The Captive Soul Read online

  No, Methos most certainly had not known that. “My loyalty,” he said dryly, hand closing about his royal medallion, “is all with Egypt.”

  “I thought it might be.”

  “Why not? After all, someone has to show your men how to handle the reins.”

  Ahmose eyed him with sudden skepticism. “You are a charioteer?” he asked doubtfully.

  “It’s not my primary occupation,” Methos agreed. “But believe me, Your Highness, I have been many things in my life. Right now, ‘alive’ and ‘comfortable’ are highest on my list of priorities.”

  That forced a startled little bark of a laugh from the young prince. “And excellent priorities they are. Let us only pray the gods that we achieve them! We shall talk again, my mysterious savior, you and I and my royal brother, when we are safe in Thebes.”

  “In Thebes,” Methos agreed.

  When I have more of a chance to decide who and what I shall be.

  Chapter Five

  Egypt, Thebes: Pharaoh Kamose’s Reign,

  1573 B.C.

  It had not, Methos thought, been exactly what one might call a pleasant ride. Not with the hot desert sun blazing down on them, and an increasingly less fresh corpse aboard the chariot with them.

  And Thebes… well now, someday it might be a mighty city, but right now it was little more than a very provincial one. It was larger than most towns, granted, full of two-or even occasional three-story buildings crowded in together, but almost all of it was built out of the same plain mud brick as was used to create those farming villages back along the Nile.

  As the bedraggled troops returned, crowds wild with disbelief and horror rushed out into the narrow streets to surround them, staring and weeping, women tearing their clothes and raking their skin with their nails in frenzied mourning. Soon all Thebes echoed with lamentations that grew louder and yet more furious as the dead and living pharaohs approached the royal palace.

  This, at least, was set off from the rest of the city by a surrounding wall. And here at last, Methos thought, was some grandeur. Both outer walls and inner buildings had clean, simple lines that pleased the eye, and were actually of stone, not mere mud brick. Painted lotus blossoms and palm trees ornamented their surfaces, the colors bright red, green, blue, and yellow in the dazzling sunlight, all under that dazzlingly clear turquoise-blue desert sky.

  Here in the royal courtyard, the storm of mourning continued unchecked. But Methos noted one figure standing to one side in dignified silence. She was a small, slight woman in a simple gown of white linen, her only ornament a necklace of red and blue beads, but her hair was covered by that blue and gold winged headdress worn only by royalty, and she was flanked by reverent attendants.

  The queen, then. No, Methos silently amended, as they approached her and he got a better look. Not the pharaoh’s widow, after all: the dowager queen. This was surely one of the oldest mortals he’d met, but there were still echoes of the delicately lovely woman she had been, and her bearing was still proud and assured.

  Prince Ahmose, leaping down from the chariot, rushed to her side. “Mother and Wife of the Gods,” he began formally, then added more gently, “Grandmother. We have both sad and glorious news.”

  “My husband’s son is dead.” It was said with quiet resignation. “The God-King Sekenenre is dead. Did the gods not already warn me and give me time and enough for grief? He is with them now, a god among them. The funeral rites,” she added with sudden sharp practicality at sight of the body, “must be brief.” A wave of a hand brought servants running. “See to it. And bring my priests to purify this site.”

  As the late pharaoh’s body was taken reverentially away for what embalming could still be performed, the queen’s sharpness faded. She added almost vaguely, “And you, my grandson, my Ahmose, are pharaoh.”

  Ahmose drew back in genuine horror. “The gods avert! Kamose is pharaoh, not I!”

  “Ah, of course. I grow confused.”

  But as the ancient, too-wise glance fell upon Methos, he felt the smallest chill race up his spine. That had not been the mental slip of an aged woman. This mortal had a Gift.

  Kamose, if she calls your brother pharaoh, then youryears are running out. And, Methos added uneasily to himself as she continued to study him, unblinking and thoughtful, I also think she may know something of what I am.

  He bowed deeply as he was introduced to her, this Dowager Queen Teti-sheri, widow of one pharaoh, recently bereaved stepmother of a second pharaoh, grandmother of a third.

