Return to Thebes (26 page)

Aye

He has come to me, stayed for ten minutes and, raging, gone. I am left to put the world together again one last time—if it can be done.

The day passed in parades and ceremonies. At last, as the Nile turned bronze and purple light began to fall upon the Western Peak, Pharaoh and Ankhesenamon returned to Malkata. Tey, Sitamon, Horemheb and I dined with them—early, for it had been a wearing day. Then they retired, he to their regular bedchamber, she to a special one arranged for her down the corridor some way from his. The birth of the Crown Prince being so near, they do not for the present sleep together, because she is having some difficulty with this pregnancy and is up much, and restless, in the night: it is better she be attended by nurses and by Tey, who watches over her with loving care. And he of course has his harim if he wishes to go there; though, being deeply in love with the Chief Wife, I believe he very rarely does.

On this night, for the first time in many nights, he drank a little more wine than he usually does. It was, he said, the exhaustions of the day which caused the indulgence; and the importance of tomorrow, which he wanted us to be sure to understand.

“I wish to sleep soundly tonight, Uncle,” he said to me, “because tomorrow we begin my mortuary temple and announce the new laws for religion, with which you must assist me. Much will be done for the Two Lands tomorrow, much will change. I wish to be fresh and ready for this. I am very tired right now.”

“I, too, Son of the Sun,” I admitted; adding automatically, “But I assume the changes will not be too great, as I do not believe the Two Lands to be quite ready yet for anything sensational.”

“Not ready ‘yet,’ and not ready ever, Son of the Sun,” Horemheb said gravely. “The kingdom has had enough of violent changes. So we hope you do not plan any such.”

“Only what will be best for Kemet, Cousin,” Tutankhamon said, a certain iciness entering his voice. “You may be assured of that.”

“I hope so, Majesty,” Horemheb said, standing his ground. “Good kingship requires no less.”

“I am a good King!” Tut exclaimed, blazing up with a temper that was suddenly, chillingly, reminiscent of his older brother. “You need not instruct me in my duties as King, Cousin!”

“Such was not my intention, Majesty,” Horemheb said, still calmly, though I could sense his growing anger beneath the enforced blandness. “It was a reminder only.”

“I do not need reminders!” Tut snapped. “Give me more wine!”

And he held out his cup imperiously to Horemheb, who accepted it with impassive face, brushed aside the servant who stepped forward automatically to assist him, went to the wine jar in the corner and dipped a portion, full running over, which he brought back and placed, still with impassive face, at Pharaoh’s hand.

“Now!” Tut said. “Drink with me, Cousin, to tomorrow and a better day for the Two Lands!”

For a moment Horemheb did not raise his own cup, but stared, still with the same impassive air, at the King. Finally he raised his cup and bowed.

“Very well, Majesty. I drink to that.”

“And I!” Tut exclaimed. “And let there be no more nonsense about it!”

Across the table Sitamon stirred instinctively as the cups met their lips, and so did I—both of us, I know, seized by a sudden fearful apprehension.

But of course nothing happened. Both drank deep and replaced their cups on the table. The moment passed without incident. In a second I was telling myself, and I am sure Sitamon was too, how absurd it was to have imagined for a moment what I know we both did imagine. Not even Horemheb—how sadly easy it has become to say, “
Not even Horemheb,
”
when calculating degrees of evil!—would dare anything so desperate and blatant in the presence of us all.

We relaxed, the meal went on. Tut, growing more talkative from the wine, changed the subject, began reminiscing about the early days here at Malkata. Soon we were all recalling pleasant things—carefully avoiding Akhenaten, Smenkhkara and Nefertiti, of course, but still finding much to talk about concerning my sister and my brother-in-law and their great days on the throne—and so it all passed amicably until Tut finally announced in a voice slightly fuzzy from his unusual imbibing, “I am sleepy, and my wife should be in bed too, taking care of the Crown Prince. You will excuse us. Come to me at noon tomorrow, Uncle. We have work to do.”

