3

THREE DAYS LATER I was standing with Pa-ari in the crowd of excited villagers when the Seer’s barge turned into the canal and laboured the short distance from the river to the watersteps. I had seen royal craft before, usually fast boats flying the imperial colours of blue and white and carrying Heralds with messages for the Viceroy of Nubia far to the south. They would pass Aswat swiftly, cutting the water and disappearing to leave nothing but their wash rippling against the bank. The great barges weighted down with mountainous granite from the quarries at Assuan also went by but rarely, for little building was being done. It was said that at one time the river was busy night and day, thronged with commerce, thick with the pleasure ships of the nobles, choked with Heralds plying to and fro on business for the hundreds of administrators and officials who ran Egypt. Watching this barge bump against the watersteps I was seized with nostalgia for a time I had never known, and fear for the slow eclipse of my country of which until that moment I had been only dimly aware. The village dreamed on, self-contained, but when talk of outside events did begin, the words were all of what had been in a glorious past, of present threats and future disasters. I will ask Pa-ari to read the history scrolls, I decided, jammed against him in the crush of excited bodies. I want to know this Egypt from a different vantage point than the village square.

The craft was painted a spotless white. Its mast was polished cedar, as were its oars, and from the top of the mast the imperial flag was shaken sporadically by the intermittent, dry breeze. The planking curved sweetly from prow to stern, and fore and aft curled inward in the shape of fanned lotus flowers, each painted blue, the petals picked out with gold that glittered intoxicatingly in the sunlight. The cabin amidships had heavy, tightly drawn curtains of some material into which gold thread had been woven, for they also sparkled in the bright day. Sumptuous red tassels hung from the cabin’s frame, waiting to tie back the drapery. High in the stern, the helmsman clung to the vast steering oar and ignored the exclamations and cries of the people.

The soldiers ignored us too. Six of them stood on each side of the cabin, tall, blackbearded foreigners with watchful eyes that peered out from under their horned helmets to disdainfully contemplate the sky above our heads. They wore long white kilts that concealed all but the shape of their massive thighs, and beneath collars of studded leather their chests were bare. They were equipped with swords and great round shields. Our father once looked like that, I thought with a rush of pride. He defended Pharaoh. He fought for Egypt. But then I wondered just what these men here today were supposed to be defending the illustrious oracle from. Us harmless villagers? Attacks from the banks of the Nile on his journey to Aswat and back to Pi-Ramses? I saw one of the soldiers shift his weight from one splayed, sandalled foot to the other. The gesture made him suddenly human, and I decided that the escort was simply for pride and show. Was the oracle arrogant, then, as well as famous? It was important for me to know.

A ripple of anticipation went through the watchers as the curtains of the cabin twitched and were drawn aside. A we’eb priest appeared, tied back the drape, and bowed to the figure who emerged. I held my breath.

The ripple subsided quickly and the silence of shock took its place, for the thing that came out of the dimness of the cabin and paused on the deck was a wrapped corpse, walking like a man. It, he, was swathed from head to toe in white wrappings. Even his face was hidden far back in the shadow of a voluminous hood, and the cloak that enveloped him covered his hands as well. The hood came up, turned from side to side, and I was sure that the unseen presence within was measuring us all.

The man stepped up onto the ramp that had been run out between the boat and the stone facing of the canal. I glimpsed a foot bound in white bandages and suddenly felt faint. The Seer was diseased. He had some terrible disfiguring illness that made him too monstrous for ordinary eyes. I would abandon my mad scheme. This was too much. Besides, the sheer daylight reality of the boat, the trappings, the sweating soldiers, had shattered my stupid daydreams. I noticed then that Wepwawet’s High Priest with his acolytes had come out from beneath the pylon, wreathed in thin streams of incense, and was waiting to receive the God’s strange guest. I turned away.

“Where are you going?” Pa-ari whispered.

“Home,” I answered curtly. “I don’t feel well.”

“Do you still want me to find out how long the Seer is staying?” he pressed. “I go to school with the acolytes. They’ll tell me.”

I hesitated, pondered, then nodded. “Yes,” I said resignedly. It was no good. Even if the man had three heads and a tail I wanted an end to the aimless not-knowing. I would stiffen my resolve. Pa-ari’s mouth came close to my ear.

“Remember, Thu,” he muttered. “You have no gift.”

