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  The Crocodile Makes No Sound

  Copyright © 2020 by N. L. Holmes

  The Lord Hani Mysteriestm 2020

  All rights reserved.

  Quotes from “The Instructions of Any” and “Be a Scribe” from Ancient Egyptian Literature by Miriam Lichtheim, University of California Press, 1976.

  Cover art and map© by Streetlight Graphics.

  Author photo© by Kipp Baker.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to locales, events, business establishments, or actual persons—living or dead—is entirely coincidental.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Lake of Flowers (The Lord Hani Mysteries, #5)

  Historical Notes

  Characters

  Glossary

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 15

  Did you enjoy Lake of Flowers? Here is a sample from the next Lord Hani Mystery, Pilot Who Knows the Water

  CHAPTER 1

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Dedicated to the excavation team at Kommos, who introduced me to orpiment.

  Historical Notes

  Our story takes place in the seventeenth and final year of Akh-en-aten’s reign (by the reckoning of this account, his twelfth alone on the throne) and immediately thereafter, so about 1338 BCE. Those who deny him a coregency with his father would put the date five years later. We are entering one of the murkiest moments in Egyptian history, where the very identities of the monarchs are held in question. This is because the later successors of the “Heretic King” completely obliterated from the record him and his immediate successors. Scholars debate whether Ankh-khepru-ra Smenkh-ka-ra held a coregency with Akhenaten or ruled alone. Indeed, we don’t even know who he was—Akh-en-aten’s brother? His son? His wife, under a masculine name? A Hittite prince? Was Ankhet-nefru-ra the same person or a female ruler sharing essentially the same name? The novelist has to make some choices, and they’re not always the most likely in the historical sense.

  Similar problems arise with the parentage of Prince Tut-ankh-aten. He may have been Akh-en-aten’s son or Smenkh-ka-ra’s... or someone else’s. DNA suggests that he was the son of two unidentified mummies that have been tested, and that those parents were brother and sister (or double cousins). I have tried to respect the genetic evidence, but the reader should bear in mind that this story is fiction.

  We know from Hittite documents about the journey to obtain a husband for a certain widowed queen of Egypt, as yet unidentified. Some scholars believe she was the widow of Tut-ankh-amen, others that she was one of the queens who preceded him, that is, Nefert-iti or Meryet-aten. I have adopted the latter scenario and tried to construct a plausible motivation. Hani was historically the emissary sent to carry this mission out.

  Because this period has been blanked out of Egyptian records, we don’t know what happened after the death of Akh-en-aten, but one may imagine that, given the dissatisfaction of a large number of important people, there would have been civil unrest of some kind.

  As for Maya, the treasurer of Tut-ankh-aten, he is certainly not our Ptah-mes/Maya, but I have taken the liberty of conflating them.

  The Egyptians had a sense of the circulatory system, the meaning of a pulse, and so forth, but they thought that air as well as blood was pumped throughout the body through the same vessels (which is more or less true on the cellular level). Turnips are attested in Egypt at a later period, but there’s no reason to think they didn’t enter the country earlier. And finally, a real wooden prosthetic toe was found in an ancient Egyptian burial.

  Characters

  (Characters marked with an * are purely fictional)

  Hani’s Family

  A’a*: gatekeeper of Hani’s family.

  Amen-em-hut: Nub-nefer’s brother, Third Prophet of Amen.

  Amen-em-ope known as Pa-kiki* (The Monkey): Hani and Nub-nefer’s younger son.

  Amen-hotep known as Hani: a diplomat.

  Amen-hotep known as Aha*: Hani and Nub-nefer’s elder son. Later takes the name Hesy-en-aten.

  Amen-hotep known as Anuia: Amen-em-hut’s wife, a chantress of Amen.

  Amen-hotep called Tepy*: Maya and Sat-hut-haru’s eldest son.

  Amen-mes known as Maya*: Hani’s dwarf secretary and son-in-law, married to Sat-hut-haru.

  Baket-iset*: Hani’s eldest daughter.

  Bener-ib*: Neferet’s partner and fellow sunet.

  Bin-addi*: a servant from Kharu, working for Hani.

