The Quest tes-4 Read online

  Only once he was certain of them would Meren allow his men to pick over the corpses and gather up their own spent arrows for reuse. He himself was the only casualty. Bare to the waist, he sat with his back to a tree-trunk while Taita examined his shoulder. There was no bleeding, but a dark bruise was spreading over it. Taita grunted with satisfaction.

  'No bones broken. In six or seven days an old dog like you will be as good as new.' He anointed the shoulder with a salve, and twisted a linen bandage into a sling to hold the arm comfortably. Then he sat beside Meren as the captains brought the spoils they had gathered from the Chima dead, and laid everything out for them to examine. There were carved wooden lice combs, crude ivory trinkets, water gourds and packets of smoked meat, some still on the bone, wrapped in green leaves and tied with bark string. Taita examined it. 'Human. Almost certainly the remains of our comrades. Bury it with respect.'

  Then they turned their attention to the Chima weapons, mostly clubs and spears with heads of flint or obsidian. The knife blades were of chipped flint, the handles wrapped with strips of uncured leather. 'Rubbish!

  Not worth carrying away,' Meren said.

  Taita nodded agreement. 'Throw it all on the fire.'

  At last they examined the weapons and ornaments that were clearly not of Chima manufacture. Some had evidently been taken from the corpses of the four ambushed hunters - bronze weapons and recurve bows, leather helmets and padded jerkins, linen tunics and amulets of turquoise and lapis-lazuli. However, there were others of greater interest, well-worn old helmets and leather breastplates of a type that had not been used by Egyptian troops for decades. Then there was the sword that had almost cost Meren his life. Its blade was worn, the edges chipped and almost destroyed by rough sharpening against granite or some other rock. However, the hilt was finely worked and inlaid with silver. There were empty seatings from which precious stones had been prised or had dropped out. The engraved hieroglyphics were almost obliterated. Taita held it to the light and turned it from side to side, but he could not make out the characters. He called for Fenn: 'Use your sharp young eyes.'

  She knelt beside him and pored over the engravings, then read out haltingly, 'I am Lotti, son of Lotti, Best of Ten Thousand, Companion of the Red Road, General and Commander in the guards of the divine Pharaoh Mamose. May he live for ever!'

  'Lotti!' Taita exclaimed. 'I knew him well. He was second in command under Lord Aquer of the expedition that Queen Lostris sent from Ethiopia to discover the source of Mother Nile. He was a fine soldier.

  So, it seems that he and his men reached at least as far as this place.'

  'Did Lord Aquer and all the rest die here, and were they eaten by the Chima?' Meren wondered.

  'No. According to Tiptip, the little priest of Hathor with six fingers, Aquer saw the volcano and the great lake. Besides, Queen Lostris placed a thousand men under his command. I doubt the Chima could have slaughtered them all,' Taita said. 'I believe that they caught off-guard a small detachment under Lotti as they did our men. But did the Chima destroy a whole Egyptian army? I think not.' While the discussion continued, Taita was surreptitiously watching Fenn's expression. Whenever the name of Queen Lostris was mentioned she frowned, as though seeking an elusive memory that was tucked away somewhere in the depths of her mind. One day it will all return to her, every memory of her other life, he thought, but he said aloud to Meren, 'We shall probably never know the truth of Lotti's fate, but his sword is proof to me that we are indeed following the trail to the south that Lord Aquer blazed so long ago. We have spent too much time here already.' He stood up.

  'How soon can we move on?'

  'The men are ready,' Meren said. They were cheerful as boys just released from study, sitting in the shade and joking with the Shilluk girls, who were serving them food and passing round jars of dhurra beer.

  'Look at how eager they are. A good fight is better for their morale than a night with the prettiest whore in the Upper Kingdom.' He started to laugh, then broke off to rub his injured shoulder. 'The men are ready, but the day is almost done. The horses would profit from a short rest.'

  'So will that shoulder of yours,' Taita agreed.

  The sharp little fight seemed to have eliminated the threat of more Chima raids. Although they saw sign of their presence over the days that followed, none was of recent origin. Even these indications gradually became infrequent and eventually ceased. They passed out of the land of the Chima and rode on into uninhabited territory.

