Men of Bronze

by Scott Oden

  "The politics of Sais," Tjemu spat.

  "No, the reality of life."

  Alone in the throne room, Ahmose sagged. One liver-spotted hand tugged the nemes cloth off his head; the other massaged his scalp. His chest ached, and he could feel congestion pooling in his lungs with every deep breath. These were the moments when this gilded prison made him long for simpler times, for a life of anonymity far away from the intrigues of court. Phanes, a traitor? He sighed. As much as he loved the culture of the Hellenes — its art, its vigor — he often had to remind himself that they were a bloodthirsty people whose ambitions rivaled those of the arrogant Persians.

  Is this how it began with his old allies? A rumor here, an insinuation there? What started as a grand alliance between Egypt, Babylonia, and Lydia had barely lived through its infancy. Croesus of Lydia fell first, outwitted by that Persian swineherd Cyrus. Nabonidus of Babylon held out longer, but he, too, eventually succumbed to the Medes, a victim of his own indifference. After the fall of Babylon, the lesser members of the grand alliance vanished like smoke. Now, only Egypt remained.

  Psammetichus spoke true. Yet, he left out how a rebellious subject lent credibility to the rumors that the cancer of corruption consumed the Land of the Nile. Once it became known that a man like Phanes, a man with detailed knowledge of the inner workings of the military and ambition beyond ability, was unhappy, Persian spies would crawl from every rat-hole in Memphis. Ahmose sighed again. He would have to take Phanes down a notch, show him who ruled and who served.

  Ahmose heard the silky grate of oiled stone hinges and looked up. A section of the palace wall swung outward; a woman stepped through. Her long cotton gown flared out behind her as she crossed the throne room. Pharaoh smiled.

  "You heard, I take it?"

  "Heard? The palace is all a-twitter! Are you seriously considering sending troops to Memphis?" Her voice echoed the concern etched on her brow.

  "Not send. Lead. Ah, Ladice. What choice do I have? In all my years, I've learned one lesson quite well: If I show weakness, I'll not be long for the throne." Ahmose gazed at her, felt the soothing effect her presence had on him. He could have stared at her for an eternity.

  In her youth Ladice had been an incomparable beauty, one of those rare few the gods had gifted with a symmetry of form and a keenness of intellect. Poets from Cyrene to Byzantium composed verses in her honor. Sculptors begged to immortalize her in stone and bronze. Indeed, had Ladice been born a man, all of Greece would have had a new demigod to worship, a new warrior to emulate, a new philosopher to follow. As a man she would have conquered nations; as a woman, she conquered hearts. Yet, even though her thirtieth year had passed, Ladice's allure faded but little. She retained the beauty of a Spartan queen tempered with the magnetism of wisdom and maturity.

  Ladice knelt by the throne and clasped Pharaoh's hand. Dark, liquid eyes stared up at him. "My heart cares more for your safety, husband. I've heard this Phanes embodies the worst aspects of my people — ruthless, ambitious, and cruel. As a tool, you could ask for none better, but as an adversary …"

  "What would you counsel?"

  Ladice sighed; her shoulders slumped. "I think you must do this, if for no other reason than to show the nobles of Egypt that you fear no man."

  He stroked her cheek. "I should free you from your bondage, child. Let you return to your home in Cyrene. I have kept you overlong as a slave of my harem."

  The woman laughed. It was a light, silvery sound that brought a smile to the old Pharaoh's face. "Child? You are as adept at flattery as you are at statecraft. Do I toil under your overseer's lash, my husband? Am I a silky plaything pining away in your seraglio? I think not. I live in the shadows by your side, giving you my love and my strength, should it be your desire."

  Ahmose kissed her gently. "If Phanes embodies the worst in your people, then you, favorite of my wives, symbolize what I fell in love with." He broke their embrace. "Time grows short. Be off with you."

  "Shall I come to you tonight?" she said, her fingers tracing the line of his jaw.

  Ahmose smiled. "Surely you do not wish to lay with a dried up old man?"

  "Now you presume to tell me my own mind," Ladice said, taking the nemes from him and arranging it perfectly. She placed the uraeus, the golden circlet wrought in the image of the divine cobra, on his forehead. "Let me come to you, if only to lay together and whisper."

