The Quest - Smith Wilbur (читать лучшие читаемые книги TXT) 📗

The priests warned that the southern road and the hills along its way had become the home of criminals and outcasts.

Once again he enquired after the preachers of the false goddess. They told him that it was rumoured Soe prophets had appeared from the wastes and made their way northwards towards Karnak and the delta, but none had had contact with them.

When night fell Taita retired to the inner sanctuary of the mother goddess Isis and, under her protection, felt at ease to meditate and pray.

Although he invoked his patron goddess, he received no direct response from her during the first two nights of his vigil. Nevertheless he felt stronger and better prepared to face the challenges that lay ahead on the road to Qebui and in the uncharted lands and swamps beyond. His inevitable confrontation with Eos seemed less daunting. His strengthened body and resolve might have been the result of hard riding in the company of young troopers and officers, and the spiritual disciplines he had observed since leaving Thebes, but it gave him pleasure to think that the close proximity of the goddess Lostris, or Fenn, as she now chose to be known, had armed him for the struggle.

On the last morning, as the first light of dawn roused him, he asked again for Isis's blessing and protection, and for those of any other gods who might be near. As he was about to leave the sanctuary he cast a last glance at the statue of Isis, which was hewn from a monolith of red granite. It towered to the roof and the head was shrouded in shadow, the stone eyes staring ahead implacably. He stooped to pick up his staff from beside the rug of plaited papyrus on which he had passed the night. Before he could straighten, the pulse started to beat softly in his

ears, but he experienced no chill on his naked upper body. He looked up to see that the statue was gazing down at him. The eyes had come alive and glowed a luminous green. They were Fenn's eyes and their expression was as gentle as that of a mother watching an infant asleep at her breast.

'Fenn,' he whispered. 'Lostris, are you here?' The echo of her laughter came from the stone vaulting high above his head, but he could see only the dark shape of bats flitting back to their roosts.

His eyes switched back to the statue. The stone head was alive now, and it was Fenn's. 'Remember, I am waiting for you,' she whispered.

'Where will I find you? Tell me where to look,' he begged.

'Where else would you search for a moon fish?' she teased him. 'You will find me hiding among the other fishes.'

'But where are the fishes?' he pleaded. Already her living features were hardening into stone, and the brilliant eyes dulling.

'Where?' he cried. 'When?'

'Beware the prophet of darkness. He carries a knife. He also waits for you,' she whispered sadly. 'Now I must go. She will not let me stay longer.'

'Who will not let you stay? Isis or another?' To utter the name of the witch in this holy place would be sacrilege. But the statue's lips had frozen.

Hands tugged at his upper arm. He started and looked around, expecting another apparition to materialize, but he saw only the anxious face of the high priest, who said, 'Magus, what ails you? Why do you cry out?'

'It was a dream, just a foolish dream.'

'Dreams are never foolish. You of all people should know that. They are warnings and messages from the gods.'

He took his leave of the holy men, and went out to the stables.

Windsmoke ran to meet him, kicking up her heels playfully, a bunch of hay stalks dangling from the corner of her mouth.

'They have been spoiling you, you fat old strumpet. Look at you now, cavorting like a foal, you with your big belly,' Taita scolded her lovingly.

During their sojourn in Karnak a careless groom had let one of Pharaoh's favourite stallions reach her. Now she quietened and stood still to let him mount, then carried him to where Meren's troopers were breaking camp. When the column was ready, the men standing by their horses'

heads, with the spare mounts and the pack mules on lead reins, Meren went down the ranks checking weapons and equipment, making certain

that each man had his copper water-pot and a bag of lime strapped to the back of the mule.

'Mount!' he roared from the head of the column. 'Move out! Walk!

Trot!' A train of weeping women followed them to the foot of the hills, where they fell back, unable to keep up with the pace that Meren set.

'Bitter the parting, but sweet the memories,' Hilto-bar-Hilto remarked, and his platoon chuckled.

'Nay, Hilto,' Meren called from the head of the column. 'The sweeter the flesh, the sweeter the memories!'

They roared with laughter and drummed on the shields with their scabbards.

'They laugh now,' Taita said drily, 'but let us see if they still laugh in the furnace of the desert.'

They looked down into the gorge of the cataract. There was no rush of angry waters. The vicious rocks, which were usually a hazard to shipping, were now exposed and dry, black as the backs of a herd of wild buffalo. At the top end, on a bluff overlooking the gorge, stood a tall granite obelisk. While the men watered their steeds and the mules, Taita and Meren climbed the cliff to the monument and stood at its foot. Taita read aloud the inscription:

'I, Queen Lostris, regent of Egypt and widow of Pharaoh Mamose, eighth of that name, mother of the crown prince Memnon, who shall rule the Two Kingdoms after me, have ordained the raising of this monument.

This is the mark and covenant of my vow to the people of this very Egypt, that I shall return to them from the wilderness whence I have been driven by the barbarian.

This stone was placed here in the first year of my rule, the nine-hundredth after the building of the great pyramid of Pharaoh Cheops.

Let this stone stand immovable as the pyramid until I make good my promise to return.'

As the memories flooded back, Taita's eyes filled with tears. He remembered her on the day they had raised the obelisk: Lostris had been twenty, proud in her royalty and womanly glory.

'It was on this spot that Queen Lostris placed the Gold of Praise upon my shoulders,' he told Meren. 'It was heavy, but less precious to me than her favour.' They went down to the horses and rode on.

The desert enveloped them like the flames of a mighty bonfire. They could not ride during the day, so they boiled and limed the river water, then lay in any shade they could find, panting like hard-run hounds.

When the sun touched the western horizon, they rode on through the night. In places the gaunt cliffs crowded the riverbank so closely that they could only ride in single file along the narrow track. They passed tumbledown huts that had once given shelter to travellers who had gone before them, but they were deserted. They found no fresh sign of any human presence until the tenth day after they had left Assoun when they came across another cluster of abandoned huts beside what had been a deep pool. One had been recently occupied: the ashes on the hearth were still fresh and crisp. As soon as Taita entered it, he sensed the faint but unmistakable taint of the witch. As his eyes adjusted to the shadows, he made out writing in hieratic script that had been scratched on the wall with a stick of charcoal.

'Eos is great. Eos cometh.' Not long ago, one of the witch's adherents had passed this way. His footprints were still in the dust of the floor at the bottom of the wall where he had stood to write the exhortation.

It was almost sunrise, and the heat of the day was coming swiftly upon them. Meren ordered the column to make camp. Even the ruined huts would afford some shelter from the cruel sun. While this was happening and before the heat became unbearable, Taita cast around for other traces of the Eos worshipper. In a patch of loose earth on the stony track that led south he found hoofprints. By their set he could tell that the horse must have carried a heavy load. The tracks were heading south, towards Qebui. Taita called Meren, and asked, 'How old are these tracks?'