NIBAMON’S FACE WAS torture to gaze upon. Ever since the day of his punishment, he’d carefully averted his gaze from pools of water, polished metal, anything that cast a reflection. It was a rule of life, a thing he’d gotten used to. He’d learned to live with the pain, too. Having one’s nose sliced off was an agony he’d have wished on no one. Himself least of all. He still remembered the sound of crinkling cartilage as the knife sawed in, how the blood had gushed down his throat, obliging him to swallow it down in order to breathe, how he’d been slowly deafened by his own screams. A hard day. And though the wound had healed and the pain had dulled, it had never quite faded.
The desert made it worse. The murderous heat clawed at the hole in his face. Sand got past his mask and stuck to his exposed sinuses, where it dried into a pale crust. His breathing produced a moist whistle that made the battle-hardened mercenaries cringe around him. He would have pitied the Kushites if he hadn’t been fully preoccupied with his own misery. It felt as if an embalmer was wriggling a rod into his skull in a fruitless search for his brain.
“Must be nice to see home again, eh?”
Nibamon glanced at Qorobar, adjusting his mask reflexively. The hulking axe man was caked in dust from their column’s uphill march. He knew from his reluctant years of living in this desolate place that the bottom layers of dust had mixed with the man’s sweat and turned to paste. Without a bath, it would be impossible to wipe away completely. And there were no baths to be had here. Not in Set-Ma’at.
Qorobar frowned down at him. “What’s this place called again?”
“The Place of Truth. Set-Ma’at.”
“Shit, that sounds pretentious. That can’t be what you chiselers actually call it.”
“No. To us, it was always the Village.”
Qorobar grunted and turned his eyes forward again, back to the wretched place whose many names could never capture the reality of living there. Nibamon was home, and it was of no consolation at all.
Set-Ma’at was situated in an arid bowl high above the Nile, which a poorly placed hill neatly blocked from view. The hill also stymied the cool northerly wind that might have been a balm for the inhabitants’ suffering. And—to add to the insult—the hill wasn’t even high enough to offer shade from the searing sun. The only shelter was in the village itself: a cluster of a few dozen homes, each touching the next, arranged in neat rows along the contours of the tiny valley. A rectangular wall surrounded the community. Heaped against it were shards of broken pottery, the debris of centuries of daily journeys to the river and back in a constant struggle for water. There were no wells, no smattering of rain, only the distant Nile.
Nibamon blew out a long sigh through his nose, provoking a flinch from Qorobar. “I’m sorry.” The big man only grunted. “To answer your initial question: no. I’d hoped never to see this place again. No one who lived here was fond of it.”
“I thought you told me your sister still dwells here.”
“I said she might. And if she does, it’s because she was the only one stubborn enough to stay. Everyone else scampered once the renovations were complete.” Receiving a questioning look, he explained, “Some pretender to the throne wanted to lighten his heart for his journey to the underworld. He figured the best way was to restore some old tombs. He commissioned workers from Thebes for the job. My father was one of them. I spent most of my youth in this place. Soon as I was old enough to take commissions of my own, I left.”
“Ah.” Qorobar nodded. His black, emotionless eyes flickered down to Nibamon’s mask, as if to say, That went well for you.
Nibamon stopped to cast a final longing look back at the Nile before trudging into the desiccated valley, toward his detested childhood home. The Desert Mice marched ahead in column, setting an unwavering pace that he found hard to match. He could only gaze after the bull-drawn cart, hating himself for not taking Pisaqar up on his offer to let him ride. Now he lagged behind with Qorobar acting as his increasingly sullen bodyguard, both of them breathing more dust than air and suffering tremendously for it.
“You wait—” Nibamon began to say before thinking better of it and stopping.
“Wait for what?” demanded Qorobar.
“Nothing.” He’d been about to tell him that their sorry state was nothing compared to the months of digging ahead, but he supposed it was even odds that Qorobar would slay him on the spot. He was a man who veered between sullenness and murderous violence, with only his captain’s will holding his proclivities in check. At the moment, Pisaqar was a tad too distant for Nibamon’s liking. Best be quiet.
