Ramses, Volume I

by Christian Jacq

  “Good work, Ahmeni, but no judge will prosecute with so little to go on.”

  The young scribe hung his head. “I was afraid you’d say that. Isn’t it worth a try, though?”

  “It would be a lost cause.”

  “I’ll get more evidence.”

  “Is that possible?”

  “Don’t let Shaanar fool you. He’s only trying to have you named Viceroy of Nubia to get you away from Memphis. His dirty tricks will be forgotten and it will be clear sailing for him.”

  “I’m aware of that, Ahmeni, but Nubia attracts me. You can come with me and see what a wonderful place it is, so far from palace infighting and pettiness.”

  The prince’s private secretary did not respond, convinced that Shaanar’s newfound helpfulness concealed another plot. As long as he stayed in Memphis, Ahmeni would keep trying to track down the truth.

  Dolora lazed by the pool where she soaked on hot afternoons, before her facial and massage. Since her husband’s promotion, she did nothing all day long and felt more and more fatigued. Hairdresser, manicurist, steward, cook—they all exhausted her.

  Despite prescription face creams, her complexion only got worse. She ought to take better care of her health, it was true, but her social obligations consumed the greater part of her time. Keeping abreast of all the latest gossip required her attendance at the endless round of receptions and ceremonies defining Egyptian high society.

  For the past few weeks, Dolora had been worried. Shaanar’s close associates were less confiding, almost as if avoiding her, a fact she felt compelled to share with Ramses.

  “Now that you two have made up,” she ventured, “you may have some influence with him.”

  “What do you want from me?”

  “Shaanar will be at the center of power when he becomes regent. I’m afraid he’ll overlook me. I’m already being pushed aside. Soon I’ll be no better than a provincial housewife.”

  “I doubt there’s anything I can do.”

  “Remind Shaanar I’m alive and I have connections. They could be useful to him in the future.”

  “He’ll laugh in my face. As far as my brother is concerned, I’m Viceroy of Nubia and out of the picture.”

  “So your reconciliation is only for show?”

  “Shaanar is trying to be fair to me.”

  “And you’ll settle for exile in darkest Nubia?”

  “I like it there.”

  Dolora sprang suddenly to life. “Don’t let him do this to you, please! There’s no excuse for your attitude. If we join forces, you and I can take on Shaanar. We’ll make him see he can’t treat his family like so much trash!”

  “Sorry, big sister, I’m not one for palace plots.”

  She got to her feet, furious now.

  “Ramses, don’t abandon me.”

  “I think you can take care of yourself, Dolora.”

  The temple of Hathor was silent. The priestesses had finished singing, Queen Tuya had performed the evening rites. Now she meditated. Serving the goddess helped the queen distance herself from human baseness. It gave her a clearer vision of the right direction for Egypt.

  She and her husband had long discussions. When she expressed her doubts about Shaanar’s leadership ability, Seti had listened attentively, as ever. He knew, of course, about the attempt on Ramses’ life by a person or persons unknown and unpunished, unless the charioteer who died at the turquoise mines was the mastermind. Although Shaanar no longer seemed antagonistic toward his brother, could he be considered in the clear? It was horrifying even to voice such suspicions with nothing to back them up; at the same time, it was true that an appetite for power can change a man into a raging beast.

  Seti weighed each detail. His wife’s opinion counted more than anything he heard from palace insiders, who were apt to be yes-men or members of Shaanar’s faction. Together Seti and Tuya examined their two sons’ behavior and listed the pluses and minuses.

  Reason helped sort and analyze facts, but reason alone could not lead to a decision. Sia, the lightning bolt of intuition, the direct knowledge transmitted from one pharaoh’s heart to the next, would be Seti’s guide.

  Opening the door to Ramses’ private garden, Ahmeni encountered an amazing object: a magnificent acacia-wood bed. Most of their countrymen slept on simple reed mats; a piece of furniture like this cost a small fortune.

  Flabbergasted, the young scribe ran to shake the prince awake.

