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Rae

“Two!” an old man shouted, thrusting two fingers into the air.

Raetawy pressed up onto her palms and spit a mouthful of bloody dust onto the ground. Panting, she leveled a gaze at her opponent. He was circling her, smiling for the crowd who had assembled to watch—and wager—on the matches of the day. He was tall and fast, his long arms allowing for a strong reach. But he was scrawny too, and his arrogant swagger made him careless.

“That’s one throw for Rae, and two for Buto!” the old man announced. His face had a lumpy quality, his nose crooked from being broken too many times. He clutched a sweaty scrap of papyrus with dozens of bets marked down in a hurried scrawl. “First to three wins!”

Get up , Rae told herself, ignoring the pain in her foot where it had twisted beneath her. Give them nothing.

Rising to her feet, Rae adjusted her belted tunic and smoothed her shoulder-length black hair, which had come loose from the simple linen strip she’d used to tie it back. The crowd quieted when they saw her move into a fighting stance and wait for the next round to begin.

“You want more?” Buto said. A couple of his friends in the crowd jeered. “I’ll give you as much as you want.”

Rae narrowed her eyes. “Oh,” she growled, “I don’t think you have that much in you.”

The crowd ooh ed at that, and Buto scowled. “In a minute I’ll have you on your back again, where you belong.” He lunged.

Rae ducked under his arm, sliding on one knee and grasping her opponent around his legs. With a shove of her head against his hip, she cinched his knees together and drove him to the ground.

The crowd whooped in surprise.

“Two for Rae!” the old man shouted over the din. “The score is tied!”

Buto was up on his feet in an instant, red-faced. “Does your father know you come here, eh, Rae? Does he know that his daughter rolls on the ground with every man in the city, like a whore?”

Rae’s face flushed with sudden heat. “Watch your mouth.”

Buto smirked. “You’d think he’d try to put a stop to that. Or did they cut off his balls too?”

With a roar of fury, Rae barreled toward Buto, ready to knock the smile off his face. But instead, Buto grabbed her by the arm and wrist, turned his back, and flipped her over his shoulder. Her stomach churned as the world turned upside down with a sickening lurch. She landed hard on her back, and every bone in her body sang with the impact.

“Buto wins!” the old man announced.

Her opponent thrust his fist into the air. “Ha!”

The spectators cheered in reply before crowding the old man for the spoils of their bets.

Rae lay on the ground, staring at a sky crisscrossed with clotheslines that reached between the low mud-brick buildings of Sakesh. Two mourning doves peered down at her from their perch on one of the lines, their heads cocked in curiosity.

A familiar shadow fell over her, nearly blocking out the noonday sun. Blood still pounded in her ears as the bullish, swarthy young man pulled her to her feet. “Come on,” her friend Omari said. “Up.”

“Better luck next time, eh, sweet lips?” Buto said with a wink, before turning to join his friends. They laughed and clapped him on the back before walking away.

Rae nearly chased after them, but Omari took ahold of her shoulder.

“Rae,” he warned.

“Curse that son of a dog!” Rae sent a piece of pottery flying with the tip of her sandal. The small pot sailed into a wall and shattered into a thousand pieces. Startled, the two mourning doves flew off in a flurry of feathers, followed closely by the remaining onlookers, who eyed her balefully before shuffling out of the wide alleyway. Rae and Omari were left alone, staring at the sad remnants of a pot that had never done anything to anyone.

“Are you finished?” Omari asked after a few moments of silence.

Rae swallowed, her fury finally drained. “Yes,” she said dully.

“Good. Can we go now?”

She glared up at him. Despite her own impressive height, Omari towered over her. His square face and wide nose made him look like he should be the one brawling instead of her. They were neighbors and had grown up together, having both been born during the Great War—though Rae was a season older and never let him forget it.

“Fine,” she said with a sigh, grabbing her pack from where she’d discarded it before the fights. They made their way back to the street, walking side by side. “Just don’t say it,” she added.

“Say what?” he asked amiably. “That you would have seen that throw coming had you not been blinded by rage?”

