“You no longer reveal your decisions to me,” she grated, “and you do not bring me comfort. You have become a stranger, Fanbearer. Do what you must. I care for nothing anymore.” But in spite of her words she clung to him when he rose to leave, and had to fight to swallow her tears.
After he had gone she rose, forcing her stiff limbs to carry her across the room to the large chest in which her most precious valuables were stored. Pausing a moment to listen to Piha talking with the guard at the door, she lifted the lid. The Declaration of Innocence lay where she had placed it, on its bed of unstarched linen. Carrying it back to the couch, she unrolled it, reading it slowly, tracing with her finger her name and the long list of titles she herself had written so many years earlier. When she had finished, she wrapped it tightly, weighing it for a moment in both hands before calling sharply. Piha came running.
“Take this to the kitchens and put it on the fire,” Tiye said. “Stand by it until it is fully consumed.” The servant nodded. Tiye dismissed her and leaned back on the pillows with a sigh. I do not deserve the declaration, she thought, and it is beneath me to try to deceive the gods. Either I am one with them, needing no justification, or I am not. Whatever happens, I am ready.
She slept deeply in spite of the heat and the next day felt well enough to walk through the house, but the experience depressed her. She had never felt at home there. Now, as she went from room to richly furnished room, her eye caught the vibrant wall paintings of ducks crouched in tangled river growth, wet grapes bursting on the vines, fish threading through sparkling blue water, so much lush beauty. But with a slight movement of her head, she suddenly found herself looking out at the real world. The cracked, baking earth, lifeless skeletons of trees, and the near-waterless ravine where the river trickled made her feel like a moving mirage without real substance. Even her own name sounded odd when she whispered it. She returned to the sanctuary of her bedchamber gratefully.
But that night she could not sleep. After enduring several hours of the sound of the fans she irritably sent the bearers away and lay listening to the silence. No sound rose from the river. No slap of oars or crack of sail, no singing of fishermen after the night catches, no subdued laughter of lovers in the reed marshes. There was no ferment of insect life either, for the garden was dead. Only the sad howling of a jackal somewhere high in the eastern cliffs came echoing drearily across the valley. Piha snored gently, invisible in her dark corner. A dry, tired moon cast gray light onto the floor. Tiye had ordered the hangings left raised on the window. As the hours glided slowly by, she half-sat, half-lay on the couch, pillows at her back, hands loose on the sheet, her long, waving hair damp with sweat, her breathing quiet.
She knew that she was waiting for something, and when she caught a tiny flicker of movement out of the corner of her eye, she was not surprised. She merely turned her head and lay relaxed, looking into the dimness. At first she thought she had been mistaken, for after that one movement the room seemed to sink once more into immobility, but presently a long, thin shape undulated across the shaft of moonlight lying on the tiling, moving from the window to the door. Tiye’s heart began to pound. She sat up. After the plague of snakes the year before, no milk was left in dishes on the floor. Something else had attracted this one. The promise of coolness, perhaps. A tiled corner in which to curl up, away from the earth outside that retained the furnace heat of the day. Leaning on one elbow, she tried to follow its progress. I should immediately summon the guard, she thought. It might be poisonous. Piha might be in danger. But some thing prevented her from calling out.
A sense of inevitability began to steal over her, a calm that gradually stilled her frantic heartbeat and relaxed the fingers that had bunched around the rumpled sheet. The snake would disappear through the crack under the door, or it would not. It would find Piha, or it would not. It would turn toward her, or ignore… She felt a gentle tug on the bedclothes under her hand and froze. Then slowly, so slowly, a dark head began to appear over the edge of the couch, swaying slightly. The breath caught in Tiye’s throat. Higher it rose, until it was almost on a level with her face, a slim column of menace. Still she felt no fear, but then her elbow inadvertently slipped, and she drew back. At the sudden movement a frill and then a dark clouded hood opened, and she realized that she was staring at a cobra. There was not enough light to see any color on the creature, but a glitter of moonlight flashed in the shiny eyes.
