...He stood before doors of dark wood that swung inward as he gazed, revealing a sight that chilled him to the bone. He was at the end of a long hallway lined with cloaked, motionless figures. Between the two rows stood a large scale flanked by two indistinct figures, one of them seeming an amalgam of monsters - crocodile, lion, hippopotamus - and the other with the long, thin neck and curved beak of an ibis. Thoth and the Eater of Shades. Beyond the scales, in splendor, sat another figure, cloaked in white with a face that seemed to shine like lightning.
Wenatef had once read through a scroll purchased by his father, telling of the
His hands rose and clenched against his heart and he took a step backward, desperately looking about for a way to escape. But there was nothing but blackness behind him, nowhere to go but to judgement.
He took another step backward, his frightened eyes riveted on the darkness behind him, a frantic prayer for help rising to his lips only to die unspoken. The gods were there already. There would be no help from them.
Something touched his hand, something warm and solid, like rock or earth.
He gasped and turned and found himself staring straight into the face of Anubis, the jackal-headed god, familiar to Wenatef from his carved shape in the entrance of the Tomb.
Wenatef flattened himself against the door with a wail of dismay, his wide eyes fixed on Anubis' face. It was as though Wenatef were looking at two faces at once, seeing beyond the jackal-visage to another face reflecting the quickness, cleverness and determination of a jackal.
He turned and beat upon the dark doors with his clenched fists. Death. The doorway between the worlds...
"Let me out!" he cried.
Anubis seemed to smile; he stepped closer, holding out his hand.
Wenatef shuddered away from him, his own hands clenched and hidden behind him. "I-I'm not ready!" he cried through chattering teeth. "This is a terrible mistake! It isn't my time! P-please - !"
The god's hand was still outstretched, poised with a grace that caught Wenatef's despairing attention. "I'm not ready!" he repeated desperately.
The god's gaze lowered to Wenatef's hands; the hand stretched out once more, inviting, steady.
Wenatef shrank back against the doors.
You're behaving as badly as Merihor, my child.
The words, slipping gently into Wenatef's mind, shocked him to silence.
Anubis had not moved.
Wenatef lowered his head and unclenched his fists. It was useless to resist. What could he do? Remain flattened against the door through all eternity? Wail like a baby? He was an officer of His Majesty and a man of honor and courage. He would be wise to put the best face that he could on this. If he had tried to lead an upright life, surely the judgement would reflect that. It was his only hope. He moved away from the doors and held out his hand; it was gripped reassuringly as Anubis led him to the scales. The walk was frighteningly short. Wenatef tried to say the forty-two denials, but found that he could only keep repeating that he had tried to live an upright life, that he had tried not to hurt anyone or offend the gods.
Now he was at the scales and Anubis was placing his heart on one of the pans and gently setting the Feather of Truth on the other. Thoth lifted his palette and dipped his brush in the ink, ready to record the results. Wenatef experienced the double- vision again, seeing the head of an ibis atop a long neck and then, at the same time, seeing a face with the deliberate movement and wisdom of an ibis.
The Eater of Shades growled softly.
Wenatef heard a commotion behind him, a sense of movement and increased numbers. A voice rang out behind Wenatef as the scales began to swing.
He is mine! I speak for him! A hand, solid as granite, descended to his left shoulder and gripped. Look! said the voice, and another hand appeared from behind Wenatef, to the right, pointing.
But Wenatef was watching the scales as the pans rose and fell slightly, balancing each other.
The grip on Wenatef's left shoulder tightened. Look! the voice said again, and light seemed to flash from the fingertips of the pointing hand.
The scales were still now, perfectly balanced...
O Unnefer, his heart was true! Anubis' voice rang triumphantly through the Hall of Judgement like the call of a great trumpet. Gentle hands set a diadem about Wenatef's forehead, and the Feather of Truth was placed there.
Look! the voice said again, and now Wenatef could turn and see the face behind him, a face full of command and power. He turned back, and suddenly the scales were gone, the rows of gods were gone, Anubis was gone and the room was dark. All that remained was the painful pressure on Wenatef's shoulder, and the flash of light off to his right...
** ** **
Wenatef sat up, all weakness and pain gone. He had slipped onto his side and the statue's foot was digging into his wounded shoulder. He had been dreaming, but he still seemed, waking, to hear the command.
Look!
He looked and then gasped. A finger of light had pushed its way through the wall of the burial room, knifing across the floor to rest upon a long, thin sliver of strange gray metal, streaked and dim, half-hidden in a pool of red within a clutter of dark shapes.
A dagger.
The glow faded and was gone as Wenatef watched, though the light now touched one of the jars. Another second and Wenatef might never have seen the knife, but he had marked its place, and now he dragged himself across the floor to it, his mind awhirl. Where had the light come from? Was the burial chamber carved so deeply into the hill that it had come out the other side?
The dream could wait, Wenatef's bonds could not, and he did not know how long the shaft of sunlight would last. He was free within two minutes. In five minutes he had located a fire drill and materials to use for a torch and had a small fire burning in a large pottery tray. The light from the fire showed that the chamber had been ransacked.
Wenatef wrapped a length of linen about the smashed leg of a chair, tied it with another strip of cloth, and poured oil over the whole before touching it to the fire. It took some time to catch, but then it burned satisfactorily. He found some vessels that he could use for lamps, and several tall jars held oil. In another four minutes Wenatef had a small galaxy of lamps burning throughout the chamber. Now he could look around.
He had been correct: he was in the burial chamber, and an alabaster sarcophagus lay in the far corner with the massive lid cast aside and broken. He went over and looked within. The wooden inner coffins had been opened and stripped of their gold, and he could see the mummy beyond. If a gold or silver mask had ever covered the face, it was gone. The face was still wrapped, but the robbers had taken an axe and split the arms away from the body and then hacked at the chest in their search for gold. Wenatef could see the ends of broken bones, yellow-white in the torchlight.
He swallowed a bitter taste at the back of his throat, found a piece of cloth, and covered the body. A glance at the sarcophagus lid convinced him that he could not replace it alone. Even broken, the pieces were too heavy to be lifted by one or even two men. He shook his head and turned slowly - and his breath froze in his throat.
He was looking at a face that he had seen less than an hour before It was the face that he had seen in his dream - but set within the graceful folds of a striped 'sphinx' headdress, atop wide shoulders and an elegant torso that narrowed to slim hips. His eyes returned to the face.
It was a good face, but a pensive, slightly sad one, and the sculptor had meant it to be a portrait, for it lacked the sweet, serene blandness of most formal sculptures of kings. Wenatef moved forward until, standing knee to knee with the statue, he was looking up into the face.
Yes, it was the face of his dream - but who was he? Wenatef looked down at the statue's chest. Beneath the broad collar was a pendant carved with two names, the given name and the throne name of the king. The hieroglyphs were beautifully shaped. Nakhtamun Nefer-Neferu-Ptah. 'Amun Mighty in Battle', with the throne name 'beautiful are the beauties of Ptah'. Nakhtamun, firstborn son of the great pharaoh Seti I. He had died after a co-regency with his father of only three years. He had died in battle, in Palestine.
Read another chapter...
Return to Tales of Ancient Egypt Return to A Killing Among the Dead