Nefertiti: A Novel by Moran Michelle

Author:Moran, Michelle [Moran, Michelle]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History
ISBN: 0307381463
Amazon: B000TWUTW8
Goodreads: 7089886
Publisher: Broadway Books
Published: 2007-07-10T00:00:00+00:00

Nefertiti wasn’t due to give birth until Thoth, but she walked through the camp as if the child might come any day. Everyone had to stand three paces back when they were near her, and work in the city stopped when she went past, so that the noise of the hammers wouldn’t disturb the unborn child. She was convinced that it would be a prince, and Akhenaten catered to her every need, ordering her wool from Sumer and the softest linen from the weavers of Thebes. Then she tested her power by demanding that he stop visiting Kiya in the pavilion across the road, in case her worry should hurt the child.

“Could it happen?” Akhenaten came upon me at the well. Though we had servants for fetching water, I enjoyed the musty scent of the earth. I lowered my bucket and shaded my eyes.

“Could what happen, Your Majesty?”

He looked across the lotus pond that had been built in the midst of our camp. “Could she lose the child if I were to upset her?”

“Anything could happen, Your Majesty, if she were upset enough.”

He hesitated. “How upset?”

He misses Kiya, I thought. She listens to his poems and draws him into her quiet world while Nefertiti’s world never stops. “I suppose it depends on how fragile she is.”

We both looked at Nefertiti, her small powerful body moving across the camp, trailed by seven guards.

She came up to us and Akhenaten grinned, as if he hadn’t been talking about visiting Kiya. “My queen.” He took her hand and kissed it tenderly. “I have news.”

Nefertiti’s eyes glittered. “What is it?”

“Maya sent word this morning.”

Nefertiti let out a little gasp. “The city is finished,” she guessed.

Akhenaten nodded. “Maya has sworn that within days the walls will be painted and we shall leave our pavilions behind.”

Nefertiti gave a small cry, but I thought at once of Nakhtmin. How would we meet once we moved? He would live with his men in the barracks and I would be trapped inside Akhenaten’s palace.

“Shall we go and see it?” Akhenaten asked eagerly. “Shall we reveal our city to the people?”

“We’ll take everyone,” Nefertiti decided. “Every vizier, every noblewoman, every child in Amarna.” She spun around to face me. “Has there been word from Father?”

“Nothing,” I replied.

She narrowed her eyes. “He hasn’t written to you secretly?”

I stared at her. “Of course not.”

“Good. I want to be the one to tell him Amarna is finished. When he sees the palace”—her face was exultant—“he will realize that Akhenaten was right. We have built the greatest city in Egypt.”

At noon, the announcement was made: The gates would be opened and Amarna would be unveiled to the people at last. A palpable excitement passed through the camp. By orders of Pharaoh, only workers and noblemen had been allowed inside the gates to see the construction. Now the palace would be revealed, along with hundreds of villas crouched in the towering hills behind it. By evening, the long procession of chariots swept through the desert, carrying viziers and noblemen, foreigners and commoners.

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