But if Khai’s predicament was unpleasant, Adonda Gomba’s was surely worse. It would not be the first time Captain Ramanon had called on him and probably would not be the last, but each visit was invariably more nerve-wracking than the one before. And so, having put the boy out of sight, the Nubian covered his table with work details and lists of tools for replacement, with quarrying schedules and food quotas and many other matters concerning the administration of the slaves, then sat back and awaited Ramanon’s arrival.
And sure enough, less than twenty minutes later, the captain and his escort of soldiers came to visit. Ramanon was Khemish by birth, though plainly it was the Arabban in him that came out in his swarthy features and bent beak of a nose. Adonda Gomba knew the captain’s face well and he hated it, but he respected (as well he might in his position) the sharp mind behind it. On several past occasions he had pitted his wits against those of the chief of Pharaoh’s “security” officers, and so far he had always managed to come out on the winning side. This time, however, he was less certain of himself.
For one thing, the boy was right here—within spitting distance if one could spit through a slab of stone—and for another, he was important. Aysha the witch-wife had first brought this fact to light with her predictions about Khai, and now Ramanon’s visit only served to confirm the old woman’s cryptic words. After all, why else should this powerful agent of Pharaoh find it necessary to come here in person? Why, as on those previous occasions, had he not been satisfied merely to send for Gomba? The answer was simple: this was not just a matter of a few missing sheep or the mysterious fall of a particularly hated overseer from the pyramid’s face. No, the boy was very important to Pharaoh, and as such his immediate presence increased the danger to Gomba tenfold!
The captain’s arrival was heralded by the sudden sound of soldiers halting in the dust of the alley outside. They had approached very quietly and Gomba would have had no warning other than the military thump of sandaled feet if his own intelligence system were not so finely tuned. As it was, he had time enough to compose himself, then to look up and assume an expression of surprise as the covering of his door was torn aside and the hawkish, red-robed figure of Ramanon appeared framed in the opening.
The captain grinned (a bad sign in itself) and entered the room in front of three of his lieutenants. Two of the latter looked like nothing so much as common thugs, while the third was a slimly effeminate creature wearing makeup applied as carefully as any woman’s. Gomba recognized this last human anomaly as Nathebol Abizoth, the son of one of Pharaoh’s most trusted overlords, and he inwardly shuddered.
Rumor had it that one of Abizoth’s favorite methods of extracting information from an unwilling victim was to first extract his more readily removable parts, such as nails, testicles, eyeballs and skin, leaving the tongue, of course, to the last. And it was not on record that anyone had ever survived one of Abizoth’s “examinations!”
“Master!” cried Adonda Gomba, springing up from his rickety table and flinging himself down on the dirt floor. “Illustrious Lord, I am honored!”
“Up, black dog,” Ramanon quietly answered, but with no trace of malice in his voice. Hands on hips, he faced Gomba squarely as the black came to his feet. “There are one or two things you might like to tell me, my friend. At least I hope so, if you desire to remain my friend. . . .”
“Only say what I should tell you, Lord, and if I can—” Gomba began.
“If you can?” Abizoth cut in, his voice the hiss of a viper. “We come to you, black dog, because we know you can!” He snapped his woman’s fingers and the two stony-faced thugs grabbed Gomba’s arms and dragged him protesting out into the alley. As they came out into the open air, a squad of twelve spearsmen snapped to attention. Ignoring the soldiers, the thugs turned Gomba’s face toward the pyramid whose peak rose massively over distant rooftops.
Ramanon and Abizoth came out of Gomba’s house at a more leisurely pace and the captain stepped up close to the pinioned black. He stared into the Nubian’s face. “Do you see Pharaoh’s tomb, Adonda Gomba?”
“Yes, Lord,” the Nubian stammered. “I see it, as I have seen it all my life, but—”
“Quiet!” Ramanon snarled. He picked at his fingernails for a moment, then once more peered close into the black man’s fearful face. “Late last night a boy climbed out of a hole near the top of the pyramid. He slid down the south face—that face you see there—and we believe he came into the slave quarters. He is probably injured, badly burned from his slide, broken from the fall at slide’s end. He could not get far without assistance. We want him, Gomba. We want him badly!”
