My day started with the most curious realizations. Nanna and Abil-Kisu were getting filthy rich at my expense. The latter was already filthy rich, but the witch has been brewing light eyes ever since I gave her the heads. I kept thinking that having pajama parties were really nice. But the girl's sleeping habits were bad. Arwia was a grabber. And Belle-Sunu a spinner. I opened my eyes to see a female calf in dire need shaving next to my face and an arm wrapped around, binding said calf to me.

At least I wasn't soiling myself with nightmares anymore. I'd pick hairy legs over the vengeful ghost of Prince Marduk at any time.

I stirred and tried to pry Arwia's arms open. She tightened her grip turned me into the little spoon and nuzzled my nape. I sighed and resigned. That's the kind of strength you gain by doing labor every day in an inn. Fear the mighty barmaid.

Belle-Sunu woke up with the first rays of the sun and kicked Arwia's arm, waking the girl up.

"Ah!" Arwia yelped. "Belle-Sunu!"

"Finally. Can you two let me go?" I complained in good spirits.

"Why did you turn me around?" Belle asked, a paragon of innocence.

"Who turned you around, woman? You kept spinning the whole night!" I replied. "Now get up, you have work to do!"

Belle sat up and we all climbed out of bed.

I checked my body while I changed my clothes and did my business before the chamber pot was taken away for cleanup. Magic threatened not only the laws of thermodynamics but also Lavoisier's. I had no idea where all the extra mass I was devouring went. I checked my right hand. I could wiggle my fingers and bend them more than halfway. I could touch the middle of my pinkie with my thumb. I could feel more muscle mass under my skin and my ribs were no longer visible. But it seemed that my stupid power still refused to rebuild the fat.

Maybe I should ask Nanna but the witch disliked being interrupted. One last check, I focused my senses inward. Still empty. Worse, now that Nanna used her water metaphor, I felt my magic pool dry and mucky. It seemed today's schedule would be recovery.

A recovery that, for me, was taking an absurd amount of time. I grew back a leg from the bare bone in less than an hour inside the mine tunnels. Was this a combination of how expensive my recovery was with how much the burnout affected me? This feeling of an unquenchable thirst that came with zero magic in the tank was borderline unbearable.

Without much to do and no desire to seek new experiences, my morning was a repetition of the previous days. Walk, play, nap. I was becoming a cat.

I would've blurred this day if it weren't for the news that arrived in the afternoon. A crier arrived and knocked on the nearby estates, gathering one guard from each to deliver his message. In my case, it was Huzzi-Ya the bearer of the terrible news. He found us in the garden.

The guard paused and cleared his throat before repeating the crier's words. "By order of the magnanimous Enshi Es-Kina, the Goddess Ishtar is now enshrined in the city of Es-Kina. A mighty ziggurat shall be erected in her honor. To that effect, he demands that all houses send half of their able men and eunuch to work in the great work. The Enshi also summons all women of marriable age, free people or slaves for the wedding market. Among the ones present at the market, the Enshi will select one to anoint as a high priestess and perform Ellu Hassadu to sanctify the ziggurat."

I looked around, the people in the gardens seemed happy. Arwia, some servants, Zuska and the children.

"A great ziggurat! The blessings of the gods will end the drought!" Zuska exulted.

"It's been ages since the city held a marriage market," Arwia remarked.

"These construction projects are dangerous. My uncle helped build the courthouse," a servant warned, "and he lost a foot to an accident."

I tried to keep an open mind but the whole thing smelled. Forceful drafting of workers and that wedding market seemed fishy. Because this was a place where women were sold. So instead of a bridal fair, we would have a bride fair. But I might have jumped to conclusions. I needed a local's point of view, and I had one right by my side.

"Arwia," I asked, "what happens during a wedding market? I've never heard of one and it's been only five months from my rebirth. So, what is it?"

