NINE

“I Could tell you,” said Menenhetet to our Pharaoh, and to my mother and father, “of how we spoke of this battle later, when each man could tell it to his own advantage. Then, it was only by comparing the lies that you could begin to look for the truth. But that was later. At this moment, there was nothing but noise, and much confusion. Yet I do not find it hard to remember how I felt through all of that long afternoon to follow when so many of us were nearer to the dead than the living, because I never felt so alive. I can still see the spear that passes to the left of my shoulder, and the sword that misses my head. Once more—it is as near to me as falling from my bed in a dream—I am thrown out from the Pharaoh’s Chariot by the shock of a lance against my shield. It was the greatest battle of all wars, and in my four lives I never heard of anything like it. Of course, my mind did not speak to me on that day as on others, and it is true that the most unusual moments and the most unimportant passed equally like separate strangers, but I remember that in the instant when the clamor first beat about our camp, Usermare-Setpenere turned to me, and said, ‘Take your shield and ride in My Chariot,’ and I who had dreamed of this moment down the Nile, in the dust of Gaza, and through the mysteries of Tyre, could only nod my head and think that the work I had spent in sharpening the wheels of the chariot of Utit-Khent was work worse than lost, for Utit-Khent would probably cut his own leg off falling out of the chariot, and such is the shock of battle where events become as shattered as broken rocks whose pieces fly in all directions, so I was seeing fragments of what was yet to happen, and Utit-Khent certainly did fall out of his chariot, and his leg was mangled by the wheel I sharpened even as his horses in panic ran over him.

“As I say, all I could feel at the instant was that I must now find my leather bag and my stone and begin to sharpen the wheels of His Chariot. But even to have such a thought was stupid. A squad of soldiers—the Royal Guard of the Chariot-of-the Mighty-Bull—were forever polishing the gold and silver filigree, and working many royal stones on the treads—you could lose your finger running it along His wheels. So I climbed up instead on the cage of the lion to get a better view of all that was happening about us. Immediately, Hera-Ra started roaring beneath like a drunken beggar, hooking at his cage so furiously I almost fell off. Standing on those slats, the beast thumped my feet with his tail and shoulders and head, while I looked in all four directions, my organs in an uproar to match a confusion of sights multitudinous as the foam of the Very Green. I could certainly see the King’s square surrounded on all four sides, for the larger square built in such haste by the soldiers of Amon was now lost. Beyond our square was a chaos and a carnage. The Division of Amon were fleeing their meals, their games, their tents, their wagon trains and their animals. While our inside square stood fast for the Pharaoh, outside I could see no more than a few of ours to face hordes of Hittites overrunning us so quickly they were caught already in their own rush. These Asiatics were not riding in one careful rank behind another of charioteers in perfect order the way we Egyptians like to advance, no, just a mob of hundreds of chariots, three men in each, wearing odd yellow hats, nor did they fight with bow and sword but tried to run everything down with their axes. In this din, our chariots, at least those still fighting, kept weaving in and out, our charioteers, some even at this hour with the reins around their waist, were pulling bows, quick as sparrows fighting boars. The enemy was so big and clumsy that I even saw two Hittite chariots crash into each other, three men in one catapulted out even as the other three were hurled to the ground. Yet over every hill, through these thin woods, came more ranks of Hittite chariots, some at a run, some at a walk, and then I saw the nearest thirty or forty, maybe a squadron, riding at a gallop toward the King’s square itself. They charged our breastworks, up and over, and nearly all spilled. Those who did not, landed among the strongest of the Pharaoh’s Sherdens who seized these Asiatic horses by the bridle, and held their footing long enough to turn the horses’ necks and halt the chariot, at which moment, other Sherdens ripped the horses’ bellies with their daggers. Then they pulled off the Hittites. Of the thirty who charged into our square, not one was left, and I, like a boy quick with excitement on the cage of Hera-Ra, had only an instant to see that the Pharaoh, His head down, His eyes closed, was still praying. Out of His mouth I heard these words: ‘In the Year Five of My Reign, third month of the third season, on this Day Nine of Epiphi, under the majesty of Horus, I, Ramses Meri-Amon, the Mighty Bull, Beloved of Maat, King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Son of Ra Who am given life forever’—so I heard Him call on all His names, and even as a shaduf lifts its pail of water up the hill, so was my Pharaoh pumping up His blood as though the very water of the Land of the Dead must be lifted into His heart until He feared no death, and the dead as well as the living would listen: ‘I, Who am mighty in valor, strong as a bull, Whose might is in My Limbs like fire’—so He kept speaking while on the battleground of woods and fields outside our square I saw a horse go over backward with an arrow in its neck, down on its own chariot with its own three Hittites, and one of our charioteers with a short spear in his chest fell forward onto the shaft between his two horses. On their backs, everywhere, were dead men staring at the sky. The nearest was farther away than I could throw a stone, yet, brilliant as a bird’s eye was his eye. I could see it. Near him lay another dead man clutching his genitals. Then I saw a man whose arm was caught in the hub of a chariot wheel, and a Hittite came along and hacked at his head with an axe. All the while, most of our army was running into the woods. I could not believe in what panic were the men of Amon.

