DON’T HATE ME ‘CAUSE I’M MUT-IFUL

 

 

A man with dimples, happy eyes, and a lithe, muscular body strolled up just as Jagger jumped onto the ship’s deck next to his sister. The man’s black hair was speckled with silver, and the lines around his eyes suggested both age and sun. Late thirties, Jagger guessed.

“These two will be joining me.” Smenkare’s eyes moved past the man to scan the shore as he motioned toward Jagger and Aria.

“I’m Babi, the captain.” The man nodded. He had a wide smile and perfect, white teeth.

“At least I can pronounce it,” Aria mumbled to Jagger before plastering an I’m-adorable look on her face and turning to the captain. “I’m Aria Jones. And this is my brother, Jagger.”

Babi’s eyebrows drew together. “Unusual names.” He glanced at Smenkare.

“Yes. Yes, they are.” The prince’s eyes crept up Jagger then slid down Aria. The look made Jagger’s skin crawl. “Now.” Smenkare’s gravelly voice was authoritative. “I’m in a bit of a rush, Captain. If you don’t mind casting off?”

The captain’s smile stiffened. “Of course.” He glanced toward the bustling harbor. “We’ll set sail shortly.”

“We’ll set sail now!” The prince may, or may not, be the Protector, but he clearly thought he was the boss.

Babi’s smile looked forced. “As you wish, my prince.” He barked commands at sailors, ordering them to prepare the ship to sail.

“So, Smell-ka …” Aria paused, obviously stumped by the prince’s name.

“She means …” Jagger squirmed, wracking his brain for words that would interrupt his sister and not sound idiotic. “We’re wondering … where the General is. And where we’ll stay.” Jagger looked around. What if the General was on this ship? “Why are you going to Thebes?”

“Quickly, Captain,” the prince ordered, ignoring Jagger’s stream of questions before turning back to Aria. “Tell me all about yourself, child. How do you know my sister?”

“She brought us here. Are you—”

“Aria!” Jagger grabbed her arm. “Don’t be rude. The prince asked about you. You gotta tell him the truth. You know, about your dementia. And how you like to make up creative stories.”

She rolled her eyes as the ship shifted, slowly disconnecting from the dock.

“Sorry about my sister.” Jagger’s brain was whirling. “But hey, I don’t have to tell you about sisters, right?”

The prince grunted.

“You know how they are. You and your oldest sister, what kind of relationship—”

“WAIT!”

Jagger spun toward the voice—it sounded like tinkling bells and summertime.

The most beautiful woman he’d ever seen landed gracefully on the ship’s deck. She’d made the six-foot jump from the dock as easily as if she were stepping off a curb on Chicago’s Michigan Avenue after a million-dollar shopping spree.

And that wasn’t even the weird part.

Two men leapt after her. A huge gust of wind—it smelled like fresh flowers—carried them forward. They rolled onto the deck, then jumped up, and stood flanking her. They were of equal height. Neither could have been over four feet.

Were there purple fireflies in ancient Egypt? Those twinkling lights … Jagger shook his head; his imagination was on overdrive.

The woman glanced back at the two men then turned to the audience of sailors, staring at her with dangling jaws. She flaunted a sardonic smile, one eyebrow cocked high. She looked like she was in her early twenties and wore a gauzy gown that glittered in the sunlight. Gold strands hung from her ears and neck, and golden sandals wound up her legs to her knees. Thick, black hair fell to her shoulders in small braids.

“Mut,” she announced, as if her name said it all, like she was Beyoncé. “My companions are Hemet and Mutef.” She whirled a polished finger at her sidekicks.

“Mutbenret!” The captain beamed. “I didn’t expect you.”

“No, nor did I,” the prince quipped, frowning.

“I do like to surprise.” Her eyes pulsed when she said it. Her glance danced over the ship’s deck, dawdling briefly on Aria, then Jagger.

Jagger’s muscles tensed. He scanned the dock, expecting to see Scrawny and Brawny. Had they sent this woman? Did she work for the General? Was the General out there, watching them right now?

“She’s like a talking doll,” Aria breathed. “Her name is moot? Like moot point?”

Jagger shook his head, too confused to help his sister pronounce moot.

“Hello, my prince.” Mut smiled at Smenkare, eyes twinkling. “Always a pleasure to be in your presence.”

“Mutbenret.” The prince nodded. His lips were tight.

“New friends?” Her perfectly arched eyebrow inched up as she turned brown eyes, meticulously lined with kohl, on Jagger and Aria.

“Not really.” The prince’s voice cracked, and he scowled. “I’m just doing my royal duty, taking care of my people, showing them to their quarters and such.” He put a hand on Jagger’s shoulder, driving him forward. “We wouldn’t want them to get lost, trying to find their way.”

