“You were with the king in that hideout up in the mountains, weren’t you?” Kleon went on. “Aide-de-camp to the commander, Archedamos said. He’s been telling the whole town about it, and about what you said to the Romans when they came to question you. He’s overcome by admiration—now that the Romans are going to be clement. Always did adore royalty, our port supervisor. Were you at the court?”
“I was a Friend of the king,” Caesarion replied cautiously. That was the third rank of courtier, below the Kinsmen and the First Friends.
“Good enough, good enough!” Kleon roared delightedly, and slapped Ani on the back, nearly knocking him on top of Caesarion. “By the Two Gods, that’s something, a Friend of the king to write your letters! That bugger-arsed Aristodemos never had anything like that. And you think you can get the tin?”
Ani spread his hands. “If it’s to be bought at all.”
Kleon laughed admiringly. “That’s the kind of man I like to deal with! Aristodemos always was a whiner—‘Can’t do this, can’t do that; my health, my lands, my resources do not permit …’ Would’ve dropped him last voyage, if I could’ve found someone else. So, we’ve got the linen, you’re sure you can get the glassware, and with a king’s Friend to write letters, you think you can get the tin. You feeling better, Arion?”
Caesarion regarded him with distaste. His sleep-dull mind caught up with the fact that his agreement to Ani’s proposition was being assumed—that it appeared to have been included among Ani’s advantages as a prospective business partner. He had not agreed to it. Ani had told him there was no hurry, and left him to think about it.
“Did Menches give you the rest of the medicine?” Ani asked, before Caesarion could think how to object.
“No,” said Caesarion, irritated to find that Menches should have done so. “But I don’t want it. The pain is better. I …”
“Oh, you want to take it!” Kleon at once assured him. “Fever in the summer is deadly, but hellebore will see it off. Purges you, you see, as well as dulling pain; clears all the poison out of you.”
Caesarion was well aware of its purgative effects—he could feel them in his gut at that minute—and they were not, in his view, an advantage with an injured side.
“I was wounded once in the stomach,” Kleon continued expansively. “—Pirates, down to the south by Ptolemais Theron. Would have died of the fever, if it hadn’t been for the hellebore; would have died of the infection, if it hadn’t been for the myrrh. I’ll send some myrrh tomorrow—top-quality stuff from Opone—a gift, eh? For the noble assistant of my new partner.”
“Thank you,” said Ani at once. “It’s the best thing for infections.” He jumped up, then came back with a glossy black flask. “Here’s the drug,” he told Caesarion. “You’d better take it. The doctor said you should have it at sunset. Menches probably thought there wasn’t any need because you were asleep. He did give you the barley broth, though, I hope?”
“Yes,” agreed Caesarion, staring up at him sullenly.
He could announce that he had not agreed to assist Ani. But … Ani had helped him. Ani had, in fact, saved his life. Ani was providing shelter, food, medicines—and a way to reach Alexandria. He wanted to reach Alexandria. Berenike had become dangerous—Archedamos might have recognized him, and the Romans were still here. But in Alexandria he might, still, be able to do something—something!—to help his mother, his family, his cause.
If he didn’t turn into a secretary on the way.
In the end, he took the black flask and drank the bitter drug without saying anything.
THE DOCTOR CAME again the following morning, and was pleased with his progress. The inflammation of the wound had gone down, and the fever had abated. The doctor cleaned and bandaged the injury and offered another dose of the drug, but, to Caesarion’s relief, did not press when it was refused. Then he asked more about the remedy—who had prescribed it and what was in it. He had no questions, however, about Caesarion’s experience of the disease, and when he wrote down the ingredients, Caesarion realized that his interest was in the medication, not the patient. It was a mistake to have named the doctor. This local physician would boast of his prescription derived directly from a luminary of the royal court, and Archedamos would hear about it, and perhaps remember the real status of the man whose medical bills he’d agreed to pay.
Were the Romans still in Berenike? Would Archedamos go to them if they were? Or would he gossip—“tell the whole town about it”—as he had before?
He had to get away from Berenike as soon as possible.
