Cleopatra's Moon

by Vicky Alvear Shecter

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  One month after our arrival, the entire household gathered to meet Livia Drusilla, the wife of the most powerful man in the world. She had finally returned from her travels. With her came that all too familiar sense of dread and foreboding. Would she really try to do to us what Octavianus dared not? How would I ensure our safety around her?

  We stood with Octavia and all the other children with our backs to Livia’s wall of death masks, which were designed to show her family’s aristocratic lineage. The Romans called the wax masks, molded upon the faces of the dead, imagines. At funerals, family members donned them to show respect. (And the Romans thought our death rituals bizarre!) Across from us, the walls were painted top to bottom in blocks of brilliant reds, yellows, and blacks. I had still not gotten used to the way Romans closed themselves off in small spaces painted with elaborate outdoor scenes. Every intsa of wall was covered with what seemed to me a jumble of architectural and garden images. Why not just open up the rooms and let true light in as we did in Alexandria?

  As the waiting continued, I noticed that I was not the only anxious one in the room. The atrium was heavy with dread. I half expected the death masks themselves to snap their eyes open in terror. Octavia had lined us up in preparation: Livia’s sons first, then all of Octavia’s children. We came last, of course. Still, everyone twitched and fidgeted like horses before the chariot races.

  Juba, the handsome young African who had returned with us from Alexandria, did not make an appearance. I wondered about that since he seemed like such an integral part of the family. Everybody seemed to love him, including my brothers. I often heard the younger children squealing in the gardens, only to find Juba throwing one or more of them in the air or pretending to be the Minotaur and chasing them with horrible roars and grunts. Whenever I saw this, I turned away, my heart heavy with memories of the games we played with Tata.

  At the sound of a door opening, Octavia straightened like a soldier called to attention. Livia emerged from her study — the tablinum — with an entourage of secretaries fluttering behind her. She wore her dark hair in the Roman style of the day, with the top of the hair pulled up like a crown while the sides flowed over the ears and gathered in a knot in the back. From the high-quality fabric of her long blue stola to the golden bobs in her ears, Livia Drusilla dripped gravitas.

  I swallowed. She exuded so much confidence, power, and yes, even majesty, that I felt a piercing ache for my own mother. I closed my eyes for a moment, remembering what it felt like to be in her presence, how I fed off her strength. But I did not want this woman to remind me of Mother. She was the wife of my enemy, partner to the man who destroyed my family. The woman who, according to the slaves, might be our executioner.

  She approached her sons first, smiling and kissing each boy on the forehead.

  “Welcome home, Mother,” Tiberius and Drusus said somewhat stiffly. Interesting that even her own sons seemed intimidated by her.

  “It is good to be back,” she said. She glided over to my brothers and me, her dark brown eyes flicking over us. When her eyes momentarily met mine, I willed myself not to shudder. Hers were not the cold killer’s eyes of her husband, but they came close. Very close. “Ah, the new members of the household. A pleasure to finally meet you,” she said.

  I knew she expected us to respond — to give some sort of formal greeting, at least — but I could think of nothing to say. Alexandros spoke up. “We thank you for having us here. Your hospitality is much appreciated.”

  She smiled at Alexandros’s formality with closed lips. “You must be Alexandros Helios. Yes, I see your father in you, as well as a little bit of your mother.”

  “You knew our mother?” Ptolly asked, surprised.

  “Yes, I met her when she was in Rome years ago with my husband’s adopted father. I was only a young girl, but I remember being dazzled by her. And you” — she peered down at Ptolly — “must be Ptolemy Philadelphos.”

  “Everybody calls me Ptolly! Or Little Bull!” he said.

  There was amusement in her eyes, and I concentrated on not curling my hands into fists. She had better not be laughing at him.

  “Well. I heard you were the very image of your father….”

  “It is true!” Ptolly said, grinning and puffing out his chest.

  Livia exchanged a look with Octavia I could not read. Octavia smiled nervously. Why?

