It was not until the Sun God had stretched his long arms above the eastern horizon that they finally reached the base of Khufu’s House of Eternity—the Great Pyramid of Stone. They had travelled in silence all through the night, keeping their pace fast and their footfalls light as the Moon God moved across the sky.
‘We have returned to where we began,’ said Tahar.
The sunrise cast a brilliant glow upon his fine angled jaw. His beard had been shorn, apparently in preparation for sacrifice, but his hair had been left untouched. The ragged locks fell around his face, softening it and reminding her of how absurdly handsome he was.
His body towered over hers. Was it a trick of her mind, or had he grown stronger over time? He was leaner now, and his muscles were more coiled. If she had not known him, she would surely have been cowering beneath his fearsome, looming figure. Since she did know him, however, she merely wished to admire him.
He knew nothing of his own beauty, and yet his body was a temple of proportion and strength. His broad chest tapered into a perfect sacred triangle, standing upon its apex. The elegant shape found its terminus in two fascinating muscles that angled like bows down the sides of his hips to the mounds of his upper legs. If there was any imbalance to his figure it was those legs. They were large and strong beyond any practical use. It was as if a sculptor god had shaped Tahar to perfection, then slapped the remaining clay upon his legs as an afterthought.
‘You are injured,’ she told him.
A fresh knife wound, likely received when he’d been dragged through the crowd of angry wedding guests, traced a crooked line down his arm.
‘It is nothing,’ he said. ‘Already it ceases to bleed.’
‘We shall tend to it properly soon,’ Kiya said, and she could hear the worry behind her words. He nodded, then looked at the ground. She knew he shared her thoughts. By now Chief Bandir’s army would have arrived at the gates of Memphis. Many lives were being lost, including, quite possibly, Imhoter’s.
Even if Imhoter survived the attack on the palace, Kiya thought, he would be captured by the raiders. What then? Knowing Chief Bandir, Imhoter would be tortured until he disclosed the location of King Khufu’s Libu prisoner...and, of course, the location of the famous Hathor, Bandir’s escaped bride.
If the Khemetians did manage to stave off Bandir’s army, Imhoter would still have to face the King. Would Khufu have mercy on the sacred advisor who had warned him of the attack, or would the King punish Imhoter for escaping his incarceration? With Kiya and Tahar disappeared, Kiya suspected that Khufu would have no mercy on the dear old priest.
Kiya bowed her head. Right now hundreds of men were dying—and for what? To make a rich man richer? Kiya bristled as she pictured Bandir’s roving black eye.
The raiders did not fight for Bandir alone, however. The Libu Chief had merely harnessed the anger they already carried in their hearts. Kiya understood that anger well, for it was born of longing—the longing for a better life. She had felt that longing all her life. Why should the highborns have all and the low-borns have nothing? She had always wondered. And surely the Libu must wonder something quite the same: Why should the Blacklanders have all and the Redlanders have none?
Now, because of Tahar, she understood that she had been asking the wrong question. The world was wide and there was enough for all. There was so much more than just the Red Land and the Black Land. There was the Green Land and the Yellow Land and the Pink Land, and every kind of land stretching into for ever. It was a great big world, with so much in it, and no reason to despair. Kiya only wished she could see it all, with Tahar by her side.
Kiya whispered a cheer as Tahar pushed back the boulder that concealed the workers’ entrance. A shaft of light poured into the large, flat space where only three months ago Kiya had gathered every day with her work gang. They stepped inside, and small flecks of dust illuminated by sunlight floated like tiny insects all around them. They did not have candles, and they would need to reseal the entrance soon so they would not attract attention.
‘We shall be safe for the length of this day and the night that shall follow,’ announced Tahar, and he rolled the large stone back to its place in front of the entrance.
A profound darkness surrounded them. Kiya could hear Tahar’s breaths, but she could not find him. ‘I have lost you already,’ she said, aware that just days ago they had been condemned to die in this very space.
‘I am here,’ Tahar said, and he pulled her against him.
Ah, the exhilaration of his embrace. She buried her face in his chest and let him hold her until she felt her breaths grow even again. Soon his heart and hers seemed to be beating in the same rhythm. They lay upon the cool ground together and Kiya felt her eyes grow heavy with sleep.
