Thothmes nodded. “So they say. But Huy, although Anuket is innocent, she is not necessarily without the guile all girls seem to inherit. You have no sisters. I have three of them, and believe me, from the time they were small they’ve shown an ability to get what they want while seeming to be obedient and sweet.”
“What are you saying?”
“Two things. One, that Anuket could have been warning you away by confiding in you, and two, that we must wait and see if your emotion grows or dies.” He grasped Huy’s hand and looked at him earnestly. “In either case, my sister is fortunate to be loved by someone as full of good qualities as you.”
The litter was slowing. The noise of the public pathway had faded. He has not mentioned the weight the gods have laid upon me or its consequences for my future, Huy thought as the bearers swung onto the approach to the temple and he caught the faint odour of the pool lying before the vast stone concourse. He believes that this is nothing more than a puff of wind stirring the sand of the desert before moving on. I wish I believed it too.
They had hardly returned to their cell and were unpacking their satchels when a young priest darkened the morning sparkle pouring in through the doorway. “The Master desires your presence in his quarters at once, Huy,” he said with a bow. “Do you need to be escorted?”
Huy sighed. “No. I know my way there by now.” The man departed and Huy lifted the cedar chest onto his cot, raising the lid and laying the faience vial reverently in one of the compartments his uncle had fashioned so carefully and expertly. Returning the chest to its place under his cot, he turned reluctantly to Thothmes. “I suppose you are going to swim in the lake and lie in the grass,” he said wistfully. “I don’t know when I’ll be back.”
“At least you know by now that you have not been summoned for punishment,” Thothmes answered with wry understanding. “Is this the day, do you think, Huy?”
Huy did not need to ask Thothmes what he meant. Shrugging, he started across the courtyard.
The High Priest himself opened to Huy’s knock on the imposing double doors that still gave Huy a pang of apprehension when he was forced to approach them. Smiling, the man indicated that Huy should enter and Huy did so, surprised to find the room full of sharp rays of sunbeams lancing down from a series of clerestory windows cut in the walls just below the level of the ceiling. Ramose chuckled. “I love the daylight as much as, if not more than, any other man,” he commented as Huy took the customary stool before the large desk. “I am Ra’s High Priest after all, I do not crouch in darkness. But of course you have made every other visit to my domain during the hours of darkness, haven’t you?” He lowered himself behind the desk. “Did you enjoy your three days of festivity? Yes,” he added thoughtfully, “I can see that you did. Nakht’s house is a warm and welcoming one, is it not? Give me your hand.”
Slightly alarmed, Huy extended it and the High Priest took it firmly in both of his. At once Huy felt a shock go through him, then a fire spread up his arm and into his chest. For some moments the Priest’s eyes held his in a steady regard, then he released Huy and sat back. Huy almost fell off his stool, so sudden was the cessation of heat.
“The title of Greatest of Seers is bestowed on every High Priest of Ra as a matter of course,” Ramose said, “just as the title of Greatest of the Five belongs to the High Priest of Thoth at Khmun. Sometimes the title I hold is more than honorary. I have the power of second sight. It is nothing like the gift the gods have bestowed on you. I cannot see into the future. Nor can I diagnose an illness. But I can see into the heart of a man, whether it is sound or as rotten as worm-eaten wood, and I can find the seat of his happiness or his distress.” He clasped his beringed fingers and laid them on the surface of the desk. “You have fallen in love, young Huy. I do not think that it is with Nasha. She is too vibrant, too colourful. She disturbs that thing in you that demands peace. No, it is sweet Anuket, weaver of garlands for the gods, who consumes your body and mind. I am sorry for you.”
Huy laughed once, shakily. “It is a relief to find my soul exposed to you without a word from me, Master. I would have told you and asked for your advice, but now all I need is the advice, not the courage to confess my weakness.”
“Weakness?” Ramose cocked an eye at Huy. “Love is no weakness, and the flame consuming you is pure until it is sullied by rashness. Only Anuket’s name is tainted. I almost lost a friend because of that.”