  “And you,” she said, turning to me, “must be Cleopatra Selene. The princess — oh, excuse me — the former princess who deems herself too good to follow my household rules.”

  I had not been prepared for such a casually delivered insult. I wanted to defend myself, to tell her that it was her niece’s idea to excuse me from spinning, but there was no way to do so without looking as if she had cowed me. So I said nothing and raised my chin.

  Livia narrowed her eyes at me ever so slightly as she waited for me to respond. Alexandros cleared his throat in what I knew was a bid to make me talk. But what could I say — thank you for not killing us this morning? For being married to the man who murdered half my family? For agreeing to do your husband’s dirty work and destroy us?

  Alexandros shifted his weight in a more urgent appeal. I swallowed the bitterness that was clawing up my throat. “Thank you for opening your home to us,” I said, trying not to speak through clenched teeth.

  She raised her head slightly, as if in victory at forcing me to speak. As she passed, her stepdaughter, Julia, asked, “When is Father coming home? How come they are here but not Tata?”

  Livia smiled down at her. “Your tata is busy cleaning up the mess that was left in Egypt and the rest of the East,” she said. “And as you know, he cannot enter Rome until after his Triumph.” Her eyes darted in our direction at the word.

  “Well,” Julia said, putting a hand on her hip. “When is he going to have his Triumph?”

  “When he is ready,” Livia snapped. Julia’s pretty mouth tightened into a white line as she slid her hand off her hip.

  They despise each other, I realized. And for some reason, this made me happy. Octavianus had ruined my family, so it seemed just that there would be discord in his.

  Days after Livia’s arrival, I found an abandoned trigon ball behind the main fountain in the back gardens and tossed it up and down, relishing the feel of the puckered leather in my palm.

  “You have the look of one who misses the game,” someone said from behind me.

  Juba.

  “I played trigon with my brothers in Alexandria,” I said.

  “Were you any good?”

  “I believe I was,” I said, smiling.

  “Let’s see about that,” he said, backing up and signaling for me to throw it at him.

  “But we don’t have a third!”

  “We can still toss.”

  I reared back and threw it as hard as I could.

  He caught it, grinned, and tossed the ball solidly back. “Who taught you how to play?”

  “My brother Caesarion. But I played with my tata sometimes too.”

  We flung the ball back and forth in silence. I had not meant to put an awkward end to the conversation by bringing up my dead father and brother. Still, the slap of leather on palms, the whoosh of air as the ball soared — I found myself relaxing in a way I had not in a long time.

  “Ptolly and the younger ones adore you,” I said after a time. “Ptolly is a wonderful boy. Very resilient.”

  I didn’t mention how he used to rock and suck his thumb not so long ago.

  “He looks like your father — is he like him in other ways too?”

  “Yes, very much so,” I said. “My tata had an irresistible smile and was always entertaining others with his charm. What about your father? Do you take after him?”

  A beat of silence passed. “I know very little about my father.”

  “Oh.”

  “So tell me,” he said, changing the subject. “What about lovely Alexandria-by-the-Sea do you miss the most?”r />
  I was surprised by the question. Nobody ever brought up our home or our past, as if it were bad luck to do so. I told him about the Lighthouse; the tame gazelles that roamed the grounds; and the lions in our Menagerie. But what interested him most was the Library.

  “You know, it had always been my dream to study in Alexandria,” he said. “To hold in my hands the original scrolls of Aristotle or Euripides … It gives me chills even now to think about it.” He smiled as if he were slightly embarrassed.

  His admission, though, delighted me. “Oh, you would have loved it!” He caught the ball and eased toward me. He did not throw it again. “If you had been a guest in our palace, we would have given you free rein to visit any lecture, class, or debate you wished.”

  He smiled, his eyes bright. We settled in the shade of a large fig tree.

  “Did you know that the world’s best scientists and astronomers studied at our Museion?”

  “I think I heard that, yes,” he said, smiling.

  “Well, sometimes Sosigenes invited me and my brothers to his private observation deck to watch the night sky.”

