“Women become so tiresome when they grow old,” Meryamun continued with a sigh. “Their irrational ravings, their dismal moods—yes, go and fix her, Nefermaat, would you? You’d be doing me a great service if you succeed.”
***
Neff found the queen sitting by a window in her chambers, clad in a yellow dress.
Yellow for mourning.
Queen Bintanath didn’t turn when Neff announced herself. She simply raised a hand to beckon her inside.
“Forgive me for not coming to you sooner,” Neff said as she approached.
“Sit.”
Neff swallowed and took a seat on the long, cushioned bench next to the queen, who stared into the desert, unblinking. Blousy curtains danced in the breeze from the open windows, which looked upon the women’s pool and the desert beyond. A falcon cried out, circling in the azure sky, but otherwise, there was perfect silence. Many palace occupants, their bellies full from the midday meal, spent the hot afternoon hours dozing.
Neff glanced at Queen Bintanath, uncertain how to introduce the topic of dreaming. The queen was slender verging on gaunt, and she wore none of her usual regalia—not even a wig. Neff couldn’t help but notice a thick line of gray at her hairline. For someone who was notoriously meticulous about her appearance, her uncolored roots seemed like yet another sign that the queen was unraveling.
“Those are very pretty bracelets,” Neff ventured, indicating the three lengths of twisted linen the queen held in her hands. Each was simple but elegant, strung with carnelian and gold beads.
“They’re not bracelets. They’re necklaces. Given to my three children the night they were born.” Her voice was dry, like the breeze. “I gave birth to them in this very room, on the night of a terrible storm. The three dancers who attended to me tied these around my babies’ necks. I saved them as keepsakes.” She lay the necklaces along her palm and touched the golden beads. “That was so long ago. It almost feels as if it happened to someone else.”
“My mother gave me a doll when I was born,” Neff said. “I keep it in a special box at home.”
The queen turned to look at her. “And where is home?”
“Bubas.”
Queen Bintanath snorted. “I should have thought my son would know better. Hanging jewels on a village girl doesn’t make her any less common.”
Neff winced, but then she remembered her father’s advice.Sometimes a customer will test you simply to see how much you can handle. A true businessman doesn’t allow his feathers to be ruffled. He keeps his eye on the prize.
Neff raised her chin, mirroring the queen’s own rigid posture. “I wouldn’t be here if you hadn’t summoned me, Queen Bintanath.”
The queen’s lips didn’t move, but the corners of her eyes crinkled with approval.
“Quite right,” she said. “I wanted to see for myself if the stories about you are true. I was never satisfied with Montuhotep’s predictions. One got the feeling he was simply saying what one wanted to hear, regardless of what the gods were telling him.”
Neff cringed, recalling the false message she’d given King Amunmose before his death—a message that failed to reveal he was being slowly poisoned by his favorite son.This time will be different, she vowed.This time I’ll tell the truth, no matter how harsh it might be.
She took a deep breath and allowed her mind to soften. “Please, my queen. Tell me of your dream.”
Fiddling with the three necklaces, the queen turned back to the quiet desert and began. “In the dream, I’m out there, among the dunes. I’m alone and wearing a long black cape made from vulture feathers.
“I walk toward the horizon, where a blue-winged sun rises over Thonis. There should be a cobra on each side of it, but there is only one, a red cobra. As I watch, the red cobra slithers to the center of the sun, as if resting upon its brow. The sun’s rays growhotter and hotter, until they are so hot the cape upon my back bursts into flames. My skin blackens and peels away. The light becomes so bright that it fills the world, and then…”
The queen blinked. “Then I wake up.”
Neff felt her mind sink into the world of the dream, into the darkness at the center of the light. She saw the desert. The winged sun. The red cobra. She saw the woman caped in vulture feathers.
Except the woman was not Queen Bintanath. She was the goddess Nekhbet, the vulture-headed protector of the kingdom, the crown, and all its children—alive and dead.
The Mother of Mothers.
Neff waited for the blazing sun to burn Nekhbet as it had in the queen’s dream. Instead, the goddess walked to the horizon and wrapped her heavy wings around it. She was so small, and yet Nekhbet was somehow able to enfold the sun in her arms, casting the world into darkness.
Through the darkness came a message, whispered on the wind.
When the vision faded, Queen Bintanath was watching Neff with a mixture of amazement and fear.
