‘Once!’
‘Do you think she cannot be trusted?’
‘I do not think that. But no approach from me would be fitting.’
‘Why not?’ repeated the queen.
Huy fought with his pride. But there was a more important reason: Taheb would not argue if the request came from the queen herself. ‘Because we do not know each other as we once did. But was she not a friend of the court? I saw her at Nezemmut’s wedding to Horemheb.’
The queen considered. ‘Where are we going?’
‘Firstly, to Napata.’
‘That is to the south!’
‘They are loyal. There is nothing to the north but greater danger. And you cannot stay here.’
‘So you have told me.’
She remained silent for a long time. Then, ‘Did you say ask?’ she said frostily.
‘Tell,’ suggested Huy, fighting exhaustion.
‘Command.’
Huy was silent.
‘Taheb will help,’ said the queen slyly. ‘Why do you think my little intelligence network is the only part of the royal palace that remains even halfway efficient and loyal?’ She paused, looking sad. ‘But now it is crumbling too. Of course I recognise the need to depart.’
When Huy returned to his house he hardly recognised it. Nothing was missing, but nothing was out of place either. Everything, even the scrolls on the shelves, was meticulously ordered, and the images of Bes and Horus which presided over his central room were free of dust and sand for the first time in years. The yard was swept and the bathroom so tidy and clean it seemed inconceivable that two nights ago it had witnessed a bloody and fatal battle.
He walked through the rooms which he would soon have to leave forever. Into whose keeping could he place this building, whose arms had encircled his battered body and protected it at the end of so many lonely, desperate days? There would be no time. He would lock up and leave, and that would be all. No doubt later some little official would come snuffling round, because the house did not conform to accepted principles of ownership. There would come a time perhaps when the guardians of conformity would control all life.
He found the note hidden carefully under the statue of Bes. A scrap of paper bearing Ay’s cartouche. Remaining only long enough to wash, shave, apply fresh make-up, and change, Huy set off again to see the pharaoh-elect.
He noticed that there were twice as many soldiers in Ay’s livery on guard, and he recognised several former members of Horemheb’s Black Medjays among them; but Ay was expecting him, and he was admitted quickly. The old man received him in a crowded room through which a number of body servants and scribes passed. At two tables, secretaries were issuing written orders. Huy might have expected to see Ineny playing a prominent part in the preparation for Ay’s new status, but decided not to ask what had become of him.
Ay looked younger than Huy had ever seen him, and stood erect, like a youth. His hair was freshly dyed, and his skin shone with oil. He wore a blue-and-gold headdress and a full-length cream tunic, with a pleated kilt that reached to below the knee. His sandals were polished leather, with gold fittings in the shape of snakes and scarabs. He was heavily scented with seshen, and his make-up was fashionably pale. His heavy collar matched his headdress, and the balancing mankhet which hung down his back was of gold, in the shape of the tjet amulet.
He was a king already.
‘Huy.’
‘Lord.’
Ay smiled broadly. ‘I have good news for you.’
‘What is it?’
‘The means to make your scheme succeed. The gods have sent us a gift.’
‘What?’
Ay’s face became graver. ‘Of course what falls happily for us is also a tragedy. But if life has a purpose, so perhaps does death.’
‘What has happened?’ Huy’s eyes prickled. He blinked to rest them, and forced them wide open. He had smudged a crumb of kohl on his lower right eyelash, and it blurred the foreground of his vision.
‘I have a body for you to bury as the former queen.’
Huy felt energy surge back into him. ‘That indeed is a gift. Where is it?’
‘On the river.On its way here from the Northern Capital.’
‘But who -?’
Ay was solemn, it may be better if Ankhsi does not know – it is little Setepenra.’
‘What happened?’
Ay spread his hands. ‘We do not know exactly. A snakebite, probably. She was in the palace garden when suddenly she cried out and fell. They called doctors immediately, of course. But by the time they arrived it was too late.’
‘When did this happen?’
‘The message came by carrier pigeon yesterday, soon after the sun had passed his zenith. I have sent a courier north to find out more, but we sent another pigeon back with orders to put the princess’s body on a falcon ship and bring it here. My people will meet it some way downriver of the city, and bring it here after dark. I hope now you will learn to trust me, Huy. I think I have repaid my debt to you.’
Huy looked inwards. If Setepenra’s death had indeed been an accident, it could not have happened at a better time. The girl was Akhenaten’s sixth daughter, two years younger than Ankhsenpaamun, and in face and body very similar to her sister.
‘What about your other granddaughter in the Northern Capital?’
Ay looked at him narrowly. ‘What reservations do you have now?’ He broke off to smile thinly. ‘I was wrong to offer you the archives. I should have suggested Kenamun’s job; but I think you’d be too good at it for comfort.’ He paused to answer an enquiry from one of the order-issuing secretaries, and then drew Huy apart from the throng of people to stand by a large window opening to a view of the great temple of Amun.
‘The princess Neferneferura will soon be leaving the Black Land. For a long time I have been in negotiations, through the vizir of the Northern Capital, with King Burraburiash of the Land of the Twin Rivers. An alliance with them now will be a bulwark against the Hittites. Now the princess is going to marry the king’s son.’
‘So, all Akhenaten’s surviving daughters will be accounted for.’
‘None of us likes loose ends,’ said Ay lightly, and without waiting for an answer, returned to the centre of the room. ‘By the way,’ he said over his shoulder and indicating one of the secretaries. ‘This is Kenna. You will be liaising with him from now on.’ The secretary, an intelligent man of thirty, with close-cropped hair, looked up unsmilingly at Huy and nodded an abrupt greeting.
Ay kept his word. He even managed to provide an excuse for Senseneb to leave the doctors’ compound and come to the palace without arousing the suspicions of Merinakhte, by summoning her to consult with him about the arrangements for her father’s burial, which would take place soon after the king’s. As chief physician, he would be buried in a place of honour on the fringes of the valley. The body of the little princess was brought secretly to a ground-floor room of Ay’s palace and there Senseneb applied what little make-up and hair dye was necessary to turn the dead girl into her sister’s double. Once dressed in a set of the queen’s robes, the transformation was complete. Keeping it from Ankhsenpaamun was a problem which the queen solved herself, saying that she did not want to see the body which would be left in her place, or know the identity of its owner. She would offer prayers for the safe passage of its soul to Thoth and Osiris, and to Isis and Nephthys.
‘How is your wound?’ asked Senseneb, when they were together at his house.
‘Sore.’
She smiled, touching it. ‘The stitches should stay in three more days, but I think you have healed enough for me to take them out before I leave.’ Her voice trailed off as she spoke the last words.
‘Have courage.’
She looked at him, taking his hand. ‘I am trying. But my heart tells me I will never see you again.’
‘I will follow as soon as I am sure Ay is not planning to send anyone after you.’