Stealing Fire

by Jo Graham

“They've worked it out before a thousand times on campaign,” Thais said practically. “Let me go down and tell the leaders among the women where the water supply and the privies are, and that they can cook in the courtyard but not in the stableyard.” She gave him another quick squeeze and started along the wall to the stair, pulling her himation up to cover the back of her hair.

  Ptolemy sighed. I thought he looked tired and strung out.

  “How many are there?”

  “Hundreds. I suspect that some of them aren't with men in my Ile or phalanx. But if they've lost their men or been abandoned by men who went with Krateros, they've got to go somewhere or beg in Babylon. They've no place there, and I suppose they think their chances are better here. Alexander intended a school for the campaign orphans, but…”

  “It will never happen now,” I said. I had been a child sold as a slave. And now I knew what good fortune it had been to be bought by Tehwaz.

  “Death can come for us at any time. I'd like to think someone would take care of Thais and the children.”

  “I imagine Thais does a fair job of taking care of herself,” I said.

  He smiled at that. “She does. But Chloe and her brother, Lagos…” He took a deep breath. “It's not good in Babylon, Lydias. Krateros and the Macedonian party want to put everything back the way it was, just go home to Pella and forget that any of this ever happened, except for being richer men.”

  I nodded. There had always been that faction, Macedonians who had followed their king to make war on the Persian barbarians, and who could not understand why, having won, there was anything to think of besides the money and going home. They had been the ones who had the least patience for ruling, and who had grumbled that the King adopted too much Persian dress, ate too much Persian food, and had too many Persians about him.

  Ptolemy continued. “Perdiccas wants to be Great King of Persia, and he's got a bunch of Persian nobles backing him. He has a Persian wife from one of the greatest families, and he's making a play for Alexander's sister Cleopatra at the same time. Add to that a bunch of half-baked contenders who want the entire pudding, and you have a disaster. Everyone wants to be Alexander.”

  “No one is,” I said.

  Ptolemy looked at me sideways. “That was a happy conjunction of circumstance and talent that will not happen again.”

  “The gods willed it,” I said.

  “Yes, that too. But in any event, the effects of the experiment are unreproduceable.”

  “And Roxane's son?” I asked.

  Ptolemy looked out over the courtyard, where Thais and his daughter had joined the others below. Thais was gesturing and talking with three women, one a dark-haired Indian in a threadbare printed sari. “Do you really think he will be allowed to grow up? Is it in anyone's interests for him to live more than a few years?”

  “It's in Roxane's interests,” I said, and felt my stomach clench.

  “Roxane, yes,” he said. “She's a tiger. Just exactly like Alexander's mother, Olympias. She murdered anyone who got in her way. If you wanted to live, you gave her no reason to fear you.” Below, Thais seemed to have made clear where the privies were, involving elaborate hand gestures for women who it seemed spoke little Greek. “Roxane had Queen Stateira killed. Which is the reason Oxathres won't support Perdiccas. Stateira was his niece, and he is not about to be of any party that countenanced her murder.” Ptolemy shook his head. “Which means if it comes to war the Persian nobility will split along blood and clan lines. That's why Artashir came with me. He will not support anyone who is with Roxane. Not only have we split along the lines one would expect, the old-style Macedonians against the new men, but now this as well. Artashir and Perdiccas should be of the same party—Perdiccas was always one of the new men, always one who got on well with Persians. But if he's with Roxane, then he's lost Stateira's kin.”

  “That's not good,” I said. I had expected that it would fall out with the old Macedonians, the men who had served Alexander's father like Antipatros and Krateros, against the younger Companions lately raised to prominence by the King. But if both those sides were split as well, then who knew how it might end?

  Ptolemy went on. “And meanwhile Athens and several other cities in Greece are on the verge of revolt against Antipatros.”

  I let out a long breath. “Civil war in Persia and Greece both. What does that leave us?”

  “Egypt,” Ptolemy said.

  “And when Perdiccas and Antipatros both call for troops?”

