Day of the False King (30 page)

Tears ran down his face as he reached his
arm into the jar. Sobs began to wrench from him. Shepak had to look
away, seeing his friend so grief-stricken. Nidaba dropped her head to
stare at the tiles. Within the thick honey, Semerket felt his fingers
move across his beloved’s features, reaching to the lips that he used
to kiss so fondly, to the nose, over the closed eyes fringed in black
lashes. Summoning all of his resolve, he reached for the yoke of her
rough servant’s dress and gently lifted her into the light.

Her head emerged, the honey streaming over
her domed forehead, black hair glued to her narrow skull. The honey had
altered her lovely dark features, however, for her skin seemed bleached
of all color…

Then Semerket looked again.

“That isn’t Naia,” he whispered.

Both Nidaba and Shepak jerked their heads to
see.

“Why, no,” Shepak said, after a moment, and
his voice was faint with shock. “That’s Princess Pinikir.”

THE FIRST WHEAT HAD BEGUN TO
SPROUT
across Babylonia’s fields. Overnight, the bearded
spears covered the tamped, rutted earth left behind by the retreating
Elamite armies. The priests of Bel-Marduk, after consulting many sheep
livers, went into the cities of Babylonia to declare that the New Year
had begun. After the proper rites and observances were made, after
sacrifice and prayer had propitiated the sixty thousand gods of
Babylonia, the priests proclaimed that the Day of the False King had at
last arrived.

The drab, mud-brick cities of the river
plain transformed themselves overnight into riotous fairgrounds, decked
in floating streamers that flew from every building. Babylon, of
course, was the loudest and most riotous of all. On the Euphrates, the
gilded barges of the gods assembled in a magnificent river procession,
parading in splendor around its walls. The flotilla’s progress signaled
to the thousands who lined the banks that the gods had returned from
their annual retreat into the high mountains to extend once again their
blessings to humankind for another year.

The Day of the False King was above all a
topsy-turvy day, when every role and law in the land were reversed. In
private homes, masters waited on their servants, while in the
thoroughfares, vendors good-naturedly opened their shops to looters.
But the most important part of the festival was the coronation of the
False King. Every year the priests of Marduk launched a citywide search
for the most foolish man in the kingdom, to name him Babylon’s king for
a day.

That very morning the priests had gone
through the city, breaking into the homes of rich and poor alike,
shouting the ancient words, “Where is the king? Bring him forth! He
must be arrayed in his royal robes and given the rod and ring so that
he can dispense justice to his people! Show us where he is, for we have
lost him!” And the people ran about, pretending to be frightened,
shouting with alarm, “Where is our king? He is lost! Let him be found
at once!”

Of course, everyone knew that the real king
was safe in his palace, and that he had already chosen the most foolish
man in the kingdom to rule in his place. This year’s festival promised
to be among the most memorable in all of Babylon’s long history, for
there were not one, but two False Kings, and they sat enthroned
together in the vast courtyard of Etemenanki. One of them was a short,
plump man, who wept piteously and bewailed his fate, even though his
elite guards jabbed him with their spears, urging him to put on a
better face for the crowds. The other, a scary-looking fellow with a
macabre smile and a mark at the corner of his eye, thrilled the
Babylonians with his glowering stare and defiant posture. Though the
pair’s lack of humor was disappointing, the crowds had every faith that
their new king had chosen wisely.

The new king of Babylonia was in fact such a
beloved figure that nothing he did could ever be amiss in the eyes of
his subjects. He was so handsome and so clever, his subjects boasted,
that people vied to see how extravagantly they could praise him, and
even predicted that Babylon was poised to embark on a new golden age.

The proof of all this?

Why, hadn’t the new king delivered the
country from the detested invader without a blow being struck? Such a
hero had not walked the streets of Babylon since Gilgamesh himself was
a lad!

As the crowds laughed and caroused drunkenly
in the corridors of the city, they did not know or even notice the true
author of their good fortune — the black-eyed Egyptian man, slim and
long-limbed, who skirted the crowd’s edge. Some of the more spirited
Dark Heads tried to pull him into the streets to join their shameless
dances, but he slipped from their hands, smiling but firm, intent on
his own business. His prudery did not offend them, for they soon found
other amusements to divert themselves.

