Eye of the Moon by Dianne Hofmeyr

Author:Dianne Hofmeyr
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Aladdin

15

THE HEAD SCORPION

We did as Anoukhet told us. We gathered water skins and goatskins and rags of wool and found leather boots as well. After the night of celebration and drinking, the people of the oasis were not too fussed about where they discarded their possessions. It was easy to find a pair of boots that fit and clothes that would keep us protected on the journey. Wherever we could, we stuffed our pockets and girdle bags with dates and nuts and crusts of bread. I found a whole uneaten fowl lying in a dish of spiced sauce and wrapped it in palm leaves and slipped it into a saddlebag.

We were assigned no tents, so Tuthmosis and I found reed mats and pulled them up against a clump of palm trees at the place Anoukhet had suggested. Then we settled down to wait until the camp grew quiet and it was time to leave.

We whispered back and forth but soon Tuthmosis was asleep from exhaustion. I sat awake, hugging my knees to my chest, glad that we would be gone by dawn. Glad that Naqada would soon be out of our lives.

As time wore on, I began to get restless. The fires around us died down but still Anoukhet didn’t come. As the shadows closed in, so my own thoughts seemed to close in as well. The smallest rustle above me in the palm leaves, the slightest movement of shadow, set my heart thumping. A feeling of dread came over me.

Where was she? What was taking her so long? Soon the sky would be streaked with light. Then it would be too late.

I leaned across to see if Tuthmosis was still sleeping, then got up quietly so as not to disturb him and went in search of Anoukhet.

It was hard to recall which tent I’d been in that afternoon. In the moonlight the camp seemed different and the paths confusing. With the flaps down, the tents all looked the same. My footsteps fell silently on the soft sand. Here and there dogs lay growling at one another, gnawing at bones and licking platters. From a tent nearby came heavy sounds of snoring, and somewhere a baby cried but was soon shushed quiet again.

If I could find Kyky, I’d find Anoukhet.

But it was the outline of Naqada’s hawk that I spotted first. It sat tied to its perch outside a tent, its feathers silvered by the moonlight. On the other side of the tent fabric came the sound of a muffled struggle. I stole to the side farthest away from the hawk so the bird wouldn’t alert anyone and strained my ears. Naqada was in there—I could hear his voice and the sound of his laugh. There was a girl’s voice, too, but it was muffled, as if something was being held, or had been tied, over her mouth.

It was Anoukhet. I was sure of it!

I slithered onto my stomach against the sand and edged a piece of the tent flap slowly aside.

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