Cruel Deceit lb-6

by Lauren Haney

  “Mistress Meret.” Pahure’s voice.

  Both sisters started. Their heads snapped around, their eyes leaped toward the doorway.

  “Pahure!” Meret flung an angry look his way. “Must you skulk around like a common thief?”

  Pahure crossed the threshold and walked along the row of colorful blooming potted plants lining the terrace. His mouth was tight with annoyance. “You must come immedi ately, mistress. Two of the servants have quarreled. One has been hurt. Your presence is required in the kitchen.” He paused, added emphatically, “Right away, mistress.”

  An odd look passed over her face, and with visible reluc tance she rose to her feet. “Very well.” Forming a smile for Bak’s benefit, adding warmth to the chill in her voice, she said, “I’m delighted you came, Lieutenant. I hope you’ll visit us here again before we return to Tjeny.”

  “I must go, too.” Taharet stood up, smiled at Bak with an insincerity born of dislike. “I assume you can find your way out. You’ve been here often enough.”

  Leaving the dwelling, Bak hurried along the processional way toward the sacred precinct of Ipet-isut, hoping to catch

  Hori and Thanuny before they left the storehouse archives.

  Meret’s invitation was uppermost in his thoughts. He liked her, appreciated her candor, her quiet and straightforward manner, a total absence of the anger boiling within her sister.

  Given the chance, could Meret fill the void in his heart left by the woman he had thought never to forget?

  Thanks to the lord Amon, Bak found the scribe and audi tor where he had hoped they would be. A young apprentice ushered him into the main room of the storehouse archives, vacated so late in the day by the men who normally toiled there. The room was long and narrow, its ceiling supported by tall columns, with high windows lighting a space large enough to accommodate at least twenty seated scribes.

  The two Medjays welcomed Bak with the broad smiles of men expecting an early release from an onerous task. He guessed they wanted very much to join the hordes of merry makers filling the city.

  “You were right, sir.” Hori scrambled to his feet and stretched his weary muscles. “With two of us searching the records, one far wiser than the other in the ways of vile crim inals…” He grinned at Thanuny, seated cross-legged on the linen pallet normally occupied by the chief scribe. “… it didn’t take long to find a discrepancy.”

  Thanuny swished a writing brush around in a small bowl of water, cleaning red ink from it, and slipped it into the slot in his scribal pallet. A reflected shaft of late evening sunlight brightened the water to the color of blood. “It took over a half hour, Lieutenant, but once we found that initial discrep ancy, it told us what to look for. After that, the rest leaped out like gazelles startled by a pack of hunting dogs.”

  “They weren’t that obvious,” Hori said. “If they had been,

  Woserhet and Tati would’ve found them.”

  “I’d bet my wife’s best cooking bowl that Woserhet hadn’t yet inspected the records we looked through today.” Tha nuny eyed the twenty or more baskets scattered around him, each containing a half-dozen reddish storage jars filled with scrolls. “He was too competent and thorough a man to have missed all we found. And surely he’d have told his scribe if he’d verified his suspicions.”

  Taking in the large number of jars, Bak’s expression turned grim. “Exactly how serious is this crime which has been perpetrated against the lord Amon?”

  “Very serious indeed.” The auditor’s expression was grave. “I know theft is commonplace in the markets and the fields, on shipboard and on caravans. Even within the royal house, men steal. Who can resist taking some small object should the opportunity arise? But here in the sacred precinct? Stealing from the lord Amon himself? On such a large scale?” Thanuny shook his head as if unable to believe such greed, such audacity.

  Bak dropped onto the woven reed mat beside the auditor.

  “Tell me what you found.”

  Thanuny withdrew a scroll protruding from the mouth of one of the storage jars. “We’ve marked the documents that contain erroneous entries,” he said, pointing to a conspicu ous red dot near the edge. “They’ll have to be corrected, or a note made on each of which items have vanished. Have been stolen,” he added sadly.

  As he untied the knot in the cord binding the scroll, Hori sat down on the floor beside him. The two Medjays ex changed a dejected look and hunkered against the wall to wait.

