Keeper of the Flame

by Tracy L. Higley

  She eyed the four men who stacked the bundles of acacia wood and bricks of dried dung beside the lift, and then checked over the pile from which they drew their supplies. “Where is the rest of the fuel for tonight?”

  One of the servants bowed low and wiped his dirty hands on his tunic. “Abbudin encountered p-problems—” His stutter annoyed her tonight.

  “What problems?”

  “The Romans, m-mistress. Since the general m-moved into the palace, they are c-controlling the royal supplies. But Abbudin is working to p-procure all we need—”

  Sophia waved away the rest of his explanation. Romans. Everywhere she turned.

  She looked up through the ramp to the signal fire so far above them that it blended with the stars in the Alexandrian sky. The mirror was constructed in such a way that a small fire could be magnified to a great light, one seen two hundred stadia away on the dark sea. But even a small fire required fuel.

  The servants worked quickly in her presence. No wonder. But concern for Cleopatra eclipsed lighthouse trivia tonight.

  One of the men glanced her way with wide eyes, and she checked his work to find his cause for fear. Nothing. Which could only mean one thing.

  The cause was behind her. And again, it was Roman in origin.

  He had returned. Lucius Aurelius Bellus. The pilus-whatever-he-called-himself.

  She stepped in front of the servants and faced the soldier, this time without his ranks. “Did you not understand me previously? Perhaps your Egyptian is not as fluent as you would think.”

  Bellus wore no helmet now. He stood easily with his legs apart and crossed his arms over his wide chest. “You received a message?”

  “Does Caesar force his soldiers to stand guard around the clock? I should think you would be quite fatigued by now, marching around with all that metal.”

  Bellus’s face darkened and silence spread between them for a long moment. “The messenger. Did he bring word from Cleopatra?”

  She pushed past him, into the courtyard where the night air had cooled.

  Bellus followed, his sandals scratching at the sand. “Get back here, you infuriating woman, and answer me!”

  Sophia reached the South Wing and whirled on him. “You do not belong here. This is my lighthouse, and my home. You will not intrude again!”

  He stalked to her and grabbed her arms. Sophia lifted her face. Let him strike her, she would not show her fear. Her traitorous eyes blinked too rapidly. “Go ahead, barbarian. Show the peace-loving Greek the way you handle things in Rome!”

  “Aahh!” He thrust her away from him and strode a few paces down the corridor before turning. “I am here at Caesar’s orders! If you know where the queen—”

  “Go and see your fearsome general. I think you will find he is no longer so concerned with searching out the queen.”

  Uncertainty flickered in Bellus’s eyes. “What do you know?”

  Sophia pointed to the doorway. “I know that you are in my lighthouse and you have no right to be here.”

  He said nothing. Did nothing. Just stood before her, staring her down as she pointed out the door, using that wicked silence. Eventually her arm tired and she dropped it. She licked her lips once, hated herself for looking away from his stare, and reached a hand back to grip her neck.

  Only then, when it was somehow clear that he had won, did he meander in her direction, brush past her, and make his way out of the lighthouse.

  By the gods, she hated this soldier.

  Surely there was some way to get rid of them all!

  She took to the ramp, circling up the lighthouse to escape to the blessed isolation of her private chambers. But the rooms felt hollow and cold without Cleopatra. The young queen’s visit had been far too short. Sophia surveyed the room, trying to see it through Kallias’s eyes. The piled scrolls were mute testimony to the knowledge she pursued. Education is the best provision for the journey to old age. But this was no time for Aristotle. She took the small lamp that the queen had lit, carried it to her desk, and pushed aside the papyrus she had been studying so long ago this afternoon. She pulled an unused roll from a small stack.

  There was another man in Alexandria whom she hated. A man of power. A man who could get things done. Pothinus.

  The boy-king Ptolemy’s minister of finance had been a eunuch for many years. He had channeled his energies into a lust for pure power and nothing else. When Cleopatra’s father breathed his last three years earlier, naming Cleopatra and Ptolemy as co-regents, the boy had been only ten years old. Pothinus had leaped in, along with Ptolemy’s tutor Theodotus and the Egyptian Achillas, commander of the army.

