Zama

by Dan Armstrong

When the attendants had completed their work, Zanthia dismissed them to be alone with Sophonisba. Sophonisba had said nothing since entering the room. She stood before the mirror stoically, appraising herself. Her gown clung to her like a lover. No detail of her body was hidden by the nearly sheer, white silk. Her black hair, brushed to a glossy ebony, hung free over her shoulders well past her waist. Sophonisba watched Zanthia approach her from behind in the reflection of the mirror.

  “No man in the world could resist you, Sophie. Be confident. And smile!”

  Sophonisba continued to gaze into the mirror.

  “Smile, Sophie, it’s your wedding night.”

  Sophonisba turned to face her handmaiden. “It’s not a wedding, Zanthia. It’s a political arrangement.”

  “Regardless of what you call it, you must learn passion—if only as an act. Do not be afraid.”

  “I’m not afraid.”

  “Then why are you shaking? Remember that you are a queen now. You cannot show fear, particularly tonight when you share the king’s bed. Syphax, all Numidian men, dreams of bold, imaginative women.”

  “How can I be bold and imaginative when I’ve never been with a man before, never even kissed a man other than my father?”

  “Pretend. Imagine that you are an animal. Use your mouth. Use your hips. Tonight especially, do the things I’ve told you to do. In the order that I said to, in the ways I’ve instructed. And do it with pleasure and heat—even if you don’t feel it. In return he will worship you. When you touch him, when you hold his phallus, imagine that the scepter to his kingdom is in your hand.”

  Sophonisba frowned at the thought.

  Zanthia sighed. “You’re right, Sophonisba. It’s politics, not love. You are here to win the war and nothing less. In no other way should you imagine it. It’s politics, and it’s politics you need to take advantage of. Take control of Syphax tonight and you will always have him under your thumb.”

  Sophonisba walked across the room to the south facing window. Her stride was long and slow like a big cat. She was starting to feel the significance of what had just transpired. The bright colors had drained out of the sunset and the sky was a steel blue. The moon was low in the east, a crescent, sitting on its back, a big grin in the heavens. “For my father, for Carthage, for Tanit, I will learn the science of pleasure tonight,” she whispered to herself.

  Three knocks sounded on the door. Zanthia slipped out the room’s back door, dousing half the oil lamps as she went. The door swung open. Syphax stepped into the room wearing a long golden robe. He noticed that the bed was open but empty, then he saw Sophonisba, a silhouette before the window, with the moon over her left shoulder. She stared at him for an extended moment before swaying across the room, slow and deliberate. She stood before him and opened his robe. She lifted it from his shoulders and dropped it to the floor behind him. Syphax was transfixed. She took his hand and drew him into the bed.

  CHAPTER 45

  Syphax was not seen until late in the afternoon the following day. He strode from his chambers with Sophonisba, looking both tired and pleased. The new couple wore matching crowns of gold and purple robes threaded with gold wire. Sophonisba’s eyelids were painted silver with antimony and her lips were painted red. They were escorted to the great hall by the twelve honor guards who had stood outside the king’s chambers throughout the night. A second throne had been installed for Sophonisba since the wedding.

  Hasdrubal, who had waited all morning in a guest room, was notified that the king and queen were ready to receive him. They were seated beside each other when he came into the hall.

  Hasdrubal bowed before his daughter and Syphax. Sophonisba appeared calm and contained behind her mask of makeup. Syphax radiated masculinity fulfilled.

  “I trust you both enjoyed your wedding night,” said Hasdrubal.

  Syphax’s answer was a big smile. Sophonisba merely met her father’s gaze with a look of strength and confidence that he had never seen in her before.

  “I cannot remember a happier moment in my life,” replied Syphax. “What business do you wish to conduct?”

  “Before I leave for Carthage, Your Majesty, I have one last request of you to complete the agreement yesterday’s wedding celebrated.”

  Syphax looked at Sophonisba and smiled. “Whatever you like, Hasdrubal. What can I do for you?”

  “I would like you to send an envoy to Scipio in Syracuse.”

