by Jerry Dubs
Yunet looked around the hut. She grabbed a sack and began to fill it with bread.
“I have a water skin,” Neswy said. “I will fill it and meet you at the edge of town.” He took a last look at Djefi, bending down to test the strength of the linen ties. “Hurry,” he said as he left the hut.
Siamun awoke early and went to the canal to wash. He was standing in the water, shaking his head dry when Bakr came up to the canal bank, a frightened look on his face.
“Come quick, Siamun. Djefi has been attacked.”
Siamun splashed his way to land and followed Bakr as they ran through the village to the far edge to the hut where Yunet and Diane had been held.
“What happened?” Siamun asked as they ran.
“I went to Yunet’s hut this morning and found First Prophet Djefi there. He returned late last night and sent me away so he could speak with Yunet alone. This morning, the women are gone and I found First Prophet Djefi tied and gagged. I freed him and he sent me to get you.”
They found Djefi sitting on a stool in the hut, his robe stained with sweat, the stench of human waste filling the small chamber. Djefi glared at them, daring them to comment.
“Find them,” he said to Siamun. “I don’t care what you do with Yunet, but bring the red-haired woman back to me alive.”
“Unharmed?” Siamun asked, his eyes glowing.
Djefi snorted in disgust.
“You want her, don’t you? How can you think of that now?” He shook his head. “Have her, I don’t care. But bring her back to me alive AND able to talk.
“No, take them to Saqqara, to the tomb of Kanakht.”
Siamun in Pursuit
The sun seemed to linger on the western horizon as if Re was resisting his nightly trip through Khert-Neter. In the fading light Diane and Yunet shook the sand out of the linen cloth they had used as a tent, preparing to roll it up so they could resume their trek.
Following Neswy’s instructions they had walked through the night and early morning. He had urged them to travel only at night to save their water and their strength. He said they should hide during the daylight under the dun-colored square of linen he had given them.
Yunet had wanted to take camels to make the trip quicker, but Neswy had pointed out that Siamun would travel faster and they would be more visible sitting high on a camel.
“I would go with you, Yunet,” he had said, tears welling in his eyes. “But I am of little use anymore.” He looked down at his leg. Brian had saved his life when he carried him out of the desert, but his broken leg had not healed correctly.
“I can only give you my knowledge.
“You cannot travel by boat because it will be too easy for Siamun to find you. There is no place to hide on the water. You cannot travel across the desert because you would lose your way and die. I am sorry, Yunet,” he said as she protested, “but it is true.
“But there is a way.”
He had led them out from under the trees and pointed to the sky. “See, there,” he had said pointing to the horizon. “Hold your hand like this,” he had turned his right hand sideways, with the fingers aligned with the horizon. “Stretch out your arm and lay your thumb along the horizon. Yes, like that. Now, just above your hand there is a bright star, brighter than the others. Do you see it? Yes? Now, turn your hand so the heel is at the horizon and the bright star is along the side of your small finger. Look, Yunet, look at the top of your fingertips. See the bright star there? It is the brightest star in the sky. It marks the east.
“When you leave here, follow the canal toward the river until it begins to be light. Then you must move into the desert. Walk into the desert until you can no longer see the trees. Then walk some more. Take the cloth and stretch it out. Scatter sand over it and then crawl underneath it. It will give you shade and it will hide you.
“When it grows dark, walk back to the canal. Always keep the water to your right. Take time to bathe and drink. It will give you strength. Walk until the sky begins to grow light, then head back into the desert to hide. I know this will seem slow, but you must be careful. Djefi will send Siamun after you and there is no better hunter.
“If you lose your way and cannot get back to the water, then follow that bright star. It will lead you east to the river. Once there, you follow the river’s flow. It will take you north to Ineb-Hedj. Remember, you must hide during the day, as far from the canal and the river as you can. They will look for you along the water.”
He had hugged her.
