Sport for kings

[Amon/Alex's POV]

A few days ago, Amon had granted a merchant an audience. The merchant had bowed down deeply and begged "his merciful ruler" to listen to his plee. The merchant turned out to be an eccentric who conducted his business through travel by land.

Now you need to know that travelling by land wasn't exactly popular in this time and age. The main reason for this was the beautiful Nile river snaking through the largest part of the country.

Everyone travelled by boat. It was still too early for horses and chariots to be introduced and camels were far and few in between. This basically meant that, if you travelled by land, you had to cross large pieces of dessert by foot.

So roads tended to be neglected. But, it was still the pharaoh's duty to maintain them.

This o-so-helpful merchant had brought it to Amon's attention that a pack of wild hyenas had been spotted around the roads and formed a threat to the merchants travelling by land. In response, Amon would have to set up a hunting party, which would be a serious test of his patience.

Don't misunderstand; if it could have been just him hunting down these animals, he would have gratefully accepted this request. But things never were that easy when you were a pharaoh.

Ever since people had started cultivating cattle, hunting had lost its economic importance and people had started seeing "hunting" as a matter of sport for kings, courtiers and dignitaries in which they could display their strength and valour.

Translation; it had become a political event.

Amon would be expected to chose a few key people who could add value to the country and take them along for some entertainment.

No need to mention this wasn't Amon's most favourite pastime. But sadly enough, that was exactly why he was currently walking between two generals, the son of a scribe and a large farm owner.

The two generals were walking up front and seemed to be enjoying themselves. They were bragging loudly about the prey they'd caught before. Undoubtedly, they were hoping to impress Amon, but all their bragging seemed to accomplish was that the newcomers were becoming nervous.

All-in-all, the mood around him was sour, and he hated it. He was so glad Merenre had agreed to come along.

"If I let you go by yourself, you'll end up murdering someone," he'd said. It had made Amon snicker.

"We've been walking for hours! Where are these vile beasts?" one of the generals complained as if it was Amon's fault they hadn't found the animals yet.

Amon glared at the general. Merenre had been right. If his brother hadn't come along, he really might have murdered the guy. These generals had already been serving under the previous pharaoh, but they would have never acted disrespectful like this towards his father.

"Don't be ridiculous," Merenre answered in Amon's stead, knowing full-well that Amon's answer would have been straight out hostile. "You know as well as anyone else here that animals don't stay in one place. But feel free to go and explore the territory further away from the road."

That's Merenre for you; straight to the point without offending anyone directly. Amon quietly but audibly chuckled at his brother's reply. He didn't even care that the sound of it made the scribe's son shiver in fear. He glanced over at the complaining general, waiting for the undoubtedly coming reply, but so far his mouth was pressed in a thin dissatisfied line.

"That won't be necessary," Amon cut the suffering of the general short as he'd seen movement from the corner of his eye and readied his bow and arrows.

"We've arrived," Merenre said as he caught on quickly and took his own bow from his back. The scribe's son actually looked excited this time.

"Joy," Amon thought to himself, noting the boy's reaction. "My laughter is more terrifying than a pack of hyenas."

Now it all came down to the hunt. Not the most efficient type of hunting, but the type to entertain people. Merenre had given Amon specific orders to not do ANYTHING until the others had killed at least one animal.

"Let's discus a course of action," Merenre said. Amon didn't mind him taking the lead, he himself was bad with two-faced people like the generals.

"I suggest we surround the beasts and try to lure them towards a secluded area. Afterwards we can stoke them with arrows," the general who hadn't offended Amon said.

He noticed the others nodding around him. It was a commonly used tactic after all. It had proven its worth many times before. However, wasn't this group of animals a little too small for this hunting method?

He counted one, two, three hyenas. They were away far enough for Amon to have an unclear view of the situation. And from what he could see, the animals were acting strange. They had barely even spared them a glance, all standing with their backs towards them, moving and squeaking nervously.

"Something's wrong," Amon said seriously. He had a bad feeling about this.

"Is that a lioness there?" the scribe's son wondered out loud. He was right. The three hyenas were all facing a lioness. It was highly peculiar that none of the animals were fighting.

Amon exchanged a meaningful glance with Merenre. His brother was glaring daggers at him. His eyes were saying; "Don't you dare!" but quickly changed when he saw his brother's worried expression.

"Go ahead," he sighed heavily.

Amon smiled gratefully. "Merenre, can you hand me your quiver?"

"Wait!" the land owner said. "That are three hyenas over there. Plus one lioness, apparently, although I haven't spotted it myself yet. You can't be planning on going there all alone?!"

"I'll be right back," Amon answered absentmindedly as he swung Merenre's quiver over his shoulder, his mind already working out a plan for the task at hand.

The landowner shot a questioning glance at Merenre as if he wanted to say, "Is this guy for real?"

"He's made up his mind. There's nothing I can say to talk him out of it," Merenre replied the landowner with a shrug.

"Do you have to make me sound like a stubborn fool?" Amon asked as he took two arrows in his one hand and his bow in the other. Merenre chuckled in reply. Whatever he was about to say, Amon was sure he didn't want to hear it, so he hurried over to the group of animals with his bow ready to attack.

The first hyena he encountered was standing with its back towards him and was so busy yapping and growling at the lioness that it hadn't even noticed Amon approaching. Amon's first arrow hit the animal straight in the shoulder and buried itself deep into its flesh.

The hyena cried out in pain. This caused the second hyena to shift its attention from the lioness towards him. And since it had already been panicking because of the lioness, the second animal charged at him without thinking twice.

Amon wasted no time shooting his second arrow. He'd aimed at the animal's chest, but the animal was moving so wildly that the arrow missed its target and hit a limb instead. Amon cursed as the animal, kept charging towards him. Luckily the arrow had slowed the animal enough for Amon to reach up to the quiver on his back and pull out two more arrows.

The distance between them was closing in fast.

Amon was barely in time to place one of the arrows onto the string, draw it back far enough and aim. This arrow hit the charging hyena right between the eyes. Its now lifeless body skidded to an abrupt halt right in front of him.

But there was no time to celebrate. Amon had barely placed his foot on the dead animals head and re-drawn his bow when the first hyena recovered from its initial shock and was ready to charge too, but Amon shot an arrow through its head before it even started to move.

He felt his blood run cold as he saw the third hyena much closer than he'd originally though. He'd thought that the lioness would have grabbed her chance to overwhelm one of the animals while he was distracting two of them, but the lioness hadn't moved at all!

"Shit!" he cursed, already reaching for the next two arrows, but he knew the animal would be able to reach him before he would be able to fire his arrow.