Warrior King, page 31
She stood up and gripped her son’s mace that a servant had hooked again on the back of the throne. With a steadying breath, she walked toward the exit.
“Royal Commander, you are going on a suicide mission,” Weshptah said, stepping in front of her.
“Today, Nomarch, is the day you have been called to give your life in defense of the throne. Nomarch Paser understood that when he led the small unit to retrieve the crown prince. But he has not returned and may very well be slain alongside the future of Kemet. We are of no use here. Leave the wounded to defend this location, and Nena will attend to them as needed. The rest,” she scanned the able-bodied men and women, “we shall go to the harem and find the royal children and bring them back here.”
Ahhotep pointed her mace at her mother. “You too, Great Wife.”
After the throne room’s attack and her mother’s unscathed body, Ahhotep was certain no one would kill her. Tetian might, but the others would not. She was still a daughter to the former prince of Ta-Seti. She was still the mother of King Seqenenre Tao.
Tetisheri stood up without a word and led the way. Ahhotep snorted at the unquestioned obedience. Now—after all this time—now was the time her mother decided to obey her command. Ahhotep gritted her teeth and released a tension-releasing breath through her nostrils. Would she ever understand the woman who birthed her? Tetisheri had not handed them over when Tetian asked. For some reason, she had stood beside the family she thought worthless. Ahhotep wondered if Tetisheri felt any guilt that her nephew caused all this bloodshed and agony, or if she had simply cast him off as she had done to them for a time.
“But Royal Commander, you are wounded,” Setka said, stepping in front of her, cutting her from her thoughts.
“I live; I can fight.” The mace’s handle was firmly in her right hand. If only she had been able to use her dominant hand when attacking Tetian, maybe this ordeal would have been over by now. With gritted teeth, she followed behind her mother, flanked by guards and soldiers.
The small corridor was eerily quiet, and the king’s room had been torn to pieces, but no one was there. Tetisheri walked with a bold gait to the hallway and peered down the corridor past the courtyard. She glanced back. “The path is only littered with the slain. No man is living.”
Their company advanced. Ahhotep’s leg ached, but she would not limp. Fresh blood squeezed from her wound as she walked. Her chin remained parallel to the floor as she wrestled the whimpers in her chest to keep them from escaping. They made it to the courtyard’s edge, where the destroyed images of Tao and Kamose lay in pieces on the ground. Ahhotep forced herself not to look for fear of the cry that would escape her lips. Men’s grumbles and grunts sounded over them and down the long corridor at the palace entrance. Bodies lay everywhere, but it seemed the palace defenders had pushed Tetian’s forces back and were securing the palace. They continued past the courtyard and around the corner to the royal harem’s entrance. The stench of blood and maddening noises caused Ahhotep to stagger. The harem workers were weaving linens for wounds and carting amphoras of honey and castor oil to various parts of the palace. One headed for the throne room.
Ahhotep watched the boy run off. It seemed their brave voyage beyond the throne room was too late. The pit of her stomach knotted as she scanned the harem-working courtyards. The Ta-Seti soldiers had no honor. Bodies of women and children lay covered with cloths. She turned her face away, quelling the rage within her. It seemed they had slain every child to ensure the princes were dead and Tetian’s order was carried out. Such cruelty, and all because a prince became too greedy, too self-empowered, too . . . powerful.
Never again.
Never again.
Her gaze fell on the motionless children and young men with blood-smeared cloths over their faces. Their sandals of reed and leather drooped from their lifeless toes—so many of them. The desire to crumple to the floor nearly took her knees in strict obedience. What if her children and grandchildren were among them? Her mother drew near to a young boy whose naked body resembled Amenhotep. She reached for the cloth covering his face.
Please don’t, Ahhotep begged her in her mind. Not here. She shut her eyes tight and waited to hear a reaction. But nothing came. But of course, it would not. Her mother barely made a sound when her own son was laid at her feet.
“Royal Commander,” Setka asked, drawing her thoughts away from the children’s bodies.
Her head bowed low, and she opened her eyes to the ground, unable to see if the boy was her close kin. “Yes, Nomarch?”
