"What happens now?" Liz asked Jerry.
Jerry tugged his goatee. "Well, according to the myth, Isis will sew the bits together, and Osiris will be reanimated. He will answer Set's accusations and vindicate himself before the tribunal of gods. Then he'll go off to become lord of the dead."
"I meant: what are we going to do? I want to go home, Jerry. Lamont needs to go home. Medea also wants to get back to her kids."
"Yeah. Well, I was getting to that. Isis and Thoth both seem to believe that if anyone can help us, it will be Osiris. He's a pretty major ancient Egyptian god. You don't go much higher except for Ra . . . or perhaps Amon, although the two get confused and once again we are dealing with a mishmash mythworld . . . "
Liz stamped her foot. "I wish you'd stop lecturing and just get to the point, Jerry. Do I need to know all this stuff?"
"He only lectures when he gets nervous," said Lamont.
Liz shook her head. "So what's spooking him now?"
Lamont's shoulders shook slightly. "You, at a guess."
Liz raised her eyes to heaven. "Oh, for goodness sake, Jerry. You can tell Odysseus off, come up with spells under pressure, you even give a surprisingly good account of yourself in a fight. Why should I frighten you?"
Jerry wisely did not answer that all women made him nervous and the more attractive he found them, the more nervous he got. He was fine with Liz most of the time, just so long as he wasn't thinking about it. "Sorry. Habit," was all he said.
"Well, break it!" she snapped.
"How many smokes have you got left in that packet?" asked Lamont dryly.
Liz sighed. "Touché. So you reckon we are stuck here until Isis gets through with sewing up her husband."
Jerry decided that monosyllables couldn't be construed as lecturing. "Yes."
"Then I'm off to help with the sewing," said Liz.
"Bully them, you mean?" Lamont asked.
She smiled. "Something like that."
Jerry found his eyes tracking the sway of her hips as she walked away. He shook his head. "I didn't know I was that obvious. Life's complicated, Lamont."
The older man leaned back against the bank. "And then you die."
The early morning sun sent streamers of mist rising smokelike from the limitless green extent of the marsh. The birds raised a paean to the dawn. Anibal Cruz sat looking out across the limpid water of one of the channels. He felt kind of like singing himself. He'd known last night, when that crocodile had seized his leg, that he was dead. The beast must have been at least fourteen feet long and immensely powerful. It had already begun to pull him into the murky depths when he'd hit out at it, and he'd known that blow was totally ineffectual. A severed arm in mummy wrappings is no sort of weapon to fend off a giant reptile.
Or shouldn't be. This place was weird. He couldn't accept it. Except . . . that it would also mean not accepting Medea. And that woman was really getting to him. He dug out his poker dice, and began to toss them idly.
A pair of cool hands came to rest on his shoulders. Cruz felt a thrill jolt through his spine.
"How do you feel?" asked Medea.
He smiled up at her. "Just fine. Glad to be able to talk with you again."
She looked down at him, thoughtfully. "I have decided to ask you to teach me to speak American. I might also find myself deprived of my powers when we get there. But I also need to get back to my children."
Cruz sighed. "If Jerry can work out how to get back to the States, he can figure out how to get back to . . . to . . . the place you came from. And I guess learning to speak English could be pretty useful. But with this translation stuff . . . how could you do it?"
Medea shrugged. "We'll just have to take the spells off. I have been learning some of the names and spells of power from Doc Jerry."
Anibal grinned. "Given Jerry's luck with spells so far . . . "
Medea dimpled. "Ah. But I have more practice than he has. He has the knowledge, without an understanding of the rhythms and cadences." She sat on the soft grass next to him. "What is that that you are fiddling with?"
"Poker dice. It's a game."
"Oh? How do you play?" She took the well-worn ivories from his hand.
"Well, I'll show you, but I'm really not too sure of the rules."
"Then we can be two amateurs together," she said, smiling cheerfully.
"Well, this is a straight . . . " He explained, and rapidly began to realize that the girl of his fancy was smart as well as gorgeous. "Here, let me hold your hand and show you how to throw."
The dice landed on the grass, cocked.
"We need somewhere flat. There is a better spot back there in the thicket. Come, I will show you." Medea took Cruz by the arm and led him back into the trees.
