CHAPTER THREE

THE WAY A CAT LISTENS

  THE HIGH PRIESTS divined that Ramesses should marry on the twelfth of Thoth. They had chosen it as the most auspicious day in the season of Akhet, and when I walked from the palace to the Temple of Amun, the lake was already crowded with vessels bringing food and gifts for the celebration.

Inside the temple I kept to myself, and not even Tutor Oba could find fault with me when the priests were finished. “What’s the matter, Princess? No one to entertain now that Pharaoh Ramesses and Asha are gone?”

I looked up into Tutor Oba’s wrinkled face. His skin was like papyrus; every part of it was lined. Even around his nose there were creases. I suppose he was only fifty, but he seemed to me to be as old as the cracking paint in my chamber.

“Yes, everybody has left me,” I said.

Tutor Oba laughed, but it wasn’t a pleasant sound.

“Everybody has left you!” he repeated. “Everybody.” He looked around him at the two hundred students who were following him to the edduba. “Tutor Paser tells me you are a very good student, and now I wonder if he means in acting or in languages. Perhaps in a few years, we’ll be seeing you in one of Pharaoh’s performances!”

I walked the rest of the way to the edduba in silence. Behind me, I could still hear Tutor Oba’s grating laugh, and inside the class I was too angry to care when Paser announced, “Today, we will begin a new language.”

I don’t remember what I learned that day, or how Paser began to teach us the language of Shasu. Instead of paying attention, I stared at the girl on the reed mat to my left. She was no more than eight or nine, but she was sitting at the front of the class where Asha should have been. When the time came for our afternoon meal, she ran away with another girl her age, and it occurred to me that I no longer had anyone to eat with.

“Who’s in for dice?” Baki announced, between mouthfuls.

“I’ll play,” I said.

Baki looked behind him to a group of boys, and their faces were all set against me. “I . . . don’t think we allow girls to play.”

“You allow girls every other day,” I said.

“But . . . but not today.”

The other boys nodded, and shame brightened my cheeks. I stepped into the courtyard to find a seat by myself, then recognized Asha on the stone bench where we always ate.

“Asha! What are you doing here?” I exclaimed.

He leaned his yew bow against the bench. “Soldiers get mealtimes, too,” he said. He searched my face. “What’s the matter?”

I shrugged. “The boys won’t allow me to play dice with them.”

“Which boys?” he demanded.

“It doesn’t matter.”

“It does matter.” His voice grew menacing. “Which ones?”

“Baki,” I said, and when Asha rose threateningly from the bench, I pulled him back. “It’s not just him, it’s everyone, Asha. Iset was right. They were friendly to me because of you and Ramesses, and now that you’re both gone, I’m just a leftover princess from a dynasty of heretics.” I raised my chin and refused to be upset. “So what is it like to be a charioteer?”

Asha sat back and studied my face, but I didn’t need his sympathy. “Wonderful,” he admitted, and opened his sack. “No cuneiform, no hieroglyphics, no translating Muwatallis’s endless threats.” He looked to the sky and his smile was genuine. “I’ve always known I was meant to be in Pharaoh’s army. I was never really good at all that.” He indicated the edduba with his thumb.

“But your father wants you to be Master of the Charioteers. You have to be educated!”

“And thankfully that’s over.” He took out a honey cake and gave half to me. “So did you see the number of merchants that have arrived? The palace is filled with them. We couldn’t take the horses to the lake because it’s crowded with foreign vessels.”

“Then let’s go to the quay and see what’s happening!”

Asha glanced around him, but the other students were rolling knucklebones and playing Senet. “Nefer, we don’t have time for that.”

“Why not? Paser is always late, and the soldiers don’t return until the trumpets call them back. That’s long after Paser begins. When will we ever see so many ships? And think of the animals they might be bringing. Horses,” I said temptingly. “Maybe from Hatti.”

I had said the right words. He stood with me, and when we reached the lake, we saw a dozen ships lying at anchor. Above us on the dock, pennants of every color snapped in the breeze, their rich cloth catching the light like brightly painted jewels. Heavy chests were being unloaded, and just as I had guessed, horses had arrived, gifts from the kingdom of Hatti.

“You were right!” Asha exclaimed. “How did you know?”

“Because every kingdom will send gifts. What else do the Hittites have that we’d want?”

The air filled with the shouts of merchants and the stamps of sea-weary horses skittering down the gang-planks. We picked our way toward them through the bales and bustle. Asha reached out to stroke an ink-black mare, but the man in charge chided him angrily in Hittite.

“You are speaking with Pharaoh’s closest friend,” I said sharply. “He has come to inspect the gifts.”

“You speak Hittite?” the merchant demanded.

I nodded. “Yes,” I replied in his language. “And this is Asha, future Master of Pharaoh’s Charioteers.”

The Hittite merchant narrowed his eyes, trying to determine if he believed me. Finally, he gave a judicious nod. “Good. You may instruct him to lead these horses to Pharaoh’s stables.”

I smiled widely at Asha.

“What? What is he saying?”

“He wants you to take the horses to Pharaoh Seti’s stables.”

