Ave, Caesarion

by Deborah Davitt

  “Need some help, domina?” the lead cook called kindly.

  “You could tell me where you keep the lentils,” Eurydice shot back. “And the Lucanian sausage.”

  With the day being turned on its head, and the masters serving the slaves, came a certain liberty of tongue as well. “Does the young mistress like sausage?” one of the Roman-born grooms called, walking in from outside. “I have a nice round, firm one for her, but it’s not Lucanian!” He gestured downwards significantly.

  This probably would have ensued in hilarity for most households in Rome. In this kitchen, the result was silence. Particularly as Eurydice flicked a finger, sending a storm of goose feathers his direction, making him splutter and raise his hands in surrender. “Was there something?” she asked, harried, as the other servants now exploded in laughter, and as she located the lentils. Started them soaking, and pulled down several lengths of sausage from the storeroom’s rafters.

  “Just that the young lords are back,” the groom said, taking a seat and putting his feet up on the table—which got him a kick from one of the seated cooks. “Hey! Ah—anyway, they’re putting up their horses and said they’d drag their bags in themselves. Oh. And they brought guests.”

  Eurydice said a word learned on campaign last year—to the enormous amusement of the servants, and to the shock of Octavia, who almost dropped the knife with which she was mutilating the goose. “My brother Alexander and Tiberius are back?” she asked. “With guests? Today?”

  “Yes, domina,” came the reply of the groom, who grinned lazily as Eurydice threw her hands in the air.

  “Octavia, watch the bread and do not let it burn.” Eurydice picked up the hem of her stola and ran for the side door, calling, “Selene, hurry up with the eggs. Alexander is home, and will want to greet—”

  “Found her already,” Alexander said, carrying Selene in under one arm, a bag of his belongings thrown over the other. His entire body was covered with road dust, and he smelled strongly of horse and sweat, which ensured that Selene squirmed in his grip, protesting mightily. He also appeared remarkably tan, a testament to Athens’ warmer climate and brighter sun, even in winter. He leaned over and gave Eurydice a kiss on the cheek. “Miss me?”

  “Yes, of course. Did you make her drop the eggs?”

  “This is what I get as a greeting after three months away and two sea voyages? No kiss, and a demand to know about the protected status of eggs?”

  Behind her, the servants roared with laughter. Eurydice gave them a harried look, and then gave Alexander a kiss on the cheek and a quick hug. “I’m glad you’re safely back, and that your trip went well,” she said, putting on a more genuine smile. “But if you’ve brought more guests on Matronalia of all days, and if you’ve broken the eggs, when I can’t even send someone to the market to fetch more, I will put live dormice in your bed tonight.”

  The servants roared anew, clutching their sides. Alexander let Selene slide to the floor gently, and Tiberius stuck his head around the doorframe, making her blink. He’d let his blond hair grow a little longer while they were in Hellas. It softened the angular lines of his face slightly, though the gray eyes remained icy. “Are these what you were looking for?” he asked, handing Eurydice a basket full of eggs. “I think the chickens were getting the better of her,” he added, looking down at Selene somberly. “It’s a good thing we arrived when we did. It would have been a terrible omen for the campaign season if she’d been defeated by them.”

  “S-stop it,” Selene fumed from the floor crossly, looking anywhere but at Tiberius. “I already have two brothers. I don’t need a third.”

  “Too late,” Eurydice said without thinking. “I think he’s been adopted already.” She caught the startled look in Tiberius’ eyes, and swung away now to put the eggs in a pot to boil them gently. “How many more mouths did you bring me?” she called to Alexander as the two of them entered the kitchen.

  “Just three today. I don’t know if they’ll all be content to be house-guests during the campaign season—”

  “They’ll be eating at your expense, living in a marvelous house, and free to explore Rome,” Tiberius cut in. “I can’t imagine that they’ll flee screaming.”

  Alexander chuckled. “There is that. We’ll take our gear upstairs. The rest of our baggage should arrive tomorrow. Along with the ambassadors. Did we miss everything at the temple of Mars already?”

