Free Shadows on the Aegean by Suzanne Frank

of
khefts
on his neck. Hurriedly he passed through the temple gate. The priest waited, his kohl-ringed eyes glittering in the torchlight.
     From the darkened rear of the temple User could hear the sound of singing priests, taking the god Ptah to his couch.
    Silently the two men walked into the chamber. The body of the woman was there, no longer stiff, the flesh warm from the heat
     of the day. Decay was setting in, and User felt his gorge rise. In protection against wandering
khefts
and
khaibits
, he had bound an amulet around his throat and one on each arm. Prayerfully he covered the corpse with cloth.
    The
sem
-priest, chanting softly, bound a black cord around her waist, then knotted it. Had he wanted to destroy her
ka
, her spirit, he would have written her name on a papyrus scroll and bound it into the cord. Since they were destroying her
     body only, it was unnecessary to use her name. A boon, since her name and identity were unknown.
    Instead they offered prayers of protection for her
ka
, already loose on the face of the earth. Once the corpse was wrapped and tied, the priest picked up a wax figure of the woman.
     This was the most sacred of ceremonies, the vilest of Egyptian ritual. But it was necessary protection. Egypt was already
     weak with the famine, with sand-crawling Asiatics invading from across the desert. The red and black lands did not need a
khaibit
wandering the marshes.
    With a sharp bronze blade the priest cut off the feet of the wax figure. Was it User’s imagination, or did the corpse jerk,
     as though she felt the knife? In an inversion of the prayers of the dead, the prayers recited by the deceased as they traveled
     through the afterworld, the priest chanted.
“When Ra’s light shines on these fields, you cannot rise to walk through them.”
He cut off the figure’s hands.
“Creativity is taken from your hands. You cannot fashion yourself.”
The priest’s voice was trembling as he raised the hilt of the knife and bludgeoned the figure’s face.
“You are blinded, you cannot find the river, the land. You cannot see to revenge or wreak destruction or take what is not
     yours.”
He cut its head off.
“In the protection of Osiris, I cut off my sister’s head. I beg the counsel of Osiris that this one’s
ka
is admitted to the afterworld. You cannot seek revenge.”
    He laid down the blade, picked up the pieces of the figure, then wrapped them in the edge of the linen. After letting themselves
     out a side door, User and the priest carried the body into the star-strung night, reciting prayers that were as rote as their
     names.
    “Hail, long-legged beast, striding from the cornfield, creature from the House of Light. I’ve seen nothing in the world but
     beauty. May we live forever!
    “Hail, priest of incense, smoke, and flame, fresh from the soul’s daily battle, I’ve taken nothing from life but strength.
     May we live forever!
    “Hail, wind in my face, blown from the mouths of the gods, I returned the goslings to their nest. The hawks soar freely above
     the cliffs. May we live forever!
    “Hail, devourer of shadows, terror lurking in the entrails of mountains, I extinguished no man’s life. I took neither his
     life nor his dreams. May we live forever!”
    They stood at the pre-Inundation edge of the Nile, supporting the body between them, water at their waists. Clumsily they
     tucked rocks into the linen wrappings. The priest was weeping freely now as they recited the final prayer.
    “May the light shine through us and on us and in us. May we die each night and be born each morning and that the wonder of
     life should not escape us. May we love and laugh and enter freely into each other’s hearts. May we live forever!”
    The splash seemed loud: then she was gone. Wherever her
ka
had gone, it was now trapped there. The two men gripped arms, looking out into the dark river. “May we live forever,” User
     whispered.

    I PIANKHU, LITERALLY “He Who Is Called ‘Alive,’ ”