“Lions fetch you, Omari…” Rae said, shoving him. “I told you not to say it.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Omari replied, his tone mocking. “I forgot that you’d rather fill your ears with dirt than wisdom.” He grinned. “You know Buto only baits you because you always bite.”

“But Omari,” Rae argued, “He so deserves to be bitten.”

She followed him onto the crowded, noisy street, which was filled with merchants hollering about their meager wares, women with skinny babies balanced on their hips, and men leading oxen laden with cargo. The air was thick with the smells of roasting meat, animal dung, and sweat.

Omari said nothing for a few minutes, his eyebrows raised in that how-many-times-have-I-told-you expression that infuriated her.

“Oh fine, fine!” Rae finally said, throwing her hands up in defeat. “I was wrong. You were right. Is that what you want to hear?”

Omari closed his eyes, blissful. “Say it again… slower this time.”

“Ugh,” Rae said with disgust. “The point is, next time, I won’t take the bait. Happy?”

Omari chuckled. “Next time…” He shook his head. “You’re really going to keep doing this, Ay?”

Rae smiled at the nickname he’d used for her since childhood. Donkey. She’d always been stubborn—butting heads with the bigger boys even then.

“Why shouldn’t I? It helps calm my savage mind. Imagine what I’d be like if I stopped?”

“You’d be unbearable, I’m sure. Still, there are other ways of channeling your fury.” Omari looked pointedly at her fat lip.

Rae licked her mouth and tasted blood. She swiped it away. “What other ways?”

Omari was thoughtful as they walked. Then he said, “I need to stop at the weavers’ workshop before we go back home.”

He didn’t answer my question , Rae noticed, but let it go. She glanced up at the position of the sun and sucked her teeth. “Not for too long, I hope. I have to help Father finish harvesting before sunset. He’ll soon be wondering about me.”

“I’ll be quick,” Omari assured her, and turned into a street lined with single-story mud-brick workshops. “You don’t even need to come in. Actually, it might be better if you don’t.”

Rae glared at the back of Omari’s big head. Now I’m definitely going in . The nerve of that ox! Telling me what to do … Anyway, there was someone in there she wanted to see.

The two wove through the throng toward the artisans’ quarter. The buildings, whose windows and doors had once been lined with colored tile, were faded and crumbling at the edges. Rae cast her eyes over them and sighed. The days when Sakesh had been the jewel of Low Khetara were gone—artifacts of her youth and the end of the Great War. It had been nineteen years, but the city had never recovered from the wounds of its defeat. Low Khetara hadn’t simply lost their king to Sematawy and his army; they’d lost their way too.

A ragged man, his face lined with scars, hunched near the corner of a bakery, a walking stick gripped in his gnarled hand. The city was abundant with men like him—old soldiers who’d been left with no land and no purpose after the High Khetarans took away their weapons and station. Rae had only been a baby when King Rahotep fell to the northern scourge. But she’d grown up hearing stories of her father’s life in the king’s palace, where he’d worked as a royal scribe. When she was little, the stories had delighted her. They were so full of sound and color—of wonders that she could only dream about. But as she got older and came to understand what they’d lost, the stories only made her angry.

Eventually, her father stopped telling them.

But he never stopped trying to teach her what he knew, and over the years, he had given her the kind of education that had become so rare in Low Khetara that even most men never received it. By the time she turned ten, she already had a basic knowledge of Khetaran history and religion, and she could read and write the common script fairly well—more than well enough to keep the records for the farm. Thanks to the High Khetarans, her father couldn’t really write anymore himself, but through his painstaking descriptions of how to form the letters and words, they’d made it work.

The one thing her father never taught her was the gods’ words, the true language of the scribes. The gods’ words were the origin of all Khetaran writing, the sacred birds, snakes, cups, eyes, and hands from which the common script had been derived. Perhaps Father never taught her how to read or write them because he never had the time, or didn’t see a need, but Rae suspected it was more than that. Her father wasn’t broken like the ragged man on the street, but the fissures in his spirit were still there, hidden under the surface. Rae got the sense that he thought there was no point to writing in the sacred word, because the gods were no longer listening.

