The Amarnan Kings, Book 4: Scarab - Ay

by Overton, Max

  Purna nodded. "What have you to offer us in return for your passage?"

  "All I have is what you see, nor can I promise you riches once I reach my destination. I have some skill as a warrior--which I freely offer."

  Some of the men standing listening to the exchange grinned. Purna smiled. "If we have need of your help in that regard, Scarab, we will ask." He hesitated and his demeanour became serious. "Why do you hide your eye from us? Our women say you hide it because you have the evil eye and will curse us with it."

  "My enemies destroyed my right eye but Geb gave me a new one. It cannot be evil as it comes from the god. I hide it because...because in truth I do not know what it looks like and I fear it might frighten those that see it."

  Several of the men paled and others whispered, fingering their weapons. Purna stood his ground, though he frowned. "From the god Geb, you say? I think I must see this eye."

  "As you will." Scarab opened her right eye. The sun struck the smooth pebble within the socket, making the yellow and brown minerals within it gleam like the eye of a lion. She turned her head slowly so that everyone could see it.

  Purna stared and after a few minutes stepped closer. "It...it is frightening but also beautiful, Scarab of the desert." He lifted his hand toward her face. "Can you...can you see with it?"

  Scarab smiled gently. "No, Purna of the Shechites, it is rock, not flesh. I can only see out of my left eye."

  Purna looked more closely and, with Scarab's permission, touched the eye with the tip of his finger. He turned to his people and held up his hand. "It is just a pebble. I find no threat in Scarab. She shall travel with us."

  The men and women said nothing, just turning away to load up the camels. When the caravan set off again, Scarab followed.

  She supped that night at the hearth of Purna, and his wife served her with a trembling hand. Scarab accepted the food and water with a smile, keeping her right eye closed. In the absence of any threat or even of anything strange, the woman relaxed and Purna's young children edged closer.

  "You are Kemetu," Purna observed, after the meal had been cleared away and the children put to bed. "And by your bearing, not a servant. Why do men seek to kill you?"

  "In my country, a person's business is his own, Purna. Is it different in your land?"

  The man sat and looked out into the desert night, where the sheet of stars on the body of the goddess dropped to the dark dunes. The only sound was the faint scrabbling of some desert creature and the muffled cry of a child from one of the lean-tos. "It is no different," Purna agreed. "I ask only that I might judge for myself the danger you bring to my people. You do not have to give me an answer."

  "My enemy seeks to eliminate any who might contend with him," Scarab said. "I am one of the last, but he believes me dead so I doubt he will come looking for me."

  "And who are you really? Back in the land of the Great River."

  "It is better you do not know, then if by some ill chance someone should ask, no one can revenge themselves on you for helping me."

  "You are cautious."

  "I have learned to be."

  "Your enemy is powerful?"

  "Yes."

  Purna looked at Scarab in the light of the low fire. "I think you could be dangerous too."

  Scarab smiled. "I? I am only a woman. What danger could I be?"

  Purna grunted. "Hmmph. The same could be said of my wife." He stretched and rose to his feet. "My bed awaits. You are welcome to join me."

  "And what of this dangerous wife of yours?"

  The man's teeth gleamed in the firelight. "It is a custom of our tribe to offer every comfort to the traveller."

  Scarab considered his words. "Offer or compel?"

  "It is your choice, Scarab. I do not compel."

  "Then I will sleep by the fire."

  "Probably a wise decision," Purna admitted glumly. "My wife would follow custom but would be as prickly as a thorn bush for days. Sleep well, Scarab." He turned and disappeared into the lean-to.

  The next day the caravan continued north and east and reached the Great Sea. Scarab had never seen any body of water larger than the Great River in flood and stood on the shore watching the small waves curl and break at her feet. She bent down and cupped the water in one hand, tasting it. "It is salty," she said incredulously. "How can that be? And what is that smell?" She nudged the remains of a dead fish with one foot. "No wonder it died. Nothing could live in salty water."

  Purna said nothing. He smiled and pointed along the shore to where men were dragging in nets.