“Now my Pharaoh had finished praying and He unhooked the door to the cage of Hera-Ra who came out. Then, to my surprise, Usermare-Setpenere leaped into His Chariot on the driver’s side. I, thereby, to the other, and He rode in a circle through our square, nearly striking some of our own men as He called, ‘We are going to attack. We are going to attack.’

“Six chariots, seven, now eight, followed in our circle. Others saluted but did not move until the next time around. Now others joined, but not enough.

“ ‘Follow Me,’ said Usermare-Setpenere, and with a force of twenty chariots, He rode at full speed to the southern side of our square, choosing the lowest place in the earth wall, and we drove over it and down the other side, banging against one another badly; but then we were on the field, Hittite chariots before us in every direction, and, when I dared to look behind, half of our force was still with us. The other half had not dared to make it over the wall. We were surrounded already, if you could speak in such a way when our Pharaoh, having pumped the courage of the dead into every one of His limbs, not to speak of the force of Strength-of-Thebes and Maat-is-Satisfied, fastest horses of any land, and Hera-Ra bounding at our side, his roars louder than an avalanche of rock down a cliff, were, all of us, galloping through every bewilderment of battle so fast that none, not even our own men, could keep up with us, although some tried. The Hittites parted before our passage, as well as any poor Egyptians from Amon or Ra whom we passed, and for the length of a field, through a wood, and down another field, not one arrow was shot at us, not one did we shoot, and no Hittite came near, not man nor chariot—perhaps they were all afraid of the brilliance of the chariot of Usermare-Setpenere and the face of Hera-Ra, bounding beside us.

“Behind, like a tail that becomes so stretched the end must pull off, were our charioteers. I knew what it cost to keep up with the Pharaoh over rough ground, and only a few stayed with us now. When I dared to look, for I felt as if my good life depended on keeping eyes to the front, I could see how some of our men were surrounded by Hittites, and some had turned back, or were fighting their way back, and still my Ramses the Second galloped south, no one more happy, nobody so brave, nobody so handsome—He looked as if the sun shone out of His eyes. ‘We’ll break through,’ He shouted, ‘and find the troops of Ptah. We’ll kill these fools when we come back,’ and with that, we met a hundred Hittite chariots waiting in the next field.

“Now I saw more battle than a man could fight. Never will I be certain how many of our chariots were still with us, if any. For when our Ramses drove with His golden vehicle full-force into the center of these heavy Hittite carts with their three men, there was nothing for the next few minutes I saw whole. So I saw the spear that came at my shield and the axe that just missed my head. I saw Hera-Ra leap across three men of one chariot onto the horses of another. I saw him hanging upside-down with his muzzle on a horse’s neck. Hidden from the arrows of the Hittite charioteers, he clung to the horse, his jaw on the blood of the stallion’s throat, the claws of his hind legs opening the belly, until the horse stood up in such extremity of pain that his mate stood up too, both screaming, and they fell backward on their drivers, even as Hera-Ra leaped from the horse to a man and bit off an arm, or most of an arm, I could not believe what I saw, all from the side of my eye, between the movements of my shield, a hundred arrows seeming to come at once, all at the Pharaoh, as if no one could think of the horses nor of me in view of His golden presence. Those arrows were wild, but not the ones I blocked. They came at us hard as birds flying full tilt into a wall, and their points came through the leather of my shield, evil as the nose of your enemy.

