10

CHIEF STEWARD USERHET bowed profoundly as Huy, with Paneb behind him, walked into the Queen’s apartments and settled into one of Her Majesty’s gilded chairs. Paneb lowered himself to the floor at Huy’s knee and began to prepare his palette, the small sound of the burnisher against his papyrus faint but discernible in the quiet air. The room was empty but for Userhet, who glided past them to take up his station just out of earshot against one of the walls. Slowly Huy inhaled the faint, spicy aroma of the perfume Tiye still wore, a distinctive blend of cardamom and myrrh that enveloped her and remained hanging, an invisible cloud, wherever she had been. The room was empty and still but for an occasional gust of the hot night wind out of the north, coursing through the low, unshuttered window. It was the middle of Mesore.

Throughout the country, the last of the harvest was being hurriedly reaped, grain scythed, fruit pulled from tree or vine, honeycomb lifted, oozing golden and sweet, from the hive. Here in Weset the heat was unrelenting. Dust pervaded every corner of the city. The fields straggling along the river’s eastern bank were already fissured by deep cracks. The palm-lined canals were dry. At first Huy had been appalled and depressed by such aridity, but in the twelve years since he had sailed south with the court he had learned to endure it. Nevertheless, the return of the New Year was celebrated here with a greater fervour than the dwellers of the Delta could understand. The river was due to begin its life-giving rise in about two weeks, and the prayers of the populace had become clamorous with entreaties to Isis for a fresh outpouring of her tears and to Hapi for an Inundation teeming with fish.

Twelve years, Huy mused. How rapidly the time has slipped away! Weset has burgeoned into one of the largest and most vibrant cities in the world, the centre of an empire I have forged for my King. At its heart the golden outer skins of its stone buildings are visible for miles around. Its citizens enjoy the influx of a constant supply of goods from every nation eager to befriend a King who could crush them with a wave of his hand if he chose to end their precarious autonomy. My countrymen flood Kush and Wawat as far as the Fourth Cataract. Gold cascades into the Royal Treasury every day. Amunhotep desires, and out of all this wealth the things he desires at once acquire substance. What he desires most is the beautifying of his domain, and I have spent the better part of these last years in fulfilling his wish. Apart from the projects begun before he was crowned, my hand has been on the raising of every monument, every statue, so that wherever I go I see a memory of those times. A few are not particularly pleasant. Working with Amunhotep-Huy on the restoration and adornment of Ptah’s temple at Mennofer was difficult. I became Vizier in his place, but he was given the control of Ptah’s temple as Overseer of Works in the temple of Nebma’atra-United-With-Ptah, and Overseer of Priests. I can understand why the King wished himself to be seen united with the creator-god, but I have never understood why he elevated my bad-tempered nephew to a position of such power in Mennofer. Was it Mutemwia’s decision, a ploy to keep Amunhotep-Huy firmly fixed in one place? He drove his craftsmen with whip and harsh tongue, and at that time I had not been given the authority to replace him.

In any event, after six years of labour the temple stood ready for Prince Thothmes’ obligatory term as a Priest of Ptah, and how he complained at the prospect of leaving the south! Huy smiled at the recollection of the boy’s mutinous face, so like his father’s at that age. The ceremonies in Mennofer had taken all day, and it was an exhausted court that had straggled to the barges sitting low in the depleted river and gratefully headed for home. Huy was still tired. His body servant Kenofer had scarcely finished washing the grime of travel from him when the Queen’s summons had arrived. Clad in a clean kilt and little else, he had left his servants to unpack his belongings and made his way with his scribe, a few soldiers, and Captain Perti to Tiye’s spacious apartments on the second floor of the palace. Custom had taught him patience. The Queen would appear when she was ready. In the meantime he, like Chief Steward Userhet and Paneb, waited without anxiety.

The events of this year have left me with a miasma of sheer weariness when I remember them, Huy’s thoughts ran on idly. Amunhotep’s demand for more temples, more sacred statues of himself and the other gods, has grown almost frenetic. He seeks to leave more monuments than any other pharoah before him, and in doing so he wishes to eclipse the lies and near apostasy of his father. He wasn’t happy when every oracle he consulted told him that his very first, precious son must be named Thothmes. He wanted the baby called Ahmose after the country’s great emancipator. Yet the Prince is a sturdy, intelligent nine-year-old boy with the promise of greatness in his eyes. Tiye refused to believe me when I touched his warm, sweet-smelling skin and predicted his death.

Huy unconsciously sighed aloud and Userhet glanced his way. Huy shook his head, correctly interpreting the steward’s unspoken question. Both the King and the Queen have deliberately put my warning out of their minds, Huy told himself. Amunhotep bends over the architect’s drawing board and I bend with him. Kha, Hori, Suti, Men the Master of Works and Overseer of Sculptors—all of us with one aim: to beautify the country and glorify His Majesty. I have built a temple to the crocodile god Sobek Lord of Bakhu, complete with a statue of the deity lovingly embracing Amunhotep. The temple of Thoth at Iunu has been refurbished and a great statue of a baboon placed before it, to help the sun to rise. The little shrine Kha and I designed to honour the creator-god Khnum on the island of Tent-to-Amu at the First Cataract is begun. Likewise a House for Horus Nekheni Lord of Nekhen opposite the temple to Nekhbet, farther south of Weset, where Thothhotep used to live. All that toil, and myriad smaller tasks as well.

