Song Of The Nile Part 24

Iullus removed his helmet and shook his head. "Selene, you look very well."

"You don't," I replied, noting the dark circles under his eyes. "Are you ill?"

"I'm sickened. When you write to Julia, tell her so. She refuses all missives from me."

I winced at the stab of guilt his words dealt me. I hadn't received a letter from Julia since she'd been wed to Agrippa and I hadn't sent one for fear that her new husband might punish her for it. Now I wondered if it might have been better to risk Agrippa's wrath. "How does she fare?"

"How do you think she fares? She's hurt and humiliated and angry. Especially at me." Sitting down, he leaned back and squeezed his eyes shut. "I couldn't refuse to marry your stepsister. Marcella is the emperor's niece. I could no more refuse than Julia could refuse."

"I'm sure Julia knows that-"

"But you! " His eyes opened again. "For all the influence you have over the emperor, you couldn't dissuade him from marrying Julia to Agrippa? I'm sure you'll tell me that you tried, but you didn't try hard enough. Agrippa wasted no time in putting his filthy hands on Julia. She's with child, you know."

My blood went to water. I didn't know what appalled me more-that Julia should be forced to carry Agrippa's child or that my dearest friend might soon become my greatest rival. If she did manage to have a son, would the emperor still have a need for me? I'd been wary of Livia, but after all the lies I'd told and the predations I'd endured, would it be Julia who finally broke my spell over her father? Stunned, all I could manage to utter was, "Julia? Pregnant? By Agrippa?"

Iullus caught me with a sideways glance. "Congratulate me. I'm to be a father soon."

Examining each word, I dared not ask the questions they raised. Was Julia pregnant with his child, or did he mean that Marcella was pregnant too? "You have my felicitations."

He nodded, eyes still locked on mine. "Our sisters speak of you often, Selene. They've even expressed a desire to visit."

"I hope they do visit!" I said, my spirits brightening. "Did you know that we have another sister? Antonia, the wife of the Greek magnate. She calls herself Hybrida, after her mother."

He showed no sign of surprise. "I'm told she's a vulgar woman. She shouldn't be here. For that matter, neither should you be. Augustus left for Syria at the opening of the sea, but the sea is nearly closed now. It's been months since he left. What are you still doing here?"

"Augustus asked me to wait for him." I almost winced at the reminder. I'd left Mauretania knowing that I might never return, but now I felt something akin to homesickness. I missed the loamy scent of the fields and the songs the Berber women sang round the fires. I even missed the taste of the wind. The sirocco. I would much rather have waited for the emperor there than here. In Iol-Caesaria, it would be time to start planning the winter banquets and the palace would be a bustle of activity while servants scurried to adorn the doorways with candles and garlands. "Will you stay through winter? Until the Saturnalia?"

My Roman half brother's lips tightened in grim military style. "No. I'm to join up with Tiberius outside Armenia. The Armenians no longer wish to be ruled by King Artaxias, so we're going to replace him with Tigranes."

"They no longer wish . . ." It was a strange idea that the people should choose their rulers but not entirely foreign. Riots in the streets of Alexandria had settled matters of succession in Egypt more than once. But that was Egyptians fighting Egyptians. This was Rome interfering. "I suppose it has nothing to do with the fact that King Artaxias executed every single Roman citizen he could find within his borders."

"That was a long time ago," Iullus said.

"Not so long ago. It happened when our father was alive. Your father and mine. Artaxias executed the Romans to settle a score with Mark Antony. Rome doesn't forget and neither do I. Neither should you."

He rolled his shoulders, his eyes on the floor. Iullus never liked to be reminded of his patrimony and let out a mirthless chuckle. "If I do battle in Armenia it will be for Augustus and for Rome, not to avenge Antony. Your twin brother was his defender, not me . . . Why do you still concern yourself with politics? You're a mother now."

As far as the world knew, Iullus was my only living brother. How was it that he still knew me so little? "Yes, I am a mother and that is precisely why I am so concerned."