  In-hapy*: Maya’s mother, a royal goldsmith.

  Khawy*: an orphaned student taken in by the household.

  Khentet-ka*: Aha’s wife.

  Mai-her-pri*: Maya’s third child and second son.

  Meryet-amen*: Mery-ra’s widowed lady friend.

  Mery-ra: Hani’s father.

  Mut-nodjmet*: Pipi’s daughter, the wife of Pa-kiki.

  Pa-ra-em-heb known as Pipi*: Hani’s brother.

  Neferet*: Hani and Nub-nefer’s youngest daughter, a physician to the royal women.

  Nub-nefer*: Hani’s wife, a chantress of Amen.

  Sat-hut-haru*: Hani and Nub-nefer’s second daughter, married to Maya.

  Other Characters

  Ankh-kepru-ra Smenkh-ka-ra: Akh-en-aten’s coregent and brother.

  Ankhet-khepru-ra Nefer-nefru-aten: former queen Nefert-iti, ruling briefly as king after her husband’s death.

  Ay: father of Nefert-iti, a cavalry officer and uncle of Akh-en-aten, who bore the title God’s Father.

  Ba-ba-ef*: servant of Pentju and Djefat-nebty.

  Djefat-nebty*: a female doctor treating the royal women. The teacher of Neferet and Bener-ib.

  Har-em-heb: a general of the infantry and son-in-law of Ay.

  Ipuki*: a laundryman, widower of Tuy.

  Khuit*: an old neighborhood healer and midwife.

  Mahu: chief of Akh-en-aten’s police at Akhet-aten.

  Mai: First Prophet of Amen-Ra until deposed by Akh-en-aten.

  Mane son of Pa-iry: former ambassador to Naharin and Hani’s friend.

  Menna*: a young infantry officer, whose life Hani had once saved.

  Meryet-aten*: Akh-en-aten and Nefert-iti’s eldest daughter, who served as nominal Great Royal Wife to her father, to Smenkh-ka-ra, and even to her mother.

  Nakht-ef-mut*: Bener-ib’s father. A wab-priest and teacher of medicine at Sau who had just been appointed physician to the crown prince.

  Nakht-pa-aten: vizier of the Upper Kingdom under Akh-en-aten.

  Nefer-khepru-ra Wa-en-ra Akh-en-aten: the “heretic king” under whom the Egyptian pantheon was replaced by a sole god, the Aten.

  Pa-ra-mes-su: adjutant of Har-em-heb.

  Pentju: royal physician, priest of the Aten, and chamberlain under Akh-en-aten.

  Ptah-mes son of Bak-en-ren-ef: Hani’s friend and former superior, who had been stripped of office for countering the king.

  Ra-ne
fer*: vizier of the Lower Kingdom. His real name is unknown.

  Sen-nedjem: nephew of Ay and tutor to Prince Tut-ankh-aten.

  Si-mut: Second Prophet of Amen-Ra, deposed by Akh-en-aten.

  Tut-ankh-aten: crown prince under Akh-en-aten.

  Tuy*: a midwife, late wife of Ipuki.

  User-hat*: a laundryman, son of Ipuki and Tuy.

  Glossary

  akh: the combined souls of a person in their blessed state after death.

  Akhet-aten: “Horizon of the Aten”, capital of Akh-en-aten.

  Amen-Ra: chief god of New Kingdom Egypt, supplanted briefly by Akh-en-aten’s “reform.”

  the Aten: the visible sun disk, probably identified with Akh-en-aten’s father, Amen-hotep III, who became the chief then only god under Akh-en-aten.

  Azzati: center of Egypt’s rule among the northern vassals. Today’s Gaza.

  bennu bird: symbol of the reborn soul; it was thought to look like a heron. Later identified with the phoenix.

  birthing bricks: the blocks on which a woman squatted during childbirth, to raise her so the baby could be lowered to the ground between her feet.

  Crocodiles: Hani’s term for the rebellious priests of Amen-Ra and their sympathizers who plotted a return to the old ways.

  Djahy: the lower half of the Levant, corresponding more or less to Roman Palestina. It had been held by Egypt since the beginning of the eighteenth dynasty.