  Syphax cocked his head in question.

  “I want you to tell Scipio that you cannot fulfill the promises you made to him a year ago. Tell him that you have married my daughter and are now bound to Carthaginian interests by blood, and that your best advice to him is to remain in Italy to protect his homeland.”

  Syphax frowned. “Is it not good enough, Hasdrubal, to say nothing to Scipio and turn away his envoys when he arrives in Africa?”

  “No. He should know immediately. I’m hoping it will be enough to dissuade him from coming to Africa at all. That would be the best for all involved.”

  Syphax was not happy with this request. He glanced at his queen. “I will have an answer for you tomorrow.”

  “I had hoped to leave today, Your Majesty, but I will remain one more day, trusting that your decision will reflect the significance of the gift I have just given you.”

  Syphax remained in the great hall to conduct business for only a short time before returning to his chambers with his queen. Women, of course, are as different in their individual makeup as men. Some women, as some men, are more predisposed to sexual intimacy than others. Some exude this quality in their every movement, in every expression they make, whether intended or not, and heat up the conjugal bed in ways that would be shocking to others. Sophonisba’s mother, who was also a woman of noted beauty, was a palpably sexual woman. It was in her blood and her being. Sophonisba had these qualities also, though prior to her marriage she didn’t really know what that meant. When her time came, a panther-like sensuality came naturally to her. Her deep intellect allowed her to use her body with a vicious kind of detachment that drove Syphax wild with craving for her.

  Upon reaching the bedroom that afternoon, Sophonisba removed Syphax’s crown, and he hers. They each then disrobed the other, Syphax hastily, Sophonisba with a slow, purposeful grace. When Syphax embraced her, she whispered, “Why would you not be willing to tell Scipio of our marriage? Am I not a woman you would want to boast of?”

  Syphax placed his hands on her buttocks and pulled her hips into his. He kissed her on the neck over and over, hardly hearing her words for the desire that encompassed him.

  “Did I not please you last night?” asked Sophonisba softly.

  Syphax lifted his head from her neck to look into her eyes. “Oh, yes, Sophonisba, more than you can know. And certainly I am proud to show you off to every man alive. In your company, I feel as though I can conquer the world.”

  “Then why the reluctance to tell this to Scipio? He will learn of our marriage eventually. Show him that you are not afraid of him. Show him that Rome is nothing to you compared to your love for me and for Carthage.”

  “I need to think it over. There should be a diplomacy to it—to save face.”

  Sophonisba took hold of his hand. “Please,” she said, “please your queen. Prove to her that Scipio is nothing to you.” She kissed down his chest, taking his left nipple in her mouth until it became hard, then dropped to her knees, pressing her cheek against his belly. She looked up at Syphax and wet her lips. “Pleasing each other, isn’t that what marriage is for?”

  Syphax agreed to Hasdrubal’s request the next day. That afternoon, after Hasdrubal had left for Carthage, Syphax and Sophonisba, sharing a litter, led an extravagant procession from the city to the Siga River. Musicians played flutes and rang bells. Slaves strew flowers or waved staves tipped with burning incense all the way to the edge of the river, where an extravagant three-hundred foot cedar barge lay at anchor, its two rows of gilded oars standing upright on each side, ready to
put the barge into motion. Syphax helped Sophonisba from the litter, and taking her hand, guided her down the ramp that led from the river bank to the barge deck. A long train of attendants followed them, carrying provisions and wedding excesses.

  With two floors of living space and banquet rooms, featuring a gym, a copper bath, stables, and an aquarium, the barge was more like a floating palace than a ship. Brightly painted, two-story cypress columns lined both sides of the deck. One hundred soldiers in white tunics and polished bronze armor stood at attention along the colonnades. Two solid gold thrones sat on an elevated stage in the center of the ship to allow the best view of the river and the shoreline. An enormous purple silk awning stretched overhead, from colonnade to colonnade, for protection from the sun. The gunwales were inlaid with silver and gold. Polished bronze accoutrements—windlasses, cleats, ladders, anchors, boat hooks, and chains—sparkled everywhere, dazzling the eye.

