Pannefer did not understand at all. I was just as common as he—my father had been a village scribe and so had his—but I had applied myself to learn how my new society worked. By his false accusation of me, Pannefer had massively lost face with the Lord Akhnaten may he live and would have to comply with my request. Mentu would make sure, without words, that Pannefer knew that I knew this.
Thus I played the game of tit for tat, while the teachers from the temple were driven away and the Father of the Two Lands thought only of his god.
Chapter Fifteen
Mutnodjme
The first thing my sister said, as I walked into the royal apartments past the ubiquitous guards, was ‘Oh, Mutnodjme, my heart is glad for you! Ptah-hotep will make you a fine husband!’
‘I am still thinking about it,’ I replied. Even after years in the temple of Isis I was not used to the speed at which gossip travelled. ‘How do you fare, my dearest sister?’
She had aged. She was breath-catchingly beautiful still, perhaps more so, since with age had come dignity and queenly self-possession. Her long neck was unmarked, her profile perfect, and her breasts despite six children still as firm as a maiden’s.
She lifted the last child from her knee and said to it, ‘See, little princess, here is your aunt!’ and I had to kneel and coo over the baby Septenre. I have never liked babies—which is strange, because I have seldom been bitten by any animal and I even handled snakes in one ordeal with the Lady whom I must no longer name—but human young look unformed, furless and puddingy. The baby gaped at me with a toothless grin which was almost charming, and then was obligingly sick, so that her mother gave her to her nurse and slaves mopped the Queen and replaced her cloth.
I wanted my sister to herself.
‘I am coming with you to Amarna,’ I told Nefertiti.
‘Of course, my lord has closed the temple,’ said my sister tactlessly.
‘No, I am in…’ I was about to say ‘love’ but my sense of truth revolted; and so I said, ‘two minds about the Great Royal Scribe. Also my friend Merope is going as part of the establishment of Lord Akhnaten may he live.’
‘Oh, yes, the wives of the Osiris-Amenhotep; no, I mean the dead King,’ she corrected herself. ‘Things are so much simpler now that there is only one god,’ she said, accepting a cup of light beer from a slave. ‘Except that I sometimes forget.’
‘Nefertiti, sister, has your lord told you of the changes which are taking place in the Black Land?’ I asked, knowing that every word was going to be reported to one spy or another and choosing my speech with extreme care. Nefertiti put down the cup and took both my hands.
‘Yes, it’s a miracle,’ she said solemnly. ‘It’s a revelation. My lord has seen the land all under one god, one worship, one truth. He is the high priest of the Aten, may it be forever adored.’
‘And you?’
‘I am the High Priestess of the Phoenix, the Star-bird, the Fire-wing.’
Her face shone. She was so transfigured by her devotion to this cult that I knew that I would waste my breath attempting to convert her to anything approaching sense.
‘You shall come with me,’ she whispered, conferring a great favour. ‘You shall see the temple of the firebird, the columns of marble, the carvings in stone, the paintings in fresh colours. We leave for Amarna tomorrow. You will stay with me? I shall order a room prepared.’
‘No, sister, I thank you, but I have already agreed to lodge with the Widow-Queen Merope.’
‘And that is near the apartments of the Great Royal Scribe,’ she patted my cheek with her elegant fingers. ‘Sly sister, wanting to be near your lover! Tell me, is he as skilled as the lady Hunero used to say? Does he make you faint with delight?’
‘He is all they say,’ I said warily. This was an aspect of Ptah-hotep which I had not considered. ‘What of you, sister? Your children, are they healthy?’
‘They are. My lord Akhnaten may he live has taken them for a walk to the Window of Appearances in the Temple of the Aten, or I would introduce you now. But there will be time. Travel with me tomorrow, sister, bring the lady Merope with you. I have not seen you for years. You have grown beautiful,’ she said, untruthfully.
‘And Divine Nurse Tey, my mother,