Sphinx's Queen (26 page)

“You must eat something, mistress,” one of them said. “You didn’t touch a bite of your midday meal.”

“Is Amenophis all right?” I blurted. Now that I was back in the waking world, I was suddenly struck by the fact that I had no idea what had become of him after he’d fainted.
How could I forget to ask such a thing?
I thought, miserable with self-reproach.

“Ameno—?
Prince
Amenophis?” The two maids exchanged an uneasy look. “We heard that he fell ill this morning, but nothing more.”

“We could go find out, if you give us permission, mistress,” the second maid said. I couldn’t tell if she was sincerely willing to serve me or just avid to have a fresh excuse to run back to her sweetheart in the kitchens.

“That would be good. You are free to go. Come back as quickly as … when you can.” I was too worn out from the morning’s ordeal to care about the honesty or duplicity of another girl in love. “Thank you.”

“Mistress?” Her expression changed from eagerness to concern. I must have looked dreadful. “Mistress, I promise you, I’ll be back
very
fast. And when I come back, would you … would you like the two of us to prepare a bath for you? I can bring some fragrant herbs to scent the water.”

The maid who’d insisted I eat something answered for me. “Yes, do that! A bath is just the thing she needs. And don’t you dare take all evening finding out about the prince. The news must be old by now; everyone will know it. You
don’t
need to get it from the kitchens,” she concluded meaningly.

The second maid didn’t wait to hear more. She was gone and back again before I’d eaten the last of my dinner. “I have good news, mistress,” she announced with a smile. “Prince Amenophis is well. It was only a mild fainting spell. He looked healthy and fit when he accompanied his royal parents back to the palace. It’s even said”—she lowered her voice to a whisper—“it’s even said that Pharaoh himself had to reprimand the prince for looking
too
well.”

“That makes no sense,” I objected.

“They say that Pharaoh was made so wretched by what his eldest son did in the Palace of Ma’at that he spent the rest of today snapping at anyone he saw who didn’t wear a face long enough to trip over. They say that finally he shut himself up in the heart of his chambers and wouldn’t see anyone, not even his Great Royal Wife. They say that she beat on the doors with her fists and shouted at him to let her in, but he refused. They say she looked like a wild thing, and—”

“That’s enough,” I said curtly. “I am tired of what
they
say. All I wanted was news of Prince Amenophis. He’s better; I’m content. The two of you are free for the night.”

“But, mistress, your bath—” The news-bearing maid offered up the basket of herbs she’d brought me.

I took it from her hands and set it aside. “These will keep. I’ll bathe in the morning. For tonight, I want to be alone.”

“We are here to obey your wishes, mistress,” the first maid said. “But we were also told—”

“To stay near enough so that I didn’t try to escape?” I finished her sentence for her with a wry smile. “You haven’t been doing a very good job of that, have you?”

The two of them looked embarrassed and nervous. “We didn’t think you
would
try to escape,” the first maid said. “You are—forgive me, mistress, but it’s true—you are only a girl. How would you be able to come up with a successful way to get out of the palace? And if you did manage that, where would you go? How could you survive?”

“I’d die,” the second maid said plaintively. Her eyes were wide with all her unspoken fears of what lay beyond the palace gates.

“And yet you must know that I did escape, once before,” I said. “What did you think of that?”

“Oh, that someone took care of everything for you.” The first maid shrugged. “You’re so beautiful, mistress; people must be pushing each other aside for the chance to serve you and keep you happy.”

I had to laugh. If only that were true! “Well, you don’t have to fret about watching me anymore. You know that I’ve been proved innocent. I can come and go as I like. So can you.”

“Oh,
yes
, mistress!” they exclaimed in joyful chorus, and left me in a flurry of promises to bring me a wonderful breakfast and a morning bath so luxurious that Lady Hathor herself would envy me.

In their haste to be gone, they left behind my dirty dishes. I sighed and carried them out of my rooms, not wanting the crumbs to attract vermin. I was in the courtyard, wondering if I should take the things all the way back to the kitchens or only leave them a reasonable distance from my quarters, when two men surprised me. One had the humble look of a servant, and he carried the burden of a covered basket as if to prove it. The other was dressed more richly and carried only a delicately made oil lamp shaped like a leaping gazelle.

