Return (Matt Turner Series Book 3) (15 page)

“Plums, Steward,” Eugenia said.

“I used to perform the very same chore. Watch out for Arachne!” It was what the elders had always said to her when she was off to harvest fruit from the gardens. And indeed, she’d come face to face with spiders whose memory, after all these years, still sent shivers up her neck and behind her ears.

“Yes, Steward,” the girls sang in unison.

“Theophila,” Patra called after them, and the girls stopped. “Do you know where I could find your father?”

“He’s in Astronomy with Steward Kaleb, Steward.”

“…special requests or prefer a list of options?”
A woman’s voice.

“Well … I think …”
Joss’s voice, with a staff member.
“I’m not sure if he can hear us. He’s, ah, taking a little nap.”

“I’m up,” Matt said, leaning forward and stretching his arms. Unsure if the staff knew who he was or why he was there, he let the smooth Taria slip to his side, into the folds of the towel beneath him. “Is it lunch time already?”

He reacquainted himself to the surroundings. The lounge chairs, the beach, the freckled young woman standing over them with a patient smile, and Joss, shiny from a swim, wet hair slicked back. When she realized he was up, one knee quickly rose, her toes had pointed, and shoulders pulled back, as though preparing for a summerwear magazine photo shoot. Matt pretended he hadn’t noticed, focusing on the attendant

They ordered lunch from an extraordinary selection of options, ate together inside the house at an informal dining area—Joss sharing her uneventful morning (“I went for a swim …
alone
.”) and then Markus showed up, requesting an update on Matt’s reading thus far.

“Very good.” If Markus was disappointed by the lack of new revelations, he hadn’t shown it. “Will you be returning to the beach?”

Matt looked at Joss, receiving an indifferent shrug.

“The Tarias?” Markus said, clarifying why he’d asked.

“Ah, right,” Matt said. “If you could leave B with me, to read at will, that’d be great.”

Markus blinked for a moment—a well-dressed,
almost
lifelike robot processing the input and calculating every potential outcome. Most likely he was running through a
“what would Ostrovsky want?”
exercise in his head.

“Let me get back to you on that request.” Indeed, Markus wished to bounce that one off the boss. “In the meantime, I’ll meet you right here at …” a glance at his watch, “… one-thirty, for your afternoon session. Good?”

“Good.” Matt waited for the click of Markus’s shoes to fade out around the corner. He looked at Joss, who’d remained conspicuously quiet. “You all right?”

“Me? Yeah, totally! I mean, it’s like I said before, I feel like I should be doing some kind of work, and you’re doing work, but I’m sort of on this vacation just because of where we are. If you gave me a list of to-do’s I’d be all over them, and without any
thoughts
or anything, so I hope you’ll tell me as soon as you need me to do something.” Her eyebrows awaited acknowledgement. He nodded, absolutely, he’d tell her. She went on, “I tried to go snorkeling earlier but that Christof guy with all the gear said he
strongly
advised I not go out alone. But don’t worry about me, seriously. You’ve got work to do, I’m on standby, and I’m on a goddamn Greek Island …
for free
. Plus, this bikini? It’s like twelve hundred bucks. Yeah. For a
bikini
. Go about your business, boss.” She paused, then, “I mean, it’s not like I’m your
date
and you’re ignoring me. And besides, I’m not one of those high-maintenance types.” A breath. She swallowed. “I’m fine … That was a lot of words.”

Matt waited a few extra seconds in case she had more. He strove for a normal smile. “Good, good. Well, I was just going to say, if you’re bored, I have a little mission for you. Actually, even if you’re not, I sort of need you to do something for me anyway … tomorrow … if you’re cool with it.”

Joss leaned close, all ears, visibly relieved to be moving on, and Matt was right there with her. If she was truly hinting at being interested, he couldn’t tell. Her ever-flirtatious manner reminded him of his ex, Isis Meier—a woman who thrived on male attention, toying with men for whom she bore zero actual interest—though he’d never seen an iota of awkwardness in Isis.

Whatever was going on with Joss, he didn’t know how he felt about it, and there simply weren’t any vacancies in his head to accommodate new occupants. Fortunately, he now had plenty with which to occupy Joss.

“Let’s go for a walk,” Matt said, rolling his eyes upward to indicate the cameras and who-knew-what-else.