When they caught up to the rest of the column, it had drawn up to the base of the guardhouse. The blocky structure was the largest in the community and looked much the same as Nibamon remembered it. The roof was caved in and the interior gutted. His father had always maintained that his great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather had torn it down during the famous strike, while his mother had shrugged that it had probably burnt down in a Bedouin raid. Either way, the guardhouse remained a deserted ruin, because there was little left to guard. It’d been that way since the line of Ramesses had ended three centuries before.
Pisaqar led them through the open north gate. At the head of the main street, he motioned toward Nibamon. The foreman hastened forward at a shuffle, his legs protesting after the long climb under the stern sun. The captain, by contrast, didn’t even sound winded as he asked, “Which of these houses is Senet’s?”
Nibamon studied the long rows of houses rising up on either side of the street. Their facades had once been plastered smooth with mud, painted white. But the years had flaked the surface off to reveal the bare mud brick beneath. The doors had been plundered for their valuable wood. Beyond the yawning frames, every house was empty. The awning that had once covered the street was gone as well—stolen or blown away. As much as Nibamon had hated living here, it wounded him to see his home abandoned to the indifference of the ages.
“That one used to be ours.” He pointed to the fifth house on the left. It was afternoon, and he knew the inside would be cooking as the sun blazed through the high windows. There was no sign of life. “If she’s still here, she moved houses. I would guess she went to the foreman’s house.” He could picture his elder sister sitting against the wall in the morning shade, wiggling her toes as the line of sunlight crept nearer, then retracting her legs just in time. He smiled despite his melancholy. “Senet always chased after the shade.”
The foreman’s house would be one of the larger buildings deep within the village. Soon as they’d turned the first corner, Nibamon saw the linen sheets flapping overhead, casting the street into orange shade. Potted fig trees lined the walls. There beside them squatted a middle-aged woman in a dress streaked with dirt, her thick hair gathered in a top knot. She was humming to herself while she sprinkled water around the tree stems. Nibamon watched her a moment, remembering his mother’s lullabies.
“Hello, Senet.”
She looked around with a quizzical expression, recognizing his voice without quite placing it. Then she saw him—and shrieked. Her body recoiled an in instinctive effort to bolt, but there was no room. She rolled across her pots, snapping the modest stems, and went tumbling in the street amid a cloud of dust.
Nibamon hurried over, stooped. “It’s me, Senet. Your brother.”
She looked up at him with frightened eyes. “Nibamon?” They filled with tears as he helped her up. “What did they do to you?”
Only then did he realize his mask wasn’t on. He’d pulled it down at some point. “I was punished. I’ll explain later. There will be time. We plan to stay for a while.”
Her handsome face grew pinched. “You’ve brought soldiers.” The mercenaries were clustered on the nearby corner to watch, like a gaggle of children. “Kushites.” She spat the word.
Pisaqar came forward with his hands spread at the waist. “Kushites, yes. But also friends. As friends, we ask your hospitality.” He correctly read her growing furor and added, “Or at least your indifference while we take up residence in some of these abandoned houses.”
After a steadying breath, she told him, “I’m going to stay angry and suspicious for a little while.”
The captain grinned. “I take no offense.” He instructed his mercenaries, “Yesbokhe, Kalab, search the rest of the village, make sure there are no surprises in store. The rest of you, go back to unload the cart. Move all the grain and provisions into one house. Choose places for your lodgings.”
The mercenaries scampered off with much whooping and yelling. Again, like children.
Senet whispered to Nibamon, “They brought food for themselves?”
“Plenty of it. And beer. Another long story for later.”
“I was sure they were going to rob us. That’s what soldiers always mean when they talk of hospitality. Why have you brought them here?” Her eyes widened with understanding. “The tombs.”
“The tombs,” confirmed Nibamon. “That of the Robber Pharaoh, specifically.”
She snorted a laugh. In that instant, she became her teenage self again. “A stupid legend. They’ll die of thirst before they find it. Better men have tried.” She practically yelled the last sentence. Pisaqar, conferring with his priest friend, stifled a smile but otherwise ignored her.
“They’re decent enough people, Senet. And we know where to look.”
