“It will suffice,” Imer said. Her hands paused, clutched together at her breast, her face turned up to the broad white spray of stars as though she heard, after all, a voice speaking beyond the reach of Hatshepsut's own ears. “And remember the Mistress of the West, the Sovereign of Stars. If she asks any gift of you, you must not deny it, God's Wife.”
The impossible breadth of the sky spread above her, and seemed to thrust at her body, to force her back to her knees, her forehead to the stones. Somehow Hatshepsut remained standing, though she swayed with the effort. She could not think what else any goddess could desire. Hathor was all but a stranger to her, but potent and present, here at the pinnacle of her own temple. She did not know how to appease the goddess's jealous desires. She wished for the presence of Amun. She knew, at least, what that god required of her: lead the chants, approve his offerings, caress him, bathe him, anoint him. She sensed that Hathor required something darker, something stranger, something infinitely more precious than anything Amun had ever demanded.
“I will deny her nothing,” Hatshepsut promised. “Nothing.”
“Good. Imer will take you back now. Go in peace.”
It was only as she rode back toward Iunet, clutching the rail of the governor's chariot, that Hatshepsut realized what had unsettled her so about the Temple of Hathor.
I spoke. I spoke, and somehow Imer understood my words – heard my words – although she hears nothing. She recalled how the priestess had turned her face toward the heavens, receiving Hathor's word – and Hatshepsut had been the one who was deaf, plunged in a dark, star-studded silence. She shuddered.
That night the tjati if Iunet feasted Hatshepsut in his modest palace, and offered her his finest room for her rest. Maids had prepared it with music and sweet oils burning in shining lamps, with fine-spun linen to cover her. Her women lay upon soft mats on the floor, and when the lamps burned out one by one, dying with a gentle hiss, the room filled with the sounds of their slumbering breath. Hatshepsut lay awake for a long time, staring into the impenetrable dark. Her thoughts were all of Imer beneath the stars, demanding that Hathor not be forgotten. The way the woman knew Hatshepsut's words even as she spoke them was a torment; she rolled continually on the governor's bed, and rest evaded her.
All too soon, though, she fumbled into a harsh, unwelcoming sleep. She dreamed of squatting upon the birthing bricks, the Seven Hathors gathered in a half-moon before her to tell the fate of her child. Their voices raised in a gabble from which she could draw no words, and at last she heard nothing but a rushing, as if plunged beneath swift-moving water, and the pounding of her heart in her own ears. The Hathors' mouths continued to move, to twist upon their own black prophecies. And she could hear nothing! She struggled on the bricks; from between her thighs there came the form of a she-cow with the sun disc glowing between her horns, so bright Hatshepsut shut her eyes in fright. When she opened them again, the cow-child had changed form, and stood before her lion-headed: Sekhmet, She Who Mauls. Hatshepsut screamed, a sound that tore at her throat but never reached her ears, and the Sekhmet child tore into her heart, drinking her blood, eating her kas until nothing was left of her. And when she had finished, she turned toward the solitary form that now advanced from the shadows: a man, long-faced and wise, his eyes downcast in shame. Senenmut. Hatshepsut tried to warn him, but the Sekhmet child leaped first, slashed his throat with her claws, lapped at his blood as it flowed upon the floor, a terrible satisfaction, a terrible grief in its eyes.
When dawn at last came, Hatshepsut was glad to board her ship and command the captain to cast off his lines. She left Iunet behind her with trembling relief.
CHAPTER TWENTY
“KA-KHEM! KA-KHEM SHORE ahead!” The voice of the man high in the ship's rigging fell upon the deck thin and distorted. Hatshepsut had been sipping beer in her cabin, her women gossiping at her side; when she heard the man's words she leaped to her feet and strode into the open air. It was mid-day. The sky was bright, a high watery haze refracting the sun into a glow that made her blink tears from her eyes. The man in the rigging came shimmying down the mast. He had a dark cloth tied about his face; a small slit allowed his eyes to peek out at the bright world.
The captain came forward and slapped the man on the back. “Good! We'll moor before the sun is halfway to the horizon.”
