The Sublime Seven Read online

  “The seeds are a nice touch. You’re settling in well, then?” Papa said. Exhaustion showed in every line of his dark-skinned face. As a skilled stone mason working in the Friends of Khafre phyle, his services were in high demand. It seemed everyone wanted Akhon to perform the finest, most delicate work. His nickname was 'Iizmil Rayiysiun – Chisel Master – and his talent was the reason he came home every evening almost too tired to eat before falling into the deep sleep of the weary.

  “I am,” Jamila said, with a satisfied smile. Her labors at the bakery weren’t as physically demanding as those of her father, but in their own wary, they were as necessary as his. Hungry builders would never be able to erect the pyramids.

  “But I like the work very much,” she continued. “And this time of year, the heat from the ovens is welcome.”

  “You won’t feel that way come summer.”

  “True. But for now, I’m enjoying it. Also, there is a boy nearby at the office of the Clerks...” She hadn’t decided to enter into this delicate conversation until just that moment. Her father was in a contented mood, and it almost felt as if Hathor, the Cow Goddess of feminine love and fertility, was nudging her in this endeavor.

  Her father’s eyes had lost their sleepy expression. “What boy?”

  “Nephi, the middle son of Makalani, the scribe.”

  Her father grunted, but didn’t reply.

  She hurried on. “Nephi is apprenticing with his father. You should see his papyri, Papa. They’re almost as elegant as yours.”

  The moment the words tumbled out of her mouth, she knew they were a mistake.

  “It is one thing to scribble ink upon a papyrus and quite another to chisel the glyphs into a block of granite.”

  His tone did not invite a response, but she persevered. She had gone this far.

  “Of course, I know that. I didn’t mean to imply that his talent rivals yours. I’m just explaining he may be a good match for me. You’re so busy, you might not realize I have become eligible for marriage.” She cast her eyes downward in embarrassment. If her mother had survived childbirth, she would be having this conversation with her, not a grumpy father who was at least as embarrassed to think about his daughter becoming a woman as she was in telling him.

  “Hmmph. Why didn’t you speak of this before?”

  “I hadn’t yet found an auspicious moment.”

  He sighed, suddenly looking older than his thirty-seven years. “His father approves?”

  She nodded, barely able to suppress a giddy outburst of happy, relieved laughter.

  “Very well. I won’t forbid it, since his father is respected in Giza. My status is not equal to his, so your beauty must be tipping the scales in your favor.”

  Akhon’s candor was as well-known as his skill. It was one of the characteristics she most loved and despised about him. She had lost track of the times he had noted her clumsiness, usually in the presence of snickering neighbors.

  “I’m only average in that area, Papa. You see me as beautiful because you’re my father.”

  He smiled. “Jamila, my dear child, you have no idea how special you are. It is a testament to you that you’re not vain, as are most of the females these days.”

  “But I’m terribly clumsy.”

  He nodded. “You are that. Nephi must not mind a girl with two left feet. Where are you going? It’s getting dark,” Akhon watched her clear the remnants of the meal and don her frayed wrap.

  “I’m going to tell him the wonderful news,” she said, kissing the top of her father’s head.

  “I’ll go with you. I don’t want you traveling alone past the beer vendors and cemetery this late.”

  “Nonsense. You’re tired. Go to bed, Papa. I won’t be long. I’ll be careful of drunkards and demons.”

  “No drunkard would dare lay a hand on my daughter.”

  “Exactly. And I can handle myself around the demons.” She grinned. It was a joke between them. Only the truly superstitious or ignorant believed in them.

  “Very well. I’ll see you in the morning, my beloved.” He reached for her hand, and pressed his lips against her fingers. “I’m very proud of the woman you have become. I’m sorry I don’t tell you that more often.”

  “You have more on your mind than inflating the ego of your daughter,” she said. But she was deeply moved. Compliments from her father were rare gems. She placed this one alongside the memories of the others she’d received over the years.

