Chapter 37

I left Helen's bed before sunrise and silently padded through the door that

connected to my own room. The sky was just starting to turn gray and the room

was still dark, yet something made me halt in my tracks and hold my breath.

Just the faintest whisper of movement. The hairs on the back of my neck stood on

end. I remained stock-still, my eyes searching the darkness, trying to penetrate

the shadows. There was someone else in the room. I knew it. I sensed it. Still

straining to see, I recalled exactly the layout of the room, the placement of

the bed, the table, chairs, chests. The windows and the door to the hall...

A slight scraping sound, wood or metal against stone. I leaped at it, and banged

painfully into the blank wall. Recoiling backward, I staggered a step or two and

sat down on my rump with a heavy thud.

I had run against the wall precisely where one of the false windows was painted.

Was it actually a hidden door, so cleverly concealed that I could not discern

it?

I got slowly to my feet, aching at both ends of my spine. Someone had been in my

room, of that I was certain. An Egyptian, not the Golden One or one of the other

Creators. Sneaking around in the dark was not their style. Someone had been

spying on me—on us, Helen and me. Or going through my belongings.

A thief? I doubted it, and a swift check of my clothes and weapons showed that

nothing had been taken.

I dressed quickly, wondering if it was safe to leave Helen alone and sleeping,

wondering if the intruder wanted me to wonder about her and stay away from Lukka

and the parade ground. Nefertu had warned me about palace intrigues, and I was

thoroughly puzzled.

A scratching at my door. I yanked it open and Nefertu stood there, dressed and

smiling the polite meaningless smile that served as his way of facing the world.

After greeting him, I asked, "Is it possible to place a guard at Helen's door?"

He looked genuinely alarmed. "Why? Is something amiss?"

I told him what had happened. He looked skeptical, but strode off down the hall

to find the guard corporal. A few minutes later he returned with a guard, a

well-muscled black man dressed in a zebra-hide kilt with a sword belted around

his middle.

Feeling somewhat better, I went off to the parade ground outside the barracks.

Lukka had his two dozen men arrayed in a double file, their chain mail and armor

glistening with fresh oil, their helmets and swords polished like mirrors. Each

man also held an iron-tipped spear rigidly erect, at precisely ninety degrees to

the ground.

Nefertu introduced me to the Egyptian commander who was to inspect the Hittites.

His name was Raseth, a swarthy, heavyset, blustery old military man, bald and

blunt as a bullet, with arms that looked powerful despite his advancing years.

He limped slightly, as if the years had added too much weight to his body for

his bandy legs to carry.

"I've fought against Hittites," he said to no one in particular as he turned

toward the troops lined up for him, "I know how good they are."

Turning toward me, he tugged at the collar of his robe, pulled it down off his

left shoulder to reveal an ugly gash of a scar. "A gift from a Hittite spearman

at Meggido." He seemed proud of the wound.

Lukka stood at the head of his little band, his eyes staring straight ahead at

infinity. The men were like ramrods, silent and unblinking in the early sun.

Raseth walked up and down the two ranks, nodding and muttering to himself while

Nefertu and I stood off to one side, watching.

Finally Raseth turned abruptly and limped back toward us.

"They fought where?" he asked me.

I briefly described the sieges at Troy and Jericho.

Raseth nodded his head knowingly. He did not smile, he was not the type of

officer who smiled in front of troops.

"Engineers, eh? Well, we don't engage in many sieges," he said. "But they'll do.

They'll do fine. The king's army welcomes them."

That was the easiest part of the day.

From the barracks Nefertu led me across a wide empty courtyard. The morning sun

was just starting to feel hot against my back, throwing long shadows across the

smoothed dirt floor. Along the back wall of the courtyard I saw a cattle pen,

and a few humpbacked brahmas shuffling around, their tails flicking at flies.

The breeze was coming off the river, though, and I smelled jasmine and lemon

trees in the air.

"The royal offices," Nefertu pointed toward a set of buildings that looked to me

like temples. I noticed that he looked nervous, tense, for the first time in all

the long weeks I had known him. "Nekoptah will see us there."

We headed up a long, slowly rising rampway, flanked on either side by statues of

Ramesses II, all of them larger than life, each of them the same: a powerfully

muscled man striding forward, fists clenched at his sides, a strangely serene

smile on his handsome face. Not a flaw in body or face, perfectly symmetrical,

utterly balanced. The pink granite of the statues caught the morning sun and

looked almost like warm flesh.

I felt as if a living giant were gazing down at me. Or a god. One of the

Creators. Despite the sun's warmth, I shuddered.

At the end of the statue-lined ramp we turned left and passed a row of massive

sphinxes: reclining lion's bodies with the heads of bulls. Even reclining, the

sphinxes were as tall as I.

"The lion is the symbol of the sun," Nefertu explained. "The bull is Amon's

totem. These sphinxes represent the harmony of the gods."

Between the forepaws of each sphinx was a statue of—who else? At least these

were merely life-size.

"Are there no statues of Merneptah?" I asked.

Nefertu nodded his head. "Oh, yes, of course. But he reveres his illustrious

father as much as any man of the Two Kingdoms. Who would want to tear down

statues of Ramesses to replace them with his own? Not even the king would dare."

We approached a huge doorway, flanked on either side by two more colossal

statues of Ramesses: seated, this time, his hands filled with the staff of

office and the sheaf of wheat that symbolized fertility. I began to wonder what

it must be like to ascend to the throne after the reign of such a monarch.

"Merneptah and Nekoptah," I asked as we entered, at last, the cool shade of the

temple, "are they related by blood?"

Nefertu smiled tightly, almost grimly, I thought. "Yes. And they both revere

Ptah as their guardian and guide."

"Not Amon?"

"They revere Amon and all the gods, Orion. But Ptah is their special patron. The

city of Menefer was Ptah's special city. Merneptah has brought his worship here,

to the capital. Nekoptah is the chief priest of Ptah."

"Is there a statue of Ptah that I can see? What does he look like?"

"You will see soon enough." He said it almost crossly, as though irritated by my

questions, or fearful of something I did not understand.

We were striding through a vast hallway of tremendous columns, so tall that the

roof above us was lost in shadows. The floor was marble, the gigantic columns

themselves granite, as wide around as the mightiest tree. Guards in gleaming

gold armor stood spaced every few yards, but it seemed to me they were there for

ceremony and grandeur. There had been no need for armed men in this temple for a

thousand years. This huge chamber had been designed to dwarf human scale, to

overpower mere mortal men with its grandeur and immensity. It was a ploy that

haughty, powerful men used up and down the ages: utilizing architecture to bend

men's souls, to fill them with wonder, and admiration, and fear of the power

that had raised these mighty pillars.

A pair of glittering eyes stared at me from the deep shadows. I almost laughed.

Another of the palace's innumerable cats.

At the end of the awesome court we climbed up steps of black marble. Down

another corridor, this one lined with small statues of various gods bearing

heads of animals: a hawk, a jackal, a lion, even an anteater. At the end of the

corridor a giant statue stood in a special niche, its head almost touching the

ceiling.

"There is Ptah," said Nefertu, almost in a whisper.

The god's statue loomed before us, almost as huge as the colossi of Ramesses

outside the temple. A skylight in the roof far above us cast a shaft of sunlight

along the length of the statue's white stone. I saw a man's face, his body

wrapped in windings like a mummy, except that his hands were free and clasping a

long, elaborately worked staff. A skullcap covered his head, and a small beard

dangled from his chin. The face looked uncannily like that of the slim,

sarcastic Hermes I had last seen when I had briefly transported Joshua to the

Creators' realm.

Nefertu stopped at the foot of the giant statue, where incense smoldered in a

pair of braziers. He bowed three times, then took a pinch of something from the

golden pan between the braziers and threw it onto the embers at his left. The

stuff made a small burst of flame and sent white smoke spiraling toward the

distant ceiling.

"You must offer a sacrifice, also, Orion," he whispered to me.

Straight-faced, I went to the railing and tossed a pinch of incense onto the

brazier to my right. Its smoke was black. Turning back to Nefertu, I saw his

eyes following the dark billow. His face was not pleased at all.

"Did I do something wrong?" I asked.

"No," he said, his eyes still on the drifting smoke. "But sacred Ptah is

apparently not entirely happy with your offering."

I shrugged.

As he led me down a narrower corridor, past another pair of golden-armored

guards and to a massive door of ebony set into a deep, stone doorway, Nefertu

seemed distinctly nervous, filled with an anxiety he could not hide. Was he

apprehensive about meeting Nekoptah, or was it something I had done? Or had

failed to do?