  Ptolemy ran his hand through his hair. “We'll face that when we come to it. In the meantime, we must do our best to put Egypt in order. Now what is this problem I hear about Cleomenes? He's a friend of Perdiccas, so I must walk softly there.”

  “There is more,” I said. “A priest named Manetho has come from Memphis, and I think you should talk with him.” And so I told him all I knew.

  WE LEFT FOR Alexandria by sea a month later, leaving a garrison at Pelousion. Ptolemy had more men coming, another phalanx and their baggage train that had started later, some thousand men. They would reinforce Pelousion when they arrived.

  In the meantime, we and the men and their dependents who had first come to Pelousion would go on to Alexandria. As it was a new city, Ptolemy was offering each man land as part of his pay, a bonus for signing on with him. Each man should get a house lot of a size commensurate with his rank, thus settling the city. Alexander had done this, giving land in new cities to veterans who were retiring. Ptolemy gave it to men who were serving as well.

  “They will serve all the better,” he said to me, “when it is their own homes they are defending.”

  “And the women will bless your name through all eternity,” I said.

  When I had seen Alexandria last it had been nothing but string and stakes. Now I could begin to see the shape of the city to come. Broad streets crossed at sharp right angles, some already clad in white sandstone pavers. The city curved around the natural harbor, the first quay already built, while another was under construction, heavy concrete piers sunk in the mud of the harbor but not yet topped. Out on the barrier island there was a watchtower, but the city walls were not yet built. I could see where they would go, pierced by great gates.

  The neighborhoods were odd—each street laid out, treeless, with perhaps one house in ten rising from the dirt, bare walls freshly painted or plastered, with occasionally a struggling vine staked up. The other houses were no more than bare dirt with a stake in it painted with a number.

  I saw the women walking in groups through the streets, their children puttering along, trying to find the right number, then stopping and pointing when they did, imagining the houses that would go there, counting the distance to the houses of friends. “Here will be your house and there will be mine.”

  Sati would have liked it, I thought. She would have wanted a fountain and a peach tree. I had brought her peaches, once, and she had laughed and kissed me, the taste of peaches on her mouth.

  One of the public markets had been built, and the stalls were crowded with traders up from Canopus and other towns, bringing vegetables and fish at exorbitant prices. Something would have to be done about that, I thought. Although there was something to be said for making yourself welcome with your spending money.

  The temples were no more than roped-off cordons. Quays were more important just now than temples.

  Of course much of the construction was not evident. The huge cisterns that should store fresh water and the sewers that underlay everything were not visible. The vast mountains created by dredging in the harbor were beneath the surface. All of those things could not be seen, yet when it was finished Alexander's city would be the most beautiful in the world.

  The original plan had included a palace, and orders were left to build it, but very little had actually been done. The building was long and low, looking more like a stoa or a marketplace than a palace. I supposed another story could be put on eventually. Situated as it was at the base of the Lochias Peninsula, t
he far right end of the crescent of the harbor, the site could not have been more lovely. It caught the sea breezes, and from the portico looking left the entire city spread before one.

  Ptolemy had an office in what looked like it should have been a market stall, three walls and a side open to the portico, and I wondered again what designer of marketplaces had been given the palace to build. But then there had not been architects of note here, after Dinocrates left with the King.

  He looked up from his work when I came in, a litter of scrolls before him and a wax tablet, the stylus in his hand. “Settled in, Lydias?”

  “I suppose,” I said. I had nothing to settle but a tent. I had not looked at the plan to see if there was a number with my name beside it. I supposed there was. The Hipparch of an Ile should have a substantial lot, but I didn't see any reason to look at it. There was no one who would care if anything were ever built there.

  “Good, because three days from now you and I are leaving for Memphis.”

  I must have looked startled. Ptolemy stretched his legs out under the writing table. “I need to see Cleomenes and work this out in person. He's a friend of Perdiccas, which makes it politically difficult, as he seems to have problems with Persians and Egyptians alike. Not to mention that the taxes he's supposed to have been spending on construction in Alexandria for the last three years haven't been spent here. The city walls haven't even been begun, not so much as a foundation laid. You're coming with me as my aide because I need a man who can handle the politics.”

