At the front of the crowd, I saw Djet. Caught up in the excitement, he began to jump up and down and whirl about.
Looking out at a sea of faces and upraised arms, hearing the enthusiasm in their voices, I felt an unexpected stirring of excitement, and even a perverse sort of pride. Never before in my life had I been singled out to stand before such a large group and then been made to feel that I was somehow special-never mind that the men were all criminals and that I was playing a role. Was this how every new member was welcomed into the Cuckoo’s Gang? I realized that each man there had experienced his own singular, exhilarating moment on the dais.
At last the shouting died down.
“Well, then, that’s settled.” Artemon clapped a hand on my shoulder. “Now you have only to take the pledge, and face the initiation.”
I was not sure which I dreaded more, taking a false oath or enduring some unknown trial, but there could be no turning back.
“Is there a particular god by whom I need to swear?”
Artemon shook his head. “There are no gods here-or hadn’t you noticed? ‘By all the gods that are not’-that’s how our oath begins.” Many of the men laughed heartily at this. “You look at the men before you as you take the oath. It’s to them that you make your pledge. It’s they who’ll make sure you keep it, and punish you if you don’t.”
I nodded to show that I understood.
“Very well then, Pecunius, place your hands upon your testicles.”
“What?”
“Do it!”
I took a wider stance and clutched myself through my clothing, then flushed a bit at the good-natured laughter this evoked.
“Upon your honor as a man, and upon pain of losing those precious orbs between your legs-as well as your head-do you hereby swear that you shall be loyal to the men assembled before you, the brave, stalwart men of the Cuckoo’s Gang?”
I cleared my throat. “I swear it!”
“Do you swear that you shall do nothing to betray us or bring harm to the group, and that you shall alert us at once to any threat that might harm us?”
“I swear it!”
“Do you swear that you shall obey the laws of the Cuckoo’s Gang, as decided by its members and enforced by its leader?”
“I swear it!”
“Do you swear that even if you should become separated from us, or be captured by our enemies, or leave us of your own volition, you will continue to obey this oath, and do nothing that would bring harm to any member of the Cuckoo’s Gang?”
“I swear it!”
“Very well then, by the gods that are not, I declare you to be a member of the Cuckoo’s Gang. Now you may remove your hands from your testicles.”
I did so, to uproarious cheering and laughter from the crowd.
“Now, Pecunius, you’re truly one of us-if you survive your initiation.”
XXVI
As if on cue, from somewhere deep in the thicket beyond the clearing came the peculiar, chilling roar I had heard when I first arrived.
My heart skipped a beat. “What is that noise?” I said.
Artemon gave me a thin smile. “Shall we go and find out? Follow me, Pecunius.”
He stepped from the dais and made his way to a trailhead almost hidden by vegetation at the edge of the clearing. The narrow path headed in a direction new to me. The way was little used, to judge by the rank vegetation that turned the path into a tunnel of sun-dappled greenery. Looking over my shoulder, I saw that the rest of the men followed us in single file, headed by Djet and Menkhep.
After many a twist and turn, we emerged in another clearing, so similar in size and shape to the one we had just left that for a moment I thought we had doubled back. Then I saw the long, wide pit that ran from one side of the clearing to the other, so deep that I couldn’t see the bottom of it. Artemon pulled me aside, allowing the others to file past us into the clearing. They encircled the long pit and crowded along its edges.
Ismene appeared, standing only a few feet away from me. She was dressed in a voluminous midnight-colored robe spangled with yellow stars. The garment was too big for her and looked like something filched from a Babylonian astrologer. She wore no makeup, but her fingers were encrusted with gaudy rings, and around her neck was a chain strung with gleaming lumps of amber. Seeing her by the bright light of day in such an outlandish costume, with her wild, uncombed hair forming a ragged halo around her head, I couldn’t decide whether she looked ridiculous or frightening.
The men crowded around the pit took notice of her. From the awestruck, almost reverent expressions on their faces, it was clear that they saw nothing absurd about the woman they called Metrodora.
Menkhep stepped toward her, then dropped to one knee and bowed his head. “Thank you, soothsayer! The mission you sent us on yesterday was a fruitful one, and all-almost all of us-came back safely. Your foresight was true once again.”
The others followed Menkhep’s example, dropping onto one knee, bowing their heads in her direction, and muttering words of thanks. Even Artemon did so. I saw no choice but to follow their example. After bowing my head, I looked up to see that Ismene was watching me with a look of faint amusement.
Any amusement I might have felt was stopped short by a sudden roar. It was louder than ever before, and much closer. In fact, it seemed to come from the nearby pit.
My blood turned cold in my veins. I rose to my feet. So did the others. They took their eyes from Ismene. Some stared down into the pit. Some looked at me, with grave expressions. A few flashed what I took to be malicious grins, which took me aback, for until that moment I thought that no one in the Cuckoo’s Gang wished me ill.
Artemon led me to one end of the long pit. The men crowded along the edge stepped back to make room for us. I saw what lay before me, and sucked in my breath.
The pit was at least ten feet deep, with sheer earth walls on all sides. I judged it to be twenty feet wide and at least twice that long. A slender wooden wall the height of the pit ran all the way down the middle, beginning directly in front of me, dividing it into two enclosures, one to my left and the other to my right. The wall appeared to be a rather makeshift affair, thrown together from pieces of scrap wood.
Palm leaves and other bits of dried vegetation had been strewn across the bottom of both enclosures. Amid the leafy debris I saw human skulls and other bones. At first it seemed that the enclosure to the right was unoccupied; then a sudden movement caught my eye, as a crocodile, half-hidden by a palm leaf, gave a start and scurried with unnerving swiftness from one end of the pit to the other, scattering bones along the way, furiously swinging its tail and snapping its jaws.
Nothing could have been more terrifying than the crocodile, I thought, until my gaze fell upon the creature that occupied the other half of the pit.
Growing up in Rome, I had seen many exotic animals in gladiator games and other spectacles put on by the magistrates. In my travels, I had seen even stranger beasts, some in the flesh and some in paintings or mosaics. But I had never encountered or even imagined a monster such as this.
In basic form it resembled a lion, with four legs, a tail, and a mane, but there the resemblance ended. Lions are tawny gold, but this creature was multicolored-the legs were bright orange, the back was purple, and the mane was a fiery red with black spots. The mane didn’t fall back from the creature’s brow as that of a lion does, but radiated outward, as if a burst of flame surrounded the creature’s face-a face that terminated not in a leonine snout, but in a strange sort of tusk, like that of a rhinoceros. Its tail was more like that of a scorpion than a lion, a horrible, segmented thing that made a clacking noise as it swished this way and that. The tail terminated in a hideously swollen, barbed stinger.
The creature stood at the far end of the pit. While I watched, it threw back its head and roared. There was a keening, howling quality to the sound that set my teeth on edge.