I stood defiant as I faced the god. She towered above me, her cow shaped head spewing steam out of her nose. Her eyes were red and glowing with an ominous glow. With a voice that shook the air and my very soul she spoke, “What have you done!”
Sticking my chin up and not bowing in the face of my potential destruction I decided what to say. “She drove me to it. She pushed too far and had to pay the price that it entailed. In the end I know it was a bad idea what I did. But she won’t challenge me again.”
“Won’t challenge you… She was to be your teacher. To prepare you for the greater world. I worked with her patron for this to happen and you pissed it away like some petulant child!” A hand the size of a boulder wrapped around me and felt as if it was crushing me with a squeeze of her fingers. “For what? A man you barely care for? For pride?”
I felt the pressure in my skull build to bursting as I grunted, “He is all I have. She was going to take him.”
“She wasn’t thinking straight, you idiot. You don’t know what it feels like to be in a breeding week. You just hit maturity. To give up your chance to bear children during it is near impossible!” I was lifted into the air up so high that the field of reeds seemed to stretch to the bending horizon. The air was thin and I could barely breathe between the crushing and atmosphere. “For all you know she would have honored it when the week was over. But your pride ruined everything!”
“What am I without pride?” I wheezed. “What do I stand for if not for myself. You ask me to be trampled upon, and I won’t let that happen.”
The world blurred as I was slammed into the earth cratering the dirt. I couldn’t see, think, the world spun and rang around me as a hoof placed itself on my chest. Hathor was no longer a towering form but one maybe twice the size of a normal person. “You’re supposed to stand for the causes that I decide! You disobey the very God that lets you ascend past what a mortal can accomplish! I should strip you of the power I have given you and let you fester in weakness for eternity. You’ll never be able to be strong enough to defeat your mother, the avatar of Montu.”
“What does it matter?” I croaked, thoughts of Melokuhle and being stripped of my home flooded my mind.
“Something is coming. Thoth sees the lands of us Gods failing in the future. The gods of darkness and blood will run wild and bring forth destruction to the lands. Those of us that value the lives of the people in the Savannah need someone to bring peace, to bring a new kind of strength to the land and usher everyone into a new era of prosperity! Each of us has out candidates and you may have just ruined two of them!” The hoof pressed down and I could feel my body strain against it. Trying not to give way and let my life be extinguished.
“She would have been no leader…” I barely got out. I couldn’t breathe in to continue. I pressed my arms against the hoof and struggled. But I couldn’t push a mountain, less so a God.
“How would you know? You cannot take the measure of anyone around you. You trample on the hearts of others like they are grass beneath your feet.” The pressure lessened to let me talk.
“She broke her word, whether or not her mind was altered she said she would not take him yet that is what she planned. Her people were left to their own devices, where was the order?” I croaked out.
The hoof was moved off me as Hathor looked at me with pity. “Is there no forgiveness in your heart? No room for the failures of others to be considered and let to improve.”
I rolled coughing and trying to fill my lungs desperately. “You don’t understand the world if you think failure can keep others alive. The world doesn’t work that that.”
Hathor’s gaze weighed heavily on my back. “You are supposed to hold the weak up and help them survive, just like Aphiwe, and Bongani. Why are they special when others are not?”
I had no words for that. I looked forward into the reeds, at the huts and the promise I had been given about the afterlife. There was no strength in me to stand upon my feet. Coughing up blood I looked at the patterns of the splatter and tried to think. “They’re mine. I take care of what is mine.”
“Does the whole world have to be yours for you to care for it? Is that what a conqueror’s heart desires most?” Hathor’s voice was incredulous. Filled with mockery.
I thought about it. Would I want the whole world? All my heart ached for right now was the arms of Melokuhle, the weight of Aphiwe in my lap. The strength to take them back. “Fuck the world. Fuck Ade, and fuck Oda. I just want my woman back.”
“Yet you lust after other women like a beast in heat. I know in your heart that you see them as more than just things to give you power. To see the truth in you is like seeing the clouds in the sky. You just refuse to look at it.” Hathor pinned my legs with a foot as I tried to stand.
“How else am I supposed to get strong? I’ll take every lover in the world if it means I will have Her back. I’ll let men fill me, I’ll fuck every woman I can. That is the path you made for me!” My legs felt like they were going to give out from the weight. Be crushed beneath a God.
“That is not the path I laid for you! I gave you one of love and cherishment. You were supposed to build a small family and learn that the ways of your people are not what the future needs. But you aren’t ready to see that, are you?” Hathor’s voice was getting distant and weak. “I think I’ve made a mistake. The path is wasted on you.”
The numbers didn’t add up. If that is what she wanted, why was I rewarded so heavily for orgies and making love to groups? “Is that what you truly aimed for? I was rewarded more for spreading pleasure over love. Love hurts too much. It is… what makes someone weak.”
“Is that what you learned that night? The same night I stripped you of your punishment. That telling Her you loved her was just to make you have more pain. To make you weak?” A hand settled on my back.
“What else did it do?” I wanted to curl up. I needed to get away from this pain. The physical I could deal with until I died. But this ache inside me was a thousand times worse than any I had felt.
“You are a fool.” The words were soft, kind in a way. “I can forgive you for that. But what you have done has separated me from an ally. You have destroyed the Eyes of Thoth. You have taken a God’s avatar and savaged her mentally. Only Thoth knows if Oda will recover after what you have done. That puts the whole striped clan in danger. You’ve rid yourself of an ally. You won’t be able to do that if you want to survive.”
“What is so important about that? My people don’t have fights where many take on one. I know in the future I’ll have to defeat Ade on my own. What will allies do for me anyways.” Standing finally I looked at the field of reeds. If I ask, will she just bring Melokuhle here and let me perish?
“You’re not ready to see the truth,” Hathor’s presence vanished from me. I looked around at it all as things melted and faded from my eyes. A darkness approached through the reeds.
I opened my eyes to the darkness of the world around me. My vision fell to Bongani as he hung limply and exhausted on a branch. We were alone, I was alone. That power I had felt humming through me since my awakening was diminished. Sitting up I looked around at the world, it was so empty out here. Only the call of night insects and the scurrying of mice and creatures avoiding the things that would end them filled the air.
I was so lonely, making sure the pack was secured. I crawled through the branches to Bongani. He was my servant, he was my male. It was his duty to soothe my heart. I laid my forehead against his and felt my chest tighten. He still stank of Oda, even through the scent of the river. Her breeding stink was on us both.
Will I lose my mind when my week comes? I have nothing to stop it with me. “Bongani,” I whispered as I grabbed at his waist wrap, freeing his length and grabbing it in my own hands. He woke up slowly as I stroked him hard. “Mount me,” I demanded as I stood balancing precariously on the branches. I pulled up the wrap on my waist to reveal my bent over form.
I felt the thick head of his cock slid up and down my slit before pressing into me, parting me open for him. I bit my lip as he pressed to the hilt into me. I wasn’t as wet as I wanted to be as he began to thrust into me, chafing me lightly. It was far too gentle and I could feel the hesitation from the difficult position. I closed my eyes and hung my head before I shifted from his backstroke slipping him out of me. “W-w-what?”
“I changed my mind. I don’t want it anymore.” I moved back to my pack and freed it. “Come on, we have traveling to do.” We climbed down the tree and I looked onward. I took a step forward, feeling Bongani stay behind me like a shadow.
