Suti and the Broken Staff Read online

  I turned to Anun. “I think we have found the assassin who killed Wah,” I said.

  Curious, I circled the corpse, wondering what name had owned this body. The front was ravaged by scavengers, the face unrecognizable.

  “Pairy,” I said, “help me turn him over. There might be something under him.”

  When Pairy shook his head in response, I said, “Please, Pairy. I will be quick. If I wait until tomorrow, the jackals will have done more damage to the body.”

  “Good,” Pairy said. “By morning they might have dragged him away and we won’t need to look at it or smell it.”

  “He read the ground where we found Wah,” Anun told Pairy softly. He put a hand on the charioteer’s arm. “Help the scribe,” he said. “Perhaps Osiris will talk to him as Geb already has.”

  ***

  I knelt beside the corpse and, hearing the rustle of leaves, I looked up, expecting to find that I was alone in the woods with the dead man, the flies, and the waiting vultures.

  Anun and Yanhamu were no longer here, but Pairy had remained.

  “Help me roll him over,” I said, thankful that there was someone to hear my words.

  “Why? He’s going to be just as dead and disgusting on the other side,” Pairy said, but he knelt beside me.

  We worked our hands beneath the body, our fingers seeking firm spots. Then, with Pairy closing both his eyes and his nostrils, we raised the body and rolled it onto its side. Then, fighting to keep it from slipping in our blood-wet hands, we pushed it over onto its stomach.

  “That was the most disgusting thing I have ever done,” Pairy said, rocking back onto his heels and standing. Spitting into the grass, he looked for wide leaves to wipe his hands.

  The back of the dead man was not as ravaged as the front. Except for a large, puckered hole midway down the back, the skin was not marked.

  I leaned close to the wound, wondering what had caused it.

  “Look at this,” I said to Pairy.

  I glanced up to see Pairy wiping the back of his arm against his mouth. He looked down at me and said, “Look at what? I saw enough dead men yesterday.”

  “No,” I said, “this wound. Have you ever seen one like it?”

  “It’s a spear,” he said without coming any closer.

  “No, no,” I argued. “A spear makes a slice, a narrow cut. Wider than a knife, not like this.” Lifting my left hand to the body, I inserted two fingers and pulled the wound open.

  Something bit my finger.

  I yanked my hand from the wound, expecting to see some vile insect clinging to me.

  Instead, a splinter hung from my finger.

  I pulled the wood from my finger and brought it close to my face. In the failing light, I couldn’t tell if the wood was dark or if it was discolored from blood.

  “What is it?” Pairy asked, his voice still several steps away, his curiosity not overpowering his fear.

  “A splinter,” I said.

  As I stood, my free hand went to my waist to open my bag. It wasn’t there.

  “I left my bag at the camp,” I said.

  “What was in it?” Pairy asked, stepping closer now.

  “Rocks,” I said.

  “Why do you need a bag of rocks? Are they weapons?” Pairy asked.

  I shook my head, then reconsidered. “They could be. I guess anything can be a weapon.”

  (I have seen many things become weapons: Rocks, of course, walking staffs, ivory tusks, water, even oil. But the most powerful weapons are words. They can be shields as well, more protective than dried hides stretched over wood, more effective than spells or other heka. But I did not know that then.)

  I stood and turned to Pairy. “Show me where you found the chariots,” I said.

  I followed Pairy, who was constantly waving his arms and mumbling as we retraced our path.

  “We should get back to camp. They will have a fire going. The smoke will keep these bugs away,” Pairy said to himself, but loud enough so that I could hear him clearly.

  “There are oils that do that,” I said. “At least that is what I have been told.”

  “Well, I know that smoke keeps them away,” Pairy said. “Always sit downwind from the fire.” He slapped the back of his neck.

  “Is it the heat or the smoke itself that repels the insects?” I asked, trying to distract Pairy from his discomfort.

  “Who cares, if it works?” Pairy said, slapping his right shoulder and then examining his hand.

