Horemheb comes next; square and thickset, dressed in leather armour, bracelets on his wrists and arms, a war club in one hand, a dagger in the other. Horemheb has a heavy face, a drooping mouth and a square chin; his aggressive eyes glare at you. A man of honour who would do the most dishonourable things because ambition roared in his heart like a fire in the furnace. Of course, behind him (yes, I’ll speak the truth even though he is the father of kings), lean and sinewy, with pointed face and hawk-like nose, eyes glittering with a malice he nourishes like a mother does her babe, Horemheb’s other self: Rameses, sly and crooked, though courageous and fierce in battle, ruthless in enmity. The other Children of the Kap rise to greet me. Oh yes, those I grew up with in the royal nursery after I was placed there by Aunt Isithia, my father’s sister, that witch-woman with the soul of midnight and a heart reeking of ancient sin. If Isithia comes I always ignore her!
Who else? Maya — oh soft-faced Maya, his chubby cheeks bulging and heavily painted, round eyes ringed with kohl, full lips painted like those of a temple girl! Maya is dressed in his flounced robes with the embroidered sash; his neck glitters with jewellery. I can even smell his perfume, a mixture of cassia and myrrh. Maya, a woman in a man’s body, with a heart as sharp as any woman’s. Maya the financier, with his genius for collecting silver and gold, who could shift the sands of the desert and still find a precious nugget. He sits and simpers at me, rubbing his stomach as he did in life, as if, even then, he knew the source of his own death.
Next to him the only person, the only soul Maya ever loved, my friend Sobeck, lean-visaged and hollow-eyed, burnt by the sun in that oasis prison. Sobeck, who had been taught a brutal lesson about the seduction of a Royal Ornament, one of the concubines of the Magnificent One, Akenhaten’s father. Sobeck escaped his prison. Shrewd and cunning, he’d found himself back in the slums of Thebes, where he had become a dog-killer selling their mummified corpses as offerings for pilgrims. Sobeck, who’d held his own with the Scorpion Men, the sand-dwellers, the desert wanderers, all the filth of the quayside and slums. He fought his way up, like the warrior he was, to become the Lord of Am-duat, the grimy underworld of Waset, Thebes, the City of the Sceptre. In sharp contrast comes Huy: urbane, courtly, diplomatic, with his slender body, wise furrowed face, pointed chin and deep-set eyes. He is dressed like a courtier in his gauffered linen robe and curled wig, fingers and arms tastefully decorated with collars and rings of office. Huy the Splendid One, Overseer of the House of Envoys, the master diplomat, his only concern being the greatness of Egypt and making its enemies tremble before it. Meryre the priest also creeps in. He of the holy lips and sneering eyes. A sanctimonious face, round and smooth as a pebble, bland eyes in a bland face, and yet the most dangerous of men! Pentju the physician, troubled and secretive, arrives too. A little man with his hunched shoulders and narrow face, all anxious-eyed with parted lips.
Oh yes, my past is crowded. The walls of the chamber expand, like a long hall of the Hittites. I sip at my wine as my soul travels across the Far Horizon, yet it does not enter the Fields of Yalou, the Meadows of the Blessed, but some hidden time and place which hangs between heaven and earth. I search the caverns of my soul, the chamber of my heart, peopled by those I have loved, fought, betrayed and killed. He also comes, but he is apart from the rest, like the glow of a candle in the dark. I talk of the Divine Child, the Blessed Boy, God’s Cherished, the Golden One, Tutankhamun, son of Akenhaten and Khiya, his Mitanni princess, the rival of Nefertiti. Oh yes, so I have mentioned her name! Nefertiti, ‘the Beautiful Woman has Arrived’! I always find it strange that the child born to us, the Divine Son given to us, shattered Nefertiti’s love and brought the dream world of the Aten crashing to earth like one of those fiery stars which lance through the heavens. Tutankhamun, with his beautiful, childlike face, so composed, so serene; with those innocent questioning eyes, like a young doe fascinated by the hyaenas gathered around him.
