CHAPTER TWELVE

A HUNGRY PEOPLE

  THE ENTIRE COURT knew that it was Iset’s time with Pharaoh, so when Ramesses arrived in the Audience Chamber with me on his arm, there was a stiffening of backs among the viziers. Iset wore a look of deep disgust, but it wasn’t her sneer that caught my attention. It was the fact that there wasn’t a single petitioner in the chamber.

“Where is everyone?” Ramesses questioned. As we reached the viziers’ table, Paser rose.

“I have dismissed the petitioners for the day, Your Highness. There is something more important.”

Ramesses looked to Vizier Anemro, who rose as well and began to wring his hands. “As you know, Your Highness, the Nile hasn’t overflowed its banks in four years. The granaries in Aswan are already empty. And this morning . . .” He glanced uncertainly at Paser. “This morning, the scribes have told us that our Theban stores may only last until Pachons. Six months at the most.”

“So little?” Ramesses exclaimed. “That isn’t possible. My father said there was enough for another dry season!”

Paser shook his head. “That was before Your Highness’s victory feast, and your marriage, and the extra rations of grain that the Theban people received for every celebration.”

I saw the blood drain from Ramesses’s face. “The scribes gave out extra rations of grain every time?”

Anemro swallowed. “It is the custom, Your Highness.”

“And no one thought to stop this custom when the Nile has run low for four years?” he shouted. “Our season of overflow is nearly over. If the river doesn’t overflow by next month, crops will fail. Come summer there will be famine within this city. And no one can predict how long it might continue. Or what its consequences might be!”

The river’s load of black earth gave Egypt not just its name, but its very life as well. I squeezed Ramesses’s hand in mine and asked calmly, “So what can be done?”

Paser spread his palms. “I would like to suggest we use this time to address the situation.”

“Arrange several tables beneath the dais,” Ramesses instructed. “I want everyone in this chamber to offer their suggestions. Nefertari, Iset, you too.”

When the servants arranged the viziers’ tables beneath the dais, Rahotep spoke first. “I suggest that Your Highness visit each of the granaries, to be certain this is true.”

Ramesses turned to Anemro. “Have you verified that the granaries are nearly empty?”

Vizier Anemro nodded swiftly. “Yes, Your Highness. The scribes have not lied. Outside of Thebes, in the city of Nekheb, some of the granaries have lain empty since Thoth, and families are already experiencing famine. Soon, people will be taking to the streets. Murder and theft will increase,” he warned fearfully.

“We need a solution before Inundation is over and Harvest arrives,” Paser said.

“And what do you suggest we do?” Rahotep demanded.

There was silence in the chamber while everyone waited, then Paser said thoughtfully, “The people of Nekheb must be given food. Begin emptying the temple granaries,” he said. “And when those are finished, look to the army’s.”

“The temple’s granaries?” Rahotep exclaimed. “And starve the priests?”

Even Vizier Anemro was shocked. Behind him, courtiers began speaking nervously among themselves.

“In every city the temples have nearly six months of surplus grain,” Paser replied. “And here in Thebes, the army has at least three months.”

“That is a fool’s idea,” Rahotep pronounced. “What happens when the army has nothing to feed itself with?” he demanded. “What will be more dangerous?” he asked. “A hungry rabble, or a hungry army?”

Ramesses looked to Paser. “We need to be sure that when the granaries are emptied this summer, new grain is coming in. This court will need to discover a fail-safe way to be sure that the Nile overflows with enough time to plant and harvest. Or if it doesn’t overflow,” Ramesses said slowly, “that enough water can be taken from the river to irrigate the land.”

“So what will Your Highness have the people do?” Rahotep asked. “Carry water from the river back to their fields?”

“Even if a hundred people worked on every farm,” Anemro objected, “it would be impossible!”

“What if we built more canals going from the river to farmers’ lands?” Ramesses asked.

“There are already hundreds of them,” Rahotep dismissed. “But when the Nile doesn’t flood its banks, they don’t flow. No number of men with water jars will change that.”

“There has to be a way!” Ramesses said. There was a defeated silence in the Audience Chamber, and he looked to me. “Speak. What would you do?”