“This will pass, Yunet. Someday you will be able to return to To-She. This evil that Djefi and Siamun have brought will not last.”
The first night they had run on nervous energy, their ears attuned to every sound in the darkness, each of them lost in her own thoughts.
For Yunet, the world had shifted, the eternal landscape of The Two Lands changed forever. She had been born into a world where order - ma’at - was the foundation of life.
The rhythm of life was immutable.
Each day Re appeared in the cloudless eastern skies and each night he entered Khert-Neter, knowing he would be guided through the darkness and reborn again. In the proper season Khnum unleashed the great river to bring life to the land, rising each year to restore the fields. Khonsu the wanderer passed across the sky each night, gliding through the darkness that was the god Kuk.
In The Two Lands that lay between the sky goddess Nut and her brother Geb, the earth god, each step of life had been taken before, by ancestors and by the gods themselves. Deadly quarrels, illicit couplings and strange births, dismemberment and loving salvation - all had taken place among the gods. Their examples guided each man and woman in their daily life.
When one drank and danced it was as Hathor, Lady of the West, the great cow-headed goddess of love and fertility, had done since the beginning of time. Bes, strange little dwarf with a lion’s mane aided in childbirth. Everyone kept magical amulets, the ankh of life, the sa - magical papyrus scrolls to protect against the desert sun.
What she and Diane had done - assaulting the First Prophet of Sobek and fleeing from their homes in the dead of night - these had never been done. Never should be done.
Yunet knew that they had disturbed ma’at. She wondered what price they would pay.
Diane was euphoric.
A lifetime of doing what was expected, of accepting her fate with unspoken resentment, was over. She felt an exhilaration and lightness that she wanted to hold onto forever.
She knew that she had snapped when she had seen Brian tied to the stone chair with Siamun standing beside him holding his bloody tongue. She had sunk into depression, her world black and bleak. She would have drunk herself to death, but there had been only beer and wine and her stomach could not hold enough to kill her.
She had heard Yunet’s pleadings, she had lain stone cold within her embrace, but Diane had withdrawn to a silent world. It had been death.
The trip down river away from the bleak stone and desert of Kom Ombo had revived her. The movement of all the life around her - the power of the re-energized river, the sight of the birds darting from tree to tree along the river bank, the swaying reeds, the splash of fish jumping from the water, the calls of hawks as they soared through the sky - slowly it had washed away the self-pity and dejection.
She was certain that Brian was still alive. She knew she would see him again and somehow things would be made right.
No one would ever stand in her way again.
Siamun was thrumming with energy.
He didn’t know about Waja-Hur’s death, and he was unaware that King Djoser and his sister Hetephernebti both wanted Djefi removed, the king for political reasons, his sister because she feared the rise of the cult of Sobek. But it wouldn’t have mattered.
He was preparing for a hunt, one that would end with Yunet and Diane in his power, to do whatever he wanted.
He gathered water bags and dried strips of oxen, said a quick prayer to Sobek and to Anhur, god of war and hunting,
ordered his men to keep Djefi safe and tethered three camels together. He would ride one until it was exhausted, then switch to a fresh one.
Instinctively he headed into the desert toward Ineb-Hedj. Once he was moving he began to think, trying to put himself in Yunet’s mind, just as he would try to anticipate what an antelope would do if he were stalking it.
She would not have gone into the red western desert. There was nothing there but sand, heat and death. If she crossed the canal and went south she would be heading toward Khmunu where Waja-Hur and Nimaasted would stop them. If she was able to cross the river and continue eastward there was only more desert and beyond that the rumored sea.
Her only hope was to reach Iunu and the Temple of Re. And that was an uncertain hope. While Hetephernebti might give her sanctuary, she also might turn her over to Djefi. Hetephernebti was, after all, a priestess, just as Djefi was a priest. Ma’at would be maintained.
Atop a jogging camel, Siamun headed northwest through the desert, his eyes darkened with wide swaths of kohl, his spirits high as he thought of what he would do once he caught the women.
