to be on guard, but his parents had kept him busy repairing the main canal that fed the village fields. Only today had he been able to claim his duty to visit the man everyone else knew only as his patron.
Leaning against the rough trunk, Tentamun gazed up at the leaves of the palm tree, one of many that formed this date field. Foliage shot out of a central point to form graceful, drooping fans. In a few months stalks heavy with dates would appear, ready for picking. Children and trained monkeys would climb high into the air to retrieve the fruit. Great baskets would be filled. Then more laborers would spread the dates out in a carpet to ripen. As fruit of different ages ripened, the field would become a dazzling sheet of color, from darkest brown to bright orange and yellow.
He became uncomfortable with the spikes of the palm trunk digging into his back. The solar orb had reached its pinnacle and was descending toward the netherworld, but the heat that had been building all day remained. He sweated even in the shade. If it weren't for the generosity of his employer, he would have avoided traveling in the last harsh weeks of Drought.
Something moved beyond the mud-and-straw wall that formed a protective barrier around the date field. Through the shadows of the sycamores and acacias that sheltered the estate strode the owner of the dates, the palms, and everything else within sight. As he approached, Tentamun could see his green-and-yellow robe much more easily than he could his features.
Odd that Tentamun couldn't find anyone who knew exactly who his people were. All he'd been able to discover was that the man had an Asiatic father and an Egyptian mother, which accounted for his fluency in Egyptian. Zulaya entered the date field and came toward him, dressed in the manner of his people. His long robe covered him from neck to ankles, hanging in diagonal folds that fit close to his body. The thin, soft wool was patterned in checks, diamonds, and swirls. A headband of the same material kept his long hair pulled back from his face.
In keeping with his foreign ancestry, he wore a beard that he kept clean and arranged in a profusion of tight coils. It concealed his face from nose to chin. The only features exposed were dark rose lips. As Zulaya stalked toward him, Tentamun felt his skin turn cold despite the kiln-heat of the afternoon. It wasn't Zulaya's foreignness that chilled his flesh and robbed his mouth of moisture. But as hard as he pondered, he couldn't identify the exact source of his fear.
Zulaya stepped into the shade of Tentamun's palm. His feet were bare, but his ankles were encased in gold bands. Tentamun considered him aged, for his dark brown hair was streaked with silver. But age had refused to mark Zulaya in other ways. His step was light, his eyes quick and exact. And he bore few lines, although Tentamun guessed that he must have at least four decades.
What was it that made him so uneasy around this man? Could it be the numbers of strange people Zulaya employed? Tentamun had never seen so many come and go from a great man's house. A few were ordinary field laborers or tenant farmers. Others, in spite of their Egyptian dress, seemed rough, some with the manners of bandits, some with scars of old knife and scimitar wounds. Many were foreigners who addressed Zulaya in the language of the Asiatics, or in Babylonian, or other obscure tongues from regions Tentamun had never heard of. Or perhaps Tentamun was uncomfortable because Zulaya seemed to enjoy traveling to foreign places. No good Egyptian liked alien lands. Egypt was a paradise blessed by the gods. Other places were exile.
Tentamun bowed low, but Zulaya had turned to survey the canal that ran past his estate, through the fields close to the river and into the Nile. 'Did you know, dear youth, that none of the waters near Byblos or those of the mighty Euphrates rival the dark night blue of the Nile?'
'No, lord.' Perhaps he feared Zulaya because he never seemed to approach any goal directly.
Zulaya lifted his arm and pointed across the river, indicating the desert. Swirls of sand formed dunes with knife-edged tops.
'That, Tentamun, is the reason for Egypt's happy nature. A great and terrible barrier against the ambitions and might of quarrelsome Asiatics. They snarl and claw at each other unceasingly, shed blood over scraps of coastline, over rich cities, over mountains covered with cedar. All the while Egypt remains fruitful and at peace behind her rock and sand ramparts. The envy of every monarch, every herder in search of pasture, every barbarian looking for plunder.'
Now Zulaya wasn't frightening; he was tiresome. Tentamun waited until his employer transferred his attention from the desert to him. It was the only signal Zulaya would give that he was ready to listen.
'Someone came to visit Satet, my lord. You said you wished to know at once should this happen. He came a few days ago, a scribe in search of servants for his master.'
'And did you know this scribe?'
'No, my lord. Now that I think, he never even gave his name.'
Zulaya's eyes seemed to catch the sunlight, and he became more attentive. 'Tell me everything, from the beginning.'
Tentamun complied, but the tale took a long time to repeat, for his master frequently stopped him with questions.
'What do you mean, he took her away?' Zulaya demanded quietly. 'Why would he employ that feather-witted old pestilence?'
'He said his master had cooks in need of training in the royal manner.'
Zulaya's questions came more quickly now. He had tugged on his headband until the ribbon of cloth came loose. He was threading it between his fingers and pulling it free over and over again.
'Where did he go?'
'I think to Memphis, lord.'
'Describe this man again.'
'A face all of angles, lord. Black hair cut short.'
'His age?'
'Oh, a great age. He could be my father, only he's much less aged than mine. I suppose it's because he's a scribe, but he wasn't weak looking, like those who spend their days inside bent over papyrus.'
At this comment, Zulaya drew nearer. His questions became sharp and impatient as he grilled Tentamun on the scribe's appearance. Finally Zulaya once more lifted his gaze from Tentamun to the Nile waters.
'A scribe who doesn't look as if he spends his days bent over papyrus. A man of well-fed appearance. Your description is at odds with itself, dear youth. Was there nothing individual about this man? His speech, perhaps, or the way he walked?'
Tentamun rubbed his brow and thought hard. 'No, my lord. He seemed very much like any other man.' Then he remembered something. 'There was a scar.'
'What scar? Where?'
'It was on his inner wrist. I didn't see it clearly. The house was dark except for one lamp, and he wore a leather wristband.'
'A scribe who wears a leather wristband,' Zulaya said as he rested his bearded chin on a fist and studied the ground.
'The band pulled up on his arm a bit, and I saw part of a white scar. I remember because it was so clearly defined, not like a wound at all, and it seemed to be half of a circle.'
His remarks elicited nothing from Zulaya. He turned his back to Tentamun and gazed at the canal, where a group of laborers was dumping loads of earth onto a collapsed section of the bank. As he awaited his employer's next command, Tentamun noticed that Zulaya had questioned him so long that the sun had moved, and he no longer stood in the shade. He stepped sideways, slowly and carefully, so as not to attract attention. He should have known better. Zulaya's fingers intertwined with the green-and-yellow headband, then grasped the ends and yanked the ribbon tight with a snap that made Tentamun jump.
'Some say I'm too suspicious and expect only the worst, but I'm vindicated by your news.'
'Yes, my lord.'
What could he say? He had no idea who would dare criticize Zulaya. He wasn't only a man of wealth. He was mayor of the town near his estate and friends with the great men of the district, who valued his trading contacts among the Asiatics, the Hittites, the Mycenaeans, and the Babylonians. But there was something ruthless and secretive about Zulaya. It caused Tentamun to doubt that even a great man would dare insult him.
Zulaya turned back to Tentamun, his speech resuming its customary soft tones and embroidered language. 'Dear youth, you have done well, and I call upon the gods and my ancestors to look with favor upon you. Ishtar,
