Soon after Meritaten’s confinement, the Office of Foreign Correspondence received word that Suppiluliumas had signed a treaty of friendship with Mattiwaza, Tushratta’s successor in Mitanni, and was at present quiet, resting, no doubt, in the satisfaction of yet another conquest. He could afford to wait, to plan his moves carefully. Yet Tiye felt that Akhenaten was weakening. Though he railed at them, accused them of treason, retreated behind increasingly debilitating headaches and fits of nausea, she, Meritaten, Horemheb, and Ay had wrung from him permission to bring the army up to full strength. The border troops still maintained constant patrols, but the divisions of regular troops had long since been thinned. Horemheb ordered a conscription, the building of new barracks, and the refurbishing of weapons and chariots, and his officers were soon able to begin drilling the new recruits. Tiye, delighted, knew that word of Egypt’s stirring would quickly reach Suppiluliumas’s keen ears.
Like the echo of a long-dead voice, letters came for her from Thebes asking for personal confirmation of the army’s reorganization. Tiye listened to the dispatches with a feeling approaching awe. Malkatta seemed not only far away but already buried in a stagnant past. I, too, have been seduced by the strange magic that imbues Akhetaten, she realized. How long has it been since I have bothered to enquire into the health of other cities? Time seems suspended here, but what is happening in Akhmin, at Djarukha, Memphis? The spell that ends at the line where grass gives way to hostile desert keeps me a prisoner with distorted vision and deaf ears. I had intended to visit the Treasury and never did. I was anxious at the mere trickle of tribute that has since dried up altogether. What happened to my concern? Holding the scrolls that had been sealed with Amun’s imprint made her feel like a spirit. She sent for the Treasurer at once.
“The Treasury is depleted but by no means empty,” the man responded huffily to her sharp question. “Trade still exists between Egypt and the islands of the Great Green Sea.”
“Only there? What of Nubia and Rethennu?”
“Majesty, our hold on Nubia is rather weak at present, as you must know.”
“No, I did not know. Nubia is not a vassal; it is a part of Egypt. Why is our hold weak?”
“That is not my affair. I merely keep the tallies in my lord’s storehouses. But I believe that the Nubian tribes have been restless of late, and several Egyptian tribute collectors have vanished.”
“Well, what of the mines in Nubia? The gold routes?”
“Commander Horemheb has a monopoly on the taxes derived from Nubian gold, Goddess. Forgive me, but in this case you should address your questions to him.”
“I will. Rethennu?”
“There has been nothing from Kadesh for a year.”
“Then why is the Treasury not depleted?”
“Pharaoh has raised taxes substantially every year, particularly on the fellahin, and of course all offerings in Egypt that are made to other gods now come directly to Akhetaten.”
When she had dismissed him, she sat gnawing her lip and thinking furiously. The fellahin were cattle, but useful cattle without whom the country could not survive. If they were being taxed to their limit and probably beyond, Egypt could be brought down by any disaster that further threatened their survival—if war was declared and ran too long, if the Delta cattle became diseased, if the grape crop failed, if Isis did not cry. Our stability is as fragile as a reed stem, she told herself. The gold that showers these streets, the jewels with which the courtiers deck themselves, the delicacies, the exotic food, the constant stream of new dresses, not to mention the entertainers brought from beyond the Delta, all as solid as a puff of sand-laden wind. How can we pay for a war? She sent for Horemheb, but at her terse questions he regarded her as though she were already senile.
“Certainly the flow of gold has abated a little,” he replied. “I lose miners every day from death, but lately they have also been escaping. The gold route has become rather dangerous, so I pay for soldiers to stand guard at the mines and escort the gold to Thebes, from where it comes north by barge.”
“Your own soldiers? Paid with the gold they guard?”
“Certainly.”
“Horemheb, do you remember when the mines were guarded by a few overseers, when the gold traveled to Thebes unhindered and the Medjay did little more than check on its progress?”
“No, Majesty.” He was uneasy and genuinely did not understand her sudden panic. Aware of the uselessness of questioning him further, she dismissed him.
