The Egyptian Royals Collection (121 page)

“Excuse me,” I said. “I think I will go and sit with Octavia.”

Alexander grabbed my arm before I could leave. “Where are you going?” he whispered in Parthian.

“Where I won’t have to hear about Octavian’s mausoleum!” When he moved to come with me, I shook my head. “Stay here with Marcellus,” I told him. As I left, I looked behind me to make sure he wasn’t following. The sun had disappeared beneath the hills and the gardens were illuminated now by hanging lanterns. As I made my way through the crowded villa, I saw Octavian in his formal
tunica Jovis
standing with Terentilla in a corner of the triclinium. She was tracing the palm leaves on his tunic with her finger, and the two of them were laughing intimately. Neither of them looked in my direction, and it wasn’t difficult to make my way to the vestibulum and out the front doors into the dusk.

I was surprised there was no one following me. Perhaps Octavian couldn’t imagine a scenario in which Alexander and I might try to escape, or perhaps we had simply finished being useful to him, and if we were foolish enough to run away, then our punishment would be of little consequence. I wondered what that punishment might be, and decided that whatever it was, I was willing to take the risk.
My mother would want this
, I told myself, making my way down the Palatine Hill.
And if anyone sees me, they’ll simply think I’m another senator’s daughter
.

The sky was the color of blooming hibiscus, a red that turned to purple and gradually black. I didn’t know where I might find the
Campus Martius, but I was determined to ask the priest in the small temple to Jupiter at the base of the hill. The noise of the festivities drifted down from above, and the sharp laughter of women made my heart race. Would one of them want to speak with me and find that I was gone? I walked as quickly as the steep incline would allow, being careful not to trip over my sandals.

Bands of drunken men lumbered up the road, singing about Bacchus and inviting me to drink with them. “Come here, my pretty Egyptian queen. There’s a thing or two I’d like to teach you about Rome.” But I had seen enough leering drunks with my father to know that I must simply avoid their gaze. I made my way around several groups of men, but when one of them reached out to grab me, I was too slow.

“Get off of me!”

“What’s the matter?” His friends began to laugh, and he pushed his lips roughly against mine. “You’re not too young for paint.”

He dragged me toward a copse of trees, and when I screamed, the laughter of his friends grew more distant.
They’re leaving me with him to be violated
, I realized. I kicked at his shins, but he wrestled me to the ground. His heavy stomach pushed against the front of my body, and I could feel his desire beneath his kilt. I turned my head to scream, but as his hand reached down to lift my tunic a shadow loomed behind him. There was the flash of a knife and suddenly my attacker grew still. I didn’t wait to see who the shadow was. I crawled through the darkness to the cobbled road, then ran the rest of the way down the hill. When I placed my sandal on the first step of the temple, a hand grabbed my arm and I cried out.

“What do you think you’re doing?”

Frightened, I turned around, and Juba shook me with both hands.

“What are you doing out here?” he shouted.

“I’m—”

“Think carefully before you lie.” I didn’t say anything, so he guessed. “You were going to the Temple of Isis.”

My eyes must have given me away, because he took my arm and wrenched me up the hill.

“You’re hurting me!” I cried.

“You were prepared to risk worse.”

“Where are you taking me?” I was ashamed that my voice trembled. When he didn’t answer, I asked quietly, “Did you kill that man?”

“Would you rather he lived?”

We kept walking, and his grip on my arm was hurting. “You have no right to touch me.” I tried to pull away. “I’m a princess of Egypt!”

“And what do you think makes a princess?” he demanded.

I raised my chin. “Her education.”

He laughed mockingly. “Her gold! Did you really think the High Priest was going to help you return to Egypt out of kindness? I saw what he gave you in the Temple of Jupiter, and there’s only one reason he would contact you. He wanted payment. Of one kind”—his eyes lingered on my diadem—“or another.” He made a point of studying the rip in my tunic.

