The Oasis

by Pauline Gedge

  “Subversion?” Aahmes-nefertari said. “That is a strong word, Kamose.”

  “I know. Probably too strong to describe the intermittent grumbling and resentment most of them have indulged in ever since I first called them to council. They wanted to go on enjoying the peace and prosperity of their little domains. The Setiu have left us alone, they said. Why should we stir up trouble? Why should you? Even though they knew of the fate Apepa had planned for us. I do not forget their words. Neither must you. Once allowed to go home, they might try to defy me and stay there.”

  “Not Ankhmahor surely!” Aahotep expostulated.

  “No, not him,” Kamose admitted. “He sees the true nature of Egypt.”

  “Part of the problem has been the power you have given to Hor-Aha,” Tetisheri said. “I have warned you about that before, Kamose. Keep him on a very tight rein. Perhaps you could even leave him behind in Wawat. Make that his princedom.”

  “Is Ahmose aware of the tasks you have set us?” Aahmes-nefertari wanted to know.

  “I will tell him later,” Kamose said. “Otherwise there would be discussions and arguments and further instructions. I wanted to keep this meeting simple.” He left the couch. “Mesore begins tomorrow,” he finished as he moved towards the door. “I will not be here for the Beautiful Feast of the Valley. When you go to Father’s tomb to eat the meal and make the offering, do so for Ahmose and me as well. Thank you, all of you. For everything. I will send the fanbearers back in.” Bowing to them shortly, he left them.

  The members of the family ate the evening meal together quietly then scattered to their several quarters. Kamose, as had become his habit, took bedding and climbed to the roof of the old palace. The Medjay were sleeping aboard the ships together with the thousand extra soldiers culled from Weset and the surrounding districts. They were cramped but resigned and their subdued sounds floated quietly and comfortingly to Kamose’s ears on the still night air.

  It is good to think of tomorrow, of being on the move again, he told himself as he lay listening to his archers and infantry jostle for places on the decks and roll themselves in their blankets. I would rather be sailing north, but Wawat is preferable to fidgeting through the Inundation here at Weset. I am not needed here. Perhaps I am not really needed anywhere. But that thought carried no emotion with it and he soon drifted into unconsciousness.

  Even the leave-taking was becoming familiar. The women stood on the top of the watersteps as they had done before and Kamose kissed them dutifully, including the baby in his sister’s arms. Amunmose was there with acolytes and incense. Ankhmahor’s son waited by the ship’s ramp with the Followers. Akhtoy looked glum as he stood on the deck in the early light. The ritual of parting proceeded with no great storms of regret, no tears. Wawat would not be dangerous. Only time lay between the embarking and the coming home. “This little scrap will be sitting up all by herself in five months,” Ahmose remarked to his wife. “Do not let Raa give her honey, Aahmes-nefertari. It will ruin her taste for other food later on. Look how Ahmose-onkh howls for sweet pastries.” He kissed her. “Do not worry if my messages take weeks to reach you,” he said. She patted his cheek.

  “I have no fears for you or myself,” she replied calmly. “I will pray for you, of course, but I will be fully occupied, Ahmose. Bring me back some gold dust for my eyelids. I hear that you can scoop it up out of the river in great handfuls in Wawat.”

  Amunmose had stopped chanting. The captains were waiting and the helmsmen had clambered to their perches. Sailors prepared to hoist the sails that would fill with the summer wind that blew with reassuring constancy out of the north. Only Nefer-Sakharu, standing apart from the others, cried and held onto her son with an embarrassing determination until Ramose had to tear himself out of her arms. The three men passed through the protecting lines of the Followers and ran up the ramp, and the order to cast off was given. With a sense of guilty relief Kamose saw the expanse of water between him and his kin begin to widen. He waved once and turned his face to the south.

