House of Illusions (9 page)

“I am so sorry, Takhuru,” I said. “I have been stubborn and callous. Forgive me for shouting at you and ignoring you for so long.” She pushed me away, waved her body servant out of the room, and turned back to me with a radiant smile.

“I too must apologize,” she put in. “I expect you to be perfect, Kamen, for so you are in my dreams, and that is not fair. Did I hurt you much when I kicked you?” Her eyes danced. “I hope so!”

“I was lame for days!” I protested, imitating her familiar pout, and she laughed, taking my hand and leading me to a chair. Gathering up her voluminous shift, she perched beside me on a stool, twining her fingers around mine and laying them on my knee.

“I have missed you, but not much,” she announced. “My friend Tjeti got betrothed and there was a big party with mountains of food and professional dancers and hordes of young men to keep me amused. I would have invited you but you were too mean.”

“I’m sorry,” I repeated. “Come with me to the boating party Akhebset’s parents are giving. I do not want to go without you.”

“Why not?” she retorted with a return to her usual asperity. “You might as well be betrothed to Akhebset, for you have more fun with him than with me.” It was true, I thought guiltily, but then it struck me that perhaps that was my fault. Perhaps I took Takhuru far too much for granted, and did not think of ways to enjoy ourselves that would please both of us the way I did with Akhebset.

“Well would you come with me to the beer house and drink and gamble?” I teased her. She looked up at me solemnly.

“Yes I would if it meant that I could be having fun with you. But Mother would never allow it.” I could see that she was serious, and the picture of dainty Takhuru, with her jewelled sandals and spotless linen, her aristocratic fastidiousness and her sensitive nose, sitting aghast amid the rough and tumble of the beer house and trying to enjoy herself for my sake, made me smile.

“One day I will take you,” I promised. “But after we are married, so that your father cannot demand your dowry returned and the contract torn up!”

There was a moment of silence during which she scrutinized me carefully. Then she placed her other hand over mine, imprisoning my fingers. “Something is wrong, isn’t it, Kamen?” she said softly. “You look ill. No, not ill perhaps, but hounded. Do you want to tell me about it?” Her perceptiveness startled me, for she often seemed entirely self-involved. I did indeed want to tell her about it, but I had feared her inattention. Now I kissed her fingers impulsively.

“Thank you, Takhuru,” I said. “Yes, please listen to me. I have already spoken of this to my father but he cannot help me.” I proceeded to relate the dreams and then my somehow unsatisfactory conversation with my father. She hardly moved except to draw in a quick breath or nod or frown until I had finished. Then she scrambled to her feet, and going to her cosmetic table, she began to toy with the pots and jars there, her expression closed. I waited.

Presently she said, “I think you are right when you surmise that the hand belongs to your real mother. What of the messenger, Kamen, the man who took you to your father’s house? He must have collected you from somewhere.”

“Yes, of course. But my father told me that the messenger simply arrived with me, said that my mother had died in childbirth and my father in Pharaoh’s wars, and handed me over.” She turned to me, leaning against the table, and folded her arms. “With no warning? No scroll to be signed?”

“Nothing. My father had begun to enquire in the city about a child to adopt and then the messenger just appeared.” Takhuru seemed about to speak, closed her mouth, then came to me and knelt by my chair.

“Forgive me, Kamen, but don’t you think he might be lying to you? The peasants might take in orphaned children without caring about their lineage, but your father is wealthy and a minor noble and would not accept a son from just anywhere, a baby that might be diseased or carrying the seeds of a later deformity. I find it hard to believe that your parents decided to adopt a boy, began to ask among their friends, and then lo, you appear as if by magic.”

I did not want to hear these things. Takhuru’s words were giving form to the vague suspicions that had been haunting me. I remembered the touch of my father’s hot palm against my skin. “Be content. Please,” he had said, and something in me had flinched. But I loved him. I trusted him. He had always set great store by honesty, and growing up I had been punished more severely for lying than for any other childish infraction. He would not lie to me—would he?