  When she returned home later, her head full of images of her future husband, Akhon was snoring. She blew out the oil lamp he had left burning for her, then crawled onto her pallet. She would be up again before the sunrise, so she hoped to fall asleep quickly. But she soon realized she was too excited to sleep. It felt like hours passed by the time she slipped into the dream realm.

  When she awoke, Madjet, the morning boat of the sun god Ra, was already traveling across the eastern sky.

  She had overslept and her father was gone. She scrambled out of bed, splashed water on her face, and used the urine jar. She wouldn’t have time to take it to the latrine before work. She would explain everything to her supervisor and be instantly forgiven for her tardiness.

  She hoped.

  “Ii-ti!” she called to her neighbor as she scurried out onto the residential road. It was unusually quiet; everyone else who had jobs were at them by now. Not Moswen. As the wife of the Head Clerk, she had only to keep her home tidy and her husband fed, which gave the older woman plenty of time to be a nosy nuisance.

  “Hello, yourself,” Moswen said. “You better have an adequate excuse for being late. Nedjem is kindhearted, but only to a point.”

  “I know, I know. I overslept,” she replied, securing the doorway covering of their apartment.

  “And your father allowed it? He spoils you,” the stocky woman said, turning to face Jamila with her hands on hips in such a way that her copper bracelets would be visible.

  Jamila rolled her eyes on the inside. “He is good to me. I’m a lucky daughter.” She tried to walk past the woman, but it seemed her neighbor was in an especially social mood. The short legs worked twice as hard to keep up with Jamila’s long, youthful ones as she walked to the bakery.

  “So where did you go last night? I saw you leave.”

  Of course she had. Moswen missed nothing. Every salacious morsel of gossip within the pyramid builders’ village crossed the woman’s path. If you wanted to know anything about anyone, factual or otherwise, you knocked on Moswen’s door.

  “I just went out for an evening stroll,” Jamila said.

  “Pfft. You went to Makalani’s house, didn’t you? To visit his handsome son, Nephi. Your father should have escorted you. It is unseemly for you to have gone alone.”

  “He was tired. He needed his sleep.”

  “If your mother were alive, she would have insisted on it. It’s scandalous the way he lets you traipse about the village like a boy or a married woman.”

  “He trusts me, Moswen. He knows I would never bring shame upon our house.”

  “That’s what all young people say. Then your blood gets hot and your thighs spread of their own volition.”

  Jamila laughed. She couldn’t deny the effect of Nephi’s kisses.

  “Save your virginity for your wedding bed, young lady. I assume your father didn’t instruct you in such matters. What a pity your mother isn’t here to do it.”

  “I’m not ignorant. I know about all that.” She felt the heat rising in her cheeks, whether from annoyance or discomfiture, she couldn’t tell. Moswen was correct. Her widowed father had never thought to reveal the mysteries of sex to his only daughter. She had learned about all that from friends, whispered revelations told between giggles and graphic pictures rendered in the sand.

  “I doubt that. Perhaps you know about the physical aspect – how that part fits into this part – but do you comprehend all the complicated, nuanced, frustrating sides to marriage? You didn’t have an example growing up, so how
could you?”

  “I’ll learn as I go. Now, I really must hurry before Nedjem gives me a lashing.”

  “Nedjem has a soft spot for you. Don’t take advantage of that,” Moswen added, as Jamila pulled away. The woman had been distracted by a trinket vendor set up near the bakery.

  “How much for this hideous piece? It’s too garish for anything but costuming.”

  Jamila smiled. In addition to gossip, Moswen was an expert on haggling. She would negotiate the price down to a quarter of whatever the seller was asking for it. She was happy to be rid of the woman, even if it meant passing the burden onto a hapless street vendor.

  “Ii-ti, Nedjem,” Jamila said, ducking into the oven room. She hung her wrap on a nearby hook. The roomy, warm space smelled wonderful. Was there anything more delectable than the scent of baking bread? She breathed it in, thinking of the savory herbs she planned to include in one of her batches today.

  When she turned to regale her supervisor with a disarming smile, she saw wide-eyed alarm on the kindly face.

