by Dakota Chase
Chess! Jeez. Was I turning into a geek, or what? It was as if being sent back into time was sucking the coolness right out of me. If I wasn’t careful, I’d be quoting Shakespeare and crap before I knew it.
I risked a glance at Grant, even though I really didn’t want to talk to him at the moment. I was still too embarrassed over him overhearing me mumble in my sleep that I was kissing him to chance drawing him into a conversation.
It’d been a really good dream, too; at least, what I could remember of it. We were at the lake near my hometown, and were floating on a wide raft, just him and me. It was hot, and we were in our swimsuits. He looked really good in his, I remember. We were just lying there, and I looked over at him, and then suddenly, we were kissing.
You know how it is in dreams... things never happen in them like they do in real life. I knew we’d probably never be at the lake together, or lying on a raft, and certainly not sucking face. Still, it was a really good kiss, and a really good dream, and I was a little pissed at Grant for ruining it for me by busting my chops about it.
He was too busy staring at the pyramids to notice me, though. His green eyes were as wide as saucers, and his mouth was hanging open. I was almost praying for a fly to zip in there, just so I’d have something to tease him about.
Tut’s litter bearers, as the men who carried his lounge were called, hoisted him up onto their shoulders again and carried him off the barge, sloshing through the water to the shore. Grant hopped over the side into the water and followed him without hesitation.
I wasn’t quite so quick to jump in with both feet. Instead, I took a minute and leaned over the edge of the boat, scanning the water for crocs. I hadn’t come this far only to end up as lunch for a crocodile.
The coast looked clear, or at least, croc-free. I lowered myself into the warm water and waded to the beach. My kilt kept floating up, and I spent most of the time it took me to get to land batting at it, trying to keep it down. After all, the only thing Merlin had given us in the way of underwear was a tiny loincloth that looked a lot like a g-string and didn’t cover very much. I didn’t want the fish to get an eyeful of any dangly bits that might make them think I was serving dinner.
We followed Tut’s litter over the beach toward the sand dunes. There was a path paved with smooth rocks, so the walking wasn’t difficult, but it was so hot out that, by the time we finally reached anything that resembled civilization, my kilt was completely dry, and I was sweating.
Tut’s home here at Giza was nothing like his palace in Memphis. It was much smaller, more like a country house, I suppose. There was plenty of treasure here, too—I guess a king needed to keep up appearances and all no matter where he was living—but not nearly as much as in the palace. There were statues and vases scattered all around, and carved and painted furniture, but it seemed almost bare bones after experiencing the wealth at Tut’s palace in Memphis.
Grant and I were each given our own rooms, for which I was grateful. While I liked Grant (maybe a little more than I should, actually, considering my dreams), a guy needed his privacy now and then. My room was small, with a long, low couch that served as a bed. There was a garden just outside my window, filled with colorful flowers and birds.
I realized one of the problems with having windows but no glass was that anything outside could very easily find its way inside. Since I’d arrived in ancient Egypt, I’d scored dozens of mosquito and fly bites. They itched, and it wasn’t as if I could run to the infirmary or drug store to buy calamine lotion or bug repellant. Layer that itching on top of my sunburn, and before I knew it, I’d become a scratching, peeling mess.
Add being tired from the boat ride and walk from the beach, and I was asleep before my body hit the bed. I don’t know how long I slept, but when a servant came in to wake me, the sun was nearly set, and it was much cooler.
Tut and Grant were waiting for me in the gardens. A table had been set with fruit, meat, and some kind of fermented beverage that Tut called “beer,” although it didn’t look like any beer I’d ever seen before. The meat was unidentifiable. It could’ve been roasted crocodile butt for all I knew, but it tasted okay, and I was hungry.
At one point, a servant came over and placed a small, perfumed cone of some sort of brownish material that reminded me of incense on top of our heads. It seemed like a really weird thing for somebody to do, but Tut didn’t blink an eye at it, so I chalked it up to being another ancient custom and let it be. After a while, the cones began to melt, filling the air with the smell of flowers. It actually felt kind of good... it cooled off my scalp, at least, but I still thought it was the most bizarre party hat I’d ever worn, and I was very glad nobody at home could see me sitting there with an incense cone balanced on top of my head.
