by Nick Drake
Instantly, serving men came forward to guide me to a room with a low bed, made up with fresh linen. They indicated that they wished me to undress so that they could wash me, but I refused. I wanted to wash my own wounds, even though my finger was throbbing horribly. I managed to get myself out of my old clothes and slowly cleaned the cuts, the sores on my wrists and ankles, and the sweat and dirt from my face and neck. Mahu and his guards had cut me up: bruises and knife lacerations criss-crossed on my inner thighs, and under my arms. Then, as I was drying myself, there was a knock at the door, and a man of middle age, wearing an understated but costly tunic, entered. He had a strange, empty face. His lips were thin. He reminded me of an abandoned house.
‘I am the chief of physicians to God’s Father,’ he said in a voice that was almost colourless. ‘I will need to examine you now.’ I experienced a reluctance to allow him to touch me. He saw this. ‘It is necessary.’ I nodded.
He placed his hands upon me at different points; then his fingers quickly probed the cuts and wounds, squeezing at the broken skin to test for infection or vile fluids. When he lifted my hand to observe the broken finger, taking it between his own to test it by moving it about, the pain was horrible and I flinched. He did not seem to notice. He just nodded, as if this confirmed the obvious conclusion that the finger was truly broken.
He opened a small chest, which I noticed contained jars of minerals, herbs, honey, fat and bile. Next to them were vessels for the mixing and storage of essences and oils, and then an array of surgical instruments; sharp hooks, long probes, cupping vessels and vicious-looking forceps hanging from hooks. It was precise and highly ordered; a small working laboratory. How similar such instruments were, I realized, to those used in the processes of embalming and mummification. I remembered the Chamber of Purification. I remembered Tjenry and his glass eyes. I remembered the canopic jar and its appalling contents. I noticed a statue of Thoth, god of knowledge and writing, in his baboon form looking down at us both from a niche. Guardian of the deceased in the Otherworld.
‘I see you are interested in alchemy,’ I said.
He closed the chest and turned around. ‘It is a way of knowledge,’ he replied. ‘Transmutation. The purification from base substance of eternal truth.’
‘By what means?’
‘By fire.’ He looked at me with his desolate eyes. ‘Turn to face the wall, please.’ He handed me a dish.
‘What is this for?’ I asked.
He did not reply. I turned away. I felt him laying out my fingers on a board, the broken one tender and crooked to one side.
‘I have heard of a substance, known only to the alchemists; a water that wets not and yet burns everything.’
Suddenly an intense pain exploded in my little finger, shooting up my arm. I vomited into the dish he had given me. When I came back to my senses he was already binding the finger in the splints. Now the pain was gone, replaced by a thrumming ache.
‘Your finger is reset. It will take time to heal.’
He busied himself with returning his room to its state of meticulous order.
‘As Chief of Physicians you must have access to the Books of Thoth?’ I asked.
After a short silence he said: ‘You could know nothing of such matters.’
‘The Books are spoken of as compendiums of secrets and hidden powers.’
‘Power is hidden in everything,’ he replied. ‘There is great power in this knowledge. And also great danger to those who are not correctly initiated into its secrets and responsibilities.’
We stared at each other. He waited to see whether I would try again. Then he nodded discreetly and departed, shutting the door silently behind him.
I was taken to the state room, with its gold chairs, long benches and Hittite wall hangings, and left alone to wait. Two trays on stands had been set-crisp linen, precious metal dishes, alabaster goblets almost pellucid in the polished light entering through the cabin windows. I was starving, and the prospect of a fine feast, however tense the occasion, set my stomach grumbling.
I was just pondering the glorious objects around me when I felt a drift of air, and there was Ay. We sat beside the trays, the two of us attended by a silent servant who was able to serve us perfectly and to maintain an air of not really being there. He brought us many dishes, including a fish cooked in a package of papyrus with the addition of white wine, herbs and nuts-a thing I would never have imagined.