“He would not lie to me,” I repeated aloud. “What would be the point?”

“He would lie if there was something that must be hidden from you, something that might hurt you,” Takhuru re-joined. “But what could it be, presuming that what I said earlier was true and he would not have accepted a child without first making sure that it was suitable for his family and his future lineage?”

“Future lineage.” I bent to her, all at once chilled. “Takhuru, your father agreed to a betrothal with me in spite of the fact that your blood is fully noble and your lineage more pure than my father’s, in spite of the fact that my true lineage, my blood roots, are entirely unknown. Perhaps they are not unknown. Perhaps your father and my father share some knowledge that must be kept from me.” We stared at each other. Then I laughed. “This is ridiculous! We are building a pyramid of supposition out of a few grains of sand.” She reached behind her, pulled forward a cushion, and sank back onto it, crossing her legs under the floating shift. Her back straightened and I smiled inwardly.

“Nevertheless I shall ask my father about it,” she said firmly. “Don’t worry, Kamen. I shall not be obvious. Perhaps I will suggest that I am worried that I might not be marrying a man worthy of my station after all and my children’s blood might not run pure. I am an arrogant and snobbish girl, am I not? And I do not care that I am so. He will not think my question strange. If he will not answer, I shall search his office. He has many chests full of scrolls. They are mainly concerned with the running of the faience factories, accounts and workers and things like that. Very dry and boring. But I might find something about you. Our fathers signed the betrothal contract last year. Do you think it might say something?” I looked at her in genuine amazement.

“You have astonished me twice today!” I exclaimed. “I am betrothed to a devious little witch who wishes to frequent the beer houses!” She giggled and tossed her head, very pleased with herself. I slid off the chair, pulled her against me, and kissed her. This time there was no hesitation, no resistance. She kissed me back fervently.

“I have a suggestion for you,” she said when we had extricated ourselves from one another, flushed and panting. “Take a gift and go and consult the Seer. He does not read for common folk but your father has dealings with him and he will doubtless See for you. Ask him about the dreams, about your birth. If anyone in Egypt can help you, he can. Now you had better go. We are entertaining one of the Royal Butlers tonight and I am not nearly ready.” I made as if to kiss her again but she squirmed away and I did not persist. It came to me as I was crossing her hall, now redolent with the tantalizing aroma of good food and the murmur of servants’ voices in the dining room beyond, that my betrothed was a girl with a hitherto unsuspected taste for intrigue.

4

HER SUGGESTION
regarding the Seer had been a good one, and later that evening I dictated a request for an audience to Setau, who doubled as my scribe on the few occasions when I did not want Kaha, my father’s scribe, to know my business. Asking him to deliver it personally in the morning, I went through the now dusky garden and out to where our boats rocked. Untying the skiff from its mooring pole, I picked up the oars and pulled myself into the current.

Night had merged water with bank and bank with the growth along the path so that I seemed to be rowing both on and through an ocean of warmly penetrable darkness that encapsulated me. I encountered no one else, heard nothing but the creak of the oars and my own rapid breath. The dreamlike state in which I drifted was infinitely preferable to the nightmares of unconsciousness, and it was a long time before I turned the skiff for home.

No word came from the Seer for several days during which I continued to work and the dream continued to haunt me. I did not hear from Takhuru either. But my mood had changed from agitation to one of patience and optimism. I no longer felt helpless. My prayers to my totem continued also, and briefly I considered addressing my dead mother directly when I woke sweating and gasping, but I was afraid to leap that particular gulf. It was said that the dead could do no real harm unless the living invited them by calling their name or speaking to them, and I did not know if the owner of that hand meant me good or ill.

On the fifth day a terse message came for me from the Seer. “To Kamen, Officer of the King,” it read. “Present yourself at the door to my house one hour before sunset tomorrow.” The note was not signed. The papyrus on which it had been written was plain but expertly prepared, the surface smooth to the touch, and the scribe’s hand was exquisite.

