by Wilbur Smith
'Surpassing strange,' Mintaka agreed grimly. 'I must dress and be ready for whatever new atrocity awaits me now.'
Her baggage had all gone up in flames in the royal barge, but her maids borrowed clothing from the other noble ladies in the fleet. They washed and curled her hair, then dressed her in a simple linen shift, gold girdle and sandals.
Before noon an armed escort came aboard the galley, and she followed them on deck. Her eyes went first to the blackened timbers of the royal barge that lay on the far bank, burned down to the waterline. No effort was being made to recover any bodies from the wreck. It was her family's funeral pyre. The Hyksosian tradition called for cremation, not embalmment and elaborate funeral procedures and ceremonials.
Mintaka knew that her father would have approved of the manner of his own going, and this gave her some small comfort. Then she thought of Khyan and averted her eyes. It was with an effort that she held back further tears as she went down into the waiting felucca and was taken to the bank below the temple of Hapi.
Lord Naja was waiting with all his company assembled to meet her. She remained aloof and pale when he embraced her. 'This is a bitter time for all of us, Princess,' he said. 'Your father, King Apepi, was a mighty warrior and statesman. In view of the recent treaty between the two kingdoms, and the combining of this very Egypt into one sacred and historical whole, he leaves a dangerous gap. For the good of all, this must be filled immediately.'
He took her hand and led her to the pavilion, which had last evening been the scene of feasting and festivity, but where now were assembled in solemn conclave most of the nobility and officialdom of both the kingdoms.
She saw Trok in the forefront of this throng. He was a striking figure in full regimentals. He wore his sword on a gold-studded belt and carried his war bow over his shoulder. Behind him in packed ranks were all his officers, grim, cold-eyed and menacing despite the gay ribbons plaited in their beards. They stared at her, unsmilingy, and she was bitterly aware that she was the last of the Apepi line, abandoned and unprotected.
She wondered to whom she could appeal, and whose loyalty she still commanded. She searched for friendly familiar faces in the multitude. They were all there, her father's councillors and advisers, his generals and comrades of the battlefield. Then she saw their eyes slide away from her face. None smiled at her or returned her scrutiny. She had never felt so alone in her life.
Naja led her to a cushioned stool at one side of the pavilion. When she sat down Naja and his staff formed a screen around her, hiding her from view. She was certain that this had been deliberately arranged.
Lord Naja opened the conclave with a lamentation for the tragic death of King Apepi and his sons. Then he launched into a eulogy of the dead pharaoh. He recounted his numerous military triumphs and his feats of statesmanship, culminating with his participation in the treaty of Hathor, which had brought peace to the two kingdoms torn by decades of internecine warfare and strife.
'Without King Apepi, or a strong pharaoh to guide the affairs of the Lower Kingdom and to rule in conjunction with Pharaoh Nefer Seti and his regent in Thebes, the treaty of Hathor is in jeopardy. A return to the horrors and warfare of the last sixty years prior to the treaty is unthinkable.'
Lord Trok beat his sword scabbard against his bronze buckler, and shouted, 'Bak-her! Bak-her!' Immediately the applause was taken up by all the military commanders behind him, and spread slowly through the entire assembly until it was a deafening thunder.
Naja let it continue for a while, then held up both arms. When silence fell he continued, 'In the tragic circumstances of his death, King Apepi leaves no male heir to the Crown.' Smoothly he passed over any mention of Mintaka. 'As a matter of urgency I have consulted the senior councillors and nome governors of both kingdoms. Their choice for the new Pharaoh has been unanimous. With one voice they have asked Lord Trok of Memphis to pick up the reins of power, to take the double crown upon himself and steer the nation forward in the noble tradition set by King Apepi.'
The silence that followed this announcement was profound and drawn-out. Men looked at each other in blank astonishment, and only then became aware that while they had been absorbed in Lord Naja's address two regiments of the northern army commanded by, and loyal to Trok, had come silently out of the palm groves and surrounded the assembly. Their swords were sheathed, but every gloved hand was on the hilt. It would take a moment only to draw the bronze blades. An air of dismay and consternation fell upon them all. Mintaka seized the moment. She sprang off the stool where she had been hidden and cried, 'My lords and loyal citizens of this very Egypt ..."
