“Have I been a good king? I know you have been here just over a year, but beyond that. You can see it, can you not? I’m told you are a seer, a prophetess, or an enchantress in your home country,” King Menkaure asked Ariennu on the tenth evening she came to him.
Nothing she tried cheered him. She knew he sensed her uneasiness. If it had been any other man, she might have made a quick and uncharitable comment, but this was the king. It was a continuing strain for Ariennu to calm her own inner fire and her tongue enough so that she would still seem caring and nurturing. After just these few days, she began to think the king should have taken Naibe-Ellit instead. She bowed her head and let her dismay show. He saw it and reached forward almost paternally. Don’t worry. So little fetches my interest lately; I will still call for you, his thoughts spoke as he continued aloud. “One of your kind, in Buto, has told me I have not been forceful or watchful; not godly enough! My devotions and protections are too kindly and not seeking to enforce right and truth. What do you think? See the mighty works I have made grow to the sky? How is that not like unto the work of a god? Why do you think my brother gods try me?”
“I never heard of anyone who dreaded your rule while I worked in the market across the river,” Ariennu smiled again, understanding that the king had taken her into a rare confidence that showed her an altogether human side of his divine nature. “I’ve heard you are so greatly loved by your people that they feel you are truly their father in all ways but your seed creating them.”
He smiled as if that comforted him, but an odd expression filtered over his face that showed her he didn’t know if being loved more than feared was a good or bad thing.
“You remind me of my sweetest sister, Khammie, when she was young; gentle like that.”
Daughter of the God Khammie, Ariennu laughed a little inwardly, must have been a lioness for him. She’d seen the statues of them together and thought of the woman dragging him around this pretty bedchamber, completely done in.
He sighed as if his thoughts were far-away. Ari rubbed his shoulders again, working her fingers up under the band that fastened his plain, casual nemes to his head. He nodded and she gently lifted it from his head. Ariennu felt him shudder in delight as she worked that area at the base of his skull.
“There. I know you must wear it, but maybe you might command a different kind, like a soft head wrap that wouldn’t pinch like that.” She laughed a little, but knew his thoughts had shifted.
“The little dancer, is she recovering?”
Ariennu didn’t know what Naibe was doing. She had learned from the quick glance through the eight Child Stones weeks ago, that the king had truly been sympathetic the night they had been distributed to the households. She was whisked away early by Prince Shepseskaf. Of Deka, she heard that she had simply vanished. Ari knew that she had been chosen by that brutally delicious piece of decorated meat, Prince Maatkare Raemkai, but nothing more. The woman of Ta-Seti was never close to any of them once the Children of Stone made the transformations. Ari couldn’t even sense her any more.
“I can’t say, Your Majesty,” Ari smoothed the king’s deep copper colored shoulders. “I haven’t seen her since…” she started to answer, but sensed the king growing increasingly tired. He’d had the broth, but after that he had taken in the spiced wine his “Wise Uncle” had insisted on him taking to cure the sweats and tremors that visited him at night.
And that’s someone who needs to go away as far as Deka or Naibe, but I’m not so lucky! Ari lay back, cuddling the king a little as he drifted. Great One is enough to bring night demons, that’s for sure.
Count Prince Hordjedtef came to speak with the king every other day or so. Ari did not witness or understand what the visits were about until she had been there for the better part of two weeks. She despised him, even though he now appeared to be trying to charm her.
“Oh Lady ArreNu…” he called in a sing-song tone whenever he saw her. “Good to see you are well.” He would sit beside her at the common pool, take her hand in his own bony hand and stroke it affectionately as if he was suddenly fifty years younger. He was a flirt and actually quite a charmer when he wanted to be, she decided. That was what Marai had said, in the thoughts he sent to them before all of this tragedy unfolded.
He’s a man with two hearts, just like Marai said, she agreed.
One heart was that of a doting old man and grandfather, and the other belonged to a ruthless wizard and an incredibly skilled manipulator of people. She shuddered to think of what life in Kemet would have been like if he had been chosen as king.
