Testament, page 27
‘I need to be careful . . . deliberate . . . so I don’t miss anything.’
The fiery lines illuminated the shape of a man – a single one this time, not the two that had been etched on the stone in the necropolis at Thebes. This was the Opener of the Way. This, he thought with a shiver, was him. He was the one being judged.
Beside that figure were three horizontal rectangles, each one with a small X carved in a different position: to the right on the first, to the left on the second, in the centre on the third.
That was all.
Piay felt queasy. What could it mean? He jolted on the rope again so those above would not become suspicious at the time he was taking. But his increasingly desperate thoughts tumbled over each other. He wished Myssa – his true Myssa – was there to guide him.
Somehow, Piay calmed himself. Imhotep had left instructions for a successful journey into the underworld. He would have to trust, even if he did not understand.
Weight . . . balance . . . feather. Then: Right . . . left . . . centre.
Piay turned those words over again and again, searching for inspiration. Finally, a notion struck him. The barriers were counterbalanced. Were the Xs the points on the slab where he should stand to tip them – perhaps shift them quickly so that he could reach the bottom before the water surged up? Could Imhotep have foreseen his size, his weight, so these barriers were perfectly attuned to him? Nothing would surprise him anymore.
‘Lower me down,’ he called up. ‘I’m going to set the trap in motion and hope I’m fast enough to get through.’
After a brief silence, Tallus’ voice floated down. ‘Do what you will.’
Piay steeled himself. Now was the moment of life or death. He tucked the Eye of Horus into the pouch and yanked on the rope.
As he descended, Piay stared down the shaft, watching the receding darkness. Eventually it ebbed away and the torchlight revealed the first slab of limestone blocking the way.
When his feet settled on it, he felt the slab begin to move, but very slowly. At the same time, a dim grinding echoed from somewhere far beneath him, followed by the sound of rushing water. So now the test had become a race. He had to solve the puzzle and get out before the water filled the chamber, or whatever else was at the bottom of the shaft.
Piay had to move fast.
Muttering a prayer to Khonsu, he stepped to the first position indicated on Imhotep’s engraving, to the right of the slab. Instantly the stone beneath his feet swung faster and he dropped through the gap. He fumbled to keep hold of the torch in his surprise. The movement must have shocked the men holding the rope, for they eventually slowed his descent. Piay jolted the rope twice, hoping it would send a message that he needed to move faster. That worked.
When his feet touched the second slab, Piay instantly moved to the left and the barrier swung open. He could hear the gurgling of the water below and smell the dank scents of the river.
On the third slab, he stood in the centre and this one tipped a different way. He felt his legs fall out from under him and he plunged down towards the final chamber.
Piay splashed into chilling water, his feet hitting stone almost instantly. He felt a rush of relief when he realised the level was only just above his knees.
His heart thumped. Time was short. He turned around in a full circle, sweeping the torch across the glistening stone walls to illuminate this new space. Shards of gold glinted across the swirling black water. At least there was no sign of Ammit, the terrifying composite of lion, hippo and crocodile waiting to devour him. But something certainly ate those other men.
Piay’s attention fell on a large dark opening on one wall. Water gushed through it so fast the chamber would be engulfed in no time.
The echoes of the cascade boomed all around him as Piay threw himself into the search for Imhotep’s secret. The torchlight swept in a delirious whirl, but the walls showed no distinguishing features and the water was licking up them at an alarming rate. Desperation spiked in his stomach.
Yet as he ranged around the space, his toe bumped against a raised object. Feeling his hope disappearing as quickly as the water was rising, Piay dropped to his knees. He held up the torch in one hand, praying that the water would not extinguish it while he scrabbled around with his free hand. His fingers slipped across something hard and slick. It was circular in shape, and seemed to be set into a groove in the flagstone.
Piay clawed at it with his fingernails, trying to get a purchase strong enough to pull the object out of its housing. Finally, he succeeded and stood back up with it in his hand. Then he held his torch to examine what he had found.
