Nile Builder: The Architect from the East

Chapter 106: Chapter 12: The Shape of the Peace — The Great Reform Goes Before the Court

The decree of the throne reached Thebes in the second month after the spring — carried up the river road by the same route the war reports had traveled, and the city had known it was coming for three days before it arrived, the way a city knows the weather is coming.

The envoy who carried it was the same envoy who had come before — the one who had read the settlement of Nekhem’s case on the steps of the great temple — and the people of Thebes recognized him at the gate, and the word ran ahead of him down the lanes: the envoy is here again. This time he carried not one roll of yellow silk, but also a long list of names — and the list, the envoy said, had taken the court three days to settle, because every province had wanted its people on it. The place of the proclamation was the same: before the stone steps of the great temple — the place that had become, in these months, where the city came to hear the word of the king, and the place where, four months earlier, the city had heard the word that ended its war.

”The pharaoh decrees —” the envoy unrolled the yellow silk — the same yellow silk, the people of Thebes noticed, on which the settlement of Nekhem had been written — and read it out, word by word, in the clear voice of a man who has read decrees before crowds many times. ”The disorder of Thebes is settled. From this day, the whole country lays down its arms and turns to rebuilding. Whatever people, craftsmen, and grain were levied in wartime are to be repaid according to the law. Further: the pharaoh intends to reopen the great assembly of the court, to deliberate on the four policies of building, of storage, of medicine, and of corvee. All those who lived through the siege of Thebes, the registered master-craftsmen of the Chief Construction Bureau, the heads of the medical houses, and the leaders of the merchants’ guild — all are to take their seats.”

He paused, and looked over the crowd — the crowd that stood in the same patient silence it had learned in the months of the proclamations — and said: ”Chief Builder Lu Zhu — receive the decree. The list of seats: the Chief Construction Bureau is to submit it.”

Lu Zhu stepped forward — he was in his plain builder’s coat, without ornament, the coat he had worn through the siege — and received the decree with both hands.

”Your servant receives the decree.” He said it the way he said everything that mattered — quietly, and with the words settled.

The street was still for one moment — the stillness of a street taking in the size of what it has heard — and then it burst open. Four policies! The great assembly of the court! The words were not new — the court had held assemblies before, on matters of war and of the succession — but never for this, never for the four policies that the siege had taught, and the crowd felt the newness of it the way a man feels a change in the air before the rain. Several men who could read turned the words over and over, aloud and to themselves: building, storage, medicine, corvee — and the four words passed from mouth to mouth down the street like four stones being handed along a line. When they came to the word ”corvee,” an old craftsman in the crowd crouched down on the spot and buried his face in his hands.

”Did you hear that?” Someone said, and the voice that said it was not loud, but it carried the way a voice carries when it is saying the thing a crowd has been waiting to hear. ”The matter of the busy-season corvee — the pharaoh will deliberate it!”

”It will be deliberated,” the man beside him said, ”and this time it is the real thing.”

”The real thing is good.” A white-haired old farmer said. ”I have lived nearly seventy years, and this is the first time I have heard that the corvee can be brought before the court.” He wiped his face with his hand. ”This old frame of mine may not live to see that day. But my grandson will.”

The news traveled faster than the decree itself — faster than the envoy had traveled, faster than the couriers who had ridden ahead of him, because news of this kind does not need legs; it grows them.

In less than an hour, half the city knew — and in the way news travels in a city that has learned to pass word quickly through four months of siege, the other half knew before the hour was out. In the market, the date-seller stopped crying his wares and talked head to head with his customers — the dates sat unsold in their piles, and no one minded, because the news was better than the dates. On the wall worksite, the rammers stopped for half a stick of incense. In the Haven of Settled Lives, the women crowded around Nefer with questions. Even the guards at the gate of the great temple looked twice at the roll of yellow silk. The children of the city ran through the streets shouting: ”A new law is coming! The great assembly is coming!” — and the shouting echoed through the whole city, and the adults let them shout, because the children were shouting what the adults were feeling.

”This city,” the chief officiant said, standing at the door of the old temple — the door where he had stood to hear the sound of the fighting on the morning the siege was lifted — ”four months ago, what it heard was the sound of killing. Now what it hears is the word ’law.’ The same streets — a different sky.”

”Chief Officiant,” a warden said, ”we who are staying behind should make some preparation too.”

”Preparation for what?” The chief officiant said. ”Preparation for living well. When the law stands, the days will be good. But for the law to stand, it does not rest on the mouths of the court. It rests on the people below the court, living their days out. When we live our days steady, we are bracing the backs of the people in the court.”

”Bracing their backs.” The warden repeated. ”That we can do.”

On the wall worksite, the news arrived just as quickly — a boy had run up the ramp with it, and the rammers had heard it between strokes, and the strokes had stopped of their own accord.

In the pause of the rammers, the craftsmen gathered in a ring. Old Master Mengtu crouched in the middle of them and said: ”Did you all hear? Four policies. Building, storage, medicine, corvee. Two of them are ours.” He paused. ”Building — that is our craft. Corvee — that is our backbone. The principles that we tested with our lives in these four months — they are to be written into law now.” He said it slowly, the way a man says a thing he has been turning over for a long time and has only now found the words for.

”Uncle Mengtu,” a young craftsman asked, ”when the law is written in, will our work have certain rules from now on?”

”It will have certain rules.” Old Master Mengtu said, and he spoke slowly, the way a man speaks when he is saying something he has waited forty years to say. ”The wages certain, the work-hours numbered, no more pressing men in the busy season. You young men, from now on, will not have to live the way I lived when I was young.”

”Then we,” the young craftsman said, ”must train our craft even better. If the law stands and the craft does not stand, it is all for nothing.”

”Right.” Old Master Mengtu said. ”The law braces a man’s back. But a man must have a back of his own.”

In the hospital, Neht had heard the news too — a medicine-boy had brought it in from the market at a run, and the patients in the waiting room had heard it before the healer did.

He sat behind the examination table — the table where he had examined the sick of Thebes through the siege and the peace — and was a long time silent. After a while he brought out the old medicine ledger — the ledger he had kept for half his life — and turned it through from the first page to the last. Then he said: ”I have kept this pharmacy for thirty years. In the first twenty, the medicines were laid in for the rich. In the last ten, I saw whoever came. I always thought: when will this business of seeing the sick have a proper set of rules? Now — it is going to have them.” He closed the old ledger. ”These two eyes of mine have lived to see it.”

”Father,” a medicine-boy said, ”when the law stands, you will be the first healer ’with rules.’”

”I do not care to be the first.” Neht said, and he closed the old ledger and laid his hand flat on its cover, the way a man lays his hand on a thing he has finished with. ”What I care about is this: from now on, the children of this city will not endure their sicknesses in silence, and will not bind their wounds carelessly.” He paused. ”That is enough.”