I swung to meet his gaze, which told me nothing, but I had the distinct impression that he suspected the thing I was determined to offer. Leaving him I slipped through the throng and began to run towards the village. The day had become oppressive, and I could hardly suck in the turgid air.

Pa-ari and my mother returned to the house much later, and I was severely scolded for not preparing the evening meal, seeing I had been home alone. But even Mother was caught up in the disturbance caused by the notable’s visit, and did not punish me. I took our cow down to the water and then milked her. We ate bread and cold soup in the last red light of the day, and then Father surprised me by asking for fresh water. I brought it to him, then sat on the floor and watched while he meticulously washed himself. Mother was twisting wicks for the lamps and Pa-ari was cross-legged in the doorway, brooding over the darkening square beyond. Then Father called for his sandals and a jug of our best palm wine. I scrambled to obey and Mother looked up suspiciously from her work.

“Where are you going?” she enquired.

He ran both hands through his wet, blond hair and smiled in her direction. “I am off to seduce one of the mayor’s nubile daughters,” he joked. “My dearest sister, your jealousy is delightful. Really, I am going to indulge in soldier’s gossip with the Shardana. I have had no contact with men of my own kind for a long time. Do not wait up for me.”

“Hmm,” was her comment, but I could see that she was pleased. He took the sandals from me gently, slipped them on, and hefted the jug of wine. “Pa-ari!” he called to the huddled form of his son outlined between the lintels. “Would you like to come with me?”

The invitation was a surprising honour, for Pa-ari would not be reckoned a man to share in other men’s affairs until he turned sixteen. He jumped up at once. “Thank you, Father!” he crowed. “I would like that very much!” And then they were gone. Pa-ari’s excited voice faded and the night fell.

My mother was asleep long before the two of them came home, but I was not. I sat on my pallet with my back against the wall in the room Pa-ari and I shared, fighting drowsiness, until I heard their unsteady footsteps turn into the house. Father’s heavier tread stumbled straight into my parents’ bedroom. Pa-ari came fumbling for his mattress in the darkness.

“It’s all right,” I hissed at him. “I’m awake. I want to hear everything, Pa-ari. Did you enjoy yourself?”

“Very much.” His voice was laboured and I could tell that he was slightly drunk. He sank onto his pallet with a gusty sigh and the air was full of wine fumes for a moment. “The Shardana are formidable men, Thu. I would not want to face them in battle. I was in awe of them, but Father sat with them before their tents and laughed and drank and spoke of things so foreign that I was reduced to silence. He is a great man in his own way, our father. Some of the stories he told tonight, of his exploits in the time of troubles! I could hardly believe them!”

“Well what of the soldiers?” I broke in sharply. I was jealous of the unfeigned admiration in Pa-ari’s voice. I wanted him to love and admire no one but me. “Where are their tents? How many of them guard the Seer at night? Is he on his barge or elsewhere? How long is he staying?”

There was a silence. For a while I was afraid that Pa-ari had fallen asleep, but then I heard his mattress rustle as he found a new position. “I called you obdurate once.” The words came quietly from his unseen mouth but their tone conveyed his expression, sad, disappointed. “I think you are ruthless also, Thu, and not always very likeable. You do have a gift, don’t you? Something shameful, dark. Do not lie to me. I know.”

I said nothing. I waited calmly. Everything in me had gone cold, a kind of dead peacefulness, while our relationship hung in the balance. Would he help me or would he turn aside, just a little but enough to sunder the closeness we had always shared, and define our affection in other, less forgiving terms. I heard the anger and sorrow in his voice as he at last gave me the information I needed.

“There are two tents, set up on this side of the temple wall. Two soldiers stand guard over the Seer, who sleeps in his cabin on the barge. The rest stand down. He will be here for two nights and will cast off for Pi-Ramses at dawn on the third day. If you take to the river and swim up the canal you should be able to accomplish your desire. The guards are really for show.”

I did not thank him. I sensed that he would be insulted if I tried. But the coldness in my ka had gone and I felt obscurely dirty. After a long time I said tentatively, “I love you, Pa-ari.” He did not reply. He was either asleep or had chosen to ignore me.

