The poppy had taken root inside of her. As the water swayed, so did she, bracing herself against Onuphrious all the while. The river was alive, respirations evidenced by the water's ebb and flow, her hands traced below the surface, sun warming her closed eyelids as her head turns to the skies in a bliss unmatched.

In this moment, she was a woman free of her reputation, a kalasiris soaked in the rivers waters that she called home. The tiny cork of the phial bobbed up and down in the water distantly, floating away from the intimacy unraveling. She took in her husband's form with lazed eyes and a smile unforced. A small gasp forms at her lips when he kisses her, bringing her back to all those years ago, the first time he had ever brought his mouth to hers... Everything felt right.

But it didn't feel like it had before the secret came to life. It didn't taste like love unadultered. It imparted understanding to the Sirdsett, vision clouded with floaters and blurred reality that maybe, just maybe, her husband would forgive her for the life she could not control. Her headwrap skims the water, unraveling in thick sheets. Braids culminate in a thick bundle at the base of her neck. A perfumed scalp breathes in the heat of afternoon.

Her eyes draw along the horizon, the opposite bank of the river scattered with the palace and temple, barges streaming along in the distance as the nobility of Egypt frolicked in the sunlight under the watchful gaze of a young Queen. The war faded to the rear of her thoughts, her children along with it, as she brought herself back to her fractured bond, seemingly tangible between them in their silence.

Shoulders loosen. Her mind darted from one slow thought to another, ambling like her hands that swam beneath the water. Though she had lost her faith twenty-four years prior, Iaheru did not deny the existence or the wrath of Hathor. There was a pull in her chest, the fabric wrapped to her wrists gluing to her movements as she yearned to be free. It wasn't so much Onuphrious' suggestion that prompted her to unfasten a golden broach bearing his sigil, but her own discomfort... The need to molt like a spring moth and stumble to new, but familiar places. Perhaps Onuphrious would be her torchlight, but she wasn't sure she could ever flitter around his strength with the same ease, no. A lifetime of trust had been lost and there was less than a lifetime to rebuild it.

But she could start. She allowed the broach to fall to the Nile's silt to lay unseen for the rest of days. The fabric, sopping with water, floated away from her form as she rose, casting away the garment still sticking to her body in odd places, as if she was tangled in her drugged confusion.

The quaint, modest Egyptian stood starkly naked, ready to be wrapped in the white cloth and receive the goddess' blessing for the first time. Iaheru's lips curl into a smile as her fingers curl around his, beckoning her husband under the ripples of the water to join her for the fleeting moments of peace they shared.