by Wilbur Smith
The cries of mourning for the dead pharaoh and the clamor of acclamation for his successor filled the hall.
In the uproar, Mintaka stared at the herald. Under the makeup she had turned chalky pale and her eyes needed no kohl to make them huge and tragic. The world seemed to turn dark around her, and she swayed on her stool. Although she had heard Nefer’s death being planned and plotted, she had convinced herself that it would not happen. She had made herself believe that, even without her warnings, Nefer, with Taita to help him, would somehow avoid the malignant web spun by Naja and Trok.
Trok was watching her with a sly, gloating smile, and she knew he was revelling in her pain. She did not care any longer. Nefer was gone and with him her will and her reason to resist and to go on living herself. She stood up from the throne and like a sleep-walker left the hall. She expected her husband to order her back, but he did not. In the general consternation and lamentation few of the other guests noticed her leave. Those who did were aware of her terrible sorrow. They recalled that she had once been betrothed to the dead pharaoh, and they forgave her this breach of decorum and protocol.
Mintaka stayed in her own chamber for three days and nights without eating. She drank only a little wine mixed with water. She ordered everyone to leave her, even her girls. She would see nobody, not even the physicians Trok sent to her.
On the fourth day she asked for the chief priestess of the temple of Hathor. They were alone together for the entire morning, and when the old woman left the palace she had covered her shaven head with her white shawl as a sign of mourning.
The next morning the priestess returned with two of her acolytes, who carried a large basket of woven palm fronds. They placed the basket in front of Mintaka, then covered their heads and withdrew.
The priestess knelt beside Mintaka and asked her quietly, “Are you certain that you wish to take the way of the goddess, my daughter?”
“There is nothing further for me to live for,” Mintaka said simply.
The priestess had tried for hours the previous day to dissuade her, but now she made one last attempt. “You are young still…”
Mintaka held up one slim hand. “Mother, I may not have lived many years, but in that short time I have experienced more pain than most encounter in all their long lives.”
The priestess bowed her head and said, “Let us pray to the goddess.” Mintaka closed her eyes as she went on, “Blessed lady, mighty cow of the sky, mistress of music and love, all-seeing, all-powerful, hear the prayers of your daughters who love you.”
Something in the basket in front of them moved and there was a faint susurration like the river breeze in the papyrus beds. Mintaka felt the coldness in her stomach, and knew that it was the first chill of death. She listened to the prayer, but her thoughts were with Nefer. She recalled vividly so much that they had shared together, and in her mind a picture of him appeared as though he still lived. She saw again his smile and the way he held his head so perfectly balanced on his strong, straight neck. She wondered what point he had reached on his dread journey through the netherworld, and she prayed for his safety. She prayed for him to reach the green hills of paradise, and that she should soon be reunited with him there. I shall follow you soon, my heart, she promised him.
“Your beloved daughter, Mintaka, the wife of the divine Pharaoh Trok Uruk, begs from you the favor you have promised to those who have suffered too much in this world. Allow her to meet your dark messenger, and through him to find peace in your bosom, mighty Hathor.”
The priestess ended her prayer and waited. The next step must be taken by Mintaka alone. Mintaka opened her eyes, and studied the basket as though seeing it for the first time. Slowly she reached out with both hands and lifted the lid. The interior of the basket was dark, but there was movement within, a heavy, languid coiling and uncoiling, a glinting of black upon black like oil spilled on water in a deep well.
Mintaka leaned forward to peer within, and slowly a scaled head rose to meet her. As it emerged into the light the hood distended until it was wide as a woman’s fan, patterned in black and ivory. The eyes were as shiny as glass beads. The thin lips were curved in a sardonic grin, and the feathery black tongue flickered out between them, tasting the air, and the scent of the girl who sat in front of it.
They stared at each other, the girl and the cobra, for a hundred slow beats of her heart. Once the serpent swayed back as though to strike, then came gently upright once more like some fatal flower on a long stem.
