Scepter of Flint

by N. L. Holmes

He’d turned to descend, but Hani said quietly to his back, “Keliya, how sure are you they’re innocent?”

  Keliya whipped around, and the two men stared at one another for the space of many heartbeats before the Mitannian strode off down the gangplank on his long legs.

  ⸎

  Hut-nen-nesut was a large city located at the juncture of the Great River and a canal that carried water to the lake of Pa-yom. There, past kings had transformed a natural marsh into the vast reservoir that helped control flooding and provided a source of irrigation for the groves of palms and greengrocers’ gardens that flourished around the lake. As for Hut-nen-nesut itself, it was a market town that had once been the capital of the two lands.

  Maya stood with Hani and Neferet at the gunwales, watching the white cubes of the city slide into view, reflected in the glittering waters of the River. He was still trying to get his mind around what had happened at Akhet-aten. Every time he thought about it, the memory gave him cold chills.

  At his side, Hani stood, silently staring out over the water and the fast-approaching bank. His normally cheerful square-jowled face was hard and unreadable. Even Neferet spoke less than normal—for once, perhaps, scared by her brush with the brutality of the world. Maya thought to himself that he should have spoken up too. What kind of man am I to let a little girl of sixteen show more courage than I? But he’d been so stunned, as if all ability to act had flown out of him. Foreign diplomats arrested as common criminals—who has ever heard of such a thing?

  “Lord Hani,” he said hesitantly after a while, “how sure can we be that Tulubri and Pirissi are innocent?”

  Hani shot him a sharp look. “I wish I knew, my friend. Certainly Pirissi doesn’t have a mole on his lip, but Tulubri’s lip is concealed by his mustache. Keliya seems to trust them...”

  “I’m for anybody who that Mahu is against,” said Neferet, still belligerent. She looked up at her father for reinforcement. He smiled distractedly.

  “Are we still going to see Lady Kiya?” Maya asked. “Should we tell her about the arrest or not?”

  “I guess we’ll have to. Pirissi and Tulubri were supposed to take her back to Naharin. I don’t know what will happen now. Will she stay? Will some of our own take her up?” Hani blew out a breath. Then suddenly, he stiffened, his face intent.

  “What is it, my lord?” Maya asked in alarm.

  “Remember I told you that Bebi-ankh had looked terrified the night before he disappeared from my house?”

  “Yes...”

  “That was the night the Mitannians ate with us.” Hani shot a significant glance at Maya. “Do you suppose he saw or heard the men? That he recognized the leader of the tomb robbers, whom he feared so much, and thought the foreigner had tracked him down?”

  Maya could feel the blood rushing out of his face. “Bes protect us! That sounds all too likely. Are we in trouble now for standing up for them? Mahu may think we’re complicit.”

  “I’m glad I stood up for them,” said Neferet stubbornly. “The only one of those policemen I like is the baboon.”

  She made her baboon face, and Maya pretended half-heartedly to be amused. But fear sent prickles up the back of his neck. He was avid for adventures to add to his eventual book, but a stint at the receiving end of the medjays’ clubs seemed a bit too much. Even worse, the thought of having his nose and ears cut off filled him with dread. Such people were shunned by everyone. Maya had worked hard enough for acceptance.

  “As soon as I get back to Akhet-aten, I want to ask Ptah-mes if he knows what’s going on. What sort of evidence Mahu might have found.” Hani’s voice grew icy. “What I’m really afraid of is that he’s tortured Bebi-ankh or the others until they ‘revealed’ to him what he wanted to hear.”

  “I told you he was bad,” said Neferet fiercely.

  The boat slid into the bank with a thump, and the sailors began to scurry around, throwing ropes overboard to the waiting men on the shore. Maya stared at the whitewashed buildings around him, glaring under a bright sun-bleached sky. In the distance, he could see the high walls and pylon of a temple, but the flags were not flying.

  Lord Hani followed his gaze. “That was the temple of Haru. Remember? Pa-aten-em-heb said his family were priests.”

  Maya nodded grimly. More angry, disenfranchised priests and lay workers. “Where is the estate of the Royal Ornaments?”

  “On the edge of town. I’ve only ever been there once before.”

  “We don’t want to be late, Papa. Lady Djefat-nebty is expecting me,” Neferet said, a note of anxiety in her voice.

