Out of the Black Land by Kerry Greenwood Read Free Book Online Page B

the Master of the House of Scribes.
I needed advice and a household before I called on the Chief Priest of Amen-Re at Karnak, the most powerful man in the kingdom, apart from the Son of Re.

Chapter Four
Mutnodjme
Tey my mother and Nefertiti the Queen and I went to see the Great Royal Wife Tiye, our relative, and nearest way to the Pharaoh Amenhotep’s private ear. We found her bathing. Her hair was loose, uncovered by her usual Nubian wig, and it was indeed red and long enough to reach to her waist. She lay back in a pool of water in which leaves had been strewed, and I smelt a sharp herbal scent; mint, perhaps, and wormwood. Her body was swelled with pregnancy. She was pale, as pale as marble, as pale as milk. I had never seen such skin before. The colour of her hair—Set the murderer’s colour—would have caused her early death in some parts of the Kingdom. Even in the enlightened and civilised city, she usually kept her head covered in public. But the hair was not red, I realised, it was like copper wire; a fine, fiery tint, a fox colour. She looked tired and the herbs she was bathing in were selected to refresh an exhausted woman.
But her eyes, when she opened them, were slate-coloured and bright. She saw us come in, motioned us to sit down, and dismissed her attendants, three young women and one old woman who drew away beyond the door-curtain, block printed with indigo lotuses. The maidens seemed reluctant to leave Tiye, eying us suspiciously. The Lady of the Two Lands, the Queen of all Egypt, sat up unaffectedly, flicked her hair over her milk white shoulder, and smiled.
‘You have come to tell me about my son,’ she said, reaching out both hands so that we could help her out of the pool. I rushed to help. She was not like my beautiful sister, slim and delicate; but was wide hipped and her breasts were big and slightly sagging as she left the buoyancy of the warm water. She wrapped herself in a wide length of linen and motioned us to chairs.
Tey sat down and I sat, as I always did, at her feet. Nefertiti, a little nervous at being in the presence of this powerful woman, examined her sandals and did not venture to speak.
‘Hmm.’ The Queen exchanged a long look with my mother. ‘The lady has lain with my son?’
Tey nodded.
‘And it is as I feared?’
‘If you feared that he would be impotent, Lady of the Two Lands, then it is so,’ said Tey bluntly. Nefertiti blushed purple.
‘She is very young; she can not have had many lovers. Can it be that she does not know…’ Tiye smiled at Nefertiti, who was still too miserable to return it.
Tey shook her head so decisively that her earrings rang like bells.
‘I have examined her account of what happened and my other daughter agrees. Nefertiti is fresh and beautiful and skilled, and entirely willing. She tried in all ways to please the son of the lord may he live but to no avail. She doubts that he is capable of producing an erect phallus, and without that there is no seed, and with no seed….’
Tiye wrapped the rope of her hair meditatively around her hand. ‘Does she wish then to return to her mother’s house?’
‘No, Lady,’ Nefertiti came to life and threw herself to her knees at the Queen’s feet. Tiye, surprised, embraced her in the curtain of her coppery hair.
‘Daughter, can it be that you love this weakling who cannot even lie with you as a man does with a woman?’ she asked in an astonished tone.
‘Yes, yes,’ whispered Nefertiti into the linen towel. ‘It is not his fault, it is the will of the Gods, who made him so. He is crippled, but he is so gentle. He did not hurt me, as another man might have done, disgusted by his failure. He did not blame me.’
‘What, then, did you do all night?’ asked Tiye, a little amused.
‘We talked, Lady, and then we slept.’
‘What did you talk about? There, daughter, be comforted, I will not tear you from your heart’s longing, I wished merely to be sure that you were not discontented. Egypt does not