just a girl, really, but she wore a woman's gown. Her breasts were firm like fruit just about to ripen. Her face . . . Her face was like . . . It was something you could stare at and stare at. I mean no offense to your family, but had I the chance I'd fuck that one till her legs bowed. A mystery of beauty like that should be possessed.”
Syphax broke off and flopped back against his cushions. He seemed drunker now than he had just a moment before. Without a thought to his guests he scratched his groin, lingered a moment on the stirring there. He looked up and fixed his gaze on Hanno, the first time that evening that he had looked at him with particular import. “Truly, Sophonisba could drive a sane man crazy. Remember that I mean no disrespect, friend. But she's been in my dreams, waking and sleeping. I've seen bits and pieces of her in other women, but never the whole. Never has a bitch stirred me like she does. I'd even marry her if that's what it took.”
Out of the corner of his eye Hanno could tell that Publius, just having gotten the translation of the king's words, was shifting his gaze between the two of them. He knew that the artery on his forehead was beating visibly. There flashed before him the sudden image of him clamping one hand around Syphax' neck and bashing his face in with the other. He wanted to look away, but he held the man's bloodshot gaze for as long as he had to.
Syphax broke away. He moved his chin to the side, toward Publius. The rest of his face seemed to follow a moment after. “But he wouldn't know about this, would he?” he asked the Roman. “She is his sister. He's not an Egyptian, after all. . . .”
Syphax cupped his large hands over his knees. At the gesture, Hanno realized that the tattoos were a stylized rendering of lion's claws, the pattern they made on wet soil. The king rose, saying he needed a woman. They would talk more on the morrow, he promised. They would talk much more.
But in his three days in Cirta, Hanno never had more than a few moments alone with the king. They met briefly in the mornings and in passing in the afternoons; both he and Publius shared the man's table for the main meal, required to sit across from each other, to speak politely, neither one wanting to show his hand or to flare up in frustration. He was not sure whether the consul managed any more genuine discussion himself, but still he could barely contain the simmering anger this kindled in him. Syphax, a petty king, was exploiting the situation to feed his own pride. He seemed to have forgotten the strength of Carthage and to be ignoring the old history of Roman treachery, living in the short glow of his own self-importance. He was a fool, Hanno thought, but he kept this opinion decidedly to himself.
By the time Syphax escorted the two guests out toward the harbor to depart, Hanno still was not sure where his nation stood in relation to Libya. Were they allies or not? It seemed that both sides had tacitly agreed not to press the issue while in each other's company, and as far as he could tell, neither had either of them gained anything certain. Syphax seemed as he had when they arrived—an amused, neutral party. Not wanting to discourage the Roman's departure, Hanno decided to pretend to leave, and then to circle back as soon as he could. He hoped the consul would not attempt the same.
“We have concluded our business, then?” Syphax asked.
Hanno nodded. “As ever, you have the best wishes of Carthage,” he said. “May we always be brothers.”
Syphax smirked at this. “Fine. Fine. Take my blessings to your countrymen, and to the women of your family.”
Hanno half-turned, one arm vaguely pointing toward the docks. It was an invitation for Scipio to precede him, but the other did not do so. The consul scanned his face quickly, and then stepped close to Syphax. He spoke softly, but with no real attempt at secrecy.
“Good king,” he said in the Libyan tongue, “since your business with Carthage is now concluded, I would speak to you of a few more matters. Just a few moments of your time in private. You will find interest in what I have to say.”
Hanno, fuming, watched the men ascend toward the palace, the Roman close beside the Libyan, their heads bent in toward each other. He almost set out after them, but he had already been beaten, in diplomacy as in the field. Before he sailed, though, he composed a letter to the king. He stated his wishes in the clearest of terms and alluded to all manner of grand rewards for his friendship. He admitted that he had no power to agree to anything on his own, but he assured Syphax that his nation valued his friendship above all others. Staying true to it could only serve Syphax' people, and make the king rich beyond his present imaginings, and as powerful as he had the capacity to become. Carthage would give him anything he asked. Anything it was within the city's power to give. He wrote that he would dock near Hippo Regius.
