The Sekhmet Bed (18 page)

She struggled to make sense of his words through the haze of her confusion. “Then…you will not make Mutnofret’s child your heir?”

“
None of us knows what the gods intend. Not even you, I think – not all the time. I hope the child will be healthy, but babies die. Or it could be a daughter. I can marry Mutnofret’s daughter to your son some day. To our son.”

This news, that Tut intended only a child of Ahmose’s body to be his heir, should have filled her with happiness. Instead, her heart broke for Mutnofret. For all her deceptions, for all her mean spirit, Nofret was her sister. And she, Ahmose, had already taken Nofret’s throne. Now, through none of her own choosing, she would take away her sister’s right to birth Egypt’s heir, too. “I can’t do this to Mutnofret, Tut. Don’t ask me to do this.”

He reached across the space between them. Moving in spite of her doubts, responding like an animal to its master, she reached, too, and his hands grasped hers. “It’s the will of the gods, Ahmoset. We do as they direct us, don’t we?”

She nodded. She wanted to shake her head, but she nodded.

“
I promise you, I will only do as the gods bid. If they change their minds…if I’ve interpreted my dream wrong, and Mutnofret is to be the mother of my heir after all…I will do as they direct me.”

“
Name her child heir, Thutmose. You must.”

“
This is why I need you, Ahmose. I need you to tell me what the gods want. You’re closer to them than I. You can help me see their will.”

“
Name her child heir.”

“
Is that what the gods tell you?”

She licked her lips. She could say nothing.

“
That’s what I thought,” he said. “We’ll wait for a sign from the gods, shall we? There is no rush for me to name an heir. I am still young and strong enough that we need not fear. We’ll wait, you and I, until we know for sure. Until then, it doesn’t hurt for Mutnofret to believe what she will.”

If Tut was right, and the gods would demand a son of Ahmose’s body, then allowing Mutnofret to believe a lie would only cause her more pain in the end. But it was easier, here and now, to let the sleeping lioness rest.

“
But the rest of them, Tut. The nobles, the priests. The rekhet. They don’t need me by your side. Once they know you can protect Egypt on your own…”

“
Then they’ll know I’m their Pharaoh in truth. My word will be law. My queen will be who I say she is.”

He still didn’t understand, for all his protestations. A country was not an army. There was no absolute ruler. The currents of politics were more subtle, more strong and swift than those he was used to navigating. For that reason alone, he
did
still need her. For now, at any rate. Because she could see where the king was blind.

She nodded, and squeezed his hands.

He smiled a dog’s smile. “So, about making that son.”

She laughed, despite the tangle of emotions, the pressure in her stomach. “I really do need to pray about your dream, Tut.”

“
You should pray, then,” he said, and helped her to her feet. He tilted her chin up and up until her throat was tight, and his breath fell on her cheek, and his lips were on hers. She let his tongue into her mouth, pressed her mouth hard against his.
I can feel his teeth
, she thought, giddy, afire; then the pavilion curtain swung and she was alone again, with the hum of insect voices and the distant susurrus of the river making music with her pounding heart.

FIFTEEN

Mother of the Pharaoh.

The voice was rich, black. Ahmose saw nothing but a river of stars.

Mother of the Pharaoh, why do you weep?

She reached out her arms, as she had as a child. Comfort was what she wanted. Reassurance, her nurse’s embrace, a sweet cake to soothe her. Her face prickled with the salt of her tears.

Mother of the Pharaoh, rise up. Come to me.

She was lying on her back, she now realized, looking at the sky; the thick band of celestial light arced over her. Her hands were stretched toward it, a child’s plea for help. Shaking, crying, she stood.

This was nowhere she knew. There was no hint of a city, no trace of men or women. Yet this was Egypt. The soil beneath her bare toes was as black as char, and it vibrated with life. Each step she took stirred up the scent of crushed herbs, wet stone, barley fields after the harvest. Somewhere before her in the black night, the river breathed, a living ka. Beyond it, giving up their heat to the night, the red hills of the desert crouched in torpor.

The voice drew her on.

Mother of the Pharaoh, lady of sorrow, bringer of the high waters.

Her feet sank into mud. She kept walking, pulling the hem of her dress high, then dropping it again as the mud became too deep and heavy to walk through easily. Her arms waved, her body tipped; each foot came free from the hot, black earth with a sucking sound and she plunged her feet back in again. Ankles, calves, knees, caked and wet. Dress stained. She didn’t care. The voice.

Now the mud was thinner, cooler; now it moved so lightly against her skin. The clinging mud washed from her legs. Her dress floated on the water’s surface. Still she pushed forward, until the current tugged at her and she wavered against it. The water’s chill surrounded her thighs, pierced the place between her legs. She gasped.

A figure stood upon the surface of the river, facing away, gazing out toward the red cliffs that marked the boundary of the Black Land. Its hips were wide and curved like the ribs of a harp. Where its feet touched water, the stars’ reflections split and ran, sailing downstream, a hundred thousand barges voyaging. It stood upon a river of light.

The figure turned, perfect face looking down on the creature trembling in the river. Vultures’ wings cradled an infant that glowed like the sun.

Mut.

You would know your fate. You have already spoken it. Weeping child, do you never listen?

