“And what happened to Arion?” Ani asked, weak with relief.
“Isn’t he here?” asked Tiathres, lifting her head from her husband’s shoulder and looking around.
“O Kastor and Polydeukes!” moaned Apollonios. “Save us! He’s escaped: they’ll kill us for certain.”
“He didn’t; I’m sure he didn’t,” Melanthe said hotly. “He went with them willingly so that he could prove we were innocent. He made them take all the documents from Soteria. He was going to tell them all about Aristodemos. He can speak Latin.”
“What?” Ani asked in astonishment.
“His father was a Roman,” Melanthe informed him. “He started talking Latin the moment the soldiers came up to us, and they were so pleased that he knew their own language that they listened to everything he had to say.” She said this with a slightly defiant air, as though it were an argument she had employed many times already, perhaps to convince the charcoal vendors that it was safe to help, perhaps simply to confort Tiathres and herself. Ani stared at her in confusion.
“Arion’s father was a …” he began.
“Ani son of Petesuchos!” shouted a harsh voice.
Ani’s body remembered that voice before his mind did, and jerked in fear. The evil old centurion had come upon them while they were talking, and was now standing over him. The old man was very grand and severe this morning, in a polished breastplate covered in silver medallions, his wiry arms adorned with gold armbands. His scowl was exactly the same.
“Your accuser has withdrawn all charges,” he announced shortly. “You and your men are free to go.” He gestured sharply, and a clerk came up from behind him and offered Ani a stack of papyrus. “Here are the documents for your cargo.”
Ani let go of Tiathres, staggered to his feet. His head was spinning, and he could not take in what had just been said. Your accuser has withdrawn all charges?
The clerk frowned. “Here are the customs documents for your vessel,” he said pointedly, thrusting the sheaf of papyri at him. Ani took them numbly. “Here are the legal papers giving you authority to act for your partner Kleon,” another set, “and here is a letter of discharge from your arrest, and a note explaining the circumstances of your detention which you may show to the authorities if you are questioned again.”
Ani looked down at the last papyrus. It was written in a language and alphabet he did not know. Latin. Discharge, from the Roman authorities. Free to go. Lady Isis, sweet, merciful goddess! So quickly, so … simply?
Why would Aristodemos withdraw the charges?
Ani could answer that: because Arion, who spoke Latin, had managed to convince the Romans that those charges were false and malicious.
“Simplicius,” the centurion said, and the soldier who’d arrived with Tiathres snapped to attention. The centurion gave him an order in Latin, and the soldier saluted.
“Tessararius Simplicius will escort you back to your vessel,” declared the centurion, “and he will dismiss our sentries. I congratulate you upon your innocence.” He turned and began to walk off.
Ani closed his gaping mouth, then managed to open it again and stammer, “L-Lord?”
The centurion stopped and turned around again. “What?”
“The young man Arion, who was accused with me … Is he free, too?”
The old man’s face darkened. “He’s with the general.” He began to walk back toward his erstwhile prisoners. “What do you know about that boy? Is he honest?”
“I think he is,” said Ani, startled and alarmed, taking a step back. “I don’t know much about his family, but he’s been honest with me.”
“He talks too fast and too prettily to be honest,” said the centurion darkly. “And he lies like a Greek, but in good Latin. And he’s diseased. Why did you bring that boy here?”
“I’ll be happy to take him away,” Ani replied faintly.
The centurion glared at him for a long moment, then shook his head angrily. “The general wants him now.” He turned on his heel and stamped away again.
“Hortalus no like poetry,” said the Roman called Simplicius. He seemed to think it was funny. “No like clever Greeks. Come. We go boat.” He tapped Ani’s arm and pointed in the direction they should go. Ani blindly started off in the direction indicated.
When Simplicius showed the bedraggled party to the camp gates, Ani expected the guards to refuse them passage. When they were through the gates and making their way back to the docks, he kept expecting a troop of armed men to quick-march after them and haul them back. When they finally arrived at the quayside, he expected to find no boat.
