The Gates of Hell

by Michael Livingston

  Pullo’s brow raised. “But?”

  Hannah chewed on the inside of her cheek as she thought, an odd habit that Caesarion had long found endearing. “But we cannot jump at shadows,” she finally said. “We cannot move the Ark at every whisper of something that may be wrong. It is hidden here for now, safe with the help of people we know and trust. It will need to be moved at some point, but to do so we would have to get it into the open. That might only compound our dangers. This is why the Ark was placed in Alexandria so long ago: we could not continue to move it. The Shard needed a home where it could be safe. And it was safe there. For three centuries it was safe.”

  “And you think this can be its home now?” Pullo asked.

  “I don’t know,” Hannah admitted. “Perhaps not. But it served as a temple for the Ark once before. Perhaps it can again.”

  “Though it had to be moved from here because it was unsafe,” Vorenus pointed out.

  Hannah nodded. “This is true. But it was a different time. We don’t know what is to come.”

  “The truth is,” Caesarion said quietly, “that we know precious little at all.”

  Pullo made a scoffing noise. “I think Vorenus is right, but then I usually do. At the same time, this Thrasyllus is just one man. What harm could he do?”

  Vorenus looked at the ground. “Khenti is dead because of that one man.”

  For a few moments everyone was silent. Then, at last, Hannah let out a heavy breath. “He can do little enough alone. The only danger now would be if he got help, right?”

  Vorenus thought for a long time, then he finally agreed.

  Hannah nodded. “Then it is settled. The Ark stays here for now.”

  20

  GROWING IN DARKNESS

  TARRACO, 26 BCE

  Almost two months after she rescued Juba and Caesar, Selene sat with her husband on a bench outside the room where Caesar continued his recovery. Praetorians stood to either side of the door before them, faces impassive, eyes straight ahead. Selene’s hand slid across the stone, touched his, and their fingers intertwined. They so rarely touched these days, and the connection made her want both to smile and weep.

  Neither of them had spoken of the traumas they had suffered while they were apart. Between their exhaustion and the uncertainty of what would happen to Caesar—and what his health might mean for them—it had been as if a distance had settled between them since Vellica had burned, since the legionnaires who’d swept forward at the first signs of smoke had found them all, stumbling from the hillfort’s walls, carrying the fevered Octavian. Tiberius, Juba later learned, had objected to the assault, but Carisius had nevertheless called out the legions. He had come down onto the field personally when word came up through the ranks that Caesar was in danger, so Selene and Juba had been standing by Carisius when the burning gate of Vellica gave way and the legionnaires entered the hillfort and began sweeping out what was left of the Cantabrians, sending them fleeing into the rocky hills.

  After they had returned to the encampment, Juba had asked no questions as to why his wife had hurried ahead to the tent, insisting that he check to be sure that Octavian was still alive. His exhaustion, Selene suspected, had overwhelmed any suspicion.

  Still later, when he’d come at last to the tent, when they were alone, Juba had asked only the briefest of questions about how she had done what she did. He’d nodded. He’d told her how brave she had been. How proud he was of her. He’d helped her out of the Aegis, and a profound weariness had overtaken her. The Shards hidden as best he could manage among their things, he’d helped settle her into the bed. He never even asked why unfamiliar sheets were upon it.

  She’d burned the old ones.

  The door to Caesar’s room opened, and one of the assistants appeared. “He is calling for you now,” the man said.

  Juba nodded, stood, and with his hand still in hers helped Selene do the same. She smiled in a gratitude that ran to the core of her heart.

  As they passed the door, the assistant leaned close to whisper, “Be brief. He is still weak.” Then he quietly closed the door behind them, leaving them alone with the emperor of Rome.

  He lay in a bed of great cushions and silks, propped up on pillows. The doors to the balcony behind the bed were open, and Selene could see the ever-breathing waves of the sea over the roofs of the city beyond them. In the room she shared with Juba they could taste the salt of those waves, but here the air was thick instead with medicinal oils and burning incense that drifted on the trembling little breeze.

