The Shards of Heaven (9 page)

The messenger came rigidly to attention, bringing his right fist to his chest and then pressing his arm out, fingers extended and palm down in a salute. “Rome eternal,” he said.

Antony's posture was less formal, the snap of his arm less brisk as he returned the salute. Vorenus felt his own jaw tighten, not surprised by Antony's air of arrogance but certainly not approving of it. “Rome eternal,” Antony said, his voice at once absent and gruffly commanding. He took a step down closer to Stertinius, his footfalls heavy. “What news, soldier?”

The messenger's eyes seemed to sink even further in his tired face. “Octavian's forces are preparing to sail from eastern Italy, sir.”

Whispers broke out across the gathered crowd, but Cleopatra and her son made no reaction. Antony raised a broad hand to keep the focus on himself. “Under Agrippa's command?”

Stertinius just nodded.

“What's his target?”

“Greece, sir.”

The muscles of Antony's jaw pulsated in and out. “Where in Greece?”

“I don't know, sir.”

“
No
one knows? North? South?”

The messenger shook his head.

“Why now?” Antony asked. Vorenus saw Cleopatra's shoulders tense slightly. Probably she thought the question below Antony's status. Why now? Because Octavian thought he could win. He thought he had an advantage. But Vorenus knew Antony. Though his tongue was too often faster than his mind—ruled by his passions as he was—Antony's thoughts were undoubtedly upon the next step: What advantage did Octavian think he had? “And how many ships?” Antony continued, his eyes narrowing.

“I'm uncertain, my lord. Hundreds.”

“How many hundreds? One hundred? Two hundred? Three? Surely, you worthless—”

“Six hundred, maybe,” the legionnaire sputtered.

Antony looked like he'd been slapped. “Six?”

“Agrippa's full fleet, sir. And everything Rome can spare. Octavian is gathering his armies, too, in the east.” Stertinius swallowed hard. “He's … he's even conscripted new legions, sir, to replace those at your side. ‘Rome should have a loyal Sixth,' is what they say he said.”

Vorenus felt anger rise in his chest and could imagine the rage on Pullo's face without turning to look at him. There were no truer Romans than they. Who else could speak of having given more for their country?

“He's created another Sixth?” Antony's voice was incredulous, spacing out each of the words as if to let them sink in.

“Yes, sir.”

It was a proclamation of exile, of final and irreparable separation, and the few Romans in the council chamber all knew it. Antony looked back at Vorenus, the general's face momentarily twisted in a look of horrified shock. Vorenus, for all his own rage, tried to focus in on Antony's face, willing him to stay calm, to think clearly.

Antony seemed to understand the message, and he let his anger pass into a kind of levity, smiling as he turned back to the messenger and the gathered council. “I remember, when I was young, that a man once stole my sword,” he said, his voice booming. Vorenus knew the tone well, from boisterous jests over countless tankards of wine. “It was a fine gladius, the likes of which I thought could never be found again, and I despaired to go to battle without it. But a blacksmith traveling with the legion heard of my troubles and offered to make me another, just like the one I lost. Loyal to his word, the blade he made looked the same as the one I lost—only better, I thought, because it was shiny and new. But when I took it to battle, it cracked on the first stroke against the edge of a shield. I learned then that nothing can replace what is tried and true.” He paused for a moment, to be sure he had the attention of the council. “Let him make a new Sixth. Let him make a new Antony. He'll find the original far superior!”

There was a shout of determined agreement from the Roman officers and soldiers in the crowded room. Vorenus, too, felt a puff of pride in his chest, though it seemed little enough to contrast the news that he'd been exiled from his homeland.

“What of the man who stole your old sword?” one of the younger Roman officers called from the back of the chamber.

“I had him crucified.” Antony laughed. “But not before I used my old friend to cut his balls off and feed them to dogs. I look forward to doing the same to Octavian!”

There were more shouts of riotous agreement from the Romans, though many of the Egyptians looked disgusted. Vorenus just felt old and tired.

Stertinius noticeably took no part in the revelry, looking more and more uncomfortable as it died down. Antony, who'd been cheering on his officers, at last took notice and motioned for silence. “What more, legionnaire?”

