Page 17 of Cleopatra

he next two years passed quickly. Once I realised I did not have to replicate my father’s reign, I found I enjoyed ruling Egypt.

First, I cut away the rotted roots of the court, ridding the local councils of corruption. Next, I improved upon the trade routes, increasing levies on imports, which bolstered the economy.

The only true strife the country had suffered from was the unseasonal weather. Akhet had come and gone and the Nile had not flooded.

But even that, I prided myself in navigating deftly. I anticipated the drought by constructing new aqueducts in the larger cities.

The two years had proven I was a just and capable leader. I was Egypt’s sun, and she blossomed beneath my light.

“The new temple is impressive, is it not?” I said to Charmion in Arabic.

We stood on the west side of the island between the buildings of the royal necropolis. The setting sun burnished the temples in a copper glow. Despite the time of day, the air was filled with the pounding of diorite hammers.

I looked over the site that was soon to be Isis’s temple. Large blocks of granite were being dragged across the newly turned soil by teams of workers. A white haze shimmered around them as those with tools ground the granite into smaller bricks.

“The temple is exquisite,” Charmion said.

Pothinus sighed beside us, as his language ability was limited to Greek alone.

I had learned to tolerate his presence, if not his odour. Though he disagreed with how I handled the ruling class, he too had come to accept my rule.

Accept, not respect. A nuance I only learned to distinguish later in my life.

I beckoned over the lead stonemason. “I’ve been told you are the greatest of builders.”

“Yes, Pharaoh.” Dust had settled into the creases of his wide face, streaking his dark skin. “My ancestors’ hands placed the bricks that raised the pyramids from the earth. My blood is mortar, my bones are stone.”

“Will the main structure be ready by the year’s end?”

“No, Pharaoh. We will need another season, maybe more.”

“I will send you more workers. Pothinus, please arrange it.”

I felt, rather than saw, the regent’s disapproval beside me. The construction of Isis’s temple had been one of the first tasks I had ordered as Pharaoh. The building would one day be my tomb, and though its construction might have seemed premature, I was hoping the gift would draw the goddess’s attention, for I was still without my divine power.

I spared no expense, utilising the royal coffers that had grown lighter during my father’s reign to send for red granite from Upper Egypt.

The bones of my ancestors warmed the ground beneath my feet. Many of the temples were large enough to house the remains of pharaoh, spouse and siblings—though the latter two were often one and the same.[*]

To my right lay the resting place of Ptolemy VIII. As the second child, he hadn’t been destined for the throne. Though unlike me, he had fought for it, assassinating his nephew to clear the line of succession.

The tomb of his mother, the first Cleopatra of my dynasty, stood in its shadow. Though smaller, the sealed door was decorated with an intricate sea-shell mosaic depicting the Syrian hills of her birthplace. The iridescent tiles glowed in the sunlight, drawing me to this quiet corner of the necropolis.

Some of the shells were cracked, the pattern too distinctive to be coincidence. I wondered whether someone in the past had taken an axe to it when war had broken out against Syria.

Battles and assassinations. Patricide and betrayal. So few of my ancestors died peacefully.

When I’d been a child, I and the young servants of the palace had traded stories of their deaths like currency. How could I have known that the myth of my death would outlast them all?

“The temple will be larger than any other on the island,” Charmion remarked.

“Yes. Smaller only than Ptolemy Sōter’s.”

Built for the god Serapis, Sōter’s tomb stood in the centre of the temple district on the mainland. It was large enough to see even with the sea that separated us. Its columns rose up from the earth like great teeth. The doorway was guarded by a statue of Serapis holding a sceptre to the sky.

“All I ask now is that Isis blesses me like Serapis did Sōter,” I said solemnly. My ancestor was the first to be bestowed with the power of the gods.

“Isis has not forgotten you,” Charmion said.