Shiri (14 page)

“Ah, but is knowledge not the
pathway to wisdom? My acolytes...” he sighed before returning to his chair. “Well, they’re a poor crop if you must have the truth of it. And you’ll be pleased to know I’m a man of my word,” he laughed. “Aye, despite it all I kept my vow to your father, besides, like I said there’s not a man worthy of her in the lot of ‘em. Since the great fire those with wit enough to know what’s good for them have long since declared for the Theban Triad and journeyed south. Those that remain spend more time drinking and wenching than performing their ablutions. Little wonder that of late even the temples of
Seth
receive greater tribute.”

Josef was barely listening, his mind racing. He would have to convince Pentephres to send
him
to Memphis to personally view the auction blocks and do the buying, a fellow veteran of Megiddo may be able to talk the Co-Regent into selling an extra few. He would have to persuade Pentephres to part with as much gold, silver, salt, grain whatever could be traded as possible. If he could manage to get four, or maybe even five thousand it would be a start, a hell of a start, better than he’d dreamed possible. He grinned to himself.
Wait ‘till I tell her about this.

He realised that Pentephres had drawn closer. “I accept you into the service of
Heliopolis, Yuya.” He held out his hand presenting Josef with the Sun Ring so that he may kiss it. Josef did as bidden and all at once the old man laughed as he would on meeting an old friend. “Yuya, my son, it’s been too long!” He motioned for Josef to rise before clasping him in what seemed to him an overly friendly embrace.

“Now
, I believe I know someone who would very much like to meet you. You’ve shown great patience, my lad, gods, if I were your age it would not have been so!” The old man’s grin had grown to almost lewd proportions. “Especially after so many years eh? By the lords of life and light she’d almost given up hope.”

Josef looked at him trying to hide his confusion.
Yuya mentioned no one else.
Pentephres led his newest charge out of the temple, instructing Hapu to provide food and drink for Yuya’s companions. He led him out passed Shiri who rose from where she was sitting and made as if to follow. Josef shook his head and she stopped, seeming to understand, and abruptly turned to follow the priest who was leading Solon and Akil in the opposite direction. Pentephres led Yuya up an empty street to a large mudbrick villa, which stood at an intersection only a short distance from the temple.

The mansion appeared to be empty, so Pentephres showed his bemused guest through to the central courtyard. There, the heat of the sun was somewhat alleviated by the shadows of the mulberry and lotus trees whose gnarled branches stretched out over the yard. A brace of comely Habiru women wearing loose fitting robes that left their breasts exposed appeared as if by magic. Josef could not help but stare, though the high priest paid them little heed.

Pentephres sent them on their way with orders to fetch meat, figs and honeyed wine. “And Yocobel,” the priest added, “have your sister bring it.” One of the slaves hesitated a moment before curtsying somewhat stiffly and continuing on her way. He motioned for Josef to sit overlooking a small pool fringed with floating lilies and fragrant multi-coloured flowers – the Sunpool, or so the household named it. The original Sunpool lay in a dilapidated courtyard behind the temple. It had been abandoned and all but forgotten after the high priest had changed residence in the wake of the fire.

“You must tell me all about your time in
Palestine, my son, I hear Tuthmosis has put the villains to flight and even now crosses the Euphrates itself.” He slapped his thigh in admiration. “Egyptians crossing the Euphrates! Gods, has there ever been a Pharaoh to match him?”

“Not even in the songs and legends of the elder days,” Josef said.

Pentephres looked suddenly sombre. He raised his eyes to his guest. “Was it really the hell I have been hearing of?”

Josef glanced beyond the priest as a fluffy haired little girl struggling with platters and wine approached. He heard Pentephres shift as she drew near. She came to the guest first, and did not meet his eyes as she filled his goblet, and presented him with an appetising looking haunch of venison. It was sided with figs drizzled in honey fresh from the comb and olives stuffed with creamed cheese.

