Out of the Black Land

Chapter Twenty-three

Mutnodjme

I had never been so frightened in my life.

Danger is all right if it’s you. Not that I ever went seeking it. But if I am the threatened one, I am immersed in the action, and until it is over my attention is firmly engaged. In real peril one does not usually even have time to notice that one is afraid until it is all over.

But danger to another person is agonising. I could think of nothing to do after I saw my dearest love walk out between two soldiers to what Huy, at least, grinning through his rotten teeth, thought was a terrible fate.

Ptah-hotep walked calmly to whatever doom the mad king was going to put him.

‘I’m going to the general,’ gasped Kheperren, and was gone in a flash of limbs. I told Meryt to send for me as soon as any word came and ran to the Widow-Queen Tiye.

She was loading Merope with gold so that she would not go to her husband with nothing. Divine Father Ay had sent around a list of the jewellery and goods which had arrived with each princess, and he wanted it all back or accounted for before they left the palace.

‘Oh, dearest sister,’ Merope grabbed me as I whirled into the inner chamber. ‘Tell me, is he kind? Is he young? Will he be a good lover?’

‘I suspect he’ll be an excellent lover, dear Merope, but he’s forty. There was not a young man in the whole scribal school who was fit for you to wipe your feet on. I’ll tell you more later. Great Royal Lady Tiye, what does the king want with Ptah-hotep?’

‘There is nothing that you can do,’ said Tiye slowly. ‘Go on telling your sister about her new husband. Has this Dhutmose sealed the deed?’

‘Yes, I saw him. The deal is made. What do you mean, lady, that there is nothing I can do?’

‘I mean what I say, which is my habit,’ snapped Tiye. ‘We will see. If I can help your man, daughter, you know that I will. But he has to make his own destiny to live or die. We must await events. Now, tell us about Merope’s new owner.’

‘He’s a cuddly forty, a scribe, a man of learning, with a small daughter who is motherless. He was a priest of the temple at Thebes before the present one, now a priest of the Aten so he qualifies,’ I prattled.

What did she mean, the red-headed woman, that Ptah-hotep must make his own destiny? He had always done so, hadn’t he? He had dealt with loss and pain and loneliness as best he could, suffered high office which was thrust upon him, lived within his own code in a palace with no rules.

I assumed that the Widow-Queen’s calm meant that either his death had been decreed beyond doubt or that this was not a threatening situation. It didn’t feel like the latter. I was distracted, but if she said there was nothing I could do then there really was nothing. Tiye would not have discounted any action; secret murder, treason, bribery, if the method would achieve her intended result. Widow-Queen Tiye alarmed me almost as much as the situation. She was a woman to whom literally nothing was, in itself, out of the question.

And she said that there was nothing I could do.

So I swallowed fear, digested anxiety, and gave such of my mind as I could locate to preparing my dear sister Merope for her new husband.

Merope was flushed with excitement. I had never seen her so beautiful. She had combed out her own ash bark coloured hair and garlanded it with lotus blossoms. Her cloth was gauze and draped her slim flanks and thighs as she inspected the growing pile of gold armrings and pectorals in her lap.

‘This is too much,’ she told the Widow-Queen.

‘Are you not my sister, Great Royal Wife of my husband?’ asked Tiye, adding a little pouch of the most precious of jewels, the blue rounded ‘eye-stone’ which came from deep in Nubia, eight dark-blue gems with a flash of white light in them.

‘In case you are stripped of your adornment before you are allowed to leave, my dear, place these stones where they will not be found by any man except the one to whom you are pledging your future,’ she said with a chuckle. Such a hiding place would only have occurred to that most ingenious of ladies. Merope blushed.

‘I’ll help you conceal them,’ I promised, and she laughed and kissed me.

What was happening to Ptah-hotep? I could feel his calm, his acceptance. He was going to his death with perfect ease, perhaps even a tinge of relief. My whole mind and body rebelled against such an end to his life, to what might have been our shared life. Was this why he did not marry me? So that I would not share his downfall?

