Chapter 14
Neff
Neff sat in the banquet hall, partaking of a midday meal with the pharaoh and a congregation of palace officials and priests.
Attendants laden with platters and water jugs filed in and out, while other servants stood nearby waving ostrich feather fans, ensuring that a steady breeze cooled the stifling air.
She picked at her bowl of stewed fava beans, anxious to return to her chambers after her afternoon duties were complete. She was desperate to open the scroll that Ahura had delivered the day before and see what Kenna had sent her.
She glanced around the table at the serious-faced men, men including Sabni and the new viziers he had appointed.
As Meryamun had commanded, the old viziers had been named traitors to the crown and executed, their bodies thrown into the river to be carried out to sea, for traitors were never to know the comfort of a tomb or the promise of eternal life.
To Neff’s eyes, the new men seemed no different from the old ones, aside from having a much healthier fear of their young king.
The new viziers said many things, but none of them included the word no.
Neff pushed her plate away. She had no appetite.
Nearly every minute of every day, she was surrounded by people, and yet she’d never felt so alone.
“More water?”
Neff turned to see Ahura standing beside her carrying an alabaster water jug. She had dark circles under her eyes, but she managed a tight smile.
“Yes, thank you,” Neff replied.
Ahura bent to refill her cup, spilling a little on the table. Then the attendant nodded and moved on to the next guest.
Watching her, Neff thought that perhaps she had acquired a new friend.
When she’d met Ahura in the courtyard that day, it had felt just like when she’d met Karim.
Like fate had placed her in Neff’s path.
Karim had described the fourth person in the Oracle of the Lamb as a tall, strapping farm girl from Sakesh.
Ahura certainly fit the physical description, and Neff doubted her claim about hailing from Bubas.
If she was indeed a Sakeshi, why had Ahura come to the palace and assumed a false identity?
Neff knew from her audiences with Meryamun that Sakesh was the heart of the southern rebellion.
Did Ahura have her own plans to disrupt power in the kingdom?
Neff had to believe that her new servant could be trusted. After all, if the gods hadn’t meant for them to meet, why would they have sent a woman with her mother’s name?
You may doubt yourself, the High Priestess of Bast had told her, but never doubt the goddess. You are on this path because she deemed it so. Stay on it, no matter where it leads.
Neff took a deep breath and forced herself to eat, using a piece of spiced flatbread to scoop some fava beans into her mouth. I need my strength to get through the day.
“Montuhotep!” sounded the king’s strident voice. “You’re late.”
Neff looked up to see her old master, the high priest of Amun, enter the chamber. He was pale, his shoulders hunched, a shadow of the powerful, self-assured man she’d met when she first arrived in Thonis. Back then, he had been the one to sit at the king’s right hand.
Their eyes met, and Neff saw a flash of hatred pass over his face as he took a seat at the other end of the table.
“Forgive me, my king,” Montuhotep said. “I was caught up in the preparations for your execration ritual.”
“Execration ritual?” Sabni asked, a bite of baked egg halfway to his mouth. The small man looked to Meryamun. “I had not heard about this, my king. Curses?”
Meryamun tutted. “Don’t be grumpy, Sabni.
I have entrusted you with the management of my viziers.
It doesn’t mean you oversee all my affairs.
As a healer has his pills, ointments, and heka to cure the sick, so a king needs an army, a strategy, and magic to defeat his enemies.
Sematawy knew this, but like so much of his wisdom, it was forgotten.
The kingdom my father bequeathed me is plagued with rebellion and has lost the respect of the neighboring kingdoms. If I am to heal Khetara of these ills, I need heka on my side as well as bows and arrows.
This execration ritual will give me just that: a curse upon each and every enemy of the crown. ”
“My priests have commissioned all the clay pots that you need,” Montuhotep broke in, apparently not wishing his accomplishments to be forgotten in the exchange.
“And they are working on the wax figures as well. I have also personally spoken to the man in charge of the fortress, and he is honored you’ve chosen that location for the ritual. ”
Meryamun turned to the high priest. “And what of the Sakeshi dogs? I want them out of the palace as soon as possible.”
“It won’t be much longer, my king. They too must be prepared for the ritual.”
The king’s smile sent a shiver up Neff’s spine. “Of course they must. They’re the main event.”
“Ach! You stupid girl! You are spilling everywhere!”