  "After a dozen years," Ahmose said, "you still surprise me."

  "I will take that as a yes." Ladice kissed him quickly and hurried from the room. Pharaoh took up the crook and flail and tried to gather his thoughts, his purpose hindered by teasing images of his favorite wife. He laughed like a man twenty years his junior.

  "Guards! "

  "I do not understand," Tjemu said for the thousandth time. The man who shared his bench was a hem-ne jer, a god's servant; he threw his hands up in defeat. "You tell me tales that openly conflict with one another, and say that it does not matter? It does matter."

  "No," the hem-ne jer closed his eyes, "all that matters is that we enact the rites and observe the festivals that mirror the perfection of divine order, and to acknowledge and hold sacred the gods as represented by their animal forms."

  Tjemu looked lost. "So, when you worship the crocodile, you're not actually worshiping the crocodile, but the spirit of Sobek?"

  "Exactly! "

  Tjemu shrugged. "It makes no sense. ."

  The priest started to open his mouth, but Nebmaatra interceded. "It would be easier, Pure One, to explain the subtleties of Egyptian religion to yonder statue." A soldier of the Guard caught Nebmaatra's eye and nodded. "It's time."

  The guards at the palace doors snapped to attention as servants levered the gold-sheathed portals open. Nebmaatra helped Tjemu to his feet. Courtiers trickled in according to their social stature, lesser making way for greater. Nebmaatra and Tjemu fell in behind the vizier.

  "… kept waiting like common courtiers! " Sethnakhte growled to one of his sycophants. "This is preposterous! I am vizier! I should be the one who counsels him! Who does he think — "

  "School your tongue if you would remain vizier!" Nebmaatra warned. They were of comparable height, but the soldier's thick frame made him seem all the more daunting. "The ground you tread can just as easily become your grave! Keep this in mind: should you attempt to walk the path that your friend Phanes has embarked on, then I will become your enemy. And my enemies tend to die violent deaths."

  The vizier's thin nostrils flared. He bared his teeth in an animal-like snarl. "You are nothing to me! A peasant! For reasons known only to himself, Pharaoh favors you, but that favor will not last many more years. I will accept your lack of respect for now, but there will come a day when no one will stand between us. No one! "

  "When that day comes, I'll not be hard to find! "

  Sethnakhte made a subtle spitting gesture and turned away from Nebmaatra, rejoining his clique.

  "Why does Pharaoh tolerate him?" Tjemu whispered.

  Nebmaatra exhaled. "His arrogance not withstanding, Sethnakhte is good at what he does. You'll find that Pharaoh has boundless patience when it comes to men of that sort."

  "Snakes, you mean?"

  Nebmaatra smiled.

  Pharaoh held up his hand, and every tongue was stilled; every eye turned toward him. Psammetichus mounted the royal dais. Ahmose spoke.

  "I rule this land, and my word is the word of the gods, yet no man rules in a vacuum. To rule effectively, I must listen to those I trust. I have learned to trust Hasdrabal Barca's judgement. His instincts have never led him astray. But, I also trust my own instincts.

  "The safety of Egypt rests in more than her military might; it rests in her people, as well. If we abandon them in times of strife, would they not abandon us in times of prosperity? Men say I am a wine-sot, that I am a philanderer, but let no man say I am fickle! Prepare the royal fleet. Muster the regiment of Amon and the Calasirian Guard. I intend to set Memphis a-right, as it should be. P
sammetichus, I leave Sais in your hands."

  "Sire," Sethnakhte said, "In spite of the preponderance of circumstantial evidence I must protest! At the very least, do we not owe Phanes the benefit of the doubt? Send for him! Make him explain himself!"

  "Protest to your heart's content, vizier, but see that my will is made known." Pharaoh rose. "I am going to Memphis. If Phanes is loyal, he will greet me as his king. But, if he wishes a fight, then by all the gods of the Nile, a fight he will have!"

  6

  Deshur

  The same sunlight warming the palace at Sais barely penetrated the tangle of streets at the heart of the Foreign Quarter at Memphis. An elongated square of dusty gold brought unnatural color to the faces of the dead Arcadians.

