Winged Pharaoh

by Joan Grant

  “I took her to a place where there was a wall of baked brick; and the wall was just so high that she could see over the top of it. Upon the far side she saw her husband sleeping in the cool of a fig tree; behind him stood his idle plough, and beside him was an empty jar of beer. And she called out to him and said, ‘Lazy one! If your plough went as quickly as beer runs down your throat, you would be a rich man and your sleeping would be a sign of merit, instead of laziness.’ And as she spoke another row of bricks appeared upon the wall.

  “I said to her, ‘Sebek, do you see that wall which has grown up between you and your husband until you can no longer reach him and now he is even hidden from your sight? Each brick of it is but a foolish word of yours; and even as you can no longer see him because of it, so can he no longer see you; and, of his loneliness, he has taken unto himself the girl who tends the cows. Henceforward, think well before you speak. Say only those things that you would like to hear said to you by one you love. Build no more upon this barrier and you shall find it crumbling before the love in your heart, as a wall of unbaked mud crumbles before the inundation.’

  “I think she will remember what I told her, for the picture that I made her see was better than if I had counselled her only with words. She lives in the Delta a day’s journey from the sea. Her house has five rooms, and three sycamores are before her door. Is that truly recorded?”

  “Yes. And you answered her prayer with wisdom.”

  “Then I went to the country that lies westward across the great ocean where Athlanta was. There, in a great forest, journeyed a man who searched for gold. When he was last born on Earth he had been a noble; but he had thought not of the welfare of his people, and they that should have been to him as his own children suffered grievously of his neglect. The drainage channels were uncleared; and where there should have been rich fields, there were swamps where fever came with the evening. When he died he knew that he had thrown away his chance of succouring those to whom he should have been a friend. And he asked that he, who had let his people die of fever, should on Earth cure others who suffered as they had suffered.

  “In this his next life, he was born the eldest son of a master road-builder. When he was eighteen he left the house of his father and set out upon a long journey; for he knew that there was something that he must find, though upon Earth he knew not what it was, and he thought that it was gold, with which he could succor his fellow-men. For many weeks he journeyed through great forests, where fiercely growing plants made walls that shut away the sun. Then, he, too, fell ill of the fever, and first he longed for warm coverings, when his body shook with cold; and then when he burned with fever, he longed for the cool sea at sunset and for the juice of fruits in a cool pitcher. And he thought that he would die and that he would have found nothing to cure even his own suffering.

  “Because of his fever he could see beyond the things of Earth as if for a time he were a seer. So I took upon me his semblance, and he thought he saw a vision of what he must do to cure his sickness. I went to a tree, the kahan tree, which grew near to where he was lying, and I took the bark of it and boiled it in water in an earthen pot over his cooking fire; and when it was long boiled I drank of it and cried out, ‘Behold! the fever has left my bones and I am whole.’

  “Then he saw me no longer. But I watched him crawl towards the tree, and I knew that he had remembered his vision. He has found a cure for the fever that once others suffered because of him, and so shall the Scales be adjusted.”

  Ney-sey-ra was pleased; and I was glad that I had been the instrument by which that man had found what he had sought so long. And through his prayers the Gods had shown him how to find one of the wonders that they have made upon the Earth for the assistance of mankind.

  “Then I went to a woman who was upon her deathbed. She lived many days’ journey beyond the most northern outposts of the people of Minoas. The people of her country have no knowledge, and they think that when they die, though the memory of life may linger round the body for a short time, soon it must return to the earth from whence it came, just as water, which has for a time been shaped by a jar, loses its separateness when it is thrown back into the river.

  “This woman had a son who longed to see beyond his horizon to new lands; so he left his home and journeyed to far countries. For a time he lived with the fishermen who collect the shell-fish from which they make the violet dye. While he worked there, he met the steersman of one of our ships that bring dye and cedarwood to Kam. And the steersman talked to the boy of the Light and reawakened memory in him, so that he knew that the words he heard were true.

  “When after many months, he returned to his home, he thought that his village would rejoice with him in his knowledge, that the widows would cease to weep and the mothers be comforted that their dead children were not lost to them. But the people listened not to him, and they called him a dreamer and a fool; and they said he was a coward that turned his back on reality.

  “But the boy’s mother listened to him, for she loved the sound of his voice. Yet did she say, ‘There is no proof of these things. Think not on death, for to think on death is to think on nothingness, and that be the thought of fools.’ The boy was sorrowful, and often he prayed to the Gods that his mother should not die uncomforted, lest she should walk bodiless on Earth.

  The boy left his village and went among many people, but he found that few there were who listened to him.

  “When I went to the woman, the time of her going was almost reached. She longed to see her son once more before she died, and her eyes were upon the door, hoping that it might open and that she would see him again, returned from another journey. But the boy was awake, for he was upon a boat upon a rough sea, where none had time for sleep because of the storm. So I took upon myself his semblance and let the mother see me walk through the opened door. And she saw not the rest of her family, who wept beside her bed, but only me, who walked towards her. Then those who watched beside her saw her sit upright and hold out her arms and they heard her cry, ‘My son, you have returned to me’.

