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  Khephren stood beside him. Drops of sweat beaded the priest’s forehead. He had the look of a man strained to the utmost of physical endurance. And slowly his arms were sinking as if the worn wooden statue he had held at arm’s length above his head had taken on the weight of the great granite image behind the altar.

  Down, down--Khephren’s arms were at shoulder level, lower, lower--the whole body of the priest was being pulled forward by the weight of what he held.

  Before it quite reached the ground, the high priest put forth a great effort and swung his body partly around. He faced away from Rahotep, inching toward the Anubis priests. As he progressed, he once more began to raise the statue, until, as he faced Pen-Seti, he again held the image high above his own head. For a long moment he stood so, but the image did not waver. Then he spoke.

  “Amon has given judgment. The youth is Amon’s. And his task is approved by Amon!”

  He turned again with a swift tread to replace Amon-of-the-Road within the small shrine. Then he went on to the high altar and took up the canopic jar. With a swift movement he smashed the clay against the stone and drew forth a roll of papyrus. Slowly he unrolled it, viewing them all.

  “This is the word of Pharaoh, of the sons of Amon-Re, of him who holds the Flail for our enemies, the Crook for his people. Let our ears be open to the word of Pharaoh by the will of Amon-Re!”

  Chapter 4: WHAT IS THEBES TO US?

  Rahotep tried to give his full attention to the words that came from the high priest’s lips. The roll was, as they had believed, an order for Pharaoh’s Viceroy to send north certain regiments settled in Nubian posts for generations--The Pride of Amon, The Protection of Ptah, The Spears of Sekmet. From what old records of vanished dynasties had they culled those names, Rahotep wondered dreamily? Maybe once they had garrisoned Semna, and Inebuw-Amenemhet at Kerma, but no longer. And Unis, hearing that roster of regimental names, was moved to laughter.

  He smiled genially now at Nereb. “Pharaoh in Thebes is to be served,” he said mockingly. “Summon up The Pride of Anion, The Protection of Ptah, The Spears of Sekmet, and I, myself, shall equip them from my storehouses. Aye, provide their officers with chariots, their men with fine bows, their quivers with a wealth of arrows. Summon them before us, messenger of Pharaoh, and all shall be done even as I say it here in the Holy Place of Amon!”

  Puzzled, Nereb looked to Methen for explanation. The veteran was studying Unis grimly, but it was with the grimness of one who has been outwitted. Now he answered the northern officer.

  “That roll was compiled long ago. We have not heard of such regiments here since before the Dark Years when the Hyksos came upon us. The troops of Nubia are mainly native auxiliaries and the Border Scouts.”

  “Aye,” Unis added. “Call up bones from the tombs to march north if you will, he who speaks for Pharaoh. But otherwise you will get no such men from the Land of the Bow.”

  “But you have men in plenty.” Nereb raised a last protest. He must have known that he was making it in vain. “Is not this the Land of the Bow? The fame of your archers has spread far! Give me a company of your archer Scouts, a force of your fortress spearmen, to equal those which Pharaoh asked of you--”

  Unis shook his head slowly. “Pharaoh asked of me three regiments by name. Those three I have not, nor can any living man lead them forth. The Land of the Bow is defended by her sons; we have the Kush ever raiding to eat up the land. Against the Kush shall our arrows fly. What harm have the Hyksos ever done in Nubia that we should march against them now? I ask you, Lord, what is Thebes to us that we should spill blood in her service, in her far-off wars!” There was a murmur of assent from those about him. Pen-Seti displayed his agreement with vigorous nods.

  “Pharaoh commands--”

  Unis corrected Nereb. “A prince who has his throne in Thebes commands--but does his force reach over all of Egypt? Apophi of the Hyksos will have a few things to say concerning such a claim. Not one man goes forth from Nubia to fight for Thebes.”

  Rahotep pulled himself up and found words at last.

  “Not so, brother. One man goes forth--”

  Unis swung about so fast that the transparent pleated upper skirt he wore whirled out like the scarf of a dancing girl.

  “Speak not so loud, tomb robber!” he snapped. “You are as a fly crawling upon the floor--buzz and a sandal shall crush you. But go north if you will; we shall be well rid of you!” Pen-Seti touched his arm, the priest’s shaven head close to the other’s elaborate wig as he hissed some suggestion, his fanatic’s eyes hard upon Rahotep.