  A thin, graceful hand beckoned him forward. “My grandsons think me merely an age-crazed old woman,” she murmured. “But you, I think, know better.”

  Methos, feeling his way, said nothing. Teti-sheri nodded as though he’d uttered something profound.

  “I wish to speak with you.” It was a command. “But later, later. First…” Her voice faltered for the first time. “First there must be a proper time for the court and the royal family to mourn. His wife—his widow—Queen Ahhotep, is overseeing our lands to the south; she must be notified. She will not possibly have time enough to reach Thebes before the rites are finished, and the work of holding the southern border safe is far too important for her to leave—but the amenities must, of course be observed.”

  But then Teti-sheri raised her voice regally. “My grandsons, make this man welcome. He shall, I believe, prove most valuable to you.”

  He shall prove most valuable to you.

  Methos bit back an oath of sheer impatience. A month had passed, ordinarily an eyeblink of time to an Immortal, and yet… a month, and—nothing. Not even private quarters, although he’d hardly been treated with discourtesy. And granted, the royal brothers needed time in which to mourn—and time in which a very new pharaoh could begin consolidating his strength.

  Patience, he told himself, patience. The month had been pleasant enough, in a restricted way. He’d not been allowed out of the palace, nor to speak more than the most casual words to guards or servants, but it had been soothing to sit by a pool, as he was doing now, and do nothing but watch lotus flowers bloom and ornamental fish splash.

  Out there in the world this past month, Methos knew, the royal embalmers would have been horribly rushed to mummify what was left of the royal body. I do not envy them that task! Royal mourners, professional chanters and singers in their gray gowns, would have followed the mummy across the Nile to the west bank, the Land of the Dead and the site of royal tombs. Surely Sekenenre would have had a suitable resting place prepared long before this; all pharaohs did. And, Egypt being Egypt, no doubt the same prayers and spells would have been said over him in his final resting place as had been said over dead pharaohs for over a millennia.

  “You are not departed dead,” Methos recited softly from memory, “you are departed alive, to be seated on the throne of Osiris, with your scepter in your hand….”

  He couldn’t recall the rest. There was something moving, though, about mortals trying desperately to gain their form of immortality.

  I did not come here to turn into a—a sage!

  A sudden shadow made him turn to see a guard looming over him. “Yes?” Methos asked sharply.

  “My pardon for startling you, my lord. You are to appear before Pharaoh Kamose and Prince Ahmose.”

  At last! “I am most honored,” Methos said, and got to his feet.

  Of course the royal brothers were going to want to question him fully now that the official period of mourning was ended; of course they were going to be wary of just who they allowed within arm’s length.

  And still nothing was being accomplished! Here they sat under this cursed awning in this cursed courtyard, going over the same matters yet again, and even though cool drinks sat on a nearby tray, he couldn’t take one before Kamose and Ahmose, who showed no sign of wearying.

  “Yes,” he told them for what was at least the third time, “my family has, indeed, had a long-standing and quite friendly relationship with your land. And yes, my…” a quick
mental calculation of mortal generations, “grandfather was given this medallion by the God-King Merneferre Ay for services rendered to the crown.”

  The brothers exchanged quick glances. Ahmose got to his feet, seemingly disinterested in the proceedings, looking out over the courtyard’s central pool with its blazingly white water lilies. “Then you claim to be some manner of ambassador?” he said over his shoulder.

  “No.” One did not lose one’s temper before royalty. Even royalty whose parents hadn’t even been conceived the last time he’d visited their land. “I am not an ambassador, a merchant, a spy, or a mercenary. I am merely a traveler who happens to enjoy seeing the world.”

  The cobra-headed crown of a pharaoh covered Kamose’s hair these days, and there was a regal simplicity to the golden pectoral across his chest and the spotless white of his linen kilt. But as he leaned back in his cedar-wood chair, fingers steepled, he was all wary warrior. “You speak our language fluently for a foreigner. Almost too fluently.”

  “Pharaoh Kamose, I speak the tongue of far-off Albion, too, but that hardly makes me a native of that land, either.” Methos shrugged. “A man may learn many languages if he lives long enough.”