“These people are traumatized. They do not even notice the Great Wives as they enter. Shall we look for the princes in the harem?”
Her mind muddled, and the corners of her lips turned down. “Find the head steward, Ranofer. He should know what became of the princes.”
“As you command,” Setka said with a dip of his chin.
Yet while Setka still spoke, a distant “Royal Commander” traveled across the harem. The steward Men nursed a bloody arm as he hurried toward them, tripping over a worker and dodging others. He arrived out of breath but still bowed at the waist.
“Great Wife, Royal Commander”—he rose from his bow—“I am glad you have survived. The gods’ blessing is great. Now, about the royal children, the princes.” His gaze shifted to Tetisheri, who was going child by child, lifting cloths. She stopped and stood at Men’s mention of those whom she sought. He cleared his throat when he had their attention. “We hid the princes, but they were not where we had placed them after the attack was pushed out of the harem. Nomarch Paser came and began a search for them.”
It meant they could be alive. She lifted her eyes to Re in gratitude, but before the silent prayer could form in her mind, she asked, “What of the royal daughters?”
Men’s mouth twitched, but he spat what he was going to say, quick and to the point: “Great Wife Ahhotep Tasherit was the only one slain.” He pointed to a woman’s body with a large blood-stained cloth over her upper body.
Ahhotep snapped her gaze to the woman Men pointed at. The dread in her stomach leeched onto the color of her face, draining it to pale.
“Tep?” she mouthed. No, it can’t be, she thought. Not Tep.
Her mother had already advanced upon the body.
Ahhotep shifted to follow, but her leg gave way. Hands reached out to support her, but she pushed them away.
“Tep.” The whimper pressed between Ahhotep’s lips. She limped, dragging her aching leg behind her as she rushed to Tep’s side. Her mother had already ripped the linen away, revealing a gaping, jagged wound that ran from her left jaw to her opposite breast.
The need to vomit at the sight of her firstborn commanded Ahhotep’s stomach, but her tongue pushed it back into its roiling depths. She fell to her knees as she reached out to caress her daughter’s cold cheek.
Heat encased her face and hands as she held the anguish in its prison until soft weeping drew her focus. In her haze, she wondered who was crying. If anyone was weeping, it should be her. She wiped her cheek: wet. Yet, someone else was crying. She looked around, and her gaze rested on her mother.
Tetisheri held Tep’s hand to her face and wept aloud. Ahhotep stared at her mother. Why did she care about Tep? And now, after running her off? Tep was the one she weeps for? Not her son, not her grandson, not any of the great-grandchildren? But for Tep, the one she ridiculed and ostracized every single day of the poor girl’s life? The one she was glad was not an active part of the royal family anymore? The one she thought the most unworthy of the crown?
Ahhotep closed her eyes. With those unanswered questions, she hated her mother and knew she would never understand her. Eyes fell upon her as she knelt beside Tep and her mother’s weeping grew louder. Ahhotep froze, wanting to allow the whimpers and cries to flood the hole in her heart and push through an open mouth, but she was the Royal Commander. So, she bit her tongue and leaned forward to place a lingering kiss on Tep’s cheek.
“You will be buried as a queen, my daughter,” she whispered in her ear. Tep had been slaughtered as she stood defenseless. “If only I had killed Tetian when I had the chance,” she uttered to herself. If only she had restrained Tetian and Metjen and forced them to give up their prince hood one year ago. If only she had not ordered the deaths of the Aamu servants twenty-four years ago. If only so many mistakes and actions had been taken or not taken, her children would be alive. Tep would be alive, and maybe, she could have held her in an embrace one last time before she parted to the Field of Reeds.
38
A TIME OF HEALING | AHHOTEP
SEDJEFATAWY, 1551 BC
Ahhotep remained at Tep’s side for what seemed an eternity. She could only imagine Tep’s final moments. Would they have struck her down knowing she was Kamose’s wife? If she had worn her vulture headdress and royal collar? Ahhotep imagined her other children and grandchildren in a similar state. Was not Ahmose-Nefertari in pain and bleeding from her wound as well?