  “It’s not far, duckling,” Hani said, smiling down at her fondly.

  Once the boat had been secured, the travelers gathered their scant baggage and clumped down the bouncing boards of the gangplank. Hani negotiated with some of the longshoremen to store the Mitannians’ things, and they set off for the king’s harem. Or more properly, Maya thought, the house of those wives and concubines who didn’t enjoy the king’s special favor. Hundreds of women were housed there—foreign princesses who’d been exchanged as gages of alliance, other girls who’d seized the king’s fancy at some point but whom he had tired of, and aristocratic ladies whose ambitious fathers had consigned them to this sad and boring life, which they passed in luxurious idleness, perhaps without ever seeing their husband.

  As if he’d read Maya’s thoughts, Hani said, “While she was the King’s Beloved Wife, Kiya lived at the palace at Akhet-aten and even had her own palace. Now she’s back in the kennels.”

  “How is it the king couldn’t beget a son for so long? He has enough women for a whole village here,” Maya said sourly. I had a son ten months after my marriage.

  Hani’s smile grew caustic. “When the gods turn their backs on you—”

  “They give you daughters?” Neferet finished, hands on her hips. Her little eyes were wide with accusation.

  “No, no, my love. Daughters are a blessing.”

  Neferet dropped her eyes, suddenly troubled. Hani exchanged a glance of concern with Maya and tipped the girl’s chin up. “What is it, Neferet? What’s wrong?”

  “I was going to say ‘The king never did have a son.’” She looked reluctant, almost frightened. “But I swore I wouldn’t tell anyone.”

  What’s this? Maya thought uneasily. He fixed Lord Hani with a questioning stare.

  Hani’s face had grown rigid with suspicion. He drew his daughter out of the stream of pedestrians and into the mouth of a quiet alley. He laid a hand on her shoulder and said in an undertone, “What do you mean, Neferet?”

  “I swore I wouldn’t tell, Papa, but... it’s been worrying me ever since. I don’t think it’s honest, but I don’t know what to do.” Her eyebrows were buckled, her eyes a little shifty.

  “You can tell your father, girl,” said Maya sternly.

  Neferet looked undecided for a moment longer, but then she heaved a huge sigh. “Remember Lady Djefat-nebty took me to the palace for the first time to help her with the childbirth of the Great Queen and Lady Kiya? The king’s sister was having a baby at the same time.”

  “It was a good year for babies,” murmured Maya, remembering. His own little Tepy had been born the same day two years before.

  Hani nodded, never taking his eyes off his daughter’s.

  She continued in an unsteady voice, “The queen gave birth to a stillborn girl”—Maya and Hani gasped—“and as soon as Lady Djefat-nebty saw she was dead, they took the baby away from the queen, even before she could see her.”

  “Bes rescue us!” Maya exclaimed. “The queen didn’t even know?”

  Neferet shook her head. “And then they sent me into Princess Sit-pa-aten’s room.”

  “Whose?” Maya cried, confused.

  “Sit-amen,” Hani said. “Nefer-khepru-ra’s sister. She was her father’s, er, wife. Remember?”

  “Her father’s wife?” Neferet’s nose wrinkled in disgust. “Well, she’s somebody else’s wife now. And she had just given birth to an adorab
le baby boy. And they told me to put the dead little girl in his place and take the boy. And, and... to put him beside the queen.”

  “Prince Tut-ankh-aten?” cried Maya in horror. “He’s his own cousin?”

  Hani groaned and covered his eyes with a hand as if he couldn’t bear to look another moment upon such a lying world. He opened his eyes at last and said to Neferet in a flat voice, “Who knows about this, little duckling?”

  “Me, Lady Djefat-nebty, her husband, Lord Pentju, a midwife, and Princess Meryet-aten.”

  “Nefert-iti’s eldest daughter? She knows about the switch?”

  “She knows that we switched children, yes, but not whose child the little boy was.” Neferet looked at her father anxiously. “Lord Pentju made me swear to tell nobody, and he had me write you a letter saying that the queen and Lady Kiya had given birth but nothing more. I had to swear to him not to tell.” Suddenly, her face crumpled. “I swore on Mama’s ka, Papa. Have I put her soul in danger?”