  “Sosigenes? The same Sosigenes who helped my patron, Julius Caesar, fix our calendar?”

  I grinned. “The very one. He was my mother’s favorite court astronomer. Once, the old man tried to tell me that the brilliant lights falling through the night sky were not the tears of the gods at all but merely rocks bursting into flame as they fell to Earth!”

  He looked at me, astonished. “Really?”

  I nodded.

  “What else did he tell you?”

  We spoke of the scientists who made temple doors open via hidden pulleys, of the mathematicians who determined the circumference of the earth by measuring noontime shadows, of the engineers experimenting with heat to make objects move.

  Juba sighed. “It sounds like a magical place.” We sat in contented silence for a time, Juba looking off into the distance.

  “How come you did not have to greet Livia with the rest of us the morning after she arrived?” I eventually asked.

  His eyes refocused on me. “What?”

  “The rest of the family had to line up as if for military inspection.” He laughed. “You mean, the children.” I nodded.

  “As an adult, I was spared that fine custom. I joined her in the triclinium later for the evening meal.”

  So. He’d had his manhood ceremony. I thought of Caesarion’s celebration. “Did you have a feast in honor of Liber and Libera too?” I asked.

  He smiled. “Just last year. Before I set off to join Caesar in Alexandr —” He stopped.

  I looked down at my hands. He had been there! I had almost forgotten.

  He cleared his throat. “Would you tell me about your mother? I know very little about her.”

  My insides melted into warm wax. No Roman had ever asked about Mother besides Julia, who always did so to find some way to insult me or her. The only time Mother seemed to live for me was when my brothers and I whispered remembrances in the dark. I nearly burst at the chance to talk about her. “Mother spoke seven languages!” He raised his eyebrows.

  “She never used translators when she met with diplomats. She had us learn many languages too, which is how we know some of your Numidian Punic.”

  He looked down for a moment. “Everybody loved her,” I rushed on. “Not every Ptolemy king was named pharaoh throughout greater Egypt, because that honor was bestowed only by the sacred Priests of Ra. But Mother was pharaoh as well as queen!”

  He smiled.

  “And she wrote many books! She wrote volumes on science, mathematics, and Nile farming, among others,” I said, aware that I sounded like I was bragging, but not caring.

  “Really? Your mother sounds like an exceptional person.”

  “She was,” I agreed, smiling at him. “She was.”

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  I worried about Alexandros as the months went by, for he seemed more and more withdrawn. One evening, as we all headed to our rooms for the night, I tried to speak with him about it.

  “What do you want, sister?” Alexandros said.

  The coldness in my twin’s voice felt like a punch to the stomach. “I need to talk to you,” I said.

  “Now? It’s late.” His eyes flickered to the torch-carrying servant leading Tiberius and the other boys. He seemed nervous, though I could not imagine why.

  “I do not care how late it is. I want to talk to you now!”

  Drusus turned to look at us. Alexandros must have seen it, for he clenched his fists. “Sister, you need to go with the girls. It’s not proper for you to follow us like this.”

  “Why are you two fighting?” Ptolly asked.

  I turned to him, straining to smile. “We are not fighting. Come on, Little Bull. Jump on my back. I bet I can still carry you that way!” He grinned and jumped on me. I grabbed his legs and staggered for a moment. “Isis! You are the biggest seven-year-old I know. I’m going to have to start calling you ‘Big Bull’!”

  Ptolly laughed.

  “Put him down!” Alexandros said. “You two are making a scene.”

  “Ptolly, I miss you,” I said. “Why don’t you come to my room with me to sleep, just like when we first arrived?”

  “Yes, yes!” he nearly shouted. I knew then that he missed me greatly too. Ptolly was too young to be among the boys anyway. He should have stayed with me.

  Alexandros frowned. “Ptolly, don’t be ridiculous. You cannot go with the girls….”

  “And why not?” I cried. “What is so horrible about being with his sister?”

  Ptolly kicked his legs to indicate he wanted down. He ran to Alexandros and grabbed his hand. “Yeah, we boys have to stick together,” he said. They started walking away, but I followed.

