by Andre Norton
Or was he? No one could live long within the confines of any household—even a household as diverse and sprawling as the royal court—without hearing as many or more rumors than those which haunted any camp or barracks. Hedged about by age-old ceremony and pressured by rite and custom as the Pharaoh might be, he still had some free choices to make as Sekenenre himself was in the process of proving, to the confusion and covert opposition of some of those about him.
When this Pharaoh had stood for the first time in the sane- tuary of Amon-Re, grasping the Flail and Crook and fronting the image of the god whose earthly representative he was, what had he said? The words were carved now for all men to read, and they were bold words for a shadow king on the shadow throne of a torn-apart kingdom.
"Re made me the herdsman of this land, for He saw that I would keep it in order for Him; He entrusted to me that which He protected."
And to Sekenenre that guardianship was not a passive thing; it was a duty that led him to front the might of the Hyksos, to pit the small remnant of what was once Egypt against the fury of a well-entrenched foreign empire. But if Sekenenre saw revolt as his sacred duty, there were others who did not, as Rahotep had come to understand.
Wearing the scarlet-and-yellow-striped headdress of the guard, with the insignia of their service emblazoned on their leather lappets, the ten archers served their tours of duty with other detachments under the Chief of the Guard and the nominal command of their own captain. If by royal favor they were accepted in theory, the facts of the matter were not quite the same, for ambition led a man into court service, and it also nourished intrigues and hidden maneuvering for royal notice.
To have a body of Nubians from what was considered in Thebes a province not only barbarous but suspect as to loyalty, under a landless officer, come into close service under Pharaoh was more than many a young, or not so young, Commander of a Hundred, or Commandant of Chariots, could accept with grace.
Rahotep walked softly, as any Scout in enemy territory. He might be new to court life, but he was not new to the atmosphere that clung to the dark corners, having contended too long with something very like it in the household of the Lady Meri-Mut. His early schooling at Unis's hands made him sense quickly veiled animosity and recognize slights for what they were. He learned more of the subtle forces warring among the officials and the household from day to day.
One by one he sorted out and marked those he believed to be the hard core of resistance to Pharaoh's will. There was the Vizier Zau, who reminded the young captain only too strongly of Pen-Seti. Not as old as the priest of Anubis, perhaps, but truly a man of intellectual powers, a worthy administrator, precise in the detailed handling of executive duties, able in a post that was intended to take much of the burden of rule from the shoulders of Pharaoh. Within those limits Zau was all any ruler could ask of the gods. But his limits were too narrow, and Rahotep pieced together words, half-understood whispers, small actions, which made him guess that Zau was sincerely convinced that the Two Lands must not break the pattern-of- things-as-they-are, and that the Vizier believed Sekenenre's proposed vigorous action was courting disaster for the land. A fanatical man completely sure of his own righteousness, he was as dangerous as Pen-Seti—more so because of the power he held beneath the royal seal.
To Zau Rahotep added Sebni of the Prince Ahmose's household. Though the younger prince appeared to go his own way with some freedom, Rahotep knew now that the scribe Sebni had been set in the Royal Son's following to act as a restraint and a curb. Only Ahmose's own strong will gave him the power to flaunt the scribe—as he had done during the lion hunt.
There were others; the captain could recite names. Some were men of power holding hereditary offices from which they could not be removed without some proof of open treason or incompetence. The Treasurer of the South, Kheruef; two judges; General Sheshang; and a few high-ranking priests.
Perhaps his own dealings with Pen-Seti, his danger in the necropolis of Semna, had made the Scout officer especially wary of the Temple of Anubis and its priesthood. But Raho- tep believed that he had no lasting prejudices against the followers of the jackal-headed god—that Seeker who was set at the portals of the other world to guide the wandering spirits to judgment. Once in Egypt the priests of Anubis had truly been "seekers," students of knowledge—not only for its own sake as scholars, but for the general benefit of the people. They had trained forelookers—those who could see a little into the future—and cast horoscopes of men, striving to avert danger and ill to come, advising and helping when it struck.
But the wisdom of any god must filter through the minds and emotions of his or her servants. While those servants were in themselves true worshipers, not misusing any power for their own gain, then did the immortal knowledge come clean and fresh. But when those servants turned from the inner laws of the Great Ones, claimed advantages to themselves, then what they had to give was muddy and befouled. There were two faces to learning, one bright, one dark. And to seek out the dark deliberately was to turn from the service of Amon-Re to that of Set.
So Rahotep, standing at attention to the left of the throne during the "small audience" of the early morning, surveyed Tothotep, High One of Anubis, and disliked what he saw. The cold serenity of Khephren was here, but with it something far more deadly smouldering underneath. Yet he could not mistake, even though it was not directed at a captain of the Bodyguard, the impact of the man's personal power.
And Sekenenre gave close attention to Tothotep, whereas he brushed aside the veiled protests of Zau. On one of his rare off-duty periods Rahotep commented on this privately to Methen. The veteran officer of the Hawk had been given the drilling of newly raised spearmen and so was stationed at the Theban barracks. Now, as he lounged at ease with Rahotep on a reed raft as they fished, he frowned.
