The Heretic Queen Read online

  “Otherwise they will be erased.”

  “And Horemheb will have succeeded.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  THE WAY A CAT LISTENS

  THE HIGH PRIESTS divined that Ramesses should marry on the twelfth of Thoth. They had chosen it as the most auspicious day in the season of Akhet, and when I walked from the palace to the Temple of Amun, the lake was already crowded with vessels bringing food and gifts for the celebration.

  Inside the temple I kept to myself, and not even Tutor Oba could find fault with me when the priests were finished. “What’s the matter, Princess? No one to entertain now that Pharaoh Ramesses and Asha are gone?”

  I looked up into Tutor Oba’s wrinkled face. His skin was like papyrus; every part of it was lined. Even around his nose there were creases. I suppose he was only fifty, but he seemed to me to be as old as the cracking paint in my chamber.

  “Yes, everybody has left me,” I said.

  Tutor Oba laughed, but it wasn’t a pleasant sound.

  “Everybody has left you!” he repeated. “Everybody.” He looked around him at the two hundred students who were following him to the edduba. “Tutor Paser tells me you are a very good student, and now I wonder if he means in acting or in languages. Perhaps in a few years, we’ll be seeing you in one of Pharaoh’s performances!”

  I walked the rest of the way to the edduba in silence. Behind me, I could still hear Tutor Oba’s grating laugh, and inside the class I was too angry to care when Paser announced, “Today, we will begin a new language.”

  I don’t remember what I learned that day, or how Paser began to teach us the language of Shasu. Instead of paying attention, I stared at the girl on the reed mat to my left. She was no more than eight or nine, but she was sitting at the front of the class where Asha should have been. When the time came for our afternoon meal, she ran away with another girl her age, and it occurred to me that I no longer had anyone to eat with.

  “Who’s in for dice?” Baki announced, between mouthfuls.

  “I’ll play,” I said.

  Baki looked behind him to a group of boys, and their faces were all set against me. “I . . . don’t think we allow girls to play.”

  “You allow girls every other day,” I said.

  “But . . . but not today.”

  The other boys nodded, and shame brightened my cheeks. I stepped into the courtyard to find a seat by myself, then recognized Asha on the stone bench where we always ate.

  “Asha! What are you doing here?” I exclaimed.

  He leaned his yew bow against the bench. “Soldiers get mealtimes, too,” he said. He searched my face. “What’s the matter?”

  I shrugged. “The boys won’t allow me to play dice with them.”

  “Which boys?” he demanded.

  “It doesn’t matter.”

  “It does matter.” His voice grew menacing. “Which ones?”

  “Baki,” I said, and when Asha rose threateningly from the bench, I pulled him back. “It’s not just him, it’s everyone, Asha. Iset was right. They were friendly to me because of you and Ramesses, and now that you’re both gone, I’m just a leftover princess from a dynasty of heretics.” I raised my chin and refused to be upset. “So what is it like to be a charioteer?”

  Asha sat back and studied my face, but I didn’t need his sympathy. “Wonderful,” he admitted, and opened his sack. “No cuneiform, no hieroglyphics, no translating Muwatallis’s endless threats.” He looked to the sky and his smile was genuine. “I’ve always known I was meant to be in Pharaoh’s army. I was never really good at all that.” He indicated the edduba with his thumb.

  “But your father wants you to be Master of the Charioteers. You have to be educated!”

  “And thankfully that’s over.” He took out a honey cake and gave half to me. “So did you see the number of merchants that have arrived? The palace is filled with them. We couldn’t take the horses to the lake because it’s crowded with foreign vessels.”

  “Then let’s go to the quay and see what’s happening!”

  Asha glanced around him, but the other students were rolling knucklebones and playing Senet. “Nefer, we don’t have time for that.”

  “Why not? Paser is always late, and the soldiers don’t return until the trumpets call them back. That’s long after Paser begins. When will we ever see so many ships? And think of the animals they might be bringing. Horses,” I said temptingly. “Maybe from Hatti.”

