The Quest - Smith Wilbur (читаем книги онлайн бесплатно TXT) 📗

Thou abidest in the uttermost parts of the earth. Thou diest each day at the setting of the sun.

In the dawn thou art renewed. Each day thou arisest with thy youth renewed as the bloom of the Lotus.

Taita possesses the words of power.

Let him pass the first pylon!'

I

480 I

It was a chapter from the Book of the Dead, a lament for a king. At once the company took up the chant and sang the refrain:

'Let him go where we may not follow.

Let him know the mysteries of the dark places.

He hath become the wise serpent of the mighty God Horus.'

Hilto sang the next verse:

'Hail, Seth, the destroyer of worlds.

Hail, Mighty One of Souls, thou divine soul who inspireth great dread.

Let the spirit-soul of Taita pass the second pylon.

He possesses words of power.

Let Taita make his way to the Lotus Throne of Osiris, behind which stand Isis and Hathor.'

The others came in together with some of the women singing a descant:

'Let him go where we may not follow.

Let him know the mysteries of the dark places.

Let him pass!

Let him pass!'

Standing in the stern of the leading boat, gripping the steering oar, Meren sang with them. Beside him, Sidudu's voice quivered and almost broke under the weight of her emotion as she reached the higher notes.

Meren felt a light touch upon his muscled right arm that rested on the steering oar. He started with surprise and looked about. Nobody was there, yet the touch had been distinct. He had learnt enough while he had been a novice in the service of Taita not to stare directly at the source, so he turned his gaze aside and saw a vague shape appear in the periphery of his vision. When he focused upon it, it disappeared.

'Magus, are you here?' he whispered, so that his lips did not move.

The voice that answered him was just as airy: 'I am with you, and Fenn stands beside Sidudu.'

As they had planned, they had come on board while the galley was moored to the bank at the spot where Taita had planted the sword.

Meren tried not to show his relief and joy in any way that the others might see. He switched his gaze and saw at the opposite edge of his vision another airy shape appear close beside Sidudu.

'Fenn stands at your left hand,' he warned Sidudu, who looked round

in astonishment. 'No, you cannot see her. Ask her to touch you. As Sidudu felt the brush of Fenn's invisible fingers on her cheek her smile became radiant.'

When they moored in the late afternoon to set up the zareeba on the bank, Meren addressed the assembled throng: 'We will set up a shrine on the foredeck of the leading galley in the place they favoured while they were with us. It will be a refuge where the spirit-souls of Taita and Fenn can rest during the ninety days while they are trapped in this plane of existence, the period before they may pass the first pylon on the road to the underworld.'

They rigged a screen of reed matting round the small space, and laid out the sleeping mats and possessions of the missing pair. Each evening Sidudu placed an offering of food, beer and water behind it, and by morning they had been consumed. The company was much encouraged to know that the spirit-soul of the magus still watched over them, and the mood in the flotilla lightened. Men smiled and laughed once more, but they kept well clear of the shrine on the foredeck.

They came again to Qebui, the Place of the North Wind, where the river on which they had travelled such an enormous distance joined the other mighty stream rushing down from the mountains in the east to become the true Nile. Qebui was little changed since they had last seen it, except that the irrigated fields surrounding the town were more extensive, and herds of horses and cattle grazed on the green pastures closer to the mud walls of the town. The sudden appearance of a large fleet of strange ships threw the garrison and the townsfolk into consternation and dismay. Only when Meren showed himself on the prow of the leading vessel and called out his friendly intentions did Governor Nara recognize him.

'It is Colonel Meren Cambyses!' he shouted, to the captain of his archers. 'Do not fire upon them.'

Nara embraced Meren warmly as soon as he stepped ashore. 'We had long given up hope of your return so, in the name of Pharaoh Nefer Seti, we bid you the warmest possible welcome.' Nara had never met That.

The expedition led by General Lotti had passed through Qebui long before he had assumed the position of governor. Of course he knew of the expedition, and accepted Meren's explanation of Tinat's status as its surviving commander. But while they were conversing on the riverbank Nara kept looking to the moored boats as though he was expecting someone else to appear. At last he could contain himself no longer and

burst out, 'Forgive me, good colonels, but I must know what has become of the mighty magus, Taita of Gallala, that extraordinary man.'

'The story I have to tell you is so strange and marvellous as to defy all imagination and belief. But, first, I must bring all my people ashore and see to their needs. They have been in exile for many years and have made a long, difficult and dangerous journey to reach this outpost of the empire. As soon as this duty is done, I will make a full and formal report to you, which you will, of course, relay to Pharaoh's court in Karnak.'

“I beg your forgiveness.' Nara's innate good manners reasserted themselves.

'I have been wanting in my hospitality. You must bring them ashore at once, then refresh and restore yourselves before I press you further on the story of your travels.'

That evening, in the assembly hall of the fort, Nara held a banquet of welcome for Meren, That and their senior captains. It was also attended by his own staff and the notables of the town. When they had eaten and drunk, Nara rose to address them, and made a fulsome speech of welcome.

He ended by begging Meren to relate to the assembled guests the story of their sojourn in the foreign lands to the south. 'You are the first to return from those mysterious uncharted regions. Tell us what you discovered there. Tell us if you reached the place were our Mother Nile is born. Tell us how it happened that her waters dried up, then came to flow again in such sudden abundance. But tell us, above all, what has become of the magus, Taita of Gallala.'

Meren spoke first. He described all that had befallen them since they had last passed that way so long ago. He told them of how they had reached the headwaters of the Nile at Tamafupa and found the Red Stones impeding the flow of the river. He went on to relate how they had been rescued by That and taken by him to the kingdom of Jarri, where they had gone before the Supreme Council of the oligarchs.

'Now I will call upon Colonel That Ankut to relate the fate of the expedition led by General Lord Lotti, how he and his surviving men reached Jarri, and the conditions they found there.' Meren gave the floor to That.

As was his style, Tinat's account was terse and without embellishment.

In blunt soldier's terms, he described the original establishment of the Jarrian government by Lord Aquer in the reign of Queen Lostris.

Then he told of how it had been turned into a ruthless tyranny by the mysterious sorceress Eos. He ended his recitation with the stark statement, 'It was this sorceress, Eos, who used her black magic to erect the

rock barrier across the tributaries of the Nile. Her purpose was to subdue Egypt and bring it under her thrall.' Pandemonium broke out as the listeners expressed their indignation and shouted questions.'

Nara jumped to his feet to intervene but it took him some time to quieten them. 'I call upon Colonel Meren to take up the tale again.

Please hold your questions until he has finished, for I am sure he will provide the answers to many of your concerns.'