The citizens were pouring out of Het-Uart. The gate was clogged with them, a slow-moving mass of humanity that seemed to ooze through the gaping aperture like dark oil and began to spread to either side along the wall. The area between wall and ditch was already choked with them and more were coming. They were almost completely silent, vague faces above huddles of shadowy clothing and bundles of belongings, but for the fractious crying of babies and the sobbing of one nameless woman.
Two thoughts struck Ahmose almost simultaneously. One was that in order to force a way through the tightly packed throng his troops would have to push the people into the water. The second was even more sobering. He knew that he was incapable of giving the order to kill these miserable shuffling creatures. “Apepa is doing this on purpose,” he said grimly. “He is using his people to prevent our rapid occupation of the city and perhaps to inspire me with pity for him and for them. Well, I do feel pity. Look at them, Baqet! Have you ever seen such living corpses! I do not think they are a threat to us, do you?” Baqet shook his head.
“I see no soldiers among them, Majesty, but I suppose a few may have weapons concealed beneath their cloaks. The light is very uncertain.” Ahmose continued to watch the pathetic exodus. The crowd now extended to right and left out of his sight, a swaying, staggering host that reminded him of paintings he had seen depicting the victims of famine when the Nile failed to rise. But of course they are victims of famine, he thought. Not through lack of a flood but through my siege.
“Open a path through the troops and let them go,” he said to Baqet. “It is not in the way of Ma’at to murder those already half-dead from starvation and disease. They can do us no harm. Set men to either side of the bridge to watch them as they cross. Bring torches. Any carrying weapons must be detained.” Baqet passed the order to a senior officer beside him who began to shout it in turn. The soldiers clustered by the water began to form themselves into two lines but their movement was misinterpreted by the people on the opposite bank. A flurry of agitation went through them and someone cried out, “Mercy, mercy, men of Egypt! Do not harm us! We are nothing!” They were turning back to the gate in their panic, but the gate was crammed with their fellows trying to get out. Baqet jumped onto the floor of Ahmose’s chariot.
“We will not hurt you!” he called, his voice carrying strongly over their shrieks. “The King has decreed that you should leave the city unmolested! Come over! Come over!” He continued to yell until his words pierced their near hysteria. Hesitantly one man, bolder than the rest, stepped onto the bridge and began to edge along it. The herd watched him, their noise dying away. When they saw him walk freely through the soldiers’ ranks in the flaring light of the torches, there was a concerted rush to follow him and soon they were streaming across, heads down, eyes darting from side to side at the impassive troops. Most were on foot but occasionally a cart appeared, full of those citizens too old or too sick to walk and hauled by straining men with bent backs. The Egyptians gave these scant attention, afraid of the diseases that lurked beneath the cloaks that swathed the occupants, and already aware that no matter what weapons might be concealed in them there were no longer any men capable of putting up a fight. Baqet rejoined Ahmose. “The donkeys must all have been eaten,” he remarked. “This sight is terrible, Majesty. What will you do with them?” Ahmose shrugged, his eyes on the river of dejection spreading out to disappear into the night.
“I don’t know,” he replied. “They are indeed nothing. The Scribes of Distribution cannot possibly feed them all. They will have to fend for themselves.”
“Perhaps they will try to go back to Rethennu,” Baqet suggested. Ahmose signalled to Harkhuf and Khabekhnet.
“Rethennu is a foreign country for most of them,” he said. “Only the blood of their ancestors ties them to it. Frankly, Baqet, I do not care where they go. As soon as this tide of starvelings abates, get the division across the bridge and through those gates.” He made his way to his chariot, turning his back on the forlorn deluge with relief.
He and his escort took up a position where tributary and canal divided and it was not long before the heralds found him. Each one had the same story to tell. Although the gates were open and the bridges laid down, no action could be taken for the press of citizens teeming out of Het-Uart. Ahmose sent them away with the command to let the people go before attempting to enter what would be a deserted city.
That thought troubled him. What was Apepa’s true aim? Did he imagine that he would be depriving a bloodthirsty King of the opportunity for a massacre? But it would have been just as easy to slay the people on this side of the walls. Perhaps he wanted to give Ahmose a literally empty victory. Or perhaps, just perhaps, Apepa was dead and his sons had ordered the surrender of the city in a spurt of despair.
