Daughters of the Nile

by Stephanie Dray

  Both girls look puzzled, so I explain, “Before the dark god Set cut Osiris into pieces, he first drowned the good god of grain in the Nile. It was on the banks of this river where Isis first wept for her murdered husband. This is where she brought him back to life with her magic. The spirit of Osiris lives here now, in the depths of the water. Here, he waits for his love, for Isis, and each year he swells to make love to her.”

  Pythia’s eyes light with sudden insight. “And she comes to him in the person of a queen …”

  “Just so,” I say, removing the amethyst ring that once belonged to my mother but became my betrothal ring to Juba, a king, but a mortal man. “You must always love your kingdom like a faithful wife or it cannot prosper. Today I will meet the Nile like a bride to a bridegroom.”

  “I’m too little to be a bride,” Dora points out.

  I sigh at her innocence, even as I am determined to guard it. “Not for long, my sweet. One day, you’ll be a beautiful maiden, then a loving mother, and then, hopefully, a wise old crone. But of these three, it’s your life as a mother that will serve your people best.”

  “And please the king,” Pythia adds.

  I stiffen, my grip tightening on the betrothal ring I have just removed. “Have a child for Isis, for your kingdom, and for yourself before you do it to please any man. Your children will be rulers, and their divine ichor will come to them through their mother’s milk—no matter who their father might be.”

  With that, I set the ring aside and wade into the shallows, my thin linen shift soaking tight against my body before I remove it, for the god. My breasts are not as firm and high as they once were, but since I have had two children of my own, perhaps the god will find me more womanly, more comely.

  “What of the crocodiles?” Pythia asks, eyeing them nervously.

  “Queen Selene is a vessel of Isis,” my mage whispers, forgetting himself. “And when she is Isis, crocodiles will never harm her, for she is sacred to all the beasts of Egypt.”

  The river is as warm as a lotus-scented bath, and the frogs sing to me a song that makes my fingers tingle with heka. Magic is already flowing through me and not much longer will I be myself. While I am still mortal, I hold out my arms to the girls. “Come. Meet Osiris.”

  Eighteen

  PYTHIA cautiously moves into the water, using rocks to steady her. But Dora leaps in with a splash. Her little feet don’t reach the bottom, and she flails in the water until I catch her under the arms. “You carry Isis with you wherever you go, but remember that the god waits here, pining for love. For surrender and rapturous embrace. One day, you will be Isis, but now I must be.”

  Already, the Nile’s green waves lap at my consciousness, drawing me into the marshy reeds of a waking dream where life teems. I have seen this before. I saw it the day my mother put a frog amulet around my neck and called me the Resurrection. Now my wizard does the same.

  “She is the Resurrection,” he prays. “She brings life from death. She gives to her kingdom an heir, she gives to her people their daily sustenance, and she gives Isis an embodiment on earth for Osiris to love.”

  I cannot make room for Isis inside myself until I loose my hold on my daughter, trusting her into Pythia’s hands. Like Demeter, I must let my daughter go if I am to have her back again.

  My skin tightens as the goddess comes to me, for she is so much bigger than my frail body can easily hold. I feel the stretch of her in my bones, her happiness and eager joy swelling my heart until it aches in my chest. She longs for the man she loved and lost—and I know how that feels. I may never see Helios again in this life, but perhaps I will find him again just as Isis finds Osiris through me. She smiles with my face, lifting it to the sun. She lays me back in the water and swims, arm over pale arm, fingertips brushing the lilies that float on the water. She calls to him with my tremulous voice.

  And he comes to me. He caresses me with the silky stroke of silt. He kisses me with the brush of a heron’s feathers on my cheeks. The hot sun is a lover’s breath on my face, my neck, my breasts. He wants her. He loves her. He waits for her always. And he has her, through me.

  I take my hopes, my fears, and my dreams and release them into the water with my heka. I let them go. I give them to him. In return, he promises me a year of plenty.

