The prince clung like a limpet, burying his head against Jack’s shoulder. In the queen’s arms the baby was wailing, but that was all right, made them look just like all the other civilians fleeing for the temple. Jack kept his head down, putting his body between the queen and the onrushing Jaffa, steering them both to the shadows as much as possible without it looking suspicious. If they could just make it to the temple — and then they were there, scrambling up the steps, the baby’s shrieks seeming even louder in the lamp-lit antechamber.
“Silence, there!” someone shouted, and the queen ducked her head, curling her body around the baby as she tried to quiet him. There were a lot of people in the outer precinct, Jack realized, servants and priests awakened by the fighting, most of them half-dressed and confused as well as afraid.
“Back,” he said quietly, and the queen edged toward the wall, still cooing to the baby. His cries had eased, and now he snuffled unhappily against his mother’s breast. The queen rocked him, bouncing back and forth, and looked at Jack.
“Where now?”
Jack looked quickly around, trying not to be too obvious. They were on the right side, at least, but they needed to get into the inner corridor, where the tunnel opened, and right now the priests were blocking those doorways, keeping the servants herded together in the outer rooms.
“O’Neill.”
Jack turned slowly, stitching a look of confusion onto his face. “Sorry?” He stopped abruptly, recognizing the chief priest of Horus, who gave him a conspiratorial smile.
“We were told to watch for you. This way.”
Jack touched the queen’s shoulder, and they slipped into the shadows, following the young priest. He was a nephew of the queen mother’s, Jack remembered, or at least some sort of cousin, and he had her delight in politics.
“Has Danyel been here?” he asked.
The priest shook his head. “No, O’Neill, though we will watch for him.”
Crap. Danyel and Carter should have been at the temple ahead of them. Jack killed that thought, made himself concentrate on the business at hand. “Can you close the tunnel behind us?”
“That was my intention, O’Neill. But we must hurry. Right now, everything is in disarray —”
But not for much longer, Jack thought. It wouldn’t take long for the Jaffa to figure out Carter’s bombs were ineffectual, and then they’d go looking for the queen. And then the place would be locked down tight, and once the Jaffa knew what they were looking for, it would be impossible to hide.
“Here,” the priest said. They had reached the end of the side corridor, where the lamplight barely reached and the wall painting looked chipped and tattered. Chipped because it was the hidden entrance, Jack realized, and set the prince down to help work the panel loose. More paint fell, and he winced. The priest met his eyes.
“It will hold a little longer, I think. If there is no search.”
“So we’d better hurry,” Jack said.
The queen ducked under the low lintel without hesitation, but the prince hesitated.
“I — there might be scorpions.”
The queen’s breath caught in something between a laugh and a sob. “There are none, my son. Take my hand.”
“I’ll light the lamp as soon as we get the door closed,” Jack said. “Hang on just a little longer.”
He ducked into the tunnel after the boy, stooped to help the priest work the panel back into place. He found the lamp where it should be, and flint and tinder with it, and coaxed the flame to life. In its wavering light, the queen’s face looked drawn and thin.
“Can we rest, O’Neill? Just for a little while?”
“We need to keep moving,” he said. “But soon. When we get to the end of the tunnel.”
She nodded, and shifted the baby to her other shoulder.
“I can take him for a bit,” Jack said. “If you’ll carry the lamp.”
“No,” the queen said, with a sideways smile. “Though I thank you. But you must have your hands free.”
In case of trouble. Jack nodded. “Let’s go.”
Carter’s penlight swept quickly over the reeds, picking out a narrow path, and then she’d hooded it again. Something coughed away to their right, and Danyel grimaced.
“Was that —?” Carter began, and he nodded.
“Yeah.”
Carter flicked the light in that direction, and two gold disks shone briefly out of the dark. Danyel caught a glimpse of a narrow, lumpy head and one thrashing foreleg, and then the crocodile turned away, vanishing among the reeds. A few moments later, there was a splash as it entered the water.
“Well,” Carter said, and sounded distinctly shaken. This was probably not the time to tell her that was one of the small ones, Danyel thought. He looked back the way they’d come, wondering if maybe it wouldn’t be better to try for the road after all, but he could see lights and movement, the Jaffa fanning out to search.
“There should be a boat,” he said, and hoped he was right.
“And if there isn’t?” Carter gave him a look.
“Well, I don’t think swimming is a good plan,” Danyel said. “There will be a boat. The fishermen always leave them here.”
