The Double Crown. Marié Heese

the priests will help?”

      “Everything possible will be done to ensure that the spirit of the Pharaoh will reach the Mountain of the Sunrise,” Thutmose reminded me gently.

      I knew that. Yet still I lived with fear. How could a human heart be so free of evil that it did not outweigh a feather? I could not be sure that my own heart did not conceal some evil thoughts and wishes, even if I did not have blood upon my hands. That it might not rise up and testify against me when my time came.

      For seventy days the fate of Khemet hung in the balance. The departed Pharaoh had to be found worthy and then he would be exalted and live for ever. He would become conjoined with the sun god, Ra, be newly reborn as the sun and sail across the heavens in triumph. Then would the Black Land be blessed and the new Pharaoh could reign. Failing that, the world would end.

      Here endeth the sixth scroll.

      Oh dear, oh dear. I should not be reading Her Majesty’s most intimate secrets, it is not right. She would be horrified if she knew. But now I have seen what I have seen and I cannot pretend that I have not. I wonder whether an act such as my reading what is none of my business could weigh against my heart in the Afterlife? I fear it could. But I will keep my counsel. Nobody will ever hear her secrets from me, unless I must pass on her journals to be used in testimony on her behalf. And even then, I think I shall select. I can be discreet. I shall never speak of this.

      I swear it by the Ka of Thoth.