She sighed with relief. Adventure was more exhausting than she had imagined. She had slept in a different bed each night, and though the nobles and governors who hosted her were suitably gracious – even in the most rural of sepats – she suspected it was the unfamiliar beds which had allowed the dreams of Hathor and her strange priestesses to haunt her. She expected to stay in Ka-Khem for several days. The regular rest should do her some good.
As the afternoon progressed, the sepat of Ka-Khem appeared on the gray northern horizon. It was a blur of golden green distorted by the haze. As Biddable Mare drew closer, Hatshepsut could pick out the low, blocky forms of buildings and the individual plumes of smoke where farmers burned refuse in preparation for the sowing to come. Before long the scents of the shoreline – cattle dung and fish offal, the dry, harsh smell of caulking lime – came drifting over the water. Sounds, too, at last could be made out beyond the splash of water against the prow. Men laughed and shouted as they worked along the shore. Children sang their chanting games. Intermittent and faint, the high reedy call of a flute crested above the rest, a bird calling high in a far-off tree. She had reached her destination. Perhaps the hardest part was already done. In a few days Nebseny would be in her hand, and she would remain God's Wife, unchallenged.
The tjati and his family greeted her at the shoreline, as each governor had done at each sepat she had visited these two weeks past. This time, though, she sized Ankhhor up with a wary eye. He was as unassuming a man as Hatshepsut had ever seen. His face was thin and dry with age, but he looked sturdy enough despite his years, with an unbent back and a smoothness to his shoulders that spoke of a confident strength. His eyes were deep-set and calm, his mouth firm but not hard. He wore a fine, long kilt of the southern style, elaborately wrapped and pleated at the front: a subtle concession to courtly fashion, no doubt intended to emphasize his loyalty to the throne. His wife, the Lady Iah, wore the round-cut Nubian wig that was so stylish amongst Waset's well-to-do wives. After so many visits to so many districts, Hatshepsut was startled to see the fashions of her own city on display here in the far-flung north. Iah clasped her hands at her waist, smiling as she bowed. Hatshepsut could see where Iset had found her great beauty as well as her beguiling meekness. Age had not diminished Lady Iah's loveliness but had rather elevated it, matured the youthful brilliance into a banked, warming glow. Behind Ankhhor his younger children stood with heads bowed: two girls who would soon outgrow their braids and a boy, perhaps eight or ten, who despite his downcast eyes carried himself with the childish arrogance that only the heir of a great and confident man can know.
She made her usual request to worship at the local temple, but Ankhhor seemed distinctly unimpressed. “On second thought,” she said, “I am weary. Perhaps the gods will do me a kindness, and wait for me until the morning.”
Hatshepsut joined Ankhhor for supper in his home – a palace, by rights, as fine as any Waset nobleman's. It was an impressive feast, spiced with the sweet-earthy flavors of the north. Hatshepsut ate readily. Her enthusiasm for the food did seem to please the tjati. He handled his wine cup carefully, watching her with inscrutable eyes.
In his wife Hatshepsut detected the faintest air of hesitancy, almost embarrassment. There is your opening, she told herself. The Lady Iah is as kindly as her daughter. She is soft enough to feel shame over her husband's ambition. She is his weakness.
When their supper concluded, Hatshepsut invited Iah to bathe with her, and the momentary flash of anxiety on the woman's face gave her a feeling of great satisfaction. Such a request from the Great Royal Wife could not be refused, and within the hour Lady Iah was clapping for admittance to her own
chambers, which had been given over to the use of the Great Royal Wife for the duration of her visit to Ka-Khem. Ita and Tem, with the help of the tjati's servants, had prepared a steaming bath rich with the scent of crushed herbs. Hatshepsut held out her arms; her women undressed her. Iah's own women came forward, a bit hesitantly, to do the same. They stepped down together into Iah's recessed bath. Hatshepsut sank into the water with a grateful sigh.
“What a lovely home you have, Lady Iah.”
“The Great Royal Wife is kind to say so. My husband's home is nothing compared to your own palace, I am sure.”
Hatshepsut gazed up toward the windcatchers. Stars were beginning to emerge in the black sky. “This is a charming land. The lady Iset told me she could hear deby from the palace at night. Do you think I shall hear any this night?”
The water splashed a little as Iah shifted in sudden surprise. “You know my daughter, Great Lady?”
