Set swims back to the Solar Barque and his great-great-uncle reaches down to helps him aboard. Their gazes meet. Set's eyes are bright red, even brighter and redder than the blood he has just spilled. Ra's eyes are mismatched. The right is a lambent amber yellow, the left a pale pearly grey. This is a distinctive coloration he shares with many of his descendants — Osiris, Isis, Hathor, Horus, the ones he trusts most, the ones he is inclined to favour.

When Set looks into his great-great-uncle's eyes, it is a tangible reminder of his outcast status. He knows he will never be well loved by the senior god of the pantheon. He knows he will always be apart and different.

Ra knows it too, and is saddened. The first saddening of today. The first of many.

''Well fought,'' says Ra.

Set shrugs. ''How much longer must this farce continue? How many more times do I have to slay that thing before you decide I've made amends?''

''For what you did to your brother? Your sentence is not nearly served, Set.''

The two gods go their separate ways, and the barque sails on.

Soon a group of elder gods appear on deck: Sobek, Khnum, Ptah, Neith. Of these, only Neith has any vigour and vitality. She marches forward to hail her son.

''Ra,'' she says, her bows, arrows, and shield clanking. ''How goes it?''

''You are strong in the world, mother,'' says Ra. ''So am I.''

''As long as those great-great-nephews and nieces of yours bicker, I will prosper,'' says the goddess of war. Her jaw has a mannish jut to it. Her hair is tightly braided and tied back so that there is no chance it will ever distract her by flapping in her face.