Suddenly Tiye knew that it was this for which she had been waiting. Cobras were almost unknown as far south as Thebes and almost as rare here in Akhetaten, as they preferred the fertile Delta land. But the Delta was a wasteland, and this magic symbol of a pharaoh’s power must have come hunting. No, not hunting, Tiye thought, once again perfectly calm, her eyes riveted on the coldly majestic creature. It is too much to believe that it is here in my room through chance alone. It has come for me. Tentatively she moved a hand. The snake continued to sway gently, its hood quivering, and Tiye could have sworn that she saw its forked tongue flick quickly out. A patience in its stance communicated itself to her. It will wait until I am ready, she reflected. Defender of Kings, Wazt, Lady of Spells, you come clothed in power to weave about me the last great spell of all.
The realization brought first a panic. No, Tiye thought frantically. I am not ready to die! But her reaction was only one of instinct, for close on its heels came a wave of relief. I am tired of life. I carry a load of guilt and sorrow that can only grow heavier as the days go by. Everyone I have loved is gone but for my son, and it were better for him if he had died a long time ago. My love has only brought him agony. Egypt is destroyed. I inhabit this rotting body like a shadow imprisoned in a catafalque. It is time to face the gods. The cobra continued to stare at her, a living emblem of all she had worshipped, all her first husband had so gloriously upheld, all her son ought to have been. Sighing, she offered her hand. “Strike, then,” she whispered. “I am ready.” For a brief second she touched its skin, dry and cool. Turning her palm upward, she presented her wrist. She was smiling.
The snake struck. She saw a flash of light on tiny, sharp fangs before they were buried deep in her flesh. Involuntarily she recoiled, dragging the cobra with her, biting her tongue to keep from crying out, but then she felt its weight leave her. I should rouse someone, she thought. No one will wish to kill it because it is holy, but it might do harm elsewhere. She felt her wrist, cradled her arm against her breast, and lay back. Slowly her gaze wandered the room, taking comfort from familiar things, Piha’s small movements, moonlight now climbing the far wall, the cry of a night-hunting hawk. Peacefully the minutes slid by. Blisters began to swell under the skin of her wrist, painful to touch.
After an hour Tiye felt her heart begin to palpitate, and she tried to breathe deeply, once more fighting a momentary terror. All at once, as nausea grabbed her, she jerked forward and vomited and then lay back gasping. She had expected it and was prepared, but the gods were merciful, and it did not come again. She would have dozed but for the erratic flutter of her heart. She did her best to keep still. As dawn approached, it became harder to draw breath, and in the end she was sitting upright, forcing air into her lungs with all her strength, eyes wide but no longer seeing. She had no last coherent thought. There was only a lingering awareness of the sheet sticking to her drenched limbs, and the unbearable pain in her heart.
Ay came from his post at Pharaoh’s door as soon as Huya summoned him. He stood looking down on the small, dainty figure with its wealth of reddish-brown hair tousled over the pillow. Death had smoothed the imperious face, returning to it a little of the fragility of youth. The full mouth was parted slightly in a smile of self-satisfaction. Under the half-closed lids the blue eyes caught the daylight with the hint of a mocking glitter. Lifting the limp arm folded above the sheet, he turned it over. The punctures were clearly visible, surrounded by purple, swollen flesh. Piha was sobbing behind him. “I heard nothing, lord, nothing at all! I would have saved her if I could. I am a wicked serv
ant!”
“Oh, be silent!” he snapped, not turning. “No one will blame you, Piha. Close the door and tell the sem-priests to wait. When Pharaoh comes, you may let him in.” He squatted by the couch and searched the immobile face for a long time. He was not certain what he was looking for, but slowly an odd conviction took hold of him. Glancing covertly over his shoulder, he saw Piha busy at the other end of the room. Huya was gazing out the window. Ay drew a short knife from his belt and quickly and silently cut one curling lock of hair, concealing it in his linen. “Very little in your life took place that was not under your direct control,” he whispered into the brown ear. “I do not believe in this so-called accident. May your name live forever, dear Tiye.” Swiftly he kissed the unresponsive lips and let himself out into the passage.
He was about to close the doors when Akhenaten came running, hard on the heels of the herald calling his titles. All waiting went to the floor. Pharaoh gripped his fanbearer’s arm. “It is not true!” he shouted. “Tell me it is not! I want to see her!” Before Ay could answer, he pushed through the doors. Ay stepped to pull them closed before Akhenaten’s terrible wailing began, but Pharaoh’s agonized howls pursued him long after he had slipped through Tiye’s entrance hall and walked back with his escort across the Royal Road.