“Until a method is discovered of bringing water up from the river into the canals, I would do as Paser suggests.”

“And if none is ever discovered?” Rahotep raged. I wondered how Henuttawy could bear to look into his deformed eye at night. “How many Pharaohs have endured such years of drought?”

“And how many have brought the greatest minds in Egypt together in order to search for an answer?” Ramesses gripped his father’s crook in his hand.

“I am sure the farmers have searched for an answer,” Anemro replied feebly. “And with all respect, Your Highness, how do we know that one will be found in two months? Because that’s all that’s left before it’s too late to plant.”

Ramesses looked to Paser. “A solution must be found by Mechyr. Summon General Anhuri and Asha. We will release grain from the temples of Nekheb today.”

“Your Highness!” Rahotep rose in desperation. “Is this wise? If you are doing this because you are afraid that the people will blame the princess Nefertari—”

There was a gasp across the Audience Chamber. Ramesses shouted, “I am not afraid of anything!” The viziers beneath the dais grew still. “We have no other choice but to feed the people. Would you have them starve when there’s perfectly good grain?”

“Why don’t we ask the princess Iset?” Rahotep suggested. “You have asked for the princess Nefertari’s opinion; what does the princess Iset have to say?”

Iset shifted uncomfortably on her throne. Ramesses asked her, “Is there anything you would like to add?”

She glanced at Rahotep. “In three thousand years,” she repeated his argument, “no way has ever been found to bring water up from a low river.”

“That is certainly true.” Ramesses nodded. “But now my viziers and I have two months to find one.”

“And if we don’t?” Anemro asked.

“Then we will all starve!” Ramesses said angrily. “Not just the people, but the priests and generals with them!” At this, the doors of the Audience Chamber swung open, and Asha approached the dais with his father.

Ramesses stood from his throne to address General Anhuri. “We are opening the temple granaries in Nekheb,” he announced. “You and Asha will inform the other generals of this, and notices will be posted on every temple door so the people know what to expect.” He turned, then looked between me and Iset. “The largest granary in Nekheb belongs to the Temple of Amun and will require the greatest supervision. Would either of you like to oversee its grain distribution?” His eyes lingered on mine, and I realized what he was doing.

“Yes,” I said at once.

“Out there in the dirt?” Iset recoiled. “With all of those people?”

“You are right. Stay here where it is calm,” Ramesses said. “I would not want you to risk the child. Asha, take Princess Nefertari to the Temple of Amun. Paser, summon my father’s architect, Penre, and every other architect in Thebes. We will not see petitioners until we find a way of flooding the canals.”

IN THE city of Nekheb, I stood between Asha and his father while a swelling crowd filled the temple courtyard, shouting for food. Behind us, three dozen soldiers with spears and shields at the ready guarded unopened bags of grain.

“Don’t bring the heretic to the Temple of Amun!” one of the women shrieked. Another cried, “She’ll anger the gods and bring us more hunger!”

Asha glanced at me, but I understood what needed to be done, and I observed the crowd’s growing rage without flinching.

“You are brave,” Asha whispered.

“I have no other choice. And until Ramesses finds a solution, I will stand here every day.”

But the crowds looked at me with loathing. I was the reason for their suffering, the reason their crops had failed in the dry earth and the waters of the River Nile had not flooded their fields.

General Anhuri held up a proclamation. “Under the orders of Pharaoh Ramesses and Princess Nefertari, the granaries of Amun are to be opened to you. Every morning, when the sun begins to rise, a cup of grain will be given to every family that lives between here and the Temple of Isis. Children may not receive cups themselves unless they are orphans. Anyone found to have joined the line twice will forfeit their grain for seven days.” There was a rush of questions and exclamations, and over the rising din General Anhuri shouted, “Silence! You will form a line!”

I stood with the soldiers who were passing out grain and, like a common scribe, tallied the number of cups being given. But as the morning wore on, the faces in line grew less and less hostile. By the afternoon, a woman muttered, “Amun bless you, Princess.”

Asha smiled at me.

“She is only one woman,” I reminded him.