All the next day I thought about what I would do. The village remained largely deserted, the people hurrying to the temple in their spare moments to try and catch yet another glimpse of the sinister figure who had glided under the pylon and into their imaginations, but my father slept late and then went out onto the desert for reasons of his own and Pa-ari disappeared with his friends. Mother and I retreated to the relative coolness of her herb room and busied ourselves in grinding and bagging the dozens of leaves that hung drying from the ceiling. There was little conversation and I was free to make plans, each more fantastic and impossible than the last, until I was ordered sharply to soak the lentils for the evening meal and stop daydreaming. With an inward sigh, part hopelessness and part recklessness, I did as I was told. I had discarded all flights of fancy and decided on a direct course of action. I would go simply, nakedly, to my fate. After all, what was the worst that could happen? Arrest, and an ignominious march back to my father’s door.

Father came home at sunset, blood caking his chest and dried in rivulets down his arms. A dead jackal was slung across his shoulder, and more blood dripped from its mouth and nose down my father’s sinewy back. He tossed it outside the door, together with his bow and two soiled arrows. “I’m hungry!” he shouted into my mother’s horrified face. He was laughing. “Don’t begrudge a man an afternoon’s sport, woman! Thu, bring beer to the river immediately. I am going to wash off this carrion’s remains and then I will drink and eat and then you and I,” he planted a kiss on my mother’s silently protesting mouth, “will make love!”

He set off for the river at a lope and later, watching him splash and plunge about in the water, I understood that the time he had spent with the soldiers had freed him to briefly be the man he had laid aside, willingly but perhaps regretfully, when he chose my mother as his wife. He was fine, my father, straight and honest and strong, yet in my arrogance I pitied him that day for the choices he had made.

We all ate together, sitting cross-legged on our mats with the food on a cloth before us while the sun dropped behind the desert. My mother lit a lamp. Father said the evening prayers to Wepwawet, our totem, and to Anhur and Amun and mighty Osiris, his voice reverential but still full of happiness. Then he and my mother walked out under the stars and Pa-ari and I went to our room. He busied himself with arranging his pallet, his back towards me. “It is the Seer’s last night,” he remarked non-committally at last, his face still averted. “Have you come to your senses, Thu?”

“If you mean am I going to meet my destiny tonight, yes I am,” I replied loftily. The words hung between us, fraught with a dignity I had scarcely intended, and I finished lamely, “Please don’t be angry with me, Pa-ari.”

He had lain down and was motionless, a dark column on the pallet. “I’m not,” he said, “but I hope they catch you and whip you and drag you home in disgrace. You know that none of us has actually seen under all those grim white wrappings, don’t you? What if he’s not human? Aren’t you afraid? Good-night, Thu.”

Half the hours of darkness seemed to pass before I heard my parents return, but it cannot have been that long. Pa-ari was soon asleep. I listened to the comfort of his regular, slow breathing and beyond that the watchful silence of a summer night, hot and still. Yes I was afraid. But I was learning that fear can make your spirit sick. It can turn you into a shuffling thing inside and it can feed on itself like a disease until you cannot move, you no longer have any pride. And without pride, I thought darkly, what am I? A jackal howled, the strident, agonized sound very faint and far away, and I wondered if it was the mate of the beast father had killed. I heard his step and my mother’s low, coquettish giggle. I wondered if they had lain down together on the warm, dusty earth of the fields or in deep shadow by the Nile. When the house had settled I rose and crept outside.

The air embraced me, fingering my naked limbs and lifting the hair from my neck. The moon rode high and full and I paused to pay it homage, raising my arms to the son of Nut, goddess of the sky, and to the stars, her lesser children, before entering the shadow of the path leading to the temple. Here a little of my exaltation at being out and free and alone left me, for the black palm fronds above my head stirred with a secret fretfulness and I remembered that the spirits of the neglected dead could be thronging the dense moon-shadows, watching me jealously. The path itself had lost its cheerful daytime face and now wore another, dreamlike, pale and magical, a road to somewhere I could not foresee. But that is why I am here, I told myself stoutly, keeping my eyes on my feet while the palms whispered a warning and their laced shadows crept up my body as I walked. I must foresee. I must know.

I sensed rather than saw the greyish blur of the two huge tents that had been pitched up against the temple wall and I came to a halt, poised for flight, my heart suddenly pounding. But there was no sound, no movement. Ahead and to my right the lovely prow of the Seer’s boat curved indistinctly. It, too, was still. The river was very low and the canal half-empty. Sweat broke out along my spine as I crouched and ran across the path to the shelter of the river growth. Peering through the branches I saw that Pa-ari had been right. A soldier stood at the curtained door of the cabin, looking in my direction, and I had no doubt that his fellow was stationed on the other side. Very well. I would swim and climb. As I turned towards the river a great tide of excitement rushed up inside me and I wanted to sing for the joy of it. I was smiling and gasping with delight as I slid into the black, moon-rippled water.

