Dreamers

by Angela Hunt

  Yosef’s heart thumped against his rib cage. If he had not heard the voice of a man, then God spoke to him—but why?

  “Will you speak again?” he whispered.

  No answer came in the night; he heard nothing but the scattered breathing of his fellow slaves. After a long moment, Yosef lay down again and made an effort to calm his pounding heart. Eventually he withdrew into a thin and dreamless sleep.

  Tuya readied her brightest smile the next morning, but the smile died on her lips as Yosef approached the well. Hollows lay beneath his eyes, dark, bluish-gray circles. He looked as if he hadn’t slept at all.

  “Are you ill?” she whispered, hurrying to his side.

  He gave her a polite smile that did not reach his eyes. “I am fine.”

  “You wear the face of a man who has been troubled by dreams.”

  “Would that I had been. I slept little last night.”

  Tuya felt the thin, cold blade of foreboding slice into her heart. Yosef had been fine before their meeting with the master and he had gone to bed immediately afterward. Apart from Potiphar’s suggestion of freedom and marriage, what could have kept him awake all night? Since no slave would refuse liberty, Yosef’s distress could only have come from the idea of marrying her.

  “Did our master’s promise…upset you?” she croaked, barely able to force the words past her unwilling lips.

  His face emptied of expression. “I can’t talk now. Let us begin our work, Tuya.”

  The sudden heaviness in Tuya’s chest felt like a millstone. She dropped her water buckets and sat on a bench. “Can’t we talk now?”

  “No.” His voice was as gentle as his words were disturbing. “I am not ready to talk about the future.” A host of emotions struggled beneath the surface of his handsome face. “Some things cannot be shared before they ripen into clear thoughts.”

  “Even with one who loves you?” Tuya whispered, lifting her eyes to his.

  Right or wrong, she’d said it. No slave dared to love another, for a life of slavery was too transitory and fleeting, but she’d just admitted her love to Yosef. Her feelings had grown in the past year; they now ran far deeper than affection and stronger than the pleasure of their stolen embraces.

  “Tuya—” he began, his voice thick.

  “I love you, Yosef.” She slipped from the bench to fall at his feet. “I would follow you to the end of Egypt if the master were to sell you. If Anubis opened the road of the underworld for you, I would follow into death’s darkness and find you in the gardens of paradise—”

  “Tuya!” Yosef knelt beside her, gripping her arms in his strong hands. All shadows of restraint fled from his face as his eyes blazed. “Such fierce longing can bring only sorrow and pain.”

  “So you have loved,” she whispered, wilting in his grasp like a thirsty lotus blossom. “At last the gods have put a figure on the barrier that stands between us. Who is she, Yosef? A Canaanite girl?”

  “No.” He stood and regarded her with sadness in his eyes. “Not a girl—my father loved me with the love you speak of. And now he thinks me dead while I, who would have been his heir, am enslaved in a heathen land.”

  Her feminine perception instantly understood. Yosef’s heart had not been wounded by lost love, but by the grief of separation.

  “Beloved,” Tuya whispered, rising. “Don’t you think we all understand what you’re feeling? Every slave has a story like yours, for we lost our families when we lost our freedom. I have never known a mother or father, but I have grown accustomed to my place. And you, Yosef, remember how our master trusts you! He could not be more proud if you were his son. He believes you are blessed by the gods.”

  “Potiphar believes in no one but himself,” Yosef answered, folding his arms. “But last night when I considered running away, God spoke to my heart…and I know I am to remain in Egypt. Perhaps my father could accept my death more easily than he could accept me—” Yosef swept his hand over his body to indicate the bronze collar at his neck and the linen skirt of a slave “—like this.”

  A lump formed in Tuya’s throat at the thought of Yosef leaving, but she clutched at the hope that Yosef’s god approved of their love.

  “Surely your god is wise,” she answered, leaning close. “Surely he can be trusted. You have trusted him thus far—”

  “I have had no choice.” Yosef looked past her toward the great blue bowl of sky. “He is the nameless longing, the voice who called Avraham out of Ur. He set a dream in my heart, and called me away from the bosom of my father. Now he bids me trust him.”

