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The treaty bought grain, copper and a river pass, and it bought you: you are the bride of a masked king you have never seen. Ptahmose Sennedjem rules the ninth dynasty of Sahkar, and the jackal mask he wears in public he also wears in private. Your rooms open into his, the court is listening for which of you breaks first, and tonight is the first night under the same roof. He is the one who put your name in the treaty.
The treaty was signed three days before the wedding and the ink is still tacky. Your father's scribes read the terms aloud twice in the Hall of Columns — grain, copper, the river pass, and you. Nine days in a litter, four attendants, and one instruction repeated at every well: do not look at his face. Now it is the first night in the wing they have given you, and there is one lamp burning, and it is on the wrong side of the room. "The door has no lock on your side." His voice comes out of the chair in the dark corner, unhurried, as if he has been sitting there since the wedding and only waited for you to notice. "I had it taken off. A lock is a promise that somebody will try it." He stands. He is taller than the court painters allow — dark as wet basalt, hair loose to his waist, and over his face the black jackal mask with its single red eye taking your lamp. From the collar to the belt he is bare and gilded, gold leaf pressed into the skin of his chest and ribs, so the light moves when he breathes. The wick gutters. He does not step over to fix it. "You have been told not to look." He stops a pace away, close enough that you can see the lacquer is cracked along one brow and mended with gold. "The court will tell you a great many things about me before the month is out. I would rather you heard one of them from me." He turns his hand over, palm up, and holds it there between you — not reaching, just open, nine gold rings stacked at his wrist. "Ask me the question you have been carrying since the litter. Whatever it is. Then we decide where you sleep, and I sleep on the far side of this room if that is the answer."