  I glimpsed a dark, well-formed circle rising above the bushes. “Are those the chariots over there?” I asked.

  “Why aren’t they biting you?” Pairy asked.

  “Maybe I am covered by too much dirt,” I said, hurrying toward the chariots. “That’s why I wondered about the smoke. If there is something in…” I stopped suddenly and knelt as my foot kicked something.

  “What is it?” Pairy asked as he stopped behind me.

  “A sandal,” I said, showing Pairy what I had found.

  Pairy looked at the sandal. Even in the fading light we could see that it was stained, either with sweat or blood.

  “Does nothing disgust you?” Pairy said, shaking his head.

  “Are your sandals the same as the other charioteers’?” I asked, looking at Pairy’s feet.

  Pairy shrugged. “I don’t know. We never compare them. Some would be bigger, I suppose. It depends on your feet. But…”

  “No, I mean are they all made the same way?”

  Pairy shrugged. “I’ve never made a sandal.”

  Rising to my feet, I saw that the three chariots were standing a few steps away in a small clearing.

  “A quiver,” I said to myself, approaching the nearest chariot. I untied the leather quiver from the side of the chariot and pushed the sandal into it. Then I tore a broad leaf from a bush and wrapped it around the sliver of wood.

  “Can I borrow your knife?” I asked Pairy.

  I took the charioteer’s knife and cut off a length of the leather thong that had held the quiver to the chariot. I tied the leaf around the splinter and dropped it into the quiver. I knotted the remaining length of thong and looped the quiver over my shoulder to replace the bag I had left in Megiddo.

  Then I turned my attention to the chariots.

  I bent over each of them, but I didn’t know what I was expecting to see. There were no pools of blood or scratches to indicate a struggle. Frowning, I looked to Pairy. He was standing away from the chariots, his hands in constant motion as he battled the relentless insects.

  “Do you see anything unusual here?” I asked.

  “No, just three empty chariots,” he said, his voice curt with impatience.

  I glanced behind Pairy toward the edge of the grove. The sky was almost as dark as the land.

  “Let’s go back to the camp,” I said.

  ***

  As we left the edge of the small wooded area, it struck me that Pairy had said something important. The chariots were simply three empty chariots. There was no reason to hide them.

  Why had they been dragged from the well to the woods?

  We took a few more steps and then I paused to look back toward the woods. I could see our tracks in the dirt, but not the tracks of the chariots.

  “Look,” I said, pointing to the dirt.

  “I don’t see anything, scribe,” Pairy said.

  “Exactly!” I said happily. I looked back toward the trees and scanned the edge of the woods. There were no obvious signs that the chariots had passed here.

  “Back up until you can see the well,” I asked Pairy.

  Pairy turned and took a few steps. “It’s too dark, scribe. I can’t see the well from here.”

  Impatient, I ran to the edge of the woods and lifted a palm frond that was lying there. I smiled, happy that my thought had been confirmed. “Pairy,” I shouted, “forget about the well. Come over here, please.”

  I saw Pairy pull his knife from his waist and run.

  I blushed to s
ee him hurry to my defense.

  “What is it?” Pairy asked, looking past me to the woods.

  “Look!” I said, showing him the underside of the palm frond I had found.

  Pairy looked at the dusty leaves. Tucking his knife back into his waist, he said, “Yes, a dirty branch.”

  “Exactly!” I said. “But how did the underside of the branch get this dirty?” I saw that Pairy had lost interest. “It was used to sweep the tracks away, to make it more difficult to find the chariots.”

  Pairy snorted and turned away.

  I dropped the branch and looked after my charioteer, feeling sad that I had somehow disappointed him. Hurrying after him, I did what I had seen other charioteers do: I draped one of my arms around his muscled shoulders.

  To my delight, he didn’t shrug or pull away.

  “Tell me, Pairy, do the charioteers travel with good provisions or should I prepare my stomach for salted fish?” I asked, turning the conversation to the topic that always held interest for soldiers.

  “Dried strips of oxen,” Pairy said. “And we usually carry figs and onions and small loaves of bread.”