“Oh yes, yes, I’ve heard it all before. But not from you. Not from my little brother. The Nibamon I know builds great things. He doesn’t pick over ruins for flakes of tarnished silver. Did they take your honor from you along with your nose?”
He wanted to snap at his sister, remind her that honor had never meant much to her. She was the one who’d raked Father with scorn for dutifully laboring on when the pretender king stopped sending bread, even after the other workers had left. She was the one who’d broken off her first engagement in favor of a younger, comelier suitor.
But bickering would only aggravate her more. “How is Rukhmire? And the children?”
Realizing that no one was going to rise to her taunts, she threw up her hands. “It’s hot out. Come inside. I’ll pour us water.” She blew her cheeks and added, “Bring your brute friend.”
Pisaqar followed them around the next corner. He pointed to the broken fig trees as he went by. “I am sorry about your plants.”
“I’ll grow more,” she said curtly.
“It cannot be easy to grow things in this heat.”
“I’ll try harder.” She stopped beside her door and ushered them into the parlor, quickly hauling the door shut so the cool air inside wouldn’t escape. One look around the interior told Nibamon that, dismal setting considered, Senet had done quite well for herself. The floor was made of mud tiles, not the hard-packed earth they’d grown up with. There was a straight staircase that provided easy access to the roof terrace, as well as a ceiling vent for the hot air. The plaster walls were painted white on the top half and decorated with murals left over from the previous owners, although Senet had taken the trouble to repaint the faces to resemble her own family: her rakish husband Rukhmire, her son Meri, and her daughter Yem. The wall tables below the murals were crammed with pots and baskets—filched, he was sure, from the many abandoned homes. The shelves and benches held a rather astonishing variety of herbs and houseplants.
Senet pointed her guests to a couple of often-repaired chairs and disappeared up into the back rooms. She returned with a jug of water on a tray, which she propped between their armrests.
“You keep a beautiful house,” Pisaqar complimented as he accepted a mug.
“You’ll want to blow on that,” she said brusquely. “I just finished boiling it.” She cleared some pots from a bench and spread a mat to cover the mud bricks. Before she could sit down, a pair of children darted out of the back room and bounced onto it, giggling and screeching, their gleaming eyes alternating between Nibamon and Pisaqar, but mostly fixing on the latter.
Pisaqar waved at them, his teeth shining bright in the dim room. They returned the greeting with bubbling enthusiasm as their exasperated mother scooted them aside and sat in the narrow space between their wriggling forms.
“Who’s that?” screamed the girl, Yem.
Nibamon said, “This is Pisaqar. He’s one of the pharaoh’s soldiers.”
“You’re too old to be a soldier,” cried Meri, the boy.
Pisaqar clutched his heart. “This poor old man! What can I say to such mean children? Should I…” he suddenly reached out, making claws of his fingers, “crush their little heads?!”
The children reared back, screaming with laughter. “Nooooo!” they shouted in unison.
Senet’s expression softened somewhat. She gathered her children and pointed to Nibamon. “And that is your uncle, Nibamon. Remember him?”
The girl nodded while the boy asked, “Why’s he wearing a thing on his face?”
Nibamon opened his mouth but found he had none of Pisaqar’s easy charm, and no way to deflect from the mutilation the priests had inflicted on him. Lost for words, it was left to his sister to cover for him.
“Don’t be rude, Meri. Now go back outside and play. We adults need to talk.”
The children jumped up and scurried toward the back room. “Can he come?” Yem pointed to Pisaqar.
“No! Shoo! And drink some water,” she yelled as her children vanished. She turned back to her guests, shaking her head. “They’re yours, if you want them.”
Pisaqar cackled. “Do not tempt me.”
“You have children?”
His smile took on a brittle quality. “Once.”
“I’m sorry.” It sounded like she meant it. She had warmed to him. Not for the first time, Nibamon understood how Pisaqar won loyalty from his people. Even him, he realized. He’d sprung to the man’s defense when his sister questioned his character.
Pisaqar cleared his throat. “So. You had questions for me.”