  "Are they fishing?" Scarab ran along the beach and watched the men hauling their catch to shore. She said nothing to them but marvelled at the quantity and variety of fish, all flapping and very much alive. "I remember," she murmured to herself. "That man on the Waset docks all those years ago. He told Smenkhkare and me about Ocean and the things that lived in it, but I did not believe him."

  The caravan stopped at a village on the shore and Purna and the other men started haggling with the inhabitants over their trade goods. A small quantity of spices and wood were exchanged for a larger quantity of dried and salted fish, blocks of pressed salt, and a small bag of gleaming shells.

  The caravan continued on its way north along the shores of the Great Sea. There were many villages along the way and Purna traded in some but not in others, slowly adding to their stores of salted fish. Scarab asked him why they only traded with some villages.

  "We have been this way before. Some treated us fairly and we trade with them again. Others..." he shrugged. "We can at least choose our trading partners."

  Scarab's time was taken up by many activities on the journey. She helped the women load and unload the camels, set up camp in the evenings and even helped with the cooking. The children, frightened at first by her gleaming stone eye, gradually came to see she was no threat and followed her everywhere. She told them tales of her childhood in Waset and of daring adventures in Nubia, disguising only her own part in the stories.

  Purna stood and listened sometimes as she talked to the children. "I have heard of this Son of Sobek," he said after the children had gone to bed. "It is said that he was a great bandit chief who plundered many cities in Nubia and Kemet."

  "Whoever said that, lied," Scarab replied quietly. "He was a king, by birth and by nature, and...and a man who looked after his people. Kemet was the land of his birth. He never plundered it, but sought to rule it with justice for every man."

  Purna moved closer and squatted beside Scarab. "This man meant something to you?" he asked quietly. "He was a lover?"

  "He was my brother."

  "Aah." Purna regarded the flames flickering in the fire for the space of a dozen breaths. "I was right to call you 'Lady'. I have heard too that this Son of Sobek was a king of Kemet ousted by his brother and his uncle. Would I be right in thinking this same uncle is the one who tried to kill you?"

  Scarab nodded. "What will you do?"

  "Take you to Zarw. I have no love for the man who is your enemy."

  "Thank you, Purna of the Shechites."

  The man got up and started toward his lean-to. "Get some sleep, Lady Scarab. We move inland tomorrow."

  The road climbed steeply into the hills along the shore of the Great Sea before easing into a well-worn path along the rim of a plateau. Away from the breezes and the ameliorating influence of the water, the temperature climbed and the air dried out, reducing conversation as every person tried to conserve their energy. Gradually, they passed from sandy desert into stony desert, where great crags and sharp-edged boulders littered the landscape. The path wound between them, the ends of the caravan sometimes out of sight of each other. During one such time, the string of camels came to a sudden halt, the bulls braying their displeasure.

  Scarab had been talking to two of the young women around the middle of the caravan and she looked up in surprise when the animals stopped. The women looked scared and started looking around for their menfolk. Raised voices came
from the front and Scarab pushed past people and beasts to where Purna stood facing three armed men.

  Purna glanced at her briefly. "Say nothing, Scarab," he muttered. "Let me deal with this." He turned his attention back to the armed men. "What do you want? We have paid our road dues."

  A tall man with dirty, broken teeth grinned and scratched himself. "Not ter us, yer 'aven't. We controls this 'ere bit a road an' if yer wants ter pass yer 'as to pay us."

  "What about Pankhu?" Purna asked. "Does he know about this? We've already paid him our passage."

  "You pay bandits to leave you alone?" Scarab whispered.

  "We don'ts care nuffink abaht Pankhu," Broken Teeth said. "'e minds 'is business, we minds ours. Now, are you gonna pay up or does we 'ave to get nasty?"

  Purna sighed. "What is your toll?"

  "Gold if yer 'as it, or copper. Some food too."

  "And a girl," said a thickset, hairy man. Despite the still air, a miasma of long-unwashed parts drifted from the bandit.

  "Yes," agreed the third one, a gaunt man with a hungry look. "Maybe even two. We can sell 'em when we tires of 'em."

  Purna heard the barely stifled outrage from Scarab and put his hand on her arm warningly. "Please, we have food and trade goods. Take them instead. They will fetch copper at any town."

  "Let's 'ave a look at yer girls first," Stinky leered. "Mebbe we'll take three and leave yer the goods."