“All the while, Ramses the Second would draw His bow and loose an arrow at full gallop, swerve by one Hittite chariot, then another, and was so adept we could stop, wheel, then charge away to stop short again as chariots converged on ours. ‘Your sword,’ He shouted, and there, not moving, two of us against three on either side, we fought back to back with our swords against their six axes, only it was not so unequal as that, for Hera-Ra charged one chariot, then another, and with such bloody fury that others did not come near, and we were free again, we had broken through, we were on our way to the south once more, we could reach the Division of Ptah, so we thought, so we shouted to each other, only to find another hundred Hittites facing us in still another phalanx.

“Sometimes a few of our own chariots caught up so we were not always alone, but five times we fought like this, five times we drove into a mass of men and horses so thick the only forest you saw was swords, armor, axes, horses, limbs, and chariots turning over. Vehicles raced by empty of riders, and ran into one another. The trees quivered. Ramses’ great bow, which nobody but He could draw, had a force to drive its arrow through a man so hard it could knock him from the chariot to the ground, yet these sights I saw in fragments like the eye of a face on the shard of a pot. So, for instance, did I see a Hittite hold up a man who was expiring in the flood of a wound, while two others galloped away in a chariot without reins. The third Hittite had fallen off already. Many a soldier was trampled by horses or run over by wheels—I saw so many of those Hittite wheels with their eight spokes that I dreamed of them for years, foul dreams, the little wheels puckered as a strange anus, and there were sights full of folly: I even saw a Hittite attacking his own horse in harness; such was the fever that the fellow killed the beast with his axe. Maybe it had tried to run him down. I did not know, I never saw more, I was ducking a blow, sticking a lance, or reeling from the impact of the Pharaoh’s body against me when He slammed our horses through a sharp turn, once I even fell off, landed on my feet and jumped up again. My lungs knew the fire of the Gods. I saw Hera-Ra leap at three men who stood motionless in their chariot, transfixed by the loss of their horses. They were still looking at their useless reins as he clawed down on them.

“Loose horses were everywhere. I saw one on broken front legs, trying to rear, and a charioteer lay on the ground, holding the tail of this horse until the animal flopped around to bite him. Another man was all alone in his wagon, his horses walking in stupor with loose reins. Then the man fainted, and I saw him slide to the ground. To the other flank was a riderless horse trying to crawl into a fallen chariot. It was a madness. One pair of horses, stripped of all three men, tried to dash over a collision of other chariots, but stumbled, and the empty chariot catapulted overhead while the horses stampeded into the ground. I never heard such a scream come from animals before. The worst was a howl from a steed Usermare-Setpenere struck in the chest with an arrow when it tried to leap between our stallion and mare. Everywhere, beasts in panic were defecating as they ran. On it went. We would think we had broken through the Hittites only to see another phalanx to the south, and we would attack again, even break through, but on the sixth attempt, we saw a thousand Hittites coming toward us in orderly formation.

“ ‘It can’t be done,’ I said to Him, ‘we can’t get out!’ He glared at me then as if I were the worst coward ever seen, and said, ‘Strengthen your heart. I will lay them in the dust!’ I looked at those thousand soldiers and at my King’s face, and in it was the expression I have seen in the eyes of mad beggars when they believe they are sons of the Pharaoh, yes, my Ramses the Second could swear to destroy all who called themselves Hittites, and I could feel His certainty so powerfully that I believed in it myself, although in a different way, and I said, ‘Let us return, my King, to Your Pavilion, and we will gather Your troops and fight and destroy these Hittites from there,’ and on that word, He wheeled our horses and we went charging back to the north, back to the remnants of the King’s square that was two hills, three fields, and I do not know how many small woods away.

“There were enemy everywhere, and none of our chariots to be seen, yet no Hittites came to intercept us. They were all too busy plundering the deserted camp of the Division of Amon. So we swept back into the King’s square and heard the cheers of all the men who were left. Officers came running forward as we halted, telling in great excitement how they had defended our square by the north side, the south side, the west and even by the river until the Hittites had retreated—with all their thousands, they had failed to take the square—but Ramses listened with wrath. To hear of their exploits, you would have thought we had none of our own, yet the arrows were still sticking in the quilting of our horses and the face of Hera-Ra was more red with the blood of the Hittites than the chest of a man laid open with a sword. I could not believe how red was the brightness of blood when you saw a great deal of it.”

