The Forgotten: Aten's Last Queen (25 page)

I ran to her and helped her to her feet. It felt as if my feet moved of their own accord, and I quickly put reassuring hands over her and helped her stand.

When Pharaoh saw me, his look seemed to soften a little. “I tried to keep it from you, Kiya, because there was nothing you could have done.”

Her body shook angrily away from my fingers as she spoke, “My daughter has been left with nothing. Our lands are gone, her grandfather is dead, and her father ignores her.” Tadukhipa started to make her way over to Pharaoh, but the guards had caught up by this time and blocked her.

“Kiya, you make too much of a fuss. You and your daughter have everything here. Aten will be your protector if you just let Him into your heart.” Pharaoh was always quick with bringing things back to Aten as if people should leave him alone and ask Aten for everything. Pharaoh was not only the ruler of the lands but also head priest over the city. He wanted to bring all citizens to his understanding, but disease, anger, and ever-decreasing food supplies rarely brought about worship and thanks to their king. Especially not to their gods.

“You could have been great, but you forgot us… your citizens. Who cares about Aten if you forget about how you treat the living!” she yelled back at him. She shoved the guard aside, but he quickly took out his sword and hit her on the shoulder with the hilt. She crumpled back to the ground. Sword poised, the guard stood over her. She looked up at him, her face contorted in a seething hatred.

She spat at Pharaoh, “My god is not Aten. My god is Amun! He is waiting for his followers to return. Aten has brought me nothing! You have given my family nothing! I refuse your God and your rule.”

Pharaoh had lost the emotion in his eyes. He turned toward his guard standing over Tadukhipa. “She threatens Pharaoh. Her father threatened Pharaoh. See to her execution. Then throw her body into the river.”

“No!” The cry came from my lips. “Pharaoh, please, have mercy on her. She speaks out of despair. Her grief is great.”

Pharaoh looked at me as if I were a stranger. “Take her back to her room and keep her locked inside. She does not need to interfere with the business of the king.”

Strong hands grabbed my arms. I struggled, but only caused myself to cramp up from the strain.

“Pharaoh, no! Don’t do this!” I cried after him. He simply walked away into the Great Hall.

Another guard had picked up Tadukhipa and held her by her left side, the first guard grabbing her right. She did not lash out or try to resist. As they passed by, Tadukhipa whispered her daughter’s name to me. Once she had passed, though, she started to cry out praises to Amun. Her voice was so loud that it seemed as if all of Akhenaten could hear her. The air was crisp and silent except for her voice.

And then I saw my last of her. She was taken out and killed on a blade of bronze. I could tell when it happened as her voice was swiftly lost, echoing its last before diving into the Duat after its drowned owner.

The guard holding onto me picked me up and carried me to my room. By now, my stomach was cramping considerably, and I had difficulty straightening up. The guard did not care. He dropped me on my couch, shut me in my room, and left me under watchful eyes for the rest of the night.

This was not supposed to happen. I should have been on my way to the workmen’s village by now. Instead, I was shut in to suffer a fate my mother had only hinted at. I prayed for her forgiveness. I had failed. I hoped that my siblings would make it out.

I stayed up most of the night with worry. I kept listening for the sounds of Pharaoh’s heavy footsteps, the sounds of charging feet, the sounds of fighting and death. But Pharaoh never came up to his room.

Nothing happened.

I fell asleep as morning’s colors began to peck at the evening sky. I slept through the day. My body and my ka were tired. I ate little and didn’t move from my couch. By the next night, the guards from my doorway had departed.

I tentatively stepped back into the world. There were lamps lit, but otherwise all was quiet. I walked across the hall and down the stairs. It felt like a ghost town around me.

I decided to walk to the throne room. So long ago I had heard the voice of Tadukhipa’s father begging for help from Pharaoh. It’s as if his voice was an echo inside the hallway while his daughter’s reverberated outside. Instead of the sound of my footsteps, I could hear his laugh after Pharaoh’s threat. I felt like I was walking through time itself. The further my steps took me, the farther I got from my loved ones. It was as if they could not fit in the corridor, and each step made me leave someone behind as time narrowed in on my life. Meketaten, Grandmother Tiya, little Neferneferuaten, how many others would there be? These walls had seen too much death.