  “We began by picking out a few specific examples of val 218

  Lauren Haney uable items commonly used during the sacred rituals,” Tha nuny said. “Aromatic oils, incense, lustration vessels and censers, amulets, and the like. We tracked them on the ap propriate documents from the time they were received in

  Waset and stored in the sacred precinct until they were either consumed or were sent to another of the god’s holdings or to the storehouses of our sovereign.”

  “You’ll never believe what first drew our attention.”

  Hori’s eyes danced with excitement. “An amulet. A simple stone scarab. Dark green, mounted on gold.”

  Bak whistled. “Not at all simple, I’d think.”

  Thanuny smiled at his young colleague. “Fortunately for us, it was offered to the lord Amon far enough in the past that all the records had been turned into the archives. It should have been recorded on a continuous string of docu ments from arrival to disposal.”

  “But it wasn’t,” Hori broke in. “According to the records, it was delivered by ship from Mennufer, dropped off at the harbor here in Waset, and sent on its way to the storehouse where Woserhet was slain. However, the record of the store house contents failed to mention it. It either vanished some where between the harbor and the sacred precinct, or was never recorded when it arrived at the storehouse, or was stolen from there and the record altered.”

  “Altogether, thirty amulets were listed as having been brought from Mennufer at the same time.” Thanuny pulled a brush from his writing pallet and, using the top end, reached around to scratch his back. “We found that four others of somewhat lesser value had also vanished-on papyrus at any rate. We sent that young apprentice who brought you to us out to the storehouse to look for the missing items. He didn’t find them, of course.”

  “What other types of items have vanished?” Bak asked.

  “Anything of value,” Hori said.

  “I fear our young friend isn’t exaggerating,” Thanuny said. “Several methods were used to conceal the thefts, depending upon the items taken and how they were recorded.

  The shorter records were copied, we believe, omitting what ever was taken. As for the longer lists too time-consuming to copy, we found signs of erasure, with other objects inserted in the spaces.”

  “I must see some specific cases. Amonked will wish to know.”

  A long-suffering sigh burst forth from one of the Med jays. Bak ignored the hint. Their task as guards would be over by sunset, when the inside of the building grew too dark to read. The men would have plenty of time to play af ter escorting Thanuny home. Hori, he assumed, would re main with them.

  Bak, having decided to spend the night across the river with his father, bade good-bye to the two scribes and their

  Medjay guards and left the storehouse archives with his head reeling. So many numbers, so much of value stolen over the past two years. And for how many years before?

  Passing through the gate that took him outside the sacred precinct, he looked to right and left to be sure no one lay in wait, thinking to attack him. The lord Re had passed over the western horizon, leaving behind a reddish glow in the sky and deep shadows in the narrow lane, making it hard to see.

  He heard sounds of revelry to the west, where merrymakers would be seeking out food, drink, and entertainment along the broader, lighter streets closer to the river, but the lane was empty, the block of interconnected houses quiet. He turned to the right and hurried along the base of the wall en closing the sacred precinct, choosing
the shortest path to the busier streets and the ferry that would carry him to western

  Waset.

  Again he turned his thoughts to the stolen items. Someone was rapidly becoming a man of vast wealth, but who? Not a man or woman among his suspects displayed an affluence beyond his or her station. For that matter, Meryamon, the man most likely to have stolen the objects, had given no in dication of having had any wealth at all. With his daily bread supplied by the lord Amon, he had most assuredly not lived a life of want, but neither had he given any sign of prosper ity. True, Pahure had set high goals for himself, but he gave no more sign of being a man of wealth than did Netermose or Sitepehu.

  As he neared the corner of the housing block, two men suddenly stepped into the lane ahead of him. In the dim light, he could see that one carried a mace, the other a dag ger. He muttered a curse, swung around to run back the way he had come. Three men, all brandishing weapons, raced out of the gate that pierced the wall of the sacred precinct. He snapped out another oath. These had to be the same men who had tried to slay him before. If he had had the time, he would have cursed himself roundly. He could not believe he had walked into a trap almost identical to the one he had ear lier evaded.

