Year of the Hyenas (18 page)

Merytra
fainted.

She awoke in
her
uncle’s sanctuary, nauseous, with the taste of bile in her mouth.
“What…?” she asked.

She was
answered by a
long, low growl. A lioness stood over her, sniffing at her
suspiciously. She screamed. The cat took a step back, uncertain of this
shrieking thing before it, and cowered behind the legs of the man who
held its leash.

“There, there,
Tasa,”
the man said in low comforting tones to the beast, scratching its head.
“It’s only my silly niece.”

“Take it
away!”
Merytra pleaded.

“I would
advise you to
stop screaming, Grandniece. Tasa will begin to think you’re just
something to play with, and it’s difficult to stop her when mischief is
on her mind.”

The high
priest
resembled his niece, down to his wide nose and slanting eyes. But where
such features made her seem ungainly and mannish, her great-uncle was
handsome, still virile and strong despite his age, though he had begun
to run slightly to fat.

Iroy’s
sanctuary was a
small room located behind the Holy of Holies where the goddess resided.
On the walls, skins of lions stretched taut. A profusion of votive
statues depicting the lion goddess were placed around the room, some
cast in gold and other precious metals, some carved in stone, donations
of warriors anxious to curry the war goddess’s favor.

“So why have
you come
to see me today?” her uncle asked indulgently. He handed Tasa’s leash
to a junior priest, with tender instructions for her feeding, and the
lioness was at last removed from the sanctuary.

“It’s Nenry!”
Merytra’s words came out in a petulant wail. “He struck me!”

Iroy sat on
his
throne, cleaning the blade of his sacrificial knife with a soft cloth.
He chuckled. “Good for him. You should be struck often, my dear. I told
him that when he married you.”

She hid her
face
behind her arm, great tears oozing from her eyes. Her head pounded.

Iroy sighed.
He had
always been a trifle embarrassed by his dead nephew’s offspring,
preferring to keep Merytra from his sight. He settled back on his
chair, bored by her trivial marital concerns. But his niece’s next
words made him sit up at attention.

“I know his
brother,
Semerket, is behind it,” she said.

His usually
languid
voice became very clipped. “What of him?”

“He’s
investigating
the murder of a priestess, over in Western Thebes—”

“I’ve heard of
it. Go
on.”

“A message
came from
him last night—this one—” She handed her uncle the wrinkled sheet of
papyrus. “He’s trying to get Nenry involved in something he shouldn’t.
When I tried to intervene, Nenry hit me. For the first time in our
marriage.” Her tears flowed in earnest now. “This morning after he
left, I stole the note to show you. I want you to stop him,
Great-uncle! I know whatever that madman asks him to do, it will
somehow threaten us.”

Quickly Iroy
scanned
the letter, running a hennaed thumbnail over the glyphs as he read.

To my
brother,
Nenry, health and life be yours! From Semerket, clerk of Investigations
and Secrets, greetings:

Brother, I
need the
help you promised. Go into the marketplace. Wear a noble’s disguise.
Put it about that you seek royal jewels. Assure them that you care not
from where they come. Buy one or two if they are offered. When you have
done so, bring them to me across the river. I will explain the rest in
person. Semerket, your own brother.

Iroy put the
papyrus
aside. “Do you know what this says?” he asked in his clipped, harsh
tones.

“N-no.” She
did not
know how to read.

“Has Nenry
departed
from his usual routine?”

“Yes! Yes, he
has! He
sent a message to the mayor saying he was ill. Then he hired rich robes
and went into the bazaar—but I don’t know why.”

A foul oath
escaped
Iroy’s lips. Oddly enough, when he next gazed at his grandniece it was
with an expression that bore traces of appreciation. “It could mean
nothing; in any event, it’s better if you don’t mention to Nenry that
I’ve seen this.” He held the letter out for her to take. “Put it back
where you found it. Say nothing to him.”

“Yes,
Great-uncle.”

His expression
eased a
bit. “You’ve done well.”

She smiled
gratefully.
If she had done as well as her uncle had said, perhaps she could
venture to ask him…

“Great-uncle?”

“Yes?”

“Have you news
of my
son?” She swallowed. “Does he thrive?”

“
Your
son?”

She nodded.

His irritation
was now
full-blown. “I have adopted him as my heir. Nenry was given a worthy
post for him. It does no good for you to ask after the child—he
certainly doesn’t ask after you. Leave him alone. The child has a
different life now.”

She felt both
hot and
icy at once. Her heart was palpitating. Her viscera churned. For a
moment she felt she was going to faint again. Then a sudden warm flush
between her legs explained to them both the reason she had fainted that
morning. She looked down in dismay to see a small red stain spreading
on her sheath.

The shame on
her face
was evident, and she blushed to see her uncle staring. But he burst out
laughing. “Do you think me so naïve concerning the tides of
women?” He laughed again. “You’re lucky it didn’t happen when Tasa was
here. The scent of blood makes her remember her wild ways. Now wrap
something around you and come with me.”

Together they
made
their way to a pavilion across the temple compound. Iroy begged an
urgent and private audience with the seeress of the temple, and both he
and Merytra bowed their arms to knee level when she entered the
pavilion.

In whispers
Iroy told
the woman of Semerket’s letter. For a long while the seeress said
nothing.

Then in a
voice that
was a magical instrument of many strings, she spoke. “Bad dreams are no
longer enough, it seems. We will require something stronger. A cutting
of his hair will do.”

She looked at
Merytra
then. “Come near to me, my dear. Let us discuss this situation between
your husband and his brother. We women know how to manage these things,
don’t we?”

Overwhelmed by
the
woman’s majesty, yet curiously attracted to her all the same, Merytra
crept forward.