"It is more common in small towns and villages. There, once a year, during the harvest festival, all girls in marriageable age are gathered and exposed," she explained. I didn't like the exposed part but didn't interrupt. "Then the men bid on the girls, and there's a competition to see who gets the highest bidder."

Yes, it was as bad as I thought. "But is it normal to call for slaves to participate?" I asked her.

She shook her head, "No, never heard of it. I don't think it's even legal."

As William Goldman once wrote, 'Follow the money'. "To whom goes the money from the brides' sale?"

She cheerfully answered, "That's the best part, most of the money goes to the brides' dowry. The father gets another chunk and a small part is given as taxes and donations to the temple of Ishtar."

An outline of the Enshi's motivation formed in my mind. He wanted to build that ziggurat so his fame would rise. He would keep the poor men occupied with the construction, the rich ones busy with new toys - wives, I mean - and pocket a lot of shekels.

And since a lot of people would get married, soon he'd have a baby boom. The ziggurat would be his legacy. The problem was, would he live that long?

A ziggurat should take at least a year to build. Even on Earth, it would take months. How does he expect to see it finished? Or was he thinking I lied when I told him he'd die soon?

Maybe he has some magic to help him. It's not impossible.

The only way to make sure was to ask the in-house magical expert. I took Arwia and Huzzi-Ya with me and went to the annex building looking for Nanna. The old witch was sunbathing outside the annex, sitting on a bench.

She waved at us. "Hello there, girl. What is the rush?" She asked.

Nanna seemed to be in good spirits. I had Huzzi-Ya repeat the proclamation to her. Nanna listened carefully but I could see a frown forming in her already wrinkled face.

"So, what do you think of that, Nanna? Is this a desperate last move to leave a legacy behind? The Enshi doesn't have much to live," I told her.

She raised an eyebrow and gave me a stink-eye. "Or does he? I don't doubt that were he in your world, the Enshi wouldn't live long. But is he? Don't we know of one that can survive that rock's poison already?"

Yes, that might be possible but how did he find a healer in so little time?

"Is there sorcery that can cure wounds that serious?"

She clicks her tongue. "No. Healing magic is extremely draining and can only be used within hours of the wounding. The greatest mortal healer might have been able to slow down his death, at most. But that didn't stop you, did it?"

I pondered about what Nanna said. Nephew wouldn't survive long enough to see the ziggurat built, even if he...

Oh, no.

He didn't do that.

If he was looking for labor, there are the remnants of Marduk's army to be recruited. But that would mean...

An influx of men without the corresponding counterpart. Then what does he do?

The marriage market. He drags every single woman he can to marry off to those soldiers. Or their officers.

But even if you throw tens of thousands of men in the construction, you would still need to spend months to build it. Months he shouldn't have.

Unless he found a way to heal from the radiation damage? But Nanna said mortal magic can't...

Yeah. Mortal magic can't.

That's why Nanna asked if that stopped me. Because my healing is from a divine source. And putting two and two and two together...

"Is Ishtar herself backing him?"

I immediately regretted asking that in front of the two young and highly-impressionable natives.

Arwia sighed and seemed to be entranced with the prospect of divine blessings from the goddess of...

"Probably, yes," Nanna replied. "Ishtar gains power with that ziggurat. Also, all the newlywed brides have to pay her tribute," She spoke the last part scanning my soul for something.

I had to know what that could possibly mean. Nanna's innuendo probably meant it would be something I'd not like. These people moved forward in some fields but still felt stuck in the bronze age.

"Tribute?"

It was Arwia that answered, blushing and bashful. "The brides need to go to the temple of Ishtar and collect donations adding up to one-tenth of her dowry and price put together."

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

Oh, some kind of raffle, fundraiser, or campaign. That meant the wave of weddings that were to come would fill the coffers of Ishtar's temple. That, added to the ziggurat would mean the goddess would grow stronger. It didn't affect me so much as long as I could go around the draft.

Nanna made a smug smirk, pointed at Arwia, and then at me. "Arwia, I think Sandra didn't understand what you meant. Could you please clarify how exactly the brides collect their donations?"

