Eater of souls (22 page)

Ese dropped to the floor on her hands and knees. Swaying unsteadily, she gulped in air, coughed, and made gurgling noises. Kysen retrieved the room's single chair and sat down in front of Ese. The red in her face had faded to pink when she jerked herself upright, yanked at her gown to untangle it from her legs, all the while spitting curses at Kysen.

"Please, Ese, you will make me turn as red as you did if you keep up this deluge of soldiers' profanity."

"Get out!" Ese winced and coughed at the strain on her bruised throat. She went on in a lower tone but with just as much virulence. "No man rules here, and no man treats Ese like a common slave. I'll see your gut split and your entrails curled about your neck while you still live. I'll have my men cut the skin from your living body. I'll cut out your eyes and—"

"Woman," Abu said quietly. "Disavow your threats, or I'm going to kill you at once."

Both Kysen and Ese lifted their gazes. Abu was standing behind the tavern owner. He had drawn his dagger, a double-edged blade of bronze. Kysen had seen him slit the throat of a Libyan tribesman in less time than it took to blink. But what alarmed him was that Abu had that peculiar air of his, the one that meant he'd made a decision from which there would be no appeal, not even from Kysen.

Drawing in a quick breath, Kysen spoke softly, never looking away from Abu. "Ese, don't move."

Something in his voice must have communicated the gravity of her situation, for Ese swallowed hard. "Make him stop."

"I can't," Kysen said. "If you don't swear by Amun not to harm me, he's going to kill you. Right now. And there's nothing I can do to stop him."

"Her oath is worthless," Abu said as he turned the dagger so that the flat of the blade was parallel with the floor.

"Not to me," Kysen said. "She didn't understand, Abu. And she didn't mean anything she said."

Abu lifted his gaze from Ese for the first time and shook his head. "You're wrong. This woman has done all the things she threatened to do to you. To men. This I have seen for myself."

"They deserved it!" Some of Ese's hostility had returned, but she darted a look at Abu and softened her tone. "You know they deserved it, after what they did to me, and to my friend, and to my sister."

"Your sister?" Kysen asked.

"She's dead."

It was a blunt answer, and Kysen could see Ese would rather face Abu's dagger than give him more details.

"I'm sorry your sister has gone west. I have three sisters, and if someone killed one of them, I would act as you have."

Ese studied him in silence. Then she sank back on her heels. "I don't believe you, at least not entirely, but I'm willing to admit I lost my temper. It's these murders, and the talk of demons. I can taste the fear in the air." She rubbed her throat. "I've lost dozens of customers. They're too afraid to walk the streets at night."

"Murders? Word has spread quickly."

"What do you expect in Memphis?" Ese lifted her hands, palms up, her voice harsh from maltreatment. "I give my oath by the king of the gods, Amun. I didn't mean those threats. I was on edge and worried. That's why I lost control."

Kysen nodded. "Abu?"

The charioteer scowled at Ese, but sheathed his dagger and stepped back. Kysen released a sigh.

"By the staff of Ptah," Ese snapped, her anger threatening to erupt again even as she voiced her curiosity. "You were more worried than I."

Kysen stood and helped the woman to her feet. Then he guided her to the chair. Rubbing her throat, she sat down with a groan. Her hands began tugging at the folds and pleats of her gown.

Studying her red flesh, Kysen asked, "Are you well?"

"Don't insult me with your concern." Her voice broke, but she cleared her throat. "You're like too many other men—pretty but with a ka more suited to a crocodile."

He protested, but Ese's indifference showed in the way she stared at the opposite wall and rubbed her neck without responding.

"Oh, very well," Kysen said. "I can see you treasure your ill opinion too much to accept any amendment to it."

Ese turned to smile slyly at him and incline her head in assent. "You wanted to know about the list you gave me. I really have little to say at the moment. There were sixteen names, and I haven't received word on most of them. It was quickest to find out about the dead ones."

"What dead ones?"

Ese was removing her necklaces now, with grimaces and sharp little intakes of breath. "The queen had many, many attendants. So far, one of the three personal maids is dead, as is one of the five dressers. One of the privy door openers and a sandal bearer, these two have gone west as well."

Kysen asked, "How did they die?"