  Although Achillas had the military strength, in Greek society the real power belonged to those with intellect. And Pothinus was nothing if not a shrewd politician. Well then, it was to his intellect she would make her appeal.

  She pulled reed and ink from a small ivory box on her desk and formed a letter to Pothinus in her mind. She scribbled the words, phrases scrambling through her mind in mad succession.

  Roman invaders. Pay the debt of the father quickly. Secure the land for his children. Secure Alexandria’s greatest assets. Philosophy, rhetoric, scholarship . . . I am being watched.

  The rush of words slowed. She despised begging. She laid the reed aside to contemplate how to end her letter.

  The cuttlefish’s black ink had stained her fingers. She rubbed at the smudge, smearing it into her skin. Her eyes strayed to the engraved box she kept on her desk. Inside lay one of Kallias’s last inventions. A gift on their first anniversary.

  She took the device from its box, then lifted a tiny marble from its trough at the bottom and rolled the smooth ball between her fingers. They had been in the Museum when he presented her with the little marvel. Several of his friends, also scholars supported by the Museum, stood by to enjoy her reaction.

  Now, as she had done all those years ago, Sophia dropped the marble into the top chute of the piece. The marble rolled down the chute, dropped to another, fell onto a tiny platform that lifted a lever, in turn releasing the marble to travel farther. Back and forth it crossed the inner workings of the mechanism, until it set in motion a tiny pendulum that clicked in rhythm between two blocks of granite.

  The marble rolled to a stop in its trough again. The pendulum continued its clicking swing. Sophia touched one granite square with her fingertip, then closed her eyes and felt the beating of the pendulum under her. When it slowed, she again dropped the marble into the chute.

  She lost count of how many times she set the marble in motion. The beat of the pendulum against the granite had become the beat of Kallias’s heart to her, and she could not bear to let it stop. The oil in the lamp burned down until the flame was a mere speck.

  In time, she laid her head on her arm at the desk, but still she kept the pendulum swinging in its tiny pool of golden lamplight. Tears fell to her unfinished letter and glistened there a moment before bleeding into the papyrus.

  Kallias.

  He was gone. The fickle gods she no longer trusted had taken him from her. She alone carried his dream, his legacy. What would he say to this present threat?

  She wiped her face and retrieved her reed. I will not fail you, Kallias. I will find a way to keep them safe.

  Five

  The morning sun climbed above the city, spilled its warmth down the paved streets, and drifted through the palace window to the shrouded bed where Cleopatra stirred, fleeing her dreams for the day’s reality. She stretched her arms above her head, eyes closed, then rolled to her side. With one eye open, she saw that she was alone in the massive bed.

  She swept the sheets away and swung her legs over the side. Her chitôn lay nearby, draped over a chair. She wrapped herself and left the solitude of the bedchamber for the front room.

  Caesar was dressed in his armor already, strips of iron held together with hinges and leather straps that hung to his waist. He was seated at her father’s desk, scribbling upon a wooden tablet, and looke
d up briefly at her entrance. He smiled, like one who is confident of his possessions, and returned to his tablet. Cleopatra hardened her emotions against the casual treatment.

  You may be assured of me now, Caesar. For it suits my purpose.

  She did not have long to prepare, she knew. And though they had spoken of many things through the night, there was still more to be said to the Roman general who scratched dispatches at the desk.

  She crossed to the door, yanked it inward, and leaned her head into the corridor. A soldier jerked away from the wall.

  “I am hungry,” she said.

  Apollodorus was there in a moment. “Clean clothes,” she said to him. “From my chambers.”

  Both men bowed, and for an instant she felt like a queen once more. The long months in Syria had nearly erased the memory.

