“How do you know?”
“I live next door. They haven’t been back all night.”
“What about this morning?”
The boy shook his head.
“Not even Magister Verrius?”
“No.”
I took the shortcut back up the hill. I didn’t dare to approach Juba’s villa, but I went to the Temple of Apollo to see for myself. A group of Praetorians were gathered at the entrance, and I recognized two of the guards as the same men who’d accompanied me to Alexander’s mausoleum. They were talking quietly between themselves, admiring the stain across the marble steps. It was just as Agrippa had described it. No one could lose so much blood and survive. I could feel my throat beginning to close, and the world was growing dark around me when the light-haired guard from the mausoleum shook my arm.
“It’s only blood. Nothing to be worried about.”
“Who stabbed him?” I whispered.
“We did.” He pointed from himself to the familiar dark-haired guard beside him. “I expect we’ll both be amply rewarded.”
I felt sick to my stomach. Suddenly, nothing made sense anymore. When I returned to Octavia’s villa, I shut myself in my room. Charmion, Ptolemy, Caesarion, Antyllus, Alexander, both of my parents. And now Juba; the man who had cared for me all along, protecting me, writing about the injustices I cared passionately about as well, all in the guise of the Red Eagle. It no longer mattered to me whether I lived or died. I lay down and closed my eyes, hoping that someone would steal out of the shadows as they had four months before, only this time, that it would be my life that ended.
But when I awoke, the sun was still high. No one had come to murder me in my sleep. There was noise in the atrium, and when I opened the door, Octavia and Vitruvius were whispering. They stopped when I appeared, and both of them looked at me.
Octavia approached. Her face was full of concern. “Augustus would like to see you,” she said.
“Really?” I asked indifferently. “Is he angry?”
“I don’t know. He is very ill, Selene. And preparations are being made….”
I could see she was on the verge of tears, and I softened my voice. “He has always recovered.”
“But this time it’s fever. He’s asked us to bring you.”
When I nodded, she released her breath. She had expected a fight, but I no longer cared what happened to me. I followed her into Augustus’s villa, where dignitaries crowded together in the atrium, and even Julia and Marcellus were there.
“He’s asked to see you,” Julia said nervously. “Do you know why?”
I shook my head.
“I think you’re going to be married.” When I didn’t react, she went on fretfully, “No one knows who it is. I don’t think even Livia knows. But he’s making all his plans. He’s even given Agrippa his signet ring.”
“The one belonging to Alexander the Great?”
She nodded.
“So Agrippa’s his heir?”
“Until Marcellus is twenty.” I could see the fear in her eyes. “Oh, Selene.” She took my hands, but I didn’t move. “Whatever happens, I am here. It will be all right.”
Octavia guided me to the stairs and pointed upward. “The first door on the right.”
I mounted the steps, and as I approached the door, I was aware of a rushing sound in my ears. But why was I afraid? It didn’t matter what future Augustus decided for me now.
I opened the door and realized that I wasn’t entering a chamber, but Augustus’s office, Little Syracuse. The walls were adorned with maps and scrolls, and where there weren’t books, there were statues. A pale-looking Augustus was seated behind his table, hunched over like an old man trying to fend off the cold. With his hand, he offered me a seat.
“Kleopatra Selene,” he said.
“Emperor Augustus.”
He smiled at the title, but didn’t disagree. “Do you know why I’ve called you here?”
I didn’t lie. “Julia says it has something to do with my marriage.”
“Yes.” He studied me. “You’ve grown very beautiful in my absence.”
“Many things have happened in your absence,” I said shortly.
He raised his brows, but instead of growing angry with me, his voice became strangely regretful. “Yes, they have. And once we die, what we leave behind is not what is engraved in stone monuments, but what is woven into the lives of others.”
“Pericles.”
He nodded. “And I have not woven much happiness into your life, have I?”
I dug my nails into my palms to keep myself from weeping.
“Before I die, I wish to change that, Selene.”
“Are you going to bring Alexander back from the dead?”
He hesitated. “You understand, I hope, that a grown son of Marc Antony and Kleopatra would always be a risk to the stability of Rome so long as he was alive.”
“The stability of Rome, or the stability of your rule?”
“Is there a difference?”
“He never wanted to be Caesar!”
“Many men have no intention of being Caesar. But when offered the opportunity by discontented senators, how many would turn it down?”
I bit my lower lip.
“I did not bring you here to discuss death,” he said quietly. “I brought you here to give you a new life. You had a very fine education in Egypt, and in Rome you have proven yourself capable of rule. If you will accept a dowry of five thousand denarii,” he began, “I wish to make you Queen of Mauretania.”
The study began to spin so quickly that I gripped the sides of my chair. “I don’t understand,” I whispered. “I thought that Juba—”
“Is ill? Yes, but he’s young and very strong. Men like him recover quickly, and he’s waiting for you in the other room.”
I stood so quickly that my seat nearly toppled over.
Augustus smiled. “At the end of the hall.”
I don’t remember whether I ran. I must have, because when I opened the door and Juba took me in his arms, I was breathless. Immediately, I inspected him for signs that he’d been wounded again. “I don’t understand,” was all I could say. “I don’t—”
He put his finger to my lips. “The men at the temple were mine. There was no attack.”
“But the mess—” I whispered.
“It was bull’s blood. I think I’m going to survive.”
“And your shoulder?”
He pushed his tunic away so I could see where Magister Verrius had neatly stitched him closed, and in the bright light of the chamber, I knew there’d never been a more beautiful man. From the time I’d been taken from Alexandria, he must have known that Augustus had intended me for him. Then I thought of the times he’d seen me weeping for Marcellus, and the many times I’d goaded him for being nasty when all of it had simply been an act to keep away suspicion, and my eyes began to burn.
“I hope you’re crying with happiness,” he said, “and not with disappointment.”
“How could I be disappointed?” I cried.
“Perhaps you wanted someone else.”
I ran my fingers through his hair. “No.” I searched his eyes, which were filled with kindness, and I drew my fingers over the handsome contours of his face. “I want you.”
“Me, or the Red Eagle?” he asked cautiously.
“Perhaps both.”