Akhtoy and his underlings brought bread, cheese and dried fruit and Ahmose and his guard ate standing, the Followers facing outward where a constant low murmuring filled the darkness. They had barely finished the scanty meal when an officer bearing the insignia of the Osiris Division came up and saluted. “Majesty, the refugees are spreading out through the army’s tents,” he said. “They are picking up whatever food they can find. Our Scribe of Distribution is afraid that he will not be able to protect the stores of grain.”
“Tell General Meryrenefer to form a detail to guard the granaries,” Ahmose decided. “Also as many men as it takes to keep the people moving. They must be allowed to scavenge whatever scraps are readily available, but they must not linger or steal tents, clothing or weapons. Any that do so will be killed.” He wondered how the navy was faring, whether any of the citizens would be sufficiently strong or crafty to try stealing a boat in the confusion. After all, the bridge from the western gate would lead them straight through Abana’s ships strung out along the tributary. Oh surely not, he told himself impatiently. I am being foolish. These scarecrows are no match for armed marines.
In another hour the muted sounds of the flight had lessened and Ramose appeared out of the dense blackness. He bowed and then stood with his arms folded tightly across his chest, his face turned towards the city. “I crossed the bridge and managed to walk all around the outer perimeter of the wall,” he said. “It has taken me a long time. Every gate is spewing out its filth.” His tone was bitter. “I questioned the citizens as I went, hoping to hear that Apepa was dead, but I was assured that he still lives, shut up in his palace. I will see Tani again this night. I know it.” Ahmose experienced a second of pure shock. He had completely forgotten about his sister.
“It has been some time since you entered Het-Uart as a spy for Kamose,” he said cautiously. “Remember your pain, Ramose, when you were allowed to confront her and discovered that she had married Apepa. She may not greet you with any joy. She may even be dead. There has been plague and starvation in the city.” Now Ramose turned at last. His teeth were bared, a gleam of ivory in the dimness.
“If there is any justice under the Feather of Ma’at she will be alive and Apepa dead,” he hissed. Ahmose had seen his friend in distress, even angry, but he had not known that Ramose was nursing such corrosive hate.
“Do you still love her?” he half-whispered so that his attendants could not hear. Ramose looked away.
“I do not know,” he answered stiffly. “But she is mine by right. The contract of promise lies in Seqenenra’s archives at Weset and I will have her, come what may.” Is it not enough that I have made you governor of the Un nome and bestowed a title on you? Ahmose wondered rather sadly. You are master of Khemmenu, you inhabit your family’s estates once more, you have my total trust and favour, but it seems that the only compensation you truly desire for the wrongs you have suffered is the reanimation of a corpse.
“We cannot re-enter the past, any of us,” he said aloud. “I want my father back. I want Kamose here at my side with all his harshness and his unshakeable integrity. If it were possible, I would wish my daughter alive and well and happy. We have all suffered, Ramose.”
“Seqenenra and Kamose and Hent-ta-Hent are dead,” Ramose retorted. “You cannot claim them. Tani lives. That is the difference.” But, my dear Ramose, there is no difference, Ahmose wanted to tell him. The Tani you knew is most decidedly dead. The girl you loved has drowned in the ocean of time and you will never find her again. Wisely he kept his counsel.
He had not expected to be summoned before dawn, but not long after Ramose had left him to go and sit huddled by the water, a herald came. “General Baqet is about to cross the bridge, Majesty,” he said. “He wishes to know if you will join him.”
“At once,” Ahmose replied. “Harkhuf, have the Followers fall in. Khabekhnet, go and rouse Prince Ramose. Makhu, turn the horses.” A thrill took him, a shudder of anticipation mixed with dread, but he hid it, springing into the chariot. Ramose was scrambling to his feet and he and the Chief Herald came running to step up behind him.
It was not far to the bridge where Baqet waited with his own guard and some twenty soldiers holding torches. He saluted gravely, but Ahmose could see his own excitement mirrored in the other man’s flame-lit eyes.
