A Choice of Destinies

by Melissa Scott

  By the time the new moon brought in the month of Dystros, Alexander was on his feet again, disdaining Philip’s last words of caution. He had lost a great deal of weight and still tired easily; both, he proclaimed buoyantly, would mend with time and food. As he grew stronger, he took more and more of a personal interest in the Roman negotiations, demanding solid answers. Fabius was forced to give ground and, with the reluctant support of Hirtius’s party, managed to get a preliminary agreement to the general terms Alexander had outlined. Alexander accepted that agreement gracefully, not yet pushing for more, and Fabius pressed his own advantage, at last securing the Senate’s consideration for a proper treaty. Between them, Fabius and Ptolemy worked out formulae that would please and protect both sides, and at last the consul was able to put that formal statement before the senators. Reluctantly, the Senate agreed to debate the treaty. The two consuls and their parties between them controlled enough votes to assure that the treaty would pass. In the Senate house, Fabius breathed a soft sigh of relief. The first part of his work was over. He straightened his shoulders, then, gathering his toga about him, invited Cassius to accompany him on the long walk back to his own house. The tribune eyed him warily, wondering what Fabius was up to, but agreed.

  The horned moon was rising when Fabius finally reached his house. Cassius waited while Fabius exchanged brief words with the slave doorkeeper, then stepped forward to take his leave of the consul. The older man stopped him with an abrupt exclamation.

  “Nonsense. Surely you’ll take a cup of wine with me, after all the good we’ve done today?”

  There was no refusing that invitation, and Cassius had to admit that there was something to celebrate. That afternoon, the Senate had voted at last to consider the treaty in formal session, and Fabius and Hirtius between them controlled enough votes to win the voting that would follow. Rome would be spared—at a cost. “It would be my pleasure, sir,” he said, and tried to force some warmth into his voice.

  “Excellent,” Fabius answered. For a fleeting moment, his smile seemed forced, and then it eased into something more genuine. “Jason,” the consul went on, “have chairs brought into the garden, and torches. Have the wine served there.”

  The elderly slave, who had appeared behind the doorkeeper, bowed deeply and vanished into the depths of the house. Cassius followed the consul through the stygian entranceway and into the atrium. Fabius avoided the central pool blindly, then paused beneath the broad archway that gave onto the garden. Cassius followed more slowly, stepping cautiously across the polished tiles that ringed the pool.

  Slaves moved among the rose bushes and the low banks of flowers, Some carrying torches, others bringing chairs and the wine table. Under Jason’s direction, they placed torches along the narrow strip of pavement that ringed the central fountain, and set chairs and table inside the ring of light. “Excellent,” Fabius said. “Pour the wine, and then you all may go. Come, Cassius.”

  Cassius took his place opposite the consul, and accepted a cup from the grey-haired slave who poured the wine. Most of Fabius’s slaves were older, and had been with his household for some years. The consul was notorious for the simplicity of his habits since the death of his wife and son. Fabius took a cup too, smiling thanks and dismissal, then sat staring at the fountain, wondering how to begin.

  “It was a good day,” Cassius said after a while. “Even Domitius Mela couldn’t sway them, and if he can’t, with his soldier’s airs, then Poppaeus certainly can’t.”

  Fabius sighed deeply, and set aside his untasted wine. With an attempt at cheerfulness, he said, “Yes. They’ll give Ptolemy citizenship. I don’t think even Alexander himself can destroy that agreement, and I have to admit he’s deft enough when sober. Hirtius and I can deliver the popular vote.”

  “When sober?” Cassius asked, startled.

  Fabius smiled, rather bitterly. “After Lanuvium, my boy. He was drunk when he threatened us, couldn’t you see?”

  “He was feverish,” Cassius said, and was surprised by the warmth of his own defense.

  Fabius looked curiously at him. After a moment, the consul shrugged and said, “Probably you’re right. Put it down to an old man’s cynicism.” He shook himself, and said, briskly, “In any case, I think he’ll speak well enough not to undo what I’ve done.”

  “So all that remains is a suitable marriage,” Cassius said.