Unconsciously he fingered the side of his head and the knobby growth where his ear had been sliced away by Yunet. He would have his revenge at last. He would hear her cry for death, beg for an end to the pain.
And he would fuck the red-haired bitch who thought she was a goddess. He had seen the way she looked at him on the boat, the anger in her eyes. She would know real anger as he rode her, driving himself into her, taking his pleasure as he gave her pain.
He dug his fingers deep into the matted hair at the camel’s neck and studied the desert for signs of movement.
He had ridden across the desert to Saqqara, almost reaching the high plateau without finding them. Waiting through the night on the outskirts of Ineb-Hedj, Siamun wondered where they could have gone.
If they had trekked across the desert toward Ineb-Hedj he would have found them, unless they had become so disoriented that they had walked more than a day’s journey in the wrong direction. He didn’t think they had enough of a head start to get that far out of sight by mistake.
Neswy! The old man would have helped them, Siamun realized. Yunet is strong and brave, but she knows nothing about hunting or traveling, except as a passenger on Djefi’s boats. But Neswy did, and there was no one else she could have turned to after attacking Djefi.
Neswy would have told them to stay along the canal and then the river. They would have no chance of losing their way and they would have water to drink. And he would have told them to travel only at night.
He decided in an instant. Abandoning two of the camels, Siamun took the tether of the third camel, which would serve as a pack animal, and began to follow the river south from Ineb-Hedj, confident that he would find them.
Yunet and Diane were talking again, the tension of the flight abrading the anger Diane had been silently nursing.
They had reached the river and were heading north, following its flow toward Ineb-Hedj, beginning to believe that they had escaped.
“If I had died at his hands it would have been worth it to see his fat face when you jumped on his back and began to claw at his eyes,” Yunet said as they washed the sand from their bodies.
They were knee-deep in the river, preparing for the night’s walk. Yunet’s dark skin made her almost invisible in the fading light; Diane’s fair skin seemed to glow.
“You don’t know what you’ve done, do you?” Yunet continued when Diane didn’t answer. “I don’t know the way you live in your country, but here there is an order - we call it ma’at - that we do not disturb. When you attacked Djefi, you didn’t just disturb it, you ripped it apart.”
“You sound like you regret it,” Diane said.
Yunet shook her head. “No, I don’t think so. Yes, a little. It makes me wonder what else can happen. It is very unsettling.”
“And being choked to death would have been better?”
“No. But the world seems different to me now. If the rules, the way of life are not what I thought they are, what I was raised to believe, then I don’t know what they are.”
“Maybe there aren’t any rules,” Diane said.
They climbed out of the water and gathered up their water skin, diminishing sack of food and the linen tent.
Hefting the food sack, Yunet said, “Now that we have reached the river, we should start seeing small settlements. We’ll be able to get some food then.”
Diane nodded as they turned together and began to follow the river’s flow north.
They walked in silence, listening to the water and the occasional small movement in the underbrush. When they had begun walking at night, Diane had been terrified at every small sound, expecting lions or crocodiles to pounce on her after every rustle of a leaf. Now she had grown to love the night, with its cooler air, the hint of moisture along the river and the blazing night sky, full of stars she had never imagined living in cities all her previous life.
Yunet was good company, too. She didn’t press Diane to talk and she didn’t fill the air with idle chatter.
Diane looked at her now as Yunet walked slightly ahead, feeling her way along the path as the darkness grew heavier. She watched as Yunet studied the ground, pushing at bushes with a sturdy walking stick she had picked up a few days ago.
Yunet’s confidence and beauty made her seem so much larger and older than she really was, but looking at her now, Diane saw her as she was - a woman not much older than Diane, abandoning everyone she knew, dismissing a lifetime of habits and training to help a stranger.
“Yunet,” she called. She watched as Yunet stopped and turned to look back at her, her expression focused and anxious.
