On the Hunt

I forced myself to look again at the helpless cat mummy. The ears were broken, the bandages loose. Across time and space, I seemed to hear Pamiu’s voice: Avenge me, Ra the Mighty. See that justice is done.

How could I ignore a call like that?

“The Great Detective is on the case, ” I promised out loud.

Khepri coughed. “Great Detectives, you mean. ”

“That’s right, ” Miu agreed. “We’re a team. ”

True. We’d settled on that after our last case. “But this feels personal, ” I told them. “It’s my ancestor lying there. So it’s my duty to take charge. ”

“We’re in this together. ” Swishing her tail, Miu stepped toward Pamiu’s desecrated mummy. “Do you think I’m not upset, Ra? A cat is a cat. ”

“But this cat was special, ” I reminded her. “After all, not every Pharaoh’s Cat gets a golden sarcophagus. That honor is granted only to the very best, and the most beloved. ” In a low voice, I confessed, “To tell the truth, I’m kind of hoping for one myself. ”

Miu sighed and glanced up at Khepri, and I went back to staring at Pamiu’s poor tattered mummy. No doubt the robbers would strip his wonderful sarcophagus of its amber eyes and melt down the rest for the gold.

The humans took a while to catch up to us, but eventually the Scribe discovered Pamiu’s mummy. “Vizier, look at this. The cat’s sarcophagus was stolen, too. Another priceless object gone! ”

“Make a list, Scribe. Make a list. ” Recovering from his initial outrage, the Vizier roved around the burial chamber. “Put down everything missing, everything that looks out of place. And above all, find where the thieves broke in. We can’t catch them till we know how they did the job. ”

Instead of sitting down with his writing board, the Scribe jabbed his staff at Kenamon. “You there. Start sketching. I want a record of all the damage we see. ”

“There’s no sign of entry anywhere, ” the Captain said, still scanning the walls. “I don’t understand how they did it. ”

As he lowered his flaming torch, the chamber darkened, creating a distinctly spooky atmosphere.

“Anoooooooooooooobis. ” It was the faintest breath of a whisper, but my fur stood on end when I heard it. Everyone stopped in their tracks, and the Vizier and the Scribe stared at each other wild-eyed.

Miu nudged me. She was watching Kenamon, and I noticed he was the one human who didn’t look scared. He even had a twinkle in his eyes. I remembered how Sabu had said the boy liked to monkey around. Did that mean he played jokes? Was he the whisperer? Or was it the god of the dead, warning us away?

I glanced back at the tunnel entrance, then gasped in alarm. Two stifflegged figures were coming toward us, moaning a little, their cloth wrappings fluttering in the eerie light of the flames.

“Mummies! ” Wailing, I darted behind a canopic jar.

“Vizier, ” said the Captain, “these are the guards who were attacked on the cliffs. ”

Oh.

“An easy mistake to make, ” I told Khepri, who was chortling on top of my head. “All those bandages are very misleading. ” I came out of hiding.

“Tell the Vizier what happened to you, ” the Captain prompted the men.

Nursing his arm in a sling, the taller man kept his head bent, as if it pained him. “We were out on patrol together, my lord. It was a moonless night, so it wasn’t an easy job. But we had the stars. ” He stopped and bit his lip.

“Go on, ” said the Captain.

The man’s head drooped even lower. “Just after midnight, we heard jackals howling in this canyon. They don’t usually make that much noise, so we thought we’d better investigate. And then they turned on us—dozens of jackals, all at once, running straight for us and splitting us up. I climbed to get away from them, but when I turned…” The man shut his eyes, as if he didn’t want to remember.

“What? ” the Vizier demanded.

“I saw a huge jackal’s head. ” The petrified man could barely get the words out. “It was the god Anubis, and he was angry. And that’s the last thing I remember. ”

The shorter man had a bandaged head and a tightly wrapped leg. “I ran, too, my lord. But then I heard a cry. That’s when I saw the great god Anubis, rising up before me, his hands full of gold and jewels. ” His voice shook at the memory. “The p-power of the god overcame me, and he wiped my mind blank. The rest is gone. ”

The Vizier looked unnerved. So did the Scribe. To tell the truth, I was feeling a little unnerved myself.