  MESORE, DAY 3. To the Great Queen Tetisheri, my grandmother, greetings. The bearer of this letter should be Kay Abana, who with his father, Baba, is on his way north to Het nefer Apu. Having taken on a quantity of natron and pilots who will guide us safely to Swenet, we expect to depart Nekheb tomorrow morning. I have made sacrifices in the temple of Nekhbet, asking her in her capacity as protectress of Kings to spread her wings over me. As we passed Pi-Hathor I debated whether or not to stop and remind Het-uy of his oath but it seemed an unnecessary waste of time. I do not doubt that he is well acquainted with the fact that I now hold three-quarters of Egypt in my control. I ignored Esna also. Both these havens of Setiu sympathy are isolated by Wawat and by us and are thus impotent. Treat the Abanas with every courtesy and do not forget to arrange correspondence with them when they reach the navy. Be sure to share my news as you receive it with my mother and sister. Dictated to the Chief Scribe Ipi and signed by my own hand. Kamose.

  MESORE, DAY 10. To the Great Queen Tetisheri, my grandmother, greetings. This town of Swenet is dusty and barren, surrounded by nothing but the arid heat of pure desert, yet its cemetery contains the tombs of many of Egypt’s mighty Kings and there are vast granite quarries here stretching east a considerable distance from the centre of the miserable collection of houses.

  Just before coming upon the island we saw the Nile widen, and the island itself rears majestically out of a river full of eddies and whirlpools. I am very aware that this place marks the formal boundary between Egypt and the south, for just beyond Swenet is the first cataract where the Nile becomes very troubled, splintering and dashing itself over and between black, smooth rocks so hard that the current can only polish them. They are beautiful, however. They contain some kind of crystalline substance making them flash red and pink when Ra strikes them. Ahmose remarked that their colour reminds him of the pink grapes of Ta-she, so far away from us here in distance as well as in memory.

  The pilots we engaged at Nekheb have gone home and I have local men who will take the ships through this maelstrom. They tell us that the Osiris King Senwasret many hentis ago caused a great canal to be cleared through the cataract. We have heard of this and, of course, I have seen it marked on the maps but a few pen strokes on papyrus do not convey the power and danger of the rocks to our ships. I am in grave doubt as to whether we can trust either the Divine One’s engineering abilities or the knowledge of the new pilots, though I have little choice.

  The name of Teti of Khemmenu is well known here. I had already forgotten that Teti was Apepa’s Inspector of Dykes and Canals even though he lived in Khemmenu. Of course few Setiu have ever ventured farther south than the root of the Delta. Their concern was a practical one. Keep the canal open so that the gold might flow. So perhaps we will brave the turbulence unscathed.

  I trust that you have been given the first reports from the Princes regarding their harvests and the ordering of their nomes. Do not wait too long to remind those who are still silent of their duty. Renew your watch on the river. It may be that Het-uy will try to send a message to Apepa on seeing my fleet go past. I do not think the serpent has the foresight or the courage to assemble a force to retake Egypt while I am gone, but the gods favour those who are humble enough to take every consequence into consideration. Dictated to the Chief Scribe Ipi and signed by my own hand. Kamose.

  MESORE, DAY 19. To the Great Queen Tetisheri, greetings. By now the Beautiful Feast of the Valley will be over. I said prayers for my father’s ka and imagined the crowds of people invading the west bank laden with flowers and food for their dead, the priests in their flowing white linens, the singing and the faint breath of incense tinging the air. I also prayed for Si-Amun. I trust you did also.

  However there has been little time for prayer. Our progress has been slowed by the need to probe for hidden sandbanks where the river widens and becomes shallow. According to the pilots these sandbanks shift from time to time and therefore cannot be mapped. This is pa
rticularly true in summer when the level of the water is low. Twice we have used up a day in having to disembark while the boats were dragged onto the shore and then along slipways to avoid rapids and sandbanks.

  Wawat is a place of harsh beauty. Great rocks that resemble rough pyramids rise out of land that is light brown, and sometimes we drift past jagged rifts that split the heights open to reveal desert running away to a naked horizon. When the cliffs retreat, we come across huge plains tormented by winds that have formed mighty golden dunes or that whine around curious rock formations jutting from the sand.

