Chapter 1
It is with the fury of a thousand suns—quite a feat for a sleek panther of the moon—that Bast enters Xibalba, a roar and grumble following. He is familiar with her sly nature; she is Bashenga’s steward and protector of the ancestral realm, his only equal in vibranium.
Chaac looks up from where he is sharpening his axe. A black paw stops him.
“I can hear the grinding from my realm. What use do you have to sharpen a weapon that is never deployed?”
The look he gives her is feral, ironically. His armor clinks with the crane of his neck. “One would think an overgrown cat is more clever, more artful than a conniving serpent yet you pounced in here a kitten that leaps upon an unguarded toy.”
“That axe guards you, but you are indeed a toy with that fit.”
He stands up, axe in hand and headdress swaying, and looks down his pendulous nose. Thunder rolls. “Your latest charge has lowered you to new depths.”
Her talons transform into more human fingers, black fur into dark skin. Her eyes remain yellow and sharp. “My charge! She is my former charge's sister I am willing to favor. But look at yours, a sorry fish with pale wings, more suitable for a tumble in hot oil than to rule the oceans and all that is within it!”
His thunder this time follows lightening. Pitifully, it snaps his favorite sharpening rock in half. “He is not my charge, he is a god himself!”
Bast is quiet, contemplative, and he knows this is a sneaky pause before another pounce. In her once-a-century forays into Xibalba and regular meets of gods in Olympus, he found her to be an arrogant sort. One that thinks herself a fine, clever warrior. Yet for all she critiqued him as a brutish soldier, she was as transparent in her desires as the waters of Talokan.
“Take some elixir," he offers. She sniffs at having been made to wait so long. “You're as stubborn as Hun Hunahpu.”
“And as beautiful as Xquic?”
He looks at her. “I am as old as your—” Well. Bast doesn’t have a father, and his knowledge of poems end at metaphors of oceans and waves and weapons. “I am very old. Too old for you to flirt with," he amended.
She lounges over the seat across from him, observing her nails. “Your rain comes from the tears you cry after your brother’s wife rejected you.”
“That is the scandalizing retelling of mortals.” He grunted. “Gods do not attach themselves.”
She perks up. Her languid limbs curl around the seat for guests. “Is that so? Does that mean your search for Aj K’uk’ulkan’s mate has come to an end?”
“No.”
“So he has found his mate? What an occasion of celebration!” She slaps her hands together. The sound they make is worthy of his thunder. “Why, I shall inform the gods of the Duat myself, for this marks the end of half a millennium of sorrow. We shall dance until a babe is born of your charge’s union, drink xtabentún until our life force turns yellow. What a woman she must be! To have caught his unchanging heart, hardened by centuries of violence, a childlike soul that has yet to bloom in the infinity you gifted him—”
“Your peace, your peace. Your mention of the Duat was enough.” He internally scowls at the idea of Egyptian gods crawling over his precious rocks and jade.
Bast's excitement simmers. “So?”
“He remains...alone.”
“I am in awe of his discipline, I admit.”
“It’s not discipline," he says testily. If he were to peer over his realm, he would see the definitely not his charge swimming around the blue orb of a planet, tirelessly working for his people. Not a single one of Chaac's…what was the modern term, colleagues?...could boast to overlook such a driven soul. A soul like that was forged of fine jade and came once in an era. His not-charge deserved the finest of flesh and most adoring of women.
Then he sees K’uk’ulkan, changed out of his ceremonial garb and flying across the gulf of Mexico. In those damned shorts of his. Perhaps it would be eternal damnation of womankind to tie him to one of them.
Bast waits. He knows she recognizes his half-formulated thought and, unlike him, has the patience to see it through. Suddenly he regrets there is no god with a capital G to invoke around him.
“He is a winged serpent and wears more jewelry than a Pakistani bride. His ears look as if a bird chewed flesh and spat it out. The ocean would lose by tidal storms in a competition of ego, his voice—”
“Had I known about his suffering and by extension, yours, I would have come to you sooner. As it is, I have a solution to your problem.” She perches on the armrest and picks up an ear of corn, sniffing.
He tries to think of a witty retort. He comes up with none and resigns himself to hosting a very nefarious feline for the rest of…time is a creation too, it works oddly here. He isn’t sure.