“How else does it start? And that’s what Ramesses wants, isn’t it? To change their opinion?” Asha seated himself on a bag of grain. “I wonder how he and Penre are doing.”

I had been thinking the same thing since I had left the palace, but in the Great Hall that evening, Ramesses was not at the table on the dais, and the architect was missing as well.

“So I hear you are counting grain now,” Henuttawy said, as she and Woserit took their places. “From princess to peasant. I must admit, you are capable of the most astonishing transformations, Nefertari.”

“I should think that your nephew knows exactly what he’s doing,” Rahotep remarked, “sending her to the temple to pass out grain. Associating her with food and plenty. I’m sure that’s obvious to everyone here.”

“Really?” Woserit asked. “It seems to me Nefertari has agreed to help in order to be kind.”

Henuttawy looked across the table at Iset. “Then perhaps Iset should be displaying her kindness.”

“I’m not mingling with those dirty crowds at Nekheb!”

Vizier Anemro frowned. “There are plenty of soldiers present to protect you.”

“I don’t care if there’s an entire battalion,” Iset snapped. “Let Nefertari go, and when the people riot, they can tear her to pieces.”

Vizier Anemro stiffened at the rebuke, and Henuttawy lost her smile. “The people like to see kindness in their leaders,” she warned.

“And I am almost six months pregnant!” Iset shot back, heatedly. “What if some hungry peasant attacks me and hurts the child?”

There was a dark gleam in Henuttawy’s eyes. “Ramesses would never forgive himself.”

Iset grew enraged. “You would happily see me dead as long as I convinced Ramesses to rebuild your temple first! It’s not enough that I have to sit in the Audience Chamber day after day so that Ramesses will pick me instead of that dwarf. It’s not enough that I lost Ashai. Now you would have me lose my life as well!”

I glanced at Woserit; Ashai wasn’t an Egyptian name. Perhaps it was Habiru?

“Be quiet,” Henuttawy hissed. She lunged forward, and for a moment I thought she might strike Iset. Then she remembered her place. Next to her, Vizier Anemro’s eyes had grown wide. “I think you should remember where you are,” Henuttawy suggested.

Iset realized what she had done, and I could see her mind race to catch up with her tongue. “Princess Nefertari wouldn’t dare to speak a word against me,” she blurted. “If she did, I would make sure that Ramesses knew she was trying to ruin my good name just to pave her own way to the dais.”

“Vizier Anemro here isn’t deaf,” I said sharply.

“No, just impotent.” Iset smiled. “He knows he’s the least important vizier. If he were to utter the name Ashai, he would disappear from court the moment I give Egypt a son.”

“You have great confidence it will be a son. What if it’s a girl?” Woserit asked.

“Then I will have a son next! What does it matter? Ramesses will never choose Nefertari for Chief Wife. If he was going to, he would already have done it!”

“Then why is he sending her to pass out grain?” Woserit asked archly.

“He asked me as well, but I wasn’t enough of a fool to say yes!” Iset turned her wrath on me. “Do you think the viziers don’t know the real reason that Ramesses goes running off to your chamber? He wants someone who will inspect their work, and busy little Nefertari with her skill at languages is willing to spy over their shoulders.”

“You are supposed to be supporting Ramesses as well,” I hissed.

“I do,” Iset said, placing her hand over her belly.

“And if you truly loved Ramesses, you would never ask him to make you his queen,” Henuttawy added. “You are placing his crown in jeopardy.”

Woserit put her arm through mine. It was unlikely that Ramesses would come that night, and we both stood up. “Vizier Anemro, Paser, I wish you a pleasant evening,” she said, and we descended the stairs. At the bottom of the dais, she whispered, “So he returned to your chamber after lying with Iset. Was it truly to translate messages for him?”

“Yes,” I told her as we crossed the hall. “From the kingdoms of Hatti and Assyria.”

“And he also has you overseeing the grain.” Woserit gave me a look as we reached the doors. “If all Ramesses wanted were your skills at translation he could hire you as a scribe,” she said wryly. “There is only one reason he’s sending a princess to do a soldier’s work at Nakheb.”