Mut’s obsidian eyes closed, a slow, deliberate blink. When they opened, they were as blue as the midday sky.
You will bear no sons, Mother of the Pharaoh.

The goddess took one perfect step toward her, another, another. The stars beneath the divine feet pooled and scurried away with the river’s flow, as if Mut’s brightness shamed them. With each step the goddess took he poor beast in the river sagged lower with the weight of awe, the beautiful burden of worship. Ahmose would have slipped under the water’s surface and drifted away like a star, but the water held her up.

The goddess bent and placed the child of light in her arms. The creature of the river, this lowly thing, transfixed by glory, held the golden babe close. She looked into its face. In its eyes were all the floods, all the emergences, all the peace, all the war, all the people of Egypt crying out in sadness and in joy. Its right eye was righteousness, its left, salvation. Its lungs breathed the sweet breath of life. Its tiny fat hand flexed, formed a fist. The river roared, roared in Ahmose’s ears, roared its tribute. The child opened its mouth, and its voice was the river’s voice.

***

The cold woke Ahmose. Her antechamber floor was bitter-cold, and the cold had crawled inside her. She was cramped. Her mouth was dry. Her face pressed against the floor. She was crumpled in a heap, legs curled, breasts pressed hard against the tiles. The bottom of her ribs felt bruised; they had dug into the hard floor. With shaky arms, she raised herself. Her legs tingled as blood flowed back into them.

She must have exhausted herself. She’d prayed so fervently for a reading of Tut’s dream that she’d worn herself out and fallen forward onto the great emblem of Mut worked into the antechamber floor. Her god statues stood mute, looking down on her from the table where she’d enshrined them. Nearby, her offering brazier was dark. Greasy ash coated its inner surface. The faintest smell of blackened meat still hung about her room.

Ahmose had no idea how long she’d lain on the floor. Her body was all knots and aches. The tingling in her legs made her totter painfully all the way into her bed chamber, where the barred wall let in dawn’s pink light. She threw herself onto her bed without undressing, but a more restful sleep would not come.

Massaging the pains out of her arms and legs, Ahmose considered Mut’s message. Looking on the goddess’s face had been more than she could bear. Even now, in the waking world, safe in her bed, she felt as though her body would break from the impossible, sweet, terrible strain of it. She squeezed her eyes shut. She could push away the image of the goddess, but not the child.

There was no answer here, only more questions. She could not be the mother of the Pharaoh if she would bear no sons. Yet Mut could not lie. What was the riddle here? Would some ill fate befall Mutnofret, so that Ahmose must raise her sister’s child as her own? That seemed most likely, most apt to fit Mut’s words. And Tut’s dream – who knew? He could have been mistaken about the identity of the dream-mother. It could well be Mutnofret he saw, in spite of his insisting it was Ahmose. Mutnofret was far more beautiful, but the sisters shared a certain harmony of features. In the dream world, they might be mistaken for one another. Tut could be wrong. One who was not god-chosen could not always trust his own interpretation of a dream.

Lady of sorrow, she called me.
That filled her with a stab of fear. If something befell Mutnofret…she would indeed mourn, yes. Mutnofret was her sister, after all. She had once been Ahmose’s friend. Even now, after all their rivalries, to lose her would be the greatest sadness Ahmose could imagine.

Was this the answer, then? Would Ahmose become mother of the Pharaoh when the heir’s true mother died? No; that was not clear. Her god-dreams were always as clear as a mirror’s reflection. This one was still a haze. She could discern no meaning at all.

It is not time to make my move. Not yet. But I mustn’t stop preparations, either. Ineni must be allowed to continue. Until I know for certain what the goddess meant, I must keep on as I’ve planned
. Mutnofret could be hiding any trick at all under her wig, and Ahmose must not be made to look foolish again.

Suddenly restless despite her aches, Ahmose levered herself up out of bed and shook the weakness out of her legs. It was still too early for many servants to be about. Her own women would still be abed. She wandered out of her hall, hesitating at the foot of the roof-stairs. But no – it was not her pavilion she wanted this morning. She crossed the courtyard and entered the palace proper, wending through corridors only dimly lit by morning glow. Columns reached above her. Servants rustled in the shadows.

The rear door to the throne room was ajar. She crept up on it, peered into the heavy shadows of the great hall. Her eyes took a long time to adjust.

From her vantage, to the side of the dais at the room’s head, she could just make out the two gilded thrones and the dim suggestion of the crook and flail standing in their supports.

Mutnofret sat on the throne of the Great Royal Wife, shrouded in shadows. Her form became truer as the darkness receded. Back straight, chin tipped high, Nofret stared out across the empty room. Her eyes were lit with a distant fire, as though her ka saw a hundred thousand subjects kneeling before her. She raised a hand, graceful and strong as a leopard, pronouncing judgment upon nothing.

Quietly, Ahmose backed away from the door. Her heart turned to a sharp blade. She could be the passive younger sister no more. Soon, she must put her hand on Mutnofret’s shoulder, and her grip must be unbreakable.

SIXTEEN

Your mother’s time to depart grows near. Her breathing has become ever more difficult. I fear she will not live another month.

Ahmose read Nefertari’s letter with regret. Meritamun had been a great queen, if a distant mother. Her death would be a loss to Egypt. And poor Nefertari – she would outlive every one of her children, it seemed.