help you decipher this puzzle of the murder of the magician priest.'
Chapter 12
Before dawn the next morning, Kysen sat beside the royal oarsman in the king's boat, shivering in the cool dampness of a marsh. Two priests had been murdered, but neither he nor Meren could neglect attendance at the hippo hunt arranged for the king by Tanefer. Pharaoh was whispering excitedly with the chief of the royal hunt, while all around them, hidden in the tall reeds and papyrus plants, noblemen and hunters steadied their skiffs. The boats were arranged on either side of a break in the reeds at the riverbank that marked the place where hippos came ashore.
The king's craft was wooden, larger and much more ornate than the skiffs, but Kysen wished he was in the one that held his father and Tanefer. The skiffs were far more maneuverable and would close in first on their quarry, but much less safe. The king would only be allowed to approach once the hippo had taken a few harpoons.
In truth, Kysen had never accustomed himself to being pharaoh's companion. He'd been born the son of a common artisan, and hunting with a living god was not something he did as easily as his father.
He watched Ahiram pole his float by and take up a position on the opposite side of the marsh from Meren and Tanefer. On shore a hunter signaled to Tanefer, and word was passed from boat to boat. The man next to Kysen began to whisper.
'Divine one, there's a group of three headed this way. They think the rogue follows them.'
Quiet settled over the hunters as they waited. Hippos came ashore at night to do their grazing and caused great damage to crops in their wanderings. Kysen gazed over the black water and could barely make out the lighter shadows that indicated the kilts of Meren and Tanefer. They had dropped to a crouch, the long shafts of their weapons thrusting out over the edge of their skiff.
He glanced at the king, a slight shadow in a gold-and-lapis broad collar, but he couldn't make out the boy's expression. Tanefer had voiced the hope that this hunt would relieve the king's strain. Kysen doubted it would prove more than a temporary respite. The court still seethed with contention between those who advocated war and those who favored diplomacy. He'd seen the cost of this division in his father's face.
Meren hated war. He hated violence. When Kysen was much younger, he hadn't understood how a man so skilled with dagger, lance, and bow could detest their use except for the hunt. Then he'd grown old enough to assist Meren in his capacity as one of the Eyes and Ears of Pharaoh.
Now, finally, he understood that Meren commanded warriors in order to prevent violence. In the last couple of years Kysen, too, had had his fill of blood. There was no glamour in death, only waste. And it was this knowledge that separated Meren and Kysen from many men at court.
Meren was disturbed. Kysen could sense this, although he'd refrained from questioning his father. When Meren grew distant and sat staring at nothing while he rubbed the brand on his wrist, he was deeply troubled. He knew his father refused to believe that Unas's and Qenamun's deaths were unrelated. He also knew that Meren's confrontation with the high priest of Amun threatened to cause an open breach between the temple and the court.
Parenefer had complained to the vizier Ay and to the king. Ay was furious with Meren for causing more trouble than was already brewing at court. The king, always touchy when his authority was questioned by Parenefer, had insulted the high priest. And he refused to placate the old man. Now courtiers were jostling each other in their attempts to align themselves with whoever they thought would be the winner.
Meanwhile, Tanefer continued to press for a military campaign of monumental proportions. He advocated marching across Palestine and as far north as the upper reaches of the Euphrates to the homeland of Mitanni. Horemheb partially agreed.
What surprised Kysen was that Parenefer also agreed with them and threw his influence behind a new campaign. Meren said that the old jackal had caught the scent of plunder-the slaves, the rich estates, the booty that would flow into the coffers of Amun from conquered territories. Kysen had thought of another reason as well. If there was war, pharaoh would leave Egypt, and so would Meren.
Shifting his weight, Kysen settled into a more comfortable position. The sky was growing light, and still the hippos hadn't reached the bank. Soon the hunters would lose the cover of darkness. Tanefer must have been thinking the same thing, because he signaled across the water to Ahiram. The two craft bearing his father, Tanefer, and Ahiram skimmed out from the reeds and toward each other.
As the gap between the skiffs closed, the water beneath the king's boat churned. From shore he heard a hollow, buzzing noise that sounded like a laugh. Hippos. Kysen glanced over his shoulder, but he saw nothing that could have caused the shifting beneath him. He looked over the expanse of water toward Meren, who was saying something to Ahiram.
Without warning the Nile took solid form. The black waters churned, and a mudlike mountain with eyes rose up and growled. Kysen shouted an alarm. A hippo's yawning jaws gaped open to reveal pale, fleshy vastness and tusks as long as a child's arm. The maw snapped the prow of Ahiram's skiff in two.
Ahiram soared into the air and then dropped into the water. He sank, only to bob to the surface in front of the animal. Over his head, the mouth opened again.
At that moment, Meren hurled his harpoon. It jabbed into the hippo's shoulder, but not before the creature snapped at Ahiram, who cried out as a tusk gashed his arm. Meanwhile, everyone punted rapidly toward the fray. Kysen had snatched a pole and joined the royal sailors in stabbing deep into the riverbed, aiming the king's boat at Meren's.
Wounded and maddened, the hippo sank beneath the water again, only to hurtle to the surface once more, slamming Ahiram with its body. The violence of the wave it caused hurled Meren's skiff away from the fight and into another boat. The crash sent Meren plummeting into the waters. Kysen shouted at Tanefer, but the prince was already diving after his friend.
The king's boat gained on a skiff. Kysen recognized Horemheb and Maya, called to them, and poled himself down onto their craft. They skidded toward Meren, who had gone underwater and hadn't reappeared. As he strained to see in the dim light, he saw Meren and Tanefer break the surface near Ahiram, who was bleeding and trailing a useless arm in the water.
Kysen felt a stab of fear when the blackish gray bulk of the hippo twisted and rammed downward under the water. Suddenly, tiny protruding eyes and flared nostrils appeared just above the water in front of the three men. Skiffs crashed into the hippo's body, but the animal ignored them. Its head rose out of the water. Those powerful jaws opened so wide a man could have fallen in and vanished. Kysen cried out again as a jagged tusk poised over Meren.
Ahiram flailed and thrashed with his good arm, but couldn't move quickly enough. The jaws began to descend even as Kysen grabbed Maya's harpoon and hurled it. The weapon hit the animal's neck but failed to sink into the thick flesh.
Then Meren lunged upward and grabbed for his harpoon, which still protruded from the hippo's shoulder. Tanefer cried out and threw himself at Meren. As he did so, his feet struck out and hit Ahiram, causing him to slide farther into the path of the raging animal. Tanefer collided with Meren, and his weight plunged them beneath the surface.
At the same time, the hippo snapped at Ahiram, and Kysen's skiff rammed into it. Harpoons and spears flew from the other skiffs as well. The hippo let out a bellow that sounded like a combination of a woman's scream and the trumpet of an elephant. With a last rumbling squeal, the creature dove under the boats and swam rapidly for the open river. Kysen shouted his father's name and searched among the litter of broken skiffs and floating weapons.
A dark head bobbed up out of the water; a second followed. Kysen lowered himself over the side as Horemheb and Maya slid the skiff in the swimmers' direction. He reached Meren, who was out of breath and shaking from exhaustion. Together Kysen and Tanefer managed to shove him up and aboard the skiff. Maya and Horemheb lifted Ahiram onto their skiff, where he lay cursing and fighting all efforts to attend him.
The king's boat drew alongside the skiff, and Tutankhamun ordered Tanefer, Meren, and Kysen to be brought aboard. Kysen scrambled up the side of the boat and dropped onto the deck beside his father. Meren lifted his head,