The shouts and screams of men at war escalated from the distant hum it had been, drawing Ahhotep from her thoughts. She pulled away from her daughter but found she could not stand. Her fingers clutched the wound in her leg, making fresh blood rise through the makeshift bandage. Pain trembled on her lips in a whimper.
Men snapped at a servant. “Get the Royal Commander to the physician-priest.”
Tetisheri placed Tep’s hand down over her chest. She looked up and scanned the harem once again as if in a daze under the dimming sunlight.
“Great Wife,” Ahhotep called to her mother, but it was useless. Tetisheri either did not hear her or ignored her. Where was the woman who stood as a stone, unwavering in whatever tide crashed upon her? Had her first love, Tetian, her adopted son, created a cleft in her hard heart? Ahhotep snorted as two arms hooked under her armpits and yanked her up.
Ahhotep straightened as she withdrew her gaze from Tep. She had failed her firstborn. Tao, Kamose, Tep—they were all slain for this divine power struggle. Their passing would not be in vain. She snatched her arms away from the help she had received and turned around with a slight limp, masking the agony that traveled up and down her leg. “I do not need a physician-priest,” she declared. “I need Tetian on a stake in the front of the palace as a symbol of what befalls traitors to the crown.”
She lifted her chin and placed her hands behind her back. “The throne will not be empty while the defenders of Kemet fight.”
Ahhotep limped toward the harem’s exit, gritting her teeth with every step. She had to stop after making it past the nomarchs. Sweat beaded her brow.
“Royal Commander,” Weshptah and Setka said simultaneously, but Setka continued. “The soldiers fight without your command for the greater of the day. Go to the royal physician-priest. Name one of us to command in your absence while the Chief Wife is injured and the crown prince is yet to be found.”
She eyed each of them and wished Paser were there. Even though they all had surrendered their prince hood, she trusted Paser the most. She glanced back at her mother, who remained seated and stared in a daze at the destruction done to the harem. Tetisheri was in no frame of mind to lead.
“Nomarch Setka, command in the absence of a member of the royal family,” she finally said and allowed a servant to take her arm without touching the royal flesh.
Servants helped her to the physician-priest’s room deep within the palace. She scanned the room filled with hyssop and smelt of rich cinnamon incense. The wounded filled the floor, and the royal physician-priest dressed in his leopard tunic stopped mid-gait upon seeing her.
“Royal Commander.” He bowed low. The tunic’s plaster leopard head swung out, and as he returned to stand, it plopped back on his soft belly. “I have used the king’s royal room to treat the injured. It is my decision, and I accept whatever punishment is befitting this perversion.”
Her gaze jumped from each man, woman, and child filling the room until her eyes found Ahmose-Nefertari lying on one of three tables. Her eyes were open, but the irises were dilated.
“You have acted in the best interest of Sedjefatawy,” Ahhotep said and limped through the bodies to the table with the help of the servants. “My leg, if you will.”
He gestured to the table, and the servants helped her upon its flat top.
“Will she live?” Ahhotep asked the physician-priest and gestured to her daughter.
“Yes,” he nodded, pushing Ahhotep back on the table with a gentle nudge of her shoulder. “She had a deep wound, and I had to administer a potion for the pain. I will have to stitch it up in a moment. Now, please, bite down on this while I remove the arrow.” He placed a wooden bite plate in her mouth before tending to her leg.
He tenderly pulled the arrow’s tip out while Ahhotep bit into the hard piece of polished wood. Sweat poured from her brow, and moans escaped past the wood. When it was over, she let the bite plate fall from her mouth as her breathing rushed past clenched teeth.
After the pricks of pain from the needle to stitch up her leg subsided, a shadow in the doorway took her attention, and she was glad for the small reprieve. Her mother stood there, scanning the room with hazy, bloodshot eyes.
The physician-priest glanced at her and bowed his head. “Great Wife Tetisheri,” he said, scanning the blood stains on her royal linens. “Are you injured as well?”
Tetisheri shook her head. “Only here to speak with the Royal Commander.”