* * *

Patra and three friends shuffled their way through the hot, stifling crowds, all vying to enter the amphitheater. Blessed with mild afternoon heat and a constant flow of scattered clouds, they’d be fine if able to reach the front rows of seats reserved for Musaeum members. Outside the amphitheater’s wall, a collective jubilance energized the air, a carefree sort of spirit that seemed to permeate all classes of Alexandrians, but only on occasions such as this. Public announcements and inaugurations brought the masses, but were typically received with cautious skepticism, and varied across the social strata. Changes at the top rarely reached the bottom, so why care if the faces were new? This event, however, presented no overt agenda, and no cost to attend.

Rumor had it the show would be amusing rather than dramatic—much preferred to the often dispiriting material the players favored. It wasn’t that the average citizen found no occasion to laugh, but rather, to laugh with and amongst a thousand others elevated one’s joy to transcendent levels.

And it helped that Prince Kaleb, the star of the show, was famous.

Patra’s group finally reached the amphitheater wall, and slid little by little, arms grazed and shoved by the throngs—all eager for good seats, or perhaps any seat at all—toward the arched central entrance.

“Pardon us,” one of Patra’s colleagues, Icarion, said to a row of men standing shoulder to shoulder, facing into the amphitheater, blocking the entry passage.

Two of the men glanced back, sneering. “Already full,” one said bitterly, a quick eye to Icarion’s affluent garb.

In any other circumstance, a peasant would not feel so emboldened to snub the wealthy, but this was a
public
event, and Patra’s group may as well have walked into a tavern on the city’s west side. There’d be no rank this afternoon, or so the band of men had thought.

“Step aside, you!” barked a deep, authoritative voice from above.

Patra looked up to find a city guard atop the wall in full regalia, spear in hand and finger pointed at the men. Another stood on the opposing wall, a warning eye on the group as they parted at the middle, allowing Patra’s party through before once more closing ranks.

“Steward Supatra,” called another commanding voice from above—a centurion. “Augusta Zenobia invites you to the podium.”

He motioned beyond the wall, and Patra peeked over the clutter of heads before her. Beneath the purple tent in the distance, Zenobia—a luminous idol above assorted dim, mooted company—sat in the shade beside another radiant figure: her son, Augustus Vabalathus. But Patra thought only of her former student, Wahb Allat.

“Wahbi,” she said, an uncontrollable smile splitting her cheeks as she slipped with surprising ease between people, her hand still clasped to Icarion behind her.

“Only you, Steward,” the centurion called, and Patra halted, glancing back at the ruffled friends she’d been dragging through the crush.

“It’s fine, truly,” Thester said before Patra could apologize. “We have seats. We’ll find the others.”

At the end of the curving aisle, after she was allowed past a barrier, attendants helped Patra up the tall, marble steps to the cordoned podium.

“Patra!” Wahbi cheered when he saw her, standing up from the throne he shared with his mother, and rushed to Patra.

Now twelve, he stood nearly as tall as Patra, and appeared a different boy, adorned in silk robes with purple embroideries and gold threading. As they embraced, Patra caught the disapproving glares of courtiers on the podium above (public affection wasn’t appropriate for their Augustus) but Zenobia simply beamed, and only she rightly mattered.

“Come, Patra,” Zenobia called. “Join us!”

“I missed you so much!” Wahbi said as he pulled Patra up the last few stairs. “Come, sit with
me
.”

Patra hoped he didn’t mean the throne. Fortunately, as they ascended to the top of the podium, courtiers arose and facilitated, guiding the young Augustus back to his seat, and stationing Patra on a newly placed cushion at Zenobia and Wahbi’s feet.

Just below her, Patra discovered a rare view, that of Governor Cassius’s balding head and the gray-blonde dome of his aide, Thomas.

Thomas turned ever so slightly without actually looking at her. “Steward,” he said, the word swathed in all the warmth of an iron commode seat.

“Thomas,” she replied, and turned toward Cassius’s shiny pate. “Always nice to see you, Governor … and,
oh my
… myself, as well!”

“Eternally droll, Patra,” Cassius said without a backward glance. “I polished it earlier. Just try to avoid an accidental glimpse of that dusty old tomb between your legs.”

Patra grinned. She hadn’t been this close to her childhood friend in at least a year. It was too bad he brought his pet snake, Thomas.

Behind Patra, Wahbi’s eager, cracking voice: “Can she come back with us after? So we may have time? I have to tell her everything about …
everything!
”

“Perhaps, my love,” Zenobia said, then leaned forward and put a hand on Patra’s shoulder. “It’s
wonderful
to see you again.”

