Song of the Nile Read Online Free Page B

untouchable. The smell of their old aristocracy wafted on the air, just over the scent of burning torches.
    I watched from beneath an archway as senators fiddled impatiently with their purple-bordered togas and ladies delighted in the confections served by passing slaves. The emperor’s daughter arrived late, accompanied by her new husband. Julia’s recent wedding had been a hurried affair, as if to prevent Livia’s jealous interference. In fact, Julia’s wedding had been nothing like this one. Her father hadn’t even been present, but Augustus was here now, waiting for me.
    My family was also waiting. The Ptolemies. Julius Caesar. My mother. My father. My butchered brothers and the only brother that still remained with me, my little Philadelphus, my mother’s youngest son. The only one missing was the one I needed most. My twin wasn’t here except insofar as he lingered in the prophecy of our shared birth. The Isis worshippers and others believed we’d bring about a Golden Age. All those hopes and dreams and expectations hovered in that courtyard. I had only to appear on the stage that the emperor had given me.
    The moon that was my namesake hung in the sky like a pale ghost, its face only half revealed, like mine. I stepped out and everyone turned to see. I stretched my hands to the sides, like the paintings of my winged goddess on Egyptian tombs. They’d all expected that I’d go meekly to this wedding, shy as a slave on the block. They expected a bride in white muslin and orange veil. Some of the guests may have even supposed I’d marry in a Greek chiton with a royal purple cloak over my shoulders. None of them expected me to cast aside the respectable garments of a Roman bride in favor of a scandalous gown, a painted face, and hair flowing over my shoulders in dark ringlets.
    The guests tittered. Some stood. Others sat down abruptly on couches. Two servants knelt in homage to me while a lute player missed his note. Then the musicians went quiet altogether. I knew the memories I conjured with my mother’s coiled serpent upon my bare arm, my ruby red lips and the malachite on my eyelids glittering like a pharaoh’s mask, firm breasts swaying beneath the gathered green folds of my thin gown. If my display weren’t so deadly earnest, I might have laughed at the way women clutched at their modest garments, all scandalized by Cleopatra’s daughter. My groom was scandalized too. The newly made King of Mauretania waited for me beneath the grape arbor, an angry expression upon his handsome face.
    But my eyes were for Augustus, who was bedecked for this occasion in the corona civica , his oak-leaf crown. He’d been sipping at wine and chatting with his adviser, Maecenas, but stopped midconversation when the crowd opened a path between us. The emperor saw me and his eyes narrowed. Then he stilled.
    In all the years since my mother’s death, I’d been raised never to address a crowd of my own accord. Never to speak unless spoken to. Never to shout or lift my immodest eyes. To remember always that I was the daughter of the whore who’d plunged Rome into civil war and that it was only by the grace of Augustus that I lived. But I knew the emperor loved a good show and I intended to give him one. With my arms still upraised, I proclaimed, “I am the eighth Cleopatra of the royal House of Ptolemy!”
    The emperor handed his wine to Maecenas so abruptly that some of it sloshed out of the goblet. This brought an uncomfortable sputter from the wedding guests. Only Lady Octavia dared to speak. “Selene!” She thought I mocked her with this display. That I meant to spit upon all the modest virtues she’d taught me. She started toward me but the emperor lifted two fingers to stop her. This and the evening wind at my back emboldened me. “I am Cleopatra Selene, Queen of Cyrenaica,” I continued. It was a title without power, for Cyrenaica was governed by Romans, but at the sufferance of the emperor, it was the only royal