  “Ptolly!” I cried. “You have it wrong! It is the three of us who need to stick together. Remember your vow? We cannot let them separate us!”

  “Go back!” Alexandros hissed at me as we neared his wing. “Go with the girls.” He jerked Ptolly’s hand, running to catch up with the other boys.

  I stood in shock, not moving, long after the flickering torch disappeared into the dark. He could not do this. We had made a vow! And just because the boys in Roman families disparaged their sisters did not mean he had to act that way with me. We were different. I was the moon to his sun!

  I wrapped my woolen cloak tighter around me in that dark Roman winter night. No, I will not wait, I thought. I will address it this very instant. I stomped toward my brother’s room, my thick leather soles on the brittle frost sounding like the crunching of broken glass.

  I swung aside the heavy drape hanging over the front of my brother’s tiny cubiculum. “Alexandros,” I said. “I do not care what you say … Isis! What —”

  “Get out of here!” Alexandros ordered me through gritted teeth. “Now!”

  I had caught my brother in the act of undressing, and in the flickering light of the small bronze lamp, I saw black-and-blue bruises — some fading into yellow-green, others still red and darkening — splattered all over his torso and arms. “How did you get those?” I nearly squealed. “Who is hurting you?”

  He threw a clean tunic over his head. “It is none of your business.”

  “Tell me,” I repeated. “Who is doing this to you?”

  “Cleopatra Selene, I warn you. Stay out of my business.”

  “But you are my brother, my twin, we are bound by the sacred laws….”

  “No, we are not!” he almost shouted. I was glad he had fallen into speaking Egyptian. I did not want curious ears overhearing our fight. “Not anymore.”

  It had to be one of the boys. “It’s Tiberius, isn’t it?” Livia’s eldest. I had thought him cold like his mother — he was usually sullen around adults — but around other children, he seemed to enjoy being cruel. Alexandros did not respond, nor did he look at me. “No? Then gods, it’s all of them! Tiberius, Drusus, Marcellus …”

  “No, not Marcellus.”

>   I was grateful that Octavianus’s favorite was not involved. But realizing that Livia’s sons had declared war on my brother made my stomach roil in fear. “Are they hurting Ptolly as well?”

  “No. I would kill them if they tried,” Alexandros said, balling his hands into fists.

  “I would as well,” I muttered, breathing out with relief. I looked around. “Where is Ptolly? Does he know?”

  “He ran to Marcellus to ask him something.” He did not answer the second question. “I know what you are thinking,” Alexandros continued. “You’re thinking, ‘How could you be the son of Marcus Antonius when you can’t even defend yourself against those snot-nosed idiots?’“

  “That is not what I think! It is because you are the son of the great warrior Marcus Antonius that they try to hurt you.”

  Alexandros ignored me, pacing like a cat in a cage. “He is sneaky,” he said. “Tiberius. He attacks when there is no one else to see, when I least expect it, when it looks like it is all in jest. If I defend myself, I am pulled off and beaten by any household slave who thinks they have a right to put a hand on me, because Tiberius has given them the order to do so.” His voice quavered and he stopped talking, trying to regain control. He had been in Rome long enough to know Romans were disgusted by any show of emotion — especially in boys and men.

  Even as I felt a stab of sadness at how Rome was changing him, I stared at my twin, aghast. We had grown up as the sacred children of the incarnation of the Goddess. Our persons were off-limits to everyone except our consecrated servants. To have even the lowliest slave manhandle him or beat him at Tiberius’s order was beyond conception.

  “Then when it is time for military exercises,” he continued, “they keep me away from the training grounds.”

  “What do you mean? They cannot do that!”

  “Oh, yes they can,” he said with a bitter laugh. “And do you know what they say? ‘Caesar has given strict orders that no son of Marcus Antonius will be allowed to train as a warrior.’ So Tiberius learns how to fight and practices on me when no one is looking. Or sometimes when everybody is.”