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and his allies were going to end Akhenaten's life. Years of attempts to curb the king's excesses had failed, and Ay had no longer been willing to watch Egypt suffer. This Meren had known, and still he'd let Ay send him away to the Libyan border. When he got back, the heretic was dead, supposedly of the same plague that had taken his queen. And now, every time Meren tracked down a criminal, every time he sat in judgment of a thief, revealed the treachery of a courtier or the guilt of a killer, the dishonesty of his position tortured him.
    Someday he would go west, to the netherworld and the Hall of Judgment. There the gods would weigh his heart on the divine balance scale against the feather of Maat— truth, lightness, and order. With such sins burdening his ka, his heart would send the weighing pan crashing to the floor. There the Devouress, Eater of Souls, would snatch it up in her crocodile jaws and sink long, jagged teeth into its meat.
    The edge of the tub was biting into his legs. Meren winced and got to his feet. If he didn't watch himself, he would succumb to babbling lunacy. No wonder Kysen was suspicious. During the past few weeks these old memories had come back with increasing frequency. It was as if the heretic's vengeful ka had been aroused by the death of one of the queen's murderers. Perhaps Akhenaten was punishing him by forcing him to find and reveal the truth, so that Meren would invite his own death.
    He was relieved that this frightening train of thought was quenched when the gate opened and a youth in a simple kilt strode into the garden. He was followed by two slaves bearing ostrich feather fans, another carrying a tray with a wine flagon and goblets, and several guards. His brows drawn together, mouth set in a tight line, he saw Meren and headed for him. The goblets on the tray clattered. The boy stopped, turned, and hissed at the small crowd behind him. The fan bearers backed away. The wine bearer skittered after them. A command like the snap of a whip sent the guards marching out the gate. Karoya appeared bearing the flagon and goblets, shut the gate, and went to the pavilion.
    By this time Meren had reached the boy, who turned from glaring at the gate. Meren sank to his knees and bent to the ground. He heard an exasperated sigh.
    "Get up, Meren. Making your obeisance to my majesty won't convince me that you're either biddable or humble."
    "As thy majesty wishes," Meren said as he rose.
    "Things are never as I wish." Tutankhamun stalked past Meren, between dense beds of cornflowers, mandrake, and poppy to a grove of tamarisk trees. In their midst was an arbor covered with ivy. The pharaoh snatched a water bottle hanging from the arbor in a woven net, poured from it into an alabaster cup from a table, and drank. He thrust the bottle at Meren, who poured himself a cup and drank as well. The king downed another cup of water without pause. When he finished, he was breathing fast and glaring at Meren.
    "You're not to scold me," Tutankhamun snapped. "I'll get enough from Ay to fill my belly."
    "Thy humble cup bearer would not dare—"
    "I remembered you doing that very thing not long ago when I visited you at your country house."
    It was Meren's turn to frown. "The golden one stole away from his own court, his own vizier and ministers, to sail unescorted to a house where I was trying to conceal the bodies of—"
    "Don't!"
    Royal irritation vanished, overwhelmed by pain and horror. Tutankhamun's face held the beauty of his mother, the great and powerful Queen Tiye. With it he had inherited her large, dark eyes, heavy-lidded, thick-lashed mirrors of a ka too sensitive for the burdens of a god-king.
    Meren waited a moment, giving the boy time to compose himself. "Forgive me, majesty."
    "I know it's really Akhenaten's fault," Tutankhamun whispered. "If he hadn't cast out the old gods, beggared their priests and the thousands who depended on them, he wouldn't have provoked such hatred. He must have done horrible