The King's Man

by Pauline Gedge

  She paused to lean forward and lift her cup, and as she did so Huy was suddenly enveloped in a miasma of jasmine perfume. At once he was overcome by a confusion of emotions. Despair, desperation, rage, desire, deluged him as they had on the night when Anuket accosted him in her father’s garden. The aroma had seeped into his earlier sleep, and his rest, though deep, had been full of unwanted dreams.

  “You don’t wear jasmine!” he blurted, half rising from his chair.

  Mutemwia glanced at him sharply. “I have it sprinkled on my night robe occasionally. For some reason it helps me to sleep. What’s the matter?”

  Huy sat down slowly. I’m so tired tonight, he thought resignedly. That’s unusual for me unless I’ve been Seeing. I want to be dismissed and drink my poppy in silence. The Queen was sipping her water, her eyes on him in speculation. Huy grimaced. “The smell of jasmine returns me to a time of great misery,” he replied. “Forgive me for startling you.”

  “You didn’t startle me.” She put her cup back on the table. “But I must say that I have never seen the marks of exhaustion on your face before. I’ll be brief.”

  She didn’t ask me what that time was, Huy’s thoughts ran on as she began to speak again. She probably doesn’t need to ask. She knows already.

  “The King’s uncle will arrive in a few days,” she was saying. “He will be treated with every honour to which he is entitled as a Prince. The King is most eager to get to know him. I remember him well and of course you do also. You made a Seeing for him. He will doubtless send for you before long.” She met Huy’s eye. “If he asks for another Seeing, I must know. If he sends such a request, it may mean that he has secretly decided to make a bid for the throne, in which case I must have him very closely watched, and Neferatiri also. The Prince will need her blood and position. She seems content, but I leave nothing to chance.” She ran both hands through her hair, lifted it, and, letting it fall back into place, folded her arms. “Apart from the hour of audience, the King won’t require your presence tomorrow. It might be wise to go to the administrative offices and let the ministers begin to get to know you. You remember the wording of your summons?”

  “Of course, Majesty.”

  “Good. You must restrict the use of your gift to those I send to you. The common people have had you long enough!” Her smile was infectious. In spite of his fatigue he found himself smiling back. “Amunhotep loves you very much,” she went on. It was the first time Huy had heard her use her son’s name. “Before he gives audience tomorrow he wishes to confer two titles on you: smer and erpa-ha. He intends to elevate you to the ranks of the nobles. It’s something his father should have done, but of course Thothmes would have reduced your power if he could, not added to it. What do you think?”

  Huy did not answer her at once, although he knew exactly what he would say. He tried to read the thoughts behind the black eyes, which often seemed full of an innocence that was, in fact, utterly misleading. Was this a challenge? A test? I deserve this, he told himself. I have served Egypt well and will serve her even better in the years to come. But I don’t want it. Have never wanted it.

  Leaving his chair, he knelt before her, and taking her little foot in both his hands, he kissed it and set it gently down. “I am more than grateful for this honour, but I must refuse it. I can’t serve the King and you if I hold a title.”

  “Why not?” There was no edge to the words, but Huy sensed the wariness beneath them.

  “Because you have brought me here to be an adviser to His Majesty. You know that I love him and hold the greatest respect for you. You stand behind the throne as Regent. When the King reaches his majority, you will no longer have that power, although you will of course always have influence with him. My position as his adviser will not change. I must be seen to be above the politics of both the nobility and the priesthoods, to favour neither the servants of the King nor the servants of the gods. Only then can I be seen as incorruptible. The priests will not be able to accuse me of a bias towards my fellow nobles. The nobles will not see me as a contender against them for the positions and preferments available through His Majesty’s generosity. As Huy the peasant, I am completely impartial. As Huy the Seer, I am seen to serve only the King.”

  She had been motionless while he was speaking, the gossamer linen that fell to her ankles stirring only with the rise and fall of her breast. Now she reached out her hands, lightly stroking down his hair and then taking both of his long braids and tugging them gently. “Get up. You are very wise, aren’t you, my Seer? I had not considered your argument, but it has validity. Very well. I shall explain it to the King.” She rose, went to another table, and returned holding a thick roll of papyrus, which she passed to him. Now standing, he took it reluctantly. “Not for tonight,” she said. “You are dismissed. And before I forget, you have our permission to hire anyone you like to be your new scribe and the captain of your guards. Choose well. The palace is not always a safe place.”