Another guard stood before the door. Without a word he opened it for Nefertu.

We stepped through the doorway into a sizable room. Morning sunlight slanted

through three windows on our right. The room was absolutely bare of decorations:

the stone walls were as blank as a prison cell's. The floor was empty and

uncovered. Far at the other end of the room, next to its only other door, was a

long table heaped with rolled-up writing scrolls. Two huge silver candlesticks

stood at each end of the table, the candles in them unlit.

Behind the desk sat an enormously fat man, his head shaved bald, his huge

globulous body covered with a gray sleeveless robe that went to the floor. His

arms, flabby, thick, hairless, and pink as a baby pig, rested on the polished

wood of the table. Every finger and both his thumbs bore jeweled rings, some of

them so buried in flesh that they could not have been taken off in years. His

jowls were so huge that they cascaded down onto his chest and shoulders. I could

barely make out a pair of eyes embedded in that grossly corpulent face, studying

us as we crossed the long empty chamber to stand before his desk. His face was

painted: eyes lined with black kohl and daubed with green shadow above and below

them, his cheeks pink with rouge, his lips deep red.

Nefertu threw himself onto the floor and pressed his forehead against the bare

tiles. I remained standing, although I bowed slightly from the waist to show my

respect.

"O great Nekoptah," intoned Nefertu, from the floor, "high priest of dreaded

Ptah, right hand of mighty Merneptah, guide of the people, guardian of the Two

Lands, I bring you the barbarian Orion, as you commanded."

The high priest's fleshy painted lips curled in what might have been a smile.

"You may rise, Nefertu my servant. You have done well." His voice was a clear

sweet tenor. It sounded strange, such a lovely voice coming from such a gross,

ugly face. Then I realized that Nekoptah was a eunuch, one who had been

dedicated to the god's service in childhood.

Nefertu slowly climbed to his feet and stood beside me. His face was red,

whether from pressing it against the floor or from embarrassment at having done

so, I could not tell.

"And you, barbarian..."

"My name is Orion," I said.

Nefertu gasped at my effrontery. Nekoptah merely grunted.

"Orion, then," he granted. "My general Raseth tells me that your two dozen

Hittites will make a passable addition to our all-conquering army."

"They are fine men."

"I am not so easily satisfied, however," he said, his voice rising slightly.

"Raseth is of an age where he dwells in the past. I must look toward the future,

if I am to protect and guide our great king."

He eyed me carefully as he spoke, waiting for a reaction from me. I remained

silent.

"Therefore," he went on, "I have thought of a test that these recruits can

undertake."

Again he waited for a reply. Again I said nothing.

"You, Orion, will lead your men to the delta country, where the barbarian Sea

Peoples are raiding our coastal cities once again. One particularly troublesome

set of raiders flies a lion's-head emblem on their sails. You will find them and

destroy them, so that they will trouble the Lower Kingdom no longer."

Menalaos, I realized. Searching for Helen and ravaging the coastal cities,

looting as much as possible while he searches. Possibly with Agamemnon alongside

him.

"How many of these ships have been seen?" I asked.

Nekoptah seemed delighted that I had finally spoken. "Reports vary. At least

ten, possibly as many as two dozen."

"And you expect two dozen soldiers to conquer two dozen shiploads of Achaians?"

"You will have other soldiers with you. I will see to that."

I shook my head. "With all respect, my lord..."

"Your holiness," Nefertu whispered.

It took an effort to get the words past my gag reflex. "With all respect—your

holiness—I did not intend to stay with the Hittites once they were accepted into

your army."

"Your intentions are of little interest," said Nekoptah. "The needs of the

kingdom are paramount."

Ignoring that, I continued, "I came here as escort to the Queen of Sparta, the

lady Helen..."

"Escort?" He smirked. "Or consort?"

I could feel the blood rising in me. With a deliberate effort I calmed myself,

constricted capillaries that would have colored my face.

Softly, I said, "So someone was spying on us in our rooms."

Nekoptah threw his head back and laughed. "Orion, do you think the king's chief

minister will allow strangers into the palace without keeping watch on them?

Every breath you take has been observed—even the dagger you carry hidden beneath

your kilt was seen and reported to me."

I nodded acquiescence of the fact, knowing that there were armed guards standing

on the other side of the door behind the priest's desk, ready to defend their

master or slay us at the slightest word from him. Yet there was one thing that

Nekoptah did not know, for he had never observed me in action: I could tear out

his throat before the guards could open that door. And I could kill three or

four armed men, too, if I had to.

"I've been carrying it for so long now that it seems a part of my body," I said

meekly. "I'm sorry if it causes offense."

Nekoptah waved a fleshy hand, the rings on his fingers glittering in the morning

sunlight. "The chief priest of almighty Ptah is not afraid of a dagger," he said

grandly.

Nefertu shuffled his feet nervously, as if he wished he were somewhere else.

"As I was saying," I resumed, "I came here as escort to the lady Helen, Queen of

Sparta, princess of the fallen Troy. She wishes to reside in the Kingdom of the

Two Lands. She has wealth enough so that she would not be a burden on the

state..."

Nekoptah waggled a fat hand impatiently, a movement hard enough to make his

mountainous jowls quiver like ripples in a lake.

"Spare me the dull recitation of facts I already know," he said impatiently.

Again I struggled to keep my anger from showing.

Pointing a stubby thick finger at me, Nekoptah said, "This is what the king

wishes you to do, Orion. You will take your men downriver to the delta, seek out

these barbarian raiders, and destroy them. That is the price for accepting your

Queen of Sparta into our city."

Kill Helen's husband in return for her safety in Egypt's capital. I thought it

over for a moment, then asked: "And who will protect the lady while I am away?"

"She will be under the protection of the all-seeing Ptah, Architect of the

Universe, Lord of the Sky and Stars."

"And mighty Ptah's representative here among mortals is yourself, is it not?" I

asked.

He dipped his chins in acknowledgment.

"Will the lady be allowed to meet the king? Will she live in his house,

protected by his servants?"

"She will live in my house," Nekoptah said, "protected by me. Surely you don't

fear my intentions toward your—queen."

"I promised to deliver her to the King of Egypt," I insisted, "not the king's

chief minister."

Again Nefertu drew in his breath, as if expecting an explosion. But Nekoptah

merely said mildly, "Do you not trust me, Orion?"

I replied, "You wish me to lead troops against the Achaian invaders of your

land. I wish my lady to meet the king and dwell under his protection."

"You speak as if you had some power of bargaining. You have none. You will do as

you are told. If you please the king, your request will be granted."

"If I please the king," I said, "it will be because the king's chief minister

tells him to be pleased."

A wide, smug smile spread across Nekoptah's painted face, "Precisely, Orion. We

understand one another."

I tacitly acknowledged defeat. For the moment. "Will the lady Helen be permitted

to see the king, as she wishes?"

His smile even broader, Nekoptah answered, "Of course. His royal majesty expects

to sup with the Queen of Sparta this very evening. You yourself may be

invited—if we are in complete agreement."

For Helen's sake I bowed my head slightly. "We are," I said.

"Good!" His voice could not boom, it was too high. But it rang off the stone

walls of the audience chamber, nonetheless.

I glanced at Nefertu out of the corner of my eye. He seemed immensely relieved.

"You may go," said Nekoptah. "A messenger will bring you your invitation to

supper, Orion."

We started to turn toward the door.

But the high priest said, "One thing more. A small detail. On your way back from

crushing the invaders, you must stop at Menefer and bring me the chief priest of

Amon."

Nefertu paled. His voice quavered. "The chief priest of Amon?"

Almost jovially, Nekoptah replied, "The very same. Bring him here. To me." His

smile remained fixed on his fleshy lips, but both his hands had squeezed

themselves into fists.

I asked, "How will he know that we represent you?"

Laughing, he answered, "He will have no doubt of it, never fear. But—to convince

the temple troops who guard his worthless carcass..."

He wormed a massive gold ring off his left thumb. It was set with a blood-red

carnelian that bore a miniature carving of Ptah. "Here. This will convince any

doubters that you act by my command."

The ring felt heavy and hot in my hand. Nefertu stared at it as if it were

someone's death warrant.

 

Chapter 38

OBVIOUSLY, Nefertu had been shaken by our meeting with the king's chief

minister. He was silent as we were escorted back to my apartment, far across the

complex of temples and palaces that made up the capitol.

