Out of the Black Land - By Kerry Greenwood Page 0,186

from the army.

‘Lady, I am resigning my post,’ said Ptah-hotep. I had more than half expected this, ever since Kheperren had been discharged. But it was a shock, anyway.

‘But you’re Great Royal Judge!’ I protested.

‘I was. For eight years I have been a judge, and I am getting old. I am very tired. I wish to enjoy the remainder of my life, lady, and I want your permission to leave your palace.’

‘You have my permission,’ I said, though he must have seen my disappointment in my face. I was looking forward to an expanded household, a whole palace of my own, in which both of my dear ones could have beautiful quarters. And, selfishly, I wanted him with me. I still loved him. But I could see that he was in earnest.

I was to be Great Royal Wife, the Lady Mutnodjme in Whom the Pharaoh Delights, and she must lie only with her husband. And Horemheb would need my help in re-ordering Egypt. He was a good man, and I could not leave him.

I put my necklace around Ptah-hotep’s neck, looked for the last time as a lover into his beautiful eyes still fringed with jet black lashes. He still wore my thin gold ring. My heart was wrung, but it would not repay him for his love if I was to weep on his breast, so I did not weep.

Ptah-hotep kissed my hand, and Kheperren kissed my feet. I watched them go away, hand in hand. I had not noticed that they were aging, but now they were both old men, forty at least, and they deserved their peaceful end.

And I would still see them. Sometimes.

***

The general was drafting a document when I came into the inner apartment. He looked up and smiled at me.

‘I am making an edict,’ he said. ‘I need your help with the wording. How shall I put it that all bad judges shall be dismissed, that all lawless acts by the soldiery shall be suppressed, that all bandits are to be hunted down, that all tomb robbers shall be exiled?’

‘Begin at the beginning,’ I suggested. ‘With your reign name.’

It was going to be a long edict, the statute of abuses which Horemheb was pledging himself to abolish. He lifted a strand of my hair and put it to his lips. I leaned over and kissed his neck where the blue beads still dangled.

‘Are you content, lady?’ he asked.

‘I am content,’ I replied.

My husband, the general and Pharaoh wrote:

Horus Mighty Bull: Ready in Plans: Golden Horus: Satisfied with Truth: Creator of the Two Lands: Favourite of the Two Ladies: Great in Marvels at Karnak: King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Djeser-kheperu-re, Ruler of Truth, He-whom-Re-has-chosen, the Son of Re, Horemheb.

Wab bought me wine and beer for the Mighty Bull of Horus, and he began with his claim to the throne, which was through me.

Behold, this fortunate Son of Re proceeded to the palace, and he brought before him the revered eldest daughter Mutnodjme. She embraced his beauty, she placed herself before him.

I nodded. ‘That is probably better than saying: I fished her up out of the Nile.

King Horemheb laughed. ‘Now for the reformation of Egypt,’ he said with relish, and wrote again:

His majesty took counsel with his heart as to how to destroy evil and suppress untruth. Behold, his majesty spent his time seeking for ways to remove oppression and to deliver the Egyptians from violence.

Then he took palette and brush and wrote:

Lo, my majesty commands, concerning all instances of oppression in this land.

If a poor man has made for himself a boat in order to be able to serve the Pharaoh, and he is robbed of his craft and his taxes, then my majesty commands that every officer who seizes the boat and the taxes of any citizen, the law shall be executed against him, and his nose shall be cut off, and he shall be exiled to Sinai…

It was going to be a very useful reign, and I was happy.

Ptah-hotep

Honourably discharged ex-scribe, my heart’s brother Kheperren led me by the hand down the steps of the palace of Thebes and onto the docks. He was being very mysterious about where we were going, but I was so pleased to be with him that I didn’t mind.

I had come to my decision to retire when I had felt ice in my heart when I thought that Kheperren was dead.

Now, fortunately, he could leave his general and I could leave my Mutnodjme whom I still