The October Horse Read Online Free PDF Page B

have been—Epicures love a new taste thrill.”
    The audience chamber stood in a building of its own, if size was anything to go by; perhaps an anteroom or two for the visiting ambassadors to rest in, but certainly not live in. It was the same place to which Gnaeus Pompey had been conducted: a huge bare hall with a polished marble floor in complicated patterns of different colors; walls either filled with those bright paintings of two-dimensional people and plants, or covered in gold leaf; a purple marble dais with two thrones upon it, one on the top tier in figured ebony and gilt, and a similar but smaller one on the next tier down; otherwise, not a stick of furniture to be seen.
    Leaving Caesar and his lictors alone in the room, the captain hurried off, presumably to see who he could find to receive them.
    Eyes meeting Fabius's, Caesar grinned. “What a situation!”
    “We've been in worse situations than this, Caesar.”
    “Don't tempt Fortuna, Fabius. I wonder what it feels like to sit upon a throne?”
    Caesar bounded up the steps of the dais and sat gingerly in the magnificent chair on top, its gold, jewel-encrusted detail quite extraordinary at close quarters. What looked like an eye, except that its outer margin was extended and swelled into an odd, triangular tear; a cobra head; a scarab beetle; leopard paws; human feet; a peculiar key; stick-like symbols.
    “Is it comfortable, Caesar?”
    “No chair having a back can be comfortable for a man in a toga, which is why we sit in curule chairs,” Caesar answered. He relaxed and closed his eyes. “Camp on the floor,” he said after a while; “it seems we're in for a long wait.”
    Two of the younger lictors sighed in relief, but Fabius shook his head, scandalized. “Can't do that, Caesar. It would look sloppy if someone came in and caught us.”
    As there was no water clock, it was difficult to measure time, but to the younger lictors it seemed like hours that they stood in a semicircle with their fasces grounded delicately between their feet, axed upper ends held between their hands. Caesar continued to sleep—one of his famous cat naps.
    “Hey, get off the throne!” said a young female voice.
    Caesar opened one eye, but didn't move.
    “I said, get off the throne!”
    “Who is it commands me?” Caesar asked.
    “The royal Princess Arsinoë of the House of Ptolemy!”
    That straightened Caesar, though he didn't get up, just looked with both eyes open at the speaker, now standing at the foot of the dais. Behind her stood a little boy and two men.
    About fifteen years old, Caesar judged: a busty, strapping girl with masses of golden hair, blue eyes, and a face that ought to have been pretty—it was regular enough of feature—but was not. Thanks to its expression, Caesar decided—arrogant, angry, quaintly authoritarian. She was clad in Greek style, but her robe was genuine Tyrian purple, a color so dark it seemed black, yet with the slightest movement was shot with highlights of plum and crimson. In her hair she wore a gem-studded coronet, around her neck a fabulous jeweled collar, bracelets galore on her bare arms; her earlobes were unduly long, probably due to the weight of the pendants dangling from them.
    The little boy looked to be about nine or ten and was very like Princess Arsinoë—same face, same coloring, same build. He too wore Tyrian purple, a tunic and Greek chlamys cloak.
    Both the men were clearly attendants of some kind, but the one standing protectively beside the boy was a feeble creature, whereas the other, closer to Arsinoë, was a person to be reckoned with. Tall, of splendid physique, quite as fair as the royal children, he had intelligent, calculating eyes and a firm mouth.
    “And where do we go from here?” Caesar asked calmly.
    “Nowhere until you prostrate yourself before me! In the absence of the King, I am regnant in Alexandria, and I command you to come down from there and abase yourself!” said Arsinoë. She looked at