Daughters of the Nile (2 page)

In adopting and modernizing this theory by reimagining Isiac worship, I relied not just upon ancient sources and current scholarship but also upon the worship of Isis as it’s currently practiced. M. Isadora Forrest’s
Isis Magic
was invaluable on that count, as was Ms. Forrest herself, who kindly offered advice on rituals that Selene may have been familiar with. The calling prayer of Isis in this novel is her work. In seeking an authentic and educational vision of death that would illuminate the ancient mind, I turned to Normandi Ellis’s moving translation of
The Egyptian Book of the Dead
for inspiration in crafting both Cleopatra’s final thoughts and Selene’s. While
The Egyptian Book of the Dead
is as old as civilization, Ms. Ellis’s
Awakening Osiris
is one of the most beautiful translations ever written and helped me form the spiritual core of this series.

While it is always dangerous to speculate about the sexuality of historical figures, I was emboldened to envision an affair between Virgil and Marcellus in this series after reading
Virgil in the Renaissance
by David Scott Wilson-Okamura and Saara Lilja’s
Homosexuality in Republican and Augustan Rome
. In this series, I’ve explored Selene’s sexual morality through the lens of mythic Isiac fertility rites, which is rooted in Merlin Stone’s fascinating book
When God Was a Woman
, itself inspired by the work of Robert Graves. While no record of Isiac mystery rites has survived, I drew upon the legend that Isis herself had served as a prostitute in Tyre. I was also mindful of Herodotus’s claim that female adherents of goddess cults gave themselves to a stranger at least once in their lives—an idea echoed by Strabo. And, of course, I must express appreciation for
The Golden Ass: Being the Metamorphoses of Lucius Apuleius
, an Isiac work and the only Latin novel to survive in its entirety. I blended all this information with extant accounts of the Eleusinian Mysteries. And Josephus was invaluable with regard to all the story lines regarding Herod.

Insofar as this novel is about Augustus, I relied upon ancient historians Cassius Dio, Suetonius, and Tacitus, and I freely admit to having adopted the latter’s most uncharitable views of Livia. When it came to reconstructing Berber culture as it may have existed in Selene’s reign, I consulted Susan Raven’s
Rome in Africa,
Paul MacKendrick’s
The North African Stones Speak
,
and
The Berbers
by Michael Brett and Elizabeth Fentress.

Additional inspiration was derived from Petronius, Mary Renault’s work on Alexander the Great, and Elaine Fantham’s work on Julia Augusti. For additional sources, please see my website at stephaniedray.com.

CHARACTERS

The Court of Augustus Caesar

AUGUSTUS CAESAR,
or Octavian, Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus, the Emperor of Rome

JULIA,
his daughter by his former wife Scribonia, and his only child

AGRIPPA,
his son-in-law and most powerful general

Gaius,
his son, the emperor’s grandson and heir

Lucius,
his son, the emperor’s grandson and heir

Julilla,
his daughter, the emperor’s first granddaughter

Agrippina,
his daughter, the emperor’s granddaughter

Postumus,
his son, the emperor’s grandson

LIVIA DRUSILLA,
his wife, scion of a powerful noble family, the
Claudii

Tiberius,
her oldest son by her former husband, the stepson of the emperor

Vipsania,
his wife, the daughter of Agrippa from a previous marriage

Drusus,
her youngest son by her former husband, the stepson of the emperor

OCTAVIA,
his long-suffering sister

Marcella,
her daughter by her first husband

Iullus Antonius,
her son-in-law, son of Mark Antony, husband of Marcella

Antonia Major,
her eldest daughter by Mark Antony

Antonia Minor,
her youngest daughter by Mark Antony, also called Minora, wife of Drusus

Germanicus,
their eldest son, Livia’s grandson

Livilla,
their eldest daughter, Livia’s grandson

Claudius,
their youngest son, sickly and enfeebled, Livia’s grandson

MAECENAS,
his political adviser and overseer of imperial artistic programs

Terentilla,
the beautiful wife of Maecenas and former mistress of Augustus

ANTONIUS MUSA,
his renowned physician, a freedman of Mark Antony’s

The Court of Cleopatra Selene & Juba II

CLEOPATRA SELENE,
Queen of Mauretania, Daughter of Cleopatra VII of Egypt and Mark Antony