  Although the Nile was still shrunken to a trickle, there had evidently been heavy rain in the surrounding countryside. The forest and savannah teemed with game, and grazing was abundant and rich. Taita had worried

  that, by this time, the troopers would be homesick and depressed but they remained buoyant, their spirits high.

  Fenn and the Shilluks delighted the men with their girlish pranks and high jinks. Two of the girls were pregnant, and Fenn wanted to know how they had come to this happy state; when questioned, the girls dissolved into paroxysms of laughter. Fenn was intrigued and came to Taita for elucidation. He made his explanation short and vague. She pondered it for a while. 'It sounds rich sport.' She had picked up the expression from Meren.

  Taita tried to look grave but he could not prevent a smile. 'So I have heard,' he conceded.

  'When I am grown, I should like a baby to play with,' she told him.

  'No doubt you will.'

  'We could have one together. Wouldn't that be rich sport, Taita?'

  'To be sure,' he agreed, with a pang, knowing it could never be. 'But in the meantime we have many other important things to do.'

  Taita could not remember having been so filled with well-being since those long-ago days when he had been young and Lostris was alive. He felt quicker and more lively. He did not tire nearly as easily as he had done before. He attributed this mostly to Fenn's company.

  Her studies advanced so swiftly that he was forced to find other ways to keep her mind working at or near its potential. If he allowed her to slacken for even a short while, her attention wandered. By now she spoke both Shilluk and Egyptian fluently.

  If she were ever to become an adept, she must learn the arcane language of the magi, the Tenmass. No other medium encompassed the entire body of esoteric learning. However, the Tenmass was so complex and multi-faceted, and had so little association with any other human language, that only those possessed of the highest intelligence and dedication could hope to master it.

  It was a challenge that brought out the best in Fenn. At first she found it was like trying to scale a wall of polished glass that gave no purchase to hand or foot. Laboriously she climbed a little way, then, to her fury, lost her grip and slithered down. She picked herself up and tried again, each time more fiercely. She never despaired, even when it seemed she was making no progress. Taita was making her face the magnitude of the task: only then would she be ready to move on.

  The moment came, but still he waited until they were alone on their sleeping mats at night. Then he placed his hand on her forehead and spoke to her quietly until she sank into a hypnotic trance. When she was

  fully receptive, he could begin to plant the seeds of the Tenmass in her mind. He did not use the Egyptian language as the medium of instruction, but spoke directly to her in the Tenmass. It required many such nocturnal sessions before the seeds took tenuous hold. Like an infant standing for the first time, she took a few uncertain steps, then collapsed. The next time she stood more firmly and confidently. He was careful not to tax her too hard, but at the same time to keep her moving. Aware that the strain might stale her, and bend her spirit, he saw to it that they still spent enchanted hours at the boo board, or in easy but sparkling conversation, or wandering together in the forest in search of rare plants or other small treasures.

  Whenever they passed a likely stretch of gravel in the riverbed, he unstrapped his prospecting pan from the back of his mule and they worked the gravel. While he swirled the slurry he had picked up, F
enn used her eyes and nimble fingers to pick out lovely semi-precious stones.

  Many had been polished by the waters into fantastic shapes. When she had filled a bag, she showed them to Meren, who made her a bracelet with a matching anklet. One day, below a dried-up waterfall, she plucked a gold nugget the size of the first joint of her thumb from the pan. It sparkled in the sun and dazzled her. 'Fashion for me a jewel, Taita,' she demanded.

  Although he had been able to hide it, Taita had felt twinges of jealousy when she wore the ornaments Meren had made for her. At my age?

  He smiled at his folly. Like a lovelorn swain. Nevertheless, he devoted all his art and creative genius to the task she had set him. He used the silver from the hilt of Lotti's sword to make a thin chain and a setting from which he suspended the nugget. When it was done, he worked a spell into it to give it protective qualities over its wearer, then hung it round her neck. When she looked down at her image in a river pool her eyes filled with tears. 'It is so beautiful,' she whispered, 'and it feels warm on my skin, as though it were alive.' The warmth she had detected was the emanation of the power with which he had endowed it. It became her most prized possession, and she named it the Talisman of Taita.

