Death of an Eye Read online

  DEATH OF AN EYE

  Dana Stabenow

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  About this Book

  About the Author

  Table of Contents

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  About Death of an Eye

  ALEXANDRIA 47 BC

  For three centuries, the House of Ptolemy has governed the Kingdom of Egypt. Cleopatra – seventh of her name – rules from Alexandria, that beacon of commerce and learning that stands between the burning sands of the desert and the dark waters of the Middle Sea.

  But her realm is beset by ethnic rivalries, aristocratic feuds and courtly intrigues. Not only that, she must contend with the insatiable appetite of Julius Caesar who needs Egyptian grain and Egyptian gold to further his ambitions. The world is watching the young Queen, waiting for a misstep…

  And now her most trusted servant – her Eye – has been murdered and a vast shipment of newly minted coin stolen. Cleopatra cannot afford for the coins to go unrecovered or the murderers unpunished, so she asks childhood friend, Tetisheri Nebenteru, to retrace the dead Eye’s footsteps.

  Tetisheri will find herself plunged into the shadowy heart of Alexandria. As she sifts her way through a tangle of lies and deceit, she will discover that nothing can be taken at face value, that she can’t trust anyone – not even the Queen herself.

  Content

  Welcome Page

  About Death of an Eye

  Dedication

  Cast of characters

  Maps

  Epigraph

  Prólogos

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Epílogos

  Acknowledgements

  About Dana Stabenow

  About the Kate Shugak Series

  Also by Dana Stabenow

  An Invitation from the Publisher

  Copyright

  This one is for Scott Gere

  who helped me build a hybrid publishing

  business model that lets me write what

  I want to, at least some of the time.

  This book is the result.

  Thanks, Scott.

  Cast of characters

  Amenemhet Nomarch of the Crocodile, friend of Nebenteru

  Apollodorus Partner in the Five Soldiers, Cleopatra’s personal guard

  Aristander Head of the Shurta, the local police

  Arsinoë Daughter of Ptolemy XII Auletes, Cleopatra’s sister

  Atet Employee of Khemit, wife of Ineni

  Bolgios the Gaul Crew on Thalassa

  Cassius Gaius Cassius Longinus, Senator of Rome, father of Naevius and Petronius

  Castus Partner in the Five Soldiers

  Charmion The queen’s personal servant

  Cleopatra VII Queen of Alexandria and Upper and Lower Egypt

  Crixus Partner in the Five Soldiers

  Cordros Gem merchant, friend of Uncle Neb

  Cotta, aka Aurelius Cotta Caesar’s cousin and trusted aide

  Debu the Egyptian First mate on Thalassa

  Dubnorix Partner in the Five Soldiers

  Edeva Taverna proprietor, daughter of Old Pert

  Gelo Paulinos’ second-in-command

  Gnaeus Lentulus Owner of a ludus in Capua

  Harmon Master of Laogonus’ workshop

  Hunefer Nomarch of Marimda, follower of Ptolemy XIV, Tetisheri’s former husband

  Ineni a prosperous flax farmer

  Ipwet Hunefer’s mother

  Isidorus Partner in the Five Soldiers

  Julius Caesar General, Senator and Consul of Rome

  Keren Student of medicine

  Khemit A weaver and the Queen’s Eye

  Kiya Wife of Amenemhet

  Laogonus Owner and captain of Thalassa

  Leon the Iberian Crew on Thalassa

  Linos the Eunuch Political advisor to Ptolemy XIV

  Naevius Son of Gaius Cassius Longinus

  Nebenteru Uncle Neb, Tetisheri’s uncle and partner in Nebenteru’s Luxury Goods

  Nebet Hunefer’s cook

  Nenwef Friend of Hunefer

  Nike Hunefer’s former slave

  Old Pert the Pict Crew on Thalassa

  Paulinos Longinus Shipping agent, father of Paulina

  Petronius Son of Gaius Cassius Longinus

  Philo Advisor to Ptolemy XIV

  Polykarpus Advisor to Ptolemy XIV, former advisor to Arsinoë

  Ptolemy XII Auletes Cleopatra’s father

  Ptolemy XIV Theos Cleopatra’s brother and co-ruler

  Ptolemy XV Caesarion Son of Caesar and Cleopatra

  Sosigenes The queen’s chief counselor

  Tarset Chief assistant to Khemit the weaver

  Tetisheri Friend and confidante of Cleopatra, partner in Nebenteru’s Luxury Goods

  Thales Egyptian general, advisor to Ptolemy XIV

  Zoe Wife of General Thales

  Zotikos The queen’s physician

  Maps

  Honestly, I think historians are all mad.

