The Quest (Novels of Ancient Egypt)

by Wilbur Smith

  ‘The sorcerer is dead!’ Basma shouted.

  His warriors took up the chant: ‘Kalulu is dead! The familiar of devils and demons is slain!’

  ‘Leave them to run back to the bitches that whelped them.’ Imbali stopped her girls chasing them. ‘We must save our master.’

  By the time they found him in the thicket Kalulu was curled into a ball, whimpering with pain. Tenderly they extricated him from the hooked thorn branches and placed him on his litter. At that moment a shout from further down the slope checked them.

  ‘It is the voice of the old man.’ Imbali had recognized Taita, and ululated to direct them.

  Soon Taita and Fenn came into view, followed closely by the party carrying Meren on his litter.

  ‘Kalulu, you are wounded grievously,’ Taita said gently.

  ‘Nay, Magus, not wounded.’ Kalulu shook his head painfully. ‘I fear I am slain.’

  ‘Swiftly. Take him to the camp!’ Taita told Imbali and her three surviving companions. ‘And you men!’ He picked out four following Meren’s litter. ‘Your help is needed here!’

  ‘Wait!’ Kalulu seized Taita’s hand to prevent him leaving. ‘The man who did this is Basma, the paramount chief of Basmara.’

  ‘Why did he attack you? You are his subject, surely?’

  ‘Basma believes that you are of the same tribe who built the temple, and that you have come here to instigate further calamity and catastrophe. He thinks I have joined with you to destroy the land, the rivers, the lakes and to kill all the Basmara.’

  ‘He has gone now. Your women have driven him away.’ Taita tried to reassure and calm him.

  Kalulu would have none of it. ‘He will return.’ He reached up and seized Taita’s wrist as he stooped over the litter. ‘You must get into the town and prepare to defend yourselves. Basma will return with all his regiments.’

  ‘When I leave Tamafupa, I will take you with me, Kalulu. Our pursuit of the witch cannot succeed without your help.’

  ‘I can feel the bleeding deep in my belly. I will not be going on with you.’

  Before sunset Kalulu died. The four bodyguards dug an adit into the side of a large abandoned anthill outside the stockade of Tamafupa. Taita wrapped the corpse in a sheet of unbleached linen and they laid it in the damp clay tunnel. Then they sealed it with large boulders to prevent the hyenas digging it out.

  ‘Your ancestral gods will welcome you, Shaman Kalulu, for you were of the Truth.’ Taita bade him farewell.

  When he turned away from the tomb, the four bodyguards stood before him, and Imbali spoke for them all in the Shilluk language. ‘Our master is gone. We are far from our own land, alone. You are a mighty shaman, greater even than Kalulu. We will follow you.’

  Taita looked at Nakonto. ‘What do you make of these women? If I enlist them, will you take them under your command?’ he asked.

  Nakonto considered the question solemnly. ‘I have seen them fight. I will be content to have them follow me.’

  With a regal tilt of her head, Imbali acknowledged his presence and his words. ‘For as long as it pleases us to do so, we will march shoulder to shoulder with this strutting Shilluk rooster, but not behind him,’ she told Taita.

  Her eyes were almost on a level with Nakonto’s. The magnificent pair stared at each other with apparent scorn. Taita opened his Inner Eye and smiled as he saw how their auras mirrored the inclination they felt towards each other. ‘Nakonto, is it agreed?’ he asked.

  ‘It is agreed.’ Nakonto made another lordly gesture of acquiescence. ‘For the time being.’

  Fenn and the Shilluk camp-followers swept out one of the largest huts for Meren. Then Fenn burnt a handful of Taita’s special herbs in the open fireplace. The aromatic smoke drove out the insects and spiders that had made the hut their home. They cut a mattress of fresh grass and laid Meren’s sleeping mat upon it. He was in such pain that he could hardly raise his head to drink from the bowl that Fenn held to his lips. Taita promoted Hilto-bar-Hilto to take his place at the head of the four divisions until Meren had recovered sufficiently to assume command again.

