Beauty of Re

by Mark Gajewski

“But you turned him down?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  “Because you were always supposed to be Thut’s Great Wife, Nefer,” I said earnestly. “I told him I couldn’t marry him before you did. I loved you too much to let myself outrank you. And what if I’d had a son before you? Do you think I wanted us to play the parts of Hatshepsut and Iset, for us to be at each other’s throats over our children?”

  “What changed?” Nefer asked icily.

  “I waited twenty–six years, Nefer. I couldn’t wait anymore.”

  She stiffened. “You will call me ‘Majesty’ from now on. You will not use my name. Do you understand?”

  I bowed my head. Tears welled in my eyes. This encounter was turning out to be even more awful than I’d expected. “I just couldn’t be apart from Thut anymore, Nef… Majesty,” I said defensively. “I’ve loved him since we were children. I’ve always dreamed of being his wife.”

  “You thought because my mother let you live among us in the per’aa you were one of us, fit to marry a king?” Nefer snapped.

  She’d never used that tone with me before. This was not going to end well. “Of course not. I never once forgot I was a commoner, in all these years, that I owed everything to you and your mother. I always knew Iset would never allow me to marry Thut, too, for that reason. I never forgot Thut was yours. But we were in love.”

  “Have the two of you been sneaking off together behind my back all these years?”

  “Yes.”

  Nefer’s eyes flashed with the hurt of betrayal. “Many things make sense to me now that didn’t before. I sent you to convince Thutmose to make me his Great Wife after Mother died. You slept with him then, didn’t you.”

  “Yes.”

  “And a week later he stripped me of everything I held dear. It was your fault, wasn’t it? You lied to him about me, didn’t you, so you could have him. Admit it!”

  “Never, Majesty! The public humiliation in the audience hall, the taking of God’s Wife from you – that was Iset’s doing. Thut never told me that would happen.”

  Nefer turned from me, stared out the window.

  “We went on this campaign and we were together every day and our love grew deeper and when I thought about coming home to Kemet and giving Thut up again I just couldn’t.” Tears coursed down my cheeks. “I wasn’t strong enough to stay apart from him anymore. So I agreed to be his wife.” I reached and placed my hand atop Nefer’s. She yanked it away. More tears spilled down my cheeks. “I know this changes everything between us. But please don’t hate me. I didn’t want to hurt you. I hope in time you’ll understand why I did it, and forgive me and accept what I’ve become. It’ll kill me if my marriage ends our friendship.”

  Nefer stared at me stonily. “Why should I care about your feelings, Meryetneith? Or do you expect me to call you ‘Majesty’ too?”

  I didn’t reply.

  “You’re right – what you’ve done changes everything.” Nefer rose, paced back and forth for a moment, looked out the window at the garden again, turned to face me. “You’ve been a sister to me my whole life,” she said, her voice cold. “But no longer.”

  “Please forgive me,” I pleaded. I fell to my knees before her. “Don’t you remember your mother sobbing after Senenmut died, because she’d denied herself his love? I’ve denied myself too, for a quarter of a century, out of love for you. Wasn’t that long enough? You married Thut because you were supposed to, because it was your duty. You married him because you wanted power, to rule at his side, to have a son who could be king. That didn’t work out because of Iset, not me. You love Thut like a brother. He loves you like a sister. But Thut and I truly love each other, as a husband and wife should. Please don’t let my love for Thut destroy us.”

  “But it must,” Nefer said. “You chose him over me, knowing how I feel about him, knowing what he’s done to me. Leave me. Now! Go live with your choice.”

  I could hardly see through my tears. I rose and stumbled from Nefer’s room. Somehow I reached my room next door to hers, stepped inside, leaned my back against the wall. A serving girl had lit oil lamps. My room was crowded with the chests Thut had given me, already carried here from the boat. Shadows danced on the walls. I’d known I risked losing Nefer when I married Thut. I’d gambled I wouldn’t, but I had. It was done and I couldn’t undo it. I looked at the chests crammed with finery, expressions of Thut’s love. And I didn’t want to undo it. I should have been ashamed of myself for what I’d done to Nefer, but I wasn’t. Thut was worth it. If Nefer wouldn’t accept me as his wife, so be it.

