Sphinx's Princess (20 page)

My situation wouldn’t have been so bad if I’d only been able to encounter another person, someone I could ask for directions. Alas, my luck led me to a part of the palace that was deserted, the gods alone know why. My steps echoed hollowly from the high ceilings. I sniffed the air, hoping to catch the scent of food or perfume or even dung—anything that might lead me to other living beings.

My efforts were rewarded: A wisp of flowers in bloom reached my nostrils through the dusty air of the vacant rooms. I followed the trail of scent eagerly, until I plunged through an archway crowned with an image of Ra’s Boat of Eternity, bearing the blessed disk of the sun through the sky, and came out into a snug courtyard thick with small evergreens, nets of glossy-leaved ivy, henna shrubs, daisies, and other blossoms.

“Oh!”

I was so intent on my hunt that I didn’t see the boy until I collided with him. Maybe it was the pattern of shadows in the garden, or how small a space it was to be holding so many plants, or the fact that his arms were filled with flowers that helped turn him invisible. Invisible but solid. The two of us tumbled to the ground. His flowers scattered.

I was the first back on my feet. “Oh, I’m so sorry,” I exclaimed. “Are you all right?”

He clasped the hand I offered him and slowly clambered up. He was more than a head taller than me, and the most awkward collection of long bones and oversized
hands and feet I’d ever seen. There wasn’t one part of his body that was a match for the rest. Skinny as he was, he had a soft stomach that stuck out over the top of his linen kilt. His head was uncovered and so unnaturally long that it looked as if a pair of mischievous spirits had grabbed the top of his skull, the bottom of his chin, and pulled.

“I—I’m—yes,” he said. It was hard to hear him. His voice was pleasant, but he scarcely raised it above a whisper. “And you?”

“No harm done.” I smiled at him. “You’ll have to teach me your magic.”

“What—I—what magic?”

“How someone as tall as you can hide yourself in a place this small,” I joked.

His laugh was startling. I never expected such a hearty sound to come from such a frail-looking body. “Hiding is—it’s what I do best.”

I’d been about to ask him who he was, but now I didn’t have to bother: My ungainly flower gatherer was obviously one of the palace workers, and not a very good one. When Mery instructed Bit-Bit and me how to manage a household, she taught us:
Never keep a shirking servant. They’re easy to spot. Many people try to disappear when there’s work to be done, but lazy servants have a talent for it that’s almost supernatural, and the laziest will even brag about it!

“Hiding,” I repeated. “I wouldn’t overdo that, if I were you. It’ll get you in trouble.”

“No.” He sounded wistful. “Sometimes it’s—it’s the only thing that keeps me out of trouble.”

“I see.”
Poor boy!
I thought.
Maybe he’s not lazy after all. With those gawky arms and legs, maybe he’s just not very good at—well, at
anything,
and he gets beaten for making a mess of his work.
My heart went out to him. I could just imagine how he’d fare if he displeased my aunt or my chilly cousin Thutmose!
I could do worse than making another friend here, especially one who knows his way around the palace, and I would like to hear him laugh again. Perhaps we can be good for one another.

“My name is Nefertiti,” I said. “If you don’t mind coming out of hiding for just a little while, could you help me? I’m new here and I’m lost.”

“I’d be happy to,” he said, eager. “Where do you want to go?”

“Back to my rooms.”

“Yes, but where are they?”

“If I knew that, I wouldn’t be lost,” I replied, but not angrily.

“Well, are they in the north wing, the south? Do you know where they lie in relation to Pharaoh’s great hall of audience, the one where he receives foreign emissaries? Can you reach them from the river? I doubt they’re near the kitchens or the stables. They’d never put someone as important as you there.”

“How do you know if I’m important?” I asked.

“Oh, everyone knows about you.” His thick lips turned up at one corner in a sad smile. “News travels very fast in this house. You’ve been brought here from Akhmin by way of Abydos and you’re going to marry the crown prince.”

“News may travel fast here, but it doesn’t always arrive
in one piece,” I said tartly. “Don’t worry, you’re not going to have to work on preparations for my wedding to Thutmose
too
soon.”

“Really?” He sounded surprised, then grew thoughtful. “I’ll bet you’ve been lodged in the women’s quarters, then, with the junior wives and concubines. Otherwise you would have been put closer to the royal rooms.”