I remained silent, also, trying to piece together the parts of the puzzle. Like

it or not, I was in the middle of some sort of convoluted palace conspiracy;

Nekoptah was using me for his own purposes, and I doubted that they coincided

with the best interests of the Kingdom of the Two Lands.

One glance at Nefertu told me he would offer no hint of explanation. He was

ashen-faced as we walked between the gold-armored guards down the long corridors

and lofty colonnaded courts of the capitol, with their cats skulking in the

shadows. His hands trembled at his sides. His mouth was a thin line, lips

pressed together so hard that they were white.

We reached my apartment and I invited him inside.

He shook his head. "I'm afraid there are other matters I must attend to."

"Just for a moment," I said. "There's something I want to show you. Please."

He dismissed the guards and entered my room, his eyes showing fear, not

curiosity.

I knew we were being watched. Somewhere along the walls there was a cunningly

contrived peephole, and a spy in the employ of the chief priest of Ptah

observing us. I took Nefertu out onto the terrace, where a pair of rope-sling

chairs overlooked the busy courtyard and rustling palm trees.

I needed to know what Nefertu knew, what was in his mind. He would not tell me

willingly, I could see that. So I had to pry into his mind whether he wanted me

to or not. Perhaps somewhere beneath the surface of his rigid self-control I

could reach the part of his mind that was searching for an ally against whatever

it was that was frightening him.

The poor man sat on the front inch of his chair, his back ramrod straight, his

hands clasped on his knees. I pulled my chair up close to his and put my hand

across his thin shoulder. I could feel the tenseness in the tendons of his neck.

"Try to relax," I said softly, keeping my voice low so that whoever was watching

could not hear.

I kneaded the back of his neck with one hand while staring deeply into his eyes.

"We have known each other for many weeks, Nefertu. I have come to admire and

respect you. I want you to think of me as your friend."

His chin dipped slightly. "You are my friend," he agreed.

"You know me well enough to realize that I will not harm you. Nor will I

knowingly harm your people, the people of the Two Lands."

"Yes," he said drowsily. "I know."

"You can trust me."

"I can trust you."

Slowly, slowly I forced his body and his mind to relax. He was almost asleep,

even though his eyes were open and he could speak to me. His conscious mind, his

willpower, were allayed. He was a frightened man, and he badly needed a friend

he could trust. I convinced him not only that he could trust me, but that he

must tell me what it was that was frightening him.

"That's the only way I can help you, my friend."

His eyes closed briefly. "I understand, friend Orion."

Gradually I got him to talk, in a low monotone that I hoped could not be

overheard by Nekoptah's spies. The story he unfolded was as convoluted as I had

feared. And it spelled danger. Not merely for me: I was inured to danger and it

held no real terror over me. But Helen had inadvertently stepped into a trap

that Nekoptah had cunningly devised. Loathe him though I did, I had to admire

the quick adroitness of his mind, and respect the strength and speed with which

he moved.

It had been whispered up and down the length of the kingdom—so Nefertu told

me—that King Merneptah was dying. Some said it was the wasting disease; others

whispered that he was being poisoned. Be that as it may, the true power of the

throne was being wielded by the king's chief minister, the obese Nekoptah.

The army was loyal to the king, not a priest of Ptah. But the army itself was

weak and divided. Its days of glory under Ramesses II were long gone. Merneptah

had allowed the army to erode to the point where most of the troops were

foreigners and most of the generals were pompous old windbags living on past

victories. Where the army had slaughtered the Sea Peoples who raided the delta

in Ramesses's time, now the barbarians sacked cities and terrified the Lower

Kingdom, and the army seemed unable to stop them.

Nekoptah did not want a strong army. It would be an obstacle to his control of

the king and the kingdom. Yet he could not allow the Sea Peoples to continually

raid the delta country; the Lower Kingdom would rise up against him if he could

not defend them adequately. So the chief priest of Ptah hit upon a brilliant

plan: send the newly arrived Hittite contingent against the Sea Peoples, as part

of a new army expedition to the delta. Let the barbarian leaders see that the

man who stole Helen from the Achaian victors at Troy was now in Egypt. Let them

know that, just as they suspected, Helen was under the protection of the Kingdom

of the Two Lands.

And let them know, by secret messenger, that Helen would be returned to them—if

they stopped their raids on the delta. Even more: Nekoptah was prepared to offer

Menalaos and his Achaians a part of the rich delta country as their own, if they

would guard the Lower Kingdom against attacks from other Peoples of the Sea.

But first Menalaos had to be certain that Helen actually was in Egypt. For that,

Orion and his Hittites would be sent into the delta as sacrificial lambs, to be

slaughtered by the barbarians.

And more.

Unrest against Nekoptah's usurpation of power was already being felt in the city

of Menefer, the ancient capital, where the great pyramids proclaimed the worship

of Amon. The chief priest of Amon, Hetepamon by name, was the main plotter

against Nekoptah. Should Orion get out of the battles of the delta alive, he was

to bring Hetepamon back to Wast with him. As a guest, if possible. As a

prisoner, if necessary.

Of course, if Orion should be killed by the Sea Peoples, as seemed likely,

someone else would be sent to pluck Hetepamon from his temple and bring him to

the power of Nekoptah.

A neat scheme, worthy of a cunning mind.

I leaned back in my chair and relaxed my mental grip on Nefertu's mind. He

sagged slightly, then took in a deep breath of revivifying air. He blinked,

shook his head groggily, then smiled at me.

"Did I fall asleep?"

"You drowsed a bit," I said.

"How odd."

"It was a very tense meeting this morning."

He got to his feet and stretched. Looking out over the courtyard below us, he

saw that the sun was nearly setting.

"I must have slept for hours!" Turning to me, he looked genuinely puzzled. "How

boring that must have been for you."

"I was not bored."

With a testing, tentative shake of his head, Nefertu said, "The rest seems to

have done me good. I feel quite refreshed."

I was pleased. He was too honest a man to carry the burden of Nekoptah's

scheming within his mind, without a friend to share the problem.

But Nefertu still looked slightly puzzled when he took his leave of me. I asked

him to meet me for breakfast the next morning, so I could tell him about our

royal evening.

Supper with the King of Egypt, the mightiest ruler of the world, the pharaoh who

had driven the Israelites out of his country, was a strange, disquieting affair.

Helen was tremendously excited about meeting the great king. She spent the

entire afternoon with female servants running about, bathing and scenting her,

tying her hair in piles of golden curls, making up her beautiful face with kohl

for her eyes and rouge for her cheeks and lips. She dressed in her finest

flounced skirt of golden threads and tinkling silver tassels, decked herself

with necklaces and bracelets and rings that gleamed in the lamplight as the last

rays of the sun died against a violet western sky.

I wore a fresh leather kilt, a gift from Nefertu, and a crisp white linen shirt,

also provided by the Egyptian. I strapped my dagger to my thigh as a matter of

course.

Helen opened the door that connected our two rooms and stood in the doorway,

practically trembling with anticipation.

"Do I look fit to meet the king?" she asked.

I smiled and replied truthfully, "The proper question would be, is the King of

Egypt fit to meet the most beautiful woman in the world?"

She smiled back at me. I went to her, but she held me at arm's length. "Don't

touch me! I'll smudge or wrinkle!"

I threw my head back and laughed. It was the last laughter to come from me.

An escort of a full dozen gold-clad guards took us through narrow corridors and

flights of stairs that seemed to have no pattern to them except to confuse one

who did not know the way by heart. Thinking back to my morning's meeting with

Nekoptah, and to what Nefertu had unknowingly revealed to me, I realized that

Helen and I were truly prisoners of the chief priest, rather than guests of the

king.

Instead of a magnificent dining hall filled with laughing guests and

entertainers who regaled the company with song and dance while servants carried

in massive trays heaped high with food and poured wine from golden pitchers,

Merneptah's supper was a quiet affair in a small windowless chamber.

Helen and I were brought by the guards to a plain wooden door. A servant opened

it and beckoned us into the smallish room. We were the first there. The table

was set for four. A chandelier of gleaming copper hung above the table. Serving

tables stood flat against the walls.

The servant bowed to us and left by the room's only other door, set in the

farther wall.

Once again I felt the hairs on the back of my neck rise. We were being watched,

I knew. There were paintings on the walls, scenes of royal hunts with the

king—drawn much larger than everyone else—spearing lions and leopards. I saw the

glint of coal-black eyes where a lion's tawny ones should be.

"Is hospitality in Sparta so cold that the king would leave his guests alone in

a room without food or drink or entertainment?" I asked Helen.

"No," she said, in a small voice. She seemed vastly disappointed.

