by T. L. Higley
No one was ever more worthy.
I stood beside Merit, my fingers wrapped around hers, as they had been since I laid her here. Our hands were equally icy.
The temple smelled of oil from the newly-lit lamps. I bent to fill my senses with perfume. I breathed it in and remembered.
The numbness left me and the questions began: Why Merit? Was she connected somehow to Mentu? Why had she been at the harbor? And why dressed as a peasant woman?
I looked at her closed eyes, still unable to think that I could not ask Merit herself for the answers to my questions.
The high priest was at my elbow. “Her seventy days will begin immediately,” he said. “But when they are accomplished, where will she be buried? Her tomb has not yet been built.”
I did not take my eyes from her face. “It will be finished. I will be sure of it.” In my heart, I cursed Khufu for delaying so long in his approval of the plans for his queens’ pyramids. It was as if he cared nothing for them, only for his own grand project.
I thought of my own tomb, a flat-topped mastaba that would lay just east of the queens’ pyramids. It was not yet complete either, or I would lay Merit there until her tomb was finished. With a pang, I realized that Merit’s tomb would stand between Khufu’s and my own.
As in life, so in death.
The priests were lighting torches now. I could feel the heat at my back. I tightened my cold hand around Merit’s.
The physicians arrived. But still no Khufu.
I called for the high priest. “Where is the Great One, Beloved of Horus?” I asked.
The priest lowered his head. “I have had word that he cannot be roused from his bed. The festival has taken its toll on him. His head servant waits for the wine to run its course.”
I turned back to Merit, disgusted at Khufu’s absence and yet grateful.
The high priest drew close and stood in silence at my side. “So you will have a bit longer with her,” he said eventually.
I glanced sideways. “I stand in place of the king until he arrives.”
Rashidi emerged from the shadows. “Yes, you have desired to stand beside her in his place for many years, have you not?”
I lowered my voice, turned on the little man, and spoke through clenched teeth. “Do not be so foolish as to speak in this way again. Not to me, not to anyone. Is that clear?”
Rashidi shrugged. “A priest must be truthful before the gods.”
“But he is not required to speak to others of it!”
“Your anger is misplaced, Hemiunu. I warned you there would be more suffering if you did not restore the divine order. You have no one to blame but yourself.”
Do you think I do not know that?
“Attend to your sacrifices, priest,” I growled. “And leave me to my grief.”
The three physicians that had been summoned from their beds moved about the body.
“Tell me what caused her death,” I said.
The physicians eyed each other as if unsure whether it was my place to command.
“I am the grand vizier,” I said, leaning over her. “Everything that happens in the Two Lands is my concern. And I intend to find out what happened to the Great Wife. Khufu would want no less!”
Ram, the chief physician, nodded. “We will look closely.” He glanced at my hand, covering Merit’s. “You will need to step away. To let us work.”
I tightened my hand one last time. I sensed that this might be my final chance to touch her. Khufu would arrive, and it would not be … logical. I opened my hand finally, with regret that felt like a solid thing in my chest. And then I let her go.
The physicians moved in and bent over Merit. I stood close behind one of them, until a glare urged me backward. They examined her legs and arms, noted the bruises on her shoulders and throat with shared murmurs.
One of them took a knife from the table, and I winced. But it was only to cut away her clothing.
I willed my ka to become granite again, to create in me an unmoving piece of statuary. I was unwilling to leave her, even during this examination.
They slit her peasant dress from bottom to top and laid it open. Attention went immediately to something on her leg. I shifted to my right and saw through the physicians’ shoulders that a dark cord was tied around Merit’s upper thigh.
“What is it? How did it get there?” I had seen nothing like this on Mentu.
One of the men turned to me, the cord in his hand. “It would appear that she tied it there herself. An amulet. For luck, perhaps.” He held the cord aloft.
From it dangled an ankh, the symbol of life, in finely-worked Nubian gold with a single violet amethyst in the center.
The strength drained from me, even as I reached for the gold piece. I took it from the physician, who seemed more interested in the body. I stepped away, the jewelry in my palm. With closed eyes, I squeezed my fingers around the ankh and pressed my fist to my mouth. I felt the pain of loss sweep through my body once more, threatening to overwhelm my reserve. Khufu could arrive at any moment. It would not do for the king to see me floundering in grief.
My amulet. She still possessed it, after all these years. Wore it privately, where it would not be seen, as if in silent tribute to secret love.
The knowledge was both a sharp knife and a healing balm.
She knew. She knew I loved her still.
I forced my fingers open and tilted the ankh to catch the firelight. Impulsively I took the ends of the cord in my fingers, lifted them to my own neck, and tied it there around my throat. The symbol lay on my chest, just above my heart.
And that is where it will remain.
I turned back to the physicians and found that they were pulling the fragments of Merit’s dress from under her body. Two of them turned her on her side to release the fabric, and two others exclaimed surprise.
I peered around them. “What is it?”
One pointed to Merit’s mouth. “She expels water when we turn her.”
My heartbeat slowed to a dull thud. “Drowned?”
The physician concurred with a bowed head.