Huy, not without a mild inner misgiving, had received orders that His Majesty would like to see himself increasingly depicted with the female members of his family. Bes, the dwarf god of all pleasures of the flesh, and Taurt, hippopotamus goddess of childbirth particularly venerated by women, had begun to adorn the palace walls, furniture, and cosmetic items, reflecting the King’s increasing preoccupation with his dozens of acquisitions inhabiting the House of Women. The goddess Hathor, mother, wife, and daughter of Ra himself, held sway. As the Eye of Ra, she also protected the god. Her name meant “House of Horus,” and as such she provided a womb in which the King, as the embodiment of Horus himself, could feel secure. Yet Amunhotep was fully aware of Hathor’s other aspect, the vengeful and savage Sekhmet, who had unleashed a bloodbath upon the country at the behest of Ra, angered by the lack of respect humankind had shown him. If Hathor-Sekhmet had not been deceived into drinking beer dyed red and subsequently become drunk, she would have destroyed everyone. Amunhotep had often pointed out to Huy that he drew his strength and many of his powers from the goddess’s aggressive vitality. Huy had not commented. He disliked the subtle aura of femininity that now seemed to diffuse from every room and hall of the palace. Nor did he appreciate the many hours he had spent designing the statues of the King that now stood in virtually every temple. Over a thousand of them proclaimed him as the beloved son of Ra, or Hathor, or Sebek, or the sky goddess Nut, or Amun himself, emphasizing not only his divinity but also his equality with them.

Huy had mastered the language of diplomacy long ago. His nephew Ramose was now a senior scribe in the Treasury. An aging May still presided over the Office of Foreign Correspondence, and he, together with Huy and the Queen, maintained a firm yet tactful hold on the country’s vassals and trading partners. The Khatti and the kingdom of Mitanni required more careful handling. Both principalities exerted a strong influence on the petty tribal regions around them, and neither Huy nor the Queen desired the wastage of a war. The King showed very little interest in any foreign negotiations unless they concerned the cementing of an alliance with a marriage. Babylon, Assur, Zahi, Arzawa, circled Egypt in obedience, and the provinces of Katna and Nukhashshi, properly belonging to Mitanni, wisely preferred a cautious liaison with Egypt.

Then there were the deaths. Five years ago the King’s uncle, walking his fields, had died suddenly at the age of forty, an event that had surprised Amunhotep, who had virtually forgotten his relative. Huy and the Queen had quietly removed their spies from the Prince’s household and generously endowed his funerary temple. In the end he had been an honest man who had endured a melancholy fate, and Huy pitied him. Heby also was gone, his beautified body lying deep within the tomb he and Huy had prepared together for the members of their family. Huy had stood outside it with Ramose and a weeping Iupia while Amunhotep-Huy, as Heby’s elder son, performed the Opening of the Mouth. He and his father had agreed on very little, but all the same he was pale and his voice trembled as he spoke the time-honoured words. Huy had no doubt that his brother’s heart would balance on Ma’at’s scales. Heby had been respectful of the gods, kind to his wife and sons, and resolute but fair with his underlings. His titles and responsibilities had passed to Menkheper, who became Mayor of Mennofer. Amunhotep-Huy was now Royal Steward at Mennofer, Overseer of Priests, and Overseer of Works in the temple of Nebma’atra-United-With-Ptah, in charge of the reconstruction and embellishing of Ptah’s home. The pompous designations fooled no one, least of all Amunhotep-Huy himself. The King did not want him at court. Mennofer was his place of exile, and he bitterly resented the task he had been set.

The wound of Heby’s passing was still fresh in Huy, but not as agonizing as the death of Ishat, and at that memory Huy grunted and closed his eyes. He heard Userhet stir again, a tiny whisper of linen in that silent place, but Huy ignored him. Ishat at sixty-two, her dear, familiar features lined and crumpled with age, her hands stiff and painful, her body, that lithe and graceful body, thickened and slowed by the multiplying years. Thothmes had sent a panicked message to Huy begging him to come to Iunu, sure that his best friend could somehow defeat the god who waited invisibly to take Ishat’s hand and lead her into the Judgment Hall, but Huy had no power to heal this, the woman who had always meant the most to him, and in spite of his secret hope, Thothmes knew it. She lay cradled against her husband’s breast, her children to either side of the couch, her hand resting between Huy’s as he knelt beside her. There was no point in trying to See for her; her only future now lay with Osiris in the Beautiful West. Huy had been fully aware of the presence of Anubis at his back, the god motionless and patient, his measured breath barely perceptible. Ishat had been without the energy to speak, yet she smiled, her sluggish glance moving from Huy’s face to the being standing behind him.

“You see him, don’t you?” Huy had said, his voice heavy with tears, and she had nodded, struggling to form words. Huy hushed her, squeezing her fingers. “I love you, my Ishat,” he managed. “The years we spent together were the happiest I’ve ever known. You need not fear the scales, and I pray that I too may be found blameless by Ma’at so that I may embrace you once more under the branches of the sacred Sycamore Tree.”

He felt his own well-being as an insult then, the scant physical evidence of his years an affront to those with whom the passing of time had dealt with its usual harshness. The awareness that Atum had decreed his survival until his service to the god was over brought him no comfort. The children, adults though they were, clung to each other with tears. Thothmes laid his cheek against the crown of his wife’s tousled head, and as Ishat’s eyes turned upward towards him she sighed, went limp, and died. Now let me see her as she was. Huy had spoken fiercely and silently to the jackal god as Anubis stepped to the couch and bent over it. Give me a glimpse of her youth and strength, her clear eyes full of mirth or hot argument or thoughtfulness, her black hair gleaming suddenly as we passed from the shadow of our house into the full glare of a summer afternoon! But Anubis did not even glance his way, and Huy found himself with face pressed into the rumpled sheets and the palm of Ishat’s lifeless hand still warm against his mouth.

