Dreamers (2 page)

Tuya felt her cheeks burning. “I dare not think of those

things,” she said, stealing a quick glance toward the wide

doors that opened into the courtyard. “I am your servant. I will

go where you go, and serve you always.”

“Tuya.” Sagira’s voice rang with reproach, for she had

seen her servant’s frightened glance. She took Tuya’s hand

and pulled her into the privacy of an arbor. “You can speak

freely now,” she said, a slow smile crossing her face. “You

need not fear my mother.”

“I don’t—”

Angela Hunt

15

“Don’t pretend with me, Tuya. I know about the whippings.

Even though you acted as though nothing had happened, I saw

the mark of the lash on your shoulders and asked Tanutamon

about them. He said my mother ordered both whippings.”

“I am sure I deserved them.” Tuya’s stomach tightened as

her ears strained for sounds of eavesdroppers beyond the trees.

Would even this conversation be reported to Lady Kahent?

Sagira’s eyes lit with understanding. “You did not deserve it.

The first time was because you were wearing my jewels, but you

did not tell my mother I asked you to model them for me. And

the second time was because we were laughing together—”

“I was too familiar. A slave should not be on such close

terms.”

“You are my friend, Tuya. We have laughed and cried to-

gether since I was a baby. Can we stop being friends now?”

Tuya smiled in a fleeting moment of hope. Sagira seemed

earnest, and her mother could not see into the thickly green

arbor. Perhaps she could safely open her heart.

“I do not know how to behave anymore,” she confessed,

lifting her gaze. “Your mother says now that you are grown,

I must be your servant, not your friend. She said although you

may confide in me, I must not speak what is on my heart, for

no one cares what a slave thinks.”

Sagira flushed to the roots of her hair. “She did not say

such a thing!”

Tuya pressed her lips together and kept silent.

“My mother is the best mistress any slave could have,”

Sagira said, turning on Tuya with a flash of defensive spirit.

She crossed her arms and sat on a low bench in the arbor. “Our

slaves have greater freedom than any house I’ve seen. My

father is as rich in graciousness as he is in gold.”

Tuya slowly lowered herself to the bench. “You are right,

my lady.”

16

Dreamers

Sagira sniffed. “Well, then, you do not need to worry about

anything. And I have a surprise for you. When I am married,

I shall take you out of this house and give you your freedom.

Then you can marry as well, and we shall live next to each

other and talk every day as we do now.”

Hope rose from Tuya’s heart like a startled bird. “You

would do that?”

“Truly.” Sagira’s eyes glowed. “And then you shall tell me

all about your husband just as you told me about what to

expect with the flowering of my red moon. And when you

have a baby—” Sagira looked down and twisted her hands

“—you shall tell me if it is truly as terrible as it seems.”

“It cannot be too terrible,” Tuya softened her voice, real-

izing that Sagira now spoke out of fear. “I am sure that bearing

the child of a man you love must be a great joy. And the

priests say that offerings to the goddess Taweret will keep evil

away from a woman giving birth.”

The two girls sat in silence, pondering the mysterious rites

they were just beginning to understand. Overhead, a hawk

scrolled the hot updrafts, precise and unconcerned, a part of

the sky. Tuya envied his freedom.

“Do you ever think about love, Tuya?” Sagira said, running

her hands through her wet hair.

“Love?”

“How and when it begins. My mother says love comes after

marriage, but I have heard scandalous things from some of the

other servants. They say one of the serving girls fell in love

with one of the shepherds. For the love of this shepherd, she

openly defied Tanutamon. He sold her that very morning for

her rebellion.”

“I am sure,” Tuya said, a creeping uneasiness rising from

the bottom of her heart, “that the captain of your father’s

slaves acted wisely. Rebellion cannot be tolerated.”

Angela Hunt

17

Sagira tilted her head and gave Tuya a searching look.

“You wouldn’t do that, would you? Fall in love with some

man and leave me?”

“I don’t think love is meant for one like me,” Tuya an-

swered slowly. “I love you, mistress. I want to follow wher-

ever you go. I have not left your side in nine years, so I am

not likely to leave it now.”

“Nor would I have you leave it,” Sagira answered, now

serious. She reached out and clasped Tuya’s hands. “By all

the gods, Tuya, my heart goes into shock when I think of

marrying and leaving my father’s house. Only because I know

you will be with me can I think about going at all.”

Tuya’s heart warmed at the light of dependence in her

young mistress’s eyes. “There is no need to worry. Your

mother and father are in no hurry to find a husband for you.

You are no commoner, Sagira. Pharaoh himself must be

consulted.”

Sagira sighed, then her mocking smile returned. “Then we

will marry at the same time, and you will be my friend

always.” She planted a brief kiss on Tuya’s cheek, then

dropped Tuya’s hands and stood to stretch. “Oh, this wet

dress grows cold! Come, find me a dry garment, and bind my

hair. We will play the hiding game in my chamber until my

mother tells us it is time to eat.”

Tuya smiled and hurried to match her mistress’s eager step.

The girls’ happy voices danced ahead of them into the

house. Reclining on a pillow-laden couch in the villa’s recep-

tion room, Kahent heard the sound. “Our daughter is growing

up,” she whispered, her dark, liquid voice intended for her

husband’s ears alone.

Intent on studying the scrolls on his lap, Donkor grunted.

“It is time, I believe,” Kahent persisted, “to approach

18

Dreamers

Pharaoh about finding Sagira a husband. Surely the king

knows his sister has a daughter of noble blood.”

Donkor finally looked up. “Pharaoh knows what?”

Kahent sighed, careful not to let her frustration show. “Our

king knows we have a daughter. Now he must be told that she

has reached marriageable age. Her red moon has flowed

twice now.”