Rae passed close to the old soldier as she followed Omari into the weavers’ workshop. The beggar was nodding rhythmically, staring ahead with cloudy, unseeing eyes.

“The lamb,” he muttered, his face creased with agitation.

Taking pity on him, Rae reached into her pack and pulled out half a loaf of bread. She pressed the food into the soldier’s empty hand.

If he noticed her charity, he didn’t let on. He gripped the bread until the crust crackled under the pressure. “The lamb, the lamb,” he chanted under his breath.

Rae shook her head grimly and stepped into the workshop.

She immediately blundered into a woman carrying an armful of spindles loaded with fine white thread. The woman cursed and said, “Watch where you’re going!”

“Sorry, sorry, sorry!” Rae snatched a fallen spindle from the floor and placed it on top of the teetering pile. The weaver tutted at her before flouncing back to her station.

The workshop was a frenzy of activity, filled with women spinning flaxen thread or weaving fabric on long wooden looms. Everything was so white and pristine that Rae felt embarrassed by the state of her dress. Her tunic was spattered with abstract patterns of dirt and blood—and her sandals? She grimaced. They didn’t bear examination. Clearing her throat, she attempted to smooth the flyaway strands of her hair, but probably only made it worse.

Omari was already speaking with one of the weavers—an expansive older woman with wrinkled light-brown skin and hair that had gone gray at the temples. Mamet Mut. The two spoke as she passed the weft beam between the taut warp threads in a steady rhythm, while a smaller woman used another wooden beam to bang the threads tightly against one another. The movements filled the workshop with sound— Shh, clack! Shh, clack! Shh, clack! Rae tried to hear to what Omari and Mamet Mut were saying, but between the looms and many voices, she could only make out a few words at a time.

“... meet tonight…”

“No, the Medjay won’t find…”

“But Asim said…”

Rae’s brow furrowed. The Medjay? Omari was a carpenter’s son. What business did he have with the pharaoh’s lawmen?

She was about to march over and ask just what in Ra’s name he was up to when her gaze fell upon a young woman spinning thread on the other side of the room.

Omari and his secrets were instantly forgotten.

The girl was a cascade of soft curves, from her tightly curled hair down to the roundness of her figure. A small clay pot sat at her feet, filled with a mass of wet flax fibers. The girl coaxed a single rough fiber from the mass, holding it aloft in one hand, while in the other she held a wooden spindle that she rolled along her bare thigh, spinning the fiber into fine thread. The movement was like a slow, undulating dance, and Rae couldn’t help but stare.

The girl caught Rae watching her and smiled. “Hi, Rae.”

Rae’s cheeks grew hot. “Tam.”

“What brings you?”

“I… Omari needed…” She coughed. Her throat was suddenly dry. She’d only known Tamerit for a season—the girl’s family had moved from Per-Abu to live with their cousins, and Tam had joined the weavers shortly after. They’d met in the market when they’d both reached for the same basket of figs. Their fingers touched, their eyes met, and Rae felt her body become liquid. Since that day, Rae had taken every opportunity to drop in on the weavers to see her again.

“Oh,” Tam replied, sticking out her lower lip. “Omari needed something, eh? Are you sure you don’t need anything?”

“I do need something,” Rae replied, teasing.

“I agree,” Tam replied. “A bath.”

Rae laughed, and then covered her mouth with one hand.

“Maybe after you’ve cleaned yourself up,” Tam went on, “we could—”

Suddenly, Mamet Mut stepped between them, eyeing Rae with disapproval.

“Omari!” she bellowed. “You didn’t tell me you brought your friend! So, are you two finally getting married?”

Rae looked over at Omari and blanched. He stared back at her with a strange expression, then hurried over, his palms raised in protest.

“No, no, not today, Mamet Mut.”

She wasn’t Omari’s mother—she had no children, in fact—but Mamet Mut acted like she was everyone’s mother. She claimed to know every single soul living in Sakesh, and more than that, knew what was best for them. Mut wasn’t her real name, but everyone called her that because, like the great sky goddess, Mamet Mut seemed to see everything that happened in the city and was never afraid to share her opinion about it.

