The Twelfth Transforming Read online

  Weak with a relief she dared not show, Tiye blurted, “I was thinking of Nefertiti.”

  Once again, startlingly, he laughed aloud. Turning, he reached for her throat, kneading and squeezing her. The gold chain holding up the sphinx pectoral pressed painfully into her skin, but she knew better than either to show fear or to resist. “A family tradition,” he wheezed, shaking her, his grip tight. “Once again you secure the throne on behalf of a bunch of Mitanni adventurers. For that is what you are, all of you. Loyal servants of the crown, earners of every reward, but may the gods have pity on any pharaoh who gets in your way.”

  “For three generations my family has served Egypt selflessly. Horus, you are unjust,” she choked. “My father did not force you to make me empress. He did not have that kind of power. You raised me to divinity yourself.”

  Suddenly he released her, and she tried to catch her breath quietly. “I loved Yuya. I trusted him. I love and trust you also, Tiye. It is the pain. Sometimes I cannot bear it. Cassia, oil of cloves, the mandrake, nothing really helps.”

  “I know,” she said, rising to stand between his legs. “There is only this.” Placing her hands on his shoulders, she bent and kissed him. He sighed gently, drawing her down onto his knee, his mouth soon leaving hers to seek her painted nipple. So much has changed, Amunhotep, but not this, she thought, passive with pleasure for a moment. In spite of everything I still adore and worship you. “Nefertiti?” she whispered, then cried out as he bit her. “If you will,” he replied, a quiver of amusement in his voice. He pulled the wig from her head and plunged both hands into her own long tresses.

  Just before dawn she left him sleeping peacefully, free of pain for a few hours. She wanted to stay and sing to him softly, cradle and rock him, but instead she gathered up her wig, fastened the sphinx once more about her bruised neck, and went out, closing the doors slowly behind her. Surero and her herald slept, the one bowed on the stool, the other huddled against the wall. The torches lining the long passage had gone out, and the guards had changed, the new faces heavy with the need for rest but with eyes alert. Into the ephemeral cool of a summer night a faint gray light was pooling. Tiye had raised a sandaled foot to stir her herald when she heard a movement and turned.

  Sitamun had stepped into the corridor and was standing uncertainly, white linen floating around her, a gossamer-thin pleated short cloak around her slim shoulders. She was wigless, her own brown hair frothing about her face, one silver circlet resting on her forehead. Amulets of silver clasped her arms, and silver scarabs and sphinxes hung across her breasts. Tiye, exhausted and satiated, had the chilling impression that she was gazing back through the years at a vision of herself, and for a second was frozen with fear and an aching longing for what had been, what could never come again. Then she began to walk toward her daughter. “He does not need your presence tonight, Sitamun,” she called, and at the sound of her voice her herald scrambled to his feet. “He is asleep now.”

  Watching jealousy and disappointment flit across her daughter’s imperious face, Tiye quelled a spurt of purely feminine triumph. It is not worthy of me to take pleasure in thwarting Sitamun, she thought contritely as the young woman hesitated. Such pettiness belongs to aging concubines in large harems, not to an empress. She smiled warmly. Sitamun did not respond. After a while she bowed stiffly and disappeared into the somnolent shadows.

  Back in her own apartments, Tiye ate to the music of the lute and harp players that woke her every morning and then sent for Neb-Amun. He was waiting for the summons and came quickly, a plump, graceful man in a full-length scribe’s gown, his head shaved bare, his face impeccably painted. He laid down his burden of scrolls and bowed, arms extended.

  “Greetings, Neb-Amun,” she said. “It is too hot to receive you on my throne; therefore I shall lie down.” She did so, settling her neck against the cool curve of her ivory headrest as Piha covered her with a sheet and her fan-bearer began to wave the blue feathers over her. “I shall also close my eyes, but my ears shall remain open. Sit.”

  He took the chair beside the couch while Piha retired to her corner. “There is not a great deal for Your Majesty’s attention,” Neb-Amun said, shuffling through his papers. “From Arzawa the usual grumbles over encroachments made by the Khatti, and of course a letter from the Khatti protesting an Arzawa raid across the mutual border. I myself can answer that. From Karduniash a demand for more gold, after the usual greetings. I do not advise that Great Horus send them anything. They have received much from us already, and beneath the demands are veiled threats that treaties will be concluded with either the Kassites or the Assyrians if Pharaoh does not continue to show his friendship.”