“Just one, really, and not exactly a question. My brother tells me you’ve come for the lost tomb.” Receiving a nod, she continued. “Before you start, you’ll need to have a conversation with my husband, Rukhmire. You see, Rukhmire is the last guardian of the valley. The others left over the years, but my husband chose to stay.”
Nibamon observed, “Just as Father did.”
“Duty makes men feel important. Makes them do stupid things. In truth, I would love nothing more than to get out of this gods-forsaken place. Move to Thebes. Memphis. Anywhere. But my husband won’t hear of it. He just disappears for days at a time and squats in his little hut with his little sword. As if he’d stand a chance against any robber who’s halfway serious.”
Pisaqar said, “We are fully serious. Ramesses’ tomb is in that valley, and we intend to pick it clean. It might be best for everyone if we simply scared your husband off.”
She smiled despairingly. “He won’t run away. He’ll die before he lets you get past him. No, best to wait until he comes back for water. Then you’ll have your chance to speak sense to him. You might succeed where I’ve failed.”
“And if I cannot?”
“I don’t know. Tie him up?” There was no humor in her laugh. “It’ll break him, but at this point it’s probably for the best. The pharaoh used to send a sack of grain every week. Now it comes once a fortnight, if that. Sooner or later, it will stop coming at all. Rukhmire needs to hear the hard truth from someone who hasn’t already told him a thousand times. Preferably someone with a sword.”
* * *
In the end, although Senet assured them her husband would return in a day or three, Pisaqar decided it was better not to wait. He was a man of action. The idea of sitting inert, beholden to the loose schedule of a total stranger, galled him. Once again, Nibamon was condemned to a long uphill march. Thankfully, dusk had fallen, and the cooling air made the effort bearable. The ochre sand darkened to umber as the sun neared the end of its circuit, the cloudless sky all crimsons and violets. The shrunken column lit torches as night approached. Pisaqar had specific errands in mind and had opted to bring a smaller crew: the two priests, the Israelite, and Nibamon.
They scrabbled uphill in the gathering dark, their torches guttering as they made their way over the rocky ground. Ahead of them lay a cliff face, tall and sheer. The setting sun cast its jagged lines into harsh relief. Any one of those innumerable shadows could have easily been mistaken for a canyon mouth. In reality, there was but one way into the valley—and Rukhmire guarded it.
His hut first announced itself with a red flicker. Fire must have been one of his scant joys, because his dwelling place was a depressing sight. It was little more than a semicircle of rocks piled man-high and topped with thatch. A pair of eyes peered out at the approaching visitors through a window maybe the size of a fist. The eyes disappeared, and out stumbled Rukhmire, bent copper sword in hand.
The robust young man Nibamon remembered had fallen prey to the ungentle years. His head of curls was reduced to a mop of limp strands. His smooth bronze skin had turned swarthy from far too many lonesome patrols in the sun. His fine teeth had been stained brown and worn flat by sandy bread.
“Halt!” he cried hoarsely, brandishing his sad family sword. “Halt in the name of Shabaku!”
Pisaqar said out of the corner of his mouth, “Nibamon, calm your brother-in-law.”
He remembered himself and hastened to the head of the column on creaking legs. “Brother! Put down your sword. It’s me, Nibamon.”
Rukhmire lowered his guard with clear relief. “Nibamon!” He grinned, and in that moment, the raffish boy who had wooed Senet out of her first engagement was visible once more. He shook his head and laughed at the sight of Nibamon’s unlikely company. “Amun’s sake, man, what’ve you gotten yourself into this time?”
He couldn’t help but chuckle in return. “New job, new friends,” he replied.
“Come sit, all of you. It’s a little cramped inside but you ought to fit. I daresay I can scrounge up enough bread for us to nibble on… Gives me an excuse to head home early, I admit…” Still jabbering, he stooped and disappeared through the door. Nibamon was no longer sure whether he was talking to his guests or himself.
Somehow, Rukhmire had managed to exaggerate the size of his living quarters. The round hut was only a few paces across. A stone bed encompassed half the hut, and the remaining space was cluttered with baskets and pottery, all empty. Their host pulled a threadbare blanket from a cubbyhole and spread it on the bed, which he offered as a seat. Nibamon exchanged a wincing look with the others, but Rukhmire was so excited to have company that no one raised a complaint. They squeezed awkwardly onto the bed while he dug through his baskets for presentable food, muttering and grinning all the while.