IULLUS didn't stay long. He and his cadre of young Roman officers shipped off to join Tiberius and the legions. As soon as they left I was again mistress of the dull island and its servile inhabitants. My Mauretanian subjects were respectful but seldom afraid to approach me. By contrast, Easterners were flatterers who abased themselves before the powerful with fluttering fingers and quaking knees. They embroidered their words with long, colorful phrases, not only for the sake of form. They were in terror of me, clearing wide swaths through the streets whenever I traveled. Some of them even bowed to my cat, knowing how highly we regarded creatures like Bast in Egypt.

"That's right, look away, for you are in the presence of greatness!" Crinagoras teased upon our return from a lecture at the Pythagorean School. "And of course, Her Majesty the Queen of Mauretania and future Queen of Egypt."

"Have a care!" I chided him. "I don't need Augustus to hear that I've crowned myself in his absence."

Crinagoras huffed. "Perhaps my humor would be better appreciated in Mytilene."

"You may visit your birthplace whenever you like," I told him, imperiously.

My unwillingness to be threatened with abandonment, even in jest, seemed to sober the poet.

"Well, it's only a stone's throw away and I could be back at your side within days," he said quietly. And I knew there would be no more talk of leaving me.

When we'd returned to the emperor's villa, Circe suggested, "Forget Mytilene, we should all go to Athens. The Athenians loved your father. They would actually worship you there."

I was keenly aware of my daughter's stare. What was I teaching her here on this island, I wondered. When she looked at me, waiting upon the emperor, what would she remember? The truth was, I'd accomplished nothing worthy of worship. Until the emperor returned, I'd stay where he left me, like his accursed chair. Though my rule in Iol-Caesaria had been a maelstrom of projects and politicking, magic and magistracy, now I was restless, a Ptolemy Eagle with clipped wings. My work in Mauretania had warmed my heart with a sense of pride. Here I'd been reduced to a secret hetaera, and I was reminded of that whenever Circe was near. "If you want to go to Athens, I won't stop you."

"A woman traveling alone?" Circe asked, as if scandalized. "Perhaps you could send Memnon to watch over me. Who knows what trouble I might find without his strong sword-arm to protect me."

I should scold her for such comments, for as long as she remained in my retinue, her conduct reflected upon me, but I feared I might choke on my own hypocrisy. Besides, my stiff-necked Macedonian guard didn't so much as acknowledge the flirtatious comment.

Calling for some sheets of papyrus, I sat down to write Julia a letter. My pen hesitated over each word, and I ended up committing it to the fire. I'd had no messages from her since her remarriage. She was being closely watched; I was sure of it. Besides, even if I could slip a letter past Agrippa's censorious eye, what could I say to her? My ambitions had driven a wedge between her father and her husband. I loved her, but we were now, she and I, kept women in enemy camps.

ON a brisk morning, Memnon knocked softly on my door to wake me. "The emperor's ship has been spotted."

I roused myself, intent upon racing to the sh.o.r.e to greet him with the pomp and circ.u.mstance to which he'd no doubt grown accustomed, but he hadn't sent word ahead or given us time to prepare. Indeed, as would later become his habit when entering Rome, he'd arrived swiftly and secretly to forestall any grandiose welcome.

I hurriedly dressed and rushed down the stairs. Augustus was already in the courtyard before my sandal left the last step. The folds of my chiton swayed behind me, and I quite feared that my diadem was askew. "Welcome back, Caesar!"

Holding his arms out so that a slave could relieve him of his dress armor, he seemed almost amused at my breathlessness. "You seem altogether too surprised by my arrival."

"Iullus said there was to be military action in Armenia. I thought you'd be there with Tiberius, to fight King Artaxias."

"As it turns out," he began flatly, "King Artaxias is dead."

I swallowed. "You had him executed? A sovereign king?"

"It wasn't my doing. By the time our forces arrived in Armenia, the king's relatives had already a.s.sa.s.sinated him. So we were able to install the newly made king Tigranes of Armenia unopposed. Tiberius put the crown on his head."

"That ought to please Livia," I said, regaining my bearings. "Her taciturn son is now a kingmaker."

"It ought to please you too. For this clears the way for our campaign in Parthia. Armenia is now an ally, and I can ama.s.s my legions there."

