THE
DESERT PRINCE
Secrets of the Sands
The Lost Scroll of the Physician
The Desert Prince
SECRETS OF THE SANDS
THE
DESERT PRINCE
ALISHA SEVIGNY
Copyright © Alisha Sevigny, 2020
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise (except for brief passages for purpose of review) without the prior permission of Dundurn Press. Permission to photocopy should be requested from Access Copyright.
All characters in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
Publisher and acquiring editor: Scott Fraser | Editor: Jess Shulman
Cover designer: Laura Boyle
Cover illustration: Queenie Chan
Printer: Marquis Book Printing Inc.
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Title: The desert prince / Alisha Sevigny.
Names: Sevigny, Alisha, author.
Description: Series statement: Secrets of the sands ; 2
Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20200200623 | Canadiana (ebook) 20200200666 | ISBN 9781459744325 (softcover) | ISBN 9781459744332 (PDF) | ISBN 9781459744349 (EPUB) Classification: LCC PS8637.E897 D47 2020 | DDC jC813/.6—dc23
We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program. We also acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Ontario, through the Ontario Book Publishing Tax Credit and Ontario Creates, and the Government of Canada.
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Contents
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Acknowledgements
1
“NORTH?” REB ECHOES. The scribe looks like he’s just tumbled off the back of a donkey. “You wish us to go north after Princess Merat?”
“Yes,” I say. My heart and mind are still racing from our confrontation with the Queen of Egypt. “If we hurry, we may catch up to the Hyksos chieftain and his men. Did you not hear Queen Anat? The princess was given to him just before the queen herself arrived here.”
“You mean when she arrived here to kill us,” Reb points out. “Why should we trust anything the queen says? She came to take the scroll and send us to the underworld.” He gestures at the mastaba that houses my parents’ bodies, that would have held our bodies if not for the intervention of young Prince Tutan and Ahmes.
“It is a good thing she only accomplished the first task,” Paser says cheerily, still holding the surgical blade Ahmes gave him.
By the gods’ good graces, the physician’s knife and the prince’s royal command were enough to stop Crooked Nose from entombing us alive. Ahmes and Prince Tutan are now on their way back to the palace to check on my brother, Ky, who is still recovering from the risky surgery Ahmes performed only hours ago.
Crooked Nose, Queen Anat’s favourite solider, is with them. He will have the unpleasant task of informing Her Highness that her plan to leave us dead has been thwarted. By her only son and heir to the throne, no less. As the cruel soldier is responsible for the fire that killed my parents, I do not feel all that sorry for him.
“If we are to catch up to the Hyksos chieftain and rescue the princess, we must get moving.” Paser glances up at the sky.
“Say we do catch up to them,” Reb says, crossing his arms. “What are we supposed to do? Walk up to the chieftain and say, ‘Greetings, we would like the princess back’?”
“Maybe we can convince the Hyksos tribe to let us join them,” I say, though my stomach lurches at the outrageous thought. “Healers are always needed.”
Reb snorts. “You really think our rivals will welcome three young physicians into their midst?”
“Why not?” I speak with more confidence than I feel. “Our skills will be of use to them, especially if there is a battle coming.”
“And if they do not welcome us among them?” Reb asks. “What then?”
“We grab the princess and run,” I say grimly. “Run where?” Reb throws his hands up in exasperation. “We cannot come back to Thebes.”
“We can go to their port city of Avaris,” Paser interjects. “That is likely where they are taking Merat anyway.”
“You wish us to go to the Hyksos capital?” Reb is aghast. “Into the very heart of their territory?”
“I have family there,” Paser says. We look at him in shock and a shadow crosses his face. “I’m not sure whether we will be welcome, but they are my blood, and it is our best chance.”
A flicker of hope ignites in my chest. “Do you think they might help us?”
“There is no guarantee,” Paser says. “But from what I know, the port city is vast, with many people from distant shores. If the gods are willing and we find Merat and free her, we might be able to disappear into the crowds.” He hesitates. “Or board a ship for another land.”
My stomach falls even further at the thought of crossing the seas to unknown worlds.
“The chieftain and his men will probably kill us before that happens,” Reb says, ever optimistic. “Especially if they hear we are there to steal away his future wife.”
“A possibility,” I admit. “But our deaths are certain if we stay in Thebes. Queen Anat will see to that.”
“We will not last a moment out there, away from our home.” Reb motions at the world beyond the city borders. “We are scribes, not nomads. How can we make our way north to the Hyksos unaided? We will be swooped up by the queen’s men, faster than the falcon seizes its prey.”
“You forget something, my friend,” Paser interrupts again, and I look at him, grateful for his support. I am not sure I would be so bold in my plans were it not for his calm strength at my side. “There is someone who can take us there.”
