Chapter 12 - Marshes
The Delta marshland. SW Asia.
Hulla asked Mallah to keep Ittidu away until a return tide on the following day. He is a pragmatist, and saw no reason not to fish. He sings happy fisherman songs to raise her mood, while he paddles to navigate the vast labyrinth of the delta keeping Ittidu safe from Engur, and to seek fish. It's when Mallah finds a promising place to cast his nets that he disturbs the peace of his passenger. Lifting the folds of his throwing net he uncovers the still form of his reluctant passenger, lying glued to the reed matting of the boat’s narrow deck,
‘It would appear this skinny fish is green around the gills, perhaps I should throw it back into the waters?’
Slowly Ittidu rolls around to scrutinise her uncle disdainfully. One eyelid stuck down, sealed by dried tears. She groans with misery, and Mallah cannot help but take pity,
‘Sweet child, you've nothing to fear. My boat is quite stable, and the waters here in the marshes are shallow, look.’ He pushes his pole down into the waters to indicate the lack of depth. Mallah helps Ittidu to sit up, and offers a waterskin.
She fully opens up her eyes, and dares to take in her surroundings. Here they are far from home or any other settlement, somewhere out in the wild marshes of the Delta. All around the murky waters are tall stands of reeds, reedmace, and papyrus. Behind them on small islands sprout tamarisk, poplars and willows. Herons of more than one kind, perch within their branches.
Although Ittidu was born to the delta, never before has she dared to voyage out into its wilds on a narrow boat of cut reed. She’s as surprised as her uncle to be able to say,
‘I don’t feel afraid and though I fear for the safety of my father, I thank you for bringing me here. It's a beautiful and serene place’. The fisherman smiles broken teeth at Ittidu, before breaking into another song. This celebrates the spirits of the waters and calls for them to fill his nets with catch.While he sings in his sweet voice, he lifts his net and happily casts. Ittidu is content to allow her uncle to go about his work. She takes in the tranquil, and natural beauty of this paradise.
Saltwaters at night
The sun sets, but Mallah knows it wouldn't be safe to return Ittidu home. He’d promised his wife to delay. Golden tones ripple across the waters of the marsh. Ittidu is stunned by the natural beauty. Darkness arrives, and with great care Mallah opens a small hide bag. Inside he keeps his reduced fire, small tufts of fungus rolled into a ball, smouldering just enough to ignite a flame on a section of dried reed. He uses this fire lighter on a wick dipped in fat. It glows with warmth. With the setting of sun, the demons of the night torment Ittidu. She pushes back these thoughts by recording each detail of her odyssey for her father into a poem.
She tells Mallah, ‘Tomorrow on return, I'll recite it to Father. He’ll be so proud of me, and grateful to yourself for bringing me out here’, Father has to be okay. He’ll be there for me in the morning. Arrapu has always been there for her. Ittidu tells herself, In the morning, the rowdy strangers from Engur will have left, and Father will be waiting for me at the wharf.
The death of the sun is compensated by a wondrous sky of bright stars above. She glimpses up at celestial beauty. It's as Ittidu does that she thinks back to the recent day on the drove across the Eden, and to her father’s wise words,
‘Sweet child, there will be times when you'll lack the support of myself or Dugala. When this happens, you can call upon the protection of the Moon. Seek out Nanna where he kisses his mother - in this world you may find that wherever the moon reflects from waters, by they of sweet or salty nature. There, you'll find fortitude, for Ittidu, you're a daughter of the Moon’.
It's only now Ittidu recognises some familiarity to this prophecy. As if she'd heard it before in some story or rhyme of childhood. Ittidu makes herself as comfortable, cramped into a small vessel, with more fish piling up between herself and Mallah. Ittidu relaxes her muscles, and permits herself to gaze lazily across the silvers of lunar light reflecting in the ripples of black waters. Patterns begin to filter through half closed eyes. They hypnotise her. Demons lose strength. Shimmering silvers form the shapes of another world for her mind to comprehend. Lights dance into her being.
The wilds of Eagle Owl. Southern Britain
No longer is Ittidu on a reed boat, in the marshes of a far away Asia. Her new reality is an alien world. Here she staggers with tired, exhausted legs. Her body aches with stress. She’s hiking through a most bizarre place . Giant trees coated in moss and lichens, abound with wide trunks and octopus limbs. Their silhouette branches and twigs leafless, contrast against a sky neither dark and starry, nor blue. It's grey.
