Kysen spoke rapidly before the two reached the king. "Golden one, I am a prisoner in my own house, and I don't know where Lord Meren is."
The two councillors joined them.
"Ay, withdraw the guards from Lord Meren's family."
Maya uttered an exclamation of dismay. "But, majesty-"
"My majesty is convinced that Lord Kysen is a loyal subject."
"But-" Maya closed his mouth when Ay put a hand on his arm.
Bowing, the vizier said, "Yes, majesty."
Kysen knew better than to trust such generosity. The fisherman might loosen the net; he didn't take it away altogether. "Golden one, I've told you the truth."
"Of course."
Kysen darted a glance at the king as he bowed. Gone was the hurt and distraught boy. In his place was Nebkheprure Tutankhamun, Lord of the Two Lands, Son of Ra, the young ruler who spoke of hacking the heads of criminals from their necks. Meren had taught the king well. Once his suspicions were aroused, the king would trust no one until this mystery was solved. And he no longer trusted Meren, in spite of the many times his councillor had almost died to protect him. For pharaoh, the risk of such trust was too great, no matter the impulse of his heart.
Kysen glanced at Maya, who seemed torn between his friendship for Meren and his love of the king. And Ay? No one could tell what Ay was thinking.
The king was watching him impassively. "Mose, escort Lord Kysen home."
"Please, majesty," Kysen said as Mose approached and clamped a hand on his arm.
"My majesty will hear no more."
Shrugging off Mose's hand, Kysen bowed and turned to follow the Nubian. Ky.
He looked back to find that the king had come after him. Kysen dropped to the ground. "Yes, majesty?"
"You may be assured, I'll never condemn your father unheard."
"Thy majesty is wise and merciful, but I fear Lord Meren won't be allowed to live long enough to be heard."
Chapter 16
Horizon of the Aten, the independent reign of the pharaoh Akhenaten
Nefertiti laid her reed pen down on the table and blew on the ink that covered the sheet of papyrus spread before her. She clenched her hands to keep them from trembling. Only her training at Queen Tiye's side kept her from plunging into a frenzy of useless action.
She looked up at her father and saw the same helpless fury that churned inside her. Ay sat nearby in the shelter of a kiosk in the garden of the royal palace. Nefertiti turned her attention back to the notes she'd taken on the translations of foreign letters from the House of Correspondence.
"It is the destruction of the empire if we don't do something," Nefertiti said. "I never thought pharaoh would allow Suppiluliumas to destroy the kingdom of Mitanni. Tushratta was once our friend."
Ay threw back his head, sighed, and contemplated the roof. "Once Akhenaten made that cursed treaty with the Hittite, you and I both knew what would happen. Mitanni is gone, and there's nothing we can do about it. Now, with the Asiatic vassals at each other's throats, Suppiluliumas merely has to see that no one forms a lasting alliance. The king of the Hittites pays Aziru of Amurru to stir dissension among the vassals, while Suppiluliumas writes sweet letters to pharaoh and sends presents."
"But all those loyal princes." Nefertiti searched through the stack of papyri. "Look, Akizzi of Qatna and Biryawaza of Upe plead for help. These are our regents, Father, and they're loyal. Nomads raid the cities of Palestine without fear of Egyptian troops. And today word came that rebels and nomads have destroyed two towns near Ugarit."
"I know, daughter."
Twisting a report in her hands, Nefertiti stared at a distant shrub without seeing it. "These rebels who want kingdoms for themselves, they use the nomads as a facade and a tool. Half the war we read about is contrived, but if we misread the situation and fail to send aid when it's truly required, we lose loyal vassals."
Ay was smiling at her. "Queen Tiye would be proud of you."
"Perhaps." Nefertiti tried not to show the doubt she felt that the queen would thank her for her many failures. Frustration cut off any more speculation about Queen Tiye. "If we fail to act, we could lose the vassals of Phoenicia, Palestine, Syria. The destruction will soak the ground with blood." Nefertiti rose and strode around the kiosk. A slave tending to their food skipped out of her way.
Ay was still smiling as he intercepted Nefertiti on her way around the shelter. Taking her hand, he said, "There has been much killing already, but you must realize that the Hittite king wants rich provinces, not burned earth."