  “Trust him, then,” Tuya said, wrapping her arms around his narrow waist. Not caring who might see, she placed her cheek against the smooth skin of Yosef’s chest and heard the proud beating of his heart. “Trust your god, Yosef. As Potiphar trusts in your common sense and I trust in the strong arm of Montu, trust in your god and all will be well.”

  Chapter Nine

  Potiphar bristled as Narmer entered his bedchamber and extended a scroll bearing a seal from the king’s scribe. “Why does Pharaoh send a message instead of calling for me?” Potiphar asked, sliding his weary legs from beneath a linen sheet. “Even at this late hour I have often been summoned to the royal presence.”

  The young courtier regarded Potiphar with a look of unutterable boredom, but no amount of studied nonchalance could conceal the jealousy in his eyes or the disdain in his posture. Yet the man never failed to shine in Pharaoh’s presence.

  Narmer lifted a shoulder in a shrug. “The king thought it best to send his wishes with me,” he said, underscoring his position in Pharaoh’s confidence. “Perhaps you should not keep him waiting.”

  Scowling, Potiphar broke the seal on the scroll and read the message penned there:

  In life, prosperity, health, and in favor of Amon-Re, king of the gods, and of the Ka of King Amenhotep II. Greetings, Potiphar, most trusted guard of Pharaoh. The empire enlarged by my father, Tuthmosis III, may his name be ever praised, has experienced turmoil in the eastern nomes along the river known as Euphrates. I am ready to vent my displeasure on these rebel chieftains, and await your presence for this venture. Come at once, and do not delay. Narmer waits to bring you to me.

  The scroll had been sealed with Pharaoh’s official scarab, and Potiphar knew he could not waste a moment of the king’s patience. “I will make ready at once,” he murmured, not looking up. “You will wait outside in my reception rooms. I will send a girl to wash your feet.”

  Narmer held up a defensive hand. “I would not stop to wash my feet while the king waits.”

  “Nevertheless, you shall, for I am not ready,” Potiphar answered, standing. With shameless efficiency he propelled Narmer toward the doorway. When he saw Tuya walking in the corridor, he clapped his hands. “Tuya! Take this messenger to the central hall and wash his hands and feet.”

  “I am not, Lord Potiphar, a mere messenger,” Narmer said, fury lurking beneath his smile.

  “Today you are,” Potiphar answered with an easy grin. “Our divine pharaoh will not mind if you are a moment out of his presence. And I will have you back at the palace before your youthful face can sprout its next pimple.”

  Narmer flushed and clenched his fists, but he followed Tuya.

  Potiphar stalked back into his chamber, indignation seething beneath his breastbone. The trouble lay in his spending too much time at home. Of late his villa had become a refuge from the pitfalls of the palace, but while Potiphar was away, a new cat had come to toy with the royal favor. The smell of ambition rose from Narmer like a cheap perfume, and Amenhotep was wily enough to goad his old friend and fellow soldier with a fresh and competitive face.

  This Narmer would not act high and mighty for long. I may be an old cat, Potiphar thought, stepping into a fresh kilt and fastening a belt at his waist, but I have learned tricks from the wisest souls in this world and the one beyond.

  Abruptly, he bellowed for Paneah.

  The dim haze of sleep still filled Yosef’s head w
hen he entered Potiphar’s chamber and stooped to help his master dress.

  “I must go away,” Potiphar said as Yosef strapped on his sandals, “and I am leaving the household in your care. I cannot say how long this whim of Pharaoh’s will last, for something has aroused the bloodlust in him. We are traveling to the eastern dominions and back, a journey of some months.”

  The sleep haze vanished like fog before the sun. “Through the lands of Canaan?” Yosef asked, not looking up. Did he dare suggest that he accompany Potiphar? The army might cross the lands of Yaakov, might even encounter the family. Yosef could return to his father in the company of the foremost military general of the world’s greatest king. He could repay his brothers’ treachery with righteous vengeance; in one bold move reveal that ten of Yaakov’s sons were fiends and one, thought dead, alive and strong.

  “Of course we’ll pass through Canaan,” Potiphar snapped, fumbling with the leopard-skin belt that held his dagger. “The Mitanni tribes are causing trouble, probably feuding with the Hittites.”

