The Crook and Flail

by L. M. Ironside

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  The dishes had long been cleared away and the feasting tables carried back into the House of Women. Serving girls moved about the twilit garden bearing pitchers of sweet wine and bitter beer, and water scented with the petals of roses or the tart rinds of fruits. They bore dates, too, and balls of honey-cake rolled in dried flowers. It had been a fine feast, a gesture of welcome to the new concubines as well as a continuation of the Opet festival. Hatshepsut felt in a celebratory mood, with Thutmose awas oqui dy. Alone in the great hall, hearing audiences and dictating her proclamations, she could almost imagine that she was the Pharaoh.

  She walked arm-in-arm with her dear friend, named Opet like the festival. Opet was two years older than Hatshepsut and a half-sister by blood, sired by her own royal father on a woman of the harem. She had grown up in the House of Women and, though her mother had never pledged her to the Pharaoh's service – she could leave and marry a nobleman or even a tjati if she chose – she had elected to stay.

  “Where else could I ever live in such luxury?” she had once said, when Hatshepsut had asked her why she remained. “Surely not in some backwater sepat. Can you imagine? The lowing of cattle would be all the music I'd ever hear. No, I will stay here in Waset, sister. It suits me.”

  “But you may be required to lie with Thutmose, once he starts showing an interest in women.”

  Opet had shuddered elaborately. “By the time that happens I will be stooped and covered in warts, with my breasts hanging down to my knees. I have nothing to fear.”

  But now, as they drifted from one group of chattering women to the next, Opet confided that Thutmose's dreaded awakening may be approaching faster than either had thought.

  “Last night before he left for his ships he visited to bid us all farewell. He pinched me on my bottom, and when Hentumire bowed to him he cupped her breast in his hand, right in front of everybody!”

  Hatshepsut groaned. “He is insufferable. I must find some nursemaid to crack him with a stick until he learns his manners.”

  “You cannot beat a Pharaoh, sister. It will take subtlety, if he is to learn the right way to treat a woman. You'll forgive me, Great Lady, but you do not have subtlety. We shall all of us work together to train him, or the House of Women will become as rowdy as a brothel.”

  “I wish you all the gods' blessings on that endeavor. Amun knows it's a task too great for one woman alone.”

  They came to the raised stone shore of the garden lake. The water stretched out into the dusk, its surface deep violet, reflecting a silver moon that danced as a breeze rippled the water. A few women gathered there, sipping from golden cups as they sat idly on the stone wall. Some dangled toes in the water, squealing at the cold, while others, well into their wine, made a game of trying to count the bats that dropped to the lake's surface. The women broke off again and again, laughing as they lost their numbers.

  Seated a little apart were the two newcomers. Hatshepsut approached them, and inclined her head to the princess of Hatti, a lovely young woman with an unshaven head of thick, dark-brown hair. It fell in waves about her shoulders, though she had knotted a few beads into the locks, no doubt in deference to Egyptian style. She wore an Egyptian-style dress, too – a green gown that hugged her shape and left her arms bare.

  “Are herhat you not cold?” Hatshepsut asked. “It is winter, after all. Shall I send a servant for a shawl to cover up your arms?”

  “No, Great Lady,” the princess said. She spoke Egyptian readily, if with a heavy accent. “Winters are much colder in Hatti. I think perhaps I will find the heat of Egyptian summer too great.”

  “What is your name?”

  “Astartakhepa, Great Lady.”

  Hatshepsut tried to repeat the name. Her tongue tripped over the unfamiliar sounds; Opet laughed behind her hand.

  “I think perhaps we shall have to call you something simpler,” Hatshepsut said. “You are beautiful; until we learn to say your name correctly we may as well call you Nefer. I hope you do not mind a pet name. We are fond of such things in Egypt.”

  “I am honored to be named by the Great Royal Wife,” she said, bowing.

  The Great Royal Wife, Hatshepsut mused. I will never grow used to hearing it. I will never think of myself that way – as Thutmose's wife.

  “And you,” she said, turning to the other, the daughter of Ankhhor. “I hope your name comes easier to my tongue.”