Neff turned to see Ahura recoil from one of the viziers, whose robe was soaked with the water she’d poured into his lap.
Ahura blinked at him, distracted. “I’m sorry…” she said and left the room in haste.
Meryamun leaned over and whispered in Neff’s ear. “Your maidservant is about as graceful as an ox. One more misstep, and I’ll be forced to have her thrashed. Perhaps that might teach her some manners.”
Neff nodded. “I’ll speak to her, my king. May I be excused? I have arranged to go to the queen’s quarters for a dream reading.”
“You may little seer. Perhaps your auguries will do my mother some good. She hasn’t been herself since Father’s death, though I would have thought my ascension to the throne would lift her from her doldrums.”
Neff noted bitterness in his voice.
“Women become so tiresome when they grow old,” Meryamun continued with a sigh. “Their irrational ravings, their dismal moods—yes, go and fix her, Nefermaat, would you? You’d be doing me a great service if you succeed.”
***
Neff found the queen sitting by a window in her chambers, clad in a yellow dress.
Yellow for mourning.
Queen Bintanath didn’t turn when Neff announced herself. She simply raised a hand to beckon her inside.
“Forgive me for not coming to you sooner,” Neff said as she approached.
“Sit.”
Neff swallowed and took a seat on the long, cushioned bench next to the queen, who stared into the desert, unblinking.
Blousy curtains danced in the breeze from the open windows, which looked upon the women’s pool and the desert beyond.
A falcon cried out, circling in the azure sky, but otherwise, there was perfect silence.
Many palace occupants, their bellies full from the midday meal, spent the hot afternoon hours dozing.
Neff glanced at Queen Bintanath, uncertain how to introduce the topic of dreaming.
The queen was slender verging on gaunt, and she wore none of her usual regalia—not even a wig.
Neff couldn’t help but notice a thick line of gray at her hairline.
For someone who was notoriously meticulous about her appearance, her uncolored roots seemed like yet another sign that the queen was unraveling.
“Those are very pretty bracelets,” Neff ventured, indicating the three lengths of twisted linen the queen held in her hands. Each was simple but elegant, strung with carnelian and gold beads.
“They’re not bracelets. They’re necklaces.
Given to my three children the night they were born.
” Her voice was dry, like the breeze. “I gave birth to them in this very room, on the night of a terrible storm. The three dancers who attended to me tied these around my babies’ necks.
I saved them as keepsakes.” She lay the necklaces along her palm and touched the golden beads.
“That was so long ago. It almost feels as if it happened to someone else.”
“My mother gave me a doll when I was born,” Neff said. “I keep it in a special box at home.”
The queen turned to look at her. “And where is home?”
“Bubas.”
Queen Bintanath snorted. “I should have thought my son would know better. Hanging jewels on a village girl doesn’t make her any less common.”
Neff winced, but then she remembered her father’s advice. Sometimes a customer will test you simply to see how much you can handle. A true businessman doesn’t allow his feathers to be ruffled. He keeps his eye on the prize.
Neff raised her chin, mirroring the queen’s own rigid posture. “I wouldn’t be here if you hadn’t summoned me, Queen Bintanath.”
The queen’s lips didn’t move, but the corners of her eyes crinkled with approval.
“Quite right,” she said. “I wanted to see for myself if the stories about you are true. I was never satisfied with Montuhotep’s predictions. One got the feeling he was simply saying what one wanted to hear, regardless of what the gods were telling him.”
Neff cringed, recalling the false message she’d given King Amunmose before his death—a message that failed to reveal he was being slowly poisoned by his favorite son. This time will be different, she vowed. This time I’ll tell the truth, no matter how harsh it might be.
She took a deep breath and allowed her mind to soften. “Please, my queen. Tell me of your dream.”
Fiddling with the three necklaces, the queen turned back to the quiet desert and began. “In the dream, I’m out there, among the dunes. I’m alone and wearing a long black cape made from vulture feathers.
“I walk toward the horizon, where a blue-winged sun rises over Thonis. There should be a cobra on each side of it, but there is only one, a red cobra. As I watch, the red cobra slithers to the center of the sun, as if resting upon its brow. The sun’s rays grow hotter and hotter, until they are so hot the cape upon my back bursts into flames.
My skin blackens and peels away. The light becomes so bright that it fills the world, and then… ”
The queen blinked. “Then I wake up.”