Desert God

by Smith, Wilbur

  The putative captain was frog-marched ashore demanding to speak to Lord Taita. I made my appearance scowling theatrically and ordered him to be given twenty lashes to impress upon him who it was that made the demands in this camp. The wretch fell on his knees, pressing his forehead to the stones of the jetty, and made a recognition sign with his left finger. Aton and I had first used that sign all those years ago when both of us were still slaves.

  I countermanded my flogging order and instead had him dragged unceremoniously to my cabin on board my flagship, the Outrage. As soon as we reached it I dismissed the guards and ordered my servants to bring hot water for the prisoner to wash in and a fresh chiton to replace his stinky rags.

  ‘What is your name, friend?’ I asked him as my cook laid out a meal of shellfish and tuna steaks for us, and I prised the wooden stopper out of an amphora of Etruscan wine.

  ‘Friend is as good a name as any other.’ He grinned. ‘Better by far than the one my mother chose for me.’

  ‘How is our mutual acquaintance?’ I asked instead.

  ‘Large,’ he replied. ‘He sends you greetings and gifts.’ He went to the pile of his discarded rags and rummaged in them until he found a scroll of papyrus which was stitched into the hem of one of them. He brought it to me. While I unrolled it I indicated the food. He went to the table and fell to with a will.

  I glanced at the papyrus and saw at once that it was the present ‘Order of Battle’ of the Hyksos fleet. In addition Aton had noted those targets in the Nile Delta which he considered most worthy of my consideration.

  Whence Aton had conjured up such a document I could not even hazard a guess. I rerolled it. It deserved my careful attention even though it was probably weeks out of date.

  ‘You spoke of bringing gifts, friend?’

  ‘I have brought you forty-eight messenger pigeons. They are in cages in my ship.’ He looked pleased with himself. I unrolled Aton’s letter and studied it once more.

  ‘The large man writes of sending me one hundred pigeons.’ I spoke mildly. ‘What happened to the other fifty-two birds?’

  ‘We ran out of food.’

  ‘You ate my birds?’ I was appalled by his gall. He shrugged and grinned unabashed. I shouted for Zaras. When he came I told him, ‘Go at once to this rogue’s ship. You will find forty-eight pigeons on board. Bring them to me at once; before they disappear mysteriously.’ Zaras asked no questions, but hurried away to carry out my orders.

  My visitor poured himself another flagon of my precious wine and saluted me with it. ‘Good wine. I commend your taste. Our large friend requests that you send him a commensurate gift, to enable the two of you to communicate more regularly.’

  I considered the suggestion for only a moment. I knew that Ambassador Toran had a large pigeon coop in Knossos. ‘How do you propose I send my birds to him without them also being devoured by jackals and hyenas?’

  He never so much as blinked at my calculated insult. ‘I shall convey them to him in person; that is if one of your fine ships can take me across and set me ashore in an uninhabited part of the Nile Delta.’

  ‘I can do better than that, friend,’ I told him, and he cocked his head enquiringly. ‘There is presently a Carthaginian trading dhow here in Krimad harbour. The captain dined with me yesterday evening. Four days from now he plans to return to Carthage via the Hyksos port of Rosetta in the delta. As you are aware the Sultan of Carthage and King Gorrab of the Hyksos are on neutral terms. I can arrange for you to sail with him as far as Rosetta. You will take with you a hundred pigeons that have been hatched in Knossos and which will be eager to return to the coop as soon as they are released. That way the large man and I can be in direct contact within a very short time.’

  ‘I know he will be delighted by that arrangement. The two of you may even use the opportunity to play a few games of bao by pigeon post.’

  I found Friend’s attempt at humour to be insubordinate, and his intimate knowledge of my personal affairs disconcerting. I am never fully at ease in the company of these clandestine agents. They are a devious and mendacious lot. How can you trust a man who will eat your pigeons?

  While I waited for Toran to send my pigeons to me from Knossos I had the derelict dhow in which Friend had crossed the sea from Egypt taken out into deep water and scuttled, before she provoked the curiosity of one of the Hyksos agents that I knew must abound here on Crete. His seven crew members I sent to the rowing benches of the Outrage.