  Taita and Hilto toured the town to inspect the defences. Their first concern was to ensure that the water supply was secure. There was a deep well in the centre of the village, with a narrow circular clay staircase descending to the water, which was of good quality. Taita ordered that a party under Shofar should fill all of the gourds and waterskins in readiness for the anticipated assault by the Basmara. In the thick of the fighting, thirsty men would have no opportunity to draw from the well.

  Taita’s next concern was the condition of the outer stockade. They found that it was still in a reasonable state of repair, except for a few sections where termites had eaten the poles. However, it was immediately apparent that they could not hope to hold such an extended line. Tamafupa was a big town that had once been home to a large tribe. The stockade was almost half a league in circumference. ‘We will have to shorten it,’ he told Hilto, ‘then burn the remainder of the town to clear the approaches and enable our archers to cover the ground.’

  ‘You have set us a daunting task, Magus,’ Hilto remarked. ‘We had better begin at once.’

  Once Taita had marked out the new perimeter, men and women fell to. They dug out the best preserved of the stockade poles and set them up along the line Taita had surveyed. There was no time to make a permanent fortification, so they filled the gaps with branches of kittar thorn bush. They erected tall watch-towers at the four compass points of the new stockade, which commanded a good view over the valley and all the approaches.

  Taita ordered bonfires to be set around the perimeter. When they were lit they would illuminate the stockade walls in the event of a night attack. Once this was done he built an inner keep round the well, their last line of defence if the Basmara regiments broke into the town. Within this inner stronghold, he stored the remaining bags of dhurra, the spare weapons and all other valuable supplies. They built stables for the remaining horses. Windsmoke and her colt were still in good condition, but many others were sick or dying after the long hard road they had travelled.

  Every evening after she had fed Meren and helped Taita change the dressing over the empty socket of his right eye, Fenn went down to visit Whirlwind and take him the dhurra cakes he loved.

  Taita waited for a favourable wind before he set fire to the remains of the old town that lay outside the new stockade. The thatch and wooden walls had dried and burned rapidly, the wind blowing the flames away from the new walls. By nightfall that day the old town was levelled to a smouldering field of ashes.

  ‘Let the Basmara attack across that open ground,’ Hilto observed, with satisfaction, ‘and we will shock them.’

  ‘Now you can set up markers in front of the stockade,’ Taita told him. They placed cairns of white river stones at twenty, fifty and a hundred paces so that the archers could have the enemy accurately ranged as they sent in their attacks.

  Taita sent Imbali with her companions and the other women to the dry river to cut reeds for arrow-making. He had brought bags of spare arrowheads from the armoury at Qebui fort, and when they had been used, he discovered an outcrop of flint in the hillside below the stockade. He showed the women how to chip the flint fragments into arrowheads. They learnt the skill quickly, then bound the heads into the reed shafts with bark twine and soaked them in water to make them tight and hard. They stacked bundles of spare arrows at salient points along the perimeter of the stockade.

  Within ten days all of the preparation had been completed. The men and Imbali’s women sharpened their weapons and checked their equipment for what might be the last time.

  One evening as the men gathered around the fires for the evening meal, there was a sudden stir and a burst of cheering as an ill-assorted couple came into the firelight. Meren was unsteady on his feet, but supported himself with a hand on Fenn’s shoulder as he came to where Taita sat with the captains. They all jumped to their feet and crowded round him, laughing and co
ngratulating him on his swift recovery. A linen bandage covered his empty eye socket, and he was pale and thinner, but he was making an effort to walk with something of his old swagger, and countered the sallies of the officers with ribald ripostes. At last he stood before Taita and saluted him.

  ‘Ho, Meren, bored with lying abed to be tended by all the females in camp?’ Taita had spoken with a smile but he had difficulty in repressing the pang he felt when he saw the callused warrior’s hand on Fenn’s dainty shoulder. He knew that his jealousy would become keener as her body and beauty matured. He had experienced that corrosive emotion during her other life.