  One hundred trumpets announced their departure. The oars dipped into the water and began their rhythmic pull to the slow beat of a drum. The barge would proceed down the river at a leisurely pace for a week, then would reverse direction and come back to Siga, a two-week honeymoon cruise that would have made even an Egyptian queen jealous.

  CHAPTER 46

  “So, Sophie, you have had five days and five nights with your husband, what do you think?” Zanthia brushed Sophonisba hair in the privacy of one of the royal barge’s bedrooms. She had chased off the other girls to have this conversation with the young woman she cared for as much as a daughter. “Has my instruction been helpful to you?”

  Zanthia stood behind Sophonisba, who sat in a chair before a large bronze mirror. The new queen had transformed herself into someone she would not have recognized prior to her arrival in Siga. She had always been somber and withdrawn. Only Zanthia had been privy to her thoughts and her turmoil. But her solemnity had deepened in the past week. She was growing into her persona as a queen and it became her and added to her beauty. Now, when she might have blushed in response to Zanthia’s question, she answered with the calculated cool of an assassin.

  “Your words have changed me forever, Zanthia. I feel no shame in the animal pleasures that once frightened me, and Syphax can please me in ways I did not anticipate. But I cannot give myself completely to a man I do not love—a man who ordered the murder of the only man I have ever wanted.”

  Sophonisba stared into the mirror and revealed the depth of her anguish. “I can rouse passion in myself and in him because I must. I consider everything I do with Syphax an act of political necessity. I can see that I am pleasing him, and your advice has enabled me.”

  “You’re more than pleasing the king, Sophie. It’s as evident as the sun in the morning sky. The man worships you. Next,” her eyes narrowed, “you must make him understand that you are smarter than he is. Engage in the politics of his kingdom.”

  Sophonisba eyes met Zanthia’s in the mirror.

  Zanthia nodded. “Rule the bedroom and the rest of the empire will follow.”

  CHAPTER 47

  Syphax took Sophonisba to Cirta following their honeymoon on the river. Cirta had been the largest and most important city in Masinissa’s kingdom. Sophonisba was well aware of this, and found it painful to be there, but she made a point of being in the palace’s great hall each day when Syphax discussed affairs of state, made legal judgments, and conducted the everyday business of running a large kingdom. Much of this was dull routine. Although only eighteen years old, Sophonisba had decided that she would try to understand it all.

  Their third day in Cirta, three weeks into their marriage, Sophonisba attended the morning session of state when small claims were assessed. Syphax had gone through three cases—two involving street vendors and one grazing rights—when a local man, in a dirty linen tunic, came running into the hall. The honor guard that accompanied Syphax whenever he was in public quickly stopped the man well short of the throne. The man screamed that he had information for the king that he would want to hear. Syphax told the guards to bring the man forward. Four guards ushered him down the aisle and pushed him onto his knees before the two thrones.

  “What have you to say?” bellowed Syphax, a man whose image of himself was that of a warrior. He was king because of his capacity as a soldier and as a procreator.

  “Masinissa is alive. I saw him outside Bizerta when the Romans landed last month.”

  Syphax immediately stood from his throne and screamed for Bucar. Sophonisba felt herself grow warm. Word traveled fast through the palace. It wasn’t long before Bucar came striding down the hall’s central aisle in full armor. He knelt before the king. “You called for me, Your Majesty.”

  “Six weeks ago you brought me the head of Masinissa.”

  “Yes, sire.”

  “And you were certain the head was Masinissa’s?”

  “Yes, sire. I cut the head off his body with my own hand.”

  “And you are certain that the body was Masinissa’s? And that there can be no doubt of that?”

  “Well, sir, the body was retrieved from the river. It was battered and swollen.”

  “Would you stake your life on the claim that Masinissa is dead?”

  “I—I am not—yes. Yes, sire.”

  “You don’t seem as certain as the day you collected the reward for his head.”

  “It’s the way that I have been summoned and the questions you have asked that shake my certainty.”