  Octavian had never been an imposing man. Unlike his adopted father, Julius, or his great rival and Selene’s father, Mark Antony, he could little intimidate with his stature. His success, his power, lay in his determination, his will to dominate, and his shrewd cunning to forego small battles in favor of final victory in a larger war. That, and his singular focus on his goal.

  The Peace of Rome.

  If he was an unimpressive physical figure in his best days, he was startlingly weak now. His face was gaunt, his skin pale and stretched over his cheekbones. His eyes were dark-rimmed and sunken, and when he smiled and beckoned them forward it was with frail arms.

  “Lord Caesar,” Juba said, bowing low before advancing to the bedside.

  Selene followed suit, and the two of them sat in chairs that had clearly been set there for just such audiences.

  “I’ve seen better days,” Octavian said, his voice a tired rasp.

  Juba smiled. “Could be worse, Caesar.”

  “Indeed so. I’ll be bedridden all winter, I fear, but I could be dead, my brother. I should be.” He closed his eyes to take a deep breath. “You saved me,” he said when he opened them again. “Both of you.”

  Selene nodded her head in a kind of bow, hoping it would hide her moment of panicked fear. What did Octavian remember of the escape? Had he seen them using the Shards?

  Juba’s hand was once more in hers, and he squeezed it in reassurance, steadying her. “We could not leave you behind,” he said.

  “Yes, you could have. And perhaps you should have.”

  “Lord Caesar,” Selene started to object, “we would never—”

  His frail arm raised again, cutting her off. “You have more cause to hate me than most, Selene. I will not have us pretend otherwise. But that morning of the attack … I tried to explain why.”

  Selene nodded. “The Peace of Rome. It is a worthy dream.”

  “I am glad you think so,” he said. Once more he took a deep breath, though his voice was seeming stronger than it had been. “I want you to be a part of it. Both of you.”

  “How can we serve, Lord Caesar?” Juba asked.

  “By becoming what you were meant to be.”

  “I don’t understand,” Selene said.

  “A queen, my lady.”

  Selene blinked. A queen? For a moment Selene’s heart soared, as visions of a return to Egypt danced in her head. But she pushed them away. Whatever paths were set before her, no road could lead her back to Alexandria. Caesar would never allow it. To think otherwise was a childish, foolish hope.

  “And you a king, my brother. Naturally.” Octavian laughed lightly for a moment before a cough cut him off. Juba reached out to hold his shoulder as he shook, and then lowered him back into the pillows when the fit had passed.

  “Shall I get someone?” Selene asked.

  Another raspy deep breath from Caesar, and he shook his head. “Please don’t. They’ve no idea what ails me.” He turned to Juba. “But you do.”

  Juba nodded. “You should not have done that. You shouldn’t have grabbed it. You knew the danger.”

  “Only too well. But I had to do it. You’re no slave, my brother. I was wrong to use you as I have.” There were tears in Octavian’s tired eyes. “I only hope you can forgive me.”

  Juba’s jaw tightened, and Selene wondered at the emotions that must be surging through him. He squeezed her hand once again. “I have. You did what you thought right. Sometimes the hard
decision must be made for the greater good. A great man once told me that, in the tomb of Alexander the Great.”

  Caesar nodded in remembrance. Selene remembered it, too. She was there that day, though Octavian did not know it. She listened from behind a door as her future husband negotiated for the lives of her and her brothers with the man who would become the emperor.

  “Peace is a greater good,” she whispered. It was true, after all, though she still wasn’t sure if she could live it. She abruptly realized that her free hand was resting against her belly, and she consciously moved it away.

  Octavian shifted on his pillows. “I do believe in that dream,” he said. “I always will. But I know now there are things that should not be done. There are powers that cannot be used again.”

  “I agree,” Juba said.

