Shaven and properly wigged, he took up a small brush made of a single river reed and sprinkled a pinch of dark powder from a jar into a carved circular indention on a wooden palette. Mixing in a few drops of water, he dipped the reed and pulled the corner of one eye out toward his ear. Carefully balancing the brush, he swooped the dark liner down the inner length of his eyelid. He repeated the procedure with the other eye and quickly lined the outer part of his eyelids in the dark kohl mixture.
No one who had been in the country more than a few days would go without the dark liner after realizing the relief that the eye-paint brought from the glare of the white-hot sun off the sand. But the thought did flicker through his mind, and not for the first time, of what a roughened man his age who had lived his life out in the Deshret would think to see such attention given to one’s appearance.
Zaphenath slipped his arms through the sleeves of a light linen tunic, spun so fine as to be nearly transparent against his skin. The material was creased with slim, soft folds and fell to his knees, extending no further than the kilt worn beneath. He cinched the tunic around his waist with an extra strip of fine linen and tied it to one side.
He reached for his amulet: a small golden disk dangling from a delicate golden chain, pounded thin like a burst of sun, with a single blue stone of lapis lazuli set in the midst of the burning orb. It had been a gift from Asenath when Zaphenath had been admitted to her father’s powerful priesthood. Though Zaphenath was not a man to wear amulets and did not keep any small god-statues inside his house, he kept this one emblem of the Light-of-All-the-World, given to him by the woman whose very presence was light and life. He wore it around his neck, close to his heart, beneath the elegant and more elaborate golden chain presented to him by the king when he had become tjaty over all the land of Kemet.
Last of all, he slipped on the signet ring the king had presented to him as a symbol of his new identity. Also made of gold, the ring bore an inscription of the name he had received upon becoming vizier: I am the king, and without thee shall no man lift up his hand or foot in all the land of Kemet, and thou shalt be called Zaphenath-Paaneah.
Clothed in the authority of the state and its priesthood, his place clearly designated within a country highly conscious of its hierarchies, Zaphenath walked down the corridor that led from the private rooms of his villa and out into the central courtyard. Open to the sky, the courtyard marked the boundary between the public and private areas of the grand house. A handful of servants were already bustling through, carrying laundry or arranging flowers. Zaphenath nodded to those he passed as he headed toward a small room where he stored his scrolls and conducted his business when away from the king’s court.
“Well,” Zaphenath said, walking into the scroll room, “good morning.”
A much younger man, also clothed in a linen kilt, was already in the room, bent over a low table with an unrolled length of papyrus. He was gesturing to one portion of the open scroll and talking to a man nearer Zaphenath’s age, who kept his bald head uncovered and had a well-fed belly that protruded over the edge of his kilt.
The younger man inclined his head. “Tjaty.”
The older man looked annoyed. “This young one thinks there’s a problem with my record keeping.”
Zaphenath stepped next to the table and looked down at the scroll. “You think there’s a problem with the record keeping?” he asked, smiling slightly.
The younger man looked serious. “Tjaty, I’m trying to get all the necessary information assembled before we have to make a presentation”—here he shot a look at the servant, as if the man had perhaps failed to grasp the gravity of the situation—“to the king.”
Zaphenath glanced down at the scroll. “Second month of Shemu.”
The older servant shrugged. “I do the best I can, you know.”
“You do very well.” Zaphenath looked at his young assistant. “What scroll do you need, Amon?”
Amon looked at the older servant again. “The fourth month of Shemu.”
Zaphenath bent down beside a wooden box set on the floor near the table. Nimbly untying the leather straps, he lifted the lid and pulled out another scroll, unrolling the papyrus far enough to verify the dates. “Here,” he said, rerolling the scroll and handing it to his servant. “Try this one.”
Amon held out his hand, and the older servant handed over the incorrect scroll.