“Yes, Majesty,” I said as we all arose, Ankhesenamon awkward with her pregnancy but looking beautiful with it, too.

“Good night, Sister,” Tut said, kissing Sitamon affectionately, a gesture she returned with a sudden fierceness that surprised him a little, though I could understand the reason for it: neither of us, still, was quite convinced we had been mistaken a few minutes before.

“Good night, Cousin,” he said pleasantly to Horemheb, offering his hand to be kissed, which Horemheb did gravely without change of expression. “You, too, I will see tomorrow, for there is much to be done to carry out my desires for your new post in Lower Kemet.”

“Yes, Son of the Sun,” Horemheb said. “Sleep well, for tomorrow’s sake.”

“What mean you by that?” Sitamon asked sharply, her worries breaking unexpectedly to the surface. Horemheb looked at her with a blank surprise and then responded with a calm, half-humorous air.

“Why, Cousin, I mean naught but what I said: he should sleep well, for tomorrow’s sake. He himself has said much depends upon tomorrow. I agree. What did you think I meant?”

And under his bland stare her eyes finally dropped and she murmured, “I do not know, Cousin. I suppose you meant what you said.”

“I suppose so,” he said comfortably. “I can think of nothing else I might have meant. But send word to my quarters by a servant later, and tell me, if you think of something.”

“I will,” she replied with a sudden flash of anger. “You may be sure I will send a servant to your quarters later, Cousin. I hope he will find you there.”

“He will find me there,” Horemheb said serenely. “I have no other plans this night.”

“What is this?” Tut demanded with a puzzled half laugh. “I do not understand all these riddles you propound, Sister.”

“She does not understand them herself,” Horemheb said in the same comfortable way. “Do you, now, Cousin!”

But she did not reply, only giving him a long stare, finally shaking her head and turning away. As she did so her eyes caught mine and a message shot from them as if to say,
I am counting on you, Uncle: control him!

And so I think I still may be able to do, though at a price I do not yet wish to contemplate, so fiercely does it harry me in this once more haunted night for the House of Thebes.

After we had all said our farewells the party broke up. I could see that Ankhesenamon, too, had been troubled by Sitamon’s remarks and the hidden contest, whose nature she did not understand, with Horemheb. But she also was tired, too tired for her normally quick perceptions to function at their best; and by then she was also feeling as she said, a little ill, so she gratefully accepted Tey’s sustaining arm and they went off together to her bedchamber. Pharaoh, after once again bidding us all good night (a repetition he apparently did not realize, now that the wine was really beginning to claim him), went off to his, where faithful Ramesses and lively Seti still guard his doors each night—though this, too, I think he may change … or would have changed … I must now remind myself.…

What will happen to me! I have dipped my hands in horror so often for the sake of Kemet, and do not know now when, if ever, I will get them clean! Too many things have crowded me over the years. Too many …

I bade Horemheb good night and proceeded alone to my bedchamber. There my servant helped me undress, clothed me in my sleeping robe, lit a small fire in a brazier in the corner against the chill of the winter night. I dismissed him and prepared myself for bed. I was about to extinguish the lamp when sharp knuckles struck the door in a fashion not to be denied. I knew who it was instantly. My heart began to pound, my hands to tremble. I made them stop, took deep, deliberate breaths to steady myself, moved with a deliberate slow dignity toward the door. Once again the knuckles struck, louder and more imperative. I thought:
He is not afraid of being heard.
It was not necessary for my son to tell me what this meant, though he did so as soon as I had let him in and closed the door tightly behind him.

“I put a sleeping powder in his wine,” he said harshly and without preliminary. “Soon he will sleep a sleep like the sleep of the dead. I suggest to you that he must never be allowed to waken.”

