Seconds pass and there is only silence.
“Vek.” It’s all I can think to say. Soft and panicked. “Gods-damned rottingvek.”
I run.
LVI
THE CHALKY, PETAL-COVERED STREETS OF DUAT AREquieter now as I slink along them, though the celebrations continue unabated elsewhere in the city. Whatever alarm we triggered seems not to have affected life outside the temple. Fortunate for me. Far easier to slide by the Overseers, which are significantly fewer and yet far more intent in their searching of faces than they were a couple of hours ago.
The tunnels were a refuge, got me clear of any immediate cordon. But I cannot hide in them indefinitely, and the Overseers only have other duties until the end of the night.
Despite my desperation to rest, I emerged some distance from the temple, and since then have put Netiqret’s lessons on movement to good use.
I do all I can to focus only on the task at hand as I walk, to avoid for now assessing the wreckage of the evening. The burning of my skin still lingers, heart thudding through my chest at every turn. My face has been seen by the Nomarch, but what will it mean? My instructions shouldn’t have been undone despite what happened; it’s entirely possible I’m still considered a chief priest, just one who was caught where he shouldn’t be. One who ran, fought with an Overseer in the Infernis and—likely—perished alongside it.
So my freedom to move around is gone before I ever gained it. But the Nomarch won’t remember my questions or instructions. It’s not human, won’t speculate at my presence down there otherwise and has no other way to know that I’m Synchronous. No way to know what I’m planning.
And as far as the others go, Netiqret and Kiya—who I don’t think the Nomarch paid any attention to, when the alarm was raised—need me alive if their new identities are to remain safe.
Which means I’m alright, as far as these things go. Press on. Survive, and regroup. One step at a time.
I’m following the river, the dying glow of Ka’s pyramid at my back, when I hear the first shouts.
My desperation to maintain my anonymity keeps me from faltering, from turning and heading in the opposite direction. Instead I mimic the frowns andglances ahead, then allow myself to be pushed along the bend of the river by the curious flow. I cannot panic, cannot let myself be rattled into a mistake. Whatever’s going on will have their attention, not me.
That turns out to be unfortunate when I see the source of the commotion, though.
Ahmose stands atop a short wall at the edge of the riverbank, his head and shoulders visible above the crowd surrounding him. Fists are raised. Shouts are being hurled. The air reeks of unresolved violence.
Heart in mouth, I slow along with the mob, crane my neck in mimicry of those next to me. “What’s going on?”
Though the question was not directed at anyone in particular, a man in front of me turns.
“Westerner.” Disgust in his voice. Angry, but not yet in the foamy-mouthed fury of those ahead. He sees my dancer’s garb and almost ignores me, but his mixture of distaste and delight in the scandal keeps him talking. “He was caught passing himself off as one of us.”
I force my expression to the revulsion that’s expected of it, covering my racing thoughts. They’ve cornered Ahmose but won’t touch him; only Overseers and priests are permitted to lay hands on the dead. And the Overseers will be mostly engaged at the temple. They’ll send one, two at most.
All I have to do is wait for them to arrive, and command them without them seeing me. I can get him out of this.
“Surely not.” I study Ahmose with carefully crafted disdain. “None would dare. Especially tonight.”
“Another Westerner recognised him during her Return. She alerted her family.”
Vek. Just poor gods-damned luck, then. “That is the only proof?”
“No. He has admitted it, since he was exposed. Ka protect us, he has been proclaiming it proudly and …” His face darkens. “And blaspheming. Screaming lies about demons with blades as hands under Ka’s control. He denies Ka’s godhood and calls all Westerners his slaves. He denies that any of us will see the Field of Reeds. Just listen,” he finishes grimly.
I hide my sinking heart, and silently curse Ahmose for deciding to find his backbone. Distracted or not tonight, the Nomarch is not going to dismiss someone trying to tell people about the Gleaners.
“… see past what you have been told!” Ahmose’s voice becomes clearerover the outraged shouts as I push my way forward. He’s terrified, that much evident in his darting hazel eyes. But there’s a manic determination in them I’ve not seen before from him, too. “I was like you, until I was shown the truth! I served for eleven years in the West. I was faithful and loyal and I truly believed that Ka would grant me my rest in Aaru after the three-and-thirty. It is what I was told my entire life. Just like you.Just like you.” He stabs his finger around at the incensed crowd, voice hoarse. Cracking. He’s been shouting for a while, I’d say. “And now I am here, because I escaped after he tried to reward me by turning me into a nightmare from which I would never have been allowed to wake. I am here because he lied, and still lies, and I am one of the very few fortunate enough to have the chance to warn you!”
His eyes, scanning the crowd as they scream obscenities and shake clenched fists at him, fall on me. Only a second of hesitation, not enough to draw notice, and then he’s moving on. But something changes in him. He’s suddenly calmer. “Please, all of you, listen. Trulylisten! I know he is coming for me now. I know what he will do to me, what he will learn from me, and for the first time in a long time I am at peace with how to avoid it. We all must end. We allshouldend. I am not sure I ever really lived, before I accepted that. So thank you.”
I see it. The edging of his feet, the slightest repositioning. He doesn’t think I can stop the Overseers. He doesn’t know that I’ve erased his face from the Nomarch. I push forward. Shake my head. “No.” The word’s a breath, directed with the force of a prayer at Ahmose.
He doesn’t see it. “Remember. Ka is not a god!” His gaze flickers over me, and then is gone again. “But who knows? Perhaps there will still be a Field of Reeds, after all.”
He smiles.
