The Eye of Horus

by Carol Thurston

  “I will have the truth from her this time,” I vowed. Pagosh did not move. “What else?” I asked.

  “Why do you refuse to let her go with you to visit those who are sick in the village of her father’s fellahin, when you did not deny her before?”

  “All pestilences are not the same. Some content themselves with attacking one man or one child. Others afflict many people, like fleas. How I do not know, but I have seen the sickness that runs among the field hands and their families before, and know it to be as painful as it is deadly.”

  “Then why does the flea not jump on you?”

  “At one time or other I suffered similar ailments, but the truth is, I do not know, despite your high opinion of my skills.”

  “Perhaps,” he agreed grudgingly “but you are alone in admitting it. I will make sure she does not go there, then—with or without you.”

  Later, when Aset accompanied me to the workshop of Ramose’s potter, she told me that “Mahu, a boy in my class, says my lady mother once was a man, so she cannot possibly be my real mother.” She skipped to catch up with me, while Tuli lagged behind to sniff the trunk of a tree. “He says my father only puts that about in order to proclaim me a royal princess. Could that be true, Tenre? Surely you must know.”

  “You are the child of her body,” I assured her.

  “But how could she be my mother if she once was a man?”

  I believe she looked for a way to explain why Nefertiti feels no affection for her, but I had none to give. “Your lady mother once was Queen of the Two Lands. Then, for a while after her first husband, the Pharaoh Akhenaten, named her his coregent, she pretended to be a man, just as you dress up to act the great lady.”

  “Oh!” She seemed to accept that, for she went on to something else. “Mahu knows many secrets, but he tells them only to the other boys. Today none of them could solve the numbers problem the priest gave us, so Mahu agreed to tell me his best secret if I would give him the answer.” She looked up at me. “He says I am to be wife to a priest of Amen, so the High Priest and his Sacred Council can put one of their own on the throne of Horus.”

  A cold fist tightened around my heart, but I held my stride. “Whose son is this Mahu that he gossips like an old woman?”

  “Neterhotep, the mayor of Waset. Why?”

  “Because the mayor should teach his son to control his flapping tongue and attend to his numbers, that’s why. Why were you late again today?”

  “Because I entered the sanctuary, where only Pharaoh and the High Priest are allowed to go.”

  “If you knew it was forbidden to enter the sanctuary, why did you go there?”

  “To see the zoo Mahu is always talking about, in a chamber behind the sanctuary, but I lost my way in the dark. My teacher says I ask too many questions, Tenre. Do I?”

  I always answer when she asks why I give this herb or that pill, but the priests believe that to question signifies dissatis faction with the accepted ways, and I did not want her punished for some heresy she learned from me. “That depends on what you ask, and why. Some things are done for no reason except habit or a tradition so old that no one remembers why. There also are private matters that do not concern you.”

  “Like what Pagosh tells Merit about what he feels in his heart?” I nodded. “Does that mean I should never tell anyone what my ka and I say to each other?”

  “That is a question better asked of your father.”

  “He says we all have a voice somewhere inside us that only we can hear and we must never ignore it or we might do something that is not maat. But when the sunu refused even to try to heal Tuli’s wound, my ka asked me why. So it is my ka who asks all these questions, not me.”

  “Do not try to put the blame for what comes out of your mouth somewhere else. No matter what the voice inside you says, you and your ka are one. What did the sunu say when you asked why he refused to treat Tuli?”

  “That Osiris would take him anyway and—” She stubbed her toe and fell to one knee. Tuli heard her cry out and came racing back. “It is these accursed sandals that cause me to fall, senu,” she muttered. The first time she called me that I thought she only twisted her tongue while saying sunu. But I have heard her use many other words from the Akkadian language since then, so she called me “shoe” and believed me ignorant of her intent.

  “We will go back and wash the dirt off your bloody knee.” I bent to pick her up.

  “I am not a baby, and there is no need to go back,” she said, jerking away from me. “Ipwet lives just over there.”

