As the shock of the moment faded I became restless, and with folded arms and head down I paced in and out of the shafts of white light falling from my clerestory windows. I had not taken the warnings of Hui and Hunro and Disenk seriously enough. I had imagined myself to be invulnerable, but now I would have to consider every morsel I put into my mouth, suspect every hand held out to me. I was indeed alone, and it came to me then that I was learning how everything gained in life has a price. I wanted to run to Pharaoh, pour out to him my indignation, demand that his police turn the harem upside down so that I might be vindicated, be secure, but as my feet measured out the bounds of my luxurious prison I knew that such a response would only increase my danger. Pharaoh could not protect me at every moment, even if he was willing to try. And suppose that the culprit was found to be the Chief Wife? Doted upon and spoiled as I was, I knew that a concubine, even a titled one, would not emerge triumphant against one of the most influential women in Egypt.
Should I plot to remove her? The prospect gave me a delicious thrill. To think of that twisted mouth disfigured even further by pain, that thin body contorted as my poison coursed through it, quietened my heart and lifted my head. But what if Ast-Amasareth was innocent? I sighed. No. There was nothing to be done.
When Disenk came back with her customary self-possession restored we discussed the matter briefly and I wrote in my own hand a message for Hui, telling him what had happened. Disenk vowed to control the preparation of my food more tightly. I asked her about the behaviour of the other harem servants. Had she seen or heard anything that might now be considered suspicious? She shook her head. The servants gossiped as fervently as their mistresses but nothing had alerted Disenk. In the end we dropped the subject but it remained in my mind, an amorphous threat that clouded my waking hours and followed me into my dreams. For I knew that poison in the hands of an expert could be administered in a dozen different ways and I could only hope that Hui and I were the only adepts in Pi-Ramses.
20
A WEEK LATER I received a summons from Prince Ramses. During the preceding days the incident of the poisoned figs had begun to shrink in my mind to the proportions of a necessary hazard. Harem life for the privileged favourites had always been fraught with danger. It was a risk that accompanied the prize of Pharaoh’s approbation, something to be included in the calculations of one who was bent on climbing the treacherous cliff of royal influence, and I should not have been surprised at my brush with its reality.
It was disconcerting to know that I was hated and even more unsettling to have to choose not to retaliate. Revenge was in my nature. However, I had become resigned to my position by the time the Prince’s Chief Herald appeared at my door, greeted me respectfully, and requested my presence in the Prince’s private quarters. Disenk was slipping bracelets onto my wrists and had just laid aside my perfumed oil.
“But I cannot answer the Prince’s summons immediately,” I told the man. “I am on my way to Pharaoh. Would His Highness wait until tomorrow?” I was secretly surprised to hear from the Prince. I had seen little of him for a long time and had done my best to put a stop to my disloyal daydreams.
“His Highness knows that your time is not your own, Lady Thu,” the Herald responded. “Therefore His Highness beseeches you to attend him tonight on your way back to the harem.”
“But that will be in the middle of the night,” I reminded him, puzzled. “I do not wish to wake His Highness.”
“The Prince will be fishing after sundown,” I was told, “and then he intends to entertain some friends. He will not sleep.” I nodded.
“Then I will come.”
When we were alone again Disenk spoke up. “It may be a trap, Thu,” she said. “You will be returning in the hour when the palace is deserted.” I considered, then shrugged.
“The Prince’s Chief Herald is no shifty-eyed mercenary,” I pointed out. “Unless the Prince himself wants me dead, I think I am safe. I will ask one of the door guards to escort me, Disenk. After all, I cannot begin to restrict myself to the confines of my rooms or the King’s. I will go mad!”
“I think the Prince does not wish to have it known that he has sent for you,” Disenk suggested. “Otherwise he would have you brought to him during the day or he would approach you at some feast. I will accompany you tonight, Thu, and wait outside the royal bedchamber. I will walk with you to the Prince’s quarters.” I thanked her and we hurried out. The sun was still free of the horizon but had already set behind the harem building and the shadows were long on the grass. I shuddered as I passed the spot where the unfortunate dog had lain. One of the servants had carried the carcass away but I imagined that I could still see the crushed place where it had died.