  The further south they travelled, the lighter and more buoyant the mood of the company became. All at once it struck Taita that there was something unnatural about it. It was true that the way was not as hazardous as it had been when they were lost in the great swamps or in the lands of the Chima, but they were far from home, the road was endless and the conditions arduous. There was no reason for their optimism and light-heartedness.

  I

  In the fading light of day he was sitting beside a river pool with Fenn.

  She was studying the trio of the elemental symbols of the Tenmass that he had drawn on her clay tablet. Each denoted a word of power. When they were conjugated they became so portentous and charged that they could be safely absorbed only into a mind that had been prepared carefully to receive them. Taita sat close to her, ready to protect her if the shock of the conjugation produced a backlash. Across the pool a giant black and white kingfisher, with a russet chest, was hovering over the water. It dived, but Fenn's concentration on the symbols was so intense that she did not glance up at the splash as the bird struck the surface, then rose with a flutter of wings and a small silver fish clamped in its long black bill.

  Taita tried to analyse his own feelings more closely. There was only one good reason he could think of for his own euphoric state of mind: his love for and delight in the child at his side. On the other hand there were compelling reasons why he should be afraid for both their sakes. He was charged with a sacred duty to protect his pharaoh and his homeland.

  He was travelling to a confrontation with a powerful evil force without any clear plan, a lone hare setting out to scotch a marauding leopard. All the chances were against him. Almost certainly the consequences would be dire. Why, then, was he doing so seemingly without any reckoning of the consequences?

  Then he became aware that he was having difficulty in following even this simple line of reasoning. It was as though impediments were being placed deliberately in his way. He kept feeling a strong impulse to let it go and to lapse back into a complacent sense of well-being and trust in his own ability to overcome obstacles as he encountered them, without having any coherent plan. It is a dangerous and reckless state of mind, he thought, then laughed aloud as though it were a joke.

  He had disrupted Fenn's concentration: she looked up and frowned.

  'What is it, Taita?' she demanded. 'You warned me that it was dangerous to become distracted when I was attempting to conjugate the rational coefficients of the symbols.'

  Her words brought him up sharply, and Taita realized how grievously he had erred. 'You are right. Forgive me.' She looked down again at the clay tablet in her lap. Taita tried to focus on the problem, but it remained hazy and unimportant. He bit hard into his lip, and tasted blood. The sharp pain sobered him. With an effort, he was able to concentrate.

  There was something he must remember. He tried to grasp it, but it remained a shadow. He reached for it again, but it dissolved before he

  could catch it. Beside him Fenn stirred again and sighed. Then she looked up and set aside the clay tablet. 'I cannot concentrate. I can feel your distress. Something is blocking you.' She stared at him with those candid green eyes, then whispered, 'I can see it now. It is the witch in the pool.'

  Quickly she removed the nugget from round her neck and placed it in her palm. She held out both of her hands. Taita placed the Periapt of Lostris in his own palm. Then they linked hands and formed the circle of protection. Almost imperceptibly he felt the alien influence recede.

  The words that had troubled him jumped into his mind. He had been trying to remember the warning of Demeter: She has already infected you with her evil. She has begun to bind you with her spells and temptations. She will twist your judgement. Soon you will begin to doubt that she is evil. She will seem to you fine, noble and as virtuous as any person who ever lived. Soon it will seem that 1 am the evil one who has poisoned your mind against her. When that happens she will have divided us and I will be destroyed. You will surrender yourself to her freely and willingly. She will have triumphed over both of us.

  They sat together in the protective circle until Taita had thrown off the enervating influence of Eos. He was amazed by the support Fenn rendered him. He could feel the strength flowing from her soft little hands into his own gnarled and knotted ones. They had shared more than one life span, and together they had built a fortress of the spirit within walls of marble and granite.