‘The fish is considered a poor man’s meal,’ Ay said, ‘but correctly prepared it is delicate and makes meat seem crude. After all, it comes from the heart of the Great River, which gives us all life.’
‘And carries away our rubbish and our dead dogs.’
‘Do you see it that way?’ He thought about it, then shook his head, dismissing my comment. ‘The fish is an impressive creature. It lives in a different element. It remains silent and pure. It has its secrets but cannot speak of them.’
He delicately peeled the tail, spine and head away from his fish, and placed them on another dish. I followed suit, more messily. The two greasy heads lay on their sides as if listening intently to our conversation. Ay ate a few mouthfuls of the delicate flesh.
‘I brought you here because I know you have found the Queen,’ he said. ‘Otherwise I would have left you to the tender care of Mahu, who hates you.’
I said nothing. Anyway, my mouth was full.
‘In fact, I will express that thought another way. She is a clever woman, and would not have led you to her unless she wished to be found. True?’
Again, I did not reply. I needed to see where we were going. I remembered the look of animal fear upon that beautiful face when Ay’s name was mentioned.
‘Therefore she has a plan, which to some extent depends on your participation. And of course this plan must be to reveal herself again during the Festival. Why else would she sequester herself?’
It was not a question requiring an answer.
‘I have not found her,’ I said. ‘I do not know where she is.’
He stopped eating. Those snow-filled eyes stared at me. ‘I know you have found her. I know she is not dead. I know she will return. So the only question is, what happens next? She cannot know, so this is the area of interest to me.’
At a nod from Ay, the servant cleared the dishes and set new ones.
‘And what have I got to do with all this?’
‘You are her go-between. That being the case, I wish you to take her a message from me.’
‘I’m not a messenger boy.’
‘Sit down.’
‘I’ll stand.’
‘The message is this: ask her to come to me, and I will restore order. There is no need for this melodrama. There are sensible solutions, correct choices to be made, for all of us. She does not have to fight us all to return stability to the Two Lands.’
I waited for more, but he said nothing.
‘Is that it?’
‘That is what I wish her to know.’
‘It’s not much of an offer.’
Suddenly he was angry. ‘Do not presume to comment on what does not concern you. You are lucky to be alive.’
I watched him, the flash of intensity, the brief revelation of his power.
‘Tell me one thing. What is the Society of Ashes?’
Ay gave me the long stare.
‘And do golden feathers mean anything to you? And a water that wets not, and yet burns?’
His face gave even less away, but this time he got up and walked away without bidding me farewell.
So I sat down and finished my lunch. After everything I had gone through, a good meal was the least I deserved.
38
I was returned to shore, my belly full, wine in my head, my finger still throbbing. I turned back to look at the great ship. Ay seemed like a mirage: vividly there, but gone when looked at from the wrong angle. Was he a figure of infinite power, or some magician’s trick of smoke and mirrors?
It was mid-afternoon now, and
the sun, remorseless above the simmering cooking pot of the city’s landscape, did nothing to clarify my state of mind. Nor did the crowds, overheated and overwhelmed, that now packed the harbour and the city’s ways. Something was blurring the atmosphere of the place. After the hours on the ship, on the flowing water, and the lost time in jail, I felt heavy and weary, as if dry land was pulling me down. I felt like I wanted to wash and then sleep in the dark.
But I had to see Nefertiti. Not because I wanted to carry Ay’s message-although I wanted to see its effect upon her-but because I needed to see if Khety had managed to reach the Queen’s fort; and also because I had things to say. Things to tell her. Shards of story. I knew she could put them together better than I, if she chose.
I made my way to the necropolis. No sign of the cat. I approached the chapel for the second time, checking to make sure I was not observed, and entered its little precinct of stone and shadow. In the flat afternoon glare it seemed less mysterious, less convincing. In the sanctuary, the offering bowls had been kicked away. The hieroglyphs had been defaced. My name was scored out. So now someone knew about this place.