  Gaunt laughed. "One each. I could do with a good lively one. What about her?" He pointed at Scarab. "That's nice red hair. Don't see that too often. I'll have her."

  "She is a guest of my people," Purna said. Two of the caravan people behind him murmured their agreement. "A guest is holy," one of them said.

  "Do you think I fornicatingly well care?" Gaunt said. "Come here, woman. Let's see if you've got red hair down there too."

  Purna drew his dagger and the men behind him did too. "Please, we have offered you our trade goods and food. We will not let you take our women."

  Broken Teeth snarled a command and the three men drew swords from their belts. Something moved in the rocks to one side of the trail and two other men appeared, armed with bows. "I is losin' patience wiv yer. Bring outs yer women so we can choose."

  "An' food," Stinky reminded him.

  Purna glanced at the men who stood resolutely behind him. The other men in the caravan had come up as the bandits talked, but there were only six of them and only four had bronze daggers. The others had staves that would be close to useless against armed men.

  Scarab could see the agony of the decision being forced on Purna. She laughed and tossed her hair. "Thank the gods you came along," she called to Gaunt. "I was rapidly tiring of these pitiful excuses for men." She stepped out in front with an exaggerated swing of her hips. "I'll warrant you're a real man."

  Gaunt grinned, a look of incredulous delight flooding his face. He rubbed his crotch and stared at the red-haired woman. "Come and find out then."

  "Scarab, no," Purna cried out.

  She ignored him and swayed closer to Gaunt, coquettishly avoiding his hand and moving across his body so that he turned to follow her. He lowered his sword and grabbed for her and she moved in toward him, fast. One hand stabbed out at his face, her nails scoring his cheek and gouging an eye. He yelled and clapped his hand to his face but Scarab kicked his leg and as he stumbled back, grabbed his sword arm and broke his grip on his weapon. The other bandits still stood staring, their grins fading as Scarab held Gaunt's sword to his throat, one arm twisted up behind his back.

  "Throw down your weapons," Scarab commanded, "Or I'll kill him."

  Gaunt cursed. "Do it, for pity's sake." He cried out in pain as Scarab jerked his arm higher.

  "What do I care?" Broken Teeth snarled. "Kill the bitch."

  Scarab heard the two archers shift position behind the rocks and swung herself, interposing the body of the bandit. Arrows slammed into his body and before Gaunt could even cry out she had released him and swung back, her sword probing toward Stinky. The man parried desperately but her blade slipped past his guard and entered him. He fell with a hoarse cry, his sword ringing on the stone.

  Broken Teeth yelled at his archers to keep shooting, but they were having troubles of their own as the Shechite men swarmed over the rocks toward them. He cursed and slashed at Scarab, driving her back by the force of his blows. Purna moved up beside her and attacked with his dagger, not putting the bandit in any danger but distracting him. Scarab slipped her blade past Broken Teeth's, scoring the outside of his sword arm. The bandit cursed again and stepped back, his guard up again.

  "Kill him with your evil eye," Purna said clearly.

  Scarab smiled and opened her right eye. The bandit's own eyes grew wide and his jaw dropped when he saw the gleaming gold and brown pebble in her eye socket, and his sword dipped. Scarab took her opportunity and plunged her sword into the man's chest.

  She turned to Purna, her eyelid closing again. "I told you. It's not an evil eye."

  Purna grinned. "It was for him."

  The other men had dispatched the two archers and a quick sweep of the area revealed no others. They stripped the bodies of weapons and other valuables before carrying them away from the path and dumping them.

  That night when they camped, the men and women of the caravan looked at Scarab with new respect and not a little fear, but the children gained confidence knowing that she was a hero worth emulating. They pestered her for instruction in fighting and, with the permission of their parents, showed them a few simple moves that might help them out in a fight.

  "The best thing you can do is run away quickly," she counselled.

  "But you didn't," protested one child. "You killed all the bad men."

  "That is because I knew what I was doing," Scarab told them. "But until I learned how to fight I made sure I could run fast."