I was a very good swimmer and could move without greatly disturbing the surface. Revelling in the silken coolness, the polite resistance of the Nile, buoyed by that strange exaltation, I reached the canal and turned cautiously up it, feeling the stern of the boat grow larger until it towered above me. My fingers found wood and then I rested a moment, my wet cheek against the sweet-smelling cedar. I no longer cared about anything but the thrill of my adventure. Something in me was being fulfilled at last and it grew and blossomed and I knew, hanging there with my mouth caressed by the river, my eyes on the broken sky-road the moon was making all around me, that I would never be the same. “Praise to you O Hapi, source of Egypt’s fructifying power,” I murmured to the dark expanse of water, then my fingers found a grip and I pulled myself from the God’s arms.

The ship’s construction was such that the planks were overlaid one upon another. It was child’s play for me to climb the side. I had some difficulty at the top where the lip curved inward but once I had anchored myself on this I had only to roll quickly onto the deck to find myself in blessed shadow.

For a long time I lay curled against a pile of rope, my brown body blending with its shape as I scanned the length of the craft. It looked eternal in the deceptive moonlight, as though the cabin was receding even as I assessed the distance. Everything was black or grey or sombre-hued. I saw the two guards, one gazing into the bushes and the other, at the rear of the cabin, watching the temple and the path that continued on to the next village. What must they have felt, standing lookout in such a boringly peaceful place? Foolish? Angry? Or were they so dedicated to their work that it made no difference to them where they performed their duties?

My skin was beginning to dry. Cautiously, lying flat on the deck, I set off to crawl towards the cabin. Only the glitter of the moon in my eyes could give me away, for the rest of me was the colour of the polished wood over which I moved and if one of the men happened to glance my way I would simply lie frozen until his attention passed. My knees and elbows began to ache but I ignored the small pain. I made no sound. I scarcely breathed. And all the while that pulse of intoxication throbbed with my blood. I felt omnipotent, a hunting animal sure of its prey. The soft brush of drapery against my outstretched fingers brought me to myself. I half rose, lifted the heavy hanging, and stepped inside.

The interior of the cabin was very dark and I stood, stilling my breath while I took my bearings. I could just see the dim form of a cot against the opposite curtain-wall and a bulk of huddled sheet on it. Cushions were strewn about, vague humps, and a table containing a lamp was close by the bed. The thing under the sheet was utterly motionless and quiet and I wondered for a moment if the cabin was in fact empty. I also wondered what to do next. All my will had been bent on getting this far, and now that I had achieved my goal I was mystified. Should I approach the cot and lay a hand on the sleeper, if he was there? But what would I feel under my fingers? The firmness of a male shoulder or something horrible, unidentifiable? And what if I should startle him and he should wake with a cry and the guards rush in and slay me before they could see that I was just a village girl? Enough! I told myself sternly. You are not just a village girl, you are the Lady Thu, daughter of a dispossessed Libu prince, are you not? The old fantasy made me smile but did not cheer me for long. I was beginning to feel a presence with me in the little room, as though the thing on the cot was aware of me standing just inside the drapery and was watching my thoughts. I shuddered, my own awareness going to the time that was passing. I must do something. I took one tentative step.

“You may stay where you are.” The voice was deep but oddly toneless and the sheet rustled. He, it, was sitting up but I could see nothing beyond the outline of a head. I withdrew my foot. “You have either bewitched my guards, or in the manner of all peasants you have the ability to slither and creep into places where you are not wanted,” it went on smoothly.

At least the voice was human. Yet my apprehension did not lift. I was angry at the words but I reminded myself of why I had come. “I did not slither or creep,” I replied, annoyed that my own voice shook. “I swam and climbed.”

The figure sat straighter. “Indeed,” it said. “Then you can swim and climb your way back to your hovel. I judge by your voice you are a young female. I do not make love spells. I do not concoct potions for use on heedless lovers. I do not give incantations to avert the wrath of parents driven to distraction by lazy or disobedient children. Therefore go. And if you go immediately I shall not have you thrashed and carted home in disgrace.”