When the doctor was gone, Ani came over again. “Anything I can fetch you from the city?” he asked. He was in a very good mood that morning: he had gone about the camp tunelessly bellowing fragments of drinking songs and patting the camels.
Caesarion looked at him with dislike. “You told the captain I’d agreed to write your letters,” he pointed out coldly.
Ani sobered quickly. “Boy, you’re not going to change your mind now!”
“What do you mean, ‘change my mind’?” Caesarion demanded indignantly. “I never made it up!—and don’t call me ‘boy’!”
“By all the gods!” exclaimed Ani, equally indignant. “Why shouldn’t you do it? I saved your life!”
“You only saved it because you thought you could use me!”
“No!” Ani answered at once. “I saved your life when I didn’t know who or what you were. It was only afterward that I found out that there was something you could do for me in return. And I’m not asking for anything that would hurt you; in fact, you’d benefit. Sweet Isis, you can’t back out now! Kleon’s going to sign the contract today!”
“You had no business telling him I’d do it when I hadn’t agreed!” Caesarion protested.
“Are you saying you won’t do it?” Ani snapped back.
They glared at one another for a long moment. “I didn’t say that,” Caesarion admitted at last. “I didn’t say I wouldn’t. But you had no business telling that drunken sea-captain that I had agreed, when I haven’t.”
Ani relaxed slowly. “Well.” He blew his cheeks out. “The truth is, boy, that I didn’t tell him you’d agreed. All I said was that I’d made the offer. Kleon just assumed that you’d agreed, and he was so pleased with the notion that I didn’t contradict him. I was sure, anyway, that you would agree: you’d be a fool not to.” He sat down on the floor of the tent, cross-legged. “So—will you do it?”
Caesarion grimaced. “Why is this business so important to you, anyway?”
Ani grinned. “I want to be rich. I do better than most, but you can’t get rich—not really rich—out of growing flax. The taxes get you coming, and the linen monopoly gets you going, and the most you can hope for is twelve percent profit in a year. Trade’ll get you two hundred, if you pick your ship carefully and Fortune smiles. You know anything about the coastal trade?”
Harbor dues and tariffs; rich cargos arriving from royal vessels; petitions for the queen to improve the roads and the harbors, to put down piracy and banditry. Nothing, really, that he could admit to.
“The ships set out from Berenike, or from Myos Hormos up the coast,” said Ani. “They go south down the Red Sea, sometimes as far as Opone, which is on the Indian Ocean. They can take over a year to go and come back again. To fund a voyage, the ship’s captain—or the syndicate that owns the vessel—looks for investors who fit out the ship and take a share of the profits on its return.
“Now, Kleon, as it happens, owns Prosperity outright—he bought her from the syndicate that built her. He also buys up cargo on his own account, and owns about half what the ship carries. The other half comes from a partner. Kleon’s partner was a rich landowner from my own town, a man by the name of Aristodemos. In the ordinary way of things, when the ship came in, Aristodemos would send a caravan to collect the cargo, both his share and Kleon’s. He took it overland to Coptos, and then down the river to Alexandria, where he’d sell it on—at a handsome profit—and buy up
goods for the outward voyage.
“This year, though, as I think I’ve mentioned, Aristodemos was afraid of the war. He wanted to keep his money safe, and he certainly didn’t want to go to Alexandria when it was going to be besieged. He sent a caravan that was half the usual size, unladen and traveling very fast, to get to Berenike before the war. He took his own share of the cargo, and left Kleon and his share sitting in Berenike.”
Caesarion had begun listening to this account of petty mercantile dealings with disdain, but it had dawned on him that, little as he liked it, the circumstances were likely to dominate his life over the next month, and he was now paying close attention. “Kleon couldn’t take his share to Alexandria himself?” he asked.
Ani flashed another grin. “He could, of course, but it would cost him plenty.”
Caesarion looked blank.
