The tension in the house was palpable.

As Ensi of Nippur, Adab was held in the highest esteem by the Sumerians. He had charge of the day-to-day government and maintenance of the city, administration of taxes, and dispensation of justice. The people of the Nippur held him in the greatest respect as a fair and capable man.

Nobody blamed Adab for submitting where others had resisted. When the invaders had flooded through the city gates, Adab immediately went to surrender to Samsu – it cost him his pride, but he was able to assure the safety of his daughters, and was permitted to retain his position. The Sumerians couldn’t help but admire his quick thinking: by securing his place, he was able to continue to work for the good of the people and the smooth running of the city, rather than abandoning them to a stranger with foreign ways.

The flower of Sumerian society had turned out for the wedding – priests, scholars, city officials and their families. Every available space was filled with gaily dressed people. Though they were dressed for a festival, they wore the faces of funeral-goers. The atmosphere was solemn, with none of the high spirits usually seen at such a ceremony. Kisha, with her kindness, charity and graciousness, was a great favourite in the community, and not one of the Sumerians present would willingly have seen her married to a barbarian. These people had come to show their regard for the family, not for celebration and levity.

Across the room, the Babylonians might have been dressed for a trip to the market.

There were less than half as many of them as there were Sumerians. They stood apart in a group, garbed in plain military tunics, daggers hanging from their belts. Their blatant disrespect spoke volumes: this marriage was as much a travesty to them as it was to the city. The Sumerians eyed the weapons uneasily – it was unheard of for guests to attend a wedding armed for battle.

The Babylonians paid them little heed, looking contemptuously at the Sumerians as less than dung beneath their sandals. Not one of them had brought a wife or child for the festivities. They stood apart in their own group, speaking the common tongue, Akkadian, with their guttural accents. A servant stood against a nearby wall, clutching a jug of sweet date-wine and trying to be invisible. He did not dare look directly at the warriors, but stood with his head bent, watching up through his lashes for any sign that the men needed their drinking bowls refilled.

Between them, the Babylonians had already consumed more wine in their short time at the house than all the Sumerian guests could be expected to drink from their first arrival until the end of the wedding feast. With every swallow they were becoming more raucous, and more vocal in their dismissal of the natives of Nippur.

‘This cesspit!’ one of them slapped his thigh, ‘I’d jump in the canal before I brought my sons here – I’ll not have them go soft and weak like these savages!’

His companions roared with laughter, wine spilling from their bowls as they gesticulated and pushed each other.

Eliana walked by quickly, sandals slapping against the bare tiles, giving a reassuring nod to the servant boy who was still trying to disappear backwards through the wall. She bit her tongue hard, praying to the mother-goddess for the wisdom and the strength to swallow back the words that threatened to leap from her mouth. It could only go badly for her if she spoke angrily to the Babylonians.

She felt their eyes on her as she passed.

Crossing the garden, she took a seat next to Kisha on the bench by the pool. She took her hand and squeezed it hard. Kisha barely seemed to notice, gazing into the pond with vacant eyes.

Eliana did not need to ask what she was thinking to know that Kisha envied the fish – free to spend the day frolicking and leaping, no need to be concerned about invaders, duty or protecting family. No memory of the past or fear of the future.

Occasionally, a Sumerian guest would approach the sisters to offer Kisha their half-hearted congratulations on her prestigious marriage, anxious to be seen to be doing so. She wore her public face, smiling and thanking her friends graciously. Eliana watched these little interchanges, wondering how many of the guests would ever see or even think of her sister again after today.

Time stretched on. Samsu was closeted in Adab’s office, discussing final details of the dowry. Eliana could not bear Kisha’s pensive silence, but there was nothing more to be said between them. So she contented herself with holding her sister’s hand, and turned her face toward the house.

People milled around the garden, wandering in and out of the house. The Sumerians were brightly coloured butterflies, flitting furtively from one flower to the next; the Babylonians were the watchful hawks, waiting for any misstep, any excuse to swoop and swallow them whole. Servants moved through the crowds, flowing smoothly around the guests like river waters around a stone, offering fruit platters and date-wine.

As they waited, Eliana darted nervous glances through the throngs of people and into the house, waiting for the office door to open. It frightened her that her father was alone in there with Samsu.

The fruit platters were nearly empty when the door finally opened. Adab emerged alone, gesturing to the servants to have the guests take their seats. He walked over to his daughters, stopping in front of Kisha. He offered her his hand. She placed hers in his and stood to face him.

They looked into each other’s eyes, as though each was trying to memorise the other’s face. As if, thought Eliana, they never expected to see each other in this life again.

She felt a threatening prickle behind her eyes and swallowed hard.

‘I would not have chosen to put you through this ordeal for anything on this earth,’ their father whispered, the lines of his face drawn taut.

‘I know,’ said Kisha, ‘but it is not for us to determine our own fates – we go where the gods send us. We must accept and bear it as best we can.’

Adab nodded, his eyes shining with unshed tears. Kisha’s eyes were dry. Eliana’s heart swelled with pride in her sister – things must be as they would, and no amount of weeping would change that, she told herself firmly.

‘Good luck,’ he said.

Kisha stretched up to place a soft kiss on her father’s cheek.

The guests were in place – Babylonians on one side, Sumerians on the other. The priest waited beside the altar.

Eliana and Adab took up their places on the front bench, and Kisha moved to stand before the altar. She folded her hands before her and bent her head, eyes on the ground.

A steward banged his staff on the floor for silence, ‘His Royal Highness, Samsu, Prince of Babylon, Lugal of Nippur.’

