Place of Darkness lb-5

by Lauren Haney

  He must hurry to Djeser Djeseru. But before he crossed the river, he must share what he knew with Maiherperi. Only the most foolhardy of men would keep to himself knowledge so important. Of equal importance was the need to discover the identity of the man he had been calling the malign spirit, and the fastest way was to draw Menna to Djeser Djeseru. How could he do so? With garrison troops searching for the fishermen, the officer was bound to be wary-if indeed he was the malign spirit-but hopefully not so suspicious he could not be soothed.

  What would put at ease a guilty man as well as one who was innocent? After a few moment’s thought, Bak borrowed brush and ink from the young scribe and wrote a brief note: I think I know who’s been causing the accidents at Djeser Djeseru. If you join me there at mid-afternoon, Senenmut’s inspection should be completed and we can snare him then.

  He handed the note to the scribe. “I wish you to take this message to Lieutenant Menna. I must go to the hall of records, so deliver his response to me there. Report to me also if you fail to find him.”

  If nothing else, the note’s enigmatic nature should pique Menna’s curiosity.

  “They’ve not yet crossed the river,” Maiherperi said.

  “Senenmut decided to use the morning hours to inspect the repairs being made at the mansion of the lord Amon here in Waset.”

  “I thank the gods!”

  The guard at the door, alerted by the exclamation whose words he had evidently not heard, took a quick step forward, poised to act. The commander signaled that all was well, sending him back to his post. “Your optimism is unfounded, Lieutenant. When he’s finished here, he plans to move on to Djeser Djeseru.”

  Bak slumped onto a stool unbidden. “It’s not too late to stop him.”

  Maiherperi made a sour face. “Amonked tried to convince him he must not inspect Djeser Djeseru today-or until the malign spirit is snared. He refused to listen, saying no one would dare injure him. When I seconded Amonked’s plea, he suggested we’ve something to hide, a wall that collapsed from shoddy construction perhaps or. .” He paused, smiled with little humor. “The list is endless, it seems.”

  Bak muttered a curse. “You must somehow stop him, sir.”

  The commander raised his hands, palms forward. “No man can stop Senenmut when he sets his heart on an action.

  After all, he’s Overseer of Overseers of All the Works of the King.” A wry note crept into his voice. “He takes the task seriously.”

  “If he witnesses a terrible accident, if he’s hurt or killed by chance or by design. .” Bak could go no further. The thought was too appalling.

  “He’s blind to the risk. To his way of thinking, spirits malign or benevolent act at random, with no purpose. When we pointed out that this spirit is a man, he remained unmoved, thinking himself safe because no ordinary individual would dare touch a man so close to our sovereign.”

  Bak stood up. “I fear not only for Senenmut, sir, but for Amonked as well.”

  Maiherperi stepped down from the dais and laid a sympathetic hand on the younger officer’s shoulder. “No more than I, Lieutenant. No more than I.”

  “Here it is, sir, the new plan we drew.” Hori, looking as proud as a father showing off his firstborn son, handed the new-made scroll to Bak. “If this was an early temple built by Nebhepetre Montuhotep, I’m not surprised he changed it. It wouldn’t have been half as imposing as the temple he completed.”

  Kaemwaset hovered close, as pleased with the drawing as Hori. “The plan makes no mention of the setting in which the temple was built. If it was built. It’s smaller than the ruined building and could easily have been leveled and the new structure built over it.”

  Bak knelt beside the pair and unrolled the scroll. The drawing, while a long way from being a work of art, was exactly what he wanted. He prayed it would also be what he needed. “Excellent. Let’s hope I can use this to good advantage.”

  Even with the blank spaces filled in, the plan in no way resembled the temple he and his men had explored cubit by cubit. The entrance to the king’s tomb was some distance in front of the raised platform rather than at the back, as at present. The platform on the old plan, shorter in width and length and not as high, was surmounted by a small memorial temple rather than the solid structure and enclosed main court surrounded by a colonnade that lay in ruins on the existing platform. The colonnade court, columned hall, and sanctuary of the present structure were not shown at all. Six small chapels or shrines lined the rear edge of the smaller platform.

