The Crook and Flail

by L. M. Ironside

  She turned from the scene, her body tingling with relief . She shook violently as the madness of the battle left her, leaving in its place a watery, dizzy weakness. She laughed, threw herself into Nehesi's arms. He supported her down the tower steps, into the fortress's yard, through the gate. A lone chariot drove to meet them: the general, who reined his horses to a stop, leapt to the ground and raised both his palms to her in awed salute.

  “Great Lady,” he said. “The gods alone know how many men you saved today. At the pace we were moving, we would never have seen the ambush before it had taken our rear.”

  She did not know what to say. She stood leaning on her guardsman, blinking at the general. Suddenly aware that she had lost her wig, she raised a trembling hand to her head, self-conscious and overwhelmed.

  “Come, Great Lady. This battle is yours.”

  Nehesi helped her into the chariot. Her knees felt on the verge of collapse; she held tight to the rail, swaying. The general drove at a trot toward the ring of Egyptians, toward the king's pavilion. She raised a pale hand to the army, and they shook their spears at the sky, roaring their acclaim. The sound invigorated her. When the general halted she stepped into the mud without his assistance. She raised both arms above her head, a salute to Egypt's brave men; they shouted her name. Hatshepsut! Hatshepsut! The God's Wife, Hatshepsut!

  The general conferred with a few of his men. At his nod, the ring of soldiers parted. On the bare ground before the Pharaoh's tent a handful of Kushites knelt, their arms lashed behind their backs, their heads downcast, the points of Egyptian spears pressed to their backs.

  “They are yours.” The general leaned close to her ear. She could scarcely hear his words over the sound of her own name in half a hundred throats. “Your captives.” He thrust the nearest Kushite onto his belly, face in the mud. Hatshepsut approached, watched the bound man at her feet as he struggled then lay still. The soldiers fell silent. Then she raised her foot and placed it upon the Kushite's head, the symbolic gesture of the king conquering his enemy.

  Amidst the roar of her soldiers' approval, Hatshepsut glanced across the crowd. Thutmose had made his way out of the hills on foot, bedraggled and limping. He froze when their eyes met, tense and twitching, a lion in a crouch. Never before had Hatshepsut seen such a look of hatred on her brother's face.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  Senenmut waited in the shadow of a great pillar. His lady's voice carried across the great hall, detailing her plans, her expectations for the Hathor Festival to come. From where he stood he could not see her seated on her small throne, the Pharaoh's own golden chair empty beside her. He preferred to lean there in the umber dimness, the cool carved stone against his skin, and listen to the music of her voice. It was an unlovely music, he knew. She lacked the refined timbre, the delicate inflection of a lady of the court. When she spoke it was with the brazen blare of a soldier's horn, sharp and commanding. But was that not music all the same, surely as the sound of harp or pipe or flute? He liked this game of isolating her to but one of his senses. Gladly he worked at the task of her, memorizing each of her facets. This was the way her voice rose when she issued a decree, a sharp ascent, sure and swift, an arrow shot toward the sun; this the way it settled again as she pondered the advice of her stewards, their scrolls of tallies and sums. His lady's voice moved like a ship at full sail, taut with power, smooth and confident.

  At last her business concluded an, sр0 Td, anticipating the change in her tone, he stepped from the shadows at the very moment she said, “And where is the Steward of the God's Wife?”

  “Here, Great Lady.” The sound of his new title was sweet in his ears. He walked to the foot of the dais, eyes on the floor. He did not need to look at her face to know that no hint of a smile showed there. None would, until they were alone together. He kept his own face humble, willing, as was proper for a steward.

  “I have business with you, but the evening is growing late. Walk with me in my garden, and we will discuss what we must discuss.”

  He bowed, waited for her to descend the steps of her dais, sweep past him with an air of stern command. He followed her in silence, and the scent of myrrh and spice fell from her body. He walked in that intoxicating current all the way to her private chambers.

  In her dusk-blue garden, when she had dismissed her women, he held his arms wide so that she might press herself into his embrace. The braids of her wig brushed his lips; she pulled back, exposing her big, bright teeth in a grin of triumph.

