Daughters of the Nile

by Stephanie Dray

  Who are our allies there? Julia, certainly. And Iullus too. He has taken my advice. He acquitted himself well as consul, making powerful friends in the Senate. Now my Roman half brother is preparing for his command as the proconsul of Asia. Iullus is becoming powerful. And I want him to be. If the emperor should die next week, next month, next year … only my Roman half brother will stand in Livia’s way.

  So whenever Iullus asks my help by way of letters of introduction or money or favors that may be called on his behalf, I do what he asks. Still, it is not enough. I cannot rely on these efforts alone to defend my family …

  Juba must be reconciled with Augustus.

  *

  “NO,” the king says, stubbornly and with a vicious swat at the bees trailing us through the gardens.

  “But you have not even let me finish explaining—”

  “Selene, did we not agree that we must keep apart from Caesar, lest he ruin us? Is that not what you said? Did we not agree that we will have nothing to do with him now?”

  Because I am so heavy with child, I cannot match my husband’s angry strides, so I sit beneath a grape arbor, forcing him to circle back. I speak only when I see that he has taken a few calming breaths. Then I say, “I am not suggesting that you go to Rome and clasp hands and reminisce about your days fighting Egyptians and Spaniards. I am suggesting that you remind the emperor how powerful and influential a king you are, by being a powerful and influential king. You should make a trip East to remind the emperor that your gift at diplomacy outstrips that of most men and that you have been vital to the advancement of his regime.”

  “I don’t care what Caesar thinks of me.”

  My husband wishes he did not care, but he does. He always has and he always will. But it will do no good to argue the point. “If Herod executes his sons and Princess Glaphyra with them, war may break out between Cappadocia and Judea. Prevent that and the emperor may take it as an apology …”

  “An apology?” Juba snaps, eyes bulging with rage. “I’m not at all sorry. If I regret anything, it’s that I didn’t bloody Caesar. And I’m not going to Beirut to preside over another trial of Herod’s sons. I’m not leaving when you are so soon to give birth.”

  Men do not arrange their affairs to be near their wives in childbirth. It is my husband’s eagerness for another baby—or perhaps his terror for me—that makes him want to stay, so I do not fight him on this. “Wait until I have delivered. Then go East for the Olympic Games, for Pythia’s wedding, and to sit in judgment over Herod’s beleaguered sons.”

  He notices my careful wording. “You’re suggesting I make the trip without you?”

  “I’ll have a new baby to care for,” I say to excuse myself. But in truth, my presence would undermine him. Augustus must see Juba on his own merits—as a valuable piece upon his game board that he cannot afford to lose.

  Alas, the reminder of our forthcoming child only sets Juba’s mind firmer against the idea. “No, Selene. You and I have spent enough years apart.”

  He is right about that. “I would not part with you either. I swear I would not, except for a greater cause. It is only a summer, and with Herod’s treasury empty, his family at war, and his kingdom in disarray, this is our opportunity to rise in prominence.”

  The king sits beside me, plucking an unripe grape from a vine, rolling it between his fingers. “Will you make me say it? I don’t want to be without you. When I married you, I vowed, When and where you are Gaia, I then and there am Gaius. It means where you go, I go. Where you stay, I stay.”

  His beautiful sentiments, spoken so earnestly, make my heart ache. I lace my arm in the crook of his elbow and say, “I too made that vow. But I think it means wherever you are, I am also. Wherever I am, you are there too. Whether we are sitting beside each other under a grape arbor or separated by a sea, we are together. That is the strength of marriage. That is marriage.”

  Juba peers down at me. “Do you mean it or is it something you are saying to have your way?”

  “I mean it,” I reply, resting my head on his shoulder. Time has tested our vows. Defined them. Made them real. Again, we are together beneath a grape arbor, but this time we need no priests or contracts. “When and where you are Gaius, I then and there am Gaia.”

  He softens, threading his fingers through mine. “What would you have of me?”