  “Have you found anything else of interest?” he asked, rolling up the plan.

  Kaemwaset pointed to a stained scroll lying on top of those in the basket. “One of the old documents we found makes mention of the sepulcher of a royal spouse named Neferu. It’s somewhere east of the new temple, at the base of the slope beneath the northern cliff.”

  “In the path of the northern retaining wall at Djeser Djeseru?”

  “Possibly. The exact location isn’t clear.” The priest offered Bak a rolled scroll made of fresh white papyrus. “The document was very fragile, so I copied it, filling in the missing or unclear symbols in red ink, as Hori filled in the plan.”

  “Good.” Bak stood up, granted each a quick smile of thanks. “I can take it and the plan with me and study them on the ferry while I cross the river.”

  The pair glanced at each other, visibly disappointed, no doubt feeling he was not giving their considerable effort the attention it deserved.

  “Lieutenant Bak.” The young scribe he had talked with at Menna’s office approached across the courtyard. “I’ve delivered your message, sir, and the officer said he’d meet you as you asked him to.”

  “How did he receive the message?”

  “He was puzzled, sir, very puzzled.”

  Bak nodded, not at all surprised. Whether Menna would have second thoughts and not appear as promised was an open question. Even at the best of times he was not dependable. With Senenmut’s inspection delayed, giving him more time, perhaps he should. . “Where is he now? Still at the garrison?”

  “No, sir, I caught him as he was leaving. I think he was looking for a boat to carry him across the river.”

  Bak thanked the scribe and sent him on his way. Had Menna crossed the river on an ordinary errand, or in an attempt to escape? Or to do further damage? He prayed fervently to the lord Amon that he had not missed the only opportunity he might have had to lay hands on the guilty man.

  “I must go right away to Djeser Djeseru. Senenmut has delayed his inspection until after midday, and I must do all I can to ensure his safety while he’s there.”

  “Do you think Neferu’s tomb is the one the malign spirit is seeking?” Hori asked, trying to hide his distress.

  “It’s impossible to say. We’ve no idea how many wives and daughters Nebhepetre Montuhotep had.” Noting the gloom on both their faces, Bak realized he could not simply walk away from them after they had searched the archives with such diligence. “The two of you must come with me. If Lieutenant Menna turns up at Djeser Djeseru as I hope, you’ve every right to be there when I question him. While we await him, we can search out the tomb he’s looking for.”

  Hori gaped.

  Kaemwaset looked perplexed. “Lieutenant Menna?”

  Bak realized they were ignorant of all he had learned since last he had seen them. “Lieutenant Menna may be the malign spirit. If he proves to be innocent, I fear we must look closer at a dead man: Montu.”

  “Menna?” Kaemwaset shook his head in denial. “He’s the guard officer, a man above reproach.”

  “Come. I’ll explain on the way.”

  Kaemwaset looked as sober as Bak had ever seen him.

  “The workmen and artisans must not be given the smallest hint of what you’re thinking. If they convince themselves Menna is the one who’s brought about so much injury and death, they’ll tear him apart.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Bidding a temporary farewell to Hori and Kaemwaset, Bak h
urried up the causeway to Djeser Djeseru about an hour before midday. The scribe and priest turned aside to walk to the ruined temple of Nebhepetre Montuhotep. At their heels, ranging from side to side as the urge struck, trotted a large white dog they had borrowed from a desert patrol unit garrisoned in Waset.

  Bak stopped at the eastern end of the terrace, where it overflowed onto the ruined walls of the temple of Djeserkare Amonhotep and his revered mother Ahmose Nefertari.

  Standing quite still, concentrating fully on all he saw, he studied the cliffs around the valley and the rim above, where a path ran along the edge. With the sun striking the cliff high and from the front, the vertical surfaces looked flat and the crevices shallow. The tower-like projections merged into the background and much detail was lost. A thin haze, minute particles of airborne dust, turned the cliffs an unnatural pinkish purple, further obscuring all but the most outstand-ing features. The heat was pervasive, the sand hot beneath his sandals.