As he entered the forecourt of Etemenanki,
Semerket slowly forced his way through the crowds to where the two
False Kings were enthroned together on their raised dais. Menef was
weeping copious tears, which only seemed to induce more cruel behavior
on the part of his “subjects,” who expected their False Kings to be
foolish and ridiculous, not sad. The crowds pelted him with waste and
spat on him as they came near, enjoining him to laugh and prattle as a
proper False King should. Menef did his best to placate the Babylonians
with halfhearted antics, but the crowds still covered him with offal.

The Asp’s aggression was more satisfying to
them, for it somehow seemed more kingly in their eyes that he should
roar and stamp his feet when they ventured near him. Chains bound the
False Kings to their thrones, but the Asp’s cruel expression was enough
to deter the people from taunting him as they did Menef. But when
Semerket emerged from the horde to stand at the base of their thrones,
to stare at them and nothing more, the behavior of the two False Kings
changed abruptly.

Menef’s eyes bugged out of his head, and he
began to scream in fright. He struggled to turn away, dementedly
gibbering. Even the Asp cowered, calling on the gods of Egypt to
protect him from vengeful ghosts. The crowd roared in delight to see
the two False Kings behave in so cowardly a fashion.

This was more like it!

Semerket merely watched the two kings, a
scornful smile tugging at his lips. Menef and the Asp had not been told
that he had survived the Insect Chamber, and they no doubt believed
that he had come back from behind the Gates of Darkness to snatch them
both into hell. Semerket made a sudden lunging gesture at them, and the
crowd screamed with laughter to see the two False Kings fall backward,
tugging at their chains, shrieking in terror.

Bored with his game, Semerket moved away.
When Menef and the Asp dared to look up again, he was gone, confirming
their supposition that they had indeed seen his vengeful spirit.

Semerket did not pause to look at the
wrestlers or jugglers who entertained the mobs. He was too intent on
his final task to clutter his mind with nonessentials. Semerket usually
detested festivals, discomfited by the crowds and the noise, but Mother
Mylitta had told him to wait by the gagu’s drawbridge. Nothing that
morning — neither riot nor war nor even a festival — could have kept
him away.

Semerket did not call out his arrival to the
female guards, for Mother Mylitta had warned him that the gagu had its
own rituals to perform and he was not to disturb them. So Semerket
joined the others who took their ease near the gagu’s moat and did as
he had been told; he waited quietly.

The Babylonian sun was its usual savage
self, and Semerket wished that he had bought one of the wide-brimmed
straw hats that the mat-weavers sold in the streets. Removing his
sandals, he plunged his feet into the moat’s cool water. With the
sounds of a mirthful people all around him and the pleasant feeling of
tiny fish nibbling at his toes, he was soon lulled into an agreeable
torpor.

Though he was not exactly dozing, he was
able to reflect at last on all that had happened to him since his
discovery of Princess Pinikir’s body. Whether he could make sense of it
all was an entirely different matter…

DOWN IN THE CRYPT, he and
Shepak had decided that it was too dangerous for Semerket to appear
immediately at the palace. They reasoned that if Queen Narunte or Menef
saw him, the two might even then engineer some desperate attempt upon
his life. Shepak therefore went alone to fetch King Kutir to the crypt
in secret. Shepak later told Semerket that he had found the solitary
king in a council chamber, pale and anxious, reading some recent
dispatches from his father’s capital city of Susa.

“Sire,” Shepak said, “we’ve found your
sister.”

Kutir gave a start, rising to his feet
slowly. “Alive?”

Shepak dropped his eyes, staring at the
floor, and the king had his answer.

“So the Isins killed her, then…”

“No, Sire.”

Kutir looked up sharply.

“Semerket is in the crypt below the palace,
where we found the princess’s body. He will be able to explain —”

“The crypt?” Kutir was appalled.

“Will you come, Sire?”

Kutir glared, unused to interruption. “Yes —
and my bodyguards will arrest him for heresy. I told him specifically
he was not to violate our dead.”

“I think it best, Sire, that you hear his
tale first, without your bodyguards as witnesses. Afterward, you can
decide for yourself who can know the truth.”

Kutir immediately comprehended Shepak’s
meaning. “Is it conspiracy, then?”

Again, Shepak said nothing. Kutir strapped
his sword to his side and thrust a dagger into his belt. Though he had
every confidence in both Semerket and Shepak, he did not intend to walk
blithely into a trap, for in the past Elamite kings had been slain by
trusted underlings.

In the palace cellars, they came to the red
wall that separated this world from the next. Nidaba and the two Dark
Heads were gone, dismissed by Semerket. Their presence would have only
served to alarm the Elamite king.