Patra observed activity beginning on the stage below, and the musicians in the orchestra were sitting up, preparing to play. She glanced behind her. “And you as well, Augusta. Please accept my humbled gratitude for this invitation.”

A triad of horns broadcasted a royal ingress, and the buzzing audience roared approval before falling quiet. Two of Kaleb’s players strode out from opposite sides of the stage, outfitted as courtiers—identical to those littered about Zenobia and Wahbi’s podium.

“Thank you, little people!” one of the
“courtiers”
began, and Patra recognized his voice. Kaleb had roped in Xander, one of the new young poets.

Xander and his companion strode to the edge of the stage and abandoned character for a moment to bow respectfully to Zenobia and Wahbi. The audience heeded their cue, facing and paying hushed respect to their monarchs.

Zenobia murmured to Wahbi, “Stand and return,” and he complied, rising from his seat and extending his in-turned hands toward his subjects. “Good. Now, half-turn, and sit.” Wahbi sat.

The players on stage re-seized the audience’s attention, resuming their belittling onslaught. “Thank you, thank you! Your applause is both appreciated and required! You up there—the crushed herds of
nearly
people—if we’re to hear your ovations, you must work harder than all the rest here in front … as you do in life.”

Astonishingly, the spectators—above and below—erupted with laughter, delighted by this brutal mocking from the perceived superior perspective of Roman elite. Patra feared not Zenobia’s reaction. The Empress had always distanced herself from Rome and the Senate and the chaos that was the Western Empire, but Patra couldn’t say the same of the courtiers around her. From their lofty standpoint, there existed a single empire, and to condemn any part was to attack the whole.

Zenobia’s voice near Patra’s ear: “You didn’t tell me one of your friends was the Prince of Kush. Are you
close
?” A romantic tone.

Patra merely flashed a coy smile, appeasing the same old Zenobia’s undying interest in Patra’s marital status—though more specifically, her venereal status. While Kaleb was indisputably attractive, and rumors about him and Patra circulated the Musaeum halls, he was already married to a Cretian noble he’d twice met, having been arranged since before he was born.

“Is that him?” Zenobia whispered, and Patra returned her attention to the stage.

The courtiers had ceded the stage to Kaleb and Philip. Patra scanned the audience, her chest tightening. She prayed her friends would adhere to their promise to exclude their caricatures’ most provocative acts.

“Yes, the ‘Emperor,’” Patra replied. “And the brother, ‘Quintus,’ is played by my friend Philip, the sculptor.”

“Ah yes …
my!
Take either, really.”

Philip and Kaleb tour the stage as whimsical music plays, the pair portraying an idea-hurling Quintus dismissed at each turn by an irritated Emperor Antonius. The audience chuckles at each stop on the stage: Philip’s
“Quintus”
pulling a chunk of brick from one of the arched background’s columns, demonstrating that the structure needs repairs, Kaleb’s
“Antonius”
scoffs in return, takes the brick, spits on it, and slips it back into the space—
Fixed!

After each of these little exchanges, Kaleb performs increasingly silly, self-congratulatory dances.

Finally, in a bout of frustration, Quintus storms off the stage as a self-absorbed Antonius faces the giggling audience, admiring himself in an imaginary mirror. He preens his hair, rubs his cheeks red like a woman, flexes his arm muscles, and then, after a sneaky peek left then right, lifts his robes to reveal his manhood.

The audience roared, weeping with laughter at the sight.

Kaleb wears a flesh-colored loincloth, wrapped tight so as to appear nude, with crudely drawn curls of pubic hair above a near-invisible bump. He pouts and flicks at the tiny phallus, as if to awaken it. With each flick, a string player plucks a single, high-pitched note.

Behind Patra, Zenobia and Wahbi were laughing—hysterical as any audience member—but the others around the tent remained cautious, reserved. Below Patra, Cassius and Thomas sat tilted toward each other, both men’s shoulders bouncing whenever they couldn’t help but snicker, but otherwise only sharing a hushed word after each gag.

Emperor Antonius now inspects a squad of Praetorian Guard, scrutinizing their uniforms for imperfections until it’s revealed he’s more interested in what hides
behind
their tunics. One by one, they’re fired and sent away as he discovers each is more amply endowed than he. Desperate courtiers then carry a baby boy onto the stage, outfitted in a miniature Praetorian uniform.