I wrenched my mind away. In mid afternoon the messenger from the office of the Master of the Household came to deliver to Merope the papyrus which decreed that she was no longer a Great Royal Wife and the order that she was to attend on the Queen in the courtyard an hour before night. There she would be given away to her new husband, the Aten.

‘It appears that we are in the presence of sophistry,’ commented the Widow-Queen Tiye. ‘My son will say to all those Kings who ask for their daughters and sisters that they are all married to the Aten, and since the King is the Aten then they are all, in a way, still married to him and the alliances sealed with their bodies are still in force. I wonder who thought of that?’

‘Probably my father,’ I said. Was there no end to his meanness? I sent word to the temple school in the town that Dhutmose should come and collect his bargain after the ceremony.

The messenger came back breathless and reported, ‘They are building the strangest fire in the courtyard!’

‘Strangest? How do you mean?’ I asked. Tiye gave me a look which bade me ask no more and I ignored her for the first time in my life.

‘It’s made of precious woods. Cinnamon wood, and cassia, and myrrh.’

It meant nothing to me. It did mean something to the Widow-Queen Tiye, however, for she immediately ordered the Royal Sculptor to attend on her. When he arrived—the best of the Amarna artists, a true genius with wood and stone—she drew him into her own bedchamber, leaving Merope and I to talk of her new husband.

I rapidly ran out of things to say about the worthy Dhutmose. Merope kissed me and drew me close, and we occupied a hour, perhaps, in pleasing her and inserting the eye stones into their treasure-chest. I brought her easily to a climax, but I was far too tense to take pleasure even in the breasts and the mouth of my most delightful sister, even though I was about to lose her.

Why was there no word of Ptah-hotep? I could not lie still even in Merope’s embrace. I kissed her and said, ‘Sister, I must go and discover what I can,’ and with moist eyes, she released me.

I went to the office of the Great Royal Scribe and found it silent. Immense diligence was being exhibited by all of the scribes, even Mentu, who was translating Hittite letters into Egyptian. No one looked up and I was directed to the inner apartment by a wary wave of Khety’s stylus.

When I reached the place where Meryt and her brothers lived, I found them packing. Bundles were being made of fine cloth and small children compulsorily fed and washed. Babies wailed. Teti, who was the calmest of the brothers, stubbed his foot on a table and swore explosively. Anubis was stalking stiffly from one group to another, whimpering.

‘You have something heard?’ Meryt’s Egyptian was deserting her. I shook my head. She continued to fold cloth into a roll which would go over someone’s shoulders, secured with leather straps.

‘You’re expecting the worst,’ I commented. She finished the roll and grabbed my hand, leading me to one side, out of the way of Hala who was loading onto a small wriggling child all the bracelets which its little arm could carry, stiffening it from shoulder to elbow.

‘All our lives together he has been living on the edge of a razor,’ she whispered. ‘We have orders as to what to do if he is summoned unexpectedly to the king. See, here I have all our freedoms, not written by him but by the old man Amenhotep-Osiris and sealed by the office.’ She replaced the papyrus in the bosom of her cloth.

‘We have title to all of our goods and we have a safe-conduct to the Village-between-two-trees sealed by the Pharaoh Akhnaten and countersealed by General Horemheb. As soon as any word comes, Kheperren’s soldiers are waiting to take us to the river.’

‘Kheperren is here?’

She waved at the bed chamber and I went that way, feeling superfluous. Meryt had the household in hand and would get it away safely at the earliest opportunity. I had not known my lover long enough to have received any instructions as to what I should do in this eventuality. I began to wonder whether I knew him at all.

But there was the emotion, which was not mine, on the edge of my feelings; calm acceptance. It was certainly not my mind. I stalked into the bed chamber and Kheperren demanded, ‘What do you here, lady? Didn’t he tell you to keep away if anything happened? He would not involved you in his ruin!’

