And what of her art? There would be little time for it in a life of service. Would she rather leave the palace and have the freedom to create in the way her heart longed?
The ground grew cold and she stood, with Simon still seated in front of her.
Did he sense the shift in her thoughts? Was it visible in her eyes?
His lips parted and he rose slowly, until his forehead was leaning against her own.
“No,” she said. “No, I do not love my position with Mariamme more.”
It was all the encouragement he needed.
His arm shot around her waist and pulled her in until they melted together. One hand was behind her head, tangled in her hair.
They had kissed once in a courtyard in Jericho. Well, twice, really.
Tonight’s kiss was nothing like those.
Warm enough to set her pulse racing, deep enough to make promises, long enough to make her forget the past. She reveled in the sense of coming home that was Simon and let her heart open to the future and its breathtaking possibilities.
She pulled away at last, laughing and glancing around. “Someone will see us.”
He kissed her eyelids, her forehead. “I don’t care.” The words were muffled against her skin.
They sat again in the dying light of the brazier and talked of his dream of a free Israel that would be their future, until it grew late and far too cold.
He kissed her again before they parted, erasing all her doubt. It could not matter that she was lady’s maid to the queen and he was palace manager. If their positions kept them apart, they would simply walk away. Like he did for the palace and the orphans who lived with Jonah and Esther, Simon protected and provided for everyone. She needed him more than she had needed anyone, but it did not frighten her. She belonged with Simon.
She wandered slowly from the inner courtyard, through the palace corridors, to the front courtyard, barely noticing her surroundings. What were shadows and cold when her heart was warm and bright? She had not believed she could be so happy. Perhaps HaShem was pleased with her efforts after all.
The scrape of sandal on stone arrested her attention in the main courtyard. A young boy had wandered through the palace arch. He caught sight of her and strode toward her.
“A letter for the queen.” He waved a small scroll.
She extended her hand. “I am her lady’s maid. I will take it.”
He seemed reluctant at first, but she clucked her tongue. “Come now, it is cold. I will deliver it at once, if she is still awake.”
He made his delivery and disappeared, and Lydia crossed to the stairs. Did the letter pertain to Cleopatra’s visit tomorrow? Perhaps she wrote to cancel. That would make the evening perfect.
She tiptoed to Mariamme’s chamber and met Leodes at the door. He gave her a friendly wink and opened the door for her.
The new mother was awake and bent over Alexander’s little bed. “Come in, Lydia.”
“A message for you. Just arrived.”
Mariamme frowned and took the scroll, glanced at the seal, then broke it open.
Lydia turned to go.
“Stay, Lydia. Perhaps it is about Cleopatra. I know you are concerned.”
Lydia waited while Mariamme scanned the contents of the letter, but it did not appear to be good news of a cancellation. Instead, Mariamme’s face paled even in the dim lamplight, and when she set the letter aside, it was with a deep breath and a determined look.
“Sit down, Lydia.” She indicated a chair. “I have some things to tell you.”
Twenty-Nine
Cleopatra Philopator, Queen of the Two Lands of Upper and Lower Egypt, was sick of Judea.
After nearly a week traveling southward from Syria, where she had left Antony still fighting his precious Parthians, the landscape had grown wearisome and her patience stretched taut. She came to examine her holdings and find a way to expand. If only it had been to fulfill her long-held desire to kill Herod. But alas, Antony’s affections were too fickle to risk his anger over the death of a friend.
She rode alone in the finest chariot Antony could procure for her from his Roman contacts in Syria. The rest of her traveling party consisted of servants, slaves, and a few advisers who were always hanging on wherever she went. And her cook, of course. She would not travel without her personal cook. It was neither palatable nor safe to eat foreigners’ food. Poisons were too easily disguised.
The hills along the western side of the Jordan River rolled past, but it was the dust, always the dust, that met her in the chariot. She took another swig of watered wine from an amphora stashed in the corner of her seat. She would be drunk by the time she reached Jericho for all this wretched dust.