  The following morning Meren was at the practice butts with the archers. At first he had difficulty in keeping his balance with only one eye to steady himself, but with fierce concentration he was at last able to master his unruly senses and train them anew. His next difficulty came in estimating the range and the hold-over of his aim. His arrows either dropped away before they reached the target or flew high above it. Grimly he persevered. Taita, who had been the champion archer in all the armies of Queen Lostris, coached him, teaching him the technique of letting fly his first arrow as a marker, and using it to correct the second, which he released immediately afterwards. Soon Meren could loose a second while the first was still in flight. Fenn and the Shilluk wives made him a leather eyepatch to cover the unsightly socket. His countenance regained its naturally healthy hue, and the remaining eye its old sparkle.

  Every morning Taita sent out a mounted patrol, but they returned each evening without having discovered any sign of the Basmara regiments. Taita consulted Imbali and her women.

  ‘We know Chief Basma well. He is a vengeful, merciless man,’ Imbali told him. ‘He has not forgotten us. His regiments are scattered along the hills of the Valley of the Great Rift, in the river gorges and the marshes of the lakes. It will take time for him to muster them, but in the end he will come. We can be certain of it.’

  Now that the most important preparations had been completed, Taita had time for less vital work. He showed the women how to make dummy human heads with lumps of clay and grass set on top of long poles. These they painted with natural pigments, until the results were convincing when seen from a distance. They enjoyed this more than arrow-making. However, the waiting was starting to wear on their nerves.

  ‘Even considering the distance they must cover from here to Kioga, Basmara should have arrived,’ Taita told Meren, as they ate their dinner round the campfire. ‘Tomorrow you and I will ride out to scout the terrain for ourselves.’

  ‘And I shall go with you,’ piped up Fenn.

  ‘We shall see about that when the time comes,’ said Taita, gruffly.

  ‘Thank you, beloved Taita,’ she said, her smile sweet and sunny.

  ‘That was not what I meant,’ he replied, but they both knew that it was.

  The child was endlessly fascinating, and Taita delighted in her presence. He felt that she had become an extension of his own being.

  When the patrol rode out, Fenn was between Taita and Meren. Nakonto and Imbali trotted ahead as trackers to read the sign. On her long legs Imbali could match Nakonto over the leagues. Habari and two troopers brought up the rear. For once Taita wore a sheathed sword at his waist, but carried his staff in his hand.

  They rode along the crest of the hills whence they could look down the full length of the valley. On the left the terrain was rolling and heavily forested. They saw numerous large herds of elephant spread out below the ridge. Their huge grey bodies showed up clearly in every open glade, and every so often a large fruit-bearing tree was sent crashing to earth by their massive strength. When a tree was too strong to yield to the efforts of a single beast, the other bulls came to his assistance. No tree could resist their combined assault.

  Since the tribes had fled from this land the elephant had not been molested, and they were unalarmed by the close proximity of humans. They did not flee at the first approach but stood their ground while the horsemen passed close by. Occasionally a cantankerous female indulged in a threatening display, but none pushed home her attack. Fenn was delighted by the antics of the calves, and plied Taita with questions about the mighty beasts and their ways.

  The elephants were not the only wild animals they encountered. There were herds of antelope, and yellow baboons foraged in the open glades or swarmed nimbly to the tops of the tallest trees. One troop erupted into shrieking panic. The mothers snatched up their infants and slung them under their bellies as they bounded away in flight. The big males formed a belligerent rearguard, fluffing out their manes and uttering explosive barks of fury.

  ‘What ails them?’ Fenn demanded.

  ‘Likely a leopard or some other predator.’ As Taita spoke, a beautiful gold and black spotted cat stalked out of a patch of grass just ahead. The leopard’s markings blended perfectly with the background.

  ‘You were right again, Taita. You must know everything there is to know in this world,’ Fenn told him admiringly.

  They angled up the slope of the next range of hills, but before they reached the crest a vast herd of zebra thundered over the skyline. Their hoofs tore up the dry earth and lifted a cloud of pale dust high into the brazen sky. They took little notice of the horses, seemingly accepting that they were of their own species, and passed them within a few paces.

  ‘Something must have alarmed them,’ Meren said.

  ‘Fire or men,’ Taita agreed. ‘Nothing else would have caused a stampede on this scale.’

  ‘I see no smoke of a bushfire,’ Meren said. ‘It must be men.’ They rode cautiously now, approaching the skyline at a walk.