‘Oh, be silent,’ I snarled. ‘How can I not be involved in his ruin? The Pharaoh gave us to each other, put our hands together. I am his and he is mine and he cannot repudiate me now. What is happening? Do you know?’

‘No.’ Kheperren did not seem to resent my tone. Actually it was a pity, as it would have been a great relief to my feelings to be able to scream at someone; but I suppose it was for the best.

‘He was called and went, and he has been sitting outside the temple of the Aten for hours. The King is inside the temple. That monster Huy is walking about with a huge smirk on his filthy face—how I would like to hand him over to my Nubian irregulars! They can keep a prisoner alive for weeks, screaming in agony all the time.’

‘Yes,’ I agreed. ‘They could abolish the screaming by cutting out his tongue, of course. We do not want to keep the children awake.’

I was keeping step with him as he paced from one side to the other of the large room. I was interested as he instructed me as to exactly what, and in what order, the Nubian irregulars do to their most precious enemies, and the recital pleased my heart. I got a truly evil pleasure out of imagining Huy suspended from a tree upside down with bone needles thrust into his phallus. But even the ingenious Nubians run out of tortures in the end. As time passed, Kheperren put an arm round my shoulders, and we walked more slowly.

Eventually we sat down in the Great Royal Scribe’s chair together.

‘You’re afraid for him, aren’t you?’ he asked me. It was stupid question. But he was trying to communicate and I had walked out some of my bitter rage.

‘Yes, and you?’

‘Yes,’ he agreed.

‘Soldiers must be used to waiting for an attack,’ I commented. He snorted.

‘That’s the army. Hurry to get all prepared and every detail finished. Then wait. I have waited on the hills in Apiru country, lady, and in the jungles where the vile Kush lurk. I have sat all night and listened for any noise in the dead silence, a noise which might mean that the sentries have been surprised and killed and that an attack in force by the merciless shepherds is about to break upon the tents. I have waited three days together for rescue when Horemheb left us watching a border post and we were besieged. I have waited until my teeth hurt with gritting together and my body was exhausted just from the strain. But I have never sat in a cool delightful palace and waited, lady, and it is terrible beyond any battle. There at least I knew who the enemy were, and at the last I could fight for my life.’

‘Terrible,’ I agreed. ‘For even the Widow-Queen Tiye says that there is nothing to be done, and that lady would have no compunction about any action if she thought that it would work.’

He was very like Ptah-hotep, if my love had been a soldier. His back felt the same under my hands, the long and beautifully arranged muscles. I had not been aroused when I had made love with my sister Merope. Now I was feeling an entirely inappropriate interest in Kheperren. I shook myself. The palace insanity was catching.

And we sat there for hours, and nothing happened, and no news came.

Ptah-hotep

I had been sitting for a long time, thinking about my life and putting it into order and perspective. Not many who die are given this time to think, and I was grateful for it. I knew that the King had arranged to dismiss the Royal Women before dark, and wondered if my summons had anything to do with that, though I could not see how it would. When the soldiers came at last to take me to the King, I gathered up my scribe’s tools and walked between them into the immense temple of the Aten.

The pillars soared up beyond sight. The temple was lined with beaten gold, and the light of the westering sun struck such blinding brilliance from the walls and floor of the central hall that I was dazzled. I could still not really see when I was shoved to my knees before a throne and went down into the full ‘kiss earth’ before my lord, the Pharaoh Akhnaten, Sole and Only One of the Sun Disc Aten, Favoured Child of the Unknowable God, Aten.

It struck me as unfair that I was about to go to my death without once more seeing his face. I had served him to the best of my ability. He could at least look at me as he ordered my death.

‘Ptah-hotep, great honour has come to you,’ said the voice of the King. I saw through wet eyes and blinked, and my tears dropped upon gold.

‘Lord, you have already conferred on me honours beyond my worth,’ I replied in the correct form.

‘I have yet another for you, favoured son of the Lord of the Two Lands,’ he continued. His voice echoed in the great space. I beat down a surge of wild hope.

‘Rise,’ he ordered, and I got to my feet, leaving my palette on the golden floor.

