Mohammed felt a chill rush through his limbs, his heart. "I am still alive," he said in wonder. His thin, parched fingers gripped the trunk of the tree. "How did I come to this place? What sent me here?"
"You did," Mōha growled, the sheet of living flame shrinking again, outlining limbs, a noble head, a face, powerful arms. "You chose to cling to life, even when death opened before you. Already the gate and the city were shaken, cracked and splintered. You refused to die and with your arrogance, your sin, your pride the arch was cast down." The beautiful man, corporeal once more, stabbed a finger at the blackened, ashy woods. "You keep them from the land of peace. You are the abomination here, not I! You are the one who has brought ruin upon this world!"
Mohammed flinched. He remembered the sadness, the agony in Khadijah's eyes. The tears of the dead as they knelt over him, watering him with their tears. "I? No... You are the deceiver. I cannot trust you!"
Mōha shook his head, long hair spilling over broad shoulders. "Can you hear the voice of the lord of the world? The voice that speaks from the clear air? The voice singing in the courts of the morning?"
"No." Mohammed gathered himself, rising up, back pressed against the trunk of the tree. "I cannot. I am captive in some realm where his will cannot enter, where his voice cannot be heard!"
"There is no such place." Mōha's eyes were filled with grief. "Is he not the maker of all that is? How can he be shut out? He is already in your heart—do you deny this? If so, and you are here, then you can hear him, hear his beloved voice..."
"Can you hear him, then?" Mohammed stood, shaky on weak legs, but on his own two feet at last. "Does his voice sing in your heart?"
The beautiful man blanched and an expression of terrible loss cut into his face, graven deep in his eyes and the set of his mouth. "No. No, I cannot."
"What escaped from the land of the dead?" The Quraysh's expression was grim. "Was it you?"
"No!" Mōha said in disgust. "I am not mortal flesh, not clay! I am eternal, the first one, the dawn star in the firmament of heaven! Death does not touch me, not as it burrows in your flesh like maggots..."
"Who then? Was it the dark power that destroyed Palmyra?"
Another shout of laughter boomed across the plain, sending burned trees cascading to the ground in plumes of ash. Mōha wept quicksilver tears, which smoked and burned on the ground where they fell. "That is not dead," the beautiful man said, in a pitying tone, "which can eternal lie... You are a fool if you think such a power as the Lord of Ten Serpents could perish! No, you have escaped death, by refusing to enter the city. You have set the balance awry, leading to chaos in the heavens and the earth. You must set the balance right. Accept your fate! There is an end to all things."
"I will not abandon those who yet live, or those who have believed." Mohammed snapped, weary of the creature's prattle. "I will open this gate to the land of the dead and let the lost find their way home!"
Mōha grinned. "You have no strength to raise such a weight. You were only a vessel for the power in the tide, in the air, in the stars above. You can help neither the living nor the dead, save by entering the city." The perfect face grew pensive. "You must hurry. The dead are a multitude and their numbers grow with each beat of your heart."
The dead... The Quraysh's eyes widened and he turned sharply, looking back into the burned, blackened groves. The transparent, ephemeral figures had returned and without the strange trees to block his sight, he saw they covered the land for as far as he could see. "The dead cannot pass from life to death without entering the gate."
"You are swift of thought!" Mōha said in a mocking tone. "Are you deaf?"
Mohammed turned, eyes narrowed to bare slits, his face like iron. "The arch fell long before I entered this land. Khadijah was here, trapped like the others and she perished over a year ago. I am trapped in the same way! You are a deceiving, glib-tongued creature! You seek to lead the dead astray, to keep them from paradise, to turn their minds from the lord of the world! You are a false guide, a corrupt councilor!" The Quraysh raised a hand, his entire body suffused with righteous strength. "Begone, creature of sin! I cast you out, I deny you!"
"Sin?" Mōha changed again, burning light oozing from the pores of his flesh, opening foundry doors in his eyes, his breath hot. "You speak of sin? You, who have murdered, stolen, cheated? You who sought revenge, hate hot in your heart? There is no one who will stand beside you in judgment and speak in your favor! You are monstrous, a thing of bleeding clay, your hands running with innocent blood!"
"The world will speak for me!" Mohammed's tongue was quick with anger. "I have placed myself in the lord's care, accepted his will, become his instrument! My soul will stand in the balance of judgment!"
"Will it?" Mōha's expression became grave. His hand pointed, stiff in accusation. "Here is the world, at your hand. It suffers for you, sacrifices for you, gives you life... do you praise it, offer it thanks? No, there is only dirt to grind beneath your feet, a crutch for feeble limbs. Dare you ask the world for judgment?"
Mohammed grew still. Someone was standing behind him. He could hear the rustle of cloth, the soft motion of breath. Stiff fingers touched his shoulder, and he could feel smooth, cool skin against his neck.
"You drank from me," a female voice sighed, like wind rustling in dry leaves. "Without care. You ate of me, without thanks. My soil is wet with rich red blood you spilt, without leave."
Mohammed staggered, falling to his knees. Harsh shadows fell on the ground, thrown by the steady brilliance shining forth from the figure of Mōha. His limbs grew heavy again.
"You sought glory in war, in the strife of men, abandoning your family, without forethought. You took up the path of vengeance, sending countless souls down to the house of the dead, without prayer to guide their path."
Mohammed struggled to rise, but his forehead cracked against the dry earth and his arms splintered, bones crushed by an ever-growing, terrible weight. He tried to cry out, but no sound escaped his dust-filled throat or passed his dry, crumbling lips.