  “As do I.” The girl bowed smoothly, raising pale, delicate hands to Hatshepsut. “I am Iset, Great Lady, and beneath the notice of the God's Wife.”

  What a perfect blend of confidence and humility. This one is from a noble house, and no mistake. “Named for the goddess. I can see it is a name that suits you.” Iset was slender, graceful, perhaps seventeen years old. She wore a fashionable gown, tight through the waist and hips, halting in a beaded band that left her breasts bare to peek through her shawl as she moved. She was lovely and light, all harmonious curves like an ibis bird, and her eyes shone with a happy complacency that Hatshepsut liked at once.

  “The Great Royal Wife is too kind. Beside her beauty I am as dust.”

  Hatshepsut barked a laugh. “Men and women say many things of the Great Royal Wife, Iset, but seldom do they praise her beauty. No, I am not offended. I would rather be strong and wise than beautiful. Beauty seldom lasts long.”

  Iset smiled. Her wig was scented with benzoin and myrrh; as she tilted her head in a coy, conspiratorial gesture the rich, spicy perfume came powerfully to Hatshepsut's senses, set a thrill racing under her skin.

  “The Great Royal Wife is wise indeed, then,” the girl said. “It is good to have at least one wise ruler on the throne.”ich>

  “I think I shall like you very much.”

  “I hope you shall.”

  “I can see your father prepared you well for life in a royal court. What else did he teach you?”

  “I can sing, Great Lady, and dance.”

  Opet clapped her hands. “Let's have a song!”

  Some of the women gathered nearby heard the suggestion and agreed. “Yes, a song!” “Ah, it's a good night for music.”

  Iset remained gazing at Hatshepsut, awaiting her command. Hatshepsut nodded, and the newcomer moved a little apart to stand facing the gathering of women. She smoothed her gown over her hips, eyes fixed distantly on the darkness of the garden, rapt and isolated, as if listening to the falling notes of a harp that only she could hear. At last she raised her voice, wine-sweet and water-pure.

  My soul will not sleep

  For want of my sister.

  The river runs between us,

  And I am sick with loss.

  My pool is broken

  By ripples unending,

  For the wind has blown her far away,

  The wind has blown her far away.

  Oh sister, your perfume

  Is like honey dropped in water.

  Like spices and pomegranates,

  You stain my mouth with longing.

  My pool is broken

  By ripples unending;

  The wind has blown your odor far away,

  The wind has blown your odor far away.

  The gods have made your love

  Like the advance of flames in straw,

  My longing like the downward stoop

  Of the falcon in bright flight.

  My pool is broken

  By ripples unending.

  I will fly to you on wind far away,

  I will fly to you on wind far away.

  I am a wild goose, a hunted one;

  The beauty of your shining hair

  Is a bait to trap me in your net;

  Your eyes, a snare of meryu-wood.

  Gratefully I fall

  Into ripples unending.

  Hunt me, sister, far away.

  Hunt me, sister, far away.

  Hatshepsut stood still as the women applauded. Iset's song had pierced her deep, raising memories of Senenmut, of their last day together
, his red-eyed stare in the jagged shade of the myrrh tree. She wondered whether he still remembered her. Perhaps he was the only man who ever would. She knew she was not beautiful – she was too blocky, too coarse, and she had inherited from her father his curved beak of a nose, his bold front teeth. For all her brave words to Iset, she knew that it was beauty, not strength or wisdom, that made men fall in love.

  “Great Lady?” Iset's brow was pinched with worry. “Did my singing offend?”

  “No,” she said quickly. “You sang beautifully, Iset. Beautifully. You must come to me one day and sing in my apartments; I would be glad of you.” Mornings she attended Amun and by day she kept her court. But nights were long and quiet, and heavy with the absence of Senenmut. Music would be a balm to her lonesome kas; Iset's singing was as sweet and soothing as the smoke of myrrh.

  The girl bowed again. “As you wish, Great Lady. I am yours to command.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  “Thou art the lord of the silent, who comes at the cry of the poor!”

  The chorus of priestesses repeated Hatshepsut's chant, lifting their sesheshet high above their heads. The iron rods were strung with bells, so black they drank the light of the braziers as the darkness of Amun's sanctuary swallowed fear and doubt.

