Going for Gold (8 page)

Chapter Ten

Y
ou really think we’re here to help Cleopatra! We didn’t just wash up here by accident?”

We were hurrying along in the shadow of the city wall, following Baraka, Adjo and the other courtiers from the royal barge.

Maia had snapped out of her sulk like magic as soon as I explained about seeing Cleopatra’s barge in my vision. In fact she started squealing like an excited little girl!

“There’s nothing accidental about this!” I assured her. “If you ask me, the gods, the friendly gods I mean, wanted us here all along. Khaled said when the gods have some little divine agenda going on, they give you, like, a teensy nudge.”

“Ateensy nudge!” Maia spluttered. “Is that what that was?!”

“Not the sand storm, fluff-brain! That was the Dark gods!”

“Oops, I’m a bit confused,” she giggled. “Who wants us to save Egypt again?”

“The good guys obviously,” I said patiently, secretly enjoying my new role. It’s usually Lola explaining everything to me!

“Wow, you have it all figured out,” she grinned. “Good guys, bad guys. So where does a tragic cosmic dropout fit into this picture?”

I could have bitten off my tongue. I was so busy thinking of Maia as my angel colleague I’d totally forgotten her dark past.

She just laughed. “Relax, babe! I was only winding you up!”

When we reached the city gates, Baraka called out in a low voice. A shutter slid back and one of the courtiers passed something across with a chink of metal.

“Doesn’t matter where you go, money always talks,” Maia commented in my ear.

With stealthy grating sounds the watchman unbolted the gates, dragging them open just enough to let the men slip through.

They all hurried off to their designated areas. “Which way?” Maia hissed. Since she’d appointed me leader I said promptly, “Follow him!” meaning Baraka.

After a few minutes we emerged into a lively market place lit by burning torches. Market traders wrapped in woollen cloaks squatted on the ground beside heaps of local produce. One guy had baskets full of cheeping chicks so tiny they looked like balls of dandelion fluff.

Half-naked little kids were playing tag in the shadows, oblivious to the cold. I loved being able to understand all their joking and teasing. Understanding human languages is one of those angel freebies that always gives me a little buzz.

Baraka stopped to warm his hands over a street vendor’s glowing brazier as he asked for directions. The man watched him walk away, sensing something unusual about this stranger.

There was a sudden commotion as a bunch of Roman soldiers came shambling into the marketplace looking, and smelling, like they’d fallen out of the nearest bar. People hastily pulled the little kids out of their way. One old man spat on the ground as the Romans staggered past, bawling out some crude army song.

Baraka just kept walking. You could feel him forcing himself not to look to see if he was being followed.

In the Street of Carpet Weavers, an animal smell of unwashed wool hung in the air mixed with deeply whiffy dye smells.

Baraka stopped outside one of the houses. A young man was sitting inside the doorway, peacefully looking up at the stars and sipping tea. Behind him I caught a glimpse of gorgeous textiles just bundled into casual heaps.

“I am sorry to disturb you,” Baraka said politely, “but I have come to you on the queen’s business.”

The man gave an incredulous laugh. “I doubt that very much! I doubt the queen even knows I exist!”

A young woman came out, holding a naked baby boy in her arms. “No matter who’s on the throne, they’re always after your money!” she said good humouredly.

“Cleopatra’s treasure houses are filled to bursting,” the courtier reassured them. “She has no need of your money, but she does need your help.”

“To do what?” asked the man obviously not convinced.

“To save Egypt,” said Baraka very quietly.

I shot a thrilled glance at Maia.

Word of this exotic stranger’s arrival spread just as Mardian had promised. In no time a small crowd was gathering outside the weaver’s house, clearly thirsty for news of the outside world.

With no planes, phones or TV, it could take weeks before people in Seshet learned of events that were common knowledge hundreds of miles away in Alexandria. Everyone seemed to realise that Caesar’s assassination had left Egypt vulnerable to Rome, but I don’t think they’d grasped that their country was in imminent danger.

