The Amarnan Kings, Book 6: Scarab - Descendant

by Overton, Max

  "I don't recall anything about a green mountain," Daffyd said. He reached out and turned the notebook around, scanning the page quickly. "Nor a crystal crown and the Aten's greeting. Where did those phrases come from?"

  "The inscription."

  "I don't remember them. I recall you translating words describing a green streak of vegetation and a notch in the cliff where the sun shines through as pointers to the tomb, but not these things."

  Dani looked down at her plate, a look of embarrassment flooding her features. "That's because I wasn't completely accurate in my translation."

  Daffyd's gaze searched Dani's face. "You were lying to us, lass?" he asked quietly.

  "Not lying exactly...more misleading."

  "But why? Didn't you trust us?"

  "You? Of course. The others on the team? Yes. Bashir? Definitely not."

  "You couldn't have let us in on the deception?"

  "I...I wanted to...but I was told not to."

  Daffyd stared at Dani. "Told not to...by whom?"

  "A voice inside my head." Dani smiled wryly at Daffyd's expression. "'Hearing voices now', I hear you say. Well, not exactly, but just a very strong impression that I should disguise the tomb description...so I did."

  Daffyd considered her words in silence for several minutes, playing with the scraps of food on his plate with his fork as he did so. "You not only rattled off a translation of Egyptian hieroglyphs but managed to fudge a few details as you did so? So fluently none of us suspected for a moment? Why aren't you a professional Egyptologist instead of a lecturer in prehistoric studies if you have these linguistic abilities?"

  "That's just it, I don't." Dani nibbled on a piece of flat bread. "I've studied ancient languages a bit, of course, and did a term or two of hieroglyphs, but my ability to translate is limited to working my way slowly through the phrases, nutting out the context as I go."

  "That's not the impression you gave in Syria. You just read it off the walls directly--or was it all invention? Did you just make up Scarab's whole life?"

  "No. I...I translated what was there, accurately for the most part, but I've no idea how I did it. Look, there's a series of pictographs--lion, hand, feather, sun, bowl, water, etc--my conscious mind wrestles them into a literal translation, but my unconscious mind has already turned them into conversational discourse. My eye sees the pictograph, I disengage my brain, and I utter what my inner voice tells me." Dani smiled, her eyes sad. "Sounds ridiculous, doesn't it?"

  "What you uttered was accurate, though? You weren't just spouting any old thing?"

  "No. My conscious mind was following along, monitoring my speech, you could say, and it was accurate--far more accurate than if I'd spent hours searching for the context with some linguistics professor."

  "That's a hell of a story, lass," Daffyd said slowly.

  "And now you know I'm crazy, having just suspected it before--hearing voices, believing in the efficacy of a golden scarab, rattling off a long story that a trained Egyptologist would have difficulty deciphering."

  "Not necessarily, lass. I'm no psychologist, but Jung talked about the collective unconscious. Could you just be tapping into that? Somehow?"

  "I'm not a psychologist either, but I think he was just referring to the human mind having collective archetypes--like rites of initiation being common to all societies. He didn't mean it as a literal memory gleaned from what other people knew."

  "Monopsychism, then. Some writers do say Jung really meant that--that the collective unconscious is the sum total of human experience and somehow you've found a way to tap into that knowledge."

  "It might be simpler just to posit that I'm Scarab reincarnated."

  "Good God, are you?"

  "I've no idea," Dani said. "I don't think so. I certainly don't have any memories of being her, or actually doing the things described in the account."

  "That's not exactly the impression I've garnered in the last year, since we discovered the chambers. Even just recently--things like you remembering being in the western desert, or today, when you said you remembered how unspoiled the river used to be."

  Dani smiled uncertainly. "I also corrected myself. Those weren't memories--how could they be? My brain, and the neurons within it, wasn't in existence in ancient times."

  "That raises questions about what memory is. Is it something that sits in the brain waiting to be recalled, a configuration of neuronal connections, or is it stored elsewhere--in an extraneous energy field for instance--and your brain just acts as a receiver, like a radio, enabling you to access memories that Scarab had thousands of years ago?"