  “Ambassadors?” Eurydice’s head swung up. “What ambassadors?”

  Alexander shook his head. “Therein lies a tale. They won’t be here till tomorrow, so you won’t have to greet them with flour on your face and your stola unbound . . . and without the servants to make the meal go well. But they’re from further away than India, sister. They made it across Parthian territory, and they’re here to give greetings to our Emperor from theirs, and we picked them up in Athens to bring them here.” He grinned at her. “So. Do we have time to get to the temple of Mars?”

  Oh my dear gods. “Thank you for not bringing them today,” she managed, finding a table to lean on, and shook her head twice. “Ah . . . Caesarion informed us that he’d be at the temple till one post-meridian,” Eurydice’s tone became more formal. Almost as formal as Caesarion’s had been when he’d told her this. “Then he said he’d be at Mother’s—Antony’s—for an hour or two. It’s just past eleven antemeridian. If you hurry through washing, scraping, and changing clothes, you can catch the last of the salii rites.” Eurydice checked the bread. “And then you can see Mother—” she paused, and glanced over at Tiberius. “And your mother, too, of course. Drusus said he wanted to walk there from the temple of Mars, and I managed to talk one of his pedagogues into going with him. Even though it’s supposed to be his teacher’s day of rest.” She sighed.

  To her great surprise, Tiberius came closer and gave her a quick, light embrace. “Thank you for looking after him,” her brother’s friend told her. “I’ll take him myself, straight from the temple, and tell the pedagogue to take the rest of the day off.”

  And then they were gone, and behind them, three more people peered curiously into the kitchen. Eurydice sighed and wiped the flour off her hands. “Alexander!” she called after her brother. “Get back in here and introduce these people with proper courtesy! I cannot greet them if I do not know their names.”

  ____________________

  Caesarion caught sight of both Alexander and Tiberius near the end of the ceremonies, and exhaled in relief. Their letters had suggested that they’d be home almost a week ago. “You’re late,” he told his brother as he caught up with them and Drusus on the steps, where they stood, watching people file out to filter into Rome’s streets.

  “Hit a patch of rough weather down the coast,” Alexander replied, his expression tightening. “Never been so seasick in all my life, but we weren’t in real danger, the captain said. We made very poor time, though. Winds were against us the whole way.”

  Caesarion grimaced. He hated the thought of sea journeys, but he—and quite a few other men—had one in the offing, as they prepared to move on Hispania. “Glad you made it back. Did you already make offerings in thanks?”

  “As soon as we made port, yes,” Alexander replied tiredly. “And then, once our stomachs stopped heaving, I tried to make up for a week without eating.”

  “I may have kissed the beach on jumping down from the ship,” Tiberius allowed.

  Caesarion chuckled. Tiberius would never lose the sense of edge to him, the constant sense that he was ready to slap back at anyone who crossed him. But he did seem a little more comfortable in his own skin. We’ll see if that lasts, once he’s visited Livia today. “You two will come back for dinner?” he asked Tiberius and Drusus.

  “I’ll take the chance that Eurydice will poison us,” Tiberius said, nodding. “In her case, if it happens, I know it’s unintentional. Mother, on the other hand . . . .”

  “She’s not that bad,” Drusus piped up, indignantly.

  “I didn’t mean it li
terally. It’s more the effect she has on people around her,” Tiberius replied, grimacing. “Most particularly on me.”

  Alexander raised his eyebrows, but just clapped Tiberius on the shoulder in farewell, and he and Caesarion set off for Antony’s villa. “I trust you brought Mother something as a gift?” Caesarion asked.

  “Oh yes. And tomorrow, when our baggage arrives, quite a few things that will be useful at the villa.” He snickered at Caesarion’s raised eyebrows. “We Julii are too highly ranked to engage in sordid things like trade and commerce, but I thought a few dozen barrels of figs couldn’t go too far amiss. Oh, and olive oil. Hellene wine. Perfume for our sisters and our mother. Pepper and other spices. And for you, dear brother, a deputation of ambassadors from a country on the other side of the earth. And everything I have up here.” He tapped his temple, smiling faintly.

