The Shepherd Kings (43 page)

He could shift quickly, if she insisted. That much his
sisters had taught him. “Why would you want to do that?” he asked her.

“Don’t be a fool. You know what you are here.”

“My kin have been lords here for a hundred years.”

“And mine were lords here for many times a hundred years.
We’ll take it back, lord of the Retenu. You can be sure of that.”

He shivered in the warmth of the night. She spoke calmly,
not threatening, simply telling him what must be.

“I will do all I can,” he said with equal calm, “to prevent
that.”

“Of course you will.” She swooped toward him before he could
recoil, and brushed his lips with hers. Then, as if her temerity had put her to
flight, she was gone. Not even a hint of her presence remained.

~~~

He might have dreamed it. In the morning she was as she
always was, no shyness, no mention of what had passed between them in the
night. He began to be certain that it had been a dream.

Then, as the morning’s lesson ended—sooner than usual,
because he had a court of justice to attend, and after that must receive a
gathering of men from the region—just as they were done with harnessing the
horses, she brushed his hand with her fingers. It was quick, and almost not to
be felt; and yet his hand stung as if she had brushed it with a flame.

She did not speak of it. Nor, he discovered, could he.

He tried to put it out of his mind—to forget it, not to mull
it over and over when he should be hearing petitions, judging disputes, and
coaxing the headmen of the villages to speak to him as if he were their lord
and not their enemy. Maybe that was why she did it. Because he was the enemy.
Or else because—

Oh, no. She cared nothing for him. How could she? If it was
not hostility that made her do such a thing, it was innocence. She found him
interesting, as if he had been one of the horses. There was no more to it than
that. And he should not try to make it matter more than it did.

The headmen left soon enough, but much later than he would
have liked. He barely remembered what he had said to them. It must have pleased
them in some way: they did not rise up to smite him, and they left with what
seemed like good cheer. Some were even smiling. He sent a prayer of thanks to
whichever of the gods had deigned to speak for him.

He would have liked to go apart and maunder further, but too
many people had need of him. First there was Teti the steward, who had matters
that must receive the lord’s approval. Then there was his master of arms, and
his master of horse, whom he must satisfy. And after they had left him, there
was Iannek.

Iannek had been quiet of late, for Iannek. A good number of
his following had wandered off in search of greater amusement than Khayan’s
backwater could offer. Those who remained were kept in hand, if sometimes with
difficulty.

And that was Iannek’s trouble. “It’s dull here,” he said.
“Don’t you do anything but trudge from duty to duty?”

“Is there anything else a lord should do?” Khayan inquired.

Iannek snorted. “What a stick you are! And here I’d thought
you were a man of spirit. You used to be, before you went away to be a
tribesman. What did they do out there, geld you?”

That startled laughter out of Khayan. “Good goddess, no!
They like their stallions all present and accounted for.”

“Ah!” said Iannek with a sudden awakening of interest. “Did
you really . . . ? Did they . . . ?”

“You would love to know,” Khayan said.

“Torturer.” Iannek wandered about the hall where Khayan had
been sitting for what seemed an eon of days. Most of the servants were gone,
and all of the men of substance. The few servants who remained were busy with
small things: sweeping the floor, wielding the fans that cooled the hot still
air, fetching wine for Iannek to drink. He sipped warily, and scowled: it was
the same heavily watered wine that he was always given. “Water is for fish,” he
muttered. “A man drinks wine.”

“This man drinks it to excess,” Khayan said. “Come, think of
it as a gift: you can drink to your heart’s content, and still be standing when
you’re done.”

“And what good is that?” Iannek drained the cup, grimacing
as he did it, and poured it full again. “Tell me what it was like, being a
stallion among such mares.”

“I will not,” said Khayan.

“You
are
a stick.”
Iannek flung himself down at Khayan’s feet, ignoring the perfectly acceptable
chair that had been set nearby. “Gods, it’s dull here!”

“So leave,” Khayan said.

Iannek rolled an eye up at him. “You know I can’t do that.”

“Why not? You could go to Memphis. Vex our uncles and