  “Sir, I am no politician,” I began.

  Ptolemy frowned. “You handled Artamenes in Pelousion ideally. The only other who can do as well is Artashir, but I can't bring him to Memphis. Bringing a Persian will give insult to the clergy in Memphis, and I need their support. Artashir is staying here to handle the fortification issues and you're coming with me.” He raised a hand before I could say anything. “Yes, I know Artashir is a mounted archer, not a siege engineer. But we must all turn our hand to new things as our duty requires.” He looked at me and his eyes twinkled. “Besides, is politics so different than dealing with horses?”

  I laughed. “I suppose not,” I said. “Only we cannot geld for bad temper!”

  “I'm considering it,” Ptolemy said.

  We sailed up the Nile on a fast galley, one of the narrow-draft lateen-sailed ships the Egyptians build for river traffic, and so I returned to Memphis for the second time in my life. Arriving from the Saite branch of the river, the city seemed even more imposing than I remembered. The walls were massive, with enormous square gate towers, and below them the levees that held back the river in the flood season were three times the height of a man.

  As we passed the city, ready to come about to the docks below, Ptolemy gestured to a massive iron grate set in the levees. “I wonder what that's for?” he asked.

  It looked like it was designed to be lifted, and I said so.

  Manetho, who had accompanied us from Alexandria, had come up to us, and he smiled. “That's where the Temple of Sobek is. He's the avenger of wrongs, and takes the form of a crocodile. The grate goes into the pools where the sacred crocodiles live. The small ones can come and go through the grate, but the large ones stay in the temple pool.”

  “How big are the large ones?” I asked, as the holes in the grate would have been big enough for a boy to swim through.

  Manetho shrugged. “Three times the length of a man, the biggest of them. The oldest are more than a hundred years old. We protected them from the Persians when they were here.”

  “I see,” Ptolemy said, and looked impressed.

  I didn't particularly think a crocodile a hundred years old and three times the length of a man needed much protecting.

  CLEOMENES WAS ABOUT Ptolemy's age, which is to say around forty, clean-shaven in the Greek fashion, fit and obviously vain of his appearance. He really had no need to flex his arms so much in his short-sleeved chiton except to show off how much time he spent in the gymnasium, and how he had certainly not run to fat like many men in sedentary jobs.

  Ptolemy, who had not made time for the wrestling matches and weight lifting of the gymnasium in years, was irritated, though he hid it well. I had certainly never trained in the gymnasium as a boy, nor been welcome until lately, so I had even less patience for it. I thought that a man who had so much time to spend on the perfection of his muscles must not do a lot of work.

  He was very accommodating, helpful and eager to go over the tax rolls with Ptolemy, delighted for us to be his guest at any number of entertainments. There were banquets and symposia, concerts and dancers. Of course Manetho and the other Egyptians were not invited. Cleomenes had kept the Persian custom of not including the natives. I thought that perhaps that was not wise, but Ptolemy kept his own counsel and attended each entertainment, though his good humor seemed to be wearing a little thin. He should rather spend time with the tax rolls and the other work of the governor. I suspected he was being diverted.

  The eighth day in Memphis, Cleomenes arranged a hunt in the desert. We left very early. The sun had not yet risen above the wadis of the eastern side of the river and the sky had only begun to pale. The men stood about in little groups, laughing and sharing a jest and bread. I dismounted and left my horse with a groom.

  Ptolemy looked up and offered me a flask. “Sport of the pharaohs, eh?” He was dressed in chiton and leather, not full harness. Who could walk about the desert during the day wearing steel?

  I took it and drank sparingly. Strong unwatered wine for breakfast made my head spin. I shrugged. “Hunting is hunting, my Lord. And it is best to be seen to do as the pharaohs, of course.” It had occurred to me that at least Ptolemy could appear a proper overlord.