  Prince Ahmose turned from where he’d been apparently studying those water lilies in great depth. “And is clever enough.”

  Methos dipped his head in wry agreement. “And is clever enough.” As you are, youngster. Too clever, in fact, for comfort. “I repeat, oh God-King, I am not an Egyptian—”

  “I believe that,” Ahmose cut in, returning to his chair. “Your accent is aristocratic, but all in all rather… archaic.”

  “Hardly surprising,” Methos retorted, face a careful blank. “I learned the language rather… a long time ago.”

  That deliberate echo of Ahmose’s tone sparked a flash of humor in the young prince’s eyes. “If that is so, if you really are new to this land, or newly returned, why were you fighting with us against the Hyksos?”

  “It seemed a good idea at the time. Besides, I’m not fond of people trying to kill me.”

  Ahmose smiled thinly. “In other words, you are wanted by the Hyksos.”

  Far too clever! Methos’s smile was just as thin. “I would hardly put it so strongly. Let us merely say that I don’t care to go visiting them.” He added flatly, “I don’t approve of people who mount other people’s heads on stakes.”

  “Neither,” Kamose cut in, “do we.”

  Methos raised an eyebrow. Neither brother was quite at ease yet, and he exclaimed as though highly indignant, “I am not a spy! No Hyksos agent would ever have saved Prince Ahmose’s life.”

  “Ah, then that was a deliberate rescue.”

  In fact, much too clever. “Prince Ahmose,” Methos said with his most charming smile, “I have already sworn that I am no mercenary. Believe me, at the time I had no idea in all the many hells who you were.”

  That forced a laugh from both brothers. “I believe him,” Kamose said. “No spy would ever be so honest.”

  “Or so blunt,” Ahmose added, eyeing Methos with sly interest. “Deliberate or not, I do thank you for the rescue. And at any rate, we must accept you. Dowager Queen Tetisheri has so decreed.” The warm affection in the boy’s voice softened the stark words. “She would speak with you next.”

  Kamose chuckled. “Our sympathies, Methos. You may find the Hyksos more merciful.” He gave Methos a regal wave of a hand. “You have our leave to go.”

  Queen Teti-sheri was waiting for him, there in the growing twilight, sitting straight-backed and composed of face in her little garden. The only sound was the small splash made by a fish jumping in the pretty pool and the twittering of birds in the interwoven flowering vines that shaded the garden.

  She might, Methos thought, have been a ruler, not merely a dowager queen, so proud and elegant she looked, and he, respecting her age and dignity, gave her as courtly a bow as ever he’d learned.

  “Flatterer.” Her voice was amused. “Come, straighten. You make my back ache watching you. Come, come, approach! Your honor is safe with me, and mine with you. Yes,” she added at his startled raise of an eyebrow, “we are genuinely alone. I grant you permission to touch the royal person, Methos. Give me your arm. I would walk about my garden a bit.”

  “As Your Majesty wishes.”

  “So formal! I said that we are alone.” She glanced sideways at him, her hand a feather’s touch on his arm. “They think me a fragile old woman. Well, old I may be, but not fragile, not,” Teti-sheri added acerbically, “in mind, at any rate. The gods have given me a Gift whether I like it or not, and I have no choice but to use it.”

  “True of us all,” he murmured.

  She glanced at him again. “What? What goes on behind that clever face of yours?”

  “I was merely… pitying you, Your Majesty.”

  “Pitying!”

  “A Gift such as yours cannot be an easy burden to bear.”

  “Ah. No. It is not. I foresaw the death of my beloved lord husband, he who was Pharaoh Tao and is now with the gods, and I foresaw the death of my foolhardy stepson, my husband’s son. So it is, so it is. And… it may be that Ahmose shall, indeed, be pharaoh before he is fully a man—no, say nothing of this to Kamose! It shall not come to pass, I think, for some time yet!”

  She paused. “Now what are you thinking, oh sly one?”

  “If I may speak frankly? Yes? I am wondering what it was you truly wished to say to me.”