It was as secluded as you could get on a relatively small swamp island. There was still a view out over the water, through a gap in the trees, but it was a narrow window onto the world. Flattening a sand ring was easy enough, as the grass was thin and scattered under the spiky trees.
"A pair." She leaned forward. Cruz found concentrating on the pair . . . of dice difficult.
"Now, I throw the other dice again . . . " She threw a trey, and clapped in delight. She tilted her head and lifted her aristocratic nose. "Beat that!"
"I'll do my best." Old habits die hard. "Hmm. Shall we liven this game up with a small bet or two?"
"I don't have any money," she said demurely.
"We could play for other stakes," he said idly, as if it was a totally unimportant suggestion.
She raised an eyebrow. "That sounds interesting. Are you not playing some sort of trick on me?"
"Me?" Butter would not only not have melted in Anibal Cruz's mouth, it might actually have unchurned itself and gone back to being cream. "Never. Now what I suggest is that the loser takes off an item of clothing. Just to keep score."
A small smile teased the edges of her mouth. "Very well. Just to keep score."
The sun shone down through the angular branches onto Anibal's bare back. His face was exceedingly red. And it wasn't only his back that was bare.
He consoled himself with the thought that he'd learned a really valuable lesson: NEVER play strip poker with a sorceress. Even in the wrong universe. So far she'd only taken off her sandals. She had very pretty feet . . .
He was buck-naked.
"This is a fun game!" Medea's smile was extremely wicked, as she examined the discomfited and naked paratrooper. It was not a brief examination. "Why are you so red in the face?" she asked innocently.
"This grass is tickling my bare . . . " choked Cruz.
"Why don't you spread some of those clothes of yours out. Then I could come and sit on them too. It would be a gentlemanly thing to do. Sitting on the grass is terribly undignified for a princess." She was looking a little flushed now, and she pushed away an errant curl from her forehead. "My, but it is hot this morning."
"I've got nothing more to lose," he growled.
"Tch." She fluttered her long eyelashes at him. "Then I'll just have to play to lose."
Anibal Cruz choked.
She cocked her head to one side and smiled provocatively. "That is what I was supposed to do, wasn't it?"
Cruz choked again.
Medea, the sorceress of Colchis, twined her fingers through the hair on his chest. Her eyes were soft. "I can tell you're not a Hellene," she said with a small, satisfied, secretive smile.
"Why?" he asked warily. "Did I do something wrong?"
"No. You did everything right. But so gentle . . . and you were trying to please me. Jason never bothered to. I know: That is only a small sample of one. But Absyrtus was like that too."
"Absyrtus?"
"My half brother. I killed him."
Cruz swallowed. Medea was nothing if not to the point. But if he understood what she was saying . . . Well, maybe the guy was just lucky Anibal Cruz hadn't gotten to him first. Very lucky.
She nibbled at his jawline. "It's a pity that Isis made the wrong leg immortal."
"Er. I think that some of the magic may have affected that limb too. It's certainly feeling like it may have died anyway."
She looked slightly alarmed. "Have we hurt your leg?"
"No . . . It's the one you were concerned about a few moments ago. The middle one. I'm sure it has died. I can feel rigor mortis setting in."
She rolled on top of him and began punching him in the ribs. Well, that's how it started anyway. Unfortunately, it wasn't that big an island. Fortunately, some of the marsh birds make just that kind of shriek.
It was a good thing that she'd gone to assist with the sewing up, thought Liz. There must be physiological limits on what magic could do. And there were certainly limits on Isis' knowledge of basic internal anatomy.
No matter what spells are uttered, a liver is a prerequisite for a decent afterlife and connecting the bile duct to the heart is almost certain to cause problems. Anubis was all for removing the whole lot, and simply substituting jewels or suitable scrolls of papyrus. Or filling the space with bitumen. He'd even brought suitable canopic jars and hooks.
"I can clean out his sinuses properly once and for all," he offered in a gravelly semi-growl. Liz did not take to Anubis. Not that she had anything against jackals. Very useful at waste disposal, scavengers were. Liz just found his drooling a bit off-putting.
Isis' twin sister, Nepthys, was also "helping." She combined being a terrible seamstress, with being Anubis' mother (by Osiris, to boot), and the murderer Set's wife. It seemed like a very complicated arrangement, added to Osiris being both Isis' husband and brother. Incest was one thing, but this!