I examined the narrow gap through which on that night I had entered the Otherworld. But it was now sealed up. There was no way in. How, then, could I reach her? And why had this place been vandalized? It was obviously deliberate. Was she preventing me from reaching her again? I was furious. What did she want of me?
I went first to the pig sty, and rooted about like a fool for the trap door while the pigs sniffed at me. But the door refused to open. Suddenly I had the sense of being watched. I glanced up and down the alleyway-empty. It was oddly quiet, though. Someone could have trailed me, and stepped back into the shadow of a doorway. No other choice, then: I almost ran to the Great River, taking a zigzag route through the streets and ways, moving through crowds then slipping into a side passage, then doubling back. I kept glancing over my shoulder; I felt in my bones I was right, yet no-one seemed intent upon pursuing me. I scanned the crowds, but they all seemed occupied with other plans. Perhaps the unreality of the city was finally influencing my mind. Still, I could think of several people who would benefit from trailing me now and I could afford to take no risks, not with so much at stake.
I pretended to be moving in a northerly direction towards the Aten temples, and joined the throng on the Royal Road. Then I took a side turning to the east and, using the advantages of the grid pattern of construction, turned right and right again, doubling back upon myself, checking at each corner that no-one seemed to be following, then slipping through the crowds again on the Royal Road and heading west, through the warren of streets to the docks.
I chartered the worst kept and least noticeable skiff, kicking the old boatman out of his afternoon sleep. He rubbed his eyes, and began to row. I looked back across the crowded dock. Many people were observing the water. Many other boats were setting out. None seemed to be following me.
We crossed in silence. The man glanced at me curiously once, then pretended to concentrate on the river. The traffic was busy, and we passed in and out of the bigger ships, the slow ferries, the flotillas of pleasure-boats, and a small herd of water-buffalo struggling across, their heads held up above the waterline.
He left me on the far side. Suddenly the simple quietness of the world returned to me: a few birds, some children playing at the water’s edge, the occasional calls of women working in the fields. No other boats were approaching or landing here. The sun, slowly descending towards the western cliffs, guided me towards the general area where the fort lay.
I set off between the fields of emmer and barley. How immaculate they were, tended to perfection over all time as if the fields themselves were worshipped gods. At one point a group of men riding donkeys appeared ahead of me, but we nodded and continued without attending much to one another. The track between the fields reached a wider path, and I followed it north, along the axis of the river’s course, through a tiny settlement where the people still lived in the same low, dark mud shacks with their animals as they had done since time began. Everyone, including the babies and the old men reclining on their low benches, stopped to watch me pass. I felt as if I had stepped down from the sky. These were the working poor who had possibly, probably, never even crossed the Great River to the city. To them it was a kind of fable.
Then I was back again among the fields and date palms, and the sounds of early evening. Where was this place? Eventually, sweating and frustrated, I found myself standing at the boundary between the Black Land and the Red. Behind me the verdant yellows, viridians and spring greens of the cultivated world; one step in front of me began the stony dereliction that surrounds us. A flat, forsaken plain extended to a continuous wavering line of crumbly red cliffs. The Red Land continued beyond them, eternal, unseen, sacred, to the end of the world.
And there, up to my right, stood the building, its squat walls giving no sign of the life within. Of course there were no doors and no windows, but I had assumed I would be able to call, or find some means of access. I stood in the shadow of the east wall and, feeling like an angry fool, called out. No answer came. I called again. Just the mocking reply of a bird in the trees some distance behind me.
What else could I do? I circled the building but there was no way in. The mud-brick crumbled under my fingers when I tried to grip it and lift myself up. I kicked the futile stones at my feet. Damn her. Enough. It was time to take my chances, forget this charade, and go home. I would charter a boat and get out of the city as fast as possible. Enough.
