The High King's Embalmer

Chapter 2

The last mummy laid neatly in his coffin. I placed the trinkets and personal items his family wanted him to have in the afterlife next to his body. The prayers were painted on the coffin with flush dovetail joints holding well and showing no signs of giving way. I finished sealing the outer lid to the coffin with bees' wax. Without looking up from my work, the presence of the king's men watching me was always in the back of my mind. They could wait. I glanced at the board hanging on the wall to see if the king wanted another citizen embalmed. There were no other pending corpses.

"His Majesty wants to see you." Enrikos, the one I loathed the most of the two, pointed his weapon where my heart resided. In his other hand, he held a small silver cylinder rod with his thumb resting on the "on" button switch.

Having been zapped enough in my life, I knew it was not a pleasant experience. I nodded and climbed the stairs, sandwiched between the two. I hesitated on top of the landing, halfway up the foot-worn stairs. The unfamiliar human without an aura I had sensed the evening prior had joined the royal couple.

Enrikos dug his knuckles into my spine and pressed the silver rod against my upper arm. "I'll turn this on if you don't move."

I complied, but my curiosity remained on the aura-less human.

The king's man entered the sitting room, but I couldn't see around him as he blocked my entrance.

"Sire, the ouHor Kem," the king's man said as he shoved me in front of him. "He just finished the last body."

"Good. Good. We can use the payments instead of another tax hike. I've had to raise the prices for his insistence that everyone have the full seventy-days instead of fifteen," King Triton said, "or three." He eyed me with disdain as though it was my fault for insisting the commoners receive dignity in the old way.

I approached the king and bowed before him on the uneven cobblestone floor. My hands and kilt were smeared with red and white paint from the death masks and coffins. The guards hadn't given me a chance to wash them before they whisked me upstairs. The king will be displeased.

The king pointed his chin to his right. It was my cue to take my usual place on his right side.

The décor hadn't changed in the room I rarely entered. It was once the high king's favorite. A potted palm leaned against the wall of one corner. All the walls of the sitting room consisted of whitewashed stone with few paintings or décor-an obvious contrast between the king and queen.

King Triton sat to the right of his wife, Dorcia. Both wore full regalia and kohl-lined eyes. A headdress of fine white linen sat atop his head. Many gold ornaments and jewelry adorned him: gold collar necklace; armbands; ankle bands; earrings, and rings on each finger. He resembled a pharaoh of olden times. He wasn't the high king, but preferred to dress the part. Everything about him was formal as though to reinforce who he thought he should be.

The queen was no less impressive in her manner of dressing with many gold, turquoise, carnelian, lapis necklaces, earrings and rings. A thin, silky peach-colored material formed her dress. A black, jasmine-scented wig donned her head with silver beads braided into the hair.

The aura-less man held an informal air of command as he moved away from the doorway opposite the entrance I had entered. The heavy scent of mint and oranges lingered on his tanned skin. His taut physique appeared to be ready for war. He bowed on bent knee before the royal couple.

"Life, prosperity and health to you always, Your Majesties," he said. With a perspiring drink in one hand, he rose and wiped the other on his short-sleeved linen shirt. His eyes were hidden behind dark sunglasses.