  “Is it good news that you have stored up there?” Caesarion said as they ducked around a dray that had been left in the street, half-unloaded.

  Alexander rocked a hand back and forth. “About fifty-fifty, unfortunately. I’ll give you the details tonight, though.”

  They reached Antony’s home, and were admitted immediately; their mother, they found up to her wrists in work in the kitchen, an annoyed expression on her face. Caesarion could smell lamb, dill, cumin, coriander, and honey wafting from the ovens, and Antony’s house servants, lounging at their ease in various areas around the big kitchen, looked both intrigued and a little off-put by the round, flat, unleavened loaves of dough the queen of Egypt had just turned out of the oven with her own hands. “Smells like home,” Alexander said with enthusiasm. “Hellas is a wonderful place, but Athens is in love with fish.”

  Cleopatra left aside her work to come and allow them each a restrained kiss on the cheek. “If my masters will permit me a moment to greet my sons,” she said, looking at the servants with hooded eyes before making a tiny bow in respect to the upturned conventions of the day, “I will be back shortly. And then my husband, his sons, daughters, and I, will serve you with our own hands in the atrium, where tables have been set up.”

  The butler gave her a gracious wave. “Don’t be too long about it,” he informed her grandly, to the great amusement of the other servants. “But run along.”

  Cleopatra took her sons to her sitting room, an air of general vexation hanging about her. “I hate this day,” she told them resignedly. “Romans and their peculiar notions of balancing the universe.”

  “And yet, you live here,” Caesarion said, smiling as he took his seat. “And have taken a second Roman husband. Perhaps there is something worthwhile about us after all.”

  “Us?” Alexander put in slyly. “Or them?”

  Caesarion shrugged. “I’m in Rome. I’m a Roman today.” He offered his mother one of the leather pouches he’d tied to his belt this morning, as Alexander produced a bottle of deep amber glass, filled with Corinthian perfume. Cleopatra sniffed the perfume with evident satisfaction, and immediately put on the new golden bracelet Caesarion had brought for her. “So, you’re both going on campaign then,” she said after a few moments of conversation. “You do need to stay in the city long enough to govern, Caesarion.”

  “I’ve been governing since Sextilis,” he returned. “Sent the Fourth Legion last year to Hispania, where they’ve retaken Valentia and are holding it, waiting for the rest of us, while the navy blockades the rebels at the northern port of Emporion.” The Tillii faction had originally taken Carthago Nova, in the southern reaches of Iberia. The locals had risen against them, forcing them further and further north. Caesarion had done his best not to chuckle over the discomfiture of his enemies, knowing that every rebellious hand in the province lifted against the Tillii would likely be raised against him, in turn.

  The Third Legion remained in Brundisium, helping keep the area from rising up again. The Second, which Agrippa had brought to Brundisium, he’d sent back to Cisalpine Gaul to secure the Italian peninsula against any Gothic incursions over the Alps. He had two legions sitting in Hellas, keeping the rebellion in Illyria from coming further south; Antony was taking a third there in two weeks, and would be moving north to try to crush the Servilii, or at least keep them occupied while Caesarion took care of the fires in the west. Which just leaves two legions to hold Gaul in the event of an invasion from Germania, and two legions trying to hold Syria and Judea. The remorseless math of it ground at Caesarion, night after night. I need to end this. I could levy more troops, but then with what do I pay them? “I even fixed the calendar, and managed to trump a couple of the proposals in the Senate that came from Octavian’s ghost, in the person of Rullus,” he added.

  “Some of Octavian’s ideas in those scrolls,” Alexander put in, “with Ti not around to hear me, please note . . . are terribly devious and downright brilliant.”

  Caesarion stared at his brother. “Explain to me the scroll in which I found notes about him wanting to abolish the worship of house-spirits other than his own,” he challenged Alexander. “That just sounds insane, not brilliant.”