“Lord, I know of no such—”
“Bring him back inside,” Ramanon ordered, turning his back and reentering the slave-king’s house.
Gomba was bundled in through the doorway once more and Abizoth was quick to follow and pounce upon him. “Black dog,” the pervert hissed, “where’s your woman?”
”My woman, master? I have not had a woman for many months now,” Gomba lied. He thanked all the Gods of Khem that he had sent his woman away that very morning. He had intuitively known that trouble was in the air, and so had sent Nyooni out of harm’s way.
“Isn’t it your duty to have a woman?” Abizoth insisted. “To produce a new generation of slaves for Pharaoh?”
“The woman I had was barren, master, for which reason she was sent to cook for the quarriers. I have not yet found another woman. My work is—”
“To hell with your work!” Ramanon’s voice was low and dangerous. “Can you guess,” he continued, “why my good friend Abizoth here wanted to see your woman, black dog?”
Gomba shook his head, his lower lip trembling in unfeigned terror.
“Then I’ll tell you,” Abizoth hissed. “In my experience, you’d soon speak up if your woman was yelping. But if you haven’t got a woman—well, if I can’t skin a black tit we’ll have to see what I can do with a pair of black balls!”
Quickly, the heavily made-up eyes of the effeminate monster flickered about the room. “On the table,” he snapped. “Strip him!”
The two thugs again grabbed Gomba, and one of them used his free arm to scatter the documents that littered his table. The crude papyrus sheets flew across the room and fluttered to the floor in crumpled disorder. Somehow the huge black broke free and hurled himself down on the dirt floor, scrabbling after his papers.
“Do what you will with me!” he cried. “But take care, masters, if you value your own skins. I control the slaves, and these documents are my schedules. Already Pharaoh grows impatient that his tomb should be finished—and where would he look for an answer if the work stopped altogether? Would you disrupt the God-king’s plans for the sake of a mere boy? I do not know this boy; I have not seen him. Would I suffer for some runaway pup when I could gain favor by delivering him into my master’s hands?”
“Hold!” Ramanon snarled. His men had already hauled the Nubian from the floor and half-stripped him. They were now holding him down on the table and Abizoth’s long-nailed hands were reaching for him, twitching fitfully. Ramanon knew that his perverted junior was a near-madman, and that he would doubtless cripple the black slave-king if given the chance.
But what Gomba had said—about his own skin being more precious to him than that of any unknown boy—had rung absolutely true. And certainly Gomba’s work as the internal administrator and co-ordinator of the vast slave workforce was all-important to Pharaoh. In actual fact, Khasathut probably did not even know of Gomba’s existence—but he would soon track down the source of the trouble if the work on his pyramid were suddenly to show a dramatic decrease.
“Put your sharp woman’s claws away, Abizoth,” the captain commanded. “Can’t you see how you’re troubling the slave-king? Why, I couldn’t let any harm come to the good and honest Adonda Gomba! No, for he has been my friend for too many years and would not lie to me.”
He turned to the thugs who still held Gomba. “Let him up. He knows
nothing.”
Released, the Nubian threw himself at Ramanon’s feet, but the captain only kicked him away. “None of that, slave-king. Better gather your documents together and get back to work. For your threat cuts two ways, Adonda Gomba, and if work on the pyramid suffers from this time forward . . . well, I shan’t have to look far for someone to blame.”
“Meanwhile,” Abizoth whispered, “you’d better keep your eyes and ears open, black dog, if you want to keep them at all. We’re looking for a boy—a blue-eyed, fair-haired youth of fourteen or fifteen years—and when we find him. . . . If you’ve had anything to do with him since he fled the pyramid, then I’ll be back. And next time the captain will let me come on my own!”