  Dani shrugged. "I'm a scientist, Dafs, a materialist--and I have no evidence of anything...of anything supernatural. To believe I'm somehow accessing thoughts somebody had years ago or that I'm somehow the reincarnation of Scarab is ridiculous. Isn't it far more likely I'm just empathising with a troubled young woman?"

  "If you say so, lass, but that doesn't explain how you suddenly got so proficient at reading hieroglyphs."

  "No, I don't suppose it does, but it's the most reasonable explanation, so I'm sticking with it."

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  * * *

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Marc and Muammar awoke the next morning stiff and aching from their uncomfortable night on the rocky floor of the rubble-blocked cave. They still suffered the after effects of their trek through the desert, and their bodies cried out for water. The spring still flowed, though sparingly, and they soaked up as much moisture as they could before turning their thoughts toward finding food in the wilderness. Muammar assured Marc that there was life in the desert, things that could be eaten if one was not too particular, but Marc was sceptical.

  There was nothing obvious moving around on the ledge, so they descended to the desert floor to search among the boulders, tumbling them aside and chasing down movement in the cooler and more humid undersides of the rocks. They found life--not in any great abundance--but after an hour of fossicking they had a haul of three medium-sized scorpions, a large centipede, and a lizard's tail. The owner of the tail was ensconced beneath a large rock and could not be persuaded to come out.

  Muammar laid the corpses out on a flat rock and smiled. "Breakfast is served."

  "Don't be disgusting." Marc poked the lizard's tail and it twitched faintly. "It's still alive, for God's sake."

  "No, it's not. That's just nerves. So, what would you like? The scorpions are probably the most nutritious but the other titbits may be palatable too."

  Marc grimaced, so Muammar picked up one of the scorpions and broke the tail from the body. Clear fluid leaked from the broken end. Muammar dabbed a finger in the fluid and touched it to his tongue.

  "Juicy," he said. "But not much of a taste." He held the sting at the end of the tail and put the other end in his mouth, crunching down through the exoskeleton. "Not bad," he mumbled. He swallowed and took another nibble, biting just short of the sting segment and flicking it away as he chewed.

  Marc stared at him as he ate, his own stomach growling its complaint of neglect, and then gingerly picked up another of the scorpions. He followed Muammar's example and, closing his eyes, bit down on the tail. A rush of fluid filled his mouth and he gagged, spitting out the fragments in his mouth. "Oh God, that was just awful." He continued to spit, his stomach heaving until he brought himself under control.

  "Try again," Muammar said. "We have to have food if we're to survive out here, and this might be the only food we can find."

  Marc grimaced and crunched into his scorpion again, disciplining himself to continue even though he almost gagged. He finished his morsel, leaving only the sting and the pincers, which he threw away.

  "Good," Muammar said. He finished off his own arachnid and offered the third one to Marc, who refused with a shake of his head. Muammar ate the scorpion and then picked up the centipede. "I've never tried these." Marc shuddered, so Muammar bit into it and immediately spat it out. "Bitter," he explained. Marc refused
the lizard tail, so Muammar ate that too, swallowing it in one convulsive gulp. "Now we must hope our stomachs accept this fare."

  "I think I'm going for a lie down," Marc said. "Maybe wash my mouth out and try not to think of...of anything."

  Muammar continued his exploration of the rubble heap by himself. He found another scorpion and, after killing it, slipped it into his pocket for later. There was little else visible, though after some diligent searching he found a few tough looking threads of ragged vegetation growing near the boulders. He sat on the hot sand and studied the plant, examining the scallops cut out of the leathery leaves and wondering what jaws had made them. Further scouting revealed other plants, also chewed and on one he found the owner of the jaws, a large brown and yellow-spotted grasshopper. The orthopteran stopped eating and looked at Muammar suspiciously with bulging, multi-faceted eyes, sidling around to the far side of the stem as he made a cautious approach. It watched Muammar and as he tried to sneak around the plant, edged nervously round so as to keep the thin stem between them.

