The Twice Born (28 page)

He thanked her effusively, fingering the exquisite glass, knowing that he held the evidence of her father’s wealth in his hands. “You don’t want it back, Anuket?” he pressed. “A clay container would be less of a responsibility for me. I’m frightened that I might lose this.”

“You will not lose it.” It was a statement, not a question.

“No. I shall put it in my cedar box with my other treasures when I have used up all the ointment, and I shall look at it often. It is very beautiful.” But his eyes told her that the beauty he was speaking of was hers.

She lowered her gaze. “Goodbye, then, Huy, until the next holiday. I trust that your hand will heal without a scar.” The litter was waiting and Thothmes was tapping his foot impatiently. Bowing politely to her, Huy ran to join his friend.

For some time they were both quiet as the litter swayed and the bearers’ muffled conversation came to them sporadically. Then Thothmes leaned sideways and drew the curtains. “The sun is hot today,” he remarked lightly, “and we are catching no breeze off the river. Is your hand stinging much, Huy? A cat scratch can turn into ukhedu very quickly. Anuket was right to treat it as seriously as she did.” He was making a show of twitching the drapes. Huy saw him give a tiny grimace of hesitation and realized that Thothmes was embarrassed.

“I had not wanted to talk to you about her yet,” Huy said. “You always tell me the truth, Thothmes, and I don’t really want it, not from you, although Nasha certainly thrashed me with it. Is she right? Am I foolish to love Anuket?”

“Is being in love foolish?” Thothmes turned to Huy in relief. “Is it all right to discuss this now that we are alone, Huy? May I tell you what I think?”

Now it was Huy’s turn to grimace. “Only if you think I have some hope of winning her,” he tried to joke.

Thothmes did not smile. “It is unlikely that Father will consent to a betrothal between you and Anuket,” he said heavily. “He is very fond of you and thoroughly approves of our friendship and looks forward to having you in the house, but even if you become rich there’s the question of your lineage. Forgive me. Such matters mean little to me. Most of the time I forget your roots, but Father will not. Anuket will marry a nobleman.” His hands came up and fluttered in distress at Huy’s expression. “It has nothing to do with love or deserving!” he pressed. “I do not hurt you purposely, Huy! And being in love is not foolish. But are you really in love, or is this just an infatuation that will pass? You don’t know Anuket well. For that matter, none of us do. She guards herself from everyone.”

“Infatuation?” Huy laughed harshly. “Gods, I hope so! This feeling is so painful, Thothmes, and so unexpected. I didn’t ask for it, it fell upon me out of nowhere. Have you ever been in love?”

“Not yet. Don’t forget that we’re both still very young. My mother says that being in love is just a part of growing up and has nothing to do with choosing the right mate. Or having one chosen for you. Has Anuket given you any sign that she shares your feelings?”

Huy sighed. “I’m not sure. Most of the time she treats me affectionately but coolly. She does indeed seem to guard herself well, but perhaps that’s because she fears the effect her name may have on her. Names are chosen carefully and have much power, as you know.” He turned to meet Thothmes’ gaze. “Yet she confided the source of her name to me. She let down her guard for a moment. That shows trust, and trust is one ingredient of love, is it not?” He knew he was beginning to sound desperate and did not care.

Thothmes nodded. “So they say. But Huy, although Anuket is innocent, she is not necessarily without the guile all girls seem to inherit. You have no sisters. I have three of them, and believe me, from the time they were small they’ve shown an ability to get what they want while seeming to be obedient and sweet.”

“What are you saying?”

“Two things. One, that Anuket could have been warning you away by confiding in you, and two, that we must wait and see if your emotion grows or dies.” He grasped Huy’s hand and looked at him earnestly. “In either case, my sister is fortunate to be loved by someone as full of good qualities as you.”

The litter was slowing. The noise of the public pathway had faded.
He has not mentioned the weight the gods have laid upon me or its consequences for my future
, Huy thought as the bearers swung onto the approach to the temple and he caught the faint odour of the pool lying before the vast stone concourse.
He believes that this is nothing more than a puff of wind stirring the sand of the desert before moving on. I wish I believed it too
.

They had hardly returned to their cell and were unpacking their satchels when a young priest darkened the morning sparkle pouring in through the doorway. “The Master desires your presence in his quarters at once, Huy,” he said with a bow. “Do you need to be escorted?”

