He encouraged me with his eyes and began again.
Nothing happened.
Then a slight wiggle. I worked harder to keep those penetrating sounds going. My mouth ached. My bruised arm throbbed. But with our combined intense concentration, the pillar lifted like a feather until we could push it aside and free the petrified dancer.
“Your ankle is only twisted. We can heal this,” he said to her, and helped her limp to safety.
Together we attended to the injured Sesh strewn like rag dolls across the hazardous palace floor. White dust filled the air. We rushed to avoid the plaster and tiles that rained down from the ceiling.
I dabbed the blood from the forehead of a wounded drummer. “Netri, I think I know why the earth cracked,” I said.
With his robe, Netri wiped the dust away from a child’s face. “When the Great Mother within the earth grows weary of being curled up, she stretches and the land must shift to accommodate her.”
“No, Netri, Sit-Amun did it. She snapped a stick to warn us of the earthcrack.”
Father’s eyes teared. “Merit-Aten, I am not sure what you saw, but this earthcrack means that we failed to protect the Ben Ben.”
“Will it get worse?” asked Meti with a chirping sound of desperation that a mother bird uses when protecting her young. She fiddled with her right earring.
Grand Djedti nodded and frowned. “Many times worse.” She clasped her blue scarab necklace.
My stomach would not quiet down. I kept readying myself for another earthcrack. With no warning, cries of anguish besieged us again from outside in the courtyard.
Netri yelled, “What is happening?” He pulled himself up on the broken chair to investigate.
“The sky darkens. Thick clouds billow above the city,” a drummer answered.
“Look, it is raining hard.” A dancer pointed. “Isis and Osiris have mercy upon us.”
We crowded to the balcony. Indeed, terrifying clouds raged over the once clear sky. The afternoon sun refused to shine through the gloom. The acrid smell of burnt sulphur filled the air. Ankhi, Meket, and some of the elders coughed.
Grand Djedti ran her finger over the dense material on the railing, “Ash from the sky.”
“How could that be?” asked Meti. She drew my two sisters to her hips and protected them within the wings of her cape.
“A bad omen,” bawled the guard. “The Deities are angered.” He stared up at the sky and his body shook as he shouted prayers.
Grand Djedti clapped her hands, “Enough. Back to your post.”
The guard stared at her horrified. “Your consort has only just wested. The Deities are not pleased that they have been chosen.” The guard thrust his finger at my parents.
Grand Djedti pointed. “Guards, seize this man!”
“It is a curse! Nefertiti usurped Sit-Amun as the next Per-Aat, and now Amun has damned all you Atenists.” The guard roared this unholy accusation at my Meti.
Some of those gathered in the room whispered and pulled out magic amulets, pleading with Amun for forgiveness.
Before they could catch him, the guard now crazed with hysteria ran toward the doors and crashed through them. Meti shook. Her perfect face contorted. She coughed in a great fit. Ash covered the floors like a thick rug.
“Get inside,” Netri ordered. We rushed to the safety of our chamber. Deep in thought, my father rubbed his chin.
Tears spilled down Meti’s cheeks. “What does this ash mean?” She pulled Meket to her to comfort her hacking cough.
“It could be what the ancients called a volcano. Those would spew ash into the sky,” replied Grand Djedti. “It is when a mountain bursts like a boil.”
Meket coughed harder. “Will we catch on fire?”
“I need to convene with the Council of Twelve,” said Netri. “We must correct the energetic matrix so that one disaster will not lead to another.” “We can bring in the bedding. Everyone can stay here, should we need help,” said Meti.
The attendants rushed to assemble straw mats upon the floor. The young and the elders rested so those still of able body could tend the wounded. The Atenists and the Amunites gave aid to each other regardless of whom they worshipped. Men held children and sang while women made bandages out of their sheaths. A flautist played a brooding melody as a drummer added a beat. The torches made the fire dance and cast shadows upon the walls. The orange flames beckoned me to surrender to sleep. I dreamt the earth cracked again. I felt the rumble and struggled in my dream to run.
“Run away. It will consume you,” shouted a dark shadow that chased me. It caught me and shook me. I tossed and turned and tried to scream, but nothing came out of my mouth.
“Merit-Aten, wake up.” Meti shook me. “Another earthcrack. We must get out into the open.”
She yanked me to my feet. Yet before we reached the door, it passed.
“Only an after-crack,” said Grand Djedti. “Everyone keep calm.”
But a guard pounded upon the door then withdrew the heavy bolt.
“A ferocious wave of water just hit Thebes. You must come. Surely, Hapi, the Nile Deity, is angry and wishes to slay us all.”