  “What is it, Nedjem? What is wrong?”

  “Oh, Jamila. They came here looking for you.” The wrinkled prune of a face had never looked so sad. Jamila felt a stab of terror that threatened to turn her bowels to liquid.

  “Who? Who came looking for me?”

  “Two of the men from your father’s phyle. He’s been injured, lamb. Your father is with the physician even now. Go to him. Hurry! There may not be much time.”

  She darted from the warmth of the room, forgetting her wrap in her blind panic. Which physician? There were several. The most revered physicians served the needs of Egypt’s nobility and the pharaoh himself. Her father would not be with them. Her mind scanned a list of names, deciding on one near the middle. She altered her course slightly toward the avenue that would bring her to the apartment building of Kamuzu; it was a respectable address at which to practice the lucrative business of surgery and pharmacopoeia.

  It took her ten minutes to run the distance.

  She ignored the clerk sitting in the reception hall; she had been to Kamuzu’s building before with a badly broken wrist and knew the way to the treatment room. When she rushed through the curtained doorway, the nightmare scenario she’d conjured during her frantic run materialized before her eyes. Her father lay on a raised pallet. Linen gauze encased his torso; bright red spots had soaked through much of it. His left arm – the Master Chisel arm – was also wrapped and dangling from a medical contraption designed to keep limbs elevated.

  The worst part was his head.

  The bandages there weren’t head-shaped. She could see a pronounced crater in the right side of his skull. His eyes were closed, but the torso rose and fell. Barely.

  Two men stood next to him; both turned to face the intrusion. Kamuzu himself, not an assistant, was treating her father. For that, she was grateful. The other man’s face evoked utterly conflicting emotions within her. She didn’t know whether to be happy to see Nephi or terrified that he was here before Akhon’s own daughter. What did it mean?

  “Jamila, you shouldn’t be here,” Kamuzu said. “He’s unconscious. You won’t be able to speak to him. It will only cause you distress to see him in this state.”

  “He is my father. Of course I should be here,” she choked out the words, then walked, dreamlike, to stand beside Nephi. She felt his arm encircle her shoulders, but she didn’t look at him. Her gaze rested on her father’s bandaged head.

  “He is alive, child,” Kamuzu said, kindness evident in his voice. “But for how long, I cannot say. And Jamila, you should know it may be better for him if he does not regain consciousness. His brain has suffered severe damage. I have removed some of the bone fragments to allow for swelling, but it won’t be enough. The injury should have been fatal.”

  “But it wasn’t,” she whispered. “And if the gods saw fit to save his life, I will take care of him.”

  Kamuzu arched an eyebrow. “A damaged brain can manifest all manner of bizarre, unpleasant behaviors. Nephi, please see Jamila home. I will send word if Akhon’s situation changes.”

  She felt arms guiding her out of the treatment room, past the clerk in the reception hall, and onto the street.

  “I don’t want to go home, Nephi. I’m going back to work,” she said, turning and facing him finally. “Why are you even here? How did you know my father had been injured?”

  The luminous dark eyes gazed down at her with something that might have been guilt. Her heart flopped in her chest.

  “I had gone to your father at his jobsite. I felt it proper to ask his permission for your hand, despite your nontraditional upbringing.”

  “You were there when the accident occurred? What happened? Did a stone tumble onto him?”

  Nephi’s eyes darted everywhere but to her own. The corners of his mouth turned down, and his chin trembled. “It was a fall. He lost his footing on the scaffolding.”

  “Akhon is the most cautious and sure-footed of all. How could that have happened? Did you see it for yourself?”

  “I don’t want you to hate me, Jamila.”

  “Why would I hate you? I love you.” It was difficult to force the words past the lump in her throat. She dreaded his reply.

  “I distracted him. I should have waited until his shift was over, but I was too excited and filled with my love for you to delay further. And Jamila, this part isn’t my fault. A large block had crashed into the scaffolding earlier that morning and weakened the section your father bumped into. Otherwise, it would have held. It was just bad luck. The worst kind of luck.”