The door from the hall opened and fat Nekoptah waddled through, covered by a

white floor-length robe that looked like a tent. He was decked in almost as many

jewels as Helen and the paint on his face was much heavier. I had warned Helen

about his appearance, and my estimation of him. He had heard every word I had

spoken, I could tell from the nasty expression he gave me.

"Forgive the informality of this evening," he said to us. "Later, we will

arrange a proper state dinner for the Queen of Sparta. Tonight, the king merely

wishes to meet you and welcome you to the Kingdom of the Two Lands."

He reached for Helen's hand and brought it to his lips. She kept herself from

cringing, but just barely.

Nekoptah clapped his hands once, and a servant immediately came from the farther

door with a tray of wine goblets.

We had barely tasted the wine, a sweetish red that Nekoptah said was imported

from Crete, when the hall door opened again and a guard announced: "His royal

majesty, King of the Two Lands, beloved of Ptah, guardian of the people, son of

the Nile."

Instead of the king, though, six priests in gray robes entered the room, bearing

copper censers that filled the room with smoky, pungent incense. They chanted in

an ancient tongue and made a mini-procession around the table three times,

praising Ptah and his servant on Earth, Merneptah. As they left, six guards in

golden armor marched in and lined themselves along the wall, three on each side

of the doorway, and froze into blank-faced immobility. Each of them held a spear

that almost touched the ceiling. Then came two harpists and four beautiful young

women bearing peacock-plume fans. In their midst walked the King of Egypt,

Merneptah.

He was a man of middle years, his hair still dark. Slim of body and small in

stature, he walked slightly bent over, as if stooped with age or cares—or pain.

He wore a sleeveless robe of white decorated with gold embroidery around its

border. His skin was much lighter than any Egyptian I had met. Unlike his chief

minister, the king wore no adornments except for a small golden medallion

bearing the symbol of Ptah on a slim chain about his neck, and copper bracelets

on his wrists.

It was his eyes that troubled me. They seemed clouded, unsteady, almost

unseeing. As if his thoughts were turned almost totally inward. As if the world

around him was not important, an annoyance, an impediment to what he considered

truly important.

I glanced down at Helen, standing beside me. She had caught it too.

The two harpers and the fan-bearing women bowed low to their king and left the

room. One of the guards out in the hall closed the door and we were alone,

except for the six guards lining the wall like statues. I knew that I would be

seated with my back to them, and that did not please me.

Introductions were polite but perfunctory. Helen curtsied prettily for the king,

who seemed completely indifferent to her beauty—even to her presence. I bowed

and he mumbled something to me about the barbarians from the sea.

We sat at table and servants brought us a cold soup and platters offish. The

king ate almost nothing. Nekoptah ate enough for all four of us.

Conversation was desultory. Nekoptah did most of the talking, and most of it was

about how the worship of Ptah was being resisted by fanatics who were trying to

reinstate the madness of Akhenaten.

"Especially in Menefer," complained Nekoptah, while gobbling a morsel of fish.

"The priests there are trying to bring back the worship of Aten."

"I thought it was Amon they glorified," I said, "rather than Aten."

"Yes," said Helen. "We saw the Eye of Amon on the great pyramid there."

Nekoptah frowned. "They say it is Amon they reverence, but secretly they are

trying to bring back Akhenaten's heresies. If they are not stopped, and stopped

soon, they will plunge the Two Lands into turmoil once again."

The king nodded absently, picking at his food.

With me translating for her, Helen tried to engage him in conversation, asking

about his wife and children. The king merely stared past her.

"His majesty's wife died last year in childbirth," said Nekoptah.

"Oh, I'm sorry..."

"The baby died also."

"How awful!"

The king seemed to make an effort to focus his eyes on her. "I have one son," he

muttered.

"Prince Aramset," interjected Nekoptah. "A comely lad. He will make a fine king,

one day." But his face clouded, and he added, "Of course, his royal majesty has

many other fine sons by his royal concubines, as well."

Merneptah lapsed into silence again. Helen glared at the fat priest.

And so it went through the whole supper. At last it was finished and the king

bade us good night and left. I noticed that Nekoptah barely bowed to his king;

not that he could have gotten far, as fat as he was.

As the guards escorted us back to our quarters, I asked Helen, "Do you think the

king is ill?"

Her face showed how troubled she felt. "No, Orion. He is drugged. I have seen it

before. That fat beast is keeping him drugged so that he can control the kingdom

for himself."

I was glad that she spoke only Achaian and the guards could not understand her.

At least, I hoped that they could not.

The situation was painfully clear to me. Nekoptah was in control of the capital

and the king. He was using me to set up a deal that would trade Helen for the

security of the delta country against the Sea Peoples. For good measure, he was

going to remove the chief priest of Amon and tighten his hold on the entire

kingdom.

To guarantee that I do as he wished, Nekoptah would hold Helen hostage in the

capital, not realizing that I knew he intended to hand her back to Menalaos.

And the Golden One had made a fortress for himself inside the great pyramid.

It all looked hopelessly snarled. Until I saw that with one stroke I could cut

the knot. Like a message sent by some god, a plan took shape in my mind. By the

time Helen and I had returned to our apartments, I knew what I had to do.

 

Chapter 39

I had not expected the prince of the realm to join our expedition downriver. As

Lukka and his men marched aboard the boat that would take us to the Lower

Kingdom, a sedan chair flanked by a guard of honor was carried by six sweating

Nubians slowly down the stone pier and stopped at our gangplank. A young man

pushed the curtains aside and stepped lithely from the chair, slim, well

muscled, and as light of skin as Merneptah and the priests I had seen.

His name was Aramset: the only legitimate son of the king. He was barely old

enough to have a bit of down fuzzing his chin. He was a handsome lad, a good

indication of what his father must have looked like as a teenager. He seemed

eager to take part in a war.

The nominal leader of our expedition, the limping, overweight General Raseth,

bowed low to the prince and then introduced me to him.

"We're going to slaughter the barbarians," Aramset said, laughing. "My father

wants me to learn the arts of war, so that I will understand them when I rule."

He seemed pleasant enough. But inwardly I knew that Nekoptah had arranged this

royal addition to our expedition. If the prince happened to get himself killed

in battle, and there was no other legitimate heir to the throne, it strengthened

his grip on the power of the kingdom even further.

Again I had to admire Nekoptah's cunning.

I had taken leave of Helen that morning, trusting her safety to the care of

Nefertu. She did not fully understand all the machinations swirling around us,

but she sensed that schemes within schemes were taking me away from her.

"Menalaos still seeks me," she said, as I held her in my arms.

"He is hundreds of miles away," I said.

She leaned her golden head against my chest. "Orion, sometimes I think that it

is my destiny to return to him. No matter what I do, he still pursues me, like

the hounds of fate."

I said nothing.

"He will kill you if you do battle against him," she said.

"No, I don't think so. And I don't really want to kill him, either."

She pushed away from me slightly and gazed up into my eyes. "Will I ever see you

again, my protector?"

"Of course."

But she shook her head. "No. I don't think so. I think this is our final

farewell, Orion." There were tears in her eyes.

"I will come back," I said.

"But not to me. You will seek your goddess and forget about me."

I was silent for a moment, thinking to myself that she was right. Then I said,

"No one could ever forget you, Helen. Your beauty will live through all the

ages."

She tried to smile. I kissed her one last time, knowing that someone was

watching us, and then bade her good-bye.

Nefertu accompanied me to the docks, and I asked the slim old man to watch over

Helen and protect her against the intrigues of the palace.

"I will, my friend," he said. "I will guard her honor and her life."

So, as our boat pushed off from the dock with the early morning sun slanting

through the obelisks and monumental statues of the capital, I waved a final

salute to Nefertu, knowing in my heart that one gray-haired minor functionary

would never be able to protect anyone—even himself—against the growing power of

Nekoptah. My only hope was to do what I had to do quickly, and get back to the

capital to deal with the fat chief minister before he could cause harm to Helen

or my newfound Egyptian friend.

I scanned the palace buildings as our boat glided out into the Nile's strong

current, looking for a terrace where a golden-haired woman might be waving to

me. But I saw no one.

"So we begin to earn our pay."

I turned abruptly and saw Lukka standing beside me, his dour face set in a tight

smile. He was glad to be away from the palace and heading toward battle, where a

man knew who his enemies were and how to deal with them.

Aramset turned out to be a pleasant young man who laughed to hide his

nervousness. General Raseth bustled about the boat constantly, hovering over the

royal heir until the prince made it clear he would rather be treated as one of

the regular officers.