There was little conversation over dinner, but when we were through and the servants had cleared our plates, Tut sent them away. He leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table. The look on his face was serious, and I knew what was coming.
“Aye will not be happy that I chose to leave the palace without informing him. He will come here after me, I am sure, and I wish to know your suspicions before he arrives,” Tut said.
“I don’t like him,” Grant said. “There’s something about him that I don’t trust.”
“Me, either,” I agreed. “I think he wants to be pharaoh, Tut.”
Tut laughed, waving a hand dismissively in the air. “That is ridiculous! Aye is my most trusted advisor. He was my guiding hand when I was young, and helped me earn my throne. What you accuse him of is heresy!”
“You told us before that you suspected Aye might not be on the up and up... er... harboring heresy in his heart,” Grant said. “I think you were right about that.”
“Exactly. You should trust your instincts, Tut. Look, you listened to his advice when you were young, right?” I persisted.
“Of course. I was a child, and he was older and wiser,” Tut said.
I exchanged a glance with Grant. We were going to be entering dangerous territory. Tut obviously respected and maybe loved Aye as a father figure, and what I was about to tell him might make Tut angry and defensive. “In other words, he suggested the policies and whatever, and you made them into law?”
Tut nodded. He cocked his head, obviously not quite able to understand where my logic was going.
“Don’t you see? Aye ruled, Tut. You had the name and the crown and stuff, but he made the laws!” Grant said.
“Right,” I added. “Now that you’re older, you’re starting to make your own decisions. I don’t think he likes that very much. Before, Nefertiti let him put his ideas into your head, but now she wants you to become the pharaoh she knows you could be. I don’t think Aye liked that either.”
Tut shook his head. “No, I do not wish to believe this. Aye wishes only the best for me.” I could see that he was getting a little angry, probably because we were talking crap about the man who had stepped in as his father after Tut’s real dad died. It was one thing if he said it and another if we did. Nobody likes to hear their family dissed.
“I think Aye wishes only the best for himself,” I said. I put up a hand before he could disagree. “You asked for our opinion and we’re giving it, that’s all. Besides, you said yourself that you’ve heard rumors at the palace about Aye wanting the throne.”
“Actually, while we’re on the subject, I know she’s your stepmom... er, second mother, but Nefertiti liked power, too,” Grant said. “She ruled for a while, didn’t she? After your dad died, but before you were crowned pharaoh?”
Tut’s face darkened. He looked offended. “She did. She changed her name to ‘Smenkhkare’ and held the crook and flail for a short while. What are you suggesting?”
“Only that she wouldn’t want Aye to sit on the throne. At least with you there, she would know her ideas would be heard. Chances are good that Aye wouldn’t want to listen to her.”
“But Nefertiti is gone! That is why we came here, because the maids confessed to fi
nding blood in her room,” Tut argued.
“That’s just it! Nefertiti has been pushing for you to take the throne fully, right? Aye wouldn’t have liked that, Tut. He likes having your ear, and likes that you take his suggestions. He certainly must not have liked it when Nefertiti was on the throne. She wouldn’t have listened to him like you do. That’s why he pushed to have you take the crown even though you were still a kid! With her out of the way, he can keep things as they are. And if something happened to you...?” My voice trailed off, leaving the darkest of my thoughts hanging in the air, unspoken.
Tut paled, his eyes widening as he finally caught on, and he gaped at us. “You think Aye murdered Nefertiti? And that he might wish to do the same to me? This is a very serious allegation, my friend. It borders on treason,” he said, lowering his voice to a whisper. I guessed that he was afraid someone might overhear our conversation and get word back to Aye. Even here, in the boondocks of ancient Egypt, the walls had ears.
“Think about it, Tut. With Nefertiti gone, who would be next in line for the throne of Egypt if something happened to you?”
