“There's something I need to tell you,” Malachi says.
Small rocks litter the path. We work our way around the first big one.
“I helped Amani paint that room,” Malachi says.
I can see the blocked path ahead where the ceiling has collapsed. “You knew about this place?”
“I swore never to tell,” Malachi says.
I'm about to turn back, to move away from an area that has proven itself weak, but an opening in the wall catches my eye. The light of the torch reflects upon something within. The dull, copper sheen looks like a flame spiraling into the sky.
“What is hidden here must never be found,” Malachi says.
I move closer. A cavity in the wall shows itself through broken plaster disguised as dirt and rock. Inside the cavity, I see something I recognize from Cyprus; a ceramic pot, a tube of copper, and a rod of iron. With it are a series of similar devices in decreasing sizes. The last is no bigger than my fist, and I recognize it from Alexandria.
On the first night Andros and I moved in together, he brought me something similar that Lucius had ripped out of Amani's snake-legged machines. Together, we took it apart and studied it, and when I realized it was the power source that drove the device, I did not tell him. I brought the news to Cleopatra and let the man I loved believe it was all a mystery.
Dust drifts into the light. A pebble bounces off my shoulder.
“We need to move.” Miriam still has her torch.
“Go back to the room,” I say. “I'll follow behind soon enough.”
“We could lose more of the ceiling any moment,” Miriam says.
Another pebble hits nearby, heard but not seen.
Malachi takes Miriam's torch. “If you die here, our only hope is Herod finding us.”
“Malachi knows the tunnels,” I say.
“No,” Malachi says. “Too many years have passed. You go. It is my job to keep this hidden.”
I hesitate, reluctant to run while Malachi risks his life.
“Amani gave me a wife, a son, and a daughter-in-law,” Malachi says. “She gave me the life I had thought impossible. I can give her this much.”
Miriam grabs my cloak. “Leave him be.”
She pulls, and I let her drag me away. Malachi moves into place, and I look back to see him shoving dirt and rock into the opening. The ceramic pot shatters.
“We painted the room to mourn things lost,” Malachi calls, “but in the end, we decided we were wrong. You can disappear in what's lost, or you can make yourself whole again in the finding.”
Every time I look back, the glow of his torch grows smaller, but we can still see it when we reach the room. We sit in the doorway, focusing on that distant light. I hold my torch in the tunnel to guide him when he is finished.
“Monuments are a bridge,” Malachi says, his voice distant but clear. “They're not meant to lock us in the past but to connect past and future and give us the hope and strength to continue.”
He stops, and the world trembles. Pebbles fall from above.
When the walls stop trembling, the light at the end of the tunnel is gone. I call out Malachi's name but hear only silence. Miriam grabs my arm, but neither of us moves. We barely dare to breathe. We listen for his reply, and we listen for signs of another cave-in. When neither comes, I step out into the tunnel, and we hurry to reach Malachi.
I try to convince myself we might find him alive, but we have to dodge our way around stones that were not there before. Soon, they cover the tunnel floor, and I crawl over them, certain we have not yet come far enough. The tunnel is shorter than it used to be. We have reached the end; there is rock and debris from floor to pock-marked ceiling but no sign of Malachi.
Miriam calls to me from out of the dark. I left her on the other side of the rubble. She asks if I see him. I do not.
“We need to go,” she says.
I stare at the fallen rock, frozen, unable to believe Malachi is beneath it all, crushed and buried. I feel the weight of it.
“I can't get out of here without you,” she says.
Those words startle me out of my trance, and I crawl my way back to her, remembering now what I had momentarily forgotten. I am an old man, and my body requires smooth, uncluttered floors. I stumble. My lungs constrict. Miriam catches me.
“I'm sorry,” she says, but Malachi's death is my fault, not hers. The regret is mine.
We reach the room. Miriam wants to keep going, but I lead her inside where I can sit and cry. My loss is focused in a single point of fire in my chest.
“Tell me you know the other way out,” Miriam says.
The Lower City is a valley, and we are beneath that. In any direction but south, the land above slopes upward.
“I know the tunnels, but that was our way out.”
“We are not trapped here,” Miriam says.
Pain radiates down my left arm. “Malachi.”
She holds me by one shoulder. “How do we get out of here?”
I look at her. “Malachi helped paint this room, and they didn't do that in a day. They came down here, often, and I know he said he didn't remember the tunnels, but that cannot be true. He was protecting us.”
“He didn't tell us anything,” she says.
“If they had come in through the north, he would have told us to wait here and hope for rescue, but he didn't. He knew a way out, and we're going to find it going south. The other directions run too deep, and soon we'd be under the Upper City or the city of David. Amani would never have found the tunnel, that way.”
She runs her finger along the floor, drawing our way south. “Okay. It's all Lower City and then the wall.”
I take her hand and lead her into the tunnel. We head south. The tunnel remains flat and even.
We hear a rumble somewhere behind us and feel a breeze against our backs. The torchlight flickers. The rumble grows louder. Air rushes by us. I feel it in my ears.
The flame vanishes into darkness.
