Chapter 50 - Enkidu
The Gardens of Engur. SW Asia
News reaches Agga and NinEriš’s tent that a delegation of citizens from the City of Engur, approach the war camp of the Moon Alliance. Agga is concerned,
‘They could include assassins or saboteurs, they might come here to spy’.
It is Ittidu who dispels this suspicion,
‘Until recently Agga, it was yourself who was suspected as being a spy. I gave you a chance to prove otherwise. Could we not gracefully greet a few of these unarmed citizens?’
NinEriš chuckles at Ittidu’s nerve, and Agga bows to Ittidu’s cleverness. He instructs the guards to permit a few peaceful delegates through. When they arrive, they’re led by a short, wide spokeswoman wearing a goatskin waistcoat, and a sash of colourful fabric around her convex waist. This citizen of Engur sees them, and lurches forward. Agga braces for an attack, but rather than any violence, this woman grabs Ittidu, exclaiming,
‘Ittidu my dear, Don’t you remember Aunt Babatu? You were so small when I last saw you with your father’.
Memories of a loud rotund merchant woman of Engur resonate in Ittidu’s distant memories. She waves away guardsmen who have stepped forward to defend their princess from this assassin. Ittidu announces,
‘Babatu is an old family friend. An acquaintance of my late father, and no ally of Uguli’.
The spokeswoman says, ‘I was heartbroken when I heard of your father’s murder by that heinous tyrant. We know of your victory at Babba, and Arrapu’s little girl had been hailed as Abzu’s new bride. Ittidu, the citizens of Engur would support your nomination. Your father was much loved here by the citizens. We’ve heard how the gods intervened to save you from the Lion, and of your fight in battle’.
The merchant woman releases her iron grip, to tell the generals,
‘Listen, I’m no soldier of the E-engur, and neither are the citizens who have journeyed out of the City along with myself. We’re not supporters of Uguli. Our sanctuary has been sorrowfully corrupted. All we wish for is to leave the City unscathed as refugees from war’.
Agga intervenes with a question, ‘What can you tell us of the mood within the sanctuary?’
‘The fall of Babba has driven Uguli insane with despair. He’s tasked magicians to summon the demon of the mound. A wild beast they call Enki-du. This terrible demon they intend to unleash in tomorrow’s battle’.
The high priestess, sangas and Ittidu confer. They grant permission for the refugees to escape the war. The legend of Ittidu the merciful spreads.
The Enkidu
Battle lines have once more been drawn, these around the gardens of Engur. The men of the Moon Alliance’s guruš have freshly shorn their beards, and have painted their features with charcoal. Spearheads salute the morning sky. The Army of the Alliance has grown to include volunteers from Babba itself, humbled by Ittidu’s grace. The entire plain has turned against Uguli.
The defenders of Engur spill over a causeway crossing the lagoon of Abzu. This water acts as a defensive moat for the city beyond. Agga and his generals assess their enemy. They are joyful. NinEriš suggests,
‘Our divine alliance outnumbers Engur’s by three to one. This war shall soon be over, and the tyrant’s regency displaced by the fair rule of NinIttidu the lion slayer’.
Agga gleefully adds, ‘It is as Babatu said, Uguli commands little support among the populace of Engur. He can’t muster a real army’.
The Army of the Moon Alliance has learned lessons from the Battle of Babba. Today, Ittidu wears more practical clothes to fight in. A simple leather skirt, free of a cape to be pulled by the enemy. A sharp bone holds her long hair in a bun. She retains her leopard skin shield, proven to be lethal, and has chosen a spear as her primary weapon.
NinEriš stands by Ittidu’s side. She wears her same black leather straps, ornamented by rivets of copper. Her ceremonial mace has been replaced with a more practical bludgeon embedded with sharp siliceous blades.
On the orders of Agga, a call is sounded for ranks to move forward. They intend to meet the defenders in the wheat gardens of Engur. A black faced mass marches forward, copper-tipped spears proudly held forth. This battle should be swift. Horns are blown as drums roll. The citizen-soldiers roar as they descend onto fresh fields where stubble remains tall.
Defenders stampede angered bulls over gangways into these gardens. This bovine resistance is more illusionary than practical. The bulls merely provide sport for the archers and spearmen of the Alliance. The defenders withdraw their gangways, and from behind irrigation ditches, jeer insults at the attackers. Some begin to release slingshots and arrows. Strings are pulled and stones fly whizz through the air.