Strangely, Lukka and the prince seemed to get along very well. The youngster

genuinely admired the battle-scarred professional soldier, and seemed eager to

learn all he could from him.

One hot afternoon, as the oarsmen paddled us past the ruins of Akhenaten, I

heard Lukka telling the prince, "All that I have spoken to you in the past days

means nothing, compared to the experience of battle. When the enemy comes

charging at you, screaming their war cries and leveling their spears at your

chest, then you'll find out whether your blood is thick enough for war. Only

then."

Aramset stared at Lukka with great round eyes and followed the Hittite soldier

around the boat like a faithful puppy.

Our boat carried fifty soldiers, and it was powered by sixty oarsmen: slaves,

many of them black Nubians. Since we were sailing downriver, the Nile's own

powerful current did the heaviest work for us.

Dozens of other boats joined us as we headed for the delta. At each city where

we tied up overnight there were more soldiers waiting to join our expedition,

and boats to carry them. I began to see the true power of Egypt, the

organization that could bring together a fleet carrying the men and materiel for

a mighty armed force that could strike over distances of hundreds of miles.

But I wondered which of the men on our own boat were spies for Nekoptah? Which

were assassins? How many of the troops on the other boats had been ordered to

fall back, once battle had begun, and let me and my Hittites be cut to pieces by

the barbarian raiders? I knew I could trust no one except Lukka and, through

him, his two dozen soldiers.

Over those long hot days and dark warm nights I got to know Prince Aramset.

There was much more to him than a laughing, nervous youngster.

"I want Lukka and his Hittites to be my personal guard, once we return to Wast,"

he told me one evening, as we dawdled over the remains of supper.

We were tied to the pier of one of the cities that dotted the riverbank, rocking

gently in the eddies of the main current. It was an oppressively hot, still

night, and we ate on the open afterdeck of the boat, desperate to catch any

stray breeze that might waft by. A slave slowly swept a palm-leaf fan over our

heads to keep the mosquitoes away. General Raseth had fallen asleep at the

table, drowsing over his empty wine cup. The prince never took wine; he drank

clear water only.

"You couldn't pick a better, more loyal man, your highness," I said.

"I will pay you handsomely for them."

He had pride, this teenager. But I answered, "My prince, allow me to make you a

gift of them. I know that Lukka would be pleased to serve you, and it would

please me to make the two of you happy."

He nodded slightly, as if he had expected no less. "Yet, Orion, I shouldn't

accept such a valuable gift without offering something in return."

"The friendship of the crown prince of the Two Lands is a gift beyond price," I

said.

He smiled at that. Deliberately, I poured a cup of wine from the little Raseth

had left and offered it to him.

He refused with a slight wave of his hand.

"To seal our bargain," I suggested.

"I never drink wine."

"You don't like its taste?"

His face turned sour. "I have seen what wine has done to my father. Wine—and

other things."

"He is not sick, then?"

"Only in his soul. Since my mother died, my father wastes away within himself."

There was bitterness in his voice. He was out to prove to his father that he

could be a worthy heir.

As delicately as I could, I asked about Nekoptah.

Aramset eyed me carefully. "The high priest of Ptah and the chief minister to

the king is a very powerful man, Orion. Even I must speak of him with great

respect."

"I understand his power," I said. "Will you keep him as your chief minister when

you become king?"

"My father lives," the prince said flatly. No trace of anger at my presumption.

No trace of rancor toward Nekoptah. He had learned to hide his emotions well,

this young man.

"Yet," I pressed, "if your father should become unable to rule, through sickness

or melancholy—would you be appointed to rule in his place, or would Nekoptah act

for him?"

For long moments Aramset said nothing. His dark eyes bored into me, as if trying

to see how far he could trust this stranger from a distant land.

Finally he said, "Nekoptah is perfectly capable of administering the kingdom. He

is doing so now, with my father's approval."

There was no sense pressing him further. He was wise enough not to say anything

against Nekoptah that might be overheard. But I thought he did not like the fat

chief minister very much. His hands had balled themselves into fists at my first

mention of him and remained tightly clenched until he bade me good night and

walked off to his cabin.

We reached the delta country at last, rich with green farmlands, crisscrossed by

irrigation canals, lush with beautiful long-legged birds of snowy white and

delicate pink. The local garrison commanders conferred with General Raseth and

told him that the Sea Peoples had taken several villages near the mouth of a

western arm of the river. They estimated the number of barbarian warriors at

more than a thousand.

That evening, the general, Prince Aramset, and I took supper together in the

small cabin atop the boat's afterdeck. Raseth was in a jovial mood as he dug

into the stewed fish and onions.

"Make allowance for the local troops' natural exaggerations," he said, reaching

for the wine pitcher, "and we have nothing more than a few hundred barbarians to

deal with."

"While we have more than a thousand trained men," said the prince.

Raseth nodded. "It's simply a matter of finding the barbarians and hitting them

before they can scatter or get back to their ships."

I thought of the Achaian camp along the beach at Troy. I wondered if Odysseus or

Big Ajax would be among my enemies.

"The horses and chariots are coming up on the supply ships," Raseth was

muttering to no one in particular. "In a few days' time we will be ready to

strike."

I looked at him from across the supper table. "Strike where? Are you certain the

barbarians will still be in the villages where they were seen several days ago?"

Raseth scratched at his chin. "Hmm. They could move off elsewhere in their

ships, couldn't they?"

"Yes. Using the sea, they could move quickly across the breadth of the delta and

strike a hundred miles away before we know they've pulled out."

"Then we need scouts to keep watch on them," said Aramset.

The general beamed at his young prince. "Excellent!" he roared. "You will make a

fine conquering general one day, your highness."

Then they both turned to me. Raseth said, "Orion, you and your Hittites will

scout the villages where the barbarians were last seen. If they have gone, you

will return here and tell us. If they are still there, you will keep them under

observation until the main body of our army arrives."

Before I could say anything, Prince Aramset added, "And I will go with you!"

The general shook his blunt, bullet-shaped head. "That is far too great a risk

to take, your highness."

Especially if I'm betrayed to Menalaos by one of Nekoptah's spies, I thought.

Was Raseth working for Nekoptah? What secret orders did he carry in his head?

Prince Aramset was not pleased at being balked. "My father sent me on this

expedition to learn of war. I will not sit in the rear safely while others are

doing the fighting."

"When the fighting commences, your highness, you will be by my side," General

Raseth said. "Those are my instructions." He added, "From the king's own lips."

Aramset was taken aback. But only for a moment. "Well, in the meantime, I can

accompany Orion and his men on this scouting mission."

"I cannot allow that, sir," the general replied.

The youngster turned to me. "I'll stay beside Lukka. He won't let any harm come

to me."

As gently as I could, I replied, "But what harm may come to Lukka, when he has

you to look after and neglects his other duties?"

The prince stared at me, his mouth open to answer, yet no words coming forth. He

was a goodhearted youth, and he genuinely loved Lukka. His only problem was that

he was young, and like all young men, he could not visualize himself being hurt,

or maimed, or killed.

Raseth took advantage of the prince's silence. "Orion," he said, his voice

suddenly deep with the authority of command, "you will take your men overland to

the villages where the barbarians were last seen, and report their movements to

me by sun-mirror. You will leave tomorrow at dawn."

"And me?" the prince asked.

"You will stay here with me, your highness. The chariots and horses will soon

arrive. There will be battle enough to satisfy any man within a few days."

I nodded grim agreement.

It was a two-day march from the riverbank where our boat had tied up to the

coastal village where the black-hulled Achaian ships lay pulled up on the beach.

The land was flat and laced with irrigation canals, but the fields were broad

enough to allow chariot warfare, if you did not mind tearing up the crops

growing in them. Lukka had the men camp along the edge of one of the larger

canals, by a bridge that could easily be held by a couple of determined men or,

failing that, burned so that pursuers would have to either wade across the canal

or find the next bridge, a mile or so away.

Then he and I crossed the bridge and made our way through the fields of

knee-high wheat, tossing in the breeze, until we came to the edge of the

village. It lay along the beach, and I saw dozens of small fishing boats tied up

to weathered wooden piers. The Achaian warships were up on the sand, tents and

makeshift shacks dotted around them, smoke from cook fires sending thin tendrils

of gray toward the sky.

Despite the breeze coming in from the sea, the morning was hot, and the sun

burned on our backs as we lay at the edge of the wheat field and watched the

activity in the village. None of the ships bore the blue dolphin's head of

Ithaca, and I found myself happy that Odysseus was not there.