“Why will it not do its work?” Mintaka asked, with her lips close enough to those of the cobra to exchange a kiss. She reached out her hand and the serpent turned its head to watch her fingers come toward it. Mintaka showed no fear. Gently she stroked the back of the cobra’s widely distended hood. Instead of attacking, the cobra turned half away from her, almost like a cat offering its head to be caressed.
“Make it do what has to be done,” Mintaka begged the priestess, but the old woman shook her head in puzzlement.
“This I have never seen before,” she whispered. “You must strike the messenger with your hand. That will surely make him deliver the gift of the goddess.”
Mintaka drew back her hand, with open palm and fingers spread. She aimed at the ophidian head of the serpent and was on the point of striking when she started with surprise and lowered her hand. Puzzled, she glanced around the darkened chamber, into the shadowed corners, then looked directly at the priestess.
“Did you speak again?” she asked.
“I said nothing.”
Mintaka raised her hand again, but this time the voice was closer and clearer. She recognized it with a rush of superstitious fear, and felt the hairs rise upon the back of her neck.
“Taita?” she whispered, looking around. She expected him to be standing at her shoulder, but the chamber was still empty except for the two of them kneeling in front of the basket. “Yes!” Mintaka said, as though replying to a question or an instruction. She listened to the silence and twice nodded, then softly, “Oh, yes!”
The priestess heard nothing, but she knew and understood that there had been some mystical intervention in their proceedings. She was unsurprised when the cobra sank back slowly into the depths of the basket. She replaced the lid, and stood up.
“Forgive me, Mother,” Mintaka said softly, “I will not take the way of the goddess. There is still much for me to do in this world.”
The priestess picked up the basket, and said to the girl, “May the goddess bless you and grant you eternal life hereafter.” She backed away to the door of the chamber, and left Mintaka sitting in the gloom. She seemed to be listening still to a voice that the old woman could not hear.
Taita brought Nefer back to Thebes from Dabba in the deep sleep of the Red Shepenn. As soon as the galley carrying them moored at the stone jetty below the palace, Taita had him carried ashore on a litter, curtained from the gaze of the common people. It would have been unwise for Pharaoh’s critical condition to become widely known in the city. There had been previous occasions when the death of a king had plunged the city and the entire state into wild despair, and caused devastating speculation in the millet exchange, riots, looting and a breakdown of all the mores and conventions of society.
Once Nefer was safely ensconced in his royal quarters at the palace, Taita was able to work on him in safety and seclusion. His first concern was to examine again the terrible lacerations down the front of the boy’s legs and lower abdomen and assess if there had been any morbid changes.
His greatest fear was that the entrails had been punctured and that their contents had leaked into the stomach cavity. If this had happened then his skills would be to little avail. He unwrapped the bandages, probed the openings gently, sniffed the effluent for the stink of feces and was greatly relieved to find no taint of that contamination. He syringed the deepest wounds with a mixture of vinegar and Oriental spices. Then he stitched them closed with cat-gut and bandaged them with all his skill, touching them wi
th the golden Periapt of Lostris, commending her grandson to the goddess with each wrap of the linen strip.
Over the days that followed, Taita gradually reduced the dosage of the Red Shepenn and was rewarded when Nefer recovered consciousness, and smiled at him. “Taita, I knew you were with me.” Then he looked around him, still drowsy with the drug. “Where is Mintaka?”
When Taita explained her absence, Nefer’s disappointment was almost palpable, and he was too weak to conceal it. Taita tried to console him by telling him that the parting was only temporary, and that he would soon be well enough to make the voyage northward to visit Avaris. “We will find a fine excuse for Naja to allow you to make the journey,” Taita assured him.
For a while Nefer’s recovery was encouraging. The following day he was sitting up, and ate a hearty meal of dhurra bread and chick-pea soup. The next day he took a few steps on the crutches Taita had carved for him, and asked for meat with his meal. In order not to heat his blood, Taita forbade red meat, but allowed him fish and poultry.