Zaphenath took the scroll from Amon. “Someone must have put it back in the wrong order.” He set the scroll back into the box and stood, glancing at Amon. “Not everyone has the headache of learning how to read.”
The old servant grunted. “Do you need anything else?”
“Just those, I presume,” Zaphenath said, gesturing toward a handful of other scrolls already set out on the table.
“Tjaty,” Amon said, “we’re going to be late.”
“Well,” Zaphenath said, “come on, then,” and he turned and walked out of the scroll room.
Amon scooped up the other papyrus records and moved briskly after his master.
Zaphenath’s older servant bent and carefully tied the leather straps, securing the box of scrolls once more.
Hot, sandy wind gusted around Zaphenath’s bare legs as he moved along. He waved away a pestering fly that kept darting at his face.
“I’m sure the king will be eager to hear your report about the viability of the additional acreage,” Amon said. He was doing his best to keep up while balancing the scrolls in his arms. Two guards walked behind them, with two more in front. “I’ve finished the comparisons you requested, and I think the plots that we’ve examined have high potential for future growth. The more marshland we can turn toward viable agriculture, the better for the recovery from the famine.”
“So you think I should include the other sectors in my report?” Zaphenath asked.
“Oh,” Amon nodded, “absolutely.”
Zaphenath blinked in the glare of the morning sun, the dark kohl lining around his eyes deflecting only so much light off the sand. A trickle of sweat escaped from beneath his wig. “How is your father?” he asked, taking another swat at the diving fly.
The young man gave a serious-faced nod. “Well enough. He retains his strength.”
“I’m glad.” Zaphenath smiled. “I know he’s proud of you.”
They were beyond the riverfront area where the grand villas lay alongside the River. The crowds of travelers had begun to grow thicker; bodies pushed and jostled, and the mingled melodies of foreign languages rose from within the tumult. The loose linen garments, smoothly scraped skin, and made-up faces of the People were a sharp contrast to the scruffier merchants and sojourners who had come from the surrounding deserts and whose clothing and bodies bore the wear of several weeks of travel.
Zaphenath saw Amon wrinkle his nose slightly as they passed two ruffle-haired, bearded men wearing coarse woolen garments and arguing with each other in some incomprehensible language.
“You’ve never traveled beyond the borders of Kemet, have you?” Zaphenath said, watching his young assistant.
Amon shook his head. He glanced back at the bearded men. “There’s no reason to go out into the Deshret.”
Zaphenath glanced back as well. “The famine doesn’t know that.”
They pushed on, the guards prodding the crowd apart. A four-sided mud-brick structure, whitewashed and guarded, rose up against the horizon. The building was one of several granaries dotting the landscape, sheltering the grain gathered over the past several years against the foretold famine that had since swept across the land.
A line of people, their bodies glistening in the heat, empty baskets in hand, snaked up toward where the grain was measured and distributed. Grumbling workers lazily waved the waiting people through the line. Each transaction was carefully recorded by a squinting, sweating scribe sitting on a low wooden bench next to the doorway.
When the guards at the front of the line caught sight of the approaching visitors, they barked out an order
that even the foreigners could understand. People quickly moved aside and created a path for Zaphenath.
The first granary guard they passed quickly lowered his head. “Tjaty.”
Zaphenath thanked the man and glanced over his shoulder at the massed hopefuls, waiting with their empty baskets. Most were native workers arriving for their pay in grain. Some, however, stood with produce to trade or carried small ducks and geese, or even, if quite a lot of grain was desired, pigs or goats. A few of the hopefuls, especially the foreigners, had brought jewelry or precious metals to exchange.
The vizier moved toward the soldiers stationed beside the granary entrance, where workers within were hauling grain up from storage silos beneath the ground. Much of the kingdom’s wealth lay in these structures, spread throughout the land and administered carefully by watchful overseers. The overseers, in turn, were carefully administered by Zaphenath, whose authority extended over nearly all of the resources of the land of Kemet and her powerful king.