Soteria was there, just as he had left her. Simplicius and the sentries exchanged a few cheerful words, slapped each other on the back, waved to the Egyptians, and marched off back to their camp, leaving them alone and free on the docks. The charcoal vendors, who’d waited for the Romans to leave before emerging from their own boat, came running over to ask what had happened. Serapion and Isisdoros and the nurse came with them, the woman shrieking with relief. Serapion flung himself onto his father, locked his small arms around Ani’s neck, and sobbed against his shoulder.
Only then did Ani find himself able to believe that he was free. He sat down on the quay, shaking; nearly dropped the papers in the Nile; kissed his sons, and burst into tears.
IT WASN’T UNTIL after noon that Ani felt able even to try to make sense of his release. It was necessary first to wash, to rest, to eat, to sort through the boat’s cargo and be certain that nothing was missing, to thank the charcoal vendors, to comfort his family and his men. From the center of Ptolemais, far up the hill, came the occasional sound of a crowd cheering, but there was no hint of any disturbances. The crew of one of the other barges—not the charcoal vendors, who had seen more of Romans than they wanted—ventured up the hill to see what was happening.
About the middle of the afternoon the barge crew came back to say that the town of Ptolemais Hermiou had officially accepted Roman authority and sworn its loyalty to the emperor. The townsfolk had acclaimed the general’s proclamation of imperial clemency to the province of Egypt, and cheered his announcement of a gift to the town’s royal temple to pay for an altar to Julius Caesar.
“That young man who was with you was standing behind the general,” a bargee informed Ani. “He whispered in the general’s ear. People were saying that he’s the one who suggested the altar to Caesar. They say that he’s the one who polluted Queen Cleopatra’s altar, and that he suggested a new altar so as to make amends. Caesar was the queen’s first husband, and she erected a temple to him in her own city, so she should be pleased with it.”
“Arion polluted the queen’s altar?” asked Ani helplessly. It didn’t seem very likely, but neither did the idea of Arion whispering suggestions to a general.
“Hadn’t you heard? Apparently he cut his hair in honor of the queen, and accidentally cut his hand and polluted her altar with blood.”
“I hadn’t heard,” Ani said. He shot Melanthe a look of mystification, and noticed that his daughter was looking bewildered.
“He didn’t accidentally cut his hand,” Melanthe told him, in a whisper, when the barge crew had gone and he was able to talk to her privately. “He tried to kill himself. It was horrible. The priest told him that the queen was dead, and he went over to the altar and cut his hair in mourning, and then he told her statue that he was sorry for failing her, and tried … tried to cut his own hand off. He didn’t even seem to feel it. There was blood everywhere. The priest had to knock him down to stop him.” She paused, then went on. “But I suppose it’s much better to say that he just cut himself accidentally. Nobody’s going to worry about that. The priest’s wife was very worried about what the Romans would think of it otherwise. They were very kind people, Papa, that priest and his wife. I’m glad Arion persuaded the general to give money to the temple.”
“Arion speaks Latin?” Ani asked again, still unable to believe it. “He told you his father was a Roman?”
&
nbsp; Melanthe nodded solemnly. “He never told you?”
“No.” He remembered, though, the way Arion had replied to the centurion in Berenike—declaring that Caesar had thought highly of the queen, and had erected a statue to her in his ancestral temple in Rome. That, he now realized, had been a Roman response to criticism of the queen, not mere Greek defiance.
“I think probably the queen interceded for him,” said Melanthe soberly. “She gave him a place at court even though he’s a bastard, because her own children are half Roman. I think that must be why he was so upset when he heard that she was dead. She was his benefactress, and she sent him to protect her son Caesarion—only, Caesarion’s dead and so is she—and he thinks he’s failed everybody and will never have another chance.”
It was, Ani thought, perceptive and very probably true. He wondered if Arion had had some wild scheme to rescue the queen when he reached Alexandria. It seemed likely.
He could believe that when the boy had learned he was already too late, he’d tried to pour out his life at the queen’s feet. He found it far more difficult to imagine Arion standing behind a Roman general and whispering in his ear.
