“Oh, yes, it does,” Caesarion contradicted, not looking up from his maps. “At least on me. Every time. Without fail.”
It was the deadpan delivery that did it. Eurydice felt her own face turn lambent with heat. Antyllus’ eyebrows went up, and stayed there. “And now I really want to know,” he said, grinning.
“She won’t tell,” Tiberius said tiredly, taking a seat near one of the desks. “Alexander did worm the secret out of Selene years ago, but he wouldn’t tell me. On that note,” he added, his voice so dry and distant that he could have been making a report on troop movements, “the dishonorable sot is no longer engaged to his erstwhile betrothed. I visited Agrippa this morning and terminated my engagement to Vipsania. My mother was highly displeased about the whole thing, which I have to say made it much sweeter than it might otherwise have been.” His gray eyes were remote and cold as he added, looking directly at Caesarion, “You have my word on the Styx that I had no idea of your sister’s attachment to me before last night.”
Eurydice’s mouth dropped open, her embarrassment forgotten. Wait, she’s been mooning over Tiberius all this time—but he and Alexander . . . oh. She knows. She hears and sees everything in the villa, and that’s why she never said anything. She was too embarrassed.
Antyllus was the first to recover, running a hand over his curly hair and saying, “Well . . . shit. I had no idea, Tiberius. You’re hardly dishonorable—gods know, you’re one of my friends. I’ll bow out—“
“No,” Tiberius replied, grim-faced, before Caesarion could get a word in edgewise. “Don’t withdraw your suit. She needs to make a clear decision between us, on her own. Without that, there might always be a question in her mind as to whether or not she made the correct decision.” A muscle worked in his jaw momentarily. “It doesn’t matter which of us she picks,” he added, shrugging. “So long as the decision is unambiguous, and doesn’t get in the way of what we need to do.” He picked up one of the maps. “Your father’s troops landed every time in the western part of the island,” Tiberius went on, using the exact same tone. “Perhaps there are other landing areas that might be less well-defended, and without the towering white cliffs of Dubris.”
There was a long moment of silence as the other three people in the room tried to shift course with Tiberius, firmly back into the realm of war, and not that of love. Antyllus cleared his throat. “No matter where we land,” he said slowly, “Caesar’s ships were damaged by the tides each time he made the crossing. The seas of the north are fierce and rough. We’ll need to pick a landing area wide enough to bring the ships in without risking them running up against each other.”
“We have some information from the Gauls of the mainland about the southern coasts of the island. They do trade back and forth across that channel,” Caesarion said thoughtfully. “There are chalk cliffs along quite a lot of the south. But here,” he tapped on the southeast corner, but further west of where Tiberius had been indicating, “among the lands held by the Regini. I was along for the last invasion, though I was only ten. Spent most of the time in the command tent, honestly, but I remember my father arguing with his legates, because they wanted to land among the Regini, and not in Cantiaci territory again.”
“Did he explain why he wanted to repeat the mistakes of the past?” Antyllus asked mildly.
Caesarion shook his head. “The only thing he ever said to me on the subject was that he’d lost something important in that region during the first invasion. And that it was important enough to go back for. Whatever it was, we didn’t find it before having to withdraw to go deal with a rebellion in Illyrica. He was annoyed.” He shook his head. “At any rate, the Regini are tributaries of the Artebates, and the Atrebates’ king, Commius, remains a . . . nominal ally of Rome,”
“Reluctantly. Very reluctantly,” Antyllus said, mildly. “His son Tincomarus grew up in my father’s house. He was an obses, a hostage, for Commius’ good behavior. I understand there were a few betrayals and broken oaths of fealty back during the Gallic Wars, until Commius finally brokered a peace agreement with my father. He swore he’d leave continental Gaul, if only he never had to look at another Roman again.”
That got heads to turn. Caesarion blinked. “All right then. Perhaps the Regini and Atrebates are our way in. Saves trying to cut through the Cantiaci for the . . . fourth time, overall.” Caesarion shrugged. “Of course, we have little reconnaissance about that area.” He looked at Eurydice, his expression tensing. “And we won’t have your eyes, beloved.”