  “And so tonight will be your last night in charge of the watch.” Octavian’s voice, though still weak, nevertheless managed the tone of command. No matter his physical appearance, he was, Selene thought, every ounce a leader of men. “You will prepare at once to go to Mauretania.”

  “Mauretania?” It was a frontier province, south of Hispania on the other side of the sea. It was almost as far from Egypt as it was possible to be.

  “I cannot have you in Egypt,” Octavian said. “But you will be a queen, Selene.”

  “Thank you, Lord Caesar,” she said.

  “I realize, too, that I never formally gave you both a wedding gift.”

  “Already you have done so much,” Juba said.

  Octavian simply smiled. “There was a wagon in Vellica. A wagon Corocotta had taken from me.”

  Selene nodded, but it was Juba who spoke. “One million Sesterces.”

  Octavian shrugged his thin shoulders. “Corocotta managed to take a few bags with him before he fled, but yes, most of it was still there when the legions arrived. It’s yours now. It will go with you to Mauretania, though I may keep the wagon.”

  Selene just stared, as did Juba. Octavian let out another weak laugh.

  “I … I don’t know what to say,” Selene said.

  “You need say nothing. You saved my life. You saved Juba’s. You gave me victory in Vellica, a victory that will be proclaimed across the empire as a most glorious and honorable win—omitting, as it must, my capture, my illness, and whatever it was that you did to bring us out of there. History will never know the truth of what happened, Selene. I do not think I want to know it. But I do know that whatever happened, however it happened, you alone succeeded where my legions could not. And whatever else you might think of me, please know I am a man who pays my debts. I reward those who are loyal to me. I only hope this will be true for the king and queen of Mauretania.”

  Juba’s fingers were tight against Selene’s. “For the Peace of Rome,” she said.

  Juba let out his breath, and his fingers relaxed in hers. “Peace,” he agreed.

  Octavian’s eyes shut for a moment in a look of pure relief. Even his breathing seemed easier, as if a great weight had been lifted from him.

  Had he been worried, Selene wondered, that they would turn against him? Had he so well guessed the truth of those dreams of vengeance?

  “One thing more,” Octavian said. His eyes opened, and he stared at Juba.

  “Yes?”

  “When you leave me, when you go to Mauretania, you will take the Trident and the Lance with you.”

  “Take them?”

  “I wish never to see them again.”

  Juba opened his mouth, but then simply nodded.

  “They are yours now,” Octavian said. “Do with them what you will.”

  “Yes, Caesar.”

  Octavian seemed to relax even further. “I should rest now. And you must prepare.”

  Selene and Juba thanked him, bowed, and stood. But just as they were leaving his bedside, Caesar spoke once more. “I would be rid of them, Juba. Destroy them. Throw them into the sea. I felt the darkness. They aren’t meant for us.”

  * * *

  The sun was setting as Selene lay nestled in her husband’s arms. Her head resting on his shoulder, her hand making circles across his chest, she watched his breathing beginning to slow and felt the last tremors of his pleasure pass through his body.

  “Thank you,” he said, and the muscles of the arm beneath her rolled as his hand came up and ran through her hair. It was the first time they’d made love since Vellica. The distance that had been between them was gone. He was her Juba again. And she his Selene.

  Selene’s eyes fluttered as a breeze rolled gently through the open doors to the balcony, tasting of the clean sea, so different from Caesar’s room. Out in the distance, she could hear the calls of the seabirds following fishermen as they brought in the last of their day’s work to the harbor. She felt more at peace than she had for many weeks, for a moment even forgetting the darkness growing within her.

  “So how are you?” Juba asked.

  Selene smiled, and she raised her head to kiss him in answer before settling back down again.

  Against her cheek she felt his smile. “You’ll be a great queen, my wife.”

  “Mauretania,” she whispered.

  “I’m sorry. I thought you’d be happy.”

  Selene hadn’t realized that she’d been frowning. She turned it into a smile and kissed him again. “I am happy. Sorry, I was just thinking about home.”