“Me?” Asha exclaimed. “No! Tell him—”

I smiled at the merchant. “He will be more than happy to deliver Hatti’s gifts.”

Asha stared at me. “Did you tell him no?”

“Of course not! What’s the matter with delivering a few horses?”

“Because how will I explain what I’m doing?” Asha cried.

I looked at him. “You were passing by on the way to the palace. You were asked to do this task because you are knowledgeable about horses.” I turned back to the merchant. “Before we take these horses from Hatti, we would like to inspect the other gifts.”

“What? What did you tell him now?”

“Trust me, Asha! There is such a thing as being too cautious.”

The merchant frowned, Asha held his breath, and I gave the old man my most impatient look. He sighed heavily, but eventually he led us across the quay, past exquisitely carved chests made from ivory and holding a fortune in cinnamon and myrrh. The rich scents mingled with the muddy tang of the river. Asha pointed ahead to a long leather box. “Ask him what’s in there!”

The old man caught Asha’s meaning, and he bent down to open the leather case. His long hair spilled over his shoulder; he tossed his three white braids behind him and pulled out a gleaming metal sword.

I glanced at Asha. “Iron,” I whispered.

Asha reached out and turned the hilt, so that the long blade caught the summer’s light just as it had on the balcony with Ramesses.

“How many are there?” Asha gestured.

The merchant seemed to understand, because he answered, “Two. One for each Pharaoh.”

I translated his answer, and as Asha returned the weapon, a pair of ebony oars caught my eye. “And what are those for?” I pointed to the paddles.

For the first time, the old man smiled. “Pharaoh Ramesses himself—for his marriage ceremony.”

The tapered paddles had been carved into the heads of sleeping ducks, and he caressed the ebony heads as if the feathers were real. “His Highness will use them to row across the lake while the rest of the court follows behind him in vessels of their own.”

I imagined Ramesses using the oars to paddle closer to Iset as she sailed in front of him, her dark hair covered by a beaded net whose lapis stones would catch at the light. Asha and I would have to sail behind them, and there would be no question of my calling out to Ramesses or tugging his hair. Perhaps if I had acted less like a child at Ramesses’s coronation, I might have been the one in the boat before him. Then, it would be me he would turn to at night, sharing the day’s stories with his irresistible laugh.

I followed Asha to the stables in silence, and that evening, when Merit instructed me to change from my short sheath into a proper kilt for the night, I didn’t complain. I let her place a silver pectoral around my neck and sat still while she rubbed myrtle cream into my cheeks.

“How come you’re so eager to do as I say?” she asked suspiciously.

I flushed. “Don’t I always?”

The pelican’s pouch lengthened as Merit pushed in her chin. “A dog does what its master says. You listen the way a cat listens.”

We both looked at Tefer reclining on the bed, and the untamable miw placed his ears against his head as if he knew he was being chastised.

“Now that Pharaoh Ramesses has grown up, have you decided to grow up as well?” Merit challenged.

“Perhaps.”

WHEN IT was time to eat in the Great Hall, I took my place beneath the dais and could see that Ramesses was watching Iset. In ten days she would become his wife, and I wondered if he would forget about me entirely.

Pharaoh Seti stood from his throne, and as he raised his arms the hall fell silent. “Shall we have some music?” he asked loudly, and next to him Queen Tuya nodded. As always, her brow appeared damp with sweat, and I wondered how such a large woman could bear living in the terrible heat of Thebes. She didn’t bother to stand, and fan bearers with their long ostrich feathers stirred the perfumed air around her so that even from the table beneath the dais it was possible to smell her lavender and lotus blossom.

“Why don’t we hear from the future Queen of Egypt?” she suggested, and the entire court looked to Iset, who rose gracefully from her chair.

“As Your Highnesses wish.”

Iset made a pretty bow and slowly crossed the chamber. As she approached the harp that had been placed beneath the dais, Ramesses smiled. He watched her arrange herself before the instrument, pressing the carved wooden shoulder between her breasts, and as the lilting notes echoed across the hall, a vizier behind me murmured, “Beautiful. Exceptionally beautiful.”

“The music or the girl?” Vizier Anemro asked.

The men at the table all snickered.

ON THE eve of Ramesses’s marriage to Iset, Tutor Paser called me aside while the other students ran home. He stood at the front of the classroom, surrounded by baskets of papyrus and fresh reed pens. In the soft light of the afternoon, I realized he was not as old as I had often imagined him to be. His dark hair was pulled into a looser braid, and his eyes seemed kinder than they had ever been. But when he motioned for me to sit in the chair across from him, tears of shame blurred my vision before he even said a word.

“Despite the fact that your nurse allows you to run around the palace like a wild child of Set,” he began, “you have always been the best student in this edduba. But in the past ten days you’ve missed six times, and today the translations you completed could have been done by a laborer in one of Pharaoh’s tombs.”

I lowered my head. “I will do better,” I promised.

“Merit tells me you don’t practice your languages anymore. That you are distracted. Is this because of Ramesses’s marriage to Iset?”