“Tincomarus was practically an older brother,” Antyllus said, shrugging. “He went back to help his father rule five years ago. His very Roman wife and his infant son are, er, hostages now, for his good behavior. They were moved to my uncle Lucius’ house for, ah, safe-keeping, when my father closed the villa down for the move here.” He shrugged again when the others all looked at him. “What I mean to say is, Tincomarus should be willing to give us more information. If asked the right way.”
Eurydice had closed her eyes at Caesarion’s earlier words. “About my not being there,” she said unsteadily, “I wanted to talk to you about the fact that Cornelius Gallus decamped the entire garrison in Alexandria—six thousand men!—and headed south to Thebes because ‘unrest’ had been reported.” She grimaced, opening her eyes. “While Mother only asked us yesterday about making Antony governor. . . I have a feeling Gallus might be trying to show his worth as prefect. He might have had intimations about his upcoming replacement.”
“And you think he might be overzealous about it,” Caesarion interpreted rapidly.
“Too heavy a hand there right now, and ‘unrest’ might become ‘rebellion,’” she murmured. “Especially with the mage-priests. Who . . . probably have ample reason to dislike us. Well, me.” She grimaced, remembering the way in which she’d dismissed the insufferable Tahut-Nefer from this house. “You’re going to tell me that you told me so, aren’t you?”
Caesarion had already picked up a stylus and a wax tablet to jot down some rapid notes for a scribe to turn into a more polished order. “I don’t need to, when you’ve already come to the conclusion yourself,” he told her briskly. “When was that report dated?”
“Two weeks ago. He admits that it’s more of a rumor than anything at the moment, but that it . . . ‘doesn’t do to let the soldiers get fat in winter.’” She grimaced. “That’s tidied up and couched in language a bureaucrat would approve, mind. Not that there’s much of a winter in Egypt.”
“By the time my order to desist gets there, whatever’s going to happen, will already have happened,” Caesarion muttered, but finished writing on the tablet anyway. “Might as well get it in the record that we tried to stop the avalanche.” He sighed and looked at Tiberius and Antyllus. “Let’s break for our midday meal, gentlemen.”
They nodded, both heading for the door. And as Tiberius turned to duck out, Caesarion called after him, “You will be coming to Egypt with us.” No compromise in his voice. “You said yourself that you want an unambiguous choice. And I’ve never seen you retreat before. Get in the damned fight already.”
Tiberius’ back stiffened, and his expression tightened. “Yes, dominus.”
______________
In the atrium of the Julii house, Antyllus caught Tiberius’ arm, still looking apologetic. “I’m sorry,” the older man told him, sincerity in his voice and eyes. “When she told me, I was mostly relieved that the issue wasn’t just some version of a virgin’s aversion. If I’d known it was you, I’d have shut my damned mouth.”
Tiberius shrugged. “It doesn’t matter,” he told Antyllus simply. He couldn’t dislike Antony’s son, much as he wished he could. They’d been through too many battles together, and while that was no guarantee of friendship, since there were plenty of outright bastards in the legions, it had created a matrix of trust and fidelity among the cadre of older advisors and younger leaders with whom Caesarion had surrounded himself. “Whatever happens, happens. And as you said last night .
. . friends.” He offered his hand, and Antyllus clasped his wrist, looking relieved. “Do me a favor, though? Make my excuses to Caesarion about joining the family for lunch.”
Antyllus’ eyebrows rose. “Selene will be there. You’re going to let me steal a march on you? Bad tactics.”
Tiberius shook his head. “I need to talk to my brother about a number of things. And he needs to hear them from me, not from our mother or Agrippa.”
Antyllus nodded. “Understood.” He hesitated. “I wish my relationship with my own brother was as good as yours with Drusus. Of course, it’s my own fault, really. I should reach out to Jullus more.” His voice was wistful.