I didn't like a bit where this was going.

"The brides enter the temple as temporary priestesses. There they perform the sacred rite in honor of Ishtar to collect donations. The supplicant men that enter the temple in search of blessings donate the money and perform the rite with the priestess. Once a bride collected enough money, she can leave with the goddess' blessings of fertility. Most brides usually get pregnant from their husbands shortly after."

I took a step back and tried to digest. "Does this sacred rite involves intercourse?"

Arwia blushed even more and nodded. "It is said to be the most divine experience."

Yeah, the bliss and rapture that comes from whoring oneself out. And I suddenly disliked Ishtar very much. Everyone was looking at me and I felt uncomfortable.

"What is wrong?" I asked.

Nanna cackled, full of unbridled mirth. Or schadenfreude. Hard to tell. Arwia fidgetted and Huzzi-Ya remembered he was supposed to be a guard and pretended to be in front of the Buckingham Palace.

"What is the matter, guys?"

"The Captain..." Arwia mumbled.

Nanna slapped her knees and kept laughing. My brain was frozen, probably keeping my conscious mind from adding two and two and figuring out it amounted to minus one. I was getting very irritated at the situation.

"What about Brandon?" I asked the seventeen-years-old woman.

"Won't you marry him?" She asked, already flinching from my reaction.

Nanna wheezed and then reined in her laughter to speak. "And the priests at the temple of Ishtar frown upon lowering one's assessed value for both price and dowry. They are known to catch cheaters that declare a lesser value and raise the amount the bride needs to collect," The witch explained.

"And if you are on your period, the priests make you wait for ten days to purify yourself before you can perform the rites," Arwia added.

No.

Nope.

No way.

Never ever.

I felt sick. To my modern XXI century sensibilities, what they were described as a sacred rite was known by another name. It was an exploitative system that disguised forced impregnation with a blessing of fertility. It also meant that the firstborn of most women was not the husband's son. Without DNA or even a basic understanding of blood types, it was almost impossible to prove. Worse yet, the temple fattens its treasury by the same measure.

The part of me that did not want to throw up my lunch overwhelmingly even recognized the stroke of genius of the Enshi's plan. He would assimilate the remnants of the army, collect a ton of money, get in the good graces of one of the most influential deities, repopulate the city, and even quell dissent by putting men to push rocks in the construction of that ziggurat. Which I didn't doubt would be the tallest building in the city.

As nanna hinted, he might even use those good graces to get a divine 'get out of cancer-free' card. I can't blame him for that, he should try to survive and cancer is terrible. I don't wish it on anyone. So long he doesn't do it at the expense of others. And it didn't look like that.

"Let me see if I get this straight. A bride has to gather ten percent of the total value of her price and dowry as donations. The priests can set any goal if they feel the declared value is too low. Then they have to 'perform' the sacred 'rite' with 'supplicants' that can pay any amount of money until they reach that value. And with a throng of soldiers that are basically destitute, it means that..."

Nanna nodded. She didn't seem happy. "You got the gist of it. The Enshi is going to turn the whole city into a brothel for Marduk's soldiers. That's why he issued the most unusual request for slave women as well. Between building the Ziggurat and visiting the temple of Ishtar with their wages, I don't think there will be time for anything else."

I took Arwia by the shoulder. "So, do you want to go to that bride market? Do you even have to accept the bid?"

Nanna snorted. "You bet that no women that show up at that market will be allowed to leave without an own... husband."

And I would put all the distance possible between us and that event. I was feeling crept out by just thinking of that. No, I wouldn't let them touch my people. Or me. I felt the same hatred I did toward Hama-Tula and Marduk. I, a person, was not merchandise. Or a tasty treat to be thrown to the wolves in a mad bid for power. I wasn't yet hostile toward Es-Kina the Nephew but I hoped he wouldn't try to push that crap my way. But I was boiling inside at the situation.