“Ta-ta, ta-ta,” Mamet Mut complained. “So slow, Omari. You’ve had your whole life to ask her and still you wait. For what? Ra only knows. Do the weavers a favor and give us a little excitement one of these days, won’t you?”

Rae couldn’t help but laugh at her friend’s embarrassment. “Yes, Omari,” she said, elbowing him. “Why can’t you be more exciting, like your friend, the fighting donkey?”

Omari rubbed the back of his head with one hand, unable to meet her gaze.

What’s wrong with him? Rae wondered. This isn’t the first time Mamet Mut has badgered him like this. Why is he acting so weird?

Omari turned back to the big woman and gave her a little bow. “I’ll do my best, Mamet,” he said. “But for now, we must get back home. Our work awaits us.”

Mamet Mut waved him off, laughing with the other women.

Rae looked back toward Tamerit, desperate for the girl to finish her thought, but the young weaver had gone back to her own work, rolling the thread onto her spindle. Rae finally caught her eye and mouthed sorry. Tam shrugged one shoulder lightly, her every movement an invitation.

Rae bit her lip and groaned softly. I’ll be back , she promised herself as she followed Omari out the door. As soon as the harvest was done, she’d return to reap what that unfinished moment had sown.

***

They left the artisans’ quarter behind and took the river road out of town. Soon, the crowds thinned, leaving Rae and Omari side by side in awkward silence. For as long as she could remember, everyone in Rae’s life had loved to talk about how she and Omari would be married one day. It had been funny when they still wore the sidelock of youth, naked and carefree, spending their days wrestling with the other children and swimming in the Iteru until the sun went down. It was only when they got older, and the talk grew more serious, that it became a problem.

Rae loved Omari, but she didn’t want to marry him.

It took meeting Tamerit to really understand why. Not that she’d tell Omari that. She wasn’t sure he’d understand.

Besides, Rae was fairly certain that Omari didn’t want to marry her either. After all, Rae didn’t think she was what most Khetaran men wanted in a wife. She was tall and thick-bodied, her shoulders broad from a lifetime of farmwork. She didn’t oil or style her hair, her hands were rough and her knuckles calloused, and in her free time, she fought men in alleyways and used the spoils to trade for beer.

Not that it mattered if the men liked it or not. Rae wasn’t going to change for anyone.

Besides, Omari was like a brother to her. Romance, she was sure, was far from his mind, at least when it came to his stubborn old friend. There were plenty of other girls who would be better suited to him, and Rae often pointed them out in the street. He’d dutifully look them over, but as far as she knew, he’d never pursued any of them. If he had, he would have told her about it. They told each other everything.

Speaking of secrets …

Rae cleared her throat. “So… what was that all about?”

“What do you mean?”

Rae swore. “Don’t play games. What were you talking about with Mamet Mut? Something about the Medjay? What are you up to?”

Omari frowned, his eyes on the road before them. The sun had sunk past its zenith, casting long shadows on the dusty ground as they walked. To the west, the River Iteru snaked in both directions, as far as the eye could see. Trading ships and small fishing skiffs crowded its waters, some riding the current north to High Khetara, others catching the wind in their sails and sailing south to the cataract, where the waters turned wild and game was bountiful. Green fields stretched across both sides of the great river, her gifts transforming the desert into the rich black loam from which everything grew. Already Rae could smell it in the air, that earthy perfume that was a welcome respite from the heavy stink of the city. That and the gentle sound of the Iteru’s flowing water was usually enough to raise her spirits, but her friend’s strange behavior made her uneasy.

“Omari,” she said, her voice low. “No secrets, remember?”

It was a promise they’d made to each other when they were small, after Rae’s mother died. She’d been sick for a while, but her parents had kept the knowledge of her illness secret from their young daughter. They’d believed they were doing her a kindness, but Rae was devastated by what seemed to her like a sudden, unexpected loss. She hardly spoke to her father during that first lonely season. Her mind was filled with thoughts of what she would have done differently if she had known, how she would have spent those last days holding her mother a little bit longer, would have said the things she never got to, would have better prepared herself for that final goodbye. Omari had come to her on one of those dark days and sat by her side, watching the boats float by on the river. “I’ll never keep secrets from you,” he’d said. “I promise.”

