“Stay!” Rahotep spoke the word distinctly. “Stay with Kheti!”
Since his arms were now in the slave halter, he nudged Bis toward the Nubian with his knee. Bis regarded the captain unblinkingly with that disconcerting gaze that is the gift of the feline clan, and then sat down, curling the tip of his nervous tail neatly over his front toes. Bis would stay.
There was a screen of reeds between them and the road. Behind Rahotep, and on either side of that highway, his men were in hiding. But now a whistling bird call from a fringe Scout heralded the coming of the caravan. A file of men, for the most part neck-noosed and arm-bound, wavered by, dull and broken-spirited. And then came a litter carried by four of their kind who had been pressed into the duty. On it one of the guards lay, his face flushed a dusky red as he breathed in tearing snores. Sun-touched, Rahotep thought.
Mahu had been right. The rest of the guards flanked the litter with an anxious attention that suggested that the stricken man was their commander. Only now and again did any run back to bring up the straggling line of slaves. Rahotep watched one guard make that tour and return to his post ahead. The slaves who had fallen into a shuffling trot under his cracking whip were closing up, and as the tail of that forlorn procession passed the screen before the captain, he drew a deep breath--such as he might have taken before plunging into the current of the Nile at flood--and stepped out into the trail to join them.
So much depended upon his luck at that second and during the few that would follow. To the outward eye he was filthy, as naked and ill-used as the rest. But would any of them show surprise and draw the attention of the guards? If that happened, he prayed it would be at once, while the archers hidden in the reeds could give him cover to escape. Let such a discovery be made beyond this thicket, closer to the city walls, and he would have to depend upon his own fleetness of foot. And once inside Neferusi, betrayal would mean only death, and not a clean or quick death.
His heart thumped heavily in his chest as he matched his pace to the slaves’ shuffle and drew level with the last two men. One of them was half reeling, his face drawn into a skull’s harsh angles under the thin coating of grimed skin, an unshaven beard straggling patchily from his jaw line. The slave’s eyes were half closed, and he stared at the ground ahead as if he saw only it--or perhaps nothing at all.
Rahotep’s other companion was of a different breed. He was no driven rack of bones close to the end of his miserable life, though he was as unkempt as the other. His head turned at the captain’s coming.
It was then that Rahotep saw he was not an Egyptian. But neither was he of the same race as the Hyksos. His skin, under the grime and dust, was several shades lighter than the captain’s own, and his matted hair was faded almost white under the strength of the sun. He was as tall as Kheti and, had he been well fed, might have matched the Nubian in strength of arm and limb.
Just as he was different in appearance from the other slave, so also was he far more alert to what lay about him. But though he studied Rahotep from head to foot in a series of sharp glances, he said nothing. And the captain began to hope that he would not, for now they were coming from the reed bed into the open territory about the city.
Or did this stranger expect to wait until Rahotep was entrapped within the walls and then give the alarm, so buying better treatment, perhaps even freedom, for himself? Though the hours the captain had lain in the dungeons of Anubis had seemed endless, longer yet was the space of time it took for the slave train to crawl to the gates of Neferusi and to enter the first of those gates and march between the encircling walls to the second.
Rahotep studied carefully the well-guarded entrance to the city. But more than half his mind waited for the eventual shout from the man marching next to him, the ultimate disclosure leading to his capture. But that betrayal did not come. The tall, fair-skinned unknown no longer watched him but marched with his eyes to the ground in front, and now his broad shoulders were a little bowed. He trudged along as if he had not only lost interest, but energy and spirit as well.
Even if his companion in the slave train did not call attention to him, Rahotep now faced another crisis. If the Hyksos administrator scribes were as meticulous in their duties as those of the Egyptian forces, there would be a roster of labor slaves and they would be checked off on that list. Discreet questioning in the royal camp had brought him no information about Hyksos affairs. He had to trust to the Great Ones’ favor in that respect as in many others.
It might have been the illness of the guard officer that caused the confusion as they entered the second and final gate of Neferusi. But in any event, no official produced any list and Rahotep, with his fellow bondsmen, was herded into a dark warehouse, already well tenanted by some of the city slaves. The stifling heat and horrible stench of the place struck them at the door, making Rahotep so dizzy for a moment or two that he lurched sidewise, stumbling against the light-haired stranger.
The man shoved him away roughly and, in the strongly accented Egyptian speech of the slave caste, grunted, “On your feet, stupid one. Do you think you are the captain to be litter-borne? “
That shove had sent the Scout captain against the wall, and he leaned there, very glad of its support, as he surveyed the hole into which they had been thrust. There were windows after all, but there were only four of them near the roof, and the air they admitted was negligible. The heat of the day was trapped below that roof so that most of the men prisoned there could only lie on the beaten earth floor, if they could find space enough to stretch out their cramped limbs, and pant like dying fish caught in a casting net.
Unless they were given some relief, Rahotep thought grimly, the labor gangs would be thinned by morning. Even men inured to labor beneath the sun and the fierce heat of the dry season could not long hold strength or health under this.