Papyrus 6.22
The Nile
Amani stood on the lead barge; enough ships were behind her to have escorted Cleopatra. With her came not only Iras but Cleopatra's personal priests and many of her most trusted soldiers. They carried the books, but, stashed in secret compartments, the boats also carried gold, weapons, pearls, clothes, and a crown. With Amani's machines stashed away in Thebes, they had everything a queen in exile might need to raise an army.
They sailed up the Nile. Expansive farmlands stretched into the distance as the rowers' songs drifted over the waters. Amani kept watch for crocodiles and judged the currents to make safe their passage while Iras watched from the canopy-shaded couch.
They sailed as far as Swenett, Egypt's southernmost city. Amani thought of continuing, but just south of Swenett began a series of six dangerous and shallow rapids that defined and protected Nubia. Only during the flood season could it be attempted, and even now, they would need guides.
The shoreline crept toward the city, and the island of Philae sat nearly even with the water. Men from Swenett paddled out to meet them and guided them into the harbor. As they had in every stop along the way, the city recognized Amani as an ambassador of the crown. She and Iras feasted with governors and slept in luxury.
The governor of Swenett promised to secure the best river guides to navigate them through dangers ahead, but Amani knew greater dangers than the submerged stones of the cataracts awaited.
Her bed was wooden and ornate with a comfortable mattress, even if it could not compare to Cleopatra's. A smooth wood block cradled her head and neck. She knew she might soon spend several nights on the barge and willed herself to indulge in comfort one last time, but sleep would not come.
The next morning, they set off, each boat carrying its own guide. The head guide rode with Amani. While many of the others were young men--their muscular flesh exposed to the sun--the head guide was old. His wrinkled skin, dark and beautiful, reminded Amani of Ma'nakhtuf.
“We have to cross
five of the river's six cataracts to reach Meroe. The first begins here, at the island of Philae. The temple there was Kushite and rebuilt by the early Ptolemies to face the kingdom of Kush. In many ways, it is the doorway between countries.”
Amani admired the long island and its buildings, which glistened white in the morning sun. “How great is the danger of attack?”
“Officially? None.” The old man pointed the way for the oarsmen.
“And unofficially?” Iras asked.
He took a moment to answer as he studied the water. “When the rocks are not our worry, Amani will take the spear from one of the guards and stand at the lead.”
Iras and Amani exchanged glances.
“I don't want them to think we pose a threat,” Amani said.
“They have a proud heritage of warrior queens, and that is what you must be now. Don't let them see your fear.”
Amani glanced at the ceremonial spear held by the lead Alexandrian guard. He was Greek. They all were and would stand out as foreign and threatening. The old man was right.
The flood robbed the Nile of its borders. Amani now saw that it robbed countries of borders, as well. They entered a part of the river unknown to her, but the floodplain here looked much like it had in Egypt.
By midday, they reached their first Kushite city. The steep pyramids and white-faced buildings felt related to Egypt in the way Roman buildings felt related to Greek. Amani stood at the head of the boat, spear in hand, and saw faces that looked like hers staring back at her from rock ledges and weathered hills. That evening, sparse forests outlined the flooded fields.
After three days, they reached Napata. Nestled at the feet of Jebel Barka, a small mountain carved by the hands of the gods, Napata had been the capital of Kush until the last Kushite pharaoh left Egypt.
They paddled on until the food was gone, and then they fished over the side and drank water from their hands.
After a bend in the river, they met a series of small boats in which boys stood. The boys used poles to push themselves alongside the barges where they offered items for sale or trade. Amani sent word from ship to ship to treat the boys well. That night, they ate bread dipped in oil and washed it down with wine.
The next day, they would reach Meroe.
Amani awoke from a dream. After Swenett, sleep had come easy and deep, but that morning, she sat upright while the sky was still dark. Her heart raced. Each breath came hard and fast. Most of the dream was lost to her already, and even if she could remember, she did not place meaning in dreams. That was the tactic of the priests. Dreams meant nothing. Yet, what little lingered in her mind felt like something. It felt important. She saw herself leading a Kushite army.
As the sun brought color to the sky, they pushed out of the fifth cataract. Across a bend in the river, the distant city stood above the floodplain; the harbor and the city beyond it were a great island in the midst of the Nile.
A royal procession filled a main street marked with statues and temples. Two princes rode at the lead, one not much older than Amani.
A herald cried, “Paqar Aqrakamani and Paqar Teriteqas, sons of the qore and kandake.”
Amani stared at the younger prince, Teriteqas. His skin was as dark as her own, but something reminded her of Andros, as he had been when she met him in Cyprus. She tried to convince herself that there could be little similarity, but there it was, in the height of his cheekbones, the line of his mouth, and the cut of his jaw. A strange energy surged through her, much as it had in Cyprus.
This, Amani thought, was not the time for such things.
Iras came alongside her and took her hand.
“Show no fear,” Amani said. “Today, we are warrior queens.”
Papyrus 6.23
As Amani entered the palace, she passed by columns carved to look like palm trees and painted in brilliant colors with the stories of battles and kings gone by. She thought of Hephaestion's pyre.