"There's only eight ships here," said Lukka.

"Either the others have moved on to other villages, or they've returned to

Argos."

"Why would some of them return and leave the others here?"

"Menalaos seeks his wife," I said. "He won't return without her."

"He can't fight his way through all of Egypt with a few hundred men."

"Perhaps he's waiting for reinforcements," I said. "He may have sent his other

ships back to Argos to bring the main body of Achaian warriors here."

Lukka shook his head. "Even with every warrior in Argos he wouldn't be able to

reach the capital."

"No," I admitted, speaking the words as the ideas formed in my mind. "But if he

can cause enough destruction here in the delta, where most of Egypt's food is

grown, then he might be able to force the Egyptians to give him what he wants."

"The woman?"

I hesitated. "The woman—for his pride. And something more, I think."

Lukka gave me a quizzical look.

"Power," I said. "His brother Agamemnon has taken control of the straits that

lead to the Sea of Black Waters. Menalaos seeks to gain similar power here in

Egypt."

It sounded right to me. It had to be right. My whole plan depended on it.

"But how do you know those are Menalaos's ships?" the ever-practical Lukka

asked. "Their sails are furled, their masts down. They might be the ships of

some other Achaian king or princeling."

I agreed with him. "That is why I'm going into the Achaian camp tonight—to see

if Menalaos is truly there."

 

Chapter 40

IF Lukka objected to my plan, he kept his doubts to himself. We returned to our

camp by the canal, ate a small meal while the sun set, and then I started back

to the village and the Achaian camp.

The villagers seemed to be living with the invading barbarians without friction.

They had little choice, of course, but as I picked my way through the darkness I

sensed none of the tenseness of a village under occupation by a hostile force.

None of the mud-brick houses seemed burned. There were no troops posted to guard

duty anywhere. The villagers seemed to have retired to their homes for a night's

rest without worrying about their daughters or their lives.

There were no signs of a battle having been fought, nor even a skirmish. If

anything, the Achaians seemed to have set up a long-term occupation here. They

had not come for raping and pillaging. They had something more permanent in

mind.

Good, I thought. So did I.

I made my way down the shadowy streets of the village, twisting and twining

under the cold light of a crescent moon. The wind was warm now, blowing from

landward, making the palms and fruit trees sigh. Somewhere a dog barked. I heard

no cries or lamentations, no screams of terror. It was a quiet, peaceful

village—with a few hundred heavily armed warriors camped along the beach.

Their campfires smoldered in front of each ship. A line of chariots, their yoke

poles pointing starward, rested on the far side of the camp, near the rude

fencing of the horse corral. A few men slept on the ground, wrapped in blankets,

but most of them were inside their tents or the rude lean-tos they had

constructed. A trio of guards loafed at the only fire that still blazed. They

seemed relaxed rather than alert, like men who had been posted guards as a

matter of form, rather than for true security.

I headed straight toward them.

One of them spotted me approaching and said a word to his two companions. They

were not alarmed. Slowly they picked up their long spears and got to their feet

to face me.

"Who are you and what do you want?" the leader called to me.

I came close enough for them to recognize my face in the firelight. "I am Orion,

of the House of Ithaca."

That surprised them.

"Ithaca? Has Odysseus come here? The last we heard he had been lost at sea."

They lowered their spear points as I came to within arm's reach of them. "The

last I saw of Odysseus was on the beach at Ilios," I said. "I have been

traveling overland ever since."

One of them began to remember. "You were the one who had the storyteller for a

slave."

"The blasphemer that Agamemnon blinded."

An old anger rose inside me. "Yes," I replied. "The one Agamemnon blinded. Is

the High King here?"

They looked uneasily at one another. "No. This is the camp of Menalaos."

"Are there no other Achaian lords with him?"

"Not yet. But soon there will be. Menalaos is mad with rage since his wife ran

away from him after Troy fell. He swears he won't leave this land until she is

returned to him."

"If I were you, Orion," said the third one, "I'd run as far from this camp as I

could. Menalaos believes you took Helen from him."

I ignored his warning. "How does he know she is in Egypt?"

The leader of the trio shrugged. "From what I hear, he's had a message from some

high and mighty Egyptian, telling him that the lady Helen has come here. They're

holding her in some palace someplace."

"That's what they say," another of the guards agreed.

The story that Nefertu had unknowingly revealed to me was stunningly accurate.

Nekoptah must have sent word to Menalaos as soon as Nefertu had reported Helen's

presence in Egypt, months ago. Of course Nefertu had recognized that she was an

important woman of the Achaian nobility; he had finally told me as much. And

Nekoptah, wily scoundrel that he was, immediately saw how he could use Helen as

bait to bring Menalaos and the other warlords of the Sea Peoples into his own

service.

I said, "Take me to Menalaos. I have important news to tell him."

"The king is asleep. Wait until morning. Don't be in such a hurry to get

yourself killed."

I debated within myself. Should I insist on waking Menalaos? They were giving me

a chance to escape his anger. Should I go back to Lukka and our camp, then

return in the morning? I decided to wait here at the beach and get a few hours'

sleep. Menalaos's wrath seemed of little consequence.

They looked at me askance, but found a blanket for me and left me to sleep. I

stretched out on the sand and closed my eyes.

To find myself in a strange chamber, surrounded by machines with blinking lights

and screens that showed colored curving lines pulsing across them. The entire

ceiling glowed with a cool light that cast no shadows.

I turned and saw the sharp-featured Creator I had dubbed Hermes. As before, he

was clad in a glittering silver metallic uniform from chin to boots. He dipped

his pointed chin once in greeting.

Without preamble he asked, "Have you found him yet?"

"No," I lied, hoping that he could not see my mind.

He arched a brow. "Really? In all the time you've been in Egypt, you have no

idea where he's hiding?"

"I haven't seen him. I don't know where he is."

With a thin smile, Hermes said, "Then I'll tell you. Look into the great

pyramid. Our sensors here detect a power drain focused on that structure. He is

obviously using it as his fortress."

I countered, "Or he is allowing you to think so, while actually he's

somewhere—or somewhen—else."

Hermes's eyes narrowed. "Yes... he is clever enough to decoy us. That's why it

is vital that you get inside the pyramid and see if he's actually there."

"I am trying to do that."

"And?"

"I am trying," I repeated. "There are complications."

"Orion," he said, making a show of being patient with me, "there is not much

time left. We must find him before he brings down this entire continuum. He's

gone quite mad, and he's capable of destroying us all."

What of it? I thought. Perhaps the universes would be better off with all of us

dead.

"Do you understand me?" Hermes insisted. "Time is running out for us. There is

only a matter of days!"

"I'm doing the best I can," I said. "I tried to penetrate the great pyramid, and

it didn't work. Now I must enter it physically, and for that I need the

cooperation of the king, or possibly the chief priest of Amon."

Hermes gusted a great impatient sigh. "Do what you must, Orion, but for the love

of the continuum, do it quickly!"

I nodded, and found myself blinking at the first streaks of dawn in the clouded

sky of the Egyptian shore.

Half a dozen armed guards were standing around me, one of them poking the butt

of his spear into my ribs.

"On your feet, Orion. My lord Menalaos wants to roast your carcass for

breakfast."

I scrambled to my feet. They grabbed my arms and held me fast as they marched me

off toward the king's tent. I had no chance to reach for my sword, still laying

on my blanket. But the dagger that I kept strapped to my thigh was still there,

beneath my kilt.

Menalaos was pacing like a caged lion as the guards brought me before him.

Several of his nobles stood uneasily before the tent, swords already at their

sides, although they wore no armor. Menalaos was clad in an old tunic, and had a

blood-red cloak over his shoulders. He was quivering with fury so that his dark

beard trembled.

"It is you!" he bellowed as the guards brought me to him. "Light the fires! I'll

roast him inch by inch!"

The nobles—all of them younger than Menalaos, I noticed—looked almost frightened

at their king's rage.

"What are you waiting for?" he snapped. "This is the man who stole my wife! He's

going to pay for that with the slowest death agonies anyone has ever suffered!"

"Your wife is well and safe in the capital of Egypt," I said. "If you will

listen to me for a..."

Enraged, he stepped up to me and smashed a backhand blow across my mouth.

My temper snapped. I shrugged off the two men pinning my arms, then smashed them

both with elbows to their middles. They fell gasping. Before they hit the ground

I had whipped out my dagger and, clutching the startled Menalaos by the hair, I

jabbed its point to his throat.

"One move from any of you," I growled, "and your king dies."

