I glanced up and saw one of the horsemen, his arm pulled right back, cast his spear with all his might-it came quivering through the air right on target for Nakht. He had not seen it. Just in time I threw up my shield, and it hit directly with an enormous thud that reverberated up my arm, throwing me backwards on to the ground, and winding me. I grabbed Nakht and pulled him down, protecting him with my body, as the storm of horsemen broke through the ring of bow archers, hacking wildly, gleefully, at them, separating arms and heads from torsos. Blood gushed and arced richly red into the fresh morning air. I glimpsed Simut attacking back, encouraging his men to do the same; they were superb marksmen and soldiers, and their weapons sliced and sang accurately through air and flesh and bone; and more of the horde fell dead from their horses. But we were impossibly outnumbered. Nakht was struggling underneath me.
‘Let me fight!’ he shouted.
‘Stay still,’ I said. For a moment, our eyes met, and it seemed to me he almost smiled.
‘Death holds no fear for me,’ he said. ‘Not if we die together.’
The savage and relentless noise of the battle suddenly seemed very far away, the barbarity of the attackers, as they slashed and hacked their way through us, seemed to slow down. I thought of the pity of life, and of my children, and my wife. In my mind I began to say goodbye to them.
But then, even as a feeling of terrible waste flowed through me, a shadow fell across my body. I looked up, dazzled by the rising sun that framed the dark figure on a magnificent stallion, gazing down at me. From the horse’s bridle hung several battered heads of dead men, the flesh torn away, the eyes missing from the sockets, the jaws hanging broken, loose. Chains of human hands had been fastened in a collar around the stallion’s neck, the yellowed, gnarled fingers imploring for help, too late. The rider’s scimitar was raised, glinting in the sun, ready to strike me dead.
But instead the figure laughed, and moved out of the sun. I looked into the face of the enemy, and I saw that it was not a man at all; but a woman, laughing with delight at the bloodshed and the victory. Her hair was black and thick, braided and tangled wildly around her head; her eyes were a compelling, shocking blue; and the mad fury of her expression was contradicted by the magnificence of her face. Then she looked at me directly, curiously; and a moment later, to my bewilderment, she smiled. And then everything went dark.
28
I tried to stir, but pain danced through my body. My hands and feet were bound, my mouth was gagged with a filthy rag, and I seemed unable to open my eyes; a raging thirst parched my throat, and the brutal sun burned my face. I tried to make sense of things: the rumble of cartwheels, the irregular sound of horses’ hooves on the rough ground, and the casual banter, cheerful shouts and aggressive laughter of men all around, in a language I did not understand.
I managed to open one eye. The other was swollen shut. It throbbed uncomfortably. The first thing I made out in the squinting light was Nakht’s face, very close to mine. His mouth was open, his face bruised, and his lips parched. His eyes were closed. Beyond him lay Prince Zannanza, awake and terrified, his mouth also gagged, his desperate, beautiful eyes pleading with mine. On the far side of the cart lay Simut, unconscious. Dried blood caked his face and beard, and flies feasted around a large, open gash on his head. His face was badly bruised. I saw his lips twitch against the flies. We four were all still alive. Why? And what of the guards?
The cart rattled jarringly over stones. I could make out little of the men on horseback who surrounded us-they were shadows silhouetted against the dazzle of the sun. But one of them saw I was conscious, and called out. The cart suddenly halted. He leaned down, unknotted the gag, and threw it aside. I gasped in the hot, dry desert air. I tried to speak. ‘Water…’ My voice was cracked and broken. One of them said something to the others, which made them laugh. Then several stood up in their stirrups, pulled aside their robes, and began to piss on me. I closed my eyes and mouth against the hot, revolting spatter, but they only laughed harder as I tried to squirm away. Then they pissed on Nakht and Prince Zannanza, too. This woke Nakht from his torpor; he coughed and cried out in revulsion. I was suddenly possessed by the strength of outrage, and, despite my hands being bound behind my back, I yanked myself to my feet, off the cart, and ran at the men, screaming with rage, trying to butt them with my head; but my legs gave way, and I fell to the ground, humiliated. This only delighted them more, and they roared with laughter. Several got down from their horses, I supposed to beat me up. I picked myself up to run at them again. But then a woman’s voice, commanding and deep, berated the men, and they stepped back, obedient as a pack of snarling dogs.
She stood gazing at me, her hands on her hips, and her wild hair like a glorious mane about her face, smeared with dust and blood. She dashed water from her leather water-skin over my face, then gripped my head between her fingers and turned it this way and that, as if valuing a horse. She raised her sword, drew the point of the blade under each eye, down my nose, and across my lips, like a crude version of the Opening of the Mouth ceremony, as if she were a high priest, and I the corpse waiting to be resurrected in the Otherworld: ‘You are young again, you live again, you are young again, you live again, forever.’ I jerked my head back, out of her grip. She smacked me hard, but then, as if pleased about something, she shouted, in a voice that could have knocked down a stone temple, something that sounded like ‘Inanna!’-and her wild Army of Chaos screamed in respect.
She gripped my face again, prised my teeth apart, held the leather water-skin from her belt to my mouth, and poured a stream of clear, cool, blissful water for me to drink. Then she nodded to one of her men, who gave Nakht and Prince Zannanza brief draughts of water from his water-skin, too. Simut was still unconscious. The man splashed the water over his face, but it made no difference. I was afraid he might be dead. But the man cuffed Simut about the face, pulled him into a sitting position, and forced water down his throat. Suddenly Simut coughed and retched. He was alive.
The others were ordered to get out of the cart, and we were made to stand in a line. Now I could see more clearly the motley militia under Inanna’s command. They wore black, together with exotic assemblies of gold collars, bangles and jewels. Their hair and beards were worn braided or plaited in wild, different styles. They were extensively armed, and must have collected their weapons from a wide range of victims, for some of them I recognized as Egyptian, some as Hittite, and others were unfamiliar to me. But to the last man, they looked like brutal criminals.
Inanna walked up and down imperiously, assessing us in turn. She gazed at Prince Zannanza, marvelling and whistling at his perfect white teeth, his smooth face, and his delicate hands whose unblemished skin showed a lifetime of luxurious leisure. She called out ribald comments, and her men guffawed, and slapped each other’s hands. Some approached the Prince aggressively, brandishing their weapons and mocking him. Inanna seemed curious about Nakht, too.
‘What is your name, Egyptian?’ She spoke in broken, strangely accented Egyptian.
‘I am Userhat,’ he lied.
‘What are you?’ she demanded.
‘I am a merchant.’
‘What do you trade? This delicate beauty next to you?’ she said.
‘He is a young scholar of the Hittite court, and we are accompanying him to Ugarit,’ he said.
She laughed out loud. ‘How beautiful are the young scholars of the Hittites! He must be very valuable.’ Nakht said nothing. She cuffed him hard across the face. ‘You lie,’ she said, simply. ‘I know who you are.’
But Nakht’s spirit seemed to revive within him, and he stared her down.
‘Egyptian armed forces will be looking for us, even now,’ he said. ‘The Hittite army will vow revenge against any harm that comes to this man, or us. You have committed a foolish crime against the empires of Egypt and Hatti, and it will be best for you if you supply us with horses and water, and release us now.’