Resplendent in gold, the qore and kandake welcomed her, extending to her a dignity Amani never knew in Rome, Cyprus, or Jerusalem. They listened as Amani told her story of a science smuggled out of Egypt when the old kingdoms collapsed and of a Kush that became a country of refuge.
“Let Kush be that refuge once again,” she said, “not just for people, but for knowledge.”
The next day, the qore and kandake gave their answer. “Our son, Teriteqas, a paqar of Kush and the w-ne of Napata, will study the books with you and report to us on his findings. Until then, you are our welcome and most honored guests.”
As Aqrakamani was the qore's expected successor, Teriteqas filled a more priestly and scholarly role--thus his royal designation as chief of Napata. His ships led Amani's on the trip back downriver to his city. From there, Teriteqas gave Amani's guides a boat of their own and provisions enough to get them back to Swenett.
Like Meroe, Napata was not a tall city. The grand buildings still dwarfed her but were only a single story, and their steep pyramids did not reach much higher. As Teriteqas led her to the temple of Amun, Amani saw beyond the city to the rugged, weathered landscape, and she understood.
In the flatlands of Egypt, architecture brought attention to itself. Here, the strange forms of the mountains were sacred, and Kushites built their cities to reveal that landscape, not hide it. A natural statue of a pharaoh, complete with the conic crown, stood alongside and equal to the mountain Jebel Barka, where the ghostly forms of four more figures were weathered flat into its side.
Moving the capital north had been a strategic move, but the spiritual heart of the country would always be Napata.
In Jerusalem, Amani had wondered if her ancestors believed in their gods or had only used them to control the people and maintain their power. Here, in this land and among these people, the very question felt absurd. This was a place of faith and a continuity of heritage that preserved that faith.
Egypt, at least among its leaders, had lost that long ago.
At night, alone in her room in the palace, she thought of Cleopatra. As long as the floods remained, she would be safe, but the season would not last much longer. A year would pass before Amani could know what had become of her, and perhaps the best she could hope for was a life in exile. She would have the priests plea before their gods to let it be so.
Papyrus 6.24
Amani studied the face of Teritegas, the Kushite prince. She studied him as if she had dreamed him into existence.
“Half a millennium might have passed since these were written,” he said.
She laid out the books. “We did our best to translate the Kushite passages, but I thought you might find things we missed.”
“I've studied writings this old, written the Egyptian way.”
Teriteqas had secured a room in the temple with windows looking out at Jebel Barka. The room was incomplete. No paint adorned the walls, and any design work was carved into the stone beforehand. It had the anticipation of life but little more.
“After the Egyptians attacked, our ancestors focused on Meroe and the cities in need of repair. For a time, Napata was all but abandoned. We rebuilt the city across the centuries, but this wing of the temple was shut off and forgotten. It had collapsed in a fire, and its ruins became something of a memorial, almost sacred.”
“You led the rebuilding?” Amani asked.
“My father did,” he said, “but I remember what it was before he started. Now, the building is complete, and it is up to me to see the interior finished. It has been a year, and I cannot delay much longer. The priests are divided and of no help. This is my first chance to make a lasting impact on our culture, and I cannot see the way.”
Amani stood in the center of the room and took in its scope and character. “It's a good place to begin. See it through, and then another opportunity will come. Your legacy won’t be about this one room.”
“Legacy,” he echoed. “I don't think that is what restrains me. Our heritage stretches back even before the birth of Egypt, back to a time when we wer
e called the Land of the Bow. We were the first great people, and how can I now stand in this temple and believe that I can look back over all those millennia and choose what to make immortal and what to forget.”
She touched his arm, and their eyes met.
“There is a man who has been like a father to me,” she said. “He taught me his tradition of honoring our fallen loved ones with something built in a place special to them. For many years, I thought that was all it was, a visual memory of things past and people lost, but I was wrong. Whatever you choose, its greatest function will not be about remembering the past. You will use your history to point your people to their future. Stop asking yourself what you should remember. Discover your vision for this country. Once you have that, the choice for what history you'll memorialize will be clear, because it will have purpose.”
His brow furrowed and his eyes narrowed, as if in anger. “After a year's worth of advice from a hundred different directions, yours is the first to make any sense.”
She smiled, and his eyes brightened.
Papyrus 6.25
The room had come alive.
The last of the artists gathered their equipment and filed out the door. Amani noticed them lingering outside, but to Teriteqas, she was certain all the world had ceased to exist. The room reflected that peculiar nature of Jabel Barka. The great southern monolith appeared to be different figures depending on the position from which it was viewed, and the four ghostly forms could be anyone the viewer deemed them to be. This had become Teriteqas’s view for the future of Kush. One land, united but reflecting to its people what burns brightest within them.
Upon each wall, they had painted a mural of the room in which they stood as if they were looking in from the outside, each wall representing the room from a different direction. In each mural, they had decorated the room differently, each inspired by one of the images presented by the great monolith, a king, a pharaoh, a serpent, or Amun. Each of the four rooms also included one of the four ghostly images from the mountain's side, indistinct, undefined, and seeming to be less a painting on the wall than something standing within the room and staring back at the viewer.
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