  Djehuty: (Thoth) judge of the soul after death and patron of scribes.

  Double House of Silver and Gold: the treasury, although technically much of Egypt’s wealth was held in commodities.

  Feast of Drunkenness: a festival in honor of Hut-haru (Hathor), goddess of joy, sex, beauty, music, and abandon. According to myth, she had once been so angered at the human race that she went on a destructive rampage, ready to drink its blood. But humans outsmarted her by dyeing beer red like blood and letting her drink her fill until she was drunk and forgot about her anger.

  Field of Reeds: the Egyptian paradise where blessed souls lived in an environment like earth only perfected.

  Gem-pa-aten: a temple of the Aten in Thebes in which Akh-en-aten tried out his shocking new artistic style for the first time.

  Great House: “Per-a’o,” meaning the palace. It came to refer to the king himself. Our word pharaoh derives from this.

  hapiru: a loose, nomadic group of bandits and social outcasts that terrorized the eastern borders of Egypt’s Syrian vassals.

  Haru (Horus) in the nest: the title of the crown prince.

  House of Rejoicing: Amen-hotep III’s jubilee palace in Waset, from which he ruled for the remainder of his reign.

  House of Royal Ornaments: the name of the king’s harem.

  Hut-nen-nesut: also known as Hnes, a city near the Fayyum Oasis. Later called Heracleopolis.

  Inpu (Anubis): jackal-headed god of embalming.

  Ipet-isut: Greatest of Shrines, the temple of Amen-Ra at Thebes.

  iteru: a unit of distance, approximately a mile.

  Kap: the royal nursery where the king’s sons were brought up with the sons of high aristocrats and vassal princes.

  Kheta Land: the Hittite empire, in modern Turkey.

  Lake of Flowers: the lake which the soul, once judged worthy, had to pass over before reaching the Field of Reeds.

  Men-nefer: Memphis, capital of the Lower Kingdom.

  menut: a mourning dove.

  orpiment: a yellow pigment made from a crystalline form of arsenic. Repeated contact, even without ingestion, can slowly poison a person.

  Osir: Osiris, king of the underworld. A deceased person was often referred to as “an Osiris.”

  Pa-maru-en-pa-aten: Sunshade of the Aten, one of several pleasure parks in Akhet-aten designed for members of the royal family as a place where the beauties of the Aten were visible.

  Per-nefer: a port at the mouth of the Nile through which ships sailed for the Mediterranean.

  Red Land: the desert, as opposed to the Nile valley, the Black Land.

  Sangar: Babylonia.

  Sau (Saïs): city in the delta, home to the cult of Sekhmet and a seat of medical training.

  Sekhmet: lion-headed goddess of plague and of healing.

  senet: a board game similar to checkers, played by two people.

  Serqet: scorpion-tailed goddess who protected from stings and other harm.

  Seyawt: modern Asyut, in Middle Egypt.

  shebyu: a heavy gold collar with lens-shaped beads, awarded by the king to those he wished to honor.

  Shu and Tefnut: Air and Moisture, the first generation of gods—siblings and spouses—after the primal All divided.

  Sutesh: (Seth) god of chaos and the desert.

  sunet (f., m. sunu): a physician of the more scientific sort, as opposed to priestly or magician healers.

  Ta-nehesy: Kush or Nubia, the land to the south of Egypt (today’s Sudan), held by Egypt as a viceroyalty in the New Kingdom.

  Teni-menu: the palace built by Akh-en-aten at Thebes, when he was still coregent with his father.

  Waset: Thebes, the capital of the Upper Kingdom, ancestral home of the Eighteenth Dynasty, and center of the worship of Amen-Ra.

  Way of Haru: one of several roads up the coast of Djahy and Amurru, maintained for the rapid movement of Egypt’s armies.

  CHAPTER 1

  Hani would forever remember what he was doing the day he learned of the coregent’s death. He and his father, Mery-ra, were strolling in the garden before dinner, on their leisurely way to the garden pavilion where they would eat on warm summer evenings. As if they were synchronized everywhere on earth, the cicadas roared in rhythmic waves, and the late-afternoon sun was a golden liquid dripping through the leaves of the big sycomore fig and spattering the gravel of the path. Hani breathed deeply of the shady air. Despite all the troubles in the world around him, he couldn’t help but believe that life was good. Jasmine and lilies were in bloom, as well as earthy aromatics and white daisies—the air was syrupy with their perfume as if scent had mass. Could a man ask for more?