I raised my eyes and wiped away my tears with the back of my hand. “Without Ramesses here, no one wants to be near me! All of the students in the edduba pretended to be kind to me because of Ramesses. Now that he’s gone they call me a Heretic Princess.”

Paser leaned forward, frowning. “Who has called you this?”

“Iset,” I whispered.

“That is only one person.”

“But the rest of them think it! I know they do. And in the Great Hall, when the High Priest sits at our table beneath the dais . . .”

“I would not concern myself with what Rahotep thinks. You know that his father was the High Priest of Amun—”

“And when my aunt became queen, she and Pharaoh Akhenaten had him killed. I know that. So Iset is against me, and the High Priest is against me, and even Queen Tuya . . .” I choked back a sob. “They are all against me because of my family. Why did my mother name me for a heretic?” I cried.

Paser shifted uncomfortably. “She could never have known the hatred that people would still have for her sister twenty-five years later.”

He stood and offered me his hand. “Nefertari, you must continue to study your Hittite and Shasu. Whatever happens with Pharaoh Ramesses and Asha, you must excel in this edduba. It will be the only way to find a place for yourself in the palace.”

“As what?” I asked desperately. “A woman can’t be a vizier.”

“No,” Paser said. “But you are a princess. With your command of languages there are a dozen different futures for you. As a High Priestess, or a High Priestess’s scribe, possibly even as an emissary.”Paser reached into a basket and produced several scrolls. “Letters from King Muwatallis to Pharaoh Seti. Work you missed while you were in the palace pretending to be sick.”

I’m sure my cheeks turned a brilliant scarlet, but as I left, I reminded myself of the truth in Paser’s words. I am a princess. I am the daughter and niece and granddaughter of queens. There are many possible futures for me.

When I returned to the courtyard of the palace, a large pavilion of white cloth had been erected where Ramesses’s most important marriage guests would feast. Hundreds of servants scurried like ants, rushing from the Great Hall into the tent with chairs and tables held high above their heads. Beneath a golden sunshade, away from the chaos, Pharaoh Seti’s sisters had arrived to oversee the preparations. Iset was there, too, with her friends from the harem.

“Nefer!” Ramesses called from across the courtyard. He left Iset to hurry over to me. He had taken off his nemes crown in the heat, and the summer sun set his hair aflame. I imagined Iset running her fingers through the red-gold tresses, whispering in his ear the way Henuttawy whispered to handsome noblemen whenever she was drunk.

“I haven’t seen you in days,” he said apologetically. “You can’t imagine what it’s been like in the Audience Chamber. Every day it’s another crisis. Do you remember last year how the lake receded?”

I nodded. Ramesses shaded his eyes with his hand. “Well, that’s because the Nile didn’t overflow its banks. And without an overflow to water the land, very little was harvested this summer. In some cities it’s already led to famine.”

“Not in Thebes,” I protested.

“No, but in the rest of Upper Egypt,” he said.

I tried to imagine a famine when tomorrow the palace would feed a thousand people. Cuts of beef, roasted duck, and lamb were already being prepared in the kitchens, and wide barrels of pomegranate wine were waiting in the Great Hall to be rolled into the pavilion.

Ramesses caught my glance and nodded. “I know it’s hard to believe,” he said, “but the people outside of Thebes are suffering. We’ve had a little rain, but not cities like Edfu and Aswan.”

“So will Thebes share its grain?”

“Only if there’s enough. The viziers are angry that the Habiru are growing so plentiful in Egypt. They say there are nearly six hundred thousand of them, and in a time when there’s not enough food for Egyptians, some of my father’s men are saying that measures must be taken.”

“What kind of measures?”

Ramesses looked away.

“What kind of measures?” I repeated.

“Measures to be sure that there are no more Habiru sons—”

I gasped. “What? You wouldn’t allow—”

“Of course not! But the viziers are talking. They’re saying it’s not just their numbers,” Ramesses explained. “Rahotep believes that if the sons are killed, the Habiru daughters will marry Egyptians to become like us.”

“They are like us! Tutor Amos is a Habiru and his people have been here for a hundred years. My grandfather brought the Habiru to Thebes when he conquered Canaan—”

“But Rahotep is telling the court that the Habiru worship one god like the Heretic King.” Ramesses lowered his voice so that none of the servants who were passing could hear him. “He thinks they’re heretics, Nefer.”

“Of course he would say that! He was a heretic himself—a High Priest of Aten. Now he wants to show the court that he’s loyal to Amun.”

Ramesses nodded. “That’s what I told my father.”

“And what does he say?”

“That a sixth of his army is Habiru. Their sons fight alongside Egyptian sons. But the people are growing angrier, Nefer, and every day it’s something different. Droughts, or poor trade, or pirates in the Northern Sea. Now everything has to stop while hundreds of dignitaries arrive and you should see the preparations. When an Assyrian prince came this morning, Vizier Anemro gave him a room that faced west.”

I covered my mouth. “He didn’t know that Assyrians sleep facing the rising sun?”

“No. I had to explain it to him. He moved the prince’s chamber, but the Assyrians were already angry. None of this would have happened if Paser had simply agreed to be vizier.”