We again poured out to the balcony where hordes of palace attendants crowded the windows and doors to watch an aqueous wall pour over the West bank of canals and engulf our estate. Water flooded in. The darkened sky filled with misery as this new havoc beseeched us.
The wall of water swept away mudbrick houses, ripped donkeys from their evening meals of alfalfa and toppled great stone slabs like toys. The angry tide upturned everything in its path with a deafening roar. The Sesh lucky enough to have foreseen this terror climbed to the top of palm trees now shaking with violent force. Some fell to their watery deaths.
The wave struck the barrier walls around the palace and protected us. Verily nothing was left of the surrounding workers’ village. Bloody screams soured the thick air with an echoing terror. I covered my mouth. The enormity of this disaster transfixed me. I had no idea nature could be so pitiless. No words. Only thoughts. Terrible, terrible thoughts.
“Cover your nose and mouth, like this.” Meti pulled the linen scarf to demonstrate. “The ash is dangerous to breathe.”
The sun dressed itself in a gauzy film that settled upon our city in discouraging heaps. The once thriving port city of Thebes appeared decimated along the shores of the Nile, leaving only soggy mudflats and palm tree stumps.
“Why do we have to go to Thebes? I want to stay home with Meket and Ankhi and paint.”
Meti wiped the ash off the table in the deckhouse on our Royal barge.
“Duty first, Daughter. The Sesh need reassurance; we must be their guiding light.”
Netri swept up the broken vase. “With their confidence restored, the Sesh may sew back the tattered remains of their lives. We, the silver needles, must guide the thread of hope, one stitch at a time.”
I clung to Netri’s leg. “I do not like boats. What if crocodiles eat us?”
Being near the Nile made me sad for Hep-Mut. Besides, the earthcrack made me feel seasick all the time.
He grimaced. “Beloved, there are far more fearful things than crocodiles. The devastation is worse than I could imagine. The Sesh have lost their lives in this disaster.”
Nodding, Pentu looked up from reading a yellowed copy of the Khemitian Book Of The Dead. “May salvation spare the villagers, and the landowners, possessionless and powerless to recover that which was pulled asunder. I lost my most gifted apprentice, who I sent to attend the Royal Scribe’s consort.”
“My childhood friend and her two boys went to the market the day the wave hit,” said Meti. “I have not seen them since. And my Bath Attendant left to tend to her sick Meti that morning. May their life in the Duat be blessed forever and ever.”
“Forever and ever,” we replied.
I wondered why the Water Deity could be so heartless as to take Meti’s friends and Hep-Mut.
“Meti, what made Hapi so angry?”
&n
bsp; “We cannot judge the ways of nature. Perhaps something new will rise from the ashes.”
Netri lifted my chin. Our eyes met. “Merit-Aten, today should not be a sight for eyes as young as yours. If I could shelter you from the horrors ahead, I would.”
“What horrors?”
“The earthcrack and the tidal wave frightened us, but now we must prepare ourselves for the horrors of our citizens who have wested. Many Sesh were called before their time.”
I nodded, but wondered about the horrors.
Pentu looked up from his scroll. “She could stay below deck.”
“Your Highness, the ash is making it difficult for the oarsmen to breathe,” said the Helmsman.
“Let us go offer relief,” said Father to Pentu as the physician hopped up to join him. His sacred scroll fell to the deck and unfurled.
“Pentu,” I cried out, but he had gone.
I picked up that scroll. I could feel the magic in it. I yearned to peek at The Prayers Of The Dead, even though it was expressly forbidden for anyone except students of the Mystery School. One little look wouldn’t hurt.
I needed to learn some magic right now to restore peace to this land. Turning my back from prying eyes, I unrolled the scroll a bit and savored the flow of the ancient text. I loved the rhythm and antiquity of this mysterious knowledge. The soft bumps into the side of our barge distracted me. Broken temple pillars or more of the mudbrick siding of a village hut had most likely clogged the dreary waters. I thought about peering over the railing of the barge but then the worry of crocodiles made me panic. I shivered. What if the horrors Father mentioned were out there? What could be worse than crocodiles?
I snuck outside the deckhouse to find out. Bloated bodies floated buoyantly up the Nile. The ash fell heavy upon them, making them look other-earthly. Their outstretched hands spoke of mute desperation, torn away from whatever they had last clung to before their lives were ripped away. They floated by the hundreds upon the dismal waters. I covered my eyes but peeked through my fingers at the swollen oxen, donkeys, dogs and cats pulled asunder. I wanted to help.
How could the Hanuti be so cruel as to move the Ben Ben stone?
If there had been no earthcrack or horrible wave, all these Sesh and their animals would still be alive. Now it would take magic to bring the Amunites and Atenists together in harmony.