Huy sighed. “No. I know my way there by now.” The man departed and Huy lifted the cedar chest onto his cot, raising the lid and laying the faience vial reverently in one of the compartments his uncle had fashioned so carefully and expertly. Returning the chest to its place under his cot, he turned reluctantly to Thothmes. “I suppose you are going to swim in the lake and lie in the grass,” he said wistfully. “I don’t know when I’ll be back.”

“At least you know by now that you have not been summoned for punishment,” Thothmes answered with wry understanding. “Is this the day, do you think, Huy?”

Huy did not need to ask Thothmes what he meant. Shrugging, he started across the courtyard.

The High Priest himself opened to Huy’s knock on the imposing double doors that still gave Huy a pang of apprehension when he was forced to approach them. Smiling, the man indicated that Huy should enter and Huy did so, surprised to find the room full of sharp rays of sunbeams lancing down from a series of clerestory windows cut in the walls just below the level of the ceiling. Ramose chuckled. “I love the daylight as much as, if not more than, any other man,” he commented as Huy took the customary stool before the large desk. “I am Ra’s High Priest after all, I do not crouch in darkness. But of course you have made every other visit to my domain during the hours of darkness, haven’t you?” He lowered himself behind the desk. “Did you enjoy your three days of festivity? Yes,” he added thoughtfully, “I can see that you did. Nakht’s house is a warm and welcoming one, is it not? Give me your hand.”

Slightly alarmed, Huy extended it and the High Priest took it firmly in both of his. At once Huy felt a shock go through him, then a fire spread up his arm and into his chest. For some moments the Priest’s eyes held his in a steady regard, then he released Huy and sat back. Huy almost fell off his stool, so sudden was the cessation of heat.

“The title of Greatest of Seers is bestowed on every High Priest of Ra as a matter of course,” Ramose said, “just as the title of Greatest of the Five belongs to the High Priest of Thoth at Khmun. Sometimes the title I hold is more than honorary. I have the power of second sight. It is nothing like the gift the gods have bestowed on you. I cannot see into the future. Nor can I diagnose an illness. But I can see into the heart of a man, whether it is sound or as rotten as worm-eaten wood, and I can find the seat of his happiness or his distress.” He clasped his beringed fingers and laid them on the surface of the desk. “You have fallen in love, young Huy. I do not think that it is with Nasha. She is too vibrant, too colourful. She disturbs that thing in you that demands peace. No, it is sweet Anuket, weaver of garlands for the gods, who consumes your body and mind. I am sorry for you.”

Huy laughed once, shakily. “It is a relief to find my soul exposed to you without a word from me, Master. I would have told you and asked for your advice, but now all I need is the advice, not the courage to confess my weakness.”

“Weakness?” Ramose cocked an eye at Huy. “Love is no weakness, and the flame consuming you is pure until it is sullied by rashness. Only Anuket’s name is tainted. I almost lost a friend because of that.”

“You were one of the astrologers commissioned to choose her name?”

Ramose nodded. “We cast her horoscope three times. There was no doubt. I conjured against the seven Hathors in order to avert whatever dangers such a name might bring her, and we tied the seven red ribbons around her limbs for seven days to bind any evil bau who might be hovering, but the name had to stand. Nakht was furious. However”—he unlaced his fingers and laid his palms flat on the desk—“so far Anuket resembles the water goddess of old, not the wanton whore she has become in her modern aspect. She is intelligent, demure, and chaste. Do you need my advice?”

“Very much.” Huy swallowed. “Nasha taunted me with the knowledge that a Seer loses his or her power unless he or she remains virgin. Is that true?”

Ramose’s eyebrows rose. “Taunted you? Yes, I can understand why. Nasha is beautiful but fiery and strong-willed. Nakht is having difficulty finding a husband for her who is strong enough to pit himself against her resolve, win, and yet keep her respect.” He grinned, a gesture that removed years from his features. “So far she has demolished all of them.”

“I had no idea,” Huy exclaimed. “Thothmes has told me nothing of these things.”

