Men of Bronze

by Scott Oden

  Phanes stepped out, raking the crowd with a withering glare. "Disperse now, and I will hold none of you to blame for these murders! You've fallen under the spell of a man consumed with hatred! Do you hear me? I hold Menkaura to blame for this! The rest of you may go free!" Phanes' voice rose in volume, carrying to all corners of the square.

  "Liar!" Menkaura said. "You are the only murderer here! You and those who follow you!"

  Phanes' smile was dagger-sharp. "There's no blood on my hands, Menkaura. Can you say the same? You were beaten by Greeks years ago, and since then my people have been the bane of your existence. The Medjay kill your poor brother, Idu, and who do you blame? Hasdrabal Barca? No, you blame me! I could have tolerated your hatred — indeed, I understand it — but when you murdered these men you crossed the line. Surrender yourself to me now, Menkaura. I'll not ask again!"

  "Let's allow the gods to decide who is the murderer here! I challenge you to single combat! "

  An awed silence fell over Egyptian and Greek.

  "I do not fight old men," Phanes said, dismissing him with a wave.

  "Why? Afraid I might teach you a lesson or two about sword-play?" Menkaura said. "As I said, a coward!"

  Phanes laughed, drawing his sword. "So be it! Zeus! You are either the bravest man I know, or the stupidest!"

  "Greek arrogance!" Menkaura shouted. He turned to stare at his kinsmen, his friends. They looked pitifully small and mean against the gleaming host around them. "They believe themselves to be the only people schooled in war! Our ancestors were mighty warriors when theirs were but ignorant swineherds! Do you fear swineherds?"

  "Have you come to preach, old man, or to fight?" said Phanes.

  Menkaura faced him. At a gesture, Thothmes brought him a shield of hippopotamus hide stretched over a wooden frame and rimmed in tarnished bronze. "Don't do this, cousin," Thothmes whispered. Their eyes met, and a faint smile touched Menkaura's lips. He looked at Phanes.

  "Time for your lesson, boy! "

  Menkaura circled Phanes, his sword ready, evoking images of the aging Nestor beneath Ilium's walls. The Greek feinted in, the tip of his sword weaving like the head of a striking serpent. His shield gleamed in the morning sun. Menkaura gave ground, wary, calling on years of experience to counter the younger man's speed. He shuffled back, circled, and lunged without warning, thrusting the point of his blade at Phanes' face. Bronze struck iron with a deafening clang.

  Phanes sneered and launched a whirlwind of blows. Menkaura parried and ducked, catching blow after blow on the edge of his shield. Sweat beaded his forehead, streamed down his face. An icy premonition clutched at Menkaura's heart, the hand of Osiris.

  The Desert Hawk swung wildly.

  With a dancer's grace Phanes slid beneath the Egyptian's sword, his own blade sweeping up and out in a glittering arc. Menkaura heard its chilling whistle; he felt its razored edge bite into the taut muscles of his neck. An unimaginable pain tore into him, then Menkaura heard and felt no more.

  Pregnant silence gripped the square as Menkaura's headless body toppled, landing with a crash at the feet of the Egyptian mob. Phanes stooped, caught up the severed head, and held it aloft.

  "The gods have decided! I have fought for Egypt, bled for Egypt, nearly died for Egypt! Now, I will conquer Egypt! If any man here would challenge my claim, then do it now! Do it now! "

  Thothmes moved to take up Phanes' challenge, but a stealthy hand on his arm stopped him. He glanced back, saw Amenmose behind him. The merchant shook his head. Beside him, Hekaib's pale face gleamed beneath his helmet.

  Phanes' eyes raked the crowd; few could meet his gaze. "Just as I thought! I know you all, every man here, and I extend amnesty to you. This man who led you was a fool, and I hold you blameless for his folly! But, I swear — by the gods of Hellas! — if the slightest rumor of unrest reaches my ears, I will kill every male member of your families and sell your wives and daughters to the Nubians! Now kneel and recognize your new king!"

  For a long moment none moved. Then, Amenmose stepped forward, his fingers locked on the forearms of Ibebi and Hekaib. "Live to fight another day, brothers," he whispered as he knelt. In twos and threes, the other Egyptians followed suit. Last came Thothmes. He glared at Phanes as he dropped to his knees.