“You have chosen a bad lodging--”
The dark of the room had been intensified by the closing of the door, and Rahotep heard the locking bar rattle into place. But that sound was not loud enough to blank out the husky half-whisper. And the barbarous accent was that of the stranger.
“You also,” he replied shortly.
The bark of sound that came from the stranger next might have been intended for a laugh, though there was little humor in it. “Not by my own will--” And in spite of the crudity of accent, the intonation of those few words hinted to Rahotep that the other was deeply interested in him and meant to press for an explanation.
“Not by my own will,” the other repeated more sharply when the captain did not reply. “I am one Icar, a seafarer--or was a seafarer,” he added with a bitterness easy to hear.
“You were wrecked?” the captain asked, not because he had any real wish to hear the other’s story, but if he kept the fellow talking of his own affairs, he escaped awkward questions in return.
“Wrecked? Not so! Wrecking one can understand--such fortune is the will of the gods. But the seizure of the king’s men--that is something else, not directed by any god save a dark one!” There was hot passion in that protest. “Let one of these Hyksos claim a debt and swear to it before a judge of his own blood and a man’s ship is seized, his body sold!”
“You are of the islanders who follow Minos?”
“Not so! I am of the northern lands beyond the Bull’s kingdom. The gods gave me an ill gift at my birthing, an itch which tingles in my feet so that I must ever seek new places. But this is a new place I have no liking for--” He sighed, and slipped down to the floor, where in the dusky shadow his big frame was but a darker blot among the others already resting there.
“You term yourself seafarer,” commented Rahotep without realizing where his idle words would lead, “yet I would have said that you know the feel of an ax haft in your hand. Or do you favor the swords of the northerners?”
“An ax and a sword, warrior! Aye, I know the swing of either--just as you do--”
Rahotep squirmed. This Icar was hitting too close to the truth. He replied to that
hint swiftly.
“A battle captive needs must forget such skills when he is put on the slave block--”
“Aye. But never before have I seen a slave come out of hiding to join himself to his fellows by his own will. Rather is it that he takes to his heels in the opposite direction. Also, though you have rolled in the dust and allowed your beard to grow somewhat, you are too well fed and walk with too firm a step to have been long in bonds. Nay, I shall not ask you what you do here--what a man does not know he cannot be forced to tell. But it seems to me that you have walked into a lion’s den for the purpose of thrusting your sandal hard against his nose. And what lion takes such impudence kindly?”
Rahotep chuckled. The wry humor of the barbarian seaman was contagious, and he began to wonder if he could not take the other a little into his confidence and include him in future plans. Icar plainly retained his spirit and, by the looks of him, much of his bodily strength. Certainly he would have little love for his Hyksos captors. And the promise of freedom might bring him into partnership.
The bar at the door was lifted, and the portal opened to admit a set of Nubians bearing jars and baskets of hard bread. They might have been mobbed by the more agile of the penned slaves, but they were accompanied by overseers who used their whips freely to clear a space in which the food and drink was left. As the Nubians and the guards withdrew, there was a concentrated rush for the supplies. But Icar had already jumped in front of the jars and was using his fists furiously, shouting, “Sons of pigs! Eaters of dust! Take care--the water must not be spilled!”
His roar, trained to outblast sea gales, reached enough ears to stem that forward thrust, and Rahotep pushed up beside him as a ready lieutenant. A nucleus of the keener-witted and stronger slaves came to their aid, so that the jars remained safe, and Icar measured out a share of the precious liquid to each man, with the exactitude of one to whom water was often scarce.
Rahotep mouthed a portion of the dust-dry bread he did not wish but could not refuse, and then sipped a mouthful of water, glad of his training in arid living. But though he had withdrawn from the huddle about the supplies, he was not to escape Icar so easily. The seaman came to hunker down beside him, cradling his own share of the bread in his big hand.
“These Hyksos dogs do not know how to handle slaves,” he remarked. “You get more labor out of a man who is well fed and tended than you do from a rack of bones.”
“It may be that they have so many necks under their yokes that they need not count the dead in their slave gangs,” returned the captain bleakly.
“And Egyptians they need not fear--since they have been allowed to lie fat and untroubled in this land for many years--”
Rahotep curbed a sharp retort, suspicious that the other might be baiting him. He schooled all emotion out of his voice as he answered.
“How may a man revolt when all the weapons are in the hands of his enemies and his own are empty? Do you expect spirit-broken specters to rise against their guards?”
“Yesterday I might have said ‘Even so’ to that. Tonight--tonight I am beginning to think that there is perhaps a spark of hope. And there may be those within this very room who might be inspired to active defiance were that hope made theirs also.”
“Why do you believe that tonight?” asked Rahotep.
There was a lazy laugh out of the dark. “Maybe I have been favored with a revelation from the gods--or more likely I have seen a slave slink out of safe hiding to join a train of his fellows. As I have said, comrade in bonds, no man with wits in his skull would do that unless he had a strong purpose, and that purpose can mean no good to those who hold the power now in Neferusi! Tell me!” A hand closed about Rahotep’s forearm, crushing the flesh painfully. “Tell me, what do you here? Is it some act of private vengeance or do you look to nose out secrets of Neferusi for another reason?”