Only a few days later, a messenger brought word of the possibility that—despite the generous overtures Rome had made to him—Syphax would become an ally to Carthage once more. Little was needed to secure the bond, because they were two nations with roots deep in the same land. Theirs was a partnership to be nurtured, to be enlarged, to be sanctified. They were old friends, but they could be more. There were just two things he must have in return. First, he wanted a guarantee that Carthage would recognize his dominion over the Massylii. King Gaia was ill and sure to die soon. Syphax wanted his nation as his own, and Carthage must acknowledge him over Masinissa.
This was bad enough, but as he read the second demand Hanno felt his pulse through the fingers that touched the parchment. There was one sure way to unite them, Syphax wrote. One way that they could truly merge their two peoples forever.
Each morning, Imco awoke with a start. As soon as his eyes fluttered the world into existence and his conscious mind recalled the dream of a life he had been living for some weeks now, he flung himself upright. He cast around, searching for the woman to confirm that she was real. If she lay nearby he would stare at her in awe. He would move closer, trying not to wake her, his gaze roaming over her long, muscular legs, over the gentle curve described by her hip; he would imagine the weight of her breast so innocently resting on the soft skin of her inner arm. He would study the fall of her dark hair over her golden skin, the intake and exhalation of her breathing, the flecks of sunburned skin on her nose, the tiny ridges of her lips. Then, as her stillness always made him nervous, he would jab her with a finger until her eyes opened, slowly, clear in their opal grandeur from the first moment, as if she had never truly slept but had simply rested in imitation of slumber. If—as on several occasions already—she was not inside his tent, he was on his feet in an instant. He charged outside—clothed or naked, it did not matter— calling the name she had mouthed for him with her own precious lips. Aradna. Aradna!
The simple truth was that he did not fully believe in her. Did not trust that he had actually found her or that she was anything other than a phantom created in his own wandering mind. It had all come from his walk behind the donkey. The creature took him up onto a ridge of wooded hills, down along a lentil field. For a time they walked one each in the two ruts of a wagon road, and then they crossed a flat, fallow field. At times it seemed the donkey stood just near him; at other moments he realized the creature was far away, hurrying him on. He lost sight of it several times, only to find it again. When he stopped at the edge of a settlement and could not see the donkey he had the feeling that he had reached whatever it was the creature was leading him to.
He entered the settlement nervously. The hair on the back of his neck flexed and quivered. He felt himself walking into an ambush, although he knew this did not make sense. What bandits employ donkeys to lure their prey? He slid a hand down his side and fingered the hilt of his sword. It was a group of camp followers. A poor lot of mixed race. There were tents in the Carthaginian style, but there were also skin structures, hovels made of sticks, lean-tos covered over in hides. The place smelled of human waste, of dogs and unwashed people. Smoke from numerous low fires drifted up in the still air like columns stretching to the sky. From around the fires hostile faces glared. A group of men stood and watched him, a few of them picking up sticks and axes. A woman snatched up a running child by the hair and then slapped him as he began to cry. Others went about their work without seeming to have noticed him, but he still suspected devious intention in their erstwhile endeavors.
In his alertness to danger he must have looked everywhere except just in front of him, for suddenly a woman stood and her torso rose into view. Just then noticing him, she spun around and froze facing him, holding in her arms the sticks she had just gathered. Just like that. She stood before him, near enough that if they had both stretched out their arms they could have touched. Her face drained of color as she stared at him.
She was exactly as he remembered. Well, not exactly. Her hair jutted up from her head in several matted plaits. Black lines of dirt clung to the creases of her forehead and under her chin. A sore glistened red and painful at the corner of her lips. The simple gown she wore had no shape whatsoever. It was caked in mud and spotted with oil stains and with a thousand shades of brown. Imco took all of this in but none of it mattered. Behind the disguise he recognized her as clearly as if she stood before him naked and dripping with cold, fresh water. Picene.
He almost called her by the name he had given her, but he had not taken leave of his senses completely. Not knowing what else to do, he motioned for her to take a seat. The only spot available in their immediate vicinity was