The next day Merykara came to visit her brother, and spent most of the day with him. Her merry laughter and her childlike prattle cheered him. Nefer asked after Heseret, and wanted to know why she had not come also. Merykara answered evasively and invited him to play another game of bao. This time he deliberately opened his center castle to let her win.
The next day the terrible news of the tragedy at Balasfura reached Thebes. The first reports were that Apepi and his entire family, including Mintaka, had perished in the flames. Nefer was stricken down again, this time by grief. Taita had to mix him another potion of the Red Shepenn, but within hours the wounds in his leg had turned. Over the next few days his condition worsened, and soon he was at the very frontiers of death. Taita sat with him and watched him tossing and raving in delirium while the livid scarlet lines of morbidity ran like rivers of fire up his limbs and his belly.
Then news came from the Lower Kingdom that Mintaka had survived the tragedy that had engulfed the rest of her family. When Taita whispered these wonderful tidings in his ear Nefer seemed to understand and respond. The next day he was weak but lucid, and he tried to convince Taita that he was strong enough to make the long journey to be with Mintaka in her bereavement. Gently Taita dissuaded him, but promised that as soon as Nefer was strong enough he would use all his influence to convince Lord Naja to allow him to go. With this goal to strive toward, Nefer rallied strongly once again. Taita could see him subduing the fevers and evil humors in his blood by sheer strength of will.
Lord Naja returned from the north, and within hours Heseret came to visit Nefer for the first time since his mauling by the lion. She brought him gifts of sweetmeats, a pot of wild honey in the comb and a magnificent bao board made of colored agate, with stones of carved ivory and black coral. She was sweet, infinitely gentle and concerned with his suffering, excusing herself for having neglected him.
“My dear husband, the Regent of the Upper Kingdom, the illustrious Lord Naja, has been away all these weeks,” she explained, “and I have pined so much for his return that I was not fit company for anyone as ill as you have been. I was afraid that my unhappiness might affect you badly, my poor darling Nefer.” She stayed an hour, sang to him and related some of the doings of the court, much of it scandalous. At last she excused herself: “My husband, the Regent of the Upper Kingdom, does not like me to leave his side for long. We are so much in love, Nefer. He is a wonderful man, so kind and dedicated to you and Egypt. You must learn to trust him completely, as I do.” She rose to her feet and then, as though as an afterthought, she remarked lightly, “You must have been relieved to hear that Pharaoh Trok Uruk and my dear husband, the Regent of Upper Egypt, have agreed for reasons of state to cancel your betrothal to that little Hyksosian barbarian, Mintaka. I was so sorry for you when I heard that such a disgraceful marriage was thrust upon you. My husband, the Regent of Upper Egypt, was against it from the very beginning, as I was.”
After she had gone Nefer sank back weakly on the pillow and closed his eyes. When Taita came to him a little later he was puzzled by the way in which he had relapsed. He removed the bandages and found that the infection in his injuries had flared up again, and that the malodorous pus streaming from the deepest wound was thick and yellow. He stayed with him through that night, exerting all his skill and his powers to ward off the shadows of evil that surrounded the young Pharaoh.
At dawn Nefer was in a coma. Taita was truly alarmed by his condition. It could not be explained entirely by the boy’s grief. Suddenly he was startled and angered by a commotion at the door. He was about to call for silence when he heard Lord Naja’s commanding voice ordering the guards to stand aside. The Regent strode into the chamber and, without greeting Taita, stooped over Nefer’s still form and peered into his pale, drawn face. After a long moment he straightened up and signed to Taita to follow him onto the terrace.
When Taita came out behind him he was gazing across the river. On the far bank a squadron of chariots was practicing their evolutions, changing formations at full gallop. Strangely, there had been much warlike preparation since the treaty of Hathor. “You wished to speak to me, my lord?” Taita asked.