‘Ha!’ he exclaimed to himself. ‘Tallus was right.’
The object he had just found was a slim disc, a little wider than the span of his hand. To judge by its weight, and the blazing gleam of the light on its untarnished surface, it was made of gold. The object seemed to be a representation of Ra’s great orb, with flames leaping from the edge at four points. It was intricately constructed with symbols and shapes etched into it – a star, a moon . . . too many for him to take in at that instant.
There was no time to examine it further. Piay slipped the disc into Tallus’ pouch and peered up at the sealed third slab. One great puzzle had been solved, but an even greater one lay ahead.
Piay knew that the only reward he would ever get from Akkan for finding Imhotep’s secret was his own death. If he allowed the guards to drag him back up, no protestations or bartering would prevent the warriors from cutting him down in an instant. But if he stayed where he was, he would drown.
Death at both ends.
The rushing water licked up to his thigh.
Piay hardened. He would not give in. He needed to lead Myssa to freedom for a second time, help her to escape from Akkan and whatever depravity he had planned for her. And Taita had placed his trust in him. He could not let down the man who had shaped him and showered him with kindness. Against those things, his own life meant nothing.
As Piay searched for a way out, his gaze fell on that now almost obscured black square where the water was flooding in. The water must be coming from somewhere, along a tunnel. So there was another opening, just like this one, at the other end of that tunnel. Piay just didn’t know how far away that hole might be.
He felt a chill along his spine. Could he? Should he? Did he have any choice at all?
When he’d stood on solid ground beside the hole, Piay had judged the distance to the river from where he was certain the water was coming. Thinking about it now, he felt sure he could cover that distance in open water. But in a tiny tunnel in the dark? And what if Imhotep had set more slabs to fall in place along the way? The tunnel was not wide enough to turn around.
Piay felt a shudder of dread run through him. He imagined being trapped in the dark, deep underground, choking on the water filling his lungs as he thrashed and died.
He shook himself. What point was there in dwelling on such a terrible vision? It would not help him escape this trap. And he had no other choice. He had to gamble everything if he had any hope of living to see the next dawn.
Piay slipped his hand into his kilt to the secret pocket where he kept his knife. Drawing out the blade, he sawed through the hide rope that bound him to the men up above.
Let the Hyksos wonder what had happened when they drew it up and found their captive gone.
The water now chilled his waist.
Piay waded across the chamber to the tunnel entrance. He felt around the edge of the hole, his fingertips exploring the grooves where another slab would descend to seal off the flooding water.
Yes, there will be no way back.
He could not waste any more time. Steeling himself, Piay tossed the torch across the chamber. With a splash, the flames sizzled out and the dark engulfed him.
Piay gripped the edges of the hole, sucked in three deep breaths and plunged beneath the surface. The water shocked him with its coldness. In contrast, he felt a fire roar through him, searing strength into his limbs.
Thrusting into the tunnel, Piay kicked out to propel himself while using his hands to drag him along the walls. The darkness was so all-consuming he could not tell if he was swimming up or down.
Piay clawed his way forward.
In that constrained space, with no perception of the distance ahead, he felt the first flicker of panic begin to ignite in his mind. He could not afford to give in to it. If he did, he was lost.
The air began to dwindle in his chest. How much further could he swim before his air burned out?
Ahead of him, he sensed a disturbance in the water as shifting currents swept down to batter his face. He prayed it was some eddy from the entrance into the river, but the shifting water became stronger until he was being buffeted.
He could see nothing.
Yet he had the sense that something was sweeping towards him in the dark. A vision of the poor farmer’s gnawed foot flashed into his mind, and suddenly he knew what was coming. Dread rushed through him once more, a dread even more powerful than his thoughts of drowning.