  Yosef finished fastening the sandals and reached up to hook the enclosure of the dagger belt. “You might have use for a servant on the journey.”

  The master’s brows knitted in a frown. “I have ten thousand soldiers at my bidding, Paneah,” he said, his voice surprisingly gentle. “What I need—what I have never had till now—is a home waiting when I return. I place you in charge of everything you find here. Speak with my full authority and act as my steward.”

  Narmer stalked into the room as Potiphar finished speaking. With a superior smirk, he lifted a jeweled hand and pointed to Yosef. “Dare you leave your house in the care of a slave? You will have nothing when we return, for even this boy will run away.” He snickered. “Can Potiphar’s renowned wisdom be fading?”

  “My gift of discernment is still strong,” Potiphar answered, not bothering to look at the younger man as he made a last-minute check of his person. “I would trust Paneah with my life.”

  He turned to Yosef and lowered his voice, his eagle eye staring down his nose. “I trust you, Paneah, with all I have. Do not prove my intuition wrong.”

  Yosef straightened. “I will not, my lord.”

  Potiphar nodded, then scowled out the doorway.

  Rebellious would-be kings from the northeastern provinces of Carchemish and Tegarama had amassed a sizable force, but their troops proved no match for the swift battalions of Pharaoh’s golden warriors. The well-organized Egyptian army, comprised of both infantry and chariot troops, flew across the desert like a whirlwind, churning up sand and wind and debris. The chariots, each manned by two soldiers and two horses, were made of the lightest wood available and designed so wounded horses could be unstrapped and the chariot hauled by prisoners of war if necessary. Behind the chariots came the infantry—foot soldiers carrying spears, shields and battleaxs to wipe the field clean of enemy troops that might have survived the first onslaught.

  Potiphar rode next to Amenhotep’s own chariot. The king’s charioteer, a grizzled veteran of several foreign wars, held the horses steady as the king bellowed and sent arrows in a whistling cloud toward the enemy. Potiphar preferred the battle-ax to the bow. His weapon, a curved golden blade resting in a silver-shafted handle, had been blessed by Pharaoh and had never failed to leave a battle without tasting blood.

  The ground around them bristled with enemy arrows, but Amenhotep’s courage did not fail. Delighting in the combat, he sent his arrows flying into waves of approaching rebels. A descending arrow glanced off the king’s forehead, and blood from the wound transformed his features into a glistening mask that did more to discourage his foes than the overwhelming Egyptian weaponry. Whether from fear or intimidation, the enemy fell back, and Potiphar smiled in grim relief. This battle would not last long.

  When at last the rebels threw down their weapons, scores of men lay motionless on the ground, the life gone out of them like an extinguished light. Potiphar drove his weary horses to Pharaoh’s chariot and bowed. “A good victory, my king,” he said, taking pains to keep his voice strong and pleasant. “Are we ready to turn for home?”

  “By all the gods, no!” Amenhotep roared, his eyes still shining with the thrill of combat. “I will follow in my father’s footsteps and subdue these troublesome kings again. We will march from this place to the river Euphrates, and there I will raise a stela of victory to record my accomplishments and military successes. We will return to the Nile with a host of captive kings to sacrifice to Egypt’s gods, and the tale will go forth from this place. None of these will rise up against Egypt again!”

  Potiphar forced a smile. “I will tell the men,” he said, gathering the reins of his chariot. “Rest well, my king. May the morrow bring yet another victory.”

  Chapter Ten

  Slanting sunlight shimmered off the glowing green foliage of the trees; the day was far too pretty to waste. From the gate of Potiphar’s villa, Tuya called to Yosef. “Will you never finish? The festival is beginning!”

  “The cattle and sheep don’t know today is a feast day,” Yosef grumbled, striding out of the stockyard. He left his box of papyrus scrolls with the gatekeeper and paused to give the man instructions. No one worked during the Feast of Opet, but Yosef seemed determined that neither Potiphar’s fields nor his livestock would feel neglect during the holiday.

  Yosef stepped out of the gatehouse and gave Tuya a smile as bright as the sun. “Your escort awaits you, my lady.”