“Octavian—” The soldier's voice caught, then he bowed again as if to excuse what he was duty-bound to report. “Octavian raided the temple of the Vestal Virgins, sir.”

What was left of the smile on Antony's face fell away at once. “He …
raided
the temple?”

Stertinius closed his eyes as his mouth worked over the words before he could speak them. Vorenus wondered if he was saying a prayer for someone's soul. Octavian's, for such a desecration? His own, for fear of Antony? “He … he forced them to hand over your will,” the man finally muttered.

Antony stared. Vorenus noted that while the general's face was suddenly unreadable, Cleopatra had actually leaned forward slightly.

“Octavian said it confirmed the, uh, Donations. And that it said you'd be buried with Cleopatra—” the soldier's eyes flew open and fixed on her for a moment—“I'm sorry. The queen, my lady.”

An uncomfortable silence fell over the chamber. Vorenus heard the soft rasp of leather armor as one of the Romans in the crowd shifted his weight from one foot to the other.

Antony's face was hard again by the time he spoke. “Yes. So?”

The messenger's face was a contorted mixture of hope and despair. His voice, when he found it, was tinged with pleading. “We're all lost, sir,” he said. “The Senate's declared war on Egypt.”

Like the breaking of a wave that roars as it crests, the soldier's words shattered the silence of the chamber. All at once, it seemed, everyone was talking.

The co-regents sat impassive in the resulting cacophony, silently listening as one advisor or priest after another shouted out to address them with portents of the gods or opinions about Rome. Antony moved back and forth from the majestic seats atop the dais to the tired messenger at its feet, seething anger. After a minute, he dismissed the shaken Stertinius, who gratefully took his hurried leave. In his wake, other Roman officers converged on the general, anxious to make status reports.

Whatever the course of the debate to come, Vorenus knew his part would be measured only in the aftermath, not in the decision-making itself. As such, he had little interest in remaining to stay and listen to the din. Slipping to the back of the raucous crowd, he made his way between glyph-inscribed columns to a short passage flanked by guards. Nodding to them both, he followed the hallway to a broad balcony looking out across the city.

The noise was still buzzing out here, but it was quiet enough for thoughts. Quiet enough for regrets.

Beyond the palace walls, Alexandria was a pool of torch-lit windows in stone facades—winking and glittering beneath a cloudless, half-moon sky—bounded by the black of water. It was beautiful—he'd always thought so—but it wasn't home. It wasn't Rome.

Vorenus breathed deep of the cooler air carried up from the water, trying to clear his head.

Replacement legions? Was he really no longer a Roman? Why had he come here if not for Rome? If not for Caesar and for all he'd meant to do? And didn't Octavian claim to be fighting for Caesar, too? Didn't that make Octavian's fight his fight?

Yet to storm the temple of the Vestals …

Vorenus shook his head in the half-dark. It was hard to imagine such sacrilege, even if it did uncover Antony's betrayal of Rome. And betrayal was what it was, without doubt. The Donations were bad enough, promising Roman lands to Egyptian royalty—he'd told Antony it wasn't a good idea—but to abandon Rome for burial in Alexandria was a slap in the face of all that they'd ever fought for. All that Caesar had ever fought for.

Was it not for Caesar that he and Pullo had fought and bled in Gaul? Was it not for him that they'd left their legion to come to Egypt so long ago? Was it not for his memory that they'd agreed to return here, to protect his son?

Vorenus blinked out at the lights blinking back.

Caesarion. A young man. But a good man, Vorenus was sure. Honest, respectful, intelligent, and strong. Truly Caesar's son.

Then again, fighting for Caesarion meant fighting Rome. How could he do that?

“Mind some company?”

Vorenus didn't need to turn to recognize his old friend Pullo. “Please.”

The big man joined Vorenus in leaning against the wall, gazing out at the city that had so strangely enwrapped their lives. “It's getting a bit heated in there,” he said.

Vorenus nodded. “Any indication of the wind?” Not that it mattered. Duty was duty. Or should be. Had been, at least.

“Antony's angry.”

