Cleopatra’s Daughter: A Novel (16 page)

“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.

Gallia held up her palms. “Romans. Men. It is the fathers and brothers who arrange these things. Domina Octavia is very fortunate not to have to remarry. Caesar has granted her special dispensation, and now she may keep her own house by herself.”

She led us back into our chamber, and while Alexander and I put on freshly washed clothes, I thought of Juba’s angry accusation that I would never have to dirty my fingers in Rome. Perhaps not, but I would be expected to marry and then remarry at Caesar’s whim. And Alexander.
… If
Octavian kept Alexander alive once he turned fifteen, who knew what would happen to him? We would be a pair of dice, thrown anywhere across the board so long as it pleased him, then picked up and thrown again and again.

Gallia tied the belt of my tunic, and I asked her quietly, “Are women of so little value in Rome?”

“When a girl is born,” Gallia replied, “a period of mourning is begun. She is
invisa
, unwanted, valueless. She has no rights but what her father gives her.”

“Was it that way in Gaul?”

“No. But now we are worse than
invisae
. Worse even than thieves. My father was a king, but Caesar defeated him and brought so many of our people to Rome that slaves are worth only five hundred denarii now. Even a baker can afford to keep a girl to pleasure him.” I winced, and Gallia spoke solemnly. “Become useful to Caesar. Do not let him hear you wish to run away, because there is nowhere you can go,” she warned. “Find a skill.” She turned to my brother, whose toga was immaculate. If not for the white diadem in his hair, he might have been a Roman. “Let him see that you are both worth something to Rome.”

“Why?” I asked bitterly. “So that I can be married off to a senator, and Alexander can be married to some fifty-year-old matron?”

“No. So that you can return to Egypt,” she said firmly, and her voice became a whisper. “Why do you think that Dominus Juba keeps company with Caesar? He hopes to be made prefect of his father’s old kingdom.”

“And Caesar would do that?” Alexander broke in.

“I do not know. Not even Dominus Juba knows. There is nothing left of my kingdom.” Her eyes grew distant, and I knew she was seeing some faraway horror. “But yours remains, and if you are obedient—”

There was a sharp knock on our door, then Marcellus bounded in. “Are we ready?” He smiled.

Gallia put her hands on her hips. “What is the purpose of knocking, Domine, if you are not going to even wait for an answer?”

Marcellus looked from my brother to me. “But I heard voices,” he said guiltily. “And how long could it take to put on a tunic?” His eyes swept over the pretty blue silk one that Octavia must have found for me, and he added, “A very
pretty
tunic.” My cheeks grew warm, and he offered me his arm. “To the Forum,” he said. “Of course, I don’t know what Magister Verrius thinks we’ll do today. The streets will be filled with so much noise he’ll have to shout over it just to be heard. But my mother insists.”

“Doesn’t she want you to be a part of the celebrations?” my brother asked.

“And miss school?” Marcellus asked sarcastically. “No. Besides, my uncle thinks one day of celebration is more than enough. He doesn’t want us to get used to so much excitement.”

We followed Gallia through the villa, and as we crossed the atrium, I saw that Octavia’s clients filled every available bench.

“Will her
salutatio
last all day?” I asked.

Marcellus shook his head. “Just another few hours. Then she’ll do her charity work in the Subura. She would feed all of Rome if she had enough grain.”

“Will we be doing charity work with her?”

Marcellus laughed at Alexander’s question. “Gods, no. After school, we’ll be in the Circus Maximus. I brought a few denarii so we can all place bets.”

Julia and Tiberius appeared on the portico, and at once I withdrew my hand from Marcellus’s arm.

Tiberius saw the gesture and laughed. “Don’t bother,” he said. “Julia has already seen you together and is working herself into a jealous frenzy as we speak.”

Julia smiled sweetly at Marcellus. “Don’t pay any attention to him. Selene and I are going to be great friends.” She made a show of taking my arm.

“Will your father be sending soldiers to escort us?” I asked.

“Who needs soldiers?” she replied. “Gallia was a warrior in her tribe.”

I looked at Gallia. With her wheat-colored hair and proud Gallic chin, she was the image of a queen, but as the sun filtered through her tunic I saw the outline of a leather sheath on her thigh. It was a companion to the knife she wore openly at her waist, and I blinked in surprise. “You fought?”

“When the men are all gone, or have been killed, it is up to the women. But I cannot fight off a mob if their intent is evil. That is what
they
are for.” She gestured behind her to a group of men. If not for the short swords at their sides and chain mail beneath their togas, they might have been senators or wealthy patricians.