All very tidy. I could never fault Augustus for poor planning. His game was expansive and deep whereas mine was of a single, narrow purpose. But I still remembered my father's tales of arrows launched upon him in Parthia like a plague of insects that darkened the sky. The Romans were infantry fighters, foremost and always; they'd never fared well against Parthia's mounted archers. "If Agrippa were with you, he'd have some new invention, some new technique to frustrate the Parths."

"I have something better than Agrippa and his strategies," Augustus said, those gray eyes fastening on me. "I have a sorceress who can summon the winds with an upraised hand and knock hardened warriors like Agrippa to their knees. I have you, Selene."

When everything we think we know about the world fractures in an instant, we don't hear the shattering. We feel it in our bodies as if we were all dry brittle bone instead of flesh. "Me? You expect me to-to do what? To call down a storm upon the Parthian army and bury them in sand?"

He answered only after he'd waved all the slaves and attendants out of the courtyard. "Is that within your power?"

"No!" Were it in my power, it wouldn't be Parths buried under sand but Roman legions.

"I've had you watched, Selene. I've had reports that you swallowed a storm whole. That you swam in a Mauretanian river and brought dead animals to life. That you nearly swamped a pirate ship with your magic. You've grown stronger."

"So that I could give you grain. I've asked Isis to bring her blessings to the soil of Africa, and she's done it for my sake. To feed people, to nourish people, to protect people-those are the purposes for which I can use her magic. She didn't give me these powers to make war."

"Why not? Your mother made war."

"And you condemned her for it!"

"Quite so," the emperor mused. "But she commanded Antony. You will be commanded by me. The Kandake and the rumors of her fire mage demoralized my Roman legions; I can play the same trick on the Parths." So that is why he kept me on this island-so that I would be near enough to send for if I was needed at the scene of a battle. He motioned me into the seat beside him, and I sank down into it in shock. "Together, Selene, we can avenge your father's ign.o.ble defeat."

My father had been defeated in Parthia, but it had been anything but ign.o.ble. It had been a disastrous campaign, but my father had bravely led a retreat through the Parthian snows. He inspired his soldiers by example, eating gra.s.s and insects to survive. His bravery in the face of relentless pursuit by Parthian forces was a thing of wonder. He'd lost his battle standards, he'd lost most of his men, and he'd lost the fight, but he hadn't lost honor, and even if he had, the emperor was the last man who could have restored it. "No, Caesar. I've never wanted to go to war; I've never wanted to kill anyone."

"That's a lie," Augustus said, leaning close. "When you were a frightened little girl, your face would go pale as the moon. When you were angry, your cheeks burned scarlet. Now your skin betrays nothing. But there is a flutter, right here, at the base of your throat, just beneath your amulet . . ." He tapped his forefinger against the very spot. "This shows me when you lie and when you're afraid."

Heart, be still. I measured my breaths, slowing them, allowing a tiny stream of heka to thicken my blood, willing the rest of my body to mold itself to my artifice. He would find no satisfaction in feeling my heartbeat quiver beneath his thumb. No corpse has ever been as still as I. "Is there something I should fear?"

"I've sent Livia away," he replied, leaning a little closer, his lips brushing my cheek.

"And Terentilla?"

"She is Maecenas's wife, not mine. You and I shall winter together here on the Isle of Samos. It will be enough time to conceive another child, I should think. The price of your throne has come due, Selene. I will come to you this night."

Thirty-three.

SOMEHOW I wasn't ready. I'd come to this island to make myself the mistress of Augustus more than a year before, and still I hadn't reconciled myself to it. I should have listened to Circe, but I'd been a fool. I was still a fool. When the door swung open to reveal Augustus on the threshold, torchlight blazing behind him, I propped myself up on my pillows, unsteady, unsure. Then he disarmed me completely by saying, "It seems that I have a grandson."

A grandson. Dismay hollowed out my belly. Oh, Julia. She'd had a boy. Instead of rejoicing for my friend, I could only grind my teeth with bitter frustration that her otherwise rebellious loins could not have defied her father in this one thing. Augustus had his heir now. He wouldn't need me. All of this for nothing! But the emperor didn't look nearly as pleased as he should have been. "Is it not what you hoped for, Caesar?"

