Silver Hair approached with silent delicacy, hovering behind his master. Othrys paid no attention to his servant or to Kysen. He was a well-built man of middle years, his arms, legs, and chest thick with hillocks of muscle. Puckered scars interfered with the smooth expanse of skin a shade or two lighter than cedar. In spite of the scars, his skin had the tautness of a youth, not a battle-weary barbarian pirate.
Kysen watched Othrys carefully, trying to discern his intentions. He gained nothing from staring at eyes the color of the sky at midday. He wasn't used to sky eyes. They seemed cold and pale compared to the warm shades of brown and black so much more common in Egypt. However, they did go with hair the color of old honey and streaked with gold from the sun. He was still assessing Othrys when Tcha's whine rose above the whispers of the scribes.
"I tell you he's dead! The jackals dragged him away, and I swear upon my own ka, I can't find our-" Tcha glanced at Kysen. "I can't find our belongings."
"By the Earth Mother, he's run off with the spoils," Othrys said.
Tcha had been squatting on the floor, but he had never been able to stay in one place for long. The thief jumped to his feet and darted in one direction, then another as he rattled on. "Not run off, killed. There was a hole hacked in his chest. A hole, I tell you!"
"Who is dead?" Kysen asked. He brushed by Silver Hair and confronted Tcha. "Who is dead?"
Tcha slid a narrow look at Kysen, then at Othrys.
"My cat."
Folding his arms, Kysen said, "You don't have a cat. No cat would keep company with one as filthy and ill-mannered as you."
"Be at ease," Othrys said in a light purring tone that encouraged neither ease nor further conversation.
"Most worshiped prince," Silver Hair murmured. "I have brought the one called Nen to you, from Mistress Ese."
The servant retreated. Kysen turned his attention back to his host to find that Othrys had been surveying him calmly, rather like a mongoose contemplating a cobra. Othrys had the most unwavering stare he'd seen, other than pharaoh's. But the golden one's stare was that of a living god contemplating an invisible horizon between mortality and divinity. Othrys's stare was a javelin piercing a man's ka. Kysen always felt that the barbarian's sky-hued gaze masked the fact that he was debating whether he would kill his guest now, or later.
"Thunderbolts and quakes, Nen, be seated while I deal with this fluttered fool."
"It's to be later, then," Kysen said to himself.
"What?"
"Nothing," Kysen replied.
Tcha's relentless movements brought him back to Othrys. "I tell you, great master, there be a fiend abroad in Memphis."
"There are always demons who torment the living," Othrys said.
Flapping his arms in agitation, Tcha burst into a tirade. "He had no heart! And there was a feather. Heart and feather, feather and heart. Do you know what that means, great master?"
Othrys rolled his eyes and shook his head.
"Judgment," Kysen said. He was growing vaguely uneasy, no doubt because Tcha wouldn't keep still and chattered absurdities.
Othrys threw up his hands. "What judgment?"
Tcha licked his lips, but couldn't make his voice work. Kysen answered for him.
"He seems to think the missing heart and the feather- was it a white one? Ah. He seems to think the missing heart and the white feather are signs of a different kind of creature. Which causes me to fear for the health of old Tcha's wits."
"By the Great Earth, cease this cloudy talk. What creature does he fear?"
Kysen met Othrys's impatient gaze with a frown. "What creature? The one who crouches beneath the balance scales of judgment on which souls are weighed against the feather of truth and rightness." Kysen's frown deepened. "She is called many names, but the Book of the Dead calls her Ammut, the Devouress… Eater of Souls."
The whispering of the scribes vanished. Even Othrys was silent, while Tcha grabbed a handful of the amulets strung about his body. His lips moved in a silent recitation of a protective spell. Then Othrys managed a question in a faint tone.
"I assume the Devouress eats-"
"The dead found unworthy of the afterlife," Kysen replied. He continued reluctantly. "She eats the living soul, the body, all. One dies again, for all time. One ceases to exist."
"Does one, by the Earth Mother? Eaten alive, so to speak."
Kysen was suddenly angry with himself. What was he doing, taking seriously the ravings of an ignorant teller of tales like Tcha? The man sold the crimes of his friends to the city police. The only reason he was still alive was that he possessed just enough sense not to try his tricks on Othrys.
Smiling, Kysen broke the fearful silence. "Tcha makes sense. Where else would Eater of Souls be drawn than to the Caverns in mighty Memphis, a place stuffed to the ramparts with thieves, ruffians, corruption, and evildoers of every description? So many to devour in such a small space."
"Ha!" Othrys threw back his head and guffawed. The scribes exchanged rueful glances and laughed along with their master.
Tcha stared at them, shaking with indignation so that his amulets clacked.
"I knew it," Othrys crowed. "He tells this tale to conceal his own deeds. Tcha, you killed Pawah, and now you spin this lying yarn to hide behind the Eater of Souls. An original notion, I admit."
All mirth fled Othrys's visage. "But you still owe me my tithe. Pay it, or by the time I'm done with you, you'll welcome the Eater of Souls."
"I spin no yarns!" Tcha squawked. The two guards who had escorted Kysen grabbed the thief by the arms and lifted him off his feet. Tcha's legs whirled in the air. The last that was heard of him was a high whine. "Everyone thinks I'm offal, goat's dung, hippo muck. Everyone despises me. I'm surrounded by malice and disgust!"
Othrys poured wine into a bull's-head rhyton. "Now, that is a man who knows the truth of himself."
Kysen couldn't restrain a grin.
The Greek gave him a tolerant smile. "So, my friend. I didn't frighten you away the last time we saw each other. I've never met a young man who would give himself over in the house of a man who had held a blade to his throat."
"I assumed the blade was your accustomed greeting for those who win games of senet and five deben of copper from you."
Othrys handed him the rhyton. It was silver with a gold rim. "You have the facile tongue of a bard, Nen, but your character is shrouded by perpetual mist."
Kysen's heart did a somersault in his chest. He looked over his shoulder at the scribes. They had resumed their work, but Othrys clapped his hands once, and they left.
"I'm what Ese told you I was," Kysen said as he turned back to his host.
Othrys lifted a double-handled drinking cup, drank some wine, and said, "Facile of tongue, dauntless of heart, swift of wit. Being all these things, you should know I would find out who you really were." The cup slammed down on a tray. Wine sprayed out, splattering Othrys's tunic and Kysen's kilt.
"Tell me, Lord Kysen. Why should I not eviscerate you and stuff your body beneath the floor of my bedchamber?"
This was one of those moments for which Father had trained him. Kysen sighed and brushed drops of red wine from his kilt with leisurely strokes. "I suppose because you know that my father would impale you on his spear, taking care not to kill you, then hang you from the prow of Wings of Horus. Just above the water, where crocodiles could take turns snapping chunks of flesh from your face and body. At least, that's what he did to the last pirate he caught. Perhaps he would be a bit more angry should you kill me."
"As I said, my lord. You're dauntless of heart and swift of wit." Othrys picked up a cloth and wiped wine from his arm.