  “And as they saw her fall back dead upon the bed, she walked with me out into the sunshine through the open doorway. And I left her resting in a place of peace, until her son should greet her when he slept.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Scarlet Poppies

  By the time I was seventeen I had learnt how to read my records. In the space of five days I lived five lives. In three of them I was a man, and in two a woman. All were turbulent, and I had died in battle, or in a pestilence, or in a famine; and in none of them had my path led through quiet fields, but always had I travelled through deserts of unrest in the shadow of thunder-clouds.

  I wondered why I should remember so little of quietness and of peace. So I asked Ney-sey-ra, and he told me, “Think of this life, Sekeeta. Which days spring to your mind? The days of strife, the days of sorrow, the days when you learnt something that made you wiser.”

  And as he spoke, before me was the day that I had lashed Zeb, the day I had met Ney-sey-ra, the day when Harka was hurt, the day of the great battle, the day of the funeral of my father.

  Ney-sey-ra knew my thoughts, and he said, “Life is a teacher. Sometimes he whispers of joy in the cool of the evening, and sometimes he speaks in a voice that thunders about our ears. But always he tells us to take courage and remember that our tears water the corn that grows seven cubits high. In many days have you known peace and quietude, and in many lives; yet are the moments of greatest joy or grief as clear in your memory as a single scarlet poppy against a sheaf of golden corn. So do you first record those lives with which you learnt courage, wisdom, or compassion: for they are in brilliant colours. The other things that you must learn, though they are stored in your memory for you to find, have not the bold challenge to memory that wisdom and courage have. You may learn patience through many lives as a ploughman, or as a woman working in the fields; yet those lives will not hasten to be remembered, for they distil their wisdom quie
tly as a violet spreads her fragrance while she shelters under her leaves. It is easy to remember those times when, heralded by trumpets, you knocked upon the gates of death with uplifted sword scarlet from your enemies; or when you crept towards them through a land of famine when only the vultures hungered not. But for each of these, a hundred times have the gates of death opened smoothly before you, swinging wide upon their hinges as you walked through them and knew their sweet familiarity as the doorway of your home. And this you remember not: for it is the sound of the mighty waterfall, and not the quiet river sliding between its banks; the day of great storm when the arrows of lightning are loosed upon mankind that you remember, and not the gentle evenings when you walked alone in the dusk.

  “In the future when again you remember how to turn the Silver Key, it will be my voice that you will hear, for wisdom speaks with a louder voice than any other. And you will remember how to remember.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Arbeeta’s Wedding

  When I was seventeen I went with my mother and Neyah to Abidwa, where we stayed at the house of my mother’s sister, for the marriage of her daughter, Arbeeta, to the eldest son of the Vizier. I had not seen Arbeeta for three years, but as children we had often played together when she stayed with us at the palace, and Neyah and I had always thought of her as rather a dull little girl.

  I found her changed, for she had become beautiful because of her happiness. She showed me the house she would live in and the rooms that her children would have when they were born. And always she said, ‘This is how we planned it—do you like this garden we have made?’ just as though she and her husband were one person. It brought home to me the loneliness of my life. For me there was none of this shared security; I should never become beautiful, as she had done, because of the love of a man; for the things of a woman’s heart were not for me in this life.

  After her marriage festival was over, we returned to our city and I lived again in the temple. But often I found my thoughts dwelling on what I had seen at Abidwa. And in my heart was envy of Arbeeta’s shared security, and though I knew this was unworthy, I could not drive it forth. So I went to Ney-sey-ra and told him of my thoughts that troubled me.

  And he said to me, “All who feel envy are looking to one who seems to have more than they, instead of looking to one who longs to be as they are. The cripple envies the swift runner and forgets the blind man who longs to share his sight; the musician envies the night-singing bird and thinks not of the giraffe, which makes no sound; the merchant envies the noble in his painted litter and thinks not of those who walk hungry past his stall. There may be ten thousand in this land who envy Pharaoh, but they do not know the loneliness of kings. The very things that you are finding difficult are the proud heritage that you have earned, and for you to wish you were not born to them is as though a musician were to throw away his harp.”

  “But, Ney-sey-ra! For years and years and years I’ve worked to bring back memory; other queens have ruled, and Pharaohs, who were not temple-trained.…When I am away from the temple, even for a little time, the earth-fever gets into my blood and makes me feel that priestly things are too hard. It is so difficult when one is young.”

  “The joys of youth are sweet, but they soon pass, like flighting birds across a summer sky. But what you are gaining here is wisdom. That is permanent, and you will still have it when your body is old.”

  “But any in the land can come to the temple to hear truth; all can bring their troubles to a priest, whose wisdom will show them their own hearts. Yet I must work to gain it for myself.”