  Darkness fell swiftly and bats flitted over the pool, wheeling and swooping on the insects that rose from the surface of the water. On the opposite bank of the river a hyena whooped mournfully. Still holding Fenn's hand, Taita raised her to her feet and led her up the bank to the zareeba.

  Meren greeted them. 'I was about to send out a search party to find you,' he called cheerfully.

  Later Taita sat with him and his officers at the campfire. They, too, were cheerful, and he could hear the laughter and the banter from the men at the far end of the enclosure. Once in a while Taita thought to sober them with a warning, but he let them be: They also are marching to the siren song of Eos, but I will let them go happily where they must go anyway. As long as I can hold firm, there will be time anon to recall them to their senses.

  Each day they pushed deeper into the south, and the determination of Meren and his men never wavered. One evening as they built the zareeba Taita led Meren aside and asked, 'What make you of the mood of the men? It seems to me that they are near the end of their endurance, eager to turn northwards for Assoun and their homes. We may soon be faced with a mutiny.' He had said it to test the other man, but Meren was outraged.

  'They are my men and I have come to know them well. It seems you have not, Magus. There is not a mutinous hair on their heads or breath in their lungs. They are as hot for the enterprise as I am.'

  'Forgive me, Meren. How could I doubt you?' Taita murmured, but he had heard echoes of the witch's voice rise from Meren's throat. It is good that I need not deal with sullen faces and surly moods on top of all else.

  In that Eos is making my lot easier, he consoled himself.

  At that Fenn came running from the camp calling, 'Magus! Taita!

  Come swiftly! The baby of Li-To-Liti is bursting out of her and I cannot get it back inside!'

  'Then I shall come and save the poor mite from your ministrations.'

  Taita scrambled to his feet and hurried with her to the encampment.

  With Taita kneeling beside the Shilluk girl, soothing her, the birth went swiftly. Fenn watched the process with horror. Each time Li-To-Liti squealed she started. In a pause between contractions, while the girl lay panting and drenched with sweat, Fenn said, 'It does not seem such rich sport after all. I don't think you and I should bother ourselves with it.'

  Before midnight Li-To-Liti w
as delivered of an amber-coloured son with a cap of black curls. To Taita, the arrival of the child was some compensation for the profligate expenditure of other young lives along this bitter road. They all rejoiced with the father.

  'It is a good omen,' the men told each other. 'The gods smile upon us. From now onwards our venture will prosper.'

  Taita sought the counsel of Nakonto. 'What is the custom of your people? How long must the woman rest before she can go on?'

  'My first wife gave birth while we were moving cattle to new pasture.

  It was past noon when her waters broke. I left her with her mother to do the business beside the road. They caught up with me before nightfall, which was as well, because there were lions about.'

  'Your women are hardy,' Taita remarked.

  Nakonto looked mildly surprised. 'They are Shilluk,' he said.

  'That would explain it,' Taita agreed.'

  The next morning Li-To-Liti slung her infant on her hip, where it could reach the breast without her having to dismount, and was up behind her man when the column pulled out at dawn.

  They continued on through well-watered, grassy countryside. The sandy earth was gentle on the animals' legs and hoofs. Taita treated any light injuries or ailments with his salves so they remained in fine condition.

  There were endless herds of wild antelope and buffalo so there was never any shortage of meat. Days passed with such smooth regularity that they seemed to merge into one. The leagues fell away as vast distances opened ahead.

  Then, at last, an escarpment of hills appeared on the misty blue horizon ahead of them. Over the following days it loomed larger until it seemed to fill half of the sky, and they could make out the deep notch in the high ground through which the Nile flowed. They headed directly for this, knowing that it would afford the easiest passage through the mountains. Closer still, they could see each feature of the heavily wooded slopes and the elephant roads that climbed them. At last Meren could no longer contain his impatience. He left the baggage train to make its own pace and took a small party forward to reconnoitre. Naturally Fenn went with them, riding beside Taita. They entered the gorge of the river and climbed up the rugged elephant road towards the summit of the escarpment. They were only half-way up when Nakonto ran forward and dropped on one knee to examine the ground.