Slayer of Gods (7 page)

The king’s cheeks hadn’t lost all the roundness of youth. His lips had that lush fullness for which his mother, the great
Queen Tiye, had been so famous. Even had he not been king the ladies of the court would have sought his favor, for he was
wide of shoulder, lean from many hours on the practice field, and graceful in a way that would make him a formidable warrior
in time. But those shadows were still there under his eyes, and he had a haunted air that worried Meren. As if to confirm his
concern Tutankhamun turned abruptly, set down his goblet, and uttered a wordless sound of frustration and pain.

“When will this end—the killing, the treachery? Must I live my whole life looking over my shoulder? And how can I bear it,
knowing that Nefertiti died at the hands of some faceless animal who sneaks and skulks and waits for an unguarded moment in
which to strike?”

Tutankhamun whirled around to face Meren and spoke in a fierce whisper. “I want to be the one to find this murderer, to avenge
my beloved second mother, but I can’t. My majesty must sit in splendid idleness while others do what I should be doing. I fear
that the queen’s ka is suffering while I do nothing.”

“That isn’t true, majesty.” Meren drew near the king. “All that I do is done by your command. I am thy majesty’s
eyes
and ears.” Meren lowered his voice. “And it is by thy wish that I will avenge the incomparable Queen Nefertiti, may her ka
live forever.”

Tutankhamun looked at him for a long time, his body tense, his gaze full of turmoil. At last he spoke through pale lips. “And
what are you going to do now in my name?”

“Golden One, I must find someone who can link the steward Wah and the cook to the one who gave the order to kill her. Or I
must find other proof such as a document that does the same thing.” Meren hesitated, then went on. “I’m going to search for
old records at Horizon of the Aten.”

Tutankhamun winced, but said nothing. Meren disliked reminding the king of his former residence. Like Ankhesenamun, the king
hated leaving Horizon of the Aten. He remembered no other home, and he had played among the date palms, acacias and incense
trees, sunken gardens, ponds, and reflection pools that formed an idyllic playground for the royal children.

Meren understood how difficult it had been for pharaoh to leave Horizon of the Aten, but Tutankhamun had accepted that in
order to bring peace to Egypt he had to heal the schism created by Akhenaten. One of the most important steps toward that
goal had been to move the capital of Egypt back to the great city of Memphis where it had been for millennia. By making such
public gestures pharaoh reassured his people that Maat, order and rightness of existence, had returned to Egypt.

The king looked away and whispered. “I wish I could go with you.”

“Majesty…”

The king inhaled sharply and lifted his shoulders. Meren watched the boy’s expression change. Personal grief vanished beneath
the distant visage of the ruler of an empire.

At last the king spoke. “Very well. It’s best you make a quiet detour on the way to somewhere else. A trip with Horizon of
the Aten as its only destination would attract speculation.”

“Yes, Golden One.”

“I’m glad Anath is going with you.”

Meren turned to look at the king. “The Eyes of Babylon
is
the source of thy majesty’s knowledge.”

“Of course.” Tutankhamun smiled at him. “You taught me well, Meren. I’d know if you purchased a new horse or caught an ague.”

He took another sip of wine. “Enough of this misery. On to another trouble. Burnaburiash of Babylon has sent me a letter complaining
that I received emissaries from the king of Assyria. He’s furious that I saw them when they’re his vassals. He says they should
communicate with me through him. Anath told me the old devil’s health isn’t good, and he’s becoming possessed with dread of
rivals. She recommends that I assuage his fearfulness so he won’t be tempted to seek out a Hittite alliance.”

“The Eyes of Babylon knows the old king well, majesty. I’ve never had cause to regret following her advice.”

Setting his wine down, Tutankhamun nodded. A spasm of pain crossed his face. “I want this evil business over with, Meren.
Find out who caused Nefertiti’s death, or I think I shall go mad with the uncertainty.”

“I won’t stop looking until I know the truth.” Meren bowed from his sitting position. “I swear by all the gods, majesty.”