  The malign spirit had twice used rock slides as a means of destruction, and Bak could think of no more spectacular a way of creating further devastation and fear than a slide originating high up the face of the cliff. Along much of the way, rock and debris would plunge harmlessly onto the tower-like projections, but he could see several chute-like places where a slide could fall unimpeded onto the memorial temple of Maatkare Hatshepsut. One had but to look at the ruined columned hall at the rear of Nebhepetre Montuhotep’s temple to see what damage could be done.

  “Menna.” Pashed, standing in the sunlight at the top of the ramp leading to the temple, looked out across Djeser Djeseru, thinking of all Bak had told him. “Yes. I’ve always thought him a man who’d go to far greater lengths to attain his goals in a less than admirable fashion than to exert himself by earning his bread in a hardworking and diligent manner.”

  Bak gave the senior architect a surprised look. “You never said.”

  “You surely noticed he seldom visited Djeser Djeseru. Or any of the cemeteries of western Waset, for that matter. If I’d not taken control, the guards here would’ve spent much of each day playing knucklebones and throwsticks, drinking beer and wagering. As it was, they neglected their duty at night.”

  “Afraid of the malign spirit.”

  Against his will, Bak looked at the cliff towering above the temple. He saw no movement along the rim, no man poised to start a rock slide, but his skin crawled as he thought again of the possibilities for destruction.

  “I could hardly blame them for that,” the architect said grudgingly. “They were but a few among the many.”

  Laughter, a sound incongruous under the circumstances, tugged Bak’s glance to the north end of the lower colonnade, where a gang of men were increasing the height of the rubble ramp in the expectation of hauling up another stone block and placing it on top of a partially completed column.

  “Montu would’ve known even better than Menna how best to do damage to Djeser Djeseru.”

  Pashed did not appear surprised by the suggestion, but gave it some thought nonetheless. “He was indolent, yes, selfish and arrogant, and cruel in his own way, but I never thought him so callous he’d slay men at random.”

  “Someone did, and I’d bet my best kilt it was either him or Menna.” A darkness consumed Bak’s heart, a feeling of sadness-and rage-that one man could be responsible for so much needless death and injury. “If one of them didn’t, the fishermen or Imen did at their leader’s instruction.”

  Pashed’s voice turned harsh with anger. “I’d like to slay them all with my bare hands.”

  “Imen can do no more harm. If the fishermen haven’t run away, they may well come today, drawn by Senenmut and the desire to do damage. And I’ve summoned Menna. .” A wry smile flitted across Bak’s lips. “. . with a promise that the two of us will snare the malign spirit, he and I together.

  Whatever the truth, I’ll find it, and your troubles will be over.”

  “I wish I could be as certain as you.”

  Bak tamped down his irritation. Over the past few years, Pashed had shouldered far too much adversity for any one man. He had every right to be pessimistic. “There’ve been four attempts on my life, Pashed. Whether Menna is the malign spirit or the fishermen are walking in the shadow of a dead man, they have to know their time is running out. If they’re determined to bring about an accident serious enough to stop construction, they must do so without delay.

  What better time than when Senenmut is here?”

  “Senenmut has the ear of our sovereign.” The worry lines deepened in the architect’s face, alarm seeped into his voice.

  “He’s her right hand, much beloved. How can we let him walk into what could be a deadly trap?”

  Bak had explained once that Maiherperi and Amonked had both tried to dissuade Senenmut from coming. He saw no need to repeat himself. “Move as many of the men as you can away from the cliff, and remove the craftsmen from the sanctuary and side chapels. I know, because of Senenmut’s inspection, that you can’t take everyone away from their tasks, but do the best you can.”

  Looking harried, pushed to the limit, Pashed nodded.

  “You must go from one chief craftsman to another, from one foreman to another, and tell them to be extra alert for anything out of the ordinary, any problem. We may not be able to stop altogether what they plan, but with luck and the help of every god great and small, we should be able to contain the damage.”