His face paled further as he stared at us in shock. “Aye would never—I cannot believe he would...”
Grant and I wisely remained silent, letting Tut work out the possibilities in his head. It must’ve been really rough for him. After all, it would be bad enough to find out that the people you trusted most may have been playing you for a fool, but it must suck the big fat one to hear that one of them was plotting to murder you.
Although I knew in my heart that I’d been sort of a jerk ever since my mom died, and especially since my dad remarried, and I knew my dad was embarrassed by the crap I’d done and my trouble with the law, I also knew he loved me and would stick by me no matter what. And even though my stepmom barely acknowledged me half of the time, and was a pain in my sphincter the other half, I believed she loved my dad, and he, for whatever reason, loved her, and neither of them would try to hurt me intentionally.
Tut was silent for a long time. I picked at some fruit, exchanging worried glances with Grant. Would Tut believe us? Even though I knew what we’d said made sense to him—enough for him to give our opinions serious thought—we were still strangers, after all. I couldn’t say with any certainty that I would’ve believed us, had I been in his sandals.
“I must have proof,” Tut finally said. “If what you say is true, then I must catch Aye in a lie, or obtain some other form of proof that he wishes me ill. It is the only way I can be certain that he does not have my welfare and the best interests of Egypt at heart.”
It isn’t exactly the response I hoped for, but at least he hasn’t called for the guards and cried, “Off with their heads!” I thought. “How can we get that sort of proof, Tut? He’s too smart to just out-and-out admit that he’s thinking about killing you.”
“On the morrow, we will go to the Great Pyramid as we had planned, and leave an offering to my ancestor, the great king, Khufu. I will pray to the gods to give me the proof I need,” Tut said. He seemed completely convinced that his plan would work, that the gods themselves would present him with evidence of Aye’s guilt or innocence.
I wondered how he thought this proof would come to him. Would he see visions in the clouds, or in the sand? Would it come in a dream? It didn’t seem likely that any sign he received would actually come from the gods. How many men’s lives had been lost or destroyed because a king thought he had a direct phone line to the Great Hereafter? He might as well call the Psychic Hotline for answers.
Tut believed it, though, and there was nothing I could say or do to change his mind, even if I could get him to listen.
Chapter Thirteen
I’d just gotten comfortable—or as close to it as I could manage, given that my mattress was made of pillows stuffed with some sort of grass that rustled every time I moved—when Grant poked his head into my room.
“Hey, are you asleep?”
“If I was, would it matter?” I asked. I was feeling a little edgy. Not only was my bed noisy, but my bug bites were itching up a storm. I felt sure I’d scratched hard enough to draw blood. “What do you want, Grant?”
He came into my room and sat down on the edge of my bed. Something was bugging him; I could that right off. “What are we going to do about the amulet?”
“What do mean, ‘do’ about the amulet? We’re going to get it,” I said.
“Really? Because you’ve been acting like you forgot all about it.” He was glaring at me as if I’d done something wrong. “You seem to be concentrating more on proving to Tut that Aye is out to get him than figuring out a way to get the amulet.”
“Do you think I’m stupid? I know the amulet is what we came here for.”
“Do you know what I really think? I think you like Tut too much. I think maybe you don’t want to go back at all!” he hissed.
“I do too want to go back! Do you think I want to be stuck here in the past with no running water, or television, or video games? Do you think I like stepping in goat crap every time I turn around? Look at me! I’m covered in bug bites!” I narrowed my eyes at him. “Why do you care if I like Tut, anyway?”
He turned his face away, so I couldn’t read his expression. “I couldn’t care less how you feel about Tut. I just want to get the amulet and go home.”
“Is it the gay thing? Is that what’s got your boxers in a knot?”
He looked back at me and seemed genuinely surprised. “No! I mean, I don’t care about... That’s not it.”
“I think it is. I think that if Tut was a girl, you’d be cool with it. Admit it! You can’t stand that I like Tut, and we’re both guys!”
