They raced up the channel, following a small, stout cargo vessel riding low beneath a heavy load of plump sacks he assumed were filled with grain. To their right, a tall, steep ridge strewn with boulders rose from the island. On the east bank, a mudbrick village nestled beside a small bay edged with sycamores, palms, and acacias. Spindly lean-tos shaded a thriving market along the shore. The vessel ahead swung into the bay to merge with a fleet of skiffs whose masters had brought produce for trade. Psuro adjusted the sail, veering in the opposite direction toward the island.
"What rank did User hold when his unit was besieged by the storm?" Bak asked, his eyes on the approaching shore. "Spearman." Psuro spilled air from the sail, cutting their speed "He was a raw recruit, a youth not long off the farm, having no experience in warfare."
"That looks a good place to land." Bak pointed toward a stretch of sandy beach near the southern end of the ridge. "We're to meet him at the shrine of the lady Anket." The goddess, along with the lord Khnum and the lady Satet, served as a guardian of the source of the great river on which they sailed. "He came close to walking with the gods, he told me. He was the last to come back from the desert, and if he hadn't been found by a boy searching for a stray goat, he'd have died less than an hour's walk from the river." They neared the shore and Psuro let the upper yard fall. Bak leaped overboard before the current could drag them backward and towed the vessel into shallow water. Psuro scrambled out, and together they pulled the boat onto the beach. The island looked peaceful enough, deserted even, and they both wore sheathed daggers at their waists, but with an intruder leaving threatening gifts in their quarters and an archer lurking about, they opted to arm themselves with the spears and shields they had brought from Abu.
They trudged up a short incline blanketed with sand and walked alongside the ridge, a steep jumble of boulders streaked with bird droppings. Bak's eyes strayed to the inscriptions, and his footsteps slowed. He glimpsed messages of kings returning victorious from battles fought far to the south, reminders of proud noblemen leading caravans laden with exotic and priceless trade goods, and records of accomplishments of a more practical nature, such as the digging of a well on a remote desert track.
"Did User say how he managed to survive the storm?" "He was in too great a hurry to leave Abu." Psuro. glanced around, searching for the man they had come to see. "He did say he was so happy to see the river he wanted forevermore to surround himself with water. Now he lives on an island where he can get a drink or go for a swim at any time, day or night."
"If his island is anything like this, he's made a bargain with the lord Set."
Set was a god representing evil and violence, patron of deserts and foreign lands. The sun was indeed ferocious, beating down unrelieved, making the sand so hot it burned their feet. The breeze did nothing to relieve the heat, merely set their teeth on edge as it passed among the boulders, whispering a soft and lonely refrain.
They plodded around the southern end of the ridge, between it and a second, smaller mound. Near the upstream tip of the island, drawn well out of the water and half hidden in a "clump of wispy tamarisks, they spotted an empty skiff. User's vessel, they assumed. Walking on, they found on the west side of the ridge a modest sandstone shrine surrounded by a decrepit mudbrick wall. The building looked across a swath of sand toward a fairly broad channel down which a canal had been cut through the rapids many generations earlier, a great feat for its time but now blocked with boulders and impossible to use.
Thinking to find User inside the shrine, they walked through the open gate and crossed the sand to the building. The door stood open, admitting light to a transverse chamber with three small, dark rooms at the back. Except for the one in the center, which contained a red granite pedestal which would support the wooden shrine of the lady Anket when she traveled upstream from Abu to greet. the rising floodwaters, the building was empty.
Leaving the sacred precinct, they looked around, seeking User, a priest, some sign of life in this lifeless place.
A short, sharp whistle broke the silence.
"Up there." Bak pointed toward the top of the ridge, where a man stood among the boulders, his head shaded by what looked from a distance like an overturned basket. "Is that User?"
"He's been watching us all along," the Medjay grumbled. "Why couldn't he show himself sooner?"
User remained where he was, well shielded by boulders, looking out at the water, examining the landscape on the far side of the ridge. A cautious man, Bak thought. A man either afraid of his own shadow or fearful for good reason. A reason not to be found in Abu, but here.
"Something's wrong," he said, darting toward the mound. Still the man they had come to see hesitated. After a final long look at the channel beyond the ridge, where their skiff lay, he began to move. As agile as a cat, he worked his way down to meet them, sidling between boulders, climbing around broken chunks of granite, swinging across spaces separating one from another. Never did he show himself fully. "I'm Lieutenant Bak," Bak called. "What troubles you?" User stopped not far above and hunkered down in the shelter of an overhanging chunk of rock. He was a stocky man of medium height, wearing a white tunic with loose sleeves that covered his arms and a kilt that fell below his knees. The fabric was heavy and coarse, the garb unusual, restricting freedom of movement for working in the fields or sailing a skiff. What had looked like an upside-down basket from a distance was, in fact, an odd woven reed headdress with a wide brim that kept his face in shadow.
"Do you know you were followed to this place?" he demanded. "A man alone in a skiff, carrying a bow and a quiver full of arrows."
Bak snarled a curse. "Where is he now?"
"Not far upstream from where you beached your vessel. He's in his boat, waiting. I feared this would happen. With so many who survived the storm already dead…" User let out a harsh laugh, leaving the rest to the imagination.
"I doubt he's come for you. It's me he wants to slay." "You?" User asked, skeptical.
Psuro hefted his spear. "Shall I go after him, sir?"
"I wouldn't," User cut in before Bak could answer. "He's sheltered within a clump of trees and surrounded by open space. No man can get close without being seen."
"Did you get a good look at him?" Bak asked. "He's too far away."
Bak stood, hands on hips, thinking. He had taken every precaution he could and still he had been followed. Maybe the lord Amon had handed him a gift in spite of himself. "Show me where he is. We must decide how best to lay hands on him."
"I'm glad you agreed to help," Bak said.
User, who had had no choice in the matter, gave him a rueful grin. "As you pointed out, Lieutenant, it's my neck, too."
Bak poled the skiff into deeper water, then settled down in the stern. He wished they were sailing his own swift vessel instead of the blocky, work-a-day craft of the island farmer. And he wished for a weapon with a longer range than a spear. He shook off the thought. The beached skiff was unreachable, useful as bait and nothing more, the object that held the archer where he was, the sole reason he had not stalked Bak and Psuro across the island as soon as he arrived.
User dipped the oars deep, sending the vessel across a patch of bubbling water and down a cascade that took Bak's breath away. "The currents are in our favor, so it shouldn't take long to get to him. The problem, as I see it, will be that list stretch of open water."
"With luck and the help of the gods, Psuro will distract him." Bak prayed he was right. The Medjay had a strong arm, but could he hurl rocks far enough and fast e- fough to hold the archer's attention? "You met us on this island to speak of the sandstorm. I can think of no better time than now."