The Egyptian Royals Collection (20 page)

Chapter Twelve

seventh of Thoth

WE STOOD ON
the top of a barren hill overlooking the Nile as it coursed through Memphis. A warm wind tore at our sheaths, snapping our short cloaks in the air.

“The temple will be two stories high and two hills across.” Maya pointed across the sunstruck dunes. Their crests vaulted one after another, cones of white sand shimmering in the heat.

“Where will the materials come from?” Nefertiti asked.

“The men will use the rocks from the Eastern Quarry.”

Amunhotep was impatient. “How long will it take?”

The wind picked up, drowning out the builder’s words. Panahesi and my father moved closer.

“Six seasons, if the men can work daily.”

Amunhotep’s face darkened. “In six seasons, I could be assassinated!” he shouted. Since he had executed the High Priest of Amun, this was his fear. Everywhere he went, hired guards from Nubia accompanied him. They stood outside his door while he slept and hovered like ravens behind his chair while he ate. They were here now, clustered at the bottom of the hill, their spears ready to dispense with any enemy of the king. In the halls of the palace, Nefertiti had whispered to me that Amunhotep was afraid that the people didn’t love him. “Why?” I’d asked her, and her look plainly answered. It was because of what had happened to the High Priest of Amun. Now Amunhotep could feel the people’s anger in the streets, and none of his viziers were courageous enough to tell him this was true. But our father had warned Nefertiti. “How can you know?” she’d railed in my chamber, and he had produced a drawing found in the marketplace; it had the body of a serpent and the head of the king swallowing up a statue of the great god Amun.

Now Amunhotep paced on the top of the hill and his voice brooked no argument. “Six seasons is not acceptable!” he raged.

“What would you have me do, Your Majesty? There are only so many workers skilled enough to build a temple—”

Amunhotep set his jaw. “Then we shall use the army.”

Nefertiti stepped forward, and her voice grew excited. “If soldiers helped build the temple, how soon could it be done?”

Maya frowned. “How many soldiers do we speak of, Your Highness?”

“Three thousand,” Amunhotep replied immediately, not thinking about the war he had promised Horemheb or the borders of Egypt that would have to be defended.

“Three thousand?” Maya tried to hide his surprise. “It might take …” He paused a moment to calculate. “With so many men, it might only take three seasons.”

Amunhotep nodded decisively. “Then every soldier who has come to Memphis will be employed tonight.”

“What of Egypt’s borders?” my father asked firmly. “They will need to be defended. The palace will still need to be guarded. Take a thousand,” he said, though I knew the suggestion pained him. He passed a warning glance to my sister, who nodded.

“Yes. One thousand. We don’t want Egypt’s borders to go defenseless.”

Amunhotep submitted, then looked to Maya. “But you will inform the men tonight.”

“And Horemheb?” my father warned. “He will not be pleased.”

“Then let him not be pleased!” Amunhotep snapped.

My father shook his head. “He could turn the army against you.”

Panahesi was immediately at Amunhotep’s side. “Pay the army more than they could ever take in booty from the Hittites,” he suggested. “Placate them. There is more than enough money from the taxation.”

“Good.
Good
.” Amunhotep grinned. “The men will not leave me after what I’ll pay.”

“And the general?” my father asked again.

Amunhotep narrowed his eyes. “What general?”

The next day, the Audience Chamber was crowded with petitioners waiting to see Pharaoh. The building of the greatest temple ever raised had already begun and messengers arrived bearing scrolls from the construction site. While Kiya waddled through the palace halls, heaving herself from chair to chair like a heifer—as Nefertiti described it—servants came and went with details and measurements from the builder Maya. Then the doors to the Audience Chamber burst open and Amunhotep tensed. The guards closed around him and Horemheb laughed.

“I fought against the Nubians when I was nothing more than a boy,” he sneered. “You think fifteen guards can stop me?” He advanced on the throne. “You
swore
to me that there would be war. I gave you the temples of Amun!”

Amunhotep smiled. “And I am very grateful.”

If I were king, I wouldn’t taunt this general
, I thought.

At the base of the dais, Horemheb stiffened. “How long do you plan on using the soldiers of Egypt as workers?”

“Three seasons,” Nefertiti replied from her throne.

Horemheb’s gaze slid from Amunhotep to my sister. I shuddered, but she didn’t shrink from his glare.

“Egypt must have its borders fully defended. That means every soldier,” Horemheb cautioned. “The Hittites—”

“I don’t care about Hittites!” Amunhotep walked down the dais to stand in front of Horemheb, knowing that in a room full of guards he was safe.

Horemheb inhaled, the leather of his pectoral straining against his chest. “You have lied to me.”

