Daughters of the Nile

by Stephanie Dray

  They watch my daughter because she is the granddaughter of Cleopatra. They watch her because she is the princess and because she is beautiful. But they also watch her because they seem to know that she is theirs. One Berber boy in particular has reason to think she belongs to him, for while the rest of the people watch Isidora, she is watching Tacfarinas, flashing her eyes at the stable boy every time she claps her hands or tosses her golden hair. And I worry at the kind of magic she is working now and if it will be her downfall.

  *

  THE children grow so swiftly.

  My daughter has become a young beauty. The sullen Tacfarinas has sprouted up in height such that he towers over the others. He will be a big man, I think. One with powerful arms. And already, the hint of a beard makes itself known like the soft fuzz of a peach on his upper lip.

  Tala’s son is now a boy of fourteen, and while he eschews the Roman custom of wearing the toga virilis as a mark of manhood, he insists on a new name. When he was born, his mother called him Ziri, the Berber word for moonlight. Now the charming little name has become an embarrassment to him and he insists on being called Mazippa, after his father, a Berber of the Mauri tribe, who died before he was born.

  In the way of young men his age, Tala’s son bristles when anyone but Dora calls him by his given name, but I am glad of his bourgeoning pridefulness because I have plans for him. Grazing lands must become plantations. We must have grain. But there is no reason whatsoever that the greatest landholders in Mauretania should all be Roman. And so I encourage Ziri—or rather, Mazippa—to learn the skills needed to manage a great estate. Make my son a great man in Mauretania, Tala said to me, but the boy will have to do some of his own making …

  My little Ptolemy is growing big too. In the spring, he celebrates his eighth birthday with a hunting trip and returns with the head of an antelope, which he proudly presents to me. Trying not to retch at the sight of the bloody thing, I praise him lavishly and announce that we will have roasted antelope for our feast. Alas, I do too good a job at disguising my distaste because Ptolemy says, “I know you said I could mount the horns over my bed, but if you want them, Mother, I would give them to you.”

  “I would not dream of stealing your prize, my generous little prince!”

  “You would not be the first to try,” he says, boasting about how raiders from the hills tried to chase the boys from their prey. “They fled when they saw our royal banner, though.”

  The story makes me wilt with fear. Only a stern lecture from Juba about how boys must become men keeps me from forbidding such hunting trips in the future. Instead, I use my terror for an opportunity, confessing to Memnon that I can trust no one but him to watch over my little prince in this wilderness city, where raiders and assassins appear from the mists.

  I work myself into such a state that Memnon promises to take up his post outside my son’s door, and I feel I have done well. Though Ptolemy is no easy child to manage, the burden on Memnon will be less. He will not be required to stand at attention for hours at official events or march in my processions. He can bark at my son and make him obey rather than chase after me and suffer my imperious ways.

  So I resign myself into the custody of my husband’s new commander of the palace guard, the young praetorian Iacentus, whose ambition and keen sense of authority has him establish a rotation of professional soldiers around the royal family in the model of the emperor’s elite guard.

  To My Friend, the Most Royal Queen of Mauretania,

  How I hate Aquileia! It is as cursed as everything else that Tiberius and I share. My new husband and I made a son here in the shadow of the Alps. (Do not be shocked; there is nothing else to do here where the nights are so dreary, the wine hardly passable, and no decent poet can be found.)

  Alas, our poor little baby did not live to see winter.

  Livia says we must not grieve in an excessive or unseemly way. Our son was only a few days old when we lost him and, according to her, hardly a real person at all. But I tell you, Selene, I have never been so sad. I am so sad over the death of my babe that I think I am ill. I have no other explanation for what’s wrong with me. I take pleasure in nothing. Wine tastes sour. Jewels do not sparkle. Fires do not warm me.

  Phoebe tells me shared grief should draw a husband and wife together. Nevertheless, I am certain that I am done with this farce and that Tiberius is done with me. There are some rifts between husband and wife that can never be mended. I think the loss of a child will smash even the strongest of foundations, and our foundations were made of clay.