  That day was the end of my life with the Beauty of Re.

  And the true beginning of my life with the Strong Bull Rising in Waset.

  1445 BC

  Regnal Year 35 – Thutmose III

  “It’s King’s Wife Meryetre–Hatshepsut’s time, Majesties. You are summoned.” The serving girl turned from Nefer and me and rushed off in the direction of the kap, the royal nursery, without waiting for a reply.

  We were in the education room. I was working with the most recent set of hostages brought back by Thut from last year’s campaign – he’d been gone for two months now on his latest – and Nefer was working with the royal children. Everyone began chattering excitedly at the serving girl’s news.

  My eyes caught Nefer’s and she quickly looked away. She hadn’t forgiven me for marrying Thut two years ago – in fact, she utterly despised me now. Both of us went out of the way to avoid each other – she because I’d betrayed her, me respecting her wish for me to leave her alone, knowing I’d betrayed her. We’d spoken only when necessary ever since my return from Naharina. The only time we were in close proximity was in this room, teaching. Out of respect for Nefer’s feelings, I kept my distance at meals and in the evenings when all of the king’s wives and concubines gathered in the harem’s garden. We weren’t at the harem together all that often anymore anyway. I resided here only during the months Thut campaigned; the rest of the time I was with him in Waset or Mennefer. Nefer was often absent too, overseeing construction projects for the king throughout Kemet. If not for the hostages to teach I would have gone mad during the time I spent at the Faiyum, for Nefer wasn’t the only one of Thut’s wives who hadn’t accepted me in my new role. Not only did they still think of me as Nefer’s servant, they resented that I, ranked last among them, was clearly Thut’s favorite, and got to spend much more time with him than they. Even the concubines – all much younger and prettier than me – ignored me; they couldn’t believe that Thut would prefer me over them.

  The Overseer of the Royal Harem and the Teacher of the Royal Children looked at Nefer, uncertain.

  “That’ll be all for today,” she told the children and hostages.

  “May we go to the kap with you?” Meryetre–Hatshepsut’s daughters Iset and Nebetiunet chimed almost in unison. They were her oldest children, 15 and 17 respectively; Iset was named after Thut’s mother and so was her favorite.

  “Can we?” Meryetamun echoed. She was their younger sister, named after an older one with the same name who had died nine years earlier.

  “Of course,” Nefer said.

  Nefer and the girls headed towards the kap and I followed. Let it be a boy, I prayed to Bes, the protector of expectant mothers. Thut’s firstborn son by Sitiah, Amenemhat, had died two years ago, only weeks after our return from Naharina. Sitiah’s daughter Nefertiry, at age 26 Thut’s oldest living child, was now his heir, followed in order by Meryetre–Hatshepsut’s daughters. Ever since Amenemhat’s death Iset had been keeping a particularly close and suspicious eye on Nefer. She once again had the best claim to the throne if anything happened to Thut. And her succession was always a possibility; Thut was always at war with the Nine Bows, and war was always dangerous, as I personally could attest.

  I exited the education room. The open square shaded with palms in the center of the harem was crowded with women and children, gathering outside the kap to learn the outcome of the
royal birth. The rooms in the opposite wing that were usually filled with the clacking of looms were deserted and silent. The women standing between the education room and the kap next door to it stepped aside to let Nefer and me pass.

  We entered the kap. Only a few were allowed to access this most restricted part of the harem – wet nurses, children, magicians, a couple of overseers. The first room, the nursery, was full of the very youngest children. A few wet nurses sat on chairs cradling infants, each with their hair bound softly at the back of their head, with long locks falling over their shoulders, wearing a bodice covering that could be easily tossed back so a child could nurse. Most of them wore amulets shaped like the rising moon to ensure a supply of milk. On a shelf were flasks containing mothers’ milk, the pottery burnished red, shaped like a kneeling wet nurse holding a baby, the hair and eyes painted black. We moved as quietly as we could past the reed baskets of sleeping infants, all being cooled by serving girls slowly waving large ostrich feather fans.