“And why should I answer your questions, Icar?” Rahotep kept his voice steady, nor did he try to jerk his arm free from that vise.
“Because I am no born slave, man of the Two Lands--” He gave Rahotep the name the Egyptians used for themselves. “And I have kept ready for the day when I might strike back at these oath-breakers and man-stealers! I love the Hyksos no better than you do. And I believe that you would not have entered Neferusi unless you not only had a plan in mind to put into action against these devil worshipers, but also a way to get out again. So I am willing to aid you in order that you may tell me of that way out--remembering always”--his light tone was gone and there was a harsh note in his voice--”that I can point you out to those who would be most eager to question you--with far less kindness!”
There was truth in every word of that. Rahotep accepted the sincerity of the man. And Icar would be an able comrade. His own plans were flexible enough to include the barbarian.
“You have guessed rightly. I am in Neferusi to see what can be seen. And I plan to leave tomorrow night.”
“And what must you see?” persisted Icar eagerly.
“The walls and the guards stationed on them, the forces within those walls--”
He had dropped his own voice to a half whisper, and now he felt Icar’s grasp on his arm, which had loosened, grow tight again.
“Say no more, man of the Two Lands,” he was ordered. “It is enough that you come here on such a mission. Let me contrive it when they call out the slaves in the morning that we shall both be in the same gang and put to the right work. I have lived among these Hyksos for a year. What I have learned of them is yours. Now, sleep if you can, for they rouse out the workers before dawn.”
But Rahotep found sleep hard to pursue in the slave quarters of Neferusi. He regretted the hours that must lapse before he could be about the business that had brought him there. And when Icar’s breathing close to his ear became an intermittent snoring, he half resented the other’s ability to rest. Then he nodded into a broken dozing in which dream monsters lurked.
The seaman had been right. The guards came in with their rousing whips before the light was gray, and a second installment of food was brought to those penned in that stinking hole. Rahotep bit into a hot onion and cooled his mouth with the bread, which was half husks. But they were given only a limited time to eat. On order, Icar pulled at his shoulder, urging him to the door and whispering, “Those first out are deemed the strongest. They shall be used for the wall work--”
That suggestion was enough to make Rahotep press forward so eagerly that again his mentor had to caution him. “What slave runs to his toil, comrade? Be out early, aye, but do not clamor for labor.”
They were lined up in squads of ten in the courtyard, and Rahotep kept to the side of the seaman. There were three Nubians also in his group, and he watched them speculatively. Like Icar, they appeared not to have suffered so severely from their hard life, though they were clearly underfed and overworked. But Nubians! If he could have the chance to sound them out, he might discover other lieutenants besides Icar among these chattels of the Hyksos. The rest of the group were a Bwedani--a small, wiry man with a vicious face, a criminal Rahotep thought, rather than a serf or war captive--and four Egyptians, dull, patient men with all the rebellion and intelligence starved and beaten out of them.
They were strung together in neck nooses, a minor torturous arrangement whereby any man not keeping pace with his fellows could well strangle his neighbors--so enlisting their vigilance to add to that of the guard. Thus they were marched to the walls, a destination Rahotep greeted eagerly.
He had thought that his life on the Kush frontier and the hardships of the past weeks had inured him to all discomfort. But he had not been before a burden slave, and he speedily discovered that neither the deserts of the south nor the dungeons of Anubis had prepared him for this. The Egyptians worked with dogged patience; the Bwedani shirked when he could, though their overseer was a conscientious man determined to get the best out of his squad, and the thongs of his lash found the back of the small man regularly until he was driven to pulling his weight
with the rest. Icar and the Nubians had the greater strength, and they hoisted stones in a rhythm fitted to the Nubians’ monotonous work song.
They were given rests measured by the sun’s creeping up a notched stick, and during one such Rahotep, greatly daring, spoke to the Nubian who had thrown himself down between the captain and the pile of stones they were to set in place.
“By the horns of the Spotted Goat, this is work to roast a man in his own juices.”
The eyes in that dark face opened, and the man stared at him.
“Who are you,” he asked in the same low-pitched whisper, “who swears by the Spotted One of the bowmen?”
“One who has drawn bow cord in their company.” Rahotep bit down his excitement. By chance, or by some design beyond his comprehension, his password had been right. The man he had spoken to was, or had been, of a southern warrior clan.
“I am Huy who was tricked into taking service with these dogs of evil, only to discover that the service was not that of the bow but of the back.” He spat. “And you who have also held the bow--what do you here?”
“If I say to make trouble for the sons of Set, will you believe it?”
Those white teeth showed in a leopard’s grin. “Believe it? Rather will I say let me join in such trouble--”
“And there are others here of a like mind?”
Huy’s head went back against the ground once more, and the captain was warned. His tender shoulders gritted against the rough stone, and he stared vacantly down at his hands as a detachment of Hyksos wall guards tramped by. But he had counted them and assessed their arms--slinger, spearmen, two bowmen.