Return to Thebes (29 page)
Authors: Allen Drury
Tags: #Literature & Fiction, #Genre Fiction, #Historical, #Mythology & Folk Tales, #Historical Fiction, #Science Fiction & Fantasy, #Fantasy, #fairy tales
Ankhesenamon
(life, health, prosperity!)
My grandfather has chosen our messenger well, one for whom my husband always felt deep trust and fond regard. He is a simple man of absolute integrity, loyalty, honor, a peasant who can disappear among other peasants so that no one will notice his passage as he goes swiftly on my mission. I pray to the Aten and the other gods—not to Amon, for Amon, like Horemheb, would stop him if he knew—that he may come safely to Suppiluliumas, and that Suppiluliumas will swiftly respond.
I had never thought to do such a thing, never dreamed that I would find it necessary. But I did not dream of my husband’s death either: and it came. Now if I would save the Two Lands from my grasping cousin I must do what I am doing. My aunt, my grandfather and I see no other way.
At first, of course, I saw nothing. When the soldier burst upon me with his dreadful news, I fainted as if I too had died. When I returned to the world I found my body tortured with pain, my child already on the way; I had no time or ability to think of anything else. Then that ended, I fell into a deep, unknowing sleep. When I awoke I remembered: dread, terror, grief for my gentle husband flooded my heart. Sitamon, trying her best to be kind, for she is very kind, told me of the death of the Crown Prince—who was not the Crown Prince at all, thanks to the vengeful gods. Again grief consumed my being, but not for long: again I had no time.
Now I carry in my heart a crying for Tutankhamon, our lost prince and our lost chances, which I shall never lose though I live to be the age of Aye; but there has been little or no time to give to that. I realized that I was sole ruler of the Two Lands, that I had to strengthen myself for many things: grief had to be sternly conquered and swiftly put aside. Now though I weep ritually each day for Pharaoh, I do not really cry inside: I suspect it will be a long while before I do. Someday I know I will, but not now. Now a cold resolve resides in my
ka
and my
ba,
in the very soul and essence of my being. I think only of my plan, and of what I shall do when it has been accomplished. First I shall take vengeance upon Horemheb. And then I shall restore to Kemet all that has been taken from her in these past sad years, using the power which will be fully mine when the answer comes from Suppiluliumas.
That I should appeal to him was Sitamon’s idea to begin with, but I was quick to embrace it when I looked about the ruins of our House and saw what was left after the horror. The gods have always denied me sons: even to the end, I could bring forth only girls, all dead—all three dead, even the last, when the Good God and I wanted so desperately to have a son. Had I been so delivered, and had the child lived, I should have ruled the kingdom as Regent until he was old enough to take the throne, and no one, not even Horemheb, would have dared challenge me. But it was not to be. And so I am forced to do a desperate thing, strange and unknown to our history, but the only thing left for me to do.
My cousin has not yet approached me formally for my hand but it will come: it will come. Sitamon tells me so and logic tells me so. I am the surest road to the Double Crown for Horemheb. We think he will not dare try it until Pharaoh has gone beneath the ground, but surely he will try it then. And by then, I hope, I shall have answer for him.
Meanwhile I remain in Sitamon’s palace and refuse to give him audience. Why should I? As surely as though he used the spear himself he killed the Living Horus, as he killed the Living Horus before him; and not I, nor anyone in Kemet, I believe, accepts his feeble tale of how he surprised Hatsuret at it and killed him to revenge the King. As Sitamon says, that is transparent nonsense. Why should I give audience to such an evil one?
I am ruler of the Two Lands and I am but a girl of twenty-two. Yet am I daughter of Nefertiti and Akhenaten, and strong must he be who bends to his will the child of that union. I may yet have to flee, he may yet kill me: but while I live, I, Ankhesenamon, Queen and Lord of the Two Lands, will do all I can to keep my kingdom safe from such a one.…
When we were young—
When we were young!