I said 'yet'. I knew how far I would go to safeguard my integrity. Unfortunately.

"Okay. Here's my ruling. So long the Enshi keeps his flaky hands away from my household, we are just going to ignore this proclamation. He wants to make his ziggurat, he wants to..." I was going to make a reference to the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah but I was unsure if they were allowed. "Have his people breed like drunk rabbits, I have nothing to do with that. But nobody from my household is going to participate."

Nanna nodded in approval. "That's good, Sandra. But it will cause conflict. The Enshi won't be happy with your refusal."

I clenched my fists - well, only the left one anyway - and shouted, bursting with irritation. "I'm not contributing a single copper shekel or a drop of sweat to that. And that's final. If he wants to fight, let's fight."

Arwia held my arm. "Calm down, Sandra. It will take at least a few days for this notice to reach the villages. We have time. Why don't you talk to honorable Abil-Kisu about it? I bet he doesn't want to release his own people too."

She was right. I might be making a mountain out of a molehill.

"You are right, Arwia. Huzzi-Ya, you are dismissed. Arwia, go ahead and wait for me, I need to talk to Nanna in private."

She nodded, "It is almost time for today's lecture. I hoped you'd join us or even share some wisdom with the children. I'm going ahead to gather the children. We'll use the tent today."

I waved her goodbye, "I'll be there. It won't take too long."

Putting aside the fact that the city of Es-Kina might become known as Debba-Ut-Cherry in the future and that the Enshi might attempt to force me and the girls to become fuel in that wicked death-cheating scheme of his, I sit with Nanna for a private chat regarding my condition.

"The priests have a spell," Nanna spoke right as I sat, "To detect an impregnated woman. Once they see one, she is sent to her husband so he may think the child is his."

I was wondering about it. Because of course, the husband would want to start his newlywed life with the blessed woman. That would also relieve the pressure on the couple to breed as fast as possible, as it was statistically impossible that all of the temporary priestess' partners in the "sacred rites" (sarcasm absolutely intended) are sterile.

"That clears one of my doubts, yes. But it wasn't the reason I wanted to talk to you in private, Nanna. It is my recovery. While I feel stronger, my body hadn't recovered and I can feel my magic power is still at its lowest. I'm afraid there's something wrong."

She looks into me and I feel invaded. In a profound meaning of the term and definitely not in the 'priestess of Ishtar' way though. It is as if she is looking at the core of my being. Nanna closes her eyes and wobbles.

"Good news, your recovery is underway. You are stronger than the last time we talked, girl. But it is not as strong as I expected. Something is draining your magic power, leaving little for the recovery. I can see why Tarhun set the priorities of the boons that way but I'd have prioritized survival."

And once again she talks like an expert. It is as if she knows how to do what Tarhun did. And it means she was a very powerful witch.

"And what is draining my magic power? Am I leaking magic?"

Like a water barrel that was hit by a shotgun.

"No. You are leaking magic and also your usual magic emanation seeping into the space around you, but that's within expected levels. You are spending magic on something. Are you using your powers? What boons do you have again?"

I summon the tablet as the divine tool comes and goes effortlessly and check my boons with her. I wasn't using the storage or Decompose during these last days at all. But Nanna browses the list and pokes exactly the storage.

"What are you keeping in storage? The objects have upkeep to keep their mass suppressed. That must be it. By the look in your face, your storage is stuffed with junk, isn't it?"

If you call three tons of exotic metals, all the food in our pantry, and... Orz.

"Yes, Nanna. A lot of things."

She groaned, then grinned, then snorted. "Well, we should relieve that stress. Come. There's an empty room next to mine that can be secured and I'll watch over it. I want you to remove everything that's not essential. And please don't do anything until I say so. I will supply you with some of my magic. The least we want is to strain your magic even more."

We went inside the annex and into one of the rooms next to Nanna's. The windows were barred and with a carpet hung over them.

Nanna looked at me, "Now, I need to touch your skin near your heart. Please undress."