  “I cannot tell you how I missed you, Senenmut. Oh, I wish you could have seen it.”

  “The new fortress?”

  “Everything.” And she led him to the red granite bench beneath the sycamore. Bats flitted among its sighing branches as she told him of her trek south, of Thutmose's camp, of her victory over the Kushite raiders.

  He shook his head at her, laughing. “The gods never made a man as bold as you, I swear it.”

  “And you? How have you kept yourself occupied this past month, with me away? Not with the court ladies, I hope.”

  “Those wigs hanging on empty air? No. I have been overseeing the gateway at Ipet-Isut. It is nearly done now; I think you will be pleased. And I have been talking with tomb-builders, gathering information on a particular site across the river. You ought to have a tomb built, you know – a monument to your achievements.”

  “I am not planning to die any time soon.”

  “Nor is anybody. It will take a lifetime to build something worthy of your memory; best start now.”

  “And have you found a suitable place?”

  “I may have. I need to survey it yet. The valley in the western cliffs, where you and I went years ago, when you sent me away...” He broke off. In the tree's dappled shadow and moonlight, he caught her expression of regret, of pensiveness bordering on sorrow. “You're not still upset about that, are you? I've forgotten it; you should, too.”

  fouဆ“No – no, it's not that. I was only thinking.” She looked away, out across her flower beds and hedges to the palace's outer wall. She stared at it with such intensity that he thought for a moment she could see through the stone. He waited for her to speak on. “Thutmose hates me, Senenmut. He would see me dead and in my tomb, if he could.”

  “The two of you have never been especially close, but surely he does not hate you. Not like that.” Not enough to kill her – no, gods, never.

  “You should have seen the way he looked at me, Senenmut, when I trampled the Kushites under my heel. He disliked me before, but now....”

  Senenmut took her in his arms. Her breath warmed his shoulder. “You have nothing to fear. He is the Pharaoh, yes, but still a boy. You are the God's Wife of Amun. You have the priesthood behind you, the High Priest himself....”

  “Nebseny. Yes, I have him, all right; I made sure of that.”

  “Thutmose is a child who runs from a fight. His soldiers saw him run, and they saw you ride to their salvation. They saw you take the Kushites under your heel. Even his men are with you, Hatshepsut. You have nothing to fear.”

  His words soothed her, he saw, though he knew she was too bright to remain mollified for long. Soon she would begin turning his words over in her heart. She would ask herself the same question he pondered now. What happens when the Pharaoh grows, and is no longer a boy? Can the priests of Amun protect her from a powerful man's hatred? Can I?

  Hatshepsut stood abruptly, a restless movement, a reined horse tossing its head, longing to run. “I think,” she said, “that I was wrong after all, to give up my birthright and marry him. To be the Great Royal Wife, and not the Pharaoh.”

  Senenmut stilled himself, his thoughts, his heartbeat. How easy it would be to leap to his feet and agree with her. She was the true son of Thutmose the First, inheritor of his courage, his strength of will. Anyone could see it. And yet....

  “Maat is maat,” he said, apologetic, loathing the words, loathing their truth.

  She looked back at him, held his gaze for a long
moment. Her eyes were deep and black and sad. “Maat is all.” She turned away, brushed past a hedge of night-blooming flowers, waxy and white. In a moment he heard her running footsteps receding into the night.

  He followed, down paths blue in the moonlight. Always she was just ahead of him, turning, vanishing into the dark beyond a flower bed. Her flight troubled him, raised in his heart some unaccountable anxiety, as though she might run so far and so fast that he could never catch her again. Then he heard her laughter rise from the darkness, and suddenly they were children at play. He rounded a corner; his foot caught on some sudden obstacle; he fell onto the grass. Aintဆs he rolled, groaning and chuckling, she sprang from the hedge where she had been hiding.

  “You tripped me!”

  She fell upon him, straddling his hips. When she leaned down to kiss him, her wig slipped, fell onto his face. She went weak with laughter; he rolled her onto her back and lay atop her.