  Alexander held up a finger. “Think about it,” he chided. “Numa, second king of Rome, was supposedly the son of a house-spirit, and that gave him enough divine blood that our people revere him to this day. Puts him ahead of you, Caesarion, and you’re born of a full god’s divine blood. All right, several gods.” He leaned back on his couch, his dark eyes alert. “If Octavian had somehow managed to become the dictator, abolishing the worship of all other house-spirits and elevating his own, requiring everyone to sacrifice to his lares? Simultaneously weakens every house in the Empire besides his, and strengthens his own.”

  Caesarion thought about it, and swore. “You’re right. It’s brilliant.”

  Cleopatra regarded them levelly. “Do you wish to enact his reform?”

  “No!” Caesarion snapped immediately. “It’s part of his plan to unify Rome by turning Rome itself—and maybe himself, too, for all I know—into a god. If I ban the lares, what’s next? Banning the worship of foreign gods? When our people adopted Hellene customs at Saturnalia to strengthen our Empire and help resist the Carthaginians? Should I require all Egyptian temples to be closed down? Rome and its provinces will grow stronger together. We don’t need to weaken our brothers’ houses to strengthen our own.”

  A hint of pride in Cleopatra’s face now, but Alexander warned, lifting his cup of wine to his lips, “Be careful, Caesarion. Most of the patricians don’t think of you as a brother. Nor do our provinces feel like fair-born children. Most, like Carthage, think of themselves as slaves. Vernae, at best—begotten on a slave mother by a Roman master, but no true child of the house.”

  Caesarion exhaled. “I know.”

  Cleopatra nodded to herself. “Alexander, you may stay. You’ll hear little that will surprise you, I suspect. But be circumspect with what I am about to say. Not even to Tiberius, should my words be repeated. Unless Caesarion or I give you leave.”

  Alexander bowed in his seat. Not a word from him in response, just a blank, attentive expression. “You’re growing up so quickly,” Cleopatra murmured fondly. “You all are, really.” She sighed. “Before I move on to darker subjects, I might point out that my eyes in the marketplace informed me that you, Caesarion, spent quite some time at the goldsmiths this past week.” She lifted the wide bracelet around her wrist, with half a dozen cabochon gems of different colors embedded in the main panel. “More than this trinket might account for, I think.”

  Caesarion shifted. “Eurydice might not be a wife, but she does the work of a matron,” he said blankly. “It seemed worth recognizing.”

  Cleopatra regarded him steadily, and Caesarion kept his face empty of expression. “Very well,” she said, letting the subject go, unexpectedly. “The night Antony and I were wed, you might recall that I spoke of how Rome has sought to remake everything it touches into an image of itself.”

  Caesarion closed his eyes. I was afraid she’d bring this up. “Yes,” he replied. “And how your chi
ldren would have a choice between allowing other civilizations to crumble under the Roman boot, or reviving them.”

  Cleopatra nodded regally. “Well remembered.”

  “I’ve put most of your meaning together, Mother. It keeps me awake at night.” It all does, really. “Pharaohs marry their sisters, or close-kin, not just to perpetuate the bloodline of the ancient kings, and increase the chance of god-born, but to re-enact the divine marriage of Isis and Osiris. Brother and sister. A warrior god of death, and a goddess of magic and fertility.” He stared at her. “And you said that without that, the pact between Egypt and its gods wanes.”

  “And the great protective magics—all the products of that compact—fail,” Cleopatra said tiredly. “Leaving Egypt open to invasion from the Numidian nomads of the west. The Nubians of the south. The nomads who wander the deserts south of Judea. All of them. Our armies have traditionally held them at bay, yes, but the protection of the gods is what has kept us safe—until Rome came. Now Rome says that it will keep us safe, but where are the bulk of Rome’s troops now? Are they in Egypt? Or are you about to call Egyptian archers up as auxiliaries to defend Syria?”

  Damn. I only wrote that order this morning. “Point taken,” Caesarion returned, heavily. “You also said that the compact ensures the fertility of the Nile.”