  Never have I hesitated to offer an insincere apology when it would suit me, but where my husband’s love for Augustus is genuine, his anger is too. So I must appeal to his heart, not his head. “We can both well imagine if we had allowed Isidora to marry Herod. We would be desperate for someone to help us now. And the man I love, the man I call husband, is not a man who abandons a desperate princess to her fate …”

  *

  I’M excited for the coming of my child. Restless in my own skin. But I know something else is coming too. I taste the spice of the cinnamon desert on the wind. I sense it days before the dry heat descends. I feel the crackle of magic lift the hair on my nape at least a week before the giant wall of red haze rolls in from the desert.

  It is the sirocco in all its majesty.

  My Berbers know this violent storm. They rush to draw water from the wells into sealed amphora and water skins. The merchants pull down a rainbow of carpets and awnings from the marketplace and load their wares into bundles and barrels. The tribesmen hurry their shaggy goats and bleating sheep up into the hills. Their women shutter up their brick houses, scurrying to cover any crack that lets daylight in.

  All the city of Iol-Caesaria makes ready against the strengthening winds. My own women sweep through the palace, taking down precious artwork from the walls and hauling statues in from the gardens, for the open design of our palace invites the wind to howl down its pillared corridors.

  Her eyes on the darkening skies, Isidora asks, “Is it true you once swallowed a storm like this one?”

  Before I can answer, my poet says, “It is true enough.”

  I smile, remembering that it was in that storm I found Helios. It was in that storm I found myself. I did not know then that the land of the sirocco would become as much a part of me as my own flesh, and that these winds would become as my own breath. But now I know.

  I was saved by a storm like this one, and that is why I am not distressed when I awaken that night to a rush of water and blood between my legs. The contractions come swiftly after that and my ladies rush to me. The drowsy palace comes wide-awake, whispering the news that their queen is laboring to bring forth another babe.

  As I am hurried to the birthing room, Isidora peeks out of her bedchamber and goes white to the tip of her nose. I know she is fearful of her vision that she will be the death of me, and so I command her not to follow. I do not want her to see me sweating and panting and writhing in agony should this birth go badly …

  And yet my daughter seems frozen, grasping at my hands as if she will never be able to hold them again. Like a startled bird that cannot remember it has wings to fly away, she goes rigid. I must command my ladies to remove her, threatening to have them exiled or sold into slavery until they obey me.

  “Mama!” Isidora calls after me, but there is another child I must think of now.

  It is the third time for me. I know what to expect. But the pains, when they come, are severe. In the birthing room, the ladies light incense, which lends the room a soothing fragrance. Both the midwife and the physician are sent for. Chryssa too, for I need her as I have not in quite some time.

  In spite of all the vows I make to myself not to cry out, a wave of agony rolls from my back to my front, sweeping away the foundation of my courage. I scream. Then I scream again because I’m angry at myself for having done so.

  The physician arrives and does nothing. The midwife insists that I drink some herbal infusion. Certain it will make me vomit, I shove it away. Then a pain closes over me as if my belly were caught in the maw of a hippopotamus. The contractions go on and on, until the midwife decides I must be strapped into the cha
ir, saying that the pull of the earth should help me birth the child.

  Squatting over the opening, I push fruitlessly, until I am shaking with exhaustion.

  Chryssa presses a wet cloth to my face, sponging the sweat from my cheeks.

  Again and again, I try to dislodge the child from my womb. The pressure of the midwife’s hands comes down on my middle as if to position the child, to push it from the outside. But it will not come.

  I push and push, screaming until I am hoarse.

  Hours pass and I cannot tell whether the sun has risen or set again because of the storm. The wind howls, the sand it carries scrapes at the stone walls and threatens to slip past the coverings on the windows. A forgotten chime in my gardens rings madly. But for it, the wind, and my cries of pain, the world seems empty.

  I am half-hysterical with agony when I hear a pounding that is louder than my own heart. It carries up to my room, shakes the floor, and dances on my sweaty skin. “What is that sound?”

