Hannibal's Children (42 page)

"Will you take your mind off fighting for one minute!" she cried, her patience ended. "We must consider the future!"

"The future?" he said, nonplussed.

"Exactly. If we live, I will be Queen of Egypt. Queen in my own right, not through marriage to my brother. I must have a consort."

"Certainly. But he will have to be someone whose birth is commensurate with your own. I am sure there are many kings and princes—"

She hissed and closed her eyes. "You've never met any of the disgusting, degenerate creatures who call themselves kings in the eastern lands, have you?"

"I confess that I haven't. Surely there is someone suitable."

"No. I don't want some pedigreed imbecile to share my bed. He must be a man. So far, I have met only one who meets the definition. You."

For a moment words failed him. "You can't be serious. I am as well born as any Roman, but we have no royalty. I'm not even a very important Roman."

"Spare me your humility! You've manipulated Hamilcar, Ptolemy, me and the whole city of Alexandria ever since you left Noricum! Forget about breeding, you are a man who can
do
things! Do you think the first Ptolemy was born a king? He was just a soldier who was in the right place at the right time. You are a man of the moment, and I want you for my husband when this is over."

"You want me to be King of Egypt?" he said, sounding unsettled for the first time since she had known him.

She stepped close and wound her arms around his neck. "Not king exactly. Consort. It's still a very desirable position." She drew his face down to hers.

For the first time in many months something entirely personal pushed aside his discipline and devotion to duty. He wondered whether he was being utterly foolish, then he discovered that he didn't care. He swept her up in his arms. The sun would come up tomorrow no matter what the two of them did here tonight. Let tomorrow take care of itself.

Hamilcar inspected the gallery, now manned by soldiers from Utica, Sicca and other subject cities of Africa. It was now much improved from the simple shed the Romans had erected. Working day and night, first the Roman soldiers and then his own slave gangs had heaped earth against the side facing Alexandria, creating a sloping ramp that protected the wooden wall against fire and the stones of catapults. Behind the shed, towers were going up. Soon they would overtop the low southern wall of the city and his archers and artillery would be able to fire down upon the defenders.

When the towers were completed, in another day or two at most, he could sweep the wall clean of defenders, allowing his sappers to attack the canal gate and give him access to the city. Who could have imagined, Hamilcar thought complacently, that the outlandish Romans would give him the key to taking Alexandria? And that the weak spot was the supposedly impregnable southern wall of the city?

"There was some sort of activity going on in the city all night," Mastanabal reported to his Shofet. "There was hammering and shouting. They're up to something." The general was looking wan these days, Hamilcar thought. Doubtless, the cross was ever in his thoughts. He had proven to be unable to take Alexandria quickly and knew all too well the fate of unsuccessful Carthaginian generals.

"Men in besieged cities often seek desperate remedies to extricate themselves from their difficulties," Hamilcar said. "They think novelties such as those absurd craft in the harbor can somehow save them."

The general was diplomatic enough not to point out that Hamilcar had made no further attempt to take the harbor. The seamen had acquired a superstitious dread of the bizarre craft that seemed more like living creatures than wooden ships driven by sails and the arms of rowers.

"I want—" the Shofet's words were cut off abruptly when they heard a whizzing noise, followed by an enormous splash in the lake behind them. "What was that?" He looked out to see the lake still agitated. A moment later water from the splash came down like a great rain.

"What just happened?" the Shofet said, unable to comprehend. Then came another splash, this one nearer to shore, casting up a huge spout of mud. A large fish landed near Hamilcar's feet and lay there flopping.

Then there came a deafening crash. Thirty paces east of the place where Hamilcar and his general stood, a huge ball of stone smashed through the lead-sheathed roof, pulping a number of soldiers and sending shudders through the whole gallery. Another crashed through the roof, then yet another.

"It's those big catapults!" Mastanabal cried, understanding now. "They've moved them across the city! They are casting stones over the rooftops to destroy this gallery! You must get to safety, my Shofet!"

Hamilcar had already figured out the last part. He could not stay here. He whirled and began to run, certain that one of the huge stone balls would squash him like a bug. In seconds he was just one of a crowd of fleeing soldiers, shoving them out of the way with his own hands, heedless of the contamination he incurred by touching unclean flesh.