  The air grows damp, heavy with dew. The birds flock. The fish leap. The reeds grow thick and green. And when I rise from the river this time, shaking the water from my hair, I am struck by the sight of the girls waist-deep in the river, praying with my mage. I am struck by it because Dora has her hands in his, heka dancing in her eyes as if she were drawing it from the river.

  “You are going to be a very great wizard,” she says to him.

  The old man is so mesmerized that he admits, “No, Princess. I was once, but no more …”

  “You will be again,” Dora insists. “I see it.”

  At these words, my poor mage staggers, and my girls help him down to the mud, both of them tending him. They have him well in hand, stroking his cheeks with water, bringing a hat for his head.

  In my life, I have so often lamented all I have lost, but I am truly blessed. The bounty promised me in that river is not merely grain. It is in my girls too. I came to teach them, and they have taught me. For I realize, in this moment, as they care for my mage, that I am not alone. My joys, my burdens, my legacy … they carry them too. Everything that has been prophesied of me is also in their power.

  For they too are daughters of the Nile.

  *

  THE mage needs a soft bed, water aplenty, and an escape from the infernal heat of the sun. As soon as we return to the palace, I call for servants to carry him to his rooms, to bathe him and rub his chapped skin with aloe. He is determined to fast in prayer and study, but I make him eat a hearty meal of eggs and stewed lentils followed by cakes made with finely ground nut flour, still warm from the oven. And when I realize that his teeth and gums hurt him, I cut up his eggs and cakes into tiny pieces.

  This infuriates him. “Majesty, leave it for servants to do!”

  “Are we not all servants of Isis? Even queens? Now finish your lentils.”

  He sulks at my bullying, but he eats. When he is fed and settled into his bed and I have taken my own bath in lavender water, I reflect on what I have seen and what I have done and what I have still left to do. I have again gone to the river and made of myself a vessel of Isis. But still, there is no temple for her in my kingdom.

  The next morning, I summon Necho of Alexandria before my throne.

  He does not answer my summons.

  Instead, Publius Antius Amphio appears before me, and for once, he does not stink like a brothel. He is freshly bathed and bows a little more deeply than he ever has before, expressing his gratitude at my return, a thing which, in and of itself, makes me suspicious. “Why so solicitous, Amphio?”

  “Oh, I am in a very good mood today,” he says. “I thought I would escort you to the site of your Iseum, where, no doubt, Necho of Alexandria is hard at work.”

  It does not surprise me to hear the professional jealousy in his voice. In the past few years, he has been tasked with designing baths and marketplaces and warehouses; nothing so grand as a temple. But when we are almost to the work site, I sense more than petty resentment from Amphio. Indeed, he can barely disguise a sneer.

  Soon I realize why. The carriage stops at the foot of the hill where a foundation has been cut into the soil and bricklayers toil. I am disarmed by how little progress has been made. Why, it barely looks as if any work has been done at all. And Necho is nowhere to be found …

  The foreman sees me and my guards and comes swiftly, wiping mortar on his tunic. “Majesty! We were not warned of your visit or we would have taken some trouble to welcome you.”

  “Tell her what you’re doing,” Amphio barks at the foreman.

  “We are laying bricks, of course,” the foreman replies.

  But glancing up at the workmen, I see that they are not laying bricks
. They are pulling them down. “What, exactly, is going on here?” I demand to know.

  Amphio is only too happy to show me, offering his arm to help me climb up to what ought to be the base of a magnificent temple. Over the foreman’s objection, the Roman architect takes hold of a brick and taps it on the ground, then crumbles it in his palm. My eyes widen. Either this Roman has strength beyond normal men or …

  “These bricks were cured only this summer in a too-hot sun,” Amphio explains. “They were not fired in a kiln. Nor were they given time to dry all the way through. It is the kind of mistake not even an apprentice would make.”

  The bricklayers fall silent in agreement and I am forced to ask, “Are you saying this is the doing of Necho of Alexandria? That he ordered inferior bricks be used on my Iseum?”

  Amphio grunts. “That and more. See here. Look at the foundation. This is not good ground to build on. That is why—”

  “I’ve seen enough—”

  Insolently, he raises his voice so that his words run over mine. “That is why you see this tiny crack here. One day it will become a very large crack. Then your precious goddess—I assume you will make a statue to her—will come tumbling down with the rest of it.”