I hid the scroll under the kilts in my chest and went through my jewels, wondering what an adequate gift for the Seeing might be. What did he receive from the princes and nobles for whom he gazed into the future? His chests must be full of expensive trinkets. I wanted to put something different into those hands that no one but his servants, Pharaoh and the High Priests of the temples had seen. Then my own hands touched an ebony box and I drew it out reverently, lifting the lid. Inside lay the dagger my father had given me when I entered the military school. The gift had been an expression of selfless love on his part considering he had not wanted me to go soldiering at all, and a lump came to my throat as I drew it out. It had no real function. It was a ceremonial piece, something for a collector, for he had purchased it from Libu tribesmen. The serrated edge of its blade curved wickedly away from a hilt of chased silver set with milky green moonstones. I valued it above everything else my father had given me, but I knew in my heart that nothing less would please the mysterious man who would tell me of my origins. Setting it before Wepwawet, I put my other jewellery away.

That night I did not dream, and I woke with a sense of anticipation. On my way to the General’s house, as I crossed our still-gloomy entrance hall, my father’s Overseer of Caravans bid me a terse good morning. He was squatting outside his employer’s office, a black face atop a bundle of coarse brown linen, and his passage over the tiles had been marked by a narrow smattering of fine sand. I returned his greeting, hearing a murmur of voices beyond the closed door to the office, my father’s and another, and surmised that either a caravan had just returned or was about to set out. I wondered if my father would be travelling with it, seeing that the rest of the family was still in the Fayum, and felt a sense of relief at the thought. I had become so preoccupied with the enigmas of my life that dealing with the people and events of the household had become a distraction.

So had my daily duties. I was bored with standing at the General’s door for hours and I no longer found his visitors interesting. I preferred the night watches, for then I could patrol his halls in peace, but I had recently fulfilled my night assignment and had to take my turn in daylight. That day, as I shifted from one foot to the other and the sword at my waist felt heavier than ever before, I wondered if the dream would have invaded me if I had been able to sleep during the sunlit hours.

But the time passed and at last I was able to hurry through my garden in search of a bath and a small meal before setting out for the Seer’s house. As I was running up the stairs, the door to my father’s office opened and he called me.

“Kamen, wait a moment.” I turned. He was looking up at me, clad only in a thigh-length kilt and sleeveless shirt, his big feet bare, his sparse hair awry. “I have a caravan going into Nubia,” he said. “I think I’ll go with it as far as Thebes. I want to pray in the Amun temple and I can stop at the Fayum and see your mother and sisters on the way back. I’ll be gone for a couple of weeks, perhaps longer. Will you be all right?”

“Yes, of course,” I assured him quickly. “You know I will. I have Setau, and I presume Pa-Bast will stay here. Why do you ask?” He blew out his cheeks.

“Because I’ve been worried about you, but I must say you’re looking better. Are you still dreaming?” He asked the last question diffidently and I knew he did not want an affirmative answer. A flash of resentment went through me.

“No,” I half-lied, for I had not dreamed the night before. He smiled in relief.

“Good! Work hard, exercise regularly, eat sparingly, and the night demons will fly away. I leave at dawn and will be back sometime next month. I’ll probably bring the women with me.”

“Fine. Then may the soles of your feet be firm, Father.” He held up a hand in acknowledgement of the blessing and padded back into his office and I continued on to my own room. I wondered, as I summoned Setau and stripped for the bath house, why my father should want to go all the way to Thebes to pray, for several Amun shrines were scattered about Pi-Ramses, but I supposed that it gave him a good excuse to visit his merchant friends there and spend some time in the Fayum. It was also true that the shrines were small and very public, little more than stone niches containing the God’s image and an altar for incense and offerings, and no priests attended them to hear petitions. One prayed surrounded by busy crowds and noise. By the time I was standing on the bathing slab and Setau was handing me fresh natron, I had forgotten my idle speculation. It was enough that I would have the house to myself for many days.