the Chamberlain, a fussy man of middle age wearing too much jewellery and paint. 'Do what you can, Meryt.'
'Sit down,' said the young woman. 'What's your name, Scribe? I'm Meryt the Nubian. Where does it hurt?'
'Only my heart,' I said as I sat down on the stone bench. She took my hand and her warm fingers found my pulse.
'The voice of your heart says that you are healthy,' she said gravely. Her skin was soot-black and her eyes twinkled. 'But drink this while I clean your face and re-apply your kohl.'
I drank obediently as she washed my face with precise strokes of a wad of damp linen and re-drew my eyes. She passed a red-ochre brush gently across my cheeks to restore the bloom of health. The drink was a warm compound of wine, honey and herbs, and it went down smoothly, not offending my already over-worked insides.
'You have left someone you love to come to Pharaoh's service,' she remarked. 'That is hard. But you will flourish in the regard of the Pharaoh, be happy, and come to your lover again.'
'How do you know?' I asked.
'I am a Nubian and we have some skill in foretelling though I am no oracle. But I know,' she said firmly.
For some reason I was greatly cheered.
'There are many people in the palace today, is it always like this?' I asked, as she straightened my earrings and flicked dust off my wig.
'It's the coronation of the great Royal Wife Nefertiti,' she replied, laughing. 'Where have you been?'
'His Majesty took me yesterday from the School of Scribes to be his personal scribe,' I told her. I felt her draw back in shock, and then she came and knelt before me, her forehead on my sandal.
'I did not know, Lord, pardon!' she whispered.
'Meryt, get up,' I tugged at her shoulder. 'Why are you bowing to me?'
'You are the Royal Scribe,' she said, looking up from her crouch. 'You rank higher than almost anyone in the kingdom, except those of royal blood or the priests of Amen-Re.'
'In that case I order you to stand up,' I was astounded and I needed more information. 'This can't be,' I said.
'Lord, if that is your position, then that is your rank.'
'I don't believe it,' I protested.
'If you will take some advice,' ventured Meryt in a whisper, 'beware the envy of others. Have your food tasted and search your rooms for serpents and your bed for scorpions. I am the lowliest of Pharaoh's slaves, but I know this much; there will be much murmuring at this appointment. No one will say anything to you, Lord, but they will be very angry. The person who was expecting to be royal scribe was the old man the Lord Nebamenet. He has expanded his household on the understanding that he would be awarded the post.'
'If this is true, Meryt, will you come to me and keep the serpents away?' I asked entirely on impulse. She looked away.
'Master, I am unworthy,' she murmured conventionally, which meant 'yes'.
Thus I acquired my first slave, for it was true - I had been elevated to one of the highest posts in the Kingdom, and with much more justice than Meryt I felt like saying, 'Lord, I am unworthy'.
The chamberlain took me into the first hall, where the common people come to speak to officials and those badly treated can appeal to Pharaoh their father. It was decorated with stiff lotuses and stiff papyrus heads, the symbols of Upper and Lower Egypt. A slave was sweeping the stone floor, another was sprinkling jasmine-water, and clearly something was about to happen. The soldiers at the gate had lined up in a long double row, light gleaming off their heavy belts and helmets. The wind carried to me the jingling of their accoutrements. The Chamberlain, muttering something about inconvenience, took me through the Audience Chamber and into the palace behind, and we stood at a window looking down into the hall.
'The Great Royal Wife Nefertiti was crowned not an hour ago,' he said under his breath. 'Both Kings may they live! Will be here soon. They will show the new Queen to the people, then come along this corridor into the feasting hall. There the Lord Akhnamen has ordered that you should meet him. Now I really should...'
'Wait, Lord,' I grasped him by the arm. 'The slave Meryt said that I had been given one of the highest offices in the kingdom. She was, of course, wrong?'
'Nubians, they talk too much. Yes boy, I mean, my Lord, you are ranked higher than almost any, and I hope you live your first decan, for I do not know what will save you unless the Gods do.'
This was alarming and I forgot my grief for a little. Still holding him, I demanded 'Explain!'
'I don't know how to explain it,' he wailed, the paint on his cheeks cracking a little with the stress of unaccustomed facial expression. 'Did he know you before, Lord Ptah-hotep, know you...when he was a boy?'
'No, of course not. Yesterday I was swimming in the sacred lake and he just came and took me. I have never seen him before,' I replied.
'Whimsical, whimsical, that's the Divine Akhnamen. I wish that his brother had lived. But at least he has married; a wife will settle him down.' He spoke to himself, then remembered me.
'Now, don't be afraid, boy, my Lord. He won't hurt you, he's the gentlest creature alive, may Amen-Re shine sense upon him! He just doesn't think, you see, he's impulsive. But he keeps his friends, and he needs them. Be a friend to him and no courtier's malice can touch you.'
'Sell me the slave Meryt,' I requested. He patted me on the shoulder.
'Certainly,' he replied. 'Ten ingots of copper and she is yours.'
'Should all this be true, Lord, I will owe you the copper, and you will send her to my quarters as soon as you can. I feel,' I added, as we heard trumpets and the whole honour guard sprang to attention, 'that I will need someone to watch over me.'
I went to the feasting hall as the procession left the Audience Chamber and walked along the corridor painted with a fresco of tribute bearers. I was puzzled and apprehensive but my heart was still too sore to be either really joyful or really afraid.
I heard the swish of the ladies' draperies and their voices, as they were freed from ceremony to speak, pass my window and I slipped out into the passage and came along behind them.
I had never seen such splendour as that feasting hall on my first night in the palace of the Kings. The Kings and their Queens were seated on a raised platform at one end of the hall, with painted frescoes of antelopes behind them and a whole lion hunt on the opposite wall.
The tables were draped with white cloth and laden with all manner of food; bread and roasted fish and dried fish, roasted oxen, goat, roast quail and duck and goose; plums and melons and figs and grapes in black bunches, bursting with juice. There were three sorts of cheese and eleven different cakes, dates, pomegranates, and salads of lettuce and leeks.
I had never seen so much food in my life. In my father's house we were never hungry, we had bread, fish and beans every day and roasted meat occasionally. But this abundance was astonishing and I had to restrain my hand from creeping out and stealing a cinnamon cake. My nostrils twitched with the heavenly scent. Cinnamon and, I thought, honey.
The chamberlain, who may have been feeling guilty about his casual reception of me, took me by the hand and led me through the feast to the Kings.
Everywhere people were tearing apart roasted quail and crunching bones and demanding more wine. Servants flew about the huge room with pots and jugs. Musicians strummed and plucked valiantly, but could hardly be heard above the voices and the demands for more drink, at once!
I was deafened and shaken - it was like being inside a gigantic mouth - by the time I was kneeling at the feet of the young man with the strange misty gaze.
'Ptah-hotep,' he said vaguely. For a delirious moment I thought he might have forgotten me and I would be sent back to my own trade and my Kheperren. Then his eyes sharpened, as if I had come into focus.
'See,