The Shards of Heaven (37 page)

It was the first time Didymus had heard the girl say Caesarion's name, and he saw the young man blink as if the word had broken a spell. The boy who might have ruled the world let out his breath with a sigh and a nod. “I'm no conqueror,” he said. He looked over to Vorenus with a smile. “You know I don't want to rule other men.”

Vorenus gave the curt nod of a military man receiving an order. Didymus wondered at the irony of it even as the room seemed to exhale. After all, wasn't a lack of desire to rule perhaps the finest characteristic to have in a ruler?

“But I don't understand how we can move it,” Caesarion continued, turning back to Hannah. “You mentioned a ship, but no vessel can get out of the city. Especially not a royal one. Not just by land are we besieged.”

“It's not just any ship we want,” Hannah said. Didymus noticed again how sure of herself the girl was. He wondered how long she'd been a leader among this sacred company.

“What then?” Caesarion asked.

In reply, Hannah turned to Vorenus. “He knows.”

Vorenus looked confused for a moment before realization swept across his face like the beam from a far-off light. “The trireme,” he said, wonder in his voice. “The one we used to escape Actium. It's one of Octavian's own vessels.”

“As soon as the city falls,” Jacob said, “Octavian's ships will enter the Great Harbor that they only now blockade. There will be chaos. If one of his ships slips out, under the bridges of the Heptastadion and out to the sea beyond, no one will notice. There's no better time for moving the Ark than in the chaos.”

“And this trireme,” Caesarion asked no one in particular, “it's in the royal harbor?”

Both Jacob and Hannah nodded.

“You could order it released,” Vorenus said to Caesarion. “We only need to get the Ark to the palace, to have it ready.”

Didymus watched as Caesarion worked things over in his mind. He didn't doubt that the young man was thinking, too, of how he could get his family out of the city the same way. “No,” he said at last. “We can't leave from the palace. Anything leaving the royal harbor will be searched, Roman-built or not. We need to bring the trireme to the Ark.”

A single pair of hurried footsteps abruptly echoed in the hall, and one of the hooded guards strode into the pool of light around the tables, walking directly to Hannah's side. As he whispered in her ear, the girl's gaze flicked over to Caesarion. She took a deep breath when the guard finished. “Go,” she said to him. “See to the others.”

“What is it?” Caesarion asked.

“Antony is dead,” she said, voice calm and unflinching.

“Dead?” Caesarion croaked. “I … we saw him, not hours ago.”

Hannah nodded, and to Didymus the gesture appeared warmly kind, like that of a mother agreeing with her child that the world was not what either of them would like it to be. “He fell on his own sword. I'm sorry.”

“The city will fall,” Pullo said, his eyes widening as if he was surprised to have spoken the thought aloud.

“So it will,” Jacob said. He stared at Caesarion, the lack of any trace of a smile on his face making him appear disturbingly intent. “Octavian's men will be in the city soon, if they're not already. No more stories. The time to act is upon us.”

Caesarion looked down at the table, eyes narrowing.

“The trireme,” Jacob said. His voice was urgent. “We need it. The Ark
must
be protected.”

Caesarion's head moved up and down absently. Didymus thought he saw the young man's lips moving.

Jacob's shoulders trembled with what appeared to be pent-up rage, and Hannah reached out a hand to grip his arm. “Pharaoh,” she whispered. “Please…”

“Khenti,” Caesarion said, his head whipping up, eyes clear and voice strong.

The Egyptian guardchief, always rigid, somehow stood even straighter. “Sir.”

“I can't go. Octavian will be looking for me most of all. You and Vorenus will return immediately to Lochias without me. Run. Do whatever you need to do to get that trireme in the water and moving. Get the children on board.”

“Your mother?” Vorenus asked.

Caesarion shook his head. “She may be dead already. If she isn't, she won't leave, I assure you. And she'll be doing what she can to keep the children by her side. In her pride she'll want us all to meet the same fate.”

Vorenus nodded. “I understand, sir.”

“Where are we to direct the trireme?” Khenti asked.

Caesarion turned to Hannah. “Well? You wanted my help, and you've got it. Where's the Ark? Here?”

Hannah's face, for the first time since they'd met her, flushed slightly, and she chewed on her lip for a moment. “The map,” she finally said.

Jacob unceremoniously pushed aside the stack of scrolls on the desk before them, causing Didymus to wince. Underneath them was a map of the city, already spread out. Hannah leaned over it. “We're here,” she said. Then she drew her finger in a line north and west along the angled avenue leading to the Heptastadion, where her finger stopped. “The Ark is in a chamber not far from the water,” she said.

Didymus blinked at the map in confusion. “It's not right here?”

Hannah actually smiled. “Not specifically, but the Ark chamber can only be accessed by two tunnels hidden under the city. One starts beneath Alexander's tomb. The other starts here.” She turned her attention directly to Vorenus and Khenti. “Bring the trireme up under the first Heptastadion bridge,” she said. “There's an access to the canals under the city there.”

Khenti glanced for a moment to Caesarion. “Under the bridge. I know of it.”

“That's where we'll meet you,” Hannah said.

Vorenus nodded for the both of them. “Understood.”

“And the rest of us?” Pullo asked.

“The rest of us,” Caesarion said, looking across the table at Hannah, “will go get the Ark.”

The Jewish girl agreed, and her brother leaned over to roll up the map. At once, the rest of the people in the scroll-filled room began to move. Vorenus turned to Pullo and the two old friends clasped arms firmly before parting. Khenti whispered something to the remaining Egyptian guard—Shushu, Didymus recalled—before the guardchief turned toward one of the hooded guards who was obviously waiting to show them out. Within seconds, they had departed, with several other hooded guards following in their wake. Four of the Jewish guards remained with Jacob and Hannah, who were starting to move away from the tables toward the far end of the room. To light their way, three of the guards retrieved lit lamps from where they hung on pillars.

