Part 1 (1/2)
The Mee
Chapter 1
THE FIRST SCROLL
War blue waters, and the sound of waves I see, hear, feel theainst my lips, where the fine, , drowsy sainst her boso a sunshade across ently, andme as well, so I sway to a double rhyth of the water all aroundme securely I am held safely, cradled in love and watchfulness I remember I remember
And thenthe memory is torn apart, upended, overturned, as the boat h the air, caught by other arrip so hard aroundI can still hear the splashi+ng, hear the brief, surprised cries
They say I could not possibly, that I was not yet three years old when my mother drowned in the harbor, terrible accident, and on such a calm day, how did it ever happen? was the boat tampered with? did so to stand up, and you know she couldn't swim, no, we didn't know that, until it was too late, why then did she go out on the water so often? She liked it, poor soul, poor Queen, liked the sound and the colors
A bright blue ball see and the arcs of water flying all over, a sweeping circle, and the screams of the ladies on the boat They say that soed down, too, and that two died instead of one They also say that I clawed and kicked and tried to flingin fear and loss, but htpushed ontoup at the underside of a canopy where dazzling blue water was reflected, and unable to throw off my captor's hands
No one cohtened child They are too concerned with preventingThey say I cannot remember that either, but I do How exposed I feel, how naked on that boat bench, torn from my mother's arms and now forcibly held down, as the boat hurries for shore
Soht seeh, too It is a room, but it feels as if it is also outdoors--a special sort of room, the room for someone who is not a person but a God It is the tee statue--pullingto be aled across the shi+ny stone floor
The base of the statue is enormous I can barely see over the top of it, to where thite feet see above it The face is lost in shadow
”Put your flowers at her feet,” the nurse is saying, tugging at
I don't want to let go of them, don't want to put theently ”Look at her face She is watching you She will take care of you She is your mother now”
Is she? I try to see the face, but it is so high and far away It does not look like my mother's face
”Give her the flowers,” the nurse pro on the pedestal at the end ofto see the statue sine that I do
So, Isis, it is thus, and on that day, I becahter
Chapter 2
My mother the late Queen's name was Cleopatra, and I was proud to bear her name But I would have been proud of it in any case, for it is a great na all the way back to the sister of Alexander the Great, to e Ptolemies are related It n I have tried to fulfill that proe and Egypt
All the women in our line were named Cleopatra, Berenice, or Arsinoe Those names, too, went all the way back to Macedonia, where our fains Thus my two older sisters received the names of Cleopatra (yes, there were two of us) and Berenice, and er sisterthere were others after ain, and soon after the untimely death of his Queen Cleopatra, he took a neife, and she straightway produced ave birth to the two little boys to who Father a er again This time he did not remarry
I did not care for my father's neife, nor for my sister Arsinoe, as only a little er than L From her earliest days she was sly and deceitful, a whiner and complainer It did not help that she was also quite beautiful--the kind of child that everyone exclaims over, and asks, ”And where did she coave her an arrogance froift to be appreciated but as a power to be used
My sister Cleopatra was soht Fortunate sisters, to have had our er than I! Not that they see sort of creature; I fear I cannot even recall her very well And Berenice-- she was a veritable bull of a wo-shouldered, raw-voiced, ide, flat feet thatThere was nothing about her to recall our ancestor, the delicate-featured Berenice II, who had reigned with Ptoleend as a strong-willed beauty to whom court poets dedicated their works No, the red-faced, snorting Berenice would never inspire such literary outpourings
I basked in the knowledge that I was my father's favorite Do not ask s, but they do, no matter hoell parents try to hide it Perhaps it was because I found the other Cleopatra and Berenice to be so peculiar that I could not i partial to them rather than to me But later, even after Arsinoe with all her beauty ca place in my father's heart I knoas because I was the only one who showed any concern for him in return
I must admit it, honestly but with reluctance: The rest of the world (including his own children) found Father either coht man, with a diffident and dreamy manner that could turn quickly to nervousness when he felt threatened People blamed him both for what he himself was--an artist by inclination, a flute player, and a dancer--and for the situation he had inherited The first was his own doing, but the second was an unfortunate legacy It was not his fault that by the tied to climb onto the throne, it was practically in the jaws of Ronified postures to retain it These included groveling, flattering, jettisoning his brother, paying colossal bribes, and entertaining the hated potential conquerors at his very court It did not make him loved Nor did it ht escape with the wine and ht it, the nificent Banquet for Poer finally to see Roerous ones, not the harmless merchants or scholars who showed up in Alexandria on personal business) I pestered Father to letwell how to persuade hi I asked, within reason
”I want to see them,” I told him ”The famous Pompey--what does he look like?”
Everyone had trembled about Pompey, since he had just swooped down on our part of the world First he had put down a major rebellion in Pontus, then he had continued into Syria and taken the re it into a Roman province
A Ro into a Ro time, Rome--which was located far away, on the other side of the Mediterranean--had confined itself to its own area Then gradually it had extended its grasp in all directions, like the are to the south, and then Greece to the east, swelling and swelling And the larger it swelled, the doamon and Caria, easily sed The ancient realer better
Qnce there had been three kingdoenerals and their descendants: Macedonia, Syria, and Egypt Then two Then Syria fell and there was only one: Egypt There were reports that the Roypt as well, and that Pompey himself was particularly keen on it So Father had decided to do everything in his power to buy Po his next victihbor, Judaea
Yes, it was shameful I admit it No wonder his own people hated him But would they rather have fallen to the Romans? His choices were those of a desperate man, between bad and worse He chose bad Would they have preferred worse?
”He's a big, strapping hed together at that, conspirators Then the laughter died ”He's frightening,” he added ”Anyone with thathis manners”
”I want to see hio on for hours--it will be loud, and hot, and boring for you There's no point to it Perhaps when you are older--”
”I hope you never have to entertain theain, so this is my only chance,” I pointed out to hiain, it won't be under pleasant circumstances No lavish banquets then”
He looked at e way for a seven-year-old to speak, but then I was just afraid he was displeased withto refuse me permission
”Very well,” he finally said ”But I expect you to do more than just stare You must be on your best behavior; we have to convince hi on the throne”
”We?” Surely he did not h at that point I had no brothers
”We Ptolemies,” he clarified But he had seen the hope that had briefly flared up in me
My First Banquet: Every royal child should be required to write a rhetorical exercise with that title For banquets play such an inordinately large part in our lives; they are the stage where we act out our reigns You start out dazzled by them, as I was then, only to find that after a few years they all run together But this one will reraved in my mind
There was the (soon to becoe in the ritual Each princess had her oardrobe mistress, but mine was actually my old nurse, who knew little about clothes She outfitted me in the first dress from the stack; her main concern was that it be freshly laundered and ironed, which it was
”Now youout the skirt I remember that it was blue, and rather stiff ”Linen is so easy to wrinkle! None of that ro like a boy that you soht you must behave like a princess”
”And how is that?” I felt as encased as a s, which were also usually of linen Perhaps going to the banquet was not such a good idea after all
”With dignity When someone speaks to you, you turn your head around, slowly Like this” She gave a de her head swivel s her eyelids ”And you look down, modestly” She paused ”And you answer in a sweet, low voice Do not say, 4 4WhatV Only barbarians do that The Rorimly ”But you must not follow their exaht well do it,” she said grimly ”But you must not follow their exa it ”And should anyone be so rude as to ue or vers at a banquet”