Song of the Nile Read Online Free PDF Page B

Agrippa’s hand on his shoulder. The emperor’s most trusted lieutenant, and Rome’s finest general, was a grizzled soldier who always looked ill at ease in a toga and today was no exception. Agrippa chuckled, his smile rueful but warm. “By Jupiter, I don’t envy you the task of making this girl into a proper wife, Juba. But you’ll never be bored.”
    Everyone laughed except for my new husband. Then Marcella kissed me warmly on each cheek. “I think you’ve bewitched my husband the admiral. I should be jealous.” She said it without malice, for everyone knew that Agrippa couldn’t be bewitched, not even by her. His heart belonged to his mother-in-law, the Lady Octavia, but we’d all learned long ago that Agrippa’s love was always eclipsed by his devotion to duty, as he saw it.
    The emperor’s daughter threw her arms around me in heedless abandon, laughing. “Selene, you always find some way to steal all the attention for yourself, don’t you? Now who is going to remember my wedding?”
    Julia was my dearest friend and I was grateful for her affection in the face of the wicked gossip that now swirled around me. Augustus has made this Princess of Egypt, this Queen of Mauretania, the richest woman in the world! How does he know she’ ll stay loyal to Rome? Somewhere else I heard snippets of hushed conversation. Is it true that she works magic? She’s a witch. They say she charms crocodiles. How eager Lady Octavia must be to get rid of her!
    I’d expected some censure, but now that I was in the eye of the storm, heat flamed at my cheeks. I stumbled through the evening under the emperor’s penetrating gaze. He was always staring at me, no matter to whom he was speaking. And while he was watching me, his wife was watching him . The serene smile Livia always wore in public didn’t reach her eyes, and I had the strange sensation that I’d somehow made a terrible mistake.
     
     
    HENCEFORTH, my wedding proceeded like an illusion. I didn’t taste the food, though I ate it. The songs all ran together and the faces of guests blurred before my eyes. My world became a haze. In another River of Time, perhaps it would have been my twin that I took for a husband—to live and love and rule jointly over Egypt as was our people’s custom. Perhaps in some other, happier, River of Time, I had taken Helios for my husband. But in this life, he’d abandoned me to the Romans, and so it was Juba’s wife I’d become.
    We dispensed with the traditional feigned struggle, where the bride was carried off and revelers cried out bawdy jests; such a performance would insult our dignity as royals. When we reached the bridal chamber that Octavia had made ready for us, I ritually adorned the door with wool and smeared it with oil. Slaves and freedmen should have carried me over the green garlanded threshold, but Juba lifted me and carried me to the large bed that dominated the center of the room. This wasn’t the typical Roman sleeping couch, but an exotic Eastern-style bed, truly fit for a king and queen, its mattress piled high with tasseled purple pillows, its festooned frame inlaid with ivory and gold. Marble statues of sternfaced Roman gods and goddesses surrounded the bed in a semicircle, as if to supervise what would happen here.
    Outside, amidst the notes of the lyre and the shakes of rattles, the lingering laughter of our guests still echoed. Inside, our bridal suite was quiet enough that I could hear the erratic beat of my own heart. Alone for the first time since the ceremony began, we were as strangers. Juba folded his elegant hands in his lap and I straightened my gown over my legs. He unfastened his cloak, then rolled his shoulders as if to loosen them. I pushed myself up against the pillows, then adjusted my mother’s famous amethyst ring upon my fourth finger, where the nerve was said to run straight to the heart. He started to utter my name, then cut himself off. He wouldn’t even look at me.
    Octavia told me that