“She is too young.” Donkor waved his hand carelessly

and returned his attention to his scrolls, but Kahent would not

be deterred.

She had borne his indifference for years. If he had been

more attentive, or she more beautiful, they might have had

more than one child. But Donkor cared more for his treasures

than for the people who lived in his house. After resigning

herself to her husband’s cold heart, Kahent had invested her

love and life in her daughter.

She stood and leaned against one of the columns in the

room, steeling herself for a confrontation. “Sagira is young,”

she said, not daring to contradict him, “so we have time to find

the best man for her.” She lifted her chin so the beads in the

heavy wig she wore clicked together as they fell against her

smooth shoulders. “This endeavor will not require your effort,

my husband, only your permission. Grant me your blessing

to speak to my brother about our daughter. Your honor de-

mands that I do this.”

Donkor’s brow furrowed as he looked up from his scroll,

and Kahent knew he had only half heard her words.

“Pharaoh will see to the girl’s marriage when I publish the

news of her maturity.”

“We must proceed slowly,” Kahent said, with a cautionary

lift of a manicured finger. “We should find a suitable man

before we reveal our intentions, then we may drop the sug-

gestion on Pharaoh’s ear. Our daughter’s husband must be

Angela Hunt

19

close to Pharaoh, for the line of kings flows through my veins

and Sagira’s. If something should happen to Pharaoh or to his

sons—” She finished with an expressive shrug.

Donkor gave her a smile of reluctant admiration. “I have

seen eyes like yours in the faces of my enemies.” He lifted

his scroll again. “I would not like to have your determination

set against me.”

“Why should you?” she asked, glad that he had looked at

her with the light of amusement in his eyes. “There is one

other thing. I must be rid of the servant girl, Tuya.”

The scroll dropped again. “But Sagira would be lost with-

out her. It is impossible to imagine one without the other.”

“Have you looked at Tuya lately, my husband?” Kahent

found it impossible to keep an edge from her voice. “The slave

has become quite attractive. If Tuya follows our daughter into

her marital home, the slave will capture the groom’s attention.”

Donkor scoffed. “Our daughter is lovely. I cannot believe

that you, her mother, would belittle her—”

“I do not dispute Sagira’s loveliness.” Kahent sank onto a

gilded settee and reached for one of the figs piled atop a

golden platter on a nearby stand. “But I want to give our

daughter every possible advantage. Sagira is attractive, but a

woman must believe herself beautiful to become so. I fear

Sagira will compare herself to Tuya, whom the gods have

unfairly blessed.”

“So how to you intend to separate the girls?” Donkor’s

voice had flattened, and Kahent knew she had already lost his

attention to the papyrus scroll in his lap.

“I will make an offering to the goddess Bastet,” she

murmured, bringing the fig to her lips. “She will show me the

way.”

Chapter Two

The glare of the desert sun blinded Potiphar for a moment.

He raised his hand to shade his eyes, and nodded in silent

satisfaction as warriors laid bodies before him: twenty-six

rebels dead, their blood staining the sand, thirty-three others

now in the bonds of defeat. He would present the slaves to

his royal master, Pharaoh Amenhotep II, and further prove

that he had earned the name Potiphar, captain of the guard,

the appointed one of Pharaoh.

He signaled for his men to leave the dead as a warning to

any others who might invade Pharaoh’s peaceful delta. Let

their mongrel bodies be consumed by worms and rats; their

immortal souls did not deserve to travel through the afterlife.

“Potiphar!”

The cry from a warrior on a cliff above them wrested his

eyes from the dead.

“Horus, the falcon god, salutes you!”

The warrior lifted his hand to the sky where a hawk circled

lazily above the blood-soaked sands. Potiphar smiled in reply.

“So be it.” He turned from the grisly scene and murmured

under his breath as he strode toward his waiting chariot. “But

it is not Horus’s approval I seek.”

Angela Hunt

21

* * *

reign of Tuthmosis III, the pharaoh whose first battle had been

to unseat his stepmother from the throne of the Upper and

Lower Kingdoms. A common man with an uncommon love

for battle, Potiphar joined the king’s army for the campaign

that culminated at the fortress of Megiddo, Armageddon.

Overflowing with youthful enthusiasm, drive and shrewd in-

tuitions, Potiphar discovered that the prospect of war affected

him like a fever. In a moment of reckless abandon, he ap-

proached the king’s generals and suggested that the Egyptian

army cross Mount Carmel to surprise the enemy from behind.

Tuthmosis appreciated the subtlety of the strategy. The

Asiatics expected the Egyptians to approach in a direct attack

from the southern plains, so when the Egyptian cavalry

appeared on the northern horizon, the panicked enemy fled

into their fortress. Leaving Potiphar to maintain the siege of

the stronghold, Tuthmosis raided the lands of neighboring

kings and chieftains, then returned to the starving fortress to

claim his victory. Pharaoh completed his conquest by harvest-

ing the crops of the land. The Asiatics, who had to eat, bowed

before the Egyptian king in submission.

The king’s victory at Megiddo secured Potiphar’s place in

the royal retinue. Under Tuthmosis III, Potiphar led armies that

conquered lands from the fifth cataract of the Nile to the Eu-

phrates River. Tuthmosis, like Potiphar, relished the thrill of war.

His standing army included hundreds of ferocious Nubian

warriors whose ancestors had won battles for previous pharaohs.

Iron-willed and hard as stone, Potiphar thought himself in-

vincible until he was taken prisoner on one expedition with

the Nubians. After his capture, he spat in his captors’ faces,

fully expecting to die. The king of Kadesh, a wily and able

adversary, wielded his sword and extracted from Potiphar

22

Dreamers

what many would have considered to be the ultimate sacri-