“Of course. A lovely girl, an excellent singer, and a very fine dancer. You taught her well.”
“The Great Lady is good to say it.”
“I spend much time talking to Iset. She tells me many things of her life here in Ka-Khem, of her family. I desired to see the place for myself, and to meet you.”
“We are humbled.” Despite the heat of the water and the perfume of the herbs, Iah's neck and shoulders were rigid.
“It must have been hard for you to let her go – to send her to the harem.”
“I miss my daughter every day, Great Lady, it is true. But I have my other girls to cheer me, and my son.”
“A daughter is a generous gift to the Pharaoh. And one as precious as Iset – it is plain that Ankhhor and Ka-Khem love Thutmose well.”
“We...we have ever been friends to your royal family, Great Lady. Ankhhor owes much to Thutmose the First.”
“Your husband is an ambitious man, yes?”
Iah hesitated. At last she said carefully, “I am lucky to be the wife of such a hard-working man, Great Lady. He puts the well-being of our family above all other concerns.”
“He will make a great name for himself before he goes the Field of Reeds; I can see that. Oh, the things he will be able to paint on the walls of his tomb! Husband and father to beautiful women, tjati of a prosperous sepat, brother of the High Priest of Amun. I wonder what else Ankhhor wishes to be remembered for.”
Iah's face went pale. She busied herself with cupped hands, pouring water over her shoulders, her eyes turned shyly away. She shifted, reaching for a jar of soft soap perfumed with lotus oil; Hatshepsut stifled a gasp at the sight of three or four dark bruises on Iah's back. They were old, turning a sick shade of yellow around the edges.
Distantly, a rough, coughing bark sounded through the wind catchers. It repeated several times.
“A deby, Great Lady.”
The sound recalled the sight of Iset's face, flushed, giggling over her wine. Hatshepsut smiled at the memory. “I will be sure to tell Lady Iset I heard her old friend singing.”
Iah sighed. “I do miss my daughter. Is she well, Great Lady? Only tell me that she is happy. I know nothing of harem life. In truth, it was not the life I would have chosen for her, and I worry every day for her happiness.”
“She has a very fine room in the House of Women, and she is surrounded by sisters. It is a good life, easy and beautiful. She wants for nothing.”
“And in the harem does she see the king? My questions are impertinent, Great Lady, I know. But ease a mother's heart, I beg you. Iset is my first-born, and the dearest to my heart. I only wish to know that my sacrifice was not in vain.”
“Would it warm your heart to know that she sees the king? That was the purpose, was it not, of sending her to Waset? Or was there some other reason Ankhhor wanted his daughter in Amun's city?” A look of panic flashed across Iah's face, and Hatshepsut laughed warmly to calm her. “Yes, Lady Iah. Iset sees the king. He is still young; he is not yet a man. But already he notes her beauty, and boasts of her sweetness to all who will listen. I have no doubt that she will be much favored by the Pharaoh when he grows into a man's appetites.” She paused, considering the bruises on Iah's back. “I will see that he always treats her gently,” she added, hoping her promise eased the lady's heart.
Hatshepsut stood, stepped from the basin, and held out her arms for her women to dry her. As they scraped the curved copper blade over her skin, flinging the water from her limbs to the bath's floor, she watched Iah rise from the bath to be similarly attended. There were more bruises on the woman's thighs, older and faint, but regular.
“I will retire to my bed now. It has been a long journey. Your company has been most pleasant, Lady Iah. I shall see you in the morning, yes?”
