Bird in a Snare

by N. L. Holmes

  ⸎

  “Off we go, Maya.” Lord Hani emerged from the commissioner’s office, and the secretary jumped up to join him. The two men strode along at their mismatched pace, and Hani directed their steps across the courtyard of the commissioner’s palace. They’d been assigned a room in the residential wing.

  “How did it go, my lord?” Maya asked eventually.

  Hani chuckled darkly. “I told him my theories about Yapakh-addi. And something new came into my mind. What if that worthy Fan Bearer was in cahoots with Ili-rapikh to cheat Rib-addi and weaken him politically?”

  Maya gasped. “Do you think that’s the case?”

  “Who knows? At the end, I started to tell the commissioner about your little experience on the riverbank at Akhet-aten, thinking maybe he had some ideas as to who was behind it. But then I noticed something.”

  “What’s that, my lord?” Maya asked.

  “Yanakh-amu was wearing the gold scabbard your mother’s studio made for the king’s friends.” Hani stopped and looked his secretary in the eye. “It was empty.”

  Maya gaped at him. “His, too? Were the knives not tight enough to stay in place?”

  Hani bounced with his silent chuckle, but he was clearly preoccupied. “I suppose we have to include Lord Yanakh-amu on our list of suspects now. Or does this just illustrate how flimsy the clue was from the start? I confess I don’t know.”

  “Maybe it was just lying on the table where the commissioner used it to sharpen his pens.”

  Hani heaved a sigh. “You may well be right. But the upshot was, I felt uneasy about telling him of your misadventure after that. I remember a long time ago, when I first showed him the murder weapon, he said he had seen one like it but he couldn’t remember where. Now it turns out he’s got one hanging at his waist.”

  “You think he may have...?”

  “I just don’t know. I’ve always liked and admired Lord Yanakh-amu. More than likely, he received his royal gift since we last spoke. He’s rarely back in Kemet, after all.” Hani looked pensive as they clopped down the corridor. The mud-brick building seemed damp and chill in the autumn air, although it was mild enough outside.

  Or perhaps the shiver that ran down Maya’s back had nothing to do with the weather.

  “He did say Yapakh-addi was in Kemet these days, so maybe it’s Yapakh-addi’s handiwork we see in the violent desire to shut you up. But I just don’t know any longer. In any case, that Sheshi must have told someone about you as soon as you left him.” They walked in silence to Hani’s door. “You know, Maya,” Hani said in a low voice, “I’m thinking of turning in my resignation as soon as I get home from this mission.”

  Maya stared at him, astonished. “You’re serious, my lord? Can you even do that?”

  Hani pushed open the door and ushered his secretary in before him. “That’s another thing I don’t know. But my father seems to have done it.”

  “Yes, but he’s old. Won’t they think it odd if a man your age resigns? It can’t be called retirement.”

  “What if I were sick?”

  “Are you?” Maya cried in horror.

  “I’m sick of traveling all the time.” A sparkle of humor lit Hani’s eyes, despite the serious set of his mouth. “These days, it means a week or more of travel altogether just to speak to my superiors for a few minutes, and I’m not about to move to the new capital. They’ve sent me out again and again for nearly a year at a time, with almost no opportunity to see my family. I keep asking myself if I would have had this... problem with Aha had I been home more often—been more of a father to him.”

  “Oh, my lord, it’s not—”

  “I can’t do it anymore. It’s worse than the army.” Hani sighed again, shaking his head.

  Maya said nothing, torn between relief and disappointment. Is my career as an adventurer already coming to an end? Part of him was delighted. He, too, wanted to spend time at home, with his new wife. But sitting cross-legged on the floor of the Hall of Royal Correspondence all day sounded unendurably boring after his escapades of the last few years.

  Finally he asked, “Will the king think it’s disloyal, do you suppose? Not to want to serve, I mean.”

  Hani’s usually cheerful face hardened. “My oath to the king has already been abrogated from the other side.”

  Maya understood then that Hani’s desire to withdraw from active service was precisely about this—not the physical hardship but the violation of his conscience. The secretary stared at him in admiration. His father-in-law was as upright as he looked, solid and square in every sense. That couldn’t be said of many people.