Though he couldn’t see anything, Piay somehow sensed when the threat was almost upon him. It would be a river crocodile, those savage beasts with their ridged armoured hide, bronze in colour and flecked with black, camouflage that allowed them to hide in the mud in the shallows. He had once seen a child, who had foolishly ventured into one of the reed beds, bitten in half by one of these silent predators, so powerful were their crushing jaws and flesh-rending fangs.
In the river he would have stood little chance. Here, there were straws he could try to clutch.
The tunnel was so restricted that the beast would have to be young, not one of the powerful older predators. He knew their eyes were sharp enough to see well by starlight, but here there was no light at all. He prayed the creature would be as blind as he was, though whether it could scent him, he did not know.
The water churned harder and then the crocodile slammed into him, spinning him against the wall. As he flailed, he lashed out with his free hand, feeling it rake across the ridges of that armoured skin.
The beast thrashed, coiling and lunging in wild movements, but it was as limited in that confined space as he was. That restriction seemed to whip it to even wilder extremes, and though Piay imagined that jaw snapping, it could not gain a purchase on him.
Throwing his arm around the scaly beast, he slid it back up the body until it reached where he thought the head must be. He could feel the jaws cranking wider and he snapped his arm tight around the snout.
Khonsu must have smiled on him, for he clamped the jaw shut. The beast twisted and turned, smashing him against the wall with the tremendous power of those muscles, but Piay clung on for dear life.
His chest burned. Sparks flashed behind his eyes and he knew his life was draining away.
But then all that struggle, all that confusion, seemed to slip away into the darkness and his thoughts became as calm as a desert night under a clear sky.
Gripping the knife, he stabbed again and again into the soft flesh of the river crocodile’s underside. The blade sank deep every time.
The beast whirled into a storm of rage. Time and again Piay slammed against the stone. How he held on he did not know, but he did. Finally he managed to rip with his knife, opening up the creature’s innards.
And then he was kicking away along the tunnel, past the writhing crocodile. It would not be able to turn and follow him. He had survived that ordeal. But there was a worse one to come.
Piay could feel the terrible ache inside him and the almost uncontrollable urge to open his mouth and gulp. His thoughts fizzed in that death-panic, but a deeper part of him knew that if he did that he would be journeying to the afterlife.
On, he forced himself, on and on. Unable to tell how far he had travelled or how far he had yet to go. All that he knew was that he loved life and did not want to let it go.
A hazy grey patch appeared ahead of him. At first he thought this was some illusion, or a vision. Soon, he told himself, he would see Osiris opening the door to the afterlife.
But then he glimpsed silver fish flash by in shafts of sunlight breaking through the water, and his heart leaped.
Piay pulled himself out of the tunnel and into the river. Death beckoned. Up he thrust. With one final, desperate effort, he broke the surface and heaved in huge lungfuls of air.
His thoughts thundered into a rush of such joy he felt he would be carried away with it. With the last of his strength, Piay dragged himself into the shallows and clawed his way up the muddy bank. There he lay, laughing and crying.
He had been judged and had not been found wanting. His journey to the great reward continued.
P
iay sprawled face down in the sticky mud for what seemed like an age. The hot sun prickled his back and the soothing whisper of the reeds rustled around him. With each deep, juddering breath, calm slowly returned until his body trembled with a rush of overwhelming joy.
He was alive!
Yet as the gulls swooped and shrieked overhead, as if celebrating his survival, he felt the weight of his responsibilities creep into his mind. With them came exhaustion, settling deep into the very core of his being. All his fire had been drained away by that ordeal.
But he could not afford to rest. He had plucked a great advantage from the jaws of what had seemed like certain death, and now he must not let that go.
Piay pushed himself up so he could delve into the pouch. The golden disc he had recovered from the bottom of the shaft was still there, as was the Eye of Horus. Without those, Akkan and his band would not be able to advance any further along Imhotep’s path. But if Piay devoted every scrap of his intelligence and courage to the Riddle of the Stars, he might be able to move forward to the great prize. And he had solved the puzzle of that shaft. Perhaps he truly could solve the whole thing.
