Eater of souls

by Lynda S. Robinson

  He hadn’t realized he was staring at the prince. When his attention returned to the present, Meren found Djoser glaring at him. Caught off guard, he felt a jolt of surprise, for he could almost feel the heat of Djoser’s rage. Was the fool still angry with him about Reshep?

  Djoser recovered himself and shoved the incense burner in front of him. Meren nearly choked on the sweet smoke. His eyes stung, and he blinked as he caught another whiff of the scent used to attract the attention of the gods. Its recipe was engraved on the walls of temples to preserve the knowledge. Meren had read the hieroglyphs once and had been surprised to find it called for juniper berries, sweet flag, cassia, and cinnamon as well as precious frankincense and myrrh.

  He drew breath again as Djoser finished, but this time the sweet scent reminded him of Eater of Souls. It was the myrrh. Those who used it sometimes kept the smell about them for hours. If it was in unguent, it would last until the wearer bathed. Surreptitiously Meren wiped away the tears the smoke had caused, even as he wondered whether a demon would smell of old incense. No, this he doubted.

  A priest standing beside him turned and handed Meren a set of golden cords. Meren took them in both hands.It was time for his part in the ritual. With Djoser leading the way, he approached pharaoh and the effigy of Ammut, the Devouress. Kneeling, he held out the cords. Pharaoh took one and tied several knots in it while the high priest of Amun recited spells. This was the ritual for binding Eater of Souls. The knots provided a barrier across which the demon could not pass.

  As the dancers kept up their protective din, pharaoh tied the knotted cord around Eater of Souls. He then placed the figure inside a tall chest made to resemble one of the towers of a desert fortress. The priest of Isis came forward bearing a heavy rope. He and Parenefer tied the rope around the closed door of the chest, then held the two ends together while pharaoh applied a clay seal. Next, to the accompaniment of chanted spells, Tutankhamun pressed the bezel of the royal seal ring into the damp clay.

  Thus the demon was imprisoned, its might sealed away and kept impotent by the most powerful force in Egypt, the living god. The dancing, chanting, and clapping rose as pharaoh lifted his arms. Meren blinked when Tutankhamun shouted a command with such force that it was heard even above the drums. All noise ceased at once.

  Meren, who was still kneeling, glanced down to find he was still holding a golden cord. Why had they given him two cords if pharaoh needed only one? The dancers stood in their ring around the king. The priests, the courtiers, awaited pharaoh’s signal for the party to leave the summit of the pyramid. Tutankhamun ignored Parenefer’s whispered hints.

  Turning his back on the sealed chest and the old priest, pharaoh signaled that Meren should stand. Meren glanced at Djoser, who shook his head to indicate ignorance. Meren had no choice but to stand before the king holding a useless length of gold cord while everyone stared at him. Then pharaoh came close, took the cord, and began knotting it while he chanted the protective spells. There was a stir among the dancers. Meren glanced at them to find that the queen had stepped forward as if to object. She was restrained by Princess Tio.

  “Keep him from harm who is bound by my protection,” the king chanted. “I beseech the god my father, I beseech Isis, Osiris, Toth, and the golden ones. Keep this Lord Meren from harm. I set my protection about him. The power of my majesty shall keep you safe from any action, any interference, any harm.”

  Meren had no choice but to allow pharaoh to slip the cord around his waist and tie it. Bener had insisted upon calling a priest to ward him with protective spells, but he’d never suspected that the king would provide one of his own. Tutankhamun finished tying the last knot and stepped back.

  “There,” he said under his breath. “Let Eater of Souls contend with the power of the son of the great god.”

  “Majesty, I—”

  Tutankhamun almost smiled, but he appeared to remember his godlike dignity before others.

  “Is the great Eyes of Pharaoh speechless? Then I am recompensed for having to learn so many endless spells, chants, and prayers for this ceremony.”

  Meren felt his features settle into a courtly mask. “Does thy majesty know what he has done? He has made me at least a dozen more enemies at court than I had before.”

  “Better a few more enemies than a hole in your chest where your heart should be.”

