The Quest

by Wilbur Smith

  ‘You did right,’ Taita reassured him, and gently dislodged the clutching fingers. Then, suddenly, he lifted Tiptip’s hand to examine it more closely. ‘You have six fingers!’ he exclaimed.

  Clearly Tiptip was mortified: he tried to hide the deformity by clenching his hand into a fist. ‘The gods built my entire body awry. My head and eyes, my back and my limbs — everything about me is twisted and misformed.’ His eyes filled with tears.

  ‘But you have a good heart,’ Taita consoled him. Gently, he opened the fist and spread the fingers. An additional rudimentary finger grew out of the man’s palm beside the normal little finger.

  ‘ “Six fingers point the way,”’ Taita whispered.

  ‘I did not mean to point at you, Magus. I would never deliberately give offence to you in that way,’ Tiptip whimpered.

  ‘No, Tiptip, you have done me great service. Be certain of my gratitude and my friendship.’

  ‘You will not tell Brother Nubank?’

  ‘No. You have my oath on it.’

  ‘The blessings of Hathor upon you, Magus. Now I must go or Brother Nubank will come to find me.’ Tiptip scampered away like a crab. Taita gave him a few moments’ start then made his way back to the library.

  He found that Demeter and Meren had preceded him, and Nubank was berating Tiptip: ‘Where have you been?’

  ‘I was in the latrine, Brother. Forgive me. I have eaten something that has upset my stomach.’

  ‘And you have upset mine, you loathsome piece of excrement. While you were there you should have left all of yourself in the bucket.’

  He clouted Tiata’s birthmark. ‘Now bring me the scrolls in which the islands of the eastern ocean are described.’

  Taita took his place beside Demeter and said to him in Tenmass, ‘Look to the little fellow’s right hand.’

  ‘He has six fingers.’ Demeter exclaimed. ‘“Six fingers point the way!”

  ‘You have learnt something from him, have you not?’

  ‘We must follow the right branch of Mother Nile to her source. There we will find a volcano set beside a wide lake. I am certain in my heart that that is where Eos lurks.’;

  They left the temple of Hathor long before sunrise the next morning. Nubank bade them farewell reluctantly - he had fifty volcanoes yet to describe. It was still half dark when they reached the ford of the Nile below Thebes. Habari and Meren led the way down into the riverbed, Taita and Demeter following, but a gap had opened between the two groups. The leaders rode through the tail of one of the stinking red pools and were half-way to the far bank as Demeter’s camel started across the mud. At that moment Taita became aware that a malevolent influence was focusing on them. He felt a chill in the air, the pulse in his ears pounded and his breathing was hampered. He turned quickly and looked back over his mare’s rump.

  A solitary figure stood on the bank they had just left. Although his dark robes merged into the shadows, Taita recognized him immediately.

  He opened his Inner Eye and Soe’s distinctive aura appeared enveloping the man, like the flames of a bonfire. It was an angry scarlet, shot with purple and green. Taita had never seen an aura so menacing.

  ‘Soe is here!’ he called, in urgent warning to Demeter, as he lay in his palanquin, but it was too late: Soe raised an arm and pointed at the surface of the pool through which the camel was wading. Almost as though it was responding to his command, a monstrous toad launched itself from the water and, with a snap of its jaws, ripped a deep gash in the camel’s back leg above the knee. The animal bawled with shock and, breaking free of its lead rein, bolted out of the pool. Instead of heading for the far bank it turned and galloped wildly along the riverbed, with Demeter’s palanquin swaying and bouncing from side to side.

  ‘Meren! Habari!’ Taita shouted, as he kicked his mare into a full gallop in pursuit of the runaway camel. Meren and Habari swung their mounts round and urged them back into the riverbed to join the pursuit.

  ‘Hold fast, Demeter!’ Taita shouted. ‘We are coming!’ Windsmoke was flying under him, but before he caught up with Demeter the camel reached another pool and dashed into it, throwing up sheets of spray.