  Chryssa grimly mops at my brow. “It is the war drums, to heal and trance you. Maysar has the tribesmen gathered in your throne room below. The Berbers remember how you fought a storm before and they will not let their queen fight alone …”

  They know it is a battle, then. I battle for my baby’s life.

  And it goes on, and on.

  I push until my muscles fail. I push until I can push no more. I wilt against the girls who hold my arms, limp and half-asleep, moaning softly. And when the world begins to blur to nothing, I hear the king’s voice at the door.

  Husbands do not attend their wives in the birthing chamber. It is not done. Moreover, I do not want the king here. I cannot bear for him to see me like this—to see more blood, more pain, more suffering.

  Thankfully, Chryssa hurries to block his way. In wildly flickering lamplight, I see her silhouetted in the doorway like a praetorian, commanding the king to go.

  “I will have you whipped,” he snarls at her.

  Still she will not give way. “Flog me, then, Majesty. You will not be the first.”

  This is my battle and she is my soldier, my brave general. Blinking through half-lidded eyes, I see the Greek physician push forward to whisper something to the king. Whatever it is, my husband does not want to hear it. Even over the roar of the storm, I hear the king bellow, “You bloody butcher!”

  I know what the physician must be saying. He is telling my husband that if the baby does not come soon, it will die. The physician can take his sharp instruments and cut my baby out of me. But there is no way to do it that would spare us both. This I know. And Juba must know it too.

  Though I would happily give my life that my child should draw breath, I will not suffer as Livia once suffered, knowing her husband would not have minded her death. No, my husband smashes the physician against the door with a promise of more violence. “Get out or I’ll have your head.”

  It is not the physician’s fault; it is mine. I must bring this babe into the world. This little miracle, this child conceived wholly in love. What must be done is beyond mortal strength, but there has always been within me a divine spark. My magic will consume me—it will tear its way out of me with the baby and take with it my life. But it is mine to use. Mine to choose. Magic carves its way out. This is what my mage taught me. What I taught my daughter in turn.

  Even if you can’t see the wounds, the magic does cut you.

  Juba will not let the physician cut me, so I must cut myself.

  Somewhere in the palace, I hear my son’s dog barking. Outside, there is the crack and splinter of wood, the clatter of debris as it flies into the air, and the roar of the sand as the storm bears down on us.

  Gathering the heka in my blood, I call on it now, using the strength of the one who dwells inside me. Helios was always strong, so very strong. He left bruises without meaning to. He broke benches with bare hands. If he is with me now, I call on his strength.

  I bear down. With all my strength. With all my will. With every part of my soul. The frog amulet at my throat burns hot with the magic I cannot tame as it tears through me. My scream is something outside of myself. Something raw and jagged and sharp that exposes all the wounds inside me.

  But the baby moves. The midwife gets a grip on his little head and pulls. Then my magic and the babe all tear themselves out of me together. I look down to see blood flow down my thighs, bright red, vivid as the fatal spray in an arena. The midwife draws back with my babe, her hands and arms covered in bright blood.

  There is so much blood. Too much blood. Salty, tangy, iron blood, an endless River of Time flowing away from me …

  Struck with terror at the sight, Chryssa sinks to her knees. I do not know if her horror is for me or for the child. Is it malformed? Why does he not cry? These are my fears as a warm river of red rushes from betwixt my legs. Why does my baby not cry?

  “My baby,” I rasp. “My son …”

  I want to hear my baby cry. As my own heartbeat pounds fainter and fainter in my ears, that is all I want. Then he does cry. A little bleat of outrage that makes me smile. And as the bowl beneath my birthing chair flows over with my blood, I think I will not have much time now.

  Forty-three

  THEY cannot stop my blood from flowing. They unstrap me and put me on a bed where the midwife massages my womb to make it close. She holds my head up so that I can swallow a draught of fenugreek and Cretan oregano. I shiver, but it is not a fever that keeps me in a drifting state of listlessness. It is that I am an empty sack, drained and thirsty. I suffer greatly from heka sickness, as if it has leeched the life force from the marrow of my bones.

