And then suddenly the King and Queen reappeared together. He had exchanged the Blue Crown for the Double Crown of Upper and Lower Egypt. The vulture and the cobra flared in divine protection from his brow. She was wearing the high double-plumed crown that her mother Nefertiti had worn-and in doing so she proclaimed herself as the Queen as Goddess. Far from looking tentative or frightened, Tutankhamun now stared arrogantly ahead over the amazed crowd of priests and dignitaries gathered in the vestibule, and beyond that in the Sun Court. He waited, and then in his quiet, intense voice he spoke.
‘The Gods have revealed themselves to Tutankhamun, Living Image of Amun, in the Temple of Amun. I possess the royal names: the Horus name, Strong Bull, Most Fitting of Created Forms, King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Possessor of the Forms of Ra, Ruler of Truth. In these, my royal names, I wear the Double Crown and I hold the crook of government and the flail of Osiris. I declare from this day I am King in name and deed.’
Names are powers. They bring forth into reality that which they declare. This was a declaration of a new policy of independence. A new coronation. A stir of amazement and awe followed this astonishing, unexpected pronouncement. I would have given gold to behold Ay’s face as he listened to these words. But his bony head remained bowed.
The King continued: ‘Let this be proclaimed throughout the Two Lands. I declare I will celebrate this day with a new festival in the sacred name of Amun-Ra. Let this be recorded for ever in the writing of the Gods, and let these words go forth in writing throughout all the nomes of the Two Lands so that every subject of the Great House may know this great truth.’
The official scribes hurried forward with their palettes and sat cross-legged, their kilts stretched out over their knees like little tables, and wrote everything down swiftly on their open scrolls.
As I now realized they must have rehearsed many times, Ankhesenamun then rose and joined Tutankhamun, and they remained standing together while the crowd slowly absorbed the revelation and the implications of his words, and then got down on their knees to prostrate themselves. I wondered how Ay would respond to this audacious move in the great game of power. He turned to the multitude of faces, which were alert with anticipation that he would not accept such a demotion without a fight. But he was more intelligent than that. After a long, careful pause, as if it was he who held the destiny of the Two Lands in his hands, he spoke.
‘The Gods are all-knowing,’ he said. ‘We who have laboured all our lives to support and strengthen the Great House, and to restore lost order to the Two Lands, celebrate this proclamation. The King is King. May the Gods make him a great King.’
The scribes wrote this down, too, and on a signal from Ay they passed their scrolls swiftly, hand to hand, down the chamber. They were then taken off by assistants, to be copied and distributed everywhere throughout the land and the dominions, in scrolls and on carved stone stele. And then he led the crowd, prostrating himself before the royal couple like an elderly monster before his children, slowly and stiffly, and with the dangerous irony only he seemed to be able to insinuate into everything he did. Ankhesenamun and Tutankhamun had gambled everything on this moment, and on the success of their declaration. The next days would decide whether they had won, or lost.
22
The King and Queen processed out of the temple complex, back through the Sun Court, where the priests abased themselves on the carefully swept ground, through the colonnade and into their waiting chariot, which drove them swiftly away in a brief blaze of gold.
Before I followed them, to depart with Simut in his chariot, I looked back at the crowded area before the Colonnade Hall, and saw Ay standing at the centre of everything, watching us all go, still as a stone. It seemed as if waves of fervent speculation and excitement were breaking and spreading throughout the multitude all around him. The news would very quickly be communicated everywhere in the city, to the bureaucracies and the offices, the granaries and the treasuries; and the official proclamation would follow in Thebes, and then by messengers directed to all the major cities and towns-to Memphis, Abydos, Heliopolis and Bubastis, or south to Elephantine and the garrison towns of Nubia.
We followed the royal chariot back to the river, where a great crowd had gathered, shouting prayers and acclamations, and then swiftly boarded the royal ship for the river crossing. The King and Queen remained in their private enclosure. The curtain was drawn. As we set off across the water, and as the cries from the dockside faded, I could hear them talking quietly to each other; the words were not audible, but I caught the tone of her voice, calming and encouraging his more querulous one.
When the ship docked at the palace, the royal couple disembarked and were quickly surrounded by a protective phalanx of palace guards. They hurried inside as if sunlight itself was dangerous.
Khay accompanied Simut and me along, talking quickly. For once he looked excited.
‘Ay will be incensed!’ he whispered eagerly. ‘He didn’t see this coming.’
‘But
‘Well, I flatter myself to say I have been the beneficiary of the Queen’s confidences. She would not have made this move in the great game without first establishing her network of support among those close to her.’
And she would need it, I thought. Ay gripped the Two Lands by the throat; he still ruled the priesthood, the bureaucracies and the treasury. Horemheb controlled the army.
‘But that was very nearly another catastrophe. How could it have happened? It must be investigated immediately. Fortunately, it did not prevent the King making his proclamation,’ Khay said.
Simut bristled.
‘The Chief Architect is being brought here for questioning, even now.’
‘And you, Rahotep, are no closer to discovering the culprit, who seems to have the freedom of not only the royal quarters but now also the Colonnade Hall within the bounds of the sacred temple itself!’ said Khay, as if now was the time for accusations to be shared equally among us.
‘We are fighting a shadow,’ I said.
‘Which means precisely nothing,’ he scoffed, irritatingly.
‘What matters is understanding how this man thinks. Everything he does is a clue to his mind. So we must read each situation carefully, and try to decipher and understand its meanings. The problem is: all our efforts at controlling the situation are undermined by the disruption he is carefully creating amongst us. To him it is a kind of elegant game. He challenges us to understand him, to make sense of him, and then to catch him. So far we have been successful in none of these things. We have hardly even begun to take him seriously. Or perhaps we have taken him too seriously, for if we ignored all of these acts, what power would he really have?’
‘You sound like a warrior admiring his enemy,’ replied Khay sarcastically.
‘I can respect his intelligence and skill without admiring or respecting the uses to which he puts them.’
Ankhesenamun and Tutankhamun were waiting for us in a reception chamber, seated upon two thrones of state. The atmosphere was heady with euphoria, but there was also a tangible edge of anxiety, for everything had not gone quite perfectly.
Khay, Simut and I offered our formal congratulations.
Tutankhamun gazed at us all intently.
‘Bow your heads before me,’ he suddenly shouted, standing up. ‘How is it possible that I should be so humiliated
We all waited, our heads bowed.
‘Husband,’ said Ankhesenamun, quickly. ‘Let us consider our options. Let us take good advice from these trusted men.’
He sat back down on his small throne.
‘Look up.’
We did.
‘None of you has been able to protect me from all these perils. But I have had an idea. I think it is a very fine idea. It may, in fact, solve all our problems at once.’
We waited with what must have been a mixture of emotions on our faces.