Tiberius blinked. “Drusus always reminds me when I’ve been forgetful of him. It’s a street on which we can pass both ways. Not a river, always flowing from mountains to sea.”
Another nod, and then a flicker of something crossed Antyllus’ face. “I keep trying to tell my brother something, but he just won’t hear me when I say it,” he told Tiberius. “I remind him that our step-mother Octavia’s dead. And that all her disapproval died with her.”
That sounds remarkably like what Alexander keeps telling me about Octavian. What is it about that brother and sister, that lingers so in the lives of those they controlled? Tiberius met Antyllus’ eyes for a long moment. “She might be as dead as Octavian,” he told his friend quietly. “But for so long as their voices live in our heads, their ghosts stay with us. And no matter how often you hang up poppets on the doorstep or make offerings at graves, the voices never seem to go away.”
As he made his way to his own small villa, this one on the Palatine, befitting the Claudii name that he and his brother bore, Tiberius reflected not on Octavian’s voice in his head, but that of Livia. He hadn’t been joking when he’d told Caesarion that she’d been angry. Though breaking his betrothal to Vipsania hadn’t, surprisingly, been the source of her ire. No, it was the reason for it that had made her voice rise in fury. “All these years,” she’d said, her face livid, “I have held off trying to arrange a better match for you than Vipsania, because I couldn’t imagine you putting her aside. And now you do—but for a half-Egyptian trull?”
“Watch your tongue,” he’d snapped. “Selene is probably the most innocent person I’ve ever met.”
“If you’re going to break your betrothal, why not for someone of real value?” she’d returned, spots of color burning on her cheekbones, and her mouth a grim slash. “Why not marry Octavia instead? A true daughter of Rome—“
“She’s betrothed to Alexander—“
“Betrothals can be broken, as you’ve just proved,” she’d almost purred. “And breaking this one wouldn’t take much effort at all.”
“And I wouldn’t marry Octavian’s daughter on a bet,” he’d returned, trying to still the nausea that the thought provoked. Alexander once wondered, in my presence, if he had some traces of Octavian’s life or spirit in him, due to the way in which Caesarion brought him back from death. I couldn’t kiss him until the unease passed. Octavian’s own flesh-and-blood daughter? I’d throw up on her every time I tried to consummate the marriage. Nothing to do with her. Everything to do with him.
He’d tried. Gods, how he’d tried. “Mother, you do realize that they’re more than just Cleopatra’s children, yes? They’re also Caesar’s. I’d have thought you’d be pleased, at least on some level. As political marriages go, it would be highly advantageous, assuming she agrees to it—“
And she’d just stared at him for a long moment, before hissing, “My goal has never been to see my grandchildren, if you ever get around to providing me with some, to be some cadet branch of the Julii. My goal has been to see one or both of my sons occupy the consul’s chair. If not a higher one. Getting in bed with the Julii—sons or daughters—doesn’t move you towards that goal. It only cheapens you. Makes you their servant. Their slave. How many times have you been used as such, I wonder? And what would your father, to whose memory you’ve been so devoted, have thought of all this?”
The words had burned. Like vinegar poured into a wound. Sons or daughters. She knows, or thinks she knows something. And yet, like vinegar poured so, oddly cleansing. Tiberius had exhaled, meeting her eyes solidly. “A slave? Never. Octavian was the one who enslaved me. Had his slaves use and abuse me. Everything I’ve done since his death has been of my own choice. I owe my life, my sanity, my sense of self, to the Julii. I’m sorry you can’t see that, Mother. Send me no more letters when I’m on campaign. If I’m fortunate enough to marry, you won’t be invited to attend. Until and if you come to a better understanding of the world as it is, one more in agreement with my own, we’re done, you and I.”
He’d left then, with her screaming after him that he’d regret the way he’d spoken to her, with such arrant lack of respect. That the Julii, too, would regret everything that they’d done. It had sounded like raving, and he’d discounted it as such. Not even worth mentioning to Alexander or the rest of the Julii. But his brother Drusus needed to be forewarned. He might want to be a bridge between Livia and Tiberius. Or his younger brother might finally decide to cut Livia out of his life, as well.