  When their voices and the clatter of their sacred rattles died away, she lifted her own sesheshet and cried, “Thou art Amun-Re, Lord of Waset!”

  Again the rattles raised, again the voices chanted. She looked down upon her priestesses from where she stood on a small golden dais. The ribbons of the God's Wife crown fell over her shoulders. Her scalp was bare of any wig, freshly shaven; the diadem of electrum lay cold up

  “Thee, who rescues him who is in the netherworld!”

  The sun had nearly risen to reveal the god's morning aspect, Amun-Re. Beyond the group of priestesses, through the temple's great, high entrance, Hatshepsut could see how the sky lightened, tending, barely perceptible, from the cold blue of night to the golden hues of blessed day.

  “For thou art merciful when man appeals to thee!”

  The light fell now through the open doorway, a lance of gold in which cold motes rose and shimmered, swirling in the gathering warmth. Hatshepsut lifted her sesheshet for the final line of the devotion, and as she called it out to her priestesses, her voice brimmed with the joy of the breaking day. “Thou art he who comes from afar!”

  The priests swung wide the doors to Amun's sanctuary. With a collective murmur, the gathered worshipers lowered their faces, none daring to look inside. The beam of light moved across the floor of the sanctuary. Hatshepsut stepped into it, pacing toward the still-hidden god with slow, deliberate steps.

  The fifteen days of the Beautiful Feast of Opet had come, at last, to a close. The dream-readers and magicians had all agreed: Amun was well pleased, renewed and invigorated; the young Pharaoh's reign would be long and prosperous; and the God's Wife was a pleasure to the Lord of Waset. Hatshepsut had taken to her duties with a zeal seldom seen before in the history of her exalted station, often spending half the day tending to the god, when the demands of the court allowed. Nowhere did she feel as light of heart than in Amun's presence. She felt a kinship here at the god's side. And why not? Was she not in fact the kin of Amun-Re, his own daughter in flesh and in ka? In the black of the sanctuary she felt not only the presence of the god, but of her earthly father, too. When all the light was shut from her eyes she could feel Thutmose the First smiling upon her, as he had so many times in life, holding her upon his lap when she was just a small thing, walking with her in the gardens, listening to her recite her childish lessons.

  You were right, Father, she whispered in her heart. Maat is all.

  She paused with her sandals touching the edge of the sunbeam. The light moved beyond her, stretching her shadow into the shrine. It crept by degrees up the god's electrum dais, fell lightly upon his golden feet, moved up his legs. Hatshepsut's heart beat harder, as it did whenever she looked upon Amun in the light. Such moments were rare, for the god preferred secrecy and dark, so that his brilliance, once revealed, might shine all the brighter. The shrine's interior slowly filled with morning light. Baskets and platters heaped with offerings resolved out of darkness, dozens of bread-loaves, strings of lotus blossoms, jars of oil both sweet and bitter, figs and melons and the tart, oily-skinned fruits brought in trade from far to the east. And of course, offered upon fine dishes of lapis lazuli and gold, heaps of myrrh, the resinous incense which was the god's favorite scent. Amun, glimmering, wrought all in gold, sat upon his throne and smiled down at his offerings, at Hat anshepsut herself, who in her very flesh was his most sincere offering. His face was at once peaceful, haughty, amused – the very face of royalty, stern and eternal beneath the twin golden plumes of his crown, each one as tall as a man.

  Hatshepsut moved toward him, shy as a girl with her first lover. She was God's Wife, God's Hand. It was her duty and privilege to please him in all things. She touched his arms gently, slid her fingers along them to his hands where they lay on his lap. Outside the shrine, the priestesses took up their hymn, singing loud of Amun's virility, of the force that had created all things.

  Renew, renew thy creation, Lord of Waset! Thine is the life of the land!

  As she caressed his chest, his face, his neck, as she knelt to kiss his feet, Hatshepsut could feel his approving presence in the chamber. It was the feeling of warm sun upon her back. Thou art pleased, Lord Amun. I know it. Thou are pleased, even with me as Great Royal Wife. Thy will is maat, and maat is all.