The king smiled at him, but the smile faded as his gaze dropped to the place where the arrow had entered Meren’s body. Meren
looked away, wishing he didn’t remember what had caused the wound. A few weeks ago Nefertiti’s murderer had launched a campaign
to disgrace Meren and implicate him in an attempt on Tutankhamun’s life. He’d been trying to prove his innocence to pharaoh
when an assassin in the service of the evil one had shot an arrow. The man’s aim had been off, or the arrow would have killed
the king instead of Meren.

“If you hadn’t grabbed me and taken that arrow, I’d be dead,” the king said. His eyes brightened with unshed tears. “I’ll
never forget that.”

“I did no more than any of thy majesty’s servants would.”

Tutankhamun shook his head gently. “I must find a way to show my gratitude.” He raised his hand to prevent Meren from speaking.
“No more of your protests.”

“Yes, majesty.”

The king’s gaze fell to the papyrus he’d allowed to fall beside him on the couch. Picking it up, he unrolled it to reveal
a text with painted decorations. Meren saw the Aten disk, and his heart banged against his ribs and he felt light-headed. Setting
his wine on the floor, he covered his scar with his hand. He always wore an armband or bracelet over it, but the gesture was
unthinking. Tutankhamun saw the movement and frowned. Regret was plain in his expression.

“Akhenaten gave this to me a few months before he died. It’s in his hand, a copy of his Hymn to the Aten.”

Meren nodded and made himself drop the hand that covered the old brand. Tutankhamun had few in whom he could confide his real
feelings about his family. He wouldn’t punish the boy for Akhenaten’s transgressions.

Tutankhamun was gazing at the lines of the hymn. “It’s beautiful, what he says about all people being creatures of the sun
god, how he made them diverse in speech, habits, and color. The Aten makes the Nile in Egypt and rain in other lands; his
rays make the fields grow, the seasons pass; and he sheds light on all the world.”

“Indeed, Golden One. Thy brother the king was divine in his writings.”

Meren didn’t add that Akhenaten had appropriated all communication with the Aten to himself. Everyone else had to worship
the king, because only Akhenaten knew his father, the sun. The Aten created the cosmos, but after that, the sun disk must
have forgotten about it, because the rest was left to Akhenaten. Only he knew his father’s thoughts and wishes, and he interpreted
them for everyone else. All worship was directed to the Aten, and to his son, Akhenaten. The heretic even had priests in charge
of worshipping himself. Over and over Akhenaten stressed that the bounty of Egypt and its well-being depended upon him and
the Aten only.

Meren remembered the other hymns and the inscriptions dictated by Akhenaten to be carved in his courtiers’ tombs. Paeans to
himself, they were. Akhenaten was the living disk, unequaled, and there was no other. The king, the sun, was the source of
all power, and none could escape his dominion. He remembered the tomb reliefs, in which everyone worshipped Akhenaten, and
Akhenaten worshipped the Aten.

Something else stirred in Meren’s memory, something important, but it vanished when the king sighed and released one end of
the papyrus. It rolled shut.

“Take care on this journey, Meren. Horizon of the Aten is now a place of misfortune, I think.”

Pain lanced into Meren’s heart as the king’s eyes became glassy with unshed tears. “Remember what they did to my brother’s body.”

“I do, majesty.”

Rabid with lust for vengeance, the heretic’s enemies had tried to destroy his soul and that of Nefertiti by destroying their
mummified bodies. They hadn’t succeeded in destroying the bodies completely, but Meren didn’t think that mattered. When Akhenaten
died and his ka journeyed to the netherworld, he faced the judgment of the very gods he tried to destroy. Meren shivered as
he contemplated Akhenaten’s fate.

Absolute annihilation. His soul must have been obliterated. Meren tried to imagine the absence of existence, the nothingness,
of an erased ka. It was as if he stood on the brink of a cliff looking over the edge into an endless void. This was surely
Akhenaten’s fate. Meren only hoped it had not been Nefertiti’s. They looked at each other, he and pharaoh. This unspoken fear
lay between them, binding them, driving them. He waited for the king to speak of it, but Tutankhamun had done with exposing
his innermost secrets. The boy disliked making himself vulnerable, even to Meren in whom he confided much. He almost started
when Tutankhamun touched his arm gently.