  Do you know that when last we were in Rome, my husband saw his former wife? Tiberius was so overcome with regrets for having divorced her that he followed Vipsania through the streets calling after her with apologies and tears in his eyes. You would think such a thing would be a humiliation to me, but it only makes me sadder.

  Unfortunately, the story so enraged my father that he sent Vipsania away, where Tiberius cannot see her again. No matter what I say, my husband is convinced it was my doing. Now we cannot stand the sight of each other, so I am returning to Rome where I am loved by the people, where I can watch over my children and my interests.

  Especially now that Livia’s youngest son has become a Republican.

  Can you believe it? Fair Drusus, who owes nearly all his success to the fact that he is the stepson of the emperor, now argues that my father should renounce his authority and give power back to the Senate. Drusus makes no secret of his sentiments. Everyone knows it. Even my father knows. Tiberius showed my father one of his brother’s letters to warn that the emperor must pay respect to the more democratic institutions of Rome or there may be rebellion.

  Yes, those Claudian brothers, such champions of the people!

  I might admire it if I didn’t know it would be at the expense of my sons and of the plebs, who have been lifted out of poverty by my father’s governance. No one believes that these Republican sentiments are anything other than an excuse for Rome’s nobles to dominate and impoverish the people while warlords make war again … Why, not even Iullus Antonius believes it, and he has the most to gain, for he has surprised us all by standing for consul this year and being elected to the post.

  Reading what I have written here, I realize this is a wretched letter. I should burn it at once if only I did not think you would take some pleasure in learning that Herod is ruined …

  Thirty-two

  HEROD is ruined. I learn it not just from Julia’s letter but from all the other messages that trickle in, reminding us that there is still a world outside our idyll here in Volubilis.

  Herod has made so many enemies that everyone seems eager to tell us about his fall, but the most vivid account comes from Crinagoras, who arrives to tell us in person. Puffed up with self-importance and pride, my poet-turned-spy appears before us sunburned and complaining of the journey, spouting verses about how he would rather have been born a shepherd than to ever have dipped his oars in the bitter brine of the Aegean.

  We receive him gladly in a private room overlooking the olive orchards, and I am nearly as grateful to be reunited with my poet as I am to hear the news. Luckily, he is eager to tell us everything. “The Judean court is not a happy one. Everyone is always suspected …”

  “But not you?” I ask.

  Crinagoras, who had been admiring his reflection in a silver tray, huffs with indignation. “Not me, of course. I promise you, Herod was entirely taken in. I was the milking goat from which he eagerly sucked every milky drop of gossip. Herod was all too pleased to offer patronage. He never doubted that my greatness would reflect well on him.”

  Impatient, Juba says, “Go on …”

  Crinagoras sprawls insolently upon the couch, accepting wine and honey cakes from our servants. “You must know, of course, that Herod is still determined to kill his sons, so he arrested and tortured the court eunuchs until he obtained incriminating evidence. I took it upon myself to send word to King Archelaus that his daughter’s life was in dang
er, and he came straightaway to Judea. The King of Cappadocia was forced to pretend he was so angry on Herod’s behalf that he wanted to kill his own daughter and son-in-law with his bare hands. Through careful questions—which I helped him practice beforehand—he let Herod eventually convince him of their innocence.”

  “Clever,” I say. “But strange.”

  Juba is appalled. “Then Herod is truly mad.”

  “He was always mad,” I reply. “We are all simply so accustomed to madness that we no longer recognize it. Now, Crinagoras, tell us the rest. How did Herod fall from favor in Rome?”

  My poet smirks. “I’m getting there … I urged King Archelaus to stay in Judea and pretend at friendship with Herod, who was keen to start a war with the Nabateans. We convinced Herod that he should attack without securing permission from Rome. Was he not a sovereign king? Would Caesar make King Juba and Queen Selene ask permission if Mauretania fell under attack? Nay, we said. Was Herod any lesser king?”