"Did you read that letter from the regent of Gezer?"
Nefertiti shook off Ay's restraining hand. "Pharaoh's own commissioner is extorting silver from him. A man entrusted with the governing of vassals by pharaoh himself." Nefertiti snatched up a translation and shoved it at Ay. "Here. Look at that. Iankhamu seized the regent's wife and children and demanded two thousand pieces of silver for their return. If you hadn't sent a king's deputy to Gezer to inquire about administration, we'd never have discovered this in time. The corruption of pharaoh's officers is a disease that will kill the empire even if Suppiluliumas were to suddenly become Egypt's lover. Why aren't you angry?"
Ay pulled Nefertiti over to his chair and gently pushed her into it. He handed her a piece of spiced cake, and she bit into it as if it were the traitor Aziru.
"I've been angry for a long time," Ay said. "But pharaoh doesn't listen to me. He hears your voice. Quell the fiends that dance in your heart, daughter. I would discuss the problems we face and what you will say to pharaoh."
"It's taken us too long to decipher Tutu's mountain of correspondence. I'll see pharaoh as soon as we finish."
Nefertiti hadn't expected her conference with Ay to take the rest of the day. The sun set before she was able to request audience with her husband. Akhenaten was in his own apartments with the girls. Knowing better than to rush into a topic that annoyed her husband, Nefertiti allowed herself to relax with her family.
Merytaten sat on a pile of cushions and played a harp for her parents. The oldest of her daughters, Merytaten was an unfortunate child. The girl had never been clever of wit, and Nefertiti feared she would be as vapid a young woman as she was a child.
Little Ankhesenpaaten, now her next oldest, was Akhenaten's favorite. Pharaoh delighted in the little girl's open manner and chattering nonsense. They shared a love of music and nature. Only yesterday Nefertiti had come upon them while Akhenaten was reading his great hymn to the Aten. Young as she was, Ankhesenpaaten seemed to enjoy the beauty of the words. Nefertiti was about to send the girls to their apartments when Akhenaten rose from his couch and dismissed them himself.
Ankhesenpaaten's lower lip protruded in a pout that was becoming habitual. "But I don't want to go, Father."
Leading her by the hand, Akhenaten admonished the child with a mildness that only encouraged her. Nefertiti intervened, earning the girl's childish ire. Ignoring all protests, she directed the girl's attendants to remove her daughters.
When the children were gone, Akhenaten motioned for Nefertiti to take a cushion beside his couch and collapsed upon his own embroidered sheets as if dealing with the girls had exhausted him. He took up a silver bowl filled with dates. Biting a chunk from one of the candied pieces, he regarded Nefertiti happily.
"Tell me what you did today. Your adventures are always more interesting than listening to courtiers whine that they can't live without receiving more royal gifts."
"Husband, your patience is a gift from the Aten."
"As is your beauty, my dear." Akhenaten licked his sticky fingers before selecting another date. "I have missed you. What have you been doing this morning?"
His expectant look gave Nefertiti the chance for which she'd been waiting. Slowly, as if she were telling a story, she described the treachery and war that loomed beyond the borders of the Two Lands. She illustrated the destruction of cities and towns. Like an artist painting a relief, she dipped her words in brilliant colors so that they dripped with th
e red of life's blood, the sandy yellow of the dust that covered a nomads skin, the black and gray of the burned brick of Jericho.
When she had finished, Akhenaten was quiet. Nefertiti's mouth was dry from talking. She held out her hand, and a servant placed a gold cup in it. Pharaoh was contemplating something beyond Nefertiti's left ear.
Finally Akhenaten spoke. "I can see I'll have to speak to the Aten about Aziru and these troublesome vassals."
Nefertiti nearly groaned with impatience. Why hadn't she expected such a response?
"Husband, we have to do more than just pray."
"Oh? I don't see what could be more powerful. I'll talk to my father the god."