The King was in high spirits, teasing me and recounting jokes as he nibbled on honey cakes and downed a quantity of wine which did nothing to dampen his ardour. Before he collapsed into the deep slumber of the satiated we had made love several times. When I was sure that my movements would not wake him I straightened the pillow beneath his head, smoothed the sheets over his limp body, and let myself quietly out. Disenk uncurled from the dark corner where she had been dozing. Without a word we turned sharply left, following the high wall of the palace, past the bedchamber in which the Mighty Bull lay snoring gently, past his private reception area and its ante-room. The portion of the palace garden that lay between building and sheltering wall was drowned in night. The moon was setting, and only weak starlight dribbled fitfully over the ground and faintly tinged the darkness between the branches of the trees. Ra lay buried in the womb of Nut the sky goddess, waiting to be born anew, and without him the world’s senses were dimmed.
At the foot of the stairs that clung to the outside of the palace and led to the Prince’s quarters two guards were talking softly. At our approach their hands went to the swords at their waists but I called my name to them and turned to Disenk. “Well?” I whispered. She ran a hand through my hair and rubbed at a smudge of kohl on my temple. Her lips looked black in the uncertain light.
“Do not eat or drink,” she reminded me, and I nodded once and mounted the stairs behind the patient soldier. The gloomy garden slowly receded below, but at last the stairs became a landing and a tall double door appeared, set in the wall. The soldier knocked, and a familiar voice immediately bade him enter. I waited, hearing myself announced, then the man bowed me inside and, as I stepped past him, closed the door behind me.
I was not in a room, I was standing at one end of a passage that ran away into dimness on my left. But directly ahead were more doors, open wide, and pale light splashed the floor at my feet. I went forward. At once a servant repeated the guard’s action, closing himself outside, and I found myself alone with the Prince.
His reception room was surprisingly bare. The walls were painted in desert scenes of beige and blue and a large representation of the Prince himself, standing astride in his chariot with a whip raised over the heads of his straining horses, dominated the far wall and gyrated spasmodically as the lamps flickered.
The Prince’s desk, on which lay a few scrolls, a broken arrowhead and a white leather belt to which an empty scabbard was attached, was a simple affair of oiled wood and so were the plain chairs with their woven flax seats and the one low table where a lamp stood. Another burned in the far corner on a stand carved in the likeness of a bundle of tall papyrus stems.
The impression I received in the swift moment before the Prince left his chair and came towards me was one of economy and a solitary comfort. But there was also an unsettling suggestion of impermanence about my surroundings, as though he lived on the stage of a palace play while his true domicile was elsewhere, hidden.
He was wearing nothing but a linen loincloth, and as he strode across the floor the subdued light slid over the long, flexing muscles of his brown legs, the tight ridges of his stomach, the two dun nubs of his nipples on the dizzying planes of his chest. Glossy black hair framed his features. He had obviously been painted much earlier i
n the day, and enough kohl remained to accentuate the clarity of his eyes. A trace of henna reddened his mouth, now widening in a smile. I sank into my obeisance with an inward cry of submission.
“Greetings, royal concubine Lady Thu,” he said. “You may rise. I beg you to forgive my attire, but I have been night fishing and then swimming with my companions. There is nothing more exhilarating than slipping beneath the dark waters of the Nile while the surface gleams with streaks of moonlight. Unless it is sitting in the desert sand while Ra spreads his dying blood across the horizon. You may sit if you wish.” I did so gladly, for I did not want him to see the sudden feebleness of my knees, and answered his smile with one of my own. He came close and regarded me reflectively. “We have seen little of each other these past few months,” he went on conversationally. “But I have heard much about you. When all other subjects are exhausted, the talk around me always turns to the young concubine with the extraordinary blue eyes and the sharp tongue, who has transformed the King into a panting lap dog.” I looked up at him quickly but there was no malice in his expression. His smile radiated warmth and approval. “No other concubine has held his interest for this long,” he said. “My congratulations, Lady Thu. You are indeed an amazing woman.” Now something in his tone rang a warning. I rose so that I would feel less vulnerable.