Ani spread his hands expressively. “This city is perched on the edge of the most desolate piece of desert the gods ever cursed. There isn’t much pasturage even in the winter, and in summer there’s none. There isn’t much water in the cisterns, either, to irrigate more than a few vegetable patches. Costs a lot to keep a camel if you have to import all its food across three hundred miles of desert. There aren’t many beast to be hired here during the summer, and those there are, are expensive. No, caravans of camels come to Berenike from the river—and then go back there. Kleon would need to go to Coptos, hire camels and drivers, come back here with them, load the cargo, take it to Coptos, hire a boat, take it to Alexandria, conduct his business, sail back up the river, hire more camels—and hope his ship was still in good shape when he returned to it, because ships need careful managing, and hired help is never going to manage anything as carefully as an owner. No, he needs a partner—and, as it happens, I’m more than willing to take Aristodemos’ place.”
Caesarion thought of what Menches had said—that Aristodemos would make trouble if Ani took his partnership. He thought Ani must be right to disregard that: Aristodemos couldn’t possibly expect Kleon to take him on again. He had left the captain comprehensively stranded. Ani, in contrast, had come to Kleon’s rescue—and hoped to profit by it, just as he hoped to profit from his rescue of Caesarion.
“You brought trade goods here before you even met Kleon,” Caesarion pointed out. “But you said you’ve never been to Alexandria.”
“I brought the linen clothing,” Ani agreed. “That part of the cargo Aristodemos always bought from me. See, Prosperity usually sails with a cargo—an outbound cargo—of linen clothing and dyed linen cloth, along with glassware from the workshops in Alexandria and tin from overseas. Yes, I took a risk bringing the linen before I knew I had a buyer for it—but I was pretty sure Kleon would be pleased to see it, and I had it ready waiting for Aristodemos anyway. I was certain that Kleon would take the linen in exchange for some of his own cargo, and that alone would make the trip worth my while. I thought he’d be pleased enough that he’d agree to let me take the rest of his cargo down to Alexandria for him, on commission. But what I wanted—and, I thank the Lady Isis, what I’m getting! —is partnership on the same terms he gave Aristodemos.”
Caesarion thought of the overloaded camels on the way from Kabalsi. “If the linen is only a part of the cargo,” he asked doubtfully, “do you have the camels to transport what you’ll get in exchange, and all of Kleon’s goods as well?”
“The linen’s an investment!” Ani corrected him at once. “My stake in the business. The whole of what we take to Alexandria will be Kleon’s, and all I’m getting on it is commission. We’ll use some of Kleon’s profit to buy up the rest of what we need. But you don’t need to worry about overloading the camels. We’ll be able to carry spare water going home, and we’ll be able to ride most of the time. Incense doesn’t weigh much, compared to linen of equal value.”
“Incense?”
Ani grinned broadly. “Three hundred pounds of top-quality myrrh from Opone,” he said reverently, “and another five hundred pounds of myrrh of lower quality. From Mundus, four hundred pounds of cinnamon and two hundred of frankincense, plus another three hundred of assorted fragrant gums. Then there’s tortoiseshell, also from Opone, and ivory from Adulis. It won’t burden the camels, but do you know what it’s likely to fetch in the market of Alexandria?”
He did not know. He did know, though, that incense was sold by the ounce, and weight for weight was worth more than silver. This was a valuable cargo even by the standards of his own dynasty. “You’ll want guards for it,” he said, startled.
“Kleon’s sending a couple of sailors with us, to keep an eye on things and help out. But guards—well, it’s the wrong time of year for bandits: they don’t sit out in the desert in summer, not after the India trade has left the ports. And if you’re worrying about the Romans or the remains of the queen’s army—there’s nothing we can do about them, with guards or without them. No, boy, I’m not going to worry about robbery.” Grinning, he patted Caesarion’s shoulder—an irritating familiarity. “What we need to worry about is tin. That’s what Kleon delivers to Opone in exchange for the myrrh and the tortoiseshell. Aristodemos knows a merchant who imports it to Alexandria, but he’s a friend of Aristodemos, and he may not deal with me. That’s why I need someone who can write the sort of letters gentlemen write—I need to persuade some rich Alexandrian importer that I’m a real merchant.”