  Bowing, Huy made his way to the door. Beyond it, Ameni acknowledged him and entered, closing it behind him. The passage was full of moving shadows between the torches on the walls, but Huy had no reason to share his fellow Egyptians’ fear of the night. Not anymore. He came to his own door without difficulty, bade the two guards a good night, and made his way to his bedchamber. Tetiankh was asleep across its entrance. Stepping over him, Huy had just enough energy to rid himself of kilt, loincloth, and jewellery before crawling onto his couch with a gusty sigh. On the table beside him was a stoppered vial. After picking it up and shaking it, Huy pulled out the stopper and drank his poppy. Almost at once his fatigue became a pleasant lassitude and he drifted easily into unconsciousness.

  He dreamed that he was sitting in his garden at Hut-herib drinking wine with Ishat. Even in his sleep he knew that drinking wine was a good omen. It meant that he would open his mouth and speak important words. He turned his head to tell Ishat so, but the woman beside him was not Ishat. It was the Queen. Mutemwia was wearing the crown with the gazelles’ heads. There was no wine cup in her graceful hands. Instead, she was lifting a wreath of jasmine and ivy over his head. “I love you also, Huy,” she said. “I have loved you almost as long as you have loved me. But what can I do?” The garden suddenly darkened and the hennaed lips so close to his own became ebony in the uncertain light. “Kiss me, Huy,” she whispered, and it was Anuket wearing the crown, Anuket whose fingers pressed the wreath against his skin. Huy cried out softly, but he did not wake.

  2

  HUY HAD EXPECTED THAT AMUNHOTEP would hold audience in the Throne Room he remembered so uncomfortably from the time when he had lost his nerve to expose the sphinx dream as a sham. But the servant who arrived the following morning did not lead him through the palace and out into one of the gardens; he stayed within the main complex, and once again Huy was lost.

  He had spent a restless night but could not recall his dreams, waking with the first grey light of dawn filtering weakly down from the high clerestory window. He had lain quietly for a moment, sure that he had not woken of his own accord. His sleep had not refreshed him. He felt tired in body and stale in mind, with the need for poppy already beginning to agitate within him. He was about to shout for Tetiankh when he heard music coming from somewhere fairly close by. One lone voice was raised in song. Huy could just make out the words and decided that they were drifting in through the clerestory above him. “Hail Mighty Incarnation, rising as Ra in the East! Hail Emanation of the Holy One!” A chorus at once answered, “Thou art risen, thou art in peace. Rise thou beautifully in peace, wake thou to life!” There was more, but Tetiankh appeared with his first dose of poppy and the simple meal Huy preferred in the mornings. Huy, rightly assuming that his body servant would have wasted no time in becoming acquainted with the routines and rumours of the court, asked him who had been singing. Tetiankh paused, Huy’s tray in both hands.

  “The chanter is Ptahhotep, the High Priest of Ptah here in Mennofer. At least, he was Ptah’s High Priest. App
arently the One has made him High Priest of Amun and Fanbearer on the Left Hand. The responders are priests from Amun’s shrine.” He set the bread and fruit down by Huy’s hip and poured his milk. “The King is supposed to go to the shrine at dawn to break the sanctuary seal and be present when the Hymn of Praise is sung just as Ra emerges from the vagina of Nut, and then to perform the necessary tasks in the Holiest of Holiest. But our King finds it difficult to leave his couch, being something of an owl as we know, so unless it’s a god’s feast day, Amun’s High Priest and his acolytes come to sing the hymn to him outside his bedchamber every morning after they’ve sung for the god himself.”

  Huy, a wrinkled fig halfway to his mouth, suddenly looked at it, frowning. “Thank you, Tetiankh. Now tell me if you saw Amunmose taste this food and milk.”

  The man nodded, lifted a starched white kilt from one of Huy’s tiring chests, and laid it carefully over the chair. “I did. Amunmose knows what you like to eat. He chose and sampled everything himself. He did the same last night with the water beside your couch. I’ll go to the nearest bathhouse now and make sure everything’s ready for you.”