But I had not come this far to slink away suffering from my own private disgrace. I had nothing to lose, now, by standing my ground and I spoke through the cloud of unease that still troubled me. “I don’t want any of those things,” I retorted, “and even if I did, I could probably do them for myself. My mother is rich in herb lore and so am I. I have a request, Great One.”

This time the voice was amused. “Only Pharaoh is the Great One,” he answered, “and it is impossible to flatter me. I know my own worth, but it seems that you have an inflated opinion of yours. How rich in herb lore can an unlettered urchin from this backwater of Egypt be? And how unique a request can she put forward? Shall we see? Or shall I go back to sleep?”

I waited, my hands sliding to clasp each other behind my back as though I was about to be reprimanded. The air in the cabin was close, faintly perfumed with jasmine. The smell made me feel slightly dizzy. My knees and elbows were now throbbing, and water was still dripping from my hair and running between my breasts and down my spine. I supposed that there might be a puddle at my feet. I peered through the cloying dimness, striving to see that head more clearly yet for some reason dreading to do so. The sheet whispered again. The man stood up. He was very tall. “Very well,” he said wearily at last. “Make your request.”

My throat went dry and I was suddenly thirsty. “You are a Seer,” I managed huskily. “I want you to See for me. Tell me my future, Master! Am I condemned to live out my days in Aswat? I must know!”

“What?” he responded with tired humour. “You do not ask for the name of your future husband? You do not want the number of your children or of your days? What kind of a village brat are you? A nasty, small-minded, unsatisfied one perhaps. Consumed with greed and arrogance.” There was a silence in which he went very still. Then he said, “But perhaps not. There can also be simple desperation. What is your gift? What can a kneader of the Aswat dung possibly offer in exchange for this mighty revelation she so blithely demands? A handful of bitter herbs?”

This was the heart of the matter. I swallowed. My throat hurt. “I have only one gift precious enough in my eyes to present to you,” I forced out, and got no further, for at that he began to laugh, sitting down on the cot. I could see his shoulders shake. His laughter was raw, a painful sound, as though he was not used to mirth.

“I know what you are about to say, little peasant girl,” he choked. “I don’t need the water and the oil to predict your offer. Gods! You are poor, your hands and feet are coarse with labour. At this moment you stink of river mud and you are doubtless naked. And you thought to offer yourself to me. Supreme arrogance! Insulting ignorance! I think it is time to take a look at you.” He bent, uncovering a tiny brazier in which a coal glowed faintly, illuminating nothing but the hands that cupped it. I tensed. There was something wrong with those hands, something terrible. He leaned to the table where the lamp was, and suddenly the room burst into light. The disordered cot was of darkly polished wood inlaid with gold, its feet like the paws of an animal. The linen rumpled over it was finer than anything I had seen, transparent and glowing white. The lamp flooding the cabin with radiance must be white alabaster. I had never seen this stone before but I knew about it—how brittle it was, how it could be ground so thin that you could see the outline of your hand through it, or a picture painted on the inside of a bowl or lamp. The floor covering on which I stood was red …

And so were his eyes, the pupils red as two drops of blood, the irises glittering pink. His body was the colour of the sheet he had wound about his waist, white, all white, and the long pale hair that fell to either side of his face to rest upon his shoulders was white too. The lamplight found no glint of gold in it, no sheen of colour on his body. The whiteness was so stark that it reflected nothing back. I was looking at death, at a demon whose only life lay shockingly in those dreadful red eyes that had narrowed and were watching me carefully.

Thank all the Gods my hands were behind my back, for before I could stop myself I was feeling for the amulet my mother sometimes lent me. It was of the Goddess Nephthys giving power to the chen sign that protected the wearer from all evil and I wished I had stolen it before setting out that night. But it was not on my wrist. Now I was defenceless before this monster, this creature from the Underworld, and I knew in a flash that if I showed horror or any fear he would order me killed at once. Those blood-filled eyes told me so. My fingers twined around each other in an agony of effort not to scream, to remain still, to hold that loathsome gaze. He sat immobile, staring back at me, and then he smiled.