  With this pharaoh turned and signaled the end of the ceremony. Meren was left to follow. The significant result of pharaoh’s actions didn’t occur to him until the royal party had descended the step pyramid and returned in procession to the palace. Ankhesenamun and her retinue continued on to her own palace. The queen hadn’t liked the king giving his magical protection to Meren, but now he understood what he’d seen in her eyes. Not just enmity, not simple hatred, but jealousy.

  Meren hadn’t considered this possibility before, and he didn’t like it. But he had too much to deal with. He wanted to leave. The search for Eater of Souls continued; Kysen was at the house, supervising and overseeing the continuing searches of the docks, the foreign quarters, and the district around Meren’s house.

  Back at the palace Meren found himself obliged to attend a royal consultation. With pharaoh presiding, Ay, several other ministers, and the priests were discussing Eater of Souls yet again. Meren’s attention strayed. He tried to think about the attack in a different way—who hated him enough to try to kill him?

  Well, that list was as lengthy as the carvings on a temple wall. Just recently he’d managed to offend the Great Royal Wife, Princess Tio, Prince Rahotep, Djoser, Lord Reshep, poor Mugallu, and General Labarnas. Those were the ones he could remember. Only the gods knew who else had reason to hate him. His duties made certain that he caused inconvenience, even harm, to many of whom he wasn’t even aware. Stifling a groan, Meren turned his attention to the men around him and found the priests still quarreling.

  His patience was disappearing quickly, and the longer the high priests argued about the significance of the killings and why the demon had appeared, the more restless he became. Old Parenefer, frail and brittle like an insect, clutched his staff of office and spoke above the competing voices.

  “The reason we can find no purpose to these deaths is that they are divine judgments of the gods, who have read the hearts of those who have been killed and found them evil. Because of Egypt’s suffering under the heresy of the old pharaoh, the gods have lost patience and have sent the Devouress to carry out punishment.” Parenefer swiveled around to stare at Meren. “Eater of Souls has been sent to rid Egypt of corruption.”

  “Then she should have begun with you,” Meren said lightly.

  He shouldn’t have spoken, but he was sick of listening to Parenefer whine about how much he and the righteous had suffered because of Akhenaten. Over Parenefer’s head he caught the king looking at him. Tutankhamun’s eyes crinkled at the outside corners, and Meren thought he glimpsed a fleeting curve of his lips. He was going to hear his own counsel of diplomacy tossed back at him the next time he was alone with the boy.

  The high priest of Isis, whose family was far older and more noble than Parenefer’s, rolled his eyes and let out a sharp sigh. “We don’t even know if this really is the Devouress. It could be someone who hides behind the guise of a demon to fool us. There was a case in the Hare nome of a farmer who moved the boundary stones of eight different fields and blamed it on the angry spirit of a dead woman.”

  Several ministers nodded, and discussion erupted again. Prince Rahotep joined Meren, nudged him with an elbow, and growled at him.

  “So, you’re an evildoer already condemned by the gods. My commiserations.”

  “You’re not amusing, Rahotep.”

  “If you’d have sent for me the night before last, I could have had my infantry hunt down this bastard killer, and we wouldn’t be here listening to that old vulture Parenefer.”

  “I forgot,” Meren said.

  Rahotep folded his arms over his chest. “You didn’t forget. It’s lik
e you to think you can combat even a fiend from the underworld by yourself, just you and your fabled charioteers. The Eyes and Ears of Pharaoh, whose name is known throughout the empire, whose spies and informants are innumerable and as hidden as the secret names of the gods.”

  “You’re still angry at me. I told you the truth about meddling between pharaoh and his queen.”

  “I’m not angry,” Rahotep said. “You were wrong, if you can imagine it. The golden one was most gracious in his thanks for my advice. Oh, and I hear your Isis is to marry that strutting ostrich Reshep.”

  Meren stared at the prince. “Don’t be absurd.”

  “Then it’s not true?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Did he hear about Eater of Souls coming for you and withdraw from the arrangement?”

  Meren turned on Rahotep and spoke under his breath. “Curse your smug face, Rahotep. This attempt at humor has the subtlety of a hippo attack and the refinement of hyena dung. If you continue to wrap your barbed tongue around my daughter’s name, I’ll tie your ankles with your tongue and pitch you into the nearest dung heap.”