  “I understand. It isn’t my home either. But you know he can’t have me in Numidia, just as you can’t be in Egypt.”

  “I know.”

  “But we can make it our home, Selene. Far from Rome. Far from all this. We can just be you and me there. Alone together.”

  “Alone together.” Selene playfully poked at her husband’s ribs. “I like the sound of that.”

  Juba grinned. “Until we have children anyway.”

  Selene gave the quickest of smiles before she turned away from him to hide what she could not keep from her face. She tried to steady her racing heartbeat as she made a show of gathering up the blankets that had been kicked down to the foot of the bed during their lovemaking. “A new start,” she finally managed to say.

  His fingertips ran along her naked back. “A chance to put everything behind us.”

  Not everything, she thought to herself. She took a deep breath, pulling up the gathered covers as she crawled back up to him and nestled against him once more. “A king. I know no one who could be a better one.”

  “I hope so,” he said. “With you at my side I feel I can take on anything.”

  “Well, I’m not going anywhere.”

  His arms enfolded her in a hug.

  For a moment Selene said nothing as she thought about what it all meant. “Can we truly do it?” she finally asked. “Be loyal to Rome?”

  “I don’t know anymore.” Juba’s voice was unsteady, uncertain. “I have so much cause to hate him. But what he wants to build, what he wants to achieve—”

  “The Peace of Rome,” Selene whispered.

  “He really did talk to you about it?”

  Selene nodded. “Just before the battle started. He told me that Rome is civilization and justice. He told me how peace reigns in Rome, and that wars like that at Vellica might be necessary right now, but that peace is on the other side of them.”

  “Do you think he’s right?”

  Selene bit her lip, thinking. “I think my mother would have thought the same thing. I think there’s a reason that she worked so hard to ally herself with Rome. So, yes. I think he’s right. And a part of me hates him even more for it.”

  Juba squeezed her again. “I think so, too. And I think he cares for me. Truly, like a brother. I think I’m one of the only friends he thinks he has in this world. And if he ever treated me badly it was only because he loves his dream even more.” He took a deep breath. “I may not have known that before, but he’s sick because he tried to save me. That’s what he was talking about. When he grabbed the Trident, he couldn’t control it and it almost killed him. He did
it to try to save me.”

  Selene nodded, thinking back to that moment in the Cantabrian prison. “That’s why you couldn’t leave him.”

  “It’s why I’m loyal, I guess.”

  Selene looked up at him and saw the mix of emotions there: the feeling that he was betraying his father, betraying his home, betraying her. Her fingers brushed his cheek. “I know. I understand.”

  He smiled at her, dampness at the corners of his eyes, and she felt the relief coming through him. She was glad he didn’t know what Tiberius had done. It would ruin him.

  Outside, the world moved closer to darkness. She laid her head back down and held him close, not wanting to let him go.

  “And now he’s given us the Shards,” he finally said.

  Selene stared out into the coming night. “What will you do with them all?”

  She felt him shudder. Memories, she knew, of their escape. Memories of what he’d done, how many men he’d killed in the impulse of a moment. He had nightmares about it, nearly every time he slept, though she pretended not to know.

  She pressed herself closer to him, wishing she could shield him from the pain. “You saved our lives. All of our lives. You did what you had to do. You had no choice.”

  “That still doesn’t make it right,” he whispered.

  Selene didn’t know what to say. How could she? In these last years not a day had gone by that she did not hate herself for bringing the asp to her mother, though she knew it was what she had to do. And now, these last weeks not a day had gone by that she did not hate herself for what Tiberius had done to her, though she knew she’d had no choice.

  Her hand, without her thought, rested on her belly.

  “I never dreamed of this.” He shivered beneath her. “I don’t want them. I don’t want the power anymore.”

  Selene at last raised up to look at him. She saw that he was staring off into the shadows of the room. “I think that’s why you must have it,” she said. She tried to smile. “And that’s why you’ll make a good king.”