“I know. I saw you cry.”
Kepi shivered. She shivered and shivered, uncontrollably. “Can I stay with you tonight?”
The boy didn’t even blink. “You’re strong. You can do boys’ work. I’m Masud. Come, and you can stay as long as you like.”
Chapter 24
Metallurgy
The master came and stood on the other side of Masud. Kepi sensed Masud stiffening. But she kept her eyes steady on the hole in front of them.
The master gave a quick nod. “Line it.” He hobbled off to inspect the work of the boys at the other fire pits.
Masud smiled at Kepi. “He’s pleased. We dug it the right size.”
Kepi could take no credit. Masud was the one who knew about these things; Kepi had never dug a fire pit before. She sighed and looked around.
At that moment, a vulture landed on the gate of the metallurgy yard. Two people were peering through that gate into the yard: a boy of around eight years old and a man sitting on a mat of papyrus reeds woven together. The boy held one end of a rope. The other end was tied to the mat. The man’s legs were stumps. Boy and man were both hollow eyed and hollow cheeked. A dullness sat on their open lips.
“We’re being watched,” said Kepi.
“Don’t look at them. If the master sees, he’ll chase them off before they’ve had a chance.”
“A chance at what?”
“Don’t talk.”
Masud looked around quickly. With his back to the gate, he tossed a pottery shard over his shoulder. The vulture didn’t move, though the shard went right past him and landed beyond the boy. The boy picked it up and left, pulling the man on the mat behind him.
And the whole time Masud hadn’t even glanced at them. He was already on his knobby knees, lining the bottom and the sides of the hole with the pottery shards. So Kepi did the same. For the past three days, ever since she’d met Masud on the dock and come here to this metallurgy shop, she’d mimicked everything he did, never asking questions. Masud said it was best not to call atten-tion to oneself. People who stuck out got beaten or given more work.
Mimicking was fine with Kepi. Last night was the first time she’d really slept since the sandstorm. Since Menes had died. So she’d been tired most of the time. She didn’t have the energy to think for herself. She was grateful to drift along at this quiet shop; no one drowned here, no one starved. It was easy to lose herself in the strange details of this new life. She was grateful for that, too.
Today, though, Kepi was rested, and her thinking was sharp again. She didn’t fully understand what had happened just now with that boy and the man outside the gate, but she knew they were homeless. Beggars. Masud had somehow helped them by giving them something as worthless as a pottery shard. He would get in trouble if the master knew. And he trusted Kepi not to tell on him.
And most of all, something had happened to that man’s legs.
For the first time in three days, Kepi felt something beyond grief. She was startled to find that it was almost disgust—at herself. She’d been hardly a person; it was as though she had no will of her own. She’d let herself act helpless.
Father always said the only thing that was humiliating was helplessness. Kepi suddenly realized that that belief probably made the loss of his foot that much more difficult for him. And it was part of what made him so determined to be not just a baker, but the best baker around. He wouldn’t give up. And Menes was like Father—not in most ways, but in that one way. When the crew stole Babu and made off without him, he didn’t cry—he got mad. He said, “No one gets away with stealing from me.”
Kepi was sick of herself. Menes had called Kepi his stubborn little tempest, but it was Menes who was stubborn. And so was Father. No one ever called her father stubborn, but now it was obvious to Kepi that that was exactly what Father was. You had to be stubborn when things got awful, or you’d give up. And giving up felt awful. Menes had told her to remember that, remember never to give up.
Kepi loved Father. And she had come to love Menes. She would probably never stop feeling a heavy sadness for Menes, but she could carry it around with more strength if she did what she knew she really should be doing. For the love of both her family and Menes, she had to find that stubborn core within again and gain the strength from it to shake herself into action.
