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ELEVEN

Returning to the room from the courtyard, Huy put everything back exactly as he had found it. He made sure that his knife was close to hand, and walked outside again, seating himself on the stone bench by the pool. For the first time he noticed that it contained two large fish, gasping side by side near the surface, their stupid, greedy faces staring avidly at nothing. Huy looked around for the water storage jar, found it, and with a small wooden bucket he passed his time by refilling the pool to the brim. He hoped the fish would be grateful, and wondered how long a wait he had ahead of him before Surere reappeared. He lay down on the stone bench.

He knew he had slept, for there was a cramp in his neck and the memory of a dream: he had been on the River, on a boat with Aahmes and their children. It was the time of the Opet festival, and they had been happy, making their new year vows to each other with no reserve in their eyes or in their hearts. He could still see the sunlight on the water. Now, as he looked around the dark courtyard, rubbing his neck, he realised that he was still alone. He glanced up at the star-crowded sky, calculating the time. By the temperature alone, it must have been well past the sixth hour.

A prescient instinct must have awoken him, for a matter of minutes later the bolt of the door was drawn softly, and Surere slipped into the courtyard. Huy made no attempt to move from his place on the bench, though the stone was cool now and hurt his rump, but the former nomarch, his heart turned in on itself, did not notice him immediately. His expression was intent.

As soon as Surere saw him he darted forward, like an animal that does not give warning before it attacks, his hand moving swiftly to his hip for his knife. But Huy already had his out and had stood with equal speed, presenting the side of his body to his adversary, balancing on his toes. For a moment they were still, staring at each other in silence, the world shrunk to the space they stood in. Then Surere smiled.

‘So. This time you visit me.’

‘Yes.’

‘How did you find me?’

‘I followed Ankhu. I was surprised to see him. I thought he was gathering a party to hunt you.’

Surere looked thoughtful. ‘That is unlikely, but the boy is full of bluster. In any case, as you have discovered, he knows where I am. How long have you been here?’

‘Since then.’

‘So you have found everything.’

‘You hid nothing.’

Surere shrugged. ‘It was over.’

‘Do you have the original papyri?’

‘They are safe.’

‘Why did you do this, Surere?’

‘It was a way of ensuring my safety, and it became a way of collecting funds for my work. I was reclaiming what rightfully belonged to the Aten.’

‘When did this start?’

Surere smiled. ‘Many years ago.’

‘At the City of the Horizon?’

‘Yes.’

‘How did you know what Reni was doing?’

Surere spread his hands. ‘I had the queen’s confidence. She did not understand figures, but perhaps she had an inkling something was wrong. I told her that I would keep an eye on things.’

‘But how did you get hold of Reni’s accounts?’

‘That was easy. He fled the city before its collapse. Many of the great officials thought their slate would be wiped clean with the downfall of the king. I made copies myself, and had them, and the originals, hidden here, in the Southern Capital, shortly before Akhenaten’s death. We all knew it was coming.’

‘Who hid them for you?’

‘Someone I could trust. Amenenopet, that sweet boy.’

‘How did you know you would need them?’

Surere smiled again. ‘I didn’t. But I knew that Reni was treacherous enough to have a good chance of surviving the Fall. I swore that if I ever survived, I would make him pay.’

‘I have read your copies. Did Reni believe you still had the originals?’

‘He couldn’t take risks. He recognised his own work. And it made sense to pay me. If the state had found out, he would have had to return it all. He would have been disgraced; and he would have been exiled from the city. It would have killed him.’

‘He could have killed you.’

‘There was that risk. But I think he was too frightened. He could not know what I had done with the originals, which he believed destroyed years ago. He could not know what provision I had made.’

‘What provision had you made?’

‘None. But I knew that God would protect me as I was working for Him.’

‘What about Reni’s daughters?’

Surere sighed. ‘That was a pity. After Nephthys had been killed, I knew I could no longer rely on him. His sadness was beginning to make him reckless. He began to speak of sacrifices to Selkit. She is his guardian goddess.’

Huy’s mind raced. The scorpion goddess. The goddess of the heat of the sun’s rays.

‘I told him she would not help. He had taken what belonged to Amun, under orders to render it to Aten. But he kept it for himself.’

Huy remembered the great tax levies imposed on the old religion by Akhenaten shortly before his departure from the Southern Capital for the City of the Horizon. Reni had been heavily involved. All the valuables stored up by the priests of Amun were forfeited, taken to finance the new city and the new cult of the One God. Inevitably, some of the funds went missing in the transition, lost in the paperwork: a caravan of donkeys disappeared in the desert, a bullion barge sunk without trace in the river. With the reversion to the old order, the priests of Amun had clawed almost everything back. But not all.

‘If Reni had betrayed me I would have given myself up to Kenamun and bought my life with Reni’s false accounts,’ said Surere. ‘They would have sent me back to the labour camps; but at least I would still have been in this world, to escape again, to do my work for the Aten.’

‘Might Reni have guessed your plan?’

‘Perhaps. It would not have mattered. It might not even have worked. Reni has ingratiated himself with Kenamun. He has information too, which the priest wouldn’t wish to be made public.’

‘How do you know?’

‘His son told me.’

‘Why?’

‘He hates his father.’

‘Then why did he not betray him?’

‘He is too good a son for that.’

‘But he knows what material his father has to threaten Kenamun with?’

Surere smiled. He no longer looked mad at all. ‘There is a brothel in the palace compound which caters to…special tastes. Kenamun has such tastes. Reni has an interest in the brothel. When I restore the true faith, I will return here and burn all such places to the ground, with their occupants. There will be such cleansing as this city has never known. If only there were not this delay I would leave tonight – but for the orders of the king.’

Huy watched in amazement as Surere abruptly threw himself down on to the stone bench and succumbed to a racking fit of weeping. There was nothing Huy could do to stop it or to give comfort. Awkwardly, he reached forward and touched Surere’s shoulder. It felt strange to him to be on a such a footing with this man. It was as if their pasts belonged to other people. He wondered if his own mind could have weathered what Surere’s had been through; the changes it had experienced, after so much confidence and so much power.

The weeping subsided. Huy fetched water for Surere to wash in. While the man was recovering, he searched for food. There was none in the house.

‘What are the orders of the king?’ he asked, finally.

Surere was eager to tell him. ‘He is unlike the man I remember. Our lord was always firm, but he was never cruel. He never let anything get in his way, but he did no injustice to anyone else.’