The pain surges, and a howl echoes throughout the birthing pavilion, an open-air gazebo with a roof made of matting and whitewashed plaster walls painted with hopeful images of mothers and children and the gods who guard them. The sound is so guttural, almost animalistic, I think it could not possibly have come from me. But all eyes are upon me and all hands support me, so I must be the source.
The sound of gentle lapping water ebbs away at the anguish, and I push myself to standing, much to the dismay of my mother and the handmaidens and priestess. Protective amulets sliding off my huge belly, I stagger to the edge of the birthing pavilion which was built at the edge of a pool.How refreshing the water appears, I think as I dip my toes in. The coolness invigorates me, and when I turn back toward the women, I feel ready.
“Get the birthing bricks aligned,” I order Nedjem, the only one I trust to do it properly.
Leaning on Mother and the handmaidens, I squat upon the bricks. The pain and pressure haven’t returned but they will momentarily, and I want to be prepared. I want this waiting and agony to be over, and my father’strueheir to arrive.
The women begin their chant, “Come, come,” to urge the baby into this world.
The high priest waves incense and murmurs prayers to Taweret to fend off the demons that could take my life and that of the child. His assistants make entreaties to other gods and goddesses—Isis, Nephthys, Hathor, Bes, and Tefnut—to keep me and the baby safe today and in the precarious days to come. Others encircle me in objects of great power, figurines, statues, wands, and amulets.
Much, much depends on a safe birth and my survival.
I think about how easily my father’s legacy might have come unraveled during the past six seasons of Thutmose II’s ostensible rule, without my guidance and that of my mother. While queen regent Ahmes met with advisers and stewards, building administrators andpriests, viziers and farmers—occasionally with Thutmose II at her side—I advised my husband. Daily, I gave him secret instructions on the structure of the government, the factions that were trustworthy and those to be avoided, the vagaries of familial connections, the machinations of the economy, the private status of the military, and the nature of diplomacy and intercountry dynamics—all the knowledge my father entrusted to me. The extent of Thutmose II’s lack of knowledge could never be revealed. If it was, the Thutmoside dynasty could be lost in one coup and, quite possibly, all the progress that my ancestors have made along with it.
I will never let that happen.
I push with all my might, as if the world could be riven in two by my effort. Instead, I feel my body cleave. A warm liquid pools between my legs, and I see myself as if from above. I observe the women press in closer to my naked body. I watch as they rub the huge mountain of my belly and my sweaty brow. I see my mother’s panic when she realizes that I am no longer on her side of the River Nile, and I stare as the glistening crimson sea underneath my body turns into an ocean.
Then I hear a cry. The mewling of a babe. My babe. And I feel myself being sucked back into my body and on to the side of life.
I gasp for air and sit up. Mother squeals with joy and wraps her arms around my drenched and bloody body. “I thought you’d already made your journey toAaru,” she cries.
“The baby. I heard the baby,” I croak.
She turns toward the red, angry creature being pulled from me. I reach for it, but the high priest, who is incanting a blessing over the child, shakes his head. “Not yet.”
“Yes, now,” I insist. A primal urge has taken hold of me to see this new life for myself, to clutch it in my own arms and protect it from everyone and everything.
“But it isn’t protocol—” My mother sides with the high priest. But I am familiar with the elaborate rituals about to be performed upon my child, and I will not allow them to stand in the way of me holding it this very instant.
“I am the queen, andImake the protocol,” I roar back, and theothers recoil at my vehemence, including my mother. She is ostensibly regent, but more and more, her power wanes and I step into the breach. “Bring the baby to me.”
Only loyal Nedjem has the courage to step toward the high priest with her hands outstretched for the baby. As she cradles it in her arms, Mother stands and looks over her shoulder at the bundle. “It’s a girl, Hatshepsut,” she whispers, as if to brace me before I can see the gender for myself.
The others cluck in sympathy, but I will have none of it. After all, our sex has not stopped my mother and me from wielding our own share of power.
I reach for my daughter, with a command to all. “You will cease that noise. We shall only have celebration for my daughter. She will be called Neferure, because she has all the beauty of Re.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
1480BC
THEBES,EGYPT
“The situation requires attention, Your Majesty.”
The general addresses my husband, but his posture is directed toward me. He never meets my gaze, of course: that would be a most egregious offense. But from the square of his shoulders to the tilt of his head, I can see that he speaks only to me about the escalating situation in Kush.How well-known is the scope and scale of my influence?I wonder. Either way, I will be the one to fix this threat.
My husband sits at the center of the throne room, with Mother and me flanking him on smaller thrones. Given their acrimonious past dealings, Thutmose II’s mother Mutnofret hadn’t acquiesced readily to my mother’s role as regent, never mind the explicit wishes that my father had left behind. She’d pled with her son to install her instead of my mother, but Thutmose refused, and here we sit.
From Thutmose’s position on the dais and his imperious, immobile stature, he appears to embody the role of pharaoh. But beneath the impossibly heavyatefand under the layers of kohl rimming his eyes, he is bored and half-asleep, waiting for this formal session to end so he can hunt. Any spare moment amidst his religious or political or ceremonial obligations is devoted to his favorite sport. That and visiting his other wives and his harem, when his health allows.
“I am wondering if Your Majesty would like to hear more from the general.” I prompt Thutmose II to ask the sort of question that the leader of Egyptshould.
I want to be irritated with his patent lack of care about our realmand his focus on selfish pleasures, although as king that is his prerogative. But then I think about an evening not long before Neferure was born, a moonless night when he’d elected to visit me in my chambers simply because he wanted my company. He’d become somewhat emotional when he felt the baby kick through the sheer fabric of my tunic, a tear welling up in his eye at the notion of becoming a father. He said that, unlike me, he hadn’t been given the time to know our father very well. How can I be angry at him for not rising to the role of king when Father never prepared him for it? Never really paid him any attention at all? My husband had been raised for the easy existence of bureaucratic work and daily luxury afforded to all royal family members, not a challenging existence with demanding religious rituals, onerous political meetings and decisions, and arduous travel and festivals. As I was.
“Yes, yes,” Thutmose II says, as if he’d been about to pose that very question. “Give us a full status report on this Kush situation.”