Rae had leaned her head on his shoulder and whispered, “Me too.”

She looked at him, still seeing that little boy from so long ago. She felt a pang of guilt, thinking of Tamerit and what she herself was keeping from him, but quickly pushed it from her mind.

Omari rubbed the back of his head, as he always did when he was nervous, but said nothing.

“Well?” she prodded.

Omari’s jaw clenched. “You must keep this to yourself, do you understand?” He scanned the area around them. Other than two farmers and a donkey carrying sacks of grain far up ahead, they were alone on the road.

Rae’s pulse quickened. “Yes, of course,” she said. “I swear it.”

Omari stopped walking and turned to face her. They’d reached the edge of his family’s land, where their mud-brick home and carpentry workshop stood. “There is a group of like-minded men who want to liberate Low Khetara from the pharaoh’s oppressive rule. They have been meeting at night, in various secret locations, to make a plan of action that begins here, in Sakesh. The weavers have been passing messages along to the men so that they can avoid being seen together on the street. Not all of the weavers know, mind you, but Mamet Mut and a few others do. The Medjay don’t like it when Sakeshis assemble in groups of any number, so…” He faltered.

“Wait… you’re one of these ‘like-minded men’?” Rae asked.

Omari squared his shoulders. “I am.”

Rae felt a chill, despite the blazing heat of the sun on her skin. “I don’t understand. Since when are you so interested in politics?”

“Since my eyes were opened to injustices I can no longer tolerate.”

“Omari,” Rae scoffed. “I know things in Sakesh are bad, but what—?”

“Look around you,” Omari broke in. “Our city is falling to ruin. Once proud men beg on the streets, dressed in rags, while High Khetarans live in luxury, wearing robes threaded with gold they stole from our land. Don’t you ever think about it, Rae? Don’t you ever wonder why you’re so angry?”

Rae was taken aback. It felt as if she were talking with a stranger. Omari had always been so soft-spoken and easygoing, in many ways her opposite. Looking at him now, she had to wonder what depths lay beneath his placid surface—what she’d been too busy to notice while focused on her own problems.

“Of course, I think about it,” she said, sullen. “But I’m too busy keeping food on my father’s table to have secret meetings with strange men.” When Omari didn’t reply, she asked, “What is it that you plan to do, anyway?”

Omari shook his head. “I’ve said too much already. I don’t want you and Ankhu involved if something goes wrong.”

“Wrong?” Rae asked, alarmed. “Omari, what are you planning? How do you know you can trust these men? Who are they? If you go and get yourself killed, I swear I’ll—”

“Keep your voice down!”

Rae was shocked by the force in his voice. He grabbed her, squeezing her wrist in his work-roughened hand. Rae’s instinct was to pull him toward her and throw him onto his back, just like she did to Buto—but she didn’t. Omari must have sensed the tension in her, though, because he quickly released his grip.

“I’m sorry,” Omari said, his voice quiet once more. “But these are dangerous times, Rae. I recommend you keep your unbridled stupidity to a minimum.”

Omari’s gentle jabs typically made her laugh, but this time, a rush of rage flooded her body. “You’re calling me stupid? I’m not the one sneaking out in the middle of the night searching for a fire to burn in!”

Omari glared at her, a similar fury reflected on his face. Then it dissipated, and he sighed. “Look, I didn’t mean to—”

But Rae was too angry and hurt to listen. “Don’t worry,” she broke in. “Even a fool like me knows how to keep her mouth shut.” And with that, she strode past him toward home.

“Rae, wait,” Omari called after her. She didn’t look back. “Rae!”

After that, he must have given up and gone inside, because only the sounds of the river followed her home.

***

Soon, the slender palms lining the edge of Omari’s family land were behind her, and the familiar fields of golden wheat began. The feathery stalks were nearly chest-high, and Rae stretched her hand out to let them tickle her palm. She pushed the fight with Omari from her mind. You’ve got too much going on to worry about him.

