Chapter Three
stood outside the entrance of my father’s tomb. Seventy days had passed so quickly.
“You were a great king, but a greater father,” I whispered. My throat was dry, as were my eyes. By then, I had cried enough to flood the Nile. I had nothing left.
The priests prostrated themselves across the temple steps behind me, their low prayers reverberating in my chest.
“Many are the cries of your subjects here on earth. Osiris, King of Death, King of Eternity. May your judgement be swift and your favour true. Chief of Pharaohs, accept this new king into your realm,” they chanted as one.
I stepped towards the tomb, breaking away from my sister and brothers. Mikro Theos was sniffling and Arsinoe held her hand out for him to clasp. The sympathetic action was at odds with her stoic expression. I had not seen her cry since the day Father died.
Qar circled the blue sky above us, his shadow weaving around my feet as I walked through the entrance of the temple.
The antechamber was full of offerings to Osiris and supplies my father might need in the field of reeds.
Woven baskets filled with dried fish were stacked in rows beside barrels of palm nuts and pomegranates.
A golden chest held a collection of gleaming yellow lemons, a gift from our allies in Rome.
Then there was the treasure twinkling amongst the food: beaded necklaces and gold armour, painted rings and marble statues.
And finally, likely to be valued the most by my father, clay pots overflowing with wine.
I walked past these riches to the main chamber where my father’s body lay within a black granite sarcophagus.
I kneeled on the ground by his feet and reached into my sleeve for the tribute I had placed there.
The wooden flute was small but finely carved, and I’d had my father’s name engraved on its body in hieroglyphics.
“May your song never end.” I placed the flute on the tomb floor. Each tile was flecked with gold leaf.
I pressed my forehead to the ground and said, “Egypt is safe in my hands. I will look after her, for she is me.”
I kneeled there for some time, feeling the silent heartbeat of my country underneath my skin.
After I rose, I beckoned my siblings forward. Each held their own final tribute to our father.
Both Theos and Ptolemy held scarabs painted gold, amulets to ease our father’s passing. They murmured their own quiet addresses before quickly leaving. The air in the chamber was hot and stifling, so I did not chastise them for their haste.
My sister lingered, withdrawing her own gift for our father. To my surprise it was a bronze-headed arrow, fletched with white feathers that I assumed were Qar’s.
“I will always strike true, Father. Just like you taught me,” she said as she placed the arrow beside the flute.
Arsinoe was a keen hunter, a skill Father had nurtured. My sister saw me watching her and nodded before retreating.
I stood beside the sarcophagus and watched the shadows stretch as midday approached.
“Pharaoh.”
Black spots danced across my vision as I focused in on the administrator.
“It is time to seal the tomb,” he said, his voice like grinding stone.
I imagined for a moment how it would feel to be locked in. Relief, because no longer would I be required to play the part of Queen. Regret, because I knew that being Pharaoh wasn’t entirely a player’s performance.
“We are not like the common man,” Father had once said. “We may bleed and die like them, but when we bleed, so too does our land. And we never die, not truly. For there is always another Ptolemy to take our place.”
My father’s lesson hadn’t been meant as a threat, but with my siblings at my back, I would be remiss not to acknowledge how easily the throne could change hands. It had happened enough times in my family’s past.
Egypt is mine. I was surprised by my own conviction, but there was something potent in the air beyond the sweltering heat. Facing death, the thing I feared more than anything in the world, urged me to cling on to life.
“Pharaoh?” the administrator said again uncertainly. “We are sealing the tomb now.”
I nodded and followed him towards the temple entrance.
It took twelve men to slide the granite door across the opening.
Hands touched my waist and I looked down to find young Ptolemy pulling on my dress.
“Is it time for the feast?”
I laughed. His callous words would have been celebrated by my father.
“Yes, it is time for the feast.”
—
I had invited all the governors of Egypt to celebrate my father’s journey to the afterlife. Their ships filled the palace harbour while their voices filled the great hall.
The dining table was overflowing with food served on fine gold platters. Servants weaved between my guests, their faces adorned with copper jackal masks in honour of Anubis, the guide of the dead. Sharp ears, studded with lapis, rose up above their heads.
My father had always enjoyed dressing up the palace workers. Like they were pieces on a senet board to be cast and played with.