“Very good,” he said softly. “Oh, very good indeed. There is courage beneath that impudent exterior. Come closer. My eyes are weak.” On legs trembling with fatigue I walked up to him, and as I grew closer the smile faded. He searched my face and as he did so his self-control seemed to falter. “Blue eyes,” he muttered. “You have blue eyes. And delicate features and a lissom body, finely jointed. Tell me your parentage. Guard!” Now I did let out a shriek but the time of my danger had passed. The soldier’s shadow appeared on the drapery.

“Is all well with you, Master?”

“Yes. Bring a jug of beer and send to the temple for honey cakes.” The shadow faded and I heard footsteps on the ramp. “Sit here beside me,” the Seer invited, and I sank onto the cot. My terror was fading but not the repulsion I felt, and I could not look away from his face. I was exhausted. “Your gift is refused,” he went on with a half-smile. “I don’t lust after girls, or women either for that matter. I learned a long time ago that lust interferes with the Seeing. But I do not grieve. Power is more satisfying and lasting than sex.”

“Then you will not See for me!” I broke in with despair. For answer he took my palm and his alien, bloodless forefinger traced the lines on it. His touch was cold.

“You have no right to disappointment,” he retorted, “for what are you? I did not say that I would not divine for you, merely that I refused your gift—such as it is. You have an inflated view of your own worth, little peasant girl. Blue eyes,” he murmured to himself. He placed my hand back between my naked thighs and pulling another sheet from the cot bade me cover myself. “Few men have seen me,” he went on. “My servants, Pharaoh, the High Priests when I stand before the Gods to do my homage. You have been honoured, peasant, though you do not know it. Some I have killed for catching me unawares. You knew that, didn’t you?” I nodded. “Never forget it,” he said harshly. “I value loyalty above all else, because of what I am.”

“And Master, what are you?” I dared to ask. He examined my face again before replying, his expression inscrutable. The lamp sputtered and I saw the tiny flame become doubled and leap crimson in both of his eyes.

“I am not a demon. I am not a monster. I am a man,” he sighed, and in that moment my revulsion began to die. Genuine pity took its place, not the scornful pity I had felt for my father by the Nile but a gentle adult emotion. I shed a little, a very little, of my overwhelming selfishness. His sigh was soon spent. “Give me your forebears,” he ordered crisply and I did so.

“My mother is a native Egyptian, the midwife in Aswat as her mother was before her,” I explained, “but my father, who is now a farmer, was a Libu mercenary. He fought for Pharaoh Osiris Setnakht Glorified against the invaders and if our present Horus of Gold demanded it he would fight again. He is very handsome, our father.” He leaned forward.

“You have a sister, then?” I shook my head.

“No, a brother, Pa-ari. Father wants him to inherit his arouras when he dies but Pa-ari is going to be a scribe. He is very clever.”

“So you are the only daughter? And I suppose that you will be a midwife also?”

I twisted away from him. It was as though he had pressed the point of a knife against an open wound. “No! I don’t want to! Always I have wanted something else, something better, but already I am trapped! I am my mother’s apprentice, I am the good daughter, I will be the good wife to some good village man, good, good, good, and I don’t want any of it!” He reached out and took my chin in his cold grasp, turning my head. My blue eyes seemed to fascinate him, for he studied them again.

“Calm yourself,” he said. “Then what do you want?”

“Not this! I wanted to go to school but Father refused, so Pa-ari has been teaching me to read …” He folded his arms. I noticed that he was wearing a heavy gold ring, a serpent winding lazily around his finger.

“Indeed? You are full of surprises, my beautiful peasant. Oh? You did not know that you were beautiful? Well perhaps if I were your father I would not tell you either. And you say you can read. Here.” He rose, and going swiftly to a chest against the side wall he opened it, withdrew a papyrus scroll, and thrust it at me. “Tell me what this says.”

I was unrolling it as the guard returned. The Seer’s attention left me as he commanded the refreshments to be placed just inside the curtain, and I had a chance to look at the words. They were closely packed and very elegantly drawn so that I was tempted to sit there and admire the penmanship but I did not want to fail this test. By the time the man had picked up the tray and returned to the cot I had skimmed the contents of the scroll. I looked up at him hesitantly. He gestured.

“Well, go on!”