“You there, girl! Do you belong to these rooms?” the lamp-bearer demanded.

Apparently I was looking humble enough to be taken for a servant, too. I suppose my freight of dirty dishes didn’t help dispel the illusion.

“Yes, sir,” I said with a little bow. His mistaken assumption amused me, and I had a great hunger for laughter that evening.

“I don’t want to disturb your mistress. She has endured much today, poor lady.”

“True, she isn’t herself right now,” I said.

“Small wonder! The goddess Ma’at appeared before everyone and declared that Lady Nefertiti was not only innocent of all wrongdoing, but also that the evil Set himself was at the bottom of the plot that had dragged such a pure and lovely girl through untold suffering!”

“Not
Set.”
I was glad to have the chance to gasp in amazement; otherwise I would have burst out laughing.

“The Evil One and none other.” My elegant visitor nodded vigorously. “What’s more, the dreadful god of the Red Land also appeared in person and tried to destroy Lady Nefertiti with a flaming spear! But blessed Ma’at’s sacred Feather of Truth became a wall of shining light around her and Set was vanquished.”

“Oh,
my.”
I opened my eyes as wide as they would go. “You must have been
terrified.”

“Er, no.” The man looked sheepish. “I regret to say that I wasn’t there. But I have it on the very best authority that everything happened exactly as I’ve told you. What’s more, I bring the proof of it.” He made an imperious gesture for his attendant to come forward with the basket. “This is for Lady Nefertiti from the god-on-earth, the Beloved of Amun, Lord of the Two Lands, the almighty Pharaoh Amenhotep himself. You shall bring it to her and tell her it is hers to keep forever.”

The servant and I performed an awkward dance as he tried to hand me the basket while taking the dirty dishes from me at the same time. It was a miracle that we didn’t drop everything. I stared at the woven lid and wondered what could be inside. The temptation to lift the lid and peek was strong, but I knew it wasn’t something a mere “maidservant” could do in front of Pharaoh’s messenger.

Then the basket meowed.

“A
cat?”
I exclaimed.

“The
royal
cat, called Ta-Miu,” the man corrected me. “The very cat whose life was proof of Lady Nefertiti’s innocence.”

“But—but she’s Prince Thutmose’s cat!”

“Not anymore, apparently.”

“Why would Pharaoh do such a thing?”

The man gave me an exasperated look. “You
are
an impudent little creature, acting as if you’ve got the right to question Pharaoh’s commands. Lady Nefertiti must have her hands full, trying to get you to behave like a proper servant. You’d better learn to be quick, silent, helpful, and obedient or you’ll find yourself looking for work somewhere else. Now go do as you’re told.”

I bowed my head over Ta-Miu’s basket. “I live to make Lady Nefertiti happy.”

“Ah, that’s the way to be!” He chucked me under the chin. “You do have a pretty face, girl. I like you. You know, I’m a rather important person in this palace—entrusted with messages by Pharaoh himself. If you could … 
like
me, I’d see to it that you got a job with even more prestige than waiting on Lady Nefertiti, better food, new clothes, easier work—”

“Oh, sir, I couldn’t,” I replied. “I know for a fact that if I … 
liked
you”—I twisted my mouth as if I’d just bitten into something sour enough to make my teeth ache—“that wouldn’t make Lady Nefertiti happy at all!” With that, I dashed back into my rooms, leaving my visitor gape-jawed and his servant stuck with my dirty dishes.

I carried the basket into the inner chamber of my rooms, set it on my bed, and removed the cover. Ta-Miu looked up at me and complained about the shameful disrespect she’d been forced to suffer.

“Yes, yes, I know,” I said, trying to make myself heard over a strident, unending series of meows. “You are the divine child of Bast, and I should be grateful for the privilege of serving you.” I lifted her onto my lap and stroked her fur. “Except I’m going to be a very bad servant, at least until morning, because I haven’t got any food in my quarters and I’m really too tired even to think of going to the kitchens now. Will you ever forgive me, O exalted feline?”

“That will depend on how many fish you lay at my feet tomorrow, O worthless human!” said a weirdly pitched, throaty voice that came from the room beyond my bedchamber.

I jumped to my feet in alarm, sending Ta-Miu leaping from my lap to hide herself under the bed. “Who’s there?”

