Valley of the Kings

by Terrance Coffey

  “My son never rebelled against me. He was a courageous warrior, one that will be remembered throughout eternity for his bravery. Your lying tongue betrays you.”

  Amenhotep took a flint knife from his belt, pried Nasheret’s mouth open and with one deft swipe, cut out his tongue. He then turned his attention to Captain Horemheb. “Tomorrow you will go to Nubia and install an Egyptian outpost. Return the Nubian tribute to me, General Horemheb.”

  Astounded by his unexpected promotion, Horemheb stood up and bowed.

  “And, general,” continued Amenhotep, “if you encounter any resistance from the Nubians, kill them all.”

  “By your order, my Pharaoh,” Horemheb responded.

  Amenhotep tossed Nasheret’s bloody tongue across the floor and returned to his seat next to a stunned Queen Ty. If she thought her husband had silenced Nasheret in her defense, she might have been gratified, but all he had proven was that her pride didn’t matter to him, only his own.

  “Pathetic,” she muttered under her breath.

  Queen Ty leaned into Amenhotep’s ear. “How noble of you to defend only your own honor,” she whispered.

  The queen rose from her seat and exited the room leaving all eyes on Amenhotep. He stood up and gave the musicians a hand signal and they returned to their positions and played again. Everyone else returned to eating and drinking as Nasheret’s blood poured out from his nose and mouth. As if by command, over a dozen cats appeared from every corner of the room, jumped one-by-one onto the table and licked the general’s blood. No one dared to scatter them away, for they were the divine creatures of the Bastet god that kept the rats from flooding the room and devouring their banquet feast.

  HOREMHEB WAS NOT THE ONLY ONE Amenhotep had given strict orders to that day. He had also spoken to Ay, ordering him to appear before the Amun priests, Sia and Neper. Amenhotep wanted confirmation that the priests had performed the customary invocation for Tuthmosis—a prayer and spell to lead his son to a safe passage through the afterlife and to his eventual return to the land of the living.

  Only Sia and Neper had the authority and knowledge to recite invocations, a privilege of the lector priests of Amun, the most powerful of the sect. Because the two priests were aware that Tuthmosis despised the Amun god and worshipped the Aten, Amenhotep had to rely on Ay’s association as a former Amun priest himself to convince them to forgive his son’s blasphemy. Ay gave Amenhotep his word he would not return without Sia’s and Neper’s assurances that they would complete the invocation. Without it, Tuthmosis’s spirit was destined to be forever lost, unable to reunite with his body.

  As Ay approached the courtyard of the Amun temple, farmers accompanied by the eldest of their families began lining up around the perimeter of the complex. This was the first morning of the solstice, an occasion that required that every farmer who wanted to receive the harvest blessing of the Amun god, appear and pay their share of taxes to its priests. Ay navigated through the crowd of roaming animals and donkeys carrying sacks of grain across their backs until he came upon Sia and Neper standing at the head of the line. Sia was checking off a list of names and taxes owed on a sheet of papyrus.

  For three days and nights, Ay had rehearsed his plea on behalf of Tuthmosis, confident he could reason with the twins. Yet now that he was face-to-face with Sia, his confidence waned. He was skeptical, and doubted they would even listen to him. Ay had had no real relationship with the Amun priesthood since the day he left the order to become the pharaoh’s manservant. He had betrayed their covenant, and because of that, he no longer existed in their eyes. The only way to be seen again by them would be if he could offer what they valued the most—the pharaoh’s tribute.

  Before Ay spoke a word, Sia raised his palm to his face, a sign for him to remain silent. Ay stepped back, intimidated. Sia pointed to the next man in line.

  “You, come forward,” he ordered him.

  An elderly farmer lurched up to Sia, straining to pull his ox on a rope behind him.

  “This one from the province of Aluset claims he’s only harvested twenty loads,” announced Neper.

  Sia checked the scroll again, then eyed the farmer as if he were a criminal. “It’s written thirty for your province.”

  “My lord, twenty are all I can spare without starving my family. I’ve brought you the best of my cattle.”

  “Amun requires tax on the full harvest. Return with thirty.”