He did not wish to remember what followed: the constant ache of bereavement, he and Thothmes locked together in a flood of grief and loss whenever they met, the terrible seventy days of mourning while Ishat’s body lay gutted in the House of the Dead. Her funeral simply underscored Huy’s deep sense of abandonment. All he wanted to do was escape to his tiny estate outside Hut-herib where he and Ishat would always be young and full of an innocent hope.

Two years ago, Amunhotep had decreed the construction of a temple at Hut-herib as a mark of gratitude to Huy. It was to replace the smaller edifice Huy had visited many times. He and Methen, Khenti-kheti’s priest, had formed a strong bond over the years since Methen had found Huy naked and half deranged outside the House of the Dead and had carried him home to his parents. Methen too was now dead, and by royal command Huy had become Overseer of the Priests of Horus-Khenti-kheti, a title Huy stubbornly refused to acknowledge although he added the supervision of the new temple’s architects and stonemasons to his already crushing list of duties. Huy made sure that Men, who had worked under Kha and his sons, was promoted to Overseer of the Works of the King, and as such Huy thankfully left the project at Hut-herib in his care. Men’s reports on his progress were terse and satisfactory. Amunhotep had decided that the new temple should be dedicated to both Horus and Hut-herib’s crocodile totem. Huy had not objected; indeed, he had not cared. The assurance of the King’s continued love and trust for him was the true gift.

Construction had at last begun on Amunhotep’s new palace on the west bank, away from the dense and clamorous sprawl the city of Weset had become. The King’s funerary temple had also begun to rise under Huy’s control. It was to be a vast edifice of gold-plated sandstone walls depicting the King celebrating his jubilee festivals in the company of the gods and his family. It was to have silver floors, and an avenue of stone jackals would lead from the river to its entrance. Amunhotep did not say so, but Huy suspected that the King had chosen the jackals not only because this was to be his funerary temple but also in deference to Anubis the psychopomp, who carried the words of Atum to Huy, his Seer. Huy had Seen for the King many times since arriving in Weset, and the King had prospered. His habit was to consult Huy and his mother when any decision was to be made, but Mutemwia, in her mid-forties, preferred to devote her time to running her many lucrative business concerns now that her son had the benefit of two wise advisers, Huy and his Chief Wife Tiye.

At the thought of Tiye, Huy felt himself tense. He had made sure to ingest a larger than usual amount of opium in preparation for this meeting, with the now inevitable consequence of a nagging pain in his stomach, but the thirst for even more of the drug came rushing at him from the image his mind presented. Six years ago, during a time of upheavals in the administration and a burst of frenetic building projects that rendered Huy both harried and extremely exhausted, the King had sent for him. It had been evening. Huy had attended the daily morning audience as usual, gone from there to the Office of Foreign Correspondence with Tiye, returned to his own office to dictate a mountain of letters answering questions from Hori, Suti, and Men, among others, ate hurriedly with Nasha, who now organized his household together with his two stewards, worked on the plans for the temples of Sobek, Khnum, and Horus at Nekhen, and consulted on the quarrying of quartzite for the colossal statues of baboons to grace Thoth’s temple at Iunu. He had been too tired to eat the last meal of the day, and had been drinking a cup of wine while listening to a regular update regarding the state of his opium crop when the summons had come. The King’s chief steward, Nubti, a little more bent, a little more wizened, but as keen-eyed as ever, had brought it himself. Gliding forward with both Captain Perti and a glowering Paroi in the rear, he reached Huy’s chair and bowed, handing down a thin scroll to Huy’s Chief Scribe Paneb. Huy nodded reluctantly for him to speak.

“Great Seer, I bring a command from His Majesty that you should accompany me to his apartments at once. The scroll bears the same invitation. His Majesty requires that everything to do with this matter be officially and correctly recorded.”

Huy’s eyebrows rose. “As you can see, I am tired and ready to retire to my couch,” he replied. “Can this discussion not wait until tomorrow?”

Nubti bowed again, this time with an air of apology. “Great Son of Hapu, I see the marks of weariness on your face,” he said gently, “but His Majesty expects you at once. Be pleased to follow me. I have a litter waiting.”

Huy’s heart sank. He knew that he was not alert enough to either match wits with Amunhotep’s obstinate nature or weigh some vital administrative consideration. “Nubti, may I not send my humble regrets to the King?” he tried. “I am truly of no use to him tonight.”

Nubti’s expression did not change. He merely stood quietly, looking at the floor. After a moment Huy hauled himself out of his chair, called for his sandals and a cloak, and, beckoning to Perti and Paneb, followed the steward out of the room.

The night was calm. A slight breeze stirred in the expanse of opium fields surrounding Huy’s house, bringing the faint odour of river growth to his nostrils. The sky, as always here in the south, was startlingly clear and brilliant with stars. The constant rumble of the mighty city came muted to Huy as he and Paneb slid into the first royal litter. Perti pulled the curtains closed, and at the same time Nubti’s voice gave the order to proceed. The litters swayed forward.

It was some distance to the palace compound, and Huy fell into a doze as the bearers left his guarded arouras, skirted the wide canal that provided both access to his home and water for his precious crops, and set off north along the river path. It had been six years since Huy had walked into the palace quarters allotted to him, and two since he had moved into the large house he had been allowed to commission in the centre of the poppy fields he and Amunnefer owned. He did not begrudge the extra time it took for him to reach the palace each day. The small but important distance of separation between himself and the endless activity in the royal domain had brought him a peace not unlike the contentment he had shared with Ishat on his estate outside Hut-herib. He had been accorded a privilege many of the King’s ministers did not share. He was still Uncle Huy to Amunhotep, and Mutemwia continued to afford him the affection of a beloved brother. Huy was blessed, and he knew it.