I returned by the same route, but as I set foot upon the path I heard something up ahead. Even the birds in the trees seemed to have quietened. A brief wind rustled through the dry heads of the barley. The hair on the back of my neck prickled. I quickly dropped down and scurried into the barley field. Before long I could make out the sound of marching feet and wheels upon rough ground. A troop of soldiers appeared and passed close by me, followed by a chariot, bumping precariously on the track, carrying two Medjay officers. They were unmistakably heading for the square fort.
Keeping low in the barley, I scurried in the opposite direction, skirting around the village. The evening light had arrived now. The village seemed deserted. Everyone must be hiding inside. When I reached the edge of the river I spotted further along the strand a military ferry roped to the trees, a few guards set about it. Before me the Great River ran ever strongly. The city’s buildings were gilded, and beyond them, in the distance, the eastern cliffs were lit bright red. How would I cross? And once I had crossed, where would I start to search for Nefertiti?
Then I noticed, paddling as if to stay still against the current, keeping almost hidden among the moving shadows near the water’s edge, another skiff. The boatman seemed to be examining the shoreline. I crouched back into the trees. There was something familiar about the outline and the movements of the figure in the boat. I peered more closely, but the figure moved in and out of view. If he was an enemy, why would he be working so hard to stay unseen, and why would he be here?
I picked up a pebble and cast it carefully in the direction of the skiff. A moment of silence, during which it seemed to me the guards’ voices lulled, and then a faint splash. I saw the figure in the boat turn quickly towards the source of the noise, and then peer into the dark fringe where I was hidden. He paddled closer, but not close enough. I threw another pebble. It landed nearer the shore. Immediately he followed the sound. Because we were on the western shore, the trees cast a long shadow across the edge of the water, even while the city was still lit up. But I believed now I recognized the shape of the figure’s head.
I waited for the guards to resume their conversation. When I heard the murmur of their voices, I ran, crouching, across the narrow strand towards the skiff. I was right: it was Khety. I jumped in behind him as quietly as possible. He did not smile, just raised his finger to his lips and allowed the skiff to slide away with the current, away from the soldiers.
When we were at a safe
enough distance, we turned to each other, our minds crowded with questions. The most pressing of which I voiced.
‘Where is she?’
‘I’ll take you to her. But first I have to know what happened with Ay.’ ‘How do you know about that?’
‘You were taken to the ship. You talked?’
Khety had never used this tone of urgency with me before.
‘I’ll tell her what happened.’
‘You have to tell me first. Or I cannot take you to her.’
His expression was determined. This was not the unconfidently confident young man I had met just days before. He had assumed a new authority.
‘She doesn’t trust me now?’
He shook his head-direct and honest.
‘You know I was captured? By Mahu?’
‘Yes. And we thought that was the end. But then we learned you were freed. By Ay. This could only mean-’
‘What? That I betrayed her? That I have been working for Ay all this time? Is that what you think? After all we have been through?’ It is hard to be furious in a small boat on open water. ‘Take me to her. Now.’
He looked at me, made his decision and nodded. He deftly turned the skiff and guided us across the strong currents of the river. The evening wind was ragged, blustery and hot-a different wind, not the cool of the northern breeze but something born of the south and its remote deserts. A nearly full moon had now risen above the city. Strange shadows of long, hazy clouds were being drawn like dirty veils across her face. The city’s white facades stood out here and there above the darkness of the trees.
We made our crossing of the jittery dark waters leaving a confused wake, and sailed directly to a jetty of new stone where little tongues of black and blue water lapped agitatedly. The steps led to a place I already knew. A wide stone terrace under a marvellous vine that made it a secret place, quiet and free of the rising wind. And a beautiful chair, set near the water, so that the occupant could sit watching, thinking. I remembered the feel of the missing woman’s figure in its shapes and contours. And there Nefertiti sat, real now, her fingers thoughtfully stroking the carved lion’s paws at the end of the chair’s arms, her mind seemingly as cool as a goblet of water.