"It is not," he said, closing the door behind him. "The baby's name is Gaius Vipsanius Agrippa. Moreover, Livia writes that Julia's child is fast fading. She doubts he'll live past winter."

It wasn't an uncommon fate for babies born into a loving family, much less for a child with an unhappy mother and murderous step-grandmother. Julia's son weakened my position but destroyed Livia's hopes for her sons. Another woman might have been content to be married to the ruler of the world, but no Claudian had ever been satisfied with less than total victory. If the opportunity presented itself, Livia would kill Julia's son without hesitation. That my own interests would also benefit from the little boy's death made me sick at heart. If I were like Livia, I'd wish the child dead. But I wasn't like her and I vowed that not for Egypt, not for anything, would I wish harm to come to Julia's child. "I'll pray for his recovery."

"You should." Augustus came to the side of my bed and yanked the coverlet away. "My grandson's illness is your doing. You and this curse you've put upon me that I shall outlive all my heirs. You and your witchery. What are you doing to the boy?"

I forced myself to take a breath. "I've done nothing. Truly, I am sorry that he's sickly. Not only for you or little Gaius, but for Julia, who doesn't deserve more unhappiness in her life. I pray that Isis-"

"Isis is a faithless wh.o.r.e of a G.o.ddess!"

My eyes went wide and round at this blasphemy. "You tempt her."

"I've done everything to appease her. I've granted amnesty to the Isiacs in Egypt. I've sent gold to the temples in Philae. So, tell me, Selene, Isis would not make your son sicken and die, would she?"

"No," I said, making a wild gambit. "But I don't have a son and you won't give one to me."

He grabbed at my arm. "Oh, I would give you a son."

"No," I said, yanking away. "You would give me a b.a.s.t.a.r.d and then leave for a war from which you may never return. You'll go off to die on some foreign field and leave me alone with your son to defend, just as Caesar's death left my mother desperate, thrashing about for a new defender."

He didn't like to be reminded of Caesarion. "What new game is this?"

"It's only the plain truth of it," I said, leaning forward so that my dark hair cascaded loose over one shoulder. "When you're gone, Agrippa will point to me and say, 'There goes the great Egyptian wh.o.r.e who stole our good Octavian away from us.' Then what fate for your children?" Genuine emotion swelled in my breast because it could all play out again in just such a fashion.

As he watched me all atremble in my bedclothes, his gaze softened. "You do fear for me . . ."

"Of course I do. When you were so very ill and all Rome said you were dying, Livia couldn't bring herself to sit beside you. Agrippa and Marcellus vied for power outside your door. Even Octavia and Julia, for all that they love you, were paralyzed. But I sat beside you, willing you to live. Now you accuse me of cursing Agrippa's infant son and insult me by allowing yourself to be surprised at my concern for your well-being."

He sat on the edge of my bed and the anger went out of him. "Insult is not what I wish to offer you."

He wished so badly to believe me that he had allowed this to become a lover's spat. I pressed forward. "Then why have you humiliated me by summoning me to this island and denying me my mother's throne?"

"My dear girl, I have not denied you. I've merely asked you to wait."

"As I'm asking you to wait."

His eyes slid to mine. "Your mother didn't make Caesar wait."

I tilted my chin and said, "My mother was already the Queen of Egypt."

He would not have satisfaction this night. I knew it because of the stillness of his hand in mine. The l.u.s.tful monster inside him was safely chained for now, perhaps because the news of Julia's son had shaken him. He would leave without touching me. Perhaps I shouldn't let him go. Perhaps it would be safer to seduce him before he had a chance to ponder whether or not he still needed a son from me at all. But I knew one thing about him as I knew nothing else.

Augustus always wants most what he cannot have.

IT had been a year since the negotiations with the Kandake's amba.s.sador from Meroe. Now the weather turned cold again, and a delegation purporting to come from King Pandion of faraway India arrived to meet with Augustus. The delegation carried with them credentials written in Greek, alleging that King Pandion was an overlord of six hundred va.s.sal kings. His eagerness to open diplomatic relations was a matter of great import and the entire court of Augustus was obliged to welcome the Indians in celebration of the winter solstice.