  “Yes,” Fabius said, and looked expectantly at the tribune, “a suitable marriage.”

  Cassius’s eyes narrowed. “You have someone in mind, then, sir.”

  Fabius nodded. “I do,” he said, “and you’ll have guessed who already.”

  “Tell me,” Cassius said.

  “Your sister Cassia,” the consul said.

  “No,” Cassius said flatly. She was his sister, aside from all the considerations of rank and status, and much loved; she deserved better than to be thrown away on a foreigner, on a barbarian king.

  “Hear me out,” Fabius said. “I have no daughters—no children at all, now—or I would offer my own kin. You are of rank, your family has a good reputation in Rome, but most of all I know I can trust you. You fought at Lanuvium, you know what’s at stake. And you’ve met Alexander, you know he won’t—abuse Cassia.”

  “No,” Cassius said again, with less vehemence. “Sir, I can’t sell off my sister, not even to Alexander. In any case, she’d never agree to it, and I wouldn’t marry her to anyone without her consent.”

  “But she would listen to your advice,” Fabius pointed out. “Cassius, think. Is there anyone else in Rome whom I could ask without having to pay too high a price for their help?”

  Cassius shook his head mutely, momentarily too angry to speak. He hated the logic of the consul’s argument, resented the very real necessity of the sacrifice even as he recognized both. After a long moment, he sighed, shaking his head again. “I can’t promise Cassia will agree, sir.”

  Fabius nodded. “I know that. All I ask is that you make the offer, and give your consent as head of the family.”

  Cassius still looked mutinous, but said, “Very well, sir, I will do that.”

  Fabius bowed gravely to him. “I thank you, Lucius Cassius. I hope—I beg you to stay a little longer, I wouldn’t have you leave here in anger.”

  Touched to the core by the older man’s appeal, Cassius returned the bow, saying passionately. “Sir, you’ve been like a father to me and Cassia. I don’t blame you for this at all. You’re right, it’s the only way.”

  Despite his brave words, however, it took two more days for Cassius to nerve himself to put Fabius’s request before the women of his family. Cassia herself, a quiet, studious girl of sixteen, accepted her brother’s announcement without apparent emotion—she was not promised to anyone as yet, though she was certainly old enough to be eligible, and had never expected to be consulted in the matter. Their mother Gratidia, on the other hand, protested violently, and was only silenced by the repeated reminder of the disastrous battle at Lanuvium. When at last Cassia herself was able to get a word in edgewise, it was only to say that she would follow her brother’s advice, and then, almost as an afterthought, to ask what Alexander was like. Cassius floundered badly in his attempt at a description, but Cassia seemed satisfied enough.

  Fabius passed along the news that Cassius had agreed to his sister’s marrying Alexander, and the king promptly made a formal offer for her hand. Cassius unhappily accepted the general terms, but did his best to delay the negotiations on the actual contract. Alexander, who had both the Senate’s final vote on the treaty and renewed trouble on Sicily to deal with, was happy enough to let the tribune make excuses. On the first day of Daisios, the Senate accepted Fabius’s treaty by a respectable margin, at the same time formally repudiating the earlier agreement with Carthage. Alexander had agreed readily enough to the suggestion that Ptolemy rather than himself was the more logical candidate for the consulship. Fabius moved at once to have the brigadier made a citizen of Rome.

  The m
ore conventional senators were bitterly opposed to the idea, and Fabius was forced to abandon his first plan—to find a senator willing to adopt Ptolemy—and fall back on a simple decree of the Senate. This was more unusual and more difficult, and it took nearly a month of patient work before Fabius was able to acquire the votes needed to pass the measure. The Macedonians watched the complicated maneuvers with reactions ranging from amazement to frustration. Craterus, predictably enough, was both infuriated and disgusted by the Roman system; Ptolemy, who was slowly developing an odd sort of liking for the stubborn city, answered sharply that Macedon could profit from Roman ways. Alexander silenced the quarrel with a look: he was intrigued by the machinations of Senate and senators, he said drily, but not when it was done at his expense. Fabius reported the remark in select quarters in Rome, and obtained the grant of citizenship for Ptolemy.

