Hand of Isis (32 page)

“I have no desire to be king,” Caesar said mildly. “And if I did, I should have more sense than to say the word. It’s like waving a red flag before a bull to say ‘king’ before Romans.”

“Your men say the word,” Antonius said. “They say it in the tavernas and watering holes of the Subura. Every tavern keeper in town has heard it. The Gauls and Germans say it all the time.”

“Oh, the Gauls and Germans,” Caesar said. “That’s just a mistranslation. They take ‘Imperator’ as king in their own languages, and they don’t have any idea why they shouldn’t say ‘king’ in Latin. They take ‘Dictator’ as something like ‘High King,’ first among a council of tribal leaders. That’s how they see the Senate. They don’t really understand our form of government, you see.”

“They say ‘king,’?” Antonius said, “for whatever reason. And people believe they know something we don’t. If you say something often enough it might as well be true.”

“And what are they saying that you’re warning me of?”

“That you intend to be king. That you intend to make Prince Caesarion your heir and put an Egyptian to rule over them.” Antonius’ voice was hard. “The son of an incestuous foreign whore.”

Contrastingly, Caesar’s voice was almost lazy. “Cleopatra’s marriage with her brother was a marriage in name only.”

“That is not the point!” It sounded as though Antonius were pacing. “It’s strange. The Roman people don’t like anything strange. They don’t like anything that seems decadent and effete and Hellenic. Ever since the Gracchi we’ve had this passion for the common man, for a just plain fellow off the street who hasn’t got any airs. Good, plain soldiers who can’t tell their ass from a bucket. Why, the gods alone can tell us! But there it is.”

“And you do the common soldier better than anyone,” Caesar said. He sounded amused. “You, with philhellene written all over you and an education as good as any man’s.”

“I do,” he said. “And so I know what they say and what I hear. It’s jealousy, plain and simple.”

“And fear,” Caesar said. His voice was thoughtful and tempered. “They think we’re still some collection of mud huts about to be overrun by anyone who wants to. They have no conception of the real political situation. They act as though this were the First Punic War.”

“And Carthage must be destroyed,” Antonius quoted darkly.

“Carthage was destroyed generations ago,” Caesar said. “And there is no real power in the world that can possibly challenge Rome. Yes, there are tribes on the Rhine that must be kept in check, and it’s possible that some new Pontine leader might emerge, or even that the Parthians might make common cause with Liaka Kusulaka, or one of the other Indian princes. But those things are no threat to Rome. They’re shadow puppets, Marcus.”

“Egypt is no shadow puppet.”

“Egypt is thoroughly neutralized, isn’t it?” Caesar said. “And will be for the foreseeable future, with my son on the throne of Egypt.”

I must have made some sound, for Marcus Antonius struck like a cat, knocking aside the plants I stood behind and grabbing my arm. “Ha!” he said. “Look what I’ve caught! Who do you serve?”

“She serves Cleopatra,” Caesar said. “And we’ve said nothing the Queen does not know. Hail, Charmian.”

“Hail, Caesar,” I said, inclining my head.

Antonius let go of my arm. “I suppose it’s your job to listen in on private conversations.”

“Of course it is,” Caesar said approvingly. “What sort of servant should she be if she didn’t?” He clapped Antonius on the shoulder. “I appreciate your vigilance, Marcus. But you worry too much. Come and make your farewells to the Queen before Fulvia wears her ears off.” He raised an eyebrow at me, and led Antonius away.

I
N THE MORNING
it seemed to me that Iras looked pale and tired, as though she had not slept much. I caught her eye as we were leaving the first meal of the day. “Are you well?” I asked.

Iras shrugged. “Foul dreams,” she said.

“Me too,” I said.

With one accord we turned and looked after where Cleopatra had gone.

“What did you dream?” I asked.

Iras picked up a scroll from the table, playing idly with the cord that labeled it. She did not look at me. “I dreamed that Caesar was dead.”

A chill ran down my back.