“Thank you, Highness,” I replied, “but I can take no credit for either my beauty or the facility of my tongue. I am as the gods have made me.”
“Oh, I do not think so,” he said. “No. I think that you are a very clever, very resourceful child of the earth. I am not sure whether I envy my father or pity him.”
“Highness, you are unfair!” I protested indignantly. “I have done Great Horus nothing but good! I have healed his wounds, I have attended to his every need, I have made him happy!”
“No doubt.” He had come to a halt in front of me, still smiling, and his eyes searched mine. “But so have many other women before you. To remain in my father’s favour takes more than the ability to please and you know it. It takes calculation, purpose. Do not mistake me, Thu. I am not condemning you. Far from it. I admire your tenacity. I have a proposition for you.”
Warily I studied him. The smile had gone but he had stepped closer so that now I could smell his body. My fingers spasmed with the sudden desire to touch the hard silkiness of his skin. “Beyond that wall,” he said, jerking his thumb into the gloom, “lie the quarters of my brother Prince Ramses Amunhirkhepshef. He is one year younger than I. He is not in his rooms. In fact, he is never in his rooms. Most of his time is spent north of the Delta, lying on the beaches of the Great Green and playing with his concubines. Across the gardens lie the quarters of my other brothers. One of them is so stupid he cannot count the number of ears he has. One of them stays in Thebes where he serves the Amun temple. He wishes to remain a priest all his life. One of them has a vicious temper and delights in whipping his horses, his servants and his women. None of them care much for our father and even less for Egypt. Father, however, places each of us before him equally, and agonizes over which of us is worthy to be declared his Heir. Meanwhile Amun’s stranglehold on this country tightens.” His voice had not risen but all at once I felt my shoulders imprisoned in his powerful hands. “I believe I am the only chance for salvation that Egypt has,” he said steadily. “But my words are not heeded. Father will not see how disastrous it would be if his choice should fall on any other royal son. I know his fears, of course. He trusts none of us, even though he sees my love for him, my devotion to my country, and that hurts.” The fine feathery brows were drawn together in a frown. “But he trusts you, my Lady. He loves you, he will listen to you. Help me as I plead my cause before him. Add your voice to mine as I try to persuade him to declare me his Horus-Fledgling.”
I felt his hands begin to move, to slide down my arms and up again, raising ripples of sensation on my skin. I swallowed and stared at him, fighting against the honeyed lassitude invading my body, my mind. Honesty had coloured his speech, yet his eyes remained shrewd as he measured my reaction to what he was saying.
“You are mistaken, Prince,” I managed. “Once before I attempted to influence the Mighty Bull, and I suffered his extreme displeasure for three of the worst days of my life. He loves me but it is the Chief Wife who has his ear on matters of policy.” It had been difficult to put that thought together. I was sure I had mouthed nonsense but his smile opened again, revealing all his perfect teeth. His hands enfolded mine briefly then he withdrew. I began to suspect that I was being manipulated and I tried to care but I could not.
“That cold foreigner,” he said scornfully. “She will not help me. She refuses to ally herself with any one of us for fear she may have gambled on a loser if the wrong son inherits the Horus Throne. But I am determined to win. I am Commander of the Infantry, I have the army behind me, yet it is vital that I achieve Divinity with the blessing of my father, not with force after he is dead. Egypt must not suffer civil war.” He came close to me again, too close for politeness, so that even though he was not touching me I felt overwhelmed by his power. “I do not make this request lightly,” he went on in a low voice. “I understand that unless you approach my father with the utmost delicacy your words could be misconstrued. Yet I trust both your tact and the fascination you hold for him.”
“Highness, you overestimate both,” I managed weakly, my eyes fixed on the movement of his mouth. “I would be risking more than three days of banishment if I anger him a second time.”