“Tutor Paser?”

“My father has already asked him twice. He’d be the youngest vizier in Egypt, but surely the most intelligent.”

“And both times he declined?”

Ramesses nodded. “I can’t understand it.” He looked down at the scrolls I was carrying. “What are these?” There was a glint in Ramesses’s eyes, as if he was tired of talking about his wedding and politics. “It looks like several days’ worth of work to me,” he said, and snatched one of the scrolls. “Have you been missing classes?”

“Give it back!” I cried. “I was sick.”

I made a grab for the papyrus but Ramesses held it higher.

“If you want it,” he teased, “you’re going to have to catch it!”

He sprinted across the courtyard, and with my arms full of scrolls, I gave chase. Then a shadow loomed across the stones and he stopped.

“What are you doing?” Henuttawy demanded. The red robes of Isis swirled at her feet. She snatched the scroll that Ramesses had taken and shoved it at me. “You are a king of Egypt,” she reminded him sharply, and her nephew flushed. “Do you realize that you have left Iset all alone to decide which instruments shall be played at the feast?”

The three of us looked across the courtyard at Iset, who didn’t seem all alone to me. She and her friends were huddled together, whispering. Ramesses hesitated, and I saw how keenly he felt Henuttawy’s disappointment in him. She was his father’s sister, after all. He glanced apologetically at me. “I should go and help her,” he said.

“But first, your father wants you in the Audience Chamber.”Henuttawy watched, waiting until Ramesses was inside the palace before she turned to face me. Her slap was so hard that I staggered, spilling Paser’s scrolls across the courtyard floor. “The days when your family ruled in Malkata are over, Princess, and you will never chase Ramesses around this courtyard like an animal! He is the King of Egypt, and you are a child who is tolerated in this palace.”

Henuttawy turned and strode toward the billowing white pavilions. I bent down to pick up Paser’s assignments, and several servants came running.

“My lady, are you all right?” they asked. The entire courtyard had seen what had happened. “Let us help.”

One of the cooks from the kitchen bent down to collect the scattered scrolls.

I shook my head firmly. “It’s fine. I can do it.”

But the cook piled my arms with papyrus. At the entrance to the palace, a woman’s hand took me by the shoulder. I braced myself for more of Henuttawy’s violence, but it was Henuttawy’s younger sister, Woserit.

“Take these scrolls and place them in her room,” Woserit ordered one of the guards. Then she turned to me and said, “Come.”

I followed the hem of her turquoise cloak as it brushed across the varnished tiles and into the ante-chamber where dignitaries waited to see the king. It was empty, but Woserit still swung the heavy wooden doors closed behind us.

“What have you done to anger Henuttawy?”

I still held back tears. “Nothing!”

“Well, she is determined to keep Ramesses away from you.” Woserit watched me for a moment. “Tell me, why do you think Henuttawy is so invested in Iset’s fate?”

I searched Woserit’s face. “I . . . I don’t know.”

“Haven’t you wondered whether Henuttawy has promised to help make Iset a queen in exchange for something?”

I placed two fingers on my lips in a nervous habit I had taken from Merit. “I don’t know. What could Iset have that Henuttawy doesn’t?”

“Nothing, yet. There is no status or bloodline that my sister could offer you. But there is plenty that she can offer Iset. Without Henuttawy’s support, Iset would never have been chosen for a royal wife.”

I wondered why she was telling me this.

“There are a dozen pretty faces Ramesses might have picked,” Woserit continued. “He named Iset because his father suggested her, and my brother recommended her due to Henuttawy’s insistence. But why is my sister so insistent?” she pressed. “What does she hope to gain?”

I sensed that Woserit knew exactly what Henuttawy wanted and I suddenly felt overwhelmed.

“You have never thought of this?” Woserit demanded. “This court is going to bury you, Nefertari, and you will join your family in anonymity if you don’t understand these politics.”

“So what do I do?”

“Decide which path awaits you. Soon, you will no longer be the only young princess in Thebes. And if Iset becomes Chief Wife as Henuttawy wishes, you will never survive here. My sister and Iset will push you from this court and you’ll end your dusty days in the harem of Mi-Wer.”

Even then I knew there was no worse fate for a woman of the palace than to end up in the harem of Mi-Wer, surrounded by the emptiness of the western desert. Many young girls imagine that marrying a Pharaoh will mean a lifetime of ease spent wandering the gardens, gossiping in the baths, and choosing between sandals beaded with lapis or coral—but nothing could be further from the truth. Certainly, there were some women, like Iset’s grandmother, the prettiest or cleverest, who were kept in the harem closest to Pharaoh’s palace. But Malkata’s harem could only house so many women, and most were sent to distant palaces where they were forced to spin and weave to survive. The halls of Mi-Wer were filled with old women, lonely and bitter.

“Only one person can make sure that Iset never becomes Chief Wife with the power to drive you away,” Woserit insisted. “One person close enough to Ramesses to persuade him that Iset should be just another princess. You. By becoming Chief Wife in her place.”