In the courtyard behind the official granary — the courtyard where the defense of the city had been planned, and where the four statutes had been read aloud for the first time — lamps were lit that same night.

Lu Zhu had called the core people together — the same people who had gathered in this courtyard through the siege and the rebuilding: Kamon, Meru, Imset, Shafi, Mery, Hapy, Asaf, Tia, Nefer, and the chief officiant. When they were all present, and the lamps had been trimmed and the yard was quiet, Lu Zhu said: ”The meaning of the decree is clear to all of you. This city — we have held it, and we have mended it. What comes next is going to the new capital, going before the court, and laying out, item by item, what these four months stored up — for all Egypt to see. Four months of siege, four months of rebuilding, four months of accounts — all of it goes on the table of the court.”

”Going.” Kamon spoke first, and his voice was the voice he used when a course of work was settled. ”The guild’s thirty craftsmen were chosen long ago. They have been waiting for this word.”

”The guild’s boats can be ready tomorrow.” Meru said, and he was already reckoning in his head as he spoke — the boats, the crews, the provisions for ten days on the river. ”Sailing upstream, ten days to the new capital.”

”From the hospital,” Imset said, and his voice was the voice he used when a course of treatment was settled, ”Shafi and I go. The medicine ledgers, the medical records, the war-hospital building drawings — all of them go with us. Neht stays in the city to sit at the examination table, and the lamp of the hospital stays burning as it has burned through the siege.”

”And one thing more,” Shafi said. ”The book must go. Not only the main copy — the thin copy too. The men of the court will find the main copy too thick. The thin copy’s one page, the frostbite remedies, tested on the northern border, proven — that one page can speak more than a thousand words.”

”It goes.” Lu Zhu said. ”The more evidence the better. Not one line of the four months’ accounts may be left behind.”

”I...” Nefer opened her mouth, and stopped. She had been about to say that she wanted to go, that she wanted to stand in the court and tell them about the shelters herself; the words had been ready in her mouth since the decree was read. What came out instead was the other truth. After a long moment she said: ”The Haven cannot spare me. The people returning to their villages still come in waves, and the women’s stalls have only just begun. I stay.”

”You stay.” Lu Zhu said, and he said it gently, the way a man assigns the post that matters most. ”The ground of Thebes must have its keepers. You, the chief officiant, the old centurion, and Uncle Woser all stay. This city is our back courtyard. When the back courtyard is steady, the front can fight its hard battles.”

”And me?” Mery asked.

”You come with me to the new capital.” Lu Zhu said. ”The Ever-Normal Granary law — you are its living drawing. In the court, your accounts speak louder than any mouth.”

”The accounts are all with me.” Mery said. ”The three ledgers — not one left behind.”

”And Kes.” Lu Zhu said. ”He returns with Old Camel’s caravan from the north; he should be here in the next few days. When he arrives, he goes to the capital too. What he saw of the north — the court will need it.”

”That boy Kes,” Meru put in, ”I have sent men to wait at the landing. The moment his boat puts in, he is brought here.” He knocked out his pipe. ”Going to the new capital, I must prepare one thing more — the materials. The great assembly will draw people from every province and every county. The new capital’s Chief Construction Bureau has already written asking for the figures on building materials. I will carry the real accounts of Thebes’s rebuilding — so they can see exactly how much material and labor one wall and one granary truly take. That lays the foundation for the Ever-Normal Granary law and the Dwellings law before a word is spoken.”

”You trader,” Kamon said, ”your abacus beads are already rattling on the court’s table.”

”A trader’s abacus,” Meru said, ”rattles for the hearts of people. The hearts of the court are people’s hearts too.”

”Then... when do we leave?” Tia asked.

”Ten days.” Lu Zhu said. ”In ten days, everything in this city that must be handed over is handed over, and everything that must be carried is carried. On the eleventh day, the fleet sails.”

”Ten days.” The whole room repeated.

In the lamplight, the people of the yard each sat with their own thoughts — some thinking of the court, some of what they were leaving behind, some of the wicker trunk, some of the walls they had held and the roads they had walked. But every eye was bright — the same brightness that had been in their eyes, four months before, in the gate tunnel of the south gate, on the night before the last battle.

Kes arrived on the third day, riding in with Old Camel’s carts and coming straight up from the landing with the dust of the northern road still on his clothes.

He had come back with Old Camel’s caravan, all the way from the northern border — down the frozen road and the muddy road and the spring road, the whole length of the country in one journey. He was thinner, and darker, and a stubble of beard stood on his chin — the beard of a man who had not had time to shave on the road, and the thinness of a man who had eaten the road’s food and slept the road’s sleep. But his eyes were bright. He came into the courtyard behind the official granary and knelt first to Lu Zhu: ”Teacher — I am back.” He said it the way the boys of the workshop had always said it when they returned from a job, and Lu Zhu heard in it the same boy who had left, four years before, to learn the craft of the northern tribes.

”Coming back is good.” Lu Zhu raised him up. ”How is the north?”

”The wall of the north stands.” Kes said. ”I have seen Seb’s drawings — the three lines, the tower every five li. Good drawings.” He paused. ”But the people of the north told me something: a wall can stop the Hittites, but it cannot stop poverty. Behind the border wall, half the houses of the villages are fallen, and the fields have lain waste for two years. With the trade roads cut, the goods of Nubia have been sitting dead at the border.”

”So?” Lu Zhu asked.

”So, Teacher,” Kes said, ”I want to go to the new capital with you. The real conditions of the north and of the south — I have seen them with my own eyes these past months. When the court deliberates the laws, someone must speak for the farthest places.”

”Then come.” Lu Zhu said. ”The roads you walked these months are the words you will speak in the court.”

”And one thing more.” Kes drew a small roll of drawings from inside his coat. ”These I drew on the road. The villages of the north, the tribes of Nubia — where granaries are lacking, where medical points are lacking, where roads must be built — all marked. When the laws stand, these places must be first in line.”

Lu Zhu took the drawings and unrolled them. He looked a while, then said: ”This drawing and your senior brother’s tower are a pair. He draws holding; you draw living. Only what is held can be lived in.” He folded the drawings and gave them back. ”Carry them. In the court, unroll them.”

”Yes.” Kes said.

The handovers began the next day, item by item — eight handovers in eight days, and every handover was a knot tied between the people going and the people staying, so that the city would hold together while the travelers were away.

The first was the account of the walls and the works — the account that began on the night the city was won, when the first emergency repairs were made by torchlight. Kamon, with Hapy, gathered every stretch of wall and every ditch of the four months of emergency repair and the month of rebuilding into one register — which stretch had been mended how many times, with what materials, at what cost in labor, all written out clearly, in the same hand that had kept the work accounts of the siege. To whom was the register handed? To the work-teams staying in the city. The man who received it was Old Master Mengtu — the senior mason of Thebes, who had been on the wall through the siege, whose hands had laid the first course of the emergency repairs and the last course of the mended wall.