  I lean forward, disturbed. “Did people die for this?”

  “Herod would have attacked anyway, Majesty, and he would have received the permission he sought. But in this, he fell victim to his own vanity. Now Augustus is furious with Herod for taking unauthorized military action.”

  When my mother plotted our escape after Actium, it was the Nabateans who burned her ships, and in so doing, condemned us to our fate. I decide that my poet’s strategy is fair vengeance. “You’re sure Augustus is angry with Herod?”

  “Caesar refuses to receive any of Herod’s ambassadors and has sent a letter revoking Herod’s permission to call himself philokaiser. There is some question of whether Herod even remains a friend and ally of Rome.”

  My eyes widen with great satisfaction. Herod will not be trusted with even a portion of my ancestral kingdoms now, and we need not fear that Isidora will be sent to Judea. The only way the news could be better is if Herod had been stripped of his throne. “He is ruined!”

  “So it seems, thanks to a little help from your poet.”

  “Oh, Crinagoras, you will be rewarded handsomely!”

  “Not handsomely enough, I’m sure—especially since it is not a service I can perform twice. When King Herod learns that I’ve returned to your court, he’ll realize he was deceived.”

  “I hope he does,” I say smugly. Because Herod is finished. The thought that I had anything to do with his downfall is a cause for celebration and I say so. Then I send my poet off to be pampered by slaves, as he complains of aches and pains and trials and tribulations endured to reach this backwater city in the wilderness.

  My mood is buoyant and when I rise from my couch, I nearly dance in a circle.

  “You’re fetching when you gloat,” Juba remarks idly, his stare traveling up my legs.

  “I can’t help gloating. That Herod has finally made such a spectacular mistake is sweet news … better than a mouthful of ripe cherries.”

  It is all sweetness here and I thank Isis for it every day.

  *

  UPON our leave-taking, the elders of the city present me with a glorious gift. It is a giant platter carved in intricate detail by the finest silversmith in Mauretania. It is an extraordinary portrait of me draped in an elephant headdress, like a fearsome Carthaginian queen. In my arm, I hold a cornucopia filled with the bounty of Mauretania topped with the crescent moon that is my namesake. There is a sistrum rattle, to represent Isis. A kithara harp like the one I sometimes play. And a lion and a lioness to represent my children. I am moved by the beauty of the piece, but startled beyond words to find a representation of Helios too.

  Who could know me so well, as to put all these things of meaning upon one portrait? “Don’t you like the gift?” the king asks, as I stare. “You are beginning to worry them.” Trying to speak over emotions that swell in my throat, I find that I cannot and the king frowns. “Now you are beginning to worry me.”

  It must have been Juba who told them what to carve. He chose things that brought me joy. Symbols of what means the most to me. Of what I am. Of what I want to be. Only someone who loved me could choose a gift like this for me.

  Sweet Isis, my husband loves me.

  When we married, he only wanted me as he imagined a wife must be. No man could have loved me and refused to believe that the emperor raped me. No man who loved me would have accused me of inviting it. But the man Juba has become … that man loves me. And what if I love him too?

  Overwhelmed with emotion, I reach for his hand, asking myself that very question. What if I love him? And yet, it is a question I must not answer, because it will all come to nothing if I am forced to stay in Rome at the emperor’s side … and I have found no plan, no scheme, to avoid it.

  *

  EVERYTHING begins to go wrong the day we return to our royal harbor city on the sea. We pass through the gates of Iol-Caesaria in time for the summer wheat harvest, when every road in the city is clogged with people and donkeys and wagons bearing sacks of grain.

  When we enter our grand palace, Ptolemy shows off his antelope horns and lets out a whoop at the soldiers who hail him as a returning prince. But my daughter seems dispirited. She complains of the summer heat, even though the ocean breeze sweeps across my wide walkways. She refuses to take our homecoming supper with our courtiers, and hides away in her room.