III
OUT OF THE CITY
With nightfall Adonda Gomba let Khai out of his hideaway. By that time, as the big black had expected, the boy was almost at his wits end. Twice he had fallen asleep, only to be shocked awake by rats scampering over him and nibbling at his crust of bread. In the end he had broken the bread into two pieces, throwing them as far as he could along the bend of the disused sewer before and behind him.
This action, while it doubled and redoubled the squeaking and scampering of the gray horde, had seemed nevertheless to satisfy them for a little while and had the desired effect of causing them to keep their distance—at least until the bread was gone. After that, they had grown more inquisitive than ever.
Once, galvanized into a sort of panic, Khai had actually thrown himself headlong at the rats, crawling frantically along the winding sinus after them until he came to a place where the ceiling had collapsed. While the rats could scamper on ahead without pause, disappearing into the tumbled debris, Khai himself could go no further; and so at last sanity returned. It was then that he had realized how quickly the already nebulous light was failing, and he had been lucky in the end to find his way back to his starting point. He had traveled a surprising distance along the track of the old sewer and there had been a number of junctions along the way, the entrances of which all looked alike in the near darkness; but at last he was back beneath Adonda Gomba’s house.
There, under his breath, panting and trembling, he called himself several sorts of fool and coward, reflecting that the black slave above was risking his very life for him—and here he was afraid of a few rats! But for all that he was able to berate himself, still he longed to be out of the place. To stand in the cool, clean air of the world above, separated from him by only the thickness of a slab of stone that formed part of the floor in the Nubian’s kitchen—which nevertheless seemed a million miles away. So that when at last he heard the thunderous approach of Gomba’s feet, and then a hideous grating as the slab over his head began to move, causing a shower of sand and gritty debris to fall upon him, he almost cried out in joy.
It was plainly just as great a relief to the huge black man to be able to drag Khai out of the hole, and he hugged the trembling boy to him for long moments before pushing him away and holding him at arm’s length. “Brave lad, Khai—you were quiet as a mouse down there!”
Khai shuddered. “Don’t talk to me of mice—” he answered, “or of rats!”
“I know, I know,” Gomba nodded, patting his shoulder. “But it’s over now. I’m sorry I left you down there so long, lad, but it had to be. There have been squads of soldiers in the streets all day, poking about here and there, but they’ve more or less given up now. Now we can make you a bit more comfortable—but you’ll still have to stay out of sight for the rest of the night. Tomorrow we’ll move you.”
“I’m to be moved?”
“Aye, out of Asorbes and upriver. Eventually out of Khem itself—but that’ll be up to you. Don’t worry, it’s all been worked out for you. But Khai—”
“Yes?”
“There’s one thing. If you are caught, I want you to remember something. My life will be in your hands. . . .”
“You’ve no need to worry on that score, Adonda Gomba,” Khai answered at once. “I would never mention your name to any man of the Pharaoh. I might well be questioned, but I would not be harmed. They could threaten but never punish. Pharaoh has plans for me, yes, but they don’t include torture just yet. No, first he would train me for . . . for other things.” He shuddered and looked closely into the black man’s eyes. “But I won’t be caught, will I?”
“Not if I’ve anything to do with it,” the Nubian gruffly answered. “But quickly now, let’s get you hidden away again.” He saw Khai’s eyes go fearfully to the floor and added: “No, not in the sewer, lad, don’t fret. You’re going upward this time—” and he jerked a thumb at the low ceiling overhead.
Khai’s eyes widened. “On the roof?”
“Under it,” the Nubian grinned. “There’s a small gap between the ceiling there and the roof above. It may get chilly before morning, but at least there are no rats. Once you’re up there and comfortable on the rafters, then we can talk—provided we keep it quiet. I’ve a lot to tell you before you can sleep. And when you’ve heard me out, then you’ll need to repeat my instructions over and over to yourself. There’ll be no margin for error tomorrow. Now then, before we do anything else, tell me: can you swim?”
“Like a fish,” Khai answered at once.
“Good! That’s very important. You’ll see why when you know the plan. But right now I’ll show you how to climb up onto the rafters and hide under the roof. . . .”