It seemed an eternity later that he was beyond the gallery and safe from the terrible missiles. He saw a man in the plumes of an officer and beckoned to him. The officer, brilliant in his gilded armor, stood trembling before his Shofet.

"Commander," Hamilcar said, "I want you to assemble all these men"—he pointed to the soldiers who had fled the gallery—"and take them to that field over there." He indicated a broad meadow at the western end of the lake, currently being used to pasture the Carthaginian livestock.

"At once, my Shofet," the man said, bowing. He strode away shouting orders.

Mastanabal came from the wreckage, picking wood splinters from his cloak and beard. "It seems the Roman project was not so good an idea, after all."

"That is not important at the moment," Hamilcar said. "You see those men assembling in the field?"

Mastanabal studied the survivors. "Yes." He estimated that three of four hundred men remained standing.

"Go get my personal guard. Disarm those men, then crucify them all."

Mastanabal understood. "Yes, my Shofet." He bowed and went in search of the guard and some carpenters. The men had done nothing to deserve punishment, but their offense was more serious than treason: They had seen their Shofet panic. They had seen him run. Mastanabal shuddered. He, too, had seen Hamilcar play the coward. Was there a cross waiting for him as well?

For the rest of the day, even as the unfortunate soldiers were nailed to their crosses and raised on display before the whole army, the huge stones continued to pound the gallery to fragments. Alexandria was once again in control of the lake and its access to the Nile and the interior. The siege would not end quickly.

“There goes another one!” someone shouted. The crowd assembled on the grounds of the vast temple of Serapis made sounds of awe as another 500-pound ball arched high overhead, crossing the city from north to south, disappearing beyond the southern wall, so distant that the crash of its impact came only faintly to their ears. Then there was applause and cheering. People had winced and ducked at the first few missiles and found the novel sight unnerving. By mid-morning they were used to it and treated the sight as a new sort of spectacle.

Selene watched from the top of the temple steps like a priestess presiding at a ceremony. Scipio had advised her to show herself to the people as much as possible. It would help to bind them to her, he explained. This, she thought, had to be connected to his republican form of government. Egyptian monarchs expected to be worshiped. They placed no value upon popularity.

She saw a ripple go through the crowd, the way an animal's progress through a wheat field can be marked by the waving of the stalks. Someone was pushing through the crowd toward her. For a moment she went numb. This must be Ptolemy's guard coming to arrest her. It was over. Then she breathed relief when she saw the two Romans clear the crowd and climb the steps.

Selene held out her hand in greeting. "Welcome, savior of Alexandria," she said, loud enough for the crowd to hear. A great cheer went up. The Romans kissed her hands, then turned to wave at the crowd, beaming. Both were tricked out in their best uniforms: cuirasses embossed to represent Herculean muscles, red-plumed helmets beneath their arms, scarlet cloaks flaring dramatically. Even unwarlike Flaccus managed to look martial.

"Don't
get
too relaxed," Flaccus said in a low voice, still grinning and waving. "Your little brother's guards are right behind us, with warrants for our heads and your living body."

Selene gasped. "We must get away!"

"No," said Scipio, waving and grinning. "We stay right here, with this wonderful audience. They love you and by natural extension now they love us. They think I'm the savior—you've named me, although Chilo and the Archimedeans ought to get the credit."

"But," said Flaccus, "taking credit for other men's work is part of the politician's art. So saviors we shall be."

"I am terrified," Selene said, taking her cue from them and waving graciously to the crowd.

"They'll take it for righteous indignation," Flaccus told her. "When the guards come, be sure to be outraged. Remind everybody of our wonderful services on behalf of Carthage, and of the disgraceful performance of Ptolemy and his ministers."

"That part shouldn't be hard," she said.

"Good," Marcus said. "Leave the rest to us. This will be an exercise in the oratorical arts we've been trained for since boyhood."

"You Romans do something besides fight efficiently?" she said.

"Oh, yes," Flaccus said, "we're great talkers, too."