Leaves of pale green, golden brown, and yellow all carpet the floor, where her heavy, sore feet plough through, shuffling and crunching. These feet are clearly not those of Ittidu. The skin is dark, and the limb is long. She stoops forward. Reluctantly she is being forced to march.
Confused, Ittidu asks out loud, ‘Where are the marshes? Where is Uncle Mallah?’ Although from legend alone, she understands this chilly place is a forest.
What is it that presses down so heavily upon her back? Somehow she knows it to be the stinking hide of an animal she’s being forced to carry like a pack ox. She feels the burn of ropes. They cut into sore flesh. Her hands have been restrained from behind, and a noose has been placed around her neck. Ittidu tries desperately to make sense of all this. Something about this cold, grey world almost seems familiar. She halts her painful progress.
Ittidu understands. She’s no longer her own physical self. This isn't her own body, nor her own world. This strange, damp place full of trees and fallen leaves, this is the world of another. A voice sounds from inside of Ittidu’s head. it's not her own voice. The words are certainly foreign, although Ittidu comprehends,
Are you real? A simple question to which she immediately answers in thoughts, I am Ittidu, who are you? A reply arrives quickly from the other, Ittidu? The spirit friend of my childhood? It’s I, Ur’salla. The essences of the moon sisters entwine. The sting is brief when it arrives, and Ittidu feels it. She knows this violence has been done before. She becomes aware of sores over Ur’salla’s poor body. Rope burns and exposed flesh on her buttocks. She turns to face her assailant, and is confronted by a dark giant who grins mischievously through a partial beard of charcoal. A guilty birch in his mitt. The monster has not noticed Ur’salla’s eyes of blue, now shine hazel.
Ur’salla shares her rage with her other. The rope around her neck is tugged forward. She turns to face ahead, and Ittidu sees a scarred face scowling. In his savage tongue, he commands for her to resume her painful march. Ur’salla’s indignation grows so strong it acts to displace the spirit of Ittidu. The forest transforms.
Delta Marshes. SW Asia
The sounds of seabirds, the smell of the fish. Ittidu is back on her uncle’s narrow boat of reeds. Evening moon has been replaced by morning sunshine. She’s relieved to observe the blue sky of An.
It was all a dream. A surreal dream. That strange forest. Here she sees Uncle Mallah as he sings and paddles back along a familiar waterway, we must be going home. She thinks her exile is nearly over. Ittidu anticipates being reunited with her father. She'll tell him of her adventures far out in the watery marshes. A pile of fish decorate the centre of the craft. Her thoughts return to last night’s vivid dream of a cold leafless forest. Those dark wild men were so menacing. Ittidu adjusts posture to better sit up on the boat. it's as she does so, that she feels a burn across her buttocks. Ittidu allows a hand to wander beneath her sheepskin where her fingertips encounter the profoundly real, and sore weal of a birch rod.
Nammu’s Wharf. SW Asia
Mallah steers his boat towards the moorings of a river bank. Ittidu sees Aunt Hulla as she waves from land. Where is Ittidu’s father? Demons' thoughts return to torment. The reed craft bumps gently against the peaty soils of Nammu. Mallah throws a rope to his wife, and he prepares to disembark his passenger. This effort is stalled by Hulla, who cautions,
‘Husband, leave Ittidu on the boat for now. Bring your fish to me, and I shall deliver fresh water’.
Mallah sighs, then asks Ittidu to wait while he disembarks to talk to his wife. He follows Hulla’s instructions and takes with him only his catch. Together, the couple talk quietly so that Ittidu may not hear. This alarms her much further! She cannot stop herself demanding,
‘Please Aunt Hulla, where is my father? Why is he not here to greet me?’ The couple’s discreet conversation closes, Mallah strides over, and climbs back on the reed boat with Ittidu. She can see his features are grey. On the wharf, Aunt Hulla visibly cries as she unties the mooring. Mallah uses his pole to push away from the banks of Nammu.
Aunt Hulla shouts across to Ittidu, ‘Sweet child, you're like a daughter to us and this rips at my heart. You can’t return here. Keep well, and I'll pray to Nammu that she guards you’.
This statement confuses Ittidu. Where is her father? She turns towards Uncle Mallah, who’s exchanged the pole for his paddle. Ittidu begs of the fisherman, ‘Please Uncle. What has happened, where are you taking me?’.
