by Lauren Haney
“So you gave him no chance, no opportunity to defend himself.”
“I offered to share with him. He refused. He was so smug, so convinced I’d bow to his demands, he even provided me with the weapon I used, the iron dagger. It lay on the table by his elbow. I snatched it up and thrust it into his breast.”
Bak started to hand over the scroll, pulled it back. “What of my Medjay, Ruru? Did you have to take his life? Could you not have stolen up behind him and knocked him senseless?”
“With what?” Paser snorted. “I carried nothing but a dagger.”
Bak had heard enough. Letting his long-dormant anger bubble to the surface, he threw the scroll as hard as he could. It struck Paser on the cheek, startling him, sending him back a pace. Drawing his dagger, Bak prepared to lunge. His opponent dropped the ingot and reached back, grabbing the weapon Bak expected. They stood three paces apart, knees bent to spring, daggers poised to strike. Paser, Bak noticed, had smeared a dark substance on the deadly blade so the glint of bronze would not be seen by a sentry on the wall above.
“You spawn of a snake!” Paser snarled. “You never meant me to leave this roof alive.”
Bak sidled to his left, away from the zigzag shadow cast by the steps, and held his dagger higher so it could be seen from atop the wall. “You brought the hidden weapon, Paser. Why if not to slay me?”
“I knew you’d not be satisfied with three ingots. What was I to do? Let you bleed me dry, leaving me with nothing?”
As he spoke, he shifted to his right and a pace forward. His intention was clear. He meant to press Bak close to the rising stairway, gradually herding him backward into the corner, deep in the shadows where the sentries could not see.
“Surely the cousin of a man as lofty and influential as Senenmut has no need for gold.” Bak spoke with a biting sarcasm. “Or does the chief steward think too little of you to raise you to the position of wealth and power you feel you deserve?”
“Senenmut cares for no one but himself.” Paser edged closer, narrowing the distance another half-pace.
Bak held his ground. “You took the gold in a fit of pique?”
Paser expelled a sharp, bark-like laugh. “You said one time that you had the ear of Menkheperre Thutmose. You know better than I that one day his regiments will march on the great cities of Kemet and he’ll take the throne for himself alone. You said as much the day of the archery contest.”
Bak had forgotten the long ago lie, his claim of knowing the young king who stood in the shadow of his powerful co-ruler. He thanked the lord Amon that Paser had believed the tale. It had made him more cautious, had forced him to contrive ways of slaying Bak that would be accepted as the will of the gods. At least until now.
“My dear cousin will fall with our sovereign, and all those close to him will fall as well.” Paser took another tentative step, bringing him dangerously close. “Senenmut has had no thoughts to spare for me. I see no reason why I should share his fate. The gold will give me a new life of ease and luxury in a place far to the north of Kemet. Perhaps in the land of Mitanni, or Keftiu, or far-off…”
He stopped, listened. Bak heard it, too. The soft whisper of sand falling on the roof from somewhere above. Paser’s eyes darted upward. His face turned ugly, mean. Bak dared not look up, but he was sure the officer had spotted Imsiba in the deep shadow cast by the wall, slipping down the stairs from the battlements. Paser lunged. Bak ducked into the shadow, felt the blade shave his left arm. Paser’s momentum drove him on and he slammed into Bak, shoving him against the stairway, pinning his right arm and dagger between his body and the mudbrick.
The quick kew-kew-kew of a falcon carried across the rooftops, Imsiba warning the Medjays who had encircled the building after Paser’s return that the fish they had caught might soon attempt to break out of the net.
Bak tried to twist away, to release his dagger. Paser caught him by the throat, shoved his head hard against the stairway, and dug his fingers into the vulnerable flesh, stealing the breath from Bak’s lungs. As the caravan officer pulled back his weapon to strike, Bak grabbed his wrist with his free hand to stave off the thrust and at the same time rammed a knee upward, aiming for Paser’s crotch. Clamping Bak’s neck with the strength of a madman, Paser jerked aside, saving his private parts but giving Bak the room he needed to extricate the hand holding his dagger. Paser twisted his own weapon and raked the point across Bak’s left wrist, forcing him to relax his grip. Bak, his vision blurring from lack of air, shoved his dagger at his captor’s middle. Paser slashed his weapon downward to parry the blow. The dagger spun from Bak’s numbing fingers and clattered across the roof.