  Maya had opened his mouth to say as much to Hani when the latter mused, “Neither Yapakh-addi nor Yanakh-amu would have attacked Abdi-ashirta personally. It must have been a henchman, in any case. So why use such an identifiable knife? It’s as if the perpetrator wanted to make something known.”

  “Why would he have given away his identity?” Maya didn’t follow Hani’s argument at all.

  But Hani shook his head. “Think about how long we’ve been tracking him—he didn’t really give away his identity. Still, one thing he did make clear.” Hani looked down at Maya with a cold flame in his little brown eyes. “He proclaimed himself to be a friend of the king. The young king. Because this all started under Neb-ma’at-ra, and it was he who assigned me to find the killer.”

  Hani seemed to realize that they were standing in his doorway, where any passer-by might hear them. He ushered Maya into the room and carefully closed the door behind him. Maya felt as if he had been rolled downhill in a barrel until he was dizzy. “You think... you think it was the king who murdered Abdi-ashirta?”

  “I hope it won’t scandalize you to learn that political assassinations take place all the time.” Hani spread his lips in a cynical line. “But I admit, I have no idea why this one seemed expedient. It has worsened our position in Kharu.”

  “What I don’t see is why Neb-ma’at-ra didn’t seem to know about it if he gave the order.”

  “He didn’t, I think. It was the coregent, as I said. I suspected his views on the north were different from his father’s, but even after two years of his reign, I confess I’m not sure what his views are. My orders have been essentially to make people happy and keep them distracted. What we were actually attempting to accomplish, no one has ever told me.” Suddenly, Hani gave a bark of bitter laughter and shook his head. “Rib-addi has taken to calling himself a bird in a snare, but it’s really me.”

  “You’re... you’re trapped, my lord?”

  “I’m a decoy, Maya. Like the duck in a cage hunters put out to lure down the wild ones. To make them think the way is safe. I’m being used to make people think the king means them well.” He looked at Maya with a wry twist of his mouth. “The last time the king received me in audience, he said with a strange smile, ‘Everybody’s happy when Hani comes.’ I’ve been pondering ever since what that could mean. At last, I think I know.”

  Hani walked toward one of the two stools in the room and sank heavily into a seat. With a strained smile, he gestured to Maya to do the same on the other. Then Hani leaned toward the secretary so that their heads were not too far apart and said quietly, “Only, to what end are the northern vassals being put, ultimately, that my presence lulls them into it? If the young king particularly wanted Aziru at the head of the hapiru rather than his father, why? Nefer-khepru-ra’s essentially having me drag him back to Kemet. Is Aziru being evaluated, as his father was? Is he being isolated to make him more vulnerable? Are we really watching to see who among the nomads floats to the top of the power structure in his absence?” His face grew more and more serious as he spoke.

  Maya was proud to be included in Hani’s musings, but the subject of those musings left him uneasy, even revulsed. He found he didn’t want to think about what was going on at the highest levels of the government—he preferred simply to follow orders. “Do we need to know?” he asked uncertainly, hoping this didn’t mark him as a mora
l coward in Lord Hani’s eyes.

  Hani’s intense expression softened, and the crinkles of a real smile appeared at the corners of his eyes. “That’s what I’ve said for twenty years, son. And now I find I want to know to what ends I’m being used.” He clapped Maya on the shoulder. “Don’t start asking questions until you’ve got Sat-hut-haru and your children comfortably established.” He drew away from his secretary and sat up straighter on the stool. He was heavy shouldered and thick about the middle, with muscular calves and a short, sturdy neck—a powerful-looking man. Maya recalled the older scribes saying what a wrestler Lord Hani had been in his student days. The word bulwark came to Maya’s mind. A man felt safe with Hani as his protector. Yet the vassals of the north had been lured into some trap by just that illusion of safety. Maya had to admit he could understand Hani’s outrage.

  “What about the Mitannians, my lord?” he asked, remembering yet another unresolved question they had batted back and forth.

  “The ones Abdi-ashirta no longer paid? Yes. What indeed? We need to find some clues. Perhaps while we’re up there.” Hani rose. “I’ll call up some dinner for us and the rest of the party. Then, tomorrow early, we’re on the road.”