  Four days later when the Carthaginian trader sailed for Rosetta in the delta, Friend was on board with a hundred healthy and well-fed pigeons from Toran’s coop.

  Before the Carthaginian disappeared over the southern horizon I released one of Aton’s pigeons to wend its way back to him carrying my message thanking him for his gift, informing him of the return gift that Friend was conveying to Rosetta on my behalf. I ended with a notation of my first move of the bao stones: the release of my heron from the west castle. This was a ploy that always made Aton uneasy.

  The fact that I had taken umbrage at Friend’s levity did not mean that I should reject his very sensible suggestion that I take this rare opportunity of continuing my bao contest with Aton.

  The rising sun was on the eastern horizon as I took my leave of Zaras and Hui the next morning and rode back up the slopes of Mount Ida, heading for Knossos along the chain of relay posts that Hui had set up at my orders. He had done a fine job.

  His men had marked out the track with bronze distance tags nailed to the trees along the way. So I was never in any doubt of my position, and I never fell below a canter. As I drew nigh to each relay station I blew a blast on my horn to warn the grooms of my approach. As I rode up they had my next horse saddled and waiting. I paused only to gulp down a few mouthfuls of watered wine. Then I was up and away again; munching on the meat and onion sausage that had been thrust into my hand by one of the grooms.

  I drew rein beside the fresh mound of earth which marked the grave of the slave who had given his life for mine.

  ‘Sleep well, good Waaga. I know we will meet anon. Then I shall fully express my gratitude to you.’ I gave him the clenched-fist salute. Then I kicked my heels into the gelding under me and started down the back end of the mountain towards the harbour of Knossos.

  As I rode into the stable yard behind my ambassadorial mansion I glanced up at the afternoon sun and estimated the angle of change since leaving Krimad.

  ‘Under six hours to cross the island!’ I told myself with satisfaction. Despite the tiring journey I went directly to the writing table in my library to attend to the pile of papyrus scrolls that were waiting my attention. Most of these were from Ambassador Toran.

  I sent one of my slaves down into the city to take my replies to Toran’s house near the palace before I ate my dinner alone and then went to my bedchamber.

  That night I dreamed of Inana again. She was standing on the terrace outside my chamber and her hood and mantle were aglow with the moonlight. But I could not see her face under the hood. I tried to rise from my couch to go to her, but my limbs were leaden and would not respond to my dictates. I tried to speak to her but my voice faded away before it reached the tip of my tongue. However, I experienced no urgency or concern at my own inability to communicate with her. Rather I felt her benevolence flowing over me, and her divine power covering me like a shield. Trustingly I allowed myself to lapse back into sleep.

  I woke again before the dawn and I sprang from my couch feeling wondrously refreshed and alive. I was not prepared for this sense of wellbeing, until suddenly I remembered my dream. Then my joy was tempered with a sweet regret that it had not been reality.

  I walked naked from my chamber through the door to the terrace and I filled my lungs with the air that had been cleansed by the passage of a thousand leagues of ocean.

  I looked across at Mount Cronus, and the god was in relaxed mood once more. I smiled when he belched a puff of darker smoke. Perhaps he had seen me on the terrace and was wishing me a
good day, or he had eaten something for dinner that had given him a touch of flatulence. It was an indication of my good humour that I could indulge myself in such childish nonsense.

  However, it was an extravagance I could ill afford. My plan was to launch our first foray on the Hyksos positions along the northern shore of the delta within the next ten days and every hour must be made to count.

  I turned determinedly back towards the door to my chamber and as I did so my foot struck something soft. I glanced down to see what it was. Then I stooped and gathered it up and examined it; at first with mild interest and then with mounting wonderment.

  It was a flower, or rather a lily. But I had never seen the like, and I am an avid horticulturalist. It was the size of a large wine flagon. Its petals were the colour of freshly cast gold shading down to glowing vermilion in the throat. The stamens were white as carved ivory, and the tips were blue as sapphires.

