Chapter 2
Rae
Rae held the scrap of papyrus in her shaking hands and began to read aloud.
“‘A letter from Raetawy to her mother,’” she recited haltingly. “‘How are you, Mamet? I hope your life with our ancestors in the West is joyful and free of suffering.’”
She sniffed and glanced up at the makeshift shrine.
In spite of repeated warnings from Menk and Omari, Rae had snuck back to the farm and salvaged her mother’s sculpture from the scorched remains of their house.
Everything else had been stolen or burned, but the small stone statue had fallen off its pedestal out of sight and had been left behind by the nomarch’s men.
It was chipped and blackened when Rae found it, but she’d washed away the soot in the river and found that the damage wasn’t too bad.
The sculpture was a bust made in her mother’s likeness, with long black hair flowing in thick waves over both shoulders, and her round, smiling face painted in yellow ochre.
Her name in the gods’ words—along with a wadjet eye of Ra—was written in black along the front.
Some of the paint had washed away, but she could still read her mother’s name.
One day, she’d thought, when this is all over, I’ll make it look new again.
She’d brought the sculpture back to the ruins of the old palace, where she and the other Horizon rebels had been staying.
The brewer’s murder had triggered a citywide search for Rae and all her associates, and Rahotep’s palace turned out to be an ideal hiding place.
It was situated on the southern edge of Sakesh, just north of the farms and not far from the banks of the Iteru.
The place was considered bad luck and full of mutu—so most Low and High Khetarans alike did their best to avoid it.
Rae had found a small room with a window overlooking the river, cleaned it up, evicted several scorpions, and made it her own.
When she’d returned there with the sculpture the night before, she’d set up her mother’s shrine using some broken bricks as a makeshift pedestal.
“Don’t mind the mutu, Mamet,” she’d said to the shrine, adding a chunk of dried fish and some water in a potshard as offerings.
“The spirits here have a right to be angry.”
Rae hadn’t slept. Instead, she spent the night writing the letter by candlelight.
Her mother had died not long after the Great War, when Rae was only a baby, so she had no real memories of her.
But her father had reconstructed her through stories—recollections of her kindness, her strength, her sense of humor—until her mother’s shape had been built into the landscape of Rae’s mind like a temple.
Since her father’s abduction, that temple had been the only place she found refuge.
Rae sniffed again, her lower lip trembling as she read the letter to her mother’s shrine.
“‘I miss you,’” she said. “‘I would say that I wish you were here, but you are safer where you are than in Sakesh. Life is not good here. There is hunger and drought, and the High Khetarans rule over us and take what little we have for themselves.
“‘I joined a group of men to fight for our freedom, and the resistance was going well until we were betrayed by one of our own. People died. Some of them by my own hand. And Yati”—she gasped, hardly able to go on—“Yati was taken, and the farm was burned.’”
She paused to dash hot tears of shame from her eyes.
“‘It was my fault. It was my fault and I am going to do everything I can to get him back. I write this letter, Mamet, to ask you to please watch over Yati, wherever he is, and keep him safe until I find him.’”
She glanced out the small window, where the first light of dawn pierced the horizon.
“‘I’m sorry I let you down,’” she said, unable to meet the painted eyes of the sculpture. “‘Forgive me.’”
Rae folded the letter and set it in front of the shrine with the other offerings. She stared at it in silence as the sun rose at her back.
***
Rae tore a piece of bread off the loaf, shoved it in her mouth, and chewed mechanically. It was stale, but she hardly noticed.
“One of the fishermen generously offered the use of his largest skiff for our journey to Thonis,” Menk was saying.
“It’s large enough to carry five. He also said we can take some of his old fishing equipment.
We can wrap your supplies and weapons inside the fishing nets so they won’t be seen.
As Rae suggested—the simpler the disguise, the less likely you’ll be stopped and searched. ”
Rae took another bite of bread. The Jackal had given her the idea to disguise themselves as fishermen.
After all, if he’d had some fishing equipment with him, or had been properly attired for the job, she would never have given him a second glance.
Remembering the Red Lands tribesman and his satchel of treasure, she thought: Isn’t it strange that I’m going downriver to Thonis, just as he did? I wonder where he is now.