Eventually, he pressed a few hardened heels into their hesitant palms, then sat on an upturned basket with a happy sigh. He smiled between them. “How’s the bread?”
The stiff crusts crackled as the men, remembering themselves, gnawed into them. “It’s much appreciated,” Ermun told him after a moment, kindly.
“Good, good. Well, brother, catch me up on your news. I’m very keen to hear how you’ve come to surround yourself with such formidably armed company. Does it have anything to do with the…?” He tapped his nose speculatively.
Nibamon opened his mouth and found he hadn’t considered such an obvious question. “The priests at Karnak did this to me. Some men were killed on the job. I ended up taking the blame.”
“Were you in charge?”
“I was, yes.”
“Well then.” Rukhmire shrugged apologetically. “Shame they decided on the nose, though. It was always your best feature. Same nose as my Senet.”
Nibamon’s gaze fell. He’d forgotten that he’d once been handsome, and with prospects. Then again, his sister still had her beauty, and she hadn’t exactly prospered either. For all their aspirations, they’d ultimately wound up back in the parched heights where only dead kings still dwelled.
Rukhmire pointed at Ermun and Kalab. “Wasn’t you who did it to him, was it?”
The acolyte swallowed his bread with a grimace. “We aren’t those kinds of priests.”
“You sure? Those sickle swords look awfully mean. I didn’t think anyone even used those anymore.”
“We raise them in defense of ma’at,” said Ermun.
“Oh. I see. That explains the feathers on all your heads.” Rukhmire frowned as he noticed Eleazar’s conspicuous lack thereof. “Except you! No offense, friend, but with that beard, you have a bit of a foreign look.”
Eleazar spread his hands and bowed but wisely chose not to speak. But Rukhmire didn’t need to hear his accent to draw conclusions.
“You aren’t the pharaoh’s men, are you?”
Pisaqar said, “Not anymore.”
Nibamon’s brother-in-law seemed to deflate as the good cheer left him. “I’d worried about that.” He looked at his sword leaning against the doorway. The men’s muscles tightened, but Rukhmire didn’t make a move. Neither did they.
The guard blew out his cheeks. “This is a shit day.”
“I must be honest with you, Rukhmire. We have come to recoup a debt by way of a dead pharaoh. We require entrance to the valley. I am aware that this puts you in a difficult position, for which I apologize. I hope we can come to an understanding.” Pisaqar touched his heart to convey his good intent.
“And me, I hope you can see what you’re asking me to do. It’s one thing to bribe a man. But my many forefathers have guarded the valley for two hundred years. With this sword. You’re asking me to set it down and look the other way and let you rob the place my ancestors protected. You’d make me put a price on their honor, and mine. I’d rather you killed me.”
Nibamon pleaded, “What about Senet? Your son and daughter?”
“You’d take care of them, brother.” Rukhmire spoke as if that were a matter of fact, which it was.
Pisaqar broke in. “Your family is exactly that: yours. Do not pass them into another man’s keeping so willingly. It is not fair to them, it is not fair to Nibamon, and you will go to the next life for no good reason.”
“At least I could tell my grandfathers I kept my oath,” said Rukhmire.
“Your forefathers were amply rewarded for their service. You cannot possibly say the same. We passed through that forsaken village down there. I spoke to your wife. She is thin as a reed, and hoarse from thirst. She receives a sack of flour every fortnight, this when the pharaoh’s bureaucrats trouble themselves to send it. She fears for the future. She is right to do so. Pharaoh Shabaku is an old man, likely to perish sooner than later. I know the man who will take the throne in his place. I helped raise him. His name is Taharqa, and I tell you now, while Shabaku may fall short on his pledge, Taharqa will not trouble himself for you at all. These dead kings you guard, them and their ransacked tombs, they mean nothing to him. I am giving you the choice to recognize your abandonment now rather than later. Let me help your family prosper.”
Rukhmire slouched on his basket, nodding along dejectedly. “I suppose this is the part where you offer to pay me off.”