He smiled at her. “Thank you,” She glanced up at that, her eyes, deep and suspicious, her skin, pale and unblemished under her golden curls.
Too pretty for her own good
,
and too young, much too young
. She gave him a strange parting look before curtsying and moving to tend her master. Josef turned his attention back to the high priest, “Aye, hell it was, but for some more than others. It does the spirit good to be back in civilisation and in the company of such noble and distinguished persons as yourself.”

“And they say it is not yet over? Old Aratama lives to fight another day?” Pentephres allowed a wrinkled hand to massage one of the girl’s small breasts as she bent to fill his goblet.

Josef shook his head forcing himself to match the priest’s tone. “He lives long enough to bend his knee before the Blue Crown.” He frowned as he saw the old priest idly twisting a nipple between thumb and forefinger. “Even now Mitanni goes down in fire and smoke. The war was done the moment the Shepherd King...” Josef found himself unable to continue, the old man had moved his hand under the girl’s skirts now, he worked it back and forth and all the while continued to chat with his guest as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

“I would appreciate a cup of water.” Josef told her. The slave looked at him, lip quivering, red-faced. Abrupt
ly Pentephres withdrew his hand. “You heard the man, Amaris, water, quickly now,” he waved the girl from his side, his eyes following her as she hurried away. “Such a delectable creature, my little Amaris … like a pale spring flower that has not yet come into full bloom.”

Josef’s lip tw
isted in ill-concealed distaste. “I would have a real woman’s company.”

Pentephres shrugged. “Aye, well, one cannot account for taste,” he took a deep draft from his goblet. “We must make burnt offerings for the sun lords,” the priest enthused suddenly. “I prayed daily, not for victory you understand, but that the war should end swiftly. The only good in war is its ending. And now, since the Three That Are One have answered me they must be thanked before the full of the moon.”

“The priests of Karnack abhor such offerings, even the acolytes of
Seth
and
Sekhmet
mock them. I think perhaps they have the right of it, I’d spare the oxen and...”

“Oxen?” Pentephres raised an eyebrow. “Who said aught of oxen? Oh they suffice for
the devils of the Wildlands no doubt, but the old gods
demand greater things, why else have they abandoned us? We burnt a hundred bulls after the great fire but the sun spirit gave us no sign. We gave up a thousand lambs a year later, a thousand! And near fifty horses went to the Godfires six moons after that, but still the lords of life and light did not heed our prayers.”

Josef shifted uneasily.
Little wonder they could not afford to rebuild the temple
. “Hapu has the right of it in this much at least,” Pentephres said, “We must return to the ancient path. A truly great sacrifice is needed, something from my own house, something precious and close to my heart. The gods see our minds, Yuya, and they appreciate true sacrifice; a maid, beautiful, but innocent, a budding flower ready to be taken. To deny yourself such a precious thing and give it to the fires ... now
that
is a sacrifice,” he laughed. “Or would you have me go before the altar with figs and stuffed olives?” The priest held Josef in a suddenly intense gaze. “The Three That Are One will find my sweet Amaris most pleasing don’t you think?”

Josef gawped at him but Pentephres did not seem to notice, his eyes were else
where now. He clapped his hands. “Ah, at last! Here is your real woman, Yuya!”

Josef followed his eyes. Through the high archway that led into the courtyard a young woman appeared. She was an attractive creature, perhaps a little under twenty years, refined and graceful, and possessed of an unusual poise. Dark hair was tied back with fine silver mesh, while flowing waves of blue linen that
revealed a little more cleavage than seemed necessary played about her like water. She walked with such practiced grace that it seemed as though she barely touched the soft earth beneath her sandals. A female slave holding a woven sunshade hurried along at her side, ensuring that the high noon rays did not trouble her mistress’s skin.

Josef rose at her approach, admiring the confident sway of her hips. She carried a basket filled with fruit, her pale moonstone necklace jangling in tune to her movements. The woman halted on seeing the handsome, chivalrous stranger who rose so smartly at her appearance. She was suddenly cautious and spoke apologetically, “I
’m sorry, Father, I did not know you were entertaining.”