  —Josephine Tey

  PRÓLOGOS

  in the Sixth Year of the reign of Cleopatra VII

  in Mesore, the Fourth Month of Shemu, the season of

  harvest on the Ninth Day of the Second Week

  at the Nineteenth Hour…

  Sefkhet, as she was called by the Egyptians, Selene by the Greeks, cast her pale-faced glory upon the storied city on the southeastern edge of the Middle Sea, turning columned palaces and marbled streets into a city of ghosts, luminous, shifting, dreamlike, a place of legends that had only gained in renown in the three hundred years since its founding.

  To the north, the Middle Sea was a continuous ripple of gilt, Lake Mareotis a shadowed mirror to the south, the Nile a slender silver ribbon to the east, all of them bathed in the glow of her care. Nothing escaped her eye. The woman in labor all night in her home in the Egyptian Quarter near the Western Gate had finally given birth to a fine, lusty son and both were now deep asleep. In a house in the Royal Quarter events were occurring that saddened her, but things like that were best left to the judgement of Hathor and she moved on. The queen slept in the Royal Palace next to the man she had chosen as her consort, and was ripe with his child. Sefkhet was not an admirer, as he was a worshipper of alien gods, but the queen was strong and intelligent and fit to rule a land as diverse as this one and thus far Sefkhet had reserved judgement.

  The light of Pharos flashed far out to sea, alerting mariners due to arrive the following morning. Boats that had already made port bobbed at anchor and at the docks of the Port of Eunostos. In Rhakotis a seaman stirred next to the woman he had hired for the evening, dreaming of his wife far to the north.

  Alexandria slept, beautiful and silent and still, beneath Sefkhet’s watchful eye, and she was content.

  And yet… no, not everyone slept. There were those abroad on the queen’s business, necessary business, and dangerous, too. Far below on one of those marbled streets sandals whispered over cool stone. A slender form wrapped in a dark cloak from head to ankle slipped from shadow to shadow, disturbing the air no more than a zephyr wafting ashore. The two men she followed were less cautious, or perhaps less practiced in moving silently.

  Yes, there were others out on business of their own as well, and less savory business to be sure. Sefkhet was annoyed at this unseemly and unnatural disturbance and was half inclined to intervene, but she yearned toward the horizon and her own rest. Besides, there was her brother Ra rising from his own sleep behind her, now only a sugge
stion of radiant light on the eastern horizon but soon to be a blinding, golden glow. She prepared to lay herself to rest.

  The momentary dark between moonset and sunrise was merciful in that the woman moving between shadows in the street below never saw the upraised arm or the weapon in the clenched fist. So concentrated on the words of the two men she was following, so intent on getting close enough to overhear their low-voiced conversation, she did not hear the scuff of different sandals behind her, sandals worn by an unsuspected third conspirator. She knew only a sudden shock, and then an immediate sensation of falling into a darkness even deeper than that of the night. She never felt the hard, cool marble beneath her cheek, or smelled the coppery scent of her own blood, or saw the dark pool spreading from beneath her head, or heard the frantic scurry of hurrying feet fading into the distance.

  A round, flat blue stone slipped from her bodice and fell to the marble tile with a distant click, suspended crookedly from the chain around her neck. When Ra in all his glory mounted the eastern horizon a moment later, the nacre inlay of the stone’s eye gleamed in the light of a new day.

  And the dead woman’s ka rose from her body and drifted south on the wind.

