“So it is.” Hannah rested her hand over Caesarion’s, and they both smiled as the child within her moved once more. “But I don’t think that’s true, anyway. I just have a feeling it’s a girl.”
“Boy or girl,” Caesarion said, “he or she will be more beautiful than we can possibly imagine.”
“With two such parents,” Vorenus agreed, “it will be so. I can’t wait to meet him.”
“Or her,” said Pullo.
“Beautiful,” Caesarion whispered, patting his wife’s belly once more.
Hannah squeezed his hand against her, but then nodded toward the piles of writings before her. “That’s not why we’re here, my love.”
Casearion let out a long breath and finally pulled his hand away. He turned to Pullo and Vorenus. “We think we figured it out.”
“Figured what out?” Pullo asked.
Caesarion nodded his head in the direction of the artifact over his shoulder. “The Ark. Why it’s weaker here, like it has lost some of its strength. When I used it I could sense that.”
Vorenus knew that Caesarion and Hannah felt that it had lost some of its powers, but he’d never really asked how they had known it—though he’d always suspected it must be because they’d tried to use it. “I thought you didn’t want it used,” he said to Hannah.
“It’s true. I didn’t. I still don’t. But you’ve said it yourself, Vorenus: the Ark isn’t safe here in Elephantine.”
Vorenus started to open his mouth to ask why they hadn’t followed his advice to move it, but Caesarion held up his hand. “It’s still safer here than out in the open. All the choices before us have ill outcomes. It has been that way from the moment we left Alexandria. We all know this.”
“It’s only a matter of choosing the least evil,” Pullo said.
Hannah nodded. “Here we have a place of relative security. The Roman garrison is over the water in Syene and only rarely do they come here. Whatever disputes between the priests of Khnum and the Jews who built this place—the ones who were here when my family once kept the Ark in this very place—they are forgotten. And the Therapeutae have welcomed us as the long-lost cousins that we very much are. No one would think to search here for us, for the Ark.”
“But if they do,” Caesarion said, acquiescing to the arguments of the elder man, “then this place is little capable of protecting the Ark. You are good men, my friends, but all of us together could not stop even a cohort.”
“Though a century, perhaps,” Pullo said, seeming to puff up at the thought of taking on a hundred men.
Vorenus patted the bigger man on the back. “Not even in our younger days. And we are anything but young now.”
“Speak for yourself,” the big man muttered. He pointed at his hideously scarred face. “This alone will turn back half of them.”
“I think it’s charming in its way,” Hannah said, causing the furrows on Pullo’s face to flush dark.
“Point is,” Caesarion said with a smile, “staying here has been the best of our bad options. But we felt we needed the power of the Ark to help even the odds if it came to it.”
Vorenus nodded. “So you tried it.”
“I did. Just a little at a time, learning to control it, learning how to control myself. The power … it’s beyond description. But it’s less than what I felt in Alexandria, like it was disconnected from something.”
“Didymus said that the Ark drew power from sacred spaces,” Vorenus said, remembering what the librarian had told him in Alexandria during the mission that had cost Khenti his life—but which had brought Pullo back to them. “Alexandria was one of them.”
“Right. But this is a sacred place, too, is it not?” Caesarion swept his arm across the space inside the shrine. “A temple, built by Jews to honor their God, constructed according to the instructions given in their scriptures by the prophet Moses, the same man who had built the Ark itself. A place where centuries ago the very Ark had been kept, surely just there, where it sits now. What could be more sacred than this? And yet its power was lessened. Still extraordinary, but still less.”
“So this place is not as sacred as Alexandria,” Pullo said. “Maybe it isn’t the making of a building that makes it sacred.”
“It seems not,” Caesarion agreed.
Vorenus thought back to their walk in the fog. “It’s like the incense,” he said.
“Incense?”
“Something Pullo and I were talking about on the way here: what they burn in the Temple of Khnum, the frankincense that Gallus and his army are wandering Arabia trying to find. I grew up thinking of it being holy. But it isn’t. Not at all. It’s just an aroma. It has nothing to do with the gods. But I still like it, it still makes me happy to smell it, to be in those places. All because of what they are in my memory. Maybe that’s what makes a place sacred. Not where it is or what it looks like or what spices they have. It’s the people who have been there, the memories of that place. Maybe we leave a part of ourselves where we have believed. Maybe this place … well, maybe not enough people believed here.”
Caesarion indeed looked like a proud teacher. He turned to Hannah and smiled at her. “You’ve just explained it far more beautifully than we ever could, Vorenus,” she said.
“Your father never taught you any of this?” Pullo asked.
Hannah sighed. “He taught me much, as did my mother. But so many generations have passed since the Ark was used. We were only tasked with protecting it, remember, we were never meant to use it. No one is.”
“And no one will,” Caesarion said to her, “unless the safety of the Ark is at stake and there simply is no other way.”
Vorenus looked over to the Ark. At Actium he’d seen something of what one of the Shards could do, and this was said to be the greatest of them. He truly hoped he would never need to see it used. “So what now?”
Caesarion at last turned back to the two old friends. “Well, that’s why we brought you here. We want to move it. We want to take it to Petra.”