  Ruka came bursting through the door calling, “Are you hurt, Aset?” Clumsy oaf that he is, the boy’s heart overflows with love simply because she calls him friend.

  After Ipwet cleaned the dirt from her knee, Aset pointed to an oblong shape made of folded strips of palm fronds, obviously the start of a basket. Ramose’s basket maker handed it to her, then watched Aset turn it over and over, examining it from the top, then the bottom and finally from the side.

  “Could you weave a sandal shaped like this,” she asked, “but with the wall leaning in rather than out, so it would keep my foot from sliding off the sole? Surely that would be better than those old things.” She made a face at her discarded sandals.

  “It takes no time to weave such a little thing,” Ipwet agreed, eager to repay Aset’s kindness to her son, “but it would not stay on without a strap.”

  “Perhaps,” Aset replied, “but not one that rubs my toes. I will think on it and let you know what I decide … tomorrow.”

  DAY 16, FOURTH MONTH OF HARVEST

  “Does she admit to what she did?” Ramose asked.

  I nodded, then told him about the boy who talked of a chamber behind the festival hall of the great Thutmose, where his outline scribes had created all manner of exotic birds and strange animals. “I suspect she wanted to see how they were drawn.”

  “The priest who is her teacher says she is skilled at outlining,” Ramose agreed. “He also complains that she sows the seeds of rebellion in others by refusing to copy the figures in the proper way.”

  “Pagosh says the boys in her class imitate how the priest binds her left arm to her side to keep her from using it. Apparently they find amusement in seeing her humbled.”

  His face flushed with anger. “I will—” He stopped as a child’s voice came from the hallway, followed by a sharp slap. A moment later, Nefertiti burst into Ramose’s library, dragging her daughter behind her. She jerked Aset’s arm, causing her to stumble and cry out in pain.

  “See what a thieving little beggar your precious princess has become!” she spat at her husband. “She not only pilfers my jewelry but paints herself as a woman of the streets.”

  Aset stood rubbing her shoulder with one hand, looking so pitiful it was all I could do to keep from going to her and taking her into my arms. The wig she wore had slipped askew and both cheeks were streaked with green from her eyes. When she dropped her hand I saw that a smear of henna stained the sleeve of her white gown.

  “Yesterday was not enough?” Ramose inquired, revealing that he knew about her transgression at the temple. Aset lifted her chin to brave his piercing gaze. “You went to your lady mother’s apartment, as well, though you have been instructed not to?”

  “Yes, because everyone is going to Mena’s banquet but me. Tuli and I decided to have our own party.” Her voice began to quiver. “I meant only to borrow her necklace, just for tonight.”

  “You disappoint me, daughter.” Ramose’s words cut deeper than any knife, causing Aset’s tears to overflow and run down her cheeks.

  “I will not tolerate such chaos in my house!” her father burst out. “You are never to come before me in tears again.”

  Wide-eyed at his display of anger, Aset darted a glance at me as Nefertiti went to Ramose and began stroking his arm—to soothe his temper, I thought. When she slid her hand beneath his arm and then over one bare breast, I realized she intended something else entirely.

 
; “You will go to your room and reflect on why you insist on intruding where you are not wanted,” he told Aset, getting himself under control—at least where she was concerned, and motioned me to take her away. I bowed first to him and then his lady, who had already turned away, and took Aset’s hand.

  As we passed from the room I glanced back and saw Ramose approach the Beautiful One from behind, grasp her breasts in his hands, and pull her against his aroused body. In the hallway I slowed my stride and would have lifted Aset in my arms except for the look on her face.

  Once we reached her room I removed the necklace and wig, then cleaned her face and scrubbed the henna from her palms. Still she refused to meet my eyes, to hide how much she was hurting.

  “Do you remember the little girl I told you about who cannot run or play because she must wear a splint on one leg?” Aset’s eyes flew to mine. “Nebet will have no one to play with tonight while her parents entertain their guests.”

  “You will take me with you?” she whispered. I nodded. “Tuli, too?”

