“Remember, we’ll be keeping watch for them from up there,” Kawit said, pointing to the top of the cliff directly above the mouth of the tomb. “We’ll drop a handful of stones when we see them coming.”
Once Nava and Kawit were gone, Amenophis and I had nothing to do but wait and sometimes check on how well Ta-Miu had settled into her basket. We sat together with our backs against the passageway wall and spoke in whispers when we spoke at all. We were too tense to exchange more than a few words, mostly small, nervous questions: Was I comfortable, was his foot bothering him, was that the sound of rocks falling or just our imaginations? When we actually heard Kawit’s signal, the handful of pebbles she dropped to alert us to Samut’s approach, it sounded as loud as if a monumental temple pillar had toppled to the ground.
“It’s time,” I said, groping for his hand and squeezing it. “Wish me luck. Better yet, beg Ma’at to forgive me.”
“Why do you need her forgiveness?”
“Because what I’m about to do is either a lie or blasphemy or both.”
“You don’t believe that and neither should the goddess. We’re fooling evil men to save the life of a child. If Ma’at can’t see the good behind that deceit, how wise can she be? Good luck, Nefertiti.” He planted a clumsy kiss on my cheek and then made a disgusted sound when he tasted the paint on my face. I smothered a laugh, but it broke the tension. I stood up, slung Thutmose’s quiver over my shoulder, grabbed the bow with one hand, swept Ta-Miu out of her basket with the other, and waited just within the entrance of the tomb.
I saw three shapes coming across the valley floor from the direction of the workmen’s temporary houses. They moved quickly, the one in the lead lighting the way with a small torch. I strained my ears to catch any trace of their conversation, but they maintained silence until they began the climb up the rocky path to where I waited.
Abruptly the torch stopped moving. “Hey! What do you think you’re doing, Samut?” a cold voice growled. “Get going.”
“Not until you let me see my son.”
“We’ll let you see him in pieces if you keep acting like a donkey.”
“For all I know, he’s already dead!” Samut cried bitterly. He was playing out the strategy we’d practiced. What courage it took for him to say those words! “If you want me to take you one step closer to Lord Iritsen’s tomb, you’d better give me proof that I’m risking my soul for a good reason.”
The cold voice chuckled. “Fine, why not?” I heard a shrill whistle from below, followed by the sound of a child’s frightened scream. I paid sharp attention to the direction of that cry. The third tomb robber must have been trailing his comrades with the boy in tow, and he now lurked close enough to overhear whatever passed between them and Samut. “Good enough?” the cold voice asked. “Or do you want to see if we can make him cry louder?”
“No, no more, please. That was all I wanted. Tell me—I’m just asking; I don’t want to make trouble—tell me, when will I see him?”
“When we decide.” The cold voice fell like a mallet.
“Hey!” The familiar nasal voice of Kawit’s brother. “What are you talking about? Weren’t we going to give him back his kid as soon as he got us into the tomb?”
“Now you’re on his side?” There was an unspoken threat in those words.
“No, but … come on, it’s Samut. We used to be friends.”
I could hear the scornful snort clearly on the night air. “You’re an idiot. That’s why no one asked you when we made our plans. It’s been decided: He’ll take us into the tomb, and then he’ll wait until we’ve got what we came for, and then we’ll let him have the brat back. Or do you want him taking the boy and running back to the village to sound the alarm? Do you want to die for this?”
Samut spoke up. “Please, there’s no need to argue. All that matters is my son’s return. Look there, up the slope. That’s the tomb entrance. I came out here earlier today to break the seals so you can get in faster. We’ll go on now.”
We’ll go on now. I cast a glance behind me to where Amenophis knelt beside our small fire. I hugged Ta-Miu to my chest and whispered, “Promise you won’t leap out of my arms, my sweet one, and tomorrow morning I’ll give you the biggest fish you ever saw.” I inhaled slowly through my nostrils, offered a prayer to Isis in my heart, and sprang out of the tomb with a shout loud and wild enough to echo through the whole valley of the dead.
I felt a surge of heat at my back and knew that Amenophis had poured oil onto the fire. A cry from the slope below told me that the tomb robbers had seen the flare as well. Ta-Miu struggled in my grasp, but I held on to her firmly as I strode forward and struck a pose I’d seen many times in statues of great Sekhmet, showing the lion-headed goddess going forth to destroy the enemies of the Black Land.
“Oh, gods, what’s that?” Kawit’s brother’s twangy voice was shrill with panic. He froze where he stood.
“I—I don’t know.” The one who’d spoken so callously to Samut was suddenly a fearful child again, shaking in his bed in the dark. I glared downhill, and he began to back away. “It looks—it looks like—”
I let Thutmose’s bow drop to the ground and used both hands to lift Ta-Miu to the star-filled sky. The little cat yowled and hissed furiously. I heard some scrabbling from the clifftop and knew that Nava and Kawit had dumped the pot of embers onto the fuel they carried up there. With fire behind me, fire above, and a enraged cat in my hands, claws slashing the air, I let the full impact of my silent presence strike home.
“It’s a demon, that’s what it is!” Kawit’s brother yelled.