“And me? Do you wish for me to wear this mask too?” Charmion had asked earlier that night. Though she didn’t show it, I could feel her disapproval as I ordered the servants to change their garb.
“I am not my father,” I replied quietly. “I only wish to honour him with a feast he would have thrown himself.”
When she did not respond, I continued, “No, you are not required to wear it.”
Charmion reached for one of the masks laid out across the bottom of the throne. “But I am a servant, and by your command, all servants must wear this…uniform.”
My cheeks grew hot. At the time I had thought it was anger, but now, looking back, I recognise the feeling as shame. “Then wear it,” I snapped. “But I have given you the choice.”
“Choice,” she repeated, before picking up the mask and leaving.
I watched her now from across the room. She stood with her hands clasped by her waist, waiting to be called should I need her.
But I could not see her expression beneath the jackal’s coppery snarl.
I turned back to my plate, picking at the roast pigeon.
It was my first time hosting the ruling elite, and I found myself wishing the evening away.
My brother and I sat apart from the main diners on an ivory table set on a dais.
“Eat something,” I encouraged Theos, who had sat twisting his hands in his lap all evening. He was just as unhappy as I was, though less versed in hiding it.
“I am not very hungry.”
“Listen to your sister. She protects your wellbeing,” Pothinus said from a stool by my feet.
Though my brother ruled by my side, the eunuch, to my chagrin, had been named Theos’s regent in my father’s will.
It incensed me further to see Theos follow Pothinus’s command and not mine as he took some food from his plate and began to eat.
The lyre player began a sweet melody and I paused to listen. Hailing from Thebes, she had been a favourite of my father’s. It reminded me of the task I had assigned to Pothinus.
“Did I not send you to retrieve the latest tax report from Thebes?” I asked the regent.
“The tablet awaits you in your chambers, Pharaoh.”
It was a shame he was so effective in his role, or I would have had cause to put greater distance between myself and his foul-smelling hair.
“Can I see the report?” Theos asked with his mouth full.
“No need, brother.”
He deserves a semblance of a childhood, I thought as he went back to his meal, his appetite clearly revived.
“And this tax report, Pothinus, were the taxes short like the others?”
“Yes, Pharaoh. But I must advise against doing anything indiscreet. The Governor of Thebes was a good friend to your father.”
“Do you know what my father valued more than friendship? Money.”
Pothinus’s lips pressed into a line.
“Bring him to me,” I said.
The regent was still unused to the strength of my obstinacy, and so he opened his mouth to disagree, but I cut him off. “Go.”
Pothinus rose from his stool slowly, making his displeasure known.
I could have dismissed him for such insolence, but the truth was, I was too scared to.
Though I had been trained to take over the ruling of Egypt, Pothinus had been closer to the day-to-day activities that kept the country prosperous.
I watched as he made his way across the room and approached the Governor of Thebes. The man was of my father’s age, though he wore his years more proudly in the lines of his face and the greying of his hair.
He rose from the dining table and followed Pothinus to the dais. He bowed low by my feet.
“Pharaoh. My thanks for this wonderful celebration. May your father find peace in the realm of the dead.”
I inclined my head, acknowledging his blessings.
“A feast full of splendour and elegance, just like our gracious queen,” he continued. A speck of oily food clung to the corner of his lip and I found myself dabbing an imaginary fragment from my own mouth.
“My father deserved no less.”
“Of course. He was truly chosen by the gods to have such a generous daughter.”
“Generosity comes at a price, would you not say?”
His eyes crinkled. “Yes, that is true.”
“I have noticed that during the last few years of my father’s reign, your tithe to the crown has lessened considerably.”
“My queen?”
“Your taxes, Governor. They are short.”
“But Pharaoh, your father and I had an agreement. Half of my taxes would be paid in wine.”
“Wine?” I said doubtfully, though the deal sounded very much like something Father would do.
“The finest of my batches have always been sent to the palace; I believe we are sampling some of them tonight.”
I looked to Pothinus, who nodded. And though his expression did not change, I felt the smugness ripple around him like a mirage.
He knew. Not once in all our conversations of Thebes did the eunuch mention my father’s dealings with the governor.
Was this my first hint of his betrayal? Or do I grant my past self too much clemency? No, I have promised you truth, so let me bare it—I was ignorant of Pothinus’s motives.