Paneb woke him as the litter was being lowered carefully to the ground, and together they walked across the palace’s lofty reception hall behind Nubti, their sandals whispering on the shrouded lapis floor, Perti’s leather belt creaking gently as he brought up the rear. The room was empty, its brooding dimness lit by two lamps on tall gilded stands whose fragile glow was soon lost in the vast reaches. The surroundings were entirely familiar to Huy. Every morning he stood on the dais beside the Horus Throne, hearing reports and petitions with the King, offering advice, instructions, admonitions, but this vacant half dark disturbed him. It seemed to him that as the bustle of the day faded, the past had come sliding in to fill the void, bringing the whispers of long-dead courtiers, their pale faces glimpsed briefly out of the corner of his eye as he paced through the duskiness. Thinking of the sealed stair leading up onto the roof, the memory of the tragedy with which its stale air was imbued, he shook his head and hurried on, the sight of Nubti’s misshapen spine a reassuring link with the present.

Huy’s apartments had been situated between the King’s on one side and Mutemwia’s on the other. Now they were occupied by Chief Herald Maani-nekhtef. The corridor leading to Amunhotep’s double doors was lined with soldiers from the Division of Amun. Several servants in the royal livery of blue and white were loitering by the stool where Nubti usually sat and decided who should be admitted. He had never turned Huy away. At Nubti’s approach the servants bowed and moved aside, for he was an important man in his own right, and at the sight of Huy they bowed again. Nubti rapped on one of the doors. It was immediately opened by Nubti’s under steward, who remained in the passage. So did a watchful Perti. Nubti gestured, and Huy and Paneb walked into the King’s private reception room.

It was empty, but a cheerful flood of light poured across its blue and white tiled floor from a doorway on their right and at once Amunhotep’s voice invited them to approach. To Huy’s surprise the young man standing by the ornate couch was fully clad, his white kilt glinting with gold thread, his sturdy arms heavy with silver and carnelian bracelets. More silver rested across the impressive musculature of his chest. A loose white bag wig covered his skull, surmounted by a small silver uraeus. Both the Lady of Dread and the Lady of Flame had red carnelian eyes that glared balefully at Huy, but Amunhotep smiled and beckoned him closer. The air in the room was redolent with the King’s perfume, rosemary, and a lingering whiff of something Huy could not place. The sheets on the couch were rumpled and the blankets disordered. Obviously Amunhotep’s evening had been spent pleasantly.

“I was washed and repainted for this occasion, Uncle Huy. I wear silver in anticipation of your promise that the floors of my as yet unbuilt funerary temple will be paved with it.” He flicked at one long silver earring and grinned. “There’s more silver than gold in the Treasury now. Did you know? But of course you did—you were responsible for the trading agreements that put it there. Your nephew delights in telling me how every day my wealth grows larger. I’m fond of Ramose. He has an amiable disposition as well as intelligence, unlike that bad-tempered stepbrother of his who keeps order with his whip. I disapprove. Why his wife stays with him I can’t imagine. However, I digress.” He passed a critical eye over Huy. “You look terrible, Uncle, and I can’t make use of a dead man. Get more rest.”

Huy did not respond. He’s at the height of a glorious maturity, he thought with a spurt of love and pride. For twenty years his mother and I have nurtured and disciplined him, and here’s the result: a pharaoh of power and good judgment, not to mention good health.

Amunhotep must have seen something of Huy’s musing in his eyes. His grin widened into a warm smile. “I love you also, Great Seer. Paneb, sit there beside Nebmerut and prepare your papyrus.”

Huy had barely noticed the King’s Chief Scribe and Seal Bearer. Nebmerut was a taciturn man of indeterminate age whose presence was often overlooked, a trait Amunhotep valued in a Chief Scribe.

“Uncle, you may take the stool.” Mystified, obedient, Huy sat. He was entirely unprepared for the King’s next words. “You have strengthened the buffer states of Canaan, Kumidu, and Simurru between us and Mitanni.” It was a statement, not a question.

“A long time ago, Majesty. Governor Khaemwaset presided over the three Assistant Governors responsible for those three areas of Amurru. He has since retired, but the replacement I appointed is extremely efficient. He sends me regular reports.”

Amunhotep began to pace. “Last year, Assurubalit made a nuisance of himself with a flood of letters complaining about the treatment his messengers received.” Again, it was an assertion of fact.

“Yes. He wanted to be recognized with dignity as the King of Assur. I took the liberty of composing a few titles for him when I dictated a reply, and promised gold in exchange for a treaty. A treaty with him was not really necessary—Wesersatet and the army could have squashed him like a bug—but a mutual agreement cost you nothing, Majesty, and perhaps preserved Egyptian lives, not to mention equipment and food. Besides, it allowed Assurubalit to save face.”

“Last year, you were forced to reassure the King of Alashia that trade between his island and us would not be threatened by the marriage alliance I wanted to make with Katna.”

“It took many letters and much tact to satisfy both King Azizi of Katna and our old and very valued partner in Alashia.”

“You did not approve of my marriage to this foreign woman.”

“You know that I did not. You endangered our relationship with Alashia.”

“Yet as always your diplomatic ability resulted in our ultimate benefit.”