Even though you’re not, Caesarion thought, with a mixture of scorn—for the deceit—and admiration—for the determination and daring.
He did not like the idea of providing a spurious authenticity to a peasant’s prentensions. But he did want to reach Alexandria. You were worried about somebody, Ani had said. Don’t you even want to see how they are? And he had thought at once of his little brother standing in the stableyard biting his fist.
So how was little Ptolemy Philadelphus—son of Marcus Antonius and of Cleopatra—“King of Macedonia,” according to his parents? Executed? Imprisoned? Weeping for his mother-and perhaps for his older brother? What did Caesar Octavian, ruthless new lord of Egypt, have planned for the last son of the Lagid dynasty?
He had never been close to his older half-siblings, the twins Alexander Helios and Cleopatra Selene. When they were growing up he’d been healthy and active; he’d been busy with tutors or with companions of his own age, and he’d rarely even seen them. But the disease first struck him when Philadelphus was only two. For the first year or so he’d been very ill—more from the attempts to cure him than from the disease itself—and he’d frequently found himself playing quiet games with his youngest brother. Philadelphus had adored him—a glamourous older brother who would play with him!—and that adoration had helped him to survive the crushing humiliations of that dreadful year. After that he’d looked for Philadelphus, talked to him, listened to him whenever he could.
If he could reach Alexandria … his first duty, of course, was to his mother the queen. He would have to see if there was any way to rescue her from her captivity—but he suspected that, one way or another, she would be beyond any help he could provide. Philadelphus, though—he was young enough that nursemaids, not soldiers, might have been set to guard him. If he was still alive, if Caesarion could help him … he had to try.
“I can write letters,” he told Ani.
“So you do agree?” asked the Egyptian, grinning widely. “Good, good! Can I get you anything from the city now, then? Papyrus? Pens?”
“You expect me to start now?” Caesarion asked in horror.
Ani waved his hand calmingly. “No, no! It’s just that I need to have the customs documents ready when we arrive in Coptos, and by the look of things, we’ll be setting off as soon as you’re able to travel. I don’t know how much opportunity I’ll have for shopping, so I might as well start on it now. Papyrus, pens, ink, wax tables … anthing else?”
Caesarion regarded him a moment with dread. His flesh rebelled at the thought of facing the desert again. On the other hand, there was Archedamos—and the Romans. Yes, go
as soon as you can, he thought. Wait for health, and you’ll wait forever. “A hat,” he said.
“A shawl round the head is better,” Ani advised him. “A coarse one, that you can breathe through. Keeps out the dust.”
“I want a hat,” Caesarion declared obstinately. “A petasos, with a wide brim, to keep the sun off. And a short cloak, for traveling—the sort Greeks wear for traveling.”
Ani thought about it. “Fair enough. You’ll have to wait until you’re on your feet again to try on hats, but I’ll fetch you a cloak out of the warehouse.”
THE CLOAK APPEARED later that day. It was a startling shade of orange, bordered with blue. Caesarion gazed at it with revulsion. All his life he’d worn purple, with occasional white and gold or crimson. Obviously he could not wear purple now, but still—orange! He remembered sitting enthroned before the multitude in Alexandria at a festival, the smoothness of purple silk against his skin, the ribbon of the royal diadem tight around his head—remembered the smell of incense and the acclamations of the crowd. The afternoon heat made the tent stifling, and he felt giddy. The wound had started to itch. Orange! Purple was for kings: what was orange for? Camel-drivers’ secretaries and drooling epileptics?
“It’s a good cloak,” Ani told him proudly. “Made in my own workshop. Dyed with saffron and root madder, and the blue is real indigo. It won’t fade. Kleon says that in Mundus they’d give you its weight in frankincense.”
“It’s too bright!” Caesarion complained. “It’s vulgar. I want something darker. Blue, or … or green. Or black.” That, he thought, would be the most appropriate: black for loss, for mourning.
Ani scowled and pulled his lip. “There isn’t much. They like bright colors in the south, so that’s what I brought along—what I’ve got.”
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