House of Two Pharaohs, page 30
‘But they have numbers,’ Piay replied. ‘I don’t think the Shuyet cares how many of his men fall if it means our destruction.’
‘Well, then, let them come!’ Hannu shouted. ‘If the portal to the afterlife is calling our names, then let us make it so choked with the dead that Anubis himself will be angry, and judgment will rain down on the Shuyet even after we’re gone!’
Piay grinned. He loved his friend like this, when his fearlessness spread to all those fighting around him.
The bark of the Shuyet’s scribe cut through the din and the mass of warriors heeded the command, withdrawing once again. From behind him, Piay heard the shouts of his own men, emboldened by the enemy’s retreat. Piay did not share in their joy. He suspected that the move simply signalled a new tactic, and began scanning the enemy ranks for signs of what was coming next.
He didn’t have to wait long. On the walls high above them, Piay saw a line of archers take their positions.
Piay barely had time to cry out a warning before the shafts were loosed. Crouching down, he whipped his shield above his head. An instant later his body shook from the thud of arrows slamming against it. One punched through the thick, seasoned leather and he saw the barbed arrowhead was made of flint. It was bound to the shaft in such a way that if any physician attempted to draw it out, the arrowhead would detach and remain embedded deep in the flesh, where it would cause an agonising, lingering death – an old Hyksos trick.
‘Advance,’ Hannu bellowed.
Lifting their shields, the Blue Crocodiles raced forward, driving into the front line of the Shuyet’s men and cutting them down. When they retreated, a fresh layer of bodies covered the bloody ground.
‘They are too many!’ Piay shouted. ‘We must lop the head off the snake!’ He pointed his sword at the tall scribe issuing commands.
‘What do you want to do?’ Hannu shouted back.
‘Cut a path! I will take him myself!’
Hannu roared with delight. ‘Blues on me!’ he yelled. ‘Now!’
• • •
Z
ahra felt the god release her. He had been gentle this time, but still her body ached, and she knew that bruises would bloom where he had thrown her onto the flagstones and held her down.
‘In my younger days, I was a physician,’ Taita said as Gyasi scurried to her mistress’s side. ‘Imhotep was also a healer, and the spells he left behind can be used to open and close the body. Your mind was changed as a result of your injury. But the power of the medu neter has healed you.’
‘I feel different,’ Zahra said, confusedly touching her fingers to her forehead as Gyasi helped her to her feet. Her mouth fell open as she found only firm bone, covered by smooth, unblemished skin.
‘When you were injured in the temple of Seth, the Lord of the Red Land entered you.’
‘Lies!’ Gyasi said, her eyes blazing furiously. ‘Lies!’ she repeated. ‘Anubis saved her. She is his vessel. It is his will that lives in her.’
‘I do not lie.’ Taita’s response was directed at Gyasi, but his eyes were trained on Zahra.
‘Gyasi is right to question you,’ Zahra said slowly. ‘You are our enemy. You serve the sons of Mamose.’
‘I know your mind,’ Taita began cautiously. ‘I knew another like it, a very long time ago, and there have been few others that have compared. This is why I suspected, from very early on, that you were a woman.’
Zahra blinked – then smiled. It was a smile that reflected an essentially benevolent mind that had been liberated from its shackles. But it was quickly dampened by the shadow that fell across her face as she gazed down upon the bitter battle beneath them. ‘What has been put in motion cannot readily be stopped,’ she lamented. ‘Those men down there, fighting for Anubis. They will not obey the order of a woman.’
‘Perhaps not,’ Taita acknowledged. Then he gestured to where she had set the Anubis mask. ‘But they will heed the command of a god. Put on the mask one last time, Zahra. Dismiss your servants, and be free of this folly.’
‘I have shed blood,’ she murmured guiltily. ‘I have killed many people. There will be punishment for such crimes. Indeed, there should be.’
‘Your future is what I am interested in, Zahra,’ Taita replied. ‘All who have borne the burden of leadership have blood on their hands, whether or not they acknowledge it. I cannot excuse what you have done, but if I condemn you, I would have to condemn many others, myself included.’
Zahra looked at him and he smiled again.
‘Lies!’