  I had said the right words. He stood with me, and when we reached the lake, we saw a dozen ships lying at anchor. Above us on the dock, pennants of every color snapped in the breeze, their rich cloth catching the light like brightly painted jewels. Heavy chests were being unloaded, and just as I had guessed, horses had arrived, gifts from the kingdom of Hatti.

  “You were right!” Asha exclaimed. “How did you know?”

  “Because every kingdom will send gifts. What else do the Hittites have that we’d want?”

  The air filled with the shouts of merchants and the stamps of sea-weary horses skittering down the gang-planks. We picked our way toward them through the bales and bustle. Asha reached out to stroke an ink-black mare, but the man in charge chided him angrily in Hittite.

  “You are speaking with Pharaoh’s closest friend,” I said sharply. “He has come to inspect the gifts.”

  “You speak Hittite?” the merchant demanded.

  I nodded. “Yes,” I replied in his language. “And this is Asha, future Master of Pharaoh’s Charioteers.”

  The Hittite merchant narrowed his eyes, trying to determine if he believed me. Finally, he gave a judicious nod. “Good. You may instruct him to lead these horses to Pharaoh’s stables.”

  I smiled widely at Asha.

  “What? What is he saying?”

  “He wants you to take the horses to Pharaoh Seti’s stables.”

  “Me?” Asha exclaimed. “No! Tell him—”

  I smiled at the merchant. “He will be more than happy to deliver Hatti’s gifts.”

  Asha stared at me. “Did you tell him no?”

  “Of course not! What’s the matter with delivering a few horses?”

  “Because how will I explain what I’m doing?” Asha cried.

  I looked at him. “You were passing by on the way to the palace. You were asked to do this task because you are knowledgeable about horses.” I turned back to the merchant. “Before we take these horses from Hatti, we would like to inspect the other gifts.”

  “What? What did you tell him now?”

  “Trust me, Asha! There is such a thing as being too cautious.”

  The merchant frowned, Asha held his breath, and I gave the old man my most impatient look. He sighed heavily, but eventually he led us across the quay, past exquisitely carved chests made from ivory and holding a fortune in cinnamon and myrrh. The rich scents mingled with the muddy tang of the river. Asha pointed ahead to a long leather box. “Ask him what’s in there!”

  The old man caught Asha’s meaning, and he bent down to open the leather case. His long hair spilled over his shoulder; he tossed his three white braids behind him and pulled out a gleaming metal sword.

  I glanced at Asha. “Iron,” I whispered.

  Asha reached out and turned the hilt, so that the long blade caught the summer’s light just as it had on the balcony with Ramesses.

  “How many are there?” Asha gestured.

  The merchant seemed to understand, because he answered, “Two. One for each Pharaoh.”

  I translated his answer, and as Asha returned the weapon, a pair of ebony oars caught my eye. “And what are those for?” I pointed to the paddles.

  For the first time, the old man smiled. “Pharaoh Ramesses himself—for his marriage ceremony.”

  The tapered paddles had been carved into the heads of sleeping ducks, and he caressed the ebony heads as if the feathers were real. “His Highness will use them to row across the lake while the rest of the court follows behind him in vessels of their own.” />
  I imagined Ramesses using the oars to paddle closer to Iset as she sailed in front of him, her dark hair covered by a beaded net whose lapis stones would catch at the light. Asha and I would have to sail behind them, and there would be no question of my calling out to Ramesses or tugging his hair. Perhaps if I had acted less like a child at Ramesses’s coronation, I might have been the one in the boat before him. Then, it would be me he would turn to at night, sharing the day’s stories with his irresistible laugh.

  I followed Asha to the stables in silence, and that evening, when Merit instructed me to change from my short sheath into a proper kilt for the night, I didn’t complain. I let her place a silver pectoral around my neck and sat still while she rubbed myrtle cream into my cheeks.

  “How come you’re so eager to do as I say?” she asked suspiciously.

  I flushed. “Don’t I always?”

  The pelican’s pouch lengthened as Merit pushed in her chin. “A dog does what its master says. You listen the way a cat listens.”