”Uncle Mengtu,” Kamon said, ”this register is the city’s medical record. Which stretch of wall has old wounds, which ditch fears blockage — all of it is here. From now on, when you lead the rounds, check by this register.”

”I will keep it.” Old Master Mengtu said. ”I have worked on the walls of this city for half my life; I know its walls better than the palm of my hand.” He took the register and held it against his chest. ”Go to the court, and win honor for us craftsmen. The wall — I will watch it for you.”

”Win honor.” Kamon said. ”The honor is earned by all of us together.”

The second was the grain — the grain that had been the city’s life through the siege, and that was to become, under the new law, the country’s floor. Mery invited Woser to the official granary — the granary whose doors Woser had opened four times in a single day at the height of the settlement — and handed over, in due form, the string of keys and a new ledger. ”Uncle Woser,” he said, ”after I leave, the grain of this city is in your keeping. The pattern of the Ever-Normal Granary is all established. Keep it by this pattern, and nothing will go wrong.”

”Nothing will go wrong.” Woser settled the keys at his belt. ”This old frame of mine has kept granaries for half a lifetime. I will keep them until the spring, until all the new granaries stand. When you come back, I will hand you an account finer than yours.”

”Then that is a fine thing.” Mery said. ”When I come back, we will check the accounts against each other.”

The third was the hospital — the hospital whose doors had never closed in four months, and whose lamp had never gone out. Shafi made three sets of the hospital’s accounts, the medicine-cabinet registers, and the war-hospital building drawings. One set went with the travelers; one was left with Neht; one was stored in the library of the old temple. Neht looked at the copy left behind and said: ”I have kept a pharmacy for half my life, and now I have a ’foundation.’ Go in peace. In this city, whoever falls sick — I will take them in.”

”Father,” Shafi said, ”your skill at triage is written into the book as well. From now on, the medical houses of the whole country will learn from your eyes.”

”My eyes?” Neht was startled a moment, and then laughed. ”These two old eyes of mine — going into the book?”

”They are.” Shafi said. ”Your ’fear stillness, not blood’ — from now on, it is a rule for healers.”

The fourth was the Haven — the shelter grounds that had grown from an emergency camp into a pattern for the houses of the whole country. Nefer sorted out the drawings of the shelter grounds, the accounts of the women’s three teams, and the rules of the work-tallies, item by item. When the sorting was done, she said to Lu Zhu: ”I do not go to the court. But I want you to carry one message — the rules of the Haven were bought with four months of blood and tears. Whoever in the court tries to bend them crooked — I, Nefer, will be the first to say no.”

”They will not be bent.” Lu Zhu said. ”Your words — I will carry them exactly as you spoke them.”

The fifth was the porridge shed — the shed that had fed the surrenders, and that had become, in the months of the peace, the place where the city’s workers and its travelers and its poor all knew they could eat.

Old Sun’s ten cauldrons had become an old institution of the city by now. Lu Zhu went to him and said: ”Uncle Sun — after I leave, this porridge shed — will you keep it open?”

”Open.” Old Sun said, and he patted the rim of the cauldron the way other men pat the shoulder of an old friend. ”Open until I can no longer lift a ladle.” He patted the rim of the cauldron. ”You go to the court to win rice bowls for all Egypt. I stay here and keep the rice bowl of Thebes. One at the front, one at the back.”

”Then this shed,” Lu Zhu said, ”is yours from now on. The grain comes from the official granary; the accounts are kept by Uncle Woser. You have only to brew.”

”Only to brew.” Old Sun laughed. ”Brewing porridge — in all my life, it is the one work I love.”

The sixth was the work-teams — the teams that had rebuilt half the city with their hands, and that would rebuild the other half after the travelers were gone.

The old sergeant now kept the roll of more than a thousand men. Lu Zhu said to him: ”Sergeant — the work-teams are left to you and Uncle Mengtu. Of the surrendered men, keep all who can work. The rebuilding from now on rests on this team.”

”Rest easy.” The old sergeant said, and he looked over the yard where the men of the teams were already forming up for the day’s work — the men he had led out of the North Camp under a white flag, and the men who had been on the wall before he came. ”I have no other skill, but I know men — who is diligent and who shirks, I see it at a glance.” He paused. ”And besides — half of these men laid down their blades beside me. If I do not lead them well, I betray that surrender.”

”Surrender or not,” Lu Zhu said, ”they are all men of this city now.”

”They are.” The old sergeant said. ”All of them.”

The seventh was the army camp south of the city — the camp whose soldiers had marched out of its gates on the morning of the last battle, and whose gates now stood open to the works of the peace.

The old centurion came to take his orders — no, to receive his charge. He said: ”Chief Builder — when you go north, what is to be done with the few thousand soldiers of the south camp?”

”By General Horenheb’s rules.” Lu Zhu said. ”The blades go into the stores; the soldiers go to the works. Half the labor of the rebuilding inside and outside the city rests on them.” He paused. ”And — the smoke of the ten towers south of the city is not to stop for a single day. It is for the north to see: the south is steady.”

”The smoke will not stop.” The old centurion said. ”That is my pledge to the general.”

”Good.” Lu Zhu said. ”When the spring grain comes down, the official granary supplies your camp first. Soldiers eat at the same price as the people.”

”At the same price.” The old centurion nodded. ”When this war is over, soldiers and people are truly one family.”

The eighth was the stretch of road outside the south gate.

The road that Panhesy managed had taken on a good shape. Lu Zhu went to find him one evening. Panhesy was squatting at the roadside, a wooden stick in his hand, marking out the grade of the next stretch. When he saw Lu Zhu coming, he stood up: ”Chief Builder.”

”The road is well built.” Lu Zhu said. ”I walked it — it is level.”

”Three parts in ten still to do.” Panhesy said. ”When the spring rains come, it will need mending again.”

”It is left to you to mend.” Lu Zhu said. ”After I leave, this stretch of road is still yours.” He paused. ”General Horenheb left you a message. He said — a man like you should not rot in a camp. When this road is finished, the grain carts of the north and the goods of the south will both travel it. What you keep is the waist of Egypt.”

Panhesy was a long time silent. He looked down at the road, and after a long while he said: ”Carry one sentence back to the general for me — this life of Panhesy’s was picked up off the ground by a defeat. It is given to this road now. While the road stands, the man stands.”

”That word,” Lu Zhu said, ”I will carry north.”

”And —” Panhesy said, ”when the law stands, if the day of ’paid labor for every levy’ truly comes, I will be the first to enroll. The work I owe this city — I will pay it back slowly.”

”No repayment is owed.” Lu Zhu said. ”The four months of the war are settled in one stroke. Every stretch of road you build from now on is your own earning.”

Panhesy said nothing more. He bowed deeply to Lu Zhu — the first bow that a defeated commander had ever made to a city.

