Prince in Exile (9 page)

By the time they reached the safety of the valley floor it was daylight. Ra had survived his perilous night journey. So had Ramose.

Ramose screwed up his nose. “What’s that?” Karoya was pressing something soft, wet and foul-smelling against the wound on his head.

“It’s meat.”

“It smells awful.”

“A wound on the head must be treated with a poultice of fresh meat on the first day.”

“It doesn’t smell fresh.”

“It’s as fresh as there is in this place.”

“Is this another of your remedies from Kush?”

“No, I learnt this from an Egyptian priest.” Karoya bound the meat to Ramose’s forehead with a strip of linen. “Tomorrow I will just use oxen fat and honey.”

“That sounds almost as bad,” grumbled Ramose. “When I hurt myself back at the palace, priests said prayers over me and the royal jewellers made amulets to hang around my neck and ward off evil spirits.”

“No priests. Just a piece of ox flesh.”

“What about the broken bones in my chest?”

“They will heal as long as you rest.”

Ramose didn’t get to rest for long. He was given two days to recover before he was called before a special tribunal. Weni, Nakhtamun and Hapu were also summoned. The tribunal consisted of Scribe Paneb, Samut the foreman and two senior tomb workers.

“Why were you boys climbing the sacred mountain?” asked Paneb.

“We saw Ramose going up there and we were worried that he might get lost,” Weni lied.

“And then when we found him, he just attacked Weni. He punched him in the nose,” said Nakhtamun.

“Is this true, Ramose?” asked the foreman.

“I didn’t mean to hit him,” Ramose replied. “I just meant to push him away.”

“I was just protecting myself,” said Weni, “and then Ramose’s foot slipped and he fell.”

Hapu didn’t say anything.

“You have behaved irresponsibly,” said Paneb.

“We are all here at the Great Place to prepare the tomb of the pharaoh, may he have long life and health,” said the foreman. “You striplings are privileged to work in this place. You have been trusted with knowledge of the whereabouts of Pharaoh’s tomb. Only we tomb workers know this. The Great Place and the Gate of Heaven are sacred places.”

“You should be banished from the Great Place,” said Paneb. “But with two tombs now under construction we need all the workers we can get.”

It was agreed that each boy should receive ten blows and pay a fine of a week’s grain ration. Ramose was exempted from the beating, as he was already covered with purple and yellow bruises.

“I think it would be a good idea to separate you boys for a while,” said Samut. “Ramose and Hapu, you can go to the Place of Beauty. Report to the foreman there tomorrow morning.”

The Place of Beauty was the valley to the south of the Great Place. It was meant for the burial of other members of the royal family. There were three tombs there. Two belonged to Ramose’s brothers, Wadzmose and Amenmose. The entrances to those tombs were hidden so that tomb robbers couldn’t find them. Ramose found himself at the entrance of the third tomb in the Place of Beauty, which was still under construction. It was his own tomb.

Ramose had been so busy in the Great Place, concerned with daily life, the possibility of death and the sharpness of chisels, that he hadn’t had time to think about the preparations for his own burial. The mood of the workers at this tomb was completely different to that of the men working on Pharaoh’s tomb. Men were hurrying about. There was a sense of urgency. The moment the two boys arrived, the foreman put them to work. He sent Hapu down into the tomb to help the painters.

“I want you to check the script on the tomb walls,” the foreman told Ramose. “This has been a rushed job and our scribe has been ill for weeks. Check for mistakes.”

Ramose entered the tomb and the cool air gave him goosebumps. It was a small tomb compared to his father’s. A few steps led down to a short corridor, which opened straight into the burial chamber. The chamber was a strange shape. Instead of being rectangular, it was narrow at one end. One corner had an ugly, jagged lump sticking out of it. The foreman saw Ramose looking at it.

“The quarry men ran into a flint boulder in the rock,” he explained. The rock deep in the desert hills was generally quite soft and easy to carve, but occasionally there were outcrops of hard flint. The tomb makers’ copper chisels buckled and broke when they hit flint.

“We didn’t have time to start a new excavation, so we had to leave it. It’ll make it difficult to fit the sarcophagus in, but it can’t be helped.”

Ramose looked at the artwork on the walls. A team of six painters, now including Hapu, were painting texts on three of the walls. They were instructions for how to travel through the dangerous underworld. The painters were also drawing maps showing two different ways to get past the monsters and lakes of fire. Hapu was on his knees, painting a border of papyrus reeds and Horus eyes.

“We’ve only had time to carve sculptures on one of the walls,” said the foreman.

“Will there be no carvings in the corridor?”

“No, there isn’t time.”

Ramose opened his mouth to complain.

“It’s not my fault the royal princes keep dying so young,” grumbled the foreman. “Three tombs in two years! How are we supposed to cope?”

Ramose looked closer at a half-finished carving of Anubis, the jackal-headed god of the dead, leading a young boy into the presence of Osiris, the god of the underworld. A sculptor was gently chipping away at the rock to shape the boy’s kilt. Another sculptor was carving the boy’s name alongside in elegant hieroglyphs. It was Ramose’s name.

Ramose realised that the carving was of himself. His heart was being weighed against the feather of truth. Thoth, the ibis-headed god of writing, was noting down the results. The monster Ammut, part crocodile, part lion, part hippopotamus watched, ready to pounce on the heart and devour it if it was heavy with wrong-doing.

