Steampunk Cleopatra

by Thaddeus Thomas

  Ma'nakhtuf would fall silent, and when at last he spoke, he would make Amani a promise. The people should know what you've discovered, but I will be dead soon and will take your secret with me. If it is within my power, I want to leave you something when I go. Ask for it, and it will be done.

  She would not deny him. When your time comes, give me use of your house for eight weeks.

  What an odd creature you are. A soft chuckle would shake his chest.

  I want to honor you in the way Philostratos honors the people dear to him.

  Ma'nakhtuf would nod. In the morning, I will tell your father.

  She would not remind him that her father was gone.

  One day, she would say all of this, but that night she contented herself in his arms. They held each other and drifted off to sleep, and, when she awoke in the morning, he was dead.

  In the weeks that followed, she built a work of remembrance in his room. She covered the floor with clay jars. Each jar held a promise. On the ceiling, she wanted to paint a small figure of a man, a figure meant to represent Ma'nakhtuf.

  Ma'nakhtuf would look down at the promises kept and smile.

  But he did not know. He was not looking down. He was not smiling.

  She knelt among the clay jars and wept.

  Papyrus 3.03

  Berenice lounged on her couch and stared out the window. She had replaced much of the furniture, but the water clock still pointed to the hour. Painted murals gave the illusion of pillars, greater space, and immense luxury in what was a modest-sized palace. It was at once the home Amani longed to return to and something cold, foreign, and oppressive.

  “Theodotus tells me you want to travel to Rome,” Berenice said.

  Amani answered without hesitation. “I wish to join Cleopatra.”

  “Do you know I'm sending Theodotus to Cyprus by way of one of those ships?”

  “I did not.”

  Berenice turned to see her face. “I can't tell if you're lying. Some people know just by looking at you. I think that's a neat trick, but either no one can teach me or no one will. They say they try, but how do I know?”

  Against the heat of the courtyard, the interior of the room felt cool. “Maybe it's better to learn who you can trust.”

  “You can't trust anyone,” Berenice said.

  “Those most loyal to you.”

  Berenice smiled. “Was Philostratos loyal? Is that why he never returned?”

  Distant voices carried across the water.

  “I just want to know if he's dead or if he's working with Rome.” Berenice sighed. “Do you know why he went? Was it only to determine the situation of my uncle? The city believes he's studying at the academy, and if he returns tomorrow, I should be obliged to welcome him. I know the lie, but I doubt I've been told the truth. That's why you're here. It would please me to know the truth.”

  At Berenice's insistence, Amani entered and took a seat at the writing desk. Until that moment, the room seemed empty, but now she saw three armed guards. Light played against their swords.

  “The problem I have is simple,” Berenice said. “I want the truth, but I can't tell if you're lying. So, I've invited you here with this proposal. You are to perform two tasks for me. If you carry them out to my satisfaction, I'll grant you one wish. Should you wish to go to Rome, you'll go to Rome. Choose Cyprus, you'll go to Cyprus, but if I am not satisfied, you die.”

  Amani's gaze returned to the swords. “What are my tasks?”

  “Devise a way for me to know if you are lying or telling the truth and then tell me the truth about Philostratos.”

  “Do I have the option of declining?” Amani asked.

  “Only if you wish to die.”

  Even with only one answer possible, she was slow to answer. “I will need time and access to the Library.”

  Berenice assigned Theodotus to follow Amani, and an assignment of guards followed him. Amani returned to her studies, but none of her reading pertained to Berenice's challenge. No book in the Library would have that answer.

  “Berenice won't wait forever,” Theodotus said, “and I know the truth. I know why Philostratos went to Cyprus.”

  Pharaoh's guards maintained their vigilant watch.

  Amani said nothing.

  “Tell her,” he said.

  “Have you?”

  “I did not need to,” Theodotus said. “You might plan on lying to Berenice, but I'm going to Cyprus, anyway. Lying does you no good. Tell her the truth, convince her to believe you, and come with me. We'll both learn what happened to Philostratos.”