Because this whole thing had grown. It was clear to Kepi now; like dawn after a long night out in the open by the river, everything was clear. Lots of people got hurt working on the pyramids. So it wasn’t just her family that depended on her. In a way, all Egypt depended on her, because all Egypt depended on the pharaoh. And Kepi loved Egypt. Her month alone with Menes on the river had made that love deep and abiding. This was her land. Kepi needed to tell the pharaoh about all of them, all the injured workers. Maybe that was why the vulture had drawn her attention to that boy and man on the other side of the gate; maybe it was the goddess Nekhbet, the goddess who protected the pharaoh. She had soared overhead after the sandstorm, and now she had come again. Maybe she wanted Kepi to talk with the pharaoh and help him change his ways, help him become a better god.
It all made sense, this whole trip. A fierce determination flowed through her. But Kepi shouldn’t do anything fast. For the moment she had to do her job, or both she and Masud would get in trouble. And Masud was really nice; Kepi never wanted to get him in trouble. Tonight, while everyone else was sleeping, she’d figure out what to do next. She looked around through newly alert eyes. Metallurgy was interesting; she might as well pay attention.
Masud now dumped charcoal into the hole. He lit a papyrus torch from one of the other boys’ fires and set the charcoal aflame. He sucked his top lip in behind his bottom teeth. Kepi had seen him do that a lot.
“What’s the matter?” she asked. Why wasn’t he gathering the green rocks and throwing them into the fire pit? That was the next step. That was what they’d done for the past three days. Those rocks contained copper, and copper was what they were smelting.
Kepi had known how to recognize copper since she was tiny. Back home those blue-green nuggets lay near streams. Once, after a thunderstorm, Kepi and Father had gone wandering in a canyon and had come across a large cliff hunk that had fallen off. Red speckled the broken side. Father told her that was the original color of copper—before the wind and rain turned it green. Brilliant red. And that was how it looked here, after they smelted it and the master made it into bracelets and anklets.
When Masud didn’t answer, Kepi nudged him. “Are you daydreaming?” She pointed at the rock pile. “Let’s go get them.”
“Don’t point,” said Masud under his breath. “And don’t look at me when you talk. The master doesn’t like us to talk at work. And no, of course I’m not daydreaming. Don’t treat me like a silly jackass.”
That was one of Masud’s favorite insults: He called the other boys silly jackasses. Jackasses were four-legged animals with short hair that stood as tall as Kepi and had hooves that weren’t split. They stank, although Masud insisted they smelled nice after a bath. In Kepi’s opinion, the people in Ineb Hedj didn’t wash their jackasses often enough. In Upper Egypt, where Kepi was from, they didn’t have jackasses. But this city was crowded with them. The millers used them to stomp grains into flour. And everyone used them to carry burdens. Kepi didn’t know if jackasses were silly or not, but she liked the insult because it made her feel just the slightest bit as though she was home, with Father and Mother and Nanu calling her silly all the time.
“So what’s the matter?” Kepi asked out of the side of her mouth.
“We’re doing something different today. Just you and me. The master chose us. Well, he chose me—he always chooses me for special tasks; but I asked for you as my partner. That’s why we dug this new pit.” Masud rubbed his nose and talked with his hand in front of his mouth. “And it’s my first time. We have to do it right. Don’t ask questions. Just do what I do.” He put charcoal into a pot about a quarter of the way full and set it beside the f
laming pit. Kepi was baffled, but Masud clearly wasn’t about to offer an explanation.
Masud picked up two metal rods and handed one to Kepi. Together they went to their old fire pit from yesterday, the one that was completely cool now. The rocks they’d melted in that pit had resolidified into a single big slab. They used the metal rods to dig out the slab and levered it onto the ground beside the pit. Then Masud cracked the rod down on top of it. “Come on,” he said. “This is the fun part. Try it.”
So they took turns hitting the slab. A brittle, glassy, silvery layer chipped off. “That’s slag,” said Masud. “The junk rock that the copper ran through.” Underneath was the beautiful, glistening, pure red copper. Masud brushed it off with his hands. “Help me carry it to our new pit.”