Moving toward the barn-like structure, Jagger craned his neck to look back at the woman. She leaned into the captain, whispering, as the prince steered he and Aria into the rectangular building on the back of the ship, down narrow steps, and into a small cabin with two cots and a wooden chest, nailed to the ground.

“But …” Jagger paused just inside the small room. “Are we captives?”

“Don’t be silly, Jaaaaggggger.” Smenkare drew out Jagger’s name, smirking. “You asked where you were staying. I’m showing you. You’re free to move about the ship. After all,” the prince said, as one side of his mouth lifted, leaving the other side behind. “Where would you go?” He shut the door, leaving Jagger alone with his sister for the first time since she touched the ankh.

“Maybe she’s the Protector.” Aria’s eyes were wide as she slid down onto the cot.

Jagger ran his hands over his fuzzy head—his missing curls were almost as bothersome as his sister’s naiveté. “Is there anyone you don’t trust?”

Aria cocked her head to the side, then shrugged. “I think that was magic she did when those two guys jumped. It’s like they were riding the wind. And Tatia said the Protector was magical. Plus, Moot Point smelled like lotus blossoms.”

“Aaaaand … that’s important because?” Honestly, mathematical physics was easier to understand than his sister’s thought processes.

“Yeah, you’re right.” She tapped her cheek with one finger. “It’s probably him. He saved us, and he’s obviously helping us get away from the evil stink-bug General. He’s taking us to Thebes. Plus, he’s Tatia’s brother.”

“That doesn’t mean we can trust him.” Jagger eyeballed the door, wondering if the prince was listening to them from the other side.

“Well it sort of does. I mean, he’s her brother.”

Jagger fell onto the other cot, dropping his face in his hands. “Not all brothers are good guys. Families are weird.” He peeked at her through his fingers. “Look at us.” He swallowed an inexplicable urge to giggle. He couldn’t believe this was actually happening.

“We’re not weird.” Aria sat crisscross applesauce, resting her elbows on her knees.

Jagger dropped his hands and stared at her. “Seriously? Have you met us?” His sister insisted on pretending their family was normal, like being ignored by their father and raised by a single mother across seven continents was no big deal.

“Whatever.” She rolled her eyes. “Besides, what’s so weird about their family? I mean, aside from the fact that they’re royal. And have a lot of kids.”

Jagger nodded—this topic was more comfortable. “The king and queen have five girls. We’ve now seen all of the princesses. And the king has two sons with other wives: Tut, who we saw at the palace, and Smenkare, who you think we should trust even though he kidnapped us less than an hour ago.”

“Other wives?” Aria’s eyes opened wide.

Jagger shrugged. “Egyptian kings got away with stuff.”

“What about the queens?”

“They got away with less.”

“That’s unfair.” Aria scowled.

“Yeah, lil’ sis.” He almost grinned. Aria was always on the lookout for inequities, real and imagined. “But the real shocker here is that Akhenaten’s daughter doesn’t worship the Aten.”

“So what?” Aria struggled to free a curl from her braids. “We have every religion imaginable in Chicago. Remember that time I went to a Mormon church, a synagogue, and a mosque in one week? Can’t Egyptians decide what church to go to too?”

“It’s not like that here.” Jagger shook his head. “Egyptians all believed there were loads of gods, until Akhenaten forced the Aten on them,” he explained. “Different people might have had different favorites. Like if you were a scribe, you might favor the scribal god, Thoth. Or sometimes people worshipped specific gods because of stuff going on in their lives. Like there would be one god you’d go to for bad teeth, and a different god for your crush—like the one you had on Ellis last year—and another god to help people make money. And there were lots of different kinds of gods: child gods and animal gods. They even had a tree goddess that was half tree, half knock-out.”

Aria giggled. “Well I guess if you were a god, you could be whatever you wanted to be. I think I’d be a panther … or maybe an owl,” she said with a grin. “A girl god would be awesome—”

“Egyptians had loads of goddesses. But Tatia’s dad made everyone worship his sun god. At least, I thought he did.” Jagger rolled onto his stomach, dangling his elbows off the end of the cot. It smelled like fish.

“Why do you know so much about this place? I mean all those history books you read,” she said as she scrunched her nose. “Aren’t they boring?”

“You say boring. I’d say safe. It beats travelling through time, facing an evil General who wants to wipe out our entire family. I wish I were home reading right now. On our sofa. With a fat slice of Chicago deep-dish pizza.”

“Giordo’s,” she quipped.