  Hani wrapped the girl in his arms. “No, my love. A forced oath doesn’t count. You did right to tell me.” He kissed her on the top of the head. After a moment of throbbing silence, Hani led the way back to the main street, and they resumed their journey.

  “Pentju is the king’s physician,” murmured Maya. “Do you think the king was behind this?”

  Hani shrugged. “Maybe. But someone like Ay seems more likely. As long as his daughter bears the king his heir, her place is assured—and so is Ay’s influence. Otherwise, who knows?”

  “Then there’s one more person who’s aware of the switch—and a dangerous one.”

  “Say nothing to anyone, either of you. I’m not sure the witnesses are safe.” Hani stared grimly into the glaring road ahead of them.

  ⸎

  A cold wave of fear and anger lapped at the edge of Hani’s heart—not that he cared so very much whether the king’s son or his nephew succeeded to the throne, but his daughter had been dragged into a shady and shameful bit of palace intrigue. Nub-nefer was right, he told himself bitterly. We should never have let her get involved with these people. He was disappointed to think that Lady Djefat-nebty, who seemed so adamantly honest, would have lent herself to such a thing. Either her husband had more control over her than Hani had thought, or she was more a zealot of the Aten than he had perceived. I wish I had talked to Baket-iset about her. She has such an insight into people.

  Yet here I am, turning Neferet back into the sunet’s hands. Hani drew a deep breath. Suddenly, he felt overwhelmed by all the things he couldn’t control yet was expected to fix.

  The clustered cubes of the city itself were thinning out, giving way to the fertile, Flood-watered countryside between the River and the canal of Pa-yom. Palm trees swayed, graceful in the tepid breeze, and a hawk floated lazily in the air high above the road. Hani stared upward, shading his eyes with a hand. There he is again. Is it the Lord Haru watching over his sacred city?

  Ahead of them loomed the white walls of the House of the Royal Ornaments. The gate was swarming with Nubian soldiers in fancy uniforms, plumes in their hair.

  “It’s better guarded than the Double House of Silver and Gold,” Maya commented.

  “Because the contents are more precious.” Hani turned to Neferet. “Where are you supposed to meet Djefat-nebty, my duckling?”

  “At the entrance. But neither of us knew the exact hour I would arrive. I can just wait until she comes.”

  “Not by yourself,” Maya said firmly. “Your mother would never forgive us.”

  “If you have to wait, we’ll wait with you,” Hani told her.

  At the pylon gate, Hani gave his credentials and those of this daughter. The three of them were ushered into the vast courtyard shaded with rows of trees. Even this semipublic area was a place of soft luxury, with flowers and pools and walls painted with scenes of nature so convincing they seemed to exhale the perfume of real blossoms. At the back stretched a colonnaded porch patrolled by yet more soldiers in a variety of costumes. Hani and his companions mounted the broad steps, where they were met by a majordomo dressed in immaculate linen with a full, fashionable cluster of pleats hanging to his knees in front.

  “My lord Hani,” he said with a pompous little bow. “Lady Kiya awaits you.”

  Hani had just started to say, “But we can’t leave my daughter here alone,” when he saw, striding toward them out of the depths of the palace, the tall figure of the sunet. She lifted a hand in greeting and quickened her pace.

  “You’re very prompt, Neferet,” she said approvingly as she drew up to them. “Thank you, Lord Hani, for bringing her on time.”

  He tipped his head in acknowledgment, biting back the reproaches that hovered on the tip of his tongue. How could you drag my little daughter into such slippery business? She was only fourteen. How could you put her under oath with such a heavy secret?

  “Come, Neferet,” Djefat-nebty said brusquely, turning. Neferet stepped out after her, shooting her father an uncertain smile.

  Together they disappeared down a dark corridor through a cluster of bowing servants. Hani could hear his daughter asking eagerly, “Is Bener-ib here yet?”

  He stood, wrestling with his conflicted conscience, then he said to the majordomo, “Lead on, please.”

  The man resumed his strut ahead of them, his staff clicking on the polished gypsum floors. They traversed broad halls, past luxurious apartments where giggling girls hung in the doorway and naked handmaids with wreaths of flowers on their lush wigs passed back and forth with platters of fruit and sweetmeats. At last, they came to a courtyard carved into a sunken garden with a covered walkway, all around, looking down into it. Various ladies in diaphanous caftans in the latest fashion strolled the sidewalk, laughing or talking. They stared up at the newcomers momentarily then continued their conversations.