A shouted curse outside the temple turned us all toward the entrance.
Khufu has arrived.
The king rushed into the temple, head bare, stripped of jewelry, and only an undergarment around his waist. I saw in him my childhood friend in that moment, and I wondered at how much everything had changed.
Khufu skidded to a stop and his eyes roamed the firelit temple interior, taking in the priests, the physicians, Merit’s body, and finally me.
A scream borne of grief and rage, which I understood, tore from his throat.
And then he rushed at me, hands flexed like claws, with all the madness of a rabid beast.
EIGHT
I watched him come, felt my cousin’s fingers tighten around my neck. Khufu’s breath stank of alcohol. I swayed on my feet. It required effort to breathe. Self-protection took over, and I dug at Khufu’s fingers.
“Stop,” I rasped from my clogged throat.
“You killed her!” Khufu’s grip weakened. I tore the king’s hands away. It was not overly difficult; the man had done no real work in years.
Khufu backed away. He panted with exertion and his eyes blazed, the whites shot with red. “You killed her.” The words were breathed out with fierce hostility.
I rubbed at my throat. “How can you even say—”
“You may not have struck the blow,” Khufu yelled. “But it is your fault. I relied on you for her protection!”
“Yes.” I pulled away from Merit’s body, toward the darkened temple entrance. It did not seem fitting to argue so close to her. “Yes,” I said again, my voice low and accusatory, “it has always fallen to me to protect her.”
Khufu turned on me, his fingers curling to fists at his sides. “Say what you are thinking, then, Hemiunu!”
I lifted my chin.
“Say it!”
Khufu met my silence with two quick steps across the temple and
a fist to my jaw. The blow took me down. I lay under the lintel of the temple and stared at the glyphs carved and painted on its underside.
Khufu jumped astride my body. He had grown heavier since we were boys. I did not return the blows that fell on me, each one fanning a flaming torch behind my eyes.
I should have protected her. She was my responsibility. I tasted the salt of my own tears. The temple walls grew dim. Would I soon join Merit? I welcomed the thought.
Blackness fell. And just as quickly, light again.
Khufu no longer straddled me. He struggled in the grasp of Ebo, his head servant, who must have heard the chaos from outside the temple. Khufu jerked his arms from Ebo’s grasp, hissed a curse at me, and retreated to Merit’s body.
I crawled to my knees, then my feet, and joined my cousin at the physician’s table. My jaw throbbed and my legs shook.
The smell of death was somehow there already. Perhaps it followed in the wake of the physicians.
“Forgive me,” Khufu whispered, already penitent. “My mind … is not clear. I cannot—”
“I know.”
Khufu bent over Merit’s body and studied her face. His breath came quick and uneven. He lifted her arm, slid his hand down to hers, then cried out when he saw her mutilated hand.
“She is not whole!”
I pulled Merit’s hand from his and placed it at her side. “They will attend to her,” I said.
Khufu stared at me. “Like Mentu,” he whispered. “Like Mentu.”
“Yes.” I swallowed and rubbed my jaw. “There was also a mask.” I pointed to where it lay at her feet.
Khufu’s gaze traveled to the mask, then back to me. “Who?”
“I do not know.”
The king touched Merit’s lips. “There is some mistake, Hemi. She is not dead. Only sleeping.” His pleading voice twisted my heart.
“No. She is dead.”
Khufu pounded a fist on the table at Merit’s head. “It cannot be! I am Son of Ra! Beloved of Horus! I will not allow it!”
I said nothing.
Khufu turned on me. “I will not allow it, Hemi!”
“There are some things that even Ra on earth cannot change.”
“No! No, no, no!” Khufu grabbed at Merit’s shoulders and shook her as if to wake her.
I pulled the king’s hands from her body, pulled him away from the table, across and out of the temple, to the cool silence of the desert night. Khufu went for my throat again, then threw his arms around my neck and sobbed. The sound echoed across the harbor, across the desert.
“I loved her, Hemi. You know that, don’t you?”
“Yes.” I wrapped an arm around Khufu’s well-built shoulder. “I know.”
Khufu did not lift his head. “I may not have loved her so well as some, but in my own way, I did love her.”
I pulled away, wiped at my own cheeks. We stood there in the darkness, facing each other and for the first time, facing the truth.
“She was a true wife to you, Khufu. Always.”
Khufu studied the dark water in the harbor below us. “I sometimes wondered if she would end it. If you both would … betray me.”
I said nothing, shocked into silence by his brutal honesty.
Khufu walked toward the harbor, as if to escape the horror inside the temple. I followed.
He spoke without taking his eyes from the water. “When the years went by, and still she stayed, I would sometimes tell myself that things had changed.” He glanced at me. “But then one look at the two of you, when you thought no one was watching, and I knew that I was a fool.”
I felt the weight of his silence, knew I should speak. “I am so sorry, Khufu. We never—”
“I know. I watched. You were both always loyal. To Egypt and to me.”
We reached the harbor’s edge and Khufu dropped to his knees, as though his strength had finally failed. “Sometimes I think I made you my vizier simply to test you both,” he said. “To see if you could remain near to one another, yet still faithful.”
