The Heretic Queen (43 page)

When Ramesses rushed to my side, I made him promise, "Don't worry about me. Just remind the Sherden that Egypt will never tolerate thieves!"

I locked the door of my cabin and sat on my bed. Though guards stood on either side of the Senet board, armed with swords and javelins, the taste of fear was bitter in my mouth. I couldn't stop my hands from giving me away. I tucked them beneath my legs to keep them from shaking. After all, servants weren't the only ones who gossiped.

There was the thump of another vessel pulling up to the quay, then shouting as strangers began to board our ship. A scuffle resounded outside my door, then it seemed as if Anubis himself had been unleashed on the deck of
Amun's Blessing.
Men shouted in foreign voices, and I imagined the moment that Ramesses's soldiers must have torn off their cloaks and revealed their weapons. I heard the clash of metal on metal, and when a heavy object crashed against the door I cried out. But neither of my two guards moved. The gray-haired one said calmly to me, "They won't come in."

My voice came out in a gasp. "How do you know?"

"Because this was once a treasury ship," the soldier replied. "There isn't a door in the navy that's stronger than this one."

The shouting grew louder and more intense. Then a voice cried exultantly, "The ships have arrived!" I heard the panic of the Sherden as they realized that their own two ships had been surrounded, but even then the fighting continued.

The sun was still high when Ramesses called to me, his voice filled with triumph. I flung open the cabin door, and he spun me in his arms.

"More than a hundred Sherden are our prisoners," he declared. "There will be no more pirates haunting the quays of Tamiat. No more Sherden pillaging from Egypt or Crete or Mycenae. Come!"

He led me from the cabin onto the prow, and I became aware of the blood on his kilt as the soldiers cheered, holding up their swords in honor of our victory. "To Ramesses the Great and his Warrior Queen," one man shouted and hundreds joined in the chant. The words echoed over the waters and from the encircling warships, where the Sherden were being bound in chains. Ramesses led me to the quay, where chests filled with precious metals and ivory gleamed in the sun. In a happy reversal, our soldiers were unloading the Sherden ships, it appeared that the stolen treasures were endless: turquoise amulets and silver bowls from ships that had once been bound for Crete. There was red leather armor and alabaster jars engraved with strange scenes of a horse from a battle at Troy. Next emerged a golden litter adorned with carnelian and blue glass beads.

Ramesses put his arm around my waist. "The soldiers are all talking about you. It was incredibly brave . . ."

I waved away his compliment. "What? To walk the deck of a ship?"

"So many captives!" Asha interrupted. "We've had to place them on two separate ships. What do you want to do with them?" he asked. "They're shouting for something, but I can't understand what they're saying."

I separated myself from Ramesses. "What language do they speak?"

"Something I've never heard," Asha admitted. "But one man was speaking Hittite."

"They probably all speak some Hittite," I guessed. "They may have learned it in Troy, along with Greek. What do you want me to tell them?"

"That they are prisoners of Egypt," Ramesses said, then repeated what I had told him. "And that Egypt will
never
tolerate thieves."

I smiled.

"And will you show yourself to them?" Asha asked.

It was a risk. Ramesses wouldn't want the Sherden to think they were so important that the Pharaoh of Egypt himself had come to dispose of them. But if Ramesses appeared in his
nemes
crown with his crook and flail, they would be reminded of whom they had dared to anger, and that none could cross Pharaoh and remain unpunished.

Ramesses looked around the quay with its piles of looted treasure, and I saw his cheeks redden. "Yes, I will come."

A soldier ran to fetch Ramesses's crown, and Asha, forever cautious, said to me, "These men are pirates. Be careful. They are vicious, and if one of them should break loose--"

"Then I will have you and Ramesses there to protect me."

We boarded the first ship where the captives were being held, and almost at once I was overwhelmed by the stench. Blood and urine soaked the decks, and I put the sleeve of my cloak to my nose. I prepared myself for the sight of men in chains, bleeding and angry. But the wounded had been taken to a separate ship, and the fifty men who sat blinking into the sun were unbowed. They didn't wear beards on their chins like the Hittites, and their long yellow hair was a sight to behold. I paused to stare at them, and when they recognized Ramesses's crown, they shook their chains and shouted. I commanded in Hittite, "Calm yourselves!"

Many of the men passed looks between one another. Some leered so that I would know what they were thinking, but I refused to be unsettled. "I am Princess Nefertari," I addressed them, "daughter of Queen Mutnodjmet and wife of Pharaoh Ramesses. You have looted Pharaoh's ships, taken Pharaoh's goods, and murdered Pharaoh's soldiers. You will now repay your debt to Pharaoh by serving in his army." The men raised their voices, and next to me, Ramesses and Asha tensed. I saw Ramesses reach for the hilt of his sword, and I shouted over the outburst, "You may serve in Pharaoh's army where you will be given training, outfitted with clothes, perhaps earn a command as an officer. Or you may rebel, and be sent to a certain grave toiling in Pharaoh's quarries."

There was a sudden silence, as the men realized that they were not to be put to death but trained and fed.