Menenhetet paused. “In what I have told you, there is not the heart of what I truly felt. Those sentiments were magnificent. During all that time we tried to break through to the south, I had been like a God, I felt twice my size—even as They are twice our height—and I was four times my strength, even as Gods know the power of four arms for each of Their shoulders. Never had I been so tireless in so heavy a work, and never was my breath so close to Them. I could have fought through the afternoon and night with the love I knew for Ramses and the horses and all that came forth from how we moved together. Often as not, I had no more than to think of a quick turn to the left for my King to perform the move, and, as if given vision in the back of my head, knew to swing my shield when a flight of arrows came down on us, never did I know as in those moments that we live for Them to see us, see us well, and thereby let us feel like Gods ourselves. I could no more have fled from the field than cut off my feet, at least so long as the Gods were with me, yet I lost them in the instant I saw the chariots of the thousand Hittites, except I do not know if I really did, for I was not full of fear when I saw that frightening sight, merely cool and calm and tired, my arm was suddenly heavy, and the voice that spoke to me was the same God’s voice I heard in the flame of the hottest combat, still the same voice now said in my ear, ‘Do not let this fool attack, or you are both dead,’ and I say to You that the voice was amused—it is the word—It was amused, yet so fine and quiet a voice I could swear I did not hear from Amon with His mighty tongue but the soft tone of Osiris Himself. Who else would dare to speak of my Pharaoh as a fool? Only the Lord Osiris Who gave me the advice to return quickly to the King’s Pavilion. And so I said to myself, ‘Even if I am the son of Amon, it is Osiris who saved me today.’

“Now we were back in the middle of the Household Guard, and in the joy of our return, so did I feel the strength of the Gods once more. My height doubled again, at least to myself, and I desired combat so much I felt the swelling of my member, and did not know whether to laugh or cry out in exultation. I saw Hera-Ra bounding about, licking our soldiers’ faces with his bloody face, and mighty for a cat was his member, also fully extended, he was one in good spirits with me. I do not know if it was the blood on the field, or the jubilation of these troops that they had held their square, maybe it was the early fermentation of the dead bodies around us before their seven souls and spirits had begun to depart, but I can only say that the air in our nostrils was like a rose at evening when the light of the sun is also the color of rose, just so fine smelled the air with our desire for new combat. I thought again of my mother’s story at how she awoke at my father’s side and a God brilliant in the gold of His breastplate was above her, and the hut was filled with a perfume lovelier than any she had ever smelled.

“Now I knew what she had known, and it was equal to the tender odor of this air, and whether we owed it to Amon or Osiris, I could hardly say, but I was moved to climb onto the cage of Hera-Ra, and this so pleased him that he, in turn, walked with humorous thumps of his paws into the space beneath where he began to purr. Only then did I look out to all four sides, and the Hittites with their thousand chariots and a thousand more behind were walking their horses toward us in two great semicircles coming in from the west and the south. To our north was devastation. All of Amon and Ra were long departed, and I saw nothing but corpses, abandoned chariots, shattered tents, and provision wagons being plundered now by the Hittites on the field. The wisdom of Osiris must still have been with me, for I whispered to my King, ‘At the east by the river, the line of Asiatics is thin.’ It was true—fewer Hittites were there than on any of the other sides of our square, indeed the river was not two hundred paces away, and so He, adding the force of Amon to the mind of Osiris, shouted to the brave Household troops on all our four fronts, ‘Come with Me. To the river!’ Leaving our flanks and rear unprotected, Ramses mounted His Chariot and we took off at a gallop, followed by our remaining chariots, and foot soldiers from all four sides.

“There were not fifty steps from our line of shields on the east side to their line, and we crossed before you could blink three times. That was just as well since I never saw so many arrows coming our way. They surprised me. A moment before, these Hittites by the river had been somnolent, as desultory in shooting at us, as we at them. So long as arrows went back and forth from one entrenchment to another, you collected what fell, and soon the arrows you returned to the Hittites were sent back again. All the same, I was amazed at the number that now came at us as we galloped across. I heard foot soldiers cry out as they were struck, and then in the full shock of combat, for so it is, full shock, we slammed into the shields before us, and our good horses, Maat and Thebes, took us up over the earthworks of the Hittites, and we came down on their chariots with all our own chariots behind us.