  The two were back shortly, and while the soldier resumed his post, she took the clothes from Apollodorus and retreated to the bedchamber to bathe and dress. She arranged a white chitôn around herself, its edges stitched in blood red, and smiled at the pieces Apollodorus had been wise enough to bring. With practiced fingers, she arranged the heavy black braids of the royal wig on her head. In true Egyptian style she fastened the uraeus, the rearing golden cobra, with its wide throat spread across her forehead.

  When she emerged from the bedchamber, a meal of maza bread and seasoned lentils had been placed on the low table beside the white couches.

  “Will you break your fast with me?” she called to Caesar, and reclined on the couch she had claimed last night.

  He seemed to notice the food for the first time and paused for only a moment before abandoning the desk and coming to her. He eyed the rearing cobra, her black hairpiece. “And here is Egypt.”

  She smiled and held out the bread. “Ptolemy will respond to your summons soon. Pothinus will be anxious to gain your approval.”

  Caesar scooped lentils with a hunk of bread, then chewed slowly.

  Speak, Roman. Do not make me beg.

  The silence lengthened. “What will you tell him?” she finally asked.

  Caesar shrugged. He understood her desperation, she knew. And would take full advantage of it. She would not underestimate him.

  “If Ptolemy XIII and his advisors are expecting to find me sympathetic to their side of this rivalry, they will be unpleasantly surprised.”

  Cleopatra looked to him, and silent understanding passed between them, the acknowledgment that treaties are made in all manner of ways.

  When the time arrived, Caesar was seated at his desk, and Cleopatra was surveying the city from the window behind him. One knock on the door, and the soldier on guard appeared, announcing the arrival of King Ptolemy XIII and his minister of finance, Pothinus. Cleopatra inhaled, steadied her heart, and turned. Standing behind Caesar, she placed cool hands on his shoulders. He looked up from his dispatches toward the door and did not pull away from her possessive touch.

  Pothinus did not wait to be invited. He was elegantly dressed as usual but shoved the soldier aside and pushed into the room, the boy king in tow and a complaint already in progress.

  “The king does not appreciate being called to his own—”

  Pothinus stopped in the center of the room and drew up his considerable height. His eyes lifted from Caesar to Cleopatra and back again, lingering on her hands still resting on the general’s shoulders. His speech hung mid-syllable, and now his lips formed a wide O, opening and closing, much like one of the harbor’s red mullet fish.

  Her brother appeared beside Pothinus, fat and unkempt as always, and his lips puckered into a pout, as though someone had gotten to his cakes before he and eaten them all.

  Cleopatra’s chest filled with a satisfaction so enjoyable she could not contain it. It spilled to her face and she felt herself smiling in spite of her efforts. A bubble of laughter erupted within her.

  Do not appear a giggling child now, Cleo.

  The delightful moment of shock broke, and Pothinus stuttered out a muddied series of single-word questions. “What—? When—? Who?”

  Cleopatra covered the urge to laugh with an incline of her head and a greeting. “Good morning, Pothinus. Ptolemy. It has been too long.”

  Her slovenly brother looked to Pothinus, as though unsure how large a disaster they faced. The boy was still too short, with greasy hair grown too long, dirty fingernails, and a brown stain of unknown origin in the center of his himation. How it must gall the fussy Pothinus to serve such a charge. Like a nobleman waiting upon a street beggar.

  Ptolemy placed pudgy hands on his hips. “What are you doing here?” The question came on a thin whine. “We thought you were in Syria.”

  Pothinus recovered and stepped in front of her brother. “It is a pleasure to see you again, Cleopatra. Perhaps we can finally end the strife.”

  She came from behind Caesar, letting her hand glide along his muscular shoulders. “Perhaps.” She moved slowly away from the Roman, and circled Pothinus. He straightened and did not meet her eyes, but she could sense the usual discomfiture she caused him. She gave her brother a cold-eyed stare, then returned to Caesar’s side.

  Pothinus looked down his thin nose at her. “It seems you are—acquainted—with the Roman general already.”

  Caesar stood. “Cleopatra came to see me last night.” He lifted a few of her braids and let them slide through his fingers. “I found we had much to speak of, and much in common.”