  “A bed? Impossible.”

  “Come and see for yourself. A masterpiece!”

  The prince agreed with his private secretary; this was the work of an exceptionally gifted craftsman.

  “Shall we bring it inside?” asked Ahmeni.

  “I should say not! Keep an eye on it.”

  Jumping on his horse, Ramses galloped to Iset the Fair’s parents’ house. She made him wait as she dressed and primped.

  As always, Ramses was struck by her beauty.

  “I’m ready,” she said, smiling.

  “Iset . . . then the bed was from you?”

  Radiant, she put her arms around him.

  “Who else would have dared?”

  The ceremonial “gift of the bed” put Ramses in a difficult position. He would have to offer her one in return, even more elaborate, a lifetime gift, implying an official engagement.

  “Do you accept my gift?”

  “I left it sitting outside.”

  “A grave insult,” she whispered cajolingly. “Why delay the inevitable?”

  “I need my freedom.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “Would you like to live in Nubia?”

  “What a dreadful idea!”

  “That’s where they’ll probably want me to go.”

  “Say no!”

  “I can’t.”

  Wrenching loose, she ran from Ramses.

  Ramses was in a roomful of people assembled to hear Pharaoh’s latest official appointments. The older ranking bureaucrats and civil servants were calm, at least outwardly; the younger ones fidgeted. Seti tolerated no delays in meeting his deadlines and was quite impervious to elaborate excuses.

  In the weeks preceding the ceremony, activity was at a fever pitch, with each administrator posing as a zealous and unconditional upholder of Seti’s policies, the better to protect his department’s interests and his own job.

  When the scribe assigned to the task began reading the decree, a hush fell. Ramses, who had dined with his older brother the evening before, was quite at ease. For him, there was no suspense; he thought instead of his friends and acquaintances.

  He watched faces light with hope, go blank, or grimace; whatever the case, it was respected as Pharaoh’s decision.

  Finally it was time for Nubia, eliciting only limited interest; after recent events there, as well as Shaanar’s overt maneuvering, Ramses was the obvious choice.

  When the current viceroy was reappointed, it came as a great surprise.

  THIRTY-THREE

  Iset the Fair exulted. Despite Shaanar’s campaigning, Ramses had not been named Viceroy of Nubia. The prince would stay in Memphis, with nominal duties. This would be her final chance to catch him, and she would make the most of it. The more he resisted the pull of her passion, the more he attracted her.

  Her parents’ pleas to consider Shaanar notwithstanding, Iset still had eyes only for his brother. Since his return from Nubia, he was even handsomer and more appealing. He had filled out, his splendid body was more imposing, his natural nobility even more apparent. A head taller than average, he looked as if nothing could touch him.

  Sharing his life, his feelings, his desires . . . it was all she dreamed of. Nothing and no one would keep Iset the Fair from marrying Ramses.

  A few days after the announcement, she called on the prince. Going too soon would have been intrusive. Now that the shock had worn off, Iset would offer him her pretty shoulder to cry on.

  Ahmeni, whom she disliked, greeted her deferentially. How could the pri
nce put so much stock in this puny specimen, always sniffling and hunched over his scribe’s palette, with no social position at all? Sooner or later she would persuade her future husband to replace him with someone more presentable. Ramses should have no use for anyone as insignificant.

  “Tell your master I’m here.”

  “Sorry, he’s gone again.”

  “For how long?”

  “I don’t have that information.”

  “Where is he?”

  “I don’t have that information.”

  “Are you fooling me?”

  “That’s the last thing I’d do.”

  “Then tell me what you do know. When did he leave?”

  “The king came to fetch him yesterday morning. Ramses got in his chariot and headed for the river.”

  The Valley of the Kings lay in stony silence. The sages called it “the great meadow,” a paradise for the reborn souls of the pharaohs. From the river landing on the West Bank of Thebes to this sacred site, Seti and his son had followed a winding road between high cliffs. Above the Valley loomed the pyramid-shaped Peak, home of the goddess of silence.

