Eye of the Moon (26 page)

I had no time to think.

Within moments soldiers were stumbling about, grabbing their weapons. Arrows were flying through the air, finding their mark all around us. Men were shouting commands. Others were clutching wounds. Horses were rearing and plunging, donkeys braying. Men harnessed what horses they could while charioteers cracked whips, grabbing their bowmen on the run and hoisting them up alongside them and at the same time trying to turn their carts.

Some men fell below the horse hooves and were trampled. Others lay facedown with arrows already in their backs.

In the pandemonium, I realized I'd lost my captors. I was loose in the crowd. I ducked low using the crush of struggling men as cover and scrambled to find my way among them. Trying to avoid the flaying hooves and trampling boots. Trying not to be dragged down or fall underfoot. At the same time struggling to keep under cover from the relentless hail of arrows that I knew, by their colors, were coming from Katep's men.

Hold up! Katep! Hold up!
I prayed.
I'm here among them!

But it was useless. How was he to know?

Suddenly I was wrenched by my arm and swept up onto the platform of a passing chariot. The charioteer clutched me to him and held me behind his shield. I turned to thank him, forgetting my Kushite tunic. I need not have bothered. He was the most evil-looking soldier I've ever seen, with wild eyes and the laugh of a maniac. The disarray of the battle had crazed him.

I wasn't being protected. I was being saved for something more important.

He let out a shriek of laughter. “You want a battle!
I'll
give you a battle! You think your men are good bowmen. Well, let's see how accurate your archers can be with
you
as their target!”

He flung me across the rail of the chariot and held me by my waist. My legs dangled freely in the air above the wildly spinning wheels and the horses rearing and plunging through the men. The soldier whooped and cheered as he wheeled around and at the same time took shelter behind me, using me as his human shield, while his archer took shots at the approaching mass of Kush bowmen.

A cacophony of howls, shrieks, and whinnying
horses rose up. The dawn was dark with arrows. The air around my ears whined with their passage. Then suddenly we galloped free from the throng of struggling Egyptian foot soldiers. The spittle of the horses flew back at me. The air rushed past my face. We were out in the open with nothing but an empty space between our chariot and the bowmen of Kush.

The charioteer ran full tilt toward them. I made out row upon row of them with arrows drawn, their shields strapped to their arms, marching toward us in a solid, unbroken mass.

I was going to die . . . killed by the arrows of my own men, arrows I had made myself. There was no saving me now.

In one dark cloud, a flight of arrows came straight at the chariot. I flailed and tried to wrench myself free, screaming out in blind panic, “Hold your arrows! It's me! The fletcher! Don't shoot!” But there was no getting away from the Egyptian's grip. In the noise of battle it was hopeless. No one heard me.

Hathor, protector of women, have mercy. Sekhmet, lioness of war, strike him down. Katep! Tuthmosis! Anoukhet—
someone
among the Kush, please recognize me.

As if in answer, in the midst of the noise, a shout rang out.

“Hold up!” It was Anoukhet's voice.

The rain of arrows from the Kushite bowmen stopped abruptly, as if choked by the unexpected shrillness of a woman's voice in the middle of battle.

A moment of utter silence followed.

The whistle of a single spinning arrow passed my face. I heard a thud behind me, followed instantly by a single intake of breath.

I turned. The arrow had taken the Egyptian high in the center of his chest. It had pierced his flesh and found his heart.

It was an arrow with green feathers and shreds of red ribbon.

His scream shook both sides into action. Arrows fell once more all around us. The wounded chariot driver clutched the rail, still holding me. I felt the warmth of his blood seep against my back. My own hands came away sticky with it as I struggled to pull free of him.

I caught the blurred movement of Anoukhet rushing forward. She leaped wildly past the horses and toward the chariot, trying to hold on to the railing
and at the same time trying to wrestle me from the Egyptian's grip.

We were suddenly surrounded by Kushite bowmen. I heard the metal slurring of swords being drawn.

But before we could leap from the cart into the safety and protection of the Kushite men, the Egyptian archer grabbed the reins from the slumped charioteer. He wheeled the horses around so fast that the nearest Kushite swordsmen fell under the rearing hooves. Then he galloped at full speed back toward the Egyptian side.

Anoukhet grabbed my arm. “Quick! Jump!” she commanded. “Jump! This is our only chance!”

But my legs went numb. The spinning spokes of the wheels and the thundering hooves turned my knees to water.

In a blur of movement the chariot gained the other side and the Egyptian army closed ranks around us.

We were dragged off and passed as roughly over the soldiers' heads and with as little care as bags of durum wheat being tossed from the hold of a ship. Finally a space was made and we were flung down onto the ground.

Our hands were wrenched behind us, and although we struggled and fought and bit at our captors, we were dragged before a stake, pushed to the ground, and tied back to back on either side of it, our arms pinned and trussed tightly against our bodies.

