Out of the Black Land - By Kerry Greenwood Page 0,52

a question.’

I was looking into her face. She had the papery skin of the aged, deeply lined, and her voice was high and trembled a little. Her dark eyes were unreadable, but might have contained a glint of humour. I gambled on this and replied honestly.

‘Lady, as long as there are questions there will be answers, or there is no sense in asking them.’

‘And you are sensible?’ At least she was continuing the conversation.

‘Sometimes, Lady of the Lady Isis.’

She gave a short laugh; almost a grunt. ‘Sing,’ she said.

I rose to my feet. I had always liked to sing and Nefertiti liked to listen to me, though I gave Tey a headache. I sang one of the spells which people used to charm snakes.

A face has seen a face

A face is against a face

The mottled knife

Both black and green

Goes forth against

What is seen

Back with thee, hidden one!

Hide thyself, venomous!

Back with thee, hidden one!

Hide thyself, toothless!

In Nemi’s name, the son of Nemit,

Thou shalt do no hurt.

I finished with an elaborate twirl on the last three notes and sat down. The old woman did not comment on my voice but asked, ‘You banish the serpent in the name of Nemi. Who is Nemi?’

‘Lady, the woman who taught it to me did not know. Teacher Khons thinks he might be a servant of the Nine of Thebes; my sister Merope says that the name is not Kritian and she does not know; and the Nubian woman who cleans the floor says that it is not Nubian. Therefore I would derive the title from our word for wanderer; so it would mean, Wanderer son of Wanderess, which is a good description of a snake. So I think that’s what it means, and it’s a way of naming the snake. So maybe the song should say ‘I name thee Nemi, son of Nemit’ which would scan, too.’

‘And the value of knowing a name?’

‘If you know someone’s name…’ I groped for words. ‘You know them, Lady, and can hurt them. All the spells depend on knowing a hidden name.’

There was a pause in which I wondered if I had said something terribly wrong. Then she nodded.

‘My name,’ said the old woman, getting to her feet with my mother’s assistance, ‘is Duammerset, Priestess of Isis, and you may come to me for more learning, little daughter, if you will.’ She made a complicated gesture of blessing and was gone, escorted by three attendants in the same green robes.

They were the most beautiful of greens, deep and rich, the colour of malachite, and I wondered what dye they used.

I was surprised by my mother hugging me and Khons offering me a honeycake.

‘That is a very alarming lady, my daughter, and you spoke up well, and sang well. I am pleased with you,’ declared Tey, ‘And so will your father be. That settles your future, daughter. If you wish to marry from the temple, then Isis is your dowry.’

Khons was so delighted at how well I had acquitted myself that he offered to take us for a walk to the walls, and Tey was so pleased with me that she allowed this.

The town of Thebes baked under the sun of the month of Mesoré. We could practically hear the old mud houses in the village creaking as they dried. The village was large, and on one side of the river the temple of Amen-Re stretched out of sight, pile on pile of glowing golden buildings. A few fishing boats slid across the river, the reed ones which the fisherman use only in this season when the river is almost stagnant. No one was stirring in the small houses where linen bleached on the roofs of the laundrymen and new spun threads hung limply at the dyer’s. All sensible people were asleep in the dark, waiting for a change of weather. No work was done in the fields in this season. There is no sense in ploughing dust. I remembered Merope saying that in her island the fields were watered from the air, by rain, but here the Goddess Tefnut contented herself with the Nile. I had only seen rain perhaps ten times in my life.

There was not a breath of air, which was an advantage. The poison-breath wind had gone and soon we would be feasting and rejoicing in the five intercalary days on which the common people got married, and then the rise of the river again at New Year, when there was another feast, Opet. Merope leaned