  Then the surface of the water directly in its path opened as another toad shot out. It sprang high at the head of the panic-stricken beast and clamped its jaws on the bulbous nose in a bulldog grip. It must have struck a nerve, for the front legs of the camel collapsed. Then it rolled on to its back as it thrashed its head from side to side in an attempt to break the grip of the toad’s fangs. The palanquin was trapped beneath it, and its light bamboo framework was crushed into the mud under its weight.

  ‘Demeter! We must rescue him!’ Taita shouted to Meren, and urged on his mare. But before he reached the edge of the pool Demeter’s head broke the surface. Somehow he had escaped from the palanquin, but he was half drowned in the mud that plastered his head, coughing and vomiting, his movements feeble and erratic.

  ‘I am coming!’ Taita shouted. ‘Do not despair!’ Then, suddenly, the pool was boiling with toads. They came swarming up from the bottom and fell upon Demeter, like a pack of wild dogs pulling down a gazelle.

  The old man’s mouth was wide open as he tried to scream, but the mud choked him. The toads pulled him below the surface, and when he emerged again briefly his struggles had almost ceased. His only movements were caused by the toads below the surface, tearing off lumps of his flesh.

  ‘I am here, Demeter!’ Taita yelled despairingly. He could not take the mare among the frenzied toads for he knew they would rip into her. He reined in and slipped off her back with his staff in his hands. He started to wade into the pool, then gasped with agony as a toad sank its fangs into his leg below the surface. He thrust down at it with his staff, exerting all his physical and spiritual strength to bolster the blow. He felt the jolt as the tip struck squarely, and the creature released him. It came to the surface on its back, stunned and kicking convulsively.

  ‘Demeter!’ He could not tell the man from the toads that were devouring him alive. Man and beasts were thickly coated with shining black mud.

  Suddenly two thin arms were lifted high above the teeming pack and he heard Demeter’s voice. ‘I am done. You must go on alone, Taita.’ His voice was almost inaudible, choked by mud and the poisonous red water.

  And then it was snuffed out as a toad, larger than all the others, clamped its jaws into the side of his head, and pulled him under for the last time.

  Taita started forward again, but Meren rode up behind him seized him with one strong arm round his waist, lifted him out of the mud and carried him back to the bank.

  ‘Put me down!’ Taita struggled to free himself. ‘We cannot leave him to those foul creatures.’ But Meren would not release him.

  ‘Magus, you are hurt. Look to your leg.’ Meren tried to calm him. The blood gushed from the bite to mingle with the mud. ‘Demeter is finished. I will not lose you also.’ Meren held him firmly, while they watched the death struggles in the pool diminish until the surface was still once; more.

  ‘Demeter is gone,’ Meren said quietly, and lowered Taita to his feet.

  He went to catch the grey mare and brought her to him. As he helped Taita to mount, he said softly, ‘We must go, Magus. There is nothing more for us here. You must tend your injury. No doubt the toad’s fangs are poisonous, and the mud is so foul that it will contaminate your flesh.’

  However, Taita lingered a little longer, looking for some last sign from his ally, seeking some final contact from the ether, but there was none.

  When Meren leant from the back of his own mount, took hold of the mare’s reins and led her away, Taita made no further protest. His leg was paining him, and he felt shocked and bereft. The old savant had gone and Taita realized how much he had come to rely on him. Now he confronted the witch alone, and the prospect filled him with dismay.

  Once they were safely returned to their quarters in the palace at Thebes, Ramram sent slave girls with urns of hot water and bottles of perfum
ed unguents to bathe Taita and wash away the mud. When he was thoroughly cleansed two royal physicians arrived, followed by a train of assistants bearing chests filled with medicine and magical amulets. On Taita’s instruction Meren met them at the door and sent them away: ‘As the most skilled and learned surgeon in all of Egypt, the magus is attending to his own injury. He presents his compliments and thanks for your concern.’

  Taita washed his wound with a distillate of wine. Then he numbed his leg with a self-induced trance, while Meren cauterized the deep gash with a bronze spoon heated in the flame of an oil lamp. It was one of the few medical skills that Taita had been able to teach him. When he had finished, Taita roused himself and, using long hairs from Windsmoke’s tail as thread, stitched together the lips of his wound. He dressed them with ointments of his own concoction and bound them with linen bandages. By the time he had finished he was exhausted by pain and filled with sorrow at the loss of Demeter. He sank on to his mattress and closed his eyes.

