Page 28 of Cleopatra

To make it seem like the decision had not been guided by Pothinus, I thought on it for a moment. Arsinoe looked between me and Pothinus expectantly. She had spent more and more time with him in recent days, and I always preferred to keep her close. “Yes, let us show Egypt the might of the Ptolemy women. We leave at dawn.”

I stood from my chair, all appetite having fled. “Charmion?”

She appeared behind me.

“Yes, Pharaoh?”

“Attend me. We have some preparations to make.”

—

Charmion paced the length of my bedchamber. “Are we really going to Hermonthis tomorrow?”

I placed my hands on her shoulders, stopping her incessant patrolling. “Yes.”

Her full lips turned downwards. “It is impossible to have the royal barge prepared in such a short amount of time.”

“The god Re crosses the sky each night without such worry. We will be fine.”

She stopped short of rolling her eyes at me. “Re has less jewellery than you. Eiras! Make ready the Pharaoh’s wardrobe. Ahmose, prepare the royal guards for a voyage. Heba, inform the cooks of the Queen’s plans.” Her orders echoed down the corridor as she wove together the threads of the journey to come.

I waited until I couldn’t hear Charmion any more before crossing the room and withdrawing a bundle of clothes from beneath the sheets of my bed. I undressed quickly, my sheath dress falling to the ground by my feet until I wore nothing but the ivory dagger—the weapon once destined to kill me. It hung on a gold chain, the blade bound in leather. I had not been parted from it since the hakawati had attacked me.

We never managed to trace who had sent the storyteller to kill me, though I was not short on enemies amongst the nobility. Some I had humiliated when uncovering their corruption, others I had brought to order with increased taxes. It was in their interests to have me killed. More of my ancestors had died by an assassin’s blade than from old age.

I stood in front of a mirror made of polished gold and removed the braids from my hair. Charmion had woven the tresses into a knot at the back of my neck. I unravelled them, the soft curls retaining the kink of the weave as they fell down my back.

My hair told my family history. The rushlight illuminated the few locks of dark copper amongst the black, passed down to me by my Macedonian ancestors. The curls were a gift from my Egyptian mother, the texture a legacy of my Syrian grandmother.

I ran my hands through the strands of my heritage, loosening the oil used to style it. And I felt myself loosen too, the role of Pharaoh slipping away.

I pulled on the dress I had retrieved. The cloth was a little threadbare but functional. The pockets, however, were lined with sheep’s leather, thick enough to protect the jars I carried there. I removed my sandals and walked barefoot towards a plinth that stood against the northern wall of the room.

Charmion’s task had distracted my guards and maids, so my bedchamber was empty. Satisfied I was alone, I pushed the stonework away from the wall.

It should have been a job for many more arms than mine, but the plinth was deceptively hollow, and as it came away from the wall it revealed a narrow set of steps. The air smelled of sea salt and wet earth.

Charmion and I were the only two alive who knew of the tunnel that led to my room. It had once been used to access the cistern that held water beneath the palace. But following an earthquake half a century earlier, some of the tunnels had collapsed, and some were forgotten completely—like the one that led to my chambers.

I walked the length of it without a torch, feeling my way through the darkness until I reached a section where the walls grew tight around me. Then, using my bare feet to feel the pathway, I ducked and crawled until I felt the familiar surface of the stone I was looking for. With a push, it moved and I was able to climb through a small hole. The air grew sweeter and cooler as I entered the cistern. Through small openings in the ceiling, the moon cast a dappled silver light on the water’s surface. The holes, used to feed the cistern with rainwater, were set into the gardens above me.

Irrigation tunnels snaked away from the pool, feeding the palace water system. I caught my reflection in the water—the image of a plain commoner, not a pharaoh.

I smiled at myself, relishing the freedom of my guise, before ducking down another tunnel that had collapsed years before. I moved through it like it was a puzzle, shifting and replacing the pieces of rock and stone that I knew would grant me freedom. Eventually the walls opened out to a stairway. I ascended into a small cave of ruins where an old part of the palace had been lost to the sea.

The tide was out; if it had not been, the cave would have been flooded and I’d have had to wait before crossing the shore towards the harbour.

The clandestine adventure had my heart racing in my throat. I had worn white to disguise myself in the twilight. If anyone caught sight of me from the palace, they would not have seen a pharaoh, but a slip of linen in the wind, hard to distinguish against the bleached shore.

Sand turned to wood beneath my feet as I crossed to Antirhodos’s small harbour and walked down the pier. I was yet to be spotted. But as I boarded the small rowing boat used to cross the bay, I heard a voice behind me.

“Who dares trespass on the Pharaoh’s property?”

I looked up. The figure was outlined by the full moon, his shape familiar. “Peace, Ahmose, it is only me.”

He inhaled sharply, realising his mistake. “My queen, I apologise, I did not recognise you.”

“That was my intention,” I said dryly.