Nubnofret was continually telling her to stand up straight, for her shoulders curved over a chest almost as flat as the stomach below it, and she did try to walk with more height and grace to deflect her mother’s often waspish aim, but it did no good. Her face was a pleasing oval, with an expressive, generous mouth and large, lustrous eyes, but the Ramessid nose had run riot and dominated her features.
A more impudent, outgoing girl might have turned such handicaps into triumphs, but Sheritra was shy, sensitive and withdrawn. Those who knew her well—her father, Hori, her servant and companion Bakmut, the other members of the household staff and a few lifelong family friends—loved her for her intelligence and generosity, her kindness and gentleness. But oh Amun! Khaemwaset thought as he submerged the dismay and kissed her forehead under the wealth of waving brown hair, she blushes at everything, my sweet misfit. Where is the prince who will take her?
“I don’t know how the girl is today,” he answered, “but as I have not heard from the Keeper of the Door I must presume she is better. Have you decided to come with me to visit your grandfather and investigate the markets of Pi-Ramses?”
Sheritra shook her head once, a sharp denial. “I don’t think so, Father. Bakmut and I will enjoy having the house to ourselves. I will sleep very late and have all my favourite scrolls from the library read to me while I eat, and I shall swim and poke about in the flower beds with the gardeners.” She was speaking too quickly, looking away. Khaemwaset took her chin and turned her head, meeting her anxious brown eyes.
“It would do no harm to spend a few hours at court,” he said softly. “If you faced those whom you fear your shyness would begin to fade, darling one. Soon your mother will begin to do more than just talk about a betrothal for you, and you should at least know what the young bloods look like before names are laid before you.”
She pulled away from his warm fingers. “It is not necessary,” she replied steadily. “You know you will have to pay a larger than usual dowry to be rid of me, Prince, and it is a matter of complete indifference to me whether I marry or not. No one is going to love me, therefore I do not care in whose bed I ultimately lie.”
Her painful honesty was distressing to hear. “Hori is coming,” Khaemwaset pressed, still wanting to persuade her, unwilling to sail away and leave this wound behind. She grinned.
“Of course he is! The women will ogle him but he won’t notice. The young men will whisper about him behind his back, but he will be oblivious. He and Antef will scour the markets for new and marvellous foreign inventions to pick apart, and after chatting with Grandfather, who dotes on him, he will disappear into the House of Life as you will disappear into the House of Books, and will only emerge to buy me a very expensive gift.” Her eyes were sparkling, but behind their gleam Khaemwaset saw the disappointment in herself that he read there so often. He kissed her again.
“I am sorry, Little Sun,” he apologized. “I do not want to push you into anything that causes you discomfort.”
She grimaced. “Mother does enough pushing for both of you. Have a lovely time in Pharaoh’s magic city, Father. I believe that Hori is already on board Amun-is-Lord so you had better hurry.” She straightened and left the room, and Khaemwaset, his heart aching, opened his shrine to Thoth, charged the censer himself and began his morning prayers.
His flotilla cast off from the watersteps an hour after noon. Amun-is-Lord carried Khaemwaset, Nubnofret and Hori, while ahead went their bodyguards and behind, the household servants. A suite of rooms was always available to Khaemwaset in the palace House of Ramses Great in Victories, and of course a full complement of palace slaves, but he preferred to be waited on by his own staff.
The day was hot and clear. Khaemwaset stood on the deck, leaning over the rail, and regretfully watched the palm groves with their backdrop of yellow sand and the sharp silhouettes of the Saqqara pyramids slide out of sight. Nubnofret was already settled under an awning that had been attached to the small cabin amidships, reclining on a mountain of cushions with a cup of water in one hand and a fan in the other. Hori stood beside his father, elbow resting against Khaemwaset’s own, his hands loosely clasped. “Memphis is a fine sight, is it not?” he said. “Sometimes I wish that Grandfather had not moved the capital of the country north. I can see the strategic advantage in a seat of government close to our eastern border and located on a river that empties into the Great Green for good trade, but Memphis has the dignity and beauty of the rulers of old.”
Khaemwaset’s eyes remained on the riverbank as the green confusion of spring glided by. Beyond the fecund, brilliant life of the bank with its choked river growth, its darting, piping birds, its busy insects and occasionally its sleepy, grinning crocodiles, was a wealth of rich black soil in which the fellahin were struggling, knee-deep, to strew the fresh seed. Drainage canals were full of still water that reflected the intense blue of the sky and were dappled in the shade of the tall palms lining the cuttings. The villages, once the city was out of sight, were the drowsy mud and whitewashed figments of a pleasant dream, shimmering sometimes in the afternoon heat, usually deserted but for two or three donkeys standing idly flicking flies with their tails, and the odd small child running after a flock of white geese or squatting naked in the dirt.