She had left Caesarion and the twins in Egypt, and strange as it sounded even to her, she missed them. Caesarion had grown into a fine young man, one who could someday take the reins of both Rome and Egypt, should he ever be given his birthright. And if not, her son with Antony, Alexander Helios, would be another likely candidate.
In the meantime, she needed only to keep Antony’s affections trained more on her than on Rome, a task that had been difficult the past two years as he insisted on moving with his troops. She needed to get him back to Egypt, where she could woo him with the extravagant Eastern lifestyle these staid Romans secretly craved.
She angled forward in the chariot and thrust a hand out the open side, waving for someone, anyone, to attend her.
A Nubian slave trotted to the side of the chariot. “Yes, Pharaoh?”
“Bring Anneas.”
“Yes, Pharaoh.”
The Nubian disappeared and she sat back, watching the Jordan River as it slid past. Water typically calmed her. Why did her nerves feel as taut as the reins of a stallion held in check?
Anneas was in the chariot in a moment, a bit breathless but smiling obsequiously. “You wanted me, my queen?”
He was a skinny man the age of her father, with a high-pitched whine of a voice, but he had served her well enough as adviser these past few years.
She pointed to the sheaf of papyrus scrolls tucked under his arm. “You brought the records?”
“Yes, yes. I assumed you would want to go over your holdings before we reached Jericho.” He set the pile beside him on the seat opposite her and began unrolling the first.
She gazed out the chariot opening once more. Yes, Antony had given her enough of the wealth of Judea to fill a half-dozen scrolls. And while she loved the money, it was the land she wanted. Had always wanted. To restore the glory of the Ptolemaic kingdom was her greatest ambition, and she would see it fulfilled in her lifetime, even before one of her sons took the throne in Rome from that young pretender Octavian.
Octavian. She hated him nearly as much as she hated Herod. His miserable influence with the Senate, pouring poison into their ears with accusations of Antony being used by the Egyptian whore. Despite their supposed alliance, Octavian would love nothing more than to see her lover fall out of favor with Rome, even while he was off fighting their wars!
“My lady?”
Anneas’s nasal whine brought her attention back to the chariot.
“Shall I begin again?”
She sighed. “Yes, Anneas. Begin again. And begin with the date-palms. They are my favorite.”
Indeed, it was the sunset streaming across the date-palms of Jericho that finally eased her aggravation, hours later. At last, at last she would have a decent bath and a generous meal and a soft bed.
As for the dinner company, she had plans for Herod.
The palace loomed on the horizon, more stately and far-flung than she had imagined. “Herod has a talent for building, it would seem,” she said to Anneas.
“Hmm. Apparently his workforce can barely keep up. Jericho, Masada, Jerusalem. They are saying he even has plans to expand and rebuild the Jews’ Temple to their One God.”
Cleopatra laughed. “Why would he do such a thing? Forced conversion hardly makes for religious fervor.”
Anne
as shrugged.
“Well, his flair for luxury will serve us well tonight, Anneas.”
The sun had dropped below the horizon by the time they reached the palace, and in the purpling twilight Cleopatra peered from the chariot. Why had the slaves who had been sent ahead not roused a welcoming party? No torches, no servants waiting to greet and unload. The front gardens of the palace lay in winter neglect, and the massive double arch at the entrance was nearly dark.
Two of her own met them at the front wall, their bare chests and white skirts dull in the gloom.
Anneas jumped from the chariot to speak with them, then returned a moment later, his chin tucked against his chest, eyes focused on the chariot’s floorboards. “He is not here.”
A jolt of pure hatred flowed through her veins. “What!”
Anneas swallowed, still studying the floor. “He is in Jerusalem.”
“But I sent word! Did he not—?”
“Yes, he received it. The palace staff has a letter for you from Herod. Inside.”