  Very much aware that his options were limited, he pivoted and raced toward the two men at the end of the housing block. The warren of lanes offered his sole chance of escape.

  If he could overcome the pair, he could slip into the lane they had come out of and vanish in the gathering darkness.

  He closed on the two men, aiming toward the one with the mace. At the last moment, he veered toward the other man, grabbed the hand wielding the scimitar, and shoved it hard against the wall of the sacred precinct. The man yelped and dropped the weapon. Bak kicked him high between the legs, immobilizing him, and turned to face the man with the mace. The running footsteps of the trio behind drew closer.

  He grappled for the mace, with he and his opponent doing an odd little dance while they struggled for possession.

  A man leaped on his back, knocking him to the ground. In an instant, they were all upon him, holding him face-down with the weight of numbers.

  “We’ve got him this time,” the man with the gravelly voice said with a satisfied laugh.

  Bak managed to raise his head, to take a look at the men who had caught him. One bent double, clutching his man hood; three other hard-faced men held him against the dirt.

  Standing over him, mace raised to strike, he glimpsed the swarthy man he thought was Zuwapi.

  The man’s arm came down and he saw no more.

  Chapter Fifteen

  The world was dark, hurtful. A throbbing place where low voices came and went. A place where the air smelled of dirt and sweat and stale beer. Where the surface on which he lay was sometimes hard and dusty, sometimes not there at all.

  Or was it he who was not there?

  He lay in the black space, sensing the world around him come and go, offering snatches of itself. A man gulping from a jar, a belch, the stench of foul breath. Something small and whiskered-a mouse, he imagined-sniffing his cheek. The crisp sound of a man chewing a radish with his mouth open. A harsh “Shhh.” The mouse again, or some thing bigger, exploring his leg. A man cursing and a short scuffle.

  He opened his eyes, but could see nothing. The throbbing in his head was intense and he felt disoriented. He tried to move, but the pain sharpened, forcing him to be still. He lay motionless, barely daring to breathe, praying the agony would lessen.

  “How much longer?” a man whispered.

  “An hour, maybe more,” a gravelly voice murmured. “Af ter the revelers have gone to their sleeping pallets and the streets and lanes are empty.”

  A third man groaned. “I’d hoped to have some fun tonight. There’s a game of knucklebones in a house of plea sure north of the royal house, the one the lame Hurrian runs.

  It started the day the festival began.” He kept his voice low, as if he feared someone nearby would hear. “I’d like to sit in just once. They say it’s the best game in Waset.”

  The first man laughed softly. “The way your luck’s been going lately, you’d do better to find yourself a woman, one with udders as big as a cow and…”

  The description went on, a buzz of words running to gether, sometimes audible, sometimes fading away.

  Feeling ill, he clamped his eyes shut, swallowed, and let his head roll to the right. The place above his ear, the spot where he had been hit, struck the hard-packed earthen floor.

  Pain exploded and he felt no more.

  He knew he was going to die, prayed it would happen sooner rather than later. His wrists were tied together and so were his ankles. His body, limp and helpless, was slung from a stout pole like the carcass of a dead deer. His head hung close to the ground, swinging free, a mass of agony too intense to endure.

  Each time the pole jiggled, each time one or the other of the two men carrying him made an abrupt movement, the torture worsened. The searing pain inside his head took his breath away, clouded his vision. He prayed for relief, for the darkness of oblivion, yet he never lost sight of the man near his head, the sturdy legs pumping, large callused bare feet.

  “Shhh. We’re close,” gravel voice said.

  The two men lowered the pole, letting him drop roughly to the ground. His head seemed to split apart, and blessed darkness set in.