“I saw him lying on his pyre, with a cloak across his body covering everything but his face. His face was composed, like the carving on the lid of a sarcophagus and just that pale. Bled white. Antonius stood behind him, and I could see his face tight with strain. He was giving the funeral oration. And then he pulled back the cloak so that everyone could see all of the stab wounds, dozens of them, awful wounds and then people started screaming, tearing their hair and yelling for blood. . . .” Her voice was intense, but her face was as quiet as that of a dreaming child.

I shivered.

Her face changed, the strangeness in her eyes fading.

“Iras?”

She blinked. “What?”

“You were telling me about Caesar,” I said gently.

She shook her head. “Was I?”

“Yes.” I took her arm carefully. “About your dream.”

She bent her head then. “I hope it means nothing,” she said. “After all, there are always plots, aren’t there? We can hardly rush to Caesar and tell him his life is in danger. It always is.”

“No,” I said slowly. “We can’t, can we?”

W
E WILL SAIL
on the twenty-first day of March,” the Queen explained in Latin for the entire household to understand. “Iras, will you make sure our vessel is at Ostia and prepared on that day? Caesar sails for Antioch in Syria two days earlier. We do not want to create confusion by sailing at the same time. And the wind should be fair for Alexandria then.”

“So it should, Gracious Queen,” Iras said. “I will see that we are prepared and our ship provisioned.”

“That will be all,” the Queen said, and the other members of the household began to withdraw, our meeting completed and our instructions given.

I went to the Queen’s side. For a moment her face looked oddly blank. “Are you well?” I whispered.

She nodded. “Just a touch of nausea.” She looked at me sideways, and her mouth twitched in a tiny smile. I would know what she meant, having charge of her linens and counting as I did. Her blood was more than two weeks late.

“Are you sure you will want to sail in three weeks?” I whispered.

She nodded. “The sooner the better, isn’t it? We will be in Alexandria before I am far gone.”

“Around the Kalends of November,” I said, counting the due date in Latin, half-thinking. “Does Caesar know?”

“Not yet. I’ll tell him before he sails.”

“He will be pleased,” I whispered.

“Yes,” she said, sharing a smile with me. “All will be well. Don’t worry so, Charmian.”

“I’m not worried,” I said. “Not at all.” I lifted my chin and embraced my sister.

I
DREAMED
, and in my dream I walked through an empty palace, down echoing halls lit by guttering torches, by lamps half-spilled on the floor. My footsteps echoed in the corridors. The flames burned straight up, never flickering, never changing.

I turned another corner. There was a bath chamber in blue and white tile, a wide pool full of lapping clean water, with fretted screens about a changing area. One white towel lay abandoned beside the pool. A couch drawn close by still bore the indentation where someone had lain.

Panic rose in me. I looked behind the screens, my scarred, calloused hands shaking. There was nothing there.

The bath was empty. Cool clean water lapped against the pretty painted tiles.

I tried a door, ran down a corridor. Somewhere was the smell of burning flowers.

“Babylon,” I whispered.

Doors opened onto empty rooms, onto other doors.

There was blood on the floor, blood spilled like wine or wine spilled like blood, red Bactrian wine poured out, the amphora broken.

“Babylon,” I whispered again, and charged around a corner. There must be some way out, some escape from the maze.

A light glimmered ahead through some untried doorway.

I ran through it.

“Lydias,” someone said, and I spun about.

She stood in the empty throne room, the Lady of Sorrows, Isis with a black veil over Her hair, Her gown all the shifting grays of a land lit by starlight. Her eyes held infinite compassion. “This is Lydias’ dream,” She said. “His memory.”

“Who?” I asked confusedly.

“A person you once were,” She said. “When you came to the Black Land with Ptolemy. You are dreaming the death of kings.”

“I must save him!” I said. “Gracious Lady, tell me how to save Caesar!”

Her eyes were sad, and when She moved the sound of Her robes was like the wind over the desert. “Osiris must go down into the West. By His death the land is renewed.”