“Indeed, let us speak of payment. Our work will take us some months. Throughout that time, you and your family will be supplied with all the provisions you need. Water, bread, beer, we will bring it up from the river daily. These are the things the pharaoh has never been able to provide for you. It will be as easy a life as your family has ever lived here.”
“Fair enough. But when you leave, I’m trapped in the same predicament. What am I supposed to do after your work is done?”
Pisaqar smiled. “You are no fool, Rukhmire, are you?”
Rukhmire smirked back. “Lately, I’ve been looking more and more to the future. That tends to happen, when you’ve children to think of. Tell me. What can you do for us after you leave?”
“There is one unspoiled tomb left. In that tomb are enough riches that we could divide it into a dozen parts and still be unable to spend it all. I can offer you wealth to pass to your children, and they to theirs. The chance to begin anew.”
Rukhmire massaged his hands, apparently mulling it over. Finally, he asked, “Which tomb are you after?”
Pisaqar shook his head. “I am afraid I cannot say. It is for your protection as well as ours.”
“I understand,” the man said. “I’d like to guard the canyon while you work. At least then I can rest knowing I’ve earned my share.” He stood up. His beaming face left Nibamon with no remaining doubt. Rukhmire hadn’t truly meant to sacrifice his life for a bunch of empty tombs. The man had been playing Pisaqar all along, extracting as much as he could. Rukhmire had always been a clever one.
“Finish your food, boys,” he told them. “Then I’ll show you into the Valley of the Kings.”
* * *
The full moon shone down on the still-warm rocks, bathing the valley in blue light. As many times as Nibamon had visited the royal necropolis, clinging back then to his stern father, it baffled him how small the valley was. In most places, the valley was narrower than a city street, only widening slightly in the center. Even then, a stone tossed underhanded would have cleared the gap easily. Steep limestone hills crowded in on both sides, some deceptively smooth—his child self had scaled them frequently enough to know better—most jagged and forbidding, and nearly all topped by cliffs many times the height of a man. Branching paths cut into the hills with regularity, ascending toward the distant mountains without ever coming close to them. There were only a handful of well-hidden entrances to the valley, which made it an easy place to guard. The pharaohs had chosen this as their resting place because of the defensible layout, the murderous heat, and the isolated locale, counting on these combined factors to protect their graves for eternity.
Almost comprehensively, they’d failed. Walled entryways were nestled into the valley walls, open invitations to the tombs they framed, invitations that opportunistic men over the centuries hadn’t failed to pass up. The thick stone portals had been battered open, the rubble-filled passageways beyond cleared, the inner sanctums gutted not just of their boundless treasure, but of any object that might carry an iota of value—up to and including the pharaohs’ corpses. The guarantee of theft was the reason pharaohs of more recent dynasties no longer chose to be buried here, but in humbler tombs across Egypt.
Nibamon’s father had devoted his life to sealing the tombs once more, but in the mere decade since he’d died, more robbers had returned to undo his work.
Kalab pursed his lips in distaste as he ran his fingers along the chisel marks that disfigured one portal slab. “All this effort to scrape at empty tombs. One imagines how they must have reacted once they got in.”
“Not well,” Rukhmire said grimly. “They spent their wrath on the inscriptions.”
The old priest hissed in dismay. “As if it weren’t enough to obliterate a man’s body. But his epitaph, too? What evil spite.”
“Aye. Better that the tombs had never been restored in the first place. At least then, they wouldn’t have attracted attention.”
Eleazar spat on the ground. “This crooning is without point.”
Ermun retorted, “A man lives on as long as his name is still spoken. Your previous master understands that very well. How curious that you do not.”
The Assyrian traitor looked supremely untroubled by the erasure of foreign kings. “Let us do what we came here to accomplish. Afterward, we can return to Set-Ma’at and resume our bickering.”
Kalab let out a burst of mocking laughter. “Listen to the tyrant’s cup bearer. He pretends as if finding a lost tomb is the work of minutes.”
“I appreciate the difficulties we face,” Eleazar said—slowly, as if speaking to a small child. “What I fail to understand is why you priests whittle away our time mewling over hollow ruins.”