Great Goddess Hetepheres, I worship your wise shadow as you pass, Ariennu saluted the air. It had been Hordjedtef’s sister, Queen Hetty, now quite infirm but cared for by her daughters, who had chosen the count’s half-brother as king instead. That choice had forever dashed Hordjedtef’s hopes of reigning over the two lands.
The morning of her eleventh day, the count had seen her sitting with her lap loom at the pool. She was working on a pretty red sash with yellow-gold bees in the border, a gift for the king. Hordjedtef ordered his servant to set up a stool beside her and invited himself to sit. This was followed by the hand grasp, the hand-rub, and the compliment which left Ari wanting to kneel by the pool and drag her hand through the water to clean it.
“So, not doing this weaving in your apartment plaza?” he blinked.
Snake eyes, Ari thought. Bastard needs a forked tongue slithering in and out of his dry old lips. He’s trying to work something out of me, I know it! She took an imperceptible breath and drew the sparkle of a rainbow through her thoughts just enough to make them seem purposeless. “I don’t like the company there. The maids are constantly looking at my work. It distracts me.”
“I see,” his lips pursed. He knew he was being shut out of her thoughts. “Tell me then, Lady ArreNu, of this broth of bird you have served His Majesty, without his required herbal tonics.”
Ari sighed and set her loom aside. She stared at her hands. “It helped him have better sleep. His physic allowed it.” She then spoke under her breath, trying to start with me? He was tired and worn out! And you’re not his physic.
“And yet, within two days his agitation returns? Perhaps not the wisest of choices, then.” His understanding voice grew condescending, as if to say ‘I humored you, but now you see the truth in the matter. My prescription was, after all, the superior one.’ Aloud, he added: “Majesty has told me he does like the broth and perhaps warm cream as he retires, but that the herbed wine I’ve long employed might also be imbibed afterwards, Mmmm? – For perhaps a keener rest so that he might be able to defeat the taunting of Apep within his heart. I have heard he tried this last night, and slept without issue. Without inner anguish, he could strengthen his resolve to be truly mighty as the oracle at Buto had once advised him. I know he has spoken with you of this, yet your insistence on your own way is coming close to the mocking of a god.”
Ariennu relented. Her wide shoulders sagged in defeat; she wasn’t going to break the old man’s influence over the king by using simple motherly charm. She didn’t like the idea that his wine was drugged, but began to feel it might be best given the level of agitation she had seen in him that night.
Ari thought she could influence him in other more subtle ways, such as being more of a kindly healer and confidant than an object of pleasure. Naibe and Deka would eventually turn up. Maybe they would work miracles in their own households. Perhaps this new mission was what the Children of Stone wished to be their lives now that Marai was gone. If that wasn’t the case, they could regroup to think of a plan to start a new life somewhere else.
Just starting to like it here, though. It makes me feel young again, and powerful. Not sure I’d want to give that up in the name of freedom. She shrugged and nodded, then picked up her loom. After she had tamped down the next few rows and straightened the borders of the belt, she noticed the old man had tired of speaking with her and had left.
Ariennu decided to see wha
t kind of herbal mixture was in the wine the next evening the king called for her, but it wasn’t that night. One of the more beautiful ladies, Netjirah, went to King Menkaure instead. As she prepared, the young woman couldn’t resist a barb in Ari’s direction. Ariennu easily read her thoughts.
Your days of influence are over, you old, used-up, Set-haired ka’t! Majesty wants me tonight. He has had a vision that you aim to overwhelm him… to steal his sacred seed like your sister is doing at the prince’s house! Irika told me you were a thief once. And now you both cast spells on men. But he is strong and wise… a god! You are powerless before him! The woman fled to the waiting guard for her escort to the king.