  “Pharaoh will arrange military maneuvers to the east,” Tiye murmured. “That should be enough. Is there anything from Mitanni?”

  “Yes. Tushratta is withholding the dowry until the city of Misrianne is officially his, that is, until the scroll of ownership reaches him. He has received the gold and silver. Princess Tadukhipa has arrived at Memphis. Word came this morning.”

  Tiye’s eyes flew open, then closed again. “So there really is to be an addition to the harem,” she muttered. “After all the haggling and kidnapping of ambassadors and empty promises and insults, little Tadukhipa is in Egypt.” I would like to see Mitanni just once, she thought suddenly. The home of my ancestors. Who knows but that this new king, Tushratta, might be a distant relative of mine. How strange! “Is there anything else?”

  Neb-Amun paused. “There is no official confirmation yet, Majesty, but it is rumored that a new prince has arisen in the land of the Khatti, who is pulling the people together. It seems that the Khatti will recover from the sacking of Boghaz-keuoi after all.”

  “Perhaps, although an enemy that can penetrate to the capital city of a country is not likely to be repulsed quickly. Particularly if it is being secretly armed and victualed.” Tiye turned her head and looked at Neb-Amun, but her gaze was unfocused. She frowned. “We know that Tushratta has been taking advantage of the chaos among the Khatti to strengthen his own position by aiding Khatti’s rebellious vassal states. The balance of power between Mitanni, Egypt, and the Khatti was delicate, and is now upset.”

  “Khatti is now very weak.”

  “And a weak Khatti means a much stronger Mitanni. We must watch the situation carefully. We cannot have Mitanni become too swollen, but neither can we allow the Khatti to grow too arrogant. We have treaties with the Khatti?”

  Neb-Amun nodded. “Yes, but they are old.”

  “We can dredge them out of storage if necessary. Is there word on the character of this prince? What is his name?”

  “The desert police are saying that he is young and vigorous, and ruthless enough to take the risks necessary to become ruler of the Khatti. He won a palace insurrection, Majesty. His name is Suppiluliumas.”

  Tiye laughed. “Barbarian! Egypt will deal with him easily if necessary. Diplomatically, of course. What next?”

  There was little else for the day. Cargo from Alashia, new oxen from Asia, gold from the Nubian mines, and a consignment of vases from Keftiu. “Send me one later. I want to see the quality,” Tiye said. “You can go now, Neb-Amun. Pharaoh will see to the sealing of any scroll that is necessary.” He gathered up his papers at once and bowed himself out.

  After being bathed and dressed in fresh linen, Tiye sent for a herald. “Summon my guard. We are going into the harem.”

  They emerged under the high roof of the palace terrace, Tiye with soldiers before and behind, her fanbearers and whisk carrier to either side. Although noon was hours away, the forecourt was already crowded with children leaping in and out of the fountains. Slaves and attendants, seeing her pass, went down on their faces. The wide paved square leading to Amunhotep’s public audience hall was likewise crowded with the staff of the foreign embassies whose quarters dotted the palace compound and who waited until such time as Pharaoh or his ministers might receive them. They, too, hearing the herald’s warning cry, be
nt in reverence as Tiye paced through their midst. Once the heavily guarded door between the public domain and the harem water steps was closed, the noise faded. As the little group turned left under the pillared entrance to the women’s quarters, Tiye’s chief steward and Keeper of the Harem Door, Kheruef, came forward, his short linens fluttering in the draught that blew through the open doors of the gardens at the rear of the buildings. Tiye held out a hand.

  “You will have another apartment to furnish and slaves to buy,” she told him as he kissed the tips of her fingers. “The foreign princess Tadukhipa arrives within days.”

  Kheruef smiled politely. “Princess Gilupkhipa will be overjoyed, Majesty. Since the murder of her father and the rise of her brother to power, she has been frantic for news from Mitanni. Tadukhipa is her niece and will bring a breath of familiarity into Gilupkhipa’s rooms.”