Piay staggered to his feet but kept his head down. The voices of Akkan’s men echoed through the date palms and the shrubs lining the river. Some were still questioning what might have happened to him. Others were angry at yet another failure, and the loss of the Eye of Horus, too.
Piay strained to find Myssa’s voice. He wanted to hear a wail of grief, as if she were tearing her hair or beating her breast at the thought of his death. But there was nothing.
Just accept it, you’ve lost her, he told himself. Maybe she’ll come to her senses, maybe she won’t. But in the meantime, you just solved the puzzle of the Second Door, and you did it without her help. This is what Taita sent you to Memphis to do. So just obey your orders and try not to think about that woman.
P
iay had lost Hannu, too, although he should, with luck, be easier to recover.
He won’t leave the area until he knows for sure that I’m dead, Piay told himself.
True, the sight and sound of the Hyksos, cursing the loss of yet another man down Imhotep’s well, would be enough to make most men write him off, but Hannu might just be stubborn enough to stick around, precisely because no one else would.
So where was he?
Somewhere close enough to observe the camp without risking his own neck, Piay concluded.
He crawled up onto the bank, some way downstream from the camp, and then circled back around it at what he considered a safe distance.
Piay was counting on the idea that after all the time they had spent working and fighting side by side, there would be little to choose between his idea of a safe distance and Hannu’s. Sure enough, he soon spotted his comrade lying on his belly in a field, peering towards the well. Piay felt sure he had not made the slightest sound, but Hannu leaped to his feet in an instant, sword in hand.
He gaped when he saw who was standing before him.
‘By Ra’s fiery chariot, are you a ghost?’
Piay grinned. ‘Flesh and bone, like you. Though younger and much better-looking.’
‘Doesn’t seem to have done you much good with Myssa,’ Hannu said, with characteristic disregard for Piay’s emotions.
Piay knew that teasing was just Hannu’s way of hiding his true feelings. And he could hear the barely disguised fear in his friend’s voice when he added, ‘I thought you were dead.’
‘So did I. But it seems the gods had other plans for me. You know, it’s not until we’re on the threshold of the afterlife that we discover what truly lies within us. Anyway, let’s be off. Akkan’s caught me once. I’m not giving him a second chance.’
‘Seriously, though, what about Myssa?’
Piay swallowed. ‘She’s lost to me for now – maybe to all of us. We can talk about it on the way back to Memphis.’
On the banks of the Nile, they searched among the vessels moored in the shallows until they found a trader taking a break from his long journey from Busiris, in the far north of the country, to Memphis. He was returning for the first time since the siege, with bales of papyrus to sell in the market. He seemed pleased to have two polite but tough men on board his skiff in case they encountered trouble.
When he resumed his voyage, unfurling the sail to catch the hot wind blowing from the delta and the Great Green Sea beyond, Piay and Hannu settled astern under the shade of a canopy. The trader was too occupied with navigation to pay them any attention.
Once Piay had described what he had found in Akkan’s camp, Hannu grunted and crossed his arms.
‘Myssa would never have turned against you in that manner.’
‘Perhaps she was fooling me from the day we first met. Just biding her time—’
Hannu snorted. ‘Get a grip on yourself. Anyone could see she really loved you. Maybe she was pretending, to keep herself safe from the Child-Killer.’
Piay shook his head. ‘No. I looked in her eyes. She truly believed what she was saying.’
‘Then I blame the Cobra. He must have given her something – a potion. Maybe it was that blue lotus stuff that the Hyksos take. Never tried it myself, but they think it’s got magic powers.’
‘I’ve been hearing a lot about that lately,’ Piay said. ‘I know that Akkan has used it to contact Seth. He transformed himself. Maybe he’s planning to do that to Myssa. He, uh . . . He said that she was going to be his bride.’