Ay longed for the comfort of Tey’s presence, but before he could snatch a precious hour in the tranquility of his own estate, he had an errand to perform. He no longer drove a chariot. He was carried by his most trusted soldiers in a covered litter to the north palace, enduring the ferocious heat of a summer noon without the shade that used to give travelers some respite along the broad road that joined palace to central city. At the wall, Nefertiti’s guards knew him and let him through. Leaving the litter, he was led within by Meryra. Even in such stultifying heat the north palace was so vast that draughts played continually through its lofty rooms, and the sweat began to cool on Ay’s skin as he walked.
Nefertiti was talking to her women and greeted her father with polite indifference. Ay asked that Tutankhaten be brought to him and turned to stare moodily out the window while he waited. Nefertiti said nothing. When the boy came running over the tiled floor with a glad smile, she waved her women away. Ay bent slowly and hugged him.
“It is good to see you again, Prince. Are you happy here?”
“Yes,” Tutankhaten replied. “I did not think I would be, but I am. I can do what I like, when I like. The queen plays with me often.”
Ay smiled inwardly. The queen had wasted no time getting into the boy’s good graces. “I want you to listen to me very carefully,” he said, holding Tutankhaten’s eye and speaking as clearly as he could. “Your mother is dead. It is right that you should grieve for her, but she would not want you to mourn very much. From now on, Queen Nefertiti is your mother.”
Nefertiti stifled a cry, and her hands flew to her cheeks.
Tutankhaten’s trusting face turned from one to the other. “Has my mother gone to the Aten?” he asked, manfully trying to still the quiver in his voice.
Ay smiled reassuringly. “Of course she has. Her justification is assured, and she is happy now. I have brought you a lock of her hair.” He drew it out and placed it on the boy’s palm. “You must go immediately and put it in a very safe place. A little box with a tight lid would be best. Guard it carefully. Regard it as a solemn talisman, a lucky amulet. You must promise me you will never give it away.”
Tutankhaten’s fingers curled around it. Ay caught Nefertiti’s startled glance. “Is it true?” she whispered, and Ay hushed her with a quick frown.
“I will put it with my brother Osiris Thothmes’ bow, that she gave me,” Tutankhaten said, awed.
“You had better do it now,” Ay urged. “Not a single hair must fall to the ground. You will understand better when you are older.” The boy nodded and ran out, holding his clenched fist solemnly before him. Nefertiti swung to her father.
“Is it true? If it is, the gods will fail to recognize her!”
Ay did not miss the faintly malicious tone. “No one will ever know for certain,” he said heavily, “but I think so. She did not seek the cobra, but surely she could have called for help and did not.”
“I think I will attend the funeral,” Nefertiti finished, smiling as she ushered her father to the door.
Ay turned with her, wondering as he left whether in giving the lock of hair to Tutankhaten he was giving his own luck away. The hair of a suicide brought great good fortune to the one who owned it.
23
Seventy days later Tiye was laid to rest in the tomb her son had prepared for her in the cliffs behind Akhetaten. It was the beginning of Athyr. The river ought to have begun to rise some weeks before, but the high banks remained arid. Tiye’s funeral proceeded under the gaze of every courtier in the city. Nefertiti, surrounded by her guards, sat under a canopy at a short distance from the crowd and watched her husband. His voice could be heard clearly over the murmur of Meryra. In between bouts of loud weeping he knelt in the sand, scooping it up in both hands and placing it on his head. At times he stood with his arms wrapped around Ankhesenpaaten, his face buried in her shoulder, his body shaking with sobs, and when he was not crying or anointing himself with sand, he was kissing and fondling her. She bore it with expressionless fortitude, her hands resting protectively on her swollen belly, her eyes carefully avoiding those of the gathering.
Near the end of the ceremony Akhenaten strode to the coffin and, laying his arm along the top, began talking to the corpse and laughing fondly. Smenkhara and Meritaten, seated side by side, held hands and looked at their laps. Ay and Horemheb exchanged glances. Pharaoh’s hysterical child’s voice multiplied against the rocks and went shrieking over the sand like the senseless babble of many demons.
