Bloodlines Read online

Bloodlines

  Robert Hill

  Copyright 2016 by Robert Hill

  Bastet appeared in Khepri’s dream as a slender, smoky mau adorned only with a gold ring dangling from her right ear, accenting the flecks of yellow in her bright green cat’s eyes. She stood upon Khepri’s sheet-covered stomach, glaring at him as he lay in bed.

  “Pharoah, there is someone within your house who will try to harm the woman who bears your yet unborn child. You must guard against this,” Bastet said, her voice purring to him through the mists of his dream.

  Khepri stared into Bastet’s feline eyes and asked, “But who would harm Naunakht?”

  Bastet ran her tongue against the smoky-spotted, black fur of her right shoulder, hesitating for a moment. Then she looked at him. “Even the gods do not know through whom fate will strike. Only that it will if left unchecked.”

  Bastet wished she could have been more precise as she continued to peer at him. But it was true; neither she nor any of the gods knew which path the future would take. Unlike the supposed god of the Hebrew slaves, Bastet and her fellow deities were not omniscient.

  “Khepri Amenokpara, listen to me closely,” she whispered. “Should your child perish before he can succeed you, chaos will consume Egypt. It is his destiny. Your heir will bring about a renewed age of prosperity and end this current period of unrest and social decay which has set upon the land.”

  “But if it is destiny, then why warn me to guard against murder? If it is destiny, then it is destined to be,” said Khepri. “Please explain, for I do not understand.”

  The black fur outline of a scarab, which was etched within the fur upon her forehead, wrinkled as Bastet’s brow furrowed and her eyes narrowed. “Always in motion is the future, changing its course like the Nile itself. But Ra sees only two paths forking off from this present moment. Events will unfold on this day that will determine which path the future follows. And Pharoah, I strongly warn you. The person who will strike against Naunakht will be someone very close.”

  Khepri leaned forward on his elbows, the white sheets of his bed slipping from his dark, hairless chest, even though he was still wrapped tight within his dream. “Then tell me who it is that will attempt this. Give me some clue to prevent it from happening.”

  “As I said, we do not know,” Bastet replied, slipping from his stomach and slinking up the side of the bed to stand close to Khepri’s ear. “But I will tell you that it is Ra’s will that I, as the goddess of fertility, come to seek this person out and to guide the future down the correct path by preventing Naunakht’s death, and therefore the unborn child’s as well.”

  “But how?” Khepri glanced at her sideways as her whiskers brushed his cheek. His voice was strained with desperation.

  “Just guard her well on this day, Pharoah, and leave the murderer to me,” Bastet purred.

  And then she melted into the haze of Khepri’s dream, hoping that her warning would aid in her mission to set the future along the correct path that Ra had foreseen.

  It would not be so simple a task, either, even for a goddess, as random actions of mortals were nearly impossible to predict or control. Bastet wished she could; however, discovering a would-be murderer was not one of her natural talents. She was not equipped as was Anubis, who could use his scales to weigh the souls of men and see the righteousness of their lives. Nor did she have the sort of power, other than her feline claws, to stop an attack upon Naunakht even if she learned the murderer’s true identity. But she could not argue with Ra. Surely he knew Bastet was the only one suited to this task for reasons he would not disclose to her.

  Several hours passed and the sun moved across the cloudless skies over Egypt, while Bastet kept a watchful eye upon Naunakht and the Pharoah and those who came to visit them in his throne room on this fateful day.

  Presently, Bastet sat on her feline haunches and peered around the curve of a great pillar; one of many that lined the walls of Khepri’s throne room, keeping her hidden even from the Pharoah himself, who sat on his chair with Naunakht sitting at his sandaled feet upon the steps to his throne.

  Bastet could smell the perfumed aromas wafting from the burning cone set atop Naunakht’s braided hair. It had the smell of jasmine mingled with lotus as the greased cone’s wick flickered atop her head. The scent pervaded the air, relaxing Bastet, somewhat, despite the grim task set before her.