cousins. Cut a swath through the maidservants there. In fact,” Khayan said,
“I’ll send a messenger to Uncle Samiel this very day, and tell him to expect
you.”

“Oh, gods,” Iannek groaned. “Not Samiel.”

“Why? Don’t tell me he has reason to clip your ears, too.”

“He’ll clip more than that. He has the most beautiful—the
most exquisite—the most astonishing concubine. She comes from somewhere
nobody’s ever heard of, where everybody devotes his life to the arts of the
bedchamber. And such arts! Brother, if you could even begin to imagine—”

“I think I’m glad I can’t,” Khayan said dryly. “Not Samiel
then. And probably not Memphis. What of one of the cities south of it? Or even
Nubia? Nubia might be interesting enough for you.”

“Ach,” Iannek said, “no. Nubian women have teeth in their
nether parts, everybody knows that. Take one of them—
snap
! It’s the geldings’ paddock for you.”

“That’s nonsense,” Khayan said.

“Do you know that for certain?” asked Iannek. “Do you
really, brother?”

Khayan smiled in a way that he knew would vex his brother
extremely. “I’ll wager I know who told you that. She was most accommodating to
those she wanted. Those she didn’t . . . she told a tale. Such
white, white teeth she had. And when the tale came to the point—
snap
! And away the poor fool would run.”

Iannek blushed furiously amid the patches of his still
uncertain beard. “I’ll kill her. I’ll hunt her down and kill her.”

“I’d like to see you try,” Khayan said. He sat back in his
chair of office, lazily, diverted for the first time that day. He was greatly
indebted to his brother for that, though he would never have let Iannek know
it. Iannek was troublesome enough without that knowledge to wield over Khayan.

“So,” Khayan said when the silence had stretched
sufficiently. “Nubia?”

“It’s beastly there,” Iannek said. “It must be. It’s even
farther from anywhere interesting than this is. Don’t you think we could start
a war? Or sack a few cities? It’s been ages since we fought the Upper
Egyptians.”

“Not today,” Khayan said, “or tomorrow either. A war takes a
little time to prepare.”

“I know that,” Iannek said crossly. “But a raid—that takes
no time at all.”

“It takes very little time to die, either,” said Khayan.
“Well; since you won’t go to Nubia and I won’t let you sack any cities, would
you do a thing for me?”

Iannek eyed him warily. “It had better not be peaceful.”

“It probably won’t be,” Khayan said, “though it might be
quiet as often as not. But it will give you ample to do, if you do it properly.”

Iannek still was not won over. “What is it?”

“You do know that the Mare has a servant,” Khayan said.

Iannek’s brows leaped toward the fillet that bound his hair.
“It’s true, then? It’s an Egyptian?”

“You’ve seen her,” Khayan said. “Everybody has.”

“Yes,” Iannek said. “Of course. But they’re saying it’s a
plot. Or a mystery. Something the women are doing to discomfit the Egyptians.”

“The Mare chose,” Khayan said. “No human creature compelled
her.”

“And it’s . . .” Iannek shook his head. “That
one thinks she’s mistress of this place, or her mother does. They both do.”

“They were once,” said Khayan.

“It seems the Mare wants to make the young one so again.”
Iannek sighed and stretched, easy as a cat on the floor at Khayan’s feet. “She
has a tongue on her, that one. I used to try to get her to kiss me, but she
never would.”

“You never tried to force her?”

Iannek sat bolt upright. “What do you take me for?”

“A young rakehell who had to leave the king’s court abruptly
because of an outraged husband. Who dares not go to Memphis because of outraged
kinsmen. Who—”

“Those ladies were willing,” Iannek said with an air of
injury. “Some were more than willing. I’ve never taken a woman who didn’t want
me.”

“I would hope so,” Khayan said mildly.

“You don’t want me to touch
her
,” Iannek said. “Not now. I’d be sitting on the haft of a spear,
and the head of it coming out my mouth, if I did such a thing to the Mare’s
servant.”

Khayan kicked him, not too hard, but hard enough to make him
grunt. “Idiot! Of course I’m not asking that. I’m asking you to look after her.
Keep her safe. Fend off the fools and the madmen. Protect her from anyone who
would harm her.”

“Even in the women’s house?”

“She lives there,” Khayan said.

“But your mother—”

“I’ll settle it with her,” Khayan said. “Will you do it?”

“That’s a great charge,” Iannek said a little slowly.
“What’s a young rakehell doing taking it on himself?”

“Maybe the young rakehell simply needs something to occupy
his mind.”

“Have you asked her what she thinks of that?”