Rae’s back ached thinking about all the work that needed to be done on the farm. She and her father had already harvested the southern field—but it was the smaller of the two, and besides that, the year’s crop, much like everyone else’s, had been middling at best, so they’d have to make sure to harvest every stalk to have enough wheat cut and bundled to pay the king’s tax. If the northern field took extra time, so be it. She began to plan out the rest of that day, and the next, and the next. The orderly, ordinary thoughts soothed her.

She caught her father as he was leading one of the humpbacked brown zebu back to its pen. He was her equal in almost every respect—from his broad muscled frame to his large knob-knuckled hands, and the sun-bronzed color of his skin. Only his frizzy halo of graying hair—which made him look far older than his years—separated them.

“You see?” he said to the cow when he spied Rae coming up the path. “I told you she’d be back. And in one piece too.” His gaze fell upon her face, and he cocked his head. “Well, mostly.”

Rae raised a hand, wincing when she touched a puffy welt under her eye. Add that to the fat lip, I guess. Had she landed on her face one of the times Buto threw her? She couldn’t really remember. Shrugging, she gave her father a sheepish grin. “Tripped over a rock in the road. You know me.”

“Clumsiest girl in all Khetara—yes, I know you.” Her father chuckled, giving the zebu a pat on the rump and closing the narrow wooden gate behind her. He fumbled with the latch, cursing, and Rae hurried forward to help him.

“I got you more salve from the market,” she said, pulling a small clay pot from her pack after securing the gate. She opened the plug to show him the white ointment that smelled of beeswax and olive oil.

“It certainly took you long enough,” he said, giving the salve a cursory glance. “It seems like every week it takes you longer.”

“The market is… ah… busy this time of day,” she lied, poking at the ointment with her finger. Her father had a way of seeing straight through her, and she couldn’t bring herself to meet his gaze. “Why don’t I put some of this on your arm before we get started? It will keep your skin from chafing.”

“Later,” her father said, waving away the pot. “I’ve already got it secured.”

Rae looked down at his right arm, where a curved wooden sickle had been fitted onto the stump where his right hand had once been. Years ago, after he’d expressed his frustration about reaping wheat one-handed, Omari’s father had fashioned the special tool for just that purpose, and her father had been using it ever since.

“I’ll say this about you, Ankhu,” the carpenter had said the first time they’d tied it to his arm, “You’re as stubborn as your zebu.”

It was true. After the end of the Great War, Father could have easily become one of those broken men, like the one she’d seen on the street. He’d lost so much in the aftermath—his lofty position as a palace scribe, his home in the city, and his right hand at the wrist. He hadn’t written a single word since—the High Khetaran soldiers had made sure of that.

As a rule, Khetarans often collected the hands of their enemies as a way to account for the number slain, but for some reason, they’d allowed Ankhu to live. Perhaps the soldier who’d done it thought it a mercy, but Rae knew that although he’d escaped with his life, a part of her father had still died that day.

Several years after that, he’d lost his wife too.

He was left with two things, and two things only: a bit of land outside the city and a motherless little girl. So instead of losing himself at the bottom of a jug of beer, her father had tied a sickle to his arm and nurtured them both.

Rae loved him for that. Of all the suns in her sky, he shined the brightest.

“Come now, Rae,” her father said. “The day grows short, and we have much to do.”

Sighing, Rae took up a length of rope and followed her father to the northern field. “I wish you would let me help with the reaping.” She slapped at a mosquito on her neck. “It would go so much faster…”

“No, it wouldn’t,” her father replied impatiently, as he did every time they had this argument. “Someone would still need to gather and bundle the wheat, and you know I can’t. Besides, reaping is a man’s job. Let me have my pride, won’t you, woman?”

Rae rolled her eyes. She knew he was right about the gathering, but she also knew it would feel good to wield a sickle, to cut the stalks with sweeping strokes and watch them fall at her feet. Maybe, if she could do that, she wouldn’t feel the need to pick fights in the street.