My lord Akhnaten was standing on the dais, looking out into the courtyard.

‘See!’ he cried, flinging up an arm, and I saw men constructing what looked like a bonfire out of logs of sandalwood and acacia. More servants were approaching, carrying armloads of cinnamon bark. I could smell the sweetness of the spices.

‘Lord, I see,’ I replied cautiously. The strange face of the king was almost beautiful, disproportionate and odd but alight with divine purpose. ‘Soon the royal women of my father will depart to their new husbands. Tomorrow the miracle will happen.’

‘Miracle, lord?’ I asked. The feeling of threat had eased a little but I still did not see what he wanted. However, that was often the case.

‘The Phoenix will return,’ he said. ‘My astronomers have confirmed it.’

I bet they had. I seemed to recall that the period of renewal of the Phoenix was more than twelve hundred years, and I also seemed to recall that I had read a scroll no older than five hundred years which stated that the Phoenix had flown to Heliopolis, landing on the altar of the temple of the sun to leave the ball of myrrh and seed which would hatch into itself before it flew off to its palm tree or Bennu pillar to burn in its nest of spices…

My stomach dropped, my breath left me as though I had been speared in the solar plexus. I looked at the bonfire again. It was made of perfumed wood and in it I could discern the Phoenix’s spices, cinnamon and cassia and acacia, sandalwood and cedarwood and whole branches of the frankincense tree. The pile of wood in the courtyard of the temple would have bought the whole produce of a Nome. It probably was the proceeds of the taxes of a Nome. Was this the reason why I had not received any reports? Were all the farmers in Egypt starving so that the King could commit human sacrifice, an unthinkable atrocity, a terrible return to the time before Egypt had gods?

And who was the sacrifice? Was it I?

I wondered how long it would take to burn to death. To destroy the body was to destroy the ka, the spirit-double. There would be no afterlife for me, no explanation of my life to the Divine Judges. I would not persist, I would not live, have flesh, speak again to my loved ones in the Field of Reeds and after they in their turn died they would never be able to find me. I would be nothing. I would burn like a candle and go out like a candle. There would be nothing left of me, Ptah-hotep, who had been diligent and loving, except a handful of ash which would blow away in the wind. The King was not just going to kill me. He was going to obliterate me, make me as nothing.

Made things are unmade, as Neferti had prophesied.

I was drenched in fear as if I had been in cold water. I had been prepared for death, resigned to it. If the King wished to kill me I could not stop him. But he was not only going to kill my life, but my soul as well.

I was craven, not brave. My bowels loosened and threatened to disgrace me. My knees weakened. I dared not speak, for my voice would quaver. If I unlocked my tongue I knew I would beg; yes, grovel and slaver and beg for my life; offer him my body, anything—as long as he did not slay my soul.

The King withdrew his gaze from the pyre and said, ‘The Phoenix must die so that she may be renewed.’

I did not speak but nodded, dumbly. I slid down into my kneeling position again, the better to implore him for my life when he pronounced his sentence. Huy was beside him, Pannefer on the other side, and they both knew what was coming. They were smug with satisfaction at my downfall and would doubtless dance round my funeral pyre. They knew that he was taking my afterlife as well as my present life. A feeble flicker of hatred and pride kept me conscious, but that was all it could do.

‘You have the honour,’ said the King, beaming down on me, ‘of lighting the fire for the Queen Phoenix Nefertiti, in which she will achieve translation.’

I almost collapsed with relief. He was not going to burn me on that fire of precious woods. He was going to burn the Queen. At that moment the idea seemed to be an excellent one. At least the sacrifice was not Ptah-hotep.

‘Of course, if you refuse, you will take her place,’ said Huy.

The soldiers drew me to my feet. I had to give an answer to the king, who was as pleased as if he were conferring a province on a deserving servant. If I refused I would die and all of me would be destroyed. But I did not assent or refuse. The temple swam before my eyes, the gold tarnished to dark green and then dark red like old blood. I fainted.