Ariennu shrugged, knowing at least three of the younger concubines had been conspiring against her. She was tempted to levy a spell of some kind of misery or bedward dysfunction on the girl, but didn’t do it. Storming to her own little bed, she sat heavily. Oh Marai, why! None of this… None of it! she shook her head. Now that bastard’s talking up our life before this. Know, I’m not ashamed of anything I ever did, but now it forces me to speak on the matter so the story doesn’t turn into a pack of lies that could blot out the sky like a swarm of locusts! She sensed more whispers. Someone had sensed her mood. Ari smoothed her hair, and with a tired sigh went out into the open plaza to listen to the musicians playing for the monarch and his choice of woman for the evening. She would come back after the girls had gone to bed.
For a moment, she thought she heard Marai’s soothing whisper in her thoughts.
Know I have not left you, sweet Ari wife…
Might as well have left us, though, she thought, then paused because she hadn’t heard Marai whisper anything to her since two days before he took his final test. And now you speak to my thoughts as a ghost. Perfect.
Ari. Listen to your heart. It will make you aware, my Wise MaMa. So much.
And if you were alive you’d see what I see. The old man is he’s controlling Majesty with these mixtures he puts in the wine, though. Ariennu thought partly to herself and partly to the “ghost” of Marai as she perceived him. Maybe next time I’m with him, I’ll just see what he’s putting in there.
Marai felt slightly ill remembering his own poisoning. When he sensed those moments through his link with Wserkaf and his Child Stone, he wanted to shout ‘Yes!!’ to her through time. Of course old Hordjedtef was controlling the king. Instead, he shut his eyes again and sighed quietly, seeking another image. He saw Ariennu return to the king’s bedchamber the following night; a new arrogance on her face as she breezed by the now somber-faced Netjirah who had entertained him the night before.
Nasty… Ari? Did you curse that girl after all? he wondered, but knew intuitively that Ariennu’s presence was like Naibe’s residence at Shepseskaf’s house. Because of their beauty and self-confidence, they had filled every nearby female with self-doubt. No spell was even needed.
Marai wanted to shriek through time that he was alive but at that moment trapped in a tomb. If she could just hang on a little while longer, he would wake. With Wserkaf’s help he would find how to get to all of them. He knew if she heard that, however, it might change the lotus petals of choice on which she stepped and alter her future as well as the destiny of everyone around her, if not the entire universe. For a little while longer the women needed to believe he was dead. He needed to keep watchful and silent or run the risk of making everything that lay before him much, much worse.
The day had been particularly draining for King Menkaure. He didn’t tell Ariennu why this evening and she knew not to ask. Ari rubbed his shoulders with hot oil the way she did every night, but once he relaxed she bent forward to whisper quite seductively in his ear:
“Your Great Majesty… What is it His Highness, the Great One of Five, places in your wine to calm you in the evening?”
The king raised one brow, pausing at her audacity in questioning his trusted uncle, but then reflected on her words. His hand reached up to pat her hand, affectionately. “You worry for your king,” his expression, at first paternal, grew distant.
Ari sensed something in the tone of his voice at that moment, but didn’t truly understand the nature of his thoughts. He seemed detached. The words ‘my death’ formed in her heart. She wondered if the king was thinking of the curse on him and perhaps if he really would die soon.
The only “king” she had ever considered at that point was Marai. She thought of the luxury in which she had lived these past few days, but also thought of the dreadful emptiness in her life as she lived in the service of these two different godly men.
Quiet, yet gentle and reassuring words that seemed to be part of a spell or a prayer filtered through her thoughts. It was as if Marai recited them to her through time. Her instincts told her to repeat them, that they would comfort the man in her care. She whispered them in Menkaure’s ear as they played in her heart: “If emptiness flourishes, my king cannot take his food… If my king flourishes, emptiness cannot take its food.”
The thrill of her words raced through both men’s hearts; one struggling in the depth of a deathlike dream, the other dreaming of death in a candle-lit room.
“The words…” Menkaure paused. What seemed to be a tear caught in the corner of one of his eyes. His lower lip dimpled slightly. “How is it that a woman such as yourself, a sojourner, knows them? They are taught to the sacred only,” the king blinked, then moved his lips to her ear. “Do you know the rest?” he asked. “Gladden my sad heart, woman of the fire. Speak her words to me so I can hear them again.”