“I do not know what it is like to fall into a river and be dashed over rocks. Since I cannot swim, I will never know, except I do, for the golden chariot of my King, stronger than any beast and beautiful as a God, was met by three Hittite chariots at once. With nine men, six horses, and three heavy carts did we collide, and all four of the vehicles went over I think, it is certain we did. I remember striking the ground and the King with me, and our chariot coming over on us, its wheel, much blunted now, still scoring my back, then we were bouncing up and the horses were trumpeting, and even as I was coming off the ground, so His Chariot was up again as well, I do not know how unless it kept tumbling with the horses, it was His, after all, and we jumped on once more, and rode in a circle, firing arrows into the Hittites. With it all, these collisions, bumps, falls, and recoveries had been happening as slowly as you would slide down a mountain in a dream. Never had I had as much time to arrange my body for each new shock, nor been this quick with my feet.

“Neither can tell You how well we fought. It was nothing like the maneuvers we had practiced for years, no orderly sweep of rank on rank, no herding of infantry into a corner, no, we were in a rush to drive them to the river and fast, very fast, before other Hittites overran the King’s square we had just left. Maybe it was the desperation of where we were, no front, no rear, no flanks, and probably no King’s Pavilion to return to, but we fought like Hera-Ra, and so great was our lust to win a victory on this dreadful day that we were forever jumping in and out of our chariots, Ramses and I often fighting back to back, and many a soldier we wounded, and more than a few we killed, and back to our chariot against new Hittites. Everywhere I could see our vehicles circling their heavy carts with our skillful turns. On the ground, the Nubians were impaling Hittites with their short spears. I saw a man bite the nose off another man, and more than one Nubian had his yellow sash turn red. Three Hittites galloped by, and one of them had an axe in his hand and an arrow in his buttocks. He kept looking backward as if to see who had bitten him.

“We drove them all into the river. Foot soldiers, chariots, charioteers, even their Princes. It was fierce, but our swords were strong, our desperation was the virtue of war itself, and snorting, sobbing, growling at each other, charioteers on foot and infantrymen so crazed they leaped up on loose horses, we fought them to the edge of the embankment of the river, and then one Hittite chariot went over, down the bank and into the stream, a scream, a splash, they were washing away. Speak of rock and a rapid river, the river was narrow here and deep, and downstream a rapids began with many rocks. The first chariot to go shattered on those rocks, and I heard water swallow up the middle of a man’s cry.

“Now, river at their back, the desperation of these Hittites matched our own, but we were close to a triumph here and our soldiers were berserk. Since we had overrun their campfires, some of us seized burning branches and hurled them, and I even saw a Sherden swinging a leg of half-cooked beef, and Hittites fought back with torches, and with daggers, and sword against sword, and axe against sword. We pushed them all in, every last man who had not fallen on the field, and the few who clung to the slope of the wet and precipitous bank were struck in the face with arrows, although one of our Nubians was so emblazoned by now with the heat of battle that he slid down the bank to push a Hittite in, and failed. Both men drowned instead, biting at each other, arms around each other’s throats.

“What a sight! We stood at the riverbank and cheered, breathless and sobbing we cheered. It sounded like the demented wails you hear in a funeral procession, and over the water we looked, and there were sights no one would ever see again. A horse was swimming downstream with a Hittite trying to climb its back, and falling off, and trying again until he slipped off and drowned, but the horse reached the other bank, and other Hittites pulled the animal out of the water. There was a Prince washed up next, that I knew by his purple raiment, and the Hittites held him upside-down until I could not believe the liquid that poured out of the man’s throat, and later I heard he was the Prince of Aleppo, no less. So I saw royalty held by its heels, and then my eye flew to another Hittite who was sinking. Clearly I saw him wave farewell to the land as he went under the water, and another man swept by right beneath me, his arms around his horse’s neck as if he would kiss the creature, and he was speaking to his animal, I heard him weep with love before the rocks struck him and the horse. Behind him went a man who had already drowned, but so fat he floated with an arrow in his belly. I even saw one soldier make it with his animal to the other bank, and crawl ashore and lie there dying from a wound. As he expired, his horse licked his hand.

“Then we saw the Hittites come out on the other bank of the river. Out of the woods they emerged, too far for any of our arrows to reach, and I, practiced at making a quick count of a hundred men in a field, or a thousand, here saw something like eight thousand. I was happy they were on the other side of the river at this place where there was no ford, though I must say so soon as our Ramses saw them, that was equal to destroying His pleasure at what we had gained, whatever it was.

“ ‘Attack again,’ He cried. ‘To the west.’

