After the funeral feast under the blue-and-white-striped awnings of Khaemwaset’s train, after the dances and the wine and the expressions of grief, Khaemwaset himself sat and watched the sem-priests seal the tomb and the necropolis workmen shovel sand and gravel over the entrance. He had already paid for guards to be posted against grave robbers. They would stand their watch for four months. Khaemwaset was aware of the irony in his deed, for did he not himself break into tombs? He could not hold the thought, and it slipped away on the barely perceptible breeze of a sweltering summer afternoon. May you live again forever, old friend, he whispered. I do not think that you would like working in my household anymore. You belonged to a domestic order that has gone, and the loyalties of your son will not be as divided as yours might have been. He did not stir until the last load of earth had been tamped down and the workmen had been dismissed. Then he rose, got onto his litter and was carried slowly home.
The following morning the whole household was at the watersteps to greet Tbubui and welcome her to her new home. Khaemwaset, Nubnofret, Hori and Sheritra formed a glum gathering. Only their physical proximity to one another gave an illusion of cohesion, though Sheritra’s hand stole into her father’s as Sisenet’s brightly beribboned barge hove into sight. Hori, clean, carefully painted and heavily jewelled, watched expressionlessly as the craft angled towards them. Nubnofret, regal but equally close-faced, nodded sharply once at the waiting priest, who immediately descended the steps and began to chant the words of blessing and purification while his acolyte sprinkled milk and bull’s blood over the warm stone.
Tbubui emerged from the cabin on her son’s arm. Harmin shot a quick glance at Sheritra, then looked away, turning to say something to Sisenet before handing his mother from the ramp to the steps.
The family waited. Nubnofret centred herself on the path, and it was to her first, as was the custom, that Tbubui prostrated herself. Nubnofret was a princess as well as the arbiter of all that went on in her house. It was obvious to Khaemwaset, tense with worry and anticipation, that his wife’s good breeding was going to win out on this crucial day. Nubnofret would behave with impeccable correctness even though a horde of Khatti warriors was ransacking her home and she had only moments to live. The thought made him smile involuntarily. Sheritra let go of his hand. She too was tense, he noticed, her homely little face pale.
“Tbubui, I welcome you to this house in the name of my husband and yours, the Prince Khaemwaset, sem-priest of Ptah, priest of Ra, and lord of your life and mine,” Nubnofret said clearly. “Rise and do him homage.”
Tbubui came to her feet with the fluid grace that had made Khaemwaset’s mouth dry up from the first moment he had seen her. She turned, the sun flowing along the plain circlet of silver crowning her forehead, and went to the stone again, this time in front of Khaemwaset. With a shock that sent colour flooding into his face, he felt her lips surreptitiously press against the arch of his foot, then she stood before him, kohled eyes sparkling under their dusting of gold eye-paint.
“A contract of marriage exists between us, Tbubui,” Khaemwaset intoned, praying that under the onslaught of that slightly parted, orange mouth, those huge, knowing eyes, he might not forget the words of ritual. “I swear before Thoth, Set and Amun, the patrons of this house, that I have dealt fairly and honestly with you, and my signature on the contract testifies to that honesty. Do you also swear?”
“Most noble Prince,” she responded, her voice rising high and emphatically, “I swear before Thoth and Osiris, the patrons of the house I once inhabited, that I have no other living husband, that I have declared the true extent of my temporal holdings, and that my signature is affixed to the contract in all honesty. This I swear.” Behind her Sisenet stirred, shifting his weight surreptitiously from one foot to the other, and Harmin grinned openly at Sheritra. The three of them, Sisenet, Tbubui and Harmin, seemed full of an odd air of frivolity, as though at any moment they might burst out laughing.
Of course they are happy, Khaemwaset thought as he held out a hand for Tbubui to take. So am I. I want to laugh also. I want to tickle her in a most unprincely fashion. At that he did smile, and she answered him with a squeeze of her cool fingers.
His servants were lined up on either side of the broad way leading to the house. Nubnofret stepped in front, signalling again to the priest, who began to sing. The acolyte walked ahead of him, and the white milk and purple blood splashed and ran together to form pink rivulets that steamed on the hot stone and ran away into the grass. As Nubnofret led the way the servants went to the ground, doing full homage to their new mistress, who was gliding past them on the Prince’s arm, her relatives behind.