As we moved through that market town towards the usurper’s camp, I realised that she spoke the truth. The inhabitants appeared to have fled, leaving their homes to the scavengers: Shardana in their horned helmets and leather garments; Libyans and Nubians festooned with feathers and plumes, faces and bodies painted or tattooed, kilts fashioned out of animal skins flapping against their thighs. Soldiers from the islands of the Great Green were there, and even a few fair-skinned warriors from the lands beyond. All were armed and dangerous, displaying weapons of every kind: bows and arrows, clubs, daggers, swords, spears and two-edged axes. The air stank of sweat and strange perfumes which couldn’t disguise the reeking odour of the narrow lanes. The camp followers had also arrived: the wizards with their necklaces of bone and grotesque masks; fortune-tellers, wandering priests, leeches and physicians, dancing girls and prostitutes of every age and country. Nevertheless, although the market town was filthy, order was strictly maintained. Hittite officers and their military escorts patrolled the streets or lounged at the mouths of alleyways, ready to quell any trouble. Here and there stood the huge Hittite war chariots with their crew of three, driver, shield-bearer and archer, garbed in striped robes over metal-fringed leather jerkins and war kilts.
A grisly sight, a dire warning to those who broke the law, waited for us in the centre of the village: a row of corpses impaled on stakes driven through the chest, or up through the bowels. Each victim had been doused in resin and burned; their twisted black shapes seemed like demons frozen in the air. On the ground before each stake was a piece of wood proclaiming their crime: techar, spy; nek, rape; thai, thievery. Despite such bloodthirsty spectacles, the town seemed a noisy, gaudy place, dominated by a swirl of colour, cheap perfume and the chatter of at least a dozen tongues. A place where men greeted each other with open camaraderie, but beneath the singing, the laughter and the raucous drinking a sinister, threatening atmosphere lurked, as men of blood gathered for the slaughter.
No one accosted us, though we had to keep a sharp eye on our baggage; eventually we were through the village into a line of trees fringing the plain where the usurper had set up camp. At first my heart failed at the sight. A great makeshift fortress, surrounded by a moat fed by one of the canals, rose up from the plain, protected not only by the moat but by a soaring mound and a lofty, sturdy palisade of sharpened stakes. A bridge crossed the moat and cut through the mound to the huge double gates with wooden turrets on either side. From these, and elsewhere along the fortress, banners and standards fluttered in the breeze. The air was rich with the smell of wood smoke, burning meat, fried fish, incense, sweat and blood. On each side of the fortress a small town had sprung up of huts, bothies and tents. The air rang with the calls of trumpets, shouts, the neigh of horses and the lowing of cattle. I felt as if I was in one of my nightmares, standing in some lonely thicket looking out on to a city of the Underworld.
‘Much stronger,’ Sobeck whispered. ‘Much stronger than we thought, Mahu. What do you reckon?’ He gestured at the fortress and the camp. ‘What?’ he whispered. ‘Ten to fifteen thousand fighting men? Not to mention those we saw in the village, as well as those we met on patrol, foraging or hunting.’
A farmer, his cart laden with provisions, whip cracking the air over his oxen, shouted at us to get out of the way. We stepped aside and joined the other travellers making their way up to the camp. Once we’d reached it, we walked as calmly as we could around the fortress precincts, our donkey plodding patiently behind us. The field camp was like any I had seen: beaten paths snaked between tawdry huts and ragged tents. Camp fires burned, farmers, peasants and a legion of road wanderers offered everything for sale. We noticed horse lines and chariot parks and, as in the market town, the ubiquitous Hittite officers and military police. Walls and canals were protected. Latrine pits had been dug well beyond the picket line. Discipline was ruthlessly enforced. We passed a huge cage containing three naked malefactors being prodded and poked with sharp sticks by a horde of camp followers. A drunk who had defecated away from the latrines was being made to stand in his own ordure. Another, guilty of filching from the cooking pot, lay spread-eagled on the ground, the soles of his feet being beaten by two burly Kushites armed with split canes.
No one bothered us except for the traders or the fortune-tellers shaking their magic cups full of tiny bones. Whores and pimps touted for custom. Cooks tried to entice us with platters piled high with spiced meats. We walked slowly, wide-eyed, gaping-mouthed yet learning as much as we could. I noticed that the side gate, similar to the main, was closely guarded by troops placed before it and in the towers at either side. At the rear of the fortress another gate, leading down to the horse meadows and paddocks, was just as closely guarded. We were allowed to pass by but warned not to stop. At the far side of the fortress stretched another camp, screened off by a soaring palisade. Above this I glimpsed the top of a Mastaba, one of those ancient limestone pyramids used to house the dead before the Two Lands came together. The outer case was crumbling but its top jutted above the high palisade like a spear point against the sky; the sickly-sweet odour of spilt blood and the nauseating stench of burnt flesh were very strong. The guards at the entrance to the palisade were all dressed in black leather armour and jackal masks. A group of mercenaries were passing through the gate. As this swung open and closed, I glimpsed stakes, blackened earth, and heard the deep, cough-like roar of a lion.
We returned to the front of the fortress, a sprawling concourse, part travelling fair or market, with its many stalls and booths. We bought jugs of beer and some freshly baked bread, and settled down beneath a palm tree, studying the fortress which soared above us.
‘It seems,’ Sobeck declared between mouthfuls, ‘there are two camps. That’s the main one.’ He pointed towards the great double-barred gates, the avenue leading to them packed with soldiers, some wearing the striped head-dresses of Egyptian infantry, the rest a motley collection of mercenaries and Hittites. ‘And that’s formidable enough!’
‘What I would like to know,’ I gestured to the left, ‘is what is behind that palisade? What does the Mastaba contain and why are those mercenaries entering? They looked frightened. I glimpsed scorched earth, a stake, and heard the roar of a lion.’
‘I heard the same,’ Sobeck agreed. ‘And I keep thinking what that Hittite told us about the Place of Darkness and a Field of Fire. Many summers ago,’ he grinned at me, ‘when I was young and handsome and a Child of the Kap, I learnt the history of Egypt and the exploits of Ahmose, who drove the Hyksos out. Now, our history is full of tales about Hyksos cruelty, how they used to love to torture their prisoners in the most fiendish manner. I just wonder if that’s a place of Hyksos torture. If this usurper instils terror with his own slaughter yard. We have been round this camp, Mahu, through the town, but never once did I glimpse an Egyptian officer. Yet we know the usurper suborned some of our regiments.’