  He hadn’t been as quiet as he thought. The silence in the audience chamber caused both of them to stop glaring at each other and turn to find themselves the center of attention. Rahotep cleared his throat and marched over to the group of ministers near Ay. Meren found that he didn’t care whether Rahotep was embarrassed before pharaoh, councillors, and great priests. He stalked around old Parenefer and knelt before the king.

  “Golden one, I beg leave to return home to oversee the hunt for this creature. We must find it, or him, before it strikes again.”

  “Come,” the king said.

  Meren rose and mounted the dais upon which sat the king’s golden chair. He knelt beside Tutankhamun.

  “If by chance this killer isn’t a demon, but one possessed, or a man of devious heart who marauds in disguise, then—”

  “We’re looking for the disguise, majesty. We—” He stopped because the king suddenly leaned closer and began to whisper.

  “Meren, why would this—this thing come for you?”

  Avoiding Tutankhamun’s eyes, Meren shook his head. “I know not, majesty.”

  “Have you—that is… Is there any reason—”

  “Like any man, I have sins for which I must answer, golden one.”

  “Great sins?”

  Meren raised his eyes to the king’s dark gaze. He wanted to say no, but he couldn’t. Which was the greater sin—allowing a heretic to cause great suffering, or failing to save a heretic from the consequences of his own heresy? This was the dilemma that haunted his ka. This sin would blacken his heart forever. So he found himself speechless before pharaoh. To Meren’s consternation, his silence caused the king to nod as if in understanding.

  Then Tutankhamun smiled. “Do you know why I have such affection for you?”

  “No, majesty.”

  “Because of all the great men, warriors, and princes about me, only you find it impossible to lie to me. Oh, I know you deceive me about things you consider for my own good. But if I ask you for the truth about yourself, you always give it.”

  “Majesty, you don’t know what—”

  “What you’ve had to do to survive?” Tutankhamun asked with bitter humor. “I am the son of a pharaoh, the brother of two pharaohs, ruler of an empire, I know, Meren. It’s bred into my flesh.”

  “Thy majesty is as wise as the Nile is long.”

  “Go, Meren. You’ve spent too much time in Parenefer’s company, and you’re beginning to sound like him.”

  Chapter 15

  In the past few days Tentamun had come to wish he had never undertaken employment with Zulaya. Indeed, he had begged the gods to deliver him from this man, but his entreaties had brought no rescue. When the stranger had come to his village asking questions about Satet, Hunero, and Bay, he had led the man to Zulaya. Now Tentamun was Zulaya’s guest, a guest without the freedom to leave.

  He wasn’t imprisoned or maltreated. Zulaya’s steward had given him a chamber in a small, white-plastered house that lay opposite the main residence. They fed him and even provided clothing. But someone was always around. If he left the house and walked toward the gates, a servant or a guard always appeared and watched him. Tentamun had never been brave enough to continue on to the gate and past the sentries that stood there day and night.

  He’d been here four days. Or had it been five now? In all that time he hadn’t seen the stranger again. The first night he’d awakened to muffled screams. They’d been distant, as if coming from underground, but the screams had grown faint, then inaudible. Tentamun hadn’t been able to sleep again until dawn. Now he waited in a richly decorated antechamber for an interview with Zulaya, and he was afraid of what would happen to him once he entered his master’s presence.

  The first time he’d seen Zulaya had been over a year ago. A fine pleasure yacht had docked near the village, and the cook from the kitchen boat that served it had come seeking fresh fruit and meat. Tentamun was drawn to the ship, which was painted a deep lotus-leaf green. It had a white deckhouse with a painted gold frieze around it. The people on board wore filmy, cloudlike clothes and jewels that glittered more than sunlight on water. He had never seen the like.

  For hours Tentamun watched the ship, a craft built only for leisure, and the richly dressed occupants who seemed to have nothing to do but sit beneath multicolored awnings and sip cool drinks while slaves fanned them. Then he looked down at his own loincloth with its patched tears and soiled spots that no scrubbing could remove.