“Queen Tiye and I spent many hours arguing it to a successful conclusion. Majesty, what is in your mind? Have I displeased you in some way?”

Amunhotep stopped pacing in front of Huy and folded his arms. “On the contrary. Everywhere I look I see the results of your guidance within and without this blessed country. Even Kush and Wawat can at last be considered one peaceful Egyptian province under Viceroy Merymose, yet another able administrator of your choice. You have made me an empire, dear Uncle Huy. I trust you completely. Paneb, Nebmerut, wet your brushes and write. From now on, the Son of Hapu will be mer kat.”

Momentarily stunned, Huy stared up at the handsome painted features. Mer kat was not a title. It denoted a position of unique authority, bestowed so rarely that Huy could not remember the name of the last mer kat unless it might have been Imhotep himself, healer, architect, and Seer. Like you, peasant, a voice whispered inside him. Like you. And do you not deserve this final accolade? Total supremacy over every facet of Egyptian life. Total power to do what you will. Pharaoh is the divinity, but you express his desire, commissioned to act without ever consulting him. You will rule Egypt.

“But surely this honour should go to Yuya, your Chief Rekhit, Amunhotep,” Huy said huskily. “Or to one of the Queen’s brothers. Ay and Anen—”

“Are estimable men,” Amunhotep finished for him impatiently. “Both have their strengths, and as for Yuya, he has so many titles already that my food gets cold while he’s being announced. You have always refused the titles I’ve wanted to honour you with, but mer kat is not a title, Uncle—it is a state of being. A mer kat is above everything and everyone alive in the country. Are you keeping pace with this, my little scribes?” He was happy, excited, his kohled eyes shining, arms unfolding to spread wide. “Well, Great Seer? Will you be my mer kat and thus free me to hunt and drink and visit my House of Women every day? You virtually run Egypt anyway. I might as well make it official.”

Huy was recovering from the shock, but his heart still raced. “If I accept, I shall be universally feared,” he pointed out, rising. “Every administrator, every priest, will know that he is at my mercy.”

“Your mercy instead of mine!” Amunhotep laughed. “This is not only a great idea, Uncle, it’s a huge joke as well. Imagine the faces when the news is announced at audience tomorrow!” Then he sobered, grasping Huy’s shoulders. “I have thought long and hard about this. I have prayed. I have talked it over with my Mother. She agrees that you are eminently well qualified to govern. You must say yes. I am your King and I command it.”

But what of the Queen? Huy wondered, looking into the King’s earnest brown eyes. What will Tiye say? Does she already know?

Amunhotep kissed him lightly on one cheek then enveloped him in a crushing embrace. “Well?” he pressed.

Huy stepped out of the King’s arms and bowed. “I will accept this great honour,” he heard himself say. “I am humbled by the supreme trust you’re putting in me, Majesty, and I promise that it will not be abused.” He felt weak as well as exhausted, as though, paradoxically, he had carried a weight that had just been taken from him.

“Good! Then tomorrow morning will be my last audience! But you may come to me at any time, dear Uncle. Now get up, Paneb, and leave with your master. Make a copy of all that has passed here and make sure that it is deposited in Weset’s House of Life together with Nebmerut’s scroll. Huy, send Nubti to me on your way out.”

Huy bowed and backed towards the door. He wanted to put a hand on Paneb’s shoulder for balance, but pride forbade it. Wordlessly, he signalled to Nubti and the door slammed closed behind the chief steward. Perti approached, and at the sight of him Huy repressed an absurd desire to cry. The litter was still waiting for him just beyond the pillars of the palace’s entrance, and he and his little entourage returned silently to his house through the warm serenity of a southern night.

That had been six years ago, and under his hand Egypt had prospered. Its citizens went about their business in safety. The floods of the Inundation did not fail to leave behind a generous deposit of silt that produced thick and healthy crops. The borders, tightly patrolled by officers personally selected by Huy, were secure. Riches continued to stream into the Royal Treasury from every corner of the empire and spill out to eventually benefit the majority of the populace. An exuberance of building projects throughout the country proclaimed the omnipotence of the gods and the King’s eminence as the most powerful sovereign in the world. Egypt, and Amunhotep, was envied. Petty and not so petty princelings swamped the Office of Correspondence with pleas for alliances, trading agreements, and protection from enemies real and imagined in exchange for a surrender of autonomy and an Egyptian Governor complete with a division of Egyptian soldiers. Foreign ambassadors crowded the reception hall every morning with requests and complaints. Even the new Khatti ruler Suppiluliumas had sent an envoy, although the man presented nothing but his credentials. He always stood at the rear of the hall, watching and listening. Huy made sure that his letters home to his King were opened, read, and resealed. The Khatti underling responsible for their safe delivery was generously compensated by Huy for his perfidy, but the messages contained nothing of interest, merely descriptions of the palace, and the courtiers and administrators, and general comments on Egypt’s continued growth and wealth.

“Suppiluliumas snatched power by sacking the capital city of Hattusas and murdering his predecessor,” May pointed out to Huy one morning as they waded through the usual mound of scrolls. “He’s entirely ruthless, Great One, and the extent of his holdings is larger than the Kingdom of Mitanni. He has asked nothing of us. Why not?”

“Because he hopes to take it all anyway one day,” Huy had replied. “But according to our spies, he is still a long way from consolidating his control of the land. I’ll have the Khatti border with Mitanni and Arzawa strengthened, and we’ll continue to watch this barbarian closely.”

