Son of the SunList of players so far -Lij, the Pharaoh Knefer-Lijedefer- Elijah Sen-Adom, the harpist - Dominic Neferura-Ulive, Lij's wife and sister - Liv Menkh, Chief Advisor - Viggo Pen-Nekeb, A eunuch; body slave to Lij - Sean Astin Seti-Hop, a physician - Ian Mckellan Nefer-Aru, Lij's mother - Cate Blanchett Merit-Aton, Liv's mother - Miranda Otto Setep-Aton another royal physician - Chris Lee Orem, a eunuch, Liv's lover - Orli Captains of the Guard, Zeser-Amon - Sean Bean and His brother, Ankh-Aton - David Wenham Imhotep, the Royal architect - Billy Menep-Atifer-Ankh-Ra - Lij's Granny - An old woman with heart. Several friends, aquaintances and folks who merit mentioning, but no names, please! Part 12 - Crime and Punishment He woke, screaming. Dom raised him in his arms, and comforted him. Lij rested his head on Dom's shoulder. He felt safe there. At peace. "What was it, Lij, a night terror?" Lij nodded, shaking. "Anubis", he breathed, sucking in air through a throat tight with screaming. He held fast to Dom's arms. The jackal headed creature of the Underworld. Come for him... again? The nightmare receded. Lij breathed more steadily. "What was it, Lij?" Dom asked, tenderly. "Tell me." Lij twisted in his arms to look at Dom's face. "He came to me - actually came! Not peering darkly round corners at me - he stood in front of me. His eyes..." Lij faltered. "His eyes were like flame." "You are fortunate, Egypt!" he said to me. His voice was like gravel dredged up from the Nile floor. 'You have returned to the living. Osiris is angry. He has lost you. The debt must be paid. He is owed a soul and he will have it. Do not grieve, it is well past time.' Then I woke up. What does it mean, Dom?" Dom shook his head. "I am no dream master, Lord. It seems strange. Why warn you? Why come to you at all?" Lij got out of bed to visit the privy pot. He was shaky, but stayed on his feet. Dom didn't try to stop him. He needed the strength of movement. Dom put his head back on the cushions, and sighed. He stared out of the window. Dawn was rising. The day was beginning. A new day, a rebirth. Pen-Nekeb put his head around the doorframe. "Great One? You wish to bathe?" Lij smiled at his servant. Anubis vanished into the mists of night. "Not yet, Nekeb. We will break our fast, then walk on the terrace for a while. My legs feel unsteady. If I am to hold audience..." Nekeb committed the unforgiveable - he interrupted the king. "Oh, no, Lord. Seti-Hop said you could rise. He did not say you could..." His voice dwindled away as he looked on Lij's face. Lij, asleep, had been beautiful. His face in repose was like sculpted marble. But awake and angry he was...incredible. His eyes blazed, and Nekeb stepped back, unsure of himself. He had been master when the king lay, unresisting, under his tending hands. Now... Lij's face softened, as he saw the terror etched on Nekeb's face. "Do you fear me, friend?" Nekeb bowed his head, and nodded, miserable. "Yes, Great One - I fear you! You are my God, and who would not fear a god?" Lij stepped forward, and did the unthinkable. He clasped Nekeb's hands in his own. Nekeb's face lit like a beacon. "Lord!" he managed. Lij smiled wistfully at him. "You have served the Thothmides well, my friend. You have cared for me, while I was sick, above and beyond your duties. Dom has told me of it. Fetch me a scribe!" Nekeb ran. * Lij glanced at the kneeling scribe. "Rem-Opit, is it not?" The scribe looked up, in astonishment, then cast his eyes to the floor as the luminous gaze rested on him. "Yes, Great One!" he murmured. Lij smiled. "I remember your father was chief scribe to mine. He chose to go with him, I remember, into the Otherworld. I do not desire that you suffer the same fate!" Rem-Opit raised his eyes, now unafraid. "I have already chosen to do so, Great One. It is recorded on my scrolls. I would serve no one but you." He bowed his head again, tears in his eyes. "You must have come very near it, then, in past days", Lij murmured, looking at Dom, carefully. "I wonder if there were others who would have walked the same path?" Dom became very interested in the gold and blue frieze decorating the wall. Gods, yes! he thought, blindly. I would not stay here, without him! It would be torture! Lij cleared his throat. He slumped down in a small chair, glad, for a moment, to sit. His knees felt suddenly weak, and it was not because of his illness. Nekeb knelt beside his chair. "I, Knefer-Lijedefer", and all the hyperbole that goes with the name", he said, looking straight at Nekeb, "do grant unto my former slave, Pen-Nekeb, manumission from his enslaved state and a monthly stipend to be set at five gold pieces as befits his new station and title as Keeper of the Royal Wardrobe, and as my friend. So be it!" Nekeb gazed up at his former master. "My father took from you something irreplaceable, when he had you cut. What I give you now is little in the face of that loss. You served me in fear. Will you now serve me for love?" Lij asked, holding out his hand to a friend. Nekeb sobbed as he took the small hand in his. "My love you have had, Lord, for all the years I have served you. Do not ask me for it, now - you have it already." Lij cast a kindly look upon his new friend, who was wiping his eyes in the sleeve of his tunic. "Come, then, we will eat. Dom?" Dom smiled at his love. His Lij was learning what it was to be a king. After all these years, he was finally learning. *** It had been a long day. Court affairs had ground to a halt whilst the king slept. Now, it seems, everyone who was entitled to it required his attention. Menkh shrugged his shoulders at him as Dom frowned his displeasure. The man was still weak. Could they not see it? It had been ten days since Lij had left his rooms and returned to his former life. Unfortunately, the sixteen days that had passed without him receiving proper nourishment had sapped his vitality, and weakened him. He grew tired very easily, and was inclined to snap at anyone within reach. Those with his best interests at heart knew of this weakness, and avoided tiring him unduly. But Pharaoh was a god to his