“Be brave,” Anoukhet whispered as she tried to reach backward for my hand. I held her fingers in my own as firmly as I could manage. “Katep and Tuthmosis will come for us. They know we're here. Listen. That's why they've let up their arrows.”

Amid the commotion and confusion of horses and men and chariots around us, I listened and knew she was right. The hail of arrows had stopped. But for how long? The Kushites wouldn't care about Anoukhet and me. They were hardened soldiers. They wouldn't stop their battle against the Egyptians just for the likes of us.

“Vixens!” an Egyptian soldier hissed at us. “We show no more mercy to female soldiers than we do to men!” He drew his khopesh from his girdle.

Anoukhet spit into the sand at his feet. I cringed as I imagined a dull blow to her neck.

Another soldier stepped forward. “Wait!”

I could see by his cloak and gold broad collar that
he was a man of rank. He nodded his broad, brutish face in our direction. “They're bargaining tools. Not to be killed outright, but punished, rather! To use as an example. So the Kushites will appreciate the strength of the Egyptian army. And know we can't be trifled with.”

He came closer and glared down at Anoukhet. “It was
your
arrow that killed our best charioteer? You found his heart!” Then he turned to a soldier at his side. “Cut off her bow fingers—so she'll no longer know the accuracy of her draw. Take them off well. Make sure the dagger is sharp.”

I felt all blood drain from me. “No!” I gasped.

Two men grabbed hold of Anoukhet's right hand, spread her fingers wide against the ground, and pinned them down. I twisted my head from side to side looking for a glimpse of Katep or Tuthmosis.

“Take her bow fingers! Take her bow fingers!”

“No! Don't!” I shouted as I twisted and tried to pull free. “Take mine . . . not hers!”

The man with the gold collar sneered down at me. “Why should I?”

“She's not a bowman. Examine her hands. She
has no calluses. She's
hopeless
with a bow. Her bow fingers are of no consequence.”

“If that's the case, she won't mind losing them. But you lie. I know differently. She shot my charioteer. She was carrying a bow when she was caught. A very fine bow at that. With very fine arrows. So she
is
a bowman.”

“By the truth of the feather of Maat, how can you be sure it was her? There were Kushite bowmen everywhere.”

“What? You have the audacity to swear by Egyptian gods?”

“The gods do not belong to Egypt!”

Anoukhet struggled next to me. “Shh! Kara!”

“You're
Egyptian
—yet a
traitor
to all that is Egyptian,” the man hissed. He turned to a soldier. “Take hers as well!” Then he kicked at me with his foot. “Be glad your punishment is mild! When the Egyptian army under the great Amenhotep last fought the Kushites, we took seven hundred and forty prisoners. From the fallen, we cut not just fingers, but took three hundred and twenty hands as punishment.”

“What?” I spit at him. “Only three hundred and
twenty hands! And still the land of Kush didn't fall under Egypt's control. How pale a victory!”

He turned abruptly to the soldier. “Yes, by the gods . . . take her fingers as well. Teach them
both
a lesson. Take their bow fingers, now! I
command
it!”

A murmur went up. “Yes! Yes!”

“Take the bow fingers!”

“The loss of two fingers is nothing to me!” I spit out. “I could easily learn to draw a bow with my left hand.” I stared at them unflinchingly. My blood was pulsing hot and angry now. If I had not been tied up, I'd have attacked them with my fists. “Take all my fingers! Take my
hands
, for all I care! That's if you have the stomach for maiming girls—you
cowards
!”

“No! No!” Anoukhet begged. “Don't taunt them, Kara! They'll do it! I know the campaign they speak of.”

But before she could say more, the soldiers bent forward and spread her fingers again. I felt my throat constrict. Felt the words shrivel on my tongue. Then everything turned soundless. As if my ears were blocked. Yet I knew there was noise all around me.

The dagger came down swiftly. I squeezed my
eyes shut so as not to witness it find its mark—but not fast enough to stop me from seeing the spray of Anoukhet's blood that fanned out across the sand.

And then, they took the first two fingers of my own right hand as well.

   
26
   
TUTHMOSIS

A
fterward it seemed a blur. What actions came in which order is hard to sort out in my mind.

My head was dizzy with what had happened. So dizzy I thought I'd faint.

I remember the blind, numbing pain and my body shaking. I remember the vague outline of the man in the gold broad collar standing over us as we sat trussed together against the post.

Coward!
I wanted to shout—to be so set on maiming
two girls.
It's a victory for
us
that you need to cut off our bow fingers! It's a victory for
us
that you have sunk so low! We've more bravery in the fingers you've sliced off than you have in your
whole body!

But the pain was too great. My mouth couldn't seem to form all the words. Whether I spoke them aloud or not, I can't be sure.

A sudden swell of voices roused me.