  We both looked at Tefer reclining on the bed, and the untamable miw placed his ears against his head as if he knew he was being chastised.

  “Now that Pharaoh Ramesses has grown up, have you decided to grow up as well?” Merit challenged.

  “Perhaps.”

  WHEN IT was time to eat in the Great Hall, I took my place beneath the dais and could see that Ramesses was watching Iset. In ten days she would become his wife, and I wondered if he would forget about me entirely.

  Pharaoh Seti stood from his throne, and as he raised his arms the hall fell silent. “Shall we have some music?” he asked loudly, and next to him Queen Tuya nodded. As always, her brow appeared damp with sweat, and I wondered how such a large woman could bear living in the terrible heat of Thebes. She didn’t bother to stand, and fan bearers with their long ostrich feathers stirred the perfumed air around her so that even from the table beneath the dais it was possible to smell her lavender and lotus blossom.

  “Why don’t we hear from the future Queen of Egypt?” she suggested, and the entire court looked to Iset, who rose gracefully from her chair.

  “As Your Highnesses wish.”

  Iset made a pretty bow and slowly crossed the chamber. As she approached the harp that had been placed beneath the dais, Ramesses smiled. He watched her arrange herself before the instrument, pressing the carved wooden shoulder between her breasts, and as the lilting notes echoed across the hall, a vizier behind me murmured, “Beautiful. Exceptionally beautiful.”

  “The music or the girl?” Vizier Anemro asked.

  The men at the table all snickered.

  ON THE eve of Ramesses’s marriage to Iset, Tutor Paser called me aside while the other students ran home. He stood at the front of the classroom, surrounded by baskets of papyrus and fresh reed pens. In the soft light of the afternoon, I realized he was not as old as I had often imagined him to be. His dark hair was pulled into a looser braid, and his eyes seemed kinder than they had ever been. But when he motioned for me to sit in the chair across from him, tears of shame blurred my vision before he even said a word.

  “Despite the fact that your nurse allows you to run around the palace like a wild child of Set,” he began, “you have always been the best student in this edduba. But in the past ten days you’ve missed six times, and today the translations you completed could have been done by a laborer in one of Pharaoh’s tombs.”

  I lowered my head. “I will do better,” I promised.

  “Merit tells me you don’t practice your languages anymore. That you are distracted. Is this because of Ramesses’s marriage to Iset?”

  I raised my eyes and wiped away my tears with the back of my hand. “Without Ramesses here, no one wants to be near me! All of the students in the edduba pretended to be kind to me because of Ramesses. Now that he’s gone they call me a Heretic Princess.”

  Paser leaned forward, frowning. “Who has called you this?”

  “Iset,” I whispered.

  “That is only one person.”

  “But the rest of them think it! I know they do. And in the Great Hall, when the High Priest sits at our table beneath the dais . . .”

  “I would not concern myself with what Rahotep thinks. You know that his father was the High Priest of Amun—”

  “And when my aunt became queen, she and Pharaoh Akhenaten had him killed. I know that. So Iset is against me, and the High Priest is against me, and even Queen Tuya . . .” I choked back a sob. “They are all against me because of my family. Why did my mother name me for a heretic?” I cried.

  Paser shifted uncomfortably. “She could never have known the hatred that people would still have for her sister twenty-five years later.”

  He stood and offered me his hand. “Nefertari, you must continue to study your Hittite and Shasu. Whatever happens with Pharaoh Ramesses and Asha, you must excel in this edduba. It will be the only way to find a place for yourself in the palace.”

  “As what?” I asked desperately. “A woman can’t be a vizier.”

  “No,” Paser said. “But you are a princess. With your command of languages there are a dozen different futures for you. As a High Priestess, or a High Priestess’s scribe, possibly even as an emissary.”Paser reached into a basket and produced several scrolls. “Letters from King Muwatallis to Pharaoh Seti. Work you missed while you were in the palace pretending to be sick.”

  I’m sure my cheeks turned a brilliant scarlet, but as I left, I reminded myself of the truth in Paser’s words. I am a princess. I am the daughter and niece and granddaughter of queens. There are many possible futures for me.