The day of departure was fixed for the eleventh — and the ten days before it passed the way the days before a battle pass, each one full of small things that had to be finished, and each one shorter than the last.

On the night before, a light rain fell on Thebes — not heavy, a fine drizzle, washing the stone roads of the city until they shone, and the shining roads reflected the lamps of the houses like a second city laid under the first. The rain was the first rain of the spring that had fallen on the city without anyone needing to watch the sky for what it meant. Someone said: ”This is the rain of farewell. It washes the road clean, so that the going will be good tomorrow.”

”Good going.” Lu Zhu said, standing in his courtyard. ”Four months ago, we came into this city in the dark. Now we go out of it on a clean road.”

That night, few people in the city slept soundly — the way few people sleep soundly on the eve of a departure, when the rooms of the house seem to be holding their breath.

In the old temple, the chief officiant burned the first long incense of the day — the incense that he had burned on the night before the last battle, and on the night the decree of the settlement had come, and now on the night before the going to the court. The smoke rose straight, and he knelt before it, saying: ”God — you are watching. Tomorrow, the hardest people of this city go to win one word for all Egypt: ’new.’ I ask you to smooth the road for them.” He paused. ”Where the road cannot be smoothed, they will mend it themselves. These four months, that is how they have mended everything.”

Lu Zhu walked his last circuit of the city — the circuit he had walked on the night the siege was lifted, and on a hundred nights since, and the walk had become so much a part of him that his feet knew the stones of every lane. From the south gate to the east gate, from the official granary to the hospital, from the market to the Haven — at every place he stopped and stood a while, and the people who saw him standing did not disturb him, because they understood what he was doing. The torches on the wall stretched his shadow, now long, now short. When he reached the wall-foot below the south gate, he stopped before the two lines of whitewash.

”The South Camp is leveled; the four gates stand open. Remember the men who went out — do not forget the men who held the lamps.”

He reached out and traced the two lines, character by character, over the fading paint. When the tracing was done, he said, low: ”We who go out — we go to win the law. You who stay — you stay to live the days. Only when the law stands can the days be lived. Neither of the two can do without the other.”

In the lamplight — the lamp of the courtyard behind the official granary, burning as it had burned through the nights of the siege — Tia made the last arrangement of the wicker trunk.

The records, in four categories, packed level and neat — the records that had been carried out of Thebes in a small boat four years before, and that had grown, page by page, into the four statutes. On top of them lay the little packet of incense ash the chief officiant had given her, and the roll of house drawings Nefer had pressed into her hands. She looked at them a while, closed the lid, and locked it — and then ran her hand over the lock once, the way a person touches a thing she means to carry far.

”This trunk,” Asaf said, ”has come such a long way with us.”

”It will go farther.” Tia said. ”To the court. To the foot of the jade steps. To the day these four statutes become the written law of the country.”

”That day,” Asaf said, ”is not far off.”

In the Haven of Settled Lives, the women were sewing through the night.

What they sewed was traveling clothes — a padded jacket, mended and reinforced, for each of the craftsmen going to the court, and the sewing went on past midnight, the needles moving in the lamplight the way they had moved through the nights of the siege. The stitches were fine and close, and the thread was new. A woman said as she sewed: ”They go to the court to win honor for us. These clothes must be sewn decently.”

”Decently.” Sister Wei said. ”The stitches are the face. Sew them close, and when the men wear them, their backs will be three parts straighter.”

”Three parts straighter.” The woman bit off the thread and shook the jacket out to look at it. ”Tomorrow they wear these to the new capital — and let the whole court see what sort of people come out of Thebes.”

At dawn — the same grey hour at which the attack on the South Camp had begun, four months before, when the horn had sounded and the gates had opened — the beach was already crowded with people.

The boats were Meru’s — the same boats that had run the river through the siege, their hulls repaired and repainted for the spring, their oars the oars that had pulled through the nights of the war. Five great boats, riding low in the spring water: carrying the people, the records, the craftsmen — and the wicker trunk that held the four statutes, set in the steadiest place in the lead boat. At the bow flew a small flag — not the king’s banner: the guild’s flag. Meru said: ”This trip carries no cargo. It carries people, and law, and everything these four months stored up. Heavier than any cargo.”

”Boss,” Shunzi asked, ”why is the guild’s flag flying?”

”Because this trip,” Meru said, ”is the most valuable trip the guild has ever sailed.”

On the beach, the people who had come to see them off stood along half the riverbank — the whole city had come, it seemed: the market people and the shelter people, the craftsmen and the granary keepers, the old and the very young.

The date-seller had come, carrying a bag of dates — the dates that had survived the siege in his keeping, the dates that had tasted of the bitterness of the days — and pressed them onto the boat: ”Eat these on the road. Four months of dates — they are sweet.” The knife-grinder had come, saying: ”When you come back, my ten free sharpenings are still unpaid.” The old-clothes dealer threw an old coat onto the boat: ”The wind on the river is sharp. Wear this.” The water-carrier, the pot-mender, the straw-sandal weaver, the grilled-fish seller — one by one, they all came.

”Go home, all of you!” Kamon shouted from the bow, his voice carrying over the water the way it had carried over the walls in the siege. ”We are coming back!”

”We know you are coming back!” Someone on the bank shouted back. ”We just came to see you off. Four months — we have been leaning on you. Now that you go to a bigger stage, we neighbors have honor in it too!”

”Honor!” The whole beach shouted, and the shout rolled out over the water, and the people on the boats heard it and stood straighter at their places.

In the crowd, the blind old soldier had come too, supported by someone’s arm — the same soldier who sat at the wall-foot of the market every day, listening to the city live. He could not see the boats, but he could hear the oars. He called out toward the river: ”Who is on the boats?”

”We are on the boats!” The young craftsmen shouted.

”Good.” The old soldier said, and he lifted his face toward the river, sightless and steady. ”I am blind, and I cannot see you. But I can hear — the oars are even. When the oars are even, the hearts are one. Go! Raise the law for us!”

”Raise it!” The whole beach answered.

The knife-grinder had come with his whetstone on his shoulder — the new whetstone, thick and solid, that he had bought for the peace, and that would be three parts thinner, he had promised, by the time the travelers came home. He said: ”You go to the court; I have nothing to give you but one sentence — my ten free sharpenings are still unpaid. When the law stands, I will sharpen a hundred pairs and let the whole city watch.” He paused. ”We craftsmen believe in one thing: when the craft can stand, the law can stand.”

”It will stand!” Kamon shouted from the boat. ”When we come back, your whetstone will be three parts thinner!”

”Three parts thinner, then!” The old man shouted. ”Thin means the days are busy!”