  Teti-sheri stopped short, turning to look up at him. The twilight softened the lines of her ancient face, making her look so lovely, and so otherworldly, that Methos froze.

  “You are not of our kind,” the queen said flatly. “No, do not try to deny it! My Gift showed me that from the moment I first set my gaze on you. What you are, I know not. But the gods have sent you, and I can only pray they have sent you to save Egypt.”

  Oh. “I… am only one man, Your Majesty.”

  “You are from the gods! Bah, and before you think I truly have slid into the madness of age, no, I am not expecting you to—to fly on the wings of the wind to slay King Apophis and banish all the Hyksos just like that!”

  The snap of her fingers was startlingly loud in the twilight quiet. “Then, Your Majesty, what do you expect?”

  Her sigh was soft and weary. “You have traveled far, seen much—more, I have no doubt, than either of my grandsons. You know the weapons the Hyksos use, and you know the way the Hyksos fight.”

  “Yes.”

  She stared up at him, unblinking. “Help my grandsons as the gods will it, show them the new ways—these ‘horses,’ these ‘chariots.’” She used the Hyksos terms; there were no equivalent words—yet—in the Egyptian language. “Yes, and they have finer swords and bows, do they not? Oh, don’t stare at me like that, I was queen to a pharaoh! My life is more than pretty gardens and hand-maidens.”

  “They do have finer weapons. And horses. And chariots.”

  “Ah, now I’ve started you thinking!”

  Methos risked a wry little smile. “It is an interesting puzzle, isn’t it? I take it that the Hyksos have forbidden the Egyptians the use of the new weaponry?”

  “They have.”

  “An additional problem.”

  “Ah, but one you must solve. You have no choice, do you, man from the gods? You cannot escape our foes any more than can we.”

  She was very much Ahmose’s grandmother. Methos thought quickly about his only alternative: Living quietly in farming village after village, with absolutely no mental stimulation, no challenges, merely waiting out the years till the current generation died out and no one remembered him…

  Which, judging from the hale old age of Teti-sheri, might be yet another hundred years. A boring, tedious, sterile hundred years.

  And, damn it, he didn’t want to leave Egypt as it was now! Illogical to risk himself for those who weren’t even his people, but there it was. He wanted his Egypt, his safe, unchanging haven, back again.

  “N
o,” Methos admitted dryly, “I cannot escape. And, as the saying goes, ‘If one cannot flee, one must fight.’ But if the odds are overwhelming…”

  “Sly One, what else?”

  Methos smiled slightly and saw an answering wry humor sparkle in her eyes. “If the odds are overwhelming, Your Majesty, why, simply put, there are other means to fight than by force.”

  “I was correct,” Teti-sheri said with satisfaction. “You will, indeed, prove most valuable!”

  No, dear queen, keeping my head firmly attached to my shoulders will prove far more valuable. To me, that is!

  But he couldn’t say that to this gallant old woman. Instead, Methos murmured only, “From your mouth to the gods’ ears,” and bowed.

  Chapter Six

  Egypt, Thebes: Reign of Pharaoh Kamose,

  1573 B.C.

  Methos paused in the doorway to the private room he had at last been granted, allowing an obsequious servant to enter first, both because the servant seemed so insistent on making sure everything was just right for this now-honored guest, and because now that night was here, it was too dark in there for him to want to enter without knowing exactly what might lie inside.

  At least the room was part of the main building of the royal palace, an honor in itself, looking out onto one of the lovely courtyard gardens. And from what he could see in the dimness past the servant’s shoulder, it was large and freshly swept; Methos sniffed appreciatively at the faint, fresh scent of cedar. It was pleasantly cool in there now and would probably prove comfortable even by day, since the windows, in sensible Egyptian style, were set deliberately high in the walls, just below the ceiling. They would, he knew from prior experience, allow even the slightest breeze to circulate.

  The servant had been bustling happily about straightening bed linen and the arrangement of clothes chest and bedside table, clearly so familiar with the layout he needed no lamp. But then he paused, glancing back over his shoulder as though only now aware of the guest’s discomfort.