  She had decided to remain in her animal guise, for cats were not accosted by wary guards, as Bastet would have been had she changed back into her natural state as that of a lovely human female. Not even Akil, the Pharoah’s tall, muscular bodyguard, who stoically loomed over Khepri’s left shoulder, would deign to question her presence should his steely eyes catch sight of her. Many cats freely roamed the palace of the Pharoah and one more would not be noticed.

  Khepri, at this moment, had summoned his two younger siblings and had just formally announced to them that Naunakht, a mere noblewoman, would bear his heir. Bastet hoped that her observations of this audience would help her determine who amongst those present would be the harbinger of death by gauging their reactions to this proclamation.

  From her unobtrusive vantage point, just to the left of Khepri’s gold-inlaid chair, she could see that Menkaura, the Pharoah’s younger and smaller brother, and Umayma, his slender sister, were now brooding over this scandalous turn of royal events. They paced amongst their loose circle of attendants and personal guards. Both were clearly agitated, like ibises defending their nests from a prowling crocodile. Studying them, Bastet knew that these two were the most likely suspects to a murder not yet committed.

  Khepri’s brother stopped pacing and turned to him. “Only a woman of the royal line can bear the next Pharoah. You know this cannot be allowed,” Menkaura said, his nostrils flaring like a bull’s.

  Khepri’s knuckles turned white as his grip upon the royal flail in his right hand tightened. “Your arguments are merely academic at this point. Naunakht already carries our child within her womb. What is done is done. And if it is a male child, he will become Pharoah one day.”

  Khepri’s tone appeared to have an effect, for Menkaura’s dark expression changed to one of supplication. “But Pharoah, surely it is not too late to alter these circumstances.”

  Khepri froze, his eyes glaring at Menkaura. “That will not happen!” he said. “My heir will be allowed to enter into this world. There will be no intervention.”

  “But Khepri, she is not one of us. She does not share our blood,” Menkaura said, pointing at Naunakht as she sat in silence upon the steps.

  Naunakht, however, was not directly staring back at Menkaura, from what Bastet could tell. Rather, she was gazing through Khepri’s siblings and their entourage of attendants as if they were not even there.

  Bastet noticed that Naunakht was indeed a beautiful woman. She practically glowed, even in the midst of turmoil. Her dark blue eyes were like glittering sapphires, and her long, plaited wig of ebony hair flowed across her shoulders, contrasting with the unsoiled linen of her pleated white gown.

  Bastet easily understood how Khepri had found himself so captivated by her. In fact, she and the other gods were watching at that moment when the Pharoah first met her. Naunakht’s father had been invited to attend one of the Pharoah’s festivities aboard his royal river barge. When Khepri’s eyes fell upon her, she was the blooming lily surrounded by a cluster of reedy women. And in that instant no other woman would do except for the enchanting beauty now seated beneath him.

  “But Pharoah,” Menkaura continued, “what possible reason could have driven you to decide to have an heir by a woman not of the royal line?”

  Khepri stood, pointing his flail at his brother. “Reason? What more reason do I n
eed than I am Pharoah?”

  Menkaura suddenly stepped forward, causing Bastet’s pointy ears to flatten and her lithe, black smoke-colored body to tense.

  Behind the Pharoah’s left shoulder, Akil smoothly slid his hand to the scimitar at his waist the instant Menkaura moved. Akil would have followed through, but Khepri turned his head toward him, warning with his almond-colored eyes that the bodyguard should keep his place.

  Menkaura, however, appeared oblivious to Akil’s potential threat as he looked directly at Khepri. “Brother, I understand your feelings for Naunakht. But for five generations we have maintained the purity of this dynasty. The Pharoah cannot ignore tradition. By this action you will alter the bloodline.”

  The neatly garbed, smooth-shavened, and manicured Menkaura was always concerned about appearances and tradition and family honor. As second born, he had nothing else to attend to except being the conservative counsel to his older brother on such matters – an older brother who rarely listened, too.

  Ra himself had once mentioned to Bastet that the forces of chaos must have intervened when Khepri was born first. As Pharoah he had ruled benevolently and with wisdom, but the gods had always felt that had Menkaura been Pharoah, he would have ruled better, for he was firmly fixed upon principles and traditions that had