Taita was barely able to sidestep the short blade as Gyasi lunged for him, her eyes wild with fury.
‘Enough, Gyasi! Stop!’ Zahra shouted. ‘I have been blind,’ she continued. ‘Blinded by my desire to see my father’s vision fulfilled. And in my blindness, I have become Qar. I have become the thing he created – the Shuyet – in the throes of his hatred.’ For a moment, as her realisation overtook her, she closed her eyes and turned away. ‘But no more,’ she said. ‘The Shuyet is no more.’
‘No!’ Gyasi howled, and before either Taita or Zahra could stop her, she snatched the Anubis mask from where Zahra had set it aside. ‘You have been poisoned by Taita’s lies! The mage who has always been our enemy!’ she roared, pointing an accusing finger at Zahra. ‘But you are right about one thing. The Shuyet is not any one person. The spirit of Anubis can inhabit whoever he chooses. And just as the essence of the Shuyet moved on from Qar when you killed him, so, too, will it now move on from you.’
Gyasi lifted the Anubis mask and set it down over her own head. ‘Now, I am the Shuyet. I have become Anubis in the flesh. And now, just like Qar before you, you must die.’
Gyasi charged headlong at Zahra, with her blade glinting in the sunlight.
‘Gyasi!’ Taita shouted. ‘Stop!’
But just when he felt certain that her fate was sealed, Zahra reached into her robes and whipped out her own short blade. Sidestepping Gyasi’s charge in one fluid movement, she swiped the knife along the base of the jackal mask, where her acolyte’s throat remained exposed.
Gyasi stumbled as her blood poured from the wound, and her head lolled backwards. The weight of the mask carried her towards the parapet, and she tripped, tumbled, and fell, disappearing from view without so much as a cry.
• • •
T
he Blue Crocodiles pierced the front line like a hot blade, roaring their battle cry. The Shuyet’s scribe was yelling orders, his voice cracking with fury as he raged for his soldiers to drive the enemy back. Piay set his gaze firmly on the tall, black-robed man and began to cut his own path through the warriors in front of him.
The Shuyet’s scribe saw him coming, and smiled. He drew his sword from his belt, and readied himself.
‘You must be the illegitimate Nomarch of Memphis. Taita’s faithful dog.’
‘And you are the Shuyet’s scribe. A sheep, led to slaughter.’
The scribe laughed. ‘I am Heru. I have spent my life serving Anubis, and now I will offer you to the god of the dead, in gratitude for our victory here today. Thanks to you and your master, Memphis will very soon be ours.’
The two combatants circled each other. Finally, Heru swung his sword, and Piay could see that for all his bluster, the scribe was no match for him with a blade. Deflecting Heru’s strike, he drove his own weapon towards the scribe’s midriff.
Awkwardly, Heru fended Piay’s sword away, falling as he did so, his feet slipping from under him.
Piay stabbed down, cutting open the scribe’s robe, peeling the flesh from the man’s ribs. But even as he raised his sword to finish his opponent, from the corner of his eye he saw a shadow fall from the citadel. A black figure, cartwheeling against the pale stone of the walls.
‘No!’ Heru cried, following Piay’s gaze.
Piay did not see the impact, but he knew that no mortal could have survived such a fall.
‘Run!’ he shouted after the scribe, as the man took advantage of Piay’s hesitation – scrambling to his feet and taking to his heels. ‘Run! Your master is no more. The curse of Anubis is broken!’
• • •
Z
ahra sank to her knees, her knife dropping from her hands. ‘We cannot stand against them,’ she said as Taita approached her. ‘We cannot.’
Taita squatted next to her. ‘What do you mean, Zahra? What is it that you know?’
Again, she raised her hand to her forehead, her fingers trembling. ‘The hubris of the Pharaohs – of the Red Pharaoh and the sons of Mamose – led them to fail in their duty to protect Egypt from invaders in the past, and our great land has suffered deeply for it. Now another invader turns his eyes to our shores.’
‘What invader? Are the Hyksos returning?’
‘Not the Hyksos,’ she replied gravely. ‘Worse.’
‘Who?’