Were Tut and I ever young?—my husband and I dreamed always of the day when we might bring to Kemet the rule of love and universal happiness that my father and mother tried to create. They did many wrong things, particularly my father: this we can all see now. But at least their hearts were good, and they wanted only good for the Two Lands and our people. In the Aten, the Sole God, my father thought he had found the key; and this did my husband and I also believe, and now it is I who am left to believe it alone—I and to some degree my grandfather and Sitamon. All else has gone back to jealous Amon.
Yet even so there was no need to do what Horemheb has done. Tutankhamon and I were not going to overturn the kingdom again. We planned nothing violent, we, too, wanted only love. We did not even wish to turn again upon Amon, though Amon, we knew, was always ready to turn upon us. We simply wanted all the gods to live, like all our people, in love and harmony. We wanted to favor the Aten, as we intended to do in the mortuary temple which would be his symbol. Yet even there, particularly there, we would have given all other gods, including Amon, a rightful and worthy place.
Now it is not to be: Aye does not think it wise to proceed with the project at this time and I agree with him. Perhaps later, he says, and I think later I will hold him to it. But right now all energies and effort must be devoted to digging Tutankhamon’s tomb in the Valley of the Kings. He had not ordered work begun on it himself, because he wished to construct a single huge family tomb in which all of us, my father and mother, the Great Wife, Beketaten, Smenkhkara, Merytaten, Meketaten, our other sisters, ourselves and all, might be gathered together to lie in one place. Thus Tutankhamon did not order his own individual tomb, and so now his friend Maya (who supervises the necropolis as his father Pani did before him), the sculptor Tuthmose and our good cousin Nakht-Min are supervising the crew that is working frantically night and day to dig his sepulcher. It will be hurried and cramped and small, but in it he will be buried with full honors and with all the riches of funerary furniture, jewels and equipment that befit a Good God. Because that is what he was, my earnest young uncle and husband, whom I came to love and whom my bad cousin has taken from me: he was a
Good
God, and he would have been a great one had he lived. But it was not to be.…
Meanwhile, loyal Amonemhet hurries on his way to Suppiluliumas, and in Sitamon’s palace in Malkata I await his word. May the Aten grant him safe passage and a quick return.
The days pass slowly for me, but they pass. I am determined to do this thing and when I have, though I have husband, it will be I, Ankhesenamon, who truly rules the Two Lands. Then will there come finally to Kemet the love and peace and goodness that my father, my mother and my husband all failed to bring about.
Tradition—superstition—jealous gods—the ambitions of others—all defeated them.
I am determined they will not defeat Ankhesenamon, last direct descendant of the Eighteenth Dynasty, last member of the House of Thebes.
***
Suppiluliumas
I do not know what I have here. They appear to be two brave, if frightened, peasants; yet in the papyrus which I hold in my hand as they stand trembling before me I find that Her Majesty the Queen of Kemet (if so strange and unheard-of a document can indeed come from her, which I doubt—and yet who could forge such a thing, and for what reason?) refers to the older, obviously the father, as “the Lord Hanis.” What does this mean? Is he in disguise as a peasant? Is he really one of her nobility, sent on mission to me? What does it mean? And why to me, who am at this very moment ravaging the borders of her collapsing empire and raiding deep into her territory? We are at war with one another, does she not know that? Can it be she has sent him and his son to sue for peace? And what of her husband Biphuria, whom they, I believe, call Tutankhamon? Does he know of this? Is it done with his knowledge, or is she appealing to me behind his back? Would she dare such treason? What use can I make of this to gain my own advantage? It is all very puzzling to me.
I peer down from my throne upon “the Lord Hanis,” who stops trembling and straightens proudly beneath my glance; still obviously frightened, but brave, as I said: brave.
“You are the Lord Hanis?” I inquire in a mild tone of voice, for I do not wish to harm my chances of getting to the bottom of this by disturbing him even more.
“I am?” he responds blankly; and then, as his son nudges him sharply in the ribs, repeats hastily, “I am! Yes, Your Majesty, I
am
!
Bringing to you the greetings of Her Majesty Ankhesenamon, Queen and Lord of the Two Lands, as you see, may it please Your Majesty.”
“Oh, it pleases me,” I agree, exchanging a wry glance with
my
son Mursil, who stands at my right hand, vainly trying to conceal his baffled amusement at this strange scene. “Welcome to the land of the Hittites, O Lord Hanis.”