  It was magnificent and so freshly cut that the stem was still bleeding drops of limpid juice. Gently I rolled it between my fingers, and I caught the soft perfume. It was a scent I knew so well that I felt the hair rise on the back of my neck.

  It was the smell of the goddess Inana; the perfume of Ishtar, the goddess of flowers whose symbol was the lily.

  ‘It was not a dream,’ I whispered. ‘She was here.’

  I raised the lily to my lips and kissed it. I felt it withering in my hands; the petals crisping and curling. The blazing colours faded to dull and ancient brown like the sunspots on the hands of a very old man. Then the petals crumbled to a fine dust that trickled from between my fingers and floated to the tiles of the terrace. The light dawn breeze scattered them.

  The essence of the goddess seemed to have been absorbed from the lily into my own body, bolstering and fortifying me against I knew not what.

  I bathed in the leather buckets of hot water that the slaves brought up to the terrace for me. Then I dressed in a blue wool chiton and went through to my library.

  The door was closed although I had left it open when I came through to my chamber the previous night.

  I pushed it open quietly and then froze with religious dread when I saw the cloaked and hooded feminine figure standing at the window across the room with her back towards me.

  ‘Inana!’ I whispered and she turned swiftly and came to kneel at my feet and kiss my hand before I could regain my voice.

  ‘Lord Taita! It is so very good to see you. I missed you. All of us have missed you.’ She pushed the hood back on to her shoulders.

  ‘Loxias!’ I exclaimed. ‘I thought you were somebody else. How did you find me?’

  ‘I asked my good friend, Lord Toran. He told me where you were.’

  I lifted her back on to her feet and led her to the couch. When she was seated I rang the brass bell on my writing table and three of my slaves ran up the staircase from the kitchens.

  ‘Bring food and drink,’ I ordered.

  We sat facing each other while we devoured the large platter of boiled eggs, dried fish, pork sausages and hard bread the slaves laid between us.

  ‘Is it safe for you to be here with me? I thought that you were imprisoned in the royal seraglio with Tehuti and Bekatha.’

  ‘Oh, no!’ She shook her curls at me. ‘The viragoes see in me only a low-born slave. They allow me to come and go as I wish.’

  ‘The life of a slave obviously suits you very well, Loxias. And you are even prettier than when last I saw you.’

  ‘You are a naughty old flatterer, Taita.’ She preened shyly.

  ‘Tell me about my other girls. Are they as happy as you are?’

  ‘They both profess to be dying of boredom. They long for just one of your stories to amuse them.’

  ‘Doesn’t their new husband entertain them?’ I asked tactfully.

  ‘You mean Old Tin-head, the Supreme Minos?’ She purred with laughter. ‘That’s what we call him, but I suppose he would chop off our heads if he heard us. Neither Tehuti nor Bekatha have seen him since the marriage ceremony. None of our new friends in the harem have seen him since their weddings, and some of them have been there for twenty years and more. Certainly nobody has ever seen him without his tin head.’

  ‘I don’t understand,’ I protested. ‘None of his wives have had carnal knowledge of the king? Is that what you are telling me?’

  Loxias had been friends with Ambassador Toran long enough to understand the meaning of the term and she blushed modestly, and dropped her eyes. ‘From time to time the Minos sends for certain of his wives to be brought to him by the viragoes. However, once they leave the seraglio they never return.’

  ‘What happens to them?’ I was puzzled.

  ‘The viragoes say that they are elevated to the rank of favourites of the gods, and that they ascend to the Higher Temple in the mountains.’

  I questioned Loxias minutely, but it was soon apparent that she knew very little about the subject other than what she had just told me, and that she was not particularly interested in the location of this Higher Temple. She attempted to change the subject of our discussion to the whereabouts and the wellbeing of Zaras and Hui. I knew that she was seeking this information at the behest of her royal mistresses.

  Repeatedly I had to bring her back to our discussion of the multitudinous brides of the Supreme Minos.

  ‘How many of the other brides have become favourites of the gods since you and the princesses took up residence in the seraglio?’ I insisted.

  ‘Forty,’ she replied without hesitation. I was surprised by the number and by Loxias’ certainty of the exact figure.