"You spoke with the god's voice, without searching your heart. You strove in battle, without spying your enemy's banner or shield. Into an innocent's breast, you thrust your spear, blind in fury." A shadow fell across the Quraysh's face, but he could not see the slim, silver-gray figure leaning over him, harvest-gold hair shot with pale green, lambent umber eyes glistening with tears. "Illusion you took as a lover," he heard, as from a great distance. "Embraced as a dear friend. Pride killed you, son of the earth, who was born from clots of blood, mixed with clay."
The weight grew and grew, grinding Mohammed into the earth, skull fracturing under the pressure with a soft pop, thin, wasted shoulders flaking into dust.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
The Roman Camp at Pelusium, Lower Egypt
"What was that?" Sextus raised his head, nostrils flaring. He stopped, reining in his mule, and held out a hand to bring Frontius up short. Both men were riding along the military road atop the interior wall of the Roman fortifications, heading for a mile-fort where—they were informed—the Caesar Aurelian was encamped. The fighting platform rose up directly to their right, reinforced with palm logs and slabs of looted stone. Men were sleeping along the rampart, wrapped in their field blankets, helmets and scabbarded swords close at hand. Pyramids of spears and javelins stood every dozen yards. At intervals, sentries leaned against the wall, watching the eastern darkness.
"I didn't hear anything." Frontius squinted around, raising his lantern. Butter-yellow light spilled across a roadway of planed logs. Off to his left, fields of stumps lay under a starry sky. A mile or more away, torches and bonfires outlined the square shape of a Legion camp. The moon had already set in the west, leaving nothing to dim the vast sweep of the river of milk. To the north, the engineer could make out a gleam of starlight flashing on the waters of the Inner Sea.
"I smelled something." Dismounting, Sextus scrambled up the fighting platform and climbed onto a wooden step behind the wall. Frontius, cursing mildly, followed. Peering over the embrasure, he saw more darkness—the dry river channel fronting the long earthwork, crisscrossed by lines of stakes—then the dim lights of the first wall and its garrison. Beyond that, there was nothing—only velvety darkness and the night.
"What time is it?" Sextus whispered. Frontius looked at the sky, searching for the gleam of Venus or Mars. They were low in the west, chasing the moon.
"Nearly dawn," he replied. His nose tickled. "Feh! What is that?"
Sextus thumped him on the shoulder. "The wind is turning from the east. That's an entire army awake and pissing out in the desert."
Frontius' eyebrows raised, then he sneezed. Disgusted, he wiped his nose. "We'd better hurry. His lordship needs to know about the dam."
The two engineers rode up to the gate of the mile-fort in haste, mules bleating in protest. The portal was open, torches blazing all around, an entire century of grizzled-looking veterans standing watch. Sextus slid from the mule, slapping away a customary bite, and saluted the centurion in charge. Runners were leaving the gate in a steady stream, each man holding a paper lantern at the end of a carry pole. The watch had weapons drawn and bare, their helmets cinched tight under stubbled jaws.
"I'm Sextus, First Minerva, a message from Scortius—to see the Caesar Aurelian."
The watch commander eyed him suspiciously and lifted his chin at a man—a priest—standing nearby. The Egyptian had his eyes half-closed, oblivious to the constant, quiet bustle all around him. "Menkaure? These two clean?"
After a moment, the priest nodded. At the same time, Sextus felt a tingling sensation, as if soft feathers brushed against his ears and neck. He shuddered, tossing his head. Frontius was scratching his nose furiously, scowling at everyone.
"Go on," the centurion said. His men parted, allowing the two engineers to hurry inside the fortress. Like its companions along the length of the fortifications, it was a hollow square, surrounded by a high, raised earthen wall and a palisade of palm logs, mud brick and—at the corners, where watchtowers loomed against the black sky—blocks of carefully hoarded stone. The lower delta was bereft of most building materials save mud and palms. Sextus squished across the muddy courtyard, weaving his way through groups of soldiers. The men were in full armor already, drinking from steaming cups, chewing on flat bread. Kitchen slaves moved among them, handing out cloth bags of bread and dried meat. The courtyard was poorly lit and it took Sextus a moment to find the Caesar's tents.
Within, a blaze of white light illuminated everything. The engineers halted, squinting, half-blinded by radiance spilling from crystalline globes hung from the ceiling in nets of bronze chain. When they could see again, Aurelian was waving them into the main room of the tent. The Caesar was surrounded by a phalanx of clerks and scribes, runners kneeling nearby, and two thin old Egyptian priests lurking behind his worktable.
"Sextus, Frontius—Mercury speeds you into the arms of Mars tonight!" Aurelian smiled, teeth white in the bushy thicket of his red beard. "The sun will be up soon and the Persians will be coming at us, I think."
Sextus nodded, saluting the prince. "You can smell them, my lord. The wind has turned from the east."
"I know." Aurelian rubbed his own nose. "The men on the first wall can hear them moving. Sound travels well over the desert." The prince motioned them closer, then said: "How stand things among the reeds?"
Sextus waggled a hand in the air. The huge project twenty miles up the arm of the Nile had been giving the Romans quite a time. "Well, my lord... things could be better."
Aurelian frowned, bending close. Even here, in a tent crawling with his own men, under the aegis of his own thaumaturges, the prince was minded to be circumspect. "What do you mean? Scortius sent no word of trouble."
Both engineers shrugged. "You know how poor this soil is, my lord, all bogs, quicksand and alluvial mud. No bone to this land, no stone, no spine! There was a subsidence yesterday; it collapsed part of the western dyke. The weight of the dam was too much for the ground to hold." Sextus shook his head, hands spread wide. "So do the gods will."
"How many feet of water did we lose?" The prince bit at his thumb, brow creased in concern.