There were no flowers to lay on the body when at last it was carried inside the dank tomb. One by one the family placed artificial sprays made of gold, silver, and jewels while Akhenaten leaned over the coffin and fingered the offerings, his head cocked on one side, whispering to himself, his eyes unnaturally bright.
Few waited to see the tomb sealed. Meryra and the priests were left to do the work alone while the courtiers scattered. Nefertiti took Tutankhaten back to the north palace without speaking to anyone. Smenkhara and Meritaten, surrounded by their hangers-on, retired to their private quarters. Akhenaten, still clinging to his daughter, was gently ushered into a litter and taken to his couch. Only Ay remained, sitting beneath his canopy, breathing harshly and watching the sign of the Disk being pressed into the clay that had been plastered over the knots in the tomb’s doors. When that was accomplished, he ordered himself carried to Tiye’s house and, together with a weeping Huya, walked slowly through the empty rooms. Piha, red-eyed and monosyllabic, was directing the slaves, who were sweeping and washing. Ay went to the cosmetics table and fingered the last flotsam of his sister’s life. An empty alabaster kohl pot, small blue beads scattered from some broken necklet, a copper mirror lying half out of its case with Tiye’s fingerprints still showing clearly on the polished metal. He lifted it and stared at his reflection before sighing and handing it to Huya as a gift. At last he went out into the blazing red evening to seek his wife’s unspoken comfort.
That same week Meritaten-ta-sherit, Akhenaten’s little princess by his daughter Meritaten, fell ill. Meritaten had her removed to her own quarters and sat over her, holding her hand and singing soothingly while the two-year-old cried and tossed. But it soon became obvious that Meritaten-ta-sherit was sick of the same virulent fever that had carried off Nefertiti’s three younger daughters. Smenkhara hovered about the sickroom uneasily, trying clumsily to comfort Meritaten but unable to evince any sympathy for the little girl who represented for him Pharaoh’s lecherous theft of his most precious prize. He was almost relieved when he was summoned to Pharaoh’s bedchamber.
Akhenaten was sprawled naked on his couch and, when Smenkhara bowed, held out a shaking hand. Smenkhara took it, swiftly scanning the yellow face
, his spirits sinking as he saw that for once Pharaoh was lucid. Since Tiye’s funeral, Akhenaten’s days had been one fit of vomiting and weeping after another. His hard-pressed servants had done their best to keep him fed and bathed and had tried to close their ears to his babbling. Horemheb had come on Parennefer’s request but had been unable to calm him, and a terrified Ankhesenpaaten had tearfully refused to answer Akhenaten’s incoherent summons. He slept little, falling at odd times into a motionless slumber from which he would jerk awake an hour or two later, prayers already on his lips, his body at once restless. But on this evening he was quieter, his eyes bloodshot but calm. He pulled Smenkhara down beside him.
“Nefer-neferu-Aten, beloved,” he whispered, his arms going around the prince, his body already pressed convulsively against Smenkhara’s. “Kiss me. You walk across the room like a vision of my younger self. I see the power of the Disk pulsing in your loins and beaming from your mouth.”
“Do you know that your daughter’s daughter is dying, Pharaoh?” Smenkhara murmured against the thick lips. He stifled Akhenaten’s reply, grinding his mouth against his brother’s with a cruel, perverse pleasure, forcing the thin, shoulders back against the mattress with both remorseless hands. Akhenaten began to whimper, but Smenkhara knew from experience that this was an expression of lust, not a reaction to his words. “You do not care at the moment, do you, my god? Well, I do not care, either. Shall I kiss you again?” He looked directly into the puffed eyes, himself full of a fierce hatred, driven from his customary passive sullenness by Akhenaten’s transparent physical need of him. Akhenaten stared back eagerly, nodding faintly, his hands behind Smenkhara’s head, pulling him down. Smenkhara’s lips brushed the other’s, but before he could go further, the doors burst open, and Panhesy rushed in, falling on his knees beside the couch. He was trembling with excitement. Smenkhara pushed himself away from Akhenaten and sat up. “What is it?”
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