Cleopatra's Moon by Vicky Alvear Shecter Read Free Book Online Page B

low stool, his back very straight, the tips of his ears red. I turned toward the columned breezeway connecting the Library with the palace, but Iras spoke again, signaling me to pause.
    “The queen has one more request,” she said. “She asks you to select a female companion.”
    I blinked. Why on Horus’s wing would she want that?
    “You may choose one from this group or call for another.”
    When I did not respond, she looked at me, her painted eyebrows raised as if to say, “
Well? Choose
.” I looked back at the girls who had joined us in lessons today. Not all of them came regularly. Except Euginia. She came more than most.
    “Euginia,” I said quickly, and saw the faces of the other two girls fall.
    Euginia smiled at me, rose, bowed to Euphronius, and walked behind me as we made our way to the palace.
    Iras led us past the queen’s chambers, through short, twisting flights of stairs and small, unfamiliar hallways. When we stepped through what appeared to be a hidden doorway, I found myself almost blinded by the bright sun shining over an enormous rooftop garden.
    It was as if we had entered another realm, a floating world of lush green framed by the brilliant aquamarine of the bay behind the palace. Jasmine, delphinium, and rose blooms cascaded over giant, elegantly painted pots. Fan-shaped papyrus plants danced in the sea breezes. Trees, heavy with fruit — yellow citron, bright red pomegranates, gray-green olives, and purple-brown figs — scented the air.
    “Ahhh, daughter,” Mother said from under a small golden canopy.“Welcome.” Her sheer, pearly blue robe sparkled in the sun like sea foam. A beautiful, long-haired Egyptian girl plucked the strings of a lyre nearby.
    I bowed my head as I always did when greeting her in a formal setting, though this was anything but. Still, it seemed the right thing to do. Euginia bowed to the ground beside me.
    “You may rise,” Mother said distractedly. She smiled, and I felt my middle expand with warmth. I had not seen Mother smile much since Octavianus declared war on her months before. She and Father and all her ministers seemed forever in meetings as they prepared for Octavianus’s attack.
    “Euginia, daughter of Hypatos. Welcome,” she added.
    “Thank you, Your Majesty,” Euginia replied in a somewhat strangled whisper.
    “An interesting choice,” Mother said to me.
    I did not know what she meant, but I never liked to appear ill-informed around her, so I kept my face expressionless.
    “The Lady Iras will escort you out,” Mother said to Euginia.
    Euginia and I exchanged a look. I knew no more than she did. I was confused, but she seemed terrified.
    After Euginia left, Mother said, “Come. Let us bathe.”
    Bathe
? She stood, and I followed her to a more secluded corner of the roof, a deck facing the sea, giving me an astonishing view of Pharos, our Great Lighthouse. Its white marble glinted in the bright sun as immense plumes of black smoke billowed from the fires that burned day and night at its summit. I had never seen our Lighthouse from this height, and the magnificence of its colossal, three-tiered architecture took my breath away. Next to it, the ships moving in and out of our Great Harbor looked like ants crawling past the leg of a giant.
    I followed Lady Charmion and Mother toward a pool in the center of the terrace. Mosaics of the goddess of love emerging from the sea glimmered at its bottom. A canopy of white, gauzy linen shaded us from the worst of the sun.
    Lady Charmion swept Mother’s robe off her shoulders as a servant rubbed Mother’s special scent — a heady mixture of lotus, rose, and other mysterious oils — into her shoulders and back. Another servant held a strigil to scrape off the excess oil.
    “Your turn,” Lady Charmion said in my ear, and I jumped. In silence, she removed my tunic and had a young maid begin rubbing my skin with Mother’s oil. I breathed deep, drinking in her unique scent. The muted light streaming