“I gave your soldiers better, less-dangerous jobs.”

“To build a temple to Aten? You defile Amun!”

“No.” Amunhotep smiled dangerously.
“You
defiled Amun.”

Horemheb’s rage brought out the veins in his arms and neck. “We will be attacked,” he warned. “The Hittites will come for Egypt, and when your men are better builders than soldiers you will be sorry.”

Amunhotep moved closer to Horemheb so that only I, sitting on the lowest tier of the dais, could hear what passed between them. “The men follow you the way they followed my brother. I don’t know why. But you will follow Aten. You will serve him, you will serve Pharaoh, or you will be stripped of your position and find yourself without a friend in Egypt. Horemheb the Friendless, they will call you. And anyone caught associating with you will be killed.” He straightened. “Do you understand?”

Horemheb said nothing.

“Do you understand?” Amunhotep shouted, and his voice rang in my ears.

Horemheb clenched his jaw. “I understand you well,
Your Majesty
.”

“Then go.”

We watched the general leave the chamber, and I thought,
It is a very foolish thing he’s done today
.

Amunhotep surveyed the chaotic scene in the Audience Chamber and declared, “I’m finished!” He looked sharply at the group of viziers clustered at the bottom of the dais. “Where is Panahesi?” he demanded.

“At the site of the new temple,” my father said, hiding his pleasure.

“Good.” Amunhotep turned to my sister and smiled indulgently. “Come. Let’s walk in the gardens. Your father can deal with all of this.” He waved a bangled arm to indicate the long line of petitioners outside the chamber.

Nefertiti looked at me, and it went without saying that I would be going, too.

We walked through the courtyard to the wide sycamore trees whose figs were ready to be harvested. “Did you know that Mutny can pick out any herb in the garden and name it?” Nefertiti asked.

Amunhotep regarded me suspiciously. “Are you a healer?”

“I learned a bit in Akhmim, Your Majesty.”

Nefertiti laughed. “More than a bit. She’s a little physician. Remember the boat?” Amunhotep stiffened, and I wondered why Nefertiti was reminding him about such a thing. “When I have a child, she will be one of my healers,” Nefertiti said, and there was something in her voice that made the Pharaoh and me both turn.

“Are you with child?” Amunhotep whispered.

Nefertiti’s smile widened. “The first son of Egypt.”

I gasped, covering my mouth, and Amunhotep let out a great shout and hugged Nefertiti to his chest. “A
family
, and no child shall ever be adored as much as ours,” he swore. He put his hand gently on my sister’s belly. I thought with incredulity that at seventeen, Nefertiti would be a mother to a Pharaoh of Egypt.

She beamed at me. “Well?”

I didn’t know what to say. “The gods have blessed you,” I gushed, but I also felt fear. She would have a family now, a husband and children to pay attention to. “Have you told Father?” I asked.

“No.” She was still smiling. “But I want my child blessed in Aten’s temple,” she said eagerly, and I stared at her in shock.

Amunhotep’s face grew serious. “Then the temple must be finished within nine months,” he said. “They must finish by Pachons.”

Inside the palace, there had already been whispers among the servants. There had been no blood found on Nefertiti’s sheets and no stains on her sheaths. Of course, I didn’t know. I was a courtyard away from her now, but Ipu wasn’t surprised.

“You knew and you didn’t even tell me?” I cried. Ipu lifted my robe over my head and put on another one for the night’s celebration.

“I didn’t know you wanted me to pass on gossip, my lady.”

“Of course I do!”

Ipu smiled so widely her dimples showed. “Then all my lady had to do was ask.”

Preparation for a celebration in the Great Hall officially began after Nefertiti told Amunhotep that she was carrying his child, but the dozens of tables and flickering oil lamps looked to have been prearranged. An army of servants must have decorated all afternoon, and every cook in Memphis must have started preparing dishes the same hour the news arrived in the palace. The dais, with its three steps leading to the Horus thrones, was bestrewn with flowers. On each step, servants had placed two chairs, high backed and well cushioned, for the highest members of the royal court. I would be sitting in one of those chairs, as would my mother and father, High Priest Panahesi, and, if she came, Princess Kiya. The last chair would be reserved for a chosen person of honor.

Once it came to eating, we would all ascend to the royal table where, most nights, the royal couple ate alone at the top of the glittering dais. But this night we would join them. This night was a celebration of our family. The royal family of Egypt.

Trumpeters announced our entrance to the room and we swept through the hall, making sure all the viziers could see how many golden bangles I was wearing and how many rings my father had donned. Kiya gave the excuse of pregnancy, but Panahesi walked with us in procession to the dais, and from beneath the Horus thrones my mother couldn’t stop beaming.