“The little serving one…” Wse paced near the porch, suddenly too anxious to sit.
Shepseskaf’s head whipped around toward the doorway to check that they were truly alone.
“That old man… He’s become the real problem for us, hasn’t he?” the king spoke through his teeth. “But catch him at his evil? I’ll never have proof and you well know that. The sly bastard makes certain he is always alone and unwitnessed, or is seen by known fools. If I were to accuse him of something, he’s spent a lifetime sprinkling allies and devotees throughout all the priesthoods and seats; men and women who would rally around him in such a case to defend his honor.”
He studied the doll as if he half-expected it to provide a solution. “You said he detained you while you were on your way here. Why?”
“You know he had some concerns about my loyalty; to the work as Great One, since he is to hand it to me when he steps down.” Wserkaf shook his head, fascinated with the almost visible energy that radiated from the doll.
“You’ve seemed ever loyal to him whenever I heard of it from others. As far as I know, only my sister and I know differently.”
Wserkaf nodded, noticing how much Shepseskaf resembled his father. And there were some like my mentor who put forth Menkaure could not have sired him.
Wse continued: “Then you both know that quite early on, I disagreed that the sojourners were a threat. I opposed his treatment of them – as if they were cattle, simply because they were not of our race. The hour I did that, I believe the goddess Ma-at opened my eyes to the way he has been working all of us in his family from the beginning, including the attempted murder of the man named Marai and the handing over of the women to Maatkare Raemkai.
The king mused quietly, carefully framing his words. “I understand the man went to Ta-Seti to find them, foolish as that might be. If he survives, I should like to meet him. The two women I met were not lacking in magic either. I would welcome them as well.” The king shook his head, looking as if he had become aware of the spell the doll cast and was freeing himself.
“So, what reason did he give?”
“His ruse, and I believe it was just that,” Wserkaf answered, “was to confer greater truths on me for my elevation. Once we were at his home, he scolded me for avoiding him over the past weeks. He knew something was amiss and used the truth-saying trances we shared during my inspectorship to pry things from my heart. It exhausted me, but I think what we know is still safe,” Wse answered, but read the pain in Khentie’s eyes. “I believe Ma-at herself saw to it that I would know the truth and be able to execute the judgement of law, but that Dede would think I had only seen truths he sculpted for me to see.”
“He was here right before, trying me,” Khentie kept her voice low as she and Bunefer moved cushions close to the chair where Shepseskaf sat. “He came to bring things from his house for the burial.”
Wserkaf sat beside her and immediately felt her hand tremble in his.
“He didn’t do anything to you, did he?” he scanned the worry in her thoughts and found the image of her reeling from the balcony, nauseated. Then, he sensed her discovery of the doll that had been missing since the evening her father had died.
He had his answer. Hordjedtef had likely planted it in the basket with an enchantment spoken over it.
“I know what you’re thinking, but perhaps I was merely tired. I listened to him go on about wanting to stay close, then I asked him to leave,” she bowed her head. “When I found the doll in an open basket, I thought he had spoken words over it.”
The king shifted, staring at the doll as if he now wanted to throw it out of the distant window, but couldn’t bring himself to do so.
“It was his hand, too, Wse,” Khentie added. “I saw the bandage that was on it under his nau brace that he wears for some of the spells he does. I wonder if he did add bloodwork to a spell…”
“No. He told me he broke his little Djehuti figure and then cut his hand trying to refit the pieces,” Wse insisted.
“Or so he said,” Shepseskaf forcibly placed the shabti on the table. “But you didn’t come here in a sweat to tell me about this doll, did you?”
“I asked about the night Our Father died and was given two visions side-by-side through the grace of the goddess. One was the version Great One tells everyone and the other was the true course of events. One thing I distinctly remember from what really happened was a piece of hide. He wrote a note on it and hid it in one of his chairs.” Wserkaf noticed the king’s expression tense, then relax and transition into a look of bewilderment, as if his memory of the incident had been erased.