He steers upriver, and soon, his wife has vanished behind more reed beds. Stony faced he doesn’t sing. Mallah is a thoughtful soul. Only once he has had the time to think, does he enlighten his distraught passenger,
‘Ittidu, no longer can you be a sweet child, for you must be a woman. Last night you braved the waters of the wild marshes, and you must brave a great flood. The Guruš who invaded our blessed commune have defied our gods. Led by a wicked citizen of Engur named Uguli, they've stolen the idol of Nammu, burned down her beautiful hall of reeds, and have enslaved our folk as the serfs of a temple estate. Ittidu, you’re no longer safe there, for they've delivered your father’s blessed soul to that of your late mother. Arrapu has been martyred’.
A deep wail erupts from poor Ittidu’s throat.
Babba's Wharf, SW Asia
It takes a few days for Mallah to deliver Ittidu to Babba. He explained, ‘Your father was aware of Uguli’s ill intent upon himself and had wisely taken measures for you to find sanctuary with your fiancé Dugala. His father can resist the probate of Engur. For their agents would wish to declare you as unwed property of Arrapu, and legally theirs to dispose of as they wish’.
On this day, they reach the wharfs of Babba. This settlement is set upon a series of marsh islands, surrounded by waterways. Although much smaller than either Engur, or its rising competitor at Anna, this township of Babba is no longer a mere village of the Eden. Here locals worship a sun god named Utu. I find it interesting that the effigy of this far away settlement is depicted as a hawk. Perhaps these citizens were once children of Mother Goshawk?
Boys run along the waterside, each lad competing for a fish or two as tip. He throws the rope and the boys scramble over one another until one victor emerges to tie the knot.
You might ask, how has poor nervous Ittidu coped with first losing her only parent, then being cast so far from her home? She’s no longer a sweet child. Those beads were broken. Her father’s spirit burns within as we shall see.
Right now, she expresses this determination to her Uncle, ‘Mallah, you need not escort myself through Babba. Dugala’s father is a proud citizen who wouldn't welcome a fisherman as my chaperone.’
She knows this to be a cruel thing to say. Aunt Hulla will be distraught and must need him home. Hulla wouldn't be safe in a village occupied by Engur’s agents. Mallah does not take offence. He guesses the thoughtful intent behind her words,
‘Bless you Ittidu, you truly are the daughter of Arrapu and Sidura. I know why you hasten my departure’. Together they hug and then part.
Trance-like, still stunned by her father’s brutal murder and by the devastation of her commune, Ittidu glides across a township of islands. Each connected by foot bridges woven from reed fibres. Her physical body feels numb to its own spirit. As if through the ears of others, she hears the chants of priests. Ittidu passes the sanctuary of the E-babba. House on Earth to the sun god called Utu. From these sounds, Ittidu imagines the priests kneeling on a rooftop terrace of the open plan temple. Their prayers urge on the passage of the celestial body. Ittidu crosses another rope bridge to reach the mainland, where the brick houses of farmers crowd along narrow streets. Ittidu turns a street corner to reach the more refined compounds of wealthier citizens.
Niginna, the father of Dugala, is the patriarch of one of the largest multi storey buildings in this district. While his tribe maintains their roots in the local barbarian peasantry, Niginna has accumulated private property of soils, pasture rights, herds and flocks. This new wealth he has further invested in the new caravans and to patronise temples for favour. The clan of Niginna prefers to be important in a smaller community swelling with the support of Engur. Enemies of Niginna proffer he is too mean to move to a pricey city.
A courtyard servant of the family, recognises Ittidu, approaching the entrance to its outer courtyard. This nervous man runs to alert a senior servant who has the dogs tethered. As this aloof servant approaches Ittidu sees disdain on his face. She becomes self conscious of her shabby appearance. She wears the same sheepskins she had worn whilst baking with Hulla, and here she is unexpected, dirty and unchaperoned.
The miserable servant grumbles, ‘Ittidu of Nammu we didn’t expect you to visit Dugala today.’
She shrugs off the thinly veiled criticism, and follows him through the courtyard where tethered guard dogs bark loudly, and into a reception room. As a primitive savage, in my own world, we’ve no rooms beyond the confines of a small den. Nevertheless, I’d expect such a space to be welcoming, and this room isn't. A sparse decor greets Ittidu in a vacuous space. A few meagre items of what you future folk would know as furniture, a low slung table of wicker, a few scattered cushions of fur, and then a grand throne of imported wood, intended for the sole use of the patriarch.
