“I have never seen such perfect order. Everything was just so, everything glittered. All the shops were open. Metals, cloths, carpets, and jewels were on display. The metals shone. We soon saw the guardians of the place. They were lying on beds of silk or seated on high chairs: dead, unblemished. The only sounds came from the birds darting over the roofs. Plants and trees were in bloom. Inside every shop, deep in the half-light, you could just see the shopkeeper, alert, carefully dressed, fossilized. The streets were empty.

“Finally, we found ourselves outside an immense palace. We crossed four pavilions, one inside another, full of precious things. The soldiers watching over them and the guards at the door had leather for skin. Hall after hall drew us on to a last room clad in marble and ivory. A woman gleaming like the moon lay stretched on a big bed, protected by two warriors, who looked like statues. Her eyes had been replaced with mercury, like a doll’s. It was impossible to escape their gaze, which was in constant movement. One of Emir Musa’s squires made to grab a dazzling jewel from the woman. One of the warriors was an automaton. He lifted his saber and cut off the man’s head.”

IX

“Shortly before the Flood, I was king of Shuruppak. It wasn’t the center of the world, but it wasn’t far off. My grandfather Ubartutu had founded the dynasty. Of my father it was said that he was a wise man of fine words. Of me, people said only that I would have a long life. My father put together a collection of sayings, some in the form of proverbs, and dedicated it to me. For the most part, they offered advice on how to behave toward other men. Only rarely did they touch on the gods. But the gods were implied. I was able to observe those rules only for a very brief part of my life, tiny in proportion to the years I’ve spent alone here in Dilmun. But I still remember them. Sometimes they make me smile; they are so distant now, incomprehensible almost. Other times they seem perfect, radiant. They weren’t rules for men who must govern. But for anyone.

“Of the words people used when I was king of Shuruppak, many have gone now, disappeared. Most of them were buried under the sand, suffocated while waiting for someone who would let them breathe again. Then in some cases, they were substituted, high-handedly, as if they had just been invented. Only one of those words is still omnipresent, though used each time in different ways. Nevertheless, it has remained on everyone’s lips, from the washerwoman to the king. The word destiny. If it weren’t for that word, you wouldn’t be here today.”

“Anzu was an eagle with a lion’s head, his body clad in chain mail. When he wasn’t flying, he stood on his claws like a powerful man. It was Ea who suggested to Enlil that they could use Anzu as guardian of the threshold, to protect the hall where Enlil would immerse himself in the sacred water. Was it treacherous advice? Some doubt remains, as with so much of what Ea did.