Voices were reaching out in the lamplight. There was active conversation in the throne room. When I got to the doors, I nodded at the doorkeepers who opened the golden doorway before me. I squinted at the cascading brightness that escaped through the widening maw.

Inside were Pharaoh’s usual counsel, Ay, Smenkhkare, Horemheb, Mahu, May, Nakht (high vizier of Akhenaten), Meryre (high priest of Aten), Ahmose (royal scribe), and various other generals of Horemheb’s choosing. I did not know all their names. I began to make my way over to Pharaoh’s left. Smenkhkare stood at his right, and he watched me as a vulture watches its lunch lying helpless far below the bird’s outspread wings.

Pharaoh’s face was alert. His expression left nothing from the night before. He looked determined. As I took a place beside him, his eyes showed surprise. “She emerges from her slumber. Your ka went on a long journey then?”

“Not one that I can remember,” I replied.

“You have missed much, young one.” Ay was the one who next spoke.

“What Ay means is that there was an insurrection, which we have dispersed. You are lucky that I kept you in your room. The future of the kingdom should not be at risk,” Pharaoh added, putting a hand to my belly. I almost jumped at his touch. He never touched me. We barely said two words to each other. This was the most pleasant conversation we had had, and it was shared among several other people.

“Then I thank you for your protection.” I fought with the words in order to get them past my lips, confused and scared as I was. “How, if I may, did you find out about this insurrection?”

“Ay’s resourceful spies weeded out whispers of a plot. He helped to squash this before it even began,” Pharaoh replied with confidence in his voice.

Though a chill ran down my back, I tried to keep my voice steady. “Praise Aten for His protection as well. Surely He guided Ay’s heart through this turmoil.”

Pharaoh smiled and looked around the room. He placed his hand back on his left thigh, sitting straight in up his golden throne. “You see, she understands why I do the things I do! Why the people have such problems is beyond me.”

“Have you caught the people who started it?” I asked, faces whirling in my heart.

“They have scattered in the wind.” Horemheb relayed. “Thankfully, we kept the royal palace safe. There were riots all day. I am surprised they did not wake you.”

I too was surprised at this revelation. I had heard nothing from the past day. I had shut myself up. It was my own fault. I neglected everyone around me because of my own fears. The thought saddened me. I had unknowingly covered my ears to their cries.

“What about my sisters? Are they all right?”

Pharaoh clicked his tongue at me. “Why would they be in trouble? They were in their rooms all night.”

I felt my cheeks suddenly swell with heat.

Smenkhkare captured everyone’s attention then, “I still suggest curfews for the citizens. Anyone caught outside means immediate death.”

Meryre’s low voice spoke up, “My lord, I fear this will draw people away from the temples. I try to keep my door open at any time when our people feel the need to pray and make offerings. Curfews could prove dangerous for the health of the temple.”

Pharaoh replied, “That is not our priority right now. First the people must fear their God. Then their kas will be cleansed enough for entering the temple. They forget their places.”

“Curfews would require many men to enforce,” Horemheb interjected. “It is a threat to which people’s mouths will water to break. If you put a piece of honey bread in front of a starving man and then tell him not to think about it, he will think about nothing else but it. Then he will plot ways to get it.”

“That is why I like you, General,” Pharaoh replied in turn. “You always have such poetic observations. In kind, I say that our people starve for the light of God. Yet they refuse to eat the bread. They are reaching for the fruit in the trees instead. No, I want a curfew so that no one can meet and plot against me at night. The only exception will be the festivals.”

Ahmose was the next to speak. “I will make it understood throughout the city. No one will be able to say they did not know.”

“I will prepare my men.” Mahu said. I had not taken a good look at him before. When I did finally notice him, I almost laughed. I thought of what Amyntas had said about sitting around getting fat in his house, and it seemed as if what he had predicted came true. His belly was so large that his belt was hidden by overflowing flesh.