  I nodded again and tried not to let her see that I was worried about him. “Do you know where he is?”

  “My lady mother ordered Paga to cut his throat and throw him on the trash heap, because he tried to bite her. But Paga will not let anything bad happen to Tuli.” She searched my face “I can go … truly?”

  The word has become our way of sealing a bargain, and once given cannot be taken back. I hesitated only because to defy her father’s orders is an act I cannot undo, either. But Ramose charged me with looking after not only her body but her akh, the spark of life that is hers alone, and in my heart I knew what I did was maat.

  “Unless you find Nebet is too young. She is not yet three, while you soon will celebrate your seventh feast day.” Aset was already shaking her head. Suddenly transformed into an imp with sparkling blue eyes, she bounced on her toes.

  “Nebet has no brothers or sisters, either?”

  “Not yet. I will call Merit to help you dress and brush your hair. I would not have you shame me before my friends.” I only said it to give her an excuse to wear something special, but when she ran to her clothes chest I saw that she held her left arm to her body. “But first I must have your word on one more thing.”

  She turned back to me. “I promise to stay with Nebet so my father will not see me,” she vowed, revealing that she understood more than I intended.

  “Come here.” When she stood before me again I took her left hand in mine. “If ever the priest ties this to your side again, you must come and tell me.”

  “But it is wrong for me to form the sacred signs of the language of the gods with my left hand. Isn’t it?”

  “Is it wrong that one of Tuli’s eyes is blue and the other yellow?” I shrugged. “Who are we mortals to deny how the gods formed us?”

  She started to giggle, but Tuli chose that moment to come running across the room and they both went down in a heap of intertwined limbs. I turned to find Pagosh in the doorway.

  “I will pole you across the river, but not until it is dark,” he said, as I passed him on my way out. “Ramose will not expect you to go against his orders, but his lady has eyes in the back of her head.”

  Merit had brushed Aset’s short curls and tied her youth lock with a yellow ribbon and carnelian tyet to match her saffron linen dress. She wore sandals made from gazelle hide painted the same colors as her wide collar, and looked a highborn lady in all but the coarse linen bag swinging from one shoulder. Tonight it held not only the little papyrus-root lion and ivory scribe’s palette, a gift from her father on her fifth feast day, but a woven straw box filled with fruit candies.

  As we approached the entrance to Mena’s compound, I took the path to the lesser gate and Nebet’s rooms. When Aneksi, her nurse-mother, came to the door, I told her I brought a surprise—“the company of another child, which may prove to be the best medicine yet for our little friend.”

  We found Nebet pulling a wooden crocodile across the tile floor, holding to the edge of the sitting shelf with one hand while jerking the string with the other to make his long snout open and close. “Watch out he does not eat one of your toes,” I called out.

  “Tenre!” she shrieked. I went down on one knee and opened my arms while Aset stood back with Tuli, watching Nebet lift her splinted leg free of the floor and swing it around in front of her. Then she let go of the sitting shelf and came straight toward me, balancing herself with each step while she lifted her splinted leg and placed it in front of the other one. Our game had started as a way for me to watch her walk alone, to see how the splint allowed her to move, but now it is that and much more. She was still some distance away when she reached out, trusting me to catch her, which I did, then swung her up and around in a circle.

  “I have missed you, little lotus bud,” I whispered in her ear. “You are growing so fast you soon will be as tall as your mother, and just as beautiful.” Embarrassed, she tucked her face into my neck and in that moment caught sight of Aset.

  They stared at each other until I set Nebet back on her feet, holding her hand while she found her balance. A wah collar of safflowers and persea blooms circled her neck, like those her parents offered their female guests on such occasions, but she was wearing a short tunic so Aset could see the jointed brace. It extended from her ankle to her hip and was made of a thin bundle of reeds bound with gum-soaked linen, for lightness and flexibility.