“I hope so.” Carter shone the light ahead of them, picking out the trail. “How many shots does it take to bring one of those things down?”
“From a zat?” Danyel paused. “I’ve never really tried.”
“I’ll file that as ‘a lot,’” Carter said.
They were getting close to the river’s bank, the ground soft and muddy underfoot. In the distance, they could hear shouted orders, but Danyel couldn’t make out the words, hoped they were going in another direction. The fishermen who served the palace usually left their boats drawn up along here, convenient to the kitchen gate; surely there would be one.
“There,” Carter said, and Danyel gave a sigh of relief. There were three of them, drawn up together in a narrow cleared space. They were all small, but they’d definitely hold two people. Carter’s light flicked over the nearest one, picking out paddles and rope and a roll of linen. There was a box of hooks, and baskets for the fish as well.
“OK,” Danyel said. “You go first.”
They got the boat down to the river’s edge, and Carter scrambled into the bow, keeping her body low. Danyel pushed it the rest of the way in and clambered after her, groping fro the paddle. The boat rocked alarmingly, and then steadied.
“OK,” Carter said. She had found her paddle, held it with reassuring competence. But of course she’d been through all the Air Force survival training, not to mention eight or nine or ten years with SG-1, so of course she’d know. Not like Sam, though Sam had learned. “Now what?”
“We’re heading downstream, which is a mercy,” Danyel began, and a beam of light stabbed out from the bank.
“Crap,” Carter said. “Get down.”
Danyel stretched out on the boat’s damp bottom, reaching for the roll of linen to pull it over them. His head was pressed into Carter’s thigh, the toe of her boot digging uncomfortably into his belly. He could see the light sweeping overhead, bright through the coarse cloth, but so far it hadn’t focused, hadn’t found them. He lay still, counting his heartbeats, a hundred, two hundred, five hundred. He could feel Carter tensed against him, ready to explode into action if they were spotted, but the light swept over them at irregular intervals, and never settled. The boat drifted, bobbing gently on the current. Danyel thought they might be traveling sideways, but there was no way to be sure. All they could do was wait.
The stable area was quiet for now, but Jack knew it wouldn’t last. He busied himself hiding the trapdoor again, brushing the dirt over it until all the cracks were hidden, while the queen nursed the baby, and the older boy sprawled beside her, sound asleep. He moved to the window again, seeing lights moving along the palace walls, looked back at the hidden trapdoor. Danyel and Carter weren’t coming: if they were, they’d have been here by now. And he didn’t dare wait much longer, or he and the queen and the children would be caught by the sunrise before they could get into the safety of the countryside.
“We need to go,” he said, and the queen made a face.
“So soon?”
“The night’s half over,” Jack said. Half over, and I don’t know where half my people are. He looked around, found a stick, and carved words in the dirt floor: gone fishin’. Only the team would know what that meant, that he’d been there, and was safe, at least for now. “We need to go,” he said, gently, and the queen rose with a groan.
“Come on, son,” he said, and picked up the older boy, who stirred, complaining, but didn’t wake.
The queen shifted the baby to an easier position and squared her shoulders. “I’m ready,” she said, and followed him into the night.
They took the long road, the track that wound away from the palace into the desert, and then back again to join the main road. Once they had to hide from a Jaffa patrol, crouching among scrub and stones until the men were past, but otherwise the night was quiet. At dawn they found themselves near a small village, and traded Jack’s necklace for food and a full waterskin, gossiping while they ate. The Jaffa had been through during the night, searched all the houses, and found nothing. Still, it was better not to linger, just in case they were to return. Jack took the hint, and moved them on.
And then it was just walking, a man and a woman and their children, ordinary people on the road from one village to another, unremarkable. The older boy demanded to walk for a while, and Jack carried the baby so that the queen could watch him; when the prince grew tired and cranky, Jack carried him again.
Finally, the house loomed on the horizon, a thread of smoke rising above the compound’s walls, and the queen drew a shaken breath.
“O’Neill. I did not entirely believe —”
“Nor did I,” Jack said, quietly. “But here we are.”
Their approach had been seen, and soldiers came to meet them, Hor-Aha at their head. He embraced his wife, who promptly burst into tears. The baby set up a wail as well, and she laughed through the tears, bouncing him to silence. Hor-Aha rested his head on her shoulder, tears bright in his own eyes, then stooped to embrace his son.
“I’m in your debt, O’Neill,” he said. “Again.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Jack said. “Did Danyel and Carter make it back yet?”