“That’s odd,” Shepseskaf frowned. “I don’t know of it. We’ve found nothing hidden among any of his possessions.” His eyes sought the doll again. Picking it up, he adjusted the little gold headdress and stared into the golden bead eyes. “You were always near him that day. You know of it, don’t you?”
“Shepsesi, beloved, put it down. It has to be cursed.” Bunefer leaned forward, anxious.
Wserkaf craned into the group, stunned at the innocent perfection the little doll emanated.
It’s like she could come to life, he mused, then spoke aloud.
“No. There’s no curse,” he affirmed, then waved his hand over the doll. “If you speak to her, Majesty, she will obey.” Wserkaf nodded, then realized what he was saying. That’s why she came to us; to Our Father, to me, to you, and gods forbid what she must be enduring with Maatkare. I hope she can still feel us despite it all; that she will speak to us.
He recalled that sorrowful night the elder king died; the same night Marai rose. In despair, Wse had called out to Naibe and, as Marai dozed and recovered, the Inspector had ventured to her and Ariennu to tell them. He knew they were suffering and heartsick then, even though Ariennu lied and put a brave face on it.
“Young Naibe,” Shepseskaf addressed the doll in his hands. “As your king and one who has seen the benefit of your softness, I ask you to take the veil from my eyes… Show me what I have missed.”
Silence.
Wserkaf nodded for him to repeat it the required three times as an incantation. With the last phrase, he felt light-headed and was about to mention it when Bunefer, who had barely taken the time to remove her glove, gasped:
“I feel her!”
“But can you read her spirit?” Shepseskaf’s expression hollowed at the swiftness of spiritual contact as he shoved the doll into Bunefer’s hands.
The prophetess’ began to speak in Naibe’s unmistakable voice.
The message was a repetition of the same thing Wserkaf had sensed at Hordjedtef’s house when he saw the golden bowl become the wheel from his sesen pond; an overcast day made grayer by the misery in which he found himself when Naibe said the words:
“You must stay, but be in Per-A-At soon and not in Ineb Hedj. It is there you will ascend like the sun. We will be together one day when your work is done and this priesthood has been purified of the wrongs in it.”
Bunefer continued speaking in the young Shinar woman’s voice as if she added to the message:
“There you will understand that it takes two hearts. There is a key within the chair in which the king sat the night he left us.”
Bowing her head with a salute to her king, Bunefer came to her senses and indicated the transmission was over.
“She was here, but couldn’t stay,” the young prophetess beamed. “At least we know she lives,” Bunefer accepted a cup of thinned wine as refreshment after her trance, then provided her own interpretation. “The part I said about Per-A-At was her own prophecy about the position you take, Highness. She has seen, as have I, that you will unite the factions of the priesthood under Ra. She was close to me, smiling at the life in my belly.”
“Is that what she meant by two hearts?” Shepseskaf smiled proudly at her.
Bunefer shook her head. “No. I thought so at first, but I know now it’s something else the spirit could not yet reveal to me. She mentioned the key in the
chair, just like Wse mentioned the note. There’s something in the back of this casual chair, Shepsesi, just a rolled-up scrap of hide stuck deep in a slot. She showed me at the last moment; it’s near where the back joins left arm, blocked by a piece of pottery with a gold sheet over it.”
“I never…” the king slipped his left hand down beside the arm of the chair, paused as he felt the pottery wiggle under the sheet, and then turned halfway in his seat to stare at the covered-over slot. “Wonder why I never saw that. Such a flaw would have never been allowed when father was alive without the craft-master flogging whoever caused the need for it. It would have been destroyed before it was ever presented,” he peeled back the soft gold sheet that covered the place, eased out a long slender piece of pottery, and then pulled the rolled-up hide from behind it. After he unrolled it and studied it for a moment, he handed it to Wserkaf.
“Look at that,” he mused, carefully turning the piece over so the writing would not smudge. “It’s coded. I never saw Our Father use sesh code. Do you think he was the one who wrote it or is there another person in our realm who has now been commanded to silence?”