“The Shock Troops under Pepynakht have already gone in, Majesty,” Baqet told him. “Also three Commanders of a Hundred with their men. The standard is with them.” Ahmose nodded.
“Makhu, get down and lead the horses over the bridge,” he said. “They will not want to go, otherwise.” Makhu did as he was bid. The horses were skittish but responded to his gentle urging and presently Ahmose found himself before the mighty bronze-studded cedar Civilians’ Gate. His gaze travelled along its two thick doors, now laid open. Beyond them there appeared to be a wide street cut through the surprising width of the walls and sloping gently upward into dimness.
“This is the way I entered before,” Ramose remarked, his voice thin with emotion. “The avenue will rapidly narrow until it meets the road to the palace.” Ahmose did not respond. He tapped Makhu on the shoulder and the chariot began to roll, past the gates and on up the mildly graded thoroughfare.
The torchbearers had quickly passed him and were moving ahead so as to illumine his way, and by the rods blazing in their hands Ahmose could see the black holes of alcoves to either side for the gate wardens. The street beyond was wide, but as Ramose had said it soon shrank to a width little more than his chariot’s axle. Buildings hemmed him in, uneven grey mud brick houses that leaned against one another in a suffocating jumble. Alleys almost too narrow for the passage of a donkey led off to right and left at irregular intervals, opening small, dark mouths whose throats could not be penetrated by the light of the torches.
The silence was eerie. No bleat of goat or sheep, no barking of dogs, no human cry pierced it. The sound of the soldiers’ sandals and the soft rumble of the chariot’s rims over the packed ground seemed almost too loud to Ahmose, as though they were desecrating a tomb. Bones lay scattered here and there. At first Ahmose thought, with a spasm of sheer revulsion, that they were human. He remembered Sebek-nakht relating that the Setiu in Het-Uart were being forced through lack of space to bury their dead under the floors of their houses and he had a sudden and lurid vision of hungry citizens digging up and eating their freshly buried relatives, but then he recognized the desiccated skin of a goat clinging to what was obviously the remains of its spine and he realized that the bones were animal. Everything—rats, dogs, goats and cats—had been consumed. He looked up to where there might have been some evidence of the grains and vegetables grown on the roofs but not a tuft was visible. Khabekhnet snorted. “Majesty, the stench! Death and plague and disease!” he mumbled and Ahmose, half-turning, saw that the man had a corner of his kilt held over his nose. Het-Uart did indeed stink, an almost overpowering brew of human excrement, rotting bodies and boiled offal.
Presently the chaotic tumble of common houses drew back and the cavalcade began to pass sheltering walls broken here and there by slightly wider alleys and occasionally sycamore trees whose sad, almost leafless branches drooped towards the gaping apertures of wells dug at their feet. Many of the doors set into the walls stood open and Ahmose, glancing apprehensively through them, saw the ruins of what once had been small but beautiful gardens, now nothing more than patches of hummocked dirt. Several had been entirely dug up, for burials Ahmose assumed.
Ramose had left the chariot and was now walking beside it, one hand resting on the rim of its frame as though for security. “These were the homes of the rich,” he said wonderingly. “Nothing is left, Ahmose. Even the wealthy have eaten their own grass. Oh gods, look there!” A shrine had appeared, little more than a low granite pillar supporting an image of one of the Setiu’s barbaric gods, Anath perhaps, judging by its crudely fashioned breasts, but the pedestal had tilted over the edge of a pit that extended into the road. An almost unbearable odour rose from it, and as Makhu eased the horses gingerly around its lip, Ahmose caught a glimpse of white limbs protruding from a meagre scattering of earth. Fighting an urge to vomit, he fixed his gaze on the brown flanks of the animals ahead of him. “They are all dead or gone,” Ramose breathed. “I am afraid of what we may find in the palace, Majesty.” So am I, Ahmose thought. But as long as Apepa still crouches there like a spider in a disintegrated web, I will allow sheer happiness to overcome my apprehension.