I had been holding my breath, but now, it left me. I sat down on a chair and gripped its wooden arms. “And challenge Iset?” I thought of rising against Henuttawy and suddenly felt sick. “I could never do that. Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t,” I protested. “I’m only thirteen.”

“You will not be thirteen forever. But you have to start behaving like a princess of Egypt. You must stop running wild through the palace like some harem girl.”

“I’m the niece of a heretic,” I whispered. “The viziers would never accept it. Rahotep—”

“There are ways around Rahotep.”

“But I thought I would study at the edduba and become an emissary.”

“And who appoints the emissaries?” Woserit asked.

“Pharaoh.”

“And once my brother is gone? Remember, Pharaoh Seti is twenty years my senior. When he is called by Osiris, who will assign his emissaries then?”

“Ramesses.”

“And when Ramesses is off at war?”

“His viziers,” I guessed. “Or the High Priest of Amun. Or—”

“Pharaoh’s Chief Wife?”

I stared at the river mosaic on the wall. Fish swam across the brightly painted tiles while fishermen lay idly on the river’s banks. Their lives were quiet. They were carefree. The fisherman’s son didn’t have to worry about what he would become when he reached fifteen. His destiny was certain, and his fate rested with the Gods and the seasons. No maze of choices lay before him. “I cannot begin a war with Iset,” I resolved.

“You won’t have to,” Woserit said. “My sister has already begun it. You want to be an emissary, Nefertari, but how will you be able to do that in Iset and Henuttawy’s Thebes?”

“I can’t challenge Henuttawy,” I said with certainty.

“Perhaps not alone. But I could help you. You aren’t the only one who suffers if Iset becomes Chief Wife. Henuttawy would love to see me banished to a temple in the Fayyum.”

I wanted to ask her why, but her tone had a finality I dared not question. It occurred to me that in the Great Hall, she never spoke with her sister, even though they both sat at the same table beneath the dais.

“She won’t succeed,” Woserit continued, “but that’s only because I am willing to rise up against her to stop it. There are many times when I go to my brother’s feasts simply to make sure that Henuttawy isn’t destroying my reputation.”

“But I don’t want to have anything to do with court politics,” I protested.

Woserit searched my face to see if I was serious. “Soon, life is going to be very different, Nefertari. You may change your mind about challenging Iset. If you do, you will know where I am.”

She offered me her arm in silence, and when I took it, she walked me slowly to the door. Outside, the tiled halls still teemed with bustling servants. They rushed about us, carrying candles and chairs for the wedding feast. All the palace had talked about for ten days was Iset. What if it was always like this, and the excitement of a new princess and possibly a child meant that Ramesses was lost to me forever? Woserit’s figure receded down the hallway, as servants polishing the tiles with palm oil stood quickly to bow to her as she passed. Their eager chatter about the feast resumed, until my nurse’s voice cut through the noise.

“My lady!”

I turned and saw Merit approaching with a basket of my best sheaths in her arms.

“My lady, where have you been?” she cried. “I sent servants to the edduba looking for you! They are moving your chamber!” She took my arm as Woserit had done, and I struggled to keep up with her as she trotted through the maze of passageways. “Lady Iset is to have your room! Queen Tuya came and said that Iset is moving from the harem.”

“But there are plenty of rooms in the royal courtyard,” I protested. “And two are empty!”

“Lady Iset insisted that yours was meant for a princess. Now that she will be the highest-ranked princess in Malkata, she asked for your chamber.”

I stopped in the hall beneath an image of Ma’at holding the scales of truth. “And the queen didn’t deny her?”

“No, my lady.” Merit looked away. “She’s moving in now, and I took what I could. But she’s demanded to sleep there tonight.”

I stared at Merit. “And where am I to go? I have had that room since I was born. Since my mother—” My eyes welled with tears.

“Oh, no, my lady. Don’t cry. Don’t cry.”

“I’m not crying,” I insisted, but the tears rolled fast and hot down my cheeks.

“They have found you a new room that’s just as pretty,” she promised. “It’s also in the royal courtyard.” Merit put down her basket and took me in her embrace. “My lady, you will still have me. You will still have Tefer.”

I swallowed a sob. “We should go before Iset decides that she wants my ebony chests as well,” I said bitterly.

Merit straightened. “Nothing of yours will go missing,” she vowed. “I saw her with your mother’s gold and lapis mirror and I have ordered the servants to watch everything.”

“Nefer!”

Ramesses was standing at the end of the hall, and as he strode toward us, Merit took out a small piece of linen and quickly wiped the tears from my face. But Ramesses could see that I had been crying.

“Nefer, what’s happening?”

“Lady Iset is moving from the harem,” Merit explained, “into the princess’s chamber. Since this is the only room that my lady has ever known, where her mother’s image looks down on her at night, you can understand that she is very upset.”

Ramesses looked at me again, and his cheeks blazed an angry red. “Who gave permission for this?” he demanded.

“I believe it was the queen, Your Highness.”

Ramesses stared at Merit, then turned sharply on his heel and commanded, “Wait here.”

I glanced at my nurse. “Is he going to try and change her mind?”

“Of course! She could have asked for any room. Why yours?”

“Because it’s closest to Ramesses.”