Khayan’s teeth clicked together. That part of his brilliant
scheme had not occurred to him. Nor should it have occurred to Iannek. Iannek,
like all blessed fools, was only clever when no one wanted him to be.

But he was a fool, and a happy one. “I thought not,” he
said. “Don’t worry, brother. I’ll charm her till she begs me to be her
servant.”

More likely, Khayan thought, she would flay him with her
tongue till a wiser man would have screamed for mercy. But Iannek, whose wisdom
was entirely of the accidental sort, would reckon it all a grand lark. It would
keep him busy, which was what mattered; and it might even keep Iry safe.

“Safe from what?” Iry had given Iannek the flaying he
professedly expected; and he had taken it in good part, and refused adamantly
to stray from her shadow. He was like a large, shaggy, and irritating young
dog. Iry was not fond of dogs. She was even less fond of lords who thought she
needed protecting. “And from what?” she demanded of Khayan. “I’m your holy
priestess. Who would dare touch me?”

“I should think you understood courts,” Khayan said. He had
been harnessing his stallions when she caught him in the stable, some time
before he could have been expecting her. But he had seemed if anything rather
relieved to see her—and to receive the sharp edge of her tongue. He had been expecting
it, too, then.

“I understand courts,” she said. “But this is no palace.”

“No?” He paused with a bridle in his hand. “You live in the
women’s house, and you can say that?”

“Sadana,” she said. The name recalled the woman: set face,
bitter eyes, teaching that yielded nothing to any resentment. Sadana had been
commanded to teach Iry the bow, therefore she did. She did it well. She made no
effort whatever to gain Iry’s liking or even her respect.

“Sadana will do nothing to me,” Iry said. “She hates me with
a perfect hate, but the Mare chose me. She’ll not go against the Mare.”

“Sadana is no danger to you,” Khayan said. “And I did say
courts. Royal courts. The king has asked to see the Mare’s new servant.”

Iry’s back stiffened. Her skin went cold. “The king?
Apophis?”

“Not Ahmose,” Khayan said dryly. “Yes, Apophis.”

“In Avaris?”

“He could come here,” Khayan said, “but that’s not overly
likely. We’re going to Avaris, yes. I have duties to the king in any case, and
so do you.”

“Not to that king,” she said from far down in her belly,
where the cold was deepest.

“Then think of it so,” he said: “the king has duties to
you.” He bridled his horses while she pondered that, and harnessed them to his
chariot.

Before he was done, and while his back was turned, she was
gone. She shed her robe before she left the stable, thrust it into a chest with
a heap of saddlecloths, and slipped into the shadows. She did not greatly care
where she went. They would find her in the end, of course; and she would find
the Mare first, and no doubt Khayan.

Khayan. She set that thought aside until she had found a
place to cherish her solitude. It was a small garden in a corner of the outer
wall, a space of little use to anyone, but someone long ago had planted a
date-palm as on an oasis, and set a pool at its feet. The palm gave little
enough shade, but the rustle of its fronds was pleasant, and the water was cool
as she laved her face and her feet.

Then the thought she had left aside came back to haunt her.
The water reminded her, the feel of it on her skin. Moonlight, and another such
escape from constant vigilance. And Khayan lying in a pool of that cold light,
glistening with water, his beard and his thick hair curling with the wet. He
had looked like some great and beautiful animal. She understood then why these
Retenu swathed themselves in robes—not to hide their ugliness, but to veil
their beauty. Then nakedness was a different thing, not a simple matter of
course, but a marvel and a gift.

She had not been able to help herself. She had had to touch
him. He had not seemed to mind it. Maybe he thought it was a dream. He had been
close to sleep. His skin was softer than it looked, and his hair, too, not
rough as she had thought it would be.

She wanted to touch him again. That would not be wise at
all, she knew it, but wanting knew nothing of wisdom. He was a foreigner, a
conqueror. She hated him. And yet . . .

It was strange to think such things, and of that one of all
men. Other women did, she knew it very well. In the women’s house, as among the
servants that Iry had been, that was all they did seem to think of. Except the
lord’s sisters—they were above it, or maybe immune to it. His mother?