Dsrt laughed with the sheer power in her veins. She lashed her whip out, catching onto the wooden rail of the little river dock, pulling herself over in an inhuman flight to land on one foot and one knee. Not on the dock. On the mud just next to the dock, she hadn't quite got her aim right yet. Mud splattered onto her face and her wings, staining the latter. It might have worried her before now, that sense of imperfection, of being seen to be not enough. But it no longer mattered. She wiped the mud from her eyes, invisible stain against her deep black skin, and laughed again. She could run and leap so high, so wild, it hurt with joy. Nearby, a small child stood frozen in surprise, ball held about to throw, but as Dsrt laughed, they laughed with her. The little child ran forward to hug her, knocking Dsrt back off her heel and into the mud. More splatters flew. So did the ball, into the water, floating out of reach. Dsrt grinned at the child. "I know how to make a new ball". She looked around and selected a stand of reeds dying back, small and thin and dry. Her whip flashed back and forth faster than the eye could see, cutting through the reeds and shredding them into tiny pieces. The pieces fell in a cloud, and her whip pulled them together into a tight clump. It was... it was magic. She ripped off a small piece of her wrap-around and pressed the reeds into it, tying it tightly, then tossed it to the small child. They reached and caught it, looking at the ball in awe.
"Nice work", a voice purred behind her. She spun, startled. A man stood there, black pleated skirt wrapped around his legs from his hips to his knees, black headscarf held loosely away from his face by two black cat ears tucked into his hair. "Kmt", she said without inflection. The black mask disguised the details of his face, but she recognised his red hair. And that purr.
"Dsrt", he replied, equally inflectionless. And then... smirked at her. "I see you are destroying the river bank today."
She glanced reflexively at the ball, then pretended she didn't.
"No need to fret. I can rebuild it." He lifted his staff and did something to its middle. It came apart into two smaller pieces, joined together with a loop of cord into an A-shape. He took the hoe and lifted black earth back around the base of the first clump reeds, building a small mound around them. After a moment he looked back over his shoulder at her. "Would you bring them water?" She must have looked blank for a moment – she was no shaduf – because he nodded towards her spinning top. After a moment she worked out what he meant, and nodded. He went back to mounding earth with his hoe. She touched the end of her whip to the top and it wound around it effortlessly. She flicked the top towards the water, and its spin brought the water up into a spout. A drag of her whip, and the water spout landed gently amongst the clump of reeds. They worked together that way for a few minutes, him hoeing up the earth into mounds around each shredded clump, her bringing a small spout of water up to the mound. It was surprisingly comfortable to be in his presence, not what she'd expected from Kmt at all. The way they worked together... made sense.
Finally they finished the last clump. He sat back on his heels with a sigh, reaching along his hoe to adjust it back into a staff – and Dsrt hit him in the face with one last water spout. He fell backwards, spluttering. Dsrt just laughed. Kmt stood up, shaking himself. His expression was very much that of a disgusted cat. She bent over with more laughter, and he took advantage of her distraction to swiftly steal in by her side and wipe his face with her headscarf. She pulled it back from his hands with a mock-angry cry, then blinked. They were standing very close, and suddenly they both realised it. He reached to her face, touching it gently. "You are also beautiful as Dsrt", he said quietly, and then turned her face with a finger towards the reeds. "Look". As they watched, new reeds sprang out of the mounds, climbing up towards the sky. Soon the clumps of reeds were there as if they had never been gone. "We work together well", he said with a tinge of awe. Dsrt felt it too. She thought she might never get used to the magic of this, and it seemed he felt the same. That is, right up until he stuck his staff between her feet and twisted, so that she stumbled into the mud. Before she could right herself, he dashed back towards the streets of the town.
Of course, she chased him. But only until the first big street. Then decorum returned, and she lost him in the crowd. As she should.
"She was creative", Marinette mused. "I'd not have thought to have used a whip like that. Or a spinning top".
"You're also very creative, and you use your yoyo in a range of ways she might never have thought of", Tikki replied.
"I'm confused though", Marinette said. "If Kmt has the same kwami as Chat Noir, then shouldn't his power be that of destruction? How did the reeds grow?"