  “Onions?” I said, surprised. “I could live on onions. They are so tangy. They wake my tongue and my stomach.”

  “And other parts,” Pairy said, grinning. He elbowed my side to get my attention and then he reached to his kilt and cupped himself.

  I didn’t know what to say, so I smiled and nodded agreement.

  Apparently, I was not convincing because Pairy stopped walking and laughed. “You haven’t had a woman, have you scribe?”

  I shrugged. “I was apprenticed to Nakht, the astronomer, when I was very young. And then I went with Lord Imhotep to help build Pharaoh Hatshepsut’s mortuary temple. And then, well, it wasn’t something they did or talked about. We were busy with other things.”

  “When we get to Gaza, I’ll take you to Seth’s Cave,” Pairy said, turning to continue walking back to the well. “We’ll complete your education.” He snorted loudly and shook his head. “Too busy! How can anyone be too busy for that?”

  I heard his words, but my thoughts, unwilling to follow Pairy’s, had turned to the dirty leaves, the assassin left for the creatures of the night and the hidden chariots.

  I couldn’t imagine Lord Imhotep hiding the chariots. Nor would the queen or Akila.

  Kebu! I told myself. The secrecy fit the actions of a Medjay warrior.

  But why, I wondered, did the commander of Pharaoh Thutmose’s archers find it necessary to hide his tracks?

  I Tell Pakhura a Tale

  From Yehem, we followed the road south and east toward Gaza, stopping at each village, each watering hole, each lonely hut because I insisted that we search for the queen at every place where she might have sheltered.

  And so our three-day ride became five, and Anun’s patience wore thin.

  We were still a day away from Gaza, and I had just emerged from the last of three huts that were clustered beneath a dusty tree. I was disappointed; the farmers and their wives and their children could barely speak our tongue, so I learned little. Not understanding me, they cowered, their eyes on the horses and the chariots and the men who stood in those chariots, wearing their strength as armor. I smiled at the children and pantomimed my questions. They shook their heads in answer, although I did not know if it was in answer to my question or an apology for not understanding my words.

  And so I left without learning if a wide, gilded chariot had passed.

  However, I had discovered that there were no newborn babies nor misplaced queens there.

  As I walked from the hut, I felt the eyes of the frightened parents and bewildered children on my back and the eyes of the weary, impatient charioteers on my face.

  Head down, I hurried to Anun’s chariot. I brought my hand to my face and slid a small pebble into my mouth. I had discovered that lodging a pebble beneath my tongue distracted my stomach from the bouncing of the chariots.

  I shifted the pebble with my tongue as I lifted one foot and placed it on the chariot floor.

  Before I was properly in the chariot, Anun slapped the reins against the horses’ backs. They lurched forward and I lost my balance. Desperate to avoid falling onto the ground and getting trampled by the horses of the chariots that followed us, I gripped the rail and pulled myself onto the lurching chariot, wondering what I had done to anger Anun.

  “You found nothing,” Anun said after a moment. “You learn nothing from searching the waterholes that we wouldn’t know by riding past them. We would not overlook the queen’s chariot. If we hadn’t tarried, we might have caught them by now. We would have reached Gaza by now, searched the city, and ridden halfway back to Megiddo.”

  “I am sorry for the delay, commander,” I said. Explanations came to mind, but I saw that he was angry. Words presented to an angry mind never find a home.

  After the initial burst of speed, Anun allowed the horses to slow and the ride became endurable.

  When it seemed that Anun had calmed, I raised my hand to my mouth and secretly spit the pebble into my hand. Then I said, “Not finding anything is a sign, Commander Anun. I watch the side of the road between wells. There have been no tracks wandering off the road. At the watering holes, there have been no scraps of bloody linen. And at three of the wells the ground held no tracks at all, new or old.”

  Keeping a firm grip on the chariot rail with one hand, I raised the other and extended my index finger. “Finding no tracks leaving the road tells me that the queen’s chariot must still lie ahead of us.” I extended a second finger. “No bloody linen tells me that it is unlikely that the queen gave birth.

