A party, Rae thought as she stepped back into the hot, steamy kitchens.
Without thinking, her hand curled into a fist.
11Rae
Rae was still brooding over Tam’s party invitation when she reached the Temple of Amun’s towering gate.Focus!she told herself. She was about to deliver Neff’s message to Prince Bakenamun, and if he was anything like his wicked brother, she needed to keep her wits about her.
She squinted up at the temple. Like everything else in Thonis, it was so magnificent that it made Sakesh’s Temple of Ra look like a hovel in comparison. The Low Khetaran priests kept up their duties as well as they could, but their numbers were small and their offerings meager at best.
Not that Ra’s House had always been that way. Before the Great War, it had been an awesome place, full of light and bedecked in gold, as befitted the falcon-headed sun god. At least, that’s what Rae’s father always told her.
Father.
It was torture, being so close to him, yet not knowing for certain that he was alive and unharmed.
I’ll see him tonight, she thought with hope in her heart.And then I’ll find a way to get him home.Hovel or not, the Temple of Ra was a holy place, and she would make sure her father saw it again.
Squaring her shoulders, Rae approached the guard standing at the temple gate.
“Greetings to you,” she said with a stiff bow, “I have come with a message for Prince Bakenamun.”
“I’ll take it,” the guard said, and offered her an open palm.
“I’ve been ordered to deliver it directly to him.”
“By whom?”
“That isn’t your concern.” Rae took a step closer to the man so that they were eye to eye. “Now, are you going to inform the prince of my arrival, or do we have a problem?”
For one thrilling instant, Rae thought the guard might put up a fight—but he was either too lazy or too gutless, because he huffed in annoyance and strode away. Rae was almost disappointed. It felt good to throw her weight around again. That, at least, was something she excelled at.
A few minutes passed before the guard returned with a very small, very strange man at his side.This is the prince?Rae thought in confusion. He barely came up to her shoulders.
Prince Bakenamun peered up at Rae over a beakish nose, his unruly nest of black hair making him appear as if he’d just rolled out of bed. He looked nothing like the king. It was a wonder they were brothers at all.
The prince dismissed the guard, who plodded to the other side of the gate, clearly put out over the entire situation.
“You’re Neff’s girl, are you?” Bakenamun asked.
“I am.”
He studied Rae with such intensity that it made her uncomfortable. He seemed to take in every detail of her face andbody—but not in a lewd way. From the way he looked at her, she may as well have been an interesting plant.
Only when his examination was complete did the prince speak further. “Fascinating,” he said simply. He cleared his throat. “You have a message for me?”
Rae handed him the sealed scroll.
“Very good,” the prince said, tucking it into his tunic. “I have something for you to take back to Nefermaat as well.” From his belt, he pulled a black leather cylinder, which Rae assumed must contain another scroll. She was about to stick it in her belt when the carnelian amulet on its lid gave her pause. It was a red lion, not unlike her own amulet.
The symbol of Sekhmet.
Sekhmet was a fierce protector, but she was also famously brutal. According to the doctrine, the lion-headed goddess had once nearly destroyed the entire world in a fit of rage. She was vengeance personified. She was the Lady of Slaughter.
Why would young Nefermaat need a scroll such as this?Rae wondered.And why would the prince give it to her? Are the two of them colluding on a secret plan of their own? That would explain why Neff questioned my allegiance before sending me on this errand.
“Do you miss it?”
The prince’s question snapped Rae out of her reverie. “Miss what?”
