“Your disgust means nothing to me, sena,” Karim said, his voice harsh. “If your people agreed to formal trade with mine and didn’t treat us like heathens, perhaps we wouldn’t have to resort to such activities, hey? You all think you’re superior, with your fertile river and your hundreds of gods and—”
“I’m not disgusted!” Sita broke in. “I’m… surprised.”
Karim folded his arms over his chest.
“I have no right to pass judgment over you and the things you’ve done in the name of survival,” Sita said. The tribesman’s confession, though shocking, was refreshing in its honesty. It made her want to be honest too. “You’ve stolen baubles from the dead. But I…” Guilt nearly took her breath away. “I’ve stolen life from the innocent.”
Karim’s anger melted into astonishment. “Youkilledsomeone? That’s why you’re running?”
“No, not exactly,” Sita replied, and suddenly, she found herself telling him truth. “My brother poisoned the king, our father, so that he could take the throne for himself.”
Once she started, the secret poured out of her like water. “He did it slowly, over a long period, so it would seem like an illness. No one suspected—although he inadvertently killed a child in the process. Then as soon as the king was dead, my brother slaughtered the entire court so he could replace it with his own.”
Karim puffed out his cheeks. “And here I thought you Khetarans were supposed to be civilized!”
Sita shot him a withering look.
They sat in silence for a moment before Karim said, “I don’t understand what you meant about stealing life from the innocent. Your brother killed those people—not you.”
“But I knew about the poisoning,” Sita argued. “I found out when there was still time to save my father and Maet. Yet I was too afraid to speak. I wanted to believe Mery was doing the right thing, even though deep in my heart, I knew it was wrong. My brother may have dealt the killing blows, but my silence was just as deadly.”
She wrapped her arms around herself and spoke more softly. “The same day my father died, Mery told me that I would be his queen. It was an ancient royal custom, marrying your sister—much like killing a king’s court so a pharaoh could bring them to the afterlife—but it hasn’t been done in a thousand years. It’s all part of Mery’s plan to return Khetara to its former glory. He’s fanatical about it—he believes it’s his destiny. I know he will be pharaoh, and a pharaoh is like a god, and yet… I fear what he’ll do, how far he’s willing to go to achieve the greatness he seeks.” She swallowed. “Not all gods are good gods.”
“So… you ran away?”
“One of the guards helped me escape,” Sita replied, her voice breaking as she thought of Femi. “I can only pray that Mery hasn’t killed him too. I can’t bear another death on my conscience.”
“Well, sena,” Karim said, running a hand through his hair. “That, at least, is something we have in common.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’ve made some questionable choices of my own lately. Do you see this?” Karim pointed a red star on the map, located deep in a mountain valley. “That star marks an ancient tomb. I found it, untouched and full of treasure. I had a young boy with me, Djet—and he and I were in the middle of ransacking the place when it happened.”
“When what happened?”
A haunted look came into Karim’s eyes.
“Something… awoke. It rose from the grave and killed Djet.”
Sita was incredulous. “You must be mistaken. It could have been an animal, or—”
“No. I thought that too, at first, but no. I saw it with my own eyes, sena. You’re the first person I’ve told. I… I can’t keep the secret any longer.”
Sita had read papyri about Heka magic and the existence of powerful spells of reincarnation. Though how a tribesman from the Red Lands could trigger one, she wasn’t sure.
“So you’re telling me a mummy killed your friend—what happened next?”
“I tried to stop it from escaping the tomb. But it followed me and killed again—an old priest in a Temple of Khnum.”
“Khnum?” Sita suddenly felt dizzy, remembering her strange interaction with the old woman who visited her at the palace before her father’s death. The woman spoke as if she was the goddess Heqet, consort of Khnum, the ram-headed creator godwho sometimes appeared as a lamb.
Karim explained how the old priest had helped him discover the name of the man who’d been buried in the tomb: a forgotten king named Setnakht. And how he’d traveled to the Temple of Amun seeking more information about the old pharaoh, where he stole the map from the House of Life.
“You met Bakenamun?” Sita asked when his tale was finished. “And that young priestess you described… I think I know who she is.” She recalled the strange girl who’d stared at her with intensity at the Bast Festival, and who Mery claimed had saved his life with a premonition. Could it be the same person? “What an odd coincidence.”
“That’s the thing,” Karim said. “I don’t think it’s a coincidence at all. I saw something else in that Temple of Khnum. The old priest explained that this painting on the wall was an ancient oracle. He called it the Oracle of the Lamb.”
Sita felt a chill up her spine.