  "I am your king! " Phanes roared, his arms spread wide. Their hatred coursed through him, driving him to the brink of ecstacy. With it, he felt waves of fear radiating out from the Egyptians. To them he had become Amemait, the Devourer, waiting to consume their souls at the Scales of Judgement. Their weapons were nothing against the Devourer.

  "I am your god! " Phanes smile grew ever wider.

  9

  Eve of battle

  Outside the cell, Callisthenes tried to ignore the sounds of a fist striking flesh, and the flesh giving way. Color drained from his face; he winced at the crunch of bones. Esna's strangled wheezes — cries of pain, he supposed — became less frequent, then ceased altogether. A moment later, Barca staggered from the cell, his eyes blazing with yet unquenched fury. Fresh blood covered his arm to the elbow.

  "Is he …?"

  "Esna was too soft to play his own game," Barca said, wrenching his knife from the doorjamb. He turned and stared at the squat bulk of the temple proper. "Now, it's his master's turn."

  "And when you finish your … business, what then?"

  Barca's frank stare sent a shudder through the Greek. "It's best not to know too much, Callisthenes. If Phanes learns what you've done and decides to put the hot irons to you. . " He trailed off. "Besides, there's not much left that I can do. Find an out of the way place, perhaps, get some rest, and discover a way to deprive Phanes of that head he holds so dear. Maybe see what progress Menkaura's made. Even twenty men with fire in their bellies could be useful when battle is joined."

  "My home is yours," Callisthenes said. "If you desire a safe haven."

  Barca's lips peeled back in a snarl as he remembered Matthias' wrecked corpse. "No, thank you, friend. I have enough blood on my hands. I don't need to add yours to it. I will find shelter my own way, and without anyone risking their necks over it."

  "I understand. I must go, before Phanes grows suspicious. Peace to you, Hasdrabal Barca," Callisthenes said, then scuttled to the tiny postern door. He opened it, glanced about like a frightened hare, and was gone.

  Barca turned back to the temple, his face hardening.

  The precinct of Neith was comparatively small for such a prolific goddess. The granary-turned-cell where they had thrown Barca lay at the rear of the temple, among the outbuildings dedicated to the more mundane matters of temple life. Here, too, were storehouses and supply sheds, crude mud brick buildings needing repair ranked against the low outer wall. The whole precinct gave Barca the impression of shabbiness, of neglect. Still, despite its size the temple itself was an impressive structure. He could see, even from here, the pylons flanking the temple entrance. Banners hung limp, a lull in the light winds sucking the life from them.

  Barca had visited the temple once before, years ago, when he brought the body of his old captain, Potasimto, an adherent of Neith, to Memphis so the priests could entomb him at Saqqara with his ancestors. The brightly painted entrance, he recalled, led to a hypostyle hall, a forest of stone columns capped by chiseled granite images of the goddess herself, in all her myriad forms. From there, the temple widened, becoming a colonnaded courtyard that housed the sacred pool. The shrine itself lay in the shadow of the colonnade.

  The temple had few lesser priests, as far as Barca could remember. Those it did employ spent their days on errands in the markets and bazaars, or on loan to the larger temples. With luck, he would conclude his business with Ujahorresnet and be gone before any clamor was raised.

  The sun reached its zenith in the azure-white sky as Barca slipped around to the temple entrance. Inside, the shadows were cool, inviting. Shafts and windows high in the walls kept the air circulating. In the pervasive silence he could hear a soft voice. He crossed the hypos
tyle hall, cones of brilliant sunlight lancing down from apertures in the roof. Barca skirted these, keeping to the shadows. The voice grew louder as he crossed into the courtyard.

  At the far end, beyond the glittering sacred pool, he spied his prey.

  Ujahorresnet knelt before a statue of his goddess, his mind focused on the complex liturgies and rituals required of him, as First Servant of the Goddess. Offerings lay on the cool stone before him: fresh loaves of bread, an ewer of water, sweet smelling incense on a bed of hot coals. They were gifts for the goddess, exhortations for her favor, her guidance.

  Barca padded to the edge of the sacred pool, watching the priest's back as he crouched and dipped out several handfuls of water to blunt his thirst. Ujahorresnet was oblivious, so intent was he on his ritual. The very image of pious supplication.

  "O Opener of the Ways!" the priest said, his arms raised, his shaven head tilted toward the heavens. "0 Wise Mother! Deliver unto thy children the milk of thy breast, so that we might live fulfilled in the light of thy divine ka."