Imsiba had to be close by on the stairs, but Bak doubted the Medjay could help. With him and Paser pressed so tight together, limbs entwined, one looking much like the other in the shadow, none but a creature of the night could tell them apart. He had to help himself-and soon-before he had no strength left.
He let himself go limp. His knees buckled. Paser clutched his neck tighter but, unable to support his weight, let him slide down the wall. Suddenly, before the caravan officer could drive his weapon home, Bak shot upward, smashing the top of his head into his captor’s chin. Paser grunted and staggered back. His fingers slid from Bak’s neck.
Gasping for air, Bak stumbled a couple of steps along the stairway, stretching the distance between them. He heard the rustle of sandals on the stairs and glimpsed through a blurred halo the point of Imsiba’s spear above him. Common sense told him Paser would accept his fate and give up. Instinct told him to breathe as deeply as he could, to stiffen his wobbly knees with air.
Paser shook his head to clear it. His eyes darted upward. He bared his teeth and uttered a sound somewhere between a moan and a growl. His arm shot up and back, ready to heave his weapon.
“Do you want to die?” Imsiba spoke in so ordinary a manner he could have been asking about the weather.
Paser hesitated, neither lowering his arm nor throwing the dagger.
“I suggest you look behind you.” Imsiba nodded toward the stairwell opening.
The caravan officer glanced over his shoulder and spat out a curse.
Nebwa, armed with a heavy spear, emerged from the stairwell and stepped onto the roof. “A dozen Medjays are scattered around this building. If you use that dagger on any one of us, their dogs will tear you to pieces.”
Releasing a hard, bitter laugh, Paser slowly lowered his weapon. “When first I laid eyes on you, Bak, I thought you a simple soldier. Never would I have guessed you’d make a fool of me.”
“Drop your dagger, Paser.” Bak’s voice was hoarse, lacking the authority he intended. “We want you living, but we’ll take your life if we must.”
Paser charged at Nebwa. Swinging his spear to impale the approaching man, Nebwa stepped sideways so the impact would not drive him through the opening behind him. His sandal skidded on the grain, and the spear point leaped upward. Before he could regain his balance, Paser rammed into him, knocking him off his feet, and grabbed the weapon. The burly officer fell with a solid thud, but had the presence of mind to seize Paser’s leg.
A light flickered in the stairwell and brightened to cast a golden glow over the pair. Paser shoved his dagger into the sheath he pulled around to his hip and raised the spear to plunge it into the man who held him. Bak grabbed the only object close by, the jar of grain. Not much of a weapon, but all he had.
A torch followed by a head and shoulders appeared in the opening. Bak stared, appalled, at Kames, the highly placed civilian he had recruited to hear Paser’s admission of guilt. The chief scribe had been told to stay in the courtyard until all danger was past, yet here he was.
“You’ve got him!” Kames said. “I heard every…” The torch wavered and the reedy old man gaped at the spear suspended over Nebwa’s chest.
Bak threw the jar. Imsiba hurled his spear an instant later. The jar hit the butt of Paser’s weapon and burst apart, spraying shards and grain over his head and shoulders.
The weapon was torn from his hand and its deadly point slid past Nebwa. Imsiba’s spear, its path deflected by a shard, sliced through the flesh of Paser’s right shoulder and struck the edge of the opening where Kames stood. The old man cringed, wrapped his arms around his head. Nebwa released Paser’s leg and tried to grab the weapon, but it slid down Kames’s back and clattered to the steps below. The old man ducked out of sight.
Bak, running toward them, saw Paser glance at the lighted stairwell which promised a way out. “Stop!” he croaked. “My men surround this building. You’ve nowhere to go.”
Paser leaped past Nebwa’s grasping hands, through the opening, and down the stairs. Cursing the villain’s obstinacy, Bak raced into the swath of light. He heard Kames cry out, the thud of a fallen body, and Azzia shrieking angry words in her own tongue. Bak turned his curses on himself. She had vowed to remain in her bedchamber with her servants. He should have realized she would do no such thing with her husband’s slayer close by.
