Akila hated Judea. The people sucked. They were, without a doubt, the most boring assholes on the planet. Yahweh this and Yahweh that, shove off it. She was surprised their knees weren’t bruised and bloodied from all the time they spent on them praying. Though Akila supposed, she wouldn’t know that seeing as they were so fucking modest that even a speck of uncovered flesh was probably some damnable sin.



Yet for as much as Akila loathed Judea and everything to do with it, there was still business to be had. Moab recently had little trading festival that brought foreign merchants to their shores. Of course, being the reputable merchant of some import herself, she attended. And she certainly procured items in some legitimate fashion as was expected from a reputable merchant. Now, these items came without a tax, but fuck Judea they didn’t need to know that.



Her ship was filled with different treasures that could make quite the profit. There was one item, in particular, that she felt a certain ringmaster would like. Incense from a land far from Judea, Egypt, or anywhere else Akila would often visit. Said to be used by performers there to elevate their show, Akila thought the ringmaster might pay a pretty penny for it. And if not him, she was sure some schmuck would pay a premium for it. Akila didn’t have a worry.



Akila was ready to set sail away from Judea, may it rot in peace, when she overheard some dockworkers talking about some Egyptian barbarians. At first Akila thought they were talking about her and her crew, and she was ready to sneer at them, fingers curling in a fist. But she realized that not once did they look at her ship. They were talking about a caravan of people outside of Moab. A… circus? They talked about different animals, such as snakes, and performers like jugglers and acrobats. They could just be some random group of people from Egypt, but the only ones worth a damn was the Tempest of Set. Unless they started chasing people out of Egypt (which she wouldn’t put it past them) then it was like they who made their way to Moab for some gods damned reason.





Hmm, was the Tempest here? Interesting. Perhaps Akila should check it out. Stepping onto her ship she grabbed a sample of the incense. “Khalid, I’ll be back.” Akila grabbed the stupid scarf, wrapping it around her hair. Ugh, she wanted to burn it. Khalid nodded towards his captain, and Akila stepped off and away from the docks.



Never did she see the circus actually stay inside the city, and it seemed Moab was no different. Outside the limits, she saw tents, identical to the ones she would see in Egypt. Though it was significantly smaller in number.



This must be a fraction of what they would normally. Were the rest in Egypt still? She supposed there was no real reason to travel en mass to Moab. It was not as if Judeans could appreciate a good show. They would take one look at the performers and likely condemned them as hedonist beasts. Racism was rampant in Judea, and anything out of the norm was punishable.



“And then he was like rawr! But Nem isn’t afraid! He was just like Hamidi! He brought the tiger down without even trying!” Akila heard a girl chattering away to a small group in Coptic. She sounded annoying hyperactive and almost childish, though looking at her face she looked nothing of the sorts. She was short, yes, but she was not a child.



Her eyes had left the group and fell on Akila. “You’re the pirate.” She said rather bluntly, to which Akila raised a scarred brow. “Why are you here? This isn’t the ocean. This is land. Pirates don’t like land.”



Pirates don’t lik- Akila didn’t have much patience to talk with this one. Her voice irritated her, and she provided nothing of worth to Akila. Ten seconds into this conversation and she was already a nuisance. “Yeah, uh-huh. Where’s your ringmaster?”



The girl’s eyes narrowed into slits. She looked at Akila as if she were some enemy, which, to be fair, Akila was ally to no one. Still, she didn’t seem to like the fact that Akila was looking for him. Touchy, touchy, the girl needed to relax it seemed.



“You can’t just demand to see N-” She had started to say but Akila just walked past her. She had seen him walking amongst the tents.



“Oy, ringmaster!” Akila called out to him. She pulled off her scarf as she did. They were outside of Moab and if someone tried to stone her in the middle of an Egyptian camp, well… it wasn’t her blood that was going to be shed, “Catch.”



She tossed him the small sample of incense. The small girl looked at Akila with such a smoldering glare that if looks could kill Akila would already be halfway to Anubis. But honestly… Akila gave exactly zero shits about the brat. She just wanted her money and to save a trip by hitting up Amenemhat way ahead of when she expected to see him.



“Heard you were in Moab,” Akila said as the girl stormed off, looking to be in a wretched mood. “I don’t think your little pet likes me.” Akila shrugged, completely unperturbed. “I got to say I’m hurt. After I come all this way with a sample of incense to be treated so distrustfully. You ought to train them better.” Akila rolled her dark eyes.



But she wasn’t here to take jabs at a nobody. This was about business.



“You like your things foreign? That’s as foreign as it gets. Comes from way to the east. Their performers use it to… elevate their shows. That’s a sample, I got more on the boat. Plus a little extra dyes and paints that might be of interest.” But she wasn’t about to lug her entire collection outside of Moab for the chance the Tempest had made their way here. “Interested? Otherwise, I’ll just head back.” Might make the kid happy, though that’s not necessarily what Akila wanted to do. She took a special pride in pissing off as many people as possible.