  "Why should she? You've strayed from her path," Barca said.

  Ujahorresnet lunged forward, still on his knees, a look of shock on his face. He scattered the offerings as he put his back to the statue. His eyes bulged as he stared at the knife in Barca's bloody fist.

  "Esna! "

  "Call louder," Barca said. "He can't hear you in hell."

  "Damn you! " said the priest, sagging in defeat against the statue's base. "What will you do now? Kill me? Then do it and have done with it! It's what you have dreamed of. What you have lived for. I am at your mercy. Send me to join my daughter in the next world."

  "What happened to your compassion, priest?" Barca said, stalking toward Ujahorresnet. "What happened to your kindness, your quietude, your honor? Are these not the virtues of your goddess? You've exchanged all you hold dear for base revenge. Is it any wonder your goddess has deserted you?"

  "Do not talk tome about honor!" Ujahorresnet spat. "You have no conception of it! Or of compassion. You broke the most sacred of bonds, the bond between husband and wife, and for what? To soothe your pride? To assuage your anger? I may have strayed from the path of my goddess, but your ka is blacker than mine, you bastard!"

  Barca snatched the priest up by the neck and pinned him against the wall of the alcove. "I loved your daughter!" he whispered through clenched teeth. "Loved her more than I have loved another living soul, and I have had to live with what I did for the last twenty years. She betrayed me! She dishonored me! If I could return to that night, I would stay my hand, I would leave Egypt with never a backward glance. But I cannot undo what happened. Neferu is dead, and her death is on my conscience. I do not weep for her … she made her own choice, just as I made mine."

  "I weep for her! " Ujahorresnet said, his voice thick, strangled with emotion. "Everyday I weep for her! You killed my little girl!"

  Barca's grip loosened; his knife sank. He looked at Ujahorresnet again and saw an old man consumed with grief, wracked with the guilt of a father who could not protect his only child. The black rage seething in Barca's soul drained away. He let go of Ujahorresnet; the priest slid to the floor, gnarled hands cradling his head.

  "You killed my little girl," he sobbed.

  Barca turned away, the pain in his limbs, his face, his side crushing down on him like an impossible weight. "I should kill you, too, old man, but it will serve no good. If you leave Memphis, Pharaoh will never learn of your betrayal from me."

  "Leniency? From you?" Ujahorresnet barked. "How droll."

  Barca stopped, inclined his head. "It's called compassion, priest. You should become reacquainted with it. One warning: forget I exist. Trust in your gods to punish me when my time comes and let me be. Because if you so much as cross my path on a crowded street, they won't find enough of your body to give a proper burial."

  With that, Barca quit the precinct of Neith, leaving a broken old man in his wake.

  Broken, but alive.

  The afternoon sun shimmered on the surface of the Nile, reflecting the light a thousand times over. A stiff northerly wind belled the sails of Pharaoh's barge, the Khepri, sending her prow slicing through the water like a wedge through sand. Sailors, naked save for leather loincloths, scurried about the deck of the ship, moving with a rhythm that suggested brachiating monkeys rather than men.

  The Khepri was a massive vessel, well over two hundred feet long, a monument to the extraordinary skill of Pharaoh's Phoenician shipwrights. Its cedar mast and railings were elaborately carved with images of Pharaoh receiving the blessings of falcon-headed Horns as a cavalcade of gods looked on. Hieroglyphs wove spells of protection around the ship. Statues of the goddesses Neith and Nekhebet, made of precious woods and inlaid with ivory and gold, stood watch over Pharaoh's path, warning all and sundry that a son of heaven sailed the life-giving waters of the Nile. At the stern of the Khepri, under a white linen awning upheld by slender columns of gilded cedar, rested a replica of the Saite throne. Here, Ahmose held court, agitated, surrounded by ministers and advisors.

  "I will not sit in the baggage train like a doddering old fool! " Pharaoh said. The awning covering the throne snapped in the wind. "Am I a coward to hide my face from Phanes?"

  "No, Great One," Pasenkhonsu, his senior admiral, wheedled. "But neither can you place your royal life in the van, in the thickest of the fighting. We could be sailing into an ambush, 0 Pharaoh. You must — "

  "You would presume to order me about like a common serf?"