Egypt’s governors and administrators soon realized that the decisions of their new mer kat were informed and just. Their mistrust of him slowly died. Indeed, if they had paused to consider the matter, they might have imposed Huy’s features instead of Amunhotep’s beneath the smooth height of the Double Crown. The King was still in evidence, hunting lions or lesser game out on the desert with his retinue, and the men in charge of governmental affairs knew that at any time the King could override Huy’s policies. But he never did. Huy, with the steady support of Queen Mutemwia, laid his hand upon the country, and it flourished.

But Queen Tiye was another concern. According to Nasha, who in spite of her age still managed to not only run Huy’s household amicably with Amunmose and Paroi but also visit the House of Women for hours of gossip and wine drinking, the Chief Wife had hotly protested Huy’s elevation to mer kat. Her father Yuya was an aristocrat and thus far more worthy of such a distinction. Her brothers Ay and Anen were princes. The Seer, regardless of his qualifications, was a commoner and had no right to direct the fate of the whole country. Her husband had listened to her unmoved. He had not reminded her of Huy’s long and excellent record of advice, or of her own affection for him, or of his rare and extraordinary relationship with Atum, the mighty Neb-er-djer, Lord to the Limit. When she had run out of words and had fallen into a flushed and angry silence, Amunhotep had said simply, “I have spoken,” and had ignored her until at last she had flounced out of the room.

Now, on this sixteenth day of Mesore, in the quiet, hot dimness of her great reception room, Huy waited for her. He did not expect her to be prompt. The good manners in which both her mother and Mutemwia had instructed her no longer applied to him. She was not foolish enough to be outright rude to him, even in private, but she treated him with a coolness that hurt and exasperated him. The reason had little to do with his absolute authority, he knew. Her anger over that had been short-lived, particularly as neither her father nor her brothers had seemed offended by Huy’s elevation. No, it was one of his Seeings that had begun the rift between them, and Huy was sorry.

At last the double doors were flung open. Guards held the doors wide while others moved swiftly to scan the shadows. Huy rose and Userhet strode forward. Servants carrying tapers began to disperse, and at once lights burst forth from the many tall oil lamps scattered about. Heria, Tiye’s body servant, disappeared in the direction of the square aperture leading, Huy knew, to the Queen’s bedchamber, carrying an ornate cosmetic box and a spare pair of sandals. By the time Tiye had entered the room and seated herself opposite Huy’s chair, the woman had returned with a footstool. Tiye’s scribe Anhirkawi bowed to Huy and then went to the floor beside Tiye, opening his palette. More servants approached carrying a silver tray, a ewer, two silver cups, and a silver dish piled with little cakes.

In spite of his exalted rank, Huy had to wait for the Queen to speak. Heria knelt, lifted the royal legs, and lowered them onto the footstool. A cat appeared from somewhere, stretching and yawning, and sprang lightly onto Tiye’s lap. Automatically her ring-encrusted hands began to stroke its sleek grey spine, but Huy kept his attention fixed on her painted face. The servants, but for Anhirkawi, drew away to stand against the walls. Silence fell. Finally Tiye sighed. “Mer kat.”

“Empress.”

“The Horus-in-the-Nest is now beginning his obligatory term as a priest of Ptah in Mennofer under the guidance of your nephew.”

“Yes.”

“They tell me that the restoring and beautifying work on Ptah’s temple overseen by Amunhotep-Huy is finished, and is completely satisfactory.”

“Yes.”

“Under your guidance a new mausoleum for the sacred Apis bulls has begun construction, the new Palace of the Dazzling Aten continues to rise on the west bank, and His Majesty’s funerary temple will have floors of solid silver rather than the more plentiful gold. You are a busy man. May tells me that you have also put the Assyrians in their place.”

“Majesty, your attention is constantly fixed on governmental offices,” Huy replied with an air of patience he was far from feeling. “You know all this and more. In particular your familiarity with the affairs of foreigners is prodigious. Even as a girl you loved the negotiations into which May entered. Almost every day you, Queen Mutemwia, and I gathered to work with May in the Office of Foreign Correspondence. Is there something pressing that you need to discuss with me?”

“Need.” The creases beginning to etch permanently into her face from nose to mouth deepened. “Need is a dangerous word, mer kat. Or rather, the prospect of its alleviation can be seductively dangerous.” She snapped her fingers and held up the cat. Huy could hear it purring. At once Heria materialized, took it gently, and disappeared. Tiye laid hennaed palms flat on the drape of the gold-shot linen across her thighs. “Because of you the King need not concern himself anymore with the administration of this country. He hunts, he frequents the House of Women far too often, and he has begun to drink too much.”

“I watch him as carefully as you, Empress. I have loved and served him since he was a little boy coming to Hut-herib to stay on my estate. I agree that he is becoming somewhat profligate in his tastes, but he still requires my reports every week and is far from ignorant regarding the state of his realm.” He hesitated, then plunged on. “Placing the cloak of responsibility around my shoulders six years ago was a relief to him. You wished to assume ultimate power instead of me, but you are certainly aware that the country would never accept a female mer kat. Empress, yes. Supreme ruler under the King, no. Amunhotep looks about him, and all is well. Egypt has never been richer or more secure. He has royal daughters and a handsome Hawk-in-the-Nest …” Huy realized his mistake at once and mutely cursed himself, but he was beyond exhaustion and he ached with the desire for his evening dose of poppy. Need, he thought grimly. Even I, Egypt’s supreme Overseer, have needs, dear Tiye.