“I never knew if my King was wise in battle, but then wisdom is a word by which one judges a man not a God, and He never looked to see if His command was followed. Instead He charged back over the old camping ground that lay within the entrenchment of our four sides, and everywhere were plundering Hittites, their backs to us and their faces to the ground. Like maggots on meat, they were as blind. The fools were so hungry for spoil they had stopped short of bearing down on us from the rear while we were at the river. Instead, they attacked our riches. Two hundred of them were ransacking the King’s Pavilion when we came back. We set fire to them there. In that way I could never understand my Pharaoh. No one loved His treasures more than Himself, yet so great was His heat in battle that He was the first to pick up a burning log and throw it on His tents, and a hundred of us added to the blaze, indeed our chariots ran a relay from the campfire to the fine stuff of His tent itself. Its walls were now collapsing upon the Hittites plundering within, and as they ran out, their beards on fire, their woolen capes on fire, even their groins on fire, our Nubians met them with short clubs, and cracked the heads of these fools on fire, twice fools for they died with the plunder in their arms. The stink of the leather of the King’s burning tents was even worse than the odor of burning flesh. Yet the smell was like a marrow to give us blood for the battle. I felt vigor in my sword, as if even the metal could know exhaustion and look for new spirit.

“We destroyed the Hittites in the King’s Pavilion and came down like a scourge on the petty plunder of the wagon trains. We took back our four sides and were a square again. Again, we gave a cheer. The two semicircles of Asiatic chariots who had been advancing upon us at a walk now stopped some hundreds of paces from our lines. They, too, were busy at plundering, but it was their own infantrymen they stripped. For those soldiers were still picking up the spoil left behind by the troops of Amon until the Hittite chariots scourged them like big animals eating little animals.

“Now the King’s Pavilion was down. Its leather was consumed. White ashes lay on the ground, and some still glowed. My Ramses said, ‘Who will bring Me our God?’ and the Captain of the Nubians pointed his finger at one of his blacks, a giant of a man with a huge belly, something in build like Amon Himself, and the black stepped into the hot ash and ran to the middle of the fallen tents, picked up the blackened statue—may I say it took all his strength—and staggered out. Given its weight, the Nubian had to hold it against his body, and his breast was burned, and his belly, his hands, his forearms and his feet, yet once he had set the God down by my King’s feet, so did Usermare-Setpenere kiss him, kiss this black—what honor could be so great as for a black to be kissed by the Pharaoh?—and then my Ramses knelt beside Amon, and in the tenderest voice began to speak to Him, talking only of His great love equal to the rapture of the sky at evening, and He took one end of His skirt and wiped all that was black from the God’s face, kissing the God on the lips even though His own mouth blossomed at once into two great blisters which He wore in combat. A frightening sight it made, for now He could only speak out of the swollen rope of His upper and lower lips.

“I would have wondered at the power of the black to bear such pain, and even the love for Amon that would lead my Pharaoh to seek such pain, but at that moment a broken feather flew loose from the headdress of Maat-is-Satisfied and drifted to my feet. When I picked it up, the feather was heavy with the blood and grime of battle and moved in my hand like a knife, it had weight. I knew enough to kiss it. So soon as I did, a terrible heat went out of my Pharaoh’s lips into mine, and, lo, I, too, was now to fight with white and swollen blisters upon my lips.

“Can I tell You of the rest of the day? Our battle, You remember, had begun under a dull and heavy sky. In that gloom, so strange to our Egyptian eyes, the sweat was cold on our bodies whenever we paused for breath, and our thirst was dry and cold and as desperate in our throats as our situation itself. Now it was easier, and as the Hittites came back into formation from plundering each other, and began to attack us, so were we also stronger. The Army of Amon that had deserted us was coming back from where they had fled, and many a skirmish was fought between these returning soldiers and the Hittites. Seeing the desire of such lost troops to make their way back to our square, my King, to help them, rode forth many times with our charioteers of the Household Guard on either side. Five times we rode out and felt the shock of battle but it was less each time for now we knew that the first of our advantages were the bows. Our arrows flew farther and so we did not have to crash against their heavier vehicles, but would stop short and send off as many arrows as we could afford, and pick up those that came back. The Hittites were hurt in this combat. Many of their horses, struck by us, would drive their other chariots amok with confusion, and often they were forced to retreat. On these scenes, the skies parted, and the Sun was revealed. We were warm in the late afternoon and grew stronger. It was then my Pharaoh lost all sense of how much we were outnumbered. Without a word to any but myself, out of the very warmth He felt from the Sun, and the burn on His mouth, with the reins hardly flogging our good horses, and Maat and Thebes no longer horses to me, but giants, may I say, in the bodies of horses this day, so did He gallop toward the largest circle of Hittites and at such a speed that we came to where they had put up the tent of the Hittite leaders, and in that place, before their phalanxes, alone with me again, my King approached their flags and standards. We were all but surrounded by a circle of the Asiatics’ chariots. Hera-Ra roared at them with such fury that I think each enemy was afraid to draw his bow for fear the lion might attack his face alone. I do not know why they did not charge, but there was peace for this moment on the battleground as if no one could move, and even Hera-Ra was silent at last.