Nefertiti slipped to the floor beside pharaoh's couch. She rested her arms on the cushions and met her husband's gaze. "We must do as your father did, as your ancestor Thutmose the Conqueror did. Pharaoh must go to Palestine and Syria at the head of his chariots and infantry. Take the Nubians and the archers. Go into the field and destroy the rebels. Cut off the heads of traitors like Aziru and protect your loyal princes. Nothing will instill fear of the god-king like rounding up a few traitors, impaling them, and displaying their carcasses on city walls."
Akhenaten was shaking his head, but Nefertiti rushed on. "Why do you think your father killed Aziru's father? The rulers of Amurru can't be trusted. You've scolded Aziru for years, and he still conspires with Suppiluliumas. Send a special force to kill Aziru before he gobbles up more cities for his Hittite master."
"Fierce little wife, I had no idea you craved the glory of conquest." Akhenaten patted Nefertiti's head. He leaned back on the couch and toyed with the golden pectoral necklace that hung from Nefertiti's neck. "I have no desire to leave Horizon of the Aten, and I'm certainly not going to go where I could be killed by a dirty, barbarian nomad in a fight to save some petty city-state."
"But we could lose the empire. Think of what might happen if Suppiluliumas controls all the lands from Mitanni to the frontier. Foreigners once ruled the Two Lands. They could again."
Nefertiti went still as Akhenaten sat up on the couch and glared at her. Obsidian black whirlwinds swirled in his eyes.
"Your words are blasphemy. I am the god of all on this earth. Even the Hittite dares not threaten me. The world is my empire."
Nefertiti made her voice steady in spite of the uneasiness she felt. "Even a god must use men to do his bidding. Aziru and the others are heretics. They worship foreign gods and defy you, the Son of the Sun. They offend Maat; they disturb the order and peace of the cosmos. Please, husband, allow Lord Ay-"
"No!"
"Yes!" Nefertiti jumped to her feet. Beneath her anger lurked the thought that she wasn't being at all diplomatic, but Akhenaten was so blind and stubborn that she wanted to tip his couch over and send him sliding across the floor.
"Then if you won't go, I'll go."
Akhenaten was off the couch before Nefertiti finished. Pharaoh caught her by the wrist. She'd forgotten what strength lay in Akhenaten's hands until they closed around her flesh.
"Do you seek to shame me, wife?"
"No," Nefertiti snapped. "I but seek to wake you." She stared into her husband's black-fire gaze without faltering. The moments went by, stretching out until she thought she would scream. Never had she confronted Akhenaten so openly. She thought of that priest of Amun hanging in that cell, bleeding. Then she started, for Akhenaten was chuckling.
"You're laughing at me!"
"I can't help it," the king said. "First you speak to me like a councillor, and then you almost insult me. I hadn't realized how bored I'd become. My beautiful one always brings excitement." Akhenaten patted her cheek. "Of course you're not going to war."
Rubbing her neck, Nefertiti berated herself for her failure. From talks with Horemheb, she knew the army chafed at being forced to stand by and watch the depredations of the Hittites. It was dangerous to lose the confidence of the military.
Tiye would be disappointed. If Pharaoh Amunhotep's ka was watching, he too would find her lacking. Nefertiti stared at a garland of blue lotus flowers draped along a food table.
"What can I do to take the sadness from your eyes?"
Akhenaten watched her with a gravity that surprised Nefertiti. "I don't know, majesty. I'm so worried about, about-"
"If I make Horemheb a king's deputy and send him north with a few squadrons to investigate, will you be content? Ah! Now you smile at me. The light of the sun is captured in that smile. Very well. You may arrange the whole thing with Ay. Don't bother me with details."
Nefertiti's smile spread into a full grin. "Thank you, husband."
Her grin faltered. Akhenaten leaned toward her and placed a hand on her shoulder. The hand slid down her arm and encircled her wrist. Nefertiti looked from the hand to her husband's face. Pharaoh's breathing quickened.
"Husband?"
She said nothing more, for Akhenaten kept silent. As Nefertiti waited for him to speak, Akhenaten ran his hand back up her arm, across her shoulder, to rest at her neck. Akhenaten's thumb traced paths back and forth over the skin at her throat. Lowering her eyes, Nefertiti remained still, waiting for him to send the servants away. He didn't, for something stirred in his gaze, something that resembled a serpent on a blazing rock in the desert.