The unfriendly servant disappears into the darkness of other rooms, and following being left alone to wait in the cold room, the bent over figure of Niginna enters to join her. Poor Ittidu. In recent days she’s lost her family and her home. She has lost everything apart from the dirty skirt of sheepskin she wears. Here Ittidu must beg for asylum from this citizen. Niginna takes his throne, inviting Ittidu to kneel submissively at his feet. Dressed in conservative woven robes, he wears on his grey-bearded face the same disdain as his servant.
The patriarch groans, ‘I was unaware we were to receive you today. My son Dugala is out doing business. I trust your father is well?’ He raises a long eyebrow. Ittidu understands his real question is, why are you unchaperoned, and here alone in a dishevelled state?
Ittidu’s mask of bravery briefly slips to reveal grief. Her sobs break free. These she reigns in so she can relay all of the events of recent days, from her father’s pilgrimage to Engur, to her journey up the river.
A brief pause follows, as a large woman dressed in robes dark linen, enters with a beaker of water sweetened with dates. Her posture is submissive to the patriarch, but Ittidu recognises the woman as Dugala’s mother. Still holding her silence, the sad woman turns to leave the room, but halts, and produces a scrap of fabric which she hands to Ittidu, still kneeling on the floor,
‘For your tears child’ she bravely offers. Niginna shoots his wife a glance of displeasure, and obediently, she sweeps back out of the room.
He delivers his judgement on Ittidu’s situation, ‘You must leave this House. I don’t care for any association between our two families. You’re no longer welcome here in this house, nor in Babba. I don’t want you tarnishing the reputation of this tribe. Your father still owes a final payment on your dowry, and in its absence I cancel your engagement to marry my son’.
Ittidu reels back from this cruel callousness, from his lack of any compassion. Yet more follows,
‘I’d agreed for my son to be wed to a respectable daughter of a Sanga-en and priest-chieftain. Not to a vagrant spawn of a disgraced criminal who cursed in the House of Abzu. The House of Niginna is loyal to Uguli and to the priests of the E-engur’.
She has inherited the famous temper of her father. Ittidu rises up to her feet and as he backs into his throne, Ittidu wags an angry finger into this mean man's face,
‘Of the dowry he’s paid you? Do I leave this wretched house with a token of its value, so I can find shelter?’
Niginna rises up to his own withered legs, and barks in anger, ‘You dirty field tramp! How dare you talk rudely to your social better? The contract was broken by your heretic father, and its value is mine to forfeit. I suggest you run off to sell your stinking body to the beggars of Anna’s streets. In that city they honour a whore!’
In fury, Ittidu slaps his cold face.
He raises a hand to the rouge of her hand imprint, and screams, ‘Dugala, release the dogs onto this vile vagrant’.
Ittidu smirks when she sees the proboscis of her not-so-intended as he runs in to his father’s aid,
‘Away on business?’ she claps in victory. But she isn't willing to face more humiliation. Ittidu marches out of the dark room, and across the outer courtyard. There, Dugala desperately tries to unleash dogs.
He’s too late. Ittidu is on the streets of Babba where she turns to stomp further down the narrow alleyway next to Niginna’s compound. Ittidu has no home to go to, but she knows this way leads out of Babba.
A dark figure emerges out of a side entrance. Ittidu braces herself, but rather than insults, she hears the sympathetic voice of Dugala’s mother,
‘Please Ittidu. I’m sorry for how my family has mistreated you. I am saddened to hear of your loss. Your father was foolish to trust my husband. Take this basket. it's not much but all I could steal from the miser’.
Dugala’s mother thrusts the handle of a fat wicker basket into Ittidu’s empty hands. She lifts up a luxurious soft blanket, folded on top, to reveal food preserves. The compassionate woman retreats back to the shadows of a sad house. Before she disappears, the guardian angel utters a prayer,
‘You're well rid of my miserable tribe. May the spirits guide you to a more fruitful destiny’. Then she is gone.
Ittidu moves along the trail past the gardens of Babba. She follows this trail far from an unwelcome township, before reaching a fork in the route. Ittidu knows the left leads back to her home in Nammu’s marshes. A past to which she can never return. From this alone she concludes the trail to the right must lead towards her future. She hopes that will include more charitable communes in the north east. Not a swamp, nor to lion infested steppes. This refugee from a predatory temple estate, steps forward and turns right, striding to an unknown destiny.