The grilled-fish wife pushed to the water’s edge — her stall would open late today, and the market would understand, for the word had gone around that the fleet was sailing — carrying a plate of just-grilled fish wrapped in reed leaves, still steaming. She said: ”Take it. Eat it on the river. This is my husband’s craft — no, it is my craft now. You go to win the law; we who stay will live the days out, and show you.”

”Live them well!” Shafi called. ”When we come back, we will eat your fish again!”

”Enough for all of you!” The wife called, her voice bright and steady in the wind.

The water-seller, A-Bu, pushed to the water’s edge with a gourd of water. He called to the boats: ”The wind on the river is sharp — drink a mouthful of water before you go!” The people on the boats waved him off. He grew urgent: ”This water is from the old well in the west of the city. Drink one mouthful — and you carry this city in your mouths!”

Kamon took the gourd and drank. When he had drunk he handed it back and said: ”Sweet.”

”Sweet, and rightly so.” A-Bu said. ”The wells of this city and the people of this city are both sweet.”

A-He had come too, with the kitchen’s permission and a date cake wrapped in his hand for the road. He pushed to the front, face lifted, and called to Shafi on the boat: ”Sister Shafi! I know a hundred characters now! When you come back with the law, I will read it to you!”

”Good!” Shafi called back, and her voice carried over the water as bright as his. ”When that day comes, the peace board will carry the words ’the law stands’ — and you will be the first to read them!”

”It is a promise!” A-He called.

The chief officiant stood on the stone steps — the steps where the decrees had been read, and where the city had heard its words of ending and of beginning — and did not come down to the beach. Behind him was the door of the old temple. He raised a hand toward the fleet and said: ”The incense — I will burn it for you. Go early; come back early.”

”Come back.” Lu Zhu said. ”When the new law stands, we will come back and hand this city a bright account of our errand.”

The old warden had come too, leading his two sons — one with a fresh scar on his face, the one who had gone out with the two hundred through the south gate; one walking with a slight limp, the one whose leg the hospital had mended. He called toward the boats: ”The lamp! Our family’s lamp is still kept for you!”

”Keep it!” A-Shi called back. ”When we come back, we will light it again!”

The boats cast off, and the oars of the five boats rose and fell together, the blades flashing in the morning light — even oars, as the blind soldier had heard them, even as the hearts of the people on them. The people on the bank followed along the water’s edge for a long stretch, calling and waving, until the curve of the river took the boats out of sight.

Five boats left the shore one after another. The oars rose, and the river broke. The people on the bank followed the boats for a good stretch, calling and waving. A woman lifted the child in her arms — the child who had been born on the night before the last battle — and waved the child’s hand toward the boats. The child was Dawn — she waved her small hand and babbled, as if saying: a smooth journey.

”This city,” Nefer said, standing on the beach, ”is sending its people off on a long journey, with all this noise, for the first time.”

”It is not a long journey.” Sister Wei said. ”It is going to win a future for this city.”

”Right.” Nefer said. ”Winning a future.”

The boats sailed half a day with the current and passed the river bend — the bend where the great camp of the rebels had stood through the four months, its tents and its banners and its thirty thousand men, and where the great temple now stood alone at the water’s edge, its door shut, its lamps burning within.

The old site of the river-bend camp had been leveled. Only a few stretches of earthen bank remained, and the great temple standing at the river’s edge. As the boats passed the temple, Lu Zhu stood in the bow and looked once toward it. The temple door was shut fast. But he knew that inside that door, nine men were keeping the eternal lamps, waiting for the word ”new.”

”Chief Builder,” Shunzi said, low, ”the great temple is ahead.”

”It is ahead.” Lu Zhu said. ”From now on, this temple stands quietly here. Let everyone on the river see it — the four months of disorder ended in this shape.”

”Ended well.” Shunzi said.

”Well or not,” Lu Zhu said, ”is for the days to come to judge.” He turned and looked at the bow. The five boats were in a line, cutting through the spring water, heading north, toward the new capital.

The days on the boats passed tightly.

Every morning at first light, before the rest of the boat was awake, Tia sat in the great cabin of the lead boat with the records open before her, reviewing them by the grey light of the river. What she reviewed was not the words — it was the numbers, the numbers that had been walked out on foot and measured with rods and reckoned in ledgers, the numbers that were the bones of the four statutes. How much grain in which city’s granaries; how many houses fallen in which village; what medicine was lacking in which county — these numbers she had to know so thoroughly that they would come out of her mouth without thought, in the court. Asaf practiced with her. He played the part of the old officials, slapping the table and raising objections; she answered them one by one. At the end of the practice, the man playing the official was the first to run out of words.

”The official you play,” Tia said, ”is fiercer than the real ones.”

”Not fiercer.” Asaf said. ”In the court, they will only be fiercer. Those people mean to eat us.”

”Then let them,” Tia said, ”break their teeth on us first.”

Kamon and his thirty craftsmen took the stern boat — the thirty men who had been chosen by their hands, from the three hundred of the guild, to carry the craft of Thebes to the court. The craftsmen could not keep their hands idle; they sorted and re-sorted the tools, and when the sorting was done they gathered to talk of their craft — and the talk turned into contests: who could lay a wall of bricks fastest, who could cut stone truest, whose mortise and tenon was tightest. Kamon crouched and watched, and when he was caught up in it — when a mortise slid home with a sound like a door closing — he said: ”In the court, you do not need to speak. Your work is your speech. Stand there and show your hands — louder than any argument.”

”Master Kamon,” a craftsman asked, ”will the court have any use for men like us?”

”It will.” Kamon said. ”Lu Zhu has said it — the law grows up out of the ground. You are the ’ground.’”

Kes spent the days leaning over the gunwale, watching the river — the river he had not seen for months, and the banks that had changed while he was away in the north.

The villages of the West Bank, the fields of the east bank — place after place passed before his eyes. He watched slowly, as if trying to engrave it all in his eyes. Lu Zhu came over and asked: ”What are you watching?”

”Watching the places.” Kes said. ”Teacher — when the law stands, I want to go south. In Nubia, my people are waiting. The trade roads have been cut for two years, and their days are harder than the north’s.”

”Have you thought it through?” Lu Zhu asked.

”Thought it through.” Kes said. ”After all these years of learning, I should go back and do something real for my people.” He paused. ”I will not stay long in the court. When I have said what must be said and carried what must be carried, I go south.”

”South.” Lu Zhu said. ”Carry the drawings with you. Your drawings, Seb’s drawings, and the ones you made on the road — all of them are your baggage.”

”I will carry them.” Kes said. ”Not one missing.”

Meru and Mery, in these days, had checked the full account of the northern line.

In the cabin of the lead boat, two ledgers lay side by side: one was the guild’s boat account; one was the official granary’s grain account. From Old Camel’s first trip north to the last boat of the spring, entry by entry, they matched perfectly.

”Merchant Meru,” Mery said, ”the account of the northern line can be closed now.”

”Closed?” Meru said. ”This is only the beginning. The spring grain has not even started moving.”