  “Considering that Gilupkhipa has been a royal wife for almost as long as I have, I find it hard to understand why she still pines for the discomforts and dangers of an uncivilized country,” Tiye remarked dryly. “But I do not want to discuss Pharaoh’s Mitanni women. I have come to see the prince.”

  “He has just risen and is in the garden by the lake, Majesty.”

  “Good. See that we are not disturbed.”

  Alone, Tiye walked through the precious breezes of the corridor. To right and left, doors stood open. She passed the little reception halls, where the women received their stewards and members of their family, and the smaller, more intimate rooms where on winter evenings they gathered around the braziers to gossip. Leading from the main passage were other corridors lined with granite statues of the goddesses Mut, Hathor, Sekhmet, Ta-Urt, the deities before whom the women would stand and burn incense, muttering prayers for beauty, fertility, the continuance of their youth, the health of their children. These led to the apartments of Pharaoh’s wives, who lived in the same wing deep within the palace complex. The concubines had their quarters throughout the sprawling harem, and as Tiye passed, she was gradually embraced by its peculiarly stifling atmosphere. Laughter and shrill chatter echoed all around. There was the clatter of bronze anklets, the tinkle of silver ornaments, the flash of yellow, scarlet, and blue linen vanishing around a corner. Somewhere, at the end of the passage leading to the nurseries, a sick child was wailing. Incense billowed suddenly into her face from a half-closed door, and the musical cadence of foreign prayers, Syrian perhaps, or Babylonian, came with it. Through another door she saw a naked body, arms extended, and heard the wail of a pipe.

  I hate the harem, Tiye thought for the thousandth time as she broke out into dazzling sunlight and began to cross to the women’s lake. The months I spent here as a frightened, determined child of twelve, a wife like all the other wives, were the most frustrating of my life. Having my mother here as a Royal Ornament did not help, either. She ruled the other women as a divisional commander does his troops, with a whip and a curse, and she hated to see me run across these lawns in the early mornings naked, without paint, when the other women were still deep in their perfumed dreams. If Amunhotep had not fallen in love with me, I should have taken poison.

  She pushed aside her thoughts for she now saw him, her last living son, sitting cross-legged on a papyrus mat at the verge of the lake, shaded by a small canopy. He was alone and motionless, both hands lying in the lap of his white kilt, his eyes fixed on the constant white flicker and dance of the light on the little waves. Not far from him a group of trees cast a dappled shade, but he had chosen to have his canopy erected in the glare of the full sunlight. Tiye approached him steadily, but only at the last moment did he look up and see her. Rising, he prostrated himself in the grass, and then he resumed his position.

  Tiye settled gracefully beside him. He did not look at her but seemed wrapped in a quiet self-absorption as his eyes continued to watch the surface of the water. As always when she visited him a feeling of puzzlement and alienation stole over her. She had never seen him behave other than passively, but after his nineteen years of life she still could not decide whether his self-possession was the confidence of a supreme arrogance or a stoic acceptance of his fate or the mark of a guileless man. She knew that the harem women treated him with a mixture of affection and disdain, like an unwanted pet, and had wondered more than once over the years whether her husband knew how slowly corrupting such influences could be on the young man. But of course he knew. The degradation of humanity was a well-charted, familiar course to him.

  “Amunhotep?”

  Slowly he turned mild, liquid eyes upon her, and his thick lips curved into a smile, relieving for a moment the jutting, downward plunge of the unnaturally long chin. He was an ugly man. Only his thin, aquiline nose saved him from unredeemed homeliness.

  “Mother? You are looking tired today. Everyone is looking tired. It is the heat.” His voice was high and light, like a child’s.

  She did not want to chatter, but for a moment the news she had brought him overwhelmed her, and she found she could not select the words to present it to him gently. Hesitating only briefly, she said, “For many years I have dreamed of telling you this. I want you to instruct your steward and your servants to pack everything you want to take away with you. You are leaving the harem.”

  The smile did not falter, but the long brown fingers resting against the shining linen tightened. “Where am I going?”

  “To Memphis. You are to be appointed high priest of Ptah.”