“Caesar is not of our land or of our people,” I argued. “He is not part of this story and he does not serve You.”

“Does he not?” She smiled faintly. “Son of Venus he calls himself, son of the Lady of the Sea. Do you not know that whether Her name is Venus or Aphrodite Cythera or Isis Pelagia or Ashteret, the fate of Her son is the same? He is the Falcon of the Sun, and he must die.”

I bent my head, tears smarting in my eyes.

Her voice was more gentle. “Gaius Julius Caesar has known for a long time how his story will end.”

“In Babylon?” I said bitterly.

“You speak as though that were defeat,” She said. “Do you think Alexander’s death a tragedy then?”

“The cruelest imaginable,” I said, blinking back tears.

Isis shook Her head ruefully. “And yet through his death, look at all that came to pass! Had Alexander not died in Babylon, there should have been no Successor kingdoms, no white city by the sea. It was the striving of the Successors that opened trade from India to Italy, that gave millions of people writing and plays, chickens and rice to lift them from poverty, clean water drawn from wells instead of stagnant pools, and the concord of the gods. Alexander had made the Choice of Achilles, and in his death the world was remade. Mourn, if you like, for his is a great soul, but do not regret, Companion.”

I raised my head. “And Caesar? Has he, too, made the Choice of Achilles?”

“Caesar is fifty-five,” She said. “I hardly think his life has been short. It took him longer, to bring the west into this world of the Inner Sea, as Alexander brought the east.”

“And yet so many will be carried down into ruin in his wake,” I said, and my heart ached for Caesarion, who should scarcely remember his father.

And whom everyone would want to kill. For a moment my heart stopped beating. “And my Queen? Caesarion?”

“That I cannot say. It depends upon the acts of men.” Isis took a step away, looking around the empty throne room, frozen in some moment three hundred years ago in Babylon. “The gods cannot control the actions of men like so many pieces on a game board. Take this as a warning: There are many in Rome who should like to see your Queen dead, and many who should profit from Caesarion’s death.”

“That is not unknown to me, Lady,” I said. It hardly took the gods to tell me that. “I will guard my sister with my life, as always.”

She turned, and as Her eyes met mine they were sad. “There is always a price, Companion. It may be that you will save her, but there will be a price in blood.”

I nodded. I had made that choice long ago. “I understand that, Gracious Lady. If my life would buy hers or Caesarion’s, I should consider it well spent.”

Isis shook Her head. “It’s not always that simple. And the gods cannot see all ends.” She looked around the empty throne room again, one little inlaid table lying on its side, as though kicked over in the rush and forgotten. “It’s never that simple,” She said quietly.

I
MUST TRY
,” I said. “I must try.”

Iras shook my shoulder. “You must try what?”

I opened my eyes to see my sister looking down at me, her face a mask of worry.

“You were shouting and calling out in your sleep. What’s wrong?”

I struggled to sit up. The room was quiet and dark, only a little predawn light coming in through the closed shutters. Iras sat on the edge of my bed. There was no one else there. Of course.

“I don’t know,” I said. I had dreamed. Something about Caesar. Something bad.

“We had a serious thunderstorm just now,” Iras said. “The wind woke me up. Cleopatra’s up too, and going to take a bath. She couldn’t get back to sleep.”

“A bath?”

Iras nodded. “The storm. It’s disturbing. But the children seem to have slept through it. I just checked on them.”

“Oh good,” I said. I still felt disoriented and strange. “Yes, of course it was the storm.” I reached for my clothes and put on the first thing that came to hand. “I’ll go attend the Queen in the bath.”

I was putting on my shoes when I looked up at Iras, something occurring to me. “Is Caesar here?” I asked.

She shook her head. “He left early last night. He had a morning meeting at the Senate today.”

Memory flooded back. I leaped up and ran out of the room, ran straight into Cleopatra in the hall. “Caesar mustn’t go to the Senate today,” I said.