Ariennu felt her own heart skip as a quiet spirit drifted through her. She suddenly felt as young as a new woman who was still learning about life and all of its joyous mysteries. At first she thought it was Naibe’s essence, but then she knew it was a different young woman who had died. Goddess. A goddess… he loved a young goddess, but she was taken from him. He did not protect her! All at once, her heart thrilled to the sound of the king’s words. She had never heard these words before. She couldn’t explain to him how she knew them, or why, other than because of her own temptation to use heka, she felt compelled to repeat them.
“Take me with you, beloved, that I may eat of what you eat,” she spoke calmly but realized that such a spoken devotion asked for love beyond the tomb. She could never give anyone but Marai that kind of devotion.
The king rose from his couch to fetch the onyx cup which was sitting near the edge of the coals in the brazier. He poured a little more from a ewer into the cup to cool the warmed contents, then sat on his couch, crossed his legs, and faced her. “Close your eyes, woman,” he gently commanded her.
Ariennu closed her eyes obediently. Menkaure reached up and sweetly touched her closed eyelids as if he was blessing them, then spoke the companion piece to her words: “That I may eat of what you eat… that I may drink of what you drink, that I may be strong…” his voice broke here and Ariennu almost opened her eyes when she heard him pause. “That whereby you are strong…” Then, he tipped the vessel to her lips. She sipped a quarter of the draught. “Open your eyes to me woman of wisdom, Your s…” he started, but stopped himself.
Ariennu knew he had been about to say: Your servant begs you.
When she opened her eyes, he had finished the cup and lay back on his soft couch beside her. She sang the soft and low words to some sweet silly song she had learned from the other women. As she lulled him to sleep in her arms, she noticed a strange, unearthly calm steal over her. It made her feel hot and drowsy at the same time. Wine had never been this strong for her.
Perhaps strong drink doesn’t go well with the changes the Children of Stone have created in me, she thought at first. She noticed the haloing around the candle-lights, and the rainbow shadows grow so large they overlapped as she drifted. When she woke, she felt nauseous, but shook it off, got up, and returned to the women’s quarters determined to ask the priest exactly what spices and herbs he had put in the wine, and why he felt it was necessary to dose his king so heavily.
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CHAPTER 21: NAIBE BROWN EYES
When Ariennu woke in the morning and noticed she still felt queasy from Menkaure’s wine from the night before, she worried about him. Dressing quickly, she made her way to the stair that ascended to his stateroom, she encountered his guards.
“Where do you expect to go, woman?” The first guard dropped his staff across the steps, preventing her from going up. He knew Ariennu by this time and knew she probably meant no harm, but it wasn’t at all proper for anyone, especially a commoner, to just visit the king without his invitation. Even his grooms had to be invited to dress him. They knew what times he expected things done and knew to be nearby, but never violated the sanctity of the royal stateroom while he was inside.
“A vision…” Ari quickly lied. She had slept as if she had been dead, but wanted to make certain the king was well after such an emotionally draining evening of sensing his thoughts. “I feel he is being poisoned by someone he trusts. I would like to taste the food brought to him.”
One guard looked at the other, puzzled, and then both men looked at her. The first guard went up the stair but remained outside in a location where he could not see into the room. “Your Great and wondrous Majesty. The Lady Sojourner is here with a vision about your morning meal. She feels it may have been poisoned.”
Ariennu heard the king’s voice, then saw the guard beckon for her to come up. The porters who brought the two trays of food overheard the exchange and balked, worried that they might be blamed if there was something wrong. She pushed by them to go up the steps she whispered: “Don’t worry, just follow.”
Just before she parted the bead drape to go in, the guard cautioned her.
“You can’t stay this morning. Taste the food and leave, but don’t speak. The Crown Prince will be here soon for his meetings.”
Going Forth By Day Page 25