“May I ask, Mahu, how the search for the attackers in the workmen’s village goes? I have not heard of any progress on it,” I piped in.

Mahu looked at me with dead eyes. It was as if he had never seen me before. Ay was the one that answered. “That is an entirely different matter, my queen. Perhaps we can discuss this at a later date?”

I merely nodded back. Strange to have Ay comment on a police matter. I wondered how deep into the sand his reach went.

“Look at her!” Pharaoh said, pleased. “She is so concerned for the workmen. She has a taste for fine jewelry, you know!”

The men laughed at me. I should not have been surprised, but the comment stung just the same. Pharaoh hardly spoke to me, never visited with me to ask how I was, and now made jokes out of my concerns. I had no idea what had changed Pharaoh so. It was as if the person in my memory from childhood was a completely different man. Could his ka have switched places with someone else’s? I understood his intention though. With his quip, he reminded me who was in charge.

I kept my expression bland. I did not want to show excessive emotion. My mother never would have done so. I too had to start acting like someone who deserved respect.

“Thank you, Ay, for your concern. I will retire then and look forward to our future conversation.” I departed their company. Other people occupied my mind. I had to find Wahankh. I had to make sure he was safe.

Unfortunately, my search turned up nothing. I asked the doorkeepers and other guards if they had seen him, but they had not. He had been missing since I had sent him out. I knew this could not be good.

I searched and questioned for most of the night and into morning. With my feet sore and back aching, I decided to retire. I did not have the stamina of days past, and now I carried the weight of two.

I turned into the hallway leading down to my apartment, but after only a few steps, I stopped. On my right side was the door to Tadukhipa’s and Marahkaten’s room.

A flurry of thoughts tumbled through me at once. Had she heard? She must have. Had she too been executed due to her blood? Would a daughter of Tadukhipa’s be allowed to live? Had she been sent away as my mother had with nothing but the clothes on her back?

I knocked.

No answer.

Putting my ear onto the painted wooden door, I could hear the cat making high-pitched noises. I opened the door and called Marahkaten’s name.

No answer.

There was movement in another room. The cat emerged from hiding and looked up at me with large-eyed curiosity. She was black with a white patch on her chin. The cat mewed at me. Gingerly, I picked her up and touched her silken fur.

“Brave One usually stays away from visitors.”

I looked up to see Marahkaten. Her eyes were wild, and her hair stuck out at strange angles. Dark circles and lines marred her features.

I set the cat down. “Marahkaten, I am so sorry. I came to make sure you were all right.”

Marahkaten did not meet my gaze. She started to walk around the room in strange patterns thoughtlessly. “I have never known him. I’ve seen him at a distance, but he has never been a part of my life. You and I have had more conversations. He has only ever been interested in your mother’s children. And he kicked your mother out!”

I wasn’t sure where her conversation had started. I continued with mine, “Your mother lamented for you. She wanted you to have something more for your future.”

“More?” Marahkaten’s voice was ripe with disgust. “All I ever wanted was a family, a father. I never wanted property or gold or titles. Mother wanted a vineyard and jewels, but I never cared for any of it! Mother wanted
things
, and she got all she asked for. She never had enough. Her father never had enough.”

“Do you know what’s going to happen to you?”

“I assume I will disappear into the night, as Mother.”

“I -- ” I remembered Tadukhipa’s eyes as she was hauled away, as she looked at me, as the shape of her daughter’s name rolled off her tongue for the last time. Marahkaten never had a chance at life, and now she had no place in her home. “I might know someone who can help you.”

Marahkaten’s eyes lost some of their intensity. Something lit up within her.

I continued, “Do you have something for me to write with?” Marahkaten walked quickly to gather up her school writing kit. I sat down at a desk and began to form a message, “I have a friend in the workmen’s village. He might be able to find a place for you to stay. That way, when you leave this place, you will have a chance at another life.”

“An, I --”

“There are no guarantees with this, but it is the only thing I can give you. I feel as if I have taken so much from your life.”

I finished writing out an explanation of her situation. Hopefully, I could give her something I had only dreamed of. If she was lucky enough to meet someone who made her heart sing…