Dropping the necklaces in her lap, Ese began to massage her neck. "Let me think, let me think. The privy door opener was filling a water jar at the river and a crocodile got him. All too common a fate, I'm afraid."

"What of the dresser?"

"She died of old age."

"And the personal maid?"

Ese wrinkled her brow while her fingers intertwined with a beaded necklace. "Oh, yes. An ailment of the gut. A pity. She wasn't that old. I think she had twenty years. And the sandal bearer was even younger, but he died of a putrid scorpion sting."

"There was no hint of any of these deaths being more than accidents or illness or old age?"

"No. The only remarkable thing about them was that they all happened within a few weeks of their mistress's death."

"All within a few weeks."

"It will take more time to find out about the rest," Ese said. "But I can't until I'm paid."

Abu spoke up. "Don't worry, woman. You'll get your wages upon the morrow."

"Don't talk to me of wages as if I were a stone breaker, you son of a—"

"Please, Ese," Kysen said as he stepped between the two. "I've already saved your life once tonight."

Ese rose and sent a flaming look at him. "Just don't send him with my fee. And don't bring him with you ever again."

"I won't send him with the fee, but I don't think I can prevent him from coming with me."

Coming close, Ese lowered her voice so that only Kysen could hear. "I accept mishandling from no one. Do you understand? How do you think I survive among men like Othrys?" Her voice gained in force from the rage she held in check. "By being even more vicious than they are. Ask anyone on the docks or in the streets who they would rather face. They'll all choose anyone but me."

"I believe you," Kysen said. "But you can't—"

He stopped; Ese had already turned her back and vanished into the second room. He heard a door slam. He was thinking about Ese when Abu interrupted.

"The hour is late, lord. We should go home."

"Do you fear encountering Eater of Souls?"

Abu opened the door to the landing and stood to one side so that Kysen could pass. "The hour is late."

"Very well," Kysen said. "But even with Ese after us, it's bound to be safer in here than in the streets with a demon."

Once Kysen left Ese's tavern, Abu insisted upon going ahead of him.

Knowing it was useless to protest, Kysen said, "Go, then. Perhaps you have a good idea. This way I can watch your back."

Abu hesitated, to Kysen's amusement, but evidently could think of no objection. They set out, and Kysen kept a set distance from Abu until they entered an older section inhabited by Syrian traders. Here the streets deteriorated into mere tracks made treacherous with dried-up gullies from previous high floods and troughs dug by those in need of mud for bricks and too lazy to go to the river.

This was the portion of the trip Kysen disliked, for the tracks reversed on themselves, then suddenly twisted at a right angle, then reversed again, causing him to confuse his location. His could navigate well during the day, but night seemed to increase distance and stretch time as though he had been cast into a dreamworld. And the night was black, the color of the netherworld, and of death.

Kysen hopped across a gully and tried to remind himself that black was also the color of the fertile soil, life of Egypt, that gave to her the name Black Land. A name so old it was lost beyond the time before the delta and Upper Egypt became one kingdom. But not older than the gods, or their servant, Eater of Souls. Kysen darted glances into doorways, over awnings, down alleys, and up stairways to roofs.

"Take heart," he muttered to himself. "You might only meet one of the others, like Blood Drinker, who comes from the slaughterhouse, or Backward-facing One, who comes from the abyss."

Abu took another track, one in which they nearly had to turn sideways to make progress. Feeling penned, Kysen closed the gap between them and hurried after the charioteer as the older man veered suddenly at an angle between an old drying rack and the half-demolished garden wall of a deserted house. Kysen plunged down the new track, but as he passed by the wall, stepping over chunks of mud brick, he stopped. Then he quietly moved away from the wall, putting his back to the side of a house. His hand slipped to his side, and he drew his dagger.

Trying not to make a sound, he hardly breathed in his effort to see. Something was wrong. He scoured the area, noting the high, blank walls that crowded in on him. He couldn't see the moon, but his eyes had become accustomed to the dark. It was possible to distinguish shapes.

Whatever had caught his attention was in the old garden. The west wind had calmed, but he could still perceive the movement of the date palms within. He forced himself to remain as still as any of the dead shrubs and flowers behind the crumbling wall. Surely if someone were stalking him, Kysen would hear him step on dried leaves. Then he heard a footfall on loose dirt. Whirling aside, Kysen ducked and pointed his dagger.