  Meryetre–Hatshepsut had elected to have her baby in a large outdoor bower. We passed through the nursery door that led to the secluded area. A grove of trees provided cooling shade, their leaves rustling in the breeze. Images of the god Bes hung amid vines draped on trellises that screened the bower’s sides. Magic charms were scattered about the grass. Flowers perfumed the air. Two staffs topped with cow–goddess heads had been stabbed into the ground to one side, and a woman in a white skirt stood between them, a painted leather Bes mask over her face, impersonating the god. Several women were playing instruments and singing softly, several more were dancing.

  From the intensity of Meryetre–Hatshepsut’s moans and cries, I assumed her time was close.

  The bower was crowded. Neit, the chief royal nurse, and Nebamun, steward of Thut’s wife Nebtu, and his wife Resti were observing from near the doorway. Meryetre–Hatshepsut’s mother Huy was present as well, concern etched on her face. Meryetre–Hatshepsut had borne three boys in a row after her youngest daughter’s birth; none had survived.

  The other wives waited along one side of the bower, seated on portable chairs – Menhet, Menwi, Merti, Sitiah, Nebtu. Sitiah’s mother, Ipu, was at her side; I thought this birth must be a hard thing for Sitiah to bear, having lost her son and the opportunity to someday succeed Iset as ruler of the king’s harem. If the new child was a boy, she’d lose her titles as Great Wife and God’s Wife to Meryetre–Hatshepsut as well. Iset observed the king’s wife’s labor from a luxurious throne. She glared at both Nefer and me. Young Iset went to stand beside her and the old woman placed an affectionate hand on the girl’s shoulder.

  Several of Thut’s older concubines were also present, though apart from the wives, amulets of Bes and Taweret and Hathor draped around their necks. The younger, those still trying to have children, wore fertility amulets shaped like penises and breasts and genitals, as well as cowry shell girdles.

  Meryetre–Hatshepsut was already squatting, naked, her buttocks resting on two birth bricks, hands on her knees, a fan bearer cooling her. Her body was wet with sweat. A Bes amulet of clay was attached to a band circling her brow. Around her neck was a hippo–shaped Taweret amulet – she was the goddess who protected pregnant women – and a knot–shaped tyet amulet. The birth bricks invoked Meskhent, the goddess of fate who governed the future of newborns, the bricks transformed into magical objects by the symbols and magic spells painted on every surface. Now magical, they had taken on the aspect of the akhet – the birth of the sun god Re between two mountains on the horizon. The bricks represented the mountains; the baby’s emerging head would represent the sun.

  Aachel was at Meryetre–Hatshepsut’s side, an arm across her shoulders, lips near her ear, speaking to her in a low, comforting voice. Having herself borne seven daughters, Aachel had more experience than any of us in what was about to happen. She’d taken up residence in the Faiyum just a month ago, joining her youngest daughter, Beset, thirteen now, who had replaced me as Nefer’s companion immediately after my marriage. Hori had died of a scorpion’s sting three months ago. He’d been buried on the hill of Qurna in a fine tomb he’d prepared for himself years earlier when he was Amun’s second prophet. Nefer and I had both returned to Waset for his funeral and had brought Aachel back to the Faiyum with us. There was nothing for her in Waset anymore, except memories; all of her daughters except Beset were married, with families of their own, and she had no one else to care for her. A decade earlier Hapu, Opener of the Gate of Heaven, had died, and Iset had convinced Thut to replace him with Menkheperreseneb, one of her favorites, a man who already served the king as Superintendent of the Gold and Silver Treasuries and Chief of the Overseers of Craftsmen. Menkheperreseneb had worked closely at Ipet–Isut with Amun’s Divine Adoratrix Huy, Meryetre–Hatshepsut’s mother. In fact, there were those who believed that Iset had convinced Thut to marry Meryetre–Hatshepsut in order to better control the Amun priests through Huy. Once Hori died, Menkheperreseneb had unceremoniously evicted Aachel from the home in which she had spent decades of her life. I never doubted for an instant that Iset was behind it, taking advantage of another opportunity to hurt Nefer through her friends. This particular machination had backfired though, for Nefer had taken Aachel into her household where she could be with her every day.