  #

  It seemed strange to see Rib-addi in Beruta, where he was a kind of refugee, living on the charity of its “mayor,” Ammunira. Rib-addi was sitting gloomily at the window of the room to which his kingdom had been reduced. When Hani entered, his haggard old face brightened like a sunrise. He struggled to his feet and extended his bony arms to the emissary. “Ah, Hani! Hani! They sent you to me after all!”

  Hani was a little surprised at the warmth of the old king’s embrace. His heart constricted with pity as he was forced to say, “My lord, I fear my visit is only personal. What happened in Kebni?”

  The old man’s pouchy eyes were sad and world-weary. “I had come to Beruta to draw up a treaty with Ammunira, and while I was gone, my loyal vizier, the son of my father, saw fit to declare himself king. As I said before, the brothers of kings are a treacherous race, Hani. And so I must end my days in thankless exile.”

  “I wish I could promise you help to regain your throne, my lord,” Hani said in a low voice. “But I fear that might be optimistic.”

  Rib-addi exchanged a brief cynical glance with him. “Ili-rapikh has been proved right after all, eh. Our masters care nothing for us.”

  Hani’s face grew hot with a wave of shame. He said quietly, “I care about you, Lord Rib-addi.”

  “Ah, my good little Hani. Would that they were all like you.” The old man laid his hands upon Hani’s shoulders, silent a moment, his eyes fogged with suffering, then he said, “What brings you to Kharu this trip, if not to restore me to my throne?”

  “I’ve been sent to negotiate one last time with Aziru in the hopes of his relinquishing his claims on A’amu.”

  Rib-addi dropped his arms and his gaze, and he commented bleakly, “Good luck, then, my friend. You won’t find any allies in Gubla anymore.”

  “You should have notified us when this happened, Lord Rib-addi. The high commissioner might have sent you troops.”

  Rib-addi snorted. “I’ve been writing for forty years, Hani, my friend. For forty years.” He looked up at Hani wearily. “In fact, I did write when I realized Ili-rapikh had shut me out of Kebni. But Yanakh-amu didn’t pass my letter along. No, he didn’t.”

  Hani didn’t ask how Rib-addi knew that. The Kebnite had had forty years to see how seriously anyone took his cries for help.

  Rib-addi mused, “My brother is all for Aziru’s rule over A’amu. And so is my son.”

  “Why is that, my lord?” Hani asked, escorting Rib-addi to his chair and helping him reseat himself. “One would think they’d want to keep control of their entire kingdom, not see half of it taken over by someone else.”

  Rib-addi heaved a sigh, only to finish with a fit of coughing. Finally, he wiped his eyes and said morosely, “Yapakh-addi has made it worth their while. Ili-rapikh’s happy to have at least half a kingdom. Yes, indeed. Half a kingdom is better than none. And as for my son... do you have sons, Hani?”

  “Yes, my lord.”

  “No doubt they love you. No doubt they’re loyal. You can’t imagine what it’s like to have a son who holds you in contempt, my good Hani. Who seems to want to dismantle everything you’ve worked to create.” Rib-addi gazed mournfully into space.

  Hani thought, with a pang of anguish that was nearly physical, that he could imagine such a thing only too well, but he only said, “Yapakh-addi is helping Ili-rapikh or Aziru?”

  “Both.”

  Hani couldn’t hide his surprise. Watching Hani’s face, the old man cackled. Hani tried not to show the depth of his confusion. “But I thought Yapakh-addi hated Abdi-ashirta. Why would he help his son?”

  “Because he’s not Abdi-ashirta, is he? Nor is Ili-rapikh me. No, Hani, he’s not me. Far from it. He and Yapakh-addi have been companions in mischief since childhood.” Rib-addi chuckled, shaking his head.

  So all that disparaging of Yapakh-addi by the usurper was just a smokescreen. They were friends from youth. Hani watched the old king closely. “Who killed Abdi-ashirta, my lord?”

  “Someone who wanted Aziru at the head of the hapiru, wouldn’t you say?” Rib-addi looked up from the corner of his eye in a way that might best be described as coquettish.

  “And that would be... Yapakh-addi?”

  “He might well have had a hand in it, Hani. But he’s not the only one who wanted to see Abdi-ashirta out. No, he’s not the only one.”

