Khu: A Tale of Ancient Egypt (18 page)

“Stay as close to Ankhtifi as you possibly can,” Sudi told one of his partners after they had found each other. They had abandoned their fishing pretense days before, and had taken on the guise of simple pilgrims in order to mingle more freely through the crowd.

“They are planning a revolt,” the other man said
, leaning in closer so that no one would overhear them. “Everywhere people are whispering of it. Have you not seen Ankhtifi’s men? Look for yourself.” He angled his chin toward a group of men watching the crowd with somber expressions. “They are not pilgrims.”

“Warrior
s,” Sudi whispered with a growing unease. He had noticed them also.

“And over there,”
the other man indicated with his head. “And there… and more by the temple.” Everywhere he looked, Sudi saw the men who had accompanied Ankhtifi to Abdju on his fleet. They were warriors disguised as pilgrims; but nothing could mask the hardness of their features, and proud bearing of their postures, that belied a false humility. Sudi also noticed the daggers strapped to the belts of their kilts, even though the weapons had been concealed under the linen cloth.

“But where is King Khety?” Sudi asked.

“Here already. He met with the priests yesterday, but they do not wish to support him. If they cannot remain neutral, they prefer to follow King Mentuhotep.”

“Ah,” Sudi replied with a slow nod as he began to realize how their enemies would stage the revolt.
“I imagine King Khety was not pleased.”

“
Not at all,” the man replied as he swiped at a fly. It was warm outside, and the throng of people and food attracted insects.

“I would not wish to be in their position right now,” Sudi said of the priests. “I am certain that Khety will not stand for their refusal.
”

“
True,” his partner agreed, “he will take the town by force and manipulate the people to help him push south into Thebes. That is why Ankhtifi is here.”

Both men brooded silently for a while as they stood watching
some of the people eating and drinking on the streets by the Temple of Osiris. Tables were laden with free bread and heqet, provided by the officials governing the province in honor of the annual feast. Men, women and children were eagerly participating in the festivities following the long religious ceremonies. Many were laughing happily as the musicians began playing their instruments, and acrobats enlivened the feast with their tricks. Others were passing around jugs of the ceremonial heqet, consuming the bread, or enjoying some of the food they had gotten from the venders in the open market.

Sudi was
studying the throngs of people, trying to locate their third partner whom he had not seen in a few days. He scanned the crowd with his eyes, wondering where the man named Pili had gone.

“Have you seen Pili?” he finally asked.

“Not for three days,” his partner answered. He turned to help himself to a piece of the flat bread when they neared one of the tables set under the shade of the colonnaded gallery, next to the vast gardens by the Temple of Osiris.

Sudi glanced at the food but did not touch it. He
was too preoccupied to eat anything.

“
He was going to try to talk to one of the officials and get information for us,” his partner said.

“But three days…” Sudi
said, with a hint of fear. “Three days is a long time.”

“It is. A lot can happen in three days.
Good luck trying to find him in this crowd. It could take longer than that.”

“Hmm…” Sudi
mumbled uneasily, forming his mouth into a hard line. A current of apprehension surged through his blood as his mind turned to Ankhtifi.

If one of them should be caught by Ankhtifi’s men
… Sudi let the thought trail off unfinished. He had heard stories about Ankhtifi. The chieftain’s reputation preceded him like the stench of death from a rotting carcass. He did not know how much of it was true and how much was simply rumor inflated over time. But he did not want to find out. The chieftain looked intimidating.

“
Go back to Thebes,” Sudi finally said. “Leave tonight and warn King Mentuhotep.” He paused a moment to think as his eyes roamed to a group of children who were chasing each other through the gardens which had been readied for the annual feast. They were squealing delightedly without a care in the world, tagging each other and then running away. “Tell the king that there will be bloodshed if he does not hurry.”

Sudi
turned his thoughts back to Ankhtifi as his partner disappeared into the crowd. The people were eager to lose themselves in the revelry of the festivities. The strongly brewed ceremonial heqet was already flowing freely throughout the town, where musicians continued to play their instruments, by the people who sang and danced through the streets, and the lush gardens and parks surrounding the Temple of Osiris.

Some
of the people had come a long way, abandoning their impoverished settlements, whose small shrines and temples had fallen into ruin after robbers had plundered their towns. Without the means to harness the Nile through dykes and canals, their fields had produced few crops, and now lay fallow under an unforgiving sun that had grown indifferent to their plight.

And so they made their way
south to Abdju for the annual celebration, which promised free bread and drink during the festivities that would last for about six days, in honor of Osiris to whom they prayed for a new life of prosperity. They came bedraggled and beaten, with nothing but the flame of hope enkindled within their souls, as they sought work in more prosperous settlements. They came hungering to fill their stomachs, aching from emptiness. And they came in search of a god-king who would protect and provide for them as their lord and master, giving them light and salvation in a time of darkness and uncertainty.

R
umors spread from mouths to ears of a revolution that would transform their lives and their beloved Egypt—rumors skillfully planted by Ankhtifi and his men. And as those rumors swept throughout the town, which grew ever more rowdy with each passing hour of the setting sun’s voyage through the cloud-speckled sky, a mob began to form.

The mob took on a life of its own under the
control of King Khety who manipulated the crowd like a deft puppeteer. He had been biding his time over the last few days, staying away from the people, as he waited patiently in the hidden rooms of the lavish residence of an official who had sworn an oath in his support. He had purposely kept from public sight when the festivities commenced, and especially during the elaborate religious ceremonies which cast a reverential haze over the people. But his own men and those of Ankhtifi had been weaving through the crowd and garnering support from the masses, telling them that King Khety would be coming to save them from their abject poverty and restore Egypt to its former glory. All they had to do was pledge their allegiance to him.