  Suddenly Fenn exclaimed again and pointed to the left. ‘A child! A little black child.’

  It was a naked infant of no more than three or four years. He was toddling up the slope on bowed legs, his plump little buttocks wobbling with each pace.

  ‘I am going to pick him up,’ Fenn exclaimed. She pressed Whirlwind into a trot, but Taita grabbed her rein.

  ‘Fenn, this smells like ripe bait.’

  ‘We cannot let him go,’ Fenn protested, as the child went over the skyline and disappeared. ‘He is lost, and all alone.’

  ‘We will follow him,’ Taita agreed, ‘but with caution.’ He did not release his hold on Whirlwind’s rein as they rode on. He halted a hundred paces below the ridge.

  ‘Come, Meren!’ he ordered. They dismounted and passed their reins to Fenn.

  ‘Stay here and hold our horses, but be ready to ride hard,’ Taita told her. He and Meren went forward on foot. They used a small bush to break up the outline of their heads as they peered over the far slope of the hill. The child stood just below them, facing them with a cheerful grin on his round face. He was holding his tiny penis in both hands, piddling a yellow stream on to the sun-baked earth. It was such a homely scene that it lulled them for a moment. Meren started to grin in sympathy but Taita seized his arm. ‘Look beyond!’

  They stared for an instant longer, then Meren reacted. ‘The Basmara impis!’ he cried. ‘That little devil was the bait.’

  Not fifty paces beyond where the child stood, they squatted rank upon close-packed rank. They were armed with wooden clubs, long throwing spears and shorter, stabbing assegais, tipped with sharp flint. Their rawhide shields were slung upon their backs, and their features were daubed with coloured clay to form warlike masks. They wore headdresses of fur and feathers, ivory pins pierced their nostrils and earlobes, while bracelets and anklets of ostrich shell and ivory beads adorned their limbs.

  As Taita and Meren looked at them a hum, as though from a disturbed beehive, went up from the close-packed masses. With a single concerted movement they unslung their war shields and drummed upon them with their spears. Then they burst into their battle hymn. The deep, melodious voices soared and swelled with the drumming. Then the din was pierced by a shrill blast on an antelope-horn whistle. This was the signal for the ranks to leap to their feet and, in a mass, they started up the slope.
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  ‘Back to the horses,’ said Taita.

  Fenn saw them coming and galloped to meet them, bringing Windsmoke and Meren’s steed. They mounted swiftly and had turned the horse’s heads as the first rank of Basmara warriors burst over the crest behind them. They galloped back to where Habari and the remainder of the patrol were waiting.

  ‘Already they have sent out men to try to head us off,’ Fenn called, rising in the stirrups and pointing into the forest. Now they could make out figures among the trees, racing to surround them.

  ‘Take my stirrup rope!’ Taita called to Nakonto, as he kicked his left foot free of the loop. Nakonto grabbed it.

  ‘Meren, pick up Imbali to cover your blind side.’ Meren swerved and Imbali snatched the right loop. She and Nakonto were carried along by the horses, their feet skimming the earth.

  ‘Ride hard!’ Taita shouted. ‘We must break through before they encircle us.’ The fastest runners among the Basmara were streaking ahead of their companions. ‘Fenn, stay between Meren and me. Don’t allow yourself to be separated from us.’

  Four of the racing Basmara cut in directly ahead of them, closing the gap for which Taita had been aiming. They turned to face the oncoming riders, their tall shields on their backs so that their hands were free to use their weapons. Taita and Meren slipped their short recurved cavalry bows, designed to be shot from horseback, from their shoulders as they closed in. They dropped the reins on to the necks of their mounts and, guiding them with the pressure of their feet and knees, rode straight at the spearmen. A Basmara hurled his spear. He was aiming at Meren, but the range was long. Meren had time to react. With a touch of his toe he turned the bay and the spear flew past his left shoulder. He raised his bow and loosed two arrows in rapid succession. One flew high, almost an arm’s length over the man’s head and went on for fifty paces – at this close range the bow was massively powerful – but the second hit the Basmara in the centre of his chest and flew clean through him. It burst out between his shoulder-blades in a spray of blood. He was dead even before he hit the ground.