She got no further. Four of the tallest Hyksosian warriors crowded around her, hiding her. They rattled their drawn swords against their shields and shouted in unison, 'Long live, Pharaoh Trok Uruk.' The shout was taken up by the rest of the army. In the joyous uproar that followed strong hands took Mintaka and spirited her away through the cheering press. She struggled ineffectually, her movements smothered and her voice unheard in the storm of cheering. On the riverbank she twisted in the arms of her captors and glanced back. Over the heads of the crowd she glimpsed Lord Naja raising the double crown over the head of the new Pharaoh.
Then she was hustled down the bank to the waiting felucca, and back to her locked and guarded cabin on board Lord Trok's galley.
--
Mintaka sat with her slave girls in the crowded little cabin and waited to learn what was to be her fate when the new Pharaoh returned on board. Her girls were terrified and as confused as she was. However, she tried to comfort them. When they had calmed a little she started them playing their favourite games. These soon palled so she called for a lute. Her own had been lost on her father's barge, but they borrowed one from a guard.
Mintaka held a competition, making each girl dance in turn in the confined space of the little cabin. They were laughing and clapping when they heard the new Pharaoh returning on board. The girls fell silent but she urged them to continue, and soon they were as rowdy as before.
Mintaka did not join in the merriment. Previously she had carefully explored her surroundings. Attached to her main cabin was a much smaller one, little more than a cupboard, which served as a latrine. It contained a large pottery toilet bowl with a lid and, beside it, a pitcher of water for washing. The bulkhead dividing it from the next cabin was thin and flimsy. The boat-builders had been concerned to save weight. Mintaka had been on board this galley in happier times, when she and her father had been guests of Lord Trok. She knew that the main cabin lay on the other side of this bulkhead.
Mintaka slipped into the latrine. Even above the noise her girls were making, she heard men's voices from beyond the partition. She recognized Naja's clear, commanding tones, and Trok's gruff replies. Carefully she laid her ear against the planking of the bulkhead and immediately the voices were clearer, the words intelligible.
Naja was dismissing the guards who had accompanied them on board. She heard them stump away, and there was a long silence. So long that she thought Naja might be alone in the saloon. She heard the gurgle of wine being poured into a drinking bowl, and Naja's voice, heavy with sarcasm. 'Your Majesty, have you not over-refreshed yourself already?'
Then Trok's unmistakable laugh, and Mintaka could hear from the impediment to his speech that he was indeed already in his cups as he replied to Naja's jibe, 'Come, cousin, be not so severe. Take a bowl with me. Let us drink to the successful outcome of all our endeavours. Drink to the crown on my head, and the one that will soon bless yours.' Naja's tone mellowed a little. 'A year ago, when we first began to plan, it all seemed so impossible, so remote. Then we were disparaged and overlooked, as far from the throne as the moon is from the sun, and yet here we are, two pharaohs holding between us the whole of Egypt.'
'And two pharaohs gone on ahead of us,' Trok joined in, 'Tamose with your arrow through his heart and Apepi, the great hog, fried in his own lard along with all his piglets.' He shouted with triumphant laughter.
&n
bsp; Tray, not so loud. You are indiscreet, even if we are alone,' Naja rebuked him gently. 'It would be best if we never repeated those things.
Let our little secrets go with Tamose to his tomb in the Valley of the
Kings, and with Apepi to the bottom of the river.'
'Come!' Trok insisted. 'Drink with me to all that we have achieved.'
'To what we have achieved,' Naja agreed. 'And to all that is to follow.'
'Today Egypt, and tomorrow the treasures and riches of Assyria, Babylon and the rest of the world! Nothing can stand in our way.'
Mintaka heard Trok gulp noisily. Then there was a crash against the bulkhead at the level of her ear. It startled her and she jumped back, then realized that Trok had hurled the empty wine bowl against the panel smashing it to shards. He belched loudly, and went on, 'Yet there is one detail that remains. Tamose's puppy has your crown upon his head still.'