“It’s his own hand, and inscribed near the time he left us. See how the forms are shaky, as if his hand struggled to create them? We know his hands shook after the ladies were sent away,” Wse reminded him.
“It’s why Great One convinced the physic to increase the herbal mixture in his medication… to calm those shakes so that those visiting would see him still as calm and strong.” Khentie’s face fell in embittered recognition. “What does it say?”
Wserkaf rose to go out to the open balcony so he could see it in a better light. As he stood holding the piece closer to his eyes, he visualized Menkaure trembling and dreadfully upset. He saw him writing the note once more. Where is the doll? It couldn’t have been in his hand as he wrote, but it still revealed the note to us. Concentrating, he sensed the doll was propped into a small upright box with a bowl of incense burning near.
Shaking his head sadly, Wserkaf pulled himself back to the present and strained to make out the almost magically small characters on the hide piece. He wondered how the king had written the code as well as he did. After reading it a few times, he glanced toward the door.
Khentie pushed up and went to it to make certain no one had crept close enough to hear. When she settled, he began:
Time of ascent.
Whisperer of the curse has victory
Sun to rise full in the god’s city.
All is behind her sacred space.
Wserkaf shook his head, sensing Khentie’s sob before he heard it.
“Whisperer of the curse. He knew the old man was killing him and he knew why he wanted to do it, too. Father was freeing himself from Great One’s control,” Shepseskaf muttered, extending his hand to his half-sister as Wserkaf darted back to hold and console her. “And even now he tries to gain an upper hand in my own house. I swear I will send my guards to take him.”
“Ooh no, beloved,” it was Bunefer who spoke this time, urging caution. “If it was that easy…”
“All is behind her sacred space,” Wserkaf interrupted, repeating the last phrase half-aloud.
Shepseskaf frowned. “More code?”
“You know why,” Wse answered. “He didn’t want the wrong eyes seeing something. There must be another note, maybe longer, hidden somewhere.” He sorted through the images in his visualization of the night Menkaure died. The doll was propped up in a carved box as if it was a makeshift altar. Before he mentioned it, Khentie repeated:
“Her sacred space… An altar? Shepsesi, did the doll have an altar?”
Shepseskaf’s eyes widened. He took the doll from Bunefer, whose face reflected shock as she pointed to a trunk of clothing.
Wserkaf rose after the king, who darted over to open the engraved trunk. The inspector watched as Shepseskaf removed a box that now held golden sandals.
“This,” Shepseskaf held it up triumphantly, returning to his chair and sitting once again.
“You mean…” Khentie started, but her brother hushed her.
“I think she was smiling on us, this young goddess,” he began to test various portions of the box to see if there was a secret compartment. “When they had taken his body to the House of Beauty, I saw the box but thought the doll missing or destroyed. I placed a pair of his sandals inside it. Just lucky these revelations didn’t come to us after all was with him in the afterlife.” He shook it, turned it, held it to the light, and inspected it, then handed it to Wserkaf. The inspector repeated the obvious processes until he felt the joining of one of the panels give slightly.
“Majesty, your blade…” he trained his eyes on the box, picking at it with his fingernails. He didn’t want to damage the box or make it seem as if it had been invaded if Hordjedtef saw it before the burial.
Shepseskaf unfastened the leather strap binding his “eye-gouger” to his belt. He handed the tiny blade to the inspector, who pried up a flat, bark-like piece from the side of the box. Underneath was a thin papyrus note covered in characters.
Wserkaf’s hands trembled as he nervously unfolded it, then read a longer letter.
I, Menkaure KhaKhet, know my life in earth ends.
There was no curse of an oracle made in Buto.
My curse was being the son of the God Kaphre.
The author of the thing which weakens my heart and is my final undoing,
Is a trusted teacher, revered for his wisdom and his magic.
I know, too, that the light of my beloved child was extinguished in carelessness by his seed.
It was not by her own hand.
She sought to make him divine with her passion,
As it was done in the days when gods walked as men,
But the acts were spoiled by the animal within.