Long after Iah had bowed her way out of the bath, Hatshepsut lay awake in the lady's comfortable, roomy bed, listening to the deby argue in the dark marshes. Iah's words sounded again and again in her ears. It was not the life I would have chosen for her. The Pharaoh's harem was nearly the finest life any nobleman's wife could dream of for her favorite daughter. Nearly. Unless her ambitious husband had put other dreams into her heart. Unless his brother had dared to whisper of his designs for a new and docile God's Wife. Her thoughts raced a deep-rutted ring around her heart; her longing for Senenmut chased memories of Iset dancing, singing, laughing. Long after the deby had fallen silent and retreated to the depths of the river, the gods at last granted Hatshepsut the respite of sleep.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
SHE HAD SPENT TWO DAYS in Ka-Khem, touring the countryside, approving in the Pharaoh's name of the clean, orderly towns, the fertile fields, the herds of cattle which produced the sacred black bulls of the north. Whenever she tried to raise the topic of Iset, Ankhhor would deftly turn her inquiries aside, his face unreadably placid, his words perfectly measured to give neither offense nor a hint of his designs. Hatshepsut allowed herself to be entertained with her usual courtly grace, fixing her regal smile on her lips, while inside her kas wailed in despair. Ankhhor was both too clever and too dangerous. The bruises on Lady Iah's body were proof of the man's hot temper. She had no fear for her own person, but she hesitated to say anything that may later cause Ankhhor to turn his wrath upon his wife or children. She could find no way to breach the subject of his plans for Iset without throwing wine upon the fire.
On the final evening of her stay, she paced about Lady Iah's room, grinding her teeth, while her women scuttled about packing her chests.
Nehesi entered and bowed. The bright, clear scent of the waterfront drifted from his body; she longed for her ship, for an escape from the tension and frustration of Ka-Khem and the tjati's secrets. “Great Lady, the ship is ready to sail with the rising sun. I have seen to it.”
She waved a hand, a curt acceptance of his news.
“Er – Great Lady, if I may be so bold to ask, what troubles you?”
She stopped her pacing and stared at Nehesi. If only she were a man – a tall, strong, imposing man like her guardsman, with a belt full of knives! She would have no fear of putting Ankhhor in his place then. But she was a woman – no, still a girl, by rights. Fifteen years old and female, for all her titles of power. She was well beyond her depth, ridden in her sleep by disturbing visions, unrested, weak, young...and female. “Nehesi, I came here for a purpose, yet now I find myself unable to act.”
“What purpose, Great Lady?”
“Ankhhor sent his eldest daughter to Waset, not only as a gift for Pharaoh's harem, but to maneuver her into the position of God's Wife.”
Tem gasped. “No, Great Lady! The station is yours.”
“Of course it is mine. And it will stay mine.”
Nehesi nodded, considering. “Have you proof of his designs, Great Lady?”
“The priestesses of Amun have heard whispers that Nebseny, the High Priest, wishes to replace me with a woman more easily controlled. Who would be easier for him to handle than his own niece – a woman as reliant on Ankhhor as Nebseny is himself? I tell you, Nebseny and Ankhhor plo
t to unseat me. Nebseny works his way into Thutmose's favors, too. Once they have ousted me from my station at the temple it will be easy for Thutmose to set me aside as Great Royal Wife. I am barren – he would need no more excuse than that, and with Nebseny complicit, the Temple of Amun would be quick to approve it, however my priestesses may protest.”
Sitre-In clicked her tongue. “This is all too much of a tangle to be believed. You are seeing shadows.”
“No, I have pondered over this for weeks while we sailed north. I know it is true. Thutmose does not love me; he would give nearly anything to set me aside, but he cannot do it without the backing of the Temple. Iset is the perfect replacement: quiet, sweet, malleable, and raised from birth to fear Ankhhor, and do his will. It all comes back to that man – to Ankhhor!” She pounded her fists against her hips, furious and helpless.
“I believe you, Great Lady. I see it.” Nehesi edged close to her, talking low. “And why, Great Lady, can you not simply force Ankhhor to do your bidding? To back down, to withdraw his ambition?”
“I am a fifteen-year-old girl!” Her voice rose uncomfortably close to a shriek.
“You are the Great Royal Wife, the God's Wife of Amun. You are the daughter of Thutmose the First.”
She caught her breath, about to protest, but Nehesi went on, his words a smoky whisper.
“You are the one who took the knife to your own flesh to silence those who cried out against you.”
She slumped onto the bed in a misery. “That was the worst thing you could have said, Nehesi. What I did that day on the temple steps I did without thought, heedless of the effect I would have on Egypt. Senenmut would tell me, if he were here, that when I get myself into a passion it is like tossing wine onto a fire. I do more damage than good when I act so rashly. I must approach this carefully. I did not think Ankhhor would be so...unapproachable – implacable – dangerous to his family. I do not have the skill to talk my way into his heart and turn it. I am in far deeper water than I had ever thought to find.”
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