  Amani did not answer.

  “That is, unless you really would rather go to Rome to find Cleopatra,” he continued.

  “I deserve to be with her. I've earned it.”

  He fell silent and studied her, smiling.

  “Why haven't you told Berenice?” she asked.

  “Maybe I did,” he said. “Maybe she knows everything.”

  They looked at each other for a long time.

  “Lying does you no good,” he said.

  Amani sighed. Why had Berenice ever placed this impossible demand upon her? She paused. It was impossible. Had Berenice set her up to fail? That would serve no purpose. Berenice could do as she pleased. She needed no subterfuge.

  If Amani revealed the truth, the only way to prove her veracity was through a second witness. Amani looked up at Theodotus and then beyond him to the ever-present guards. She felt herself smile.

  Berenice waited between the stone lions. Her guards surrounded both Amani and Theodotus and drew their swords. Overhead, the sun drained the color from the sky, and a bead of sweat ran along Amani's brow.

  “This is your moment,” Berenice said. “Teach me to know if you're lying or telling the truth.”

  “And I can go wherever I choose?”

  Berenice raised a hand to her swollen neck. “Are you ready to argue for your life, or do I just end it now?”

  Amani bowed. “I'm ready.”

  “Then speak.”

  “Philostratos went in search of a hidden library and the lost history of Egypt.”

  Berenice paused before speaking. Her glare focused firmly on one indiscernible spot. “How do I know you're telling me the truth?”

  “There's only one way. A second witness must confess.”

  The smallest smile pulled at the corners of Berenice's mouth. “Who do you suggest? Theodotus?”

  “I am your second witness,” Amani said. “Theodotus came to you, wanting to sail to Cyprus. He told you the secret, and you are using me to determine the truth of his story. You've watched him, so you know what we have said between us. We've not conspired against you, and yet our secrets are the same. So, now you know. What we tell you is the truth.”

  Berenice looked to Theodotus.

  “Just because she figured it out,” he said, “that doesn't mean it didn't work.”

  Berenice stepped closer, her long, tight tunic bobbing against her shins. She wore a simple white ribbon around her head and no jewelry. For a moment, her regal posture slipped away.

  She stood before Amani, her eyes assessing but not judging her. “You've performed as expected.”

  Amani bowed her head.

  Berenice moved to Theodotus. “Go to Cyprus. If Rome hasn't found the annex, I want it secured until we can bring the books home.”

  Amani broke her silence. “And what of me?”

  Berenice gave her a side glance. “Is it not enough you live?”

  If Amani wanted to join me in Cyprus, if she wanted to see the annex and the books--if there were any--she knew all she had to do was ask. I had left her unprotected and sent no word, and she resented the fear and the worry. If I cared, she would have heard from me. If the books existed, she would have heard from me. Amani knew Cleopatra loved her, and she needed love above answers.

  “It is enough that I go to Rome.”

  4

  The Hills of Rome

  Hemmed on either side by water, Alexan
dria was a golden city, but Rome was something else. Larger than any other city in the known world, it commanded a series of green hills and appeared to continue forever as the sun dipped low against the horizon.

  Sellers would soon close their shops. Fires were being lit along the streets. Soldiers escorted Amani and the hundred delegates as far into the city as the Tiber River. There the soldiers would wait. No one could bring weapons across the pomerium, the long-vanished wall of the original city, now a border that marked Rome's heart.

  Under penalty of death, no one could cross the pomerium, except between the markers where the old gates once stood.

  The men found food and wine and secured rooms among those sympathetic to the cause. Berenice had appointed Dio to lead the delegates, and he arranged for Amani to stay with him; they would have rooms off the second-story mezzanine of a private home, but sleep was not yet a priority. Dio gathered the group’s leaders in the home's central courtyard.

  Amani watched.