“To the Eminent Master Hui, Seer and Prophet of the Gods, greetings. Having upon your command journeyed to your estates in the Delta, and having sat down in council with your stewards of land, of cattle, of slaves and of grain, I assess your holdings at this harvest thus. Of land, fifty arouras. Of cattle, six hundred head. Of slaves, one hundred. Of grain, your granaries are full. Of wine, three hundred and fifty jars of Good Wine of the Western River. In the matter of the disputed boundary of the flax field with your neighbour, I have entered into an appeal for judgement with the mayor of Lisht who will hear the pleadings within the month. Touching upon …” He twitched the scroll from my hand and let it roll up.

“Very creditable,” he commented wryly. “So you did not lie. Your brother achieved this miracle? Do you know that very few women in the harem of the Great God can count the number of their fingers, let alone read? Can you write also?” I could see the beer and cakes on the edge of my vision.

“Not well,” I blurted. “I have had nothing to practise on.”

He must have sensed the direction of my attention for he flicked a hand to the tray and bade me eat and drink. True to my mother’s stern training I poured for him first, offering him the cup and the dish of cakes. He refused both and sat watching me as I gulped the beer and bit with relish into the cakes. They were lighter and sweeter than any I had tasted at home. I tried to chew them slowly. He continued to regard me, one foot up on the cot, an elbow resting on his knee and his cheek against his knuckles, then he got up, returned to the chest, and pulled out another scroll. This one he unrolled himself.

“What would you prescribe for a headache that has been intense and very sharp for more than three days?” he asked. I stopped eating and blinked at him, all at once aware that I was being tested. From the time he had lit the lamp and seen my blue eyes he had been probing me. I answered without too much trouble.

“Berries of the coriander, juniper, poppy and sames plants, crushed with wormwood and mixed in honey.”

“How do you administer?” I hesitated.

“By tradition the head should be smeared with the mixture, like a poultice, but my mother gets better results if the patient swallows it by the spoonful.” That cracked, dry laugh filled the cabin again.

“Your mother may be a peasant but she possesses some wisdom! And what may be used to make the met supple?” I stared at him. The met involved the health of all the nerves and blood vessels.

“There are thirty-six ingredients to the poultice,” I replied. “Must I list all of them?”

“You are impertinent,” he chided me. “Can you handle the poppy?”

“In all ways.”

“Do you know what to do with antimony?” I did not. “Lead? Lead vitriol? Sulphur? Arsenic? No? Would you like to learn?” I lowered my beer cup.

“Please, don’t make fun of me,” I begged, stifling a sudden urge to cry. “I would very much like to learn.” He tapped the scroll against the ghostly white of his forearm.

“Thu,” he said gently, “I saw your face in the oil three months ago. I was divining for Pharaoh, my mind upon him, and as I bent over the bowl you were there, the blue eyes, the sweetly curving mouth, the sultry black hair. Your name whispered through my mind, Thu, Thu, and then you were gone. I do not need to read for you. Fate has presented us to each other, for reasons that are as yet unknown. My name is Hui, but you will call me Master. Would you like to learn?”

Three months ago! My pulses raced. Three months ago Pa-ari and I had sat in the red sand of a desert sunset and I had cried out my frustration. The gods had heard me. A shiver, light as a drifting blossom, went through me and I was filled with awe.

“I am to be your servant?” I breathed. “You will take me away from here?”

“Yes. I leave at dawn. The orders have already been given to the crew. You must agree to obey me in all things, Thu. Do you agree?”

Feverishly I nodded. Now all was happening with the speed of an approaching khamsin. The storm had not struck, but its imminence appalled me. Is it really what I want? I asked myself frantically. The choice is here. After so long, it has come. Do I hold out my arms to embrace it or do I run home to the babies and the herbs, the palm wine and gossip, village dust between my bare toes and Father making the nightly prayers in our little house, his blond head bent in the candlelight, Pa-ari and I in the delightful stolen hours, knee to knee … Pa-ari …

Now I did weep. Fatigue and excitement, fear and tension had taken their toll. Hui made no move until I had finished, then he rose.

“Go home and tell your father to be at the foot of the ramp an hour before dawn,” he said. “Come with him and bring whatever you wish to remember of Aswat. If he refuses, you must stay here, for come what may I must sail with Ra’s rising. Go now. You have two hours.”

I was dismissed. Stumbling, I pushed aside the drapery and started down the ramp. The air smelled good after the close confines of the cabin, fresh and full of the things I realized now were more precious to me than I had supposed—Nile mud and dry grasses, the tang of the dung-laden dust and the clean odour of the desert. I did not run back to the village. I walked, sobbing all the way.