The New Year was celebrated at Akhetaten with the customary burst of optimism. Because Pharaoh had shrunk from issuing the order for mobilization Tiye had so desperately wanted, the rumor of war sank temporarily to a whisper. Akhenaten’s health had improved, and weak but smiling, he distributed the Gold of Favors to his physicians and other lesser officials in person from the garlanded Window of Appearances with Meritaten at his side. All settled down to wait for the Aten to decree the rising of the Nile, their thoughts on the sacks of seed in their storehouses, ready for the sowing.
But the Inundation was late. The month of Thoth passed, and the river remained a thin ribbon of muddy water flowing deep below the level of the dusty, cracked banks. There was some concern but no alarm, for the flood had been late before. The Aten was all-powerful and would not fail its obedient son. In anticipation of an answer to the prayers for a flood, worship intensified at Akhetaten. Crowds milled about the Great Temple’s fore-court and gathered three deep around the little shrines on the street corners, placatory gifts in their hands.
Paophi came and went, and still the level of the Nile did not change. The disgruntled courtiers had their pleasure craft hoisted onto land, for the river had begun to smell. The officials responsible for reporting on the speed and plenitude of the annual flooding sat under their canopies beside the nilometers, eyes fixed on the stone markers sunk in the banks, but the oily, stinking water still lapped below the first notches. Athyr passed. Khoyak, the month that had always marked the time of the river’s highest level, saw a drop in it instead as the dry air lifted moisture from the surface. The air became fetid and full of stinging in sects. Dismayed, the fellahin dug into their meager stores. Standing on the edge of their villages, they watched the cracks in their fields widen into gaping miniature ravines, the baked soil around them too hot to walk on. The trees did not leaf. The brown spears of the palm trees hung stiff and brittle, and the branches of the sycamores cracked off at the slightest touch.
At the beginning of Mekhir, when the peasants ought to have been ankle deep in black mud, strewing seeds, snakes began to invade Akhetaten, and scorpions sought the coolness of the rifts appearing everywhere in the ground. Morning and evening Tiye had her house searched by servants with sticks, and forbade milk to be left on the floors for the house snakes.
By the end of Pharmuti all accepted the fact that there would be no flood that year. Water steps all along the riverfront at Akhetaten hung stained and dry, feet above the thick, refuse-filled water. The shadufs that fed water to the gardeners brought up mud that seemed alive with unnameable worms and repulsive water insects. Pharaoh ordered servants to take their buckets into skiffs and lift water bodily from the river for the gardens, and gave permission for the lakes to be emptied. Tiye, sitting on the roof of her house and looking across the hollow valley where the river now trickled to the brown desert on the other side, thought that the gardens should also have been sacrificed to provide enough water for the fields opposite to grow a small crop for the palace. But Akhenaten refused, still believing that water would come.
“It is a test,” he told Tiye as they sat in his audience hall. “Our faith is being tried.” Sweat ran from them both. The swish of the fly whisks filled the room, a soft, wearying susurration of sound. Flies hung in thin clouds along the ceiling and crawled over salty flesh. No early fruit had come to Akhetaten from the Delta, and the salads so greedily enjoyed at this time of the year were sparse and tasted of mud. Everything tastes of mud, smells of mud, Tiye thoug
ht, feeling her scalp prickle with the heat. She glanced beyond the shade of the en trance pillars to the dead brown lawn already showing patches of dry soil. “Have you sent north for grain?” she asked. “Rethennu should be willing to sell us something.” She longed to rub her skin. Water no longer cascaded clean and cool in her bathing room. The liquid Piha trickled carefully over her was as brown as her own skin and full of grit.
“There is no need,” he replied. “Our granaries are full of last year’s harvest.”
“But, Akhenaten, what of Thebes, the villages, the rest of the population? The tax collectors have been taking everything. The people have nothing stored. Soon they will begin to starve.”
“I care nothing for Thebes,” he said. “As for the fellahin, they must simply wait. The god will yet prove his power.”
“If the fellahin die, there will be no crop sown next year at all,” Tiye muttered darkly. “The only reason this country has survived other droughts is that each pharaoh has been careful to maintain stores of extra grain in every city. Your collectors emptied those granaries a long time ago.”