Tikki smiled. "The new reeds were already there, waiting to grow. All they needed was the old reeds to be broken away to make room for them, and the new earth to take hold in. Kmt broke away the old reeds with his hoe. And he built mounds, but hoed the earth to do so. The people who lived on the floodplains of the Nile understood better than most that creation and destruction are closely linked." She looked at Marinette, who was still puzzled, and grinned cheekily. "Think of it this way. What if Chat Noir made a hole? Is that creation or destruction?"
It was the day of the Dance. At the noon meal, Henuttawy took Tikki's earrings from Senseneb with a shout of glee. In the afternoon, Tentopet, Dakarai and Mashanksse carried several sacks across the town to the house of the tomb decorator Qen.
Qen's head servant met them at the door and led them up to the flat roof. Dakarai recognised the roof – it was one of the highest in town. She'd watched the sun set and the new day begin from here just a few weeks before. This time, it wasn't empty. A low table had been carried up. Two black-scarved temple priests were already there, laying out covered dishes on the table. Tentopet walked up next to them, put down her sack and began getting out its contents. "Hey, Gabrielophorou. How've you been?"
The black-scarf next to her grinned. "Good to see you, Tentopet. I take it you're not Dancing this year?"
"Roster didn't work out that way. You neither I take it?" She looked over at Dakarai and Mashanksse, standing still in shock. "Hey, relax you two. We're the opposites of the followers of Kmt, but we're not their sworn enemies. That's just an idea that folk got in their heads. Come help set up." She looked at Mashanksse, and followed his gaze to the second black-scarf, then nudged Gabrielophorou. "Hey Gabe, introduce us to your hot friend."
Gabrielophorou kept unpacking as he answered. "This is Ngeshshadena. He's from the coast." He glanced up in time to catch the look that Mashanksse and Ngeshshadena were giving each other, then grinned. "I see I should mention something to the roster-makers."
"I will if you will", Tentopet replied. "Dakarai, bring over your stuff".
Dakarai squatted down and began pulling out containers. "Date bread, honey bread... an aseb board?" She looked at Tentopet, puzzled. The older woman just smiled. "Sometimes the Dance takes a while." Dakarai lifted the lids of some of the other containers to see what was there. She found dried fish in horseradish oil, lentils with sesame, fresh figs and... soured clotted cream? She put the lid back on that container quickly, waving the scent from her nose. Gabrielophorou laughed. "Not my favourite either, young one. But the Beloved Manifest has a particular liking for it." Mashanksse put out a closed pitcher of barley beer and cups, then a small basket of fresh flat carob pods next to them. "That's all of mine," he said. Tentopet smiled again. "We can stay a few minutes if you want to chat to these guys. The nice thing about this roof, besides the height, is that Qen's wall is just high enough that nobody below can see us when we sit or lie down like this." She stretched out next to Gabrielophorou, who draped an arm across her, and closed her eyes. "What happens on the roof, stays on the roof." Mashanksse sat down next to Ngeshshadena, who was giving him a look both bold and shy. Neither seemed displeased by the proximity.
Returning, they were three streets away from their own temple when Tentopet stiffened, looking ahead. "Oh no, not good". Henuttawy was limping down the street, attempting to hold herself steady with a long stick. The other three raced to catch her up.
"What happened?" Dakarai asked.
"Oh, the silliest thing. I slipped as I was walking through the market," Henuttawy said.
"Walking?" asked Tentopet drily as she slipped her shoulder under Henuttawy's arm.
"Well, I might have been skipping. Or running. I'm not sure." Henuttawy had the grace to look a little embarrassed. Mashanksse just laughed. "Henuttawy, I don't think I've ever seen you walk when you could be doing any other thing."
Dakarai caught sight of Tikki, hidden in the folds of Henuttawy's scarf. The Beloved Manifest was giggling too. Dakarai lowered her voice for the next question so as not to be overheard. "But the markets are several streets away, and you can barely walk. Why didn't you transform, and let Tikki help get you home?"
Henuttawy smiled. "It's something you new ones haven't learnt yet. On the Day of the Dance, we don't transform until the Ritual begins. Tikki needs to be at full strength. Besides, it was my own fault." She sighed. "I'm just disappointed. Being Dsrt for the Dance is... well, it's amazing. I was really looking forward to it. That's why I went out for a walk – I couldn't sit still. And then I ran into Meritamen..." She trailed off, blushing. Tentopet stopped walking. "Meritamen Meritamen? The black scarf?"