‘They call themselves the Shardana. They come from the Great Green. My army was built to fight the Hyksos, but then you defeated the barbarians and drove them from the delta. Now, the Shardana see a divided land, with no one to protect it. Do you see now why I needed Imhotep’s spells? They are coming, and not even the might of Thebes will drive them back into the sea.’
‘Sea peoples?’ Taita ventured.
‘The greatest and most warlike of that race. The Weshesh and Denyen are their vassals, and the Tjekker and the Peleset run from them, calling them the Sardi – the ones who laugh while they kill.’
‘How did you learn of their plans?’ Taita asked.
‘The Peleset seek an alliance. They believe that the Shardana will drive them from their islands with the army they are massing in the west. And then, when the Peleset are defeated, they will turn their eyes towards the delta.’
‘And you believe them?’
‘They have no reason to deceive me. The people of the delta have long been their enemies. We are their last hope. They sought Heru out – they know every vessel that moves on the Great Green, and they were not fooled by the Hyksos galley that he used to visit the cities along the coast. The Peleset know the Hyksos are broken. And then they sent an envoy here, to Hardai. Only they remember this place – it was they who built the citadel in the years before the rise of the Red Pharaoh, and it is the bones of their dead that lie in the chambers beneath it.’
• • •
B
reathing heavily, Piay crouched beside the fallen body of the Shuyet. He inhaled sharply as he grasped the Anubis mask, and pulled it off.
He had prepared himself, but he was not ready for the face that greeted him, the almond eyes that gazed, open and lifeless, into the empty sky. ‘Gyasi,’ he said in amazement. ‘The Shuyet was a woman, and she was amongst us the whole time.’
‘Explains a lot,’ Hannu muttered.
Piay stared down at Gyasi for a moment longer, as a host of different thoughts and emotions swirled through his head. She had awakened feelings in him that he had thought would remain forever buried. She had drawn him back to life. And yet, it was all a deception. All this time, the Shuyet had been right there in front of him. How did he miss it? As he gazed at her face, he shook his head.
Finally, Piay stood and turned to Hannu. ‘Have some men take the body out and burn it. Burn the mask with it. We can’t risk someone else thinking he can take the Shuyet’s place. The threat she posed ends here.’
As Hannu directed his men to carry Gyasi’s body away, Piay sank to his knees. The battle had been furious, but now it was done. The fortress had been overcome. ‘The battlefield was littered with bodies, clouds of sandflies swirling over the bloody pools that steamed in the fierce heat of the midday sun. Overhead, vultures circled, waiting for the last of the living to depart so that they could descend and feast.
In pursuit of Heru, Piay had hacked his way through the last line of the Shuyet’s soldiers, who, fighting with their backs to the fortress, had failed to see the figure in the Anubis mask tumble from the parapet.
Hurling himself through the gate in the mighty brick wall, Piay had been just in time to see Heru drop to his knees in front of the prone body. A disbelieving cry of despair had torn the air, as the scribe had mourned the loss of his mistress – a cry that was taken up by those near enough to realise the truth of what had happened and carried across those who remained on the field of battle.
Piay had thought that Heru would fight, make a last stand against the wall of the citadel, but, instead, the Scribe had jumped to his feet and made for the main gate.
Cupping a hand to his mouth, Piay called to Hannu. ‘Come, we must still hunt down the Scribe and find Taita.’
• • •
T
he battle had turned so quickly that the gate to the citadel stood half-open. The guards had begun to barricade it with a jumble of wooden chests, benches and chairs, but the Shuyet had fallen to her death before they could complete their work.
‘Step inside and you will die,’ someone called out from inside.
Through a gap in the makeshift barricade, Piay glimpsed four guards, waiting with their hands on their sword hilts. ‘The battle is over,’ Piay replied calmly. ‘Put down your swords, and leave in peace.’
‘We will die for the Shuyet.’
Piay turned to Hannu, who shrugged and spoke loudly, more for the benefit of the four guards than Piay. ‘As futile a gesture as I have ever seen, since the Shuyet is already dead, but let’s have it.’
