Lynda Robinson: Eater of souls

"I don't care-"

"Have you seen Father?" Kysen interrupted before Isis succeeded in provoking her sister.

"Not this morning," Bener said as she added another item to her list. "Did you know that the steward has been obtaining watermelons from a street vendor?"

Kysen, already on his way out of the hall, answered with impatience. "No."

"The kitchen garden produces abundant melons."

"Then I suppose we use more than we grow," Kysen snapped without turning.

Bener's voice rose. "We don't. Damnation, Ky, who has been looking after the accounts while we were in the country?"

"I don't know," he shouted back.

"Find out!"

He didn't answer. If he'd argued with Bener, saying such small matters weren't important, she would have contradicted him and pointed out why watermelons were important. Then she'd have proved her assertion with so well-reasoned a series of statements that he'd feel like a fool for questioning her judgment. Bener had grown into womanhood in the few months they'd been separated, and he'd learned not to challenge her. She'd been right about too many things, even about the culprit in a murder a few weeks ago. He would have to control his temper, or Bener would notice and try to make him tell her what was wrong. She didn't give up once her curiosity was aroused, and he hated lying to her.

Where was Meren? Kysen looked in the master's office, the scribes' rooms, the library, even a few storerooms. All he found were servants, slaves, and old Hapu, the household steward. Finally he realized he was wasting time and climbed an inner stair that rose the height of the house. Coming out on the roof, he left the shelter of an embroidered awning and strode toward the wall, which came up to his waist. He noticed his pace. It had quickened as he searched, and he'd almost run up the stairs.

He made himself slow down. It would do no good to confront his father in this agitated and inflamed state. Meren would observe it, lift one brow in that understated and unmistakably noble and elegant manner of his, and refuse to talk until Kysen had calmed.

He reached the eastern roof wall and forced himself to pause, turn his thoughts elsewhere, so that he could absorb even the smallest sand grain of peace. Looking over the landscape, he beheld a sight that always provoked his awe. Across the dark ribbon of the Nile was baked black land, fertile, life-giving. Beyond that came the east bank villages, and then the red and cream of the desert.

Ra, in his solar boat, approached the horizon of the living world, showering Egypt with his amber-and-gold light. And all around him lay Memphis, greatest of the cities of Egypt, city of Ptah, the creator god in his vast stone-and-gold temple, city of palaces unrivaled even by those of rich and powerful Babylon; Memphis, city of princely mansions and vast foreign trade.

Kysen turned to gaze out beyond the protective walls of Golden House to that other, even greater city, the Memphis of the dead. In the west, up and down the river as far as he could see, stretched tomb after abandoned tomb, deserted mortuary temples, aged and decaying monuments erected by the ancient ones. These had been intended to carry on the mortuary rituals of kings, queens, and nobles whose very names now had vanished from memory. The new cemeteries invaded those of the ancients. Even the uncompleted tombs of great ones like General Horemheb seemed like brash little children clinging to the legs of stronger, wiser old ones.

Kysen watched, holding his breath, as Ra sailed higher. The sun's rays hit the sheer, polished faces of the giants of Memphis-the pyramids. He released his breath, annoyed with himself for feeling so insignificant at the sight. Though distant, the stone triangles loomed, thrusting out of the desert floor. They ascended so high and their bases covered so much ground that even after all the centuries that had passed, nothing had been built to equal them.

His jaw had gone stiff. Kysen had to force himself to stop grinding his teeth. It had been ten years since his father had adopted him at the age of eight, taking him away from the blood father who had beaten him. But he wasn't used to Memphis, White Walls, the royal city, named for the vast protective ramparts of plastered mud brick that protected palace and temple alike. He'd never become accustomed to such grandeur. How could he when he'd been born of a common artisan, a carpenter among the tomb makers in Thebes?

Kysen breathed in the last cool air of morning. Before long, the power of Ra would sear it to the temperature of a furnace. He glanced once more at the pyramids, the walled cities and temples that accompanied them, the first smattering of houses of the living. Then he transferred his gaze to the Golden House compound.

He leaned forward and looked over a white enclosure wall set some distance from the main house. Meren's private garden. He should have guessed. Still as the water of a delta marsh, a tall, lean figure in a pristine kilt and sheer overrobe cinched by a jeweled belt stood beneath a palm.

Placing his cupped hands close to his mouth, Kysen emitted a short, rough panther's cry. Meren turned quickly, looking up at him. Kysen saluted, and Meren nodded, then began to walk slowly to the garden gate. Kysen would await him on the roof, for lately Meren hadn't welcomed anyone into his garden.

As he watched his father's progress across the far-flung grounds, Kysen remembered the first time he'd come here. He'd thought it the most magnificent house ever built, and the largest. And even after having spent years attending court at the various royal palaces of pharaoh, he still felt a jolt of astonishment at its size.

How could Meren have adopted him, made him firstborn son in a house that almost rivaled that of pharaoh? The place was vast, from its columned verandas that surrounded the central house to the five reflection pools, the protective verge of palms, sycamores, and acacias, and the jewellike furnishings. When he'd first set foot inside the high front gate, he had mistaken the private family chapel for the main house.

Small as it was compared to Golden House itself, the chapel was many times the size of the narrow abode in which he'd been raised. To him, Golden House had been a small city complete with granaries, stables, servants' quarters, barracks for charioteers, and a well with winding stone steps leading down to water level. It had taken him years to grow accustomed to his new life, years to forget the beatings, years to believe the love Meren offered so freely.

Now he believed. Now he returned that love, and now he was afraid. Meren had discovered that pharaoh's sister-in-law, the great and powerful Nefertiti, hadn't died of a plague as assumed but had been poisoned. The crime had happened years ago-before the heretic king Akhenaten, Nefertiti's husband, had died-in Akhenaten's new planned city, Horizon of Aten. But those responsible had survived the furor of their heretic king's death. One had been killed only a short time ago, after secretly confessing to Meren that he'd poisoned the queen.

Young as he was, Kysen knew that more people must have been involved in such a crime. The murderer hadn't been powerful enough to order the slaying of the Great Royal Wife; whoever had been responsible for such a decision might still be alive. He and Meren had been aware of this possibility for weeks. But what alarmed Kysen was that since learning the evil secret of Nefertiti's death, his father had grown more and more tense, silent, wary. He'd even stopped juggling, a pleasure he had to enjoy privately since a great noble could not be seen tossing brightly colored leather balls like a common entertainer.

Kysen's brow furrowed as he gripped the edge of the wall and heard the voice of his heart pound in his ears. He'd seen what happened to those foolish enough to stumble upon hidden wickedness or trade in it. He squeezed his eyes shut at the vision of a man at the Nile's edge, stumbling. A long, dark snout shot out of the water, rigid jaws flying open, snapping as the creature lunged. Long ivory teeth punctured flesh; that powerful body hurtled backward into the water, dragging the man, who howled in unremitting pain and terror. Then the victim's cries changed to short repetitive screams. Even when he was dragged beneath the waves, he screamed into the blue-black waters.