It was as though someone had tugged on the ends of a string and loosened the knot in my stomach. “So who is Ashai?”

We passed through the doors, and before Woserit could reply, Ramesses saw us emerge from the Great Hall. “Nefertari!” he called. “Where are you going?”

“She wanted to find you,” Woserit answered, “to tell you about the temple.”

Ramesses searched my face. “It wasn’t chaos, I hope?”

“No. Asha and his father would never have allowed that.”

“But the people?” he asked worriedly.

“They were happy to receive the grain. In fact, some of them even thanked me.”

Ramesses exhaled, and I could see the immense relief in his eyes. “Good.” He placed his hands on my shoulders. “Good,” he repeated, and in the light of the oil lamps, the flaps of his nemes crown framed his face like a lion’s golden mane.

“It was a wise idea to send Nefertari to Nekheb,” Woserit complimented him. “But tell us what happened in the Audience Chamber while she was gone.”

Ramesses glanced warily at the door to the Great Hall, then took my arm and led us away from the prying ears of the palace guards. In the shadow of an alcove, Woserit and I both leaned forward.

“My father’s architect, Penre, thinks he may be able to find a solution.”

Woserit frowned. “In one day?” she asked in disbelief. “After farmers have suffered for so many years—”

“But they haven’t suffered. Not in Assyria. Or Babylon. Or Amarna.”

This time, it was Woserit who glanced back at the guards. “What do you mean they didn’t suffer in Amarna?”

Amarna was the city that my aunt, Queen Nefertiti, had built with her husband. From the time of her murder it had been abandoned. When General Horemheb made himself Pharaoh, he used the building blocks of her city as rubble for his projects all across Thebes. I had heard people say there was nothing now left of what my aunt and the Heretic King Akhenaten had built.

Ramesses lowered his voice. “I mean that at least one farmer in Amarna knew how to take water from the River Nile, even when it didn’t overflow into their canals. Think of it,” he said quickly. “The Heretic King invited emissaries from every kingdom to Amarna. The Hittites may have brought the plague, but perhaps the Assyrians brought knowledge. Paser checked the records, and in the year of the Heretic’s greatest celebration there was drought. The next year, under Pharaoh Nefertiti, the silos belonging to the High Priest of Meryra were bursting with grain. Perhaps the Assyrians saw the dried-out fields and knew they could help.”

“Even if they helped,” Woserit said shrewdly, “there’s nothing left of Amarna. The city is buried beneath the sands, and what hasn’t been buried has been looted or destroyed.”

“Not the tombs.” Ramesses smiled widely. “When Penre was a boy, he helped his father with the tomb of Meryra in the northern cliffs of Amarna. He swears he can remember his father painting an image of a basket attached to a pole, lifting water out of the Nile. It was unlike anything he’d seen before, and his father told him that this was the device that had made Meryra the wealthiest priest in Egypt.”

“Ramesses,” Woserit said in a tone I had heard Merit use with me many times. “There are only two months left before it’s too late to plant. To place all of your hopes in a painting this architect may or may not remember correctly—”

“Of course we will keep searching for a solution. But this is better than what we had, which was nothing!”

“And what does he plan to do?” I asked. “Return to Meryra’s tomb in Amarna?”

“Yes,” Ramesses said. “I have given my permission.”

I covered my mouth, and Woserit stepped back.

“The tomb was never finished!” Ramesses exclaimed. “We’re not disturbing his rest or offending his akhu. The tomb was abandoned when the Heretic Queen returned to Thebes. And if Penre can find this image—”

“If,” Woserit whispered, and Ramesses turned up his palms.

“You’re right. It’s not certain. But there is a chance, and it’s the best we have. Amarna is closer than any city in Assyria.”

“And what about traders? Or Assyrian emissaries?”

“How long before they would arrive in Thebes? Two months? Three? We don’t have that kind of time.” Ramesses turned to me. “No one shall know but us. If Penre returns with an image, we’ll say it’s something that he created. We won’t reveal that it’s from Amarna.”

The heavy double doors of the Great Hall swung open, and Henuttawy appeared.