“I will make it worth your while to try,” he urged. “The Heir inherits his father’s harem when he becomes Pharaoh, you know that don’t you? He may discard or use the women as he pleases. You are very young, my Lady Thu. I would choose to keep very few of my father’s hundreds of concubines, and you would be one of them. The rest would of course be dispersed to the various harems of retirement. You would be safe from such a terrible fate when the Double Crown sat on my head, indeed, I would pile riches and preferments at your feet. Is that not worthy of a few words in my father’s ear from time to time?”
He had leaned even closer to me with the intensity of his words, and I could contain myself no longer. With a fierce, despairing inner wrench of surrender I closed the tiny gap between us. Now at last my fingers met the glorious resistance of his body and my mouth opened under his. His lips were as assured, as enticing, as I had always imagined they would be. I felt him grasp my waist and ease my body against his. So young, so firm, I thought giddily. Fire and heat. Solidity, not the yielding flabbiness of Pharaoh’s flesh. Pharaoh’s flesh …
Gasping I pulled myself out of the Prince’s embrace.
“What a fool you must think me, Highness!” I cried out, half-mad with the desire and the rage battling inside so that I felt deathly ill for a moment. “I hazard my very existence for your sake, and what have you promised me in return? Nothing. Nothing! Suppose your father, by some remote possibility, listens to me and designates you his Heir? He goes to sail in the Heavenly Barque and you don the Double Crown and inherit the harem. Then you are free to forget your fine promises of this night, to ignore me or banish me as well as to take me to your bed and then discard me! No. It is not enough.” He was breathing heavily, and as I watched, a thin trickle of sweat coursed down his neck and onto his chest.
“Well, what do you want then?” he asked in exasperation. “Gold? Land?” I pressed both hands to my forehead. I was shaking all over as though I had a fever.
“No, Highness,” I said, dropping my arms and striving to be calm. “I want you to dictate a scroll making me a queen of Egypt in the event that you become King. I want the scroll witnessed by a priest and any scribe you trust, and then given into my care. And do not forget that I can read very well.” He stared at me in astonishment, then his handsome face broke into lines of amusement and he began to chuckle.
“By Amun I do pity my father,” he grinned, “for surely I see the wiles that have ensnared him. You are an impudent little witch, my
Lady Thu. Very well. I will consider your proposal if you will consider my request.” Suddenly I felt well again, and strong.
“You will?”
“Yes.”
“I thank you, Highness!” Bowing elaborately I walked to the door.
“Where are you going?” he demanded. “I have not dismissed you yet.” I halted but I did not turn around. I was afraid that if I did so I would fly into his arms, onto his couch, and thus wreak my own destruction.
“Dismiss me then I beseech you, Prince,” I said quietly. “For the respect I bear to your father.” There was a silence which was not broken, and after a time I opened the door and went resolutely away.
That night I had the dream again. I was kneeling in the desert as before, my mouth and nostrils choked with sand, my naked back blistering with the heat of the sun. Fear was all around me, but this time a voice muttered and whispered within it, the words, if words they were, rapid and unintelligible. Nor could I determine whether the voice had a sex. It droned on chillingly, rising and falling without taking breath, and in the midst of my terror I strained to hear what it was saying, for I knew that if I could catch its meaning I would be free. I woke entangled in sweat-soaked sheets with nausea churning in my bowels, and arms flailing I struggled to sit up. Through the open door of my bedchamber I could see Disenk in the faint first light of dawn, curled up peacefully on her mat, but this inner room was still sunk in darkness.
I tried not to peer into those dense shadows in case the power that had held me doubled over in my dream should be lurking there, mute now but still full of malevolence. Earlier I had not wanted to consider my confrontation with the Prince. I had hurried back to my comfortable womb, Disenk at my side, both of us very tired, and fallen between my sheets where sleep had claimed me. But now I sat limply, staring at the barely discernable outline of my legs under their covering of linen, and remembered all he had said.
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