  “My name is Aset, and this is Tuli.” She clicked her fingers, and he sat up on his haunches. Nebet covered her mouth with her hand to hide a smile. Next Aset dug in her bag for the papyrus-root lion. “Would your crocodile like to play with my lion?” she asked, holding it out to the other girl. Nebet has always been fearful of strangers, and I could not be certain she would accept the offer of friendship. But Aset seemed to sense that she was shy and let her take her time.

  When Nebet reached for the lion, Aset held out her arm and said, “Here, you can hold on to me.” Nebet is tall for her age while Aset is small for hers, so they were not so far apart in height. “I promise not to let you fall. And you are not to worry about your hip. Tenre will fix it. Truly. He gave me life when no one else could. Even Paga says there is no one his equal in all the Two Lands. Except your father, of course. Tenre says he is the best physician in this world. Then when you can walk better, we will go all sorts of places together. Would you like to pretend that Tuli is our baby brother? We could tie this piece of cloth around his hips for a kilt. If he is good, you might even give him a piece of the candy I brought you.”

  I left them then and went around to Mena’s garden, where his other guests stood about, women with other women and men with men, sipping wine and talking. Tall for a woman, Mena’s wife stands eye to eye with most men, and disarms them with her penetrating insight as well as her beauty. Tonight Tetisheri wore a white gown fringed with blue, a gold necklace inset with lapis lazuli, and a wreath of flowers like Nebet’s.

  “It has been too long, Tenre.” She touched her cheek to mine and whispered, “Now that you are here to keep the hyenas from attacking his back, I can relax and enjoy myself.”

  “Fear not, Sheri. It was your husband who kept the crocodiles from eating me when we were boys,” I murmured, holding her close long enough to explain about Aset.

  “Do you seduce my wife before my very eyes?” Mena called, clapping me on the shoulder as he slipped his other arm around Sheri. That she chose him amazes Mena still, I think, for it has changed him in ways that neither of us could have anticipated. I made a show of inspecting him, from his gold armlets to the hem of his pleated hip wrap and purple belt, the ends weighted with nuggets of turquoise.

  “Take care, my friend, lest one of your soldiers mistakes you for a woman.” He laughed and slapped my cheek, a familiarity he does not visit on anyone else.

  “Come, let me get you some wine and introduce you to our guests.” He led me to three tall clay jars standing like soldiers at attention, their bottoms planted in a
bed of wet sand. “We have Antyllan, but the Ymet is better.”

  “I have the tongue of a peasant, so I will leave the choice to you.” I spoke in jest, then realized it was true. “I do not belong here, Mena.”

  “It was your pure heart and good sense that took Ramose’s eye, not your taste in wine.” He grinned, knowing he had me in the palm of his hand. “Ymet it is then—the white gold from Lake Mareotis.”

  Several men attended the guest of honor, but Mena did not hesitate to interrupt. “It is my pleasure, General, to present my friend Senakhtenre, physician of Waset like his father before him.” He began to recite Horemheb’s titles. “Commander of Pharaoh’s Armies of the North and the South, First—”

  I noticed that Horemheb has eyes like a bird, with lids that stand wide open and irises as black as the pupil, leaving them without depth. He also is so big that only one man stood taller. The Nubian.

  “You are too short,” Horemheb said to me. “Our host speaks so highly of your skills I expected a man at least twice your size.”

  I risked a glance at Mena and found him grinning like a fool. “In that case, General, he has misled us both. The last thing I expected of you was a sense of humor.” The Commander of Pharaoh’s Armies honked like a goose while Mena’s ruddy face turned even darker.

  He hurried to perform the other introductions, leaving the Nubian to last. “And my aide, Prince Senmut, son of the King of Aniba.” In all the talk of his young assistant, Mena never had mentioned that he was royal or from the province above the First Cataract. But Senmut did not wear his hair bobbed above the ears like his countrymen, and his skin is black as night, not brown. Indeed he is fortunate in his wide mouth and straight nose, both suggesting that his forebears came from Punt, the land near the mouth of the Red Sea.

  Mena guided me across the garden to the cluster of men standing with the High Priest, Ramose among them. “You have heard me speak of my physician, Senakhtenre,” he said to Paranefer.