“You have seen what this world may become, and you have experienced the connected singularity of the living universe,” he began, “and now you may choose. Your will is free and inviolate by your very nature as Kalpeon human beings of this planet. So listen well, and choose as you will when I have finished.”
Silent stares of anticipation awaited Barjeen’s final words. “You may choose to live out your lives as normal human beings in any way you choose and eventually pass in death to whatever lies beyond. And I tell you, the realm of any afterlife is a mystery beyond my knowledge and all of Kalpeon. So, you may return to a world you know and understand to live out your lives. That is your first choice.
“Or,” Barjeen paused and pointed to the king and queen, “you may choose transcendence, and return to the world in an ageless existence in an everchanging world to seek and await the way you have seen today.” Barjeen understood that everyone except the king and queen had already experienced such an existence, but the choice was extended to everyone nonetheless.
When he finished, Barjeen ordered the biotech and biosyndrone out of the facility, and then he and Robfebe exited, leaving Tutankhamun, Ankhesenamun, Ott, Cha, Graf, and Yaan alone in thought. Several minutes later, Tutankhamun and Ankhesenamun emerged from the interior of the craft, followed by the others. They approached Barjeen and Robfebe, who stood on the observation deck overlooking the veranda. They all had made their choice. No one chose to return to a normal life. They would seek the world they had experienced in the indoctrination.
Tutankhamun pointed across the veranda. “I would like to speak a last time with Horemheb and Ay before we depart.”
With a nod, Barjeen waved his palm forward. In the soft glow of moonlight, Tutankhamun stepped from the craft, crossed the veranda to Horemheb and Ay, and as they listened with faces twisted in quiet bewilderment, he explained in detail what he wanted them to do. From the deck of the craft, Ott watched as the king spoke and Horemheb and Ay nodded and gestured toward the ship. After several moments the talking ceased, and the young king grasped and patted the shoulders of each of the men before pointing back to the ship and then looking up and pointing to the night sky.
Tutankhamun, Horemheb, and Ay stood in silence for another long moment until the king turned and walked back to the craft. Standing next to Ankhesenamun, he looked back as Horemheb took several steps forward, stopped, and raised his hand. The king and queen returned the gesture as the craft glided back out and over the inky expanse of the great river that was the life-giving force of the kingdom Tutankhamun had ruled. As the ship rose into the night, Tutankhamun looked out over the greatest city on earth, and north to the plateau where the white, polished pyramids glimmered hauntingly in the reflected light of a full desert moon floating in an endless, stelliferous sky. It was the last time he would see his kingdom in its true magnificence, but he knew he would see it again.
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Early the following morning, Ay and Horemheb discussed what Tutankhamun had asked of them. He had said he was leaving with the queen by his own choice. He had offered no further explanation other than to say he would rather serve the neteru than rule in his own kingdom. He had also explained that what he was asking was not a decree from a departed king, but rather a request made to the two men he felt loved the kingdom and the way of maat as much as he and the queen did. Both Horemheb and Ay had promised to honor his request, and now in full agreement with each other, they prepared to fulfill the king’s wishes.
It was midmorning of the following day. The large antechamber adjoining the throne room was filling with the usual gathering of high officials, administrators, and bureaucrats responsible for overseeing all the administrative and civic affairs of Thebes and other major cities of the northern region. As was customary, the massive doors to the throne room would remain closed until the king was seated.
At first the proceedings went along as usual. The crowd grew, and the chamber was abuzz with the usual talk of building projects, agricultural concerns, and trade and commerce along the river. But this day, something was different, and it became noticeable as the large chamber became more crowded than normal, and not with the usual high officials and administrators. On this day, members of the royal court were gathering in the chamber. They had been summoned by General Horemheb, and none of them knew why.
The vestibule had filled to overflowing with the unusual mix of government functionaries and court royalty when two military officers made their way through the crowd and approached the high doors to the throne room. At the sight of the officers, silence swept over the crowd. The huge doors to the throne room were normally managed by palace attendants. The military presence was as unusual as the summoning of court royalty at what was normally a routine administrative session. Everyone sensed something far different than a regular gathering was about to take place. As the military officers slid the heavy latch aside and pulled the high doors open, the apprehension soared. Everyone filtered in and took immediate notice that the king’s throne was empty. The sight was made even more ominous by the presence of Horemheb and Ay, who stood solemn at either side of the golden armrests. The last group of individuals stepped through the entrance, and the massive doors were swung shut. Ay and Horemheb stared out at the crowd that fidgeted in anticipation of what would happen. Ay outstretched his arm, motioning for quiet.
True to a demeanor forged over a lifetime of military service, Ay immediately addressed the matter at hand. “It is with great sorrow and regret that I tell you Tutankhamun is dead,” he began, sweeping a firm gaze over the crowded chamber.
