'I've seen him perhaps three times.'
'Here?'
'No, lord, in the village of the tomb makers of Pharaoh.'
Kysen felt the strength drain from his arms and legs, and he was glad that he was sitting down. 'Tell me.'
'We came to Thebes last Drought in search of work and found it at the tomb-makers' village. My father is servant to the painter Useramun. Raneb has allowed me to visit him on feast days, and I saw Hormin there. I think he was paying the servants of the Great Place to decorate his tomb. You know they take on extra work to be done after their service to Pharaoh is done each day.'
'I know,' Kysen said. 'So you've only been at the village a short time. How often did Hormin go there?'
'I don't know, Lord Kysen. I only saw him briefly, and by chance.'
'What was he doing?'
'Once he was yelling at the chief scribe, once he was yelling at a draftsman, and another time he was walking down the path to the landing at the river.'
'Hormin yelled a lot.'
Sedi nodded.
'But you know nothing else of his business at the vil lage?'
Murder in the Place of Anubis 49
'No, Lord Kysen. I am but a water carrier, son of a humble cup bearer, but…'
Kysen watched Sedi chew on his lip. 'You won't suf fer for your honesty.'
'I don't think anyone in the tomb-makers' village liked Hormin.'
'How do you know?'
'I'm not sure, lord.' Sedi squinted and stared out into the white heat of the afternoon. 'I think it came to me because whenever I saw Hormin, I noticed that everyone else seemed anxious to find something to do elsewhere. He must have been an unpleasant man.'
Kysen smiled. 'Someone found him unpleasant indeed. You've done well, Sedi.'
Rising to his feet, Kysen motioned for Sedi to get up. Over the youth's shoulder he saw the approach of his men. They'd finished their examination of the Place of Anubis. He glanced at Sedi, and found the water carrier watching him anxiously. Kysen knew what it meant to feel helpless in the face of happenings one didn't understand. Before his men came within hearing distance Kysen whispered to the youth, 'If you remember something else, come to the house of my father in the Street of the Falcon near the palace. And listen, brother. Should you need help, or if you lose place because of this evil, come to me.'
This time Kysen didn't object when Sedi fell to his knees. When his men reached them, he had assumed the proper attitude of a lord receiving the obeisance of an inferior. Without looking at the water carrier on the ground beside him, Kysen walked out of the drying shed and stepped into his chariot.
On the way back to the palace district he tried not to think of the possibility that he would have to go to the tomb-makers' village. He hadn't been back there since his real father had dragged him from it ten years ago. The village lay a short distance north and west of the offices of the government of Pharaoh, yet Kysen managed never to see it even if he happened to look in that direction. The good god Amun had given him new life on the day his father sold him to Meren. The old life was as dead as the ancient ones in their pyramids.
As he approached the great walled house that had sheltered the count's family for generations, Kysen's spirit lifted. Perhaps Remi would be awake from his nap. Leaving his team in the hands of a groom, he forsook the ovenlike day for the darkness of the entryway. The difference in temperature was so great that he shivered. A maid came forward with cool water to drink and wet cloths to bathe his face, hands, and feet.
Kysen was bending over to slip on a sandal when he heard the clatter of metal wheels. A miniature bronze chariot raced across the tiled floor. Kysen snatched up his sandal and hopped over the vehicle before it rammed his toes.
'Father, I slay you!'
Small feet planted apart, body turned sideways in im itation of an archer's stance, Remi let fly a blunt-tipped arrow that hit the floor in front of Kysen. Kysen groaned, clutched his chest, and crumpled to the floor on his back. Remi gave a loud whoop and flew at his father. A three-year-old sandbag landed on his chest, making Kysen grunt.
'Sweetmeats, Father. Nurse won't give me sweet meats. You give them to me.'
'I can't,' Kysen said with his eyes closed. 'I'm dead.'
Remi bounced on his father's chest with each of his words. 'No, you're not. I unkill you. Now the sweetmeats.'
Murder in the Place of Anubis 51
From the courtyard a shrill voice with the force of a hyena's call said Remi's name, and Kysen's eyes popped open. He groaned.
'Why didn't you tell me your mother had come to visit?'
Remi scooted off his father and dived for his toy chariot. 'I forgot.'
'Kysen, what are you doing?'
Rolling over on his stomach, Kysen rested his fore head on the cold tile. 'I'm dead. Remi killed me.'
'Nonsense. Quit wallowing on the floor.'
Kysen turned his head and looked at the woman in the doorway. She was still lovely in spite of her indulgence in wine and potions mixed by her magician priests. She had the largest eyes and widest lips of any woman he'd ever met, and she was dressed as usual in a complicated court robe, gold and carnelian broad collar, and long wig. Her oiled lips were twisted in distaste.
'Has it been a month already, Taweret?'
'You know it has, and Remi and I have been playing.'
'You? You and Remi have been playing?' Kysen propped himself up on his forearms and stared at his former wife. Behind him Remi trundled his chariot around in a circle.
'Mother watches me shoot Nurse.'
'You should include your mother in the game, Remi.: Shoot her.'
Remi stopped pushing his chariot and looked around for his bow and arrow.
'I will not be shot,' Taweret said. She clasped her hands together in front of her body, straightened her shoulders, and turned on her heel.
Kysen sighed and got up to follow her. She'd come to look at her tainted son and his low father, to remind herself once again of her misfortune and the wisdom of her divorce. He'd stand her presence as long as he could and then take refuge in the workshop where the physician would be examining Hormin's body. Once again he thanked the good god that he'd never really loved Taweret.
She had stretched out on a couch under a stand of palms in the courtyard. Two of her servants fanned her with ostrich-feather fans. She watched him come toward her, eyeing him with that critical wariness that never left her when he was present.
Kysen dropped down to sit by the edge of the artificial pool. He scooped water into his hand and drank, and was rewarded with a sneer at his common behavior. He considered shedding his armor and kilt to bathe in the pool, but he didn't want to lengthen Taweret's visit.
'Only peasants drink from their hands.'
Kysen let a handful of water dribble down his bent knee to his ankle. 'Some are bom to be peasants. Some the gods ordain to become beer brewers, goldsmiths, architects. Do you know what the gods made you, Taweret? A sufferer. That's why you married me. So you could suffer. Was it worth it, that exquisite pain and the virtue of bearing it?' Kysen smiled at his wife's glare. 'Obviously not, or you wouldn't have divorced me.'
'I am henemmet — '
'I know. Your mother's father's mother's mother was the spawn of a harem woman and Pharaoh. A thin strain of divinity, it seems to me. Though once I was willing to kneel before you for it. But then my knees got sore, and I decided I had enough gods and goddesses to worship, and that one living god was enough for me.'
Taweret jumped off the couch, sending cushions fly Murder in the Place of Anubis 53 ing. She picked one up and threw it at Kysen on her way out.
'I was right to divorce you! You're lower than a dog's belly. All my friends say so. All of them, do you hear?'