  “Two men.” That was Methen. And Kheti, grinning, smacked his lips together as one might when facing a feast. “Eleven more, all archer Scouts,” he added to the tally.

  The archers who had come with Methen gave their consent to that eagerly.

  Unis had his temper once more under control. He ignored Rahotep but spoke to Nereb. “You have had your answer, Lord. We regret we cannot send the regiments your Pharaoh has asked for--there are no such men within the borders of Nubia. Also, since you bear no orders for recruitment, that you cannot do. It would be well for you to hasten back to Thebes lest your lord depend too much on service he will not get and so go rashly into some enterprise--”

  Nereb flushed, reading well the insolence beneath that. But the exactness of the royal orders had tied his hands, and he was forced to stand silent as Unis and his party left in triumph.

  Methen moved to the side of the couch. “You are badly hurt, boy?”

  “A small slash only.” Rahotep was quick to make light of the wound.

  “He has lost much blood,” Kheti corrected. “Lord Methen, it is in my mind that if we would keep to our purpose and get us to Thebes, we must do it speedily before those others can think of some net to take us in.”

  Methen beckoned to the northern officer. “Just so. Kheti, send one of these guards to bring their fellows here prepared to march. If they are all like minded to take service elsewhere--”

  The Nubian underofficer chuckled. “Lord Methen, they are fighting men. What matter if they pad the border sands or the northern plains? And I think that I smell more loot in this foray against the Hyksos than can be found in any Kush hole!”

  Nereb came up as Kheti sent one of the archers back to the fort with orders to round up his fellows and collect the baggage they had brought from Kah-hi.

  “Now”--Methen spoke to the King’s messenger--”do you accept us for service under Pharaoh by the rules of the warriors’ code?”

  Nereb looked over his shoulder to the Voice of Amon.

  “Will he who speaks for Re witness in the place of Pharaoh?”

  Khephren did not reply at once. It was dawn now, though the first rays of the sun were not above the eastern hills. And the priests of the temple were assembling for the morning “Awakening Hymn.” Their leader fingered the roll of papyrus.

  “The time is the time of Amon-Re,” he said. “Await you upon Him.”

  Sistrums chimed; the trumpet of the Great One called from the portico. With the others Rahotep bowed his swimming head and tried to fit one word of the chant to another. But he was glad to have Kheti settle him back upon the bed as the incense arose and the bright streamers of the rising sun cut the sky.

  Sometime later--time was dim now--something was placed beneath his hand. His fingers identified the impress of a seal in wax. And he repeated stumblingly the words of an oath, seeing Nereb standing in the place of his future commander, Khephren as witness. He heard other voices saying the same words--Methen, Kheti, the slightly awed tones of the archers.

  It was done, they were no longer Scouts of the border, but men of an unknown Pharaoh ruling in a city they had never seen, tied to a purpose Unis and his court believed to be without hope. Were they fools, Rahotep wondered, fools or the wisest men in Nubia? But who could look through a Great One’s eyes and know?

  The small side court of the temple was remarkably full as Kheti assisted Rahotep through its d
oor shortly after the following dawn. Untidy bundles holding the personal possessions of ten archers were stacked against the outer wall, while Methen was superintending the activities of two Kush slaves transporting his own chests. Today the veteran wore not only his “gold of valor,” gained in the battles of his youth, but he went in full military dress, the baton of a regimental commander flourished in his hand to give point to his orders.

  The few articles Rahotep had brought from the south by donkey-back were in a plain small chest beside Kheti’s bulging bag of spotted cowhide. The captain’s most cherished belongings, his bow, his noble’s armlets, and the leopard cub were either on his back or under his hand.

  Kheti seemed dissatisfied. “It is ill for the Hawk to go so meanly before the Pharaoh. Look upon this northern lord. If that is how they sport their gold in Thebes, we shall be as field workers instead of warriors--”

  He indicated Nereb who stood talking with Methen. The wiry royal officer not only bore himself smartly, but, also as Kheti had pointed out, his body armor made Methen’s uniform as out of date as the decrees of the builders of the pyramids. Where the Scouts and the Nubian soldiers went bare above the waist save for crossed shoulder belts in times of ceremonial parade, Nereb was encased in an armor of leather and bronze. He did not wear the sphinx headdress of linen, but a cap of bronze over a wig of short tight curls, to which was clipped a single nodding plume.

