“Why do you have a jewel that is shaped like a beetle?” she asked as she kneaded bread dough in a large clay bowl. “It’s a heart scarab,” replied Ramose who was sitting in the kitchen garden watching her. “What’s it for?” “It’s made to be buried with me when I die.” “It’s very beautiful. It seems a shame to bury it in a tomb.” “When an Egyptian dies, their body is preserved so that it can travel into the afterlife.” Karoya glanced at him dubiously and started to shape the dough into flat round loaves. “I’ve heard about this. They take out all the insides and wrap the body in strips of cloth.” “Not all of the insides—the heart is left in. In the afterlife Osiris, the god of the underworld, judges whether the person is fit to enter. Anubis, the jackal-headed god, takes the heart and weighs it against the feather of truth. If the heart exactly balances the weight of the feather, then Anubis knows the owner of the heart has been a good and truthful person and allows him to enter the afterlife.”