“I have tried killing him here and there. My swipe of an axe only fortifies his belief that he is the chosen one. His belief is unshakable.”
"I do recall you making him what he is. I know a god’s favorite when I see one.” She chews delicately on a singular kernel of corn. “More than I can say for my charge. She thinks me a vile being or mere amusement to pass the time, as though I don’t have countless responsibilities and a country to protect. And when she does pray, she thinks I’m to be trifled with.”
“You are vile,” he reminds her. “She prayed, and you still took her brother.”
“Growth does not happen in the absence of grief.”
“Explain why you want to help with K’uk’ulkan, then. He has centuries left to grieve.”
She smiles.
“Shuri is a misled girl.” She opens her claws and silvery wisps float onto the table between them. It pulls them into a memory...
“Aneka. I do not understand. What is this for? Are you begging Bast to help with your mold problem? Because I can go to the lab and grab the finest combination of toxic fumes with a floral afterscent.”
Aneka looked down at her bowl of mashed kola nuts and boab tree. The incense fills her living room with an opaque fog. “Good reminder. I need to light a candle for that ritual too, but that’s not the point here. Your mother said you overworked yourself again.”
“Bah. I can stay in my room all day and she will still think I am working too hard.” Despite her words, her wrists are too thin and eyes too deeply set. She knows this. She is tired of everyone coddling her as though she will break. “Get on with it. My techs are waiting for me.”
“That second Avatar movie is being released soon. The one with the blue people? Except they will be in water. I wanted to rewatch the first one tonight…”
Shuri considers this. “Fine. I will stay.”
Okoye’s ashy head makes an appearance. The Dora General is out of place in Aneka’s home and makeshift ritual. The River Tribe are the caretakers of Wakanda’s spiritual state; but the Border Tribe personality of discipline and regiment suits her like the costume of a Dora.
“I am nearly done with the Awaze beef ribs. Do you need me to do the chants?”
Aneka quickly shakes her head. “No, no. It is a simple ritual for an auspicious year.”
When Okoye ducks out, Shuri squints at her. “You’re lying.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“How would you know, Princess?”
“Because I use the same tone with my mother when she thinks I am in the lab and, get this, I am in fact in the lab, but with a boukha.” It's a Tunisian drink distilled from figs. Aneka is horrified.
“You are not of age!”
“Do the Dora not teach mathematics anymore?”
“Your five years blipped do not count—Bast, nevermind. We don’t have time. Here.” Aneka hands her the bowl. They sit across from each other, knees touching. The incense is suffocating but the pleasant undercurrent of Okoye’s cooking soothes her. Very little has soothed her since… “Your brother would not want you to be like this, suffering alone.”
“Suffering with another, then.”
“He would be proud to see that mouth of yours remains in good health.” Aneka starts the ritual with a chant. Then a low hymn in Xhosa. A series of thumps like a Jabari. “Quickly, Princess. What do you wish for in a man?”
Shuri's eyebrows engage in a dazzling imitation of a puppet with cut strings while Aneka continues without faltering.
“I know you like men, as questionable as your taste in them may be. After the White Wolf woke up, I caught you making moon eyes at him twice. I thought he would return to Wakanda for the funeral but perhaps this will do the job.”
“Is this—is this the boyfriend ritual? Are you mad?” Bast-damnit, she never paid enough attention in her youth to recognize the hymns earlier for what they were. Little good her eidetic memory does.
Unfortunately for her, Aneka is a Dora, her nature impossible to tame. Aneka presses her knees together tightly.
“Quiet! Okoye will have my head for this.”
“I will have your head.” She considers tattling to Okoye. Immediately she wilts at what that would mean for the beef ribs.
“Bast’s spirit will descend upon us soon. Make your asks quickly and make them nicely. Please,” Aneka urges.
Shuri may not be pious, but she is also not a colonizer to make a mockery of what she does not understand. She settles for blithe. “Oh great Bast, take me from whence I came.”
Her patellas vibrate under Aneka’s severe grip. “Princess. I never cared for your irreligiosity but you have a long life ahead of you. Don’t say such things.”
“Did my brother not have a long life ahead?”