  When I returned to the courtyard of the palace, a large pavilion of white cloth had been erected where Ramesses’s most important marriage guests would feast. Hundreds of servants scurried like ants, rushing from the Great Hall into the tent with chairs and tables held high above their heads. Beneath a golden sunshade, away from the chaos, Pharaoh Seti’s sisters had arrived to oversee the preparations. Iset was there, too, with her friends from the harem.

  “Nefer!” Ramesses called from across the courtyard. He left Iset to hurry over to me. He had taken off his nemes crown in the heat, and the summer sun set his hair aflame. I imagined Iset running her fingers through the red-gold tresses, whispering in his ear the way Henuttawy whispered to handsome noblemen whenever she was drunk.

  “I haven’t seen you in days,” he said apologetically. “You can’t imagine what it’s been like in the Audience Chamber. Every day it’s another crisis. Do you remember last year how the lake receded?”

  I nodded. Ramesses shaded his eyes with his hand. “Well, that’s because the Nile didn’t overflow its banks. And without an overflow to water the land, very little was harvested this summer. In some cities it’s already led to famine.”

  “Not in Thebes,” I protested.

  “No, but in the rest of Upper Egypt,” he said.

  I tried to imagine a famine when tomorrow the palace would feed a thousand people. Cuts of beef, roasted duck, and lamb were already being prepared in the kitchens, and wide barrels of pomegranate wine were waiting in the Great Hall to be rolled into the pavilion.

  Ramesses caught my glance and nodded. “I know it’s hard to believe,” he said, “but the people outside of Thebes are suffering. We’ve had a little rain, but not cities like Edfu and Aswan.”

  “So will Thebes share its grain?”

  “Only if there’s enough. The viziers are angry that the Habiru are growing so plentiful in Egypt. They say there are nearly six hundred thousand of them, and in a time when there’s not enough food for Egyptians, some of my father’s men are saying that measures must be taken.”

  “What kind of measures?”

  Ramesses looked away.

  “What kind of measures?” I repeated.

  “Measures to be sure that there are no more Habiru sons—”

  I gasped. “What? You wouldn’t allow—”

  “Of course not! But the viziers are talking
. They’re saying it’s not just their numbers,” Ramesses explained. “Rahotep believes that if the sons are killed, the Habiru daughters will marry Egyptians to become like us.”

  “They are like us! Tutor Amos is a Habiru and his people have been here for a hundred years. My grandfather brought the Habiru to Thebes when he conquered Canaan—”

  “But Rahotep is telling the court that the Habiru worship one god like the Heretic King.” Ramesses lowered his voice so that none of the servants who were passing could hear him. “He thinks they’re heretics, Nefer.”

  “Of course he would say that! He was a heretic himself—a High Priest of Aten. Now he wants to show the court that he’s loyal to Amun.”

  Ramesses nodded. “That’s what I told my father.”

  “And what does he say?”

  “That a sixth of his army is Habiru. Their sons fight alongside Egyptian sons. But the people are growing angrier, Nefer, and every day it’s something different. Droughts, or poor trade, or pirates in the Northern Sea. Now everything has to stop while hundreds of dignitaries arrive and you should see the preparations. When an Assyrian prince came this morning, Vizier Anemro gave him a room that faced west.”

  I covered my mouth. “He didn’t know that Assyrians sleep facing the rising sun?”

  “No. I had to explain it to him. He moved the prince’s chamber, but the Assyrians were already angry. None of this would have happened if Paser had simply agreed to be vizier.”

  “Tutor Paser?”

  “My father has already asked him twice. He’d be the youngest vizier in Egypt, but surely the most intelligent.”

  “And both times he declined?”

  Ramesses nodded. “I can’t understand it.” He looked down at the scrolls I was carrying. “What are these?” There was a glint in Ramesses’s eyes, as if he was tired of talking about his wedding and politics. “It looks like several days’ worth of work to me,” he said, and snatched one of the scrolls. “Have you been missing classes?”