I woke in my own bed. For a delirious moment I wondered if I had dreamed the whole scene in the temple. But Mutnodjme and Kheperren were both holding me. I could feel their fear and concern. It was all true and I had to secure what I could before my choice could be made. I sat up.

‘Bring Meryt,’ I ordered, and she came to me, my dear Meryt who had loved me and protected me for many years. She was in tears and I kissed her and she hugged me. Her brothers crowded around the bed on which I lay.

‘Go,’ I ordered. ‘Go now. Do not stop for rest or tears. Before night you should be on the river and on the way home. I cannot thank you, Meryt, for all you have done, not properly. If you want to honour me, Nubian, live well. Prosper. All the blessings I have I load upon your head.’

Meryt kissed my feet and Kheperren motioned to his two soldiers, not Nubians but Klashr, members of the general’s own honour guard. The procession formed with Meryt at the head and her whole household walking behind, small children crying and Teti, Hani and Tani looking back to see the last of Ptah-hotep, who had done at least two good deeds for them. I had taken them out of slavery, and now I was sending them away.

I watched them as they marched out of my life, Meryt with Anubis by her side. He had already bitten Hani, and I had to order him to go. He was a good dog, so he obeyed and his obedience snagged my heart. But they had gone. One group settled and safe, for I did not think that even the King would dare to outface General Horemheb, especially not on so unimportant an issue as a few Nubian ex-slaves.

I rose and walked into the outer office. All faces turned to me. I had no need to ask for silence. Menna and Harmose laid down their clay tablets and looked at me. Bakhenmut was terrified, patently anticipating his wife’s reaction to his probable dismissal if my office came down with me. Khety looked shocked, Hanufer worried. Only Mentu was unconcerned. He even attempted to comfort me.

‘Easy got, easy lost,’ he quoted; always his philosophy. ‘Do not be troubled, Ptah-hotep. You can always join the army. That’s where I am going. Horemheb always needs skilled charioteers.’

So, my office did not know the terms of the demon’s choice which the King had thrust upon me. I was glad. If I could manage it, no one would know. I said, ‘There is no need to be concerned. There is no reason for the King to change this office in the slightest. He just wants me.

‘So. tomorrow Bakhenmut, I will appoint you Great Royal Scribe, before I am summoned to the king again. Come to me at dawn for your jewels-of-office. You will, however, I trust, keep the office as it is. Menna and Harmose are here by the will of the old king, as well as the new, and their translations are vital in giving the throne the best advice. Your friends Khety and Hanufer are very skilled. I also remind you how valuable our friend Mentu is when he honours us with his presence. By the way, ask the king, when I am gone, what has become of this year’s tax returns. I believe that giving you the position will preserve all of you from royal attention. Will you accept, Bakhenmut?’

For a long moment, fear warred with ambition in Bakhenmut’s face. The battle was so naked that I wanted to look away. Then he dropped to the floor and kissed my feet, murmuring, ‘Lord, I am unworthy of this honour,’ which meant yes.

‘No more work is to be done today,’ I announced. ‘Go home, all of you. I thank you for your loyalty and your love,’ I added.

I did not know how much more I could stand, so it was good that they were mostly too afraid to approach their doomed master. Bakhenmut left at a run to carry to his wife the good news. The old men bowed and left. Mentu embraced me suddenly and hard, then left without looking back. Khety and Hanufer kissed my hands, murmuring long forgotten prayers which would have condemned them to death if they had been heard.

Then they were gone. The office was empty. I swallowed, thinking that my hearing was at fault, and realised that I was listening to utter silence. No noise of Meryt and her tribe, no babies crying, no sizzle of food cooking. No noise of rustling papyrus or thud of clay tablet into basket. No one left in the office of the Great Royal Scribe Ptah-hotep.

Except two people who would also have to be induced to leave.

The lady Mutnodjme and Kheperren the scribe stood close together, considering me as I was considering them.

‘I love you,’ I said to them. ‘I would not involve you in my ruin. I bid you depart.’