I was grateful for the cloying presence of Terentilla, because she disguised my status. Whereas she draped her beauty in gaudy jewels and little else, taking no pains to hide her adultery, I maintained the very image of maternal virtue, wearing gowns that Octavia would have approved and keeping my daughter close so that few might guess the true reason for my extended sojourn at the emperor's side.

Keenly aware that Nicholas of Damascus, Herod's amba.s.sador, was always watching me, ready to report all my doings back to my enemy in Judea, I made subtle inquiries about him too. He maintained frequent contact with Livia. I hadn't forgotten how she'd feted Herod's sons during the Saturnalia in Rome. Herod and Livia. That was a dangerous alliance that I must not underestimate.

When the feasting began, the Indian emba.s.sy presented Augustus with exotic gifts. Slaves rolled huge cages into the room inside of which were enormous striped cats. And when the animals roared, all the feasters gasped. "Tigers." Augustus tested the word with great pleasure. "I've never seen such a creature before. They will make for excellent entertainment in the arena. Look at their teeth, almost four inches long!"

My daughter, who seemed intent on forming her very own menagerie, wanted one for a pet, but I told her that these tigers would eat the rest of her little animals in one gulp. Nonetheless, the great cats were beautiful and I was no less amazed by the rest of the curiosities. The Indians also presented Augustus with a giant river tortoise, a very long python, and an enormous partridge with a red beak. In addition to the animals was human merchandise. At the emperor's feet, eight naked slaves prostrated themselves, one of whom was a boy named Hermes, whose arms had been amputated at the shoulder.

The armless boy demonstrated that he could perform tasks with his feet, bending a bow, throwing a javelin, and even playing a trumpet with his toes. When the boy glanced up at me as if sensing that I might have some power over the new life he'd find as property of the emperor, I had to look away.

We learned that a much larger Indian contingent had set out to reach a treaty with Augustus in support of his quickly approaching war with Parthia but that a great many of them perished on the way. One of the survivors was a holy man named Zarmanochegas, who said, "We're told that you have a powerful sorceress to aid you in battle."

All eyes turned to me for there were some rumors I couldn't squelch. My congress with the emperor was a well-guarded secret, but my magic was not, so I allowed a smile to touch my lips. "Caesar doesn't need a woman to fight his battles."

My words only echoed the very Roman ideals Augustus strove to embody, but he recognized my political volley. The more this line was repeated, the less likely he could make use of me in wartime without losing face. Irritation twitched at his brow, just beneath his oak-leaf crown. "The Queen of Mauretania speaks truly," he said. "But perhaps there will be no battle. Rome seeks to fight only just wars. Parthia must surrender to us our lost battle standards and make tribute for their offenses. If they refuse, they'll be crushed by the legions I've ama.s.sed near Armenia. But if they can be persuaded, the Parths may recover something they want."

I doubted my words alone had convinced him but found myself strangely delighted by this apparent change of heart. The Indian amba.s.sador seemed pleased as well. "We'd be happy to travel with you, Augustus, to serve as intermediaries."

I could see it now. All the emperor's actions here on the Isle of Samos had taken on a shape of the same character. From his willingness to negotiate a peace with the Kandake to his toppling of Artaxias . . . he was, step by step, ensuring a stable stage upon which to perform his next act. Marcus Cra.s.sus failed to conquer Parthia because he was a fool. Caesar failed because he was a.s.sa.s.sinated before he could try. My father failed because he left diplomatic instability in his wake. Augustus had studied; he'd learned from these men. Now he approached his attack on Parthia in slow crawling steps, just as he'd approached everything he wanted, including me.

H E summoned me to his rooms that night. I waited until the oil lamps burned low, half dazed by my unexpected admiration for his thoroughness. When I entered, Augustus wasn't abed but throwing dice upon a table. "Caesar doesn't need a woman to fight his battles for him," he mimicked, shaking the tali bones in his cup. "You think you're very clever, don't you?"

"Not as clever as you are," I admitted without prevarication. Circe had advised me to find something in the emperor to love; his cunning, his persistence, his plodding determination all resonated deep inside me. We were alike in so many ways that it ought to have disturbed me. "I begin to sense that you may actually prevail with Parthia."