I dared to lift my eyes to gaze into those of Ptolemy, but the king was staring into the middle distance. It seemed strange to hear such a young man utter sentiments so bittersweet; but Ptolemy was not, after all, an ordinary young man. He was the descendant of a long line of kings and queens stretching back to the right-hand man of Alexander the Great; he had been raised to think of himself as semidivine and the possessor of a unique destiny. Had he ever played with the boyish, careless abandon of Mopsus and Androcles? It seemed unlikely. I had interpreted the presence of his attendant piper as a purely political device, a calculated ploy; in Rome, such would have been the case, but gazing upon Ptolemy through jaded Roman eyes, I had missed something. Could it be that Ptolemy was both more mortal and more kingly than I had thought?
"The bond between father and son is a very special thing," I said quietly, and my thoughts took a dark turn.
Again, Ptolemy seemed to read my mind. "You have two sons, I understand. The one called Eco, who lives in Rome, and the other, called Meto, who travels with Caesar; but the one called Meto you no longer call your son."
"That is correct, Your Majesty."
"You had a falling-out?"
"Yes, Your Majesty. In Massilia-"
For the first time I heard him laugh, though not with joy. "You needn't explain, Gordianus-called-Finder. I've had my share of fallings-out with family members. If my latest military excursion had been successful, I'd be coming back to Alexandria with two heads to show the people, not just one!"
Across from me, Pothinus pursed his lips, but if he thought the king spoke carelessly, he said nothing.
The king continued. "Tell me, Gordianus-called-Finder, what do they say about Egypt, where you come from? What do the citizens of Rome make of our little domestic squabble?"
This opened treacherous ground. I answered carefully. "Your father was well-known in Rome, of course, since for a period of time he resided there." (In fact, the Piper had been driven out of Egypt by rioting mobs and lived for a while in exile in Rome, while his eldest daughter, Berenice, seized the opportunity to take over the government in his absence.)
"I was very young then," said the king. "Too young to accompany my father. What did the Romans make of him?"
"While he lived there, your father was well-liked. His… generosity… wasmuch spoken of." (Passing out money and promises of money, the Piper had petitioned the Roman Senate for military assistance to restore him to the throne; in essence, he had ransomed the future wealth of his country to Roman senators and bankers.) "For many months, Your Majesty, Roman politics revolved around 'the Egyptian Question.' " (The question: Put the Piper back on the throne as a Roman puppet, or take over the country outright and make it a Roman province?) "It was a delicate issue, endlessly debated." (Caesar and Pompey staged a titanic struggle over who should get the command, but to choose either man threatened to upset the precarious balance of power in Rome; the Senate finally picked a relative nonentity, Aulus Gabinius, to pacify Egypt.) "The people of Rome rejoiced when your father was rightfully restored to his throne." (Gabinius, with the aid of a dashing young cavalry commander named Marc Antony, routed the forces of Berenice. Back in power, the Piper as his first act executed his rebellious daughter; his second act was to raise taxes, so as to start paying the vast sum in bribes he had promised to Roman senators and bankers. Egypt was impoverished, and the Egyptian people groaned under the burden, but the sizable Roman garrison left behind by Gabinius assured that the Piper would remain in power.)
I cleared my throat. "The sudden death of your father two years ago caused grief and consternation in Rome." (The senators and bankers worried that chaos would overtake Egypt and that further payments from whomever succeeded the Piper would dry up; there were vicious recriminations from those who had argued for annexing Egypt outright while the pickings were easy.)
The king nodded thoughtfully. "And what is the attitude of the citizens of Rome regarding affairs in Egypt since the death of my father?"
The ground became even more treacherous. "To be candid, Your Majesty, since the death of your father, my knowledge, and, I suspect, the knowledge of most Romans regarding events in Egypt, are rather hazy. In the last few years, our own 'domestic squabbles' have occupied all our attention. Not a great deal of thought is given to affairs in Egypt, at least not by common citizens."
"But what was said about my father's will, at the time of his death?"
"A man's will is a sacred thing to a Roman. Whatever dispensation your father decreed would be respected." (In fact, there had been a great deal of disappointment that the Piper had not bequeathed the governance of Egypt to the Roman Senate; other monarchs, close to death, massively in debt to Rome, and wishing to spare their countries from inevitable war and conquest, had done exactly that. But the Piper had chosen to leave Egypt to his eldest remaining daughter, Cleopatra, and her younger brother, Ptolemy, to be ruled jointly by the two of them. Presumably, brother and sister had married one another, as was the custom with coreigning siblings in the Ptolemy family. Incest was abhorrent to Romans and looked upon as yet another decadent symptom of monarchy, along with court eunuchs, ostentatious pageantry, and capricious executions.)
The king shifted uneasily on his throne and frowned. "My father left Egypt to me-and to my sister Cleopatra. Did you know that, Gordianus-called-Finder?"
"That was my understanding, yes."
"My father dreamed of peace in the family and prosperity for Egypt. But in the world of flesh, even the dreams of a god do not always find fulfillment. The Fates have decreed this to be a time of civil war all across the earth. So it is with Rome. So it is with Egypt. So it is, I take it, even within your own family, Gordianus-called-Finder."
I bowed my head. "You speak again of my son."
"Meto, the tent-mate of Caesar," he said, watching me closely. I bit my lip. "Ah, does that have something to do with your estrangement? Has the eagle taken your son perhaps too much under his wing?"
I sighed. "I find it strange that Your Majesty should show so much interest in the family affairs of a common Roman citizen."
"I am interested in all things having to do with Caesar," he said. The gleam in his eyes was partly that of a curious fifteen-year-old boy, and partly that of a calculating politician.
"For many a Roman," I said, speaking slowly and quietly, "the choice between Caesar and Pompey was not an easy one. Cicero searched frantically for a third way, but found none and finally sided with Pompey-to his regret. Marcus Caelius leaped to Caesar's side, then grew dissatisfied and betrayed him. Milo escaped from exile in Massilia and sought to raise an army of his own-"
"And you have known all these men?" Ptolemy sat forward. "These heroes and adventurers and madmen of whom we hear only echoes here in Egypt?"
I nodded. "Most of them I have known better than I cared to, certainly better than was good for me."
"And you know Caesar as well?"
"Yes."
"And is he not the greatest of them, the nearest to godhood?"
"I know him as a man, not a god."