  Her brother shook a finger at Caesar, and his himation slipped from his shoulder. “Caesar, remember who it was that removed your great enemy Pompey.”

  Cleopatra hid her amusement at her brother’s foolishness. Pothinus tried to smooth over the boy idiot’s comment, but Caesar’s face had already gone dark. “You treat a great man like a criminal and you expect me to reward you?”

  Pothinus jerked the boy’s himation straight and turned to Cleopatra, scowling. It was clear he had read the situation accurately, even if the brat was a fool. “Caesar,” he began with a bow to the Roman, “you have come to collect on a debt, and the king has every desire to repay it. Do not let others convince you—”

  “I do not need anyone to make my decisions for me, Pothinus.” Caesar looked to her, then to her brother. “This civil war must end. It divides the country and wastes resources that could be used to produce revenue.”

  Cleopatra watched him carefully. Where was he going? Would he bring his legion to bear upon Ptolemy’s troops, and reestablish her as the rightful ruler of Egypt, as she desired?

  He looked to her with that disturbingly possessive light in his eye. “You must rule together, as your father wished. It is the only way to unite the country.”

  “No!” Ptolemy stomped a heavy foot. His full face reddened. “I will be king alone! Tell him, Pothinus! Tell him I want to be king!”

  Pothinus licked his lips and eyed Cleopatra. She slid closer to Caesar and ran a light hand up his arm. “He is a boy, Caesar. Not ready to rule. And his advisors—”

  Caesar held up a hand. “You have my decision. Rome’s presence in your city has been one of peace to this point.” He turned to Cleopatra and she felt a chill between them. “If you wish this peace to continue, you will end this rift, reunite your country, and repay the ten million denarii you owe Rome.”

  “That’s not fair!” Ptolemy whined. “Egypt doesn’t need a queen! One Pharaoh, that’s all this land has ever needed!”

  Pothinus wrapped long fingers around the boy’s arm, and with the other hand he smoothed back his graying hair. “Come, my king. We have much to discuss.” He dragged the boy from the room, and Cleopatra half-expected her brother to fly at her with a kick in the shins as he used to do when they were younger.

  When the door clanked shut behind them, she turned to Caesar, her questions playing across her face.

  Amusement danced in his dark eyes. “You are a powerful and brilliant woman, Cleopatra. You have more than proven yourself to me since you rolled out of that carpet at my feet last night. But
you cannot rule Egypt alone. The people will not have it, and without the people, you have nothing.”

  She frowned and studied a tapestry that hung on the wall. The truth galled her, but it was the truth nonetheless. She must have a co-regent, even in name only, if she wanted to be queen.

  She lifted her eyes to Caesar, willed them to turn soft and flattering. “I can see why every land you touch falls into your hands, General. But remember that Ptolemy and his advisors hold no affection for the Romans.”

  In two steps he closed the gap between them and swept her into his arms. “And you, Queen of Egypt? Do you hold affection for the Romans?”

  She gave him her fullest smile. “One Roman, especially.”

  He met her lips with his own, but for only a moment. The peace of the chamber broke apart when a scream went up from outside the palace window.

  Cleopatra ran from Caesar’s side and leaned out the window to search the palace grounds below.

  “What is it?”

  “Ptolemy. He is running from the palace, crying like he’s skinned his knee.”

  Caesar joined her and leaned through the open window.

  Below them, Ptolemy lumbered across the courtyard, keening loudly. He passed the lotus-flower pool, ran under the squared-off stone entryway to the palace grounds where two sphinx sat guard, and into the street beyond. Cleopatra saw Pothinus amble toward the street, watching Ptolemy, his fingers intertwined at his waist.

  “My sister has given Egypt to the Romans!” Ptolemy screamed to those who walked past. “This very moment she shares his bedchamber, and they plot against the people of Alexandria!” A crowd was forming, and Ptolemy pointed a fat finger toward the window where she and Caesar watched. She drew back, letting the window coverings conceal her.

  Surely the people would recognize petty jealousy.

  But still, her palms felt slick. She gripped the fabric of her chitôn.