Hor-Aha paused, and shook his head. “We have not seen them.”
Damn. Jack turned to look over his shoulder, squinting into the sun as though he could will them into existence, conjure them up out of the dust of the road. “They’ll be here,” he said. Whatever he had to do to make it happen.
The boat ground to a stop, its flat keel digging gently into the mud. Danyel tensed beneath the concealing linen, waiting for a searching light to find them, for someone to shout from the shore. There was no way of telling how far they’d come, how long they’d been drifting with the current. A while, certainly, long enough for the damp to settle into his skin, so that he was very grateful for the warmth of Carter’s leg against his chest. Maybe it was long enough, maybe they’d come far enough — and in any case, it wasn’t safe to stay grounded like this. There were the crocodiles to worry about, and a beached boat was bound to draw intelligent interest as well. He propped himself up carefully on one elbow. The boat wobbled under him, but didn’t break free.
“Careful,” Carter said.
“Yeah.” Danyel folded the linen down from his face, peered cautiously over the edge of the boat. It was still dark, the moon down and the first hint of the dawn lightening the eastern sky. There was a mist on the river, obscuring the far bank; they lay across the current, the boat’s bow resting gently on a finger of mud that extended from the near shore. Nothing was moving, not even a night bird, and he sat up slowly, shivering as the night air hit him. Carter did the same, and shoved the crumpled linen toward him.
“You’ll want that.”
“Thanks.” Danyel wound it around his shoulders, trying to keep the driest parts next to his skin. He’d warm up soon enough once they got moving, but for now — it wasn’t very pleasant.
Carter fumbled for her paddle. “Where are we?”
“I’m not entirely sure.” Danyel found his own paddle at last, wedged into the stern. They were surrounded by mist and black water, the bank a darker shadow, the stars fading overhead. It was about an hour before true dawn, from the position of the stars. “Downstream from the palace.”
“I had kind of figured that out,” Carter said. “So what do we do now?”
“We get off this sandbank,” Danyel said. “And then — keep going downstream, I think. We’ll find a village soon enough, there are enough of them along the river. We’ll get our bearings there.”
“OK.” Carter dug her paddle into the mud, pushing them away, and Danyel backed water at the same time. The boat rocked, but didn’t move.
“Again,” Carter said, and pushed harder. The paddle slipped, flipping a clot of mud away with a splash, but this time the boat rocked free. Carter fell forward, caught herself, and Danyel backed water as hard as he could.
“Quick, before we’re stuck again —”
Carter dug deep with her own paddle, and together they got the boat turned and steadied, steering around the tip of the sandbank. Danyel relaxed a little, setting himself to paddle, and after a moment Carter matched his stroke. Down the river, then, he thought, and when the sun comes up, we’ll know where we are. We’ll find a village and make our way home — his home, not Carter’s. And Carter — Carter wasn’t dead. They’d really done it, fixed the time line so that SG-1 had never taken the puddle jumper back in time to find Ra’s ZPM. Jack, the original Jack, and Teal’c, and Carter had never been killed in the rebellion. It was as though a weight lifted from his shoulders, a guilt he thought he’d put behind him long ago. It had been his bad idea that had started it, his bad idea that had gotten them all killed, but they’d managed to fix it, Jack and Sam and Teal’c and the other self he hadn’t met. No one had died, and he — had Abydos again. Or something better.
He was grinning like an idiot, and Carter glanced over her shoulder. “What?”
He thought for a moment about parrying the question, pretending it was nothing, but in that moment he couldn’t bear anything less than honesty. “You’re alive,” he said, and Carter looked back at him again.
“What — oh.”
“It worked,” Danyel said. “We managed to stop my stupid plan from ever happening, and everything’s all right. Well, more or less, and assuming that we manage to drive off Ra, but —”
He stopped, not sure he was making sense, but Carter nodded. “Doesn’t it bother you?” she asked, after a moment. “Being stuck here, I mean. We could probably bring you back, I don’t think it would disrupt the timeline too much.”
“It doesn’t,” Danyel said. “Bother me. And I don’t want to go back. I’m happy here.” He paused, trying for a lighter touch. “Besides, two of Jack in one place…”
“Might be awkward,” Carter agreed, but he thought she’d heard what he hadn’t said.
They paddled on in silence, the light slowly spreading along the horizon, paddling just hard enough to keep the boat steady in the current. The air was warmer now, with day approaching, but Danyel was still glad of the linen around his shoulders.
