A Trail Through Time (The Chronicles of St Mary's #4)

by Jodi Taylor

‘Well, Akhenaten comes to power. He succeeds a powerful and popular father – not sure how much that’s got to do with his rebellion – and immediately starts chucking sacred cats amongst the pigeons.’ ‘Why?’ I hesitated. ‘I don’t think there’s any clear reason why. The fact is – he’s different. In every way. Deliberately so. It’s almost as if he said, “How can I overthrow the thinking of thousands of years, upset my people, antagonise the priesthood, and offend all the gods? Oh, I know! Let’s abolish all the gods and have just one. Oh, and let’s have a new city devoted to that one god and make people abandon the ancient city of their ancestors and live there. They won’t mind. And what else? Oh, yes! Let’s have a new style of realism in our art. Warts and all. Well, don’t just stand there, everyone – jump to it. Nations don’t just weaken themselves, you know.”’

‘Furthermore, to mark your return, you may select whatever assignment you please. Your choice. Your team. Your mission. Take that away and think about it.’ ‘As a reward?’ ‘Good heavens, no. Please be perfectly clear about this, Dr Maxwell. It is a bribe.’