Suddenly Akhenaten began to retch. Bending over with one hand on his stomach, he signaled frantically, and a servant carrying a bowl rushed to his side. He vomited and then sat back gasping. Another slave knelt, proffering a damp cloth. Pharaoh wiped his lips. “That always hurts,” he said, still short of breath, “but the pain does not last long.” He handed back the cloth and straightened slowly. “Have you seen the terraces of the north palace, Empress? Still so lushly green? Nefertiti does not suffer the withering of her garden.”
She divined his thought. “No, Akhenaten, the fertility of her domain is not due to Nefertiti’s enjoying the protection of the god,” she said. “Water from her lake can be poured onto the upper terrace and then simply trickles down over the others.”
“It is time to pray.” He rose, pulling the wet linen away from his legs, and Meryra stepped forward, incense already smoking in his hand. “Mother, did you know that in the city the people have opened shrines to Isis? If the Aten sees such lack of faith, he will punish them even further.”
“They are afraid,” she suggested, watching a little color creep back into his gaunt face. “They want Isis to cry.”
“There is no Isis,” he snapped impatiently. “I will talk to them from the Window of Appearances on my way to the temple. Come with me. Where is Meritaten?”
He turned to her querulously, like an old man, as she hurried forward. They left the hall, crossed the wide fore-court, and approached the ramp. Beyond the wall, the Royal Road was strangely silent. The sun attacked them with blind ferocity, drying their lips, making their eyes water, burning up through their sandals. The air was full of dust. Breezes were no longer welcome, for the slightest stir out behind the city lifted the sand and sent it blowing down the streets to mingle with the powdery topsoil already suspended, breathed into dry lungs, clinging to moist skin, insinuating under linen to add to the torment. Tiye, squinting against the sudden glare, saw Akhenaten’s arm slide through his queen’s, his other hand rise to brush away the flies crawling over his neck. There are no people to adore him today, she thought as they walked up the ramp and under the slight shadow of the roofed window. They are lying in their homes dreaming of water. She was taken aback when the royal group stopped and turned to look down, for the road was filled from wall to wall with a silent crowd. Akhenaten raised a hand. There was a slight swaying below, and heads were bent, but the people did not sink to the hot ground.
“Foolish ones!” Pharaoh called, his voice kindly. “Do you come with guilt in your hearts? I have heard how you turn from your true protector at the first testing of your faith and mutter prayers to another, while the Disk blazes overhead, watching your every motion. Have no fear. I, and I alone, stand between you and the god. I will petition the Aten, and he will hear his son and send the flood. I, Akhenaten, promise you.”
There was no answering cheer. Tiye, snatching linen from Huya and wip ing her neck, saw doubt and distress in the upturned faces.
“Bring water, Pharaoh!” someone shouted indignantly. “You are a god! Make the river rise!”
Akhenaten lifted the crook and flail over the people, but the muttering continued. As he stepped into the shadow and began to move toward the temple, the cry was taken up by the entire crowd. “Make water, Pharaoh!’’ they shouted, derision unmistakable in their voices. “Make water, Divine Incarnation!” Meritaten stiffened beside him in shame, hurrying him forward until they were beneath the stiff trees of the temple garden and walking to the pylon. Passing beside it, he abruptly stopped and, leaning against its rough stone, doubled over. Once again a servant with a bowl came to his assistance, but the spasm passed. Akhenaten straightened, his face drawn in pain, and continued into the temple.
Tiye watched from the privileged shade of her kiosk as Meritaten stood alone in the vast expanse of the sanctuary, a small black head crowned with the golden cobra above a field of offering tables, bowed against the insufferable heat, swaying a little while her husband mounted the steps to the raised altar and began to pray. His words, though unintelligible, echoed anguished and pleading against the tall walls. He prostrated himself, then knelt, gripping the sides of the food-laden table, his forehead pressed against the stone. Meryra circled him with the incense and poured oil on his head. His groans rang out.