Reb pales in the moonlight. “You cannot mean —”
“The Hyksos spy,” I breathe. “The one they caught in the marketplace. Paser, you are brilliant! He can show us the way.”
“What makes you think he will help us?” Reb scoffs. “Be
sides, even if we could free him from the Place of Confinement — which we cannot — it would only have Pharaoh’s men joining the queen’s in hunting us like rats for betraying both him and the kingdom.”
“It is our only choice.” I look back at the mastaba, then at my friends. “We do not have much time. We should gather up anything that might assist us on our journey.”
“Did you take some of the blue lotus flower you gave your brother this evening?” Reb, assessing that I am quite serious, seems truly alarmed. “In addition to this terrible plan, which will likely see us all killed —” he looks at Paser, who shrugs, then back at me “— you wish us to free an enemy spy right after we rob the tombs of our ancestors? Of your very parents, Sesha?”
“While our ancestors may have need of these objects in the afterlife, we need them now, in this life,” I insist. “My parents will not begrudge us borrowing a few items.”
“We will be cursed,” Reb protests.
“We already are,” I say, tart as unripe berries. “I have lost my parents and my home, and now I must leave my brother behind. The gods can take nothing more from me. I do not ask you to join us, but if we are to have any chance of escaping, we must be on our way.”
2
RESTING MY HEAD AGAINST my mother’s coffin, I collect my courage. It is quiet in the room. Paser and Reb are searching the other tombs for anything that might be of use on the long and dangerous journey ahead. I say a brief goodbye to my parents.
“I will not be back for some time, Mother,” I whisper.
If ever.
“We are going to find Merat.” I smile, thinking of my friend. “You remember the princess? She has a most irrepressible spirit.” My smile fades. “Know I will honour your memory every day with my life. I will never forget you and Father.” Wishing I could look upon my mother’s face once more, I close my eyes to recall the image of her eyes, the colour and sweetness of honey, her wide smile, and the soothing sound of her voice. I picture her singing to my brother when he was young and had woken suddenly from a restless dream.
If only this were a dream I could wake from as easily.
Will Ky think I have abandoned him? I would give anything to see my brother once more, to explain why I am leaving Thebes, why he is safer without me. I take a deep breath. I must trust that Ahmes will relay my message to Ky: I will come back for him as soon as I am able. I must also trust that Prince Tutan’s affection for his best friend is enough for the queen to leave Ky alone. Despite her threats otherwise, I pray she will not harm my brother just to get back at me. After all, he is only a child.
I am not a child. His stubborn words come back with the bittersweet realization that he no longer is a child. Perhaps he has not been one since that night our parents died, despite my best efforts to keep him so.
“Sesha.” Paser stands in the doorway, holding a waterskin, the long woven strap slung over his broad shoulder. “We should be on our way. Khonsu will only shine a few more hours before Ra chases him from the sky.”
“Coming,” I say, picking up the objects I hurriedly gathered from the crypt. A scalpel, a scarf, some loose gemstones that once adorned a bracelet Father bought Mother — these are the remnants I have to remember them by, items that may make all the difference to our survival. These plus my father’s obsidian blade and his priceless scarab amulet, which hangs from my neck. There is much more I wish I could bring, but we need to travel light. The burden on my soul at leaving my brother is heavy enough.
I kiss my fingertips and brush them along the length of my parents’ intricately painted coffins as I walk between them, leaving the room and their physical remains for what may be the last time. Our chances of reaching the Hyksos unscathed are slim, maybe nonexistent, making it unlikely I will ever return. As Reb pointed out, we are scribes, not nomads.
But there is no other option.
Pausing at the exit, I am unable to resist one last glance at their final resting place. And though I hope they are somewhere in the Field of Reeds, laughing and having a wonderful time, a part of me hopes their spirits will be with me always.
“What did you find?” I ask Paser and Reb to distract myself from the fact that we have just become tomb robbers and are currently on our way to release an enemy spy from confinement. That, and out of simple curiosity.
“In addition to the knife Ahmes gave me, I have a water container.” Paser holds up the waterskin. It looks to be the bladder of a rhino. “And some silver for trading.”
“Praises,” I say in admiration. “Reb?”
“I did not take anything.” He is defiant, fists at his sides, eyes a bit wild. “I do not wish to be cursed for defiling the graves of my ancestors.”
“That is your choice.” Though, ten ankhs to one he will not turn down a drink from the waterskin once we are on our way.