Was he there of his own free will? He’d been arrested on a charge that had been withdrawn, so presumably he was free to go, and the barge crew had the impression that he was high in the general’s favor. So, come to think of it, did that foul bugger Hortalus: that had been why he was so angry. But … was Arion there freely? Perhaps the general was a lover of boys and had taken a fancy to him. Perhaps Arion was trying desperately to get away without offending the man. Or perhaps the general still suspected him, and he was, despite appearances, a prisoner.
The way to find out would be to go to the Romans and ask, but the thought of doing so made Ani cold all over. The centurion had beaten him with that vine stick—over the back and shoulders when Ani insisted that Aristodemos was lying; on the side of the head when he tried to speak after an order to be silent. The centurion had shouted at him and kicked him and done everything he could to force him to admit that he was guilty. The thought of meeting the man again, of asking his help, made his stomach curl up with dread. He would wait for a while, and see whether Arion showed up.
The afternoon wore on. When it was almost time for the evening meal, Apollonios came over and suggested that they leave Ptolemais while there was still light, and put a few miles between themselves and the Roman army.
“We’ll wait for Arion,” Ani told him at once.
Apollonios scowled. Ani was aware that Kleon’s man had been sent primarily to keep an eye on the cargo, and that as a Greek he disliked taking orders from an Egyptian. Ani had tried, hitherto, to avoid giving any cause for offense.
“Arion’s with this general,” Apollonios protested. “From the sound of things, well in with this general, and we’re well rid of him. He always was more trouble than …”
“Silence!” Ani hissed, suddenly very angry. “Do you really think we’d be standing here free if it wasn’t for Arion? Aristodemos was always going to lie; it’s just a miracle of the gods that Arion was able to prove he was doing it. We’ll wait for Arion. If he isn’t back here by tomorrow morning, I’ll go to the Roman camp and find out whether he’s planning to come with us or not. We will not simply sail off and abandon him.”
Apollonios scowled more fiercely, and went off to complain to Ezana. Ani cursed himself as a fool for committing himself.
They ate supper. Evening faded into dusk. Ani sat down at Soteria’s stern, watching the path which led along the riverbank up to the Roman camp, trying to accustom himself to the idea of walking up it again in the morning.
As the first stars flowered in the dark blue of the sky, a light appeared on the track, startling gold in the soft air.
Ani got to his feet, watching it draw nearer, hardly daring to breathe. Soon he could make out that there were two people coming down to the docks: a drably dressed man carrying a torch and a basket, and a man in a short orange cloak and wide-brimmed hat walking in front.
“I praise Isis,” Ani whispered, and rested his head on his hands.
Arion speeded up when he saw Ani waiting for him. “Ani, good health!” he called breathlessly as he reached the boat. The light from the torch fell on his face as he tilted his head back, and showed the look of gladness and relief. Ani jumped off the boat. He wanted to hug the boy, but somehow this was something he could not quite dare, and he contented himself with seizing Arion’s hands in both his own and squeezing them hard.
“Careful!” exclaimed Arion, extracting his hands quickly. The left wrist was heavily bandaged. “Ani, what happened to you?”
“You know,” Ani told him. “By the immortal gods, boy, I thought we were all going to die. I couldn’t believe it when Melanthe told me you spoke Latin, that you could talk to them. Are you all right?”
Everyone else in the party was on the quay as well now, staring at the returned wanderer with relief—or, in the case of Apollonios, resentment. Melanthe was beaming, and her eyes shone; Serapion jumped up and down with joy—though there was something about Arion which forestalled an embrace, even from the children. Tiathres emerged from the cabin last, carrying a lamp.
“I’m fine,” said Arion. He looked, in fact, tired but well, his face flushed and his eyes bright with pleasure. He was wearing a new tunic, Ani realized in surprise—a good one, bleached linen bordered with a pattern in blue, undoubtedly not cheap. “I need to write a letter to the general. Can someone get me my pen-case and a sheet of papyrus?”