Those same conniving
men who had been filling the peoples’ ears with promises of plenty, if they supported King Khety’s expanded rule, had also been slandering King Mentuhotep with vicious, deceitful rumors meant to turn the people against the Theban king.

“He cares for no one but his own kingdom,”
one scowled with a frown.

“He grows fat while the rest of Egypt is starving,” another
claimed with a loud snort.

“He eats from
alabaster plates, and sleeps on a bed of gold,” another lied, nodding for emphasis.

And eyebrows were raised in
surprise, and furrowed in anger, from the perceived injustice of it all, as the liars sought to divide and conquer by instilling class envy and spreading malicious lies.

Bu
t not everyone believed the rumors. Those pilgrims who had come from settlements closer to Thebes knew that the king of Upper Egypt was a good and generous ruler, and that he had protected them from the lawlessness plaguing the north.

“We have had no droughts,” one
spoke up in Mentuhotep’s defense. “Our fields have yielded much grain and plentiful harvests,” the man touched an amulet hanging from his neck to avert the evil eye.

“Our villages have been safer than those closer to King Khety,” another said. “Why hasn’t King Khety
done a better job protecting his kingdom the way King Mentuhotep has done with his?” he shook his head.

“Yes,” another piped in. “If the state of King Khety’s lands are any indication of what we are to expect under his rule of all of Egypt, I will want none of it,” the man set his jaw and crossed his arms over his chest before continuing. “That
sort of change will lead to the destruction of all of Egypt. What hope will we have then?”

“
King Mentuhotep is a good and just ruler,” another stated proudly, with a high chin. “Son of the Great Osiris and Amun.”

“Then why is he not here, honoring Osiris during these holy days?” Khety’s man
countered, as he continued trying to turn the people against Mentuhotep.

“But neither is King Khety here,” responded the man.

“Oh, but he is. He is here and he is the true son of Osiris. You shall see him when he chooses to show himself.”

And on it went.

The seeds of doubt had been sown among the people, whose hunger for change made a fertile breeding ground.

By now all the p
eople returned to the main part of town after laying their god to rest in his ancient tomb, and they succumbed to the festive atmosphere by the temple. Musicians played their lutes, cymbals, sistrums, and
sheneb
trumpets, while people clapped and danced around the acrobats performing on the streets. It was a loud and joyful ruckus, swirling with an energy that quickly spread throughout the town.

***

King Khety had waited for the heqet to lull the crowd with its intoxicating effects so that their inhibitions would be lowered, their spirits raised, and their wills more pliant and amenable to the power of suggestion. He had gone to wait with a group of his advisors and several guards in the colonnaded courtyard of the Temple of Osiris after the crowds had followed the priests on their procession to the god’s final resting place.

When
Khety finally emerged from the temple’s pylon, it was like one of the gods coming forth in the flesh, resplendent in all his dazzling regalia including a golden scepter, a ceremonial wig, the
Deshret
Red Crown of Lower Egypt, and the long, narrow, false beard of Osiris that he wore on special feasts. He made a magnificent sight as he dangled glittering promises before the pilgrims, who had fallen to their knees before him. They were transfixed by his
kohl
-lined gray eyes, gleaming with a fierce and glacial beauty from his handsome, chiseled face. Even the austere quality of his features that he had acquired over the years, imbued his face and bearing with a godlike dignity, not unlike the great sphinx inspiring reverence as it stared out over the desert.

A hush fell over the inebriated crowd as they drank his words like one parched from the desert heat.
He spoke of sacrifice, and blood, and the intense labor required to give birth to a new nation—a new and unified nation of Egypt.

“And you will prosper once again,” his voice rang out after th
e musicians had stopped playing so all could listen. “The gods will resurrect the dead and imbue new life throughout the land.”

There was much murmuring of voices in assent.
Even the children running about through the crowd, paused from their rambunctious activities to stare at the king who captivated the people’s attention. Khety was radiant, regal and refined; all masculine grace and magnetism.

“This division must end for a new life to begin,” he continued.

The king of Lower Egypt paced before the temple that rose above the gardens like a beacon. Each of his measured steps accompanied his words like the beating of a drum. His voice resonated deep and melodious above the susurrations of the crowd. The sun had just set, and the torches lining the Avenue of Sphinxes had all been lit. Their smoke rose to the heavens, toward the sky whose clouds had been ignited by the last rays of the sun, into tongues of fire which bled a passionate haze over the people, who were feeling the rapturous effects of their revelry.

“YES,” the
people shouted back, falling under his spell. They were pushing to get closer to the god-king who had bewitched them.

None of
the people even remembered Egypt as it used to be before the breach which had left it crippled and vulnerable to corruption. The rise of the provincial powers in Lower, Middle and Upper Egypt had weakened the central authority, so that the Old Kingdom had greatly declined during the sixth dynasty under King Pepi II. By the end of Pepi II’s long reign at that time, civil wars tore apart the last remnants of the unified kingdom, and the fractured lands were plagued by severe drought, famine and conflict.

But the people did not recall these details.
All they knew were the stories they heard which had been passed down from their parents and their parents’ parents: tales of prosperity and plenty under a succession of god-kings who had reigned from the Old Kingdom’s throne in the great city of Inebou-Hedjou, north of Nen-nesu, at the base of the Nile Delta, where the creator god Ptah was revered as patron of craftsmen and giver of life to all things in the world springing into existence through the power of his word.