The evening sun was beginning to set, as J’tan motioned for Malachi and Samali to keep pace. He lengthened his stride, racing across the parched earth toward their sanctuary. His heart pounded with the screams wafting above the houses and echoing through the narrow streets. As they broke out into the plaza, he headed toward the house of his father, as Malachi and Samali scampered toward the temple.
The many nights spent looking after Malachi reawakened J’tan’s passion for the priesthood. He spent hours with Jethro, learning about the rituals performed, and the reasons for them. In Jethro’s presence, J’tan could finally absorb what he wanted to as a boy. He ensured he did not miss the opportunity.
For most Egyptians, there were four major ceremonies throughout the year. The first, the Festival of the Eastern Star, was held in the spring when the first shoots of the New Year’s crops sprouted forth from the ground. It coincided with the return of the Eastern Star to the skies after its three-day period below the horizon in the domain of Set.
The second, the Festival of Fertility held on the longest day of the year, was associated with the male fertility God Min. Due to this, many people still called the day min-summer, although this was rarely used anymore. Over its two-day period, feasts and orgies abounded. Children conceived on these days were considered blessed, and due to the natural cycles of womanhood, the offspring produced would sometimes be born on the Festival of the Eastern Star, doubling their blessing and exalting their positions within society.
The third, the Feast of the Harvest, was a sacred time. Offerings from the harvest were given at temples all over the lands to honour the God Renenutet and bring blessings from the God whose temple the offering was made at.
The fourth, the Festival of Return, signalled the shortest day of the year, when the God Ra would teeter on the edge of oblivion, his yearly battle with Set almost at its end. Wine and food abounded, the chanting of the Priests of Ra heard all over the land, heralding the return of Ra to his exalted place in the skies and the eventual reappearance of life to the land.
J’tan could remember the day Jethro showed him the secret chamber in his temple for the first time. Loaded down with offerings from the Feast of the Harvest, Jethro stepped behind the Altar and revealed the hidden vault; storing the wines and wheat away, and only allowing the faithful back into the temple once the altar was empty.
J’tan knew that to many the temple being empty was a sign that Ra-Horakhti had accepted their offering and was pleased. However, once he realised Jethro had hidden them away to maintain that illusion, he found he was not upset, but pleased.
J’tan had always believed men took the offerings given to the Gods. What would a God, he reasoned, whose power was unlimited need with a slaughtered lamb or a goblet of wine? A God would surely not want some poor man’s tarnished offering. Seeing the hidden vault finally confirmed his suspicions. Priests were not just the mouths of their Gods they were actively involved in keeping the devotees faithful.
However, all that was in the past. Now more than ever, he needed to give something back. He needed to protect his new family.
J’tan arrived at his father’s house and flung the cloth to one side. “Father!” he said, searching the room for signs of activity. “Father!” There was no response.
Leaving the abode, J’tan made his way quickly across the plaza and up the ramp before the temple, as the screams coming from the fast approaching chaos drew ever closer.
The temple was comprised of a single, stone hall. Four alcoves were carved into each wall and a large altar lay to its rear. In each alcove was an intricately carved statue of Ra-Horakhti in the various poses of his horizons, each one a delicate depiction of the yearly cycle of his glory.
J’tan opened his mouth to call out to the figures in the shadows of the temple and froze. In the chamber with Samali and the others were the figures of five guards. The lead guard he recognised instantly as a despiteful lower caste dullard called Rhion. The runty, hairless oaf expelled from their order months ago for extorting money from hapless market holders in exchange for favourable locations.
J’tan slowed as he approached. Rhion held the upper hand.
Rhion held Jethro to him, a blade pressed against his neck. Two of his compatriots grasped the women and children, whilst two others restrained Malachi.
“Glad you could finally join us, J’tan.” said Rhion, his glee evident in his twisted smile. “It would be a shame if you missed this.” His lip curled upward, a sure sign of intent.
J’tan tried to remain calm, as he began to stride forward, hoping to gain control of the situation. “You should leave these people alone and exit this place while you still can.” he said, his voice loaded with confidence.
“We act as our God’s will this day. You shall all suffer for your heresy!” said Rhion.
J’tan caught the flash of pure hatred as it glinted in Rhion’s eye and knew this was no posturing threat. There were no options. Rhion simply wanted him here to witness what he was going to do.
J’tan sprang into action and tried to bridge the gap to the group of men. As he advanced, Malachi wrenched himself free of one of the guards, swinging a punch at the other, and felling him with the blow.
J’tan careered down the chamber, as the other guard grabbed Malachi and twisted him sideways. He watched in horror, as the guard drew a slender knife from his belt and plunged it deep into his son’s side.
Malachi’s torso arched, as a gargled froth of blood sprayed out of his mouth. He fell to his knees, desperately clawing at the blade as his strength failed and he lilted sideways to the floor.
J’tan watched helplessly as the light behind his son’s eyes flickered and failed, extinguished forever.