By the time the sky had lightened enough for them to see the opposite bank, Danyel was fairly sure he knew where they were. They were still upstream of the house, but only by a few hours’ walk. If they were lucky, they were still above the potters’ village, and they could get food and water there. He was definitely hungry, and once the sun came up, they’d need water.
The sky to the east glowed, red, then gold, Horus ascending, and the first white-hot sliver of the sun-disk rose above the horizon. It was no wonder people worshiped the sun, he thought, not for the first time. Sunrise over the black land came like a blast of trumpets, the god leaping up with a shout, pouring light and life onto the plains. Carter shipped her paddle and they drifted as the sun rose, the enormous disk pulling free of the horizon, the haze puddling at its base as though it was formed from a bed of molten iron.
“It’s spectacular,” she said at last, when the sun had risen far enough that they could no longer look at it. “No wonder you want to stay.”
That wasn’t why, or not the only reason. But he couldn’t deny that it was part of it, either, these moments of pure, heart-stopping beauty. An ibis lifted from the reeds, black against the glowing sky, and his breath caught in his chest. “It doesn’t hurt,” he said, and lifted his paddle again.
The current was flowing faster here, and there was more debris in the river, coming probably from one of the villages they had passed in the dark. Danyel did his best to steer around the largest of the floating objects, but first one and then another thumped against the low sides. Something else scraped unpleasantly against the underside of the hull, and a few minutes later Carter said, “I hate to mention it, but my feet are getting wet.”
“Yeah. Mine, too.” Danyel couldn’t see a hole, but he could definitely feel that there was more water than there had been. It was coming in more quickly, too. He could see the smoke of cooking fires rising from the potters’ village, a mile or so ahead, maybe a little less. They’d probably make it, if the leak didn’t get any worse.
They covered maybe a third of the distance before Carter had to stop paddling to bail, and it wasn’t long after that that Danyel began angling toward the bank. The reeds grew thickly here, breaks had the trodden, polished look of crocodile wallows: not at all where he would have chosen to land, but choice didn’t have anything to do with it.
Carter emptied another pot-full of water over the side. “It’s gaining on me,” she said, and Danyel nodded.
“I’d noticed.” He dug his paddle deeper into the current, the boat wallowing, awkward. “I’m going to put us ashore there —”
Carter dropped the pot she’d been using to bail, picked up her paddle, and together they drove hard for the bank. At last the bow touched the slick mud, and Carter drove her paddle hard into the ground. Danyel sloshed his way forward, and together they dragged the boat the rest of the way onto the shore. Water spilled out over the stern, and finally Danyel saw where a seam had split. There would be no repairing that, not with anything they had in hand. That meant they’d have to walk the rest of the way, first to the village and then home: not impossible, not even that difficult, but first they had to get out of the reeds.
Carter drew her zat, letting it unfold to check the mechanism. Danyel did the same, scanning the ground for what he hoped would be a safe path. And then they both heard it, a grunt and a roar and a rushing through the reeds. Danyel flung himself aside, saw Carter dodge the other way, and then they both brought zats to bear. They fired together, and then again. The crocodile staggered as it turned, but gathered itself for another rush. Danyel backed away, firing, heard and saw Carter’s zat blasts hit home along the animal’s back. And still it kept coming, slower now, but still digging its claws deep into the mud, hauling itself forward. The narrow jaws opened, showing crooked teeth and puffy flesh. Danyel aimed for the head, the tiny brain, and fired twice more. Carter fired, too, and the crocodile roared. It lifted its head, and then, abruptly, collapsed.
“Come on,” Danyel said. He wasn’t entirely sure the thing was dead, and he didn’t want to wait to find out. “Let’s go, we’ve got to get to the high ground, to the road…”
Carter gave the crocodile a wide berth — he guessed she wasn’t all that sure it was dead, either — and together they scrambled up onto the road. They stood for a moment, breathing hard, and then Carter folded her zat.
“How big do you think it was?”
“About the biggest I’ve seen,” Danyel said. It had to have been over nine feet long, even allowing for the exaggerating effects of pure terror, and it had taken far too many shots to finally put it down. Two shots to kill a human, but a crocodile?
“I hit it at least six times,” Carter said. “And I’m guessing you did the same.” She shook her head. “That was one tough crocodile.”
“They grow that way here,” Danyel said, and couldn’t avoid a quick glance into the reeds. “We should probably get moving.”
“Good idea,” Carter agreed, and they set off down the road.