Don’t you ever wonder why you’re so angry?

Omari’s words nagged at her like an itch she had to scratch.

Don’t you ever think about it, Rae?

It was a stupid question. She thought about it every day. Everyone did. Sakesh was falling to ruin, more rapidly than ever before. But what could she do? What could anyone do? She might as well have tried to stop the wind from blowing.

Omari was wasting his time. Worse, he was endangering his family. Rae glanced over at her father, already glistening with sweat as he swung his sickle across the wheat. Despite her weekly treatment with the salve, she could see that the skin around the rope harness was raw and weeping. She hated to see him struggle, but she couldn’t see that there was an alternative. Her father had nearly lost his life in the war with High Khetara. What could possibly be worth risking it again?

***

The sun was low on the horizon, a golden disk burning in a pool of bloodred light. From the middle of the northern field, Rae and her father saw a large sailboat coming up the river. Its white sail was taut with a bellyful of wind and boasted the sigil of a ram’s head painted in black and red ochre. The boat sliced swiftly through the water, nearing the edge of their land.

Rae’s father shielded his eyes to squint at the approaching craft. “It’s the nomarch.”

Rae dropped the wheat she’d just finished bundling on top of the pile and stood panting, her arms akimbo. “But he’s not due to visit for ten days. We’re not ready!”

“I’ll handle it,” her father muttered, and began walking to meet the boat.

Rae followed close on his heels, wiping the sweat from her brow.

The nomarch and his retinue of soldiers and scribes were already disembarking when Rae and her father reached the river road. Sakesh’s representative to the crown was a short, stooped man with chin-length black hair—probably a wig—and a bulbous, florid nose. He wore a long robe made of fabric so fine and so white that it made Rae and her father’s clothes look gray. He stopped in front of them, his men assembling themselves in formation behind him.

“Ankhu,” the man said by way of greeting. He chewed a glob of mastic, his lips making a smacking sound.

“Nomarch,” Rae’s father replied, bowing his head.

“We’ve come to collect the king’s tax,” the man went on, still chewing. “Please show my men to your store.”

Rae saw her father’s jaw tense. But when he spoke, his voice was calm. “I would be most pleased to do so, except that we have only eighty hekats of wheat ready today. We can have the other twenty in ten days’ time, if that suits you.”

The nomarch stopped chewing and was silent for a moment. “What suits me,” he said with casual malice, “is getting what I ask when I ask for it.”

“With all due respect,” Rae’s father replied, “You’re ten days early—”

The nomarch continued as if Rae’s father hadn’t spoken at all. “Furthermore, the tax is now one hundred and fifty hekats. By decree of King Amunmose.”

Rae felt the blood drain from her face. A hundred and fifty hekats , she thought. But that’s … We couldn’t possibly …

As if sharing her thoughts, her father scoffed. “You can’t be serious.That would take out more than half of our harvest. The king must know that the crops have been poor this year. What are we to live on?”

The nomarch’s eyes narrowed. “I’m sure I don’t care, Ankhu. But if you would like to keep your other hand, you’ll produce the remaining seventy hekats and have it ready in four days. I’d much rather have it now, but what can I say? I’m feeling generous.” He spat the mastic gum onto the ground at her father’s feet. “And if you don’t have enough wheat, perhaps I’ll take your daughter as payment instead.” He sauntered over to Rae, his heavy-lidded eyes roving up and down her body. When he leaned in close, his breath bitter and hot, it took all her willpower not to lace her arm around his neck and squeeze. “She’s an able-bodied girl,” the nomarch mused. “I’d be happy to put her to work at my estate.”

Rae looked over at her father. His face was a mask of studied passivity. “You’ll have your seventy hekats.”

It was only after the nomarch’s soldiers had carried the prepared wheat onto the boat and the king’s scribes had marked the number on their scrolls and sailed on; after her father, silent and brooding, had returned to the house; after she had stowed their tools and made sure the zebu were settled in their pen for the night; it was only then that Rae walked out through the fields to the desert, fell to her knees, and screamed her rage into the night.