  “Ptolemy has no hand to play,” said a large stranger with shoulders shaped like mountains. “His people can't even bring weapons this far into Rome.”

  “I wish it were true, Urban,” Dio said. “The republic is splintering. Cicero has been banished. Against Roman law, the Senators Clodius and Milo have armed mercenaries patrolling the streets, each in opposition to the other. They've killed citizens and senators, alike.”

  “And yet we come unarmed,” Urban murmured.

  Amani approached Dio, feeling both out of place but compelled to speak. “You need to hear what Theodotus told me.”

  Dio grabbed her hands. “Not now.”

  She pulled away, certain she was being patronized, but when she saw his face, she found something else.

  “Let me finish here,” he said, “and we'll discuss it in private.”

  Amani nodded and retreated to the alae.

  She was not alone. The lady of the house rose from her couch, her face firm but kind. The room's walls were painted red, and the cloth and wood darkly stained, swallowing up lamplight. Yet, when the lamp's halo captured her tunic, she glowed a spectral white.

  She bade Amani follow her to a door with wood stained as if wet with blood. It opened onto an exedra, an alcove off the atrium, semicircular, domed, and painted with images of the Roman countryside. Her husband, Consivius, sat on a bench, watched the men, and brooded.

  He looked up at Amani and smiled. “You must be Cleopatra's companion. I hope the men didn't frighten you.”

  “How right are they to be scared?” she asked.

  “The danger is only in the time before they speak before the Senate, but meetings between the Senate and foreign ambassadors have a way of being postponed, indefinitely.”

  Amani made the scornful pout she reserved for when she was being lied to. “Your law forbids such a thing.”

  He raised his brow with a reassessing gaze.

  “A good law with poor enforcement,” he said. “Go back to Ostia. Sail home to Egypt.”

  She shook her head.

  He glanced at the others. “They hope Ptolemy is weak because they've cut off the funds to feed his bribes, but he doesn't need gold. He trades in promises to be paid when he regains the throne.”

  “Is there nothing we can do?” Amani asked.

  “To help them? No. But there is something we can do to help ourselves. Let the hundred go their way. I will take you to Ptolemy.”

  Amani had sailed for Rome in early spring, north to the straight of Messana, where the snotgreen sea wedged itself between Sicily and the tip of the Italian peninsula. There, Dio and Theodotus had stood with her, admiring the coasts on either side.

  “Have you read of the Roman siege of Syracuse, when it was still a Greek colony?” she asked.

  Both men said they had not. Amani assumed they were lying, but if they offered lies in kindness, she would accept them.

  “Archimedes held off their ships with a weapon that could set a ship ablaze from 300 cubits,” she said.

  “Why don’t we have such machines now?” Dio asked.

  “When the Romans finally took Syracuse, they killed Archimedes,” she said. “Many tried to guess how the weapon operated, but none of their designs ever worked.”

  “How do you think it operated?” Theodotus asked.

  Amani looked at him, and now, it was her turn to lie. “I don’t know.”

  There was some truth in that. She felt certain they had added water to a heated metal cannon and the resulting steam fired a large ceramic projectile. On impact, the projectile released the mysterious Greek Fire, which consumed entire ships and even burned underwater. What Greek Fire was, no one knew.

  In Messana, the breakwaters curled north, like a mother's arm, and they sought permission to harbor a few days. The city sent out supplies and an uneasy welcome. They would be better off to hurry along the last days of the journey and reach Ostia before the weather turned.

  The skies showed no signs of ill-fortune. The leaders conferred with the captain and agreed to press on. They followed the coast and reached Ostia, a giant port at the mouth of the Tiber River. Tugboats guided them to the quay.

  The city's ordered buildings shone clean and white. Amani almost felt safe as they awaited inspection. Two weeks had passed since they left Alexandria. Another day's journey by land would take them to Rome.

  They spent that night in proper beds, free of the movement of the water and the sound of tortured wood.