“It is my pleasure,” he says loftily, “to be here. Particularly,” he adds, “on the business of Her Majesty. Poor girl!”
“‘Poor girl’?” I echo sharply. “Why ‘poor girl’?”
“You have not heard then,” he says, suddenly cautious; and then, shrewdly (I still think he is a peasant, but no matter: I will play the game until I find out its meaning), “Perhaps it is in Her Majesty’s letter.”
“Perhaps it is,” I agree, “but it is not in this one you have given me. This one says only that you are the Lord Hanis and his body servant”—at this “Lord Hanis” gives his son a superior glance and his son grins cheerfully and not, I am afraid, too respectfully, at his lordship—“and that I am to welcome you as though you were Her Majesty herself and receive from you her message. Why does this not come from His Majesty Biphuria? Do you carry another letter for me?”
“Perhaps,” said “Lord Hanis,” and I say—suddenly stern, for I do not want him to think he is too clever—“Do not joke with me, Lord, or I shall have thy flesh served me on a platter, which you know we do here in the land of the Hittites.”
(Of course any civilized man knows we do no such thing, but it has helped us militarily a good deal to spread such rumors. I can see “Lord Hanis” and his body servant have heard them, for both he and his son turn suddenly pale and very quiet.)
“Come now,” I say more reasonably. “I have no intention of eating
you,
good Lord Hanis, or your son either. But if Her Majesty has sent me another letter, give it me at once. I still do not understand why it comes from her and not from His Majesty Biphuria.”
“His Majesty is dead,” “Lord Hanis” says, and suddenly his eyes fill with tears and he is quite genuinely overcome. I could wish I had a few subjects who loved me as he obviously loved Biphuria. “He has been foully murdered, and that is why I come to you from Her Majesty, I believe.”
“You ‘believe,’” I say sharply. “Has Her Majesty not told you?”
“Her Majesty,” he says grandly, recovering a bit through his tears, “does not tell me
everything.
”
Now I know he is a peasant, but the knowledge, I must say, gives me a sudden respect for Her Majesty’s cleverness. Apparently there is some desperate urgency about this message of hers, and who better to entrust it to than two peasants who can pass unseen through the millions that fill the world?
“Well, come, come,” I say. “Give me her other letter, now. I would read it and try to untangle this mystery for myself.”
He hesitates, although I am sure he has orders to hand it to me.
“Give it to His Majesty, Father!” his son says sharply; and with a strange reluctance, almost as though he were afraid of its contents, although of course he really has no idea what they are, he draws from beneath his rags a second papyrus. This one is tied with a ribbon of gold, and upon it in wax a royal seal, which I take to be Her Majesty’s, for beneath it there is also stamped in small, as though from a signet ring, the cartouche of Biphuria.
“How do I know this really comes from Her Majesty?” I ask, and again from beneath his rags my strange “Lord Hanis” takes a leather thong on which hangs a small leather bag and a ring.
“See?” he says, holding the ring next the cartouche of Biphuria. “Are they not the same?”
Mursil and I inspect them carefully. I nod.
“Hide His Majesty’s ring again, my lord,” I advise. “We
do
have robbers here … Well then, let me see what it says.”
And while my lord, his son and Mursil all watch me closely I untie the ribbon of gold, break the wax seals, open Her Majesty’s letter, start to read—and, with a startled gasp that makes them jump, almost drop it in amazement.
Never have I heard of such a thing! Never have I dreamed it possible! It is impossible! I do not believe it! Yet here it is, I give you my word as King of the Hittites, sixty years old and aware that the world is full of wonders, but by all the gods I know of anywhere, not full of
this
kind of wonder. It is absolutely unbelievable. Yet here it is:
“Her Majesty Ankhesenamon, Queen and Lord of the Two Lands, to His Majesty Suppiluliumas of the Hittites, greetings. May all go well with you, may all be well in your house and in your country. May we live in peace hereafter.
