The Double Crown: Secret Writings of the Female Pharaoh Read Online Free Page B

at Memphis keeps snapping at my heels.
    I sighed again.
    “Majesty,” said Khani, who had stood silently while I considered his news. He was always able to be still, to be patient. Most men cannot. “You must keep your eyes open. Especially those at the back of your head. You must be vigilant.”
    “I always am,” I said shortly. “Why this particular warning? What do you know?”
    But clearly he had no specific information to give. “Just be vigilant,” he repeated. “I am due back,” he added. “I was given a document to deliver to the Grand Vizier. But I should not tarry. None saw me come here.”
    “A document? From Commander Thutmose?”
    He nodded. This too was disturbing. Usually there was no love lost and little communication between those two. Something was decidedly going on.
    “Thank you, Khani,” I said. The shadows under the lush trees closed around his disappearing form as he strode away.
    I was deeply concerned, too much so to return to my writings. Instead I sat down, knowing that at least one of my pet cats would jump onto my lap. Bastet came at once and settled down, purring. I stroked her creamy fur thoughtfully. She blinked her blue eyes at me. The other one, Sekhmet, has tawny fur and golden eyes like her namesake the lion goddess. She was probably off somewhere looking for mice. Like myself they are both daughters of the sun, but only Bastet has her nurturing qualities; the destructive powers of the sun are to be seen in Sekhmet. She is less companionable but she keeps the vermin down.
    Even Bastet did not do much to soothe my troubled spirit. I wished that I had someone to talk to other than a state official. I wished Khani could have stayed. I wished that Inet could have been there with me, assuring me by her repetition of the known and familiar that the world is a safe and predictable place; keeping the threatening forces that I feel closing in on me at bay.
    Here endeth the first scroll.                      
     
    IT IS INDEED an important and a dangerous document that King Hatshepsut has entrusted to me. I am overcome that it should be given to me, a mere assistant scribe, and not to the Chief Royal Scribe. Yet I think I understand why this is the case. First, if it is true that there are those who seek Her Majesty’s life (and I have reason to fear, alas, that this may be so), then they will keep a close watch on all those in her employ and especially those known to have her trust and thought to have ways of influencing her. The Chief Scribe may soon find that documents in his care are confiscated under some pretext or another. But nobody will expect me to have anything worth reading.
    Second, I am Her Majesty’s faithful servant and great admirer and she knows that she may depend on me. Indeed, she may be sure of my entire loyalty since already once I almost gave my life for the King. It happened some five years ago. Her Majesty had expressed a wish to sail to her great temple at Djeser-Djeseru, which was built for her by the late great Senenmut; it has a shrine to accommodate the god Amen on his annual procession from Karnak, but it also has a double chapel for King Hatshepsut and her royal father Thutmose the First where she wished to make offerings to her late father’s Ka.
    Pharaoh also wished to view some samples of white marble reported to have a beautiful tracery of green veins. It had been unloaded at Djeser-Djeseru, where the ramps for transporting materials were still in place. This unusual marble had apparently been located in the Eastern desert, and if the Pharaoh found it pleasing, orders would be given for extensive quarrying. I was instructed to accompany the group, for I have knowledge of such materials due to the fact that I spent a portion of my training as scribe in a number of quarries.
    The journey was not to be a royal progress, just a trip on a simple barge, an opportunity to get away from the pressures of the court and the never-ending