Another sculptor was working on the other end of the wall. He was putting the finishing touches to a carving of Ramose’s family: Pharaoh, his mother, his beautiful sister Hatshepsut, his two brothers and himself as a small boy. He was sitting on his mother’s lap. A cat was playing under her chair.

It probably wasn’t a real likeness of his mother. The man who had drawn the outline for the sculptor would never have seen her. Ramose couldn’t remember what she looked like. He held a lamp up to the image of his mother’s face. It was beautiful. Calm and smiling. One elegant hand was resting on the shoulder of the child on her lap. Another sculptor, who was working on the hieroglyphs, had finished his work on the other carving. He came over and started to carve the names of the family members. He was a skilled craftsman. Following the outlines painted on the walls, he carved the shapes with smooth assured strokes. The hastily drawn outlines were transformed into neat three-dimensional hieroglyphs, each one a small work of art.

Ramose looked closer. Next to the image of his mother the sculptor had carved the hieroglyphs for Mutnofret.

“Stop!” Ramose reached out and grabbed hold of the sculptor’s hand.

“What do you think you’re doing, stripling?” said the sculptor.

“You’ve made a mistake,” said Ramose angrily.

The sculptor turned to look at the new apprentice scribe, surprised by the tone of his voice. “What are you talking about?”

“Mutnofret is only a lesser queen. The name of the Great Royal Wife was Ahmose. You’ve carved the wrong name.”

“We’re in a hurry,” the sculptor said, going back to his carving. “I haven’t got time to redo it.”

“You have to change it,” shouted Ramose as he prised the chisel from the sculptor’s hand.

Hapu looked over to see his new friend grappling with the sculptor. He ran across to restrain Ramose before he got hurt in the scuffle.

“Calm down, Ramose. Does it matter if it’s the wrong queen?”

“Yes it does matter. It matters a lot. Mutnofret isn’t Prince Ramose’s mother. It has to be changed.”

Ramose stopped struggling and Hapu released his hold. As soon as he was free, Ramose lunged at the sculpture and with the chisel attacked the name of the hated queen. He gouged the first two hieroglyphs from the wall before the startled tomb workers realised what he was doing and wrestled him to the floor. Ramose fell hard and cried out in pain as his unhealed ribs hit the stone floor.

Hapu pushed through the knot of men around his friend and knelt at his side.

“He’s still recovering from an accident,” Hapu pointed to the gash on the side of Ramose’s head. “He fell. It’s affected his judgement a little.”

“A lot, I’d say,” said the sculptor looking at the damage done to his work.

The foreman came into the burial chamber.

“What’s all the noise about?”

“This new apprentice scribe is gouging holes in the walls.”

“It was wrong,” said Ramose holding his chest. “I just wanted the queen’s name to be right. You told me to check for mistakes.”

“I didn’t tell you to gouge holes anywhere.”

The men looked at the apprentice scribe and shook their heads as they went back to their work. Ramose took a stone flake and a pen from his bag. He wrote his mother’s name on it as neatly as he could.

“This is the real queen’s name,” he said, handing it to the sculptor.

“Plaster over the damage,” said the foreman, “and recarve the queen’s name.” He turned to Ramose. “You,” he said angrily. “Go and check the painted hieroglyphs on the other walls, that’s what you’re here to do.”

Ramose and Hapu ate their midday meal out in the valley. “You must like getting into trouble,” Hapu said with a wry smile.

“Of course I don’t.”

“You wouldn’t think so,” said Hapu through a mouthful of dried fish. “We’ve only been here for one morning and you’ve already upset half the team and been fined a sack of grain for damaging the tomb.”

Ramose dipped bread into his lentil soup, and ate it without commenting.

“You’re a strange person.” Hapu looked at Ramose, trying to work out his new friend.

“What’s strange about me?”

“You climb mountains by yourself, you attack tomb carvings, you have a slave for a friend.”

“I have good reasons for all of those things.”

“I’m sure you do, but I don’t know what they are.”

“I can’t explain.”

“Perhaps it’s because you come from the south.”

“Maybe.” Ramose was keen to change the topic of conversation. “Do you miss your friends?” he asked Hapu.

“Not much. Weni isn’t really my friend. He’s a troublemaker.”

“Like me.”

“No, not like you. Weni’s mean. He likes to hurt people. You don’t get into trouble on purpose.” Hapu laughed. “You’re not mean, you’re just not very smart.”

Ramose laughed too. A few weeks ago, if anyone had made fun of him in that way, he would have been angry. Now he didn’t mind.

“Come on, you boys,” said the foreman as he passed by them in a hurry. “Time to get back to work. A messenger just came up from the city. There’s going to be a royal visit.”

“The pharaoh?” asked Hapu. “He’s coming here?”

“That’s right, Pharaoh himself, may he have long life, health and prosperity. He’ll be here in a few days to see how his tomb’s progressing. Half our team will have to go down to the village to get his residence in shape.”

“Will he be coming to inspect the prince’s tomb as well?” asked Ramose.

“Yes, and we have orders to finish it before he does.”

Ramose’s heart started thudding. He didn’t have to worry about how he could get into the palace to see his father. His father was coming to him. This was Ramose’s chance. He could see his father and let him know that he was still alive.

The tomb workers spent the next nine days working very long hours to get the tomb finished. There wasn’t really enough time, but they did their best to have the tomb as close to finished as they could. Ramose was grateful to them for this, even though it wasn’t him that was going to be buried there. He checked the texts on the walls carefully. The peasant boy who was to be buried there in his place deserved to find his way safely through the underworld.