The Twelfth Transforming by Pauline Gedge

softly. “And under them all is a great happiness that my son has come home. You and I have become too much like mice immobilized by fear of hawks circling above that we cannot see. It is time to relax and fix our gaze on the abundance of the fields around us.”
    “A pretty speech,” he murmured dryly, and she laughed at her own pomposity and dismissed him.
    In the evening she took her attendants and went in search of her son. His sumptuous apartments were still in chaos as his servants hurried to unpack the chests and boxes that had accompanied him from Memphis and the palace craftsmen delivered the furniture Tiye had ordered. After one glance inside the silver doors opening to his reception hall, she went out into the garden and finally found him sitting in the grass by the edge of the lake, just as she had always seen him in the harem, his legs tucked under him, a crowd sitting or lying with him. She scanned them quickly as her herald ordered them to make their obeisances. Nefertiti had had her arm linked with his before she knelt to bow to her aunt, and Sitamun had been reclining very prettily on one elbow, her scarlet linen pulled tight over the suggestive mounding of one hip. Amunhotep rose and came forward smiling, arms outstretched, taking her hands and kissing her gently on the mouth.
    “Tell me who these men are with their faces in the dirt,” she said good-humoredly as Piha unfolded her chair. “Sitamun, you should not be publicly lolling among the flowers like some little concubine. Piha, send for another chair.”
    Sitamun gave her a look of mortification as she came to her feet and pulled the gossamer-thin blue cloak across her breasts with both nervous hands.
    “But the grass has just been watered,” Amunhotep said in his high, lilting voice. “Sitamun was enjoying it.” He waved an arm over the company. “Majesty Mother, these are my friends. Pentu, priest of the temple of Ra-Harakhti at On. Panhesy, also priest of the sun, whom I have made my chief steward. Tutu, who has so diligently written down my words and whose hand you saw in my letters to you. Kenofer, Ranefer…” One by one the men left the ground and kissed her feet, looking up at her with a mixture of reverence and challenge. With few exceptions they were distinctive for the shaven skulls and long white kilts of their priesthood. Around their necks or emblazoned on their forearms were the emblems of the God of the Horizon, the hawk with the disk.
    “Mahu,” she said as one man raised kohled eyes to hers. “What are you doing here? Have you lost your headship of the Mazoi?” So this is my son’s spy , she thought. Chief of the Memphis city police .
    Mahu smiled ruefully. “No, indeed, Majesty, but the prince has seen fit to include me, a humble soldier, in his circle of friends.”
    A humble soldier with a not-so-humble liking for the secrets of your queen , Tiye thought again. “And you, Apy? Are you neglecting Pharaoh’s interests in order to sit in the grass at Thebes?”
    “Certainly not, Divine One,” the man replied swiftly, bent double before her. “I simply accompanied the prince on his journey and will take this opportunity to report to the Overseer of the Royal Estates directly on the condition of Pharaoh’s holdings in Memphis before returning home.”
    Tiye sat, and the company relaxed. Amunhotep sank to the grass, pulling his feet in under him, and immediately Nefertiti went down with him, knee to knee. Tiye wondered what she had interrupted, having noticed several scrolls scattered in the grass, together with dishes containing the remains of pastries and cups half full of wine. She became aware of her son’s placid yet steady gaze on her and turned to him. “What did you think of Thebes, Amunhotep?”
    He considered the question with a seriousness it did not deserve. “The streets are filthy,” he said at last, “and the common people smell.”
    The little crowd burst out laughing, and Tiye heard the