  "Ah, Leon," Phanes whispered, crouching over the assassin's corpse. "Finally met your match." The Greek's practiced eye swept over the slain men, noting their positions, their wounds. In his mind he recreated the carnage, willing the dead to rise again and fight, watching them die in painfully slow motion. The men who did this …

  Phanes picked up Leon's sword, an antique weapon, its leaf-shaped blade fitted with a worn ivory hilt. A deep notch scored its edge. Phanes stood as Lysistratis approached. A small crowd had gathered, kept at bay by a hedge of hoplite spears.

  "Whatever else happened," Lysistratis said, his voice low, "they accomplished their objective. Idu and his family are dead."

  "What of Menkaura?"

  "No word yet. You don't think an old man did this?" The Spartan glanced down at the corpses.

  "Oh no, this wasn't Menkaura's doing."

  Lysistratis frowned. "Who, then? Idu's cronies?"

  "My guess … Barca." He tossed the notched sword to Lysistratis. "Leon fought briefly with someone wielding a heavy iron blade, probably a scimitar. The Medjay use scimitars with blades of Carchemish iron."

  "If the Medjay are here, they made good time. How can we confirm it?"

  "Assume Barca will make his presence known in due time. Have you doubled the guards and stepped up patrols?"

  "I have," the Spartan said.

  One of Phanes' hoplites, his crested helmet perched on his forehead, gestured back to the perimeter. "The merchant, strategos."

  Callisthenes crossed the street, confusion writ plainly across his face. He glanced from Lysistratis to Phanes to the corpses. His face paled. "Merciful gods!"

  "They are, indeed, my friend," Phanes said. "I'm sorry to rouse you this early, but I'm in need of your counsel."

  Callisthenes hovered at the fringe of the slaughter, unwilling to approach any closer. "You should have sought my counsel before you loosed your dogs."

  Phanes, a grim smile on his lips, nodded. "Advise me, then, Callisthenes. In honesty."

  "In honesty?" Callisthenes stroked the scarab amulet. "I would say this bit of foolishness did your cause little good. By making martyrs of Idu and his family, you've given the rabble an ideal to aspire to. Were I in your place, I would salvage this blunder by finding a scapegoat — a business rival, a scorned lover, someone. Make arrests and show the people the truth of Greek justice."

  "You're a ruthless man, Callisthenes," Phanes said. "I admire that trait in my associates."

  One of the hoplite guards approached Phanes with a note in his hand, a square of papyrus. He whispered something and nodded back the way he had come. A boy stood along the perimeter, a scribe's apprentice in a stained tunic.

  Phanes read the note, crumpled it in his fist.

  "What is it?" Lysistratis said.

  "Our confirmation, it seems. The Medjay have been spotted in the Square of Deshur. Take three squads. If they are indeed there, arrest them. If they resist, kill them." Phanes said, grinning. "Scapegoats."

  "What about me?" Callisthenes said.

  Phanes turned. "You and I must see a priest."

  Menkaura closed the door and walked over to the narrow window. The house where they had fled to lay nestled in a palm-grove on the southwestern edge of Memphis. A breeze fluttered through the window, carrying the scent of damp earth and barley off the open fields. Menkaura's shoulders slumped as he leaned against the window casement, his face long beyond belief. Barca handed him a crockery juglet of beer, one of two their host provided. He drank without tasting.

  "How is she?" Barca said, sitting heavily on a divan. Menkaura shrugged.

  "She's sleeping. Jauharah's a strong girl, for an Arabian."

  Their host, a pinch-faced old scribe Menkaura had addressed as Weni, backed out of the room and left them alone.

  "He was with me at Cyrene," Menkaura said, nodding after the scribe. "Many of my old followers live in Memphis, in near poverty, their service to Pharaoh all but forgotten. I truly don't know how I can help you, especially now. I have funerals to oversee."

  "If you try to claim their bodies, the Greeks will kill you. It's what they are betting on," Barca said. "You said many of your old followers live in Memphis. Do you think you can organize them and their kinsmen into an effective irregular force?"

  Menkaura rubbed his leathery skull. "Possibly. I owe it to them to try, at least. Idu and I were not close, but he was my son nonetheless. But their burials … "

  "Let the girl handle them," Barca offered.