Vorenus was tempted to shake his head, so strange a suggestion it seemed to be. “Why Petra?”
“Well,” Caesarion said, gesturing toward the books around them, “unless I’m wrong, that’s where it is from.”
23
THE RISING OF THE MOON
CAESAREA, 25 BCE
It seemed like the sun had hardly risen in the sky, and already Selene wanted to go back to sleep. She didn’t understand it.
Not that the daily rule of a kingdom was generally exciting. She’d seen enough of her mother’s duties to know what to expect, but it didn’t make living the truth of it any easier: ruling a country could be an awful bore.
But the tasks were never unimportant. Her mother had taught her that, too, and it had served her well. This morning, for instance, it had been meetings about repairs to the city’s main aqueduct. The growing city needed more water, and the old structure was showing signs of being inadequate. If the aqueduct failed, great swaths of the city would be without fresh water. People would die. Chaos would ensue.
Nothing could be more important, she knew that. Yet she still found herself needing to concentrate not to yawn or get distracted as the engineers and artisans explained in detail what was wrong and how best to fix it.
Many rulers, she knew, didn’t sit through such interminably detailed accounts of the works they conducted, but that wasn’t Juba’s way. He wanted to understand the matter—not just in vague waves of the hand, but at the level of chisel and stone. More than once he had surprised those delivering reports by asking for the opinions of the actual laborers themselves. It was unheard of for a king to ask a commoner for his advice, but to Juba it was a simple matter of who had the best information.
It was exactly how her half-brother Caesarion would have ruled if he had lived to take his rightful place upon the thrones of both Egypt and Rome. She could think of no higher praise than that.
And it made her love him all the more.
So she stilled her yaw
ns and generally tried to match her husband’s hard focus as he received final clarification on the additional work to be done on the vital structure.
“I see,” he said, leaning forward from his seat beside her on the dais. The light from the open balcony behind them stretched their shadows forward onto the polished tile floor of the chamber, and for a moment her attention was caught by the way those darker forms of their enthroned selves looked like statues of the kings and queens of old. Her own shadow needed only a headdress to be her mother’s.
We become our parents, she thought. Whether we welcome it or not.
Juba’s shadowed form turned to face hers, and she could see the hazy outline of his thickening beard. It gave him a look of wisdom, he thought, and an authority that came with the age he still thought he lacked—as if he had forgotten that all kings were once young. A few weeks earlier she’d pointed out to him that at twenty-three he was a year older than Alexander the Great had been when he’d invaded Asia and begun the destruction of the Persian Empire. He’d laughed at that and told her that Mauretania would be good enough for him.
“What do you think, Selene?”
It took Selene a moment to realize that the shadow was speaking to her, and she looked up from the floor and smiled at her husband, noting that the beard also made him handsomer than ever. “I think your words on this matter are wise,” she said.
It was rare for her to lose focus like this, and it didn’t surprise her that her observant husband had sensed it. His eyes were twinkling at her with both a kind of amusement for having caught her and a shared pity for their duties. For all that he seemed born to rule, she knew he’d rather be in bed, too. Though perhaps not sleeping.
“It appears we are agreed, then.” He turned back to the man who had been placed in charge of the project. “I’ll trust you to see to the matter efficiently. Regular reports will be thorough and unflinching. Remember that problems in executing the plan will not be treated as harshly as attempts to cover up those problems will be.”
The man bowed and retreated along with several other individuals involved in the project. Selene saw that as he turned, he was smiling. He had been thorough in his preparations, he had answered truthfully, and he had been rewarded with oversight of the project, which was a key promotion. And like so many of the men they hired, he seemed relieved that the king and queen had no tolerance for half-measures or empty gestures. They were going to build Caesarea—and the kingdom of Mauretania around it—based on a foundation that was as devoid of rotting corruption as possible. They expected the best work out of the best people, and they would pay what it took to get that, because it was the only way to sustain the dream that they were building.
As the chamber emptied of one group and the herald waited at the door for the command to bring in the next, Juba leaned over toward Selene, whispering quietly so that neither the guards nearby nor the servants in the corners of the room might hear. “You can go back to bed, my love. I’ll delay anything of great importance.”
Though many queens were mere child-bearers for their kings, present as figureheads at the most formal functions but otherwise uninvolved in the daily workings of the realm, Juba and Selene had agreed—without ever needing to discuss it—that Mauretania would have a true king and queen, who ruled side by side and hand in hand. “I should be well,” Selene replied, shifting in her seat to move tiring muscles. “I don’t know why I’m so tired this morning.”
“Well, I know I didn’t keep you up late. For once.” Juba grinned, and it was clear that there was still a young man behind his beard.
Selene narrowed her eyes. “Maybe that’s the problem.”
His eyebrows raised. “In that case, my queen, you’ll be full of energy tomorrow.” He nodded in the direction of the door. “Still, we can take a break. The aqueduct was the most pressing thing. I’m sure everything else can wait.”
She shook her head and yawned in the middle of it, which almost made her laugh in the most un-royal of ways. Why was she so tired? “I’ll be well. I will. Call in the next.”