  Amani rose early, and she and Dio sat outside the city, staring off at the green hills and the roads. One would soon take them away to Rome.

  “I need to ask something that may offend you,” she said.

  Dio took a sip of wine and set down his chunk of bread. “At my age, I'm not easily offended.”

  “I owe you. Don't think I've forgotten.”

  “I won't.”

  “You've eaten with Ptolemy,” she said.

  “I have.”

  “You've laughed with him and paid him homage, and now you travel to Rome as his accuser. I don't understand.”

  “I haven't come to accuse him but to defend our people and our Pharaoh against his accusations. We are all here for one reason, to save our lives. Each of us has transitioned into the power structure under Berenice. Whether it’s her or her father who wears the crown, someone must care for Alexandria and run Egypt. The work continues without him, but he will see our care as treason.”

  She wanted to argue against his reasoning, but could not. Instead, she nodded and ate her grapes, and they sat in silence as weightless clouds soared above the endless green. It was a wholly different beauty, and she wondered if she would ever see Egypt again.

  Papyrus 4.01

  Amani awaited Dio on the mezzanine, but he was away late into the night. Sleep came without warning, and morning announced itself through shuttered slats. Amani refreshed her face with water from a basin and slipped into a fresh tunic. Though it made her squint, she opened the shuttered wall and looked down at the men gathered in the central courtyard.

  Beyond the courtyard, Rome glowed in the morning sun. The light made red tile roofs redder still; it bleached walls and pillars a white as pure as the sun itself. Below, the men stood among herb gardens and statues painted in rich colors. They spoke in whispers, with their heads bowed.

  Amani hurried to make herself presentable. She poured water over her bald scalp, dabbed herself with oils, and pulled on her wig.

  She walked downstairs to the alae and stepped out into the atrium, her tunic catching a hint of the courtyard's reflected glory. The voices of the men faltered.

  “Last night, you didn't listen,” she said, “but you will hear me now.”

  Dio moved to intercept her, but Urban pushed his way through, guarding her against those who would interfere.

  In Ostia, the voices of these men had settled under Dio's leadership as he bridged the gap between the bureaucrats and the soldiers. Theodotus stood with Amani, watching the absurdity of horses
and men.

  “You're witnessing a mass suicide,” Theodotus said. “Come with me to Cyprus while you still can.”

  “Cleopatra...”

  “Will never be queen. That was never the plan.”

  “You think she'll stay in Rome?”

  “No,” he said, “that won't be possible after this. Politics is a game, and sometimes you can see each move in advance. We send the delegates. Ptolemy silences them with violence. The Senate reacts by forcing Ptolemy out of Rome. Berenice intends for these men to die, and do not think for a moment your presence will change that. Ptolemy will strike because he must, and that will turn opinion against him even further. Come to Cyprus. Help me find Philostratos. There's no reason for you to be caught in this.”

  She watched Dio parade his horse between the lines of delegates and soldiers. “Warn them.”

  “The best I can do is warn you,” he said. “Some of these men may survive and fall away into silence. That is all we can hope for. Better that than if they were to turn back.”

  “Cleopatra will save me,” she said.

  “There is no way she can.”

  Amani tried to smile, but could not. “You underestimate her because you don't know her as I do. You believe the future immutable; all the pieces placed and moves decided, but you determined that outcome before knowing I would be here. She and I are the uncertainty you cannot plan for, and, together, we will prove you wrong.”

  Amani told the delegates gathered in the Roman courtyard what Theodotus had told her, and, in the stillness that followed, she heard Dio's soft words. “Talk to me first; that's all I wanted.”

  Urban turned to face Dio, who looked small and beaten. “Is what she says true?”

  Dio had aged on this trip, or maybe he had always been older than Amani imagined. “Is it true that Theodotus said it?” he asked. “I'm sure it is. He probably even believes it. Is this Berenice's true intent? I don't know. Who among us has not considered this a possibility? And yet we came.”