JUBA,
her husband, the Berber-blooded King of Mauretania

Isidora,
their daughter, the Princess of Mauretania

Tacfarinas,
her childhood playmate, a Numidian tribesman

Ptolemy,
their son, the Prince of Mauretania

PYTHODORIDA,
her niece, ward of the queen

CHRYSSA,
her Greek freedwoman, now a court minister

Maysar,
her husband, a Berber tribal leader and royal adviser

TALA,
her Berber attendant, sister of Maysar

Ziri,
her son, later called Mazippa

CAPTAIN KABYLE,
her Berber-born ship’s captain

EUPHRONIUS/EUPHORBUS,
her court physician, mage, and priest of Isis from Alexandria

CRINAGORAS OF MYTILENE,
her court poet

MEMNON,
her captain of the Macedonian guard from Alexandria

LADY LASTHENIA,
her adviser, a Pythagorean scholar from Alexandria

MASTER GNAIOS,
her father’s famous gem cutter, now her court sculptor

LEONTEUS OF ARGOS,
her court tragedian

CIRCE,
a Greek
hetaera
turned grammarian and teacher at court

PART ONE

THE SOWING

One

IOL-CAESARIA, THE KINGDOM OF MAURETANIA, ROMANIZED NORTH AFRICA

AUTUMN 19
B.C
.

I
will never see my mother’s Egypt again, I think. The closest I will ever come to touching my native soil is bathing in the same sea of green that caresses its shores. So each morning, I go down to the water where the frothing waves tumble over themselves and the brine-scented spray leaves salty kisses upon my cheeks. Squinting into the brightness, I might imagine that the lighthouse gleaming white in the harbor is a far-off vision of the Pharos of Alexandria. But the breeze that sweeps over the forest of ships’ masts reminds me that this is my kingdom of Mauretania. This wind carries with it no Song of the Nile, but the melodic voices of my Berber fishermen, singing as they haul in their nets.

Later, my skin tingling with dried salt water, I linger between the billowing white curtains of my chambers in the palace. Standing beside me, stirring a dark greenish-brown paste in a bowl, is Tala, my chief attendant, the woman who nursed my daughter—the only one I trust to care for my little princess. Together we watch my women gather henna in my gardens. They squat with their colorful skirts hitched up to their knees as they choose leaves for their baskets and cut efficient swaths with sharp scythes.

As Tala stirs the paste, her silver bracelets and beaded earrings jingle, outdone in their brilliance only by the indigo shawl draped over her hair, the dye from which stains her skin blue at the creases. “Best to harvest all the henna now before the winter rains come,” she says. “By the time we finish making you beautiful for the king’s visit, we’ll have used all the henna we have left in the storeroom.”

Though I’ve been married to the King of Mauretania for more than five years, our marriage is only by contract.

Tonight will be the first time I take him into my bed.

This I must do if I want a life of my own, an escape from the emperor who forced my parents to suicide and made me his war trophy. His possession. His mistress. The emperor will never believe that I do not belong to him unless he sees me as the true wife of another man. So if I will not make love to Augustus Caesar, I must make love to my husband.

Lavender perfume wafts up from the linens, and a shift of gossamer white drapes over the chest at the foot of my bed. Every beeswax candle in the palace has been brought to my chambers as if to turn my bed into a sacred altar. But the preparations make me uneasy. “Must we go to so much trouble? King Juba is, at heart, a practical man.”

Tala tests the consistency of the henna paste between her fingers. “He is also a man preparing himself for you as a bridegroom. After his morning ride on his new stallion, he washed, sat in the steam room, and had himself rubbed down by a Nubian slave before calling for a barber. He’s demanded a special dinner in your rooms and hasn’t let a drop of wine touch his lips.”