“No.” I shook my head. “Not a high priest of Isis.”

“Oh no. And not a citizen of Rome. Do you understand what that man would have done to you?”

“Of course!”

“Then understand this.” He stopped walking, and his face was so close to mine that I could see the muscles of his jaw working angrily. “Women who walk the streets by themselves are kidnapped by men and sold as slaves. So far, Fortuna has smiled on you, although I have no idea why she wastes her time on such a pampered little girl. You have your brother in Rome, a tidy sum in the Temple of Saturn for whatever you need—”

“I don’t have any
sum.”

“Of course you do,” he said bitterly. “I know because I transferred it there myself. So unlike some of us who were captured at war,
Your Highness
will never have to dirty her fingers to make her way in Rome. Octavia may want to see you survive, but I can promise you this. Fortuna’s smiles don’t last forever. And if I ever hear of escape or rebellion associated with your name, I will not bother to knife the next man in the back.”

He released my arm and I staggered backward. “You’re Octavian’s man through and through,” I said, intending to insult him. But he only smiled.

“That’s right. Everything belongs to Caesar.”

“Not me!”

“Yes, even you,
Princess.”

A group of men dressed as Egyptian pharaohs passed us by, but none of them looked in my direction. They all eyed Juba warily and then moved away. He caught my arm and we continued walking up the Palatine.

“Where are you taking me?”

“Back where you belong,” he said.

In the vestibulum of Octavia’s villa, I heard footsteps coming toward us and held my breath.

“Selene!” Octavia put her hand on her chest. I could see the shadows of Marcellus and Alexander behind her. “We couldn’t find you anywhere!” she exclaimed. “We thought you were—” She looked from me to Juba, and her expression grew wary. “You weren’t planning on running away?”

“No,” he said. “I found her near the Temple of Jupiter. I think she was planning on making an offering.”

Octavia studied me with her soft eyes, refusing to admonish me for what she must have known I’d attempted.

When everyone had left, Alexander kept staring at me. “You didn’t really—?”

I turned from him and stalked into our chamber. “I had a message from Egypt.”

“What do you mean?” He slammed the door.

“In the Temple of Jupiter, the High Priest of Isis and Serapis gave me a message.”

In the lamplight, Alexander watched me, aghast. “And you thought you would travel across Rome to visit him? Without telling me?”

“You would have said no!”

“Of course I would have! Gods, Selene. How could you be so foolish? Ptolemaic rule of Egypt is finished.”

“It will
never
be finished!” I ripped off my wig, too tired to bother with my paint and tunic. “As long as we are alive—”

There was a sound outside our door, then a soft knock. Alexander glanced uneasily at me. “Come in,” he said. We both rushed to our couches and pulled the linens over our chests.

Octavia appeared, and I was certain that she had come to reprimand me. She placed her lamp next to Alexander, then sat on the edge of his couch so that she could look at both of us. I held my breath.

“Tomorrow, school will begin,” she said softly. “Gallia will take you to the Forum, where you will meet Magister Verrius near the Temple of Venus Genetrix. He will be the one to instruct you over these next few years.” When we didn’t say anything, she added, “Marcellus will be there, as well as Tiberius and Julia.” When there was still nothing either of us felt we could say, she asked awkwardly, “Did both of you enjoy the feast?”

Alexander nodded against his pillow. “Caesar’s villa is magnificent,” he replied. But I knew he was lying. My mother’s guest houses
had been larger than Octavian’s villa, and all of the lanterns in Rome could not have illuminated the smallest palace garden in Alexandria.

But Octavia was pleased. “My brother is turning Rome from a city of clay into a city of marble. He and Agrippa have great plans.” She placed her hand tenderly on Alexander’s forehead, and I saw him flinch. “Sleep well.” She stood, then gazed down at me in a way that only Charmion ever had.
“Valete,”
she said softly. When she opened the door, I could see the figure of a thin, balding man waiting near her chamber. He wrapped his arm around her waist, and as the door swung shut, I sat up and looked at Alexander.