"Here they come," she gasped. She could see a party of armed men plowing through the crowd, causing a broad "V" pattern to ripple through it. They wore the uniform of the king's personal guard: mercenaries from a score of nations who had no connection to Alexandria and therefore were unlikely to be involved in domestic conspiracies. In theory, at any rate.

Once through the crowd, the guard, perhaps a score in number, climbed the stair. In the forefront was a young Spartan officer who held aloft a roll of parchment. "I have here," he said, "the king's warrant for the arrest of the Romans who call themselves Marcus Cornelius Scipio and Aulus Flaccus, and for the arrest of Selene, of the family of Ptolemy." The crowd stood in stunned silence.

"What?" Selene almost jumped when the word boomed out. "You dare to so address the Queen of Egypt?" Marcus stood in a most impressive pose: feet widespread, upper body half refused, head turned to glare at the officer with a majestic, eagle gaze. She had never heard a voice trained to be heard across a noisy forum or a legion encampment.

Flaccus made a broad, actor's gesture, his cloak draped gracefully from one arm. "Surely that corrupt child Ptolemy never gave you this order!" The humorous scorn in his voice was infectious. "Who was it really? That coward Parmenion, who lost the first and only field engagement of this war? Or was it that no-balls Eutychus? Or that vicious bungler Alexandres?"

The crowd began an ugly mutter. The officer looked around nervously. Then he turned to his men. "Arrest them!" he said in a half-whisper.

Hands reached for them. An ugly Syrian tried to grasp Selene's arm but Scipio's sword was already out, flashing up, then downward in a great, theatrical blow that was serious in its intent despite its flourish. The man's hand fell to the steps as he cried out and clasped the spouting stump with his remaining hand.

"Alexandrians!" Scipio shouted with a broad gesture. "They have laid profane hands on your queen! It is sacrilege! Will you allow this?"

With a roar, the crowd surged up the steps like a great wave breaking upon a beach. The guards were overwhelmed by the mass of citizenry, disarmed, cast down the steps, pummeled and trampled until the pavement was slick with blood.

"Citizens!" Selene cried. "I am your queen!" The crowd roared approval. "Ptolemy is a boy, and his corrupt advisers have brought Alexandria and Egypt near ruin. Hamilcar defeated them in the field and ever since they have cowered here, unable to take decisive action. If Alexandria has been saved, it has been only through the heroic efforts of Marcus Scipio! Will you let your city, founded by Alexander the Great, fall to the degenerate descendant of Hannibal?" A great cry of protest rose from the throng. "Then take me to the palace and I, Selene Ptolemy, will give you the leadership that Alexandria deserves!"

"Brief and to the point," said Flaccus. "Very well done, Majesty."

"But now what?" she said. "Once they know the guard failed to arrest us, they will call out the troops."

"You go to the palace," Scipio advised. "This mob will set you comfortably on the throne. I will go to the Macedonian Barracks and address the troops."

"How will you handle this?" she asked. The dice had fallen and she was resigned to following his lead.

"What you always do with soldiers such as these. I will bribe them."

“What is going on in the city?” Hamilcar asked. He and his officers sat before his tent in the heat of the afternoon. All day, strange cries and murmurs had been heard from within the walls. There had been much scurrying about atop the battlements and the bombardment from the catapults had ceased.

All around the Carthaginian camp, work was in progress as men built lofty siege towers high enough to assault the western wall. Others were busy with sledgehammers, demolishing tombs to make a path for the ponderous machines through the necropolis. The Shofet had finally conceded that there would be no quick victory over Alexandria and he was preparing for a long, grinding siege.

"It sounds like civil war," said an adviser.

"Excellent!" Hamilcar said. "Perhaps someone sensible has killed Ptolemy and is ready to make terms."

"What terms would my Shofet find acceptable?" the adviser asked.

"Simple ones. If the Alexandrians surrender their city at once, I will spare their lives. Other than that, they are entirely at my mercy. We will take all their treasures, Egypt will be mine to govern under the customs of Carthage, their army will be absorbed into mine and the lands are to be divided among my nobles. There is no need to make things unnecessarily complex." His council made sounds of approval.