Cy screamed. he was falling. Tumbling down and down, inside the Great Pyramid. He flailed about with both hands as he fell, desperately trying to find something to grab on to. Close beside him he could hear Aten yelling.
‘We’re going back! We’re going back!’
Cy landed on a hard surface. Solid ground below him, and – he felt about cautiously – around him, and . . . above? He couldn’t see above.
‘Aten?’ Cy called. There was a groan and Cy could just make out Aten sprawled alongside him in the darkness. ‘Where are we?’ Cy whispered.
‘In the tomb,’ wailed Aten. ‘The worst place I could be.’
‘Not the worst,’ said Cy, trying to be cheerful. ‘I mean there have to be worse places than this.’
‘Only one.’ Aten shuddered. ‘Thank the gods we are not at Lake Moeris with the crocodiles.’
From within the darkness Cy heard a sliding thump.
‘What was that?’
‘What was what?’ asked Aten.
‘Didn’t you hear anything?’ said Cy, and then he dug his nails into Aten’s arm as he heard the same noise again. Only this time louder, and closer. ‘What is that?’
‘I can’t see,’ said Aten. ‘We need light, some torches . . .’
Further down the passageway a ruddy glow crept along the wall. Cy scrambled to his feet. ‘Come on. Let’s go that way.’
‘Someone has left flares to show the way,’ said Aten. He reached up and lifted a burning torch from its bracket. Behind them came a noise of something heavy slithering across the ground.
Cy glanced back nervously. ‘I don’t like that noise,’ he said. ‘I don’t know what it is. But I know that I definitely don’t like it.’ He took down another torch. ‘At least we can see a bit better now.’
‘If we are in a burial place there should be wall paintings,’ said Aten. He held his torch high. ‘Ah, yes . . .’
In the dim flickering light they could see pictures on the walls. Figures with kohl-lined eyes, names in elaborate cartouches, and many, many lines of writing.
‘Can you read what this says?’ Cy asked.
‘It tells us of the gods. There is Horus, falcon of the sky, and there is Sebek,’ Aten shivered, ‘with the head of a crocodile.’
‘It must have taken years to write it all out,’ said Cy. ‘I’d hate to have had to do that.’
‘To be a scribe is a privilege. It means you have an honoured place in society,’ said Aten, ‘with much power and wealth. You would pay no taxes.’
‘Well, I suppose that is an advantage,’ Cy admitted grudgingly. ‘If you could earn lots of money then it might be worth it.’
‘A scribe’s work has much more worth than mere money.’ Aten pointed at the hieroglyphs. ‘Here upon this wall is written wisdom, and ideas.’ He stretched out his fingers and touched Cy gently on the forehead. ‘Ideas,’ he repeated. ‘More valuable than gold or incense. More precious than water in the desert.’
Cy looked again at the picture-writing. He thought of the tremendous effort involved. ‘Writing is such a lot of work,’ he said.
‘Without writing,’ said Aten, ‘knowledge would be as perfume in the air. Across time and space, with writing, we are able to meet the minds of others.’ Cy followed Aten as he moved along, examining the drawings and the script.
‘This,’ said Aten, ‘tells of the Journey to the Afterlife. Anubis weighs the person’s heart against the Feather of Truth. See, there are the judges seated on their thrones. They will watch to see on which side the scales come to rest. Insincerity will be found out. A heavy heart is full of deceit and will tip the balance down.’
‘Like Chloe and Eddie,’ said Cy. ‘Pretending to be nice, but nasty on the inside.’
‘Chloe and Eddie,’ repeated Aten. ‘They are as crocodiles. Wide smiles to devour the innocent, but remember, those who deal in darkness will remain in the dark.’
Again Cy heard the strange noise. He looked back down the tunnel. Was there something moving there in the dark, just beyond the light cast by their torches? He shivered. A very vivid imagination, Mrs Chalmers had told his mum and dad on parents’ evening. Too vivid. He turned his head firmly to the front and continued walking after Aten. ‘Why do you think we are going downhill?’
‘Don’t all tunnels slope down?’ said Aten.
Just as Aten spoke, there was an unexpected dip in the ground beneath them. Aten stumbled and then stopped. Ahead of them were two passageways. Cy peered into the gloom. The passage on the right looked drier, the wall paintings fresher and cleaner. ‘Which way?’ he asked.
‘I don’t know,’ replied Aten. ‘They both look exactly the same.’
‘No,’ began Cy. ‘The one on the right is better . . .’ Cy stopped speaking and focused his eyes. He looked from right to left and then back again. The tunnels now appeared identical. ‘I thought . . .’
‘What?’ asked Aten.
‘Nothing,’ said Cy. ‘Let’s go on. I don’t like this place at all.’
They took the right fork and walked on . . . and on.
‘Soon we must reach a hieroglyph which tells us where we are,’ said Aten. He held up his torch to illuminate an elegant cartouche. ‘This . . .’ he began. Then he stopped, and reaching out a trembling finger, he traced the outline of the pictograms. Cy could see an owl, a plaited tress . . .
‘E-M-,’ Aten began to spell out the word, ‘Emseh.’ Aten’s voice gurgled in his throat.
‘Are you all right?’ Cy asked him.
Aten pointed to the hieroglyphs. ‘It says . . . it says . . .’
‘What?’ cried Cy in exasperation. He held his own torch closer. There was a scraping sound, heavy and dull, from near their feet.
‘Eeeeeeeeeeeee!’ Aten’s voice screeched in terror directly into Cy’s ear.
‘What is it?’ Cy looked around wildly and then followed Aten’s pointing finger. Just beyond them in the darkness he could make out a low, hulking shape. And then, two pinpricks of dull red. ‘What is it?’ he repeated. He shook Aten by the arm. ‘What is it?’
‘Now I understand,’ said Aten. ‘The tunnels, the noises . . .’ His voice stuttered in fear. ‘We are in the labyrinth . . . in the labyrinth with the crocodiles.’