Ramesses looked at me. "You know that their leaders will have to be executed."

I nodded solemnly. "But the rest of them--"

"May serve a better purpose."

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

PI-RAMESSES

Avaris

NEWS OF THE Sherden conquest traveled quickly up the River Nile. As we sailed toward the city of Avaris, people along the shore chanted triumphantly, "PHARAOH! PHARAOH!" Then the soldiers in the fleet took up the cry of, "WARRIOR QUEEN," which the people on the shore returned without knowing why. And yet, I felt unease--for I wondered what Henuttawy would do when she heard that chant repeated.

Three days after the Sherden were defeated, we stood on the deck of
Amun's Blessing
as the ship sailed into port. Because war and rebellion had stolen recent summers, the court in Thebes had not made its progress to Avaris since Ramesses had been crowned, and I was shocked by how much the city had changed. In the years I had been away, it was as if someone had taken a painting and left it out in the sun, allowing it to fade, then crack, and finally peel. I turned to Asha.

"What happened?" he gasped.

We both looked at Ramesses, and although he should have been basking in the adoration of the people who crowded the shore shouting his name, his face was stricken. "Look at the quay! Half of it's falling to pieces!" Entire boards were rotten, and there appeared to be no system for washing away the grime, which clung to the women's robes and feet. Merchants had dropped fish heads to rot where they lay, not bothering to kick them back into the river. "And the litters!" He pointed to the faded canopies resting atop chipped carrying poles.

"It's like Pharaoh Seti hasn't stepped outside of his palace in years," Asha murmured.

"But he came to Thebes for the Feast of Wag. He must know about this! He
had
to have seen . . ."

We disembarked with twenty soldiers who would accompany us to the palace of Pi-Ramesses, and the clapping mobs were too happy to notice Ramesses's distress. They ran before the litter he was sharing with me, throwing lotus petals into the air and passing the soldiers tall cups of barley beer. And even though he waved, I knew what Ramesses was thinking. Large holes in the main road had gone ignored, when all they would have required was dirt and stone to fill them in. The streets were littered with half-eaten pomegranates, sewage, and discarded papyrus. There was the unmistakable look of abandonment in Avaris, as if the city had been left to rule itself and no one much cared what happened to it.

When we reached the palace, heavily armed guards opened the gates. As Ramesses descended from the litter, he shook his head fearfully. "Something has happened. Something terrible has happened in there."

The gardens had been allowed to grow untended, and on a carpet of weeds the towering statues of Amun stood cracked and dirtied. Every house in Egypt kept a courtyard of tile or dirt at its front where no snakes would be able to hide, but weeds and grass had been allowed to grow right up to the steps of Pi-Ramesses. We reached the heavy wooden doors, and when Ramesses saw how worn they had become, he snapped angrily, "Is this my father's palace or the ruins of Amarna?" Even the tiles underfoot were cracked and broken. He turned to me. "I don't understand this--what could be more important than maintaining this palace? My grandfather built Pi-Ramesses. If it's crumbling now, what will happen in a hundred years? What will be left for our family to be remembered by?"

The doors swung open, and when there was no one in the hall to greet our arrival, the soldiers escorting us grew nervous. A figure emerged from the shadows, and as it grew closer I could hear a dozen swords being drawn from their sheaths. Then the light fell across Woserit's face, and she was weeping.

"Ramesses, your father has taken ill. He's lying in his chamber, waiting for you."

The color drained from Ramesses's cheeks. "When?" he cried. "When did this happen?"

"After we arrived. Just yesterday."

Ramesses dismissed his soldiers with a wave of his hand, and Asha knew to settle them in the Great Hall with food and drink. I followed behind Ramesses and Woserit, and because I had never seen her cry, the sound frightened me. Her turquoise cloak trailed before me, and I tried to concentrate on its beaded hem rather than allow myself to feel the horror of what was happening. Seti was ill, but that didn't explain why the city had been allowed to deteriorate; or why the palace, besides the few servants peering nervously between the columns, seemed to be an empty husk.

When we entered Seti's chamber, several guards parted their spears to allow us through. But the man in the bed was not the same man I had seen during the Feast of Wag. Not even the linens they had covered him with could conceal how slight he was, or how pale he had grown since I'd last seen him.

"Father!" Ramesses cried.

Queen Tuya, Iset, and Henuttawy already stood in a circle around him. Paser sat on a wooden stool nearby, and Woserit joined him. Pharaoh Seti opened his eyes, but he seemed to know his son more by his voice than by sight. "Ramesses," he whispered, and coughed.

"Iset will find you more juice," Henuttawy said. "Is that what you'd like?"

Seti nodded painfully, and she took Iset and quickly left the chamber.

Ramesses knelt at his father's bed. "What is it,
abi?
" He used the intimate word for
father.
I had never heard him use it before. There was heartbreak in his voice.

Pharaoh Seti let out a heavy sigh, and Queen Tuya began weeping. Her
iwiw
lay with his muzzle between his paws, looking almost as sick at heart as his mistress. He didn't even raise his head to offer me his customary growl. "I have been sick for many months now, Ramesses. Anubis is following me."