''I've no belongings to pack.''
''Good. Neither have I. We can start all the more quickly. Let's get to work.''
A little over seventy-two hours after the airstrike, Nephthysian forces moved in on Freegypt from three sides. Libyan armoured divisions rolled across the border and into the Western Desert, kicking up a towering plume of dust behind them, while Sudanese troops pushed up from the south along the course of the Nile, past Aswan, and Arabian warships took up position along the Red Sea coast, blockading ports and harbours from Hurghada to Foul Bay.
The Libyans arrived at Luxor the following day, halting at the river. Their Scarab tanks blasted ba across the water, not with a view to hitting anything in particular, more as a way of announcing that they were there.
The lack of answering fire from the town was disappointing to say the least. Unsettling, too. Not even the crackle of a machine gun. Nothing.
By arrangement, it was left to the Sudanese to make the first forays into Luxor on foot. Troops darted along the streets, going from house to house, kicking down doors and entering. At any moment they anticipated being ambushed and shot at with conventional weapons. They held their baboon-head ba lances at the ready.
Silence hung over everything. In the streets stray dogs sniffed and roamed with unusual boldness. In the houses the Sudanese discovered grandparents and children cowering in corners or behind furniture. All morning and afternoon the soldiers encountered only the town's infirm, the very elderly, and the young with their mothers. There appeared to be nobody else left in Luxor. Virtually everyone of sound body and arms-bearing age was gone.
18. Anubis
The palace of the god of the dead is built of bones, high on a snowy mountain peak. Its gateway is formed from the ribcage of a whale. Its floors are tiled with human teeth, toe joints, and knuckles. Femurs and shins make up its walls, interleaved like brickwork. Its windows are framed with skulls and elephant tusks. Its towers are, literally, ivory towers.
Anubis dwells here, alone. Alone, he sits and broods, a dark presence at the heart of this white place.
Ra arrives with trepidation. It is never easy to predict what sort of mood his thrice-great-nephew will be in, but the safe bet is it won't be a good one. Added to that, Ra has a perennial dread of the realm of the dead. He spends half his time voyaging through its bleakest, blackest regions, and its lightlessness distresses and repels him. It is everything that he is not. He shines; it overshadows. He is filled with life; it is oppressive. He gives; it takes.
Anubis, on his throne, looks up and sombrely assesses his visitor. He squints somewhat, Ra's inherent radiance irksome to his gloom-adapted eyes.
''Great Ra,'' he says, and something in his tone of voice tells Ra that — miracle of miracles — Anubis is actually not displeased to see him. His mien is a few notches below its usual level of grimness. He is, by his own glum standards, almost jovial.
''He Who Belongs To The Cere-cloths,'' says Ra, ''I'm here to-''
''I know why you are here,'' says Anubis. ''I know of your self-appointed peace mission. We all do. Talk amongst the Pantheon has been about little else of late.''
''Then that spares me the effort of a lengthy explanation.''
''I confess I am slightly surprised you did not come to see me sooner.''
''Really?''
''I occupy a unique position,'' says Anubis. ''To all intents and purpose I am the son of Set and Nephthys. However, it's common knowledge that my real father is Osiris. My mother visited him in the night, he mistook her for Isis, and I am the bastard product of that adulterous union.''
''It has never been proven…''
''It has never been admitted, which is not the same thing. Osiris refuses to accept that he could have been so careless. My mother adamantly denies that she would seduce another woman's husband. Their efforts to cover up the whole sordid business are as strenuous as they are ludicrous. But dignity must be preserved at all costs, mustn't it?'' Anubis barks a laugh. ''Really, though, it's pathetic. How can Osiris not have known that he was lying with a woman other than his wife? Mind you, he has to say that. Otherwise Isis would doubtless see to it that he was going around with a pair of wooden balls to go with that wooden cock of his.''
''You blame him solely for the indiscretion? Surely Nephthys must bear some responsibility too.''
''Oh no, I blame her equally. She was no less guilty.''
''But my impression,'' says Ra, ''is that you don't hate your mother as much as you do Osiris.''
''Your impression would be erroneous. I hate her. I hate Osiris. I hate my adoptive father, dear old Set, who feigns not to be aware that I am not his blood son and yet still holds me at a distance. I hate all of them for their lies and their hypocrisy. I decry everything they stand for. And now you have come here to ask me to heal the rift between them, to act as the glue to reunite my true father and my adoptive father. Because, nominally, I belong to both Osiris and Set, I ought to be well placed to prick their consciences and bring them to the negotiating table. Am I not wrong? That's what you're after? That is the task you wish to enlist me to carry out?''
''You are not wrong,'' says Ra.
''So why did you not approach me earlier? You have spoken to Osiris and Isis and to the First Family. Why me now? Why was I not top of the list?''
''I…'' Ra hesitates. ''I would have solicited your aid sooner, had I not believed that I could discharge this mission on my own. I did not wish to burden anyone else.''
''But you have failed so far, and this is the next step, talking to me. An act of desperation, one might perhaps call it.''
''No.''
''How am I not supposed to feel second-rate, though? An afterthought?''
Anubis, thinks Ra, is sensitive when it comes to feeling wanted. Like many a child of dubious parentage he is insecure at heart, forever afraid of rejection. His brooding demeanour masks fragility. I must tread carefully.
''One avenue of approach has proved unsuccessful,'' he says. ''This fresh direction, which I was initially loath to take for fear of troubling you, may yet be the one that bears fruit.''
''For fear of troubling me?'' Anubis's grin looks very much like a baring of fangs. ''Or for fear of me?''
''O Chief Of The Necropolis, Lord Of The Hallowed Lands, He Who Stands Guard At The Head Of The Bier…''
This litany of epithets is begun by Ra on a note of protest. Then he realises he is not being honest, and did not Anubis just now state his abhorrence of dishonesty in all its forms?
So, with humble straightforwardness, he says, ''Yes, I do fear you. I cannot deny it. I wish it were otherwise, but it isn't. I am the sun, light, life, and you — you are not.''
Anubis nods, approving of Ra's plain speaking. ''We cannot all be alike, or sympathetic to one another. It would be boring and absurd if we were. But alas, Great Ra, for all your most welcome frankness, I'm afraid I must decline your invitation to help. And before you remonstrate, let me explain my reasons why. Come.''