These deeds must be met by you, divine son of my body.
Be strong, welcoming the wisdom of the far beyond ones and shunning all treachery,
Until we sail together among the stars.
Shepseskaf shook his head. “I need to do something. Waiting on Old Dede to retire or die is only causing him to be bold. It seems many who ought to have followed him to the Underworld are arriving there before him.”
“Your Majes… Shepsesi…” Wserkaf pressed Khentie close to calm her. “I listened to what I was reading and I know what my vision showed this afternoon. Our Father knew the old man was doing more than just easing his pain. Everything that has happened since the Oracle pronounced the curse almost seven years ago is part of this. I wouldn’t be surprised if Hordjedtef bribed the oracle to interpret her vision so his own influence would be supreme. I think Hordjedtef wants to hang on here, even if he must do it through Maatkare Raemkai and use him as his dagger. Stop him? We have to stop them both, and while we are at it, let’s just drag in every priest and noble on good terms with either of them into a tribunal.” Wse rubbed his eyes.
“There’s much more to do here than merely issuing an edict. You know what the worst of it is?” he asked without expecting an answer. “I can’t be seen to be part of this takedown. I’m his successor, for the gods’ sake. He already doesn’t trust me and thinks I have turned on him. If he keeps on he will certainly discover about…” Wse turned to face the king and mouthed the sojourner. On top of it all, I’m due to return to meet with the house of Ra and my father at Per-A-At by your command.”
“Wait. Let me see that note again.” Shepseskaf rose from his seat and began to pace for a few moments as Wserkaf handed the piece of hide back to him. He watched the king place it with the shabti figure in a peculiar act of reverence.
“There you go, sweet one, his words for your heart,” the king smiled. He sought his nemes and placed it on his head. “Here’s my thoughts. By the gods, I feel kinglier than I have ever felt.” He sat in the chair again, but leaned forward to clue the others before he sent for the vizier and a scribe to record and witness his edicts. “Per-A-At, you say? I have wanted to deliver a ston
e image of the Great Lady as lion. I want you to take it there. Your father, Wse, we can count on him to stand with us? Will the two of you be able to cause the House of Ra to stand with us?”
“I haven’t spoken to him of his allegiance specifically,” Wserkaf quipped. “You know we didn’t speak for many years, after I began to study with the Great One. I never understood why there was such enmity between him and Hordjedtef over something that occurred years ago, with my mother. Even when we spoke not long ago, he wouldn’t explain… said the dead ought to stay buried.”
His eyes widened with the echo of Naibe’s words: ‘rise at Per-A-At’ and the end of a thought he had sensed when he left Hordjedtef’s house, having mentioned his return in a few days to the City of the Sun. Take the Daughter of the God with you. Mother was a daughter of the god, so is my Khentie…
“Majesty. I’ll get my boat ready for an early departure and not in a few days. I agree I need to secure his allegiance… make my father tell me all he knows and place his signature for you before Dede even knows I’ve gone.”
“True,” Shepseskaf nodded, then beckoned Khentie to his embrace. “Oh, and take our sister with you. I think she could use some fresh air away from this place.”
Wserkaf froze as another piece of myth and legend began to move into place.
Part 2: Per-A-At
Chapter 10: Plans in the Night
Quarter moon, she thought. What’s next for us now that we are one and yet apart from each other? Deka Nefira Sekht thought about Marai, Ariennu, Naibe, and the young man from the neighborhood, Djerah. They are safe now in Qustul Amani, but my heart beats strangely when I think of that place and the two men I saw in my spirit flight the night the demon lion came.
For several nights, after the prince slept, she had thrown a gauze wrap over her shoulders and then called the two guards to her side. As she walked away from the camp with them, she reveled in the hot, arid night that released a shimmer of imaginary mist into the black sky. Soon, the sounds of the men in the camp always stopped. After a space of silence, night animals called and chorused but soon enough even they stilled. At those times, Deka felt the peace of the late night calling her to walk out.
Heart of the Lotus Page 11