Kepi was surprised. Usually the master had the cakes of pure copper carried to his workshop. There boys hammered them so flat that the master could cut and bend them any way he wanted. Jewelry, bowls, boxes, mirrors. Sometimes the master set colored stones into box lids—amethyst, carnelian, quartz, garnet. Kepi loved the mirrors especially, because the master outlined them with bits of turquoise, the color that ensured fertility and protected against the evil eye. Kepi wanted a copper mirror with a turquoise border when she got older. Nanu would love one now.
So it was odd to carry the copper cake to the new flaming pit. But Kepi obediently curled her fingers under her end of the slab.
The fire glowed blue already.
“I’m a silly jackass,” said Masud. “We should have put the pot of charcoal in the pit when the flames were still red. Now the fire’s so hot, we’ll get burned.”
“We have to put the pot in the fire pit?”
“I told you not to ask questions.”
Kepi looked at the pot. It had a lip around the top. “If we hold the metal rods under the lip, you on one side and me on the other, we can lift it in without getting burned. It’ll be easy because we’re just about the same height.”
Masud knitted his brows. “Please, great god Seker,” he said softly. “Please help us. Don’t let us drop the pot. You love jewelry, and we are metalworkers, so we are your humble servants.”
Kepi and Masud used the rods to place the pot in the fire. Then Masud set the charcoal inside the pot afire. “Now the copper cake goes in.”
Kepi blinked. “How? There’s no way to hold it at a distance, and we can’t throw it in or the pot will break.”
Masud didn’t even look at Kepi. He picked up a stone and hammered the tip of a rod into one end of the thin slab. Slowly the rod pierced the copper cake. He smiled at her triumphantly. “See, you’re not the only smart one. Pure copper is soft.” They skewered the copper slab and lifted it down into the pot, then slid out the rod.
Masud pumped air into the side of the pit with a goatskin bellows. The fire grew white hot. Then Masud tossed a dark, shiny, silvery rock into the molten copper.
Kepi stepped back in alarm. “You’re dirtying the copper again.”
“It’s upje. That’s what we’re supposed to do.”
“I never heard of upje.”
“Some call it arsenic. It makes bronze. A harder metal. Better for statues.”
“Statues? Are we making statues?”
“Not us. Just watch.”
Stinking fumes rose from the molten soup—like old, wet, musty garlic that had grown extra strong.
The master looked into their pot. Then he called over the dozen other boys to sit in a semicircle and watch. But Masud and Kepi were told to stay on their feet, so they could see everything better.
Kepi didn’t like standing when everyone else was sitting. She could tell from their faces that it made the boys angry. Masud and she were the only free people working here. The other children were slaves, stolen or traded for from other countries.
Masud was an orphan. The master had adopted him. But he showed the boy no affection. Masud said that the master had adopted him only because he wanted to make sure he’d have someone to take care of him in his old age. So Masud was learning the trade—the master taught him everything, not just the menial tasks. When the other boys got older, the master would trade them away and get younger slaves, but Masud would stay here his whole life.
Masud had told the master that Kepi was an orphan, too. He hadn’t lied, though. That was what he had believed when he’d first brought her to the workshop. Now he knew all about her, but he hadn’t then.
The master took long metal tongs, and with great effort, he lifted the pot from the fire pit and set it on the ground. He was a big man, but he was lame in one leg, so everything was hard for him. He hammered a hole in the side of the pot, up near the top.
Kepi noticed that a slave boy was trying to peer past her. It was the odd slave boy—the one the others kept their distance from, as though there was something wrong with him. He was tall, but she was exactly in his way. Their eyes met. She moved aside so he could see.
Now the master gripped the pot with the tongs and tipped it. Molten metal poured through that hole into a casting mold. The rising steam made it hard to see, but as it cleared, a golden thread appeared, connecting the pot to the mold. It seemed sublime, like the long shiny finger of a god.
The master threw the empty pot onto the shard pile. Then he squatted by the casting mold. After a long while, he tapped the mold with a hammer, and it broke away from what was inside.
