House of Dreams (19 page)

“You have been crying,” he said matter-of-factly. “Drink.” I did so. The violet liquid was dry and refreshing and I drained it quickly. It touched the pain in my abdomen with a different, more earthy fire than the sadness, enclosing and shrinking it. I put the cup on the desk and he promptly refilled it. “Are you going to tell me what is wrong or are you going to guzzle my wine and disappear in silence?” he said wryly. I drank again before answering, then grasped the cup with both hands.

“I am troubled, Harshira,” I began, not really aware until later that I had addressed the great man by his name instead of his title, but he did not object. He made no move. Those black eyes of his remained fixed on me. “Today Kaha told me things that have distressed me. I cannot believe them. I do not want to believe them! I need to know if they are true or not.” His eyebrows rose.

“What things?”

I told him. As the wine slowed my tongue and deliciously loosened my body I repeated all that Kaha had said. The numbers were still there in my brain, ready to spew from my mouth like some terrible, indigestible fruit. “I do not deny the figures,” I finished. “But the matter of the Good God’s helplessness—is that merely Kaha’s assessment or is it truly a part of what Egypt has become? Tell me, Harshira, for it is as though someone I love dearly has died!” He let out his breath slowly and pursed his thick lips, then he folded his arms and leaned on the desk.

“I am sorry, Thu, but it is as Kaha says,” he replied. “For you it is a shock. The common people live and labour far from the labyrinthine weavings of power. Their vision of Egypt is an ancient and simple one. Without it they would lose heart, and Egypt herself would falter and dissolve into barbarism. They must go on believing that Pharaoh sits at the pinnacle of divine and secular authority and can do no wrong. We live in an age of peculation and greed, dishonesty, ambition and cruelty.”

“But it should not be that way!” I burst out. “I have been diligent in my studies of history and I know that it is not right, it has never been right! Do the priests not fear the vengeance of Ma’at? What of their judging when the ka leaves the body? Why does Amun allow such things?”

“Perhaps Amun has withdrawn his favour,” Harshira said gently. “Perhaps he, too, waits for a cleansing tide of anger to sweep the country on his behalf and for Pharaoh.” I lifted the cup with trembling hands and drank more wine. He broke off until I had swallowed. “You are not alone in your indignation, Thu,” he went on. “Many of us hate what is happening, and people like the Master who have access to the palace and the temples are continually trying to counter the insupportable pressure the priestly hierarchy places on the Double Crown. But part of the problem lies with Ramses himself. In battle, in defence of this country, he has been a brilliant tactician. But he does not seem able to fight his enemies within our borders. I expect that Kaha has asked you to put forward a solution of your own. What would it be?” He was speaking to me without a trace of his usual coldness or sarcasm. He smiled at me with a kind of dismal complicity as I hesitated, trying to think past the effects of the wine.

“I have only just heard how things are,” I said slowly. “If the great ones cannot find an answer, how can I? I am still aching, Harshira. I do not know. Everything I held to be right is gone.”

“Not everything,” he contradicted me kindly. “Pharaoh is still on his throne. The foreigners try to force their way past our defences and so far have failed. Egypt has an imbalance but she is still Egypt, glorious and eternal. It is up to those of us who are aware of the true state of affairs to do something about it, and we will.” He heaved himself free of the chair and came around the desk. Taking me firmly under my arms he helped me rise. To my dismay I staggered as he let me go. He chuckled drily. “You will sleep now,” he said, “and by tomorrow you will have considered the question Kaha has put to you with the objective coolness of a good pupil. You will give a dispassionate answer and argue with your teacher respectfully. Will you not?” I looked up at him through scarcely focused eyes.

“No, I will not,” I managed with difficulty. “It will never be a matter of cold discussion for me. I am distraught, Harshira.” Now he laughed, but I was not so incapacitated that I could not see the way he was looking at me, with humourless speculation.

