After the presentation, Melmokh saw his opportunity to move in and establish himself as he never could with Gur’mekh.
As Roh’kash, he took Shenzi apart from the crowd to be alone with him. The two of them went along to a cave far from the others.
“You are my anointed, and I have brought you here to confirm our relationship and bond us together forever.”
Shenzi bowed before Roh’kash. “Even so, Great Mother.”
Melmokh laughed prettily. “You do not need to bow before me. I do not want your service but your companionship. Do you not know that I have sought you out to rule beside me?”
“To rule beside you?”
“Yes. As my mate.” The false Roh’kash rubbed her down her full length. The sexual meaning was not lost on Shenzi, and she froze in terror.
“You quake, my little one. Do you not know that I am both Roh’kash and Roh’khim? The Great Mother and the Great Father? They are different aspects of the same God. Behold the one who courts your affections!”
Melmokh revealed himself to her, though his evil heart was disguised with the beauty of golden light that wrapped him like a mantle. “Is this more to your liking?”
“Oh!”
He was musky and handsome, and the gleam in his eyes was hypnotic. She stared at him spellbound. He began to nuzzle her lightly around her face, kissing her passionately beside the eyes and under the corners of her twitching mouth. “You fill me with every wholesome desire,” he purred. “Our love could last the centuries. I can please you the way you were born to be pleased, and you will please me too.” He began to nuzzle her neck and her trembling shoulders. “I’m on fire, child. Give yourself to me freely, not because I command it, but because you want it. Only if you call me of your own free will, for I will not force myself upon you.”
She did not answer him, but she stood her ground when he rubbed her along her length, and from her throat escaped a low whimper as her jaw trembled. She gave herself willingly, and in doing so became truly his. As the death of Demrath bound Gur’mekh to him, so her intimacy bound her to him. But he had no desire to torment her. Far from it.
There in the darkness, Melmokh made love with her. And there in the darkness he forged a bond with her that would make her his. For it was his wish that she would one day conceive a child who would become the physical presence of Melmokh, a body through which he could fully enter the world of Ma’at and have his way unobstructed by time and space.
Of course, he neglected to tell her that.