“And who says that her chamber must be near to Pharaoh’s? She isn’t Chief Wife.”

“Not yet,” I said fearfully. We waited in the hall, and when Ramesses returned, I saw his face and grasped Merit’s hand. “She said no,” I whispered.

Ramesses avoided my gaze. “My mother says the move has already been made and that she can’t go back on her word.” His eyes met mine and he looked deeply unhappy. “I’m sorry, Nefer.” I nodded and he continued, “My mother wants me back in the Audience Chamber. But if there’s anything you need . . .” His words trailed away. “All of the servants are at your disposal . . .”

I shook my head. “Merit is here.”

“My mother says you’ll still be in the royal courtyard. I made sure of that.”

I smiled thinly. “Thank you.” I could see that he didn’t want to be the first to leave, so I picked up Merit’s basket and said impassively, “We should go. There’s a great deal to pack.”

Ramesses watched us walk away, but I closed my eyes as I heard him turn and the sound of his footsteps faded.

Inside my chamber was chaos. The perfumes and necklaces that had been in my ebony chests for thirteen years lay strewn in baskets, without any thought of how to keep them from breaking. My Senet board had already been removed, but someone had dropped its gaming pieces, now lying abandoned across the tiled floor.

“What is this?” Merit bellowed, and Iset’s harem servants shuddered to a halt, chests still in hand. Even the royal attendants regarded Merit with timid amazement. “Who was responsible for this?” she demanded, and when no one answered, Merit muscled her way through the tangle of baskets and chests. “Somebody is going to clean this up! No one will treat Princess Nefertari’s belongings with carelessness!”

Servants began picking up the scattered pieces at once, and Merit stood over them with her hands on her hips. I waited in the doorway and noticed that Iset’s belongings had been placed on a new cosmetics table. There was a fan of ivory and ostrich feathers, and a dress of netted faience beads in a basket. Someone has bought all of this for her, I realized. I wondered if they were wedding gifts from Ramesses, for no one could afford such luxuries in the harem. A gilded bed had been placed against the wall where mine had been, and long silver linens wrapped around its posts. They would be let down at night to cloak Iset from the light of the moon as it fell across the blue tiled walls. My walls.

“I know you are small, but I’d rather not walk over you, Nefertari.” Iset swept past me with her arms full of sheaths and before I could reply, I saw my mother’s wooden naos. The gold and ebony figure of Mut had been taken from the shrine in order to move it, and my breath caught in my throat when I saw that the statue had been broken in two.

“You broke my mother’s statue?” I shrieked, and the commotion in the room came to a second complete halt. I leaned over the goddess my mother had prayed to as a little girl and gathered her in my arms. Her feline head had been separated from her torso, but it might as well have been my body that had been broken.

“I didn’t break it,” Iset said quickly. “I’ve never touched it.”

“Then who did?” I shouted.

“Maybe one of the servants. Or Woserit,” she said quickly. “She was here.” Iset looked over her shoulder at the other women, and their faces were full of fear.

“I want to know who did this!” Merit said with soft menace in her voice, and Iset stepped back, afraid. “Woserit would never have touched my lady’s shrine! Did you break this image of the goddess?”

Iset gathered herself. “Do you have any idea whom you are speaking to?”

“I have a very good idea who I am speaking to!” Merit replied, rage shaking her small, fierce body. “The granddaughter of a harem wife.”

Color flooded Iset’s cheeks.

Merit turned away. “Come!” she said sharply to me. In the hall, she took the broken statue from my hands. “Nothing good will come to that scorpion. Don’t worry about your shrine, my lady. I will have the court sculptor fix it for you.”

But, of course, I couldn’t stop worrying. Not just about my mother’s shrine, which was dearer to me than anything I owned, but about Woserit’s warning, too. Her words echoed in my head like the chants we sang in the Temple of Amun. Already, life was changing for me, and not for the better. I followed Merit’s angry footfalls to my new room on the other side of the courtyard. When we arrived, she pushed open the heavy wooden doors and made an oddly satisfied noise in her throat. “Your new chamber,” she said.

Inside, the windows swept from ceiling to floor, overlooking the western hills of Thebes. I could see that Tefer had already found his place on the balcony, crouched as proud and confident as a leopard. Everything about the chamber was magnificent, from the tiled balcony to the silver and ivory inlay that shone from the paintings of Hathor on the walls. I turned to Merit in shock. “But this is Woserit’s room!”

“She gave it up for you this morning while you were in the edduba,” she replied.

So Woserit already knew that Iset had taken my chamber when she had spoken to me. “But where will she stay when she comes to the palace?”

“She will take a guest room,” Merit replied, then regarded me curiously. “She obviously has an interest in you.” When I didn’t respond, she asked temptingly, “Do you want to see the robing room?”

In most chambers, the robing room is very small, with only enough space for three or four chests and perhaps a table with clay heads for keeping wigs shapely. In my old chamber, the space could barely fit a bronze mirror. But Woserit’s robing room was nearly as large as her bedchamber itself, with a limestone shower as well, where water poured down from silver bowls. Merit had arranged my makeup chest near a window that looked out over the gardens. I opened the drawers to see my belongings in their new home. There were my brushes and kohl pots, razors and combs. Even my mother’s mirror, in the shape of an ankh with a smooth faience handle, had been carefully laid out.