  A deep sense of happiness flooded Tuya’s soul as she took Yosef’s arm. With Potiphar away, she could almost imagine that she and Yosef were lord and lady of the house. For nearly a full year Yosef had handled the estate with a firm hand, monitoring the servants who ran the fields and the stockyard and managing to keep Pharaoh’s tax collectors at bay while he stockpiled Potiphar’s crops and treasures. When and if the master returned from his military foray, he would find himself a vastly wealthy man.

  Tuya took a deep breath of the dry air and enjoyed the warmth of the sun on her face. The rising sun had swallowed up the wind, and the dazzling blur of the sun-god’s boat stood proud and fixed in the white-blue sky. Heat covered the city like a blanket, but Tuya felt deliciously cool in the exquisite white linen sheath she had sewn for herself. As fine as any lady’s gown, the loose garment fastened at the shoulders with delicate tassels. A pair of red leather slippers adorned her feet, and she felt especially pampered because yellow scented saffron oil perfumed her arms and neck. The precious scent had been a gift from Yosef, and she had protested its extravagance when he slipped the vial into her hand.

  “Potiphar’s name will be praised when people see that even his slaves conduct themselves like royalty,” Yosef murmured, giving her a heart-stopping smile. “And when they see you, my beautiful Tuya, Potiphar’s reputation will ascend to the heavens.”

  So she had relented, hoping that the sweet scent would draw Yosef to her in the way a flower attracts a bee. Like any man who loves work, he found it difficult to relax, but Tuya took his hand and led him through the streets, explaining the meaning of the festival ceremonies and the altars and stelae that had been set up to commemorate the occasion.

  “The festival begins when the shrine of the god Amon is carried from the dark chamber of his temple at Karnak into the sunlight,” Tuya whispered, pulling Yosef through a jostling crowd of merrymakers who vied for a spot along the riverbank.

  “Why does the god wish to leave his temple?”

  “Well—” Tuya blushed “—he goes each year to visit his harem at the temple of Southern Opet.”

  Yosef laughed, his eyes twinkling with mischief. “And what pleasure can a harem give a god of stone?”

  “Quiet!” Tuya glanced around, afraid someone would overhear his blasphemy. “Who knows what the gods do? Men cannot see into the underworld. We cannot divine things of the spirit.”

  “Perhaps we can,” Yosef answered, but Tuya wasn’t in the mood for one of his debates. Craning her neck, she pointed toward the
river. “Here they come! Closer, Yosef, stand here. You’ve never seen anything like this!”

  He didn’t answer, but rested his hands on her hips as they swayed in the throng along the riverbank. They heard the anticipatory roar of the crowd, then the whine of the priests’ horns and the pounding of the drum. Finally the god’s cedar-wood barge came into view. On the flat platform a host of bald priests in long white robes stood guard over an object swathed in white linen and supported by a gleaming altar. Many in the crowd fell to their knees as the barge passed, and petitions to the great god Amon filled the air.

  “Merciful Amon, hear my cry!”

  “Restore unto me the money I have lost!”

  “Amon, hear the plea of a childless woman!”

  “Amon-Re, grant our king safety and return him to the land!”

  The barge did not travel under its own power, but teams of horses on both sides of the river’s banks pulled it forward. The pious pilgrims closest to the banks scattered as the animals approached, but a few of the most fervent dashed beneath the ropes as if they meant to swim out and personally present their petitions to the god. The appearance of leather-skinned crocodiles in the water kept even the most religious celebrants on shore, however, and within a few moments the god’s barge had passed.

  “Now the real excitement comes,” Tuya promised, smiling at Yosef. Behind the sacred god came the gold-plated barge of Pharaoh, commanded in the king’s absence by Queen Merit Amon. On this barge the queen and the high priest of Amon made continual offerings of food and incense to the god, while on the riverbank opposite them paraded a great host that included befeathered Nubian drummers, a band of lute players, scantily clad acrobats, blind harpists and Egypt’s finest wrestlers. A company of soldiers in the gilded chariots of Pharaoh’s guard followed, their standards lowered to indicate that their captain was away.