“It’s just a matter of time before the Romans give the order to invade,” Baraka told them gravely. “Our spies believe we have six months at most before their legions descend like locusts. But Queen Cleopatra has a plan!”

“I told you, she’s after our gold!” The weaver’s wife half-joked, to break the growing tension.

“In a way that’s true!” Baraka gently touched her baby’s perfect little forehead. “Our queen is after the precious hidden gold which lies inside each one of her people, the same golden qualities of ingenuity, patience and skill which brought Egypt to greatness long ago. Now Cleopatra asks you to pour out your hidden brilliance once again, to help her usher in a new and shining future for the Two Lands.”

You could see people were genuinely moved.

“What would Cleopatra have us do?” someone asked Baraka.

“The actual details of our queen’s plan are known only to Queen Cleopatra herself and her most trusted advisers. Even / may not be told what she intends to do. But she has sent us forth into her kingdom to search out the finest craftsmen and women in the land, and I know those who help her will be well rewarded.”

“You did right to come to Seshet,” an old man piped up. “We still keep to the old ways in Seshet.”

I’d stopped listening. I may actually have stopped breathing.

I’d seen a girl in the crowd. She was clutching a bag of apricots to her chest. Tiny fruits kept spilling out, but she was too gripped by Baraka’s speech to notice. I’d never seen her in my life, yet with a crazy leap of my heart, I recognised Sky Nolan.

Chapter Eleven

M
aia refused to be impressed by this unexpected

cosmic reunion.

“You only want to think it’s her. How can you ‘know’ some totally random ancient Egyptian human is your old friend?”

“I just know, that’s all,” I said shakily. The extraordinary coincidence had shaken me to the core.

Baraka pulled an important looking scroll from inside his cloak, and started to read from a list of skills and talents which were apparently crucial to Cleopatra’s mysterious plan. “Glassblowers, carpenters…”

I moved in closer to this strange yet fabulously familiar version of my friend, and realised for the first time that her clothes were almost threadbare. It was the proud way she carried herself that made you not notice at first. She had fastened a fresh lotus blossom in her glossy black hair. She had attitude, like my Sky. And like Sky, she was lonely to her bones.

“Dancers, acrobats, silk weavers,” Baraka was reeling off.

In a rush of cosmic info I knew everything about this girl’s life. Her dad was dangerously ill. He hadn’t taken solid food for days, but tonight he’d had a sudden longing for apricots. She’d dashed to the market to buy some, but something about this stranger from Alexandria had stopped her in her tracks.

“Linen weavers, jewellers, perfume blenders…”

I saw sudden longing in her face.

“Shame,” someone muttered behind her. “Her father ran the finest perfume business in Upper Egypt before he married that witch.”

The girl who was, or one day would be, Sky, whirled around. “My father’s not dead yet,” she flashed back. “So don’t talk about him as if he’s already gone to the Field of Reeds!”

Another girl was watching her with concern. Like my friend, she was underfed and poorly dressed.

She tentatively touched her arm. “How is he, Khamsin?”

“Why should you care, Amisi?” she snapped. “Your uncle and aunt are just waiting for him to die so they can steal his customers!”

“I know and it makes me feel ashamed,” Amisi said huskily. “Your father has always been kind to me. It’s a pity he chose a bad wife.”

Khamsin’s face showed absolutely no emotion. “It’s not hard to fool a man with a motherless child!”

An old woman came half-running into the street, weeping as she ran. “He’s calling for you, Khamsin!”

Apricots rolled everywhere as Khamsin dropped her bag and ran, literally pushing people out of her way.

“I’ve got to go with her,” I told Maia. “You can tell me what happens.”

“Gosh, I’m all confused!” she said brightly. “Weren’t we saving Egypt a few minutes ago?”