The two princesses of the Alliance enter this excitement. For this battle they refuse to be carried on the shoulders of others. They march side by side with their supporters. Gangs carrying pontoons run towards frontline ditches. Agga and his generals have learned from the Battle of Babba. Men with long spears guard these gangs as they lay them to bridge Engur’s defences. Dismay paints faces of the defenders when they fail to prevent these breaches. The citizen-soldiers of the Alliance fight their way onto the banksides of their enemies. Some, in this excitement, bypass the bridges to sprint down and up the sides of the now poorly defended ditches.
Engur’s defenses collapse. More aggressors enter their gardens to stab and to cudgel in hand to hand combat. Two Amazons cross one bridgeway and rapidly engage in this fierce fighting. The first defender to come for Ittidu is a strong woman of Engur. The banshee’s face is enraged, as she proves herself capable with a shield, blocking Ittidu’s attacks. The woman lands a few blows of her shield into Ittidu’s chest, who responds by dropping down her cumbersome spear, to pull out a stone dagger from her skirt belt. Her opponent shouts,
‘Bitch-whore of Anna’ and then swings a stone hammer at her face. Ittidu tilts back to narrowly avoid its deadly blow. She bounces back with a counter attack of her own, leaping into the air to land a deadly kick into the woman’s screwed up face. This she executes by her own new found strength, and through her training by NinEriš. Ittidu strikes forward with her dagger. It slashes the forearm of her opponent who drops her hammer. Ittidu follows this by hitting her hard with her leopard shield. The banshee collapses back, and Ittidu is on her, plunging her dagger into the woman’s throat. Blood spurts all over Ittidu’s frontage. She wipes it from her eyes.
The woman defeated, Ittidu rises to find her spear, and searches for NinEriš, where has the high priestess gone? She spots her mentor, driven further away, swinging her new bludgeon. Ittidu sees the resolve of the enemy is poor. Already some cowards of Engur flee back to their causeway, where a column of better organised soldiers are stationed around the banners of Uguli. The tyrant has chosen to make the entry point to the City his last stand. Ittidu wants to reach him first, and it's in that direction she continues to fight.
Black-faced guruš around her, see intent, and form a vanguard around their heroine. Their spears jab and swipe at any foe who comes within reach, as Ittidu moves towards Engur’s gateway.
Something extraordinary occurs. From the waters of the lagoon, a new, invisible force emerges to enter the wheat gardens. Even though the fighters cannot see this danger, they feel its wrath. Like a tornado, it casts the bodies of attackers and defenders alike to the side. Its slaughter is indiscriminate, for this unseen monster only cares to kill, as it winds its way towards Ittidu. From one edge of the battlefield, NinEriš sees this demon, but she is too far away in combat to help. She screams out in the direction of her friend,
‘Ittidu, beware, for Enki-du is here for you!’
The lion-slayer doesn’t need this introduction. Unlike the other combatants in these gardens, she sees this monster in form. A mammoth sized beast man, covered in hair. Longhorns sprout from a wide forehead. Erect on two legs that are the hindquarters of the bull. Ittidu has seen him before in visions. She knows this demon has been sent to deliver her to the Underworld. This is her final test, set by the gods. She requires Ur’salla’s strength and skill. Yet she feels no familiarity of possession. Ittidu watches in horror as the demon approaches, swiping away the citizen-soldiers who remain between them. Her fortitude is breaking, and she thinks,
How can a mere mortal young woman possibly defeat such a savage ghost?
The black headed warriors of an Alliance are confused by an enemy they cannot even see. Ittidu sees Enki-du carries with him no shield, but waves a wide dagger of black stone in one hand, and a war club in the other. She watches him swipe away three large men with one wave of that monstrous club, and decapitate a fourth with his dagger. The monster reaches the outer perimeters of Ittidu’s vanguard. He presents his horns to toss a few victims into the air. Ittidu screams out to those loyal guards who remain,
‘Run and leave me to fight this demon alone. This need not be your fate. It is mine alone’.