  “It will be good hunting, I hope,” Ptolemy said. “But it's the cats I'm not used to.” A short distance away, three cheetahs paced on light leads of scarlet leather, their handlers beside them.

  I raised an eyebrow. Their thin leather cords wouldn't stop the cheetahs for an instant if they wanted to go. It was their training that kept them within the bounds of the leads. “I've never hunted with them before,” I said, my eyes following their pacing, lean muscles moving beneath perfect, mottled hides.

  “You can see them in the paintings on temple walls, back a thousand years,” Ptolemy said. “But they don't capture the beauty of the animals.”

  “Not hardly,” I said, admiring the way one sleek female turned, her graceful tail carried high like a pleased housecat. She looked at me then, and I did not look away. Green eyes met mine, as though it were she who assessed me. I tilted my chin, but did not break the stare.

  She moved toward me then, her handler following, telling her to stop. Ptolemy reached for the knife at his belt reflexively.

  I looked into her eyes. I thought that she might be the mother of cats herself, so steady and intelligent was her gaze.

  “My Lord, don't move,” the handler said as the cheetah reared up on her hind legs, resting her forepaws on my shoulders. Her claws pricked through the linen of my chiton, just barely testing the skin, her green eyes raised to mine, her massive jaws almost at my throat.

  I was not afraid, and I did not need the handler to tell me that. She looked at me keenly, measuringly, her hot breath against my face. And yet I felt no menace in her, only curiosity.

  “No, my Lord,” the handler said again, as I heard the scrape of Ptolemy drawing. “Wait.”

  She bent her head, butting at my chin with the soft fur of the top of her head, nudging at me like a cat. I leaned forward, butting back with my chin at the top of her head, my cheek rubbing against her. For a moment we stood thus, like lovers locked in an embrace.

  Then she disengaged, her paws leaving my shoulders as she dropped down and ambled a few steps away, where she sat down unconcernedly to wash.

  Ptolemy let out a breath, his sword in hand. “That was… interesting.”

  The handler was looking at me closely. “She wanted to see you, my Lord. And you must
never run from a cat.”

  “I know,” I said, my eyes still following her with admiration. “She's gorgeous.”

  The handler said something under his breath, and went to collect his charge.

  “What was that?” I asked. I had not quite gotten what he said.

  Ptolemy looked amused, and something more. “He says you are favored of Bastet, my friend.”

  “Oh,” I said.

  We rode into the desert before the sun was high. By noon I had decided this was a rather hopeless endeavor. How any game should be found with twenty men in the party, and a dozen horses, I could not guess. No doubt we looked grand, but in hours we had not seen anything besides a hawk on the wing, far above hovering on the hot air that rose from the desert. Perhaps we weren't supposed to really catch anything. Perhaps it was all to look good.

  Cleomenes seemed unperterbed. At midday we halted in the shadow of an overhanging cliff and ate and drank from a fairly sumptuous hunter's spread. Then we rested a while replete in the shade.

  Ptolemy was being gracious to Cleomenes, but I thought he was getting annoyed. An entire day lost riding around the desert at a snail's pace doing nothing! Even the cheetahs looked bored and drowsed, washing their paws in a desultory fashion.

  Afternoon came on with long shadows. I was fascinatedly watching the trainers with their animals, and only half heard Ptolemy talking to Cleomenes, saying that perhaps we should be getting back.

  “But you have not caught anything!” Cleomenes said. “And I have heard that there are lions near here. Men have seen them! I would consider myself disgraced if you returned without bagging anything!”

  “You must be easier on yourself,” Ptolemy said dryly. “And anyway, how could we possibly get a lion with all this parade? In Macedon we hunted lions on foot, with five or six men.”

  Cleomenes laughed heartily. “You must think us very soft here! I can't bear that! Let us send away the parade, as you call it, and hunt lions as a king should, just us with our spears!”

  And dogs, I thought. In most places they used dogs, but we had none with us, as the cheetahs would not abide them. The hairs on the back of my neck rose.