  Hani struggled to retain his aplomb in the face of what had the air of deliberate baiting. He said with a patient smile, “Who else might have wanted to see him out?”

  “Why, me, even. Or your king Nipkhuririya. Or Aper-el. Or Tutu—any of those fellows with the gold necklaces.”

  “Why would the viziers care who ruled the hapiru? And why would you have wanted him out?”

  “Oh, I don’t say that I did. But I might have.” He grinned toothlessly at Hani with the mischievous air of a small child who knows he’s being naughty.

  Hani was both irritated with and sorry for the old king in exile, who probably just wanted to keep someone talking to him. “Do you really think our king had a hand in it, my lord?”

  “Definitely.”

  “But what did he gain by it?” Hani pressed.

  “Nothing, as it happens. But he must have thought it would help him. He must have thought so, mustn’t he?”

  Hani remembered Yanakh-amu’s words. We miscalculated. His cheeks grew hot with disgust. A man was dead—no, several men—and Rib-addi was in exile and Hani’s and Maya’s lives were at risk because of a gamble that had not paid out. Is that how foreign policy is set now—by a roll of the knucklebones? I cannot do this anymore, by all the gods.

  He took his leave of Rib-addi, who clung to him, misty-eyed, before letting go. Hani strode from the palace, his mind in a turmoil to rival the blackest sea storm. He had to force himself to set a smile on his face with which to greet Maya. But Maya was not in their room. A potsherd lay upon the table, scribbled in the secretary’s neat hand.

  “I’ve gone to find us something to eat. Be back before dark,” Hani read out loud then shrugged. It was unlike the boy to go off on his own like that, since he had only barely mastered the language, but Hani had never told him not to.

  Hani settled down with a fresh sheet of papyrus and prepared to write a letter to Nub-nefer and his father. He had just covered their safe trip and the acquisition of a military escort at Azzati when the door was thrown open and Maya burst into the room, panting and wreathed in triumphant smiles. He caught sight of Hani and cried aloud, “My lord, you’re back! Guess what I just saw!”

  “A flying hippopotamus? A desert-dwelling crocodile? A heron with a horse in its mouth?”

  Maya laughed uproariously. “Stranger than that. I just saw the two men who threw me into the River at Akhet-aten.”

  Hani bounded
to his feet in surprise. “Here in Beruta?” He pulled a stool out for the secretary and seated himself on the other.

  Maya settled with a bit of fanfare at his father-in-law’s side. He was beaming so broadly he could scarcely compose his face to speak. “I was wandering around the courtyard, watching the soldiers get their gear together for our departure, when I happened to see a pair who made me think of the boatmen’s description—”

  Hani stared at him quizzically. “Description?”

  “Oh, I forgot to tell you at the time. The boys who rescued me got a glimpse of the perpetrators. It was fairly generic, I admit, but—well, let me finish. I saw this pair off by themselves, one Egyptian with a wide studded belt, a little like a cuirass without straps, and one Nubian. They looked like soldiers, but they weren’t taking part in the preparations. I dodged around the building so they wouldn’t see me, and I crept up behind them. I overheard them”— Maya doubled over with laughter and slapped his thigh—“saying, ‘At least one of ’em’s taken care of.’ And then I stepped out from behind the corner and said, cool as you please, ‘Can one of you gentlemen please see to it that I’m given a proper burial?’”

  Maya was laughing so hard there were tears in his eyes. Hani hung on his words, not reacting. He wasn’t sure he really understood what had happened.

  “You should have seen their faces, Lord Hani! Their eyes nearly popped out—they thought they’d seen a ghost! Oh, my! Ha ha!” The secretary rocked back and forth over his knees.

  Hani risked a little laugh, and Maya grabbed his arm as if to reinforce his punch line. “And the Egyptian was wearing a knife like the one I lost! It was in a plain scabbard, but I’d know that hilt anywhere! It was surely them, my lord!”

  “They’re soldiers, you say?” It occurred to Hani that this was rather more dangerous than funny. “They’re part of the commissioner’s garrison?”

  “I don’t know. But there they were. Maybe they were someone’s bodyguards.”

  If they had the knife, then Maya was probably right to think they were the same men. Had he and Maya been followed from Waset? Then how is it they still thought Maya was drowned? “What did they do next?” he asked, managing to act amused.