“You were one of the astrologers commissioned to choose her name?”
Ramose nodded. “We cast her horoscope three times. There was no doubt. I conjured against the seven Hathors in order to avert whatever dangers such a name might bring her, and we tied the seven red ribbons around her limbs for seven days to bind any evil bau who might be hovering, but the name had to stand. Nakht was furious. However”—he unlaced his fingers and laid his palms flat on the desk—“so far Anuket resembles the water goddess of old, not the wanton whore she has become in her modern aspect. She is intelligent, demure, and chaste. Do you need my advice?”
“Very much.” Huy swallowed. “Nasha taunted me with the knowledge that a Seer loses his or her power unless he or she remains virgin. Is that true?”
Ramose’s eyebrows rose. “Taunted you? Yes, I can understand why. Nasha is beautiful but fiery and strong-willed. Nakht is having difficulty finding a husband for her who is strong enough to pit himself against her resolve, win, and yet keep her respect.” He grinned, a gesture that removed years from his features. “So far she has demolished all of them.”
“I had no idea,” Huy exclaimed. “Thothmes has told me nothing of these things.”
“I doubt very much if Nakht takes his young son into his confidence regarding his daughter’s matrimonial prospects,” Ramose said dryly. “I tell you so that you will not judge Nasha too harshly. Her heart is generous and kindly, but it must hurt her to know that Anuket is adored, even by a stripling like yourself.” He lifted an arm in admonition against Huy’s unspoken protest. “I do not insult you, Huy. I speak a truth. You are twelve. You are in the violent throes of a first love. It will either last no longer than a few months or it will deepen, in which case I will then answer your question. You do not need to know now. Don’t be anxious. Enjoy the experience. Give thanks to the gods for it. It is sacred. Feast on little Anuket’s presence with every faculty but one, for many perfectly ordinary reasons I do not think I need to name. Do I?”
Miserably Huy shook his head. “No, Master.”
“Good.” Ramose smiled. “Then we may move on to your immediate future. I have spoken with your Overseer and we have ordered your afternoons thus. After the noon meal and the sleep you will continue your work with the bow and spear, but we will add control of a chariot to it. You need no more swimming lessons. After an hour on the training ground, more or less, you will go to the bathhouse, wash yourself thoroughly, and present yourself at my quarters. Together we will approach the Ished Tree, in whose shade you will begin to study the Book of Thoth until it is time for your evening meal. I presume that these arrangements are not inconvenient for you?”
Huy saw that it was a serious question. “No, Master, of course not. You will sit with me while I read?” He was remembering his first encounter with both Tree and High Priest and the thought brought apprehension.
“No, there is no need. The scrolls are not difficult to read. The language is archaic, but decipherable to a student of your standing. You may take your palette with you to make notes of anything you may wish to ponder later. The Book does not of course leave the vicinity of the Tree. When you feel that you have read enough for one day, whether it be a few minutes or a few hours, you will tell the guard on the door. He will fetch me, I will take the scrolls away, and you will be free to spend your evenings as you wish.” He rose and came around the desk. “I am needed in the temple and you have the rest of the day to prepare for your lessons that begin as usual tomorrow morning. The other boys are trickling back to their courtyards. Go and greet your friend
s.”
Huy stood. “I am not to discuss what I read with anyone, is that correct, Master?”
“You may bring any problem to me or to the Rekhet.” He hesitated. “The Book is forbidden to no one, Huy. The responsibility of the priests here and at Khmun is to keep it safe, not to keep it from those wishing to read it. You would think that every literate man would want to see what the god has set down regarding the ordering of the cosmos, but few come and ask for it.” He pursed his lips. “It is as though the god chooses those destined to read it and sends them here. During my own tenure as High Priest there have been only two requests to see it. Neither man stayed long. Both seemed to find something in it that satisfied them, whereas when I read it I understood only one truth.”
“And what was that, Master?” Huy asked eagerly.