Naja turned to him. His expression was grim. “You have disappointed me, old man,” he said, and Taita bowed his head but made no reply. “I had hoped that my way forward, my destiny as predicted by the gods, would be cleared by now of impediment.” He stared hard at Taita. “Yet it seems that, far from allowing this to come to pass, you have done all in your power to prevent it.”
“This has been pretense. I have made a show of caring for my patient, while in reality I have been fostering your interests. As you can see for yourself, Pharaoh hangs over the great abyss.” Taita made a gesture toward the sick chamber where Nefer lay. “Surely you can sense the shades drawing in more closely around him. My lord, we have almost obtained our object. Within days the way ahead will be cleared for you.”
Naja was not convinced. “I am reaching the limit of my patience,” he warned, and strode from the terrace. He passed through the chamber without another glance at the still form upon the bed.
During that day Nefer’s condition fluctuated between deep coma and bouts of restless sweating and delirious ravings. When it became clear that the leg was giving him intense agony, Taita removed the linen bandages and found the whole of his thigh grotesquely swollen. The stitches holding the wound closed were strained and cutting deeply into the hot, purple flesh. Taita knew that he dared not move the boy while his life hung on such a slender thread. The plans that he had laid so carefully over the past weeks could not go forward unless he took drastic action. To interfere further with the wound in this condition was to risk a fatal poisoning of the blood, but there was no other course open to him. He laid out his instruments and bathed the entire leg in a solution of vinegar. Then he forced another heavy dose of the Red Shepenn between Nefer’s lips, and while he waited for the drug to take effect he prayed to Horus and to the goddess Lostris for their protection. Then he took up the scalpel and cut one of the stitches that held the lips of the wound together.
He was taken aback by the way in which the flesh burst open and at the gagging flood of yellow corruption that poured out. He used a gold spoon to scrape it clean, and when he felt the metal strike some hard obstruction in the depths of the wound, he probed with ivory forceps and gripped the object in the jaws. At last he prised it free. He took it to the light from the doorway and found that it was a ragged splinter of the lion’s claw, half as long as his little finger, which must have broken off as the beast was savaging Nefer.
He placed a gold tube in the wound to allow it to drain, then rebandaged it. By evening Nefer’s recovery was miraculous. In the morning he was weak, but the fever in his blood had abated. Taita gave him a tonic to fortify him, and placed the Periapt of Lostris on his leg. While he sat beside him in the noonday, gathering his resolve, there was a soft scratching at the shutters. When he opened them a crack, Merykara
slipped into the chamber. She was distraught and had been weeping. She flung herself against Taita and hugged his legs.
“They have forbidden me to come here,” she whispered and she did not have to explain who “they” were, “but I know the guards on the terrace and they let me pass.”
“Gently, my child.” Taita stroked her hair. “Do not distress yourself so.”
“Taita, they are going to kill him.”
“Who are they?”
“The two of them.” Merykara started sobbing again and her explanation was barely coherent. “They thought I was asleep or that I would not understand what they were discussing. They never said his name, but I knew they were talking about Nefer.”
“What did they say?”
“They will send for you. When you leave Nefer alone, they say that it won’t take long.” She broke off and gulped, “It’s so horrible, Taita! Our own sister, and that awful man—that monster.”
“When?” Taita shook her gently to brace her.
“Soon. Very soon.” Her voice steadied.
“Did they say how, Princess?”
“Noom, the surgeon from Babylon. Naja says that he will push a thin needle up through Nefer’s nostril and into his brain. There will be no bleeding or any other sign.” Taita knew Noom well: they had debated against each other at the library of Thebes, arguing the correct treatment for fractured limbs. Noom had come away smarting from the lash of Taita’s eloquence and knowledge. He was deeply jealous of Taita’s reputation and his powers. He was a rival and a bitter enemy.
“The gods will reward you, Merykara, for daring to come and warn us. But you must go now, before they find out that you have been here. If they suspect you, they will treat you as they plan to do Nefer.”