  Rahotep laughed. “Scouts travel light, Kheti. Have we not always boasted that in the face of those who man the forts? Let Pharaoh know that we shall fly bird-free to scout out a path for his troops, and he shall look no more than to remark our skill. Ah, the time has come to leave. Bid the men take up their packs.”

  The captain had made his farewells, and his thanks, to Khephren. And the Voice of Amon had once more been the austere man he had known in his early boyhood. A little subdued and chilled, sure now that loyalties to Thebes rather than any personal interest had brought him the high priest’s help, Rahotep was glad to be out of the temple, eager to face a new venture.

  He was still uncertain enough on his feet to be glad of Kheti’s hand beneath his arm. But the temple healers had assured him that his wound was closing properly, that the rest on board the river ship would restore him, so that when they reached Thebes, he could march his men ashore with much of his old energy and strength.

  The captain brushed aside Methen’s suggestion of a litter, preferring to leave Semna on his own two feet, even if he had to have Kheti at his side. Nereb matched his step to the younger officer’s slower pace as they went down to the waiting ship. The northern officer laughed harshly as Rahotep commented on the craft.

  “I return as I went--with one ship!” Nereb was bitter. “And I had thought to head a fleet to Pharaoh’s aid! If all his messengers have served him so ill, then indeed will Thebes have cause to weep.”

  “Not so.” That was Methen. “You return with a company of picked Scouts, Lord, men trained to their duty by constant warfare in a harsh land.”

  “Thirteen men--” Rahotep was inclined to share Nereb’s pessimism.

  “One man, with his spirit bent to the task, can plow the desert and raise a vineyard. From small beginnings do armies grow. Let each messenger of Pharaoh bring back but thirteen such men and there will be a regiment of seasoned warriors.”

  The party on its way to the quay was brought to a halt by the sharp impact of something thrown on the pavement before them. It was a crude reddish bowl as the captain could distinguish by the shards into which it had splintered. One of the archers picked up the largest fragment, passing it to Rahotep’s waiting hand.

  He saw a sentence scratched in a temple scribe’s hematic script: “Rahotep, born to the Lady Tuya and the Royal Son Ptahhotep, shall die.”

  A cursing--such as he had used against the Kush. He did not realize that he had read that aloud until he heard Methen’s sardonic comment:

  “So Rahotep shall die? So shall every man who walks Egypt when his time comes and it is Re’s will to summon him before the Judges.”

  His hand struck the fragment of bowl from Rahotep’s loose clasp, and then deliberately he kicked it and the other shards from their path. “Anubis curses, but Amon-Re smiles. And do the gods ever take as great an interest in the affairs of men as their mouth pieces would have us believe? Let them keep their warnings for the barbarians and the Kush!”

  Kheti laughed and planted his sandal on one small piece, grinding the clay to dust against the stone.

  “Arrows fly, spears have points, fever comes up from the river marshes, and a man can die of belly ache safe in his bed. Dedun shall have a fat ram and we shall see what will come of it. Ah, Lords, this is a fine ship we go to--”

  It was a ship such as they seldom saw on these upper reaches of the Nile. The carved head, turned inwards on the prow, was the Ram of Amon, and the cabin was hung with walls of painted linen, which could be rolled up for the cool of river breezes. At this season the Nile moved sluggishly, starved for the flood of waters that later would swell the current. The brittle, searing winds from the south teased the sail, but it was the current, not those unpredictable gusts, that would take them downstream.

  Someone waited for them on the quay, standing a little to one side as if his natural humility made him wait for their recognition. Rahotep dropped Kheti’s arm and went up to Hentre.

  “You go with us also, old friend--”

  The elderly scribe smiled wistfully. “Not so, my son. A handful of wornout brushes and a palette that has served a man for almost a lifetime cannot stand for spear and shield. And it is the weapons of war not the arts of peace that are needed now. I am too old to be torn from my rooting to seek a new growing place--”

  “But--” Rahotep began a protest, realizing what it might mean for Hentre to remain in Semna. The scribe’s sympathies were widely known. He had made no effort to conceal his allegiance to the Lady Tuya and then to her son. And Unis was petty-minded. Hentre must go with them now!