A slight breeze freshened the air and Ahmose inhaled it with relief. The ominous silence was also gradually left behind as the sounds of the army flowing into Het-Uart through the other gates grew louder. The crossroads of which Ramose had spoken were crowded with troops from several divisions mingling noisily, and Makhu pulled the horses to a halt. Turi and Kagemni had found each other. They saluted Ahmose and came hurrying over to him. “This is a terrible place!” Turi exclaimed. “Even before the plagues and the siege it must have stunk with so many people jammed into it! How could they live like this?”
“They are not like us, that is how,” Kagemni said. “When they ate the rats, they were eating their own kinsmen.” He graced Ahmose with one of his rare grins. “Majesty, it is over,” he said warmly. “Egypt is whole once more.”
“Have you encountered any Setiu soldiers?” Ahmose wanted to know. He was looking over their heads to where the temple to Sutekh reared its pillars away to the right and next to it the walls of what he knew to be a barracks. Turi followed his gaze.
“The temple had been invaded, by the sick I think,” he said. “Its courts and anterooms are still full of their detritus: pallets, bowls, animal bones, physicians’ pestles. There are even a few decomposing bodies. As for soldiers, no. We entered their compound and found none. Perhaps they were all expended during the battle last year. The men are disappointed.” He laughed. “They feel cheated of a proper victory.”
“Keep them away from the temple!” Ahmose said urgently. “The pestilence may still linger there. Set guards outside it. Have your troops search the city for anyone left, but they must do so very carefully. I want no illness spreading in my army.” Now at last he looked to where the palace walls loomed just beyond the soldiers’ quarters. “I shall be in there,” he told them, jerking his chin in its direction. “Bring me reports when you are ready. General Baqet, you may also deploy your men throughout these miserable streets.” O Amun, Greatest of Greatest, he prayed as his commanders saluted and melted back into the press of their men, let Apepa be alive and waiting for me. Let this night be remembered as the mightiest vindication in Egypt’s history.
It was not far to the tall cedar doors set into the palace’s protecting wall. Ramose had relinquished his hold on the chariot and now walked with his arms folded and his head down. Khabekhnet jumped from the vehicle and together with Ankhmahor and half the Followers, who had taken the torches from Baqet’s escort of Shock Troops, ran to precede the horses. Ahmose did not believe that he would need their shield. There was no danger here. Het-Uart was dead, its diseased heart pulsing out the last of its life somewhere within the maze of corridors and courtyards Ramose had described after his return. Ahmose spared a glance at his friend as Makhu slowed th
e chariot but could not see his face in the dimness. He looked up at the sky. He had no idea how long it had been since he had received the news that the gates were opening but there was no hint of dawn yet. The stars still flared white in a velvety blackness. More torches could be glimpsed through the palace entrance, moving to and fro across Ahmose’s vision like flames that had escaped from a fire. He stepped down, and bidding Makhu wait, he followed his defenders into Apepa’s precinct.
The space he entered was full of his own soldiers. In front of him, right in the centre of the imposing path that led to the shadowy bulk of the building beyond, the standard of Montu had been planted and beside it his own royal flag, its blue almost inky and its white greyish in the uncertain light of the one torch that had been set before it. Statues lined the avenue, strange figures holding staffs or emblems unfamiliar to Ahmose, most of them bearded and horned, their solemn features seeming to twitch and stir in the flickering torchlight. To right and left he received the impression of vast, shrouded gardens. The scent of orchard blossoms came to him faintly and he heard leaves rustling. But the ground was barren, a carpet of brittle, dead grass interspersed with patches of bald earth. No water, he thought. Apepa could not water his precious lawns and flowerbeds and rain was not enough.
Sebek-khu was coming towards him with Tchanny, who was holding a torch. They bowed. Both were smiling. “My division came in by the Royal Entrance Gate, Majesty,” Sebek-khu said. “It is very close by, through the ancient citadel fortification and Apepa’s orchard and then down at once to the tributary. I was surprised to meet no resistance at the palace walls. I entered the palace with a small force intending to battle whatever remnant of Apepa’s soldiers remained but there are only a few courtiers left.” Ahmose felt a wave of despair settle over him like a well-worn cloak.
The Horus Road Page 35