  The old farmer handed the rope with the ox to Sia and slogged his way back through the crowd. Sia examined the animal, gently petting its head.

  Anxious to get his request heard, Ay stepped forward again, rubbing the side of his thigh to settle his nervousness. “The pharaoh has kept his word as I promised you. A bountiful tribute of gold and ivory is at the rear of the temple waiting to be unloaded.”

  Sia didn’t look at him. He continued to study the ox, then turned to Neper. “Secure the pharaoh’s tribute,” he said.

  Neper handed Sia a linen scroll before he exited toward the rear of the temple, and Sia counted the farmers that were in line. It was a blatant effort to dismiss Ay’s presence, but Ay, determined to get Sia’s attention, stepped in front of him, blocking his view of the farmers.

  “The pharaoh desires you to confirm Tuthmosis’s invocation into the afterlife,” said Ay in a flash of boldness.

  Sia exploded with laughter. “Tell the pharaoh we don’t perform invocations for spies.”

  Sia kissed the scroll, knelt on the ground, and unrolled it. Inside was a dagger that glinted in the sun.

  “I assure you, Prince Tuthmosis was no spy,” said Ay. “His only intention was to service the temple of Amun.”

  “His intention was to exalt the Aten, never Amun!” Sia shouted.

  He ignored Ay’s presence, bowed his head and prayed. “Amun, the god of gods and of Osiris. Empower me through this utensil of your sacrifice, so that I may strike him, who is in the form of an ox who struck you.”

  Sia picked up the dagger and slowly circled the ox. Ay watched him, still determined in his mission for Amenhotep. He found his confidence restored.

  “As the firstborn of the pharaoh, Tuthmosis deserves all the honor afforded a prince of Egypt,” Ay urged. “That is written law.”

  “Don’t speak to me about the law. I know the law. Tuthmosis deserved Amun’s judgment of death and that is all he will get.”

  Without warning, Sia plunged the dagger deep in the ox’s neck, then yanked it out, severing the animal’s jugular vein. The beast let out a choking shriek as a geyser of blood shot out from the wound. The ox teetered for a moment before it fell to the ground.

  “My lord, I beg of you,” said Ay. “The pharaoh is in deep mourning. Your invocation for his son would bring him a measure of peace.”

  Rolling the bloody dagger back into the scroll, Sia glared at Ay. “The matter is closed,” he said and walked away. Ay stood there unable to move. To admit his failure to the pharaoh would be more shameful than any banishment from palace royalty.

  FOR THE NEXT FORTY DAYS, Ay presided over Tuthmosis’s mummification. The first thirty-nine days they dehydrated the prince’s body with natron—a mixture of water and salt. Then they placed the body inside a tent, laid out across a wooden table. Ay had participated in several mummifications as a former Amun priest, including the mummification of his first wife, an experience that rendered him numb to the process. Queen Ty had sent Ay to oversee what she herself was too fragile to witness.

  Ay stood stoically in a corner of the tent as a man, taller than normal and wearing a jackal mask, stepped inside. He rolled Tuthmosis’s body over on his stomach, and with a mallet and spike, punctured a hole in the back of his head. A speck of Tuthmosis’s brain matter landed on Ay’s cheek. He didn’t bother removing it; there would be more. It was easier to wait to cleanse himself once the embalming was complete.

  The masked man pushed a two-cubit-long metal wire up through Tuthmosis’s nostril, then vigorously shook it until it liquefied his b
rain and the dark-gray membranous fluid dripped out from the hole in the back of his head. The man then took a knife and made a “T” incision on Tuthmosis’s chest. He broke open the ribs and removed the lungs, liver, and intestines and placed each in separate Canopic jars. He put sand and linen in the chest cavity, then stitched it closed.

  How soon might this be my fate? Ay thought. And who would I trust to oversee my own mummification? No one came to mind as he watched the masked man pour the resin liquid over Tuthmosis’s face and body. Within thirty days, the entire corpse would be wrapped in small strips of linen cloth, and by the seventieth day, the resin would have set and Tuthmosis’s body entombed in the hills above the Valley of the Kings—a long narrow passage between the mountains west of the river.