"A man does not shout aloud his presence when scouting a Kush encampment," he observed obliquely.
"Nor does he walk barefoot among serpents!" Rahotep countered. "I am no simple savage to be befooled by traders. But I must ask some questions lest I paddle unknowingly into a nesting place of crocodiles. Is it because I have no cause to remember those of Anubis with liking that I distrust their high priest here?"
"No one speaks ill of a temple." Again Methen talked around the question. "But any Pharaoh's face turns to the Jackal with respect, for there is an old bond between them, one not spoken of openly in these days. My younger brother was of that shrine. When the Hyksos overran the Hawk Nome, his throat was cut on his own altar as a pleasing gift to Him Who Dwells in the Darkness. But thus it is that I know some of the secrets of Anubis. And the greatest of these is that in the ancient days the Jackal held Pharaoh's life between His jaws—and more straightly than the gods hold the lives of us all."
Rahotep sat up, setting the light craft to bobbing under them. "How so?"
"Long ago—before the pyramids were built, before Menes united the Two Lands, North and South, making them one, then did Pharaoh live only as long as he was strong and vigorous. And when he aged, the Jackal came to him—for those who served Anubis cast his horoscope and so foresaw his death date. They sped him toward his horizon so that a younger and more virile man could occupy the Great Throne. To the Jackal alone—and those who served Him—was given the power of Pharaoh's fate. And now His priests still cast the royal horoscope. Also they have the power of forelooking so that they may warn of ills to come."
"I would not like to stand opposed to Tothotep," Rahotep said slowly.
"Neither would I. You wish now that the prince had not shown you the favor of court promotion?"
Rahotep, having ventured one confidence, now released a flood. He needed both reassurance and advice.
"I hate the court—it is no better than Semna. Also I feel now that I am but a piece in some game played by those hidden from me. Were we from Nubia put where we stand to be a defense—or a weapon? I am as one treading a strange path with a cloth about my eyes!"
There was no sign of sympathy
on Methen's face. Instead, his features had taken on the expression with which he had so often met unnecessary stupidity in the past, giving Rahotep a momentary but nostalgic memory of less complicated days.
"Do you wish to return again to the House of Captains as a boy, refusing to play a man's role? It is time for you to awaken and be true to your inheritance. You are not a simple soldier of the forces—you are what you were born to be—the No- march of the Hawk. What matter if there be no nome under that standard now? The day will come when it is restored, and you must be ready to take your place as its ruler. Use your eyes, your ears, your mind, and do not act the sullen child whose playthings have been stolen from him. This is more your life than that of Kah-hi. Learn, learn so that when the right time comes, you shall be prepared to act! You compare yourself to a piece in a game—prepare to play such games yourself. On the border you strove to think as the Kush in order to entrap them. Here you must be taught a new way of survival. Do you understand?"
The veteran's momentary anger changed into a serious pleading. It was as if he were pointing out to the younger man a path that must be dutifully followed but for which he could not be the guide.
Rahotep laughed shortly and bent almost double to present his bare back to his companion.
"Use your flail, Commander. Is it not rightfully said, 'A boy's ears are on his back, he hears best when well beaten'?"
"As long as the beating is from my hand, then it is well. But, oh, Rahotep, walk carefully, lest the beating be another's!"
"And those words shall I wear as a shield on my arm. Be sure I have ears to hear that!"
Thereafter he tried earnestly to follow the veteran's advice, knowing it to be good. Though the life of Pharaoh was so hedged about by ritual and ceremony that he seemed more the symbol the priests claimed him than a living man, yet Seke- nenre was no puppet. He lacked the boundless, exuberant energy of his younger son; he even appeared to lack the force and drive of his heir. Yet, as Rahotep came again and again into his presence when on duty, the captain began to see and appreciate the way this frail, dedicated man was working to achieve his own ends.
Physically the Pharaoh had that delicacy of form that Kamose had inherited. His features were finely sculptured, almost feminine in their beauty. But his mouth and jaw were firm, giving a truer clue to his inner strength. He was a master of chariots, and Rahotep guessed that he only approached a measure of happiness when he was freed from the confines of the court to lead his army in the field, where custom not only allowed, but decreed, that he take an active and vigorous part.
The dry season was nearing its end, and the Nile was showing the first signs of the approaching flood. Rahotep had been a month of long days in royal service. And, as the river darkened and began to swell, so did tensions within the court heighten.
The captain was on duty the night that the Queen's scribe Pepinecht, that same stranger who had guided him to the Hall of Royal Women on his first night in Thebes, came to him with an order that bypassed the Chief of the Guard and yet was given under the royal seal.
"A week from now Pharaoh must travel for the measuring of the river rise. Tonight there will come those to read what lies before him. Admit them."