A hush fell as the door swung open and Samsu strode out.

He had not altered much in the time since Eliana had last seen him. He still stood half a head above any of his officers, built of solid muscle encased in copper skin burnished by the sun. A tangle of dark hair hung down past his ears, framing a square jaw and slightly crooked nose that had been broken once too often in battle. He wore the same military tunic as his men, showing off the scars on his powerful arms and legs, luminously pale against his dusky skin.

His most striking features though, were his eyes. On another man, they might have been beautiful. On Samsu, they were cold and hard and black as jet, glittering cruelly in the midmorning sun.

He stalked down the aisle between the Babylonian and Sumerian sides, looking neither left nor right, fixing his gaze directly on the altar.

Eliana recoiled as he passed.

As he approached, Kisha sank to her knees, sat back on her heels and touched her forehead to the floor in a full Babylonian bow. The faintest ripple of a whisper passed over the Sumerian guests at this – in Nippur, a man and a woman were joined together as equals.

Eliana was expecting it. Kisha had been schooled in the Babylonian marriage rites before being brought home from the Red Palace, and had practiced her movements with her sister again and again. She was expected to make a full submission before her husband, and remain there until he raised her up by his side.

He stood before her and offered his hand. She took it, rising gracefully to her feet, keeping her eyes on the floor.

‘Raise your head,’ he commanded in a voice as rough and harsh as pumice stone.

She lifted her eyes no higher than his shoulders, allowing him a full look at her face without ever meeting his eyes.

Samsu grunted and nodded his approval. ‘Well, get on with it!’ he barked at the priest.

The priest began to chant a strange prayer unknown to the Sumerians, invoking the blessings of Marduk. The Babylonians sang the response as the Sumerians shifted uncomfortably on their benches, feeling that Enlil should have some part in this ceremony.

Next, grain was sprinkled over Kisha, accompanied by a prayer for her fertility and the bringing forth of sons. The priest took a length of rope, binding Kisha’s hand to Samsu:

‘We here present pray you now, almighty Marduk, to help this woman to be a good and honest wife. We bind her to this man, from now until the end of time. May she be fecund, loyal, and above all, faithful. May your thunder strike her down if her heart ever strays from her husband. Keep her obedient, humble, pious and reverent in all ways, that she may be pleasing to this man you set above her.’

Pouring oil from a little jar into a golden cup, the priest added a sprinkling of powder and ignited the mixture with a taper. A brilliant blue flame flared from the little vessel, exciting involuntary gasps from the Sumerians, and sniggers from the Babylonians.

He dipped his fingers into the oil and anointed first Samsu’s forehead, then Kisha’s, and then the length of rope that tethered them. Untying the rope, he repeated the strange prayer which had opened the rites.

The moment the last response had been sung, Samsu gestured to his personal guard, turned on his heel and walked away. The soldiers closed in around Kisha and walked through the house and out to the street, forcing her to move with them.

Eliana ran after them, her mouth open to shout to her sister, determined to say a proper goodbye, when somebody snagged her wrist and dragged her backwards. It was Isin, Kisha’s beloved. He put his fingers to his lips and shook his head, his eyebrows drawn together in pain. He was right, of course, it would do no good to scream and shout. She chased after her sister in silence.

Outside, Samsu had already mounted his horse and set off up the road to his Red Palace. A soldier gripped Kisha around the waist, lifting her as easily as a doll, and set her up on a saffron-red mare.

She just had time to turn and catch a last desperate glimpse of her family before her horse was led away.

The Sumerians looked at each other, outraged as the Babylonian party moved away – to take the bride so suddenly, without even giving her a chance to say goodbye to her family! To make such a swift exit, with none of the traditional toasts to the couple’s good health or taking part in the wedding feasts! The Babylonians were barbarians indeed.

Eliana struggled to maintain her composure throughout the wedding feast, sitting to the left of her sister’s empty place, her father to the right of Samsu’s. It was a grave and sober affair, but her father had decided that the feast should go ahead in honour of Kisha. It would be unseemly to waste the lavish, exquisite dishes when so many in the city were starving. The farming community had still not recovered from the deaths of so many of its menfolk during the invasion.

She choked down the delicacies, but they made her stomach turn. Finely spiced gazelle, goose stuffed with garlic, fresh fish baked with leeks and mustard... it all turned to ash in her mouth.

Maintaining her facade until the last guests had dispersed with whispered thanks and condolences, Eliana began to help the servants clean up – anything for something to do. Her hands shook so badly that she dropped a beautifully painted alabaster jug. It smashed in the dirt, the last remnants of its wine seeping away into the ground. The servants, not unkindly, sent her away.

Her father had shut himself away in his office, so she took herself off to her room. Shedding her day’s finery, she changed into a simple tunic, numb, fumbling with her trembling hands.

She threw herself face down on the bed. The tears came slowly at first – a trickle, sliding silently down her face and into the blanket. Then a stream. Then a torrent. She took great, shuddering breaths, feeling as though she would never have enough air in her lungs again. Her sister’s face swam up in her mind, that last pleading look in her eyes as she was led away – the last hug and words of farewell that they had been denied ran through Eliana’s head again and again in all the different ways they might have happened. She yearned to feel her sister’s protective arms around her just once more, bitter with the knowledge that she would never have that comfort again.

The blanket was soaked with her tears and her sweat as her body overheated, convulsing in the throes of misery. She was wracked with violent sobs until, at last, she was exhausted enough to fall into blessedly dreamless sleep.