  He opened them when he heard a commotion at the doorway, and a familiar, authoritative voice bellowed, ‘Taita, where are you? Cannot I trust you out of my sight, but that you commit some rash folly? Shame on you! You are no longer a child.’ At that the Divine God on Earth, Pharaoh Nefer Seti, burst into the sickroom. His suite of lords and attendants crowded in after him.

  Taita felt his spirits rise and the well of his strength begin to refill. He was not entirely alone. He smiled at Nefer Seti, and struggled up on an elbow.

  ‘Taita, are you not ashamed of yourself? I expected to find you breathing your last. Instead you are lying at your ease, with a foolish grin on your face.’

  ‘Majesty, it is a smile of welcome, for I am truly delighted to see you.’

  Nefer Seti pushed him back gently on to the pillows, then turned to his retinue. ‘My lords, you may leave me here with the magus, who is my old friend and tutor. I shall summon you when I need you.’ They backed out of the chamber and Pharaoh bent to hug Taita. ‘By the sweet milk from the breast of Isis, I am glad to see you safe, though I hear that your companion magus was lost. I want to hear all about it, but first let me greet Meren Cambyses.’ He turned to Meren, who stood guard at the door. Meren went down on one knee before him, but Pharaoh lifted him to his feet. ‘Do not abase yourself to me, companion of the Red Road.’

  Nefer Seti seized him in a hearty embrace. As young men they had embarked together on the ultimate test of warriorhood, the Red Road, a trial of skill in handling chariot, sword and bow. The two had been matched as a team against proven and tried veterans, who were free to employ any means, even killing, to prevent them reaching the end of the road. Together they had won through. Companions of the Red Road were brothers of the warrior blood, united for life. Until her death Meren had been betrothed to Nefer Seti’s sister, the Princess Merykara, so he and Pharaoh had nearly become brothers-in-law. This reinforced the bond between them. Meren might have held high office in Thebes, but he had chosen instead to enroll himself as an apprentice to Taita.

  ‘Has Taita been able to school you in the Mysteries? Have you become a magus as well as a mighty warrior?’ Pharaoh demanded.

  ‘Nay, Majesty. Despite the best efforts of Taita, I lacked the skills. I have never woven the simplest of spells that succeeded. A few even rebounded on my own head.’ Meren made a rueful face.

  ‘A good warrior is better than an inept sorcerer any day, old friend. Come, sit in conference with us, as was our wont in those long-ago days when we were fighting to free this very Egypt from the tyrant.’

  As soon as they were seated at either side of Taita’s sleeping mat, Nefer Seti became serious. ‘Now, tell me of your encounter with the toads.’

  Between them Taita and Meren described the death of Demeter.

  When they ended Nefer Seti was silent. Then he growled, ‘Those animals grow bolder and more voracious every day. I am certain that it is they who have made impure and sullied what remains of the water in the river pools. I have tried every means I can think of to be rid of them, but for every one we slay two more spring up to take its place.’

  ‘Majesty.’ Taita paused for a moment before he went on. ‘You must seek out the witch whose creatures they are, and destroy her. The toads and all the other plagues she heaps upon you and your kingdom will disappear with her, for she is their mistress. Then the Nile will flow again, and prosperity will return to this very Egypt.’

  Nefer Seti stared at him in alarm. ‘Must I infer that the plagues are not of nature?’ he demanded. ‘That they are created by the sorcery and witchcraft of one woman?’

  ‘That is what I believe,’ Taita assured him.

  Nefer Seti sprang to his feet and strode up and down, lost in thought.

  At last he stopped and stared hard at Taita. ‘Who is this witch? Where is she? Can she be destroyed, or is she immortal?’

  ‘I believe she is human, Pharaoh, but her powers are formidable. She protects herself well.’

  ‘What is her name?’

