Place of Anubis 17 ing side by side, they gazed down at the body nestled in the crystals.
'They haven't touched him since they found the knife,' Kysen said. 'You're here earlier than I ex pected.'
'Pharaoh commanded me to hurry.'
Kysen sucked in a breath, then let it out slowly. 'The living god is wise.'
'The living god is bored.' It was difficult not to smile at Kysen's awe. 'Don't wheeze as though you had swallowed a whole pomegranate. Tell me what you know.'
'This man is Hormin, scribe of records and tithes in the office of the vizier.' Kysen nodded in the direction of the frightened laborer. 'As they were digging him out, that water carrier recognized him.' He pointed to an engraved bronze bracelet on the wrist of the dead man. 'Then the lector priest found his name and titles on that. There are also a signet ring and wig.'
Kysen leaned over the natron table and touched the obsidian blade that protruded from Hormin's neck. 'This is a ritual embalming knife. It is used to make incisions when the bowels-'
'I understand,' Meren said. 'And this Hormin, is he known to the embalmers?'
'No, only the water carrier admits to having seen him before. I'm going to talk to him after we get rid of the body and that pigeon-witted lector priest.'
Kysen shoved away from the natron table and walked over to the side of the shed, and Meren followed. Kysen stopped beside the table containing the Anubis casket.
'The knife was kept in here,' he said. He took a blade from the casket. Even in the shade of the embalming shed the facets of the black glass reflected light. Kysen pointed to the ground around the table.
'Blood has soaked into the earth. You can see the stains beneath the footprints, and some of it splattered on the legs of the table. The evil one couldn't remove all the markings in the darkness. I think Hormin was killed here and put on the nearest table that contained enough natron to cover him.'
'Very well. Shall we dig Hormin out of his nest?'
Meren stood at the head of the natron table while Kysen supervised the removal of the body. Hormin was lifted onto a carrying board, and two assistants began dusting crystals from the corpse. Kysen withdrew the knife to the accompaniment of a prayer by Raneb. Meren stopped the priest from carrying the blade away.
'Lector, you may have the body after my physician sees it, but I will take the possessions and this blade.'
'But it must be purified,' Raneb said.
'After I have found the one who killed this man.'
The priest bowed, and Meren turned back to the natron table. The two men were shoveling natron away from the darkened remains of Lady Shapu. Kysen jumped down from the table, and Meren shoved an arm in front of his son.
'Don't move,' Meren said. He bent down and picked up something from beside his son's foot. He held it out in his palm.
Raneb came over to them and looked at the small stone in Meren's hand. 'An ib amulet. We have hundreds of them. This one is carved from carnelian. Some are of lapis lazuli, and some are of gold. One of the bandagers must have dropped it.'
Meren closed his hand over the amulet. Such talismans were vital to both living and dead, for they protected the wearer's heart, the seat of emotions and intellect. This amulet wasn't made to be suspended from a necklace. Perhaps Raneb was correct, and it was one that belonged in the Place of Anubis.
Meren gave the amulet to Kysen. 'Put it with the possessions of Hormin. Don't worry, priest, it will be returned. Lighten your heart. After all, I'm giving the body back to you.'
'That is of no comfort, my lord. We will have to say spells and prayers for weeks to rid the area of evil.'
Four men lifted the carrying board and body. As they passed Meren lifted a hand to stop them. Meren sniffed. He bent over the corpse, lifted a fold of the man's kilt, and sniffed again. Through the mingled smells of natron and body waste released at death he detected a faint, sweet odor-perfume. On the linen there were light yeL-low smears. Dropping the kilt, Meren touched the signet ring on Hormin's right hand. It bore engraved hieroglyphs that spelled Hormin's name. Meren straightened and waved the bearers on.
'Kysen, see that they remove everything from the body. I'm going to the offices of the vizier, and then to the house of Hormin. I'll see you after I've finished there.'
Meren received his son's respectful inclination of the head. Unspoken was the knowledge that each of them looked forward to their end-of-the-day talk, when they would go over each event, every conversation, winnowing through contrived and honest appearance in search of Maat-order and truth. Leaving Kysen to harry the unhappy Raneb and his fellow priests, Meren and his men drove back to the palace district, away from the realm of the dead.
When a man was murdered in a sacred place, it was the concern of the Eyes and Ears of Pharaoh. When that man was also a servant of the king, the crime merited the scrutiny of the hereditary prince, master of secrets of the Lord of the Two Lands, privy councillor and Friend of the King, Meren, Lord of the Thinite Nome. And because the evil touched the business of the king, Meren went first to the office of the vizier.
Instead of looking for the records and tithes office where the man Hormin had worked, Meren went first to a room filled with stacks of papyri and swarming with clerks. At a table on a raised dais sat an elderly man whose hands were swollen at the joints. The skin of his palms and fingers was soft and permanently stained with red and black ink. Meren approached, sending clerks scurrying out of his way by walking steadily forward without looking to see if anyone was in his path.
The old man looked up from a papyrus when Meren routed three of the men hovering over his table. The old man returned to his papyrus and barked at Meren, 'Quick, boy, what is immortality?'
Meren smiled and said, 'A book, for though a man's body is dust, and all his kin perish, his words make him remembered through the mouth of the storyteller.'
'Adequate,' the old man said. He shoved his papyrus at one of the clerks. 'Come here, lad, and tell me what brings the Friend of Pharaoh to his old teacher.'
A chair appeared in the hands of one of the scribes. The man set it near his master, but Meren only leaned on its back. 'Master Ahmose, there is trouble.'
'And there is sand in the desert and water in the Nile. Your ka draws trouble as a whore attracts sailors.'
'I don't seek out trouble.'
'Your father was of like spirit, and that's why the Heretic killed him. At least you learned from his example.'
At the mention of his father, Meren lowered his eyes. Removing a hand from the chair, he touched the tips of his fingers to the bronze dagger in his belt. The cold metal eased his ka, and he lifted his eyes once more.
Ahmose was watching him. 'You've learned much.'
'I'm not a youth anymore. Master Ahmose, I would speak with you about one of your officials. Hormin, a scribe of records and tithes. He has been murdered in the Place of Anubis.'
'I know. One of the priests came to tell me.'
Ahmose got up and stepped down from the dais. Meren joined him, and they walked out into a courtyard. Ahmose took refuge from the sun on a stool under a sycamore beside a reflection pool. Meren sat at his feet.
'Well, boy, why are you looking for the killer? Hormin was a contentious man, a plump goose stuffed with hatred and basted with rancor. There's no need to search out one who has relieved so many of a vicious annoyance.'
Meren shook his head and studied a yellow fish in the reflection pool. 'Murder is a sin against Maat, the divine order of justice and lightness. You taught me about Maat, and now you want me to allow an offense against the harmony of Pharaoh's kingdom?'
'Hormin was an offense in himself,' Ahmose said. 'I know you, Meren. You won't stop until you've conducted inquiries, pursued the lion into the desert, brought down the waterfowl with your throw stick. But think on this. No matter how many rebels you subdue or criminals you banish into the desert, you'll never right the injustice done against your father.'
Meren rose and faced Ahmose. 'Are you going to tell me whom I should question, or will I have to spend days speaking to each man in the office of records and tithes?'
Using a black-smudged finger, Ahmose traced the hi eroglyph of the ka.