  “As well they should.” Syphax pointed to the man standing off to one side of the hall in a dirty tunic. “This man says Masinissa is alive. What do you say to that?”

  “Ask my men what they saw. We surprised Masinissa and thirty of his men one morning. We killed all but Masinissa and four other riders before they were out of their bedrolls. We caught two of those five, then chased Masinissa and the others to the edge of the big bend in the Chelif River, where it runs fast and deep. All of them leapt into the river while still mounted and went beneath the surging water with their horses. We searched the river bank downstream for miles. We found three dead horses and one body, Masinissa’s. The others could not have survived.”

  “Someone bring me the head,” shouted Syphax. He had brought it to Cirta as verification to the locals of his position as their new king.

  Syphax motioned to the guards. They stepped in close around Bucar as the king waited for the jar to be retrieved.

  A slave came into the hall carrying the glass jar that was said to contain Masinissa’s head suspended in olive oil. Beads of perspiration broke out along Sophonisba’s hairline, fearing she might cry.

  “Who’s head is in this jar?” demanded Syphax.

  Bucar bowed his head without giving an answer.

  Syphax held the jar up with both hands and peered into the murky oil. “I can’t see a thing in his light.” He angrily threw the jar on the stone floor. It shattered in front of Bucar. The head rolled up to his knees, face uppermost.

  “Is that Masinissa, Bucar? Is it? Your life depends on it.”

  Bucar bowed his head.

  Sophonisba couldn’t stop herself from standing to get a better look at the poorly preserved head. One of the guards kicked it with the toe of his sandal so that it rolled a quarter turn and faced directly at the king and queen. Sophonisba took a breath. She had not seen Masinissa in more than a year, but she was certain the head was not his.

  “That’s not Masinissa,” said the guard.

  Syphax took three steps closer. “You’re right. It’s not.”

  Bucar sat up on his knees, hands upraised, seeking mercy. Syphax pulled a sword from the scabbard of one of his guards and in a single long stroke decapitated Bucar. The head rolled across the aisle, stopping at the feet of one of the guards. The corpse fell forward, blood pulsing from the severed neck.

  “Masinissa lives!” Syphax shouted to the gods. “What could be worse?”

  Only being married to you, thought Sophonisba, her heart split in two by the news.

  PAR
T V

  PROBLEMS IN LOCRI

  “If you are ruled by mind you are a king; if by body, a slave.”

  -Marcius Porcius Cato

  CHAPTER 48

  Scipio might have achieved his goal of reaching Africa before the end of the summer had Africa been the only theater in the war, but Carthage had been anticipating Scipio’s arrival for almost a year and was continuing to do whatever she could to stop him or slow him down, part of which had been sending Hannibal’s youngest brother, Mago, to northern Italy.

  Unlike Hasdrubal’s march through the Alps two years earlier, Mago left Spain by sea. He took thirty warships, carrying twelve thousand foot and two thousand horse, to the Balearic Islands and then to Corsica to recruit more soldiers. Shortly after Laelius arrived in Africa for reconnaissance, Carthage sent Mago additional ships and troops with orders to immediately sail for Italy. He landed north of Rome in Liguria with approximately twenty thousand men. Within a week, Mago had taken the city of Genoa. Suddenly he was a looming threat in Italy. The Roman Senate responded by sending four legions to Liguria, with orders to keep Mago in the north and to prevent him from joining forces with his brother. Only a year earlier the war in Italy had seemed to be winding down. Now it was heating up again, not only in the north but also in the south.

  About the time of Laelius’ return from Africa, Scipio received word that a Roman cohort had gained access to one of the two citadels in Locri, a Carthaginian stronghold since early in the war. After Marcellus’ siege of Syracuse, Locri had become Hannibal’s closest port to Carthage and one of his most important sanctuaries in southern Italy.

  When Scipio learned that Hannibal was headed to Locri to prevent a Roman takeover, he decided to put the invasion of Africa on hold to take the two-day voyage to Locri. He put Laelius in charge of Syracuse and set sail the following day with a small fleet and the Fifth legion.