Dreading what he would find, he plunged down the stairs. The old man lay crumpled in the doorway of Nakht’s reception room, his long white kilt bunched around his knees, the torch lying on the floor, sputtering. As Bak leaped over him, he saw Paser just outside the courtyard door, struggling with Azzia for possession of Imsiba’s spear. The caravan officer spotted Bak. He jerked the spear, and her with it, out of sight. Her screams ended abruptly.
A frigid hand clutched Bak’s heart. “Azzia!”
No answer.
He ran to the door and peered around the jamb. Azzia stood chalky-faced midway across the courtyard. Paser stood behind her, his left arm holding her close, the dagger in his bloody right hand much too near her white throat. The blood dripping from his wound was smeared across her bare shoulder. Smoke drifted over them from a torch mounted beside the door leading to the stairway and the audience hall below. Imsiba’s spear was nowhere to be seen.
A soft moan drew Bak back away from the door. Kames had regained his senses. Bak thanked the gods that at least his witness was all right. Imsiba mounted the torch in a bracket by the door, preventing a dreaded fire, and was raising the old man to a sitting position.
“Come out where I can see you, Bak,” Paser called. “Bring no weapon. I’ll not take her life or yours, that I promise. I need you to clear my path to the river, and she’s my guarantee that you’ll cooperate.”
“No, Bak!” Azzia cried. “I’d rather die than see the swine go free.”
“Silence! Do you want me to run my blade down your pretty face?”
Imsiba spat out an oath in his own tongue.
“May all the gods of the ennead lay misfortune on his shoulders,” Kames muttered bitterly.
Bak’s thoughts tumbled over each other. He dared not help Paser leave Buhen. Once outside the walls, the officer would take a skiff from the quay and sail off with Azzia. The moment he no longer needed her, he would slay her. She had to be torn from his grasp.
He glanced around, seeking a weapon. Something small, something he could somehow conceal while he waited for Paser to lower his guard.
“I know you’re there, Bak,” Paser called. “Show yourself!”
Nakht’s iron dagger! Bak swung toward the inlaid cedar chest, where he had placed the weapon the night Heby had ransacked the room. Praying Azzia had not moved it, he lifted the lid. The dagger lay exactly as he had left it. Withdrawing it from the sheath, he noticed for the first time the blood coagulating on his left hand, more than he would have thought possible from a wound that barely stung. An idea took form, a way of concealing the weapon.
“Nebwa is on the roof above us, Bak.” Paser sounded grim and a bit desperate. “If you don’t call him off, this foreign bitch will never again look in a mirror without shedding tears for her lost beauty.”
Bak dropped the dagger where he had found it, squeezed the cut to make it bleed more, and smeared his chest. Praying he could deceive Paser, he held the injured wrist in front of the stain, making the wound appear far more serious than it was, and stepped into the courtyard. Azzia gasped at the sight of him. Nebwa, peering down from the roof, expelled a breastful of air and a curse.
Paser, who had taken shelter among the potted plants, his back to the wall, pressed his blade to Azzia’s cheek. “Call off your dog. Now!”
Bak hesitated, his unwillingness to obey not a sham. “Drop the weapon, Nebwa, and back off. He’s won the game, I fear.”
The infantry officer’s face reflected indecision, dismay, and when he looked at Azzia, helplessness. He laid the spear on the rooftop and backed far enough away that he could not easily reach it.
“Good.” Paser’s gaze dropped from the roof to Bak. “Let’s go.”
“I’ll do all you say, but first I must stop the bleeding.” Bak was glad his voice was so rough, making it easier to pretend weakness. “Give me time to bind my arm. I can tear the cloth from Kames’s kilt.”
Paser studied him with narrowed eyes, nodded. “Go, but waste no time. And bring bandages back for me.”
Bak retreated into the reception room, his relief tempered by fear for Azzia. Kames and Imsiba had begun to tear strips of cloth from the bottom of the old man’s kilt. Bak grabbed the sheathed iron dagger and a piece of linen. Working as fast as he could, he tied the sheath upside down to his bloody wrist, inserted the dagger, and wrapped a loose bandage around wrist, dagger handle, and hand.
Imsiba offered him several additional lengths of fabric and squeezed his shoulder. “Good luck, my friend.”