“He can’t go alone,” I said quickly. “What if something happens in those hills? You need someone else you can trust.”

Ramesses nodded. “You’re right. I’ll send Asha with him.”

NIGHT AFTER night Ramesses came into my chamber, regardless of whether it was his time with Iset, but instead of translating foreign petitions with me, he sat at the brazier and studied strange sketches made on papyrus. Knowing that he still wanted to come to me, even when there was nothing I could translate for him, filled my heart with such intense love I thought it would burst. Iset is wrong, I thought fervently. He’s not waiting for her to have a son. He’s waiting for the people to accept me as his wife before declaring a queen.

But even though I was happy, I grew afraid for Ramesses’s health. In the middle of the night he would crawl from my bed, searching through sketches his architects had submitted, hoping to find something that looked promising. He’d hunch over the low flames of the brazier and wouldn’t move until the sun rose in the sky and his eyes looked as red as the High Priest of Amun’s.

When Penre had been gone for a month, I wrapped my arms around Ramesses’s shoulders and whispered, “Let yourself rest. Without sleep, how can your thoughts be clear?”

“There’s only a month before it will be too late to plant. Why didn’t my father search for a solution? Or his father? Or Pharaoh Horemheb?”

I ran a soothing hand through Ramesses’s hair. “Because the Nile never ran so low.”

“But my father knew!”

“How could he have predicted that the Nile wouldn’t overflow for four years? He was busy planning war in Nubia and Kadesh.”

Ramesses shook his head in frustration. “If there was more time we could have sent emissaries to Assyria. We could have asked the farmers—”

I took his hand. “Come to bed. Stop for tonight.”

Ramesses let himself be led away, but in bed, I knew he wasn’t sleeping. He tossed beneath the linens, and I closed my eyes, willing him to be still. Then I heard three soft knocks outside our chamber. Ramesses looked across at me, and in the warm glow of the brazier, I saw his eyes widen. He rushed to the door, and Penre, the architect who had traveled to Amarna to find and unseal the tomb of Meryra, was standing with sheaves of papyrus in his hand. Behind him, Asha was dressed in a traveling cloak, his long braid arranged in a neat loop at the back of his neck. I scrambled from the bed and put on a robe to cover the thin linen sheath I was wearing.

“Asha! Penre!” Ramesses cried.

Asha stepped inside to embrace Ramesses like a brother. Penre bowed deeply at the waist. I took Asha’s arm and led him to the brazier. “It’s good to have you home,” I said truthfully. “Ramesses hasn’t slept for weeks.”

Asha laughed. “Neither have we,” and I noticed the dark circles under his eyes.

“Your Highness, our ship arrived in Gebtu this evening. We took a chariot the rest of the way, knowing that what we found couldn’t wait.”

“Everything. Tell me everything!” Ramesses exclaimed. Without his nemes crown, his hair fell over his shoulders like brilliant sheets of copper. He guided Penre and Asha to carved wooden chairs, then leaned forward to hear what his father’s architect would say.

“It was just as I remembered,” Penre revealed. “The very spot.”

Ramesses glanced at Asha. “And only you went with him?”

“Of course,” Asha replied. “No one else knows.”

I looked into Penre’s hard gray eyes and knew he would be as trustworthy as Asha. Whether the design he brought back failed or succeeded, no one would ever learn that it came from the Heretic’s city and had once been used by a High Priest of Aten. I wondered what my aunt’s capital looked like now. Though her name had been chiseled from the walls of Amarna when Horemheb became Pharaoh, perhaps images of her had remained beneath the earth.

“The tomb was in the northern hills,” Penre began. “We placed an offering of incense at the door, and inside, this is what we found.” He held out an image drawn on a papyrus. The drawing looked like the wooden toy that children play on, with a post in the middle and seats at each end. But instead of seats, the long end had a clay bucket, and the other a heavy stone.

“It’s so simple . . . with a fulcrum in the middle.” Ramesses passed the drawing to me, then looked at Penre in shock. “Do you think it can work?”

“Yes. With a large reed basket sealed with bitumen, it could do the work of hundreds of men. In fact . . . with a heavy enough stone, it might be able to lift five thousand des a day.”