We walk in the dark, as furtive as stalking cats, toward the pits. Khonsu has disappeared behind clouds left by the earlier storm, which passed as quickly as it began. Good for our travels, catastrophic for the crops and the kingdom, which desperately need the rains. The threat of famine looms over the landscape, an invisible cloud of its own.
As we draw closer to the pits, we move even more slowly so as not to fall into one of the gaping holes and break our necks, or any other body part essential for a quick escape. We carry no torch; fire will only call attention.
“That one,” Paser says softly, pointing into the blackness. It is quiet, and though we tread lightly, our footsteps make a soft crunching noise in the dirt.
“Who’s there?” a voice shouts, high pitched and tremulous. “It is I, Nebifu, High Priest. I am being held here in error. Let me out and you will be rewarded handsomely by the gods!”
We ignore Reb’s uncle and keep walking. No noise or pleading comes from the spy’s cavity, which is just to the left of where we stand. In fact, it is ominously quiet. In unison, we peer over the edge of the pit.
“Pssst,” I call down into the hole.
No answer.
“Do you think he is dead?” Reb whispers, sounding hopeful.
Paser, on my right, shrugs. “It depends if they’ve been feeding him or not.”
“Maybe this is the wrong hole?” I say, a little louder. At that there is a scuffling noise and a voice starts speaking in the startled tone of someone just woken, wondering who is there and if they are dreaming.
“Peace.” I make my voice soothing, like my mother’s.
“We mean you no harm.”
A short bark of laughter from the pit suggests he does not believe us.
“He speaks our language,” whispers Reb.
“Of course he does, they all do,” I whisper back. “The Hyksos people have been in our lands for many years. Our language is theirs now. Besides, what good is a spy who cannot understand what is said?”
“How shall we get him out?” Paser asks as we stand there, looking down into the pit.
“The rope.” I look around, something prickling at the back of my memory.
Reb scuffs his toe in the dirt, then clears his throat. “I, uh, threw it into Nebifu’s pit when we were here earlier.”
Eye of Horus. I had forgotten that. The High Priest had not been kind to his nephew, and Reb had returned the favour, leaving him in the pits where he had been put on Pharaoh’s command. The king did not look well on the priest for keeping Egypt’s most sacred treasures hidden from him and proclaimed it an act of betrayal. Presumably, Pharaoh does not know of his wife’s collusion with the priest, though Nebifu swears he and the queen were only keeping the country’s priceless heirlooms safe. She does not want them used to provide for the common people, or even more insultingly, as tribute for the Hyksos who rule in the North. She’d rather use her daughter as an offering instead, I think indignantly while scouring the area for another rope.
Have faith, Merat, we are coming for you.
Further searching reveals nothing we can use to fish the spy out. Then I remember the scarf. Quickly, I unwrap
it from around my head and dangle it down into the hole. The clouds part, clearing away from the crescent moon, and though it is still dark, a little illumination makes its way into the pit. A man stands there, rubbing his eyes and blinking up at us as if he cannot quite believe what he is seeing. The scarf hangs several royal cubits above his head.
“Jump,” I say. The moonlight shifts, glinting off white fragments of something deep in the pit.
He jumps, high, but not high enough to reach the end of the scarf. Trying again, he grunts with effort, but misses. There is a clattering sound when he lands, and I finally recognize the ivory shards glinting in the moonlight.
Bones.
3
“WE WILL HAVE TO GET NEBIFU to throw the rope back up to us,” Paser, ever logical, says after a few moments of this.
“He will only do that if he thinks we will free him.” Reb folds his arms. “Which I made very clear I will not do.”
“We may not have a choice,” I say, glancing over at Nebifu’s pit. Besides, even if the scarf is long enough to reach the spy, it might not be able to bear his weight. Reeling the scarf back up, I make up my mind.
Reb and Paser follow me over to Nebifu’s pit.
“Nebifu,” I call.
“Yes?” he says, his voice frantic. “Who’s there?”
“It is I, Sesha, Daughter of Ay.”
“Gods be praised, Sesha, you have come to your senses. Hurry and free me, child!” The desperation in his tone hits me, along with an unpleasant odour. I suppose there isn’t a separate latrine in the pit.
“Very well.” I take a hesitant step closer to the edge. “Throw me the rope and we will set you free.”
“Do I have your word?” he cries in a warbly voice.
“Yes.”
“Swear it! Swear it on the names of your father and mother.”
“We could always say we are going to free him and then not do so.” Reb looks over my shoulder into the dark pit.
I sigh, weighing the risks, and reach my decision. “Despite my previous claim, it seems there is something I possess that can be taken from me. And, fortunately for Nebifu, I would like to keep my word.” I take a few more steps toward the hole. “I swear on my family name, if you throw up the rope, you will go free.” I hope I am not making a mistake.
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