  Muammar leapt and his hands enveloped the insect. He gave a yelp of pain and opened his hands, whereupon the grasshopper opened flimsy looking wings and soared away. Muammar sucked his thumb where the insect's hind legs had scratched him and started in pursuit. It had landed about ten yards away, but the hot sand was not to its liking, so it whirred back to the shelter of the rocks. He ran after it and threw himself headlong with his hands outstretched, determined to hang on this time, no matter what. The insect raked him again, but Muammar squeezed and one of the hind legs broke off and a wing crumpled. The grasshopper looked at him reproachfully, but he crushed the insect's thorax anyway, killing it.

  He pulled the legs and wings off the dead insect and looked at the long tubular body, imagining the nutritious contents. He tucked the body away with the scorpion and went looking for more. Scraggly plants were scattered around the base of the mound, evidently benefitting from the water trickling down, and there were several more grasshoppers of varying sizes. They were hard to catch, but as they seemed reluctant to fly far from the mound--he caught them if he persisted in his pursuit. By the time Muammar started being affected by the heat--somewhere around mid-morning--he had caught eleven.

  "I suppose I had better check they are edible," he muttered. "If I am to offer them to Marc." He popped the smallest one in his mouth and chewed. After a few moments he swallowed and considered the taste. "Not bad. I suppose it depends on what they have been eating."

  He carried the rest of his haul up to the ledge, first slaking his thirst and then approaching the cave. Marc was asleep but woke up as Muammar shuffled into the cave.

  "How are you feeling?"

  Marc yawned and shrugged. "I've got a bit of a headache and I still feel sick, but apart from that...just hungry. How'd you get on? Find anything more palatable than bugs?"

  Muammar grinned and emptied his pocket, lining up ten grasshopper bodies--some as big as his forefinger--and one small scorpion. "The grasshoppers are all right. I had a small one."

  Marc grimaced, but reached out and took a medium-sized one. "What do they taste like?"

  "Hard to say exactly, but better than the scorpions."

  Marc bit off the end and chewed, eyeing the yellow and grey-purple entrails in the other piece with distaste. He was reluctant to take another bite but forced himself to do so anyway, quickly chewing and swallowing before fighting back the urge to throw up.

  "It helps if you don't look at it," Muammar observed. "It's a pity there's no fuel around. I think they'd be a lot nicer cooked."

  "How would you start a fire anyway?"

  "I thought maybe my watch cover might concentrate the sun's rays enough, but I guess the question's moot without fuel."

  Muammar and Marc ate another grasshopper each and dozed, conserving energy, or sat watching the shadows slowly move.

  "You know," Muammar said. "This hill has saved our lives, but we'll just die slowly unless we can find another source of food. A few grasshoppers and scorpions won't be enough."

  "What do you suggest we do?"

  "We have to leave, and soon. If we can't find enough to eat, we'll only get weaker, and nobody knows we're here, so there'll be no rescue."

  "In which direction?"

  "We have to get to Esna or Edfu or one of the villages, so I'd say we head east to the cliffs and follow them south or north until we find a way down."

  "When do we leave?"

  "Later tonight. I think the moon will give us enough light to steer by, but I need to be sure of our direction, so I'll study the night sky earlier--see if I can recognise the Pole Star. The last thing we want is to be wandering around in circles. The rising sun tomorrow will confirm the direction once we're on our way."

  "Tonight then," Marc agreed. "In the meantime, we'd better catch some more grasshoppers. Maybe if we dry them in the sun they'll taste better."

  They found another half dozen small grasshoppers, but they were already apparently exhausting the available food around the hill, confirming their need to leave as soon as possible. Back at the cave in the late afternoon, Marc went in to rest before their coming ordeal.