The quick tug of fabric and the subsequent sting told Ahhotep the physician-priest was finished with her leg. She swung herself off the table with a grunt and groan, and he held out his arm to stop her. “You are injured. You need to stay and rest. I have already prepared the potion for pain.”
“I shall not rest,” she said and looked at Ahmose-Nefertari, seeing her eyes aimlessly wander in a daze. “I must have my mind about me. Stand aside, for there is no one in the throne room.”
He dipped his head low. “Then I shall attend the Chief Wife.”
“Very good.” Ahhotep put weight on her injured leg and her knee buckled, but she caught herself on the table. She swallowed down her yelp and stood again. Breath filled her chest as she tried once more. She walked to the doorway with a sure step, ignoring the searing agony that ripped down her leg, although a grimace remained on her face.
“Mother,” she gritted as she pushed past her.
“Ahhotep, wait,” she said and grabbed her daughter’s arm. They stood outside the room.
“Why should I wait for you? Before the attack on the throne room, you would have told me to be worthy of the crown and never leave my duty to the throne, no matter who was laid at my feet. Never show weakness. Or have you changed your mind, now that you have wept for your eldest grandchild whom you hated?”
Tetisheri withdrew her hand. The haze in her eyes returned to their usual cold grey. “I never hated Tep. I loved her with all my heart.”
Ahhotep scoffed and began the journey to the throne room by herself. Tetisheri took Ahhotep under the elbow and arm and supported her while she walked.
“I was harsh, yes. I know you believe me to have a hard heart, but I loved Tep so much. I love you all.” Her voice broke. She stopped and faced her daughter.
“You only say this now because your kin has failed you by ordering the death of the Crown Prince.” Ahhotep tried to push forward.
But her mother’s hand remained firm on her elbow, keeping Ahhotep where she stood.
“Did you know of Tetian’s plans?” Ahhotep spat and snapped at her mother. “Are you to blame for this as well? Did you conspire with him?”
Tetisheri’s face blanched. She looked at her hand and curled it into a fist. “I did not think my nephew would bring an army against the king. I had told him of my disappointments in you in a few of our letters.” Her chin drooped. “I never knew it would come to this. Tetian is no longer my own. I disown him.”
“As you disowned me?” Ahhotep jeered.
Tetisheri stood up straight and yanked her hands to her side. “I never disowned you, Ahhotep. You disappointed me greatly with some of your actions, but I never disowned you.” Her voice softened, as did her eyes. For once, Ahhotep thought this harsh woman might speak something other than insults.
“I thought I could make you a better regent,” she confessed. “Harden you for a day like today. Harden you for when your husband and sons could be laid before you, before us, broken and defiled against our sacred traditions. Harden you so you could still lead in spite of agony. I did not have a mother who had endured what I endured. I did not have a mother who could teach me how to remain strong and powerful in the midst of war, in the eyes of the enemy, while standing upon the divine dais. I had to learn it myself. And I did my best to teach you because I did not want to see my firstborn daughter—you—laid at my feet. For if you were laid there,”—her eyes filled with mist, and she cupped Ahhotep’s face—“then I knew I had failed my family. My son always had a chance to be brought home in a litter carried by Anubis priests off to war. It was something I had accepted could happen, but if my daughter was slain, then I knew the war was lost. Seeing Tep . . . ” Her voice trailed off, and she shook her head. “All my mistakes rushed upon me.”
Ahhotep still did not wholly believe her mother’s confession, but it was the most genuine slew of words she had ever spoken to her.
“You do not make mistakes, Mother,” Ahhotep said in a gentle mockery.
Tetisheri took a deep breath, and the mist formed tears in her eyes. “I disregarded my nephew, and in my quest to teach and provide the best for you, I lost my virtue in how I treated you, Tep, Ahmose, and all the rest. I never made amends with Tep. She will never forgive me for what I have said and done. She lost her family, and I only pushed her away. I saw you that night sitting with Ahmose-Nefertari, comforting her after the crocodiles. It was then that I realized you are a better queen, leader, and mother than I ever have been.”