Still memorizing Gomba’s instructions, Khai eventually fell into a fitful sleep on a platform of rough boards placed across rafters above the sagging and cobwebby ceiling. Twice during the night he was disturbed when soldiers came to shake the Nubian awake and search the house; but on both of these occasions the black man grumbled so much about lack of sleep, unnecessary harassment and Pharaoh’s displeasure if ever he should discover what was going on, that the soldiers quickly grew uncomfortable and left. Half-way toward morning, when it was much cooler, the youth did manage to fall into a deep sleep, which claimed him utterly until some hours later when he sensed furtive movements in the ruined apartments below.
“Are you awake, Khai?” came Gomba’s urgent voice from the darkness beneath him. “Yes? Then come on down. Quickly, now. Our visitor has arrived.” Easing the cramps in his muscles, Khai stiffly obeyed and lowered himself down between dusty rafters. As his feet swung in empty air, the big black caught him and lifted him down.
Gomba’s visitor, a Kushite of about Khai’s own age and size, was in the process of disrobing and wrapping himself about with a blanket. In the kitchen, a small oil lamp showed that the slab had been prized up again from the floor, exposing the old sewer beneath. As Khai dusted himself off and shook cobwebs from his hair, Gomba helped the other youth down into the claustrophobic hole under the floor. Before he could replace the slab Khai went over and kneeled at the edge of the hole. “Thank you,” he said to the huddled figure in the sewer. Then the slab was moved back into place and dirt was scuffed over it, hiding the cracks in the floor.
Finally, as Gomba lit a second lamp, Khai began hurriedly to don the Kushite’s rags. “Over the top of your own clothes, lad,” the big black told him. “Quickly! You needn’t have bothered to tidy yourself up, for now I’ve got to darken your face down a bit and sprinkle a little dirt over you. And here—” he produced a sliver of charcoal and expertly drew an ankh on Khai’s forehead. “We mustn’t forget your slave mark. There—and you can wrap this rag around your yellow hair. So—” He paused to cast a critical eye over his handiwork. “There we are, a slave if ever I saw one—if a little too well-fed! Right, let’s be on our way.”
“Did the soldiers stop the Kushite on his way here?” Khai asked as Gomba steered him out into the dark, dirty streets.
“They did, as I suspected they would. A couple of them have been watching the house all night, I think—probably the same ones who kept waking me up! They might even be watching us right now, but they’re hardly likely to check us again. After all, they know now that you’re just a Kushit
e youth come to waken me up so that I can get the rest of the lads moving!”
The “lads” Gomba talked about were one hundred male slaves detailed to work for a week in the quarries downriver. They would be transported by barge to a point above the second cataract, marched around the falls to a second barge below the white water, and so on down the river for another seventy miles or so to the quarries of the east bank. There would be ninety-nine of them in all, with Khai making the figure up to one hundred; but long before the slave-barge reached its mooring above the cataract Khai would have made his escape. That is, if all went according to plan.
It would not be the first time a slave had escaped, many had tried it at one time or another. Usually they only made their run when they were well away from the slave-city, when they could quickly head for open country or lose themselves in the forests and swamps. Sometimes they made it, but more often than not they were caught. When that happened the soldiers made examples of them, putting their heads on poles in the slave quarters to be picked into skulls by vultures. And of course there were other deterrents: the swamps were full of hungry crocodiles and there were many poisonous snakes in the grasslands. . . .
Now Khai and Adonda Gomba hurried through the deserted, garbage-littered streets, and as the first hint of daylight tinged the sky to the east, so the slave-king urgently banged on doors and shutters and called out the names of those slaves detailed for work in the quarries. In no time at all his ragged party was a hundred strong, and soon they crossed the perimeter of the slave quarters into the city proper where a small squad of six Khemish soldiers was waiting for them. Then, with the soldiers flanking them three to a side, they formed four ranks and tramped quietly through the still sleeping streets, marching through areas of Asorbes which grew ever more opulent, until at last they approached the looming city wall and the massive arch which contained and guarded the east gate.