“You are drunk,” he said, “and that is good. It is just what you needed. Now go with your faithful little escort, Thu, but remember that there are many who care as you do, many who strain to restore the purity of Ma’at, and the members of this household are among the most zealous.” He patted me on the back. “Go.” I wanted to fling myself into his arms, to feel the reassurance of a father’s embrace, but of course I did no such thing. All the same, I thought to myself hazily as I made my way carefully out the door and Disenk rose to pad after me, there has been a subtle change in my relationship with the Chief Steward. He addressed me as an equal.

When I woke the following morning the edge of my distress had been blunted but by no means erased. I saw that I had reacted to Kaha’s lesson with the outraged offence of a spoiled child; nevertheless an adult sadness and anger remained. My peasant innocence had gone as surely as the days of my country’s ancient innocence, and would not return. I could not calmly ponder a solution to Kaha’s question. I was still too emotionally engaged for such an exercise, and all I could picture was a great hand sweeping away all of them, priests, foreigners and Pharaoh himself, so that Egypt could begin afresh. I told Kaha so when we met in his tiny cubicle that afternoon.

“You do not look well,” he observed crisply as I sank onto my habitual stool beside him. “You need to fast, cleanse your body.”

“I need a better night’s rest and a more optimistic lesson from you,” I replied tartly. “I am sorry, Kaha, but I have come to no conclusion with regard to the assignment you set me.”

“Well let us hope that you have remembered the numbers,” he drawled. “Say them.” Wearily I did so. They were still there in my mind, clear and black and uncompromising. I thought he was going to rub his hands together when I had finished. “Excellent!” he exclaimed. “Very good, Thu. Your powers of recall are prodigious. Now can you not hazard even a guess as to what might be done?”

I sighed inwardly and made a feeble attempt. “Pharaoh could send to Babylon or Keftiu for gold with which to pay soldiers to overthrow the priests,” I offered. “Or use them to confiscate the temples’ wealth. He could have the priests murdered. He could enter into a deceit whereby the God appears to speak to the High Priest, expressing his divine displeasure and commanding that his son, Pharaoh, be re-established as the ultimate power in Egypt.” Kaha snorted derisively.

“You are indeed not your usual nimble-witted self,” he retorted. “Such things have already been considered and broached to the Mighty Bull with cautious tact. He reacted with horror and puzzlement. He will not risk offending Amun, not in the slightest degree. What if it is the God’s wish that his servants rule instead of his son? What if the end did not justify the means and Egypt’s final fate was worse than it is now? Besides, Thu, Ramses is afraid and tired. He is forty-five years old. He has fought three great battles to keep the eastern tribesmen and the sea peoples from pouring into Egypt and claiming its fertility as their own. Each time he has returned to Pi-Ramses as to a place of safety and peace, a nest where he can curl up after having done his duty and where he chooses to ignore the increasing corruption around him. If he fouls that nest by attempting to change the situation, and if he should fail, he will have no safe place left in which to retire if circumstances force him to go to war again. At least if he closes his eyes he can cling to the pretence that he still rules Egypt and of course the priests give him all the respect and reverence due to his position, even though their words are empty.”

“If I were Pharaoh I would risk everything for a chance to restore Ma’at!” I broke in hotly, and Kaha laughed.

“But you are not forty-five years old and scared and tired,” he pointed out.

There was a brief silence between us.

“What of the Hawk-in-the-Nest?” I wanted to know. “Has Pharaoh appointed his successor yet? Surely a strong son would do his best to persuade his father that his inheritance must be secure.” Before he answered, Kaha seemed to consider. He began to toy absently with a papyrus scraper on his desk, his gaze travelling the untidy, scroll-crammed recesses of his walls. Finally he looked at me.

“Ramses has not yet designated an heir,” he said. “The royal sons fall over each other in the harem. Ramses has many women, and several wives, all of them fertile. He is obsessed with the question of the succession but he cannot make a decision. Which of his many fully legitimate sons will make a good Horus of Gold? The priests have their own choices, of course, and pester him with their merits. Ramses knows that if he does nothing there will almost inevitably be bloodshed upon his death as his sons, with their supporters, battle for supremacy. Yet he does not dare to declare for any one of them in case he loses what tenuous power he has. He has tried to weed them out.”

