Lynda Robinson - Slayer of Gods

“Ah, Lord Meren,” she said in a low voice as a girl bearing a harp made of costly wood and ivory appeared behind her.

“Great royal wife, may you live forever in health and prosperity.”

“You’re better. Nebamun has driven out the fever demon that attacked you.”

Meren kept his gaze fixed on the floor, his back bent. “I am unworthy of thy concern, majesty.”

“Nonsense. Straighten up, my lord. I don’t want my husband to hear I kept you in an uncomfortable position when you’re not yet fully recovered.”

Meren straightened and said, “All of Egypt knows the kindness of thy majesty.”

Ankhesenamun waved her attendant away and walked across the chamber. “A word, my lord.”

Meren reluctantly followed the queen. Ankhesenamun had never liked him. A follower of her father’s heresy, she blamed Meren among others for advising the king to abandon the Aten and return to the old gods. More recently he’d foiled her attempt to replace Tutankhamun with a Hittite prince, and it had taken her a long time to convince her husband of her contrition.

Meren didn’t believe in her reformation. He could see the same obsidian fire in her eyes that had burned in her father’s. That black void of chaos had haunted him since Akhenaten had his father killed for refusing to conform to the heresy. Sometimes his dreams consisted solely of those eyes chasing him, tearing into his soul, ferreting out its deepest secrets, ravaging him until he longed for extinction. No, he didn’t believe Akhenaten’s favorite daughter had reformed. She was too much like him.

“How may I serve thy majesty?”

“It is a small thing, and yet a great one, my lord.”

Ankhesenamun held a fan that she plied gently, sending a small breeze toward him that carried the scent of myrrh, cinnamon, and oil of lilies. Her bracelets clicked rhythmically, and the tension he’d felt ever since encountering the queen faded with the mesmerizing scent and sound. Ankhesenamun’s throaty whisper joined the motion of her fan and the pleasing sound of her jewels.

“I’ve had much time to think, my lord. You and I have been rowing in opposite directions for some time, but my husband has spoken to me of your care of him, how you guard him with your life. For that I’m grateful, and I regret our past differences.”

“Thy majesty is as generous as the goddess Isis. I am unworthy.”

“No, Lord Meren. You were right not to trust me.”

Meren’s eyes widened, but he said nothing. The queen’s own eyes glittered with green malachite and black kohl, and behind them flitted hints of grief and indefinable emotions that twisted and writhed briefly, and then vanished.

“I was intolerant, and I was angry at having to abandon all I knew in Horizon of the Aten to come here among those who hated my father and therefore hated me. But, slowly, I have come to understand the necessity.” The fan stopped, and Ankhesenamun slapped it against her palm, giving Meren a smile he’d never seen before, one of teasing mischief. “Besides, I like Memphis. So many colorful foreigners live here, and it’s closer to the oases, which I love.”

“I’m glad, majesty.”

“So we must begin again, you and I.”

Meren bowed. “Of course, majesty.”

The queen turned to leave. “You don’t believe me. No, don’t protest. I didn’t expect you to. You will in time. A good evening to you, my lord.”

The little girl with the harp scurried after her mistress. Meren raised one eyebrow and wondered what had brought about the queen’s new strategy. Ankhesenamun had never been fond of compromise, conciliation, or forgiveness.

The daughter of Akhenaten and Nefertiti, she had grown up in Horizon of the Aten. Nefertiti had protected her daughters from the conflicts and intrigues that festered in the royal court, but in doing so she isolated them from all disagreement and contrary opinions. Ankhesenamun grew up listening to her father expound upon his beliefs. She still followed the precepts of his religion. Akhenaten had made her his favorite; Ankhesenamun had loved and believed in him without question. Unfortunately she had also absorbed his fanatical intolerance, and she deeply resented Tutankhamun and his ministers for leaving her father’s ideal city and reconciling with the old gods, especially Amun. To her the priests of Amun, who had led the resistance against Akhenaten, were traitors, unbelievers, and eternal enemies.

Meren refused to believe that she’d changed so much in so short a time. He was prepared to believe, however, that she’d adapted to her new situation after her treachery had been thwarted, and waited for a more auspicious moment in which to assert herself. She must have a new advisor who’d convinced her that the way to power lay in changing her conduct. He would have to find out who this advisor was; he would bear watching, for the king’s sake.

Karoya appeared and led Meren into the royal presence. The doors closed at his back, and Karoya disappeared into the shadow of one of the four painted columns that soared to the roof. At Meren’s feet stretched a brilliant painting of a pool brimming with fish and water plants, and the whole room swam in light provided by alabaster lamps. At the opposite end, on a couch bearing gilded leather cushions, sat Tutankhamun, pharaoh of Egypt.

For a moment Meren held still, caught off guard by the fact that the king’s flesh seemed to have turned to gold. The yellow metal was eternal; it never tarnished or succumbed to rust. The gods had flesh made of gold, and the king was the son of Amun by a mortal woman. It was the sign of immortality and divinity. Shimmering, eternal gold, flesh of the gods.

Tutankhamun moved, and the spell broke. Kneeling to touch his forehead to the floor, Meren chastised himself for falling prey to ignorant fancies. Of course the king was divine, the golden Horus incarnate. There was no need to imagine him literally turning to gold on earth.

“Come, Meren, and sit.”

Meren joined him on the floor beside the couch. The king was holding a papyrus roll, and he’d been reading it by the light of half a dozen lamps, which accounted for the golden glow. Pharaoh had cast aside the weighty accoutrements of kings in favor of a simple kilt held by a belt with a buckle of openwork filigree red gold. On his right hand was a silver signet ring engraved with the royal cartouches. Heavy earrings lay on a table beside the couch along with a wine flagon and goblets of electrum. A servant appeared and poured wine. Tutankhamun clapped his hands, and Meren heard unseen attendants file out of the chamber. He glimpsed Karoya moving to close a door and stand beside it, his gaze as impassive as ever. They were given as much privacy as the king could ever expect.

Tutankhamun leaned against the high back of the couch, the papyrus still held loosely in one hand. “You’re sailing tomorrow even though you’re not fully recovered.”

“I’m well, majesty.”

“I’m not going to argue with you anymore. My physician has told me that forcing you to remain idle any longer would do little good.”

“Thy majesty is wise.”

“Wise enough to know you’re up to something. You’re going to Syene. Why?”

The king often knew what he was going to do before Meren told him. Ay, Meren, and the boy’s other mentor, Horemheb, had trained the king to keep himself independently informed as a protection against anyone who might attempt to manipulate him. Still, it was disconcerting that Tutankhamun discovered things so quickly.

“I’m going to find Queen Nefertiti’s chief bodyguard, Sebek.”

“He’s in Syene? You showed me old documents that recorded a gift of land in the Hare nome when he retired.”

“But he’s not there now,” Meren said. “I suppose he must have traded the gift for a property in Syene. The cook’s sister, Satet, told me about him. I talked to her frequently, hoping to spur her memory, and for once I was successful.”