  “Is Pharaoh dead?” The tone was enquiring, nothing more.

  “No. But he is ill and knows that he must name you as his heir. An heir apparent always serves as high priest in Memphis.”

  “Then he is dying.” His eyes left her and fixed themselves on the sky. “Memphis is quite close to On, is it not?”

  “Yes, very close. And you will see the mighty tombs of the ancestors and the city of the dead at Saqqara, and Memphis itself is a marvel. You will live at Pharaoh’s summer palace. Does that please you?”

  “Of course. May I take my musicians and my pets with me?”

  “Anything you like.” She was mildly irritated by his lack of reaction and decided that he did not yet fully understand how complete the change in his circumstances would be. “I’d suggest you empty your apartments here,” she went on crisply. “You will not be returning to them, and besides, as Horus-Fledgling in Egypt you must marry, and you can hardly expect a future queen of Egypt to inhabit less than a palace of her own.”

  For the first time, she had moved him. His head whipped around, and for a fleeting second she read a gleam of satisfaction in his eyes. “I am to have Sitamun?”

  “No. Pharaoh reserves the right to keep her.”

  “But she is a fully royal sister.” His mouth was pursed, his brow furrowed. Is he pleased or disappointed that he cannot have her? Tiye wondered. “My son, the days when the succession went only to a man who married fully royal blood have passed. Now the choice is made either by Pharaoh himself or by the Amun oracle.”

  Amunhotep’s lip curled in a sneer. “I am the last choice the Son of Hapu would have made. I am glad he is dead. I hated him. It is you, Mother, who have forced this upon Pharaoh, is it not?” His hands left his lap and went to the white leather helmet he wore, pulling at its wings reflectively. “I want Nefertiti.”

  Tiye was taken aback. “Nefertiti is my choice also. She is your cousin and will make a good consort.”

  “She comes to see me sometimes and brings Uncle’s baboons. She visited the library on my behalf and brought me scrolls to study. We talk of the gods.”

  So Nefertiti is deeper than I imagined, Tiye thought. “That was good of her,” she said aloud. “You will serve at Memphis for one year. Afterward you will return to Thebes and be married and set up your own palace. I will help you, Amunhotep. I know it will not be easy for you, after so many years of captivity.”

  He reached for her hand and stroked it. “I love you, my mother. I owe this to you.” His gentle fingers caressed her wrist. “Will
Pharaoh wish to see me before I go?”

  “I do not think so. His health is precarious.”

  “But his fear of me is vital enough! So be it. When do I leave?”

  “In a few days.” She rose, he with her, and on impulse she leaned forward and kissed his smooth cheek. “Will Prince Amunhotep want to begin a harem of his own?”

  “Eventually,” he responded solemnly. “But I shall select my women myself, when I am ready. I shall be busy in Memphis.”

  “I will leave you to give your instructions, then. May thy name live forever, Amunhotep.”

  He bowed. When she glanced back at him a moment later, he was still standing where she had left him, and she could not read his expression.

  Before she began the official acts of the afternoon, Tiye sent a message to her brother Ay, requesting that he leave his own duties to his assistants and wait for her in his house. Then she sat restlessly through two audiences, heard the daily report from the Overseer of the Royal Treasury, and absently refused the fruit Piha offered during a brief lull in the proceedings. Her mind revolved around the changing fortunes of her son and the burden of new responsibility his freedom would lay upon her, and she was impatient to discuss it all with Ay. Before the last minister had bowed himself from her audience chamber, she had left her throne and was brusquely ordering out her litter.

  Her brother’s house lay a mile north of the palace, along the river road. He was waiting for her, and as the bearers lowered her litter and she stepped into the thin shade of his garden, he knelt on the grass. “Stay by the gate until I call,” she commanded her servants and then walked forward to receive Ay’s kiss on her feet before seating herself on the chair set ready. Ay resumed his own.

  “I know I look tired.” She smiled, seeing his expression. “I had little opportunity for sleep last night. But I will take some of that watered wine and rest here with you. This place never changes, Ay. The house ages gracefully, the same flowers that I loved as a child still bloom, the trees are as willfully ragged as ever. You and I have solved many mysteries together here through the years.”