“My majesty wishes you to guard yourself well on this journey, Meren,” said the king.

Meren smiled. “Thy majesty may be correct that the gods look with ill favor upon those who go to Horizon of the Aten. But I
won’t be there long, and I’ll have Anath to protect me.”

“Good. Anath is worth an entire company of charioteers. There is no other woman like her.”

On the evening of the day his father sailed for Horizon of the Aten, Kysen dallied on a wharf near the Caverns. He heard the
noise of hammers coming across the river. Someone was working at the naval docks by torchlight.

At the moment he was disguised as Nen, a scribe fallen on hard times who dealt in other people’s secrets. Nen sold information
for valuable goods—metals, expensive woods or stones such as malachite and lapis lazuli. Nen lived in the dark world of thieves,
corrupt government officials, whores, and murderers. He was supposed to be the sixth son of the assistant to the steward of
a minor noble. From a family with numerous children, he had little wealth, but a taste for luxuries, and he didn’t care how
he acquired them. In the Caverns he was known for his clever heart and dislike of hard labor.

Nen dressed in a kilt with slightly tattered edges and a plain leather belt that had been mended in several places. His wig
was one he’d gotten secondhand. It fit with the character he sought to portray. Once the wig had been finely plaited, and
its tresses were cut short in back and were longer in front. Now the wig looked worn, and some of the locks were coming loose
from the net of threads to which they were attached. Nevertheless, it was surely the cast-off headdress of a nobleman.

Secure in his disguise Kysen strolled down the Street of the Ibex and into the foreign quarter. The buildings in this area
had been built tightly against each other in long, irregular rows, scarcely big enough for two people to squeeze by. The roads
were dusty and littered with refuse and slops. More than once he had to dodge a cloud of dust from the broom of a homeowner
or shopkeeper who used the street as a waste receptacle.

He shouldered through a group of sailors speaking one of the languages of the Asiatics outside a beer tavern, and turned down
a passageway that led to an alley. He dodged an inebriated Syrian merchant who stumbled out of a house and tried to vomit,
then lurched back inside. The door slammed, and Kysen was alone. He remained motionless, waiting. Soon other figures appeared
in the passageway. One of them flitted up to him.

“We’re all here, lord.”

“Excellent, Reia. Five of us should be enough to deal with one fat merchant, don’t you think?”

“Yes, lord.”

Reia smiled at him. One of Meren’s most trusted charioteers, he ranked highest after Abu. Reia had risen through the ranks
of the royal bodyguard. His father was a physician’s assistant, not a nobleman, and Kysen felt more at ease with him than
with the charioteers who came from aristocratic families. Competition to become one of the company serving the Eyes and Ears
of Pharaoh was fierce, but Meren selected men by their character and skill as well as their lineage.

Almost as tall as a Nubian, with large hands and a severe expression, Reia was fanatically loyal to Meren, grateful to him
for taking a chance on him despite his lack of high rank. Kysen knew how Reia felt. To be a commoner cast among noblemen was
to be a duck swimming with crocodiles. He himself had been born to a carpenter who worked on the royal tombs but was adopted
by Meren. He too loved Meren for his kindness and generosity, for he’d saved Kysen from his real father, Pawero. Kysen had
taken beatings for any misfortune that befell Pawero. Eleven years ago, when Kysen was eight, Meren had purchased him from
the carpenter. Since then he’d learned to be a nobleman, a role he was sure he’d never completely master.

Turning his attention back to the charioteers, he addressed Reia. “Very well. We’ll go in pairs and singly so as not to be
too conspicuous. I’ve found out that our fat merchant Dilalu is going to visit the Divine Lotus, which we all remember well.
According to my informant, Dilalu will meet with Ese, although I can’t imagine that lady enjoying his company.”