Talk about keeping it all in the family . . .
Liz felt she had enough to contend with, dealing with the gory sewing-up task. But she also had to listen to the ceaseless lamentations of Isis, Nepthys, and the doleful chanting of Thoth, who ritually cleansed each piece before the sewing team was allowed loose. However, she soon found there was something further required of her. "You must either lament, chant or leave, sorceress," demanded Thoth.
Liz sighed. "Fine! But don't complain . . . "
The island and the reconstruction of Osiris echoed to ancient Egyptian funerary chants. And to: "de-hip-bone, connected-to-de-thigh-bone . . . "
Well, perhaps that too was a powerful spell in this universe. In the end, Osiris went together in more or less the right order, and with all the right bits connected to the right bits.
And then to Liz's alarm . . . he stirred. Liz had done more dissections than most people had had hot breakfasts. She was normally as squeamish as lead, but this was asking a bit much.
Osiris groaned. Liz, stepping back, took a very deep, deep breath and wondered if now was not the perfect time for that second-to-last cigarette.
He sat up. This, thought Liz, is where I get the hell out of here.
But the small island glade was too full of chanting Egyptian deities to let her just slip away.
"Ohhh. Well, it's a better job than last time." Osiris croaked and felt his groin.
"Thank Ra for that. That desert jackass won't be able to call me 'dickless' again." He massaged his throat. "Isis, my queen, you wouldn't have something to drink, would you?"
"No, my lord brother-husband. We came in haste."
Liz had some of Mac's "brandy" in her bag, in a small wineskin. It was all that she had, besides river water. "Here, Isis. It's pretty strong."
She passed it over. Osiris struggled with the cork and then gratefully swallowed some.
The mummy-man's greenish pallor flushed. His eyes bulged. He sprayed the liquor out. "Gah! Kehaph!! Eheh!"
Strong, rough hands seized Liz.
And Osiris took another pull at the skin. This time he swallowed it. He shuddered. Then he took a deep breath and smiled beatifically. "By Ra, Nut, Geb and even my brother Set—now that's what I call embalming fluid! Here, my good vizier! Try this. Make sure that you write down the recipe."
He passed the skin to a doubtful-looking Thoth. "Chug it, old birdbrain!"
The rough hands ceased holding Liz in a grip of iron, as the pedantic grand vizier spluttered but did not die. Indeed, even Osiris was looking remarkably lively for a fairly ripe corpse that had just been sewed up by a bunch that would have been rejected by most sewing circles, never mind med schools.
Osiris turned to Liz. "Tell me, she who brings Sa, that which warms the very cockles of the Ka—who are you? How do you come to the land of the Nile?"
"We were kind of hoping you could tell us how we got here. But what we're really interested in is how we could get home."
Osiris shook his head vigorously. It was a good thing, thought Liz, that she and Isis had done most of that section of the sewing. If it had been Nepthys, it could easily have just fallen off again.
Liz was the noticing kind. But you could hardly help noticing the looks on Cruz and Medea's faces, even if they hadn't been leaning against each other. She couldn't help feeling a little envious, if pleased for Medea's sake. The broad sergeant was a nice guy. Heh. He was looking a bit bemused. That was good.
"Basically," she said, flopping onto the bank, "Osiris has no trouble remembering that this was a decaying Mythworld. He says even now things are barely beginning to change. There are large tracts of upper Egypt where the desert just disappears into nothingness."
Jerry studied her intently. "He seems very cheerful. If a bit unsteady on his feet."
She chuckled. "He's dead drunk. Which is not bad seeing that he was just plain dead, earlier. I think any favors we want to ask had better be soon and not tomorrow. Still, he and Isis are very obliged to us right now. He says he can feel the Ka of this universe being drawn into the naos of a dark force that sucks out its Sa. Whatever that means."
"Better than it sounds, I hope," said Mac with a grin, looking at Medea and Cruz. "I wonder if it's infectious."
"I'll thump you," growled Cruz, without any signs of a deep desire to do so. Actually, he was looking very relaxed. Almost as if, were he to relax any more, he'd be asleep. "So what does it mean, Doc?"
"Ka is soul, Sa is life-force. Naos is the inner sanctuary of the temple."
Cruz's expression showed that Jerry's explanation was as clear as mud. "So . . . can we go home? Or even back to—to—the Olympians' universe?"