Henuttawy nodded. Dakarai could barely hear her whisper "She's so cute!"
"But was she..."
"I think so. She was smiling, and she said she'd see me tonight. I think she was going to be Kmt."
Tentopet was still standing stopped in the street. "Was? Henuttawy, what did you do?"
"Um... well, when I slipped I might have grabbed onto a hanging carpet, which pulled down a clothesline, which knocked a pot over, which made a bread boy lose balance and tip his tray, which sent a pile of flatbread all over her face, so she couldn't see, and then she fell too..."
Tentopet's mouth was hanging open like she wanted to say something, but no words were coming out. Finally she pulled herself together with an almost audible snap, and started shuffling along again under Henuttawy's weight. All she said though was "We need to tell Merytre about this. Immediately."
Merytre looked almost as startled as Tentopet had, when they were safely inside the temple complex and away from the eyes of the streets and could tell her what had happened. Senseneb couldn't stop laughing. Henuttawy was pouting at her, which made Senseneb laugh even more. Finally Merytre said "Enough." She looked around at the gathered guardians. "Some of you know what this means, so I will explain it to the rest of you." They grew still to listen. "Dsrt is the representative of bad luck. Kmt is the representative of good luck. But truthfully, neither is bad or good. They are both Luck.
"Henuttawy cannot dance tonight. That is her bad luck. But it is good luck for someone else, who will be chosen in her place. Always it is both, together and entwined. There is always a Great Balance. Luck is the thing that sends the balance askew, so that we find a foothold to live and grow within the great unchanging Eternity. It is the force that shakes the lives we live just as the flood stirs up the river and keeps it from stagnation. When the two Great Gods of Luck join as one, great things can happen." She let her voice drop out of lecture-mode and looked at the newest three. "In practical terms, what this means is we're going to roll a die to see who dances. Normally I'd just go by the roster, but if both the planned Kmt and Dsrt have been taken out of play, then something bigger is going on here." She looked at Tikki enquiringly. Tikki just shrugged. "Wasn't me".
Merytre nodded. "OK. Pairs first, then each pair can roll for highest." She pointed at each of the guardians in twos, saying "One, two, three, four", and rolled her four-sided cylinder. It came up a three – Dakarai and Pensekhmet. Pensekhmet tossed the cylinder in his hand once, then rolled it across the table saying "As the Beloved wishes". He winked at Tikki, then jumped back with a surprised howl as he saw the die stop on "1". Several of the others laughed, and after a moment so did Pensekhmet. "Best out of three?" he said, smiling, as he scooped up the die and handed it to Dakarai. Dakarai let the die fall from her fingers.
It rolled across the table, and stopped on the number 4.
Merytre clapped her on the shoulder. "It's you then. Tonight you are the red winds of Dsrt, and apparently also the thorn in the side of Shai who plans all things as they will be. Come with me, and we'll talk a little about the Ritual so you have more idea what you need to do."
It was an hour before sunset. Dakarai stood alone on the temple roof – alone except for Tikki, perched on her shoulder.
"Are you ready?" Tikki asked.
Dakarai looked out at the lowering sun. Only a few minutes until the Ritual of the Dance began. A thought struck her.
"I know what it is", she said.
"What what is?"
"What I want you to say to me", Dakarai said quietly.
"What do you want me to say?" Tikki said, just as quietly.
"Trust me".
There was a pause, then Tikki flew up in front of Dakarai's face and looked her in the eyes. "Don't you want me to explain anything else? Or tell you more about how it goes? I should be earning your trust, not commanding it."
"No. I don't need that. I trust you no matter how it goes. But I want you to say it, so that I know you know it and I know it."
The little red kwami looked shocked, but then slowly she smiled, nodding. She flew to Dakarai's forehead and rubbed her own against it. "Trust me", she said firmly.
Dakarai smiled. "I do.". She raised one arm to the sky, to the sun a handswidth above the horizon. "Hesty merty!"