I remove the linen dress Madam Cloe made for me and the bra. I felt bad and exposed, unwilling to show my gaunt figure. Nanna put one hand over my left breast and another on my back.

"You will feel a desire to pull. Don't give in. You are starved for magic, but if you try to draw, you'll hurt me," She told me. Then she sighed and mumbled something about how impossible it is to keep a sudden windfall.

She chanted a song that was incomprehensible, ancient, eerie, and beautiful at the same time. I felt a warmth flowing from her palms into my chest, and it felt like a sip of cold water after a day trekking through the desert under the sun.

I moaned.

It was almost impossible to not pull it. Nanna's magic was calm, bright, and soothing, and it felt like the light of a full moon over a dark meadow. I whimpered and tried to draw more. I needed it. Oh, how I missed this feeling. I was dry without magic. I had that wellspring and took it for granted.

Nanna kicked my shin. "Focus! Don't pull! Keep your mind and your metaphors still. Think not of what I am doing! Or I'll kick your shin until you feel so much pain you forget about my magic!"

I could feel my healing boon using that power to fix my body.

She kicked me again. "Summon the junk now! Before the magic goes to waste!"

I did. I summoned the hundred-liter plastic trash bags filled with metal ingots. The silicon. The trash bags from Earth with the items Kali-Maru and Sere-Naha cleaned for me. The bundles of silk, pelts, and furs.

"Should I summon the tent with the food?" I asked between my teeth, using my utmost willpower to ignore the soothing feeling from her magic.

"No. We might have a food shortage soon with all the soldiers the idiotic Enshi is going to bring here. Keep it, it might save us."

"I don't think I have anything else that's non-essential now!"

Nanna interrupted the flow. I fell down in a W with my legs splayed on my sides. I craved the ecstasy of Nanna's magic. I think I healed myself more in those few minutes than yesterday. All the twenty-ish hours.

Speaking of hours, I really needed to find someone that could explain to me the calendar of this place.

"Good," Nanna panted.

I could swear she looked ten years older. Curved. Tired. I felt extremely guilty for having almost wetted my panties on the feeling of her magic. I looked around. Between the ten bags of metals and silicon, there must be over three metric tons of materials. That was a lot.

"You should rest for the rest of the afternoon," she told me. "Dress up and come with me, you can use my bed. I want you to stay around. I need you to charge the last batch of enchanted eyes."

I did as she said and thought about the enchanted eyes. It was a funny enchantment. The eyes absorbed ambient magic that naturally seeped out of sorcerers and people with magical powers. Even in my weakened state, I still leaked a lot of magic as it came out both from my magical wounds caused by the burnout and as a byproduct of my boons and powers consuming magic. And since I was spending all the magic I generated on healing, I was oozing a lot of it.

It was good to know that this magic could be reused for something else. But it begged one question.

"Nanna, is the magic I leave around harmful? Is there such a thing as magic pollution?"

She looked at me as if I told her the sky was green. "What preposterous question is that? This world is starved for magic. You are a boon to this place just by existing, and I guess that's why Tarhun chose you."

"It really wasn't an accident then."

She scoffed. "Gods aren't perfect beings, girl. But gods are an order of magnitude above mere mortals. Tarhun wouldn't miss a lightning bolt. You knew that, didn't you?"

I couldn't help but nod. It still hurt to know from a second party. Tarhun killed me to bring me here.

"Was that the reason he was so keen on having me discharge him of any debts?"

Nanna answered without turning around, rummaging through her things, searching for something.

"Probably the reason he was so generous with you too. But I can't talk about that, so don't ask anymore," She turned with a ceramic vial. "Now drink this and lie down on the bed to sleep. It is bitter, but make sure to swallow everything. This potion also will not let you have any dreams. Just a long, refreshing sleep."

I smiled. "Sounds like exactly what I need."

I took the vial and drank it all. It was bitter and had a terrible aftertaste. But I felt drowsy immediately after. I barely had time to lie down before I blacked out.