”What I mean is,” Mery said, ”the account of the war ends here. What follows is the account of the peace — and the account of the peace is kept by the Ever-Normal Granary’s method.” He paused. ”When the law stands, your guild’s boat accounts and the official granary’s accounts run on one line.”

”On one line.” Meru clicked his tongue. ”Then this trader of yours will have half a foot inside the official granary from now on.”

”Not the official granary.” Mery said. ”The national account. In the national account, the merchants have their roads and the officials have their granaries — and the roads and the granaries are governed by one general chart.” He patted the ledger. ”This is the shape of Egypt from now on.”

”This shape,” Meru said, ”is good.” He knocked out his pipe. ”What a trader hopes for most is exactly this — a general account for the whole country. When the account is clear, the roads are smooth. When the roads are smooth, the days are good.”

”So,” Mery said, ”this law must stand.”

”It must stand.” Meru said. ”I, Meru, will stand below the jade steps and hold it up.”

The fleet sailed upstream — no, it sailed downstream, with the current — for the Nile runs north, and the new capital lay north, and the spring flood that had risen with the melting of the northern snows was carrying the boats of the law to the place where the law would be made. The spring water of the Nile had risen, and grown muddy, carrying the meltwater of the northern mountains. On the boats, some people dozed, some talked, some leaned over the gunwale watching the river. On both banks, the fields had just turned green again. In the fields were oxen pulling plows, and people bending over — the people who had come home from the war and the siege, planting the fields that the war had left waste, and the green of the new crops lay over the black of the turned earth like a second spring. Children ran after the boats, shouting: ”Boats! Great boats!”

On the first night on the river, Tia did not sleep soundly — the motion of the boat was strange under her after the still ground of Thebes, and the night was full of the small sounds of the river: the water against the hull, the creak of the rigging, the low talk of the boatmen changing watch.

She sat at the stern, watching the river. The spring river at night was black and heavy, but here and there a point of fisherman’s fire floated past. The oars beat steadily, carrying the boats north. Asaf came over and laid an old coat over her shoulders, saying: ”What are you watching?”

”Watching the river.” Tia said. ”Four years ago, we fled Thebes by boat. It was night then too, and just as black.” She paused. ”In those days, I held this trunk and the word in my heart was ’flee.’ Now I hold the trunk still, and the word in my heart is ’go.’”

”From ’flee’ to ’go,’” Asaf said, ”we have walked four years.”

”Four years.” Tia said. ”Four years of road are all in this trunk. In the court, I will show them how this road was walked.”

”They will see it.” Asaf said. ”The ledgers will speak. The cases will speak. The numbers will speak.”

”Then all is well.” Tia said. She looked up at the sky. There were stars — a few sparse ones, flashing in the gaps of the clouds.

”These stars,” she said, ”are like the lamps on the wall of Thebes that never went out.”

The fleet passed the West Bank and stopped for one night — the West Bank where the first granaries had been raised, and where the road of the war had begun, and where, four years before, a crew of house-builders had set out for the new capital.

The West Bank was Meru’s old home port — the dock where the river map had hung, framed, through the months of the peace. The guild’s people had had word of the fleet, and the beach was bright with lamps, and the lamps were more than the guild’s people could account for, because half the village had come out to see the boats. Old Camel, Shunzi, and a crowd of the old hands were all there. Meru stepped off the boat and had not yet found his footing when Old Camel came up to meet him: ”Boss — they say this fleet of yours is going to make the law?”

”It is.” Meru said, and he looked at the beach where his old comrades stood, and for a moment the trader’s mask slipped from his face. ”The leader of the merchants’ guild takes his seat in the court. For the first time, I, Meru, am carrying my trade to the foot of the jade steps.”

”Then that is a fine thing!” Old Camel said, and his voice was the voice he used on the northern road, where a man’s word had to carry over the wind. ”Go in peace. The guild’s boats — we will watch them. The grain of the northern line and the goods of the southern line — not one trip will be missed.”

”They will not be missed.” Meru said. ”This trade road was walked out with lives. While the lives are here, the road is here.” He knocked out his pipe, and lowered his voice. ”And — keep your eyes open in these days. When the great assembly opens, there will be men in the new capital hoarding goods and forcing up prices. The guild does not join that game. Whoever tries to make a war-profit at this moment — he is no longer of the guild.”

”Understood.” Old Camel said. ”Our guild does only honest business.”

”Right.” Meru said, and he said it the way he said everything about the guild’s business — as a rule that was not open to argument. ”Honesty is the guild’s face. And this face is worth more than gold.”

Shunzi came close and asked — he had been working up the courage to ask since the fleet left Thebes — ”Boss... may I go to the new capital with you?”

”What will you do there?” Meru asked.

”I...” Shunzi scratched his head. ”I just want to see what the court looks like.”

”What does the court look like?” Meru laughed. ”The court is one great table. And what is laid on it is not goods — it is principle. You are too young yet; learn your accounts first. When you know every bend of the river map by heart, I will take you.”

”Then... it is a promise!” Shunzi said.

”A promise.” Meru said. ”The road of this river — you walk it for me first.”

”This river,” Kamon said, standing in the bow, ”is livelier than it was four months ago.”

”Livelier is good.” Meru said. ”When the river is lively, the days are alive.”

At the villages along the way, people waved to the fleet — from the fields and the docks and the doorways, and the waving followed the boats from one bend of the river to the next, and the boatmen said afterward that they had never seen the river so full of waving hands.

When the boats stopped for water — the boats needed water for the people and the horses and the cooking pots — the people of the docks crowded around, asking questions. The most frequent questions were: ”Is the south truly at peace?” and ”Is the law truly coming?” The boatmen answered again and again, without impatience. A white-bearded old man took a boatman’s hand and said: ”Our village — two years ago the rebels levied our grain; last year the corvee took our men. I had two sons; one did not come back. When you reach the court, you must shout out those four words — ’no levies in the busy season’!”

”We will shout them.” The boatman said. ”Those four words are packed solid in the trunk on our boat.”

”Solid is good.” The old man said. ”This old frame of mine will stand here and listen. The day the law stands, I will have my grandson come to the river and knock his head to the ground for you.”

”Do not knock.” The boatman said, and he laid his hand on the old man’s shoulder before he turned back to the boat. ”When the law stands, it is yours. If you must thank someone, thank yourselves — it was people like you who endured the days through these four months.”

When the boat cast off, the old man was still standing on the dock. He waved, and kept waving until the boat’s shadow vanished into the river mist.

”Do you see?” Tia said, pointing at the fields on both banks. ”Those fields are all turned over. The seeds of the spring are going into the ground. When autumn comes, the grain of these fields goes into the newly raised granaries.” She paused. ”When that day comes, these four statutes will be growing in the fields.”

”When the law grows in the fields,” Asaf said, ”then it is truly law.”