  A day after Tuthmosis’s burial, Ay returned to the palace and found Amenhotep stumbling out of his bedchamber into the corridor, naked and screaming Tuthmosis’s name. Ay helped him back to his chamber, carrying within his garment what Amenhotep’s body yearned for. Having seen the paranoid side-effects the cure had on the pharaoh and the many citizens of Thebes, Ay never had the desire to try it himself. He punctured the capsule of one plant and squeezed the opium latex into Amenhotep’s mouth. The pharaoh swallowed it all in a single gulp and sank into his bed.

  “You never told me what transpired on your visit with Sia and Neper. Did you convince them to perform the invocation for Tuthmosis?” asked Amenhotep.

  Ay paused. The details of his failed mission with Sia at the temple came to mind, and how now despite the care taken with Tuthmosis’s mummification and proper burial, he had no invocation from the Amun priests to guide him back to the world of the living. Ay couldn’t bring himself to look his pharaoh in the eyes and lie, so he focused on a spot beneath the pharaoh’s gaze when he responded. “Yes, my Pharaoh. It is done.”

  CHAPTER 7

  Teppy whimpered when Queen Ty set foot in his bedchamber. He had grown more infirm, and he was sprawled out in the middle of the floor trying to maneuver his body into a kneeling position, so he could stand and walk to his platform bed just five steps away.

  Anger surged through the queen’s body. Teppy’s debility was a hindrance—a reality that tormented her and at the same time demanded her empathy. She not only needed to find a way to help him overcome his curse, but also to reverse the debilitating effect it already had over his body.

  Teppy struggled to lift himself, and once again, dropped to the floor. When he gave up and started to crawl, it enraged her. “A prince of Egypt will not crawl across the floor like a helpless infant! You will stand and walk to your bed, Teppy!” shouted the queen.

  “I can’t, Ma. Help me,” he said.

  Teppy reached his hand out to her. She stared at him with a blank expression. He tried again to lift himself, and this time almost stood erect but fell again.

  “I can’t,” he whimpered.

  Frustrated, the queen marched up to Teppy, grabbed him off the floor, and, with a jolt, dropped him down on his bed. When she lifted his chin, there was a pathetic expression on his face. Any acceptance at all of his incapacity would make it grow worse.

  “Listen to me,” she said grimacing. “Repeat this: ‘I am strong; I am a prince.’”

  Teppy shook his head. “I’m not strong. My legs are weak.”

  She slapped him across his face. Teppy stared at her confused, tears forming in his eyes. The queen lifted his chin a second time. “What are you?” she demanded.

  He cried out louder. “I am weak, Ma. It’s true.”

  Teppy had never lied to his mother. She had taught him from infancy how his life would be cursed if he wasn’t truthful with her at all times. For the sake of his survival and her own, he would have to lie and believe it with all his heart. So, the queen slapped him again, harder this time. “What are you!” she screamed, raising her voice to the heavens.

  “I’m a prince.” Teppy sniveled.

  “’I am strong. I am a prince.’ Say it,” Ty demanded.

  Teppy did as he was told. “I am strong. I am a prince,” he repeated softly as he looked in his mother’s eyes for her approval.

  “Louder!”

  “I am strong! I am a prince!”

  Ty was unconvinced and slapped him a third time with the back of her hand. It left a mark on Teppy’s face.

  “Say it louder!” she shouted again, and finally, Teppy closed his eyes and let go. He screamed out at her with all the pain and anguish he had held inside for so long.

  “I am strong! I am a prince! I am strong! I am a prince! I am strong I am a prince!”

  The queen lamented as her son broke down in tears. She wrapped him in an embrace and held him close to her bosom.

  “Hush now, you are strong like your brother, and in time you will overcome this.”

  She sang him a lullaby, the same melody that had never failed to soothe him when he was an infant.

  “I miss him,” Teppy said. “He’s sleeping too long, Ma; we have to wake him.”

  Queen Ty caught her breath. Now more than ever Teppy needed to know the truth. “Tuthmosis is not with us anymore. Your brother is dead,” she blurted out.

  Teppy looked at his mother confused. “No, he’s not dead. He’s in the temple sleeping.”