  "The girl?" Menkaura's voice dropped to a hiss. "Didyou not hear me? She is Arabian, a Bedouin. I would as soon leave Idu unburied as to trust his eternal ka to a foreign slave! "

  Barca shrugged. "Then your son and his family died for nothing. I cannot fight the Greeks alone. I need help. I need you, Menkaura. But, I understand. The dead come before the living. Such is the Egyptian way."

  Menkaura said nothing, his brow creased in a troubling scowl. He stared out the window. In the distance, darkskinned workers in loincloths grubbed a boulder out of the ground on the edge of the field. The sounds of their voices, their tools, did not reach the house. Finally, he spoke: "Tell me again how you would handle this thing. This diversion."

  "We operate independently of one another. While you inflame the people, my Medjay will wage a war of attrition. We need to sow chaos in their ranks, keep them off balance. That way, once Pharaoh arrives, the task of rooting them out will be less dangerous." Barca stretched out full-length on the divan, his sword inches from his hand.

  "You're sure Pharaoh is coming?"

  "Depend on it, Menkaura."

  "Rest, then." The old man sighed. "I will consider your plan."

  "You do that," Barca said, his eyes closing. He fought the inexorable pull of sleep. So much to do, so much to plan for, but his exhausted body overruled everything else. Slowly, he drifted off. "You do that."

  By the second hour after dawn, an endless stream of humanity choked the Square of Deshur. Merchants, both Egyptian and foreign, erected stalls in the long shadows cast by the walls of Ptah's temple. All manner of bread, fruit, and meat could be found heaped on woven-straw platters. Women, matrons and their daughters, filed past mounds of old faience beads destined to find new life as jewelry. Their husbands and brothers clustered around temporary rope paddocks, haggling over the prices of sheep and cattle. Under awnings of striped linen, sculptors honed their craft on chunks of diorite and granite as their representatives bawled their praises to the crowd. Naked children darted and played underfoot.

  Voices blended with smells: cones of fat infused with fragrant oils, strings of sun-dried fish, fresh onions, sweat, and offal. Motion, sound, and smell wove together, forming a hypnotic haze that overwhelmed the senses.

  Matthias moved through the crowd like a man twice his age, his body leaden and heavy. What little sleep he had, if it could be called such, had been restless. The excitement of Barca's arrival, his revelations about Phanes, drove away the cloud of despair that had gripped him. He hurried past the Alabaster Sphinx, ignoring the pack of older children who had claimed it as their own and were hurling taunts down on the swelling mob. His destination lay in the lower corner of the square, where taverns and inns existed in profusion. There, if he understoo
d Barca correctly, he would find the Medjay. The Judaean cursed himself for not rising before dawn to intercept them at the ferry.

  Ahead, in a stall erected near the wall of the Mansion of Ptah, Matthias caught a glimpse of an arm bearing a tattooed uadjet Eyes accustomed to picking details out of the crowded heavens spotted others, too, in a variety of forms: amulets on thongs, bronze and gold buckles, lapis inlays. Their owners were milling about, studying the crowd, reconnoitering. As he drew closer, a voice rose above the clamor of the bazaar.

  "You don't understand! I don't want to buy your whole shipment! Just enough for my men! "

  An exasperated Egyptian voice answered. "No! It is you who do not understand! I sell amphorae of wine, not bowls! There are taverns a-plenty down the street!"

  The sight of the small merchant in his starched white kilt, his beaded collar flashing in the morning sun, striking a defiant pose against the lean and dusty Canaanite, Ithobaal, nearly sent Matthias into spasms of laughter. He could tell the graying old Medjay had about exhausted his boundless stores of patience. As Matthias approached, Ithobaal's hand had strayed toward his sword hilt.

  "Peace, Ithobaal! Peace! Do not kill him, for he knows not what he does! Were I you, master merchant, I would reconsider selling a few juglets of your wares. I have seen the Medjay stake a man out in the sun for a lesser insult."

  Ithobaal glanced at Matthias, a twinkle in his eye.

  The merchant paled, sweat popping out on his brow. "M- Medjay?"

  "Indeed," Matthias said, touching the golden symbol inlaid in the obsidian pommel-stone of Ithobaal's sword. "This is not the mark of a priest of Horus."