I shrugged. “I smelled a lot of perfume and I heard a lot of giggling, but that’s all I know about it. There’s a garden with a long pool just outside my door, but this place seems to have a lot of gardens.”

“It does. I think that’s the only thing I like about living here. Well, that and the wall paintings. They’re all beautiful, and all differ—By Amun, I
am
stupid! My lady Nefertiti. If you can remember how the walls of your rooms were decorated, I can help you find them easily!”

He listened intently while I described the painted marshes, the waterfowl, and the hunting scene, then smiled like the sun. “You
are
in the women’s quarters! I haven’t been there since I was a child. I can’t take you all the way back—there are things I must do elsewhere before nightfall or I’ll be neck-deep in muck—but I can set you on the right path.”

“Wonderful!” I cried. “Let’s go.” I started back the way I’d come.

“Wait, please.” He dropped to one knee and fumbled for something hidden in the greenery. “You lost this when you fell,” he said, standing up and holding out Sitamun’s crown of flowers. It was badly crushed, and it took him a
moment before he realized he was offering me a handful of ruined blossoms. “Oh,” he said apologetically. “I’ve done it again.”

“You didn’t do anything,” I said. “I was the one who ran into you. Leave it.”

As we walked out of the tiny garden, I looked up at my lanky escort and said, “You know who I am, but what’s your name?”

“Amenophis.” It was the last word I got out of him for a long time. It was as if once he’d solved the riddle of where to lead me, he’d taken fright and put up a wall between us. The farther we got from his cozy green refuge, the thicker and higher he built that wall.

Finally he stopped at a place where two palace halls crossed, and pointed. “The women’s quarters are that way. Good-goodbye.” He was gone before I could thank him.
So much for making a new friend
, I thought.

I had no difficulty making my way back to my rooms from that point. Once there, I found Berett merrily playing her harp in the corner of my bedroom while my three maidservants clapped their hands and danced. They stopped abruptly when they saw me, as if I’d caught them at some crime, and bowed deeply.

“Lady Nefertiti, pardon us,” Kepi said. “We unpacked all of your things and we’ve laid out the dress you are to wear tonight. Since you hadn’t come back to give us further orders and we had nothing else to do—”

“You knew
exactly
the right thing to do,” I told her, smiling. “Berett, play some more for all of us. I haven’t had the
chance to dance for far too long.” I didn’t have to repeat my request. Berett’s fingers skipped over the harp strings and one of the other girls raised her voice in a comical song about a baboon who kept stealing a farmer’s grapes until the farmer tricked him into drinking wine. I did a clownish dance, pretending to be the baboon, Kepi played the farmer, and the others clapped in time to the music until we all fell down laughing.

There was more music and many more songs and dances before it was time for my maids to get me ready for the evening. I was bathed, rubbed with scented oils, and dressed in a flowing white gown that Aunt Tiye sent along with a cedarwood box holding a cascading necklace of gold and crystal beads. Last of all, Kepi painted my eyelids green and outlined my eyes heavily with black. She wanted to add a little red ocher mixed with oil to my lips, but I refused because I’d never used that before. I didn’t want to spend the evening making faces if it tasted nasty.

I had a small pang of worry about leaving Berett behind in my rooms. The maids would look after her, but would she be afraid without me? It was one thing to leave her alone in the daytime, but at night, in a strange new place?

But Isis smiled on me: I was murmuring my concerns to Kepi when I felt a small hand pat my arm. Berett smiled at me, then slipped her fingers willingly into Kepi’s palm. “Well,
good
,” I said, pleased. I hugged the child and left, lighthearted.

The same older woman who’d brought me to meet Thutmose was waiting to lead me to dinner. My heart thudded louder at every step. This was not just a simple family
meal: I was going to meet the lord of all the Black Land, the living god, Pharaoh Amenhotep.

What will I say?
I wondered.
Should I say anything at all? How do I address him? What if I trip and fall when I approach him? What if I tear this dress? What if I lose my voice, or squawk, or get the hiccups? What if—? What if—? What if—?

I was so absorbed in reviewing that unending series of humiliating possibilities that I barely noticed when the older woman stepped to one side at a lofty doorway and motioned for me to pass through. I obeyed her without thinking and found myself in a large room, bathed in the glow of dozens of lustrous alabaster oil lamps. A group of musicians sat in the corner to my left, playing sweetly on double flutes, harps, lutes, drums, and tambourines, while a choir of at least nine rich-voiced male singers sang to my right. As soon as they saw me, they stopped.