As she listened Mintaka was in a whirlpool of emotion that tugged her one way then the other, and spun her until her senses reeled. She had listened in horror as, dispassionately, they discussed the murders of her father, her brothers and Pharaoh Tamose, but she was ill-prepared for what they had to say about Nefer.
'Not for much longer,' Naja said. 'That will be taken care of as soon as I return to Thebes. It is all arranged.'
Mintaka clamped her hands across her mouth to prevent herself crying out. They were going to murder Nefer as coldly as they had all the others. Her heart seemed to shrivel within her, and she felt helpless. She was a prisoner and without friends. She tried to think of some way in which she could send a warning to Nefer, for only in that moment did she know the full extent of her love for him: she would do anything in her power to save him.
''Tis a pity the lion did not do your work for you,' said Trok, 'instead of only scratching him a little.'
'The beast set the stage nicely. Nefer needs just a little push, and I will give him a funeral even more splendid than I gave his father.'
'You were always a generous man.' Trok chuckled drunkenly.
'While we speak of Tamose's brat, let us also speak of what remains of Apepi's brood,' Naja suggested silkily. 'The little princess was meant to burn with the rest of them, was that not what we agreed?'
'I decided to change that.' Trok's tone had become sulky. She heard him fill another wine bowl.
'It is dangerous to leave any seed of Apepi unreaped,' Naja warned him. 'Mintaka might easily become a figurehead in the years ahead, a rallying point for rebellion and insurrection. Get rid of her, cousin, and that soon.'
'Why did you not do the same with Tamose's girls? Why do they still live?' Trok challenged him defensively.
'I married them,' Naja pointed out, 'and Heseret dotes on me already. She would do anything I ask of her. We share the same ambitions. She is as hot to see her brother Nefer buried as I am. She lusts for the crown almost as much as for my royal sceptre.'
'Once she has felt my honey bee in her little pink lotus flower, Mintaka will be the same,' Trok declared.
Mintaka's flesh crawled. Once again she was thrown into the maelstrom. She was so appalled at the picture that Trok's boast conjured up that she almost missed Naja's next remark.
'So she has you by the testicles, cousin,' Naja said, but his tone was unamused. 'She is too bold and unruly for my taste, but I wish you joy of her. Be careful of her, Trok, there is a wildness in her. She may take more managing than you think.'
'I will marry her immediately and breed her as swiftly,' Trok assured him. 'With a bundle in her belly she will be more tractable. But for these many years past she has lighted a fire in my loins that cannot be extinguished except by her sweet young juices.'
'You should use your head more, cousin, and your prong less.' Naja's voice was resigned. 'Let us hope that we do not live to regret this passion of yours.' Mintaka heard the deck creak under his feet as Naja stood up, 'So, then, may the gods love and protect you, cousin.' Naja took his leave. 'We both have grave matters to attend. We must part on the morrow, but let us meet as already planned in Memphis at the end of the inundation of the Nile.'
--
During the rest of the voyage downriver from Balasfura, Mintaka was confined to Trok's galley. While they were under way she had the freedom of the deck, but at anchor or at moorings she was locked in her cabin, and there was a guard at the door.
That happened often, for at every temple along the way Trok went ashore to sacrifice and give thanks to the resident god or goddess for his elevation to the throne of Egypt. Though no others knew it as yet, Trok was also giving notice to those gods that he would soon be joining them in the pantheon as their equal.
Apart from these restrictions, Trok's attempts to ingratiate himself with Mintaka made up in perseverance for what they lacked in subtlety. Each day he presented her with at least one marvellous gift. Once it was a pair of white stallions, which she gave to the captain of the galley. The next day it was a gilt and jewelled chariot that had been captured from the king of Libya by her father. She gave it to the colonel of the palace guard, who had been a stalwart of Apepi. Another time it was a roll of gorgeous silk from the Orient, and on another a silver casket of gemstones, which she distributed among her slave girls. When they were decked in their finery Mintaka paraded them in front of Trok. 'These tawdry pieces look well enough on slaves,' she remarked dismissively, 'but not on any lady of quality.'