  Huy ate and drank slowly. He did not relish having to be washed and oiled in the company of others every day, but he supposed that given the hundreds of people inhabiting this warren it was unavoidable. He wondered how long it would be before he could have a home built for himself, just out of the city perhaps, by the river.

  Now, dressed simply as a scribe but ornamented as a favourite of the King, he strode after the servant, his palette and the scroll the Queen had given him under his arm. At last the man halted at a tall doorway. “This is where His Majesty discusses matters with his ministers,” he told Huy, bowing and waving him through. “I will return later and take you wherever you wish to go.”

  Huy thanked him and plunged into the throng of men milling about and talking loudly. As he moved, he caught a glimpse beyond them, into a vast room he recognized as the main reception hall. He was behind its rear wall, looking through an open door and across its dusky expanse to the wide, pillared entrance of the palace. Feeling a little less bewildered, he studied the officials around him. Amunhotep had complained in a letter that he was surrounded by old men, Huy remembered, but the faces he saw were mostly young. For a while no one noticed him, but at last he saw someone he knew. Heqarneheh approached him, beaming and bowing.

  “Great Seer, you are here! It’s been a long time since I chased a Prince around your garden.”

  “It’s good to see you,” Huy replied, pleased. “I presume your days of nurse to Amunhotep are over. Are you still a Royal Tutor?”

  “I am, but I spend most of my time at the harem in Mi-wer, seeing to the care of our late King’s lesser children. Menkhoper still teaches Amunhotep, of course, along with an army of experts in every field His Majesty must conquer. Oh, here comes Maani-nekhtef! I hope we may speak again and at length.”

  The Chief Herald had mounted a dais on which two thrones and a rather large cushioned stool were placed. His Staff of Office hit the wood three times and a hush began to settle over the crowd.

  “His Majesty Amunhotep, King of Upper and Lower Egypt, neb-maat-ra, Ka-nakht kha-em-maat …” He went on calling Amunhotep’s titles while every back was bowed. When he was at last bidden to stand, Huy saw that the chairs were occupied. Amunhotep, in a plain white kilt and a blue and white striped linen helmet, had crossed his legs and placed both arms along the golden lions’ spines making up the arms of the throne. Mutemwia, in a long yellow sheath belted in gold and with a coronet of red faience flowers on her head, was surveying the company. Catching Huy’s eye, she beckoned him. At once the assembly drew aside and Huy went forward. At the same time a man of about Huy’s own age came hurrying through the door behind the dais, bowed peremptorily, and settled himself cross-legged on the cushioned stool beside the King, setting a large box on the floor beside him and a palette across his thighs. That must be Seal Bearer and Royal Scribe Nebmerut, Huy thought as he halted at Amunhotep’s feet.

  “Come up and stand behind me, Huy,” the King said. “You slept badly, I see.” Then in a louder voice he addressed those present. “I have been pleased to appoint the Great Seer Huy Son of Hapu to the position of King’s Personal Scribe. I desire his wisdom and value the gift the gods have bestowed upon him. In token of his love for me he is now known as Amunhotep. Reverence him and then let us get on with the matters of the day.”

  Every head went down then lifted. Every eye was fixed on Huy. No response was necessary. Huy unrolled the scroll Mutemwia had given him and prepared to put faces to the daunting list of names and then try to remember them all.

  Afterwards, Amunhotep disappeared to his lessons and Mutemwia, her entourage behind, walked Huy and his escort out into a garden Huy recognized though he had once entered it from a different door. Mutemwia indicated one of the many buildings enclosing it. “The lesser audience hall,” she said. “Reserved for occasions less formal than those that take place in the reception hall but more official than the meeting of the King with his ministers. You have been inside it, I think.”

  Huy did not answer. He was revelling in the blue sky and bright sunlight of a spring day. A warm breeze pressed the Queen’s yellow linen against her legs and freed wisps of black hair from Huy’s one thick braid. The grass, watered earlier and now quickly drying, sparkled with moist droplets. Petals from the trees growing everywhere showered the ground with every gust of air and Huy, passing the spiny arms of a plum tree, caught the spicy scent of its little greenish-yellow flowers.