Sandals scuffed against hard sand as Kalab whirled, fists bunched and nostrils flared. Eleazar reflexively grabbed for his knife, but there was no need. Ermun placed a hand on his acolyte’s shoulder and brought him back to himself.
“His words may sting, but he isn’t incorrect. Now give me light.”
Kalab rolled his shoulders, and with a final glare at the Israelite, held a torch aloft for the elder priest. Ermun leaned through the open door and into the dim tomb, frowning at the worn hieroglyphs within. His feet remained just beyond the doorstep, and Kalab kept a firm grip on his belt to ensure he kept his balance. Neither man was willing to risk bringing down the wrath of a departed pharaoh by entering his tomb.
Eleazar’s lip curled. “And they return to their idle studies.”
It was Nibamon’s turn to lose his temper. “Oh, will you shut your mouth? How is it not obvious they’re doing this for a reason?”
“I see that they read over inscriptions, which your brother just said were erased, in a tomb that plainly is not the one we seek. I fail to see what this accomplishes.”
Ermun cried out with excitement. “Here! This cartouche! Usermaatre Setepenre Meryamun!”
Eleazar lifted his hands, aghast. “Just as I said. Wrong tomb.”
“No, this is the marker we sought,” the priest told him. “This is the tomb of Ramesses, Seventh of His Name. The predecessor of the king we seek. From here, we look to the stars. They will point the way.” Kneeling, he pulled a bolt of cloth from his satchel and unwrapped it to reveal a papyrus: the copy of the mortuary scroll from the Vault of Osiris. He spread it on the ground with eager hands.
Kalab looked up at the cliffs that rimmed the valley. “Someone should call Nawidemaq off.” He pointed to the reedy-limbed figure dancing madly on a rocky outcrop, his limbs flailing and twisting as he bellowed a lyrical entreaty to some unknown god. The white bull was there too, plopped on his rump and watching his friend with patient curiosity.
Kalab cupped his hands. “Nawidemaq! Stop! We don’t need the rain anymore!”
The medicine man’s gyrations came to a teetering halt. His arms dropped disappointedly. The syllables drifted back down. “I go back now! Sleep!”
The Israelite watched him vanish. “Why was he asking his gods for rain?”
“Well, they aren’t his. He only borrows them,” Ermun explained.
Nibamon said, “Rain is how robbers normally find tombs. In the wet seasons, they’ll sit and watch the water flow. If they see some disappearing, it means there’s a hidden void. A good indication there is a tomb beneath.”
“Does it ever rain in this place?”
Kalab seemed to take enormous satisfaction in chastising, “Of course not. That’s why Nawidemaq was asking.”
Nibamon concealed his smirk by squatting down beside Ermun to study the scroll. By the torchlight, he could make out Kalab’s script, so exactingly neat that he could have sworn a royal scribe had written it all. Amid the archaic, formalized words, the acolyte had sketched out a table that could only be a star chart. Ermun traced one column until he found the appropriate row.
“There. It’s as I remembered. During the first week of Inundation… Israelite, make yourself useful. Stand here on the threshold. Very good. Now face north.”
Eleazar frowned up at the Pole Star and followed it downward. “If this is a joke, it is a terrible one.” He was facing a wall of smooth limestone.
“This is where I want you.” Ermun placed himself in front of the reluctant Israelite and squinted over the man’s shoulder, searching the hills.
“What exactly are you doing?” demanded Eleazar. He was immediately shushed.
Kalab looked in the same direction with an increasingly perplexed face. “The papyrus tells us to look for a cleft hill. Except…”
It dawned on Nibamon what had gone awry. The terrain they were scrutinizing was a jumble of slopes that crowded each other out as they competed for height, merging and splitting, their slopes dotted with jagged rocks. He couldn’t pick out a feature that he might describe as a cleft or a seam—a shallow draw here, a divot there, but nothing remarkable enough to warrant scrutiny. If the priests had translated correctly, and it was a cleft hill they sought, any of those gradual inclines could have been made to fit the description.
Rukhmire, true to form, broke the dejected silence with a joke. “A good time for rain, no?”