Aneka, mercifully, lets go of a knee and cups her cheek. “Live, Princess.”
Hurt, she tries not to pout. “I never thought you the sort to believe in all this.”
“A Dora knows when to seek aid. Please?”
“It’s not going to work,” she mutters.
"Would it be so bad? I want you to have more than what I have found.”
The plea is so earnest.
“Bast,” she starts again. Aneka nods along eagerly. “Grant me a king.”
“A king for a princess is only suitable. Go on.”
Most men never quite caught her eye. Even Bucky began as a morbid curiosity into how far her knowledge of neuroscience stretched. Shit. What else? What other men does she care for? Ross?
“Old.”
Aneka frowns. “An older man to match your maturity, I suppose. Though age isn’t always a measure of maturity. And?”
M’Baku is a man too, despite his gorilla-themed curios.
“Broad-shouldered, decorated, but not too beastly.” Quickly, she adds, “Definitely reads books and carries with him the knowledge of a hundred libraries.” It doesn’t deter Aneka.
“Eh, eye candy? Shall I tell Queen Mother to prepare for a Jabari to join her lineage?”
“...You like women.”
“I know a beautiful man when I see one. Ayo would agree with me. If you tell her I said this I will never let you in here again.”
“Great, thanks, I will be going now—"
Aneka glances at the bowl. “Not yet! The leaves need to turn blue.” The mush in the bowl is a dark teal. Or maybe jade. “What else?”
Shuri takes a deep breath. Her mind is sharper than a Dora spear, so enormous that the Dean of Wakanda University suggested, despite his shaman brother's protests, that she must donate her hypothalamus for scientific purposes after she joins the ancestors.
“A…leader from water. From a blue people. Beautiful hair and wears little.” Her mind whirs faster than words can tumble out of her mouth. “Ah, he is—he’s a fantastic swimmer. And speaks to animals.”
“Enough.” Aneka sighs. “Bast forgive me for thinking this would go any other way.”
“What?” she says innocently. “Surely I can ask for my heart’s desire?” She tries not to let the bitterness seep through.
“Most of Wakanda’s men would vie for your hand and you choose an Avatar character.” The warrior threw her hands up in the air as she stood up. The haze of the incense dissipated. “As you were, Princess. I pray your brain finds satisfaction in the reality of your lab, all things considered.”
“He could exist,” she insists. “We have seen purple aliens and Asgardian gods and sorcerers.”
“Hah? And still you disbelieve.”
There is nary a scrap of land in Wakanda that can meet her demands. She smirks inwardly, satisfied.
The mush in the bowl had turned into to a blazing blue. She swallows the bittersweet concoction out of guilt, hoping Aneka leaves feeling at least somewhat satisfied. “Seeing is believing.”
“Are you both done? More prayers and Bast might flood our fields with too much grain.” Okoye violently motions for them to join her. Relieved, Shuri leaves the bowl on the floor, unaware of the spirit above she so vehemently denied.
“Aha!” Bast opens her arms in the start of a large embrace. Chaac knows it's the effect of their holy drink. Once, he thought her dumb enough to want an embrace from him and promptly found himself abandoned in Hades’ underworld to roam alone for six mortal months.
“I don’t follow.”
“Her prayer!”
“Was a very poor one. K’uk’ulkan rides a whale for six days and seven nights with no food to call upon me.”
“Yes, but her prayer.” Bast reminds him of a mother cooing over and placating a child for their inferior additions to a refrigerator’s canvas of art. “Oh, you big oaf. She thinks herself too smart, for who can find a broad-shouldered king of water with immaculate jewelry of sacred metal carrying centuries of knowledge?”
Realization dawns on him.
“You’re looking to punish her. You sneak.”
She doesn’t hear him. Or she does, but ignores him, as is the way of the panther order. She starts to slink back and forth in his quarters, sparks flying from her fingers.
“She thinks herself a brainiac, brighter than the sun and creator of her own destiny. Tries to trick me. Alas, who else to help me but my own rivaling ingenuity and an unwitting old friend, desperate for his charge to find a maiden to bury himself in?”
A smile spreads across his face. It is small, at first, and then it reaches his eyes and they crinkle with joy.