  “You are saying that my architect is incompetent? Necho is known by name and reputation as a great talent.”

  Amphio bleats with triumph. “I am saying he’s a fraud! Any letters recommending him were undoubtedly forged. I doubt very much that the man who has presented himself at your court is Necho of Alexandria or any sort of architect at all. What I am saying, Majesty, is that you have been duped.”

  *

  THUMBING the hilt of his sword, Memnon growls. “Necho must be ridden down, captured, and beheaded.”

  Chryssa is even thirstier for vengeance. “A beheading is too good for the thief. To think how we sponsored countless smelly garum factories to pay for nothing!”

  Time wasted. A fortune squandered. How is it that I continue to fail at everything I was supposedly born to do? Brooding, I decide, “We’re not going to behead him. We’re going to let him disappear into the desert.”

  Chryssa’s eyes bulge. “Why would we do that?”

  “Because I cannot let it be known what a fool I am. Yes, I was a credulous fool. Now I’m going to pay a heavy price for that foolishness without even the satisfaction of seeing justice done to a man who would steal from a goddess!”

  Publius Antius Amphio leans idly back on his seat, braced upon both elbows in supreme satisfaction. “It isn’t a total disaster, Majesty.”

  By the gods, I want to cut the insolent smirk off his face. “Say what you mean, Amphio.”

  His smirk widens to a grin. “Now you have the chance to start again. A hill in the Greek quarter amidst all the clacking wagons and crowded streets was never a good place for your Iseum.”

  “You think you know a better place?”

  “Aye and so do you, madam. Wouldn’t you like to open your linen drapes and be able to see your great vain tribute to your imaginary goddess? Wouldn’t you like your temple to be, like the Parthenon in Athens, the first thing anyone sees?”

  He has my rapt attention now.

  “Build it on the island with your lighthouse,” he suggests, with a sweep of his hand. “Build it there and it will be the first thing anyone sees coming to this city and the last thing they see before they leave.”

  I close my eyes, imagining it beneath the flutter of my lashes. The blazing fires of the lighthouse reflected off a golden roof like a glow of salvation. A temple that will dazzle in daylight and shine like a beacon in the night. A temple here, near my throne. A proclamation to all who come to our shores that Isis has come again to her throne through me. And it is an arrogant, godless Roman who gives me this vision.

  “Will you build it?” I ask, opening my eyes again.

  Amphio sits up. “If I am given a free hand I can start in the springtime. We’ll use concrete where convenient, but we’ll also need travertine—quarried and cut into blocks. We’ll need bronze struts and iron bands. We’ll need marble for the facing. We’ll need gold, Majesty. Lots of gold.”

  Chryssa pales, nearly paralyzed by this litany of expenses. I think she will say it cannot be done.

  But her eyes meet mine and she says only, “I will find the money.”

  *

  “I want to learn curses,” I tell the mage. “And don’t pretend you haven’t mastered such spells, because I have scented dark magic on your clothes since I was a child.”

  “As your mother’s wizard, it was my place to master them. But dark magic is not an art you want to learn.”

  “I cannot send soldiers after Necho of Alexandria, but he should not escape justice completely. You must show me.”

  He teaches me the incantations and rituals to call forth my heka and turn it to vengeance, but I realize that he is only humoring me when he adds, “Of course, you would need some essence of him—his urine, his semen, his saliva. Something of his body.”

  This I do not have. “Should I send servants to search his empty apartments for a stray hair or nail clipping?”

  “Majesty, I have told you before that all magic cuts its way out of you. Curses have especially jagged edges and hooks that take chunks of you with them. Even with careful wording, dark magic may come back upon you. It is a thing to be feared and used sparingly, which is why the laying of curses is work for mages, not for monarchs …”

  But he cannot do it for me. He drew his magic from the Temples of Isis in Egypt and has too little to spare. I draw my magic from wherever I feel her presence. That is why my blood is infused with heka and he, having forsaken Egypt to follow me, has withered in his powers. If a curse is to be laid upon this villain, I must be the one to do it. But before I can send for servants to scour the architect’s room for some trace of his person, my mage asks, “Majesty, do you not think Isis can avenge herself without your prompting?”