  We are at present moored at Mi’am. Here there is a large cemetery and a fort in disrepair but I have explored neither. The heat is indescribable, a furnace that saps moisture from the body and takes away the desire for movement. The Medjay are less affected by it and I have sent out Medjay scouts to ascertain the state of the villages under attack. Mi’am is in the centre of Wawat, a good position from which to operate. Our Egyptian troops are dispirited. The heat and the immensity of this bleakness make them so. I also feel my ka loose within my body, but I cannot allow this dullness of mind to conquer me. I await the reports of my scouts and some news from you. Dictated to the Chief Scribe Ipi and signed by my own hand. Kamose.

  MESORE, DAY 21. To the Great Queen Tetisheri, greetings. I received your letter yesterday together with one for Ahmose from our sister and one for Ramose from his mother. I congratulate you for the vigilance that resulted in the interception of the message from Nefer-Sakharu to Prince Meketra at Khemmenu begging him to send an escort for her so that she may return to her city. She also asks him for a house there and his protection. From us, I presume. You say that the tone of the letter was curiously formal, as though she had already concluded some kind of contract or agreement with him and that a similar one was to be delivered to Prince Iasen at Badari. I am surprised that she did not include Intef in her correspondence, but perhaps Intef’s estate at Qebt is too close to Weset for her comfort. I wonder what is in her mind? I trust that you had the letters resealed and allowed the heralds to take them north. If the two Princes mention her contact with them in their communications with you, then we may know that they are to be trusted. If they do not, then we must presume that the time she spent in their company has borne a dangerous fruit. Perhaps it is no more than a fervent, even desperate desire to escape into the company of old friends, but I suspect something darker. If Apepa regains control of Egypt, Nefer-Sakharu stands to gain more back than she has lost. Am I full of vain imaginings, Tetisheri? Continue to watch her but do nothing. She is a disagreeable woman, but if I am wrong I risk the disapproval of the gods.

  We have spent the last eleven days in skirmishes with the desert predators who have been harassing the Medjay villages. It seems that they came up from Kush some time ago and they have been gradually pushing north into Medjay territory east of the river, from Buhen almost to the first cataract, in the large tract of land called Khent-hen-nefer. They terrorized the Medjay women and children but there is no evidence that they have done so under orders from Teti-En. Hunting them down has been a hot, dirty and brutish affair. They are good marksmen but not as adept as the Medjay, who are taking to this little foray with the ferocious glee of cats let loose on the rats in a granary.

  The Kushites are poorly armed. Most of them carry clubs alone. Some have knives. A few wield swords that look suspiciously Egyptian in design. Looted from the forts in hentis past, I think. They wear nothing but loincloths made from the hide of gazelles and go barefoot on sand that would burn the skin from the soles of all but our hardiest peasants. They yell a great deal and shake their clubs. The Medjay scream back at them and then there is the usual confusion of running, shooting and slashing, blood and sweat and wounds. In the night the hyenas come for the corpses. Our losses have been so slight as to be negligible. Tomorrow I am sending a thousand Medjay under Hor-Aha into the north-eastern portion of Khent-hen-nefer to destroy any straggling Kushites. We cannot have them creeping close to our own border. Wawat is an excellent buffer zone and we must continue to keep it peaceful.

  Send to the masons’ workshops and make sure that the carving of my two stelae is proceeding well. I want them set up in the temple by the time I come home. Dictated to the Chief Scribe Ipi and signed by my own hand. Kamose.

  THOTH, DAY 3. To the Great Queen Tetisheri, my beloved mother and dearest sister, greetings on this, the third day of the New Year. I wanted to be with you all on the first day of this month when all Egypt celebrates the Rising of the Sopdet Star and we in Weset make solemn sacrifices to Amun. I long to know what auguries Amunmose discovered regarding our fortunes during the coming year and how little Hent-ta-Hent is faring and what the final tallies of the harvest were. There is no sign here yet that Isis is crying, but I trust that she will honour our endeavours on behalf of Ma’at and provide us with an ample flood.

