When Hugayr invited Soph to lie down on the dais between the candles and stones, more women in the room wandered over to sit down, or left discreetly through the doors. At last there was enough of a crowd that it was starting to feel properly ceremonial.
“All right, everybody, let’s get started.” Hugayr said it with an unmistakably southern American accent from the twentieth century, then switched back into Nabataean. “Welcome, Soph. Your offerings and sacrifice are pleasing to al-Lat, who gives shelter to women and new genders who have been cast out of the time when their mothers birthed them.”
“Praise be to al-Lat.” Soph spoke in a clear, strong voice.
“This the most difficult part, so pay attention.” Hugayr addressed the audience. A few had taken out scrolls and ink. I could hear the faint scratching of reed pens on papyrus. Palming two of the stone flowers she’d set out, Hugayr held her fists over Soph’s chest and let out a prolonged cry. “DIE AND LIVE AGAIN!”
Blue fire enveloped Hugayr’s arms and fell across Soph’s body like lumps of lava. She sucked in her breath and let out an ecstatic scream. My muscles tensed. This looked too much like a real sacrifice, and not the metaphorical one I’d expected. But no one around me was panicking, so this was obviously part of the ritual. I peered more closely. Where had the fire come from? It burned everything, but consumed nothing. That’s when I realized: the stones. They were raining illumination, like Morehshin’s multi-tool. Somehow these ancient priestesses had access to technology from thousands of years in the future. I tried to relax. This was not going to end in carnage. Soph would be fine.
“CALL THE WATER IN THE ROCKS, SOPH! CALL IT!” Hugayr opened her hands and the stones blazed. Though at first I’d thought they were carved into flowers, perhaps those petals were flames.
Soph stood up, towering over us, cloaked in fire. “I CALL THE WATER!” The air instantly poured with rain and fog. I could smell the Ordovician again, and through the mist I saw embers dying.
“Is she going to be okay?” I couldn’t help but whisper it.
C.L., grinning next to me, practically bounced with glee. “Yes! This place has its own mini-wormhole. You’ll see.”
Now Soph was floating upward, her hair free around her face. Smoke and steam plumed from the rocks below, where Hugayr gesticulated for her students to clean up spilled wax and water. Soph spun slowly toward the statue of al-Lat as she reached the height of the goddess’s faces. She was fully thirty feet above the dais now. Electricity buzzed around her.
“GODDESS, DO YOU ACCEPT MY SACRIFICE?”
A ball of lightning cracked where Soph hung suspended. She winked out, then reappeared on the dais in a burst of seawater.
“LET DEATH AND LIFE JOIN IN THE BODY OF THE TIMELESS!” Hugayr raised her arms and the air was clear again. I could hear water dripping from Soph’s robe onto the floor. The students were working frantically to soak everything up with sponges and cloth. C.L. applauded enthusiastically, and the rest of us joined in, some snapping fingers or stamping their feet.
“Nice job, everybody! Very controlled.” Hugayr beamed and folded her arms. “You are now Timeless, Soph! Welcome!”
Soph grinned and wrung out her hair. I still felt a little shaky, but joined the others swarming her with hugs while students in the audience headed back to work.
Morehshin eyed the flower-fire stones that Hugayr was slipping back into her robe, then addressed her in a language I couldn’t understand.
“Is that English?” Hugayr cocked her head, and spoke with her southern accent again. “I’m afraid I only speak Atomic Era.”
“Where did you get those multi-tools?” Morehshin switched back to Nabataean.
Hugayr readjusted her shawl and glared at Morehshin. “This temple belongs to the Raqmu women and new genders of its time. Do you understand? We shelter the Timeless, but it is our place. You get no special privileges because you are from the future. If you want to learn our secrets, you must join us and never travel again.”
Looking sheepish, Morehshin took out her own multi-tool and showed it to Hugayr. “Do you mind if I ask you some questions about this?” Immediately the tension evaporated and they got into a long, muttered discussion about its technical features.
Ignoring them, C.L. nudged Anita and pointed up to the spot where Soph had been eaten by lightning. “It’s a Machine that only leads to its present. Isn’t that cool? Probably a beta test that somebody forgot to turn off half a billion years ago.”
“What makes you so sure it isn’t magic?” Soph jumped off the dais, stripped off her wet robe, and took a fresh tunic and trousers from one of Hugayr’s students.
“Because it always works the same way every time. It’s repeatable.” C.L. sounded extremely certain.
“Isn’t that what a magic spell is?” Soph retorted.
Anita rolled her eyes.
Hugayr’s student began piling the remaining cloths into a basket. “Sorry to interrupt, but I should show you to the dormitory.” She glanced at us. “Timeless and priestesses only.”
“Are you a priestess?” Soph asked.
“I will be one day. Hugayr is training me.”
“Well, according to your training, would you say that what we experienced here was magic or science?”
The student shot a neurotic look over her shoulder at Hugayr. “I’m not sure what you mean by ‘science.’” Soph had used two Nabataean words that translated more literally as “knowledge device.”
“Do you know the word ‘science’?” C.L. said the word in English.
The student shrugged and continued in Nabataean. “I haven’t started English yet. But I speak Hebrew and Greek.”
“What about Plato? Do you know him? We’re talking about his idea of logical deduction.” C.L.’s Nabataean was terrible, but the student understood them.
“Plato hates women. His work is useless to us.”
“I don’t mean him. I mean his method.”
“Talking to other men to discover truth?”
I snickered. She had a point. C.L. frowned at me.
Anita broke in and tried to restate the question so it made more sense in Nabataean. “I think Soph was asking whether you think this is a spirit or a mechanical device.” She pointed at the dais.
“Oh, I see.” The student set down her basket. “We discuss this question often. It is one way to contemplate the three faces of al-Lat, who represents many kinds of power in one woman. She is an engineer, she is a mother, and she divines the answers to cosmic mysteries. So I guess… sometimes she is a mechanical device, and sometimes she is a spirit.”
“That was very well said, Ahed.” Hugayr had been eavesdropping.
Ahed bowed her head respectfully and fought to suppress a pleased smile. “Thank you, Priestess.”
“And thank you, Ahed. I’m ready to see my new home.” Soph scooped up the basket of wet fabric and linked arms with the student. “Should we drop this off at the laundry?”
“Yes, let’s do that.”
Hugayr nodded at us. “Well met, travelers. I believe we still have something to discuss.”
We sat on cushions in her chambers and Anita presented our case. “We think there are men who are trying to destroy the Machines.” She paused, searching Hugayr’s impassive face. “I have heard… you might know something about this.”
The priestess nodded. She withdrew a multi-tool from her robes and turned it over in her hands, pondering. I wondered if she’d gotten it from someone like Morehshin, fleeing a future of bioengineered patriarchy. At last she spoke, sounding weary. “It’s happened before. We have records of it, from several times.”