  ‘So that is approximately one bride a day since you and the princesses have been resident in the seraglio?’

  ‘No, no, my lord. All forty of them left the seraglio at the same time. They went dancing and singing and with flowers in their hair.’

  ‘The Supreme Minos must have had a busy night.’ I could not resist the quip. Loxias struggled to keep a modest expression but there was a sparkle of laughter in her eyes. I went on with my questions: ‘None of those forty women have returned to the seraglio, are you sure of that?’

  ‘I am completely sure of that. We know everything that happens in our section of the palace.’

  I pondered her replies. I had the uneasy feeling that I was missing something of deep significance.

  ‘Forty brides all left together and none of them have returned,’ I mused aloud.

  ‘I have already told you that, Taita.’ Her expression was long-suffering. ‘Tehuti wants to know where Zaras is now. Is he in Krimad or is he on patrol with his ships? She would like to send him a present. Would you take it to him?’ I ignored the question. I was determined not to let myself be sucked into this intrigue.

  ‘When did the brides leave the seraglio?’ I laboured my point.

  ‘They left at noon on the day of the earthquake,’ Loxias snapped at me impatiently. ‘Didn’t I already tell you that?’

  I stared at her, as my mind raced to keep up with the twists and turns in our conversation. ‘Are you telling me that Tin-head had his wicked way with forty virgins in the middle of an earthquake?’ I demanded.

  ‘I suppose so.’ She giggled. ‘If so, I would have loved to watch.’ She stood up. ‘I must go now or the viragoes will not let me back into the palace. Shall I take the girls a message from you?’

  ‘Tell them I love them more than anything else in the world.’

  ‘What about me?’ She pouted dramatically.

  ‘Don’t be greedy. You already have one old man who loves you, Loxias.’

  ‘He isn’t so old,’ she protested. ‘He is quite young and very rich. He is going to marry me; just you wait and see.’

  After she had gone I sat alone on the terrace thinking over everything she had told me. I could make very little sense of it, and I was left with a feeling of pervading unease, a sense of impending disaster.

  I wanted to hurry back to Krimad to immerse myself in the warlike preparations with Zaras and Hui, w
hich I knew would distract me. However, I had to be at Ambassador Toran’s pigeon coop when one of the birds that Friend had taken to Aton in Thebes returned.

  I was in conference with Lord High Admiral Herakal and his staff when there was a mild commotion at the barred doors of the command room.

  ‘What is it?’ Herakal bellowed in a voice that echoed through the cavernous chambers of the Admiralty. ‘I ordered no distractions!’

  The captain of the guard unlocked the polished cedar-wood doors and came through them bowing and blurting apologies.

  ‘Lord Toran of the Privy Council has sent a message. He says that it is of the utmost importance, and must be delivered to the hand of Lord Taita, the Egyptian, without delay.’

  Herakal cast me a lugubrious glance of disapproval and threw up his hands in mock despair. ‘Let the knave in! Let them all come in! Go ahead and disobey my orders whenever you take it into your heads to do so.’

  Swiftly I came to my feet to protect the fellow who was quailing before Herakal’s wrath. ‘I must accept full responsibility, Lord High Admiral. I have been expecting a despatch of the utmost importance from my sources in Egypt.’

  ‘We will all wait on your convenience, Lord Taita.’ Grumbling to himself, Herakal rose from his stool and stalked to the windows, where he stood staring out at Mount Cronus across the bay. I snatched the despatch from the captain’s trembling hand.

  It was a tight roll of yellow silk, no larger than the top joint of my little finger and almost weightless. When I unfolded it I saw that it was as long as my arm and densely covered with the coded symbols that Aton and I had devised between us. These were a great advance on any other written language in existence, both in their compactness and in the range and exactitude of meaning that they made available to the writer.

  I read through the message swiftly, and glanced up at the lord high admiral before he had time to compose and deliver his next complaint.

  ‘Lord High Admiral, I have wonderful news. We have been presented with the opportunity of striking a blow at the heart of our mutual enemy. Gorrab of the Hyksos has assembled a cavalry force of more than a thousand chariots on the plain of Shur on the western extreme of the Nile Delta.’