To Rahotep that statement meant little. But when later he was making the rounds of the archers he had posted at the inner doors of the private quarters, he witnessed the arrival of a party of priests from the Temple of Anubis. Tothotep, wearing his robes of ceremony, was accompanied by a thin, dried wisp of a man whose ascetic face was like a single sheet of papyrus through which shone torch light. This elderly priest carried carefully in his two hands, breast-high, a bowl of blackened silver, and by that token Rahotep recognized him as a "seer," one of the small number of those who could by some Great One's favor look into the past or the future.
The Royal Mother and the Royal Wife were borne through the halls in their carrying chairs. Once within the inner chamber where the priests had gathered, they dismissed the majority of their attendants, and it was the servants of the Jackal who drew across the doorway the woven curtains, closing the room.
Still through the fabric the scent of incense found its way, nor did the curtains deaden a low monotonous incantation, intoned with the intention to seal the seer from the world and enable him to open his eyes elsewhere. Rahotep had seen the process once before—in Semna—though at that time the re- ults had been negative.
The seer would stare into the depths of the god's bowl, while on the water that filled it floated a film of oil. Were Anubis willing, that film would form a picture—or some sign to be interpreted by His priests.
Sound and scent together were intended to dull the outer senses. The captain paced down the corridor, taking care to pause before each of his men to ensure that they were still alert. But he was before the door of the chamber when the chant ended abruptly and through a thick silence the tremulous voice of an old man mumbled. Rahotep could make out no separate words, but then there was a sudden, sharp exclamation, uttered by a woman.
Other voices were raised, and Rahotep could hear the anger in one, well controlled though it was. That was Tothotep! Then the calm tones he had heard pronouncing judgment, uttering decrees, brought silence again.
"So be it! What Re gives is also His to take away. But while I live, I shall do what I believe to be His will. Does a warrior in battle wrest away a comrade's shield to cover his own body? Even the Hyksos do not so. Sekenenre shall live so that no man after his departure to the horizon can say: 'This was no fit lord, but one who cowered in the sun, fearing the dark.' Nothing is altered, nothing will be altered in my plans. I have spoken!"
When the priests of Anubis came forth, one of them led the seer, steering him by the arm, for the man tottered along as one who is blind, a pallor of shock drawing his face yet closer to the likeness of a corpse. Tothotep came last of all, and in the compression of his lips, the jerk with which he set straight his cloak of leopard skin, Rahotep read the extent of his anger.
It was by some evil chance that in that same moment the high priest fronted the captain almost squarely. And that which lay like coals of a smothered fire deep in his eyes was not good to see. Pen-Seti had been feared, but this man was greater than Pen-Seti, just as the emotion he aroused was more terror than fear. For what seemed a long moment ripped free from normal time, they stood face to face, and those dark eyes raked the younger man as if Tothotep were by some means transferring to this lesser object all his rage and frustration. Rahotep knew that no good would come from that meeting, chance though it was. Again he was plagued by the thought that he was being moved here and there, will-less, by those to whom he was only a mindless piece on a game board.
The high priest did not speak, nor did Rahotep as he stepped aside to let the other by, and then hurried on to answer a beckoning hand from the doorway. It was the same senior Lady of the Household who had escorted him to his first meeting with the queens. And now, adding to her orders to recall the carrying chairs, she said in a half whisper:
"When you are off duty, Captain, the Great Lady would speak with you. Come to the wall door."
The incense was gone, the palace itself settled into the usual calm of the night, and then he was free. Almost timidly he rapped on that portal through which Pepinecht had ushered him. And within, the scribe waited, to lead him to the small hall.
But this time the two queens sat alone. There were no tables piled with feast dishes, no gaming board set out. He had an odd, fleeting impression that he was walking into the quarters of some commander in chief. A glance at that back wall, which had been cloaked with a rug on his first visit, showed him now a curtained door. As he "kissed dust" before the royal ladies, both the scribe and the lady of honor withdrew out of hearing.
"Captain." The Royal Mother's hands rested on the arms of her chair. Now they tightened their grip. "Is it yet known what has passed this night? There are ears, aye, and eyes, too, in the walls of Pharaoh's house, and tongues to relay ill news (]uicldy."
"Royal Lady, if aught is known it has not come to my hearing!" He spoke the truth with all sincerity.
She watched him with the narrow-eyed intentness of a hawk. Then she glanced at her daughter, the Royal Wife. That younger face so mirrored the elder that it was uncanny. And in that short space when their eyes met, some silent message was exchanged.
"Listen well." Teti-Sheri's voice was only a fragile husk of a murmur. "This night He-Who-Speaks-for-Anubis brought
his seer and it was foretold that if Pharaoh goes up against the Hyksos, then his time will be cut short and he will depart to the horizon—" "Be it not so!"
She waved aside his shocked protest. "So must say all those who love Egypt, for Pharaoh plans to throw off the shackles of the invaders and do it now. The longer men lie in chains, the more they forget the sweetness of freedom. There are those who come in time to look upon their chains, their cages, as places of safety in an uncertain world."