“I say to you this, O King of the Hittites:
“My husband Tutankhamon, whom you know as Biphuria, has been slain in a terrible way by those he trusted. All the land of Kemet grieves for him. I, his widow, grieve for him. Yet I must act, O mighty King, for you know who I am and the blood I bear. I carry the blood of the Living Horus, eternal and sacred in the eyes of Ra—”
(Sometimes their pretensions in the land of Kemet amuse the rest of us; but there it is. What does this strange girl want of me? I learn soon enough, and this is when I gasp.)
“—and in me there lies the right to the Double Crown. Lo, at this moment while my husband whom you call Biphuria lies dead, I am myself the Living Horus, for no other rules now in the land of Kemet save myself.
“I am, however, but a young woman, surrounded by few friends and many enemies. Though I could continue to rule alone, yet my heart does not desire it and my enemies would seek to deny it to me. I needs must have a husband to share with me my power. That is why I write you, O King of the Hittites. This is what I ask of you:
“My husband is dead and I have no son. People say that you have many sons. If you send me one of your sons he will become my husband, for it is repugnant to me to take one of my subjects to husband.
“Thus will your son be King and Pharaoh of Kemet at my side, O Suppiluliumas. Thus will one of your House be given an honor never before conferred upon one who was not of the land of Kemet. Thus will our two kingdoms be united so that we may live in peace together forever and ever, for millions and millions of years!
“Thus do I beseech thee, mighty King of the Hittites! Send me one of your sons that I may marry him and have his help in the rule of Kemet. Heed me speedily, for Biphuria will be buried soon and on that day I must have husband to rule with me as King and Pharaoh.
“Great will be the happiness in my heart, and great the happiness between our two countries, if you accept my offer of the Double Crown, O mighty King! You know such a thing has never been done before. You know I do not lie.”
But that, I think as I finish reading and slowly roll up the papyrus again, tapping it thoughtfully against my palm as I muse, is exactly what I do not know. I still cannot grasp it. It is unbelievable.
“Mursil,” I say finally, “take my Lord Hanis and his son to your private quarters, dine them and wine them well. Let them sleep fully overnight until they wish to rise, for I can see they are weary from their long journey. Then tomorrow escort them yourself to our borders and let them return to Her Majesty with word that I am considering her request.”
“You do not accept it, then, Majesty?” my Lord Hanis inquires hesitantly, and I shake my head.
“Not yet,” I say, “but tell Her Majesty I do not reject it either. Tell her I must think about it for a time. But tell her I shall act quickly when I do.”
“But—” he says, face crestfallen, voice openly disappointed. His son tugs at his arm.
“We do not know the message, Father,” he says. “Perhaps His Majesty needs time to think about it.”
“His Majesty,” I say dryly, “would not say he needs time if he does not need time. You have a bright lad there, my Lord Hanis. I am sure he is of great help to you in your village.”
“Yes, Your Majesty,” he says, his eyes humble as he acknowledges my perception of his true calling, but proud also in his son, which I like because I have many sons, and they are all fine lads and a great help to me, as his to him. “He
is
a bright lad, and we thank you for your patience with us in receiving the word of Her Majesty.”
“Go, then, and rest well,” I say, “and tomorrow begin your return to the Queen. Tell her as I say: I shall think and then I shall act. She will receive further word from me.”
After Mursil has taken them away I sit for a long time, musing. Then I clap my hands and order the servant who comes to gather before me at once the great ones who form the council of my kingdom.
To them I read Her Majesty’s letter. Their amazement is like to the heehawing of sixteen donkeys at feeding time.
“Since the most ancient times,” I remind them, “such a thing has never happened before.”
They nod and agree and babble on in noisy amazement. None, however, dares give me advice until, as usual, I myself decide what to do.
To my chamberlain, Hattu-Zittish, I say:
“Go to the land of Kemet, bring me information worthy of belief. They may try to deceive me. And as to the possibility that they may have a prince in spite of what she says, bring me back information worthy of belief.”
And then I tell my generals that I will lead a campaign against Kemet’s city of Karkemish in Palestine. My spies inform me it is ill defended and I know I can conquer it easily. I shall keep the war going for a while as I probe Her Majesty’s words, just in case it is all some kind of trick designed to lull me to sleep.
***