The two officials greeted Zaphenath in the usual deferential manner.
“We need the report of your grain levels,” Amon announced on behalf of his master, “for official business.”
The sweating scribe had already risen to his feet, wiping his forehead. He held a wilted sheet of pounded papyrus, partially rolled, on which he had been recording the transactions.
“Levels are lower, Excellency,” the official admitted. “The famine seems to be striking the foreign peoples much harder. They were unprepared.”
Zaphenath nodded, eyes darting over the numbers. “As we anticipated, then,” he murmured.
Amon held out his hand, and the scribe blew a dry breath over the freshest characters before handing over the record. Amon took the papyrus and unrolled the scroll several inches further, then nodded as well.
“Thank you,” Zaphenath said. The scribe bowed. “And for your good service, all of you.”
The two officials inclined their heads in acceptance of their superior’s praise. Straightening, the senior of the two barked out, “All hail Zaphenath-Paaneah, vizier of the land of Kemet and the People!”
The native People bowed at the pronouncement of Zaphenath’s identity. But a handful of coarsely appareled, heavily bearded men hesitated, observing the others before likewise kneeling. Their confused delay caught Zaphenath’s eye. Usually merchants traveled alone, or perhaps in pairs, but these men did not appear to be merchants.
After a moment, Amon and the two officials followed the vizier’s gaze.
Without turning, Zaphenath asked quietly, “Who are those men?”
The officials glanced at one another. “We’ll find out,” one promised. He gestured to the scribe standing beside them. “He can talk to them.”
The scribe was clothed in a thin linen kilt, and his head was cleanly shaved. But Zaphenath looked at the bone structure of his face, the coloration of darkened skin that came from long exposure to the sun rather than by birth, and the shading on his cheek that indicated where a bold beard would have grown.
“Translate,” the official ordered.
The scribe bowed and looked toward the kneeling foreigners in their shaggy clothes. Then he walked down the line toward the men, as ordered. Amon began to follow, but Zaphenath waved him back and followed instead, the familiar footfalls of two of his guards trailing behind him. By this time, several of the People waiting for grain had begun to raise their eyes, also watching.
“Are you one of the ‘Aamu?” Zaphenath asked the scribe, falling into step beside the man. The ‘Aamu, nomadic desert tribes who lived to the north and east of Kemet, usually stayed in the country only as other men’s slaves.
The man looked at Zaphenath, then inclined his head, averting his eyes. “Yes, Tjaty.”
The assembled grain buyers watched warily as the vizier approached. The fame of his predictions about the famine and the story of his elevation by the king had spread throughout the kingdom; it was whispered he was a man endowed with almost mythical powers of magic. When he slowed before the foreign tribesmen, the men hesitantly half-raised their faces. The whole bundle of visitors—how many of them were there?—had full beards, some thicker than others, and all peppered with gray and silver streaks, as if the withering desert sun had burned out all the color.
“Ask them who they are,” Zaphenath ordered.
The scribe quickly addressed the men in a foreign tongue more often heard in the slave markets. The travelers glanced at one another and began murmuring back and forth. Then one whose beard was thicker and grayer than the others spoke in reply.
“We are men of Canaan,” he said, keeping his eyes downcast respectfully.
The scribe turned to Zaphenath, but the vizier was already staring fixedly at the man’s worn face with its broad cheekbones and heavy brows.
“They are Canaanites,” the scribe reported.
“Ask them their business,” Zaphenath said, his throat suddenly dry.
“We have come to buy grain,” the Canaanite replied, his voice low, addressing the translating scribe.
Zaphenath’s gaze moved over the faces of the other men, counting, feeling the pounding tighten within his chest. Eight, nine, ten . . .
Ten.
He scanned their faces again, blood thudding in his ears. Only ten.
“They are here to buy supplies,” the scribe confirmed.