“You tell me,” said Amenophis, smiling as he crossed the bedchamber threshold. “Today I’ve been many different—well, not
people
.” He struck a stiff, dignified pose and intoned, “You are wrongfully accused. You are guiltless. You are free!”

The verdict of Ma’at!
“You
were the voice of the goddess?” I cried. “But what happened to the priest Thutmose bought? The one who was going to use Ma’at’s mouth to condemn me?”

“You knew about my brother’s plot?”

“Henenu told me.”

“I see.” He looked dejected. “I would have done the same, Nefertiti, but I thought if you knew what Thutmose had in mind—”

I stepped into his embrace and took a swift, sweet kiss from his lips. “Hush. I understand why you kept some secrets from me. Henenu helped me see your reasons.”

“Bless him for that,” Amenophis said. “I was afraid you’d be mad at me for hiding things from you.”

“Just see to it that you never do so again,” I told him. “Now, how did you deal with Thutmose’s hired priest?”

“By hiring men of my own,” he replied. “Did you see them? They were the ones who carried me away when I ‘fainted.’ As soon as we were well away from the courtyard, in a deserted part of the temple, I enjoyed an extraordinary recovery. I led the way as we stole through the inner corridors to reach the room where the ‘voice’ of Ma’at hides. Father showed it to me once, when I was still a child. It’s very small—not more than a cubbyhole with a speaking tube that leads to Ma’at’s wooden image—so the job usually falls to one of the youngest, smallest, scrawniest priests. When my men yanked open the door, he took one look at them and crawled out without a fight. I took his place, and you know the rest.” He grinned. “No one else will, though. My men made it clear to the little priest that his silence and his health are now partners. And they’ll never say one word about what happened. I sealed their lips with well-earned gold.”

His smile withered. “It’s always gold, gold and influence. Thutmose buys the goddess to destroy you, I buy her back to save you, but the real voice of Ma’at is gone. Was it ever there? If the gods have any real power, why do they stand by and allow us to buy and sell their voices? If Ma’at is the goddess of truth, why does she remain silent and permit so many lies to flourish? I am just as guilty of profaning her holy truth as the priests my brother bribed. I impersonated Ma’at herself, speaking in her name: If that was sacrilege, why didn’t she stop me?”

I lifted my face to his. “If she had stopped you, what would have become of me?”

He kissed me, and his kiss was far more lingering than mine had been. I wished I could drown in it. When he drew back to speak again, I gave a little sigh of longing.

“Maybe the gods know better than we do when to keep silent,” I said, resting my head over his heart. “Maybe—maybe the goddess sees what we can’t, a greater truth.”

“I love you, Nefertiti,” Amenophis said softly. “I don’t know of any greater truth than that. Do you think that’s what Ma’at read in my heart when I pretended to be her?”

“If she did, then she must have forgiven you.”

We kissed again, and I felt my blood turn to honey, warm and sweet. My senses danced, and all the fears and uncertainties and revelations of the day blew away like the dust of the Red Land’s wild wastes. We were alone in my rooms, and I was powerless to tell whether knowing this made me eager or afraid. When our lips parted, he murmured, “I should go.”

“Don’t.”

His long-fingered hands, once so clumsy, brushed my hair away from my face. “Even in the lamplight, you shine like the sun, Nefertiti. When I kiss you, it’s like bathing in the fire of heaven. What an incredible gift of love Hathor has given me to cherish in you. I’ve never felt like this. I never knew I could.”

“And I—” I choked on all the words I wanted to say. There were too many things I needed to tell him, and not enough time, not if we lived for a hundred years. “I want you to—”

A cascade of flickering flames invaded my bedchamber, oil lamps held high in the hands of a small army of harried, fearful serving women. Their eyes darted here and there, as if they didn’t dare to look at us but didn’t dare to look away. Then their ranks parted and a blazing coal of pure fury hurled itself upon us.

“Get
away
from her!” Aunt Tiye’s nails dug deep into Amenophis’s shoulder. She pulled him back so hard that it seemed she was trying to fling him to the floor. “Is
this
what you do? Fly to
her
like a vulture to carrion? There’s not enough gold in this palace to reward the man who warned me about where to find you!”