Melanthe darted back onto the boat and fetched them. Arion got the man with the torch to lift the basket, braced the sheet of papyrus against the wickerwork, and wrote a short note. It was not Greek, Ani saw, watching the confident strokes of the pen. Arion could not only speak Latin, but write it. He blew on the ink to dry it, rolled the papyrus into a scroll, and handed it to the man with the torch. The torchbearer set down the basket, bowed and said something; Arion replied, and the torchbearer bowed again and departed.
“Has he forgotten his basket?” Tiathres asked nervously.
“No,” said Arion, picking it up. “It’s mine. My old tunic and some books. He’s just a slave the general sent to light me back.” He picked up the basket and climbed confidently onto Soteria.
“Are you really all right?” Melanthe asked him, following.
“Yes,” said Arion, sitting down heavily in the middle of the stern deck, “though if I hear one more precious mini-epic I am going to have a fatal seizure and die. Dionysos, I thought I’d never get away!” He took off his hat and tossed it into the cabin. His hair had been cut down to an even quarter-inch of dark fur. There were scars on the back of his head which had been hidden before—narrow parallel bars, too regular to be accidental. “He offered me a job. Zeus, he didn’t so much offer as insist! I told him I had the disease, and he said it didn’t matter. I told him my family in Alexandria were very worried about me, and he told me to write them a letter. In the end, he accepted that I had to go and see how they were …”
“I thought you said they were dead?” interrupted Ani in bemusement.
“I lied. To him, not to you. I’ve been lying like a lawyer and flattering like a whore. I suppose it’s too dark for us to leave now?”
“Who are you talking about?” Ani asked weakly. “Who offered you this job?”
“Gallus,” Arion said, rolling his eyes.
“Gallus?”
“The general,” Arion expanded. “Gaius Cornelius Gallus. Soon to be governor of Egypt, if you believe him, and there’s no reason not to. He’s got the qualifications—military achievements, fluent Greek, no senatorial rank to feed private ambitions, and the emperor’s already shown his intention by appointing the man to do a tour of the province and receive the oaths and petitions of the people. I don’t think he’s the man for the job—though don’t for life’s sake, repeat that.”
“He’s going to be governor of Egypt and he offered you a job?” Ani echoed,
in consternation.
“Mm. He has two secretaries already, one for Latin letters, one for Greek, but neither of them can read the other’s language, neither of them speaks a word of Demotic, and neither of them knows much about poetry. They both hated me. If I’d taken the job, I would have had to hire a wine-taster.”
“What’s poetry got to do with it? Isis, I hope you don’t mean he’s in love with you!”
Arion laughed, ran his hands over his cropped scalp. “Gallus writes poetry. Four books of love elegies—to a woman, Ani, don’t worry, to a blowsy actress!—and a miscellaneous assortment of mini-epics. Not bad, actually, though not as good as he thinks they are. I told him they were wonderful, elegant, delicate, so charming, the best things ever written in Latin … Apparently I’m the first Greek to have read his works before I met him, but I doubt very much that I’ll be the last. In love with me? No, but oh, how deeply in love he is with praise! Not good, not good at all, not in this country. Attend to flattery, and you allow into your heart maggots that will eat you alive. Flatterers always want something. I did—us out of here—and I got it, and now I want to get away.”
“Are you really all right?” asked Melanthe, gazing at him steadily.
“I’m tired,” he told her, “and I’ve had too much to drink—celebration dinner with General Gallus—io triumphe!—another town surrendered to the province, a toast to the genius of Caesar! and another to General Gallus, conquerer of Cyrenaica, pacifier of Paraetonium! What could I do but drink? If I’d stayed sober, my heart would break for the loss of my country.” He caught several sharp breaths, and added, more quietly, “And my wrist hurts. I didn’t dare change the bandage, in case someone realized that I was lying about how I hurt it. I put a fresh one on top.”
“I’ll get some brine to clean it,” Melanthe said at once, “and some myrrh.”
Arion nodded, wearily now. “We need to get away from here,” he said, in a low voice. “As soon as we can. One more lie, and I may start telling the truth out of desperation.”
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