Heretic of El Amarna

Chapter 5: Nefertiti

This morning Thutmose came to my rooms with guards and his confounded cat – the cat and I disliked each other because she bit me my first day at the palace, and I had struck her away from me out of instinct. Thumose woke me with a brisk manner and made me get up. I shivered in my thin nightdress because the night air had not yet fled from our desert home. Glancing out the window, I saw that it was still dark. 

“You remember that promise I made you, Nefertiti?” He whispered sharply in my ear.

I nodded, my stomach suddenly lurching and my face turning pale.

I struggled not to be sick as he said, “Well, my fulfillment of that oath is beginning now.”

With that, he allowed the guards to take me by the arms and lead me down the halls of the palace.

Ordinarily, I would probably have kicked and screamed, but I was not fully awake yet, and I did not understand what he was going to do with me. Where was he taking me? I was too afraid of the possible outcomes to this event to struggle. I just went along peaceably.

We reached a small room in the palace that was normally used for storage. When the guards threw me in, I fell on my side on the hard ground. I sprained my ankle in the fall and was in considerable pain. I fought to keep back the tears welling in my eyes.

Thutmose noticed that I limped as I walked over to the bed in the corner of the room. For some reason, Thutmose looked annoyed with the guards. He hissed at them, and I caught only the words, “Not allowed to damage her physically! Be more careful with her!”

I filed the information away for possibly use later as Thutmose waved the guards off and came over to stand above me in the small room his cat by his side, purring loudly like usual. I wanted to shrink away from him. However, I steeled myself and stared him down.

“You are staying in here until I am satisfied that you are broken. Not only that, you are not going to have any visitors apart from myself and my mother.”

I dropped my eyes from his cold black ones.

His tone softened the slightest bit as he said, “This is your last chance to cooperate with me, Nefertiti. If you do not do so now, I will go through with my plans to break you for as long as it takes to accomplish my goal. Will you cooperate or not?” He lifted my chin so that I had to look him in the eye.

He seemed to see the answer in my eyes before I even responded to the question.

A moment later, I shoved his hand from my face and shook my head vehemently. I would not cooperate with him. He could do his worst. I hardly cared anymore.

He nodded and with a slight, tight-lipped smile, he said, “I thought that would be your response.”

Then he was gone, taking his infernal cat with him, and I was left alone in the small room with only one little slit to let in the coming dawn.