“You did
not know I was entertaining! Hah! And what else would I be doing when such a fine man as this sees fit to return to Heliopolis?” Pentephres waved his hand in Josef’s direction. Josef, in turn offered her that practiced courtly bow of his. She returned the bow with a shallow curtsey, her eyes flitting towards the stranger’s and holding them an instant longer than seemed appropriate. His were blue flames, half concealed under a mess of windswept black hair that was somewhat longer than the current mode. It fell about handsome brows in a manner that she decided was not unpleasant, a faint scar on his forehead doing little to hurt his appearance. Her eyes dropped to his kilt. It was of Theban style, a little dated perhaps, but they were still wearing the like in Tjaru and parts more distant, or so she had heard. She turned an enquiring gaze on her father.

Pentephres laughed.
“Well, my dear, what are you waiting for?” He seemed positively beside himself. She looked confused and somewhat embarrassed. Finally Pentephres could hold himself back no longer, “Come now, you can surely do a better job of welcoming your betrothed than that!”

She gasped, dropping the basket. Josef took an unsteady step back, his leg hitting the chair causing him to lose his balance and fall unceremoniously backwards. He bounced back to his feet in a hurried attempt to regain his composure. He coughed and stared at the priest, his eyes wide as saucers, “Betrothed!?”

Pentephres laughed again and harder this time. “You see! You see! Our Yuya hasn’t changed a bit!”

The woman motioned for her bodyslave to remain behind and gather up the fruit. She moved closer, into the shadow of the mulberries allowing the dappled light to play over her voluptuous curves. But still a good ten yards remained between them, she
eyed the stranger suspiciously. “Y-Yuya is it really you?”

She
’d begun to hope the boy she’d loathed would never return, begun to believe that the rumours of his death were true. He’d been fat and ugly, a year older than she and with an air of entitlement about him. She remembered how the brat used to insist she kiss him every day and seemed to take untold pleasure from explaining to her how she was ever doing it wrong.

Josef didn
’t even know her name. His stomach churned.
Why are old men ever trying to wed me to their daughters?
“It is I,” he bowed again so as not to meet her eyes.

“Well? Tjuya well? What are you waiting for
? Come forward,” Pentephres was standing now, ushering his daughter towards Josef.

Hesitantly she drew closer, reluctantly submitting to her father
’s command. She looked at Josef once more, “But I do not recognise him,” she said with an almost plaintive look to her father.

“Hah! Do you hear that? She does not recognise you! Hah! Well what do you expect, my dear? You haven’
t seen him in a decade and a half! What were you three? four? Damn my memory.” He nudged Yuya with his elbow inviting him to laugh and thus join him in his mockery of the girl. Josef did not see the funny side of it, though he managed a cringing smile for the priest’s benefit.

“Five,” she answered curtly.

“Ah yes that’s it, five, and he six! And now you expect him to look identical to then, as if not a day had passed!” he slapped his thigh. “By
Horus
the vanity of a woman never ceases to amaze me!”

Growing w
eary of his mockery she flushed. “But Yuya was short and,” she sought for a nice way to say it, “... and stout, and his hair was brown, not black.”

Josef, beginning to panic interrupted her, his voice contained an air of confidence that he was far from feeling. “My time on the frontier has changed me from the boy you once knew, into a man. I
’ve become tall with age and my hair has darkened over the years.”

She was not convinced and kept her distance. “Remember the cat we once had?” she said, “Remember the mischief she got us into? What was her name again?”

Josef eyed the exit. If he made a dash for it now he might yet escape. “I ... I confess I cannot remember a cat.” It was over, his mind was in meltdown.
She knows me for a fraud, run Josef run!
“It ... it was so long ago, I can remember naught but your smile.”

Pentephres laughed once more before moving to his daughter
’s side. “Ah the old romantic remembers your smile! Put away your claws, Tjuya, we all know you never had a cat! You sneeze at the very sight of them! How can you expect a man to remember a cat that never was! Come now enough of this nonsense, another word from you and I’ll be forgetting your age and bend you over my knee. Embrace him now as you should have when I first told you his name.” He placed a hand on the small of her back and thrust her towards Josef with rough gentleness.