I looked down on the king in his sorrow. “I loved her, my friend. You know that. But we both loved you as well.” I joined Khufu on my knees.
Pharaoh sobbed again, covering his face with his hands. “I do not know how to rule without her, Hemi. She knew more of what it means to be a god than either of us ever will.”
Khufu’s grief quieted and we sat in silence for awhile, studying the play of starlight on water.
And then slowly, the king lifted a handful of dirt from beside him and looked at me.
I knew his intent, the age-old ritual of grief.
I repeated Khufu’s actions and filled my own hand with dirt. I held my fist closed and bent my head toward Khufu. I waited through his hesitation. Then the king opened his hand over my head and let the dirt tumble over me. My tears fell to the ground at my knees and mixed with the falling dirt. I did the same for Khufu, pouring the soil over his bent head. We then embraced, and in our grief we were joined, as though we buried each other beside the harbor where Merit had died.
* * *
I slept with thoughts of Merit biting at me like vicious ants. I roused myself well past daybreak, accomplished each of my morning rituals and kneeled before my shrine of the goddess Ma’at to pray and light incense, begging the goddess’s favor. Then I left my residence for the Great House, staff in hand.
I had only one thing in mind: to obtain Pharaoh’s official sanction on my efforts to bring Merit’s killer to justice.
Khufu had sent me home in the early morning hours, borne in the king’s own litter by twelve slaves. I was too exhausted to argue, and Khufu wanted to be alone with his wife.
The Great Hall of Pillars had been cleared of last night’s celebration already and was empty, save one, when I entered.
Khufu sat on his throne, head in hands. The red-and-whitestriped nemes had fallen forward around his face, shrouding him from any who happened by. He still wore a white dressing robe loosely around his shoulders, and I suspected he had neither bathed nor offered sacrifices this morning.
I strode across the hall, letting my footfalls rouse the king.
Khufu looked up briefly, then let his head fall again.
“I’ve sent them all away, Hemi.”
“Who?”
“The treasurer. The superintendent of clothing. The overseer of the storehouses. All the others who want my attention. I have nothing for any of them.”
“Pharaoh is grieving. They must understand.”
“Do they? How can they understand when I do not?”
I looked to the high-backed chair beside Khufu’s throne, often occupied by Merit, and said nothing.
“You must finish her pyramid, Hemi.”
“Yes, my king. Your people will devote themselves to making it ready. It will be done in time.”
Khufu’s eyes found mine. “It cannot delay the building of my own, however.”
Of course not.
I ran my fingers over the length of my staff.
“Hemi, you must promise me that the deaths of Mentu and Merit will do nothing to cause the project to falter.”
“The work continues,” I said, my voice tight. “But I believe that nothing in Egypt will be as it should until these deaths are resolved. I swear to you, Khufu, I will find who did this.”
“No!” Khufu stood. His robe fell from one shoulder. “The pyramid must be your only focus.”
I frowned. “Surely you want justice to be restored?”
Khufu began a reply, but the sound of a crowd entering the palace cut him off. Behind us, a swarm of men, priests it appeared, tramped into the Great Hall like an army crossing the desert. They brought with them the smell of burnt offerings, filling the room with the odor of sacrifice.
Khufu scowled. “You approach the Son of Ra without permission?”
An old priest emerged from the crowd. I recognized him as the former high priest of On, recently replaced. He had not shaved his head for some days, sprinkling
of white on his dark skin. He still wore the priestly skirt and belt, and a leopard skin over his shoulders, the head hanging down his back. “So you still claim sonship with the god?” he said.
My blood pounded in response to this shocking disrespect. I stepped to the platform where Khufu stood, knowing the king would prefer me at his side.
Khufu sat and lifted the crook and flail, symbols of his Ra-given authority, and crossed them over his chest. “You have come to complain about your recent dismissal,” he said. “Take your complaints to the gods.”
The priest shrugged. “You have made yourself Ra on earth. Why should we not complain to you?”
I stepped forward. “You dishonor the king by bringing this rabble of malcontents into the Great Hall.”
The old priest raised his voice. “And the king has caused the death of a much-loved queen with his heresy!”
I heard Khufu’s quick intake of breath and turned to him. He clenched the lion-head arms of his throne. “You blame the Beloved of Horus for the death of the queen?” he said. “You prove yourselves more inept than I had thought!”
The room erupted with outrage, like a herd of angry cows bellowing their disapproval. I moved closer to the king and leaned my staff across him like a shield.
Where are the palace guards?
The High Priest would not be silenced. “You have defied the gods!” he declared, his finger pointed in accusation. “In pride and arrogance you have stolen the worship of Ra from its rightful place in On. You have brought it here to Giza solely to control and manipulate the rites.” Spittle flew from his lips. “But the gods will not be controlled!”
Khufu waited for the ensuing buzz to settle, then lifted his voice above the priests. It was smooth and even, the voice of a monarch. Or a god. “You were given land and wealth, each of you. I was not required to act with such kindness. I am Ra on earth, and I do as I please.”