He became aware that the sounds of battle from further down the valley had changed. With his arm still around her, he turned to look back. Trok's men had seen their pharaoh cut down, and the fight had gone out of them. They were throwing down their weapons, and wailing, 'Enough! Enough! We yield. All praise to Pharaoh Nefer Seti, the one true king.'
With the realization of victory, Nefer felt the last vestiges of strength flow out of his battered and bleeding body. He had just enough left to raise his voice, and shout, 'Give them quarter. They are our brother Egyptians. Give them quarter!'
As Nefer slumped down, Taita materialized at his side and helped Mintaka lower him to the ground. While the two of them dressed his wounds, and staunched the bleeding from the deep cut in his thigh, his officers came to report to Nefer.
Nefer discounted his own injuries as he demanded to know who had survived the battle and who had been wounded and killed. With joy, and thanks to Horus and the Red God, Nefer saw that his trusted captains, Hilto, Shabako and Socco, were among the men who crowded around him, exulting in the victory, proud of themselves and their men, filled with joy to see him alive.
They made a litter of lances and carried him back down the valley to Gallala, but it was a long journey for Trok's captured officers, and men crowded the roadside, kneeling unarmed and bare-headed to plead for his mercy, shouting repentance and remorse that they had ever taken up arms against the true Pharaoh.
Three times before they reached the gates of the city, Nefer signalled for his litter to be lowered and allowed the captured centurions and captains to come forward and kiss his feet. 'I spare you from the traitor's death you so richly deserve,' he told them sternly, 'but you are all reduced to the rank of sergeants of the Blue, and you must prove once more your duty and loyalty to the House of Tamose.'
They praised him for his mercy, but Nefer frowned and shook his head when they addressed him as a god. 'I am not one of the pantheon, as the blasphemers Trok and Naja claim they are.' But they would not be dissuaded, and renewed their praises and entreaties, and his own men led by his brother warriors of the Red Road, joined their voices to those of the defeated, begging him to declare his divinity.
To distract them Nefer issued his orders with a frowning mien. 'The corpse of Trok Uruk, the false claimant to the double crown of this very Egypt, shall be burned without ceremony, here upon the battlefield so, that his soul shall wander through all eternity seeking but never finding a home.'
They murmured with awe for this was the most dreadful punishment that could be devised.
The other enemy dead are to be treated with all respect, and allowed embalmment and a decent burial. The name of Trok Uruk shall be erased from every monument and building in the land, and the temple that he erected to himself in Avaris shall in his stead be dedicated to the winged Horus in memory of the victory that he gave us this day before the city of Gallala.'
They shouted their approbation at this decree, and Nefer went on, 'All the possessions of Trok Uruk, all his treasure and estates, his slaves and buildings, his warehouses and goods of whatsoever nature shall be forfeited to the state. Send water wagons back along the road to Safaga, with grooms and surgeons to bring in all the horses, chariots and men that Trok Uruk left along the way during his arrogant march on our capital here in Gallala. If they repudiate the false pharaohs and swear allegiance to the House of Tamose the prisoners shall be pardoned and recruited into our armies.'
By the time Nefer had given his last order, and issued his last decree for that day, his voice was hoarse, he was pale and almost exhausted. As they carried him through the city gates he asked Mintaka quietly, 'Where is Taita? Has anybody seen the Magus?' But Taita had disappeared.
--
Taita watched from the hillside above the battlefield as the jaws of the trap closed on Trok's army and his chariots were smashed by the rock-filled wagons, the arrows and the javelins falling like nights of locusts upon the survivors, when a single bizarre figure caught his eye in the chaos.
Ishtar the Mede scampered between the rocks. Like a running hare he disappeared from sight only to reappear further up the slope, ducking and dodging. By some chance or magical charm he avoided the arrows and javelins of Nefer's troops and at last dived over the crest and disappeared from sight.
Taita let him go. There would be time for him later. He watched the climax of the battle, extending all his powers to act as a shield over Nefer during his single combat with Trok at the base of the rock. Even at this distance he managed to deflect many of Trok's blows that should have been fatal, and when Trok went for the final thrust into Nefer's thigh his blade might have found the great femoral artery if Taita had not used all his influence to turn the point aside.
Since that time long ago when Taita had saved Mintaka from harm during the encounter with the cobra of the goddess, she had become a subject who responded readily to his influence. She had the intelligence and imagination that opened her mind to him. It was impossible to influence a fool. He had summoned her back to Gallala to show herself to Trok at the head of the valley, and to lure him into the trap. Then, when she had stood frozen with horror on the rock above the fighting pair, Taita had bent her to his will once again and put into her mind the impulse to reach down for the javelin that lay at her feet. He had bolstered her right arm as she steadied her aim and threw. Then, as the life went out of Trok, he had rushed down the slope to minister to Nefer and to bind up the wound that had cut so perilously close to the pulsing artery in his thigh.
When his brother warriors of the Red Road lifted the young pharaoh on to the litter of spears, Taita with his duty done for the present drifted away into the throng. Nobody paid him any heed as he went.
He picked up the tracks that Ishtar had left as he escaped out of the narrow valley and followed them until they were impossible to discern on the earth on the top of the hills, which was baked hard as mosaic tiles by the sun.
Taita stopped and crouched down. From his pouch he took out a sliver of dried root and slipped it into his mouth. As he chewed on it, he opened his mind and reached out to detect the Mede's aura, the trace he had left as he passed. As the root sharpened his senses Taita saw the aura in the corner of his vision. It was a shadow, dirty grey and ephemeral, that vanished when he looked directly at it. Each person had his own aura. Nefer Seti, on account of his noble and divine inner being, threw a rosy essence that to Taita was readily detectable. Taita had followed that faint rosy emanation to find Nefer after he had been mauled by the lion and he and Mintaka were lost in the desert beyond Dabba.
Ishtar the Mede's aura was dark and tainted. Taita stood up and went on again after it, striding out on his long legs with his staff tapping on the stones. Every so often he saw physical confirmation that he was on the right track, by a smudged footprint in a softer patch of earth or by a recently dislodged pebble.
Ishtar had circled round to the south then come back towards Gallala. Taita was alarmed and lengthened his