The new Pharaoh was undeterred and as soon as they sailed past Asyut into the Lower Kingdom he pointed out a lush and fertile estate that extended for almost a league along the east bank. 'That is yours now, Your Highness, my gift to you. Here is the deed of ownership.' Trok handed it to her with a flourish and a smirk.
She sent for the scribes that same day and had them draw up a charter of manumission, freeing all the slaves who were owned by the estate, and a second deed transferring the entire estate to the priestesses of the temple of Hathor in Memphis.
When Mintaka tried to throw off her sorrow and mourning by relaxing with her girls on the after-deck, dancing and singing, playing bao and setting riddles, Trok tried to join in the sport. He made two of the girls dance the Flight of the Three Swallows with him, then turned to Mintaka. 'Set me a riddle, Princess,' he pleaded.
'What smells like a buffalo bull, looks like a buffalo bull, and when it cavorts with the gazelles does so with all the grace of a buffalo bull?' she asked sweetly. The girls giggled while Trok scowled and flushed. 'Forgive me, Your Highness, that is too obscure for me,' he replied, and stalked away to join his officers.
The next day he had forgiven, but not forgotten, the insult. When they anchored at the village of Samalut, he ordered a troupe of itinerant entertainers, acrobats and musicians to come aboard the galley to entertain Mintaka. One of the magicians was a handsome fellow, with an amusing patter. However, his repertoire of tricks was stale and his execution lacking in finesse. Yet as soon as Mintaka learned that the troupe was taking advantage of the peace that had come with the treaty of Hathor and was on its way upriver to Thebes, where they hoped to play before the court of the southern Pharaoh, Mintaka became enthralled with their performances, particularly that of the magician whose name was Laso. After the performance she invited them to join her for refreshments of sherbet and honeyed dates. She gestured at the magician to sit on the cushions at her feet. He soon overcame his awe of her and regaled her with a few stories at which she laughed merrily.
Under the cover of the chatter and giggling of her girls she asked Laso to deliver a message to the famous Magus, Taita, when he reached Thebes. Almost overcome with her condescension Laso agreed readily. First she impressed upon him the secrecy and the delicacy of the task, then slipped into his hand a small roll of parchment, which he hid under his chiton.
She felt a great lift of relief as she watched the troubadours go ashore. She had been desperately seeking some means to convey a warning to Taita and Nefer. The parchment contained protestations of her love for Nefer as well as a warning of N
aja's murderous intentions, and that his sister Heseret could no longer be trusted as she had joined their enemies. She went on to tell of the true circumstances surrounding the death of her father and brothers. Finally she told of how Trok planned to take her to wife, despite her betrothal to Nefer, and asked Nefer to intervene with all his authority to prevent this happening.
She estimated that it might take the troupe ten days or more to reach Thebes and prostrated herself on the deck to pray to Hathor that her warning would not arrive too late. That night she slept better than she had since the terrible events at Balasfura. In the morning she was almost gay, and her girls remarked on how beautiful she looked.
Trok insisted that she joined him for breakfast on the foredeck. His cooks had provided a lavish banquet. There were twenty other guests and Trok seated himself next to Mintaka. She determined that she would not allow even this imposition to dampen her spirits. Pointedly she ignored Trok and directed all her charm and wit to the officers of his army who made up most of the rest of the company.
At the end of the meal Trok clapped his hands for attention, and was rewarded with an obsequious silence. 'I have a gift for the Princess Mintaka.'
'Oh, no!' Mintaka shrugged. 'And what shall I do with this one?'
'I believe Your Highness will find it more to her taste than my other poor offerings.' Trok was looking so pleaseed with himself that she began to feel uneasy.
'Your generosity is misplaced, my lord.' She would not address him by any of his numerous new royal titles. 'Thousands of your subjects, victims of war and plague, are starving and stand in greater need than I.'
'This is something special, which will have value to you alone,' he assured her.
She threw up her hands in resignation. 'I am only one of your loyal subjects.' She made no effort to hide her sarcasm. 'If you insist, far be it from me to deny you anything.'