They all froze: the nobles, some of them with their hands already on their sword

hilts; the other guards, their eyes wide, their mouths hanging open.

"Now then, noble Menalaos," I said, loudly enough for them all to hear, even

though my mouth was next to his ear, "we will discuss our differences like men,

or face each other as enemies in a fair duel. I am not a thes or a slave, to be

bound and tortured for your pleasure. I was a warrior of the House of Ithaca,

and now I am the leader of an army of Egypt, an army that's been sent here to

destroy you."

"You lie!" Menalaos snarled, squirming in my grasp. "The Egyptians have welcomed

us to their shores. They are holding my wife for me, and have invited me to sail

to their capital to reclaim her."

"The chief minister of the Egyptian king has built a lovely trap for you and all

the Achaian lords who come to this land," I insisted. "And Helen is the bait."

"More lies," said Menalaos. But I could see that I had caught the interest of

the other nobles.

I released my grip on him and threw my dagger onto the sand at his feet.

"Let the gods show us which of us is right," I said. "Pick your best warrior and

have him face me. If he kills me, then the gods will have shown that I am lying.

If I best him, it will be a sign from the gods that you should listen to what I

have to say."

Murderous anger still flamed in Menalaos's eyes, but the nobles crowded around

eagerly.

"Why not?"

"Let the gods decide!"

"You have nothing to lose, my lord."

Seething, Menalaos shouted, "Nothing to lose? Don't you understand that this

traitor, this abductor—he's merely trying to gain a swift clean death instead of

the agony he deserves?"

"My lord Menalaos!" I shouted back. "On the plain of Ilios I begged you to

intercede on behalf of the storyteller Poletes from the anger of your brother.

You refused, and now the old man is blind. I'm not begging you now. I demand

what you owe me: a fair fight. Not some young champion who rushes foolishly to

his death. I want to fight you, mighty warrior. We can settle our differences

with spears and swords."

I had him. He took an inadvertent step back away from me, remembering that I had

fought so well at Troy. But there was no way he could back out of facing me; he

had told them all that he wanted to kill me. Now he had to do it for himself, or

be thought a coward by his followers.

The entire camp formed a rough circle for the two of us while Menalaos's

servants armed him. This would be a battle on foot, not with chariots. One of

the guards brought me my sword; I slung the baldric over my shoulder and felt

its comforting weight against my hip. Three nobles gravely offered me my choice

from several spears. I picked the one that was shorter but heavier than the

others.

Menalaos came forward out of a cluster of servants and nobles, armored from

helmet to feet in bronze, carrying a huge figure-eight shield. In his right hand

he bore a single long spear, but I noticed that his servants had placed several

others on the ground a few paces behind him.

I had neither shield nor armor. I did not want them. My hope was to best

Menalaos without killing him, to show him and the other Achaians that the gods

were so much with me that no man could oppose me successfully. To accomplish

that, I had to avoid getting myself spitted on Menalaos's spear, of course.

I could feel the excitement bubbling from the Achaians circled around us.

Nothing like a good fight before breakfast to stimulate the digestion.

An old man in a ragged tunic came out of the crowd and stepped between us. His

beard was long and dirty-gray.

"In the name of ever-living Zeus and all the mighty gods of high Olympos," he

said, in a loud announcer's voice, "I pray that this combat will be pleasing to

the gods, and that they send victory to he who deserves it."

He scuttled away and Menalaos swung his heavy shield in front of his body. With

his helmet's cheek plates strapped shut, all I could see of him was his angry,

burning eyes.

I stepped lightly to my right, circling away from his spear arm, hefting my own

spear in my right hand.

Menalaos pulled his arm back and flung his spear at me. Without an instant's

hesitation, he dashed back to pick up another.

My senses quickened as they always do in battle, and the world around me seemed

to slow down into the languid motions of a dream. I watched the spear coming

toward me, took a step to the side, and let it thud harmlessly into the sand by

my feet. The Achaians "oohed."

By this time Menalaos had grasped another spear. He pivoted and hurled this one

at me, also. Again I avoided it. With his third spear, though, Menalaos came

charging at me, screaming a shrill war cry.

I parried his spear with my own and swung the butt of it into his massive shield

with a heavy thunk, hard enough to knock him staggering. He tottered to my left,

regained his balance, and came at me again. Instead of parrying, this time I

ducked under his point and rammed my own spear between his legs. Menalaos went

sprawling and I was on top of him at once, my legs pinning his arms to the

ground, my sword across his throat, between the chin flaps of his helmet and the

collar of his cuirass.

He stared at me. His eyes no longer glared hate; they were wide with fear and

amazement.

Sitting on the bronze armor of his chest, I raised my sword high over my head

and proclaimed in my loudest voice: "The gods have spoken! No man could defeat

one who is inspired by the will of all-powerful Zeus!"

I got to my feet and pulled Menalaos to his. The Achaians swarmed around us,

accepting the judgment of the duel.

"Only a god could have fought like that!"

"No mortal could face a god and win."

Although they crowded around Menalaos and assured him that no hero in memory had

ever fought against a god and lived to tell the tale, they kept an arm's length

from me, and looked at me with undisguised awe.

Finally the old priest came up close and stared nearsightedly into my face. "Are

you a god, come to instruct us in human form?"

I took a deep breath and made myself shudder. "No, old man. I could feel the god

within my sinews when we fought, but now he has left, and I am only a mortal

once more."

Menalaos, bareheaded now, looked at me askance. But being defeated by a god was

not shameful, and he allowed his men to tell him that he had done something very

brave and wonderful. Yet it was clear that he held no love for me.

He invited me into his tent, where he watched me silently as servants unstrapped

his armor and women slaves brought us figs, dates, and thick spiced honey. I sat

on a handsomely carved ebony stool: of Egyptian design and workmanship, I

noticed. It had not come from this fishing village, either.

Menalaos sat on a rope-web chair, the platter of fruit and honey between us.

Once the servants had left us alone, I asked him, "Do you truly want your wife

back?"

Some of the anger returned to his eyes. "Why else do you think I'm here?"

"To kill me and serve a fat hippopotamus who calls himself Nekoptah."

He was startled at the chief minister's name.

"Let me tell you what I know," I said. "Nekoptah has promised you Helen and a

share of Egypt's wealth if you kill me. Correct?"

Grudgingly, "Correct."

"But think a moment. Why would the king's chief minister need an Achaian lord to

get rid of one man, a barbarian, a wanderer who stumbled into Egypt in company

of a royal refugee?"

Despite himself, Menalaos smiled. "You are no ordinary wanderer, Orion. You are

not so easy to kill."

"Did it ever occur to you that Helen is being used as bait, to lure you to your

death—you, and all the other Achaian lords who come to Egypt with you?"

"A trap?"

"I didn't come alone. An Egyptian army is waiting barely a day's ride from here.

Waiting until they can snare all of you in their net."

"But I was told..."

"You were told to send word back to your brother and the other lords that they

would be welcomed here, if you did as the king's chief minister asked," I said

for him.

"My brother is dead."

I felt a flash of surprise. Agamemnon dead!

"He was murdered by his wife and her lover. His prisoner Cassandra, also. Now

his son seeks vengeance, against his own mother! All of Argos is in turmoil. If

I return there..." His voice choked off and he slumped forward, burying his face

in his hands.

Cassandra's prophecy, the tales that got old Poletes blinded—they were true.

Clytemnestra and her lover had murdered the High King.

"We have nowhere to turn," Menalaos said, his voice low and heavy with misery.

"Argos is upside-down. Barbarians from the north are pushing toward Athens and

will be in Argos after that. Agamemnon is dead. Odysseus has been lost at sea.

The other Achaian lords who are coming here to join me are coming out of

desperation. We've been told that the Egyptians will welcome us. And now you

tell me that it's all a trap."

I sat on the stool and watched the King of Sparta weep. His world was collapsing

on his shoulders and he had no idea of where to turn.

But I did.

"How would you like to turn this trap into a triumph?" I asked him.

Menalaos turned his tear-filled eyes up toward me, and I began to explain. It

would mean giving Helen back to him, and deep inside me I hated myself for doing

that. She was a living, breathing woman, warm and vibrantly alive. Yet I

bartered her like a piece of furniture or a gaudy ornament. The anger I felt

within me I directed against the Golden One; this is his doing, I told myself.

His manipulations have tangled all our lives; I'm merely trying to put things

right. But I knew that what I did I did for myself, to thwart the Golden One, to

bring me one step closer to the moment when I could destroy him—and revive

Athene. Love and hate were fused inside me, intermingled into a single white-hot

force boiling and churning in my mind, too powerful for me to resist. I could

barter away a queen who loved me, I could sack cities and slay nations to gain

what I wanted: Athene's life and Apollo's death.