"Lord, it is I."

"Quiet, Abu."

Abu melded himself to the wall beside Kysen. Pointing to the garden, Kysen lapsed into his watchful state again. Abu's sudden appearance had startled him and caused his heart to gallop. He drew in a deep breath, then let it out quickly and sniffed; motioning to Abu, he dropped to a crouch and stole to the garden wall. Abu slithered toward Kysen; they were separated from each other by a gap in the wall.

Kysen picked up a clod of mud and tossed it over the wall, where it landed at the base of a palm tree. Immediately dried leaves crackled, bushes quivered. A disembodied howl sounded behind him. Then a black silhouette eclipsed the stars above Kysen's head. Kysen launched himself into the air, hurled his body into the gap, and grabbed. His hand closed on something pliant, moist, greasy. A hyena's shriek issued from the thing, but Kysen yanked hard, and it hurtled over the gap to land between Kysen and Abu.

Releasing his grip, Kysen peered down. "If you want to track someone, you shouldn't go around smelling like rotting hippo meat, Tcha."

The thief scrambled around in the dirt, whimpering. "Never had no fine house with baths and slaves to pour water over me. Never had no house at all. Just a hut, a miserable hut. Sometimes a corner in a yard, or a place in the street."

As the whining continued, Abu kicked the huddled mound of grease, string, and amulets. Tcha fell silent.

"Where have you been, and why are you following us, you addled dung beetle?" Kysen asked.

"Been with the great master. He sent me. Wants to see you at once."

"Now?"

"He says it must be now. Already it may be too late, he says. Oh, what a day of misery and woe. Poor Tcha, poor wretched Tcha. No guards for him. No protection, only orders and threats, orders and threats."

"Here's another," Abu growled. "If you don't stop whining, I'll cut out your tongue."

Wiping the hand that had grabbed the thief, Kysen said, "I'm not going anywhere with you, Tcha. You're coming with me to answer some questions about your friend Pawah."

There was no answer at first. Tcha worked his way to an upright position, which put his eyes level with Kysen's chest. The thief took a couple of wary steps away from Abu. Fishing among his amulet draperies, he took one of the talismans in both hands. He held it close to his body while he turned in a circle and muttered incomprehensible phrases. Kysen sighed and was about to interrupt, but Tcha broke off his incantation.

"Othrys says if you don't come, he will take wagers that neither you nor Eyes of Pharaoh will live to see Inundation."

With deliberate slowness, Kysen swung toward Tcha and spoke quietly. "If you're lying, I'll give you to Abu."

The thief shook his head violently, but it seemed Othrys was the greater peril, for he began to trot down the path. He beckoned to Kysen.

"Come, lord. We must go to the pyramid city."

"At night?"

"At night." Tcha whimpered and danced from one foot to the other. "No one cares if a demon eats Tcha's heart. No one cares if Tcha is eaten. Go to the pyramid city, Othrys says. Go to the pyramid city. In the dark, in the
dark
."

Abu joined Kysen. "Don't go, lord. You can't trust that bag of grease and misery."

"I have to," Kysen said as he watched Tcha scuttle away. "You heard what Othrys said. Father's life may be in danger."

"Yours as well."

"I'm not fearful for myself." Kysen set off after Tcha.

Abu kept pace at his side and glanced at Kysen. "That is what worries me. A little fear would benefit you, lord, by making you more cautious. Then perhaps I'd get a little rest."

Kysen pulled a fold of his headcloth over his nose and mouth and turned east, away from the malicious desert wind. In the darkness, hot gales soared in from the west, hurling their vast stores of sand. Millions of tiny spikes scored his legs, and he closed his eyes as the storm whirled around his body. He could feel dust cake his skin and embed itself in the linen of his kilt.

With surprising suddenness, the wind ebbed, the incessant wailing faded, and Kysen was able to stand erect. Walking between Kysen and the thief was Abu. They climbed another rise. At the top, Kysen called a halt and approached Tcha. The thief seemed unconcerned about the necropolis police. Either he was practiced at avoiding them or they had been bribed by someone else, probably Othrys.