  A Choice of Destinies

  Chapter 10:

  near Rome, early summer (Panemos), 31 imperial (325 B.C., 428 A.U.C.)

  After five months in the same place, the original conglomeration of tents had begun to take on the outlines of a small city. Farmers from the surrounding towns had joined the merchants who followed the army to set up a real marketplace. Beyond that open space the more enterprising of the camp followers had set up their own quarter. Less-professional women were in evidence as well, and their children: there had been plenty of time for the individual soldiers to look to their own comforts.

  The Macedonians had also spent some of their time in fortifying the area, replacing the original shallow trenches with a more permanent wooden palisade. Some of the senators had questioned its erection, claiming this was a hostile move from Alexander. Ptolemy, who first received the complaint, answered blandly that the building gave the soldiers something to do with their time, and kept them from harassing the natives. That silenced the most vocal objections. Still, not all of Rome was reconciled to the Macedonian alliance, and Fabius privately urged his tribune to come to an agreement over the contract as soon as possible. The tribune did as he was told: ten days after Ptolemy had been made a Roman citizen, Cassius made the short journey to the Macedonian camp to finish the arrangements for his sister’s marriage.

  The guards at the main entrance to the camp had been warned of Cassius’s arrival, and a page was waiting to escort him to the king. The royal tent stood rather apart from the rest, near the river, but well upstream from the horselines. The two pages on duty at the tent door had also been warned to expect the tribune. They passed him in instantly, the younger of them murmuring a shy Latin greeting, the older announcing self-importantly, “Lucius Cassius Nasidienis, sirs.”

  The king had been hard at work when the Roman’s arrival was relayed to him, and his table was covered with rolls of papyrus. At the Roman’s entrance, Eumenes snatched protectively for several of them. Perdiccas, lounging in one of the several chairs, rolled his eyes, and Hephaestion sighed.

  The king ignored them both. “Welcome, Cassius,” he said, in Greek. His Latin was still very limited and likely to remain so: he had no particular gift for languages. He nodded to the shaven-headed slave who waited patiently in his corner to take dictation. “That’s enough, Phaedrus, you may go.”

  The slave gathered his tablets and vanished. To Cassius, the king said, “I assume you’ve come about my offer for your sister?”

  It was a reasonably tactful way to express it. Cassius suppressed a last, momentary bitterness, and nodded. “Yes, King Alexander. Cassia has accepted your offer, and I am willing to give my consent.”

  Eumenes raised an eyebrow at that—who had ever heard of a woman refusing an offer of marriage when it was presented by her male kin?—and he sneered faintly. Hephaestion said, “We’re not in Athens, Eumenes.”

  “Thank the gods,” Perdiccas added, grinning.

  “There are a few matters that must be dealt with first,” Cassius said firmly. “Chief among them, King Alexander, your previous marriages.”

  Alexander nodded, the corners of his mouth curving upward in a knowing smile, and waved the Roman to a chair. “It’s common practice for a king of Macedon to have several wives—I only have two living. I don’t see the difficulty.”

  Cassius seated himself opposite the king. “It is customary among Romans to take a single wife,” he said austerely. “A subsequent marriage is invalid under our law.”

  “My queen—my chief wife, mother of my son—has been dead for four years,” Alexander said. Somewhat to his own surprise, he was enjoying himself. “Surely, under law, that changes the situation somewhat.”

  “Yet you have two other living wives. The ideal solution,” Cassius said, bracing himself, “would be to renounce your other wives.”

  Perdiccas laughed softly, turning his head away, even as the secretary said disapprovingly, “Impossible.”

  Alexander struggled to repress his own grin. He liked the Roman the better for the suggestion. “I could hardly divorce Darius’s daughter,” he said, with an attempt at severity.

  “Roxane,” Hephaestion observed, “is another matter entirely.”

  “I won’t divorce her, either,” Alexander retorted.

  Perdiccas snorted, and Hephaestion said, quite audibly, “Pity.”

  Alexander gave both men a sardonic look, and turned back to Cassius. “But I don’t mean to joke about such a serious matter,” he said. “These other marriages aren’t contracted by Roman law; your sister would be my only wife under your law, and would be treated as such in Rome, and with all honor in my household. The latter would be true regardless of law.”