Shepak and Kutir found Semerket, stained and
sticky, in the far end of the crypt. Kutir saw the shards of the
shattered seals littering the floor, and his eyes flashed indignation.

“Sire,” Semerket said before the king could
vilify him, “rest assured that a priestess said every proper prayer
over the dead before I searched here.”

Kutir fell silent, and Semerket continued
warily. “We believe that your sister’s body was mistakenly identified
as a servant and placed into this jar. Will you look?”

Kutir exhaled, then nodded shortly.

Semerket reached again into the jar and
gently pulled the princess’s head into the torchlight. The honey
streamed in oozing rivulets from her nose and forehead, and the torch
picked out her features in wavering outline.

“Is this your sister, lord?” Semerket asked.

The king looked away quickly. He nodded.
“Who did this?” muttered Kutir darkly.

“I’m ashamed to say, Sire, that Egyptians
committed the crime. It was Menef who sent the raiders to your sister’s
home. And it was the Asp, his bodyguard, who carried out the murders.”

Semerket related how he had discovered that
Menef had been part of the conspiracy that had taken the life of the
Great Ramses III, and that Menef kept his ties to the remaining
conspirators in Egypt, principally Prince Mayatum, who himself had
instructed Menef to execute Naia and Rami.

“Are you saying that my sister and her
husband were killed because this Egyptian prince wanted to revenge
himself — on
you?”

“No, Sire. It was not Menef, but your wife
who ordered your sister’s death. All the killings occurred at the
plantation to make it seem as if Isins had carried them out. The queen
admitted this to me herself.”

Kutir, who must have known of his wife’s
hatred for his sister, put a hand to his forehead and looked as if he
might have fallen had not Shepak assisted him to a bench. Leaning
heavily against the wall, the king listened in wonder as Semerket told
of being locked in the Insect Chamber by Narunte and the scheming Menef.

Kutir was incredulous, and he shook his
head. “The Insect Chamber? But that’s impossible. No one survives it —”

“Shepak rescued me at the last possible
moment. If you don’t believe me, I’ll show you the marks.” Without
waiting for Kutir’s consent, Semerket turned and pulled down the yoke
of his tunic. The wound where the beetle’s jaws had dug into him was
swollen and discolored.

The sight of the still-bleeding lesion at
last convinced Kutir that Semerket’s tale was true. “But why?” he asked
dully. “Why would she do it?”

“Queen Narunte discovered that your sister
and her husband came here with secret orders from your father. Your
victories in Babylonia threatened him. They had been charged to
undermine your successes where they could.”

“Successes!” Kutir echoed bitterly. He
abruptly brought his hands to his face, and his shoulders shook
silently. He regained control of himself quickly, however, looking off
into the dark. “Narunte’s only a mountain chieftain’s daughter, unused
to more enlightened ways, fierce in her love for me. She’s rough,
sometimes, I acknowledge it…”

At that moment, Semerket knew that Kutir
would never bring the queen to justice for what she had done to him. He
shrugged philosophically and said, “Then let the blame fall on Menef
and his henchmen alone, Sire. They come from a civilized nation and
should have known better.”

Kutir regarded him gratefully. “You’ve lived
up to your reputation, Semerket. You found my sister, as I knew you
would, and were honorable enough to tell me of your compatriots’ part
in her murder. Many other men would not have had the courage to tell me
the truth. I will order the arrest of Egypt’s ambassador and his men.
Their punishment will be left to you.” Then his eyes filled with shame.
“As to my part of the bargain, I regret that my current strategic
position prevents me from allowing Bel-Marduk’s idol to leave Babylon.
The god’s magi, I’m afraid, would laugh in my face if I ordered it.
They’re counting on another king to give the orders in Babylon soon; I
wish you luck with him.”

“I understand, Sire.” He felt it would only
cloud the issue to tell Kutir that he was already on extremely friendly
terms with his likely successor. Why trouble the poor man with
inconsequentials?

It was dawn when they emerged from the
palace cellars. To Semerket, who had spent most of the previous day in
the tunnels beneath Babylon and the long night hours searching through
the palace crypt, it seemed as if he had lived for a time in perpetual
darkness. It was almost startling to see the rays of the sun again.

Kutir told them both to wait at the
garrison. He would send for them after he arrested the pair, he
promised, when it was safe for Semerket to appear. But the hours passed
and no message came. Concerned, Semerket and Shepak took themselves to
a side entrance of the palace used by tradesmen and servants. They
hoped to waylay some butler or serving woman, to ask if they might know
why the king tarried. But the servants were just as ignorant as they.