  Ramses was rigid with suspense.

  Why had his father brought him to this mysterious place, where the only mortals allowed were the reigning pharaoh and the workmen assigned to build his eternal dwelling? Because of the treasures amassed in the tombs, archers were stationed with orders to shoot any unidentified person on sight and without warning. Any attempt at theft was considered a breach of national security and incurred the death penalty. But there was also talk of knife-wielding spirits who cut off the heads of unauthorized visitors.

  Riding next to Seti was reassuring, but Ramses would have preferred ten armed encounters with the Nubians over this trip through the valley of fear. His strength and bravery would be of no help to him. He felt diminished, easy prey to unknown powers he was unsure how to combat.

  Not one blade of grass, no bird, no insect . . . the Valley seemed to have rejected every life-form. There was only stone, symbolizing the victory over death. The farther Seti drove their chariot, the closer they came to the towering walls of the monuments. The heat grew stifling, the sensation of leaving the human world behind oppressive.

  A narrow passage appeared, a sort of door cut in the stone face; on either side, armed soldiers. The chariot halted. Seti and Ramses got out. The guards bowed; they knew their sovereign by sight, since he regularly came to inspect the work on his tomb, dictating which hieroglyphs were to be carved on the walls of his eternal dwelling.

  When they passed through the door, Ramses’ heart stopped.

  The great meadow was a boiling crucible, boxed in by tall cliffs and capped with a bright blue sky. The Peak imposed an almost total silence, providing rest and peace for the souls of the pharaohs. The prince’s fear had given way to wonderment. Absorbed by the light in the Valley, he felt both insignificant and elevated. He was one small man, a speck in comparison to all this grandeur and mystery. He was also aware of an otherworldly presence that did not destroy, but nourished.

  Seti led his son to a stone portal. He pushed open the gilded cedar door and walked up a steep ramp into a small room with a sarcophagus on a central platform. The king lit smokeless torches. The splendor and perfection of the wall paintings dazzled Ramses, brilliant shades of gold, red, blue, and black. He lingered over a picture of the huge serpent Apophysis, monster of the netherworld and devourer of light, subdued yet not destroyed by the creator, with his white staff. He admired the Bark of the Sun steered by Sia, the spirit of intuition, the only means of successfully navigating the netherworld. He stood awestruck before the mural of the pharaoh being spellbound by falcon-headed Horus and jackal-headed Anubis, then admitted into paradise by the goddess Ma’at, the universal law. The king was depicted as young, strikingly handsome, dressed in the traditional headdress, golden collar, and loincloth. He appeared serene, eyes raised toward eternity, opposite Osiris or Nefertum, the god crowned with a lotus representing life renewed. A hundred other details caught the prince’s attention, particularly an enigmatic text about the gates to the netherworld, but Seti would not give him time to finish reading it. He made Ramses lie facedown in front of the sarcophagus.

  “The king who lies here shared your name, Ramses. He was the founder of our dynasty. After years of dedicated service to his country, he had just retired when Horemheb named him as his successor. What energy the old man had left, he spent in governing Egypt. He lasted only two years, but he justified his coronation titles: He Who Confirms Ma’at Throughout the Two Lands; Divine Light Brought Him Forth; Stable Is the Power of Divine Light; Elect of the Creator. Such was this wise and humble man, whom we must honor, asking him to help us see more clearly. Pray to him, Ramses, honor his name and his memory, for we must follow in the footsteps of our illustrious ancestors.”

  The prince felt the spiritual presence of their dynastic founder. A palpable energy emanated from the sarcophagus, which bore the designation “Purveyor of Life.” It felt like warm sunshine.

  “Rise, Ramses,” his father said. “Your first journey is over.”

  The Valley was scattered with pyramids. The most impressive was Pharaoh Djoser’s—a stairway to the sky. His father brought him to another burial ground, Saqqara, where the Old Kingdom pharaohs had built eternal resting places for themselves and their faithful servants.