  ‘It is Eos.’

  ‘The goddess of the dawn?’ He had been well schooled by the priests in the hierarchy of the gods, for he was a god himself. ‘Did you not tell me she was human?’

  ‘She is a human being who has usurped the goddess’s name to conceal her true identity.’

  ‘If that is so then she must have an earthly abode. Where is it, Taita?’

  ‘Demeter and I were seeking her out, but she became aware of our intentions. First she sent a giant python to attack him but Meren and I saved him, although he came close to death. Now she has succeeded with the toads where she failed with the serpent.’

  ‘So you do not know where I can find the witch?’ Nefer Seti persisted.

  ‘We do not know for certain, but the occult indications suggest that she lives in a volcano.’

  ‘A volcano? Is that possible, even for a witch?’ Then he laughed. ‘I learnt long ago never to doubt you, Taita. But tell me, which volcano? There are many.’

  ‘I believe that to find her we must travel to the headwater of the Nile, beyond the mighty swamps that block the river above Qebui. Her lair is near a volcano beside a great lake. Somewhere at the very end of our earth.’

  ‘I remember you told me when I was a boy how my grandmother, Queen Lostris, sent a legion south under Lord Aquer to find the source of the river. They disappeared into those dread swamps beyond Qebui and never came back. Has that expedition aught to do with Eos?’

  ‘It has indeed, majesty,’ Taita agreed. ‘Did I not tell you that there was a lone survivor of the legionaries who returned to Qebui?’

  ‘I do not remember that part of the tale.’

  ‘At the time it seemed insignificant, but one man came back. He was raving and demented. The physicians thought he had been driven mad by the hardships he had endured. He died before I could speak to him. But recently I have learnt that before he died he told strange tales that were disbelieved by all who heard them so they were not reported to me. He raved about vast lakes and mountains at the end of the earth … and a volcano set beside the greatest of the lakes. It is from this legend that Demeter and I divined the whereabouts of the witch.’ He went on to describe his meeting with the hunchback Tiptip.

  Nefer Seti listened, fascinated. When Taita had finished, he thought for a while, then asked, ‘Why is the volcano so important?’

  In reply Taita described Demeter’s captivity in the witch’s lair on Etna and his escape.

  ‘She needs the subterranean fires as a forge in which to fashion her spells. The power emitted by the immense heat and sulphurous gases enhances her powers to godlike proportions,’ Taita explained.

  ‘Why have you selected this particular volcano to examine first of all the many hundreds?’ Nefer asked.

  ‘Because it is closest to this very Egypt, and it sits upon the source of the Nile.’

  ‘I see now that your reasoning is solid. It all fits together neatly,’ Nefer Seti said. ‘Seven years ago, when the Nile dried up, I r
emembered all that you had told me of my grandmother’s expedition so I ordered another legion to march south on the same mission to reach the source and discover the cause of the river’s failure. The officer I placed in command was Colonel Ah-Akhton.’

  ‘This I did not know,’ Taita said.

  ‘Because you were not here for me to discuss it with you. You and Meren were wandering in foreign lands.’ Nefer Seti’s tone was a rebuke.

  ‘You should have stayed with me.’

  Taita adopted a repentant attitude. ‘I did not know you had need of me, Majesty.’

  ‘I will always have need of you.’ He was readily appeased!

  ‘What news of this second expedition?’ Quickly Taita seized his advantage. ‘Has it returned?’

  ‘No, it has not. Not a single man of eight hundred who marched away came back. They have vanished more completely than my grandmother’s army did. Has the witch destroyed them also?’

  ‘It is more than possible, Majesty.’ He saw that Nefer Seti had already accepted the existence of the witch and did not have to be convinced or encouraged to pursue her.

  ‘You never fail me, Tata, except when you are on a jaunt to the gods alone know where.’ Nefer Seti grinned at him. ‘Now I know who is mine enemy and I can move against her. Before, I was helpless to lift these terrible afflictions from my people. I was reduced to digging wells, begging food from my enemies and killing toads. Now you have made clear the solution to my problems. I must destroy the witch!’