  Muammar went looking for a way up the mound. He had the direction they must take sorted out--more or less--but he still had a faint hope that there might be a source of help closer to hand. The short climb to the summit proved easy once he found the route, for the sides of the mount had collapsed into a steep slope of boulders and rock fragments. A jumble of rocks caught the light, reflecting back the setting sun in a splash of white sparkles. The sight was so unexpected; he dropped to his knees and examined the phenomenon. Thousands of minute mica crystals littered the rock, each one acting like a tiny mirror. He looked up at the peak--now so close--and saw that the jumble of rocks had fallen from its side. Once upon a time, the peak must have flashed with white fire as the sun's rays caught it. Crowned in glory. That's what we saw--not a headlight on a rise but a reflection ...

  Muammar shook his head and hauled himself up the last few yards as the sun dipped and the life went out of the crystals. He stood on the top in the fading light of the day and mapped out their route as best he could, looking for the easiest path over stone and sand.

  It's not going to be easy. Normally, I'd say eight hours should bring us to the cliffs and another six moving south to Edfu, or north to Esna ...

  Rather than dwell on the strenuous task ahead of them, Muammar looked around at the desert, shading his eyes against the low rays of the setting sun. All he saw was a wasteland or rock and sand...

  Every way's the same .

  ...where nothing moved except dust caught in small whirlwinds engendered by the heat of the day. They faded and collapsed even as he watched, the heat draining from the day as the sun dipped below the western horizon and the first stars came out. He knew he should go back down and prepare for the journey ahead, but he lingered, enjoying the deepening chill of the evening. The shadows grew and the landscape lost all colour, becoming tones of grey on black. Light flickered in the southwest, illuminating nothing.

  Thunderstorm. We could do with some rain .

  The flicker came again but there was no accompanying sound of thunder.

  Heat lightning...but that's closer than the horizon ...static discharge from dry sand grains rubbing together ?

  Flick...and for a moment it looked as if two faint columns of light lifted into the clear sky, reflecting off floating dust particles. Muammar stared until spots of light floated in front of him, but the phenomenon was not repeated.

  Those were headlights ... A road? And close ...

  Already he was unsure of the right direction so he hurriedly cast about for loose stones and placed them in a more or less straight line from him to where he thought he had seen the lights piercing the night sky. He studied the line thoughtfully and shifted it slightly to the left before taking one last look into the night and starting the climb down to the cave in the gathering darkness.

  He
was almost at the cave when disaster struck. A stone gave way under his foot, and Muammar lurched and tumbled, falling onto the ledge. Pain flared in his right ankle and he cursed in Arabic. He sat in the darkness and gingerly felt an ankle already swelling, before hauling himself to his foot and limping around to the cave mouth.

  "Are we leaving now?" Marc asked. Then, "What's wrong?"

  "There's a problem. I fell and hurt my ankle."

  "What? Let me see."

  It was too dark to see, but by touch alone Marc could tell that Muammar's right ankle was swollen and tender. He eased the boot and sock off and tenderly probed the damage with his fingertips.

  "Can you move your toes?"

  "Yes, but it hurts."

  "Probably not broken then. Sprained or twisted, I'd say. Rest up a couple of days and you'll be fine." Marc was not at all sure of his diagnosis, but tried to keep his friend cheerful.

  "We don't have a couple of days," Muammar said.

  "You can't walk on that," Marc pointed out.

  "We can't just stay here. Nobody knows we're here; we have an uncertain supply of water and only a handful of grasshoppers as food."

  "There's no alternative."

  "I know but...when I was up there I saw something..." Muammar trailed off into silence, suddenly struck by doubts. "I thought I saw something," he amended.

  "What did you see?"

  "I saw headlights."

  "What?"

  "Headlights. I think I saw car headlights."

  Marc's worry could be heard in his voice. "Are you all right, Muammar? Not feeling faint or anything?"

  Muammar shook his head. "I know, it sounds odd, but I really think I saw the lights of a car. A couple of flashes first, that I thought were lightning, and then two beams stabbing into the air for a second. There's a road out there." He pointed to the southwest.

  "What are you saying?"

  "I think we should try for the road instead. The cliffs are too far off--maybe ten miles--and the towns further still. A road may be a lot closer, and if there's one car, there'll be others."