I looked at Kenamon. He seemed as spooked as the rest of us. The twinkle was gone.

“I don’t know what to think. ” The Captain glanced around the tomb uneasily. “We questioned the men separately, of course, but the details match. And they both swear their testimony is true. ”

The torch flickered, and the chamber grew darker still. In the uncanny setting, it was easy to imagine a dark, wolfish face looming against the night sky. As the silence stretched out, you could almost hear the jackal god’s stealthy footsteps coming our way.

I shivered. Khepri dropped down to the floor, as if he needed the comfort of solid ground beneath him. Even Miu looked unsettled.

“Could it be true? ” The Captain’s voice was hushed. “Does Anubis walk this Valley? ”

The Vizier stared at the wall painting beside him, of the black-headed jackal god weighing the hearts of the dead. My eyes were fixed on it, too.

“The tomb was sealed. ” The Vizier sounded faint. “And we have found no other entrance. ”

“Only a god could enter, ” the Scribe whispered.

He and the Vizier gave each other a long, uncertain look.

“I need fresh air. ” Pressing a hand to his sweaty forehead, the Vizier stumbled toward the tunnel. With a shudder, the Scribe followed him out, gripping his staff tightly and clutching his writing board close to his chest.

I crouched down, trying to avoid the golden eyes of the Anubis painting.

No one is braver than Pharaoh’s Cat, of course. My friends always say so. (Well, not Khepri and Miu. But everyone else. ) Yet a god is a god, and a cat’s powers can hardly compare. Our purr can make you humans talk, but that’s all we have. And that isn’t much help when you’re dealing with the guardian of the afterlife.

“Honestly, this whole Anubis business gives me the creeps, ” I said to

Miu and Khepri. “How about we leave right now? ”

Khepri clicked at me in reproof. “We’re Great Detectives, Ra. We don’t let our fears get the better of us. We search out the truth. ”

“That’s right, ” Miu agreed. “We need to look for evidence—cold, hard facts. ”

“Fine, ” I said, still crouching. “How about we look for them outside? ”

“Ra, if we go out, they might not let us back in, ” Khepri said. “We need to search this tomb while we can. ”

“If you’re scared, you don’t have to stay, ” Miu said reassuringly. “We’ll get the job done and meet you outside. ”

“Who’s scared? ” I forced myself to stand up. If anyone was going to avenge Pamiu, it was going to be me. “It’s just that it’s kind of dark in here, and stuffy. ” And spooky.

“Let’s see if we can work out how the robbers got in. ” Khepri scrambled toward the corner of the room. “Check the walls, especially down low. Oh, and the floors. Humans never pay proper attention to floors. ”

The Captain and his men and Huya were examining the main chamber and the tunnel that led to it, but Khepri was right: they weren’t paying much attention to anything below their knees. Only Kenamon seemed to be inspecting everything, and he was making very slow work of it.

Khepri, Miu, and I got down to business. We paced the perimeter of the chamber, keeping out of the way of the humans, sniffing (me and Miu) and scuttling (Khepri) as we went.

We were under a gilded chair, examining a section of floor the humans had skipped over, when I said, “You know, this is hard work. ” Miu pressed her nose to a crack between two stones.

“The kind of work that makes you hungry, ” I said.

Click, click, click, went Khepri.

“The kind of work, ” I said dreamily, “that makes you wish you had a bowl of spiced ibex right in front of you. ” I closed my eyes, imagining it. “Seasoned with cumin, and just a touch of cinnamon. I tell you, I can practically smell it right now. ”

“That’s funny. ” Miu sat up, alert. “I can smell cinnamon, too. ” “Aha! ” Khepri pounced. “Look at this! ” He waved a tiny crumb above his head.

“Our first clue, ” he announced.

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