  The caravan was another month on the road, moving at a slow walking pace along desert paths, winding down to coastal villages and back up into the dunes and rock fields of Kemet's border lands. They crossed a broad road running east-west. Purna said that to the east, across a narrow stretch of the Great Sea was the land of Sin, where soldiers of Kemet mined copper and malachite and lapis.

  "This is the road they use. We may be able to use it ourselves, at least until the soldiers turn us off it."

  A little later a patrol of soldiers stopped them and asked their business. Scarab put the hood up on her robe to hide her red hair, but when one of the soldiers caught a glimpse of it and spoke to her, she answered with a Khabiru accent.

  "Our new king is part Khabiru, they say," the soldier said.

  Scarab hesitated, knowing the answer before she asked. "Who is your new king?"

  "You have not heard? Kheperkheperure, who was once the Tjaty, Lord Ay, uncle of Nebkheperure."

  Scarab nodded but turned away to hide the expression on her face. She walked off a few paces and oriented herself to where she knew the city of Iunu lay. "Hear me, Gods of Iunu," she prayed in a low voice. "The man who calls himself king killed my three brothers, all anointed kings themselves. Give him into my hands. Let me exact vengeance on him." The wind whispered over the sand and rock but that was all the answer she received.

  The patrol commander let the caravan stay on the road for half a day as they were moving in the same direction, but when a road north presented itself, ushered them off the Royal Road to the mines of Sin.

  Another eight days brought them to Zarw, where Scarab said farewell to the Shechites. They were sorry to see her go, Purna especially, for he had never quite given up on the idea of bedding his exotic guest.

  "Thank you, Purna, for bringing me home. May fortune smile on you."

  "Be careful, Lady Scarab. Your enemy is powerful, but remember you have friends among the Shechites. If ever you need help..." He turned and walked back to the waiting caravan.

  Scarab watched them go, the line of people and camels disappearing so slowly toward the north. When she could no lon
ger distinguish individuals, she turned and trudged toward the walled city of Zarw and the huge semi-permanent tent city of the Khabiru that lay outside it.

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  Chapter Eleven

  The southern gates of Waset opened wide and citizens thronged the walls, cheering and calling down to the legions that marched from the north and around the eastern perimeter. Nakhtmin led the procession at the head of the Amun legion and Hednakht and the Re legion brought up the rear, the standards of both legions flying prominently. Sandwiched in the middle was the Sept legion with Horemheb and Paramessu. Horemheb fumed and made no secret of it.

  "It is a calculated insult. Nakhtmin may be his adopted son, but until he is formally made the heir, I am the most senior man in the Kingdoms. I should be leading the legions."

  "Don't let it get to you, sir," Paramessu said calmly. "Ay is trying to upset you. Remain focused. You must show him he may be king but you are still the General of all the Armies of Kemet."

  "I can be removed from that post with a word," Horemheb growled. "I must demonstrate that he is king illegally, that he blasphemed the gods by breaking his holy oath. Then maybe the legions will turn to me again."

  "That could be dangerous if others accept him as king. I beg you have a care, sir."

  The legions stopped outside the southern gate and Nakhtmin waited for Horemheb. "Only the Amun legion can enter the city, Lord Horemheb. If you and your general would accompany me..."

  "Since when?" Horemheb rasped. "A month ago, the Re, Heru and Khent-Abt legions accompanied me inside the walls."

  "Indeed, sir, but King Kheperkheperure has decided it is fitting for only Amun's own legion to reside within the god's city. All others are to camp outside. If you give instructions to your men, they will find the Heru legion camped just south of here by the river. A very pleasant spot, I'm told."

  Paramessu had no choice but to issue the relevant commands to his troop commanders. He and Horemheb then accompanied Nakhtmin within the city. The Amun legion marched in with them.

  The streets of the city were crowded and the air festive. All the banners and flags that had been taken down following the king's death were back in place and the stonework had been scrubbed and freshly painted until the walls of the buildings glowed. The streets themselves were freshly swept and free of debris and animal dung. People cheered the marching troops and called the names of Nakhtmin and the Amun legion officers. Horemheb even heard a few call his name but there was a questioning tone in the voices that made him uneasy. It was only a short walk from the gate to the Great Temple of Amun and its adjoining palace. The Amun legion marched up to the Temple entrance and stopped.