“Who is already nine years old and in full health,” she cut in. “I have made sure that he is never alone, and two physicians examine him every day. Only you, His Majesty, and I know that Atum has decreed his death. Or so you said when you Saw for him.” Her mouth turned down. “Every other oracle predicted a long life full of successes. Everyone but you. And what of my daughters, mer kat? Death for every one of them, according to you. Could it be that Anubis is greedy for their souls or that Atum himself has decided to visit a punishment on Egypt’s ruling house for some reason unknown to us? Or perhaps the gift of Seeing has deserted you and you have resorted to lying.” She had leaned forward, the scorn in her voice all too familiar.

“We have walked this ground before, Empress. Why must we do so again? I have never lied to you, and in your heart you know it. You need me to See for you again, don’t you? Why?”

Her hands came up to cover her face, then she sat back. “My physician tells me that I am pregnant again,” she said dully. “I have given my King four daughters but only one son. He has other wives, Huy, some of them barbarian, foreign. I remain his friend, his most intimate companion, and the bedmate of his choice, but if I continue to produce daughters he will be forced to legitimize any one of his other women so that he may have more sons. The Horus Throne must be protected. One Hawk-in-the-Nest is not enough, particularly as you have predicted an early death for my darling Thothmes.” One hennaed palm rose briefly to cover her mouth, a gesture betraying such desperation and defencelessness that Huy was shocked. “Forgive my harsh words,” she begged. “They are spawned from fear and bitterness, two emotions I disdain but which seem to dog me all too often of late. Userhet! Come and pour us wine. It is shedeh, your favourite, Huy. Or would you rather have beer?”

Huy wanted neither. Tiye’s fingers shook as she raised her cup, draining half the red liquid before cradling it on her knee. She was very pale. Userhet had disappeared. “Please See for me now, tonight,” she begged. “I can’t sleep without a word from you.” The earlier hostility had vanished, but it would come back, Huy knew sadly. It always did.

“I will do as you wish,” he said, “but you must dismiss your scribe and send for Paneb, who will take down my words as usual.”

At a sharp order from Tiye, Anhirkawi uncurled from the floor, bowed to both of them, and waited in front of one of the double doors until a soldier let him out. At another command Userhet followed him. There were several minutes of quiet. Tiye had apparently regained most of her poise. Either that, Huy thought, eyeing her carefully, or the pomegranate wine is unusually potent. She sipped occasionally and gazed at the dimness of the far wall. You no longer trust my visions, Huy’s thoughts ran on, and yet what I said to you is true. In your consciousness I lie in order to preserve my position as mer kat, but deep in the recesses of your ka you know perfectly well that no one else will give you certainty. In spite of your crown, your life as a woman has been hard. You bore your children in rapid succession—Thothmes, Sitamun, Henurtaneb, Isis, and now the baby Nebetah, one female after another—and in spite of your youth and health you have begun to fear the damage each long pregnancy might be causing in that tireless body of yours. To make matters worse, I tell you that your beloved children will soon die, and only Sitamun will temporarily escape the Judgment Hall. If I had spoken fully of Sitamun’s disastrous end, what would you have said? Would you have bowed in humility to the will of Atum? Not the girl who came to my palace apartment in Mennofer all those years ago and demanded that I See for her. Not the young woman who constantly thwarted her mother’s attempts to turn her into an ideal wife for a King. Yet your intelligence and candidness won Amunhotep’s heart and mind, as Atum required. It is a hard thing to let go of one’s offspring, my Tiye, but if you are to maintain control of your husband you must overcome the fear and bitterness of which you spoke. Don’t you know that I am the one person in the whole of Egypt who requires nothing of you at all?

“Sitamun,” she said suddenly. “Her estate yielded well this year? She remains in good health?”

“You have my reports, Empress. As the Overseer of the Princess’s holdings I decide what crops must be sown and I see to the care and disposition of her herds. She prospers. Her tutors tell me that she has little interest in her studies but she enjoys watching her brother take his chariot lessons.”

“Now that Thothmes is in Mennofer, she will have to find other means of entertainment.” Tiye’s tone was waspish. “You are in charge of her education, mer kat. Hire new tutors if necessary, but Sitamun must learn to care for something other than the glamour of the chariot.”

“She’s only eight, Tiye. She cares that she closely resembles you.”

“That is hardly an accomplishment.”

Huy was saved from replying by a flurry of movement at the door. Paneb came forward with his usual unhurried pace, knelt before Tiye and touched his forehead to the tiles, and at her word sat up and crossed his legs. Quietly he opened the drawer in his palette and said the prayer to Thoth as he prepared to work. Huy leaned forward, enfolding Tiye’s hand in both of his. For a moment their eyes met. Huy could not read her expression, but he noted that before her blue-dusted lids closed, her left eye was slightly bloodshot. The hour was late. Clearly she was as tired as he.

“A remarkable woman, isn’t she, mer kat?” Anubis was leaning his folded arms negligently against the back of Tiye’s chair, his jackal snout inches from the top of her bowed head, the golden kohl sweeping around his eyes glinting dully in the flickering lamplight. Thin gold chains slung across his chest winked at Huy, emphasizing the oiled blackness of the god’s skin. Thick golden bracelets crowded each strong wrist. “She’s given our increasingly dissolute young King five children in the space of nine years, all of whom but Sitamun will die before they reach maturity, yet she fights to keep a flame of hope burning inside her. Perhaps this one will be different. Perhaps this time the gods will reward me with a son who will survive to inherit all the wealth and power the Egyptian empire offers. An empire that you created, mer kat. How unfortunate that you are not a pharaoh with an able son! If anyone deserves to rule Egypt, you do, and your progeny after you. But wait! How foolish of me! You already rule Egypt, don’t you, mer kat, even though no son walks the halls of the palace behind you.” He laughed, a hoarse animal bark, lips drawn back from two rows of glistening white teeth.