I have already mentioned her name, and she comes with the other, Nefertiti and her daughter Ankhesenamun. Both beloved by me, both so different. Nefertiti with her face of pale gold, glittering blue eyes, all framed by that fiery halo of red hair. She comes in many forms like the mischievous minx she could be, teasing and flirting, or all majestic in that blue crown, head tilted imperiously back as she surveys the world from under heavy-lidded eyes. Behind her, Ankhesenamun, treacherous like a marsh covered with the greenest succulent grass, a trap for any man’s soul! I am an old man but I recall Ankhesenamun’s round sensuous face, those sloe eyes and kissing mouth, her body full and ripe, and I feel the excitement stir. The heart strains. If I could, I’d caress that body and clutch her face between my fingers and kiss that mouth. So, they all are here along with the rest.
I pick up a papyrus pen and wonder where to begin again. How shall I start? The past is like a battlefield, covered in the misty dust of conflict and killing. The war chariots rattle and crash. The horses gallop and charge. The mist shifts; gold, silver and electrum glitter in the sun. I hear the harness snap and stretch, the blast of the war trumpet, the screams of men, the clash and clatter of monstrous feet where the God of battles has sucked up blood. Yes, going into the past is like crossing a battlefield. So, where did it all begin? Perhaps, as all battles do, in the resting time, those days of serenity before the chariots are hitched and the swords are drawn. I shall begin in the last month of the Peret season, when the Nile ran strong and full, washing the black lands with its wet coolness. Yes, that’s when it began again, a full year after Nefertiti had taken the poison I had given to her. I’d watched her life-glow fade and felt her beautiful body shudder in my arms …
We had left the city of Aten and gone south to Thebes. We were all there, in the Lion Courtyard of the Malkata Palace, the Dazzling House to the south of Thebes. I remember it well. The sun-washed limestone courtyard with crouching lions carved in red quartzite in each corner. Garden banks fringed all four sides, their black soil, especially imported from Canaan, filled with every fragrant herb, plant and flower. I can even recall their smell, especially that of the cornflower with its grey leaves and bright blue flowers. The doors to the inside of the palace were closed and guarded by members of the imperial household troop, handpicked by Nakhtimin, Chief Military Scribe of the Palace, Ay’s secretive, close-faced brother. These warriors stood in the shade, heads protected by blue and gold striped head-dresses, leather kilts fastened around their waists, sandals on their feet, long copper bracelets on their wrists, one hand resting on a ceremonial shield boasting the ram’s head of Amun, the other grasping a pinewood spear with a barbed bronze point. They were handpicked because each of them could cast his spear and pin a butterfly to the wall. They were guarding us, as if we needed guarding!
We lounged under perfume-drenched awnings, slouched on cushions or divans or sat on stools, their panels inlaid with ebony and ivory. We talked and we rested. Before each of us stood a small table of acacia wood bearing gold dishes of sliced melon, pomegranate, apples and cherries. In the centre was Tutankhamun, no more than six summers old, dressed in a simple white robe of the purest linen, his little egg-shaped head all shaven except for the lock of reddish-black hair hanging down his plump right cheek. He sat on scarlet gold-fringed cushions under a purple awning, sucking a piece of melon, smiling beatifically to himself. Beside him Ankhesenamun, now fourteen years old, the girl-woman in her thick braided, perfumed wig bound by a green-gold filet, her face exquisitely painted, jewellery and collars glittering in the strong sunlight. She lounged to face her brother, her future husband, arranging her linen robe to emphasise rather than disguise her beauty. She was teasing him as she would a pet kitten and was rewarded with Tutankhamun’s brilliant, innocent smile. Servants holding fragrant pink ostrich feathers ranged behind them, wafting a cooling breeze with their great fans, scenting the air and driving away the marauding flies.