Three Novels of Ancient Egypt

“I hear and obey, Your Highness,” said Djedef.

“Then wait at the camp for my messengers at dawn, and be careful not to forget my instructions.”

The prince said this, then stood up to signal that the meeting was finished. Djedef bowed to His Highness and left the room — astounded, distracted, and confused by his bizarre command. “Why,” he said to himself, “did the prince order me to keep the army in its encampment? What could these strange commands possibly be that the messengers will bring to me at dawn? What kind of enemy threatens the nation? What sort of insurrection menaces her security? Every Egyptian goes about his business peacefully under the protection of Pharaoh and his government. So why does he need the army?”

Nervously he returned to his chariot and took off in it, the lady with him. But the closer the vehicle came to Bisharu's house, the lighter seemed his uncertainty as his inner whisperings fled and his mind turned toward his family who had been awaiting him so long with great expectation. Reaching the house, he showed the lady to the guest room, then went up to be with the dearly loved people whom he also had so much longed to see.

His mother Zaya met him — with open arms. She rained kisses upon him as she pressed him to her breast — with fervor, not letting him go until Bisharu pried him loose from her grip, saying, “Welcome, O conquering scion! The courageous commander!”

He kissed him on the cheeks and forehead, then his brothers, Kheny and Nafa, embraced him, as well. He greeted Nafa's wife, who was carrying a nursing baby boy in her arms. She presented him to Djedef, saying, “Look at your namesake, Little Djedef! I gave him your name so that perhaps the gods will grant him glory, like his mighty uncle!”

Djedef looked at Nafa as he held the little one in his arms, then kissed his baby-soft lips, saying to his brother, “What a beautiful portrait he'd make!”

Nafa smiled — his son made him happy the same way his art did — and he took him in his arms. At that moment, Djedef found the opportunity to announce the great news of his engagement. “You won't be the only father, Nafa!”

They all awoke to what he had said, as Nafa called out with joy, “Have you chosen your partner, Commander?”

Djedef lowered his head. “Yes,” he said.

His mother stared at him with ecstatic eyes. “Is it true what you say, my son?”

Quietly he answered, “Yes, my mother.”

“Who is she?” she shouted.

Mana, spellbound, asked as well, “Who is she?”

“You have just come from the field of battle,” laughed Nafa. “Did you woo one of the captives?”

“She is Her Highness Meresankh,” he said, calmly and with pride.

“Meresankh! Pharaoh's daughter?”

“She, and none other.”

Utterly astonished, they were seized by an overpowering happiness that rendered them speechless. Djedef regaled them with the story of Pharaoh's blessing upon him as tears of joy glistened in his handsome eyes. Zaya could not control herself, but burst out weeping, praying to Lord Ptah the Magnanimous, the Gracious. Bisharu was beside himself, rocking back and forth — with his bloated, sagging frame. As for Nafa, he kissed the young man and laughed for a long time with glee and delight. Kheny blessed him, assuring him that the gods do not decree such glorious things without having designed some lofty purpose that no man had previously achieved. All of them kept expressing the gladness and gaiety that were uppermost in their thoughts.

Suddenly, Djedef remembered the woman that he had left in the guest room. He stood up immediately upon recalling her. Quickly relating her story, he said to his mother, “I hope that you will extend her your hospitality, Mama, until she departs our home.”

“I will go down to welcome her, my son.”

Djedef escorted his mother as they entered the guest room together. “Welcome,” she said. “My lady, you have arrived at your own house…”

The woman rose from her seat, her heavy figure drooping from the degradation and disgrace of her long captivity, and put out her hand to her generous hostess. The two women's eyes met for the first time. With lightning speed, they forgot all about their exchange of greetings as they looked at each other strangely, each as though she were struggling to pierce the heavy veil that time had pressed over the face of the distant past. At length, the eyes of the strange woman widened as she shouted with mad astonishment, “Zaya!”

Seized by panic, Zaya stared at her with intense confusion. Djedef kept looking from one to the other in bewilderment, amazed at the woman who knew his mother though she had spent twenty years of her life in the wilderness.

“How do you know my mother?” he asked her in shock.