Ramesses inhaled sharply. “Are you certain?”

“I’ve been making the calculations.” He shuffled the other sheaves of papyrus and gave one to Ramesses. I didn’t understand what was written, but both Ramesses and Asha were nodding in agreement.

“It’s unlike anything else in Egypt,” Asha promised. “In the tomb . . . dozens of images of the Heretic King.” His eyes found mine, but it was Ramesses who spoke.

“And did you find—”

Asha nodded briefly. “Yes.”

Ramesses stood from his chair and addressed Penre. “We will tell the court of your invention tomorrow. You will have your pick of the men for construction. If the first one built works, I will ask you to build them all along the banks of Thebes. You have done a great service to me,” Ramesses complimented. “I would not have trusted anyone else.”

Penre inclined his head to show that he was humbled. As Ramesses led him to the door, Asha held out a folded sheet of papyrus. “For you,” he said quietly.

I glanced at Ramesses, then carefully unfolded the page. Instead of a drawing, there was a small fragment of plaster painted with an image of a woman in a chariot. Her skin was dark, and even if the artist hadn’t taken the time to color her eyes, I would have known her name. I pressed my lips together to keep them from trembling.

“Ramesses wanted you to have it,” Asha said tenderly. “You are the only star in his sky.”

I blinked rapidly. “How did he know—”

“He didn’t. But he knew there were dozens of paintings of Amarna’s court. I would have brought back an image of your aunt, too, but . . .”

I nodded so he wouldn’t have to say the words himself. “They were destroyed.”

“But Horemheb left the images of your mother and father.”

I pressed the small painting into my palm. I felt somehow that by holding it I could reach the ka of my parents. Of the many gifts Ramesses had given me, this was by far the most precious.

I waited until Asha and Penre were both gone before placing the painting inside my mother’s naos. And when Ramesses asked what I was thinking, I didn’t tell him with words.

THE NEXT day, Meryra’s design was announced in the Audience Chamber. At first, there was silence. Then the court erupted into exclamations of astonishment and joy. But the village elders, who had been invited from surrounding farms for the occasion, looked at one another in confusion.

“If this device succeeds,” Penre promised, “there will be harvest this year and every year thereafter!”

I leaned over to Ramesses. “Why aren’t the farmers rejoicing?” I whispered.

“They are wary. They’ll want to see it working first.”

“Well, they should be appreciative,” I said. “No Pharaoh in the history of Egypt will have changed the lives of so many people.”

But in Paser’s chamber later, even Woserit was cautious.

“Why doesn’t everyone see what Penre has achieved?” I cried.

“Because it has to work first,” Woserit said flatly. Although a large fire warmed the brazier, she was dressed in a heavy blue sheath. “There is still the matter of Iset,” she said quietly. “In two months she will be the mother to Ramesses’s eldest child.”

I felt my throat tighten at my own failure.

“Have you taken mandrakes?” Woserit pressed.

“Of course!” I flushed. “Merit gathers them for me.”

“And have you made the right offerings?”

I nodded, ashamed, because it meant that the gods were not listening. What if Tawaret, the goddess of childbirth, could not distinguish my plea among the thousands she received? Why should she? I was one of two wives, and the niece of a heretic who had abandoned the gods.

Woserit sighed. “At least the news is not all bad.”

“Your performance in the Audience Chamber is still inspiring a great deal of talk in Thebes,” Paser said. “I no longer have to direct foreign emissaries to see you. They ask for you now.”

“It is a great honor,” Woserit clarified. “No emissary ever seeks out Iset.”

“They will if she becomes Chief Wife,” I said, seeing into the future. “The people rarely smile at me. I could have passed out grain from now until Thoth, and it wouldn’t have mattered.”

Paser said firmly, “You cannot help who your family was.”

“Then why am I cursed to live in their shadow?” I asked.

“Because they were giants,” Woserit said, “and their shadows loom large. But you are creating another path for yourself. You are becoming a partner and adviser to Ramesses. And if you can give Egypt an heir, there will be less reason for the people to want Iset.”