Didymus remained where he was.

Caesarion, looking back over his shoulder at the departing Vorenus and Khenti, saw him and stopped, too. “Come on, Didymus.”

Didymus stood still, a thousand thoughts, a thousand visions, roiling in his mind.

“Didymus?” The voice was Pullo's, though he could not see him. All he could see was the image of the Ark and, behind it, the Great Library in flames.

“We must hurry,” Hannah insisted.

Didymus blinked the real world back into focus, saw that the light was dimmer and marred by his own tears. “I'm … I'm not coming,” he said. “I can't. The Library … I … I can't.”

Caesarion came back, reached out his hand. “A Shard of Heaven, Didymus.”

Didymus swallowed hard. “I can't leave it all to the torch.”

“You might not be able to stop it,” Caesarion said.

Didymus saw how grown the young man looked in the lamplight. Faint stubble marred the smooth skin of his face, and his eyes were unblinking at the beauty and the horror of the world. When, the scholar wondered, had they all gotten so old? “I can try,” he said. It was, truly, all he could do now. All he could be good for. “I'm not worthy anyway. We both know it.”

Caesarion shook his head. “Oh, Didymus. It's forgiven. If I can forget it, why can't you?”

“It doesn't matter. My place is here. What good is a scholar without his books?”

Caesarion began to say something more, but he seemed to recognize that nothing would change his tutor's mind. Instead he reached out and embraced him warmly. “Thank you, Didymus. For everything.”

“The pleasure was mine, my boy.” Didymus thought he would have to force himself to smile, but instead it came naturally. He held Caesarion for a moment longer, then pushed him away. “Now go. Save the Ark. Save us all.”

 

24

T
HE
C
ITY
F
ALLS

ALEXANDRIA, 30 BCE

Selene sat at the head of the boat, trying to appear more serene than she felt. The night-shadowed water of the harbor passing beneath the hull seemed a perfect match for her mood. It was bad enough that Caesarion had left her behind again, but now she and her brothers had been pulled from their beds by their tending nurse to fulfill a summons from their mother on Antirhodos. Kemse, for her part, also seemed ill at ease, the whites of the nurse's eyes more visible than usual, standing out strong on her dark-skinned face against the background of the night. Young Philadelphus was huddled up in Kemse's lap, and she was gently running fingers through the sleeping boy's hair as she made little cooing noises.

Such a baby, Selene thought. She looked over at her twin brother, Helios, to make a face, but he was staring out across the waves with deeply sunken eyes, his skin paper-pale in the light of the moon and the great lighthouse. He'd been sicker than usual these past days.

She had always known her brothers were weak, that she was the strong one, and it usually gave her pleasure to remind herself of the fact. But now and then, in times such as this, a small but persistent voice in her mind wished it wasn't so. She longed, for once, that she could be the one sleeping in Kemse's lap, rather than the one who had to lead them, who had to be strong.

Selene straightened her back, swallowing hard, and watched the royal island getting closer. Small lights bobbed on its shoreline: the men waiting for their little boat. They seemed to be moving around more than usual, and Selene actually turned to look out north to where Pharos stood like a mighty, sleepless sentinel over the mouth of the harbor. She could see the moving lights of Octavian's vessels out there upon the sea, the Roman blockade that had held them trapped in the city. It seemed peaceful, no cause for such anxiety among the servants and guards. Was it only the oddness of the predawn summons that had set them all on edge? Or was it something else, the same deep horror that she felt in her own gut that something had gone very wrong this night?

Their little boat turned to angle into the island's private harbor, and Selene could see that another small boat was anchored there along the dock. It was one of the supply ships, perhaps the same one she'd used to sneak away from the island the previous year, when she walked alone to the Great Library and first learned of the Shards, whose power so thrilled and frightened her.

Selene frowned, thinking it odd to see the supply boat on the island so early. It wasn't due for many hours yet: the goods it would bring typically weren't ready before dawn.

As their silent rowers pulled their own little boat into the harbor she could see that the supply boat was indeed cluttered with empty crates and barrels, evidence that the supplies hadn't been picked up yet. A tarp had been pulled across the haphazardly arrayed containers, and she could see, by the red-yellow light of the Pharos lighthouse, that it was wet.

The guards who met their little boat were nervous. Selene could see it in the shaking of the lamps in their hands, in the way they kept their eyes from looking at anything but her and her brothers as they beckoned them from the royal dock to the island's small palace. What little they spoke was in hoarse whispers, in quick words, and they hurried them as if fearful of being outside. Selene helped Helios along and noticed that he, too, was shaking. From fright or his illness, she couldn't tell.

Once inside the palace, the guards moved them efficiently toward the royal rooms, and Selene felt her heart beating harder. They were going to their mother's chamber. She wasn't meeting them in the hall. She'd summoned them to her private room. Why? What was going on?

Down twisting corridors, from lamp to lamp, they walked in silent parade. Philadelphus was awake now, but he clung to Kemse, sensing the foreboding anxiety in the air. Helios coughed once or twice, the rattling hacks shockingly loud in the tomb-silent halls.

And then they were there. The guard leading them knocked lightly on the door, but Selene didn't need to strain to hear her mother's strong-voiced reply. “Come.”

The guard paused for a moment at the threshold before he pushed open the door, his body bowing low and out of their way as he did so.

Kemse gasped and almost violently pulled Philadelphus to her as the little boy cried out in horror. Helios croaked out the word “Father” before his voice was broken off by his sobs.