Maybe this concern for her men impresses some god. It's following this declaration, that a second ghost enters the affray. This ghost, invisible to all but Ittidu, appears as a tall, dark skinned savage woman with startling eyes of blue. She holds the long wooden javelin of a huntress in her hand. Ittidu cries out,
‘Ur’salla, my sister of the Moon’. Ittidu understands. She has been granted a wild defender to aid her in this fight with a wild demon. Ur’salla’s ghost glances at her, and in a foreign tongue, shouts words that Ittidu comprehends,
‘Together we battle against this beast. We fight as Moon sisters, not as one but as two’.
Enki-du glowers at the two Moon sisters and bellows. This roar is heard by all. He lowers his horns first at Ur’salla, and launches his great thundering charge. Born to wild children, Ur’salla is a skilled dancer of bulls. At the last moment she leaps to the side and rolls out of his way. Enki-du misses his target only to crash into unfortunate bystanders. Not unscathed, because as she leapt aside, Ur’salla had spiked her wooden javelin, painfully hamstringing the demon in a thigh.
Enki-du turns, hobbling in obvious injury as he turns on Ittidu. She throws her spear at the monster. It pierces him in a side and he bellows in damage. Ur’salla is fast. She jumps back into the game, running over to rip out the spear. He swings his horns and she ducks beneath their arc. Blood spills from an open wound. Ittidu sees this, and loudly exclaims,
‘This devil bleeds just like any mortal. Let’s finish him and feast on beef’. Fluffed with pride she isn't ready when angered by her slur, Enki-du charges. Ur’salla perceives this and shouts to her moon sister,
‘Ittidu, use your shield to block.’ Ur’salla lands a broadside kick into Enki-du’s ribs, to give Ittidu time to prepare a defence. Enki-du groans in pain, but is determined to resume his attack on Ittidu. He lowers his great horns, and waves his black blade.
The lion slayer pulls her own stone dagger free and raises her shield as she crouches down on one knee, bracing for the heavy impact of this huge beast. At the last moment as Enki-du arrives, Ittidu plunges her own blade forward. Enki-du sees this move, and swerves in avoidance. He rolls over onto her, crushing the leopard skin shield, and knocking Ittidu to fall beneath his leviathan weight.
Ur’salla makes a fresh attack onto the fallen monster. She stabs at him with her javelin, releasing more blood. Enki-du wails, but he isn't vanquished. He manages to climb back up onto his hoofed feet, picks Ur’salla up and throws her aside.
Ittidu feels crushed, but she peels herself up, and restores her defensive pose with her shield. She cannot find her own dagger. Enki-du charges, horns lowered. Death would appear certain.
At the last moment. Just as the horn is about to meet with the ripped leopard skin of her shield, Ittidu moves like lightning. She pulls the bone needle to allow her hair to fall. With this she stabs Enki-du in a bovine eye. She finds his weakness. As the orb punctures, this monster loses its ghost. It dissolves into the air. Ittidu sees Ur’salla smile, before her own ghost vanishes into the air.
It‘s over, the Moon sisters defeated Enki-du. She rises up to survey an astonished crowd of citizen-soldiers. The last of the defenders have run from the gardens. All who remain are a few loyalists on the causeway around Uguli’s banner. Admirers rush to surround her. Ittidu has passed a test set by the gods, and can enter the city to claim her office as bride of Abzu, chieftain of Engur.
The crowd of supporters press against her. A warm glow spreads throughout her body, this followed by a painful cramp in her back. A deep, stabbing sensation replaces the glow. She sees horror fall across the faces of the citizen-soldiers who rush to congratulate her. Hands reach out to catch Ittidu as she falls. She doesn’t yet understand they see the bone handled stone dagger that has been plunged into her back.
Insanity twists Merkar’s face when he pulls back the hood of his priest’s cloak. His mad grin further outrages the soldiers. They seize hold of Merkar, and beat down on the cowardly assailant. Fists and feet fall on Merkar’s body as he wriggles in the stubble like an injured snake. He laughs until his heart is ripped out by the mob.
These executioners had failed to see the real murderer, sneaking away. Šamkat covers her face as she swiftly moves from her crime.
Ittidu is cradled in the arms of so many citizens. They openly weep and they beg her spirit to remain with them. Ittidu coughs up blood and chokes. A darkness descends. She knew this would arrive. It had been foretold. A small distant light, a distant moon appears. A life for a life had been her deal with the spirit.
She experiences the comforting heartbeat of a mother.