“I doubt very much if Nakht takes his young son into his confidence regarding his daughter’s matrimonial prospects,” Ramose said dryly. “I tell you so that you will not judge Nasha too harshly. Her heart is generous and kindly, but it must hurt her to know that Anuket is adored, even by a stripling like yourself.” He lifted an arm in admonition against Huy’s unspoken protest. “I do not insult you, Huy. I speak a truth. You are twelve. You are in the violent throes of a first love. It will either last no longer than a few months or it will deepen, in which case I will then answer your question. You do not need to know now. Don’t be anxious. Enjoy the experience. Give thanks to the gods for it. It is sacred. Feast on little Anuket’s presence with every faculty but one, for many perfectly ordinary reasons I do not think I need to name. Do I?”

Miserably Huy shook his head. “No, Master.”

“Good.” Ramose smiled. “Then we may move on to your immediate future. I have spoken with your Overseer and we have ordered your afternoons thus. After the noon meal and the sleep you will continue your work with the bow and spear, but we will add control of a chariot to it. You need no more swimming lessons. After an hour on the training ground, more or less, you will go to the bathhouse, wash yourself thoroughly, and present yourself at my quarters. Together we will approach the Ished Tree, in whose shade you will begin to study the Book of Thoth until it is time for your evening meal. I presume that these arrangements are not inconvenient for you?”

Huy saw that it was a serious question. “No, Master, of course not. You will sit with me while I read?” He was remembering his first encounter with both Tree and High Priest and the thought brought apprehension.

“No, there is no need. The scrolls are not difficult to read. The language is archaic, but decipherable to a student of your standing. You may take your palette with you to make notes of anything you may wish to ponder later. The Book does not of course leave the vicinity of the Tree. When you feel that you have read enough for one day, whether it be a few minutes or a few hours, you will tell the guard on the door. He will fetch me, I will take the scrolls away, and you will be free to spend your evenings as you wish.” He rose and came around the desk. “I am needed in the temple and you have the rest of the day to prepare for your lessons that begin as usual tomorrow morning. The other boys are trickling back to their courtyards. Go and greet your friends.”

Huy stood. “I am not to discuss what I read with anyone, is that correct, Master?”

“You may bring any problem to me or to the Rekhet.” He hesitated. “The Book is forbidden to no one, Huy. The responsibility of the priests here and at Khmun is to keep it safe, not to keep it from those wishing to read it. You would think that every literate man would want to see what the god has set down regarding the ordering of the cosmos, but few come and ask for it.” He pursed his lips. “It is as though the god chooses those destined to read it and sends them here. During my own tenure as High Priest there have been only two requests to see it. Neither man stayed long. Both seemed to find something in it that satisfied them, whereas when I read it I understood only one truth.”

“And what was that, Master?” Huy asked eagerly.

“‘It is Ra, the creator of the names of his limbs, which came into being in the forms of the gods who are in the following of Ra,’” Ramose quoted. He looked at Huy inquiringly. Huy’s face was a blank. “Think about it for a moment.”

Huy frowned. “It cannot be!” he exclaimed. “That would mean …”

“Yes,” Ramose said quietly. “Remember that the words were written down in the dawn of our history, before the vast proliferation of gods we have now. Those words appear in the seventeenth chapter of the Book of the Dead. Our gods are personifications of the names of Ra. Each god is one of his members. The name of a god is the god himself.”

“So Ra is the visible representation of the creator-god Atum. As Ra is to Atum, so is our King to Ra.”

“You will learn much, much more from the Book than this,” Ramose said. “More than I could ever fathom. You have been chosen to do so. If you wish to take young Thothmes into your confidence, you may, but he will be no more than a sounding board for you. He will understand only that he loves you. Go and sit in the temple gardens for a while. Try to empty your mind.” Ramose leaned close. “It is perhaps a good thing that your parents have no interest in the things of the gods,” he commented. “You will bring no prejudices to your study of the Book. The gods must be honoured, Huy, but what are the gods? I am late. I must go. I will see you tomorrow afternoon. The guard at the door to the Tree will be expecting you.” He hurried out, his priestly robe floating after him.

Huy followed more slowly, smarting from the High Priest’s offhand comment regarding his parents’ ignorance. The shame of his origins would probably always dog him, he thought dismally, the emotion lying dormant until a chance word revived it. No matter how refined his speech became, how cultured his manners, how sophisticated his education, he would remain the son of a peasant from Hut-herib.