“No,” Diane said, smiling, “I’m not hurt. I just want to thank you.”
Yunet shook her head, not understanding.
“For everything.” Diane sighed heavily. “I’ve been a bitch,” she said in English. She looked around in the darkness and saw a clearing off to the side of the path. She stepped slowly to Yunet and took her hand.
Yunet grasped her hand in returned.
Diane leaned closer to kiss her. Yunet returned her kiss and, dropping the food bag, put her arms around Diane to pull her close.
After a moment Diane pulled back and rested her cheek against Yunet’s shoulder. She ran her fingertips down Yunet’s back and flattened her hand against her curves.
“Diane,” Yunet said. “I want you very much. But we cannot take the time for this. We are not safe yet.” She squeezed her close.
“I know,” Diane answered. “It’s just that you have done so much for me. Before now, I mean, when I first got here. You didn’t tell me do anything; you were so patient and understanding. I’ve been selfish in every way. I was angry with Brian and so I expected you to make it up. I know that sounds stupid.”
Yunet brushed Diane’s hair with her hand and kissed the top of her head softly.
“Anyhow,” Diane continued. “I feel different about Brian now. I know that I still care for him, but it’s like I want to make sure he’s safe before I can say goodby to him. I don’t know what will happen with you and me, but I want you to know how wonderful you’ve been to me. I’ve been so lucky to have you as a friend, and as a lover.”
She tilted her head back and kissed Yunet again, her eyes closed, her entire being focused on the warmth and tenderness where they touched. She opened her eyes and gasped as she saw Siamun’s leering face over Yunet’s shoulder.
He killed Yunet quicker than he wanted to.
She fought more fiercely than he expected and Diane even tried to fight him. He knocked Diane away with a sweep of his arm, but when he was turned away, Yunet squirmed out of his grasp and grabbed a rock.
They circled each other warily, Yunet calling out to Diane to run. Siamun watched her intently, waiting for an opening. When he saw it, he swung in low, dropping to his knee as he swiped his knife at her ankle. Instead of backing away as he expected her to, Yunet stepped
closer.
She swung the rock hard at his head, clipping just the back of it as he ducked toward her legs. He saw fiery lights in his head as he rolled forward, his momentum knocking Yunet down. He scrambled to get on top of her, but was knocked sideways as Diane kicked him in the ribs.
Rolling with the kick, he came to his knees as Yunet rushed him, swinging her thick walking stick at him. He rocked back on his heels and launched himself at her, trying to get inside her swing. As he moved, Diane tossed a handful of dirt in his face. Blinded, he felt the walking stick slam against his shoulder.
He screamed in anger and twisted his arm around to grab the stick. He pulled it violently toward him with one hand and thrust his knife toward where he thought Yunet would be.
Yunet was gripping the stick with both hands, realizing it was her only hope. When Siamun jerked on it, it pulled her toward him so quickly she wasn’t able to dodge the knife that came at her at the same time.
The knife caught her under the rib cage, driving upward under the bones, its sharp tip cutting through her lungs and slicing into her heart.
She fell against Siamun, her hot blood pumping out onto his outstretched arm. She was dead before she landed.
Diane had emptied the food sack and gripping each end, she twisted it around Siamun’s neck, trying to strangle him. She heard him laugh as he jerked his head forward, the movement slamming her against his back as he reached up to grab her arms. She felt the slippery blood on his hands, realized what it was and felt a cold wave of terror replace her anger.
She landed heavily on her back as Siamun came to his feet.
Now there was a burning pain along her cheek and a sharp, bruising ache between her legs. She stretched her legs and felt the sticky pull of drying blood on her inner thighs.
Slowly Diane opened her eyes. She was lying on her stomach in a small clearing. She could hear the river rushing past behind her. She reached up to her face and felt the open gash where Siamun had cut her. From her other pains she knew that he had raped her after he had knocked her out.