Lauren Haney: Path of Shadows

“Get him! Now!”

The words rang through the air, carrying an edge of cruelty.

“We’ll teach him a lesson,” another voice, equally vicious, snarled. “Show him a thing or two.”

Lieutenant Bak, officer in charge of a unit of Medjay po lice until recently posted on the southern frontier, was in stantly struck by the meanness he heard. His head snapped around and he looked along the waterfront. His Medjay ser geant Imsiba and Lieutenant Karoya, head of the harbor pa trol, followed his glance. They saw three men in the distance, standing at the mouth of what they knew was a dead-end lane. The object of their hatred had to be trapped inside.

A third voice shouted, “Cast him back into the desert he came from.”

“Not enough!” the first man snapped. “We must send a message to others like him. They’ve no right to defile the streets our sovereign treads.”

Exchanging a quick glance of mutual agreement, Bak, Im siba, and Karoya raced up the broad, open street, lined on their right by ships moored along the riverbank and on their left by several blocks of interconnected buildings.

“Let’s geld him,” the second man yelled.

“Yes!”

The three ruffians, so intent on their victim they failed to notice the approaching men, slipped into the lane.

Bak slowed as he neared the opening and raised a finger to his lips, urging silence. Followed closely by his companions, he crept to the corner and peered down the narrow passage that, hugged between two rows of adjoining buildings, lay in deep shadow. Though the three scoundrels blocked the way, he could see at the far end a man clad in a brownish kilt, with a wrap of a darker color around his shoulders. He held a long shepherd’s staff horizontal to the ground as if to bar their way. Behind him, a woman stood half-hidden by a laden donkey, clinging to its rope lead.

“Look what he’s brought with him!” one of the ruffians chortled. “As dirty as the desert she came from, but a choice bit nonetheless.”

“Get him out of the way,” the most dominant of the three said, brandishing a short whip that ended in several thongs knotted at the ends to hurt more. “Then we’ll take her.”

“You’ll take no one!” Bak, his tone as hard as granite, stepped into the broad shaft of sunlight that reached into the mouth of the passage. He was a man of medium height with short-cropped dark hair and broad, muscular shoulders. Se nior to his two companions, he carried only his baton of of fice. A symbol of power that, when used with purpose, could be a deadly weapon.

The men swung around, startled. Their leader, the quickest to recover, sneered, “Who are you to tell us what to do?”

“Drop your weapons!” Karoya moved up beside Bak, brandishing his spear and holding before him, so none could mistake his authority, the black-and-white cowhide shield of the harbor patrol. The young Medjay officer was tall and slim, with a tribal tattoo on his left upper arm.

Imsiba took his place beside them. The Medjay sergeant, the tallest of the three, was as lithe and graceful as a leopard.

He carried a long spear and the black shield the men of Bak’s company had chosen as their own while posted at the frontier fortress of Buhen.

“Are we supposed to be afraid of three men?” the leader of the ruffians scoffed. “Bah! The odds are in our favor.”

Bak had to smile at how highly the man overrated himself and his friends.

One of the men said, “Kames, maybe we’d better…”

Kames laughed harshly. “Don’t worry, my timid friend.

We’ll give them something they’ll not soon forget.” He swaggered toward the policemen, raising the whip and slap ping the hard-packed earth on which he walked.

“One’s a harbor patrolman, Kames.”

“So?”

Bak shifted his grip on his baton and eyed the trio, the leader approaching with malicious purpose, his friends drawn along behind, one willing if not eager to participate, the other dragging his feet. He cocked his head as if measur ing the men he faced. “How long will it take the three of us to teach them to respect their fellows? A count of ten? Fifteen?”

“Ten or less, I’d say.” Karoya grinned at Imsiba. “Will you offer up your weapon, or shall I?”

“He knows you’re official and most likely thinks I’m not.

If he believes he’s disarmed the better-trained man, he’ll be come overconfident.”

“I’ll provide the distraction,” Bak said. With so many don key caravans crossing the southern frontier, he and his men had often used the technique of which they spoke to disarm drovers who applied their whips too freely to man and beast.

Suddenly he stubbed his toe. Karoya caught his arm, sav ing him from falling and giving Imsiba time to slip a couple of paces ahead.

Kames, imagining a weakness where none existed, ran forward. Mouth clamped tight with purpose, eyes glittering, he drew the whip back, shoved aside the point of Imsiba’s spear, and struck out at the sergeant with all his might. Im 4

Lauren Haney siba ducked sideways and, at the same time, Karoya leaped forward and thrust his spear diagonally between assailant and intended victim. The lashes wrapped themselves around the point and shaft. Kames tried to jerk the whip free. Karoya twisted his spear, winding the lashes tighter. Bak moved in and slammed his baton down on the man’s head. The scoundrel tumbled in a heap, senseless.

Bak leaped past his fallen opponent and ran with Imsiba toward the two remaining men. The sergeant whacked the nearest on the side of his head with the flat face of his spear point, felling him. Bak lunged forward to disable the third man, who had turned away in a futile attempt to escape. The man with the shepherd’s staff bounded toward him, holding the simple tool as if it were a club. The ruffian could not have missed the fury on his face. Panicking, he swung around again and raced toward Bak, who rammed his baton hard in the pit of his stomach. With a whoosh of escaping air, the man dropped to his knees and bent double, moaning.

Karoya walked to the mouth of the lane and gave a loud, piercing whistle, summoning the men who reported to him.

The sound of pounding feet heralded their approach and within a short time, they hauled away the three scoundrels.

As quiet descended on the lane, the man they had aided bowed his head in a show of gratitude. He was tall and thin, emaciated almost, and darker than Imsiba. His kilt was made of leather and the rough shift covering his shoulders was worn and ragged. His hands were callused by hard labor, his bare feet toughened by a lifetime of walking on sand and rocks. He looked to be about thirty years of age, but was doubtless younger. Bak recognized him as a nomad from the

Eastern Desert.

“We owe you our lives.” The man spoke slowly as if the tongue of Kemet was unfamiliar to him-as it undoubtedly was. Nomads sometimes grazed their animals along the fringes of the valley, but rarely came into the city.

“You owe us nothing,” Bak said. “We’re policemen. It’s our duty to serve the lady Maat, to see justice done.” Maat was the goddess of right and order.

“They would have slain me. As for my wife…” The no mad nudged the donkey, urging it against the wall so he could place a protective arm around the young woman. She stood, her head bowed, her hand resting on her swollen stom ach and the unborn child within. “She would have suffered a different kind of death.”

She must have understood a few words, for she glanced up to receive his brief, reassuring smile. Her hair and shoulders were covered by a length of red fabric, framing a remarkably pretty face. Her eyes fluttered toward the men who had come to their rescue, then she turned her head away, whether out of modesty or embarrassment Bak did not know.