“NO ONE HERE WOULD WANT TO HARM
HER,” the
painter Aaphat said as Semerket sat cross-legged before him, writing
notes. “Her body was found on the other side of the river. Why do you
question
us
?”

“She was
beloved by
everyone,” softly echoed his wife, Teewa.

“She was
kind,”
murmured their daughter.

They sat
together in
their small reception room, which Aaphat had vividly decorated with
portraits of his neighbors at work. The figures crowded together on the
walls, so lifelike that Semerket half-expected them to voice their own
opinions about the murder.

Aaphat rose
and
pointed to the likeness of Hetephras herself, whom he had painted as
she made offerings to the moon god, Khons. “Tell me—does she look like
a woman with enemies?” he asked.

Semerket
examined the
portrait closely. Hetephras had been in her prime when the painting was
made. Though she wore a wig of bright blue in the painting, Semerket
recognized her from her pectoral and the style of the linen sheath she
wore, the kind he had seen blood-drenched and crumpled in the House of
Purification.

“Nevertheless,”
said
Semerket, “she is dead and someone murdered her.”

“Perhaps a
foreigner
or a vagabond. No one here. We loved her.” Aaphat and his wife lowered
their heads to indicate they had no more to tell him.

A quick
surveillance
of Aaphat’s studio told Semerket that whatever tools the painter used,
they were not made of the hard blue metal that matched the small chip
he kept always in his sash. He never mentioned the chip directly to the
tombmakers—to do so would ensure the axe’s quick disposal, if indeed
it still existed. But his eyes were ever on the alert for anything made
of the same dark metal.

The morning
after
Hunro told him of the elders’ consent, he began his investigation. From
home to home he went, always uninvited, asking questions of even the
children. But however he phrased his words, however deeply he probed,
the villagers made their eyes into blanks and their answers seemed
always the same. Nevertheless, he pressed on, believing that if any
villager knew something about the murder, he would find it out through
simple persistence and repetition.

The sculptor
Ramose
was chipping at a small statue of diorite when Semerket came upon him
in his workshop at the back of the village. From the figure’s
distinctively shaped wig Semerket saw at once that it was Hetephras,
and he said her name aloud.

“Do you
recognize
her?” asked Ramose, pleased, holding it up so that Semerket could see
how finely detailed the figure was.

Semerket
nodded,
making a note to himself that Ramose sculpted with only copper chisels.

“It will be
placed in
her tomb, an offering from her neighbors. She was a great lady.”

Behind Ramose
an
immense stone circle of limestone was being smoothed by his sons, Mose
and Harach, who also supervised a host of village men-servants. The
stone wheel lay on the ground, taking up most of the workshop’s length.
From time to time, the sons glanced at Semerket from beneath their
eyelids coated in fine dust.

“Had she any
enemies?”
Semerket asked. “Did she indulge in feuds—exchange unpleasant words
with anyone?”

“No.” Ramose
shook his
head firmly. “She was kind.”

“We loved
her,” said
Mose from across the yard.

“If you ask
me,”
Ramose said, his voice so low and conspiratorial that Semerket had to
bend to hear him, “it had to be someone of foreign birth. Or a
vagabond. You’re wasting your time here in the village asking all these
questions. Why don’t you go to the other side of the river? She was
found there, after all.”

“Do you agree
with
your father?” Semerket barked suddenly to Mose and Harach. They jumped.

“Hetephras was
loved,”
Mose repeated.

“A vagabond or
foreigner,” seconded Harach.

The young men
returned
to their task of polishing the wheel; the pumice scraped against the
stone like a scream caught in a woman’s throat.

Yunet, the
woman who
embroidered shrouds and robes for the royal court, plied her needle
while she answered him, her eyes cast modestly downward. Her three
nieces sat beside her in their reception room, clothed in the same
intricately pleated white linen their aunt wore, starched so stiffly
they seemed to be wearing egrets’ wings. The nieces embroidered on the
cloth, too, and Semerket found himself staring fascinated as their
bronze needles, fine as hair, quickly stitched a constellation of
five-pointed stars along its border.

“Hetephras?
Enemies?”
whispered Yunet. She was a widow, though young-looking. Her many
knotted braids were discreetly drawn back into a heavy ebony cluster at
the nape of her neck. She wore no jewelry, but her features were even
and her lips red. “I had known Hetephras since I was a girl… not so
very long ago, though you may not think it. No one was kinder or more
beloved.” Her voice was a gentle breeze.

“When was the
last
time you saw her?”

Yunet pricked
herself
suddenly, and sucked the blood from her finger. She gazed at Semerket,
considering. “The last time…?” She looked about in pretty distress.
“That would be at the Festival of the New Moon, wasn’t it?” All of her
nieces nodded their agreement. “Just a day or so before her…
disappearance. She loved the moon god, Khons, above all the others.”

“Can you
remember what
you said to one another?”

She shook her
head. “I
can’t seem to…”

Her niece
Thuya spoke
up clearly, “I remember, Aunt. You sought her advice about Uncle
Memnet.”

“I thought you
said
you were a widow.” Semerket again checked his notes.

Yunet blushed
to the
roots of her hairline. “Yes, that’s correct.”

“Uncle
Memnet’s ghost
comes to Aunt Yunet at night,” Thuya continued in the same forceful
tone. “He takes the form of a… of a…” Even she could not go on and
solemnly rose from her seat to whisper to Semerket. The word she
uttered into his ear sent him into a sudden fit of coughing. One of the
other nieces inexpertly stifled a giggle.

Yunet glanced
at
Semerket with embarrassment. “I believed that after he was in his tomb,
he would make no further demands on me. Yet, alas, the women in my
family are desired even by the dead.” She leaned forward and placed a
tender hand on Semerket’s knee to emphasize her earnestness.