  “Yes, my little one. He is asleep, but in death. Tuthmosis is free to move about as he pleases now. He comes forth by day and assumes any shape he chooses for himself.”

  Teppy stared at the floor, sensing what his mother told him was dire, but still unaware of the true meaning of death.

  “He’s not himself anymore because he’s taken the shape of an animal?” Teppy asked with tears returning to his eyes.

  “Yes, any animal he chooses,” said Queen Ty.

  Teppy wiped his tears away on the sleeve of his garment. “If my brother has taken the shape of an animal, it would be a hyena because they are fearless, quick, and strong.”

  “You’re right, my little prince, that’s precisely the animal he would be.”

  Teppy’s demeanor suddenly brightened. “Can I search the fields for him?”

  The look of hope in her son’s eyes stifled her answer. “No, Teppy,” said Queen Ty, holding him closer. “Hyenas are wild and unpredictable. They’ll hurt you.”

  “I’m not afraid of hyenas. If I could see its eyes, I would know if Tuthmosis was in there, and I would be so happy to be with him no matter what. I would take care of him.”

  Her son’s words forced her emotions to surface, causing the queen to do the very thing she had tried so hard to avoid. It was the first time she had cried in Teppy’s presence.

  “Don’t cry, Ma. He would be a friendly animal. Tuthmosis would never hurt us.”

  “I miss him, my little prince, as much as you do,” she confessed, “but he is not an animal in the fields. Your brother is above, watching over us. He is with the Aten when it rises from the mountains.”

  “Is he happy there?”

  “Yes, and when he’s looking down upon you and sees that you are strong and brave, that’s when he is the happiest. You’ll be a great king one day, my little prince, and when you take your rightful place as pharaoh of Egypt, you will sustain your mother on the throne as queen.”

  “I’ll never be king,” Teppy replied, eager to correct his mother. The conviction in his voice frightened her.

  “Why would you say that?” she asked, growing angry again.

  “Father told me it was not meant to be.”

  Queen Ty was rattled. How could Amenhotep have repeated such a cruel thing to their son? She searched for the right response before she answered. “Your father is not well right now. His illness makes him say things he doesn’t mean. No one deserves to be king of Egypt more than you, and don’t you ever forget that, my little prince. No one.”

  The queen ignored the confusion in Teppy’s eyes, before he nodded his head in agreement.

  “Now it’s time to dream good dreams for me and your father,” said the queen.

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sp; She kissed him on the forehead. “The guards will keep the torches illuminated while you sleep, so don’t worry.”

  Teppy retrieved the Aten amulet from under his headrest and kissed it.

  “Tuthmosis’s amulet protects me. I’m not afraid anymore.”

  Teppy put it around his neck and settled into his bed. “I hope when I dream, I dream of my brother,” he said.

  Queen Ty placed the bedcover over Teppy, and he drifted off to sleep. His expression was not of fear this time of what he might see in his dream, but an expectant smile exuding the courage that his brother and the amulet had instilled in him.

  Queen Ty walked out of Teppy’s bedchamber satisfied the boy had accepted his brother’s death and incensed at what Amenhotep had told him.

  With a tray in hand, she approached the entrance of Amenhotep’s bedchamber, very much aware that it was not her appointed time to see her husband. The period from sundown to twilight was set as Lupita’s time to be with Amenhotep, and seldom would it not include copulation. Over the years, Queen Ty had learned to tolerate her husband’s sexual desire for his many secondary wives, largely because he had lost the urge for intercourse, but his renewed craving for sexual relations with Lupita were now a threat to Teppy’s birthright.

  Ty took a step to enter but stopped at the sound of an intimate conversation coming from within her husband’s chamber. Keeping herself concealed behind the curtain, she peeked into the room at Amenhotep lying in his bed naked as Lupita stood above him slowly undressing.

  “What was it about me that attracted you?” Lupita asked Amenhotep.

  “Why do you ask?”

  “I’m curious. My father’s arrangement did not guarantee you would love me.”

  “But I did, from the very first day I saw you in the garden. I’ve never seen a more beautiful flower. How I longed to be surrounded by your goodness.”