Bak returned a tight smile and hastened to the courtyard. Arms spread wide, he pivoted to show Paser he carried no weapon. Azzia bit her lip, disappointed at how readily he had complied with her captor’s orders.
“Go to the stairwell,” Paser commanded. “I want you in front of me, not behind when we descend.”
Bak made a wide circle around the officer and his captive, praying all the while to the lord Amon that he would have a chance to strike before Azzia was hurt. Paser edged sideways in the same direction, hugging the wall, where necessary shoving the heavy pots out of the way with a foot. Bak yearned to signal Azzia that he had a weapon, but the risk was too great.
When Bak reached the exit, Paser shifted the blade to her neck. “Enter the stairwell. Slowly. Or I’ll bleed Azzia before your eyes.”
Bak backed one careful step at a time onto the dim, enclosed landing at the top of the stairs. The tall, heavy water jars were stacked along the wall like ghostly sentinels. “It’s blacker than night below. We’ll need the torch.”
“Go to the far wall and feel your way down.”
Bak bumped into the wall behind him. Paser pushed Azzia across the threshold. She jerked to her right, slamming his injured shoulder into the doorjamb. He grunted, the dagger twisted away from her neck, but still he clung to her waist. Taken by surprise, with no time to think, Bak caught the neck of a jar, tipped it onto its side, and shoved it hard. It rolled forward and struck Azzia’s legs and Paser’s, sending them staggering backward, and smashed into the jamb. The neck snapped off and water gushed across the landing. Paser lost his balance and fell backward into a potted acacia, pulling Azzia with him. The limbs of the tree, too spindly to support their weight, collapsed beneath them, spilling them onto the floor. Paser landed hard on his wounded right shoulder.
Bak jerked the iron dagger from its bandage and splashed across the puddle. Paser, grimacing with pain, managed to keep Azzia on top of him. Bak halted in mid-stride, as helpless to come to her aid as before. She gave him a quick, desperate look and, like a wild creature, began to twist and turn, to kick Paser’s legs. She tugged an arm free, clawed his thigh, the arm around her waist, his bleeding shoulder. His face contorted with rage. He loosened his grip on her waist, grabbed her flailing arm, and pinned it to the floor. He flung his other arm wide to drive the dagger into her side. She jerked away, exposing his chest. Bak threw the iron dagger, burying it to the hilt. Paser stared at the weapon, fashioned a smile of sorts, and tried to sit up.
He coughed, gagged. Blood dribbled from his mouth. His dagger clattered to the floor and he crumpled lifeless alongside Azzia.
She lay as still as Paser, staring at him, horrified. Bak wiped the sweat from his face and strode toward her. She gave a strangled cry, rolled away from the dead man, and began to sob. Bak knelt, drew her into his arms. She clung to him, trembling, sobbing, laughing, half hysterical with relief. He lay his cheek on her head and murmured words of comfort.
Imsiba, Nebwa, and Kames streamed out of Nakht’s reception room, the excitement in their voices muted by death. Kasaya and Pashenuro came with them, the latter carrying a small rush basket. The golden ingots inside glittered in the torchlight.
Bak looked beyond Azzia’s head to Paser’s prostrate form. He did not regret the officer’s death, nor did he rejoice in his own victory. Paser must have known he was doomed the day he decided to take the flesh of the lord Re as his own, yet in the end he had fought like a demon to escape. Had he, Bak wondered, chosen the more valiant death over the harsh justice meted out by man?
Chapter Nineteen
Bak entered the commandant’s residence, hurried up the stairway, and burst into the courtyard, which was bathed in a clear morning sunlight so bright it made him blink. The change he found, the disarray, brought a lump to his throat, a sense of impending loss. A husky male servant he had never seen before trod back and forth, moving furniture and storage baskets to rooms the new commandant, Nakht’s successor, was taking as his own. Two rectangular baskets, their lids tied and sealed for travel, sat outside the door of Azzia’s sitting room. The rest of her belongings, he had seen Lupaki stow safely aboard the ship that would carry her away.
She had to go, he knew. Though she had been born and reared in a land whose customs were far different than those of Kemet, she had vowed to respect her husband’s beliefs and wishes. She would travel for many days down the river and place him in his tomb near Mennufer with all the pomp and ritual due a man of his rank. Bak had no quarrel with that. But what of later?
