Soldier of Sidon Read Free

spoke with was a tall, lean man, as many men are here.
    "This fellow," Muslak said, indicating me, "is a mercenary officer who has served the Great King. He's a good man and a fine fighter, but he cannot remember his name. Every morning we must tell him who he is and where he is, and why he is here."
    The healer rubbed his jaw. "Why is he?"
    (I should write that this was not said in my own tongue, in which I write it, but in the speech of Kemet, which Muslak knows much better than I.)
    "He saved me from slavery," Muslak explained. "The price he asked was to be returned to his home in Luhitu."
    "You did as he wished?"
    "I did, and the next time that we put in there I looked him up to see how he was doing. I hoped he had his memory back and would remember me. He was as bad as ever, but he had written 'Riverland' above his door. I talked to his wife, and she said it was to tell him he must go there again to find out what had happened to him. I asked some other people what it meant, and it is their name for your country."
    "Ours is the Black Land," the first healer said. (
Kemet
is
black
in their speech.)
    "I know. But other people have other names for it. Anyway, I told him we would go there to trade, and he was welcome to sail with us if he wanted to. His wife wanted to come along, too. I told her it was impossible--a ship has to have special arrangements for women, and we didn't have them. She said she would come anyway. I told her she would be in a lot of danger. You understand."
    The first healer nodded.
    "Somebody would lift her skirt, then kill her so she couldn't tell Lewqys. Because Lewqys would kill him sure. He's a terror with that crooked sword. When I was to be sold, they had two men guarding us, and he killed them both before they could draw breath."
    "His wife is not with you?"
    Muslak shook his head. "He came down to my ship in the harbor when we were nearly loaded, but he came alone. I think he must have written his law on her as soon as I left. But what's wrong with him? That's the point. Why can't he remember?"
    "I was not merely inquisitive," the first healer explained. "A wife often knows things a man's friends do not. I hoped to question her." He clapped his hands. "I want to consult a colleague of mine."
    "You think we're all rich," Muslak said. "Let me tell you that it isn't so, and until I can sell my cargo I'll have very little."
    A boy came, and the first healer told him to bring Ra'hotep.
    While we waited, the first healer talked with me, asking my name. I gave it, and he asked how I knew it. I explained that Muslak had told me.
    "Would your wife call you so?"
    "I don't know," I said. "I did not remember that I had a wife until now."
    "When we are born, we do not know how to talk. You remember how to talk, clearly."
    I nodded.
    "Also how to use your sword, from what your friend says."
    I said that I did not know whether I knew or not, but it seemed plain how such a sword must be used.
    "Just so. May I look at it?"
    I drew my sword and offered it to him hilt-first.
    "There is a word written here," he said, "but it is not in the true Thoth-inspired writing. I cannot read it. Can you?"
    "Falcata," I said. "It's the name of my sword."
    "How do you know that?"
    I said I had read it on the blade this morning, which was a lie.
    "If he were in the grip of a xu, he would not have handed me his sword," the first healer told Muslak. (I think this word must mean
daemon
in their tongue.) "Also, he speaks sensibly, and those who are in the grip of a xu never speak sensibly for long. Has he anything to gain by shamming?"
    "Nothing," Muslak declared, "and he couldn't have deceived me for more than a day. Besides, he pretends to remember sometimes. He wouldn't do that if he were faking."
    The first healer smiled. "So, Lewqys, you lie to us, do you?"
    I said, "I suppose I do. All men lie at times, it seems to me."
    "Oh, really? I would have said not. Who has lied to you recently?"
    "I don't know."
    While we spoke, the