Sphinx's Princess (3 page)

“Well,
that
was quick,” the servant remarked. “You’re good.”

The young midwife spread her slender hands. “The gods be thanked, not me. The child is healthy and the mother is well.” Then she turned to me. “You must be the young mistress. Your mama wants you to come back inside.”

Mery was lying on her side in bed, nursing the newborn. She smiled warmly when she saw me. “Come and meet your sister, Mutnodjmet,” she said. She’d named the baby Mut-is-the-sweet-one, but I didn’t see anything particularly sweet about the red, wrinkled little person in Mery’s arms. After only a glance, I decided she was boring and became much more interested in two big bricks left on the floor near Mery’s bed. They were too heavy for me to pick up, so I squatted low and stared closely at the pictures carved on them.

“What are these?” I asked.

“Birthing bricks,” the older midwife replied as she and her colleague went about the task of tidying the room. “Your mama crouched on them when it was time for your sister to be born. It’s all right, you can touch them. I doubt you’ll break them.” She grinned, showing badly worn-down teeth. “Or their magic.”

“Magic?” With one fingertip, I traced the images of a parade of carved and painted goddesses. I recognized some of them—Hathor with her cow’s ears and horns, and of course Isis, but I was still too young to know all of the great divinities on sight. “Who’s this? She looks like a frog. And this one? She’s got a hippo’s head!”

“Ah, the first is Heket, who protects women in childbirth, and the second, that’s Taweret. Very few creatures are fiercer, more protective mothers than hippos. You must never go near them, young mistress.”

“I know
that
,” I said stiffly. “I’m not a baby.” I cast a look back to where Mery was cradling my new sister and felt a pang of envy.
Now that
she’s
here, will Mery still love me?

“Of course you’re no baby, young mistress.” The younger midwife was done with her chores, so she knelt beside me and pointed to a very strange image, a brick with the head of a woman. “See this? This is Meskhenet, goddess of the birthing bricks themselves. All of them had the power to keep demons at bay, shielding mothers in childbirth and their babies.”

I dared to trace the outline of Taweret, with her strong arms, bulging belly, and crowned hippo’s head. “Are they good at it?” I asked.

“What a question, young mistress!” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the young midwife clutch the amulet around her neck. “They are gods!”

Then why did my mother die when I was born?
I wondered. But I didn’t ask that out loud. I knew better. It was a very great sin to question the gods. It could bring horrible misfortune crashing down on your head in this life and condemn your heart to being devoured by a monster after you died. I loved Isis because she was beautiful, and the stories Mery told me about her proved she was also brave and clever—everything I wanted to be and feared I never would—but the other gods made me uneasy. Every morning
when I stood with Father and Mery to offer up our family prayers, I felt as if I were giving honey cakes to a gang of bullies, hoping they would accept the bribe and leave me alone.

“Nefertiti, sit with me, please.” Mery patted a place beside her and the baby. I clambered onto the bed, happy to be near her and to feel her fingers twirling my lone lock of hair the way she always did. “You are a very lucky girl, do you know that?” she said. “The gods favor you. They
gave you
the gift of meeting little Mutnodjmet even before your father does.”

That was true. Father had left the house even before breakfast, because he had some unknown, grown-up business to discuss with the chief priest of Amun’s temple. Still, I had to ask: “Why is
that
a gift? What can I do with it?”

“It’s a good gift because it gives
you
a great power over your sister: the power to give her a name.”

“She
has
a name!” I protested. “You gave it to her.”

“Yes, but I don’t want everyone calling her by that name. Names are magic. When Isis used her wits to learn the secret name of Ra, the almighty sun-god, she became as great as he! You and I need to protect this baby until she’s old enough and strong enough to carry the name I gave her. Until then, she needs to be called something else, to keep her safe from evil spirits who could harm her if they knew her true name.” Mery let go of my youth-lock and stroked my cheek. “Will you do this for my baby? Will you give her a good name?”

So that was how I became the one to call my sister
Bit-Bit, which means a double helping of honey. When Father came home from the temple and heard the name I’d chosen, he praised me. “Mut-is-the-sweet-one and honey is the sweetest thing I know. You’re a very clever girl, my little kitten.”