“‘It is Ra, the creator of the names of his limbs, which came into being in the forms of the gods who are in the following of Ra,’” Ramose quoted. He looked at Huy inquiringly. Huy’s face was a blank. “Think about it for a moment.”
Huy frowned. “It cannot be!” he exclaimed. “That would mean …”
“Yes,” Ramose said quietly. “Remember that the words were written down in the dawn of our history, before the vast proliferation of gods we have now. Those words appear in the seventeenth chapter of the Book of the Dead. Our gods are personifications of the names of Ra. Each god is one of his members. The name of a god is the god himself.”
“So Ra is the visible representation of the creator-god Atum. As Ra is to Atum, so is our King to Ra.”
“You will learn much, much more from the Book than this,” Ramose said. “More than I could ever fathom. You have been chosen to do so. If you wish to take young Thothmes into your confidence, you may, but he will be no more than a sounding board for you. He will understand only that he loves you. Go and sit in the temple gardens for a while. Try to empty your mind.” Ramose leaned close. “It is perhaps a good thing that your parents have no interest in the things of the gods,” he commented. “You will bring no prejudices to your study of the Book. The gods must be honoured, Huy, but what are the gods? I am late. I must go. I will see you tomorrow afternoon. The guard at the door to the Tree will be expecting you.” He hurried out, his priestly robe floating after him.
Huy followed more slowly, smarting from the High Priest’s offhand comment regarding his parents’ ignorance. The shame of his origins would probably always dog him, he thought dismally, the emotion lying dormant until a chance word revived it. No matter how refined his speech became, how cultured his manners, how sophisticated his education, he would remain the son of a peasant from Hut-herib.
Finding himself in the grove of palms by the south wall of the temple, not knowing how he had got there, he chose the bole of a tree where the grass made a green patch in the surrounding sand and lowered himself onto it, drawing up his knees and resting his chin on them. What of Khenti-kheti? he thought dully. Is the totem of my hometown simply a symbol of some aspect of Ra? When I prostrate myself before his image in my cell, am I praising or beseeching aid from the great sun himself? And what of Osiris and Isis, Horus, Hathor, where do they come from? He slumped back against the tree and closed his eyes. “I do not want to know,” he murmured aloud. “I have cared very little for the things of the gods. They have treated me cruelly, foisted their strange ways upon me without my permission, as though I were of no account, and now I am their prisoner.” You chose, a voice whispered inside his head, and he closed his mouth. So I chose, he thought mutinously. That does not make me love them or want to know about them. All I must do is read and understand the Book while keeping my emotions to myself. When that is done, will they let me go?
Waking the next morning, he moved through the hours enveloped in a sense of unreality. He received a sharp reprimand from his teacher for inattention, listened to Ptahmose the architect speak of plumb lines and pillar foundations without comprehension, and ate the noon meal without appetite. He came to himself briefly in the white dust of the training ground, for he enjoyed drawing the bow and was beginning to have some mastery over the previously erratic flight of his arrows. Later, his weapons master walked him over to the adjoining stables, where a curious nose appeared over the half door at their approach and two mild brown eyes regarded Huy. “This is Lazy White Star,” the man said. “He pulls the chariots of the beginners. He is very lazy, as his name suggests, and will do no more than an occasional trot.”
Huy stepped close to the beast, his hand going to the firm warmth of its arched neck, his nostrils full of its reassuring odour. Suddenly his fingers froze. “Master, this beast still has a stone embedded in its hoof from the last exercise. It wants you to remove it before it is required to work again.”
“Oh, you’re that one!” the man said loudly. “I’ve been drilling you for a year and I didn’t know. Hoi, Mesta!” he shouted to the man hurrying towards them. “Lazy White Star has a stone in his foot! You’d better see to it!”
Mesta’s hand grasped Huy’s as he came up. He was a short, well-built man with weather-beaten features and a shock of greying hair. His smile was unfeigned. “I am the chariot master. Do you like horses?”