Huy waited. He was well used to these goads and had stopped reacting to them long ago. Anubis unfolded his arms and, roughly grasping Tiye’s head, lifted it so that Huy could look directly into her closed face. Her breathing remained even. Her eyelids did not even flutter. “She wants you to tell her that a male child inhabits her womb,” Anubis went on harshly, “but the seed she carries is death, Great Seer, more death than you or she can possibly imagine—the eclipse of Ma’at and the destruction of this blessed country. A Queen, but worthy to be a King, is she not? And she knows it. She will indeed give birth to one, and then let Egypt beware!”

To his horror, Huy saw that the god was weeping. Tears were slipping over the lustrous fur of his doglike face and falling onto Tiye’s dark red hair, and where they landed, small uneven circles of grey appeared. Her features were aging also, the folds more pronounced, the corners of the mouth turned down in an expression of cruel petulance. Huy had seen her like this once before. Frantically he searched his mind, until with a savage gesture Anubis let go Tiye’s head and seemed to fling something at him. A familiar vision blossomed: Tiye and a royal man Huy did not recognize standing side by side in a place that resembled the inner court of a temple except that the roof was missing and scorching sunlight flooded the place. Huy could feel its heat, but more than the physical discomfort, it carried with it a sense of desolation so strong that he cried out.

“You chose to ignore this prophecy, didn’t you?” The image vanished. Anubis straightened. “The happy scene preceding it was altogether too convenient, wasn’t it? A way for Egypt’s Great Seer to demonstrate his wisdom, his closeness to Atum, his infallibility. Tiye as a Queen? A commoner like yourself elevated to the pinnacle of the aristocracy, and, moreover, at the will of Atum himself? How deliciously improbable, and what a challenge, to force those around you to agree!”

“It was not like that,” Huy protested—but it was. He vividly remembered the anxiety the vision had caused him and the relief he had felt when the scroll on which it was written had been sealed and stored away. He did not think he had been as arrogant at the time as Anubis had described him, but he had certainly pushed for a betrothal between Tiye and Amunhotep on the strength of only half the message the god had provided.

“Yes, it was like that,” Anubis hissed, lips raised to reveal his pointed teeth. “And now Atum commands you to undo the harm your conceit has caused. All these years, Son of Hapu, all these years as a Seer, so many visions granted to you, and you still have not divined the difference between what is inevitable and what may be changed.”

Only a god can do that, Huy wanted to object. Such a subtlety of understanding is far beyond the reach of any Seer, no matter how able. None of the visions accorded me held the slightest hint that the events I saw were not predestined.

Yet there were moments of doubt, weren’t there? a small voice inside him answered. Times when the visions were fulfilled in unexpected ways or their events transferred to someone other than the petitioner. Then I was troubled.

“But not troubled enough,” Anubis said. He stepped back, and at once Tiye’s features smoothed. Colour returned to her hair and she took a slow, deep breath. “We have great sympathy for you, Huy,” the god continued. “Your intentions have been good. You made a choice in the innocence of youth when you stood before Imhotep in the Beautiful West and agreed to read the Book of Thoth. You could not have anticipated everything your decision implied, yet when you realized that the task of Seeing had been thrust upon you, you were obedient in spite of your rebellious desires. Atum, Thoth, Ma’at—we all know what you have lost and what Egypt has thus gained. You rule her well.” Once more the god’s jackal lips lifted, this time in a smile. “But you are human, you will die, and unless you find a way to disinherit the boy the Empress carries, all your work will have been in vain. Amunhotep is your tool. Use him.”

Huy had opened his mouth to ask just how the King might be used when he realized that his head was pounding, the god had gone, and Tiye was pulling her fingers out of his grasp.

“Well?” she said. “Did Anubis tell you the sex of my child? I am not afraid to hear it, Huy.”

Yes you are, Huy thought, watching her eyes. And my fear at the knowledge is now greater than yours. “You are carrying a male child, Majesty,” he said.

Her face lit up. Clapping her hands, she called the guards on the door to summon Userhet, and picking up her cup, she drained it quickly. “Good news!” she exclaimed. “Great news! Thank you, Huy! Amunhotep will be overjoyed! Now we must have more wine to celebrate!”

Huy shook his head, then winced. “Forgive me, Tiye, I must go home to my opium and my couch.”

Immediately she sobered. “Of course. You are in pain. You may go. Userhet, escort the Seer to his litter.”

The steward had come up to Tiye’s chair. Now he offered Huy his arm, and gratefully Huy took it, struggled to his feet, sketched a bow, and, followed by Paneb, escaped into the corridor, where he leaned against the wall.

“Perti, have my litter brought here—I can’t walk through the palace tonight. Userhet, go back to your mistress.”

He wished that Kenofer had accompanied him. The body servant would have been ready with Huy’s drug, but Huy had been unprepared for a Seeing. He was thirsty for water. Already the familiar black and white pattern was forming in front of his eyes, blocking his sight. By the time he and his attendants reached his house, he could not see at all. But before he allowed Kenofer to administer the opium and then undress him, he dictated the sum of his encounter with Anubis to his scribe. As always he remembered every word said, every inflection. Paneb would seal the scroll and place it in the chest with the accounts of all the other royal Seeings. Then Huy took the tiny ball of raw opium and stood while Kenofer removed his clothes, washed him, and helped him onto the couch. He could neither sleep nor think. He lay curled in upon himself like a child while the night wore away.