“That isn’t it! You’re an idiot, do you know that? A walking, talking butthole. I can’t believe I even let Merlin talk me into doing this with you!” He got up and began heading for the door. “I’m ending this right now!”
Alarms went off in my head. If Grant did something stupid, like jump Tut and try to take the amulet from around his neck, Tut might have us killed as traitors before Merlin could whisk us home! I jumped off the bed and ran after Grant, grabbing his arm and spun him around. “Where are you going? What are you going to do?”
He yanked his arm away from me. His back was against my bedroom door, and our faces were only inches apart. He pulled his head back, and it hit the door with a good, solid thunk. “Back off, Aston!”
“Not until you tell me what you’re going to do!” I pressed closer, trying to intimidate him. Unfortunately, I could feel the heat of his skin against my bare chest, which made other parts of me sit up and take notice. He smelled good, too, and his skin looked shiny; he must have used some of the oils the Egyptians used on their skin. He also needed a shave, the same as me, something that wasn’t going to happen for either of us since the Egyptians had yet to invent a triple blade with aloe, and neither of us was about to let anyone near our throats with a knife. Sexy, dark stubble dusted his cheeks.
His eyes snapped with anger, and he gave me a push. “I said, back off!”
I pushed him back. Somewhere deep in the back of my little pea brain a light went off (wasn’t this how we’d ended up in this mess to begin with?), but I ignored it. “What is wrong with you? You were fine at dinner, now all of a sudden you’re acting like a jerk!”
“Yeah, well, if you stopped trying to make out with Tut all the time and thought more about how to get his amulet, we’d be home by now!” He pushed me again, and I lost my balance, falling to the floor. I managed to grab his arm on the way and pulled him down with me. We landed in a tangle of arms and legs. My back hit the hard floor, and I grunted in pain. “Get off me!” I yelled.
I heaved with all my strength and managed to get up into a half-sitting position, but Grant shoved me back down again before I could wriggle out from under him.
Grant pinned me to the floor, glaring down at me. I cursed and tried to push him off, and when that failed, tried furiously to wiggle out from underneath. I couldn’t free mys
elf, no matter how hard I tried. He had his full weight pressing down on me, and since he was a bit taller and weighed a little more than I did, I was having a hard time budging him.
His green eyes had gone dark with anger, and his lips were curled over his teeth. I’d never seen him look so furious, not even when we were fighting in Merlin’s office. He looked as if he would like nothing better than to rip me to pieces with his bare hands. I think he was in the middle of an adrenaline rush, and that’s what gave him the strength to keep me pinned—or at least, that was what I told myself. I didn’t want to admit that he was just stronger than me.
I was absolutely certain that he was going to haul off and slug me, and my entire body tightened as if to ward off the blow that I was positive was coming. I took a deep breath and squeezed my eyes shut, waiting for him to pull his arm back and plow his fist into my face.
He didn’t.
A full minute ticked by. I cracked one eye open, expecting to see his fist zooming in, but to my surprise, he didn’t hit me.
Instead, he lowered his head and kissed me. There was a lot of anger in his kiss—it was almost as if he slugged me with his mouth. He kissed me so hard that I could feel his teeth pressing against my lips.
It was over just as quickly as it had happened. His head jerked up, his eyes wide, and he pushed away from me as if he couldn’t wait to put distance between us. He scooted away on his butt until his back hit the door. I could see he was breathing hard, and he looked scared. “Oh, God... I’m sorry! I’m sorry, Aston. I’m sorry...”
“For what?” I asked, sitting up, feeling as stunned as he looked. I rubbed my lips absently with my fingers. They tingled, in a good way.
“For... you know... doing that,” he said lamely. “I didn’t mean to, I swear!”
“Didn’t mean to do what? Be an idiot about Tut and body slam me to the floor, or for trying to bash my face in with your mouth?” My lips were still tickly from his kiss, brutal though it was. I realized I wanted him to kiss me again, although I wasn’t about to tell him that.