In the cabin of the lead boat, the wicker trunk was set in the steadiest place — the place where the boat’s motion was least, measured by the boatmen with a cup of water, and the trunk was roped so that not even a lurch could shift it. Meru had the boatmen pad it with straw and rope it fast. He said: ”This trunk is the fixed star of the fleet. While the trunk is on the boat, the boat is steady.”

”Steady.” Tia said, sitting by the trunk. ”In four months, this is the first time the trunk has ridden such a steady boat.”

”From now on,” Asaf said, ”it will ride the table of the court.”

”Then let it,” Tia said, ”land there steady.”

On the tenth day — to the day, as Meru had promised, and the boatmen had marked the days off on a tally stick like the work-tallies of the siege — the fleet entered the waters of the new capital.

From far off, the outline of the new capital came out of the river mist — the high walls of the palace, the spires of the temples, row after row of houses, stretch after stretch of worksites — and the worksites were the first thing the craftsmen of Thebes saw, and they measured them with their eyes before they measured anything else. It was a city still growing. The craftsmen on the boats crowded into the bows to look. An old craftsman said: ”So this is the new capital? Newer than Thebes.”

”New.” Kamon said. ”But four months ago, we went out of this city. Now we come back — carrying four months of war, and four statutes.”

”Then we,” a young craftsman asked, ”are we returning in triumph?”

”Not triumph.” Kamon said. ”The war is over, yes. But the real hard battle is still ahead.” He paused. ”The battle of the court uses no blades. But it is harder than blades.”

”Then we...”

”We are craftsmen.” Kamon said. ”Craftsmen fight their battles with their work. Four months of work — that is our blade.”

As the boats entered the city’s reach of the river, the oars slowed.

On both banks, the boats of the new capital were three times as many as four years before — cargo boats, passenger boats, official boats, coming and going. On the banks were worksites stretching out of sight — men ramming walls, carrying earth, hauling stone. The sound of the work chants drifted from the banks to the water, warm and busy. A boatman recognized the guild’s flag and called from far off: ”Merchant Meru! Is the war of the south truly over?”

”Over!” Meru shouted back from the bow. ”This fleet of ours is the war over — we have come to make the law!”

”Make the law!” The boatman shouted. ”Then that is a fine thing! On our worksites, we pray every day for certain rules!”

”Soon!” Meru shouted. ”In ten days — the great assembly!”

”Ten days!” The whole river heard it, and the cry ran from boat to boat and from the water to the banks, where the workmen on the quays took it up and passed it into the streets. The news spread in rings, like ripples on the water.

The boats came alongside the dock — the dock of the new capital, wider and busier than the dock of Thebes — and the people waiting to receive them were already there, drawn up in a line that reached from the water’s edge to the street. At their head was an official of the civil administration, who bowed to Lu Zhu first: ”Chief Builder — you have had a hard journey. The pharaoh has said: settle in first, deliberate later. The great assembly is fixed for ten days from now.”

”Ten days.” Lu Zhu said. ”Enough. Enough to set everything, item by item, in the place where it belongs.”

The place of lodging was the old quarters of the Chief Construction Bureau — the same row of rooms as four years before, their walls whitewashed anew for the assembly, but with several new sheds raised in the yard before them, the sheds smelling of new timber and lime. The party came ashore and settled their baggage. The wicker trunk was carried by two craftsmen, steadily, into the innermost room. In the room stood a table, swept clean — a place cleared for the records.

”This table,” Tia said, running her hand over its surface — the surface worn smooth by four years of records, and scarred here and there by the edges of ledgers set down hard — ”four years ago, our first corvee account was sorted on it. The account that began as a clerk’s complaint, and became a map of the country’s wounds.”

”Now,” Asaf said, ”a national law is to be sorted on it.”

At the dock, the five boats had been made fast. The people on the bank were unloading and receiving. But behind the crowd, a few pairs of eyes watched — not the boats: the wicker trunk being carried down. They watched a while; then one of them turned and walked away quickly — toward the deep houses of the city, to carry the news.

”Do you see them?” Lu Zhu said, low.

”I see them.” Asaf said. ”These people arrived before we did.”

”They have been here all along.” Lu Zhu said. ”From the day we left the new capital, they have been waiting for this day.” He raised his head toward the palace. ”Let them wait. Ten days from now, we meet on the jade steps.”

From the next day, the ten-day countdown was marked off with care.

On the first day, Asaf and Tia went to the civil administration — the office where the four-year road had begun, and where the old records of the corvee still stood in their shelves, the records that had been the first pages of the trunk. Their old colleagues were startled and delighted to see them. A clerk who had copied corvee accounts with them in the old days took Asaf’s hand: ”You are back at last. In these four years, the old records of this office have piled up to fill a room. Those above did not ask, and those below did not change. Everyone has been waiting for someone to turn this whole business over.”

”Whether it can be turned over,” Asaf said, ”we will see in ten days.” He lowered his voice. ”In these days, keep an ear to the ground in this office. The great assembly is not only about what happens on the surface.”

”Rest easy.” The clerk said, and he lowered his voice as he spoke, the way men lower their voices when they speak of the wind in this city. ”We clerks have no other skill, but reading the wind — that we do well.”

The letter from Thebes arrived on the third day — the fastest passage a letter had ever made up the river, the boatmen said, as if the letter itself had been in a hurry, and the seal on it was the seal of the old temple.

The letter was carried by a guild boat, and it was from the chief officiant. The letter said: the market goes on as usual, livelier every day; the spring plowing has begun, and the seed grain of the official granary is all in the ground; the Haven has taken in another wave of people returning to their villages; Dawn can stand holding the wall; Uncle Woser practices his counting-rods every day, saying he will check the general account when you return. At the end of the letter, the chief officiant had written four sentences:

”The city is well; do not worry. The incense burns on; the lamps keep their flame. In the court, win one more inch for the people. When you return in victory, the whole city will come to meet you.”

Lu Zhu read the letter twice and passed it around. When it reached Kamon, he said: ”This chief officiant — he writes letters like he chants scriptures now.”

”Let him chant.” Lu Zhu said. ”These words warm the heart.”

”They warm it.” Tia said. ”With this letter in hand, I will dare to speak all the more boldly in the court.”

”Why?” Kamon asked.

”Because there are people behind us.” Tia said. ”The lamps of a whole city are burning at our backs.”

Lu Zhu and Kamon went to the Chief Construction Bureau the next day — the bureau whose seal was on every drawing that had built the walls and granaries of the country.

The gate of the bureau was grander than it had been four years before. But the old files inside were the same files. Lu Zhu filed the damage maps of Thebes, the repair accounts, and the house drawings, item by item. As he filed them, he said to the clerks of the bureau: ”These are not for Thebes alone. From now on, the building of the whole country follows the principles in them. When you copy the catalogs, copy them carefully — every item in these files was paid for with a life.”