____________
At Agrippa’s house, Livia still burned inside. But the path before her now was clear. Tiberius had unintentionally given her one important piece of information. In two weeks’ time, the hated Caesarion and Eurydice would be leaving for Egypt, along with Cleopatra and Selene. Leaving one member of the Julii family utterly alone here in Rome. Alexander. Who, without his brother present to protect him—or bring him back to life again!—was just a mortal man, like any other.
His eyes and ears in the city were impressive, and certainly owed a debt to Cleopatra’s original network of informants—but he was young, and hadn’t been at the game for nearly as long as Livia herself had been. They call him Cerastes, she thought, sitting down at her loom to weave. The snake. But a snake can be trapped in the right net. And the only reason men don’t call me the spider? Is because I’ve never been foolish enough to be seen spinning my web. She considered the matter dispassionately. This is the first time that any member of that cursed family has been alone in Rome in decades. And that it’s Alexander? The reason for which my Octavian died? All the better. It will sting Tiberius to the core. Make him reconsider, perhaps, all his decisions and conceptions of the world. One by one, I’ll take them all.
She called for a servant and said, simply, “That young whore you made contact with a few weeks ago? Jocasta? Bring her sister to me. We must see if she can be cured of her ailments. After all, our lives must be formed of service to others. Kindness. True pietas.”
An hour later, and young Viola had been collected, along with the slave who looked after her. An easy matter, really. The invalid sister was paralyzed from the waist down, her legs thin and wasted under her plain white stola. And the slave, the best the two women could afford, was a eunuch boy of eighteen, purchased on the cheap once he’d grown too old to be a proper puer for some noble master or another. He had a man’s height, but a life spent first as a sexual slave, and then as a servant to two women, one an invalid, hadn’t trained him as a protector. The slave hovered uselessly near his invalid mistress in Livia’s house, anxiety in his eyes.
“And how did you lose the use of your legs, my dear?” Livia asked the Hellene woman kindly.
“A fever, my lady,” Viola whispered, shaking. “Sent by the gods when I was ten, and my sister twelve. Both our parents died of it. Jocasta was ill for a few days, but recovered. But I lost all feeling below my waist. The temple of Asclepius said the gods did not receive our sacrifices with favor.” She looked down at her withered legs. “Jocasta brought me to Rome three years ago. Hoping that the gods of Rome would be kinder than the gods of Hellas. Since then, Ianos here has been my legs.”
“Well, then, boy,” Livia addressed the Hellene slave, “don’t just stand there. Pick her up and carry her. We’ll see if my physicians can do anything for you, my dear.”
Ianuarius 16, 20 AC
Alexander had awoken early, to see his friends and siblings off at Ostia, where they’d arrived late the previous evening. Two weeks was a short amount of time to make the arrangements for such a trip, but everything needed to be as settled as possible before the campaign season.
Frustration seethed in him, however, as he stood on the quay, the rising sun behind his back. Caesarion had given him the Imperial seal for the duration of his journey to Egypt; he still wore his signet ring, of course, for certifying formal documents and letters written during the journey. But for the next several months, Alexander would carry the weight of borrowed imperium. But for all that implicit power, there was nothing Alexander could do to help any of them, for the moment. I can’t control the tides to give them a safe journey, he thought, giving his mother a kiss before she and Antony boarded their ship, young Gaius in her arms.
The next quay down, he gave Eurydice a quick, light hug, and exchanged wrist-clasps with Caesarion. His sister’s eyes were haunted, and he understood why. This was an exile, of sorts. Three years as Empress, in Rome, at the heart of the world. Only to be sent to Egypt, far from her beloved. “Cheer up,” he murmured in her ear. “It won’t be forever. No matter how much like an eternity it might feel.” At least you have that assurance. That your exile will mean something, and will end. I’m not leaving Rome. But I’m exiled, too, after a fashion.
Eurydice nodded against his shoulder. “Be safe,” she told him, and disappeared up the ramp.
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