people. Gods did not tire. Underneath the paint and oils Dom could see his lover's chest heave with the strain of holding the crook and flail.Only two more petitioners to see - then he could rest. Unfortunately the squabble between two rival farmers seemed to stretch on for ever. The disputed land had no defined borders. Neither man would give way. Lij was exhausted. Exhaustion lent itself to impatience. He snapped at one of the men, "Why did you bring this before me? Could not the local ..." The man, frightened he would lose his land, made a strategic and disastrous error. He instructed the king. "It is your duty, Exalted One..." He got no further. "Duty? My duty? You go too far, little man! Do not preach duty to a god! I am not here for your...." Lij panted, and continued berating the man, who had fallen on his face before the king's wrath. Lij, incensed by the man's rudeness and weak from exhaustion, leapt up from the throne, and threw the crook and flail to the floor. There was a gasp at the sacrilege. His voice grew louder, his hands were trembling. Dom cast a look at Seti-Hop, who shook his head. He must be stopped. But the queen was not here. Menkh had left the room, temporarily. No one was here who could calm him...except Dom. Dom stepped up to Lij and took hold of his arm. "Lord..." Lij shook him off. "Do not touch, me, Dom - I am not safe!" Dom could see this. Lij's eyes were blank with rage, his lips blue. Any moment now he would have a seizure like the one he had several days ago in the privacy of his own apartments. It must not happen, not here, in front of Pretep and Nat. Not in front of an interested and critical audience. Dom grabbed his arm, again. "Lord...please!" Lij turned on him in a trembling fury. "Take your hands off me, you insolent pup!" Dom struck him across the face. The assembly gasped. Pretep smiled. Death! she crowed, inwardly. She resented Dom's influence over Lij, and here it would end. He had written his own death warrant. He had struck God, and he would die for it! Lij froze. Dom held him close in case he fell. "Out!" Seti-Hop yelled. "Out, all of you! Now!" The room cleared of all but Nat and Pretep. The physician approached Lij, still shaking violently in Dom's firm grip. "Sit, Lord", the old man ordered. Lij's eyes were suffused with pain. "Oh, Dom!" he breathed. "Oh, Dom!" Dom guided Lij to the throne and pushed him gently into it. Pretep bustled up to Lij and knelt at his feet. "Not now, woman!" Seti-Hop muttered at her. "Can you not see?..." She smiled, sneeringly. "Oh, yes, I see perfectly. Sen-Adom struck God. He will die! When will this be, Lord?" Lij glared at her with all his remaining strength. Black spots were weaving before his eyes. He could smell honeysuckle. He would not be able to keep them open much longer. "Get. Her. Out!" he breathed. "Dom will not die. He has written permission to touch me for my own good. That was for my good. I have spoken. Get her out, or I will..." Dom caught him as he fell forward. The look he cast at Pretep as he carried the king to bed after the fit had passed would have melted a weaker woman's skin. But Pretep was not weak. She was obsessed. The throne was her husband's, and he would have it. She would make sure of it. *** "That woman's tongue will dig her grave for her!" Menep spat, as she heard the full story. She. Menkh and Seti-Hop were in the king's outer chamber. Dom was calming Lij after the storm. He wept, when he woke. The cataracts of the Nile were nothing to it, Seti-Hop informed the elderly queen, as he was invited to sit by her side on the padded bench. "What will we do?" the physician worried. "Dom must not die! The Great One would not..." He twisted his hands together, and looked to the woman for guidance. "Do not worry, you old cat - Dom will not die. I read the document Lij spoke of, most carefully. It will save Dom. He must be punished, of course - we cannot avoid that - but he will not die." She rubbed her gnarled hand up and down the old man's arm. "You are very fond of the pair of them, aren't you?" she asked, reaching for her goblet of watered wine. "They are a fine couple, and dote on each other. Dom was such a strength to us all when Lij was sick. Lij will not suffer that he be hurt too much. It is the greatest pity it had to happen before witnesses. In private, it would have been resolved quickly." Menkh shook his head. "Pretep is murmuring", he offered. "She saw what many of us who should have been there to witness it, did not. She said Dom hit Lij deliberately hard, because he called him a pup. She said he could have taken other measures to stop the king. She said...." "She said! She said! She is a meddling trouble-maker who revels in chaos and misery. She is of no importance." The old woman was tired and cross. She could see a way out, she thought. "Tomorrow", she sighed. "Let them rest, tonight. Let us all rest - by Anubis's balls, we'll need it!" *** There was no rest in Lij's bed. He lay with his head on Dom's chest, it was true, but he could not rest. Dom ran his hand over the trembling body. "There, my Lord - be still!" "But I have caused you harm, Dom! It is true that you will not die, but Pretep saw. A punishment must be given. It is written - an unalterable edict. I cannot change this, for you struck me - and it is ...I have a temper, Dom. I called you...I am sorry, my Dom, I..." Dom stopped Lij with a kiss. "Be quiet, Lij. I do not care about the insults or the punishment, whatever it is, as long as it is not exile, or death. They can flay me to within an inch of my life, but if I can still see your face, it will not matter. I love you!" Lij touched Dom's gentle, kindly face. "And I, you, but you know this. If only my mother had not gone to visit the Temple of Hathor at Karnak for a season, to offer thanks for my recovery, and to pray for our child. She always knew how to handle Pretep." Dom smiled. "There is always Menep...and Menkh!" Lij looked more at ease. "Yes, you are right. We must not despair." He looked at Dom, shyly. "Dom? Um..." "Yes, my love?" "Would you kiss me again?... If you please, that is." It pleased. |