I almost didn’t notice. My gaze was set on the group of seven people seated straight before me, behind a scattering of low tables covered with food, drink, and flowers. I recognized Aunt Tiye at once. She sat in the second-finest chair, her short wig crowned with a double ostrich plume and a gold disk and horns, so that she looked like the living image of the goddess Hathor. Anyone with eyes would have known her royal husband, whose seat was even grander than hers, although he was more simply dressed. He wore a striking gold pectoral, but no crown, only a wreath of blue flowers like the one Sitamun had given me and that had been destroyed.

Thutmose sat stiffly on a chair between his mother and father, his wig, clothing, and jewelry even more elaborate
than Aunt Tiye’s.
He’s eating dinner with his family
, I mused.
Who does he need to impress?
Sitamun sat with her four sisters, on stools at Aunt Tiye’s other side. The only other seat I could see in the twinkling light was an empty chair next to Pharaoh. My mouth went dry. I was nervous enough to be meeting the living god; I didn’t know how I’d fare if I had to eat an entire meal with his eyes on me.

“My dear Nefertiti, come to us and be welcome!” Aunt Tiye stood up gracefully and swept her arms wide, as if they were divine wings. I bowed to Pharaoh, then crossed the floor until I stood with one of the short feasting tables between us and bowed again. All of the courage I’d learned from Mahala’s brave and selfless act deserted me. I was a shy little girl again. I didn’t know what to say, and my silence, like the sacred river at the Inundation, seemed to rise and flood the room, drowning me.

Running footsteps and jagged breath cut through the heavy hush. A wheezing voice cried, “I’m sorry! I’m—I’m sorry I’m late, but I had to make something for—Oh! You’re here.”

I raised my head and turned to face Amenophis, his hands quaking as he held out a wreath of flowers. “This is for you.”

Gods, is he out of his mind?
I stared at him in disbelief.
I thought he was a mouse, and yet here he comes, barging into Pharaoh’s presence. And for
this
? Aunt Tiye’s going to have him whipped, or worse!

“Um … thank you,” I said, and in a whisper added: “You should go now. Really.” I took the wreath and tried to
put it on my head, but I was so worried about the punishment in store for poor, frail, crazy Amenophis that I wound up with a loop of flowers tilted over one eye. Sitamun’s sisters tittered and I heard Aunt Tiye muttering darkly.

But Pharaoh laughed. “Would you look at that? She’s even beautiful when she doesn’t look perfect! Ah, Tiye, what a treasure you’ve brought back to us. Amenophis, don’t just stand there like a plucked goose; help your brother’s bride!”

“Yes, Father.” Amenophis carefully adjusted the wreath so that it sat properly on my hair. “Is that all right?” he asked me in quiet voice.

I couldn’t say a word. My shock was so total that I couldn’t even make a sound—no, not even if a jackal had been gnawing on my leg! The words
your brother’s bride
and
yes, Father
resounded through my head like the throb of a giant drum. I was still speechless when Amenophis took me by the arm and led me to my place before taking the empty chair for himself. I was seated on a stool at Thutmose’s feet. I hadn’t noticed it at first because it was hidden by the feasting table.

Somehow I got through that dinner. The food was delicious, but I ate sparingly, still dealing with the revelation that my timid, awkward “servant” was actually the crown prince’s younger brother. I kept darting incredulous glances at him throughout the meal. Pharaoh was tall and muscular, a good-looking man with a hearty voice who looked ready to take on the whole world just for the fun of it. My aunt was dainty and attractive. The gods had given
Thutmose and Sitamun the best parts of their parents’ looks, and the other four princesses were pretty girls. Homely, rawboned Amenophis didn’t fit in at all.

I was thankful when Pharaoh took one last mouthful of honey cake and stood up, the signal that the meal was over. “I hope you will be happy with us, Nefertiti,” he said while the servants and slaves scurried to clear away the dishes and the tables and the entertainers bowed low and vanished from the hall. “We didn’t speak much tonight, but you’re tired from your journey here. You and I will have plenty of time to talk in the future. Would that please you?” All I could do was nod.