  “This is not maat,” she said, serious and stern all at once. The note of the trumpet was in her voice again. Senenmut pulled away. He lay beside her on the grass, hands at his sides, staring hopelessly up at the stars. “But I do not care,” she said at last.

  He turned his face to look at her. Tears shone in her eyes.

  “My father always told me that maat was everything, that it was the very soul of the sun, the essence that created life. What has maat given me – given us?”

  “Us?”

  “Not only you and me – all of Egypt. Thutmose on the throne – a Pharaoh who runs from his enemies. A child-king whose only cares to play with his harem pets. Maat has left me isolated – left me to fight for my station while some northern tjati plots to strip it from me. It has left me to fortify our borders when my husband cannot be bothered to even know where the borders lie! It has left me to see to the court, to worship, to justice – alone!” She knelt above him, took his face in cold, hard hands. “If I were Pharaoh – if I had had the strength to claim the throne when I should have, you would be my Great Royal Husband. Don't laugh! I would have made it so. Who would have dared stop me?”

  “The priests of Amun, for one. And all the nobility for another. Even a Pharaoh cannot act without some restraint.”

  She sagged into the grass. “I know. I know it's hopeless even to think of it. It always was hopeless, no matter what my mother thought. Ahmose and her useless visions.” They both lay silent, empty as forgotten vessels. Senenmut watched the moon slide in among the branches of the sycamore, a slow and inevitable sinking.

  Hatshepsut reached for him. His hand moved to intercept hers; their fingers laced together. She whispered, “But I still do not care. About maat.”

  And in one quick movement she was atop him again, her face eclipsing the moon. Its light limned her in silver, and she hung for a moment poised among the stars. The glow around her seemed the presence of her ka itself – of all her kas, bursting from this body that could not contain them, could not house such greatness – by the gods, it was impossible, she was impossible, and maat was impossible, and Senenmut cared nothing for it, nothing. Reverent, he cupped her face in his hands, held her with trembling awe. She leaned, and slowly her eyes closed, and her mouth found his, and he could isolate her by facets no more. Every fire inside him woke at once. His senses brimmed, left him helpless beneath her, weakened, pinioned by her intensity, her shin noဆiing. He panted, unmoving, as she pushed his kilt aside. He shut his eyes when she raised the skirts of her gown to her waist. As they came together, she moaning, he holding his breath, he thought perhaps the light of her kas would burn him away. It would burn maat itself away, and Senenmut would rejoice to see the flames.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  The Hathor Festival was over. Hatshepsut had performed all the rites of worship, presided with the Pharaoh over the great feast, her entire body tensed in anticipation of danger. Since falling pregnant, the terrifying dreams had returned, the nightmare of birthing the goddess who turned to Sekhmet before her eyes, who thirsted for her blood. Thutmose's coldness had only made the Hathor Festival a greater strain. He turned toward her only when ceremony or propriety demanded, and when he looked into her face it was with a force of loathing that chilled her from within. Yet no ill had befallen her. Hathor seemed appeased once more; the year would progress, fertile and pleasant. And perhaps her dreams would recede, too.

  She lay in her bed watching the sun rise through her wall of pillars. Her heart reverberated with the feel of the nightmare's familiar impression: the dull, dense surprise as the cow-goddess drifted from between her bloodied thighs, light and airy; her rising horror as the form of Hathor stretched, lengthened, the lovable face distorting with a grimace of rage, the teeth turning to white daggers, the eyes to blind fire.

  She rolled from her bed, stood warily. She was four months with child now. The morning illness had mostly left her, though some days she still felt dizzy and sick on rising. This morning she was lucky. Her legs were strong, her stomach without complaint. The morning air on her naked body felt fresh and bracing; she stretched; the dream recede into nothingness, and she shivered with relief and pleasure.

  It was Iset who arrived to dress her. Hatshepsut greeted her with some surprise. “Are you to be the mistress of my bedchamber now?”