  “Where will I find you should I need you?” Pashed asked, too worn down to offer further resistance.

  “Utter not one word of what I’ve told you,” Bak cautioned, not for the first time. “I must speak with Menna before the men learn he could be the malign spirit. I don’t want them attacking an innocent man.”

  “I’ve always been one to behave in a right and proper manner, to obey the law of the land and do right by the lady Maat, but in this case. .”

  “No.” Bak placed a hand on the architect’s wrist. “What good is the law if men take punishment into their own hands?” He noted Pashed’s troubled demeanor and said no more. The man’s conscience would lead him to reveal nothing-or so he prayed.

  He started down the ramp, remembered a question he had failed to ask, and turned back. “Do you know anything about the tomb of a woman called Neferu, spouse of Nebhepetre Montuhotep?”

  “Neferu?” Pashed shook his head slightly, as if to clear away his troubled thoughts, at least enough so he could speak of a less bothersome subject. “Hers was the first sepulcher we came upon in this valley.”

  Bak gave him a sharp look. “Kaemwaset knew nothing of it until he found mention of it in the archives. Has he not been priest from the day construction began?”

  “He wasn’t assigned to Djeser Djeseru until after our sovereign laid the foundation deposits and the chief prophet consecrated the valley. We found the tomb a few months earlier, the day we inspected the landscape to learn the extent of the effort we must make to give the building a firm base.”

  Bak nodded his understanding. “You were here at the time?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Where exactly is the tomb located?”

  Pashed pointed eastward and a bit to the left of the temple of Djeserkare Amonhotep and Ahmose Nefertari. “At the base of the slope below the cliff, north of an old wall partly buried in sand that runs alongside the temple.”

  “How did you find it way out there?”

  “The mouth of the tomb lay open.” The architect eyed the terrace below them, the incomplete statues and architectural elements, the many men toiling there, and a look of pride blossomed briefly on his face. “You must remember that before this project began, this valley was seldom visited by man or woman much of the year. Only during the Beautiful Festival of the Valley. Oh, a few women came to bend a knee at the shrine of the lady Hathor, and the cemetery guards made random visits. The robbers must’ve felt they had the place to themselves.”

  Bak well remembered how empty and desolate the valley had been when,
as a small boy, he had accompanied his father’s housekeeper to the shrine of the lady Hathor. “What did you find inside the tomb?”

  “As was apparent the moment we laid eyes on the open shaft, robbers had been there ahead of us. Not once, but several times. Much of the devastation we found in the burial chamber had occurred many years before, many generations ago, but a small niche looked as if it had been opened recently. What had been removed, we had no way of knowing.”

  Bak was willing to bet his iron dagger that the jewelry he had found in far-off Buhen had come from that niche. If so, the malign spirit and his gang had already entered Neferu’s tomb and rifled it. It could not possibly be the one they were searching for-or had found but had been unable to clear.

  “The tomb was quite lovely,” Pashed went on. “Senenmut ordered it temporarily closed, to be reopened later. He’s not yet decided if the terrace will be extended beyond its entrance, but he plans to make it accessible so all who come to Djeser Djeseru will be able to visit the sepulcher of our sovereign’s worthy ancestor.”

  An admirable goal, Bak thought, especially since Maatkare Hatshepsut’s forebears had no blood tie to Nebhepetre Montuhotep, and probably not to his spouse either.

  “I must leave you, Pashed, but I wish to be told the instant Senenmut appears.”

  “Should I need you, where will you be?”

  With a grim smile, Bak pointed toward the ruined temple of Nebhepetre Montuhotep, where Hori, Kasaya, and Kaemwaset stood with the white dog among the broken columns on the northern terrace. “We’ll be there, searching for the tomb of a royal spouse or child.”

  The architect flung him a startled look. “If Menna’s the malign spirit, if the tomb he’s been seeking is there, he’ll not sit back and let you find it ahead of him.”

  “So I hope.”

  “How much time do we have before Senenmut arrives?”

  Kasaya asked.