Beyond the altar the ben-ben rose, and on it his likeness smiled. The oil slipped lazily down his neck and trickled along his spine, glistening in the harsh light. In the fore-court the temple singers’ voices rose and fell. To Tiye there was something anciently barbaric about the scene, the twisting, tortured man, the rows of smoking slabs, the priests unnaturally motionless in white, the slight, gorgeously arrayed queen swaying faint and sick, alone in the huge expanse, and floating over all, like the compelling, emotionless voices of demons, the disembodied singing. The ferocity of the sun was almost unendurable, and the sudden fancy took Tiye that the Aten, feeding for years on the frenetic worship of his son, had grown bloated with it and yet insatiable, his growing strength at last overcoming the life-giving gentleness Akhenaten had taught, and being unleashed in its full horror over Egypt. The more Pharaoh moaned and prayed, the more the heat seemed to intensify. Tiye, with aching legs and paining back, sank onto the stool she had ordered placed in the sunshade. Meritaten turned around at the small movement, her face pale. Tiye beckoned, but after a moment’s hesitation, Meritaten shook her head, not daring to offend her father or the god by seeking shelter.
Glancing back at her son, Tiye froze. He was lying before the altar, but face up, his limbs rigid. His head was canted back at an impossible angle, and strangled cries were coming out of his mouth. Meryra stood at his feet, waving an incense holder over him. Tiye did not hesitate but strode into the glare, shouting at the priests as she went. Hurrying up the steps, Meritaten behind her, she bent over Pharaoh.
“Bring a litter quickly,” she ordered, “but a canopy first. Majesty, find Panhesy and have him send for the physicians.”
“But, Empress,” Meryra protested. “Litter bearers cannot come into the sanctuary! It is forbidden!”
She ignored him. Other priests were rushing to obey her, and already Pharaoh’s litter was moving along one of the aisles. Akhenaten’s teeth were now clenched, his eyes open wide and unseeing. Vomit dribbled from the corner of his mouth. “Go and tell those women in the forecourt to be silent!” Tiye shouted at Meryra. “It is too hot to sing!” Ashen and cowed, he went away, and presently the chanting faltered and stopped. Gently the litter bearers lifted Pharaoh, and the canopy was unfolded over him. Tiye followed as he was carried to his apartments.
By the time he was laid on his couch, the rigidity had gone out of his body, and he had begun to mutter and occasionally shout words of prayers, snatches of love songs, and long, incoherent speeches. She left him to the physicians and waited with Meritaten in the passage outside, where Parennefer, Panhesy, and other members of the s
taff were clustered anxiously. Several minutes later one of the physicians stepped from the room and bowed.
“What is the matter with him?” Tiye demanded.
“It seems to have been some kind of fit, Majesty,” he explained. “Pharaoh is already much improved, but weak.”
“Are you able to treat him?”
The man hunted for words. “No,” he said at last. “If Pharaoh were a common man and not a god, I would say that either the demons had him in their grip or that he suffered from a madness that under the law ensures a man complete protection. But as Pharaoh is divine …” Wisely he did not finish. Tiye dismissed him and, gesturing for Meritaten to follow, went into the room.
Akhenaten was propped up on pillows. Tiny shudders shook him intermittently, and his face was still gray from the violence of the attack, but his eyes were clear. Meritaten knelt to kiss his hand, and Tiye bowed, sitting on the couch beside his knees.
“They have ordered me to stay out of the sun,” he said. One hand crept into Tiye’s and clung to it tightly.
“Then you must obey, my son,” she answered, a sudden thought coming to her. “Did the god speak to you? You have been ill like this before, but never with such violence.”
The hooded eyes dropped. “No, the god did not speak. No vision came.”
Tiye stroked the long fingers. “Pharaoh, I want you to consider what will happen if someday the god visits a bout of illness upon you from which you do not recover, if the dreams in which he causes you to walk have no end. I do not speak of death,” she said hurriedly, seeing his expression harden. “But it is time to appoint an heir.”
“I have been thinking about it,” he said slowly, much to her surprise. “It would have to be a child of my holy loins. Tutankhaten is the only candidate.” He spoke the words clearly and sensibly, as though the fit had purified his mind. Tiye battled the desire to let her sheer astonishment at this turn of events show on her face, afraid that any reaction at all might deflect his train of thought.
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