  I am dictating this at sunset from the deck of my ship. The whole desert, the old fort, the mud huts of Mi’am, the motionless palms, everything is on fire with the lingering red glow of Ra as he is swallowed by Nut whose mouth here in Wawat seems as wide as the whole world. This is the hour when our spirits begin to rise. A desert coolness begins to creep in on an ephemeral breeze. Fires are lit and before long the odour of cooking food wafts over us. Akhtoy brings cool beer that has been sunk in the river all day. The villagers sidle close to receive whatever the cooks will give them, and when they have eaten, they bring out their little drums and sing and beat rhythms so that the Medjay will dance. So much seems familiar after two seasons campaigning along the Nile, yet the flavour of this country is foreign, wild and inhospitable outside the boundary of civilization we take with us and set up wherever we go.

  Hor-Aha and the troops returned this morning with six prisoners, the headmen of the villages they sacked and burned. I think I will bring them to Weset and show them the power and riches of Egypt as a warning not to attempt future incursions. Hor-Aha is able to speak to them in their own language, a mixture of the Medjay’s tongue and something more guttural. Once captured they become very meek, but Hor-Aha has put them under constant guard all the same.

  Tomorrow I intend to leave some five hundred men here and take the rest farther south to Buhen. There is little more to be done in this area. We must go on foot, for the Nile shows a slight rise and the boats must be hauled high onto the bank to avoid the coming flood. We expect a long, slow progress because there are many villages on the way and they are all infested with Kushites. I am anxious to see the great fort at Buhen, whether it will be worth repairing and garrisoning, and I hope to investigate the possibility of taking back the retrieving and shipping of gold at once. I trust that you have been receiving the letters Ahmose has been dictating. I am sure he has told you, Aahmes-nefertari, that where we are going gold can be picked up from the bank of the river even as we walk along it, and can be seen glittering under the water. I love you all. Dictated to the Chief Scribe Ipi and signed by my own hand. Kamose.

  PAOPHI, DAY 7. To the Great Queen Tetisheri, greetings. I wish that you could see the sheer grandeur of this place. The fort of Buhen is situated in the centre of a kind of bay of low sand hills, the bay itself being a very fertile plain that extends on both sides of the Nile and supports many fields and groves of palms. The river runs long and straight here. There are no narrows, no rocks or dangerous currents, so that the ancients were forced to build stone quays for the berthing of large ships. The quays themselves are not in a good state of repair and are at present largely just under the surface of the flood.

  However, it is the fort itself that draws the eye. I will not describe it in any detail save to say that perhaps a third of the population of Weset could be poured into its brick walls. It is like a small fortified town. Within its perimeter there is a walled citadel containing residences, workshops, granaries, all surrounded and protected by walls thicker than two men lying head-to-feet. Ramose told me that it reminded him of the citadel in Het-Uart. Apepa’s predecessor
s chose to build their palace behind a shield our own ancestor provided all unwittingly for them, that same ancestor who had this invincible place erected.

  Two great gate-towers give access to the two stone quays but the mightiest gateway opens out to the desert on the western side. I will say no more regarding its dimensions. Ahmose is having it mapped for further study when we return home. He urges me to revive it, leave troops here, but I cannot see the necessity at present. Teti-En’s capital, Defufa, is over two hundred miles farther south. I no longer believe that he is a threat. The barbaric inhabitants of Kush belong to several different tribes and none of those tormenting the Medjay belong to Teti-En. Besides, my soldiers must be concentrated on routing the remainder of the Setiu before I seriously turn my attention to Kush. Soldiers stationed here would be able to provide themselves with fresh vegetables and meat but grain and all other provisions would have to come regularly from Egypt and Egypt is in no condition yet to bother with Buhen.

  It has taken us more than a month to battle our way here. The river from Mi’am south is thick with Medjay villages, all of them more or less controlled by Kushites to be flushed out, all of them containing the families of our archers, so not only have we fought but we have also been compelled to remain a day or two in each village while Medjay reunions took place. We are storing up much goodwill for the future, but I chafe under the yoke of this necessity.