The Empire of Darkness by Christian Jacq

Author:Christian Jacq
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 2001-07-15T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 29

The minister for agriculture paced up and down in front of the door to the queen’s audience chamber. Teti would pay dearly for this insult. Not only would she give him back his property, but he would force her to give him arable land as compensation. The fact that her daughter had gone mad was not his concern; but the queen ought to pay more attention to what her firstborn was doing.

“Her Majesty will receive you,” announced Qaris very calmly.

“And not before time!”

As he went in, the minister saw that the little audience chamber had been repainted. Then he saw Ahhotep; dressed in white, and with gold bracelets gleaming at her wrists, she was sitting on a gilded wooden throne whose feet were shaped like a bull’s hooves.

“I do not want to see you,” he said. “I want to see the queen.”

“She sits before you.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“Bow before the Queen of the Two Lands.”

The minister’s jaw dropped. “The Queen … ?”

“Bow, or I shall have you arrested for insulting the crown.”

Her tone was so stern that the minister took fright. “I did not know, Majesty, I—”

“Now you do know. Here are my first decisions. I have abolished several posts that have no place in a time of war. Heray, overseer of granaries, will take charge of Thebes’s agriculture.”

“You mean … I am no longer minister?”

“That is correct.”

“But Heray is a nobody, Majesty. He’s a simple baker—he’ll never be able to manage our province’s wealth.”

“Heray is an honest man,” said Ahhotep pointedly. “In order to support the war effort, your lands and possessions have been requisitioned. I shall leave you just one house: the most modest one. You are to raise poultry there, to feed our soldiers. And try to put your heart into the work, unless you wish to sink lower.”

“Majesty …”

“This audience is at an end.”

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