religare
what is love if not friendship?
In the form of a wise, old baboon, Thoth climbs to the top of the stone platform to scream at the sky. To both mourn the temporary loss of his dear moon and welcome the radiance of this life-giving ball of fire.
He presses the Eye of Ra to his chest, and sighs out.
He has so many things he wishes to write, so many things to process, so many things to share with his acolytes. The never-ceasing work of digesting life spurs him on, but it also leaves him weary for his actual responsibilities are many. Sure, he could be replaced, he thinks. But as of right now, no one else has stepped up to the plate.
First and foremost, he’s Ra’s vizier and voice. That role is fun. And very demanding for he speaks Ra’s commands into existence. Navigates, counsels, and during the night, during the journey through the Duat, let’s just say — there’s no rest while Ra travels.
Then there are Horus and Seth. They’ve been at each other’s throats as far as he could remember. He suspects that they may even be in some sort of love, or lust, because that hate is too passionate for it to be mere repulsion. As their eternal mediator, he will arbitrate as well as document whatever happens at the perpetually reconvening tribunal of the gods. At this point it has become a sport for the rest of the Ennead — a diversion, hasn’t it? Almost as if they don’t want them to reconcile. Otherwise what else would excite them?
He even wonders if Seth is sick of his role as the villain. He can tell the constant antagonizing is wearing him thin. Seth tried escaping once. Fuck war, fuck the humans. He dug a hole deep in Deshret, the desert — his home, and refused to come out. Every time Isis called out for him, he dug even deeper. Anubis was eventually called to drag his stepfather out by his ankle back to the tribunal. There was more fun to be had, Ra had murmured once.
Ah right, lest he forget. Isis asked him to meet when the sun is at zenith. She has questions about resurrection magick, and he’s more than happy to help, to guide her through it. She was able to recover all the pieces of her man, all with the exception of his penis. Which a fish devoured. He can help her with making a replacement piece. Gold should work, a phallus fit for a king.
Sometimes though he feels like his bone marrow is being sucked dry. For at times, she pries into his personal life, and to him that is sacred and frankly irrelevant to what she’s trying to do. As if he didn’t have enough things to think about, he has to dodge queries too? Harmless but annoying. Not one for the desert, he still understands Seth’s impulse. Deeply.
So perhaps he’s in need of a good soak in the Nile. Yes. Tomorrow. At dawn. Just before Ra’s barque crests the horizon. The window for today has already passed, sadly. He must howl his hellos at the sun, and then promptly head to The Hall of Two Truths. Chip away at his infinitely long to-do list.
Or... perhaps today, he will go to her instead. Take off his ibis headpiece and lay his head on her lap as she strokes his long hair slowly. So slowly it lulls him to a state of not quite sleep, not quite wakefulness. His favorite state of being for there he floats suspended. Without the weight of executing mandates, regulating the cosmos, tolerating (and pacifying) bickering, nor stoking gossip. With her, talk is optional. The silence divine, her sparse speech wondrous.
They’d chat about many things.
Souls lost to the scale at the last moment.
She’d look at him. He’d know. And say “the stonemason from Waset?”
She’d nod her head, “a good son, father, husband... but the desperation for money corroded his heart. Slowly, but surely. It did.”
The man wasn’t even aware of his tragic condition until the heart on the scale dish thunked down. His face grew pallid. No paradise, no Field of Reeds, for him. Obliteration. Verdict, complete.
Tongue-in-cheek complaints about Ra’s insistence to take the same route every single night.
“The serpent and Ra battle it out literally on the same spot, every single night,” he’d share, “I suggested he change the course of the barque a khet or two. Ra laughed and ignored me.”
Ma’at would chuckle, “Ra will never give up on the theatrics. You know this.”
And she’d give him a wink.
Of isfet, chaos, almost winning, threatening the community of gods with utter devastation.
Of spells he’s working on, how he’s fascinated by such and such word.
How one of his devoted followers drawled erroneously at the end of a chant, and the spell went awry. So interesting, he’d muse.
Ma’at would arch her brow, “testing fate, I see.” Then give him a little laugh, “good thing you were there, huh?”
Sycamore figs and lotuses, newborn calves and hungry crocodiles.
Of temples and fields.
And sometimes, nothing said at all. Parallel play. She sits. He writes.
Or they both nap together, like cats.
Generate heat between sheets. Lie tangled, breathing.
Walk along the river hand in hand. Steal a kiss, slide his hand down her arm.
Revel in warmth, this companion so perfect.
Some people love the idea of you. Or what you can do for them, especially if you are particularly competent. They mine you for stories, entertainment, knowledge, labor. People can be greedy bottomless pits.
True love, real friendship, requires no interpreter. No translation. When the scales are unbalanced, whatever you give goes right over their heads, and whatever they give will never satisfy. Real love is mutual recognition. Being actually heard, boundaries respected. Someone who walks with you toward the better path without ever hoarding the wheel.
With her, he is known.