  Mutemwia pointed, ignoring the trio of gardeners now flat on their faces as she walked by. “That whole building continues into the next area of garden. You can see the path that cuts off the end of the wall. All the ministers have their offices there. No, Tekait, don’t bother with the sunshade—the wind is too strong. Huy, I am taking you to meet a few of them, and that will be enough for today. We eat the evening meal in private again tonight, the King, you, and I. Greetings, Ptahmose!”

  They had halted at the doorway of the first cell. At the sound of his name a man came out swiftly, bowing as he did so. “Majesty.”

  “I have brought Amunhotep Son of Hapu to meet you. Huy, this is the Vizier of Upper and Lower Egypt, the noble Ptahmose.”

  They exchanged a few light pleasantries. Huy endured the other’s polite scrutiny. These men knew nothing of him but rumour. The Osiris-King Amunhotep the Second, who had generously rescued Huy and Ishat from poverty, had sometimes sent court officials to Huy for Seeings, but his son Thothmes had not dared to do so. Thus a generation of nobles had never seen him.

  “As His Majesty’s Personal Scribe, you and I will be sharing many private matters,” Ptahmose told Huy. “I hope we may become friends in our service to the Horus Throne.”

  “So do I,” Huy agreed. He was sure he would enjoy this noble’s company. The eyes met his with quiet confidence. Although Ptahmose was obviously not a young man, his lean body and well-muscled arms spoke of a balanced life. Huy was surprised by how much the Vizier knew about Hut-herib and its environs.

  “Part of my work for the King lies in examining all land transactions from the Great Green in the north to our border with Wawat, where Nehemawi serves His Majesty as Viceroy of Wawat and Kush,” Ptahmose explained. “I have representatives with every Governor and I tour the sepats twice a year, once to assess the health of the fields and once to settle any major disputes between the noble landowners after the Inundation has destroyed the canals. I have met your uncle Ker.”

  Mutemwia held up a hand and immediately Ptahmose stopped speaking. “We must continue on our way,” she said. “Is there anything I need to hear, Vizier?”

  “No, Majesty. I shall not need to trouble you with any governmental matters until I return from Weset.”

  “Very well.” She turned towards the next cell and Ptahmose bowed and withdrew. “The Vizier is a very powerful man,” she remarked to Huy. “He reports only to the King and t
o me. His most difficult task lies in making sure that Thothmes’ lesser sons receive estates or trade revenues commensurate with their station. They can be a quarrelsome horde, always demanding more because their blood holds the tincture of royalty. Ptahmose handles them firmly and with tact. He refuses to give any of them government posts. He prefers to promote the young men under him who have worked hard to improve their station. This cell houses the Overseer of the Treasury, Nakht-sobek. The Sobek family comes from Sumenu, south of Weset. They are lovers of the desert, but live here because they are entirely trustworthy. Nakht-sobek reports to me on the state of the Treasury every day. Of course, I have a spy in the Treasury as well.”

  Of course, Huy thought with a flash of humour that rapidly became gratitude. She has obviously decided to confide in me completely. She must know the power over both herself and her son she’s giving me. Eventually I would be able to destroy them both. He was exchanging greetings with Nakht-sobek while these thoughts flitted through his mind.

  He and Mutemwia moved on, and soon Huy gave up any effort to remember the many faces that smiled at him. I simply must hire a scribe who will walk with me and remind me what titles each person holds and what positions they fill, he thought a trifle anxiously, and I urgently need a captain who will organize the few guards I brought with me, someone who will have my welfare and the care of my staff at heart. Who can I go to for advice? Heby? My nephew Amunhotep-Huy?

  “You look worried, Huy,” Mutemwia said, and Huy came to himself.

  “Not worried, Majesty,” he responded, “but I’ve already forgotten the names of half the men I’ve seen.”

  “That will change.” She had halted and turned to him, and with a curiously possessive gesture she lifted the golden sa amulet he always wore and, setting it against his naked chest, once more patted it lightly. “I must leave you here,” she went on. “I have my own office adjoining the hall you were in earlier, and ministers waiting for decisions. You will be summoned this evening.” Huy watched her walk away in the direction of the main building, her steps smooth and graceful, her escort hurrying to catch up to her. He could still feel the mild touch of her hennaed fingers on his skin.