"He was long ago laid to rest in his tomb." Huy must have known the man well, for a sadness clouded his face. "Many years before his death he was an envoy of Akheperenre Tuthmose, our present sovereign's deceased husband. Senu accompanied him upriver more than once to the courts of the various tribal kings."
Bak tamped down his excitement, cautioning himself to jump to no conclusions. Huy was right about a woman of royal blood. Unless she was a daughter or sister or one of more distant parentage who attracted the favor of the king, she would be one among many, a ewe in a herd of ewes to be handed ever to the most tempting bidder. Yet what if Senu had stolen away a royal favorite? Unlikely, but as plausible as any other theory Bak could conceive. He must speak with Senu or the woman as soon as possible.
Vowing to hurry straight from the harbor to Senu's house, he asked, "Have you any…?" His voice was lost in a flourish of drumbeats as they neared the quay. "Have you any idea how well Senu knew Amon-Psaro?"
"He's never spoken of him to me or to anyone else as far as I know, but neither do I mention I once befriended a king."
Bak eyed the officer with curiosity. "Most men would be proud of so lofty a comrade."
"Can I call a man my friend when I've not set eyes on him for more than twenty-five years?"
"You've mixed emotions, I see, about meeting him again."
"I'll not draw attention to myself, of that you can be sure." A stubborn pride glowed in Huy's eyes. "If he chooses to recognize me, I'll be delighted. If he doesn't, so be it."
The officer's modesty was a trait to envy, Bak thought, and one seldom developed to so great an extreme. Perhaps, if the occasion arose-and if he could keep Amon-Psaro alive-he might get the opportunity to whisper a word in the king's ear. "Are you prepared now to tell me more about Inyotef?"
"I know less about him." "But… ",
"I've heard…" Huy hesitated, sighed. "I've no way of knowing how true the tale. I was gone then, assigned to far-off lands." He sipped from his bowl, emptying it, and set it on the forecastle. "They say Amon-Psaro was a wild creature when first he went to our capital, a prince of the river and the desert, one who could never be confined within the walls of the palace. Oh, he studied like the royal children and played with them, they say, and he learned the ways of Kemet. But he valued his freedom above all things."
"What was Inyotef's role in the prince's game?" Bak could well imagine the kind of knowledge a young sailor could pass on to an innocent but willing child.
"First, Amon-Psaro took Inyotef's family as his own." Huy's smile turned inward. "A peasant family, they were, much like mine. A mother and father to substitute for his own lofty parents living in faraway Kush. A sibling or two close to him in age, and Inyotef, like an older brother."
Bak noticed a sailor standing close by, poised to take up the mooring rope. He backed out of the way, drawing Huy with him. "And then?"
Huy gave a cynical laugh. "Anion-Psaro grew to manhood. No longer in need of a family, he went out in search of life. From what I was told, Inyotef helped him find it."
Bak, born and raised near the southern capital, had grown up hearing tales of hostage princes and young men of noble birth slipping out of the palace, of wild carousing and ungoverned and licentious behavior. As he grew older, he had learned to sort fact from fiction, but a few of those tales, he knew, had been close to the truth.
"How old was Anion-Psaro when he went back to Kush?"
"Fifteen years? Sixteen? I'm not sure." Huy gripped the frame of the forecastle and stiffened his stance, ready for the jarring bump when the hull nudged the quay. "The very next day I said good-bye to him, I was sent on to the land of the Retenu and from there to the island of Keftiu. I was gone for close on ten years, and when I returned to Kemet, he was gone."
Bak spread his legs wide, waiting for the thud. Inyotef or Senn. Which of the two would want Anion-Psaro dead? Many signs pointed toward the pilot, especially the way Huy's skiff had been sabotaged. Only a man knowledgeable about boats could've removed the dowel and butterfly cramp with such expertise. On the other hand, Senu had been on the Wand when Bak's skiff was cut free of its mooring. And his wife was a Kushite, a woman of royal blood.
"He could be anywhere," Huy said. "Probably at his quarters, or more likely in the barracks. It's time for the evening meal."
Bak stood on the quay, looking down at Inyotef's skiff, as sleek and pretty as any craft in the harbor. It looked much as usuaclass="underline" sail furled around the yards, lines neatly coiled out of the way, oars lying in the hull with several bound lengths of extra rope. As far as he could tell, nothing had been removed since he had last seen the vessel. Several items had been added: a pair of inflated goatskins; harpoons and other fishing equipment including a rod, a basket for the catch, and a pottery bowl containing fishhooks, weights, and extra line; and a good-sized reed basket covered with a lid. He dropped into the boat to peek inside. The container was empty.
If Inyotef planned to slay Anion-Psaro, he surely would make his escape by water. He knew the river well, the Belly of Stones. In fact, he had walked the shore only a few hours ago, seeing how high the water had risen, perhaps planning his escape. No other man in Iken knew the rapids as well. If he sailed down them, no one would be able to follow, and his way north would be clear. Not even a courier could carry the word ahead fast enough to catch him.
"Gone!"
Muttering a fervent curse, Bak held the torch high so he and Imsiba could study the small room at the front of Senu's house. It was clean, but far from neat. The sleeping platform and stairway to the roof were cluttered with toys. A reed chest standing open against the wall was stacked high with dishes, two other chests overflowed with bedding and clothing, as if the objects had been hastily dropped inside. An unused loom had been pushed against the wall, sharing the space with a tawny shield, bow and full quiver, and four spears. Seven large water jars leaned against another wall.
"They left an hour before nightfall, two at most." Senu's neighbor, a woman of middle years with thin gray hair and no shape to speak of, shifted a chubby, bright-eyed baby from one solid hip to the other. "A man came, a farmer he looked to be, and the next thing I knew they were leaving. The whole family. Senu, his wife, and all the children from the oldest to the youngest."
Bak questioned the woman further, but she could tell them nothing more. She had come to live in Iken less than a week before and had had no time to get to know Senu's family. The other houses in the block, she told them, were either empty or housed traders, transients who neither knew nor cared about their neighbors.
"One thing we know for a fact, my friend," Imsiba said after she had gone. "A man who runs away has a guilty conscience."
Bak wandered around the room, walked through two other rooms as cluttered as the first, and stepped into the kitchen. Senu and his family, it appeared, had dropped everything, leaving all they owned behind in their haste to go. Vegetables, fresh bread, a vat of beer brewing in the kitchen; more than a month's rations of grain in an alcove beneath the floor, bronze and beaded jewelry in a chest in one of the rear rooms; Senu's weapons.
"To run away, leaving so much behind, makes no sense, Imsiba."
"I agree, but why else would they go with such haste?" Bak, dead tired and discouraged, shook his head. "He has a farm somewhere, I've heard, but wouldn't they take food with them if that's where they went?"
Imsiba took the torch from his hand. "We can do nothing more tonight, my friend. Come with me to Kenamon's house, where you'll find food and a safe and comfortable bed."
A safe bed. Bak had never thought of himself as needing a safe haven, but now the offer came as a relief.