“I don’t know,” Huy replied. “This is the first one I’ve actually touched. I like donkeys, though.”
“Ah. Good. Come inside and we’ll see if this lazy old nag really does have a stone in its hoof.” Huy followed Mesta into the small room. Its floor was covered generously with straw. One clay trough held grain, the other was full of water. Opposite the half door through which they had entered was another door leading onto a long passage open at each end. Rakes, pails, linen bags, and harnesses hung or were propped all along its length.
Mesta knelt, running his hand down Lazy White Star’s leg, but the horse shifted its weight and lifted the opposite foreleg. “Well!” the man exclaimed. “You are co-operating with me today, you godless old warhorse! Huy—your name is Huy? yes?—hand me that implement on the nail on the wall.” Expertly cradling the animal’s hoof in his lap, Mesta examined it carefully, whistled in surprise, took the tool, and with a few sharp twists extracted a stone, which fell into the straw with a rustle. Huy, standing by the horse’s head, felt its muzzle thrust against his chest. “How did Ptahmose know it was there?” the chariot master muttered to himself. “In any case, the last boy to stable you after his lesson will be whipped for not carrying out his inspection properly.” He came to his feet. “This beast seems quite comfortable with you,” he said to Huy. “Are you afraid of him?”
“Not at all, Master.”
“Good. We will harness him to one of the chariots and you will stand in it, only stand at first, while I lead him around the training ground. You must find your balance before all else. When the lesson is over, you will learn to wash this horse, comb him, check his feet, and make sure that he has no injury anywhere. Then you will feed him from your own hand so that he learns to trust you. A good charioteer cares as much for his horses as he does for his harness and his weapons. Come and see the chariots.”
He led Huy out the other door into the cluttered passage. Lazy White Star turned and nudged Huy as he closed the door. “You’re welcome,” Huy whispered, and strode after Mesta.
When the lesson was over, Mesta congratulated him. “I think you will make an excellent charioteer, Huy. Perhaps one day you will be as accomplished as the men who drive the King’s gilded chariots and prize horses. Now you must wash both chariot and animal and check his feet. Then you may go.” Lazy White Star looked smug. Huy thanked his instructor, performed the chores, and limped slowly towards the gate leading into the temple grounds. His knees were trembling.
He bathed with deliberation, consciously putting off the moment when he must present himself at the High Priest’s door, but eventually he was forced to tie back his wet black hair, put on his sandals, and, clad in clean white linen, take the long passages behind the sanctuary. The priests’ quarters were busy. Men greeted him courteously as he pas
sed them, many bowing civilly, and he bowed back, feeling stupid and young and thoroughly unworthy of such acts of respect from these holy servants of the god. Soon, too soon, he stood before the double doors and had raised a reluctant hand to knock when one of them opened and Ramose peered out.
“Oh, there you are! I was beginning to think that you had been injured. Or that you had decided to take a stroll by the river,” he added shrewdly. “Wait here a moment.” He vanished and reappeared with a small, plain cedar box under his arm, striding away down the passage at once. Huy followed, his heart sinking. A sense of dread had been growing in him since he left the sunny reality of the training ground, a fear that he might read things he did not want to know, an awareness that on this day the gods (but are there many gods or only many manifestations of the one?) had drawn close and were watching him. He felt them as an uneasiness between his shoulder blades where demons liked to strike, as an almost imperceptible disturbance in the flow of his blood. As the High Priest slowed before the locked door behind which the Ished Tree flourished, Huy needed all his willpower to prevent himself from fleeing. Heart pounding, he followed Ramose inside.
Nothing had changed here in the eight years since he had crept into the room from the palm grove. Sunlight bathed the roofless space but for a shadow being cast by the west wall as the sun descended leisurely towards the horizon. The Tree still spread its many heavily leafed branches in every direction. The impression of a deep peace saturated the air, but Huy, inhaling the well-remembered odours of a mingled delight and corruption, scarcely felt it.
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