In his life, J’tan sacrificed everything for the Pharaoh. He could never marry, nor have children. This was the way of Pharaoh’s elite. When Jethro offered him the chance to be Malachi’s guardian, he saw it as a gift from Horus. He took it as a sign to imbue the child with as much knowledge as the boy’s mind could hold.
As the years passed, J’tan grew to act as if Malachi were his own. He could think of no greater honour than the day Malachi chose to follow in his footsteps. He stood and cheered with the other elders, as Malachi was accepted to be part of their order. His son was just like him. It was the first time in his life he cried. That day he knew for sure. He loved his son. He loved the child Malachi was, and he loved the man Malachi aspired to become. Yet, here he was, faced with his son’s lifeless body. His beautiful, perfect child had been taken away.
J’tan glared at Rhion and caught the look of unbridled joy on his face, and something snapped deep within him. A tormented lust for pain erupted from that dank recess no man should ever know is part of him. As the red mist descended on his actions, it blinded his conscious mind to the animal unleashed.
The next thing J’tan registered was a voice. It fretted from somewhere distant, just within range of perception, calling him back from the edge of the black.
J’tan focussed on the voice. It was soothing and friendly, and it made the demon unleashed descend back from whence it came.
As if from a dream, J’tan’s vision slowly returned and shapes began to appear from the haze.
“J’tan!” the voice pleaded. “For the love of Horus J’tan, please put him down!”
Still fazed, J’tan looked down. He was not ready for what he saw. Reflexively gagging, he recoiled from the sight of Rhion’s skull in his hands; his thumbs inserted deep into the eye sockets. He let go of the head instinctively, as the weight of the lifeless object pulled it from his digits with a foul plop, tumbling to the temple floor next to the shocked figure of Jethro.
To J’tan’s left, the guards holding the women back were in no better state than the scum at his feet. Heaped on the floor at the base of the wall, most of one man’s brain matter drooled down the limestone face, and oozed out around his crumpled body.
To his right, another man was now just a tangled mass of jutting bone
s. His arms were dislocated and his face was savaged, the flesh ripped away from one side.
The scene behind J’tan was equally macabre. The men who killed his son lay atop one another. The man on the bottom of the steaming pile of flesh unrecognisable due to the quantities of blood, bile, and other bodily fluids the man perched on top of the gruesome stack was issuing. His head was matted with blood, and his skull was smashed into fragments that jutted out through his hair and tangled with his brain like dough. His neck and chest were covered in claw marks and a savage bite hole was visible where his ear once was.
“J’tan?” said Samali, cautiously edging forward. “Can you hear me?”
J’tan moved to look at her, his head turning slowly and methodically, as his mind carefully ordered itself. She was tearful and afraid, clutching the daughter of the mason to her chest. The child bawled, afraid to look at the monster in the room.
“J’tan, you are injured. I must tend to your wounds.”
J’tan heard the words and looked down at his body. Bathed in the innards of the men killed, fragments of cranium and clumps of distended flesh clung to his clothing. Swirls of hair were caught underneath his fingernails, his palms traced by cuts and abrasions. Nothing seemed real. Everything danced and swam; scrambling his thoughts and making him feel nauseous.
“Samali,” J’tan said, his voice slurring, “help…”
Samali rushed to his side, as J’tan collapsed to the ground with a heavy thud. A wound was present in his abdomen and there were numerous other injuries from his conflict all over his torso. She knew she must do something to try to mend the wounds or he would not survive the night.
“I need a spare tunic and some fresh water.” Samali said, not moving from his side.
“There are supplies down there.” Jethro said, pointing to the hidden chamber through tear-swelled eyes. “We should get into cover, as my son told us to.”
Without waiting for response, Jethro moved behind the offering table and lifted the false slab from its notch. Covered in a finely polished slither of limestone, its wooden construction looked unremarkable.
“Come, my dear. You grab his feet and we will take him into our vault and tend to him there.” said Jethro as his daughter helped the children inside.
With no time to argue, Samali helped Jethro lift J’tan to the opening. She expected the hidden chamber would be small, but was surprised to find it was a large and spacious. Jars of assorted goods lined one wall in niches, and a manger sat in the other. The fire the manger contained throwing out just enough heat to make the space comfortable.
Samali worked through the night to stem the bleeding and try to repair as much of J’tan’s broken body as she could. Even though they were underground, she could still hear the continued screams of the inhabitants of the city, as the Pharaoh’s servants carried out their vile plan.
Try as she might, Samali could not take her mind from what happened to Malachi and how that was now repeating everywhere around her. To kill a man’s son was an act of evil beyond anything she could imagine. Out there in the Great City, that wickedness was on the rampage. Innocent children, not one of whom could even have the faintest idea about why they were being tortured, slaughtered like animals. It made her feel sick to her core to contemplate what they must be going through.
As Samali cleaned J’tan’s side and used her salve to ensure it remained free from the rotting green, she fought hard to force the welling tears of sorrow back down inside her soul. Closing her eyes, she prayed to Zhang Dai. With his aid, she would not allow these sacrifices to be in vain.
Chapter 23