Juba nodded his head, turned to face forward again, and then waved to the herald.
The herald bowed, disappeared through the doorway, and then returned again a few moments later with a young man in tow.
He was a handsome-enough man, well dressed, with deeply tanned skin that immediately reminded Selene of her homeland. She sat up a little straighter and focused on him as he approached. He was clearly nervous about the audience. Most people were, but there was something even more skittish about him, as if he half-expected to be struck by someone. It made her want to pity him. But then as she watched him get closer she realized, too, that he was someone that she felt she’d seen before. She couldn’t place where, but she was certain she’d met him.
The herald brought him up to a spot some five paces in front of the thrones, then stopped and bowed low. The young man with him stopped at his side, hesitated for a moment, and then awkwardly did the same.
“Thrasyllus of Mendes,” the herald announced. “Come from the Great Library of Alexandria.”
As the herald backed away once more, Selene found that she had leaned forward in her seat. To her right she sensed that Juba had done the same.
“Welcome, Thrasyllus of Mendes,” Juba said.
Thrasyllus opened his mouth to say something, then closed it and bowed again. “My Lord King,” he said. “Thank you for agreeing to see me. And you, too, Lady Queen.”
Juba waved at the titles as if he might brush them away, but Thrasyllus appeared too wide-eyed to have noticed. “So, you’ve come from Alexandria,” Juba said, clearly trying to coax him out of his shock.
Thrasyllus nodded but still said nothing.
“It’s been a long time since I’ve seen Didymus,” Selene said. “Is he well?”
“He is, Your Majesty. Very well indeed.”
“We’re pleased to hear it,” Juba said. “What business do you have?”
Selene saw the young scholar’s eyes flash away from them, toward the guards nearby. That was what was making him nervous, she realized. Was it because he was a threat? “I think I remember you from somewhere,” she said. “Did I meet you in Alexandria?”
Thrasyllus let out his breath as if he was relieved to be talking of something other than what was on his mind. “You did, my lady … my queen. You both did, in fact. During the, ah, fall of the city, when you both came to the Library. I was the one who brought you to Didymus.”
“Of course,” Juba said. “I remember.”
Thrasyllus nodded and smiled gratefully, but once more Selene saw his eyes move toward a servant who was walking quietly from one shadow to another, tending to some of the plants that stood among the pillars and statues lining the walls. Not a threat, she decided. He was nervous because he had expected to talk with them alone.
Selene made a show of making a welcoming gesture with her arms, allowing the movement to subtly give her control over the room. “We are glad you have come, Thrasyllus, and I know we both want to hear more about how things fare in Alexandria, and what news you have from the Library.” She abruptly stood, and she heard Juba immediately do the same. “But let us not sit in chairs to hear of it. I think a walk out of doors would do me well on this beautiful morning.”
Juba started to say something, but she looked over and a message unspoken passed between them. He smiled grandly and stepped down to stand before her, offering up his hand. “A walk outside would do the three of us much good, I’m certain.”
As she took her husband’s hand and began to descend, Selene caught the look of pure relief on the scholar’s face as he realized that Juba had just said they would be alone.
Whatever the young man had to say, she decided, it was going to be interesting.
* * *
The sun was shining even higher in the sky as Thrasyllus took leave of them and moved away.
When he was gone, Selene turned and placed both hands upon the railing of the long pal
ace balcony they’d been walking along. Stretching out below her, the city of Caesarea was a hive of activity: hammering and crashing, yelling and laughing. They had come so far. For a time she had thought she’d actually left everything behind in Cantabria. But it wasn’t true. It had never been true. And now more than ever, the old thoughts were coming back. Vengeance. Death.
And hope, too.
Juba came up behind her and placed his hands gently upon her shoulders. “What are you thinking, my love?”
So many things were swirling in her head that she could not find the words for them. How could she tell him that despite all that they’d tried to leave their old ways behind them she needed this last chance to put her mother’s spirit to rest, to put herself at rest? She’d sworn vengeance for her mother, and she’d left it unfulfilled. And she’d felt her mother, closer than ever as she’d flown above Vellica, using the Shards. If even more power could be pulled from the artifacts, what could they accomplish? Could they ally with a greater power? Could they send Tiberius to his grave? That alone could bring her peace, could it not? And maybe they could do more. Maybe they could break the very walls of death, see those whom they’d lost. Juba’s father. Her parents. Her brothers. And how to convince Juba to help? He’d sworn never to use the Shards again, and she’d tried to do the same—tried, God knew it, and failed.
At last she let out a long sigh. “It’s a lot to think about.”
“It is. I can understand why Didymus sent the news of what he’d discovered in person rather than in writing.”
Selene nodded. “We saw the power of the Shards in Cantabria. Just the beginnings of it.”
“And it was terrible.”
Juba’s voice was shaking with emotion, and Selene turned to see that there were tears at the corners of his eyes. His nightmares, she knew, had never gone away. The sight of his face brought fresh ache to her heart. She nodded at him, knowing she couldn’t deny the truth. “Used in anger. Used to destroy. Yes.” She reached up and gently brushed away the tears. “But you had no choice, my love. We would have died.”
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