I shrugged. “I just like honey. Besides, she’s too puny to have a big name.”

“
That
will change,” he replied. “Meanwhile, so you’ll like your sister as much as you like honey, I’m going to give you a double portion of the best honey under this roof, right now. Does that please you?”

I nodded vigorously. “I’m glad I didn’t name her Penu,” I said. (And I almost
had
named her Mouse because she was so small.) “Even if you call me Kitten all the time, I’d never want to eat
that
.”

The days passed and Bit-Bit grew quickly. She was a sweet-tempered baby, even when her teeth began to come in. Every time I was allowed to hold her, she smiled at me and patted my face with her tiny, chubby hands. Soon I was begging Mery to let me take care of her every day, and though it got harder and harder for me to carry her as she grew, I refused to give up the right to take my baby sister everywhere. My playmates saw less and less of me. When Mery finally insisted I spend time with someone besides Bit-Bit, they snubbed me because I’d ignored them for so long. I didn’t care. I still had Bit-Bit.

One day, when Bit-Bit was old enough to walk and could even run a little, we were playing on a shaded bench in the covered walkway that faced the garden. It was the
hottest part of the day, when the sun-god Ra blazed most fiercely.

“I’d better rub some oil on your skin, Bit-Bit,” I told her. “Otherwise you’ll dry up and blow away.” But when I came back from the kitchen with the olive oil, Bit-Bit was hiding under the bench, and when I tried to put the oil on her, she squirmed out of my slippery grasp and took off. One of the servants must have left the garden gate unlatched, because before I knew what was happening, she’d pushed it open and was toddling swiftly down the street outside our house.

I raced after her. It was easy enough for me to catch up to her, running along on her plump little legs, but the instant before I could snatch her up, I heard her let out a horrible yowl. She sat down hard on her bare bottom, arms and legs flailing, and her cries rose to a shrill shriek of terror.

“Bit-Bit, what’s the matter?” I cried, throwing my arms around my sister. Then I saw it.

It was a small insect, golden brown from the tips of its two clawed forefeet to the barbed end of the segmented tail arched above its back. My breath caught in my throat as I watched it scuttle away: My precious baby sister had been stung by a scorpion!

“O gods, have mercy,” I whispered, kneeling in the dirt and holding Bit-Bit so close to my chest that I was almost crushing her. She howled louder, tears carving tiny rivers through the smudges on her cheeks, and fought me, but I held her in an embrace made strong by panic. A scorpion! I remembered Mery telling me the tale of how even great Isis
had been powerless to shield her son, the child-god Horus, from the life-threatening sting of those venomous creatures, but I’d fallen asleep before she finished. If Isis was so helpless, what could I do?

I began screaming for help, but the street was deserted. The noontime heat was hammering the life out of the land. People were inside their homes, waiting for Ra’s sun-ship to sail westward, bringing back the cool refuge of shadows. The house walls facing the street were thick and had no windows, so no one could hear me, no matter how loudly I yelled. I might as well have shrieked into a tomb.

“Merciful Hathor, what’s the matter with you children?”

I looked up and saw the most remarkable person. He was tiny, no taller than me, with a perfectly round head on top of a perfectly round body that balanced on a pair of thick legs. I was surprised to see that he wore a fine white linen kilt and sandals adorned with sparkling jewels. Because he was so small, I expected him to go around completely unclothed, the way all of us children did. He carried a big palm frond over his head to keep off the sun, and his kohl-rimmed eyes were filled with concern.

“Help us! Please, help us!” I cried, getting a closer grip on my sister, who flailed her feet and bellowed like a whole herd of cows. With tears and snot running down my face, I told the stranger everything that had happened. His wide mouth fell open in alarm.

“A scorpion?” he said. He flung his little body down in the dust beside us and stared closely at Bit-Bit. “What color was it?”

Why does
that
matter?
I thought, but I answered, “Brown.”

“Mmm-hm. And where did it sting her?”

“I—I don’t know,” I said. “Her foot?”

“Let me look.” His strong, square hands reached for my sister’s feet.

Bit-Bit kicked him right in the chin.

He sprawled backward, his short legs paddling the air like a topsy-turvy beetle. The sight took Bit-Bit by so much surprise that she stopped hollering and began to giggle.