  “And finding some wells with no tracks at all tells me that someone swept them clean, just as was done at Yehem. The person who swept the tracks at Yehem — Kebu, I think — is following this same road.”

  When I raised a third finger to list the point, the pebble I was holding slipped free. I released my other hand from the chariot to catch the pebble. Fumbling with my hands, I lost my balance and fell against the side of the chariot. I clapped my armpit over the rail to steady myself. Turning, I slipped the pebble back into my mouth.

  Balance restored, I straightened and looked ahead, pretending that nothing had happened.

  “What did you put in your mouth?” Anun asked.

  I shrugged. “A small stone.”

  “Why? Are you hiding something? Is it a gem of some sort?” Anun asked.

  “No, commander,” I said. “It is simply a pebble. Nothing more.”

  Anun looked at me suspiciously.

  “I find that if I place a pebble beneath my tongue, then my stomach is restful while we ride,” I said.

  “Seriously?” Anun asked. “This is true?”

  I nodded.

  “A stone can do that?” Anun said.

  “It has for the past four days,” I said. “I think it is a gift from Geb,” I added.

  Anun grunted. Then he said, “Telling you where the queen is would be a better gift.”

  ***

  Anun had remained grumpy overnight and I wanted to cheer him. So, when the walls of Gaza appeared over the western horizon, I said, “Our mystery will soon be solved.”

  I believed my words; the sky over the port city inspired optimism.

  Re had bled the blue from Nut’s belly, leaving it pale as washed linen. Upon that faint background, clouds, softer and less substantial than smoke, drifted in from the sea, dissolving as they moved over the city. I saw that empty sky as the still waters of a sacred lake, or, better still, the unblemished surface of freshly pressed papyrus upon which the future would soon be written.

  Anun slowed his horses to a walk as we approached the few tents that stood outside Gaza’s walls. He had pushed the horses hard and now they were covered with sweat, the hide over their shoulders rippling as the muscles beneath quivered.

  Relieved to be finished with chariot rides, I lowered my head and coughed the pebble into my hand and then droppe
d it onto the dust-covered road.

  “The queen’s chariot will be here, Commander. Commissioner Pakhura will know where she and Lord Imhotep are staying. You will be able to return to Pharaoh Thutmose with his wife and his new son,” I said, wondering if he would take offense if I clapped a hand against his back.

  I decided to restrain my enthusiasm.

  “I hope so,” Anun said, his mood lifting a little.

  I nodded, happy and feeling for a moment like a brave scribe who rode with the maryannu.

  “It looks different, doesn’t it?” Anun said, nodding at the few dust-covered tents that stood before the mudbrick walls of Gaza.

  It did.

  Little more than a week ago, army tents had covered the Gaza plain, spreading in a growing circle from the command tent of Pharaoh Thutmose, who had spurned the commissioner’s palace, choosing instead to stay among his men.

  Donkeys had crowded the road as they transferred supplies from the small fleet to the waiting army. Small cattle had filled the air with their cascading bleats, and oxen had lowed sadly from the field where they were slaughtered to feed the growing army.

  Once the army decamped, Gaza quickly returned to being a small, coastal outpost. However, it was important because it was home to Pakhura, commissioner of southern Canaan, and because it housed a garrison of a hundred foot soldiers and twenty charioteers — reminders to the Apiru, the outlaws and brigands who wandered the desert east of Gaza, that Pharaoh Thutmose’s rule extended even here, far from monuments and temples and markets of the Two Lands.

  Anun reined the chariot to a stop.

  Four seagulls swooped toward us. One of the birds was ahead of the other three, which were squawking loudly as they beat at the air and followed the lead bird’s twists and turns.

  As I watched the birds, it struck me that I couldn’t tell if the bird in front was leading the others, or if the three following birds were pursuing it.

  The thought raised another.

  I was sure that Kebu had found Queen Menwi in Yehem. Her chariot tracks led from there. His quiver with Medjay arrows told me that he had been there.