“A girl,” the fair one said, smiling as the baby cooed. “Sitamun, She Who Knows All the Names.”
The queen’s body went slack, and she crumpled. The two attendants rushed to her side, grasping her by the shoulders. They made to carry her toward the bed, but the short woman stopped them. “Not yet,” she said huskily. “There is one more.”
Queen Bintanath looked up and shook her head. “The pain is gone now. How can there be another?”
The short one shrugged. “Perhaps this one takes the pain onto himself.” Reluctantly, the queen stepped back onto the birthing bricks and resumed her position. “Please, my lady. Push.”
Still perplexed, Queen Bintanath closed her eyes and tensed.
The short one reached out just as a child, smaller than the first two, fell into her open palms. The infant was silent as she cut the cord.
“Is he all right?” the queen asked, peering down anxiously.
The short one gathered the small child into her own arms, giving him her finger to suckle. He gazed up at her with a tiny serious face. “He is fine. Another healthy boy. Bakenamun, He Whose Heart Is Hidden.”
The queen gave a deep sigh and smiled, contented. Outside, the driving rain washed the world clean and made it quiet with a mother’s hush.
***
When the nurse and priests—dripping and disheveled—came crashing into the chamber a little while later, primed with apologies, they found the queen tucked in bed with a babe nursing at each breast. Meryamun suckled hungrily, while Sitamun reached her tiny hands toward the flickering torchlight as she drank. The third child, Bakenamun, watched from the attendant’s arms, waiting patiently for his turn. Each child wore a necklace of twisted linen, strung with beads of carnelian and gold.
Nebet was busy gathering up the soiled cloth and closing the curtains against the rain, which had slowed to a diaphanous mist. Her eyes were wide and haunted, as if she’d witnessed something holy and inexplicable.
The dancers had vanished into the night.
The long-awaited nurse stood before the bed, penitent, her expression that of a dog expecting to be whipped.
“My queen,” she stammered, “We tried to reach the palace sooner, I swear to you. The temple road was flooded, and I—”
“Those women you sent me, the dancers,” the queen broke in, her voice unusually placid. “They were very good. Strange… but good.”
The nurse, who had sent no such dancers, blinked. Then, without missing a beat, she bowed her head. “I’m pleased you liked them, Queen Bintanath.” Something had diverted the queen’s wrath. It would not do to question it.
“Tell the king to come greet his sons and daughter,” Queen Bintanath commanded. “Surely he will be delighted to find them so numerous. The gods have blessed us today.”
“They certainly have, my queen,” the nurse agreed, and with a parting bow, she hurried through the corridor with the wind at her back.
The cat watched it all with interest, her golden eyes unblinking. She was warm and dry, and enlivened by the activity around her.Perhaps there is more to see here before I die, she thought.Perhaps I shall remain a while longer.
Winding delicately around the birthing blood still pooled on the tiles, she found her way to a pile of discarded linens, pawed it into a satisfactory shape, and began licking herself with a rough pink tongue.
1
Sita
Sitamun lay on her stomach by the edge of the pond, watching the fish. There were about a dozen of them, ranging from the size of her hand to the length of her arm, and they floated lazily in the crystalline blue-green pool. Sita dragged the tips of her fingers across the surface of the water, and the fish came to suckle at them with their round, hungry mouths. Whether they’d come to know her after years of daily visits to the pleasure garden, or whether they thought she was food, it didn’t matter much. Spending time there—her body nestled among the fragrant lotus, mandrake, and poppy flowers, her bare legs and shoulders baked by the midday sun—was one of Sita’s favorite things to do. At that time of day, it was a place of quiet contemplation, an escape from the clamorous crush of palace life.
Sita’s carnelian amulet, carved in the shape of an Isis knot, dangled from her neck, nearly touching the water. When the head priestess visited from Bubas and gave it to her on her thirteenth birthday, Sita thought it was an ankh, but the woman had clicked her tongue and told her no. “You see the arms?” she’d said. “They go down. It’s a knot of cloth, not a cross. Cloth stained red with the first blood of womanhood—a threshold you shall soon pass over, little princess. With this amulet, the blood of Isis, the spells of Isis, and the magic words of Isis shall protect you from those who would do you harm. Wear it always.”
Four years had passed since that day. Sita had never taken it off.
Likely thinking it was a bit of juicy flesh, one of the fishnibbled at the amulet until Sita tucked it into the folds of her dress. Having lost interest in the taste of her fingertips, the fish slowly drifted away. When their wake stilled, Sita saw herself reflected in the water’s glassy surface. The warm breeze had blown her hair into a tangle, so she raised a hand to smooth it.
Her long black hair was her pride—thick enough that she could refuse extensions and her mother wouldn’t make a fuss. It hung in the traditional style for girls her age, with two tresses falling over her shoulders, and the rest gathered into a golden ring to trail down her back. One of the attendants had woven golden thread and red carnelian beads into it, which made a gentle ringing sound whenever she moved. She’d complained about the noise at first, saying she felt like one of the palace cats, who could be tracked by the sound of their beaded collars tinkling as they walked. Seeing it now, though, with the sunlight glinting off her bejeweled hair, Sita had to admit it was very pretty indeed.
She became aware of her unique looks at a young age, more from the way others treated her than from noticing it herself. In her eyes, she was no lovelier than any of the young servants in the palace. Any one of them, treated to fine oils for their skin and clothed in linen and jewels, would have been equally appealing. Sometimes she lamented the aggressiveness of her face, her aquiline nose, her thick brows, her strong chin. Her perspective on the matter changed over the past few seasons, however, when she noticed a shift in the way young men reacted to her presence.
As before, there was respect, deference. But there was something else too. Something new. It was the same look the striped palace cat gave the plump little birds as they flitted about in the garden.