  Worried that she has fallen ill, I call her name at the door. She does not answer. When I knock, she does not open it. When I try to push the door open, I find it barred. I cannot imagine any good circumstance in which my daughter might bar the door against me. For a brief moment, I wonder if she has locked herself in with the stable boy. So I pound on the door, vowing that I will bash it in if she will not admit me. What I fear, of course, is that she can’t admit me. That something terrible has happened.

  “Guards!” I cry.

  That is when Isidora finally opens the door, her eyes bloodshot, her hand trembling. By the gods, she is ill. She is so ill she can barely stand. She sways on her feet, and I see the whites of her eyes before she collapses into my arms. Iacentus helps me carry her to the bed. It is only then that I smell the magic, sweet and smoky, floating in the hazy air of her bedchambers. Her divination bowl is tipped upon the floor, Nile water wetting the tiles, and I watch in dread as her snake slithers through the puddle and disappears under her bed.

  So my daughter has been felled by heka sickness. I do not know whether to be furious or relieved. “Fetch some cold water and a cloth,” I command one of the slaves gawping at us from the doorway.

  Dora moans again but doesn’t open her eyes until the candle has almost burned away. She wakes to find me wiping the sweat from her brow, and she lowers her eyes, abashed. “I just wanted to know what lay ahead for me in Rome. What sort of husband I might have …”

  I do not shout, though I want to. “Nevertheless, we agreed you would not try to read the Rivers of Time without me. I knew you were too young to understand the dangers of that particular magic and now you have proven it.”

  “If I’m old enough to be a wife, I’m old enough to be a sorceress,” she insists. “You can’t control everyone and everything, Mother.”

  Well, that much is true, I conclude. But I have learned to master everything over which I have authority, and as long as my daughter remains with me, that includes her. “I will have your obedience.”

  Her eyes do not drop in surrender the way they should. “You should be encouraging me to read the Rivers of Time. I could use my gifts to warn you and Papa of dangers or foretell opportunities …”

  I am too hot with temper now for this to persuade me. “My mother, my brother, and my mage could read the future and it did no good for any of them. It did harm. No, Isidora. I am done with this now and so are you.”

  She narrows her gaze. “You just don’t want me to know the truth. When I see into the Rivers of Time, don’t you think I see what you could do?”

  She has never spoken to me with such disrespect, but I keep my voice even. “You have no id
ea what I can do.”

  “I know you can break Papa’s heart!”

  It is too much. I have let her have her way too many times. “You don’t understand your visions and you are forbidden from this magic. If you disobey me, I will keep you from the stables. Oh, yes, I know you like to go to the stables. I know whom it is you go to see. So do not test me.”

  *

  “I won’t do it,” Isidora announces flatly, several days later.

  “Wear the white one, then,” I say, exasperated with her. I am accustomed to being obeyed by my subjects in the smallest thing. How is it that my daughter becomes more willful by the day? “Wear what you want to the council chambers. Only stop dawdling.”

  Taking a big breath, she turns to face me. “I’m not talking about the chiton I will wear.”

  Are we to argue about magic again? I give her such a withering look that it should cow her. I am her queen and more importantly, I am her mother. At the moment, however, she seems not to care about either of those things.

  “I won’t be packed off and sent away like some chest of jewels, delivered to a foreign king as a bride. I don’t want to leave Mauretania. It isn’t right to force me. It isn’t.”

  There she stands, flushed with righteous anger, her arms folded tight against her chest, and what am I to say? I was fortunate in the match the emperor made for me. Will she be as fortunate? “This is the way it is for women. Wherever would you get the idea you should have any choice in the matter?”

  Her eyes blaze. “From the example of my grandmother.”

  So she has been listening to me when I speak of our heritage—when I speak of the women in our line … I might say to myself that my mother chose her husbands. She chose Caesar. She chose Antony. But were they choices? Both men were a means to keep Egypt. “Your grandmother always chose the good of her kingdom, Isidora. As you must. You’re a princess and you have a duty.”