Liz shook her head. "The linkage, from the 'gods' point of view, seems to be having believers in both universes. Whoever or whatever is running this show seems to be able to ignore or override that."
Lamont, as usual, was quick on the uptake. "So. Aren't there any gods in common?"
Jerry pursed his lips thoughtfully. "In a way, there are. In the latter days of Egypt, the Greeks identified numerous of the Egyptian gods as being the same as their own. Bastet was considered to be one with Artemis. Anubis with Hermes, Nepthys with Nike, Osiris with Dionysus or Hades. Isis got identified with Demeter, Hera, Selene and even Aphrodite."
Liz sighed. "Great. So the only two I've taken to, are so confused they don't even know who they are. Anyway, Osiris is off to face the judgment. Then he will be going to preside over the weighing of souls. We have been invited. You can ask as many gods as show their faces in the halls of the dead."
"I just can't wait," said Mac.
Liz gave him a wry smile. "Well, you'll just have to. We must stay here on the floating isle of Chemmis until a ship is sent for us."
"I do not like the sounds of that," said Henri, doubtfully.
Liz shook her head at the Frenchman. "And just how do you propose to go elsewhere?"
It was a good question. They'd been guided there in the dark, through a maze of twisty papyrus channels. Of course they could—in theory—navigate by the sun. Mac looked at the curving channel. The landmarks were occasional tufts of trees. All remarkably similar to each other.
A small Egyptian in a loincloth came up and bowed. "Buto has ordered us to set food for you, foreigners. Barley beer, bread, lentils, onions, cucumber, fish, pigeons and ducks, lotus root and pomegranates. My lady apologizes for the inadequate fare, but supplies have been disjointed of late."
A second servant approached. "Toiletries await: oils, unguents and kohl for the ladies to darken their eyes. Cones of perfumed fat for your heads are prepared. Fresh garments of pleated linen are just being starched. Collars of faïence and coiled gold." He took a long look at the men. Shuddered. "Bronze-bladed razors and tweezers await the lords, for the removal of unwanted facial hair."
"Are you sure you don't want that cone of perfumed fat to melt slowly into your hair?" asked Lamont innocently.
"Are you sure you want to live until nightfall?" retorted Liz, her eyes darkened with kohl and her ears adorned with large golden earrings. Around her neck was a fine-woven gold collar. "And no, I wasn't prepared to shave all my hair off and wear a wig either. Or wear a thing that exposed one breast!"
Jerry swallowed. No point in letting your imagination run away with you. "It's a mishmash. They don't all come from the same era . . . "
His explanation was interrupted by McKenna.
"All right. Out with it! Who told them to do this?" McKenna descended on them snarling. He was wrapped in a shred of linen and still dripping. He was incandescently angry. He was also clean-shaven. Entirely clean-shaven. Well, they'd left his eyelashes. But otherwise not a hair on his head or chin . . . or armpits. "Who told them I was a priest? That bastard Henri?"
"I am well aware of who my father was," said Henri, tugging his goatee complacently. "My neat beard they thought Pharoic."
Mac seemed on the verge of removing Henri Lenoir from this plane of existence. Cruz stepped forward and wrapped his thick arms around the corporal. "Cool it, Mac. He was already with the flunkies when you went off. He wouldn't have even known you were going."
"Somebody told Isis I was a priest!" snarled Mac. "Was this your idea of a practical joke—Sir?"
Liz went bright red and slapped him hard enough to make his do-it-yourself loincloth fall off. This revealed that they'd not stopped shaving when they got to his armpits. "If I'm going to abuse you I'll do it firsthand!" she snarled, as Mac groped hastily for the fallen linen.
Jerry cleared his throat. "I think you did it yourself, Mac. You said to Isis that you were trained in 'First Aid.' If you try and translate that, it could come out as knowing the rituals of healing. That was the province of priests. And they were shaved bald."
"You look like a boot, Mac," said Cruz with a grin.
Lamont nodded and chuckled. "But that strip of linen does things for you."
"Seriously," said Jerry, trying to cool things off, "it's a good thing Mac got rid of his hair. It could help us a lot."
McKenna was not mollified. "I don't know anything about being a priest!"