“Well,
there’s
a fine thing,” the little man said to me, shaking his oversized head with mock annoyance as he sat up. “Some magician’s obviously pulled a trick on you, young lady. He’s stolen your real sister and put an enchanted donkey in her place. I’ve half a mind to let the scorpion take her.”

“Oh, please don’t!” I cried, reaching across Bit-Bit to grab his arm. “This really is my sister. Don’t let her die! Mery will be heartbroken.”

“Mery?” The little man’s brow creased with surprise. “Mery the wife of Ay? You’re
their
daughters?” He glanced at our house, baking in the sun, and sniffed. “True, this is the place. How long it’s been …” All at once, he looked at me so intently that it was frightening. “Ah, yes. I see it now. I would know that face anywhere. You’re Nefertiti, aren’t you?”

All I could do was nod. My lips were dry, and not just from the heat. How could he talk about knowing my face when we’d never met before? My head swam with memories of something I’d seen near Min’s temple the previous
year, when the priests hired workmen to add a magnificent new building to the god’s shrine. The first thing the laborers did was set up a stone carved with an image that looked almost exactly like the little man before me, except the carved dwarf had hair and whiskers like a lion’s mane and looked ready to fight. When I asked Mery, she told me it was the god Bes.
Always show him honor
, she told me.
He may be small, but he’s a fierce fighter and especially devoted to protecting children
.

Bes!
I thought.
It’s the god himself, come to save Bit-Bit. And she
kicked
him!
My tears flowed freely as I finally found my voice and exclaimed, “Oh please, don’t be mad at her! She’s only a baby!”

“Of course, of course!” He clapped his hands and winked at Bit-Bit. “So, little donkey, will you let me save your worthless life? Or are you going to kick me again?”

Bit-Bit laughed and began clapping her hands, too. When he crouched in front of us and studied her feet—from a safe distance, this time—she sat docilely in my lap in the middle of the sun-drenched street until he was done.

At last he slapped his broad thighs and looked satisfied. “Just as I suspected. Dry your eyes, Nefertiti—and wipe your nose while you’re at it—the time for tears is over. I know
precisely
the spell to drive the scorpion venom from this child’s body. Moreover, it will leave her skin unmarked by even the smallest scar from the creature’s deadly stinger.” With that, he began to mutter in a singsong voice, all the while tracing line after line of pictures in the dirt between us. Bit-Bit squealed with delight but didn’t squirm. As for
me, I watched in fascination as the god performed his magic.

When he was done, he grinned at me and said, “Casting spells is thirsty work, especially at this time of day. Do you think I’ve earned a drink for my pains?”

In answer, I threw my arms around the god’s neck, thanking him, praising him, and promising him every drop of beer that was in the house. Scrambling to my feet, I lifted Bit-Bit onto my hip, grabbed the god’s hairy wrist, and dragged him with us around the corner and into the cool shelter of our home.

Once inside, I set Bit-Bit down gently and began shouting for someone to bring food and drink. I made so much racket that it fetched nearly every slave and servant under our roof. The four slaves didn’t have much choice, but the servants weren’t used to having a child give them orders. They glared at me, though as soon as their eyes lit on our guest, their scowls became gracious smiles of welcome. Obviously they, too, recognized a god when they saw one.

They were just beginning to bring in baskets of bread and fruit and a big clay beer jug when the room rang out with the sound of Father’s voice demanding, “What’s going on here?”

I rushed forward to tell him everything. Bit-Bit stayed where she was, happily bouncing on the god’s plump knee while he shared the glittering, juicy red seeds of a cut pomegranate with her. I was so overwhelmed by what
might
have happened to my sister, if not for Bes’s miraculous appearance, that I began crying all over again. Father picked me up to comfort me, then regarded our guest.

“So, you’re a god now, are you?” he said lightly. “Does Pharaoh know?”

The dwarf spread his thick hands, casting all blame to the winds. “My lord Pharaoh declared himself to be a god, the earthly child of Ra himself. I, on the other hand, was named a god by a young woman whose beauty equals Isis’s own! Tell me, Ay, who’s the higher authority here, Pharaoh or Isis?”