“Louie’s,” he corrected her, as he had many times before. Everyone knew Louie’s had the best Chicago deep-dish.

Jagger’s stomach ached at the thought of pizza. He rolled toward the wall, longing for home, and they both fell silent.

“Think Mom knows we’re gone yet?” Aria’s voice was low.

The thought was like a kick in the gut. Jagger had been trying not to think about how upset Mom would be when she realized they’d disappeared. Would she know it was his fault?

“Maybe,” he admitted after a pause. “But who knows? Maybe we’ll get back, and it will be one minute after we left. It is time travel. Weirder things have happened. Oh, wait!” He banged his head against his knuckles. “What am I saying? Nothing weirder than this has ever happened in the entire history of the world.”

“Jagger!” Aria hissed. She stared at the door, eyes wide. She sniffed, then tapped her nose. “Lotus blossoms,” she whispered.

Jagger jumped up, heart thumping. He tiptoed to the door and yanked it open.

Mut stood outside, arms folded, staring at him. A mischievous smile played around her lips. One of her guards stood behind her. “Senet?” she asked.

“Senet,” Jagger repeated, stalling for time. Senet was a popular board game. That much he knew. He’d seen game pieces in museums, but he didn’t have a clue how to play it.

“Come.” She tipped her head toward the stairs. “I’ll teach you. No fun being stuck in a …” She looked around the small room. “Here.” She grimaced.

“Okay!” Aria jumped off the cot and bounced out the door, following the ancient beauty up the short flight of steps into the sunlight.

Jagger sighed, then trailed them.

The Senet lesson was the first of many. The gameplay was simple enough, but Jagger was too busy trying to figure out who was trying to save them and who was trying to kill them to focus. Aria picked it up quicker than him, which stung.

The next two days passed like a dream he couldn’t wake up from. He and Aria spent most of their time on deck, playing Senet with Mut and Smenkare, sometimes the captain. They played for hours under a shade umbrella on top of the barn-like building, snacking on bread slathered in honey and date tarts the first mate brought them. It wasn’t deep-dish, but it didn’t suck.

Jagger tried to tease information out of Mut and the prince, but it was useless. It didn’t help that he was never alone with either of them. If Smenkare was playing, Mut or one of her sidekicks was within earshot. If Mut played, the prince loitered nearby. Babi came and went, jovial but guarded. Neither of Mut’s guards uttered a word, even when Aria tried to charm them. Jagger wasn’t entirely sure they could talk.

The lack of sleep made everything worse. He knew ancient Egyptians used wooden pillows inscribed with sleep spells, but he’d never given any thought to just how uncomfortable wooden pillows could be.

Sometimes Mut flirted with the prince, even though he was about a decade her junior. She tossed her braided wig, touched Smenkare’s shoulder, and laughed at nearly everything he said, which was particularly noteworthy, as the prince had no sense of humor. If her bids to beguile him worked, Smenkare hid it well.

The prince’s mask only slipped once over the two long days.

The afternoon of their second day aboard, Aria and Mut were playing while Jagger watched the shore speed by, thinking of Gramps. Gramps would sit by Lake Michigan for hours, a pole in his hand and a smile on his face, while Jagger did homework by his side. Gramps didn’t even care if he caught a fish. He just loved sitting in the sun, watching it play on the water. Jagger’s eyes stung as he watched a boy lead a herd of sheep along the shore as two old men cast fishing nets into the water. One second the scene was in front of him. The next, it was behind him.

“Wait.” Jagger stared back at the shrinking men. “How fast are we going?” He turned to ask the captain, but Babi was gone.

“Hmmm.” The prince straightened and turned to Mut. “An interesting question.” His eyes narrowed on her as he tapped steepled fingers together. The guard standing sentry behind Mut shifted closer to her.

Jagger stared back to the shore, calculating their speed in his head. He glanced up at the sail, full of wind. Too full. Sure, he felt wind against his skin, but not that much wind. Were those more purple fireflies, stuck in the sail? What was happening here?

“It’s magic.” Aria clapped, gazing adoringly at the white sail fluttering in the wind. “You?” She looked at Mut. “Or …” She shifted her gaze to Smenkare.

Mut’s smile was as enigmatic as the sphinx, but the prince was stone-faced.

“Wait. So how long until we get to Thebes?” Jagger asked, rubbing the letter still stuffed in his kilt’s inside pocket. If they could get to Thebes, they could get to Herihor, the one guy Jagger knew they could trust. He’d assumed they had three more days on the ship, but at this speed …

He felt Smenkare’s glare boring into him and looked up at him. The prince looked away.

“Not long.” Mut smiled. “Not long at all.”

The attack came the next morning.