That brought an honest smile to Vorenus' face. “When is he not?” he asked.

Pullo's own smile was grim. “He'll go to Greece to lead the defense. The only question is whether Egypt will go with him.”

Vorenus let the air out of his lungs and was suddenly struck by the memory of his breath rising into the winter-grayed skies of Gaul, above snowfields strewn with stains of red amid leafless trees. How often had he thought he'd left war behind, only to find it at his heels? And for Rome.
Always
it had been for Rome.

“I don't like this fight,” Pullo said.

“Have you liked any?”

“Sure. I guess. I mean, I liked smashing heads in Gaul. And our fight here in Egypt.” Pullo's voice grew wistful. “That was a piece of work, you must admit. One legion surrounded but holding back the tide. Nine months—”

“I was here,” Vorenus whispered.

“Well, you know. Some fights are good fights. But Romans against Romans…”

“Apparently we're not Romans anymore, Pullo. Didn't you hear?”

“Bah.” Pullo spat out into the night. “They said the same of Caesar once, didn't they?”

True. But was this the same? The people loved Caesar, but he knew they didn't feel the same for Antony. And fewer still loved Caesarion, the foreign prince for whose sake Antony claimed to be fighting. “I just don't know anymore,” Vorenus muttered.

“Antony should go to Rome. It's what Caesar would've done.”

Vorenus shook his head. “When Caesar crossed the Rubicon he did so as a liberator, not a conqueror. You know that as well as I. But Antony … as soon as he cast his lot with Egypt he became like a foreigner to the people. Attacking Octavian in Italy would only make him look worse.”

Pullo frowned. “I just don't like this fight,” he repeated. “Antony or Octavian. Isn't much of a choice, is it?”

“It's not our choice to make, Pullo,” Vorenus said, struck by the honest truth of it. “We cast our lot when we came to Egypt, I think. Octavian would have our heads if he could. I think our fate is Caesarion's.”

Pullo said nothing for a long time. “Well, I don't understand why they can't just live in peace,” he finally said. “Octavian can keep the west; Antony can keep the east. Just like it's been.”

Vorenus smiled at his friend's naive optimism and was starting to reply when he saw, out of the corner of his eye, a shape move among the shadows inside the palace, along the base of the inner wall. Staring after it, he thought through the rotation of the guards, trying to recall whether any had business there at this time of the night. He felt a sinking in the pit of his stomach.

“I mean, I guess there's the problem that Antony proclaimed Caesarion to be his father's only true heir,” Pullo continued.

“Pullo,” Vorenus whispered, eyes still fixed below.

“I guess that means Octavian lied about Caesar's will, about how Caesar had meant for
him
to be his heir. That can't make Octavian too happy, being called a liar and all.”

“Pullo—”

“But I still don't understand why Octavian needs to attack—”

“Pullo!” Vorenus said, his voice rising to a hushed shout.

“What?” the big man asked, seemingly annoyed with having lost his impressive chain of thought.

“The guard,” Vorenus said. “Call them out quietly. Don't let anyone in or out of the council chambers. Lock the gates. Then take a strong contingent toward the northeast quarters, checking for intruders.”

Pullo just stood, looking confused. “Why?”

“Just move!”

Pullo blinked, actually snapped to attention, and then rumbled off, his hulking form blocking the interior light in the seconds before he vanished inside.

Vorenus turned back, trying to catch sight of the figure again among the various pockets of shadows within the confines of the palace's thick walls. When he failed to find it, Vorenus looked down over the balcony. The stone wall was sloped below him, not unlike the sides of the massive pyramids up the Nile. Farther down, the smooth surface disappeared into the black shapes of a garden shaded by palm trees. He could make his way back through the commotion, he knew, back through the winding stairs and rooms, but the straightest line would be the fastest.

Taking one more look to memorize the place where he'd last seen the intruder, Vorenus stepped up onto the edge of the stonework. His knees ached, and his aging back seemed to groan from the anticipation of what was to come, but duty was duty. No matter how old he got. No matter who that damn Octavian thought he was.

With a final glance at the moon, Vorenus dropped down into the dark.