”Yes.” A clerk answered. ”We will not leave out one character of the Chief Builder’s drawings.”

Imset and Shafi went to the medical house of the new capital — the house that had been raised four years before, when the first medical standards were being set, and that had grown in the years since.

The main house was as it had been four years before, but the patients at its gate were several times more numerous. The director of the house came out to meet Imset from far off: ”Priest — you are back at last. The medicine ledgers and the case records of these years — I have kept them all. I have been waiting for you to come and give the final word.”

”The final word comes in ten days.” Imset said. ”When it comes, the building, the management, and the storage of every medical house in the country will have its law.” He paused. ”First, take me to see the medicine storehouse. Are the damp-proof racks of four years ago still there?”

”They are.” The director said. ”And by your pattern, three more rooms have been added.”

”Good.” Imset said. ”That rack is the backbone of the medical house.”

In the deep houses of the city — the houses whose gates opened onto the quiet streets behind the palace, the houses that did not appear on the maps of the city that were shown to strangers — the lamps had been burning late again, and the servants of those houses had learned to walk softly past the closed doors.

Several old nobles had gathered. On the table lay a copied list of the names who would take their seats. The old noble at the head of them tapped the names one by one with his finger: ”Lu Zhu. Kamon. Meru. Imset. And that accountant Mery, and that woman clerk...” He laughed coldly. ”Well, well — a pack of mud-footed people, all coming to the court.”

”They come to their court,” the man beside him said, and his voice had the confidence of a man who has seen the ancestral system hold against every challenge of his lifetime. ”We block our way. Those two words — the ancestral system — have held them down for forty years. Can they fail us this once?”

”Held down or not,” the old noble said, and his finger moved from name to name on the list as he spoke — Lu Zhu, Kamon, Meru, Imset, the accountant, the woman clerk — ”it is a question of how you press. Pressing head-on is the lowest strategy. We must make them stumble over their own words in the court.” He paused. ”Go. Gather everyone connected with Thebes, the West Bank, and the new capital who is kin to us, or in our debt. They talk of evidence? We will talk too — we will talk about how much of their evidence is true, and how much is invented.”

”Right.” Another noble said, and he tapped the table with his finger as he spoke, marking the rhythm of his argument. ”That woman clerk’s account — abolish the corvee and the grain harvest grows threefold? Threefold — who believes it? When the assembly meets, we bite on that number. If the number breaks, every account in their trunk is paper.”

”Do it by this plan.” The old noble said, and he looked around the room at the faces that the lamplight carved out of the dark. ”Ten days. In these ten days, no one rests.”

And in the palace, the pharaoh had been sleeping late too — the lamps of his study burning past the middle watches, over the reports and the catalogs that lay on his table, and the guards at the door of the study had learned to admit no one after the second watch.

On his table lay two things: one was the war report and the clearing accounts of Thebes; the other was the table of contents of the four statutes. He turned the catalog over and over — the catalog that named four statutes and carried four tables of contents — and at last asked the chief minister beside him: ”Has the evidence of these people been verified?”

”Verified.” The minister said. ”The accounts of Thebes — the granary’s, the hospital’s, the guild’s — have all been checked by our own men. The numbers are true.”

”If they are true, that is well.” The pharaoh said, and he looked at the two things on his table — the reports of the war, and the catalog of the statutes — as if measuring one against the other. ”These four statutes were bought with four months of blood. What is bought with blood must not be lost on the tongues of the court.” He stood up and walked to the door of the hall. ”Send the word down: the great assembly goes forward as fixed. Let them all come.”

The wind outside the door blew in — the wind of the spring, carrying the smell of the turned fields — and turned the pages of the catalog on the table. Every word on those pages was heavy — heavy as cartloads of grain, heavy as courses of wall, heavy as the four months that had paid for them.

On the night before the assembly — the last night of the ten-day countdown, the night that the clerk of the countdown had marked with a double stroke on his tally — a table was spread in the yard of the Chief Construction Bureau, and the yard was lit by the lamps that had been lit for every night of the countdown.

It was not a banquet — it was coarse tea and plain rice. Lu Zhu, Kamon, Meru, Imset, Shafi, Mery, Hapy, Kes, Asaf, and Tia sat in a ring. No one spoke of tomorrow. They spoke of things that had nothing to do with it: the fish of the river, the dates of the city, the well water of Thebes, the sand of the western line. As they talked, they laughed; and as they laughed, they fell quiet.

At last Lu Zhu stood up first. He raised a bowl of water and said: ”I take water in place of wine, and say one thing. Four years ago, we set out from the West Bank — a crew of house-builders. Four years later, we sit in this new capital — still a crew of house-builders.” He paused. ”Only — before, we built houses. From tomorrow, we build a country.” He raised the bowl. ”This bowl of water — to the four months, to the four years, to tomorrow.”

”To tomorrow.” The company raised their bowls and answered together — ten voices, one word, and the word went out over the yard and into the night of the new capital.

The bowls touched with a small clear note — the sound of a door being gently pushed open.

Late in the night, when the others had gone to their rooms and the yard had fallen quiet, Lu Zhu walked alone into the yard of the bureau — the yard where, four years before, he had first set down his tools in the new capital, and where the first drawings of the granaries had been unrolled.

The night of the new capital was still enough to hear the wind on the palace walls far off. He looked up at the sky. The moon was a thin sickle, like a blade just out of the forge. He looked at it a long time, and said, low: ”Over there, I built houses for half my life. I never thought the day would come when I would help set rules for a whole country.” He smiled a little. ”If these rules stand, then these hands of mine have not come to this world for nothing.”

”Chief Builder.” Asaf had come out without a sound and stood behind him. ”Tomorrow — where will you stand?”

”Behind all of you.” Lu Zhu said. ”In the court, you are the blades. I am the man who sharpens the blades.”

”No.” Asaf said, and he said it the way he had said it a hundred times in the four years of the road — as a fact that did not need proving. ”You are our root. While the root stands, the blade cannot break.”

Lu Zhu said nothing. He patted Asaf’s shoulder and turned back toward the house. In the yard, the moonlight lay white over the ground, like a road stretching out of sight.

The sky was almost light.

In a few hours, the great assembly of the court would open — the assembly that the old nobles had spent ten days preparing for, and that the people of Thebes had spent four months preparing for, and that the pharaoh had spent four years waiting for. The records of the four statutes were already packed in the wicker trunk, the lid locked, the lock polished bright — the trunk that had been carried out of Thebes in a small boat four years before, and that had grown heavier with every year of the road. Everything waited for the dawn, for the opening of the palace gate, for the step onto the jade stairs.

And in the deep houses of the new capital, the last few lamps had at last gone out. Whether those people slept — only they knew. But when the sky lightened, both sides would enter the same hall, spread out their accounts, and speak their words.

The true battle was about to begin.

(End of Chapter 12)