So I went ahead and told Menalaos how to regain his wife and win a secure place

in the Kingdom of the Two Lands.

Nekoptah's scheme was a good one. Practically foolproof. He had thought of

almost everything. All I had to do was turn it against him.

 

Chapter 41

I moved through the next several weeks like a machine, speaking and acting

automatically, my inner mind frozen so that the bitter voices deep within me

could not catch my conscious attention. I ate, I slept without dreams, and I

brought my plans closer to fruition, day by day.

There was a measure of bitter satisfaction in turning Nekoptah's treacherous

scheme against its creator. The fat priest had taken one step too far, as most

schemers ultimately do. By sending Prince Aramset on this expedition, he had

hoped to eliminate his only possible rival for kingly power. But Aramset was the

key to my counter scheme. I followed Nekoptah's plan to the letter except for

one detail: Menalaos and the other Achaians would offer their loyalty to the

crown prince, not the king's chief minister. And Aramset would treat the

Achaians honestly.

Vengeance against the chief minister gave me a taste of gratification. But only

the ultimate vengeance, triumph against the Golden One, would bring me true

pleasure. And I was moving toward that final moment when I would crush him

utterly.

It was strange, I reflected. I had entered this world as a thes, less than a

slave. I had become a warrior, then a leader of soldiers, then the guardian and

lover of a queen. Now I was preparing to create a king, to decide who would rule

the richest and most powerful land in this world. I, Orion, would tear the power

of rulership from the bejeweled fingers of scheming Nekoptah and place it where

it belonged: in the hands of the crown prince.

Aramset at first listened to my plan coolly when I brought Menalaos to his boat,

moored a day's march upriver from the coast. But once its implications became

clear to him, once he realized that I was offering him not only a solution to

the problem of the Sea Peoples, but a way to remove Nekoptah, he warmed to my

ideas quickly enough.

Nekoptah's spies still infested the army and the prince's retinue, but with

Lukka's Hittites protecting him, Aramset was safe enough from assassination. And

gruff old General Raseth was loyal to the prince, in his blustering way. The

overwhelming majority of the army would follow him if a crisis arose. Nekoptah's

spies were few in number and powerless against the loyalty of the army. The

king's chief minister depended on stealth and cunning to achieve his ends; his

weapons were lies and assassins, not troops who fought face-to-face in the

sunshine.

The young prince received the King of Sparta with solemn dignity. None of his

usual laughter or youthful nervousness. He sat on a royal throne set up on the

afterdeck of his royal boat, under a brightly striped awning, dressed in

splendid robes and wearing the strange double crown of the Two Lands, his face

set in an expression as stonily unchanging as the statues of his grandfather.

For his part, Menalaos gave a splendid show, his gold-filagreed armor polished

until it blazed like the sun itself, his dark beard and curled hair gleaming

with oil. Fourteen other Achaian lords were ranked behind him. With their

glittering armor and plumed helmets, their dark beards and scarred arms, they

looked savage and fierce alongside the Egyptians.

The boat was crammed with men: the prince's retinue, soldiers, dignitaries from

the coastal towns, government functionaries. Most of them wore long skirts and

were bare to the waist, except for their medallions of office. Some of them were

spies for Nekoptah, I knew, but let them report back to their fat master that

the crown prince had solved the problem of the Sea Peoples without bloodshed. My

only regret was that I could not see the chief minister's painted face twist in

anger at the news.

Official scribes sat at the prince's feet, recording every word spoken. Artists

perched atop the boat's cabins, sketching madly on sheets of papyrus with sticks

of charcoal. Many other boats were ringed around us, also thronged with people

to witness this momentous occasion. The shore was crowded, too, with men and

women and even children from many towns.

Lukka stood behind the prince's throne, slightly to one side, his lips pressed

firmly together to keep himself from grinning. He enjoyed standing higher than

Menalaos.

I stood to one side of the assembly and listened to Menalaos faithfully repeat

the lines I had told him to speak. The other Achaian lords, newly arrived from

their troubled lands with their wives and families, shuffled uncomfortably in

the growing heat of the rising sun. The converse between the Egyptian prince and

the dispossessed King of Sparta took most of a long morning. What it amounted to

was simply this:

Menalaos pledged the loyalty of all the Achaians present to Prince Aramset and,

through him, to King Merneptah. In return, Aramset promised the Achaians land

and homes of their own—in the name of the king, of course. Their land would be

along the coast, and their special duty would be to protect the coast from

incursions by raiders. The Peoples of the Sea had been absorbed by the Land of

the Two Kingdoms. The thieves had been turned into policemen.

"Do you think they will do an honest job of protecting the coast?" Aramset asked

me, as servants removed his ceremonial robes.

We were in his cabin, small and low and stuffy in the midday heat. I felt sweat

trickling down my jaw and legs. Somehow the young prince seemed perfectly

comfortable in the sweltering oven.

"By giving them homes in the kingdom," I said, repeating the argument I had made

many times before, "you remove the reason for their raids. They have nowhere

else to go, and they fear the barbarians invading their land from the north."

"My father will be pleased with me, I think."

I knew he was expressing a hope more than a certainty.

"Nekoptah will not," I said.

He laughed as the last windings were taken off his torso and he stood naked

except for the loincloth around his groin.

"I will deal with Nekoptah," the prince said happily. "I have my own army now."

The dressers departed and other servants brought chilled water and bowls of

fruit.

"Would you prefer wine, Orion?"

"No, water will do."

Aramset took up a small melon and a knife. As he began to slice it, he asked,

"And you, my friend. You worry me."

"I?"

He slouched on the bunk and looked up at me. "You are willing to give up that

beautiful lady?"

"She is Menalaos's lawful wife."

Aramset smiled. "I have seen her, you know. I wouldn't give her up. Not

willingly."

Feeling distinctly uncomfortable, I said nothing. How could I explain to him

about the Creators and the goddess I hoped to restore to life? How could I speak

of the growing unhappiness within me, the reluctance to give up this woman who

had shared my life for so many months, who had offered me her love? Silence was

my refuge.

With a shrug, Aramset said, "If you won't talk about women, what about rewards?"

"Rewards, your highness?"

"You have done me a great service. You have done this kingdom a great service.

What reward would you have? Name it and it is yours."

I barely gave it an instant's thought. "Allow me to enter the great pyramid of

Khufu."

For a moment Aramset said nothing. Then, pursing his lips slightly, he replied,

"That might be difficult. It's actually the province of the chief priest of

Amon..."

"Hetepamon," I said.

"You know him?"

"Nekoptah told me his name. I was to bring him back to Wast with me, if I

survived his trap with Menalaos."

Impulsively, Aramset jumped to his feet and went to the chest on the other side

of the tiny cabin. He flung open its lid and pawed through piles of clothes

until he found a small, plain bronze box. Opening it, he lifted out a gold

medallion on a long chain.

"This bears the Eye of Amon," he told me. I saw the emblem etched into the

bright gold. "My father gave me this before... before he became devoted to

Ptah."

Before he became hooked on the drugs that Nekoptah administered, I translated to

myself.

"Show this to Hetepamon," said the prince, "and he will recognize it as coming

from the king. He cannot refuse you then."

 

Our mighty armada unfurled their sails and started up the Nile two days later.

The army that the Egyptians had gathered was now augmented by Menalaos and a

picked complement of Achaian warriors, bound by oath to Aramset. The main

strength of the Achaians remained on the coast, with Egyptian administrators to

help settle them in the towns they would henceforth protect. The prince headed

back for the capital, with his bloodless victory over the Peoples of the Sea.

I paced the deck each day, or gripped the rail up at the bow, trying to make the

wind blow harder and the boat move faster against the current on the strength of

sheer willpower. Each morning I strained my eyes for the first glimpse of the

gleaming crown of Khufu's great pyramid.

Each night I tried to reach inside that ancient tomb by translocating my body.

To no avail. The Golden One had shielded the pyramid too well. Mental exertion

could not penetrate his fortress. My only hope was that the high priest of Amon

could lead me physically through an actual door or passage into that vast pile

of stones.

That would be the ultimate irony, I thought, as I lay on my bunk sheathed in the

sweat of useless exertion, night after night. The Golden One may be able to

prevent his fellow Creators from entering his fortress, but could he stop a pair

of ordinary humans from merely walking in?

The day finally came when we sailed past the outskirts of Menefer, and the great