"Beautiful one, I've heard that you fail to worship the Aten in your palace as you did in the past."
Someone in her household had been telling tales again.
"Forgive me, my husband. I have been so anxious to relieve you of burdensome duties that I've been negligent."
"Better to neglect duties than the Aten."
"Are you angry with me?"
"No, no." Akhenaten stepped back from her. "But it disturbs me that you can so easily give up the path of truth. I like not what I hear, Nefertiti."
"What do you hear?"
"That your devotion to the Aten is of the surface only. That you seem sympathetic to those heretics who refuse to give up the old blasphemies. These are evil tidings I had not thought to hear of you, my love."
Nefertiti went to Akhenaten, placed her hand flat on his hollow chest, and looked into his eyes. "These are lies, husband."
"Are they?" he asked in a musing voice.
Lifting her gaze to him, Nefertiti said, "I make my vow in the presence of the one god, the Aten."
Once Akhenaten would have been satisfied with such a response. To her dismay, he didn't smile at her and accept the reassurance. Instead, Akhenaten watched her with judgmental gravity before waving her away.
"Leave me, beautiful one. I–I have to speak with the Aten. There are things I don't understand. I must speak to my father, and I don't want you with me."
Protest would only provoke Akhenaten's temper, so Nefertiti returned to her own apartments. Uneasiness was her companion for the rest of the evening. Akhenaten was no longer so trusting of her as he had been. If she wasn't careful, he would guess how justified he was in his suspicions, and her influence would vanish. She had no choice but to continue on her chosen path. She was the only one who could make Akhenaten listen to reason. At least Horemheb was going north, but unless the army followed him, his mission would have little effect.
Late that night Akhenaten came to her. His attentions had a desperate quality, as if he sought escape from something he feared. As always when they were together, Nefertiti felt more caretaker than lover. There had been lessons from Queen Tiye in this as in all else, and Nefertiti had been a good student. But while they touched each other, she kept remembering that look in his eyes-that serpent writhing on a sun-blasted rock.
Its tortured twisting was an evil sign, one that had begun to appear in Akhenaten more and more frequently. She herself had never been its focus. But today for the first time, with his hand squeezing her wrist to numbness, she realized the serpent could turn on her, strike, and sink its fangs into her heart. If Akhenaten ever lost faith in her, there was no one, not even Ay, who could protect her from the wrath of this man who believed he was the inc
arnation of the one god in all the world.
Chapter 17
Memphis, reign of Tutankhamun
Kysen watched the royal troops leave while he stood beside Bener on the loggia. Their going was ostentatious, but of little consolation to him. Having dealt with criminals and traitors, he knew that the household would still be observed from afar all the hours of the day and night.
As the gate closed on the last guard, Bener nodded. "Good."
"The withdrawal means nothing," Kysen began.
"I'm not a fool." Bener led the way inside to the cool half-darkness of the reception hall and sank into her favorite chair, with its embroidered cushions. "The king's men can watch until they turn to dust. I care not."
"You weren't dragged before pharaoh. You didn't see the king's face."
"None of that matters, Ky. What matters is proving Father innocent."
Kysen gave his sister a skeptical glance before dropping to a cushion on the floor. "And how will we do that when we can't set foot outside the house without being seen?"
"We'll have help."
"From whom?" Kysen growled. "Even Maya dares not visit us, and Horemheb is busy hunting Father. Who will aid us?"
Bener grinned at him and glanced over her shoulder. Someone came through the shadowed doorway that led to the family quarters. Kysen glimpsed a tall figure, hair the color of obsidian. When the newcomer move toward them with a leopard's hunting pace, Kysen caught his breath.
"Father?"
"I thank Amun daily that I'm not your father," Ebana said as he strolled over to them.
Scowling, Kysen rose and faced his father's cousin. No wonder he'd mistaken the man for Meren, for Ebana shared with his cousin the same wide-shouldered, long-legged physique, embodying the canon of proportions so dear to painters and sculptors. Each had long cords of muscle in the neck, shoulders, and arms, kept taut by hours of practicing war skills. Each had angular features and a strong nose softened somewhat by a wide mouth. Even their hair curled the same way, causing tendrils to trespass on their high foreheads.
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