She awoke to the soothing feel of his fingers running through her short hair.
‘We have been sleeping for many hours, I think.’
Her head was in his lap.
‘I have wanted to do this since the day I captured you,’ he said, tracing the length of each of her eyebrows with his fingers.
Kiya felt a dull stab of emotion. ‘If you wished to hold me close, then why did you set me free?’
‘I told you why—so that I could create a false trail.’
‘But could we not have waited and escaped together? Surely we could have lingered with Bandir’s army until a better opportunity came. We could have escaped together.’
Tahar’s words were measured. ‘I could not wait and watch you become Bandir’s slave.’
‘You mean his wife?’
‘It is the same thing, is it not?’
Kiya smiled to herself. ‘I have taught you well, then.’
‘You have, Goddess,’ said Tahar. He stroked Kiya’s hair. She had been stripped of her wig and all her jewellery, but her natural hair had grown much. It grazed the bottoms of her earlobes. ‘Your hair is so soft,’ he said. ‘It is like—’
‘Wait,’ she said. She moved his hand down to touch her gown, sending a thrilling shiver all through her body. ‘It is like the fabric of this gown, is it not?’
‘Verily it is,’ Tahar said, stroking the fabric against her stomach. His voice was thick. ‘I have never felt a material so soft.’
‘It comes from the Land of the Potters,’ Kiya pronounced. ‘Far beyond the Big Green. They employ insects to create it—can you believe it? Worms!’
‘Worms? How very strange. I should like to see them for myself,’ he said.
She wanted to say that she would like to see them, too, with him by her side. But did he feel the same way? His body’s response to her remained strong. Even now, as he caressed her hair, she could hear his breaths growing shorter. But it did not answer the question on her mind: Did he wish to continue the journey they had begun?
He had let her go, after all. He had set her free. It had been the act of a good man, a noble man, but also a man who did not see his future with her. It was true that he had returned to Abu, but perhaps it had merely been to ensure her safety. And then there was the darker question she harboured: if a more respectable suitor had bid for her—someone gentler and nobler than Bandir—would Tahar have sold her into marriage after all?
She was not ready to know the answers to these questions. If their paths were destined to diverge, they would. In the meantime she would think of Tahar as her friend—a strange kindred soul—that was all.
They settled themselves against the wall of the dark room, side by side, and talked for many hours. Tahar described his ordeal: how Chief Bandir had captured him and made him run until he’d collapsed; how he’d been bound in shackles and beaten nearly every day; how he’d been made to grovel upon the ground for his dinner. He explained that he had never had to live such a life, the life of a slave, and it had humbled him.
As she listened her eyes filled with tears. She could not believe the pain he had endured. It sounded much worse than the life of any slave. And he’d done it to secure her freedom.
Finally, Kiya gathered her courage. ‘Can I ask you two questions, Tahar?’
‘You may ask me a thousand questions.’
‘If Bandir had not claimed me—if his party had never happened upon us—would you have taken me to Nubia after all?’
They sat together in silence for so long that Kiya couldn’t bear it.
‘The second question is this,’ she continued. ‘If you had found me at Abu, what then? Would we have continued on to Nubia? Would you have sold me to a more amicable suitor? A Nubian prince or some such?’
It annoyed her that she could not see his expression. What was going on in his mind? And why did he not answer her?
‘It is unnerving to be so enveloped in darkness,’ he said, ‘when one is so accustomed to light at this time of day.’
‘There is nothing we can do, alas.’
‘Not nothing,’ he said, avoiding her questions.
‘What? Do you intend for us to walk up the tunnel?’
‘Why not? I have often longed to see the inside of this great structure.’
‘But we would march in total darkness. None of the torches will be lit.’
‘How many times a day did you say your gang hauled stones up the tunnel?’
‘Thrice a day.’
‘For how many months?’
‘Three.’
‘That is many hundreds of journeys. I think you are quite prepared to lead the way.’
Kiya started to protest, then realised that he was right. What were they doing here, squatting in the darkness, when they could look upon all of Memphis and perhaps even discover clues to the outcome of the battle?
‘Fine. But you have not answered my questions,’ Kiya said, releasing Tahar.
‘No, I have not. I will answer them at the top.’