“Bast!” He widens his arms too in a magnanimous show. “You have done it! What a pair they will make, the Princess of Wakanda, elevated by a descent to seas.” Who said a brute could not be poetic? It is a moment to celebrate; to be finally rid of the cloudiness that hovered over his K’uk’ulkan’s head and the dim glow he brought to Chaac’s realm.
She eyes him in disdain. “Elevated?” She scoffs. “I will say this once. My charge deigns to mate with your K’uk’ulkan. Every word and child she offers him is a blessing he will never be able to repay. He will suck her every finger and toe and give her only the iridescent of dresses, the glorious of jewels, the height of pleasure, and it will still put not a dent in what she will bestow him.”
He frowns. “Did you not insinuate you hated your charge?”
“My dear friend, it was you who called it a punishment.”
He hesitates. “Do you hate your charge so much you would unleash on her a god with a god of all god-complexes, the Feathered Serpent for whom neither air nor water can drown, bender of waves, master of tides, the very rays of the sun itself?”
She stares. He stares.
They meet in a frenetic hug, cheering.
“What an honorable day!” he breathes. “Let us call for an early Council of Godheads. Zeus himself must hear of the coupling that will change the course of this universe!”
“Not yet.”
His stomach drops. “What?”
Bast morphs into a panther three times the size of his axe and hisses. “I will make my move. Make yours.” It is a half-threat he understands well.
Namor pokes his head out of the water. The sudden urge that carried him to Wakanda evaporates as his eyes set upon a Queen and a Princess. The threats beyond the stars dealt with, the world is now revisiting the issue of Wakanda.
The time is now. He is sure of it. A fate so strong it wrenches his head open until he succumbs.
“You mucked it up. He killed her mother.”
Chaac bows in remorse but he will not apologize for what his not-charge did. That is for the mortals, er god and the Black Panther, to sort out. “Have you seen her on the ancestral plane?”
Bast’s yellow eyes narrow. “I said nothing of the fishman you granted her daughter.”
“Me? You came to—”
She swipes her talons at him. He attempts to plunge an axe through her tail.
While they squabble, the Feathered Serpent God meets the Black Panther in a searing kiss.
A mortal decade later, Shuri and Namor swing upon a hammock of her own fashion, large enough to carry the third occupant, and a fourth in her belly. He doesn’t ask for forgiveness and she will never forgive him, but as their child slumbers under his cloak, she thinks of the ritual offered in celebration of their eldest's second birthday.
“It’s unnecessary. Countless rituals for what purpose?”
He sucks on her forefinger and releases it with an obscene pop. “If you did not have to return to the surface every other season, my wife, we could space them out more thoroughly.”
She scowls. The pregnancy keeps her from traveling as often as she desires, a fact she suspects is greatly enjoyed by her husband and exploited in his refusal to use any form of birth control. At first, it was we have two nations, we need one child to rule over mine, because I bleed and can still die as you so lovingly showed me. Then it was your Toussaint will be in need of a second-in-command, one who knows both the grass of Wakanda and the seas of its ally.
Sometimes, she comes upon him secretly rehearsing a reason for a third, as though she could not hack his kimoyo beads and listen as she wishes. She doesn’t trust him; it is a precaution in case he decides to bomb a seaport, she tells herself.
“You don’t stay in Wakanda long enough to witness all their rituals too. Bah. So many that there are more days of ritual than days of freedom.”
“Why do you suppose a ritual to be the antithesis of freedom?”
“Because they’re binding and take away choice. Someone has a cold? Start a ritual. You have a neighbor that hates you? Hold a ritual. You want a boyfriend? Do the ritual.”
He nibbles her earlobe. “You hold a ritual and choose to pray for your heart’s desire. Is that not freedom?”
She begrudgingly thinks he has a point and, unable to formulate a witty response, assumes her knobby, malfunctioning neurons are a matter of pregnancy hormones.
His thumb hovers dangerously close to her breast. Every chide at him to stay at least three meters away from her whilst holding Ixchel is met with an impish smile of disobedience. “Now tell me about this…boyfriend ritual. Did you hold one?”
“Of course not. I never believed...” Her jaw snaps shut. “Oh, Bast.”
She chose him, didn’t she?
A sound that suspiciously resembles a panther’s purr echoes in the cavern.