Just outside the market, Dsrt landed hard on both feet, dust puffing out from underneath. "KMT!", she yelled. "SHALL WE DANCE?" Her voice was ferocious, wild, joyous... unstoppable. Like the red winds that tore down houses thought safe inside the town. The people at the market's entrance scattered out of her way, and the nearest stallholders began to quickly put away any stock they valued highly. Dsrt grinned, and began running through the market. Up over benches, around poles, leaping over piles of carpets and sometimes over the lines that they hung from. People leaned out of her way, careful not to touch the force of bad luck as it flew past, and they called her name loudly. She could hear elsewhere in the market a similar crowd of people calling the name of Kmt, and she steered away from that direction. No need to find each other too soon, Merytre had said. The people need to see you.
She left the market and swung up to a nearby roof. An old lady was there, setting out figs to dry in the sun. The lady squeaked her name as Dsrt ran along the roof's low wall and leapt out into nothing. Behind her, she heard the sound of Kmt coming nearer. She ducked into an alley, one she knew had more than one exit. Especially if you didn't mind taking a short-cut through the courtyard of the middle house. She leapt and spun in mid-air in the centre of the courtyard, whip flicking around her with a crack. Two men sat up from their mats, senet game forgotten, and shutters above pulled closed. From each she heard her name echoed, and echoed again.
The street beyond was quieter than usual, and some children had started a game of ball-stick using two wooden boxes as makeshift goals. Dsrt grabbed a pole from a nearby clothesline, letting the clothes fall into the dirt. She leapt into the middle of the game, slashing at the ball to the resounding cheers of the children. Her enhanced speed let her move around them as if they were standing still, and the ball went straight into the goal. She retrieved it and threw it back into the middle of the game – only to see it intercepted by a black blur. The blur stilled inhumanly quickly, resolving into a black-clad, black-masked man with red hair and cat ears, with the tip of his staff on the ball. The children screeched with sheer enthusiasm to see Kmt facing her down in the very middle of their game.
He cocked an eyebrow at her. "Shall we dance, Beloved?"
It was the traditional greeting.
She couldn't bring herself to speak it. The word felt foreign in her mouth. Yet every part of her yearned to know this man better. Even knowing that this was part of the Ritual of the Dance, the strength of the feeling still took her by surprise.
She mastered her tongue long enough to say "Only if you can stop me scoring". His eyes glinted, and she knew it was on.
The two of them weaved back and forth, passing the ball to one or another child and receiving it back, slashing at each other's sticks up and down the length of the makeshift court. She managed to send the ball through his legs. He almost over-balanced, and as she sped past him she murmured "Payback". When he passed her next, he murmured "But this ball's not nearly as good as yours". She hesitated for just a moment, caught by his words, and the ball sped past her into the goal. The children cheered, even those supposedly on Dsrt's team. Everyone wanted to see Kmt win. Dsrt gave him a half-bow, and leapt away. The chase was on.
They chased each other across rooftops and through courtyards, along streets and over canals. He balanced on top of a well; she struck out with her whip and nearly knocked him in. She raced for a ladder to a rooftop; he pulled it away with his staff as she climbed. But slowly, slowly, the chase became a circling around each other. What began as a challenge and had continued as a competition, slowly became a sharing. He reached for a ladder; she pushed it closer to him. She leapt onto the low wall around a roof; he leapt onto the parallel wall. They both leapt from the roof together. Red and black flew around each other and away, and then back to a centre again. If the two dancers had forgotten that the black dancer wore red and the red dancer wore black, not all the many watchers missed it. Nor did they miss the drawing together, the way that Dsrt and Kmt danced synchronised through the air and the streets as if they'd danced this way forever, knowing each other absolutely. Which they had, these gods from before time. The symmetry formed, broke and formed again across all of the town, and the people watched, called, cheered. Until finally they met in mid-air, each coming in one giant leap towards the other, colliding high above at the exact moment the setting sun touched the horizon... and plummeting down onto a rooftop. The crowds of people who'd followed the dance craned and peered, but none could see where they'd fallen.
"Ouch", said Marinette.
"Yeah", said Tikki, "that's what she said."
"Hesty merty", they groaned in unison. The costumes of Kmt and Dsrt disappeared, and their two kwamis rushed away to meet each other, squealing and chirping and purring.
He grinned at her, both lying on the roof, hidden by the low wall. "That was fun, Beloved".
