“Didymus,” he said, his voice a whisper of concentration. The big man wasn’t shaking anymore, and he seemed extraordinarily calm. “Get me the lamp.”
The librarian complied without thinking, turning and picking up the lamp before he looked up and saw Juba, walking slowly toward them.
Pullo reached out and took the lamp from his hands. “Tell Vorenus I’ll miss him,” the big man said. “And he may be right about the gods. I’ll know soon. Now go.”
Didymus gathered himself to his feet, looking from his friend to the Numidian, who was walking like a man possessed, ignoring everything but the Ark in front of him.
“Go,” Pullo repeated.
The librarian looked once more to the man on the ground. Pullo was still staring at Juba, the lamp hot in his hands. “But Pullo—”
“Go.”
Didymus backed away, tripping over the big man’s useless legs and staggering to keep his feet. Juba was very close.
“Vorenus always said there’d be judgment in death,” Pullo said, his voice deceptively strong.
Juba stopped walking, turning his attention toward the big man. Didymus stumbled two steps, three, to the edge of the canal. He leaned out into the cold, momentarily still air.
“If so, I’ll see you in Hell,” Pullo said, and Didymus, turning for one last look at his old friend, already jumping for the water, saw him toss the lamp over his shoulder into the oil pots behind him.
The librarian broke the surface of the canal a moment before the churning fire of the explosion tore through the air behind him. The water around him shook violently, tumbling him like a stone for the second time this day. He dove deep before kicking his way up, feeling for the direction of the air as concussive blasts rocked the canal in waves, one after another. And then, just as he reached the surface, the ceiling between Didymus and the new wall beside the Ark fell into darkness as the stones of the collapsing tunnel sealed him inside, shutting out the sun.
* * *
Didymus heaved himself, dripping wet and more exhausted than he’d ever been in his life, up out of the canal and onto the fractured stones of the walkway. Dust glowed like sprinkling, slow-falling rain in the slivers of light that shone through the few gaps in the wall of rubble that had come down across the end of the canal where Pullo had lain. Light shone, too, like thin drapes hanging down from cracks that the quaking explosion had torn in the ceiling above. The librarian groaned, aching in seemingly every part of his body. The sound of small rocks rattling down through the rubble, or calving off the ceiling to splash into the canal, echoed loudly in the cavernous space.
The scholar hobbled painfully toward the ruinous wall of collapsed stone. From beyond it he heard the muted sound of movement. His first thought was of Pullo, but the big man had to be dead. No one could have survived that.
There was one gap, perhaps a few inches wide, near eye level, and he approached it first, leaning forward to put his eye to it. There were clouds of dust outside, but through spaces in the drifting haze he could see the Ark, littered with dust and small bits of shattered rock but protected from the force of the blast and the collapsing tunnel by the short metal wall that had formed up beside it. Hannah stood behind the Ark, her garments singed, her long hair grayed with chalky dust, but otherwise seeming unharmed. She was waving at someone, and as Didymus watched, the prow of a trireme glided into view, pushing through the debris-littered sea. The sun shone brightly on its decks and on the platform, and the librarian realized that the bridge that ought to have sheltered them must have been destroyed in the blast.
The trireme slowed and stopped. Didymus heard the thump of a plank falling on stone, and then his heart leaped to see Vorenus run into the line of his sight. Pullo’s friend—God, he thought, Pullo’s friend—knelt behind the Ark, Hannah bent down, too, and when they stood, Vorenus had Caesarion in his arms like he was cradling a child. Caesarion’s chest rose and fell. He was alive.
Vorenus and Hannah moved away, out of sight. Egyptians came, six or seven of them, and they lifted the long poles on the sides of the Ark between them, carrying it down to the trireme.
Didymus smiled to himself tiredly. It was gone. Pullo had done it. The Shard would be safe now. Caesarion would be safe now.
Vorenus came back to the wall, began throwing rocks out of the way, fist by fist, as if he meant to tear his hands to stumps on his way through the rubble.
Didymus felt his throat catch before he managed to speak. “Vorenus,” he croaked. “Stop.”
Vorenus looked up, eyes searching the wall. “Pullo?”
“It’s Didymus.”
“Didymus? Where’s Pullo?”
Didymus had to close his eyes. He couldn’t bear to look at him. “He’s gone, Vorenus.”
“Gone?”
“He’s … dead, Vorenus. He … he saved us,” Didymus said, trying but failing to be strong. “He was hurt. He … told me to tell you—”
The librarian’s voice finally gave out and his words choked off in a sob. When he finally had control of himself, he opened his eyes and saw that there were tears on the face of the Roman, his jaw tight with emotion. “What did he say?”
“He said to tell you … he said you were right. About the gods. You were right all along. He said he’d see you soon.”
Vorenus coughed out something between a laugh and a sob. “Always was a lying bastard,” he said. Then he swallowed and his face grew hard. “Thank you, Didymus. I … I—”
“Just go,” Didymus said. “Hurry. Go.” His own words made him think of Pullo, but he managed to set that memory aside for the moment. “Get out of here, all of you.”
Vorenus seemed about to say something more, then only nodded. But he didn’t move, and his eyes remained downcast.
The sound of shuffling and a grunt of pain came to Didymus out of the dark behind him. He turned and saw in a distant ray of light that Juba was limping toward him along the walkway. No longer a man possessed, he seemed instead a man defeated. As Didymus watched, he fell over against the wall to rest for a moment, his hands gripping the broken end of an arrow protruding from his side. With a jerk and a gasp he ripped it from his body and dropped it, the wooden shaft clattering on the ground.
The scholar turned back to the wall. Vorenus was still there. “Go,” he said again, voice stronger with desperation. “Take care of him. See that he reads his books, okay?”
The Roman’s smile was grim when he looked up. “Good-bye,” he said.
Didymus didn’t know who Vorenus was addressing, but he decided to speak for both of them. “Good-bye,” he whispered.
Vorenus started to go, shouting something to the trireme even before his back was turned. Didymus heard oars hitting the water, and the ship began to move. Vorenus took one last look at the wall, face hard as its stone, and then all Didymus could see was the sea.
The shuffling of Juba’s feet was louder now. Didymus turned and watched the Numidian approach, close enough for the librarian to tell that the man’s clothes had been ripped and torn to tatters by the force of the explosion, that his dark skin was sooty with streaks of black. He’d pulled all the arrows from his body while Didymus had said his good-bye to Vorenus, and now damp streaks of red spotted his sides. Only his breastplate seemed untouched. He looked tired beyond exhaustion, like a broken man, and there was both confusion and acceptance on his face. “It’s gone, isn’t it?” he asked, voice hoarse.
The scholar didn’t need to ask what it was that was gone. Not knowing what else to do, he helped the Numidian hobble painfully over to the wall. There was nothing more to be seen through the gap, but the stones there gave the Numidian a temporary place to rest his weight.
Didymus wondered, absently, if this adopted son of Caesar would kill him for helping his friends. Or perhaps he’d simply turn him over to the other adopted son of Caesar as some kind of peace offering. He didn’t even know if that made sense, and he himself was far too tired to care.