  Fortunately, both Nefer and I had spent much time in Waset in the past few years, though never together, and so had seen much of Hori before his passing. Thut’s campaigns had filled the royal treasury to overflowing, and Thut was using that wealth to build as no king before him had done, especially at Ipet–Isut. Nefer had supervised most of those improvements and had resided for months at a time in the southern capital. As for me, when in Waset I was Thut’s preferred companion and spent almost all his free time with him. We raced in his chariot on the desert, drifted down the river in the royal boat, hunted, played games, read the ancient literature he admired so much. Since our marriage, our love had grown to the point that sometimes I felt my heart would burst. As it grew, so had Iset’s enmity towards me. She still considered me Nefer’s ally and thought Thut had made a grave mistake marrying a commoner. She’d gone so far as to accuse me to my face of using magic to seduce him. For my part, I ignored her. I never once worried that Thut would take Iset’s part over me, as he had hers over Nefer.

  Nefer moved to Meryetre–Hatshepsut’s side. Aachel welcomed her with a smile. Huy, the suffering woman’s mother, standing opposite Aachel, acknowledged her. Huy and Nefer’s relationship was complicated. They’d been friends when Nefer was God’s Wife of Amun, but after Thut married Huy’s daughter, Iset had convinced her that Nefer was her daughter’s rival, and so they treated each other coolly. Huy was mopping her daughter’s brow with a piece of linen. I stepped to Meryetre–Hatshepsut’s side and reached behind her to loosen her tightly–bound hair, an old ritual that was supposed to release the baby from the womb.

  “You’re not needed here,” Nefer told me icily.

  I heard a few snickers from the other wives.

  I retreated to where they waited, my face flaming red, embarrassed, shamed by Nefer’s harshness.

  Huy released her daughter’s hair.

  Nefer chanted the appropriate spell: “Hathor, the Lady of Dendera, is the one giving birth.”

  Though the spell was supposed to transfer Meryetre–Hatshepsut’s pain to the goddess, from her continued cries, it hadn’t.

  A serving girl handed Nefer a cup of beer and Nefer held it to Meryetre–Hatshepsut’s lips. She sipped it to ease her labor pains and looked at Nefer gratefully. Normally, she had nothing to do with Nefer. None of Thut’s wives did, their ears filled with Iset’s ravings, except the foreign ones, but Meryetre–Hatshepsut had other concerns just now besides Nefer being a threat to displace her child as king, if he was a boy.

  In less than an hour Meryetre–Hatshepsut delivered her child. I held my breath.

  “There’s a new Falcon in the Nest!” Aachel announced joyously, holding up the blood–covered infant
for all to see. He began to squall, and we wives gathered close around the new mother to see him. He looked healthy and I thanked the gods. Meryetre–Hatshepsut was drenched with sweat and laughing and crying at the same time. I knew Thut would be extremely pleased. But not for the first time was my happiness tinged with sadness; every time a wife or concubine bore Thut a child it reminded me of what I was missing. I was barren. Like Nefer, I would have to content myself with mothering my hostages and the children of others.

  Aachel placed the child into the arms of Senetnay, a noble’s young wife, chosen as wet nurse. She would suckle the new heir to the throne for the next three years to keep him safe from contaminated water. He’d be the second child at her breast; her own son, Mutnofret, was but a month old. He’d be raised in the harem alongside his milk–brother and future king.

  “My son shall be the second to bear the name Amenhotep – ‘Amun is Pleased, Ruler of Iunu,’” Meryetre–Hatshepsut announced wearily, as Aachel mopped more sweat from her brow. “Thutmose himself selected the name.”

  Senetnay carried the child from the bower towards the nursery, where he would be washed and then fed. Half the wives trailed after her excitedly. The rest helped Meryetre–Hatshepsut to an adjoining room in the kap where a pool of warm water waited. They would bathe her, anoint her, burn incense, feed her honey cakes and beer, then put her to bed for well–deserved sleep. She would remain in a special area of the harem for the next fourteen days, until she was fully cleansed of the birth; that whole time she’d wear only a collar and girdle, with her hair tied up, attended by numerous serving women and her fellow wives.

  Aachel gently took hold of my elbow and pulled me to one side of the bower as everyone left.

  “You see how it is with Nefer and me,” I said sadly.

  “I had no idea things had gotten this bad, Mery. She was civil to you on the boat when I came from Waset.”

  “She didn’t want to add to your sorrow over Hori’s death. Neither of us did. But now…”