  “No; only a dear friend who misses her lady. With the festival and the harvest, and all your travels, I have not seen you for so long – and Little Tut, of course. He keeps me well occupied. I paid Tem a silver bracelet to sleep late so that I could have the honor of dressing the Great Royal Wife.”

  Hatshepsut embraced her. “Iset. I have missed you; don't think I have not. These past months have been frantic, but you have been always with me, sister of my heart.” She kissed her cheek. Iset's smile was as soft and lovely as the dawn light. “How is the boy?”

  “Wonderful. He is so strong, so smart. He's beginning to talk, I think. At least, he tries. His nurse says he is the best baby she has ever cared for.”

  “I believe it.”

  Iset wenen ဆi0 dt to Hatshepsut's great free-standing chest and pawed inside, searching for her favorite gown. “Shall I give you some harem gossip, just like old times?”

  “Have you been to the House of Women?”

  “Ah, I like to take Tut there to play with the other babies. None of them are as adorable as he, though. I think the other mothers are envious.”

  “Surely your gossip is not of jealous mawats.”

  “Oh, no. It seems your husband has lost face among his soldiers.”

  “The only thing that surprises me about that news is that it took so long to reach Waset.”

  “Many of the concubines are from good Waset families, you know, and their mothers and sisters often come to visit. Apparently one can hear whispers in this wine house or that.”

  “What sort of whispers?”

  Iset found the dress she sought, blue with golden thread at the hem. She held it to her cheek a moment, admiring the softness of the fabric. You are two years older than I, and already a mother, Hatshepsut thought, watching with some wistfulness. And yet you are so innocent, you may as well be a child. She felt a sudden urge to shelter Iset. But whether she needed protection from her family's plotting or from Hatshepsut's own, she could not say. The realization made her ashamed and angry, as it did whenever she allowed her heart to turn to thoughts of the girl.

  “Whispers that say the Pharaoh is weaker than a woman.”

  “He cannot like that. Has he heard?”

  “That I cannot say. But he has gathered up Tabiry and her girls – it seems he plans to leave Waset again. They say he plans to return to Kush and make war, to regain the respect of the southern garrison.”

  “How utterly ridiculous. Will he never learn?”

  Iset draped the blue dress over Hatshepsut's shoulders, and bent to tie it just so at her waist. Her face came level with Hatshepsut's chest, and she halted, staring. Her breasts had grown yet more, she knew. They were certainly a good deal fuller than when Ise
t had seen her last. She waited, silent and still, for Iset to speak. The girl placed one hand on Hatshepsut's belly, felt the small rising swell. She jerked upright, and though she said nothing, her face was eloquent with fear.

  “Yes,” Hatshepsut said.

  “Oh.”

  “When Ihan went south to inspect the fortress, I lay with Thutmose, and I have conceived.”

  Iset nodded, looked down at her feet. The dress lay forgotten about Hatshepsut's shoulders; she knotted it herself, doing a poorer job than Iset would have done. It pulled across her stomach in a way that seemed to accent its slight roundness.

  “Iset, I know what you are thinking. Here, sit with me.” She took her by the hand, led her to the bed. Iset's skin was cold and pale. “Your son will remain the heir, Iset. I swear it. Even if I should bear a boy, he will wait in line behind Little Tut. My child will be his brother's heir, not our husband's.”

  “But you are the Great Royal Wife. Your sons come before any other's. It has always been the custom.”

  Only if they are sired by the Pharaoh. “Then I shall change the custom,” she said lightly. “You and I have shared much. You are more than a friend to me, Iset; you are my heart's sister. When I think on Little Tut, I think on my own child. When I hold him, I hold my own son in my arms. We share him together. He was our idea, together; we created him. Do you remember how we decided, that night in Peret, with the owl calling in the garden?”

  Iset nodded, then grinned ruefully. “Though I did all the work in making him.”

  “And that is why you are King's Mother, and ever will be. No one will take that from you.” For if they do, all I have will be taken from me. Oh, Iset, how I wish I could tell you everything – all of it: your father's plot for you, and Senenmut, and how I have used you, too, to protect my own interests. But I cannot. You would not understand. You are too innocent. You would never understand.