  Her knees buckled and she slumped to the ground. The tears that had been lurking for the past half-hour burst forth from their dam and slid down her cheeks.

  “Oh, Nephi. Better I don’t say anything than to blurt out words I’ll regret later. Please, just go away. I need to be alone for a few minutes before I return to work.”

  “I knew I shouldn’t have told you!”

  “You didn’t have a choice. I would have heard all the embellished details from Moswen. Just go.”

  When she looked back up, he had vanished from the street. Passersby glanced at her crouching on the bricks – some with sympathy, and others with disdain. It was not the Egyptian way to display one’s emotions so publicly.

  She gathered herself, brushing fingertips across a damp face and straightening her shoulders. She pressed her lips together, stared straight ahead, and walked back to the bakery.

  Two weeks later...

  “Very good, Papa!” Jamila held the door cover open for her father to shuffle through. At least he was able to walk on his own now. She was young and strong, but her father was not a slight man, despite losing weight during his recovery.

  “Where am I?” His one viable eye took in the surroundings of their apartment. The impact of his fall had not only shattered his skull, it had also damaged the delicate bones where his eyeball resided. Kamuzu said the misshapen, milky thing it had become should be removed since it was useless, but Jamila had no money to pay for the surgery, and she had already given her a discounted price for treating the worst of her father’s injuries. So she had covered the eye with the softest linen she could find, then tied it in place with a gauze strip.

  “You’re home, Papa.” She guided him to his sleep pallet and eased him to its surface.

  “Oh, yes. I remember now,” he said, though she could tell he didn’t. This was a new development, the lying about things he thought he should know. It broke her heart.

  “Of course you do. Now why don’t you take a nap while I get supper? The line will be short now.”

  “Jamila, I’m no longer employed. They won’t let us get our meals from the food complex if I’m not working on the pyramid.”

  “Hush. That is not your problem. And did you forget that I am also a worker in the service of Khafre?”

  “You’re a baker. I remember.”

  She smiled. It was gratifying when her father got something right. Perhaps
with time, the workings of his mind would improve. Kamuzu the physician didn’t hold out hope, but she did.

  “That’s right, Papa. I’m leaving now, but I’ll be back soon.”

  She waited until his good eye closed and his breathing became regular, then she grabbed her market basket and stepped back out onto the street, inhaling air that did not smell like soiled diapers and body odor. She would fetch water from the village cistern after dinner to bathe her father. The notion of washing his naked body was alarming and revolting, but she would do it. She had to.

  Her mind wrangled with a hundred problems, so she didn’t notice Moswen’s pointy nose poking out of the nearby doorway when she walked past.

  “Jamila, wait. I’ll go with you,” the stout woman said, huffing and puffing to catch up to her. Jamila intentionally increased her pace.

  “I’m in a hurry, Moswen. I don’t have time to chat.”

  The woman would not be deterred so easily. “Then you’ll make time to listen, at least.”

  She glanced down at the woman who wore an expression that was both unfamiliar and indistinct. She couldn’t imagine what useless prattle would spill forth from those thin lips.

  “What is it?” she said, distracted by thoughts of the food complex in the distance. She hoped they wouldn’t demand to see her credentials; she only had the one chit for herself. Her father no longer qualified for the meal program since he wasn’t an active worker on the pyramid, but it depended on the supervisor as to whether she would be given enough for two people or just one. There was leeway in the system, but she knew she couldn’t exploit the kindness of others forever.

  “I want to help,” Moswen replied, breathlessly. “I know you’re struggling. I can keep an eye on your father during the day when you’re at the bakery. And perhaps I can assist in other ways, too.”

  “Why would you want to help us? We’re neighbors, not family.”

  Jamila was forced to stop now that she was at the food line. She took a deep breath and turned her attention to the squatty woman gazing up at her with a forlorn expression.

  “There’s much you don’t know, child.” Moswen spoke in a whisper, her eyes glancing around, looking for potential eavesdroppers.