  That day he had promised himself that someday he would own such a ship. It would be just like this one, a shining green leaf forever floating in the gentle current. And he would rest on a gilded couch, his body cool from the breeze of a dozen fans, his eyes closed against the glare of the sun, with no work to do and only orders to give that work should be done. No more trudging behind an ox pulling a plow. No more threshing grain beneath the withering white eye of the sun.

  As he dreamed of a life of riches and laziness, Zulaya had appeared, crossing the plank to shore like a god stepping out of the sun boat of Ra. He’d been dressed in a foreign robe tied at the shoulder and secured by a golden lion pin. Tentamun remembered the robe’s color, a deep, dark red like the finest jasper. But what he remembered most vividly were Zulaya’s hands. Clean, long fingers without the disfigurement of large knuckles, they had been free of calluses and scars. Unlike Tentamun’s, the nails were unbroken and free of soil.

  Zulaya said he’d noticed Tantamun’s interest. He offered employment. Tentamun didn’t hesitate. Because he had wanted a boat of lotus-leaf green and clean hands without blemishes.

  Nebra came in through the tall double doors of Zulaya’s apartments and beckoned. Tentamun disliked Nebra, although he’d never spoken to the man. He disliked Nebra because he moved like a cobra and had eyes like the false glass ones used by artisans for statues and death masks. Nebra seemed to have no position about the household or tasks to perform. He appeared suddenly and stayed for many days, during which his only occupation seemed to be secret conferences with Zulaya. Then he vanished again.

  Nebra had an Egyptian name, but his skin was a shade lighter than most men’s, and his hair had an auburn tint. It was a natural color, similar to that hairdressers achieved with henna. But what was most disturbing about Nebra was his youth; he was only a few years older than Tentamun.

  In spite of his age, however, his appearance always caused a stir in Zulaya’s household. Servants grew jittery and dropped things. Guards found patrols in the fields and desert suddenly rewarding. Slaves sent to wait upon Nebra went unwillingly and returned with great speed. And yet Nebra was quiet, undemanding, courteous.

  As he passed Nebra in the doorway, Tentamun glanced quickly at him. It was obvious that Tentamun hardly existed in whatever landscape those glasslike eyes surveyed. Tentamun shivered, for he suddenly realized that Nebra reminded him of a shabti, a statuett
e provided in a tomb so that it would perform any labor demanded of the deceased by the gods. With his vivid coloring and almost total lack of facial expression, Nebra could be a magically animated statuette. When he was still, Nebra gave the impression that he was waiting and would wait for eternity to perform some mysterious and frightening task for his master.

  Tentamun had hoped that Nebra would leave once he’d admitted him, but he guided him into a room of high columns and bright airiness. Leaving Tentamun, Nebra crossed the chamber to the long, low window that formed a kind of balcony running most of the length of the room’s west wall. Zulaya was there, a hand resting on a low balustrade as he gazed out at the Nile. Nebra whispered to him, then retreated to lean against a column on the balcony. Zulaya beckoned without looking at Tentamun.

  “Come.”

  Tentamun went cold, but forced his legs to take him to his master. Zulaya still didn’t look his way. The balcony overlooked the lapis lazuli band of the Nile, and Zulaya seemed fascinated by the activity on the bank. There a freighter had docked. Hundreds of pottery jars had been stacked on the ship’s deck in an orderly mountain. Sailors perched on the slope of the mountain, on the deck, and ashore in a line, swinging the vessels to each other in a chain of motion.

  Farther along the bank where the ground was level, workmen scooped up rich, dark mud and slapped it into wooden brick molds. Line after line of drying bricks marched up the slopes of dry ground. Beyond the brick molds, gangs of laborers shored up canal banks and dikes, for Inundation would soon turn the Nile into an inland sea.

  Zulaya suddenly leaned out and pointed across the river, beyond the west bank, at a trading caravan. Dark-robed, herding a long line of donkeys bearing panniers, the group trudged away from the Nile on its way to one of the desert oases. Two of their company struggled with several bulky parcels wrapped in tattered sailcloth. Finally the last bundle was strapped into a pannier and the donkey persuaded to join the line plodding out to the sand.