  “There is a strength and peace that only self can give to self; and therein lies the value of your striving. There is nothing that life on Earth cannot take away from you, save your own wisdom. Here in Kam, where there are many priests, the Light shines and all may bathe in it. But in the past, evil has swept Earth and there were no priests to light their fellow-men through the dark valleys of their troubled years. These things have been, and they may come again. You may be born in a country of the blind, where there are puppets dressed in robes of priests, who mouth forgotten words that bring not comfort even to themselves. But though there be no other in the land who walks not in the Shadow, yet will the wisdom I have taught you here be with you still, and you can never feel the loneliness that those who have sought not for themselves shall know. Then can your voice speak to the multitude. And some there may be who heard it here in Kam, and they shall seek it to quench their spirit’s thirst for truth, so they no longer starve in a waste of words, as they shall do in the temples of that time.

  “But always, my pupil, you must speak of Truth. Cry to the Gods, ‘For Atet and the Light’, and I shall hear you, even if I am far away from the Earth. Fear not to die for what you know to be true, though evil ones should burn you for your words. And in your burning, look towards the stars and you shall feel me clasp you by the hand.”

  “But why should these things happen? Why should the Light not shine, always?”

  “I remember what happened before Athlanta fell. Men of themselves create their time on Earth: if they sow evil, they must return to gather their harvest, and the fair meadows become a wilderness. The future is in the hands of mankind. When they allow the Light to shine upon them, they walk in peace; but in the Darkness they cannot see their way and they fall into destruction. If the time comes when men have forgotten the Light, then will they live in a land where there is more despair than in a city where all are dying of a pestilence. Children in spirit shall hold the Crook and Flail, and they shall have a terror of true priests and when one speaks shall silence him with fire. When they have broken the Mirrors of the Gods they will have brought a desolation upon Earth. Then Death shall walk through the streets, not as a beloved guest but in that guise of the long dead which chills the heart with fear. And there shall be wars, not of the Light against Darkness, but of people against people, who will have lost the nobility of leopards, which kill only when they are hungry. They shall slay not even for the lust of destruction, but because their thoughts are dead and the jars of their memory are sealed so that they die of thirst unquenched by waters of their own memory. The granaries shall be filled, yet the people shall starve. There shall be great temples, but the bread of wisdom and the wine of truth shall not be found there.

  “In their affliction the people shall cry out to the Gods whom for so long they have denied, and for many years their voices shall die upon the wind and leave no echo. But at last, when they think that their darkness is of a tomb, upon the horizon they shall see a small clear flame, and they shall hasten towards it and it shall fill their hearts. Then, as the sun drives forth the shadows of the night, the Light shall return and they shall cherish it, and Earth be so brilliant that it shall be ready to become a moon.”

  And as he spoke he cleansed my heart and I no longer yearned for Arbeeta’s life, but only wished for strength to shield the land of Kam from Darkness.…Anubis, whose priestess I shall one day be, give me the courage to use thy wisdom well, that I may be thy servant worthily.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Neferteri

  I had a close friend in the temple. Neferteri, who used to live in the palace when I was a child. She was two years older than I. At the age of thirteen she was betrothed to a young noble, but he was killed in the same battle as was my father. On the same day that he died, but before she had heard of his death, she was knocked down by a chariot. The horse, maddened by the sting of a hornet, galloped down a narrow street between high, mud-brick walls where Neferteri was walking; and the swaying chariot knocked her down and the wheel went over her and injured her back.

  For five days she lay as if she slept, and when at last she returned to her body, her legs no longer obeyed her. And when she awoke, she knew that her betrothed had died, and yet she grieved not, for she remembered all that they had done together away from Earth. But the next time that she awoke, she remembered only vague fragmentary dreams. So she wished to go into the templ
e to train her memory. The priests thought it would be too great a strain on her, for only those who are strong in body are taken into the temples. But my mother thought that in the temple Neferteri would find, not that her burden would be made more heavy, but that it would be lightened. So when she grew stronger and could walk again, although her right foot was twisted, and cold as the claw of a bird, she became a pupil of Ney-sey-ra.

  Neferteri stayed in the temple until I was nineteen. Often when I had been away at the palace, I would cry out to her that the temple training was too long and wearisome. Before she talked to me, the colour and the pageantry of the palace were bright before my eyes, and the walls of my little room seemed narrow as a tomb. Then Neferteri would talk to me, until the music of festivals sounded remote, and the walls of my room seemed to fold back like a door, a door which led to as yet undreamed-of-splendour; and hot impatience left me, and again I knew that time passes as quickly as sand slips through closed fingers.

  When I was nineteen, Neferteri died. She had known for three days that her time on Earth was drawing to its close. Her spirit had burned too brightly for her body, as burning oil would crack a thin shell bowl.

  I sat alone beside her in her room. She felt no pain, and the hand I held in mine was quiet and cool. Sometimes she smiled and talked to one who stood beyond the bed, where I saw but the wall.

  Then dawn showed through the window, and I turned to pinch the wick which spluttered in the last few drops of oil. But when for a moment I would have left her side, I felt her faint hold tighten on my hand, and she said, “That little lamp is to the sun as what I’ve done to what I’ve longed to do. Soon we both must go, but each of us shall leave the Earth a little darker for our going.”