  “There is no need to fear for me, young lord,” the scribe hastened to add, as if he read Rahotep’s thoughts as fast as they crossed the captain’s mind. “I have taken service with the Voice of Amon, and Re shall protect His own. I but come now to wish you well and to bring you that which is rightfully yours. When the Hawk was slain by the Hyksos, making his last defense against those who swept over his land, I was one of those who stole away his body to lay it in safety. And thinking that one of his line might indeed again raise his standard, I brought away from his entombing this which such an heir could use as valiantly as did my lord--” From beneath his cloak Hentre brought out a packet done up in a twist of time-yellowed linen. “Wear it on the day when you go up against the Hyksos, Lord, so that he whom I served before will, by the grace of Re, see it flash in battle once again!”

  Rahotep put aside the wrappings to find that he held a fine archer’s bracer, shaped to cover the hand, with a chain to go about the thumb and a thong to lace it in place at the wrist. This was fashioned of rare silver, and it was engraved with the Eye of Horus, the Winged Hawk of his mother’s nome, and the Feather of Maat--the Truth of the Gods. Since this had been shaped to fit the hand of another, Rahotep slipped it on experimentally, believing it would not fit. But the cold metal was smooth against his skin as if it had been forged to his measure. Hentre smiled happily.

  “It is just so, Rahotep, that I have many times seen your mother’s father--my good lord and friend--fit that into place. Aye, even on that last day when all of us knew that there was no hope of victory! But no barbarian called it his spoil, and now it will gleam again among the arms of Pharaoh’s following. Hail Hawk!” He gave Rahotep the salute due a nomarch.

  The young captain laughed ruefully. “A nomarch without a nome, heading a party of eleven archers into a misty future, Hentre. But my thanks be unto you, not only for this”--he rubbed the bracer--“but for all else you have done for me since I was a child in the Women’s Hall of the Viceroy’s palace, tumb
ling over my own feet. And for what you did for the Lady Tuya, whom you served exceedingly well!”

  So it was Hentre’s figure Rahotep watched recede into the distance as the ship Shining in Thebes cast off its moorings and passed into the pull of the current under the careful direction of the bow pilot. A gong sounded and oarsmen bent to the task of adding speed to their going. Behind them first the quay with Hentre, then even the towering walls of Semna grew smaller and were gone as the turns of the river took them out of sight.

  Once this waterway had been thronged with river traffic. The cargoes from Nubia, gold, ebony, ostrich plumes, aromatic woods, and fine skins had gone north, while south had flowed in exchange the finished work of city craftsmen. Now trade was dead. No one moved a cargo willingly into Hyksos territory, except as tribute wrung from nomes by threats. Nubia’s wealth stayed at home. Consequently, there was a sad lack of the manufactured articles she needed.

  In place of the laden cargo boats, they passed the rafts of herders taking their charges from one side of the river to the other in search of better pasturage. And these half-wild rovers looked upon the energetic downstream swing of the oared ship with amazement.

  If the simple people of the land were amazed, their lords were almost uniformly hostile. When Shining in Thebes tied up at quays and Nereb tried to bargain for extra supplies, he was met coldly. For the most part he had to deal with insolent overseers who might not laugh openly at Pharaoh’s seal on a royal order, but who, trained by years of outwitting tax collectors, were able to evade any direct compliance with official demands. But there were wild fowl among the reed banks, and Hori of the archers proved himself adept with a throwing stick. They might not feast upon roast goose, but neither did they lack something to add to the hard snail-shaped loaves of bread.

  No more recruits were added to Nereb’s party until they reached the boundaries of old Egypt and came into the domain of the Elephantine lords. The nomarchs of Elephantine, while not yet ranged openly under the Theban standard, were inclined to join in support of Sekenenre. Two regiments of spearmen marched on board transports, making an armada behind the swifter Shining in Thebes. Meanwhile, Nereb, impatiently pacing the confined deck space of his ship, talked and Rahotep and Methen listened.