“You cannot—” I said, wondering that I could speak at all. “You cannot—”

“I can and I will,” Horemheb said sharply. “He has revived the Aten this day and intends to revive him further tomorrow and the day after—and the day after—and the day after—until all the land suffers again from the madness.
It must not be.
”

“You
cannot
!”
I said, trying to hold my voice to a near whisper but becoming almost shrill in spite of myself. “There must be no more killing in the House of Thebes. You
cannot.
”

“I can and I will,” he repeated in the same harsh voice, “with or without your permission, Father. It will be done this night.”

“
No!
”
I cried. “No!”

“Yes,” he said with a steady quietness doubly devastating in contrast to my frantic protest. “Yes, Father. There will be no more turning back, no more tolerance for that which will destroy the kingdom if we let it grow again. The consequence I warned you of five years ago when he returned to Thebes has come. As a youth he toyed with the Aten and you allowed it with your policy of ‘compromise’ and ‘toleration.’ As a man he now seeks to restore the Aten fully, and that you cannot allow.
You cannot permit Kemet to be ravaged again.
It would be unconscionable.”

“It is unconscionable what you propose,” I managed to get out. “He has done nothing to deserve this. His gestures to the Aten have been harmless these past five years—”

“Not harmless!” he snapped. “He has kept the Aten alive, and very much alive. The throne, the crook and flail, preserving the temples at Akhet-Aten, enlarging the temple here at Karnak—they have not been harmless. And they have not been done with a child’s innocence, for Neb-Kheperu-Ra has not been a child since the Heretic’s death. He has known exactly what he was doing, and so has she. Now today, with their clever trick of a ‘mortuary temple’ that is nothing but the Aten in giant form, they move to begin the full restoration. Tomorrow he says there will be ‘new laws for religion.’ That can mean only one thing. It must be stopped.
Father!
Surely you can see that?”

“I can see only more horror for the House of Thebes—” I began, and I am afraid my voice broke and trembled and sounded very old: I
am
very old. He interrupted me without pity. This night Horemheb has gone beyond pity.

“
I
can see only more devastation for the Two Lands,” he cried, his voice suddenly filled with a great anger. “It is enough, enough,
enough
! I will have no more of it! Father!”—And he dared put a hand like iron on my frail old arm, a grasp so fierce I thought it might crunch the bone were I to endure it long. “
Father!
With … you … or … without!”

And he glared into my eyes with an anger so consuming that I think he barely knew I was there.

“We will hold him to the mortuary temple and nothing else,” I began—feebly, I am afraid, but I was almost at the end of my strength. “We will not permit him—”

“Not permit him!” he cried. “He is the Living Horus, Son of the Sun, full in his power as of this day! We will ‘restrain’ him? What nonsense! One restraint only is possible now.
Father!
”
And again his painful grip tightened on my arm, his eyes stared furiously into mine, he spoke very slowly and distinctly. “You
know
I am right. You
know
he intends to do what I say. You
know
what this means for the kingdom. You
know
we cannot stand it again.…”

Abruptly his voice became very soft and very adamant.

“With you or without you, Father. With you or without.”

For what seemed many minutes he held me so, his grip unrelenting, his eyes boring into mine, his face implacable. And at last, of course, I told him what he wanted to hear: because, in truth, I felt him to be correct and I, too, was terrified of the chaos into which the last of my three ill-fated nephews might once again plunge the Two Lands.

“Very well,” I whispered huskily, shuddering and turning away as he instantly released me, covering my head with my robe and not looking at him again. “Very well. Do what you must.”

“
Good!
”
he said—one short, sharp, explosive word—and was gone, leaving me to weep, as I have so many times before, for three dear little boys, running and laughing down the sunlit pathways of Malkata … three little boys who became great kings and betrayed their trust, and so had to die to save the Two Lands, for whose sake we of this House have seen and done and suffered so much, in all these recent dreadful years.…

I weep: but I will go on because I am Aye, and the Two Lands depend upon it.

***