  “Look, Father,” Hani said with a smile.

  He pointed to where Qenyt, his pet heron, stood on one leg in the shallows of the pool, as still as a statue, her gray color making her almost invisible among the reeds that swayed there—a whisper of feathers, a deadly shadow of bird. All at once, her long neck unfurled, and her dagger-sharp beak plunged into the water. A moment later, she stood with a twisting silver fish in her bill, which almost immediately disappeared down her throat.

  “She’s ruthless.”

  Mery-ra chuckled, his belly bouncing. “I’ve found that to be true of females generally, son. Haven’t you ever noticed that with all the devious ladies you’ve had to serve over the years?”

  Hani joined him in his laughter. “You have a point. Certainly, the royal women are a cutthroat bunch.” But he added with a twinkle in his eye, “Of course, our women are very different.”

  “I should think,” said Nub-nefer from behind him. She emerged from among the bushes, a tray in her hands, upon which were arranged a variety of cheeses and pickled vegetables and bread cut into chunks. “However, our men tend to get hungry before a meal.” Hani’s wife set the tray down on a little folding table in the pavilion. “I’ll bring you some beer. The kitchen girls have had it cooling in the well. Dinner will be a while yet.”

  “Thank you, my dove,” Hani stroked her coppery arm. As Nub-nefer’s name proclaimed, she was pure gold—his golden treasure. Even after thirty-six years of marriage, he felt she had perfections he had yet to plumb.

  The two men settled into their chairs on the porch of the pavilion and stretched out their legs. Mery-ra expelled a big breath with a whoosh. “Hot.” He folded his arms over his head to cool his armpits.

  “That shouldn’t surprise you, Father. It’s almost time for the Inundation.”

  Without lowering his arms, Mery-ra scrubbed his close-cropped gray hair. “I’m not surprised, but it’s hot none
theless. These are the heriu-renpet, the intercalary days. The old year is fast coming to an end. What will the new one bring, do you suppose?”

  Nub-nefer and one of the serving girls approached with the beer pot and its stand. “Here you are, my hungry men,” she called from the porch of the pavilion, her voice rich with affection.

  Suddenly, Hani heard wild footsteps hammering down the gravel path from the gate, and his youngest daughter, Neferet, burst into the open, red-faced and panting. “Mama! Papa! Grandfather! Ankh-khepru-ra Smenkh-ka-ra is dead!”

  Hani and Nub-nefer exchanged a stunned look. Hani struggled to swallow, wondering if he’d heard his daughter correctly. The coregent, only in his twenties, has died?

  Mery-ra was the first to regroup. “When, my girl? How?”

  “The plague, Grandfather. It just took him off like that.” She snapped her fingers. “It hasn’t even been made public yet.” Neferet, a physician of the ladies attached to Ankh-kheperu’s court in Waset, would have been one of the first to know about this turn of events.

  “That’s what happens when the king doesn’t perform the Appeasement of Sekhmet ritual,” Mery-ra said in a dire tone. “She gets mad.”

  “Today’s the birthday of Sutesh,” Hani murmured. “A day of ill omen.”

  They all got to their knees and scraped up dust to strew on their heads in a gesture of mourning. Hani climbed heavily to his feet, sweat beginning to spring out on his forehead. This is the first brick falling out of the edifice King Nefer-khepru-ra has built. Now what will happen? The building is starting to crumble.

  Nub-nefer’s face lit up with hope. She fastened huge glowing eyes on her husband, and Hani knew she was thinking the same thing but with a more unambiguous joy. Hani stared around him, the tableau of his family fixing itself in his memory. This wasn’t just an occasion to tie on the white headband of mourning and participate in the lavish funeral rites of a king. Something significant had shifted—far more significant than the young deceased himself, who had been none too bright and was undoubtedly under the sway of others, probably his brother—or his wife. The likelihood of civil war breaking out when the present king died had just grown immeasurably greater.