The Twice Born Read Online Free PDF

lettuce and cucumber, and cold fried inet-fish lay invitingly beside fresh dates and figs, newly picked grapes, and succulent sweet doum fruit. Huy pounced on a dish of ribbed pods. “Bak seeds! Is Uncle Ker here?”
    Hapzefa tapped his hand away. “Of course, or how would the seeds get here? What a strange child you are, mad to crunch up those pungent things! He and your aunt are in the orchard. Did you make a proper obeisance to the god, or did you squirm and grumble under your breath? Your father has included Ishat in your celebration meal. Be nice to her, Master Huy. Here—keep the flies away from the food while you wait. I must unseal the wine.” She thrust a fly whisk at him and hurried away.
    For a while Huy amused himself in trying to accurately knock the insects out of the air just as they were about to settle on some chosen morsel, but the lure of the bak seeds proved too strong. His mouth was still full of the sweetly bitter radish taste of both pod and seeds when his uncle and aunt came through the gate leading from the orchard. He rose to greet them as his aunt flung herself upon him.
    “Huy! Darling Huy! So you are four today! The gods have answered our prayers and kept you safe for another year! Give your Aunt Heruben a big kiss!” Obediently, Huy allowed himself to be crushed to her fashionably bejewelled bosom, kissing her cheek while inhaling her perfume, which he liked. His mother had told him that it was the most rare and expensive perfume his uncle made, a blend of imported cinnamon, myrrh, and cassia in a base of balan oil, unlike the simple aura of lilies Itu carried around with her. Ker provided Itu with that popular perfume also, and Huy loved it because when it drifted into his nostrils it meant that she was near. But Aunt Heruben smelled of faraway places, and that was almost as good.
    Hapzefa reappeared carrying a tray, and behind her came Itu and Hapu, who presented Huy with the traditional bouquet of flowers. “We give you life, dear Huy,” Hapu said.
    Huy buried his face in the cool blooms. Everyone loved him, and somehow the priest Methen had taken away his fears. Contentment filled him, and he beamed at them all as they sought the cushions scattered about. “I’m a lucky boy, aren’t I, Mother? Can I have wine today?”
    Everyone laughed. Hapu nodded and Hapzefa bent almost double to offer him the tray. “Date wine, grape wine, or shedeh?” she asked. Beside the cups a square of spotless linen was folded. Hapzefa indicated it with a jerk of her head. “And that is my gift to you,” she went on. “I sewed it myself.”
    Huy pulled it off the tray and it shook out to reveal a little shirt with yellow ankhs embroidered around the scooped neck and down the front. “Like gold,” Huy said, standing so that he could wriggle into it. It felt soft against his skin. He shrugged his shoulders experimentally. “I really like it, Hapzefa. Thank you very much.”
    Seeing his genuine pleasure, the servant grunted. “Well, try not to get it dirty, and don’t wear it if you’re going to lie in the soil by the pond. What wine do you want? Are you ready to eat?”
    He chose grape wine although he liked the pomegranate better. Adults drank a lot of grape wine and today he felt as though, with the anniversary of his Naming Day, he was much closer to being grown up himself.
    He was allowed to fill his plate first, which he did with a child’s omnivorous appetite, chewing and sipping with serious concentration, taking care not to spill anything on his new shirt, and he had almost reached the point of satiation before he realized that he had not once thought about the gifts he knew his relatives would have brought for him. They were talking quietly with his parents about amounts of seed to sow, and the plague of dock leaves and wild oats that had infested the flower beds last season from a careless local farmer’s neglected fields, and the reasons for the poor crop of mandrakes. Huy lay back in