to lead the church and the Empress on the path Isitobu intended?"
Lady Nestem looked at Apui very seriously, "I think you have been ready for a long time. You're sixteen now, when I was your age I had already moved out with Htuabi on the way." She grabbed a piece of her hair and continued: "This is all the proof I need that Isitobu lives in you, more than she does in the rest of us. If you let her, she will guide you and that is all you will need."
"What if I left in three days?" Apui asked.
Nestem looked deep into Apui's eyes. It was the kind of stare that scared Apui when she was a little girl. "Do you want to leave?" She asked. The table got silent as everyone stopped eating and looked to Apui.
"I do, but if I leave now I won't get to say goodbye to Hasra, for years maybe," Apui said quietly.
"Hasra?" Kemmes interjected loudly, "You want to delay becoming the Arch Priestess, something that affects not only you -but our Empress and every soul in the empire- for a lowly Assembly Commander in Medva? Obviously he is my son and I love him but Lady Apui, compared to you he is just an ant. You are a great, gorgeous giraffe!"
"I agree," Htuabi chimed in, "You should not delay your duty to wait for him. We'll send him a letter."
Apui looked to Piaa for guidance, but his eyes were downcast, focused on the floor. She was silent for a moment, and so was everyone else. The room had a great weight to it. All they could hear was the soft sound of the servants fanning them, the locust, and the revelries still happening outside, and they all had the same feeling. That in this house, they were in a bubble of importance. And the feeling was contrasted with the eeriness that all those revelers outside had no idea. They knew that what they said here to Apui tonight would have an effect on not just the course of the night, but the course of the empire. When Apui rose to power as the Arch Priestess of the Tobu Empire, her power would rival that of the Empress.
They had talked like it would be Apui who served the Empress but it was well known that for decades, maybe centuries, the power of the government was slowly being taken by the power of the temple.
"Should I surrender myself to the Secha Temple the day after tomorrow?" Apui asked, cutting the silence. Small nods went around the table. "Okay," She said.
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