The first musician Nawirnushu noticed immediately, as he had been playing since he entered the courtyard. He was a young man, his vision shrouded behind a blindfold. He continued to beat down in a somber, slow tempo on a traditional lillizu drum which stood up to his waist.

Next to him was a huge man with a firm chest and broad shoulders who stood next to the enormous alu gong, fashioned from the sacrificed hides of four whole oxen. The enormous gong stood almost twice his size! Nawirnushu shuddered to imagine the sound of the wild bull's bellowing!

Another man with a blindfold sat hunched over, tuning his pitnu lute. After some moments of fiddling, when the other three highest strings finally complimented the lowest, he began to pick boldly between the bass notes, multiplying the dreadful foreboding of the alu's severe beat. The metal chains and bells which hung from the end of the pitnu's fretboard tinkled softly as he drew each string.

A slender girl in a speckled wool gown took her seat beside the kinarru harp that towered over her. Her long black hair draped her face as her long fingers fidgeted with the instrument's kamma, tightening and loosening each of the strings for the perfect pitch. The sound of the strings twanged from youthful to mature at her detailed adjustments.

The kinarru itself was incredible, vivid scenes of wild animals dancing and feasting were inlaid across its wooden frame. Out from its bottom peeked the full-sized face of a friendly horned bull, painted in black, white, and gold. It was the very spitting image of Ninigizibara, the legendary kinarru long lost to the city during the Hanigalbatu occupation. Nawirnushu marveled at the integrity of the replica.

A clean-shaven man wearing an excessive amount of makeup and eye-shadow stood straight, his hands behind his back, with a very serious expression on his face. He was the nargallu, reserved as austere decoration until his deep voice would be sparsely called upon in the verse.

A short man, his eyes also sewn asleep, with a thin beard and a bowl haircut, stood holding a long ebubbu pipe carved from two river reeds. The pipes must have been at least two forearms long, and the instrument the man held at his shoulders looked as though it could topple him over.

In the corner of the stage, a heavy-set man with a thick beard, whose great belly protruded forth from the top of his kilt, practiced breathing exercises next to a table on which was set an enormous ox qarnu. I imagined the noise of the great horn and trembled!

An old woman in a black wool gown held an ornate duwahu tamberine cast in silver and bronze. The instrument's metalcraft was unusually ornate, a glittering, drooping shrub of spades and crescents. Perhaps it was an heirloom from her youth?

In the front row at the bottom there was even a group of five nude, rowdy, little children who each held a little whistle, rattle, cymbal, or shaker. As their elders in the band had finished preparing, they haphazardly quieted themselves and formed rank alongside each other.

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Finally, after each piece of the band had finished preparing their instruments, a woman stepped forth, the zammartu. She focused on her breathing slowly and held firm the halhallatu drum under her shoulder.

The zammartu wore a pure white wool gown and a silver headdress ornamented with Zumun's crescent which sat perched above her forehead. She was the spitting image of Pakinana, or one of the other great entu priestesses or noble ladies of Kharani's silver age. Her beauty captured the king's heart and took his breath away!

Yet such pleasure to Nawirnushu's eyes were interrupted, as two men now approached the open circle of seats which he had claimed, and sat down beside Nawirnushu before he could get up.

"Ah-hah! It is wonderful that you should join us, your grace!" Said the jolly man who had taken a seat at Nawirnushu's right. His voice was smooth and bold and his enthusiasm matched well with the mirthful mask he wore.

"Yes yes yes! We panicked when we thought we'd lost you" added the other, also wearing a mask of similarly wide-eyed expression, yet his voice was raspy and soft, as though quivering with trepidation.

Nawirnushu smiled politely. "Who are you?" he asked.

"Isn't it obvious, my king? I am your exceedingly distant yet exceedingly esteemed predecessor, Nugal Idin-Zumun, and I am accompanied by the immortal poet of my court, Nabi-Utu!" the man said, pointing to his mask.

Nabi-Utu silently nodded in turn and pointed to his own mask.

"It is as you say, your holiness." Nawirnushu deferred with wit. These fools spoke to him with a boldness which to any other king would be treasonous, but Nawirnushu had a special fondness for those unexpected exchanges where his station was ignored.

"Thank you, noble descendant! Now, if it please you, my friend Nabi-Utu would sing a zamaru he has written of your great accomplishments and strength of character!"

Nabi-Utu lowered his head and knelt to his knee before Nawirnushu. If the context had not already been in jest, Nawirnushu would have read this mocking subservience to be seditious.

Nawirnushu rose to leave and tried to excuse himself: "Oh, pardon me, but I must surely relieve-"

"Oh, please my king, soothe Nabi-Utu's heart! It is but a single kirugu in length, composed in your honor!" imposed the man masquerading as Idin-Zumun.

Often had Nawirnushu contemplated the plight of an artist's heart, and so, his knees unwilling to support his flight, he nodded acknowledgment, though quite bewildered. 'Who is this man masquerading as the great bard?' he wondered.

Nabi-Utu stood up and cleared his throat. He began the recitation of his zamaru in a most elegant emesal speech, utterly unlike the previous anxiety which gripped his voice, through which Nawirnushu struggled to anticipate his flourishes:

"King Nawirnushu, You, whose heart sails like the moonlight of your Lord Zumun.

Righteous Shakkanakku!, You, who strikes as the lightning cast by Lord Adad,

Mighty Nugal, the abundance of Dagan swells in the fields of Kharani for You,

You who rose up out of exile, like the calf that lost its mother in the reeds,

You who revenged your father like Asalluhi, You who slew the usurper as Erra,

You who stormed the rings of Kharani and seized Lord Zumun's approval,

You stand here between two lands! two countries! The Akkadu! The Amuru!

So many choices! So much heartache! So much power! So much conflict!

Yet behind it all there is only one home, one city: Fairest Kharani.

And its fate shall be your fate. That is your regal privilege!

Alas, It would not be sorrowful if what was lost was not so sweet."