But she felt numbed and bruised as though she had been beaten with the knotted leather lashes of a flail. Her father was gone, that monumental figure in her life whom she had hated a little and loved a great deal. Her family was gone, all of her brothers, even little Khyan, who had been more a son than a sibling to her. She had watched him burn and she knew that the horror of it would stay with her all her days.
The felucca drew alongside Lord Trok's galley and she made no protest as he picked her up as though she were a doll and carried her on board, then down to the main cabin. He laid her on the mattress with uncharacteristic gentleness. 'Your slave girls are safe. I will send them to you,' he said, and went out. She heard the locking bar placed across the door then the sound of him climbing the companion ladder, and crossing the deck above her head.
'Am I a prisoner, then?' she whispered, but that seemed of little importance in the light of what she had just witnessed. She hid her face in pillows that smelt of Trok's stale sweat, and wept until her tears were exhausted. Then she slept.
--
The burning hull of Apepi's royal barge drifted up on to the riverbank opposite the temple of Hapi. In the dawn the smoke rose high into the still air. It was tainted by the stench of burned flesh. When Mintaka awoke the smell had penetrated into the cabin and sickened her. The smoke seemed to act like a beacon, for the sun had hardly risen above the eastern hills before the fleet of Lord Naja came sweeping around the bend of the river.
The slave girls brought the news to Mintaka. 'Lord Naja has come in full array,' they told her excitedly. 'Yesterday he left us to return to Thebes. Is it not strange that he could reach here so soon when he should be twenty leagues upriver?'
'Surpassing strange,' Mintaka agreed grimly. 'I must dress and be ready for whatever new atrocity awaits me now.'
Her baggage had all gone up in flames in the royal barge, but her maids borrowed clothing from the other noble ladies in the fleet. They washed and curled her hair, then dressed her in a simple linen shift, gold girdle and sandals.
Before noon an armed escort came aboard the galley, and she followed them on deck. Her eyes went first to the blackened timbers of the royal barge that lay on the far bank, burned down to the waterline. No effort was being made to recover any bodies from the wreck. It was her family's funeral pyre. The Hyksosian tradition called for cremation, not embalmment and elaborate funeral procedures and ceremonials.
Mintaka knew that her father would have approved of the manner of his own going, and this gave her some small comfort. Then she thought of Khyan and averted her eyes. It was with an effort that she held back further tears as she went down into the waiting felucca and was taken to the bank below the temple of Hapi.
Lord Naja was waiting with all his company assembled to meet her. She remained aloof and pale when he embraced her. 'This is a bitter time for all of us, Princess,' he said. 'Your father, King Apepi, was a mighty warrior and statesman. In view of the recent treaty between the two kingdoms, and the combining of this very Egypt into one sacred and historical whole, he leaves a dangerous gap. For the good of all, this must be filled immediately.'
He took her hand and led her to the pavilion, which had last evening been the scene of feasting and festivity, but where now were assembled in solemn conclave most of the nobility and officialdom of both the kingdoms.
She saw Trok in the forefront of this throng. He was a striking figure in full regimentals. He wore his sword on a gold-studded belt and carried his war bow over his shoulder. Behind him in packed ranks were all his officers, grim, cold-eyed and menacing despite the gay ribbons plaited in their beards. They stared at her, unsmilingy, and she was bitterly aware that she was the last of the Apepi line, abandoned and unprotected.
She wondered to whom she could appeal, and whose loyalty she still commanded. She searched for friendly familiar faces in the multitude. They were all there, her father's councillors and advisers, his generals and comrades of the battlefield. Then she saw their eyes slide away from her face. None smiled at her or returned her scrutiny. She had never felt so alone in her life.
Naja led her to a cushioned stool at one side of the pavilion. When she sat down Naja and his staff formed a screen around her, hiding her from view. She was certain that this had been deliberately arranged.
Lord Naja opened the conclave with a lamentation for the tragic death of King Apepi and his sons. Then he launched into a eulogy of the dead pharaoh. He recounted his numerous military triumphs and his feats of statesmanship, culminating with his participation in the treaty of Hathor, which had brought peace to the two kingdoms torn by decades of internecine warfare and strife.
'Without King Apepi, or a strong pharaoh to guide the affairs of the Lower Kingdom and to rule in conjunction with Pharaoh Nefer Seti and his regent in Thebes, the treaty of Hathor is in jeopardy. A return to the horrors and warfare of the last sixty years prior to the treaty is unthinkable.'
Lord Trok beat his sword scabbard against his bronze buckler, and shouted, 'Bak-her! Bak-her!' Immediately the applause was taken up by all the military commanders behind him, and spread slowly through the entire assembly until it was a deafening thunder.
Naja let it continue for a while, then held up both arms. When silence fell he continued, 'In the tragic circumstances of his death, King Apepi leaves no male heir to the Crown.' Smoothly he passed over any mention of Mintaka. 'As a matter of urgency I have consulted the senior councillors and nome governors of both kingdoms. Their choice for the new Pharaoh has been unanimous. With one voice they have asked Lord Trok of Memphis to pick up the reins of power, to take the double crown upon himself and steer the nation forward in the noble tradition set by King Apepi.'
The silence that followed this announcement was profound and drawn-out. Men looked at each other in blank astonishment, and only then became aware that while they had been absorbed in Lord Naja's address two regiments of the northern army commanded by, and loyal to Trok, had come silently out of the palm groves and surrounded the assembly. Their swords were sheathed, but every gloved hand was on the hilt. It would take a moment only to draw the bronze blades. An air of dismay and consternation fell upon them all. Mintaka seized the moment. She sprang off the stool where she had been hidden and cried, 'My lords and loyal citizens of this very Egypt ...'
She got no further. Four of the tallest Hyksosian warriors crowded around her, hiding her. They rattled their drawn swords against their shields and shouted in unison, 'Long live, Pharaoh Trok Uruk.' The shout was taken up by the rest of the army. In the joyous uproar that followed strong hands took Mintaka and spirited her away through the cheering press. She struggled ineffectually, her movements smothered and her voice unheard in the storm of cheering. On the riverbank she twisted in the arms of her captors and glanced back. Over the heads of the crowd she glimpsed Lord Naja raising the double crown over the head of the new Pharaoh.