  This question strips me of my high-minded reasons and makes me suspect that the honor I seek to avenge is my own. In the matter of the architect, I allowed myself to be guided by too much prejudice and too much pride. Can I justly curse Necho of Alexandria—or whatever his true name is—without also cursing myself?

  “He is beneath you, Majesty,” the old man advises. “Save your wrath for worthier opponents.”

  Grudgingly, I accept his counsel. I do not want to be like the emperor used to be, punishing most severely the faults in others that found a source in himself. Augustus was a man who seldom forgave and never forgot, and I am desperate to believe that he is my apprentice now, and that I am no longer his …

  *

  THE king returns at the head of a legion.

  A year and a half my husband has been gone, and in that time, he has raised troops enough for a light infantry and a fearsome cavalry. I know better than to ask too closely as to how this was accomplished. Juba has equipped them with the finest mounts and says our Berbers are the best horsemen in Africa. Some are archers, others carry javelins, and some fight with swords, but they are all trained for quick strikes, and even the Romans praise them for agility on their fleet-footed mounts.

  After their parade into the city, the king dismounts, greeting me formally. I greet him just as formally, though it is a struggle not to smile. At fourteen, Pythia bows with poise. I have taught Dora to bow to the king too, but she is so excited that she runs to him, crashing into his legs. Juba stoops to kiss her hair, then scoops our son out of my arms. I fear that little Ptolemy will not know his father, but he laughs as if he only saw him yesterday.

  I throw a fine banquet to celebrate the king’s return, during which Crinagoras recites his new poem about the lion that would have eaten my Berber woman did she not command him in my name. Juba is amazed by this story, asking for details I had not thought to, such as whether anyone else was harmed by the lion before it was captured or killed. He wants the lion’s pelt to present as a gift to me, but I remind him that it was Tala, and even the
half-wild boy, Tacfarinas, who were heroic and deserving of reward.

  “Yes, what will you have of us, Tala?” the king asks.

  She shrewdly turns away his largesse, insisting that she would rather hold a favor in reserve one day when she might need it more. Such is the practicality of Berbers.

  “Surely you want something, Tacfarinas,” the king says, motioning to the boy. “Maysar tells me that you will grow up to be a true horseman.”

  The Berber boy seems startled by the praise and pushes out his chest. “I can ride without saddle cloth or reins. Give me two javelins and a round shield of hide and I can harry my enemies.”

  This makes our soldiers laugh, for it is a proud boast for a boy so sleight of build. Give him two javelins and a round shield of hide and he would stagger under the weight. Still, Juba rubs his chin and pretends to consider it. “Perhaps, when you are of age, you would like to serve in my cavalry and harry my enemies?”

  Delight shines in the boy’s eyes. “I would gladly serve a true Berber king.”

  My husband raises his goblet in a toast. “What am I if not a true Berber king? I am Juba the son of Juba. I am a descendant of Masinissa. Kin of Jugurtha too.”

  Of those names, only Masinissa was loved by the Romans. The rest were rebels and the boy must know it too. “Will you join with our Berber brothers in fighting the Romans near Egypt?”

  I shoot a potent glare at Lady Lasthenia, who is to bring me such news before I hear it anywhere else. “What fighting near Egypt?”

  It is the king who answers me, reminding me that when he moved his court to Volubilis, most dispatches from Rome were sent there too. “There is a rebellion on the border of Egypt, near Cyrenaica. The Garamantes who survived the campaign fought by Lucius Cornelius Balbus have made alliance with other tribes. Publius Sulpicius Quirinius is leading legions into the interior of Africa.”

  “We should fight Quirinius,” Tacfarinas insists, heedless of the many Romans in our court who would count this akin to treasonous rebellion. “We should come to the aid of our Berber brothers.”