I heard a voice within, The Prayer.
What prayer? I thought, still mesmerized by the gentle rise and fall of the waves, lifting the bodies of those who bore witness to nature’s mysteries. I couldn’t blink. I couldn’t move.
Then I remembered the scroll. The Prayers Of The Dead.
Every one of those horrific bodies who had wested without a proper burial must be freed. How else could the ka, or spirit find the door to the threshold of Amentii, the heavenly realms? They needed to receive the proper ritual to guide them. I could send them across the first threshold.
A naked man bobbed upon the water. His dark beard grayed, not by age but soot. His testicles, now swollen as melons, made him look monstrous. I retched over the side of the boat.
Steadying myself, I found a recitation named The Calling Forth Of The Wested.My voice grew strong as I read the words.
“Ashu-a-ma Aku-ti, Ee-akuta anay atu. Aten-hua-reckha-aduathihor- amay. Shep ti hor-ba Athu-i-na.”
May your soul essence rise up and empower thee. For those who have been robbed of their soul nature, may the power of the Aten bring the transformative light of redemption. May these incarnates resume their light in the seven light bodies of their celestial nature.
Lo and behold, his spirit separated from his body like a sheet had been lifted. The filmy outline of a man looked down upon his corpse. The ghost simply said goodbye to the form that housed his spirit then rose, lingering a bit to enjoy this new freedom. He nodded at me and smiled.
Such woe to be bound within this garment of flesh. No more would this villager want for anything. And before my astonished eyes, a door appeared. Glowing golden light poured forth. The spirit looked back one last time, as if to give thanks for the simple joys of his experience on this earth before stepping through the door without a trace.
My prayer had worked. I gazed upon the broken bodies and I pondered if I could do more.
Another body drifted by of a young girl not much older than Ankhi with half of her skin ripped away. An elder woman whose long braided hair spread like tentacles around her had a deep gash in her stomach. A baby bobbed face down. An Amun priest bedecked in jewels lost an arm and leg. Hundreds of decaying bodies needed to be freed.
I repeated The Calling Forth of the Wested. The souls of all these people broke free of their damaged bodies and floated up like shining outlines of their former selves. Thrilled to create so much magic, I summoned forth the golden door so they could take their place within the celestial realm. Then out of nowhere, a black shadow exploded out of the mouth of the Nile. It had reptilian features and looked like it had emerged from the netherworld. This frightening demon blocked the baby spirit’s path. An earth-shattering screech made me cover my ears as the eerie apparition isolated the infant from the others. The demon darted this way and that, and its constant fidgeting motion increased my anxiety.
This dark snake with red tipped scales had the large flapping wings of a bat. With careful calculation, it opened its dreadful mouth and clamped down upon the soul. The child contorted and twisted in agony as the demon consumed the life-force with sickening sucking noises. The winged beast drained the energy and left only a lifeless form that fell into the dark depths of the Nile. As the scales fell off, more snakes appeared, and they too slithered through the gauzy air, winding to and fro abducting more of the freed spirits. I tried to find another prayer but the scroll slipped from my nervous hands and unfurled across the deck.
I shrieked. “Netri. Pentu. Help!”
Pentu brandished his staff and waved with frantic arms. “The Apepians!” His calm manner cracked. I stared in disbelief that our usually peaceful Physician was so excitable.
“How did they get free?” demanded Netri. Everyone turned to me.
“Merit-Aten, did you have anything to do with this?”
“I did The Calling Forth of the Wested.”
“You asked for that without protection from the Apepi?” he asked.
“Hurry Pentu, we have to stop them. Merit-Aten, hide. It will try to destroy the one who summoned it.”
My father and Pentu lifted up their wooden staffs and recited the sacred chants. They called forth the protective rays of the Aten to shield the souls from dissolution. They called forth a downpouring of Atenic Light to absolve and protect the spirits until they penetrated through the first door.
“We cannot hold the Apepis off for long,” Pentu said. “The energy from their consumption of spirits regenerates them.”
“Merit-Aten, you must say that ritual backwards,” my father ordered.
“Hurry.”
I recounted my prayer, remembering each word so that I could repeat it in reverse. An Apepi nearly swooped in to devour me. It smelled like rotting eggs and its red eyes looked like flames, but the light from Pentu’s staff averted it.
Pentu hit one hard. It plunged into the Nile. “Hurry! We do not have much time.”
I forgot the words. I couldn’t find the prayer on the scroll. Golden jags of lightning thrown from the heavenly filament pierced the Apepians, but the demon worms wouldn’t die.
Shadow of the Sun (The Shadow Saga) Page 16