He knows he has not convinced her at once, but he does not stop his fond remarks on their newfound home. Atair chafed at the knowledge that Maslakhat was true king in this land, but Aldebaran figured that he felt no yoke and so what difference did it make? They were here, they were thriving against what odds Miranian’s would have suggested, and with them came the favor of gods and stars alike.

He flew in the face of normalcy on so regular a basis at home that doing so when they left, doing so now, was utterly commonplace and almost boring. His brothers thrilled at the defiance because Shu was not their master and his wandering ways did not call to their soul as if, for all the world, he should never cease moving until Shu took the last of his breaths on the breeze.

He looks on her and remembers going to the Tribe as a yearling to watch her be given to the god as tribute - a life that would have meant she tend the Temple of Shu if she had been born from the noble womb of her father’s First Wife. Instead flowers from the far meadows at the edge of the desert had been plucked low on the stem and woven into her wild child’s mane, the blue flowers called Desert Scorpionweed crushed under hoof and dropped into dew-puddles so that their color could be painted on her, marigolds treated the same for the same purpose. It was a task of exhaustive preparation and she had, amazingly, stood still for it all.

He had not thought of it till now, but even then she had been beautiful in his eyes. She was notably untrained but even unprepared - Shu had whispered between the twin fluted ears that now paid him half-hearted considerations.

He tries to woo her with words largely smacking of defiance rather than deference - and in that behavior lay the truth of the matter. Her second goddess was cat, his second god was dog. Contrasting, but all the more curious that she should not grasp hold of her wildness with more enthusiasm. Perhaps it was because Pakhet’s feline graces did not settle well within her yet, always having been a burden she must bear by the law that said ‘wed or be inducted’ to the women of their people.

Had being wed been such a sour note to her? Sayyida seemed to like it almost as thoroughly as his brother. He decides that he will find that goddess within her beyond the abraded woman chiding him now.

She is not unprofessional, that compliment he could pay her, and he thinks that he’d have been disappointed if her loyalty to Mira was any less than her hesitation implied. One who could flip their fancy too fast was not able to be loyal in the least, after all. Her flicking shoulder, however, spoke of a hidden urge and he feeds off that promise like a bull finding water in the consumption of cactus flesh.

"if I'm to return empty, I would at least like some water first." She snarks at him and he smiles broadly at it, her spiritedness always having spoken to him, even when her peers thought her too dull without the trappings of a woman obsessed with adorning themself. "Are you coming along, or are you going to stand there gaping like a fish out of water?"

He is goaded this time, steps following at a respectful distance as she would have expected in her own country. He walks with her, amused that she knew their territory already so well. “You have given Atair some trouble, hunting for a wisp of scent where there ought to have been a pool of it. He knows you are a woman, he knows you smell of Mira, but he is almost convincing himself you are a specter sent to haunt him for abandoning his men for the sake of his brother, his sworn King, in his time of need.”

He sounds like Peter Pan, enthused by his brother’s frustration and entirely too gleeful over something that could tilt the balances in Atair’s mind like the black mare who courted him while he thrashed against the bonds it could make in them. Sakhmet, he thought, was not her only hurdle. "As for your choice in watering hole - you ought to be more careful to keep better watch on the thicker foliage. You’ve come to my sister-in-law’s oasis..." he says at last, having waited for her to dip her head to sip.

Sayyida, he thought, would convince her if any at all could. Most especially being the original betrothed and every inch of her breeding proof of a fine Mira away from Mira. If nothing else, Ra and Set and Isis’s hands in their lives establishing here should give Zazu something to think on… for rare was it that Set and Isis found common ground, creating a true life romantic comedy.