  Pasenkhonsu wrung his hands. "No, Great One, a thousand times, no! But, your divine blood is too precious to spill in battle with mere rebels. Please, listen to reason! " The other ministers agreed, adding their assents with the perfect timing of a trained chorus. "Please!"

  Ahmose dismissed them with a curt gesture. He turned and watched the landscape pass by, the villages of mud brick, the green fields, the temples and monuments. Men, women, and children flocked to the Nile's edge, awe-struck at the glimmering splendor of the god-king's procession. A deep melancholy gripped his soul, as if he stood witness to the ending of an age. His allies were gone, swallowed up by the Persians. Croesus of Lydia. The Chaldean, Nabonidus. Even Polycrates of Samos, once his staunchest ally, had given in to the lure of Cambyses' gold. Ahmose was alone. Adrift on a sea of foes, all of whom wanted what he had devoted his life to rebuilding. And now, Phanes.

  The hero of Sardis. Ahmose remembered that day well, when the combined armies of Egypt, Lydia, Babylon, and Sparta, stood strong against the swarming hordes of Cyrus the Mede. The Plain of Thymbra, before the walls of Sardis, ran red with blood; the slain circled the living like a ring of mountains. His forces alone fought the Persians to a standstill, fought with such fury that Cyrus granted them a separate treaty. His generals awarded the gold of valor to a young mercenary, a hoplite from Halicarnassus, who had waded into the thickest fighting to prevent the Egyptian standard from falling to the Persians.

  That young mercenary was Phanes, and Sardis was just the beginning. Year piled upon year; battle upon battle. Phanes' rise through the ranks had all the hallmarks of a Homeric saga, and his genius at warfare was beyond compare. He was a Hellenic ideal, a living Odysseus. A shame, Ahmose reckoned, that such an auspicious career had to end like this.

  Pharaoh looked up and saw Nebmaatra approaching. The Calasirian commander maintained the perfect blend of nonchalance and watchfulness, his frame relaxed, his eyes never still. His hands did not stray far from knife and sword hilts. He stopped at the proscribed distance and bowed. Ahmose motioned him closer.

  "I envy your iron nerves, my friend," Pharaoh said, smiling. "Nothing gets under your hide, does it?"

  "Just the opposite, Golden One. Everything gets under my hide. I just disguise it better," Nebmaatra said. "I've heard you plan on fighting in the vanguard."

  Pharaoh's eyes flickered to Pasenkhonsu, who stood among a knot of his underlings, talking is hushed voices. Ahmose sighed. "Will you counsel me otherwise, too? I
am an old man, Nebmaatra. Old and sick. If you live to carry the weight of my years on your back, you will understand why I need one last taste of battle."

  "To die in battle, you mean," Nebmaatra said.

  "If I fall it is Amon's will. Who am Ito declare otherwise?"

  Nebmaatra bowed. "And who am Ito deny the will of Pharaoh? My Calasirians will fight at your side, Golden One."

  Ahmose pursed his lips. "On another matter, has any word reached you of Petenemheb? His father and I served together in Nubia. Surely, he is not part of this?"

  "If Phanes has not disposed of him already, then my guess is he is in collusion with the Greeks. Even if he is not, his silence is suspect, to say the least."

  Ahmose grimaced, looking his age in the afternoon light. He stared off to the west. Nebmaatra felt Pharaoh withdraw into himself, bringing the audience to a close. He bowed and took his leave.

  Nebmaatra left the stern of the Khepri, descending into the waist of the ship. He closed his eyes for a moment, listening to the thrum of wind in the cordage, to the snap of sails, to the creak of the hull, to the slap of water. Harsh sunlight seared his face. He opened his eyes and stared at the endless buffcolored cliffs and rich green marshlands. He, too, looked to the west.

  Squadrons of chariots, the regiment of Amon, kept pace with the ships, raising a pall of dust that could be seen for miles. Behind them, marching at a punishing pace, came columns of infantry — spearmen and archers. The native militia, the machimoi, had mustered with uncommon speed, answering Pharaoh's call to arms. In a few days' time, Pharaoh's displeasure with Phanes manifested itself as an army five thousand strong, including five hundred chariots, the Calasirian Guard, and Pasenkhonsu's river fleet.

  Nebmaatra caught sight of Tjemu leaning against the railing, staring at the western bank of the Nile — no, beyond it. Nebmaatra walked to his side.