Neither of them moved a muscle.

‘Must I order you?’ I demanded. My control was slipping. I had a dreadful choice to make, such as no man in the Black Land had to make before, and they would not let me make it freely.

‘Order away, ’Hotep,’ said Kheperren. ‘Anubis obeyed, but he’s a dog. It won’t make the slightest difference to us. We aren’t leaving you. How could you think it?’

I knew I would not get anywhere with Kheperren, but I said despairingly to the lady, ‘Mutnodjme, you have only lain with me twice, both times in strange states of mind, you could easily say that I or the night had overpowered you and be free of me.’

‘So I could,’ she replied, unmoved, fists on hips like a peasant. ‘Do you think that I am likely to say that?’

‘You could,’ I encouraged. Her face shut in on itself like a box, concentrating into an expression of complete obstinacy.

‘I won’t,’ she assured me.

‘Now we’ve got that over with,’ Kheperren said easily, ‘Let us bar the doors, eat some of the food which Meryt has left for you, and we can talk about this. We cannot help you if you will not tell us anything, but if that is the case we are quite willing to drink your Tashery vintage and occupy your space. My lady Mutnodjme and I have nothing else to do today,’ he added, and the lady nodded emphatically.

Kheperren knew me very well. He knew that in such company I could not keep silent forever. Forever, in my case, extended until the next morning, when I would have to officiate at…

They sat me down and held a wine cup to my lips and made me drink, and I told them all about it.

Then we began having the argument that I dreaded. I knew that they would not let me face the choice I had to make.

‘It’s simple, Ptah-hotep, we just get you away,’ Kheperren urged for the one hundredth time. ‘You need make no choice except the soldier’s choice not to be there when the arrow lands. General Horemheb is leaving to take the Widow-Queen Tiye’s message to the Mittani soon. We can just go to the camp, hide there, and travel with him. I can teach you the ways of the army and we can be happy.’

‘That seems sensible,’ said Mutnodjme.

‘But what about your sister the Queen?’ I cried. ‘If not I, then another will light that pyre. Do no evil deed in the service of the gods, that’s what they taught me. If I do not die instead of her, then another will light the pyre, and the Royal Wife will die a terrible death!’

‘Better her than you,’ Mutnodjme flatly. She shocked me. Was she so willing to watch her sister immolated? She loved her sister. I said as much.

‘Certainly I love her. But she is the king’s accomplice in the evils of this reign. She rules the House of the Phoenix, and it may be fitting that she is the sacrifice, she may even be eagerly anticipating this end.’ Mutnodjme was thinking, elbow on knee, chin on fist. She sat like a man, legs spread, and stroked where she would have had a beard, thumb moving across her chin.

‘She knows what she is doing, she knows what the king is and what he has made of Egypt and of her. You know that such a death would condemn you to be nothing, to blow away. She may well be anticipating a happy afterlife, united with the Firebird. In any case, this choice which has been thrust upon you is not made for a religious reason.’

‘I agree,’ said Kheperren. ‘The king perhaps has always worried about your loyalty. You have never asked to be made a priest of the Aten. This is his way of testing whether you are still wedded to the old beliefs, which of course you are. The person who should light this pyre is Divine Father Ay, curse him with many curses.’

‘She is his daughter and he loved her once,’ put in Mutnodjme. ‘Perhaps he cannot bring himself to do it, so he has suggested this dreadful substitution to the king.’

‘No, he may well have suggested finding someone else; but he approves of your love for me, as it relieves him of any responsibility for you,’ I said, following her line of argument. ‘Either or both of Pannefer and Huy have done this to me.’

‘So they have. Now, we need to make plans for your escape,’ said Mutnodjme as if it were all settled. My heart ached for my loves, my dears. But I could not let them do this.

‘No, there will be no escape,’ I said. ‘I will appear tomorrow in the courtyard of the Phoenix, and on that I am not to be dissuaded. You see that it must be so,’ I said.

They must have seen, for they stopped arguing.