Zaphenath closed his eyes, seeing suddenly, in a bright flash, a stalk of corn stretched out on the ground, prostrate beneath the onslaught of the famine my sheaf arose, and yours stood round about and the stars swirling in the expanse eleven stars, and the sun, and the moon and he tried to take a breath you all bowed before me—
“They wish to buy grain,” the translator reported.
“They lie,” Zaphenath said softly.
The translator leaned closer. “They—?”
Zaphenath turned his face toward the man who knelt at his feet. “You are spies from the ‘Aamu,” he said, “come to see the weakness of the People in this time of famine.”
Eyes wide, the scribe stumblingly repeated the message to the immediate outrage of the Canaanites. Babbling their protests, the men’s words tumbled over each other, and the one who had been speaking for them all vigorously shook his head.
“We are brothers,” he insisted. “We are simply brothers—”
The people who had been fortunate enough to gather for grain before the excitement began were all watching now, although those closest seemed to be making a subtle effort to move away from the accused men.
“Ten brothers from Canaan?” Zaphenath dismissed the claim with a wave of his hand.
“More yet, my lord,” the man insisted, nearly speaking over the translator in his haste. “We were twelve, but the youngest is not with us—”
“Another brother?” Zaphenath looked at him. “You have another brother?”
The man shrank back, not understanding the official’s words but clearly unsettled by the tone of his voice. The scribe spoke to him to clarify the meaning. The man murmured an explanation.
“The youngest,” came the translated reply, “is not with us. And the other . . . is not.”
A breeze rose up, stirring the hems of the heavy desert robes, rustling across the sand in the quiet that followed.
Zaphenath turned and raised a hand. The Canaanite tribesmen cried out in protest, struggling in confusion against the approach of the guards until one brother, who until then had been silent, began to speak, raising and lowering his flattened palms, as if ordering the others to soothe themselves, to lie flat, to be still.
“Do not fight,” he hissed. “This is a mistake. Do not fight them . . .”
The guards hustled the protesting men to their feet. Zaphenath saw the confusion in their stumbling movements.
“Tell them,” Zaphenath said, voice low, “that one of them will bring this youngest brother back, if he exists. If he does not, then that one can tell of how the People deal with spies.”
As
they were led away, only one—the one who had spoken in an effort to calm the others—turned back.
But Zaphenath turned away from the man’s gaze. He walked back toward where Amon and the officials were waiting for him and apologized for disrupting their work. The officials quickly shrugged, eager to express their lack of displeasure toward this man whose extraordinary command had just been exercised in their presence—the man whose influence was supreme over every law court in the country.
“Excellency.” Amon inclined his head. “The king will be waiting for us.”
And so the vizier went on his way, separated from all present by the almost tangible veil of power, while the officials gestured for the next citizens to move forward. Keep coming. Don’t hold up the line.
But the scribe stood apart, watching the vizier and wondering why the man had used a translator when he so clearly understood everything that had been said.
Chapter 4
Genesis 42:17
Huddled in the darkness, the men from Canaan crowded into their own corner of the prison—the royal prison, though they were unaware of the distinction. They were separated from their freedom by a mud-brick wall, unbroken except for a single small window, cut out and barred with stiff wooden poles so that the guards could peer inside.
A handful of other prisoners, awaiting their own fates, shared the tight space, murmuring at the crowding arrival of this new band of men.
Judah found himself locking eyes, unintentionally, with a grizzled, thin-faced prisoner sitting in another corner and staring at the foreigners with dark, unblinking eyes.
“There was no reason to accuse us,” his oldest brother, Reuben, muttered, speaking in low tones to the brothers who sat around him with their knees pulled up to make room for the others.
“Everyone knows these people look down on—what do they call us?—desert dwellers.” The voice belonged to the second brother, Simeon, a tall, thin man with a slight beard, whose face favored their mother’s more than his broad-shouldered elder brother’s did.
“But we weren’t doing anything,” insisted Levi. “There was no reason—”
The Eleventh Brother Page 2