“If the High Priestess hadn’t given me her chamber,” I asked, “where would I have gone?”

“To another chamber in the royal courtyard,” Merit said. “You will always remain in the royal courtyard, my lady. You are a princess.”

A princess of another court, I thought bitterly, as a soft body rubbed against my calf.

“You see?” Merit added with forced cheerfulness. “Tefer approves of his new home.”

“And you’ll still be next door to me in the nurse’s quarters?” I looked across the room, and near the foot of the bed I saw the wooden door, that for royalty meant that aid was only a softly spoken word away.

“Of course, my lady.”

That evening, I climbed into my bed with Tefer while Merit swept a critical eye over the chamber. Everything was in place. My alabaster jars in the shape of sleeping cats were arranged on the windowsills, and the carnelian belt I would wear the following day had been laid out neatly with my dress. All of my boxes and chests had arrived, but my shrine was missing. And tonight Iset would be sleeping beneath the mosaic of Mut that my mother had commissioned.

I AWOKE in Woserit’s chamber before even the earliest light had filtered through the reed mats.

“Tefer?” I whispered. “Tefer?”

But Tefer had disappeared, probably to hunt mice or beg food from the kitchens. I sat up in the same bed I had slept in as a child, then kindled an oil lamp lying by the brazier. A breath upon the embers, and then light flickered over unfamiliar walls. Above the door was the image of the mother-goddess Hathor in the form of a blue and yellow cow, a rising sun resting between her horns. Beneath the windows, fish leaped across blue and white tiles, their scales inlaid with mother-of-pearl. And near the balcony Hathor had been depicted as a woman wearing her sacred menat, a beaded necklace with an amulet that could protect the wearer from charms. I thought of the painting of my mother in my old chamber and imagined her confusion at seeing Iset beneath her instead of me. I knew that a painting was nothing more than ochre and ink, not like an image in a mortuary temple to which the ka returns every Feast of Wag. Still, my mother’s image had watched over me for more than thirteen years, and now, across the courtyard, Iset was in that room preparing for her marriage. I glanced at the corner where my mother’s naos should have been and anger blurred my vision. Woserit had warned me. She had said that Iset would try to drive me from Thebes.

My feet felt their way uncertainly through the gloom, as my lamp brought color to the robing chamber ahead. I sat at my makeup chest, taking out a pellet of incense and rubbing it under my arms. I tied back my hair and leaned close to the polished bronze. Woserit believed I could challenge Iset, but what about me could ever compare with Iset’s beauty? I studied my reflection, turning my face this way and that. There was the smile. My lips curved like an archer’s bow, so that I always appeared to be grinning. And there were my eyes. The green of shallow waters touched by the sun.

“My lady?” I heard Merit open my chamber door, and then when she saw that my bed was empty, the heavy pad of her feet into the robing room. “My lady, what are you doing awake?”

I turned from the mirror and felt fierce determination. “I want you to make me as beautiful as Isis today.”

Merit stepped back, then a slow smile spread across her face.

“I want you to bring my most expensive sandals,” I said hotly, “and dust my eyes with every fleck of gold you can find in the palace.”

Merit smiled fully. “Of course, my lady.”

“And bring me my mother’s favorite collar. The one worth a hundred deben in gold.”

I sat before the mirror and inhaled slowly to calm myself. When Merit returned with my mother’s jewels, she placed a bowl of figs on my table. “I want you to eat, and I don’t mean picking at the food like an egret.” She bustled around me, collecting combs and beads for my hair.

“What will happen today?” I asked.

Merit sat on the stool next to me and placed my foot in her lap, rolling cream over my ankle and calf. “First, Pharaoh Ramesses will sail to the Temple of Amun, where the High Priest will anoint that scorpion in marriage. Then there will be a feast.”

“And Iset?” I demanded.

“She will be a princess of Egypt and spend her time in the Audience Chamber, helping Pharaoh Ramesses rule. Think of all the petitions he must stamp. Pharaoh’s viziers oversee thousands of requests, and the hundreds that they approve must go to Pharaoh for final consent. Pharaoh Seti and Queen Tuya aid him already; he can’t do it alone.”

“So now Iset will render judgment?” I thought of Iset’s hatred for learning. She would rather be at the baths gossiping than translating cuneiform. “Do you think that Ramesses will make her Chief Wife?”

“Let us hope our new Pharaoh has more sense than that.” In the cool hours of morning, she stiffened my wig with beeswax and resin, then replaced the beads that had broken in storage. She spent a great deal of time with my kohl, mixing it with palm oil until it was perfectly smooth, then applying it to my eyelids with the thinnest brush I had ever seen. When she turned me around to face the mirror, I inhaled. For the very first time, I looked older than my thirteen years. My face was too small for the wide sweeps of kohl that women like Iset and Henuttawy used, but the fine black lines Merit had extended from the inside of my eyelids to my temples were incredibly flattering. The carnelian beads she’d braided into my wig matched the large carnelian stones of my scarab belt. And the pinch of precious gold dust that she had blown onto the wet kohl highlighted the filigree of my sandals.

