Bak glanced at Pahuro, who stood stiff and straight and tight-lipped, a man too proud to display the indignity he must have felt at being caught so soon and so thoroughly.
Or one who expected to suffer the anger of the gods-or the wrath of mighty Kemet.
“You found nothing else on board the ship?” Bak asked, not for the first time. He was thinking specifically of elephant tusks, for none had been found among the contraband.
“We’ve held nothing back. That I swear by the lord De-dun.” Pahuro’s voice was as stiff as his spine, the oath to an old Kushite god.
Bak believed him, and the false manifest listing all the precious objects seemed to bear him out. No tusk had been recorded.
His eye was drawn to Ramose, hurrying past the village, raising a puff of dust with each step he took. A yellow dog barked halfheartedly from a patch of shade. Getting no reaction, it hauled itself to its feet and trotted down a sunny lane to sniff at the heels of several women kneeling before a small mudbrick shrine dedicated to some local god Bak could not identify from so far away. Women praying, he felt sure, for the safety of their village and their men.
“I’ll keep my vow, Pahuro,” he said, irritated they had such scanty faith in his word. “I’ve no desire to squeeze the life from your village.”
“They’re old women, Lieutenant, frail creatures who remember a time long ago when our men were made to march off to war and not one in ten came back.”
Bak remembered tales he had heard of the last full-scale conflict fought through this area and farther south. Many years had since passed and the village now looked prosperous enough, with plump livestock and fowl, rich fields, lush date palms, and vines that no doubt bore succulent fruit. Not 56 / Lauren Haney visible was the amount of work required, back-breaking labor leaving meager time and energy to repair the poor houses, or to allow the sick to rest and mend, or to travel to Buhen to take part in the festivals of the gods.
Bak turned to the oarsmen, drew in a breath, and closed his heart to thoughts of his responsibility to the lady Maat and his duty to the royal house and his sovereign, Maatkare Hatshepsut. “Now, so I can show Ramose what I’ve asked you to do before we sail, and he can lay no blame on your heads, you must place in the hands of this headman one copper ingot and two bundles of cowhides.” He paused, scanned the objects in the shelter, selected the most and least useful. “Give him also the smallest of the two lengths of heavy linen, and one jar of perfumed oil for the women.”
Pahuro dropped to his knees and covered his face, too moved to speak. Bak hurried away, cursing himself for a soft-hearted fool. Commandant Thuty, whose fierce tongue had been known to make brave men quake in their sandals, would not be pleased to learn he had rewarded a village which by rights should be punished.
“This is the place, all right. See?” The sailor with the crooked nose knelt beside several small brownish lumps half-covered by sand and dried hard by the harsh desert heat. A few flies crawled over the surface, but none found a morsel fit to hold them for long. “They must’ve thrown water over the cages to wash out the filth.” He glanced up at the youth with the monkey clinging to his neck. “You remember. The sand around them was wet when we came.”
The boy, looking sheepish, pointed. “I stepped in that pile.
It was so dark, I couldn’t see a thing.”
Tjanuny, squatting beside an irregular ring of rocks a dozen paces away, glanced up from the thin layer of ash and a few pieces of charred wood he had cleared of windblown sand.
“If this poor fire was all the light you had, I’m surprised you saw the cages.”
Shading his eyes with a hand, Bak scanned the area, a broad, open plain on both sides of the river. The sands, barren of plants and animals alike, blanketed the earth from the water’s edge to the horizon, lost in a pinkish-purplish haze.
The flat, burnished gold surface, relieved at intervals by low sandhills, appeared to tremble like a living creature, veiled as it was in heat waves. From high above in a vivid blue sky, the lord Re looked down upon the men below, parching their throats and scorching the sands they trod. Other than the makeshift hearth and the animal waste, the storm had conspired to hold the site’s secrets, erasing all signs of man.
This bleak plain seemed an unlikely spot for a rendezvous, Bak thought, too open and visible. Yet it was a place where nothing lived or moved. Its sterility, its utter desolation, would make it one of the few spots along the river where one man could meet another unseen, especially on a dark night.
“Our ship drew in close to shore, and the loading went fast. Not a man among us wanted to tarry.” The sailor stood up, eyed the site, grimaced. “We didn’t like this place. A land of death, we thought, even in the cool of night.”
“Who met you here?” Imsiba asked.
“We never saw anyone,” the man grumbled. “Just…” His voice tailed off; he shifted his feet, uneasy.
“We saw shadows in the dark,” the boy said in a hushed voice. “The oldest man among us, one who should know, said the sandhills were ancient burial places, so we feared at first they were shadows of the dead. Later…”
“Why not a headless man?” Tjanuny mumbled, chuckling,
“or some other specter of the desert?”
Bak silenced him with a frown, wanting no distractions.
The man and boy exchanged a quick look. The latter said,
“Later, after we finished loading, Maya thought to go off by himself for some reason. He’d not gone ten paces when an arrow came out of nowhere, narrowly missing him.”
“Dead men don’t carry bows and arrows.” The older sailor’s tone was dogged, as if a fear of the unknown nibbled at the edges of his commonsense. “Nor do they take traveling ships to the netherworld.”
It was Bak’s turn to exchange a glance with Imsiba. “You 58 / Lauren Haney saw another vessel here? The one that brought the contraband?”
“No!” The boy’s voice was so sharp the monkey grabbed his hair and wrapped itself around his head. “We didn’t know it was close by until we were ready to sail, and we don’t know for a fact that it left the objects we loaded. First, we heard across the water the groan and creak of rising yards and the snap of heavy linen catching the wind. Not long after, the ship sped south and we saw the spread of sail passing in the dark. Not easy to see, but impossible to miss.”
And impossible to identify later, Bak thought, irked. Especially when your wits are addled by fear.
“Mahu’s still here, I see.” Ramose stood at the prow of his ship, directing the oarsmen and the man at the rudder as they eased the vessel against the northern quay. “I thought by now he’d be well on his way to Abu.”
“I forgot we left him here.” Bak scowled at the cargo ship, no longer moored at the southern quay where last he had seen it, but tied up now at the central quay. He glanced at the sun and groaned. Close to midafternoon already. So much for the leisurely swim he yearned for. “I’d better search that vessel right away, Imsiba. The cattle and goats they had on board are tribute bound for the capital. The sooner they sail north, the better.”
Sailors threw hawsers over the mooring posts and pulled the ship on which they stood snug against the quay. The instant the gap closed, Bak leaped across to the landing, with Imsiba close behind. The stones felt hot beneath their sandaled feet, the air warm and close.
“Before I inspect that vessel, I must go to Commandant Thuty.” Bak drew the Medjay down the quay, out of the way of the men who were securing the vessel and setting out the gangplank. “Seldom do I have such good news to report. I’d like to be the first to deliver it.”
Imsiba laughed. “Then you mustn’t tarry, my friend. I’ll wager the rumors have already taken wing.”
“Don’t speed me on my way yet,” Bak grinned. “I’ve several tasks I wish you to shoulder.”