Read Seer of Egypt for Free Online Page B

whom I developed a large affection.”
    “Call me whatever you like, Anhur.” Huy rose also. “You are expected to dine with Ishat and me every evening. Now I must lie down and get Tetiankh to put a cool, wet cloth over my eyes.”
    They parted, Anhur to the gate and Huy up to his room. The window hanging was down and the air a little cooler than the furnace outside. Huy put his head on his pillow with a vast relief. He did not open his eyes when Tetiankh entered. He heard the sudden rush of water as the servant wrung out the cloth, then felt it settle over his face. The action was repeated.
    Huy drowsed, but at the back of his mind was a picture of Amunhotep walking across the outer court of the temple to the Aten, the Visible Disc of the sun. Huy did not know why the image disturbed him. The worship of the Disc had gone on for many hentis. The Aten was not popular with the common people; its representations were too starkly simple. It had no face, animal or human, to receive the prayers. It enjoyed a constant but small following among well-educated aristocrats, who revered it for its rays of light that struck the earth and became lions. “The Aten makes the actual physical rays of Amun, who is also Amun-Ra.” Huy could hear the voice of his teacher during the time the class had been taught the intricacies of the various forms the gods took, and their modes of worship. “Lions are the physical representations of the rays of Amun-Ra. Representations. Do you see the difference, boys? Aten and its rays belong to the sun. When the rays strike the earth and become lions, they are representations, without the power of the rays themselves. Every sphinx with its lion’s body is, however, revered for what it represents .” Huy remembered being supremely bored with this nitpicking. Now he wished he had paid more attention to his teacher.
    The cult of the Aten was a solar cult. The rays of the Aten were superior to Amun until they touched the earth, where they became impotent, imprisoned in lions both real and stone. It was not a concept designed to appeal to the unlettered peasant, who brought his gifts and his pleas to the local totem of his town. Why is this important? Huy asked himself. Why am I puzzling over it when all I want to do is sleep away this damnable pain until the evening? Nevertheless, the vision of Pharaoh striding towards the inner court where the Disc filled the sanctuary made him afraid, and he could not rest.

2
    T he small barracks for Anhur and his soldiers was almost finished by the time Huy’s parents and his brother, Heby, accompanied by Ishat’s mother, Hapzefa, alighted from the barge Huy had sent to bring them and walked hesitantly through Huy’s gate. Huy and Ishat were waiting for them under the shade of the pillars fronting the house. Both watched them come with mixed emotions. “They are bunched together like frightened sheep,” Ishat hissed at Huy. “Even Heby looks apprehensive. I hope Merenra is busy pouring plenty of wine!”
    Huy did not answer, his mind all at once filling with his father’s refusal to approach him, even to look at him, after he had been rescued from outside the House of the Dead by Methen and carried home. The Rekhet’s pronouncement that he was free of any demon possession and did not need exorcising had made no change in Hapu’s desertion of his needy son. That was eight years ago, Huy reminded himself as he stepped out into the sun’s glare and prepared to greet his relatives. Father and I have managed to arrive at a mutual respect, yet the extent of my love for him has remained small.
    The little group was slowing. Huy held out his arms to Hapu and embraced him, inhaling the man’s nervous sweat, the slightly harsh underlying odour of his skin, feeling its untreated roughness. “Welcome to my home, Father,” he said lightly as they broke apart. “Life, Health, and Prosperity to you.”
    Hapu acknowledged the polite greeting with a half smile. “Your