Eater of souls by Lynda S. Robinson

Author:Lynda S. Robinson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Historical Mystery
ISBN: 0-345-39533-6
Published: 1997-12-31T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 10

The residence of the Hittite emissary boiled with activity, like a disturbed ant mound. Servants stood in corners and argued with each other. Guards marched around the privacy walls and hustled loiterers from the vicinity. Kysen arrived with the watchman Min and a squad of charioteers, to be told by the porter at the door of the death of a female slave and the disappearance of Prince Mugallu.

The chief of the prince's military escort, General Labarnas, wasn't in the house. With his own men behind him, Kysen strode across the kitchen yard to an area beside a storage building. There the general stood over the body of the dead slave, arguing with his men.

The argument stopped abruptly when Kysen appeared. Labarnas, a man with an imposing military reputation and the usual ill-concealed Hittite arrogance, turned on Kysen and shouted.

"What have you done to Prince Mugallu!"

Kysen paused in midstride, then closed the gap between himself and the general before replying smoothly. "I know that his highness is missing, and I have brought news, general."

They didn't know. He and Meren had assumed word from the streets would have reached the Hittites. He'd expected outrage, the usual Hittite accusations and demands, but these men looked like they expected to engage in battle at once. The general and his officers were dressed in bronze armor and boar's-tusk helmets. They bristled with swords, daggers, and spears.

"You Egyptians!" Labarnas snarled. "You beguile with your polished manners and sweet words, lure a warrior into taking his ease, and then, like cowards, strike when a man is most vulnerable. Prince Mugallu is dead, isn't he? Don't bother to spew whatever tale of accident and woe you've created." Behind him, the Hittite officers muttered to each other and gripped their straight swords.

"General, I come with no tale."

Labarnas stalked close to Kysen, causing the charioteers to close ranks. Labarnas ignored them and stuck his face close to Kysen's.

"Very well, son of the Eyes of Pharaoh. Tell me what has happened so that I can return to Hattusha and repeat the lies to my king."

He should never have come without a royal minister and a larger escort. Kysen looked down at Labarnas. Odd how a Hittite could seem as big as a colossus when he was at least three finger-widths less in height. It must be the relentlessly hostile temperament.

Kysen took a moment to marshal his wits. He drew in long breaths and released them without drawing attention to what he was doing. As he breathed, he called up scenes of Meren in the royal throne room sparring with a Babylonian prince, of his father facing down the poisonous old scorpion of a high priest of Amun in his own temple. He wasn't the son of a common artisan; he was the son of the Eyes and Ears of Pharaoh.

When he felt the muscles in his face loosen, the tension fade from behind his eyes, Kysen gave Labarnas a stare he hoped was as regal as his father's. Labarnas had

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