She looked at me as if I’d asked if water was wet. “The One,” she said again. “When I pray, I ask Him to—”
“I hear the guards changing shifts. The new ones will be poking their noses in here any moment. If we linger too long, they’ll report it to Thutmose. We’d better go,” Sitamun said, interrupting Nava, and leaving me behind.
I was deeply grateful to Nava for her gift. It took me a long time to fall asleep that night, what with my mind whirling over possible escape plans, so it was comforting to have a lasting light to keep the demons of doubt at bay. When the third day of my captivity came, she and Sitamun arrived even earlier than before, with fresh lamp oil and a different kind of gift.
“Here,” Sitamun said. She took my hands and closed them around a bronze pin adorned with a scarab.
“Thank you, it’s very pretty,” I said, turning it in the light.
“It’s better than pretty, it’s—Nava, dear, sing a little louder for us, won’t you?—it’s part of your escape. May Bes give his blessing to Master Henenu, our teacher is as wise as Thoth. ‘Don’t underrate Nefertiti,’ he said when I told him where Thutmose is keeping you. ‘You talk as if we need an army to rescue her when all she really needs is this.’ ” Sitamun pointed at the bronze pin.
“Oh, it’s a magic pin,” I said dryly.
She giggled. “It’s a pin you’ll use to secure your dress so that once you get out of this room all you’ll have to do is climb a wall and make your way to the river, where a boat will be waiting. ‘She can do that in her sleep,’ he said. ‘She’s a dancer, strong and nimble, but more importantly, she’s brave.’ ”
“I’ll have to be invisible, too,” I said. “If—when—I escape this prison, how do I reach that wall without being seen?”
“Don’t worry about your guards. Master Henenu has plans for them.”
“What about anyone else I might meet while I’m trying to reach that wall?”
Sitamun tilted her head. “You really don’t know where you are, do you?”
“Only that it’s quiet.”
“Your prison is an outbuilding that stands alone in what used to be a part of the old servant’s quarters. I think it was once surrounded by a vegetable garden, but in any case, once you’re out, you won’t have to worry about passing through any part of the palace. The wall between you and the river is just a little way outside that door.”
We parted a little after noon, with Sitamun’s pledge to do everything she could to arrange things with Henenu that would hasten the day of my escape. “The longer we wait, the greater the risk that some ‘accident’ will befall you.”
I cast a leery glance at the remains of my latest meal. “Maybe you should bring me my food from now on,” I suggested.
She shook her head. “If your food was tainted, the crime would be examined much too closely for my brother’s comfort. If he does intend to be rid of you, poison never looks like an accident.”
Thutmose didn’t come to visit me that day. I was just as glad to have him leave me alone. It was tiring, pretending that everything was the same between us, and how would I react if he kissed me again?
I didn’t waste my hours: I danced. I didn’t want to grow soft by just lying on my mat all day, especially not when my escape was going to depend on how fast and how easily I’d be able to get over a wall. When I wasn’t dancing to keep myself fit, I worked at finding the best way to pin up my dress so that it wouldn’t come loose and entangle my legs midclimb. I was so focused that I was almost caught at it when the servant brought my dinner.
I tried to eat, but I kept remembering Thutmose. When I looked at the food, all I could think was What if-—? What if-—? What if-—? Since I couldn’t eat, I decided that at least I ought to drink something, but when I served myself some beer, it smelled strange. I poured it into my toilet stool, covered the pot to hide the faintly flowery scent, and tore up the rest of my dinner to make it look like I’d eaten something when the servant came back to take away the dishes. I stripped off my dress, placed it with my scribe’s kit beside my mat, and lay down to sleep.
The night wore on and I learned the hard lesson that an empty belly makes a bad mattress. No matter how still I lay, hoping for sleep, the rumbling of my cheated stomach kept me awake. I tried counting as high as I could go, then tried losing myself in the pattern of shadows on the ceiling cast by my flickering oil lamp. Once more I was thankful for Nava’s gift of extra oil. The only thing worse than lying awake and hungry in my prison would have been doing so in the dark.
As a last resort I tried closing my eyes and imitating the slow, regular breath of sleep. I don’t know if it worked. I think I dreamed, or maybe I was only in that peculiar place between sleep and waking where wandering thoughts sometimes counterfeit dreams. My mind drifted over the wastes of the Red Land, the sandy stretches where my nightmare lions dwelled. I walked alone across barren ground, expecting to encounter them at any moment. My eyes swept the desert, waiting for the first telltale stirring of the sands before the monsters leaped out at me. Instead, all that I saw was an odd series of wavy tracks, and my ears echoed with a faint, unfamiliar sizzling sound.
Why are you wandering here, Nefertiti? A great voice rolled across the desert. The air rippled with heat, and through the shimmering haze I saw a titanic figure striding toward me. The Great Sphinx’s lion-pawed stride devoured the distance between us and his human face was grim as death. Why do you sleep while your enemies wake? Get up! Get up! Open your eyes while you can and—! The rest of his words were drowned out as the buzzing noise surged louder and louder around us until the Red Land shook with it and the wavy tracks in the sand split open into a chasm at my feet. I plunged into the depths, crying out to my sphinx to save me, save me!