“What do you mean?” I asked apprehensively. Kaha shrugged.

“Six of his legitimate princes died suddenly, very close together. The Master believes that Ramses had them murdered. It was a desperate attempt to thin the ranks of potential heirs to the Horus Throne. Ramses cried and beat his breast and they were buried with full pomp, but I do not think he was suffering overmuch.” I felt little. The major blow to my gullibility had been struck the day before.

“It was the action of a weak man,” I said slowly, “if it is true. Is there no prince left who can shoulder the responsibility of restoring Ma’at?”

“There is Prince Ramses,” Kaha replied. He had relinquished the scraper and was drumming his fingers almost soundlessly on the surface of the desk. “He is twenty-six, strong and handsome, but he is an enigma, a man who spends much of his time alone in the desert. No one is close to him, not even his father. His political sentiments are unknown.” I was all at once aware of Kaha’s intensifying attention fixed on me. His fingers whispered on, tap tap across the wood, and he was still relaxed, but he was waiting eagerly for my response. I stirred on my stool.

“It seems to me,” I said bitterly, “that there are no scruples left anywhere in this country but in the remotest villages. Therefore why not commit the final blasphemy? Ascertain the Prince’s position. If by some chance his heart bleeds for Egypt, then remove Pharaoh entirely and place his son on the Horus Throne. Of course, those who did so would then become the real power. If the Prince is as gutless as his father, find another legitimate princeling, a baby or child, one who has no conviction, and elevate him to Godhead.”

“Your intelligence is truly fearsome for your age, precocious one,” Kaha said softly. “But you know that you speak high treason. Anyone entertaining such nefarious schemes would be endangering their immortal ka as well as their body. Who in Egypt would take such a terrible risk? Is there no other way?”

“Seeing that this is merely an academic discussion,” I responded bleakly, “I must say that of course there must be other ways, but I cannot think of any. May we pursue another subject today, please Kaha? I am surfeited with the agonies of the King.” Immediately his hands were stilled. He straightened.

“Very well,” he said, and smiled sunnily. “Today you can practise taking the dictation for a very lengthy and horribly wordy letter from the Overseer of Royal Monuments to the Chief Mason at the quarries of Assuan. I, naturally, will play the part of the Overseer. You are his long-suffering scribe.”

The lesson ended on a cheerful, almost hilarious note, but when it was over and Kaha dismissed me I felt exhausted and curiously soiled. I would have been glad to submerge myself in the timeless indifference of the Nile. As it was, I did not return to my room. I wandered out into the garden and sat hunched beneath a thick bush, my chin on my knees, eyes on the play of brilliant light and grey shade just beyond my feet. I was still there two hours later when a flustered servant found me and I was led, unprotesting, to where Disenk waited in the hot dazzle of the courtyard, wringing her little hands and almost weeping in consternation. I did not care. Turning a deaf ear to her words of reproach I followed her into the house.

8

SO THE WEEKS WENT BY
, and although outwardly my routine did not change there was a subtle difference in the attitudes and conversation of the people who dealt directly with me. It was not that they were more familiar in their kindnesses or harsh in the disciplines to which I was subjected. I was not able to isolate just what the shift was, but I felt as though the household had taken me into its confidence, that I was at last a part of its organization. Perhaps it was simply that my own coloration had changed. I was no longer homesick.

The letters I dictated to my family became more stilted as time went on, although I tried to keep them warm and interesting. I prattled on about the details of my life while Ani industriously set down my words, but I said nothing important, for what could I tell them? That the King they idolized was a weak, impotent man? That he was probably a murderer also? That the holy men we were never allowed to speak of lightly were rapacious animals absorbed in their own selfish needs? I wanted to sit down with Pa-ari and share this wound. Pa-ari, however, was far away and judging by his own letters to me, was courting the dancer he had told me about before. We were separated by more than distance. Increas-ingly our lives were taking very different paths.