Queen's Gambit - Karen Chance Page 0,39

the two became associated with each other over time. Thus Ra-Horakhty, ‘Ra who is Horus of the Two Horizons.’”

I nodded, looking up at the figure of a young man’s sun bronzed, muscular body, with gold glinting on the neck and wrists and sandal clad feet, as well as on the elaborate, jeweled overskirt he wore. I didn’t know how some ancient sculptor had managed to make the skin look smooth and touchable, and the rock cut underskirt appear as filmy and diaphanous as fine silk, but he had. Ra was the very image of an ancient king, even with the huge falcon’s head growing out of his shoulders.

Or maybe because of it.

In most of the portrayals I’d seen, the combo had looked like a guy wearing a bad Halloween mask. But not here. The artist had carefully shown the transition from skin to feathers, with the color starting well down his chest and shading darker as it flowed up the fine muscles of his torso, to the huge pectoral he wore.

The broad piece of gold was studded with what looked like genuine lapis, turquoise and red carnelian. Likewise, the plumage that started around the edges of the necklace and flowed up onto the head was carved from some kind of blue stone—agate perhaps? Whatever it was, the fine striations perfectly mimicked the look of feathers.

The head itself was a masterpiece, fierce and intelligent in its expression, with a vicious looking beak and gleaming dark eyes. And even more than the rest of the murals, this one was done in deep bas-relief. To the point that it looked as if Ra was stepping out of the wall, about to descend on us puny visitors.

I belatedly noticed that we had been included on the murals, too, or people like us. Small, brown humans, hunched over in deep obeisance, littered the area around the gods’ feet, not even coming up to their knees. No jewels had been wasted on them, nor any differentiation in the features. They could have been clones of one another, with the only variance being dresses for the women instead of the loin cloths the men wore.

Way to let us know our place, I thought. Although, in comparison to Ra, the gods weren’t in much better shape. Not only were they smaller than the big, main mural, they were also bearing gifts, their hands clasped around boxes and baskets overflowing with grain, incense, gold or jewels, which they were about to present to their lord and master. Those near the front of the line, where the upper edges of the octagon pushed them closer to the stairs, were already beginning their obeisance, sinking to one knee with their offerings raised high above their heads.

The message was clear: gods they might be, but one was far above the rest, as much so as they were above the pathetic humans.

“There, you see?” Hassani said, pointing, and jolting me out of the almost reverie I’d fallen into. “There is the sun disk, above Ra’s head. It was the symbol of godhood to the ancients, and became the royal emblem of pharaonic Egypt as well. The cobra that surrounds the disk was even added to the royal crown.”

I nodded, but I was finding it hard to focus on where he was pointing, because the disk in question was blinding. Instead of the usual, plain, orange-red sphere that decorated tourist statues and tomb walls alike, this was a huge, polished bronze mirror, which reflected the firelight like the sun’s rays, spearing them out to all points of the hall. It was dazzling.

But after a moment and some squinting, I finally located a black cobra wrapped around and then protruding outward from the sun. It looked like its scales might be obsidian, but I couldn’t look at it long enough to tell. It was also probably as big as me, but from this angle, it looked tiny.

“Is there a story behind it?” I asked, because I assumed so.

Hassani chuckled. “There are always stories in Egypt, and many for the Uraeus. I have my own theory as to its origins, but many believe it to be the symbol of Wadjet, a flame breathing snake god who destroyed Ra’s enemies.”

I blinked. “That’s . . . pretty hardcore.”

“Indeed. What I find most interesting, however, is that the pairing is similar across so many cultures.”

“The pairing?”

“Sun gods and serpents. Take the Aztec snake god, Quetzalcoatl, for instance. He vanquished an early sun god, Tezcatlipoca, and took his place during

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