“The architect Vitruvius,” he said.

“The one who wrote
De architectura?”
He was the only Roman architect we’d ever studied in the Museion. “Are they—?”

“Lovers? I guess. He came here to see your sketches, but you had disappeared. You should be thankful she isn’t going to tell Octavian. Instead, she came in here and wished us happy dreams. You have no idea how fortunate we are—”

“And how is losing your kingdom fortunate? How is losing our brothers, our mother, our father, even Charmion and Iras, fortunate?”

“Because we could be dead!” Alexander sat up. I heard the sound of a window opening in the chamber next door. I imagined it was Marcellus letting in the fresh air, and suddenly I felt hot. “We could be prisoners,” he went on, “or slaves like Gallia. You’re just lucky that Juba found you before someone else did!”

My brother blew out the lamps, but in the darkness I could still see Juba’s eyes, full of anger and resentment.

Gallia woke us while the sun was still rising. She placed a pitcher of water on our table, and two slaves brought in bowls of olives and
cheese. But even the fresh bread, which smelled deliciously of herbs, couldn’t tempt me to move.

“Up with the sun!” Gallia said forcefully. “Domina has clients waiting for her in the atrium, and her morning
salutatio
has already begun. Take off your tunics and put on your togas!”

I opened one eye and saw that Alexander had placed a pillow over his head. “What is a
salutatio?”
I groaned.

Gallia clapped her hands so loudly that Alexander jumped. “It is when clients come to the villa to ask for the money they are owed, or, more likely, favors. Every Roman with a few denarii to rub together has a
salutatio
in the morning. How else do the baker and the toga maker get paid?”

Alexander sat up and eyed the food warily. “Olives and cheese?”

“And bread. Come,” I said wearily, “I can already hear Marcellus.” He was singing in the hall, possibly something crass about the priestesses of Bacchus.

“What are you doing?” Gallia exclaimed. “Up! Get up!”

We both rose, and I looked at Alexander. “Our first day at school,” I said mockingly. “I wonder who will be more cheerful, Julia or Tiberius?”

“Well, you know why she dislikes you.”

“Who says Julia dislikes me?”

My brother gave me a long look, and I followed him into the bathing room. “She’s already been engaged twice,” he said, washing his face in a bowl of lavender water. “Once to Antyllus, another time to Cotiso, the king of the Getae. But Octavian can’t betroth her to a foreign king, because now he needs an heir. So he’s hoping to marry her to Marcellus. She’s jealous that you get to live here with him.”

“How do you know this?”

He glared at me. “She told me last night. While you were at the bottom of the Palatine.”

I looked at Gallia and asked if it was true. “Is Julia really engaged to Marcellus?”

“Yes,” she said cautiously, and I put my face above the bowl of water so that no one could see my disappointment. “But engagements among Romans are like the wind,” she added. “They come and go.” She passed me a square of linen.

“Why?”

“That is simply how it is,” she explained while I dried my face. “Most women are married four and five times.”

She handed me a small jar of toothpaste, and I paused to look at her. “But how can a woman love so many men?”

“Your mother loved many men,” she pointed out.

“My mother had two men,” I said sternly. “Julius Caesar and Marc Antony. That was it.”

When Gallia looked disbelieving, my brother added, “It’s true. Whatever the gossip may be here in Rome, she had only two men, and she was loyal to our father until his death.”

“Like a
univira,”
Gallia said reverently.

I frowned.

“A one-husband woman,” she explained. “Well, you will not find many of those in Rome. A woman may be married for fifteen years, but if her father decides on a better match.…” She snapped her fingers and I understood that to mean the marriage would be over. “It is also expected that a woman will remarry if her husband dies, even if she is fifty years old.”

“And who expects this?” I asked with distaste. I began to scrub my teeth.