Two golden ears appeared, pointing to the heavens. Then a head with deeply incised long whiskers. The cat sat on its haunches with its tail straight up. The master rubbed with a thick cloth until the cat glowed. At last he held it up for all to see. “I made this for rich customers,” said the master. “Do you think they’ll like it?”
The slave boys cheered.
It was afternoon by now. The fires in the other pits had died down. The master told the boys to put away the tools; they were free till dinnertime.
“I have an errand,” Masud said to Kepi. “Want to come?”
Kepi hadn’t yet been out of this shop, except to go back and forth to the home they ate and slept in. The offer tempted her. But her curiosity was piqued even more about something else right now. She shook her head, and Masud left.
Chapter 25
Bells
Kepi went to the wall of the workshop and sat in the shadows to wait. She was familiar enough with cats; wild cats stalked the refuse pile outside her village. But she wondered who on earth would commission a statue of a cat, of all things.
Soon enough, Kepi heard musical clinks; these customers clearly wore lots of jewelry. Kepi heard the master meet them at the entrance and lead them inside. She stood and peeked in through a window.
A couple with long, drawn faces and many bracelets, anklets, and necklaces followed the master. Their eyebrows were shaved. At the sight of the cat statue, they gasped. “It makes us think of our dear departed one.” The woman beat her chest in grief, as though the cat was a member of her family. The man paid and carried away the statue.
Kepi backed into the shadows again and plopped down, almost landing on the lap of one of the slave boys. “Sorry. I didn’t see you.” It was the boy she had moved aside for earlier. “I saw the customers,” she said in a confidential tone. “That statue is for their dead cat. Imagine that! They owned a wild cat.”
“It probably wasn’t really wild. It’s popular here to tame cats. When one is really nice, they mate it with another really nice one, and the kittens are even nicer. They sleep with them.”
“You’re joking. Cats in a house?”
“Cats keep poisonous snakes out. And rats, too. People say they’re wonderful. I bet the owners shaved their eyebrows.”
“They did!” said Kepi.
“I told you. It’s what they do here to show respect at the death of a cat.”
“How do you know so much about Ineb Hedj?”
“I’ve lived here since I was six. Half my life.”
Kepi swallowed. Half his life away from his family. “I’m Kepi.”
<
br /> “You probably don’t want to talk with me, Kepi.”
“Why not?”
“I was a swineherd before I came here. The master says swineherds stink. He says that’s why I’m bad. He beats me. If he sees us talking, he might beat you, too.”
Kepi worked to keep her face placid. Her family said swineherds stank, too. She took a deep breath without being obvious about it. This boy didn’t stink. And it wasn’t his fault that his family kept swine. “I don’t care. I’m happy to know you.”
The boy stared. Then he gave a quick head bow. “Call me Kan. But that’s not really my name. I was born in Kanesh, so that’s what the man who bought me from my parents called me for short, and it stuck.”
His parents traded him away! Kepi looked down at her feet so Kan couldn’t see the shock in her eyes. In Egypt no one would do that to their children. “Kanesh. Where is that place?”
“Northeast. In the land of the Hattians. It takes months on the backs of jackasses to get there.”
“My home is far, too. But south. It takes a month and a half to get there by boat.”
“My home has mountains all around,” said Kan. Then he gave a little humph. “Actually, I don’t remember it that well. Sometimes I think I don’t remember it at all.”
“I remember home. I haven’t been away so long, though—not even two months. I think about it all the time. I think about my mother and father and my sister Nanu.” Talking like this made Kepi tremble.
“Yeah.” Kan looked away. “At least we’re busy here. You won’t be able to think about them so much as long as you’re working the metals.”
“I’m not working here long. I only came by accident, really. It all started because of a baboon.”
“Baboon? You mean a monkey?”
Kepi hadn’t meant to talk about Babu. She’d given up hope of ever seeing him again. But it felt nice to remember him right now. “The best little monkey.”
Kan gave a twisted smile. “Is that a joke?”
“Two boys stole him, and I went after them to get him back. Anyway, he’s lost. But I have something else I need to do now. Then I’m going home.”
Lights on the Nile Page 12