She was obviously hopping mad that I was taking off without her, but just now saving Egypt suddenly seemed far less important than supporting this human girl, a girl I couldn’t help thinking of as my friend.

Khamsin lived just round the corner in the Street of Perfume Blenders, and I don’t think there has ever been a sweeter smelling street on Earth. As for her actual house, it literally smelled like paradise. As Khamsin opened the door, thousands of delicious scents, floral, musky, subtle, spicy, came swimming in through my senses.

In the front room, a few reed lamps gave a smoky glimmer, enough for a rushed impression of carved cabinets and softly gleaming bottles, as we pelted through.

Khamsin’s dad seemed well-off for these times. Why doesn’t he buy his daughter some new clothes? I wondered.

Then I remembered that Khamsin had a stepmother.

Male and female laughter floated down from an upstairs room. I could hear sharp clicking sounds, like counters being slammed down, and shouts of “Cheat!” Khamsin’s step-mum had invited her mates round to play board games, the way you do when your husband is dying.

Khamsin didn’t even glance in their direction. She flew through the back of the house and out again into a starlit courtyard.

A flight of stone steps went up to the Egyptian-style flat roof. Khamsin took them in a stumbling rush.

“He says he can’t go, dearie, not till he tells you what’s on his mind,” the old woman wheezed behind her.

Khamsin’s father was lying under a heap of furs and blankets, but his teeth were chattering with cold. Beads of sweat stood out on his papery yellow skin. He was obviously in terrible pain.

“Isis help him,” Khamsin whispered. “Help us both.”

Then she ran to him and took both his hands.

When humans are dying, they sometimes need to set the record straight before they leave their bodies forever. Khamsin’s dad had obviously been torturing himself over something he should have told his daughter long ago.

“Your mother wanted… give it… to you,” he gasped out.” But I said… too dangerous for such a young—”

“He’s been like this since you left,” the old woman explained as if the poor man was deaf.

Khamsin’s father was mumbling feverishly. “Had to swear… secret… handed down from mother to—”

He gave a groan as the pain stabbed again deep inside.

When he could speak again he seemed to have lost his thread, “…rats… couldn’t read half… but your mother… determined to—”

Suddenly the dying man’s eyes filled with a kind of exhausted happiness. Every cell in my body tingled as a precious memory shimmered from his mind into mine.

I saw his dark-haired young wife, as if I was watching with him through an open door. Surrounded by exotic plant materials and scribbled notes in Egyptian hieroglyphics, she was dripping a silvery-green essence into a tiny glass vial.

“Best perfume blender in the Two Lands… and most beautiful” he murmured. “Stubborn too… worked through the night… till she… found… secret of Nefertiti’s perfume—”

I almost bit through my lip.

I know what some people would say. Khamsin’s dad was dying an excruciatingly painful death. To make his agonies more bearable, he had escaped into an Egyptian fairy tale where his young wife had rediscovered the secret formula for Nefertiti’s perfume.

I can only say it didn’t seem like that to Khamsin. I saw her blink with shock as she took in what he was saying.

He struggled to sit up. “You know… where I keep the frankincense?”

Khamsin sounded as if she was talking in her sleep. “In the big chest. You never let anyone go to that drawer, even me.”

“Your step-mother mustn’t—” He fell back again, groaning. “Should never have—” he told someone Khamsin couldn’t see. “But a girl needs a mother—”

I gave a little gasp of surprise. He was talking to me.

If he was seeing angels, he probably didn’t have much longer.

“You did the best you could,” I told him softly. “Don’t feel bad. I’ll take care of Khamsin for you, I promise.”

Khamsin was so pale I thought she was going to faint. “You mustn’t talk, Father, just rest.”

His eyes went back to Khamsin. He gave her a look filled with so much love it made my heart feel too way big for my chest. “You’re just as lovely as your mother,” he mumbled.

They were his last words.

Khamsin never took her eyes off his face as the gap between those terrible rasping breaths grew longer.