Ay remained silent until the flood of gasps, sobs, and murmuring quieted. “The king was taken ill yesterday evening and retired to his chamber, where he grew worse and visibly weak despite all the efforts of the royal physicians. Shortly after midnight, anticipating the possible eventuality of not recovering, he summoned the queen, myself, and General Horemheb to his chamber. When we arrived, he excused his physicians and attendants, motioned us close, and relayed his instructions and wishes if he were not to recover.” Ay lied with believable conviction, and then paused to gauge the reaction of the crowd. “Before dawn, the king fell quiet, and within an hour he passed. The body of Tutankhamun is now being prepared for transition to the afterlife, and the queen has gone into mourning.”
Ay waited another moment, and then, with a furtive glance to Horemheb, continued. “I will be overseeing the construction of the king’s tomb and preparations for the ritual. During that time, I will assume the responsibilities of the throne and rule of the kingdom. When Tutankhamun has traveled to the afterlife, the throne and rule of the kingdom shall be passed permanently to the Hereditary Prince and protector of the kingdom, General Horemheb.” Ay turned to the general with a nod of deferment.
The entire chamber remained silent. The king was dead, and the two most powerful military leaders in the known world now commanded the largest, richest, and securest kingdom on earth. No one would challenge the authority and power of the men who stood on the throne platform. There would be no dissention, power struggles, protests, or pretenders to the throne from the nobility. Everyone knew the kingdom now rested in the hands of those with absolute power.
The next morning, with Ay on the throne, Horemheb prepared to travel to all the major cities along the river and make sure they were secure with adequate military presence and enlarged garrisons. When finished with the cities, he would do the same with the forts protecting the upper and lower borders. With the cities and borders secure, he would return to Thebes and replace Ay as the permanent reigning king. They were following Tutankhamun’s instructions, but there was something else the young king had requested. As General Horemheb set out to secure the kingdom, Ay took steps to complete the plan.
The day he assumed the throne, Ay summoned the senior overseer of construction and instructed him to begin construction of the tomb in an isolated section of the valley necropolis. The instructions were explicit. The tomb was to be located in a low-
lying area of the valley and cut into the bedrock, not built above it. It would be small by royal standards, but large enough to accommodate all the goods assembled for the king to take to the afterlife. And it was to be completed within no more than seventy days. Seventy days was the amount of time required to mummify a body, and Ay wanted no deviation from normal burial procedures. The kingdom would mourn a dead king, not a departed king neither he nor Horemheb could ever hope to explain, even though they had both witnessed it with their own eyes.
If Ay or Horemheb ever tried to explain what they had seen, it would only give rise to suspicion that they were somehow responsible for the king’s disappearance, or even murder. Tutankhamun was loved by the people, and the truth of what they had witnessed would be impossible to believe. It would only lead to unrest and the possibility of violence. Deceit that was believable and a peaceful transition of rule would be far better than trying to explain the truth. And Tutankhamun himself had requested it, for the good of the people and the way of maat. No, the king and queen had not disappeared into the night sky on a ship from the heavens with strange neteru. The king had died of illness, and now his body would be mummified and placed in his tomb, where his soul would pass to eternal afterlife. And when the queen came out of mourning, it would be announced that she had abdicated her throne and left the kingdom, unable to stay and bear the constant grief brought on by the surroundings in which she had lived with the king she had so loved.
The king would be buried like all previous kings, and Ankhesenamun would be gone and forgotten. Maat would remain the way of the kingdom. It had been Tutankhamun’s departing request, and Ay and Horemheb had sworn to carry it out. But to do so would require one more thing.
Ay needed a body.
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Mummification and ritualistic entombment were costly and time-consuming practices affordable by only the wealthy and royalty. Burial of the lower class was a much simpler matter; their bodies were placed in shallow graves at the edge of the desert and covered with sand.
But Ay needed a fresh body.
The guards Ay had sent to find a suitable body left the palace complex. One officer led in a chariot, followed by two others riding in a small wagon pulled by two horses and carrying a simple wooden coffin. They arrived at their destination a little over an hour after leaving the palace grounds.
The construction site was huge, and as the chariot and wagon wove through it, thousands of men scurried about laboring under a blistering sun to build what would be a mammoth temple to the supreme creator god Amun. The charioteer pulled to a stop at a large white tent, hopped to the ground, and secured the reins to a support pole. He ordered the other men to remain outside while he stepped inside the tent.
The air was heavy with the coppery smell of blood. Low moans and grunts of pain filled the large interior. Twice a day the bodies of workers who had died at the site were loaded on wagons and taken to the edge of the desert and buried.
The physician in charge stiffened at the sight of a military officer. The officer spoke with the physician for a moment, then followed him to the rear of the huge tent. Pushing aside a flap, the physician pointed to the bodies of workers who had died that morning.
There were three shroud-covered bodies lying side by side in the tent. The officer pulled the shrouds down and examined them. The first two were older men with leathery, worn faces and graying hair, but the third appeared to be no more than a young man, with a full head of black hair. The physician said he had died of infection or disease, and there was no apparent wound. The officers examined the body and noticed the right foot was deformed and clubbed. It didn’t matter. The age was right, and the boy had been dead for less than an hour.
The officer retraced his steps back through the large tent and out to the chariot. He ordered the two soldiers to retrieve the corpse of the boy and put it in the coffin. An hour and a half later, Ay had his body.