  Hani saw Maya craning his neck around to take in everything. Hani was surprised that they had been admitted to this seemingly private area, but perhaps it wasn’t so private—soldiers stood unobtrusively at every corner of the quadrangle. The majordomo led them around the cloister and bade them wait while he disappeared through a nearby doorway.

  Maya beside him, Hani took a seat on a stone bench and absorbed the fresh, fragrant air cooled by the long pool in the middle of the courtyard and perfumed by beds of flowers. He tried to imagine what he could say to Kiya that would give her any comfort. A pair of ducks came flapping in from the River and dropped with outspread wings into the water. Hani observed them with a smile. Birds never failed to warm his heart. “They’re so clumsy on land yet so graceful in the air or in the water,” he said fondly.

  “Who’s that, my lord? The Mitannians?” Maya asked, confused.

  Hani laughed. “I was talking about those ducks. Sorry.” Of course, Maya was still thinking about the Mitannians. Hani’s mood blackened with the recollection of what had happened to them in Akhet-aten.

  Footsteps clattered on the pavement, and a moment later, the majordomo reappeared with a tall, slender specter in his wake. “Lady Kiya,” he announced and bowed himself away. Hani noticed that he took up a post out of earshot but not much farther off.

  Hani and Maya rose and made a full court bow, hands on their knees. Kiya might be in marginal disgrace, but she was still a wife of the Great King.

  “Hani,” she said in a weak voice. “Thank you for coming.”

  Certainly Nefer-khepru-ra’s loss of interest in his once-Beloved Wife could not have been due to fading physical charms—she was only twenty-two and as beautiful as ever—but all the sparkle and vivacity had gone out of her. Her kohl-edged eyes red and swollen, she seemed as transparent as her caftan, as if she were beginning to disappear already. “Can’t you make them relent? They want me to leave little Baket-aten behind, and she’s... she’s all my life now.” Her lip began to tremble, and her voice grew very high. “She’s all I have left.”

  Hani’s fatherly heart ached for the girl, but he was helpless to aid her. He said gently,
“My lady, I know what you’re going through. But I beg you to obey with good grace. Neither of us can prevent what’s happening, so there’s no point in beating yourself against the reality. It will only cause you more pain. Surely, seeing your father and mother again will be some comfort to you.”

  She buried her face in her hands, and her hunched shoulders began to jerk. “Why has he cast me off, Hani? What have I done wrong?” she sobbed.

  His first instinct was to tell her she’d done nothing wrong and that her royal husband was a fickle, spoiled bastard. But she’d had a brief affair with a sculptor, and the queen was aware of it. Hani had managed to forestall Nefert-iti’s vengeance, yet perhaps the queen had finally decided to reveal her rival’s misdeed. If so, sending her away was a merciful understatement of a punishment.

  Hani heaved a sorrowful sigh, and he exchanged a hopeless glance with Maya. Kiya took her hands from her face and made a valiant effort to stifle her tears. She nodded in resignation. “I’ll go. What choice have I?” She faced Hani with the bravery of a true princess. “When is my father sending his men down to escort me home?”

  Hani cringed. He would have to tell her what had happened. “My lady, there has been an unfortunate occurrence. The two men sent by Tushratta have been arrested.”

  “Arrested?” she cried, her eyes round with outrage. “Who would dare to arrest my father’s emissaries?”

  “The same man who is separating you from your child,” Hani said in a quiet voice.

  Kiya let out a howl that might have been sorrow and might have been fury. She grabbed her wig at the temples with both hands. “Why? Why? Why am I being humiliated again and again like this?” She sank to the bench, her face a twisted mask of misery. Eventually, she grew calmer and asked Hani bitterly, “What accusation have they concocted?”

  Hani drew a deep breath and told her, “Tomb robbing. I’m supposedly the one conducting this investigation, but in effect, the royal police have taken it over. And they have decided that the culprits are Pirissi and Tulubri, your countrymen.”

  “The queen is behind this, I’m sure, Hani,” Kiya said in a desolate voice. “She hates me.” She dashed at her eyes with the back of a hennaed hand. “She even refused to take Baket-aten to raise. But I thank the gods it won’t be her. The queen mother has said she’ll take her in.”