The word still sounded strange to her, but not as much as before. She grinned back. "I think they'll be a while", she said, and they both glanced upwards at their two kwamis, who floated twirling and caressing in a deep embrace. Had they seen it, the same fond smile was on their faces.
"Well, that's pretty much the entire point of this ritual", he said. "Tikki and Plagg get to be together for a little."
"This is all for them?"
He looked at her, surprised. "Yes. Don't they deserve it?" There was unfeigned affection in his voice, and she found herself smiling and nodding in agreement.
His eyes roamed her, turning deep and dark. "We get to spend time with our opposites too".
She let his unspoken offer pass unremarked and gestured to the small table. "Care for a game or three of aseb while we wait?"
He smirked at her and picked up a ripe fig. "Sure. Are we playing for any stakes?"
She smirked back, mimicking his expression and tone. "Sure. Winner gets to give the other a kiss."
His breath hitched. "Do I get to choose where I kiss you?"
Dakarai laughed loudly. "So sure that you're going to win?" She took the fig from his hand, bit into it and handed it back. "I'll let you have the first move, and I'll still beat you. Beloved."
Some hours later, under the moonlight and in the warm winds, two exhausted kwamis lay snuggled up to each other on a low table. Nearby, their holders also lay sleeping, limbs tangled in a trusting embrace.
Marinette smiled at Tikki, and lifted her up so that they could rub foreheads. "It seems like a lot of effort to go to just to hang out", she smiled.
"It had more purposes than that", Tikki admitted. "But that was always the best part for me". The little kwami had a distant look on her face, and Marinette guessed she was thinking of her partner.
"I still have one question though", she said, interrupting the kwami's thoughts. "You were telling me this story because somebody taught you something. Why this Dance, out of all the dances?"
Tikki smiled. "More than two hundred Dances, with nearly as many holders. Most of them I don't remember very well. It was a long time ago. But this one I do, because of Dakarai." The little red sprite giggled to herself. "Dakarai's greatest strength was her trust. I had spent a long time being very careful with each new holder. She had every reason to hesitate, many times over. But she never did when it came to trusting her partner. Whether it was me, another of my holders, or one of Plagg's holders. She taught me that I could take that leap of trust without second-guessing. Because really it was about whether I trusted myself."
Marinette thought for a moment of Chat. Tikki recognised the smile on her face, and smirked to herself. Some holders needed to learn that lesson too. On that note...
"So, Marinette, should we go out for a while?" She carefully avoided mentioning Chat, leaving it to Marinette to connect the dots.
Marinette refocused from the distance she'd been staring into, and looked at Tikki with excitement. "Will you let me try a different outfit?"
Nope, dots not connected. Tikki suppressed a groan.
Marinette jumped to her feet and climbed up to her balcony. With an impish grin at her kwami, she struck a pose and called out "Hesty merty!" Tikki had just a moment to smile before she was pulled into the earrings. A pink light surrounded Marinette, moving across her body. Her jeans disappeared and were replaced with a pleated wrap of almost-sheer red linen, reaching to her knees. A red headscarf appeared, trailing down her back like wings. A whip and spinning top sat at her hip where her yoyo normally was. She looked like she'd stepped straight out of a papyrus scroll. There was just one problem.
"Hesty merty!"
The pink light surrounded her, and she detransformed.
"What's wrong, Marinette?" Tikki giggled. She knew very well what the problem was.
"The outfit! It, um..." and there was a silence. "I, uh.. don't think I could wear that in front of Chat Noir."
"Well, it was a much hotter climate in the New Kingdom than here."
"You're telling me. I'm getting a jacket. And some hot chocolate. Want some?"
"With cookies?"
"For you? Always, Beloved."
A/N: There will be more adventures throughout time and space , but not for a while :-) I have some ideas – I actually started one set in Tillya Tepe / the Silk Road first, before deciding to join the legions and finish this instead – and I'll usually post up an entire arc at once regardless of how many chapters it ends up being. Historical fics take a while for me to write because I get really nerdy about the little details despite MLB being a show that's more about impressions and "feeling" true than what's actually true. On that note I need to apologise for Gabrielophorou. It's a real name from that region of the world, like the others I've used, but as best I can tell I'm using it one if not two thousand years before its actual time. I just loved it too much to leave it out :-)