  And the bleeding will not stop.

  “The baby,” I whisper, and they put the little swaddled bundle to my breast, though I am too weak to hold him. Praise Isis, my baby is a perfect little boy, pink from head to toe. There is nothing wrong with him. Nothing at all. His hair is dark and his eyes are blue. I wonder if they will turn green like mine or a warm amber like Juba’s. I want to hold him in my arms and kiss his tiny nose and the furrowed little brow, but I am too dizzy even to lift my head.

  The king is near but Chryssa is gone. He must have vanquished her somehow. Driven her off or had her carried off by his praetorians in his unseemly, and un-Roman, insistence upon entry to my birthing chamber. But I am so tired, I do not mind that he has won the battle.

  “Open the doors to the terrace,” I whisper.

  The midwife says gently, “There is a storm raging. You don’t know what you are saying because you are so near to the veil. Rest easy and go peacefully.”

  She has given up all hope—as if she has glimpsed the carnage from the inside. As if she has seen the hacks and slashes and chunks that have been torn out of me by curses and magic beyond that which one mortal body can endure.

  “Open the doors,” I say again.

  The midwife glances at the king, fearful to let in the storm that rages outside. But Juba, face shadowed and tortured, says, “We commanded you to open the doors.”

  The midwife moves to obey, but is not fast enough for the king. He goes himself to tear down the coverings from the doorway. Little puffs of sand cloud up by his feet, but it doesn’t stop him. Then my ladies rush to help. Pulling rugs from where they are piled at the door, yanking draperies out of the way, and throwing the doors wide.

  A great gust of air blows in, showering us with sand. It is the king who lifts me up and carries me out onto the terrace, where his purple cloak billows up around us. With the wind whipping into my face, I take in the view of the sprawling city under siege. In our harbor, the waves froth and churn in the ocean, plucking fishing boats from their lines on the pier only to smash them to splinters.

  I want to save my kingdom from this, but I cannot battle every storm. I cannot battle this one. It is too big for me to swallow. I am ravaged by childbirth, too weakened to serve as a vessel for all the desert’s rage. Still, the storm and I are kin, so I surrender to its heka.

  This storm and I, we are b
oth of the desert. We are both of Mauretania. I have given of myself, of my magic, and all of my strength to make this land prosper. I cannot take it all inside myself, but neither does it take me.

  The land gives back to me again. The Romans sometimes say of my lands that they are too close to the sun. That it is so hot here that it will set a man’s blood boiling. It is true. The heat of the sirocco is like a furnace. It sets fire to my blood. But then, I am part fire now, so I welcome it.

  It burns away bile and bloat and phlegm. It cauterizes my wounds. The hot desert preserves me as it does a mummy, bandaging what has been cut open inside me and drying up the flow of blood betwixt my legs, just as it dries up riverbeds at the end of a season.

  And I know it is the sirocco that heals me, because as I cling to Juba, blood rain begins to fall.

  *

  “IT is some manner of miracle that you are alive,” the physician says while my servants collect silver pots of red rain and the wet nurse drapes my baby’s cradle in a transparent purple veil with beaded fringe. “You lost more blood than I have ever known any person to lose and survive to tell the tale.”

  “I am not any person,” I reply. “As you can see, I am recovered.”

  The physician puts his tools back into a small chest designed just for such instruments of torture, then gives a long-suffering sigh. “You may think so, but the body cannot recover from such a loss of blood. Eventually, your blood will pump slower and slower. You will find yourself dizzied and you may swoon away at the smallest provocation. Any exertion will cause exhaustion and you will find it more difficult to breathe. You are very frail.”

  Frail, am I? He does not know that I have been bleeding most of my life. He has not seen my goddess work her magic through me. What does he know? My women hang extra lanterns and stack coals in the brazier in case I am chilled, but I am sweating through my linen shift, for the sirocco inside me is hot. Gloriously hot. So hot that it has boiled the lethargy from my bones.