Cleopatra breathed slowly through clenched teeth, but the effort did little to calm her rage. How dare he? “Inside, then. Let us hear what the mighty king of Judea has to say.”
The chariot rolled through the gate in the wall, along the bare and drooping gardens’ edge, to the double arch. Anneas helped her from the chariot, and she entered the palace with all the dignity she could muster, even if only slaves saw it.
Three female slaves waited inside, one of whom took her mantle, one who put a cup of warmed wine into her hands, and another who led her into the courtyard, where at least a few torches had been lit. Somehow the promised letter ended up in Anneas’s hands, and he held it to her tentatively, as if she might bite his hand.
She tore it open, blood pounding in her ears.
My dearest Cleopatra,
I regret that it was inconvenient for me to attend you and your much-anticipated visit in Jericho. My wife has just given birth and it was necessary for me to remain here. Please take your ease in my magnificent palace, examine the plantations Antony has so generously lent you, then make your way to Jerusalem for an audience in my throne room.
She crumpled the letter and tossed it to the ground with a curse. One of the slaves hurried to pick it up and Cleopatra kicked her. She fell without a sound, then crawled away.
Herod’s words dripped with condescension and arrogance. Lent me? Antony had given her Jericho’s dates and balsam as a down payment on her future rule of this near wasteland.
She would kill him.
Never mind Antony. Somehow she would find a way to see Herod dead.
This latest rejection was as much a slap in her face as the night he had tossed her from his bedchamber like a slave girl who failed to satisfy.
Not even the great Julius Caesar nor Marc Antony himself had treated her thus.
“My lady—”
“What, Anneas? Will you tell me that I am a fool for thinking Herod would show anything but contempt? Fine, then I am a fool.” Her face flushed like an embarrassed adolescent and she cursed again. Anneas backed away, bowing.
She took a deep breath and glanced at her surroundings. Magnificent palace—ha! How could a man who had seen the splendor that was Egypt make such an exaggerated claim?
Well, she would make the best of it. Wash the journey dust from her body, sleep for the night in his finest rooms, and examine her wealth in the morning.
And then she would go to Jerusalem.
She would have to play him with all the intelligence she had been born with, for he was a clever adversary. But she would play him, make no mistake. She had not come so far, seen so many rivals dead at her feet, to be bested by an Arab with a tiny, dusty kingdom.
She and Herod had business to finish.
Thirty
I have a story to tell you, Lydia.”
Lydia sank into the chair Mariamme indicated, a flutter running along her nerves.
“What do you know of Cleopatra’s grandfather, the ninth Ptolemy to rule?”
Lydia blinked. It was a strange beginning. “Little, my lady.”
Mariamme frowned at the title.
Lydia smiled and ducked her head. “Very little. He was dead more than twenty years when I was born, I believe.”
“And when were you born?”
“In the last year of the twelfth Ptolemy’s first reign—Cleopatra’s father—just before he was exiled to Rome.”
Mariamme closed her eyes briefly, as if this information brought pain. “And do you know why he was exiled?”
Such strange questions. It was like her early tutoring with Samuel, though he’d been more interested in Jewish history.
“Rome took over the Egyptian-ruled island of Cyprus, where his brother was king, and Cleopatra’s father did nothing to stop it. The Egyptians were angry and rebelled. He fled to Rome for protection.”
“And what of Ptolemy’s brother, king of Cyprus?”
Lydia studied the floor, tried to remember, then shook her head. “I remember nothing of him. Perhaps the Romans killed him? It would have been the same year I was born.”
Mariamme was watching her carefully. Did she think Lydia was holding back some buried knowledge?
Mariamme seemed to make some sort of decision. “He took his own life, it would seem. He could not bear the shame of Roman annexation and wanted to die a king.”
“How sad.”
“He had a wife. Did you know of her?”
Lydia shook her head. “As I said, my knowledge is very limited—”
“She was the daughter of Alexander Janneus.”