  Seti drove toward the edge of the desert plateau, overlooking palm groves, green fields, the Nile. For nearly a mile stretched tomb after rough brick tomb, a hundred and fifty feet long, the sides like palace facades. Twenty feet high, the walls were painted in vivid hues.

  One monument stunned Ramses with three hundred terra-cotta bull’s heads jutting from its perimeter. Equipped with real horns, they formed an invincible army guarding the tomb from harm.

  “The pharaoh who lies here is named Djet,” revealed Seti. “The name means ‘eternity.’ Around him are the other kings of the First Dynasty, our most distant ancestors. They were the first to establish the earthly reign of Ma’at, bringing order out of chaos. Every reign must be rooted in the garden of their planting. Do you remember the wild bull you faced? This is his birthplace. This is where power has been reborn again and again since the beginning of our civilization.”

  Ramses stopped to look at each bull’s head. Not one wore the same expression. They represented each facet of the art of leadership, from strict authority to benevolence. Once Ramses had toured the perimeter, Seti got back in the chariot.

  “Now your second journey is finished.”

  They had sailed north, then ridden down narrow trails between newly green fields, to a little town where the arrival of Pharaoh and his son was greeted enthusiastically. In this Delta backwater, such an occurrence should pass for a miracle, yet the villagers seemed quite familiar with the king. The local police made feeble attempts at controlling the crowd while Seti and Ramses made their way into the utter darkness of a small shrine. They sat facing each other on stone benches.

  “Do you know the name of Avaris?”

  “The dreaded capital of the Hyksos invaders?”

  “You’re sitting in the middle of Avaris.”

  Ramses was dumbfounded. “I thought it was destroyed.”

  “What man can destroy a divine presence? This is the domain of Set, the god of thunder and lightning, who gave me my name.”

  Ramses was terrified. He sensed that Seti might annihilate him with a mere touch, a single glance. Why else would he have brought him to this cursed place?

  “You’re afraid. That’s good. Only the vain and the foolish know no fear. Your dread must give rise to a strength that can overcome it: that is the secret of Set. Anyone who denies it, as Akhenaton did, commits a fatal error and endangers Egypt. A pharaoh must embody the firestorm of the cosmos, the relentlessness of thunder. He is the arm that guides, and sometimes strikes in punishment. No king should be deluded into believing in the goodness of man. Such an error would bring ruin to his coun
try and misery to his people. Can you stand up to Set?”

  A ray of light pierced the chapel roof, illuminating the statue of an upright figure. The eerie head had a long snout and two big ears: the fiendish face of Set.

  Ramses rose and marched toward the statue.

  He collided with an invisible barrier and could go no farther. He tried again, but could not go beyond it. On the third try, he broke through. The statue’s red eyes blazed like twin flames. Ramses looked directly into them, although he felt a burning, as if tongues of fire danced over his body. The pain was sharp, but he held fast. He would not back down to Set, even if it meant the end of him.

  It was the decisive moment, an unfair duel he was not allowed to lose. The red eyes burst from their sockets. Ramses was wrapped in flames, devouring his head, consuming his heart. But he stayed on his feet, challenging Set and willing his spirit away, deep into the shrine.

  Thunder crashed, and a torrential rain broke over Avaris. Hailstones pounded the walls of the shrine. The red glow dimmed. Set returned to the underworld. He was the only god who had no son, but Pharaoh Seti, the earthly heir of Set, recognized his own son as a man of power.

  “Your third journey has ended,” he murmured.

  THIRTY-FOUR

  The entire court had traveled to Thebes for the grandiose feast of Opet in mid-September. This was when Pharaoh communed with Amon, the hidden god, who renewed the ka of his son and representative on earth. The two weeks of festivities in the great southern city were not to be missed. Attendance at religious ceremonies was restricted to initiates, but the people celebrated in the streets and the rich held society receptions in their elaborate villas.

  For Ahmeni, it was no vacation. He had to pack up his scrolls and writing gear, throwing his orderly work habits into upheaval. Despite his obvious distaste for the expedition, he had made meticulous preparations, to please Ramses.