“A priest who wants Pharaoh’s favor, Nefertiti.”
“Even better!” I saw his grim expression, but it made no sense to me. Why look so gloomy in the face of so much good news? I blithely ignored it. “Pharaoh likes me; he knows I’m guiltless. The only reason he’s putting me through this trial tomorrow is because Thutmose gave him no choice. If the priest of Ma’at wants to please Pharaoh, the goddess will free me before I finish taking my oath!”
“Not if the pharaoh he wants to please is the pharaoh to come.”
Henenu plunged a needle into my heart. My whole body felt suddenly numb. “It can’t be. Ma’at’s priests serve in the house of truth! How could Thutmose corrupt them?” I cried out in betrayal and anguish, but I already knew the answer: The gods were not the same as the servants who spoke for them. Thutmose already had the powerful priests of Amun on his side. They’d helped him engineer my false conviction, because they looked forward to the day he’d rule the Black Land. Then he would remember how well they’d served him and reward them for it. Were the priests of Ma’at no better? Would they sell the voice of truth itself if it meant riches and other royal benefits would come to them in the future?
“So I’m about to put my life in a scale weighed down by lies.” I stared into Henenu’s eyes. “Does Amenophis know?”
“The royal family has always known, as have some of us who are easily overlooked when loose tongues wag.” Henenu dropped his voice in shame. “Only the common people are kept ignorant. The temples that use special statues of the gods—statues that can be made to move and talk—have the most hope of influencing the people. Sometimes they share this power with the pharaohs, when it benefits them both. There are times when the love and reverence the people have for their ruler aren’t enough to keep them docile and obedient: times when crops fail, when the sacred river doesn’t rise properly, when there’s plague in the land, when taxes grow heavy. At those times, when angry mutterings begin to rise against the god-on-earth, the voices of the other gods are used to proclaim terrifying threats against any who aren’t entirely loyal and devoted to Pharaoh. They ignore the people’s justified complaints and silence them by filling their hearts with awe and dread.” He smiled at me sadly. “Have you never noticed how much easier it is to control a man who’s always afraid?”
I clenched my hands. Lies! So many lies, and in the house of truth! Did no one else feel as sick at heart as I did, knowing this? “Why do we let such abuses go on, Henenu?” I cried. “Why do we build so many shrines to so many gods if every one of them is just another storehouse for hollow images and falsehood? Too many of their servants act like rival packs of mongrel dogs, fighting over scraps in the street. And why didn’t Amenophis tell me the whole story when he came to prepare me for Ma’at’s voice? Why has he lied to me, too?”
“Sweet girl, he loves you.” The scribe’s words were placating and sympathetic. “You told me he wanted you to be brave. How would you be able to face tomorrow if he’d told you that your fate was already decided?”
“You didn’t have any problem telling me about it,” I said bitterly.
“I see you through clearer eyes than he does, Nefertiti,” Henenu said. “He can’t look at you without wanting to build strong walls around you to keep the dangers and ugliness of the world away from you. He loves you because you’re a strong young woman, not a delicate little flower petal, but he still wants to cup your life in the palms of his hands. Haven’t you ever wanted to shield someone you love?”
I had to say yes. Ma’at knew it was so; Ma’at, the real voice of truth in my heart, and not in the trickery-haunted shadows of some self-serving temple. “I think I’d do the same for him if he stood in my place tomorrow,” I said.
“You know that’s not all he’s prepared to do, if his brother has his way with Ma’at’s verdict,” Henenu said, resolute. “You have many friends, Nefertiti. We will not let you suffer for crimes you didn’t commit. You escaped from an unjust verdict once before; we’ll help you do so again. We’ll spirit you out of the Black Land altogether. You and Amenophis can make a new life for yourselves. Sitamun and I will see to it that her brother leaves Thebes with treasures worthy of a prince. I’ll go back to Akhmin and arrange for your whole family to follow you wherever you decide to go, whether south to Nubia or north to the kingdoms of the Mitanni, to the great trade city of Byblos, to the lands of the Canaanites—”
“No.”
“No?” he repeated. “Well, you could also travel to Punt, if you’d rather—”
“No, Henenu, don’t give me any more choices like that. I’ve made one of my own: I will not run away again. My innocence is true, whether or not the priests of Ma’at have sold themselves to Thutmose, and I will defend it. If the voice of the goddess proclaims me guilty, I will reveal that there is an even greater sacrilege taking place in the house of Ma’at herself.”
“My dear, what good will that do? You’ll be silenced where you stand.”