  He came back to life slowly, in bits and pieces. Once he heard a man’s shout, a reassurance that all was well. Another time he glimpsed two men carrying him, walking rapidly along a narrow lane, his body swinging from the pole be 224

  Lauren Haney tween them. He saw a dog nipping at the heels of a stranger, who threw a rock to frighten it away. He saw the swarthy man standing on the deck of a ship, ordering its mooring ropes released. He felt himself lying on the ground, the pole on top of him, hearing the loud laughter of a dozen or more revelers passing by. He saw his father, standing with Hori and Commandant Thuty on a ship bound for Mennufer. He saw a woman’s back, knew she was the one he had vowed to love forever, but when she turned around to smile, her face was that of mistress Meret.

  The visions ended and for a while he must have slept. Or perhaps he fell into a deeper unconsciousness.

  When Bak came to, or awakened-he knew not which he felt better. He lay motionless in the dark, letting his thoughts pull themselves together. His head throbbed, but no longer felt as if it would burst. His side ached as if he had been kicked, but a cautious intake of breath did not bring about the sharp pain of a broken rib. He was groggy and confused. His tongue felt thick and was so dry he could not moisten his lips.

  He sensed he was alone. Knew it for a fact when he heard the tiny noises vermin make when they seek out sustenance undisturbed. He was lying on a sloping wooden bed of some kind. He tried to move his arms from behind his back, but was unable to do so. Burning wrists awakened a hazy mem ory of being bound hand and foot.

  He wondered where his captors had left him. The dark ness was total. The world around him felt unstable, as if it might be moving, swaying. Or were his thoughts playing tricks on him? He could smell stagnant water and rotting wood, the leavings of small creatures. He tasted grit between his teeth and something else. Blood. His own, he felt sure.

  He heard the soft whisper of… Of what? Running water.

  He was very close to the river. Or on a ship.

  Yes, a ship. His feet were in a shallow pool, his body on a slightly curving incline. Not a breath of air stirred around him. As muddled as his thoughts were, he knew exactly what those facts signified. He had been dropped down the hatch of a ship and lay in the hull beneath the deck in the space normally filled with ballast. The water bathing his feet was sloshing back and forth, probably along the center board, while he must be reclining between two ribs. Thanks to the lord Amon, he had fallen with his head well out of the water.

  He could hear no voices, no sound of rowing, no flapping sails, nothing but the tired, sporadic groan of the wooden hull. The vessel had to
be moored against the riverbank.

  Most likely in Waset or not far from the city. Had his captors meant to leave him alive, thinking he would be found and rescued? Or were they planning to come back and slay him?

  Was there something about his situation that he had not yet begun to understand?

  Water inside a hull was normal, common to all ships.

  Only time would tell how much was seeping inside. The musty smell of rotting wood was strong, indicating that the vessel was old, its condition questionable. As far as he could tell, the rats had left him alone, but that did not mean they were not skulking somewhere in the dark, waiting for him to die. Or waiting to abandon ship, should it begin to sink.

  He sat up abruptly, awakening the demon in his head. He had to get off the vessel. Fast.

  The pain, the dizziness, a hint of nausea forced him to wait, to sit quietly until the throbbing eased and the world around him stopped spinning. When at last he could think clearly, he realized he had a decision to make. Should he try to find a hatch and attempt to climb out, bound as he was?

  Or should he first rid himself of the ropes?

  To release his hands would be time-consuming, but with luck and the help of the gods he could untie his ankles, which would allow him greater freedom of movement. He lay down on his side, drew his legs back as far as possible, and tried to reach the rope around his ankles. He managed to touch the wet cord with his fingertips, but could get no closer. Cursing his body for being so inflexible, he sat up and scooted down the incline into the puddle. Better to look for a hatch than waste further time.

  The water tempted him, but it smelled of rot and fish and the lord Amon only knew what else. Promising himself a drink from the river the instant he got out of this wretched ship, he cautiously rose to his feet. He could not believe how frail he felt, how wobbly his knees were.

  The hull was so shallow, he could not stand erect. The vessel was not large. Shoulders hunched, head down, he tried to raise his hands high enough behind him to search for the way out. He could reach the beams that supported the deck, but was not limber enough to raise them all the way to the underside of the deck planks. Unable to think of a better solution, he decided to run his battered head along the boards. With luck, he would find the hatch through which he had been thrown almost directly above him.