I turned to face Merit, and she fastened my mother’s jewels around my neck, then let the hair of my wig fall into place.

“You are as beautiful as Isis,” she murmured. “But only if you sit like a lady. There will be no running around with Pharaoh Ramesses today. This is a marriage, and princes from Babylon to Punt will bear witness if you are acting like a child.”

I nodded firmly. “There will be no running.”

Merit scrutinized me. “No matter what Pharaoh wants. He is King of Egypt now and must behave like one.”

I imagined Iset in my chamber, and all of the things she would do with Ramesses under the painting of my mother come nightfall. “I promise.”

Merit led our path through the crowded halls of the palace. Outside, beyond the linen pavilion, hundreds of courtiers had gathered near the quay where the ships would set sail for the Temple of Amun. Neither Ramesses nor Iset had arrived, and Merit raised a sunshade above our heads to protect us from the rising heat. I couldn’t see any of the students from the edduba, but Asha spotted me from across the courtyard and called out, startled, “Nefer!”

“Remember what I told you,” Merit said severely.

As Asha approached me, his eyes widened. He took in my wide, carnelian belt and the gold that glittered above my eyes. “You’re beautiful, Nefer,” he said.

“I haven’t changed,” I said heatedly, and Asha stepped back, surprised by my seriousness. “It’s everyone else!”

“You mean your chamber.” Asha glanced at Merit, who pretended not to be listening. “Yes. And she did it out of spite.” Asha lowered his voice. “She may be all sweetness and perfume with Ramesses, but we know the truth. I can tell him—”

“No,” I said at once. “He’ll think that you’re being petty and jealous.”

Trumpets echoed from the quayside, and Iset emerged from the palace, answering their call. I knew that once she reached the quay, she would sail alone to the Temple of Amun on the eastern bank. Ramesses would ride in a vessel behind her, and the court would follow them in boats decorated with silver pennants and gold. Once the High Priest anointed Iset a princess, she would return with Ramesses in his boat, wearing his family ring to signify their union. Then Ramesses would carry her onto the quay and over the threshold of the palace they would come to rule. They would only emerge later that night for the feast. It was his carrying her across the threshold of Malkata that would bind their marriage. Nothing the priests did in the temple could make them married in the eyes of Amun unless he chose to carry her inside, and for a wild moment I imagined that he might refuse. He might realize that Iset was not the rose she pretended to be, but a tangle of thorns, and he would change his mind.

But, of course, this did not happen. Instead, we sailed in a long flotilla of boats down the river, and all along the shore the people began chanting Iset’s name. The women raised ivory clappers above their heads, and those who couldn’t afford such luxuries used their hands as they shouted for their queen. It was as though a goddess had descended to earth. Children floated lotus blossoms on the water, and little girls who caught sight of her face wept with excited joy. When we reached the temple, Ramesses took Iset as his wife, and they returned to the cheers of a thousand guests. Then he took her up in his arms, and they disappeared together into the palace.

The festivity was so joyous that all formality was dismissed, and Asha seized the chance to join me at the viziers’ table. “So Iset is a princess now,” he said. He looked down the length of the pavilion to the closed double doors of the palace. “At least you won’t have to see her anymore. She’ll spend all of her time in the Audience Chamber.”

“Yes. With Ramesses,” I pointed out.

But Asha shook his head. “No. Ramesses will be with me. There is going to be war with the Hittites.”

I put down my cup of wine. “What do you mean?”

“The city of Kadesh has belonged to Egypt since the time of Thutmose. It was the Heretic King who allowed the Hittites to take Kadesh, and all of the port cities that made Egypt wealthy are enriching Hatti now. Pharaoh Seti won’t stand for it anymore. He has reconquered all of the lands that the Heretic lost, and all that remains to be retaken is Kadesh.”

“I know this,” I said, impatient. “I’ve studied it all with Paser. But he never said Egypt was preparing for war now.”

Asha nodded. “Probably by Phaophi.”

“But what if Ramesses is killed? Or if you come back maimed? Asha, you’ve seen the soldiers—”

“That won’t happen to us. It’s our first battle. We’ll be well protected.”

“Pharaoh Tutankhamun was well protected, and it didn’t stop his chariot from overturning. He died from that broken leg!”

Asha put his arm around my shoulders. “A king is expected to lead his men into battle. It’s too bad you weren’t born a man, Nefer. You might have come with us. But we’ll come back,” he promised easily. “And you’ll see. Nothing will change.”

I smiled, and hoped it would be so. But in the blur of events, I was learning how poorly hope alone would serve me.

THAT EVENING, Merit brought me a stick of wax. She held the tip to the flame of the candle, then dripped it slowly onto the papyrus. I waited until the droplets had hardened before pressing my signet ring into the wax. Then I handed the letter to Merit.

“Are you sure you want to send this, my lady? Perhaps you need a few days to think?”

I shook my head. “No, I am certain.”