On Hannu’s order, the Blue Crocodiles rushed forward, kicking and heaving at the barricade until the heavy objects fell away. The Shuyet’s guards lunged through the spaces that had been revealed, stabbing with their blades, but even after the exhausting battle, the elite soldiers were light on their feet. They danced back from each strike.
Snatching a spear from one of his men, Hannu hurled it into one of the larger gaps that they had created. A cry rang out as the bronze spearhead thumped into the chest of one of the Shuyet’s men and he fell back, hands clawing at the shaft.
As the other guards darted away, dragging their stricken comrade with them, the remnants of the barricade were torn down and Piay and Hannu slipped through, ahead of their men.
Crossing the courtyard, they entered the citadel’s opulent entrance hall, following the trail of blood that spattered the flagstones. Beyond a small antechamber, down a dimly lit corridor, two of the guards waited for them either side of a doorway, their blades levelled.
‘There is nowhere to run,’ Piay called. ‘Give yourselves up.’
The Blue Crocodiles edged forward. They outnumbered the guards five to one, but the Shuyet’s men showed no signs of surrendering. Finally, Piay swung his sword and let out a battle cry, his men surging behind him as he ran towards the guards.
The sound of blades clashing echoed off the stone walls, but the Blue Crocodiles made short work of the Shuyet’s remaining loyalists, cutting them down without receiving so much as a scratch in return.
‘Taita!’ Piay called out, stepping over the bodies, his voice echoing up the stairwell that lay beyond the doorway where the Shuyet’s guards had chosen to make their stand and through the empty stone halls. ‘Taita!’
But no one replied.
‘The blood leads up the stairs,’ Hannu said. ‘I wager we will find what we are looking for at the top.’
• • •
T
he wind tugged at Piay’s tunic as he stepped onto the roof of the Shuyet’s citadel. A storm was brewing out over the Great Green, the air turning thick and humid, and the vultures that had been waiting to pick the battlefield clean had been scattered by the turbulence.
The last of the citadel’s guards stood over his comrade – the man Hannu had speared at the main gate – his sword drawn.
‘Where is the Scribe?’ Piay asked. ‘Where’s Heru?’
‘He . . . He has followed the Shuyet,’ the guard stuttered. ‘He and my captain.’ He gestured to the man that lay on the flagstones at his feet – it was clear that the officer had succumbed to his wound; his tunic was caked with blood. ‘He will hear his mother’s voice again . . . He will see his father’s house . . .’
‘Ay, I see that,’ Hannu said, pointing over the wall. ‘He has begun his journey . . .’
Piay knew what would be revealed to him, but nevertheless he stepped to the parapet and looked down the dizzying height to where Heru’s broken body lay, the flagstones around it splashed with congealing blood.
• • •
‘T
aita!’ Piay called out as he and Hannu stepped back into the stairwell, his voice echoing through the citadel. ‘Taita!’
‘Here,’ came the calm reply from below.
Descending, Piay found Taita waiting for him on the floor below, a woman at his side.
Taita smiled. ‘You have done well, Piay. Better than I ever could have hoped.’
Piay bowed gratefully. ‘Thank you, my lord.’
‘This is Zahra,’ Taita said.
‘Zahra,’ Piay repeated, already entranced by the powerful, intelligent aura that radiated from her.
‘Zahra is as promising a mind as I have met since the day my queen crossed into the afterlife. She has lived all over the delta, and I believe she should oversee the renaissance of Lower Egypt in my absence. I have felt this way since we first encountered her in the desert. Do you remember, Piay?’
Piay’s eyes widened anew in recognition. ‘Yes. The merchant, on the road back to the caravan.’
‘She was held captive by the Shuyet,’ Taita said, as Zahra glanced at him hesitantly. ‘She came here willingly, but once she did, she could not leave.’
As Zahra gazed at Piay with her almond eyes, he felt compelled to extend a hand. When she took it, a shiver ran up his spine.
‘She will relieve you, and assume the responsibilities of the Nomarch of Memphis,’ Taita said. ‘With Pharaoh’s approval, of course.’
Piay looked at his master in sudden confusion. ‘And where will I go?’
‘I know this is what you want, Piay. I have seen it written on your face since the day I arrived at Peru-nefer.’
‘I don’t deny it,’ Piay conceded.