She sat at the remains of an old banquet table in a large chamber of the palace, breaking the fast with Menk, Omari, Baki—and Mamet Mut.
After taking control of the Horizon rebels two nights earlier, Rae’s first order of business was to bring the head weaver into their inner circle.
The stout woman took to rebellion with her signature gusto, offering a host of ideas, strategies, and information.
Menk was impressed, and maybe a little infatuated.
Every time she spoke to him, his tremendous ears turned pink.
While Menk explained that everything would be ready for their departure the next day, Rae felt Mamet Mut’s probing gaze upon her. The older woman leaned over the table, her generous bosom nearly upsetting a bowl of lentils.
“You haven’t touched your beer this morning,” the woman whispered. “Nor anything except that piece of bread. You need your strength, Raetawy. It’s hard enough for these men to take orders from a woman without her looking like a boiled chicken. Eat! Drink! Get some color in your cheeks!”
Rae grumbled and reached for her cup of beer, but when the cloying, sweet smell hit her nostrils, she nearly gagged.
That smell.
It immediately sent her back to the brewery. To the night she confronted the brewer with his treachery and thrust a dagger in his gut. The smell of the beer recalled it all: the rage, the sound of the brewer’s cup shattering on the floor, the sight of all that blood pouring out of him—
Rae groaned softly and pushed away the drink.
Menk stopped midsentence, and Omari looked over at her.
“You all right, Ay?” he asked.
Rae cleared her throat and sat up straight. “Fine,” she replied. She reached for the water jug and poured herself a cup. “It all sounds good to me, Menk. We’ll leave first thing in the morning.”
“Have you decided who you’re taking with you?” Menk asked.
Rae nodded. “It will be me, Omari, Buto, the potter’s son, and Kay, the fisherman. Buto is a pain in my ass, but he’s young and strong and a good fighter—as is the potter’s son. And Kay is dependable and will help ensure that our disguise is convincing. Not a bad one to have in a brawl either.”
There was flash of movement at the door. Rae glanced up, but saw no one. Somebody is eavesdropping. She had a good idea who it might be.
“Wise choices,” Menk said. “Mamet Mut, Baki, and I will remain here with the others to continue our canvassing and surveillance efforts.”
“Because the plan will be fluid once we arrive and set up in Thonis, we’ll need to relay messages back here to Sakesh,” Rae said. “Menk, do you think your pigeons can make the trip?”
Menk nodded. “They’ve carried messages to Thonis and back before. They can do it again.”
“Good,” said Rae. It was only after her rise to leadership in the Horizon that Rae found out about Menk’s flock of trained birds, which were about to become extremely useful. “Now, if we are successful—”
Mamet Mut quirked an eyebrow at her.
Rae cleared her throat. “When we are successful in recovering our people,” she corrected, “we will need a safe way to transport them home. One skiff will not be enough for the return trip.”
Baki spoke up. “It will be my mission to devise a plan for your safe passage back to Sakesh.” The shepherd had been quiet for most of the meeting but seemed to jump at the undertaking. Rae suspected he was still eager to repay her for taking a beating from the nomarch on his behalf.
There was only one more point to discuss. No one had spoken of it yet, as if its mere mention might bring greater misfortune upon them. But Rae was never one to hold her tongue.
“And what of the river?” she asked.
Her question was greeted with silence.
“Menk, you were obviously down at the riverbank this morning, speaking to the fisherman. Tell me: What of the river?”
Menk scratched behind one of his enormous ears and spoke.
“The Iteru appears to have returned to normal after yesterday’s…
phenomenon. Though none were yet brave enough to enter its waters—at least not while I was there.
I’m sure that will have changed by now. Even one day without the river is too much. ”
Rae toyed with the golden swivel ring she’d gotten from the Jackal, spinning the rectangular bead that had a different symbol on each face.
Snake. Feather. Eye. Scarab. Snake. Feather.
Eye. Scarab. She’d gone down to the riverbank the day before, as soon as news of its transformation reached her.
It was an extraordinary sight—the entire river had turned the color of blood.