  Bring forth the crops, fill the land with light! The priestesses were dancing now. Their skirts of red and white lifted and flattened as they whirled past the door to the sanctuary, swayed to the music of horns and drums. The land is fertile! Sow thy seed, Lord of Waset, from the God's Hand!

  ***

  When the ceremony was over, Hatshepsut moved among the god's servants, sharing with them bread and honey, dates and wine spread upon tables in the temple's forecourt. The sun was well up now, sweet in a pale blue sky. She accepted the praises of priests and priestesses alike, dipping her head demurely when they spoke of her devotion. “You are so young, and yet so dedicated to the god. This is a blessing upon Waset – upon Egypt, in truth.” “You have taken your station entirely to heart, Great Lady, and Amun's blessings will overflow onto the throne.”

  She separated from one small crowd of priestesses and wandered along a line of myrrh trees, breathing in the subtle, spicy scent of their winter slumber. Their branches lay bare against the sky, sharp, but beginning to swell with the promise of leaf buds. Nebseny leaned against one tree, wine cup in hand. The leopard-skin mantle of the High Priest fell over his shoulder to his waist. His golden leopard mask hung from a thong around his neck, glowering at her from his chest.

  “A good morning to you, High Priest.”

  He half-bowed, formal but chill. “God's Wife. Your devotions today were...pure.”

  “I try to please the god in all things,” she said, ruing the defensive tone in her voice.

  “I am sure you do.” He was stiff, mildly offended by her presence. She recalled the way he had looked the day she'd cut herself on the temple steps, how he had crouched, suspended somewhere between admiration and hort>

  “Have I offended the Great Lady?” Nebseny's tone said he did not much care if he had.

  His insolence angered her, but there was nothing she could do. Only two people in all the world stood above the station of the God's Wife: the Pharaoh and the High Priest of Amun. She had no choice but to suffer his disdain. “The sun is in my eyes; that is all. If you will excuse me, High Priest, I shall find a shadier spot.”

  Near the feast tables she saw three or four priestesses laughing merrily, bumping their hips together. Their company seemed infinitely preferable to Nebseny's. She made her way toward them, and sighed in relief when they bowed at her approach. Here, at least, she would find no scorn.

  Nedjmet was plump and kindly, a happy, gossipy
woman of perhaps twenty years with a protruding belly that proclaimed her a mother three times over at least. She welcomed Hatshepsut with a smile and a measure of sticky dates, which she poured into her hands. “Something sweet for the Hand of the God!”

  “Oh – Nedjmet, I cannot eat another bite. Here.” Hatshepsut held the dates out, and the priestesses each took a few, nibbling, until at last Hatshepsut's hands were empty. Her heart, though, filled. She loved the company of her priestesses. They understood her devotion to the god as no one else did.

  “We saw you speaking to Lord Highborn,” said Bakmut, an older priestess and thin, but still with a pretty face despite the lines of age beginning to show around her mouth.

  “You should not speak of the High Priest so,” Hatshepsut said.

  “If the God's Wife commands,” Bakmut said, her voice laden with amusement.

  Nedjmet shook her head. “Great Lady, it might do you some good to speak of the High Priest so, if you will forgive my saying it. What a strutter that one is. He's worse than a whole flock of geese.”

  Wiay, the newest priestess, laughed. She was hardly older than Hatshepsut herself, but already she had found her feet among the temple servants. Hatshepsut envied her a little, the ease with which she forged her friendships. “Hahnk, hahnk!” Wiay waddled like a goose and made as if to peck at the date in Nedjmet's fingers. “Count up the measures of grain! What is the wealth of Amun? Hahnk! Stop that laughing, priestesses! Amun demands solemnity!”

  “Oh, Wiay, stop! The God's Wife will think us wicked.”

  Hatshepsut smiled. She knew their ease in her presence was due to her youth, but their camaraderie was such a relief that she could not feel indignant. “No, it is good to see you laughing. I wish I could be aGods free as you. It doesn't help to have Nebseny glaring at me and turning his shoulder every time I approach him. Why does he dislike me so? I have been absolutely devoted in my duties. I can't think what I may have done to anger him.”