Lydia frowned. “Daughter? Your mother’s aunt, then?”
“And my father’s aunt, since my parents were the children of brothers.”
“Strange. A connection between Judea and Egypt I never knew.”
“Shira was with child when her husband took his life. She feared for the safety of her child, and so she fled to Egypt, to Alexandria, hoping for protection against Rome.”
Lydia sighed. “Alexandria was not a place for protection in those days, I fear. Cleopatra’s sister Berenice had taken her father’s throne while he was exiled in Rome, and she was killing anyone who might wrest it from her, including her own mother.”
“Yes. And Berenice had Shira killed as well.”
“The history of the Ptolemies is much the same story, both before and after.”
“My great-grandfather Alexander Janneus gave his royal seal, embossed into bronze discs, to all three of his children—my two fighting grandfathers and their sister, Shira. Hers was made into a pendant.”
A strange coldness flooded through Lydia. Had the tapestries at the window been opened? Her attention drifted to the window, but they were intact.
“Are you hearing me, Lydia? Do you understand? The daughter of Alexander Janneus, married to the king of Cyprus, wore the pendant you now wear. She was killed by Berenice in Alexandria, and the child she carried was thought dead in her womb.”
Lydia watched Mariamme’s lips moving and somehow watched even her own self, as though she stood apart or perhaps floated above, like a spectator in the theater. A terra-cotta oil lamp flickered at some stray draft and threatened to go out. Mariamme’s elegant perfume, a scent that had always marked her as royalty in Lydia’s mind, was heavy in the air. She tried to focus on Mariamme’s smooth voice.
She saw Mariamme stand and move to where she sat, fixed in her chair. Saw the reddish-brown hair, loosed at this late hour, hang about her shoulders as she bent her head to Lydia’s. “I believe you are that child, Lydia. I believe you are the child of a Ptolemaic king and a Judean princess. You are my mother’s cousin.”
Lydia’s cold fingers went to the string at her neck, pulled the pendant from under her tunic, clutched it inside a fist pressed against her chest.
All those childhood fancies. Daydreams of being a lost princess, torn from royal parents who still searched the world for their beloved child . . .
If it
was true—if Mariamme’s mad supposition was true—then they had never searched for her. They had been dead at her birth.
But while they had never searched for her as they did in her fantasies, the reality she had believed was also untrue. She had not been abandoned. Not rejected, tossed away as worthless by the very ones who should have valued her most.
The room swam and blurred. She clutched at the pendant as if it were an anchor.
Mariamme was on her knees, forcing a cup to Lydia’s lips. “Drink this, Lydia. Focus on my voice.”
She took a sip of the wine, studied Mariamme’s sympathetic eyes, her cerulean-blue robes, the elegant curve of her neck. This was what it looked like to be a princess. Lydia was no princess.
She stood on shaky feet, needing to move, to pace.
Mariamme took the chair she vacated and did not force more questions.
Suddenly warm, Lydia went to the window, parted the tapestries, and slipped between them.
Alone in a cocoon, she looked over the city and the night sky. The winter air revived her, and she slipped the pendant from her neck and held it to the window, where a bit of moonlight filtered down.
The bronze seal was worn, but the sheaf of wheat and crown were visible. She ran a finger over its embossing. What was it Samuel had said about Cyprus as he lay dying? She could not remember. He had known, though. Samuel had known the truth and kept it from her.
She grew chilled and pulled the tapestry around her body.
She was lost, lost and confused in what could not be true, and yet she knew it was. The truth changed not only her present circumstances, but it changed everything she had known, everything she had believed about herself. It was like knowing your life as a story, then having the first few pages ripped out and replaced.
The dizzy bewilderment swept her again, and she wrapped the tapestry tighter.
Yes, it was disorienting. But wasn’t it also like being swept into the embrace of a stranger you have somehow always known?
Lydia put the pendant to her lips.
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