With the body secured, Ay would soon fulfill Tutankhamun’s final request. There was one last hurdle to overcome, but it would require intimidation. Mummification was a complex and exacting process, and only one man was permitted and qualified by religious rank and skill to oversee the mummification of the king. That man was a high priest known as the Hery Seshta, or controller of mysteries. He was the overseer and ultimate authority in the per-nefer, or “good house,” as the mortuary temple was known. He alone was responsible for the mummification of the king, and his directions to those who would assist him were absolute. Ay knew the old Hery Seshta would oversee the mummification, and he also knew he had met Tutankhamun many times. He would recognize that the body being delivered was not that of the king. It was an issue to be addressed. Ay sent word to the priest that he was bringing Tutankhamun’s body to the mortuary within the hour.
When Ay and his guards arrived at the per-nefer, the closed coffin was brought into the multichambered building and placed on a raised stone platform within a central chamber. The room was windowless and lit with torches and large oil lamps that illuminated the working area and the numerous depictions of gods that adorned the walls. The priest stood to the side of the platform, dressed in a white, pleated, ankle-length tunic. On his head was a beaded skullcap encircled with a band of gold and fronted with a protruding carving of the jackal incarnation of the god Anubis, the conductor of souls. Five lesser priests who would assist in the mummification lined a rear wall, their shaved heads bowed.
With the coffin resting on the platform, Ay dismissed the guards, stepped closer to the priest, and spoke in a low voice. The Hery Seshta turned to the priests lining the wall and ordered them out of the chamber.
Ay stared at him with unblinking eyes. “Who are you speaking with?”
Confused by the question and uncomfortable with Ay’s glare, the priest cast his eyes down. “I—I am speaking to my king.”
“Yes, you are speaking to your king. I want you to listen carefully to what your king tells you. Do you understand?”
“I understand I am to listen carefully to the king—to my king,” the Hery Seshta answered in a faltering cadence.
“Whose body are you going to prepare for the eternal afterlife?”
“I am to prepare the body of Tutankhamun for the royal burial.” The priest’s voice wavered as he realized what was happening.
“Yes, you are to prepare the body of Tutankhamun, and the favor Tutankhamun showed you and all the other priests shall continue to flow to you through your new king. Do you understand that, Hery Seshta?” Ay’s voice was a cloudy mix of authority and menace as he drilled his eyes into the priest’s face.
“I understand, my king, and I will pray to the gods to protect my king. I thank my king for the favor he will show to the priests of the kingdom.”
Ay remained silent, looking down at the priest for a moment, and then placed his hand on the lid of the coffin. “Before I leave, Hery Seshta, I will ask you one thing.” He slid the lid off the coffin and pointed inside. “What do you see here?”
The cowering priest straightened and peered into the coffin in silence for a few seconds before raising his eyes to Ay’s face.
“I see the body of Tutankhamun that I shall prepare for the afterlife,” he said without hesitation.
“See to it.” Ay exited, leaving the Hery Seshta staring silently into the coffin.
As the Hery Seshta looked at the body, he wondered what had happened to Tutankhamun. He would probably never know, but there was one thing he did know, without any doubt. He and all the priests served and lived comfortable lives by favor of the all-powerful king, and that king was now Ay. A few moments later, the Hery Seshta reassembled the lesser priests who would assist in the mummification process. He pointed to the body.
“We begin immediately to prepare the body of Tutankhamun for the journey to the eternal afterlife.”
Over the ensuing days, the priests worked continuously. The body was washed repeatedly in a drying salt solution of natron, and the internal organs—except for the heart, w
hich was considered the source of intelligence—were removed through an incision in the left side. The brain was then removed by a special curved hook inserted in the skull through a nasal cavity. The internal organs were dried and placed in gold canopic jars with sealed lids. The jars were then placed in an alabaster container topped with carved heads of the king. With the brain removed and the internal organs stored, the body was next soaked and saturated in the drying natron solution for forty days. At the end of the soaking period, the Hery Seshta inspected the mummified remains. Satisfied with their condition, he personally began the wrapping procedure, which would take up to fifteen days to complete and require over three hundred square yards of linen.
The body was first coated with resin, and then a beaded cap decorated with cobras was placed on the head. Necklaces and pectorals of gold and precious jewels were hung from the neck and placed on the chest. Rings and gold fingerstalls were placed on each hand and foot. While being wrapped, additional jewels and amulets were placed in folds, and a solid gold dagger was positioned beside the body. With everything in place, the body was wrapped in multiple layers with strips of finely woven linen. When the Hery Seshta completed the wrapping process, the mummy contained over one hundred and forty-three amulets and pieces of jewelry.
Alone in the central chamber of the per-nefer, the Hery Seshta inspected the mummy resting on the stone platform. It was complete. Satisfied, he turned to an adjacent room and clapped twice to summon his personal attendant. The boy appeared seconds later.
“Go to the palace and tell the king the body of Tutankhamun is ready for the journey to the afterlife,” said the priest.
The Way of the Seed_Earth Spawn of Kalpeon Page 32