"No, it's your hair and skin color," explained the mythographer. "Set was supposed to be white-skinned and red-haired. Rough and rude, too. That was one reason Isis was so upset when she saw us with the dismembered pieces of her hubby."
Lamont grinned. "Well, Mac could get a job as a stand-in. Wasn't he supposed to have ears like an ass too?"
Jerry shook his head. "Shut up, Lamont. You're stirring things up just because you were the only one besides Liz who could stand that vile beer."
"Real African beer has lumps in it. Not thin clear stuff like cats wee." Liz was grinning broadly.
Jerry pulled a face. "We were all expecting . . . beer. It was vile, Liz. I don't know how you and Lamont could drink the stuff. But Mac'll be useful as a 'priest.' I'll teach him a few chants. Hmm. We could use some upgrading of our status. If you've seen the numbers of soldiers around here, fighters won't impress them, but an extra sorceress might."
"Medea's learning too damn fast," grunted Cruz. She responded by tickling him.
Jerry grinned at Lamont. "Actually, I was thinking that what we really need is the most powerful and feared of sorceresses. The ones that came from Nubia—or, as it was otherwise known, Cush. Black people."
Lamont blinked. "Me? Aren't you forgetting something?"
"Like what?" asked Jerry, innocently.
Lamont shook his head. "Like I'm the wrong sex."
Jerry clucked his tongue. "Nothing to it, Lamont! Cross-dressing has a well-established precedent in ancient Egypt. Queen Hasheput who was regent for Thutmose III dressed herself as a man." Jerry's grin got more wicked still. "All we need to do is shave your head and put you in a dress. You'll be a winner."
"You're not going to do that to me?" said Lamont, with disbelief.
"Oh yes, we are!" said Mac fiendishly. "If I've got to suffer for a good cause, so do you!"
"There was the wig they tried to give me . . . " said Liz. "And another dress that was way too big."
"The topless one?" asked Medea, getting in on the spirit of things. "And there is much makeup." She looked at Lamont. "Fortunately."
Liz snorted. "I don't think he's gynecomastic enough for the topless one. And he's probably got hairy boobs."
"I'm not going to do this!" protested Lamont.
"It's all right, Lamont," murmured Medea sweetly. "We'll do it for you."
Jerry managed to wipe off the grin. "Lamont . . . Seriously, Nubian sorceresses were big-time power. And I've got a feeling we may need that desperately. And what do you care what you look like, if it can get us all home?"
"I'm not going to do this." But Lamont sounded less sure about it. His companions arose and advanced upon him.
"Not going to . . . " Mumble, mumble.
By the time the ship arrived to transport them, Lamont had been made into a strapping lass, if not a pretty one. And a very sulky lass, he was.
The vessel was a far cry from the papyrus-bundle boat that they'd used to bear Osiris' remains to the island. The ship was at least a hundred and fifty feet long. It was made of curved cedar wood, with a high pointed prow and stern. It was canopied with spotless linen, with a team of rowers sweating at the long spear-bladed paddles. A harpist played melodiously from under the shaded canopy. "I think we have elevated our status in the world. Now if only they have more of that tilapia scented with cumin and fenugreek . . . " said Henri happily. "And perhaps something to drink other than that terrible beer."
Liz looked at the vessel and shook her head. "It looks like a thin wooden banana. I could make a fortune here as a boat designer."
Lamont struggled to board the ship. "I can't even walk in this stupid tight dress. This is a dumb, dumb idea."
"Are you in Dis-dress, Lamont?" asked Jerry.
Lamont was less than amused. "I should toss you to the crocodiles, Jerry."
"I think he's skirting the issue," offered Liz.
Jerry snorted. "Dressed like that, you never know what it might be. But I'd better say no more. I might get kilt."
Liz groaned. "Why did I ever join in this ridiculous punfest?"
Jerry smiled. "Because you like them?"
Liz shook her head. "Who ever admitted to liking puns?"
Liz was far more impressed by the vessel now that she was aboard. "Not one nail. It's amazing. This ship is held together with strips of linen. Like a mummy."
Henri Lenoir shuddered. "Madame, I do not think I wish to know this. A few pieces of linen between my person and the crocodiles? Not even the finding of something the locals call 'wine' can adequately comfort me. Although," he said, drinking some from the jar, "I shall do my best to insulate myself from water, both inside me as well as out."