  “If you marry Cassia without divorcing these other wives,” Cassius said slowly, “I suppose the law could stretch a point.” He paused, pretending to consider, though he and Fabius had worked out all the implications some days before. “But their children could not inherit in Rome, since those marriages would be invalid under our law.”

  Alexander’s eyes narrowed, but he said, mildly enough, “Philip Alexander is the son of my first wife, now dead. That marriage would be valid, surely.”

  “Certainly, King Alexander,” Cassius answered, “provided that you describe yourself in the marriage contract as a widower, and provided that Cassia steps into the place of the dead woman.”

  This time he had gone too far. The two generals exchanged a suddenly wary glance, and Eumenes said again, “Impossible.”

  Alexander’s face hardened. “I cannot favor any of my wives above the others,” he said. “Politically, it’s impossible. But with Euridice dead, I’ll have no other queen, and we can put that in the contract, if you like.”

  Cassius bowed, willing to back down gracefully if he could gain his other points. “I would want that,” he said. “And also assurance, as a part of the contract, that Cassia would have at least the same rank and status as the—other women of your household.”

  “That,” Alexander said dryly, “I would do for my own sake. But, certainly, we can put that in the contract as well—if in your turn you will formally acknowledge my right to have other wives.”

  “Maintain other women in your household?” Cassius asked apologetically. “To admit other marriages would prejudice this marriage in Roman eyes.”

  “To maintain other households, then,” Alexander said. “That describes the situation more exactly, anyway.”

  “In consideration of your foreign birth and customs,” Cassius murmured as though thinking aloud. Hephaestion chuckled softly. The king nodded.

  “Thank you, King Alexander,” Cassius said. “Then there’s only a dowry and the specifics of Cassia’s rights of maintenance—”

  Before he could go any further, the tent flap was pulled back. Alexander frowned deeply, and said, “Theodatus—”

  “I’m sorry, sire,” the page said hastily. “But there’s a messenger from Syracuse.”

  The king’s expression changed. “Show him in,” he said. “Cassius, your pardon.” Cassius nodded politely, but Alexander didn’t see him, his attention already
focussed on the newcomer. The page pulled the tent flap back further, admitting a sun-browned, strikingly handsome man.

  Alexander’s frown eased a little, and he said, “Timander, isn’t it, son of Hellanicus?”

  “Yes, sire,” the man said, nodding. His faded blue cloak was mottled with salt stains: it had been a hard passage from Syracuse, the sailing season only just open.

  “What’s the news, then?” Alexander asked softly, fixing his eyes on the messenger’s face.

  “Good news, sire,” Timander said hastily, and Perdiccas said, “Thank the gods.” Hephaestion nodded agreement.

  “Nearchus and the Sicilian cities brought the Carthaginians to battle,” Timander went on, proffering a leather-wrapped cylinder. “They send this.”

  Alexander snatched at the cylinder, snapping the seals and letting the wrapping fall to the ground in his haste to read. Hephaestion edged close to read over his shoulder.

  “Well?” Perdiccas demanded. Eumenes affected disinterest.

  Alexander tossed the roll of papyrus in the general’s direction. “Nearchus beat the Carthaginians after all,” he said, in Macedonian, and then, remembering Cassius’s presence, repeated the words in Greek. Perdiccas skimmed the scroll, then handed it to Eumenes, who read through it quickly.

  “Do you think they’ll stay back beyond the Halycus?” he asked.

  “I don’t know why not,” Perdiccas said.

  Alexander reached again for the scroll. He read through it again, Hephaestion still leaning over his shoulder. After some months of suffering constant small-scale raids from the Carthaginians, Nearchus had managed to force a battle, and had won a bloody victory. It had been a neat bit of maneuvering, and deserving of praise, but the admiral had not yet had to face the full resources of Carthage. “What about reinforcements from Carthage proper?”

  “Nearchus has the fleet,” Eumenes began, then stopped, reconsidering he’s own words. The Carthaginians were too great a sea power to be dismissed so lightly.