“ ‘I am with Amon in the great battle,’ said Ramses the Second, ‘and when all is lost, so will He cause them to see Me as the two mighty arms of Amon who are Horus and Set. I am the Lord of Light,’ and He raised His sword until the sun glittered upon it, and then jumped down from His chariot, and walked ten steps toward the Hittite leaders.

“ ‘Tie the lion,’ He commanded me, and He waited, sword in hand, until I tethered Hera-Ra to our chariot. Then He held up the forefinger of His hand as a way of saying He wanted to fight their best soldier.

“From the Hittite leaders came forth a Prince with a terrible face. His beard was lean, and one eye was as flat as a stone, the other was bright. He, too, was dismounted, and in the moment Usermare saw him, I think my King was not at ease.

“They began to fight. The Hittite was fast and his movements were quicker than my Good and Great God. If this Prince had been as strong with his blade as my King, it would have ended soon, but Usermare attacked with such force that the other went back in a circle away from His great arm. Still, the Hittite’s parries blocked the sword of the Sun from above and below, and now, given the chance, he struck back. Behold, there was blood on my King’s leg. He limped now, and moved more slowly, and the look in His eye was not good. He breathed like a horse. I could not believe it—the sword of the Hittite grew bolder. Soon he began to attack, and my Lord retreat. The weight of all these hours of fighting was on His mouth, and, then, fending an overhead blow from the Prince, my Ramses’ nose was broken by His own shield. I thought He was lost, and it may be that He was, but the end of the fight was interrupted. For the lion had become so agitated that I had to cut him loose from the tether or he would have turned on the horses.

“The Hittite, seeing the beast bound toward him, lost no time running back to his own people, and, Usermare, much fatigued, leaned on His sword. The lion licked His face. A sound like the bellowing of hippopotami came forth from the Hittites, and I was certain they would charge us where we stood. If so, we were done. Usermare might not have the strength to lift His sword, and then the lion and I would be alone. Yet at that moment, a Hittite trumpet blew. I heard a call for their retreat. Now, to my astonishment, they moved out quickly, leaving their royal tent behind.

“I was certain of a trap. I could not believe they would leave such spoils for us. Not when they were so strong. Yet in the next moment, I saw their reason. The Division of Ptah had come on to the field at last. The phalanxes of its chariots were moving up fast from the south. So the Hittites were now in a rush to reach the gates of Kadesh before Ptah crossed the line of their retreat. We had been left alone on the field.

“I think my King had a vision then. It was other sights He saw. I can only tell you that He staggered across to the abandoned tent and emerged with a bull in His arms made of gold. It was the God of these Asiatics, and had great furled wings, and the face, not of a bull, but of a beautiful man with a long Syrian beard. It also had the pointed ears of a monster, and a castle in the shape of a tower was its hat. I had never seen a God like this. He was screaming now, in some harsh language of the Asiatics, a hideous host of lamentations, and must have been naming all the larger catastrophes, locusts and boils for being deserted by His troops. In truth, it was the most horrible voice I ever heard. It spoke through the blistered lips of my Pharaoh, the oaths resounding in Usermare’s throat until He threw the God to the ground. Whereupon fumes came from the mouth, yes, from the golden mouth of this bull-beast came smoke, I swear it. I did not know how my Pharaoh could be called the Mighty Bull of Amon, yet here before us was another bull, also a God, with wings, and a beard. It was then I saw the face of the secret whore of Kadesh. It was her features I saw on the winged bull, a beautiful woman’s face with a beard. So I knew that the cries of this voice came from Metella’s God. We were hearing His agony that the battle was lost. Maybe it is in war that you come to the place where the rainbow touches the earth, and much that has been hidden is simple.”