Nefertiti

“What is to allow with Akhenaten? It’s his city.”

We looked down over the building and I said thoughtfully, “No, it’s all our city now. It is with him that our names will be remembered.”

My father didn’t reply. Tonight he would sail the Nile toward Thebes and return only when the palace was finished. And who knew when that might be. Five months? A year?

Our procession of viziers, followed by nobility and a thousand court servants, turned into the walled City of Tents. Then we crossed on foot over the rolling landscape to the brightly colored pavilions of the royal court. The soldiers’ tents were set up outside the wall in rings, three tents deep, and as we passed through the gates I wondered which was Nakhtmin’s. We stopped before the Great Pavilion where the court of Amarna would dine.

“So what do you think?” Nefertiti asked at last.

“Your husband has large aspirations,” our father said, and only I knew what he really meant. That it was a cheap, quick city, a pale shadow of Thebes.

Two soldiers parted the curtains of the Great Pavilion. Newly polished tables stretched over rugs and tiled flooring. The walls had been covered with tapestries. At the longest table, Akhenaten was pouring himself wine. He was smug in his confidence as he raised his cup. “So how does the great vizier find the new city?”

My father was the perfect courtier. “The roads are very wide,” he replied.

“Three chariots can ride abreast,” he boasted, seating himself. “Maya says if we push, the palace will be done by the beginning of Mesore.”

My father hesitated. “You’ll get poor quality and half finished monuments.”

“What does it matter,” he hissed, “so long as the temple and the palace are built to last? The workers can rebuild their houses. I want this city before I die.”

My father pointed out, “Your Highness, you are only nineteen—”

Akhenaten brought down his fist on the table in front of him. “And I am hunted at every hour! Do you really think I’m safe among the soldiers? Do you think General Nakhtmin wouldn’t try to turn my men against me if he were given the chance? And then the priests of Amun,” Akhenaten continued. “How many might escape the quarries to come hunt me in my sleep? In my own pavilion? In the halls of my own palace?”

Nefertiti laughed nervously. “This is foolishness, Akhenaten. You have the best guards in Egypt.”

“Because they are Nubians! The only men who are loyal to me are outside of Egypt!” Akhenaten’s eyes flashed and I looked to my father. He had dropped his perfect courtier’s mask and I could see what he was thinking. The Pharaoh of Egypt had become insane. “Who can I trust?” Akhenaten demanded. “My wife. My daughter. The High Priest of Aten and you.” He whirled on my father. “Who else?”

My father met his gaze. “There’s an army of men waiting for you to lead them. They trust you and believe in your will to conquer and keep the Hittites at bay. They will do whatever you ask.”

“And I am asking them to build the greatest city in Egypt! Nefertiti tells me you are returning to Thebes. When?”

“Tonight. Until the palace is finished, it is the wisest thing, Your Highness.”

Akhenaten set down his wine. “Isn’t my mother in Thebes?”

Nefertiti glanced at my father.

“I don’t like the idea of the two of you there,” Akhenaten admitted. “In the former capital of Egypt. Alone.”

Nefertiti moved quickly around the side of the table. “Akhenaten, it is better this way. Do you want foreign leaders to send their ambassadors to meet us in pavilions? What will the ambassadors think? If they come to Amarna before it’s finished, imagine what they will report back home to their kings.”

Akhenaten looked at his wife and then at his trusted vizier. “You’re right,” he said slowly. “No dignitary must see Amarna before it’s finished.” But his dark eyes met my father’s. “You will not be taking Mutny.”

My father smiled easily. “No,” he replied. “Mutny stays here.”

Akhenaten was afraid my father would take me to Thebes as his heir, and then crown himself Pharaoh to reign with Tiye. So I am to be his hostage, I thought. Nefertiti colored at the idea that my father would ever choose me over her. She swept past Akhenaten, hooking her arm through our father’s and said sharply, “Come. I will see you off.”

Akhenaten rose to join us, and Nefertiti leveled him with her gaze.

We stood on the quay and my eyes filled with tears. It was possible that my father would be gone for months, and suddenly I found myself wishing as much as Akhenaten did that the palace would be finished.

“Don’t be sad, little cat.” My father kissed the top of my head. “You have your mother and sister.”

“And you will come back,” my mother’s voice was constricted, “just as soon as the palace is finished?”

He cupped her chin in his palm, brushing her hair from her face with his thumb. “I promise. It is business I’m going for. If I didn’t have to—”

Nefertiti stepped forward, interrupting their moment. “Good-bye, Father.”

My father gave a parting look to my mother, then turned to Nefertiti. He embraced her. “Your time will be near when I return,” he said.

She rested her hand on her stomach. “An heir for the throne of Egypt,” she said proudly.

We watched the ship set sail. As the barge disappeared over the horizon, Akhenaten came to stand next to me. “He is a loyal vizier.” He put his arms around my shoulders and I tensed. “Isn’t that right, Mutnodjmet?”

I nodded.

“I hope so,” he whispered. “Because if he should try to make a move for the crown, it wouldn’t be my wife who would suffer the consequences.”

“My lady!” Ipu cried. “My lady, sit down. You are shaking.”

I took a seat on my bed and put my hands beneath my legs. “Would you make me some tea?”

Ipu lit the brazier. Once she’d boiled a pan of water, she poured it into a cup with leaves. “You look ill,” she said quietly, bringing me the tea and inviting my confidence.

I lifted the cup to my lips and drained it. “It’s nothing,” I said. Only an empty threat. My father was no traitor. “Was anyone here to visit today?” I asked her.

“Like the general?”

My eyes flew to the door and she lowered her voice.

“No. I’m sorry. Perhaps he can’t get through the royal camp with so many guards.”

A shadow lengthened outside the door of our pavilion. Someone pushed back the flap and Merit appeared.

“My lady, the queen wishes to see you,” she said. “The young princess has earache and the queen is ill. Pharaoh has asked for a physician, but she’s said she’ll only have you.”

“Tell her I’m coming,” I said at once. Merit disappeared, and I rummaged through my boxes. I took out mint for Meritaten. But what for Nefertiti? “I don’t know why she should be sick,” I mumbled. She was only two months. She had carried Meritaten for five months before ever feeling ill.

“Perhaps it is a son,” Ipu said. I nodded. Yes. Perhaps that was the sign. I took out the fenugreek, shoving the dried herbs into several pouches.

The Nubian guards parted to let me inside the Royal Pavilion where the royal couple slept. At the bed, Akhenaten was standing over Nefertiti, holding her while she heaved into a cup. It was a strangely tender scene— this man, who thought nothing of sending men to their death, hovering over his queen while she was sick.

“Mutny, the herbs.” Nefertiti groaned.

Akhenaten watched me unwrap the herbs. “What are they?”

“Fenugreek, Your Highness.”

He snapped his fingers twice without taking his eyes from my face and two guards entered into the pavilion. “Test them.”

I gaped at Nefertiti, who said sharply, “She’s my sister. She’s not going to poison me.”

“She’s a rival to the crown.”

“She’s my sister and I trust her!” Nefertiti’s voice