  1

  on the morning of the Tenth Day of the Second Week

  at the Fifth Hour…

  “Sheri! Where are you, girl? Sheri!”

  “Uncle Neb! You’re back!” A slim woman materialized from the depths of the house. She ran forward to throw her arms around the speaker. He raised her off her feet and squeezed her so hard it caused a breathless protest.

  Nebenteru the Trader (Imports and Exports, Dealing Exclusively in Luxury Goods Fine and Rare, Prices Available Upon Request, Commissions Negotiated) was a man made to chuckle and he did so now, all two bellies and three chins shaking as he set her down again. “Wait till you see the treasures I have brought downriver!” He spread his arms wide and raised his face to the sky, as if imploring Hathor herself to witness his words. “The merchants of Alexandria will weep with envy and we shall be rich beyond dreams of avarice!”

  Tetisheri regarded him with affection. His hair was black and his skin was dark, in part from their common Theban ancestors and in part from long days spent shepherding shipments up and down the Nile and across the Middle Sea. His eyes were large and dark brown and thickly lashed and drew up slightly at the outer corners. Like Tetisheri’s own but that hers were a clear blue, a blue as deep and dark as the Middle Sea itself.

  As dark as he, she was taller by a hand and slender where he was stout, she was simply dressed in a slim tunic of white Egyptian cotton, her only ornament a tiny chalcedony pendant in the shape of an exquisitely carved black cat hanging from a silken cord around her neck. By contrast Uncle Neb was a bit of a dandy. His tunic and trousers were made of the finest linen from the looms of the city’s most talented weavers, the sash that bound them a marvel of red and gold thread. His hair was close-cropped and always neatly trimmed, and his beard was drawn into a point off his chin and that point adorned with a large, tear-shaped pearl that trembled violently as he talked and laughed. It trembled now as he caught her shoulders in his hands and looked her over. “All is well with you then, Tetisheri?”

  She smiled down at him, hands raising to clasp his. “All is well, Uncle Neb.”

  “Breaking any hearts?”

  She made a face. “Not lately.” Not since her disaster of a marriage had ended two years before, and not ever again if she had anything to say about it.

  He raised an eyebrow but forbore to comment. “And the business? Sales are booming?” They turned as one toward the back of the house, her arm settling around his shoulders and his about her waist.

  “The business goes well, Uncle, although there has been more trading than selling, and what we sell is bought mostly with denarii. You’ve heard the news? That Caesar is leaving soon?”

  He nodded. “I passed him and the queen coming upriver as I was coming down.”

  “I saw them leave. It was quite the procession.”

  “Difficult to believe the royal barge didn’t sink beneath the weight of the statuary she loaded on board.”

  “Living and dead,” Tetisheri said, and they both laughed. “I hope Caesar was properly impressed.”

  “As he was meant to be.”

  “As he was meant to be. But my point is, Uncle, is that with Caesar and his men leaving soon, we might like to look at the inventory. As long as there is one Roman left in all of Egypt we can never stock enough olive oil, but there might be less call for garum.”

  “Caesar is not the man to leave a prize as rich as Egypt unguarded, Sheri.” Uncle Neb shook his head. “Nor is he so unwise or so unambitious as to leave a puppet behind with no minder, lest she cut her strings.”

  “The queen is no puppet, Uncle.”

  “You’ve known her longest and best,” he said agreeably, and left the but unsaid. “Regardless, I venture to say that there will be Romans enough left behind when Caesar goes to maintain a healthy profit on any amount of garum we care to stock.”

  Tetisheri’s frown deepened. “Very likely you’re right.” A young woman entered the room. “Yes, Keren?”

  “You have a caller. He waits in the atrium.”

  “Thank you.” She kissed Neb’s cheek. “Go gloat over your treasures. I’ll be with you in a moment.”

  “Well met, Keren!” Neb said. “You won’t believe what I found for you!”

  “I won’t?”

  “Indeed, in a little shop in the souk in Berenike. An enormous collection of healing herbs such as would have wrung your heart at the very sight.”

  “You went all the way to Berenike?”

  He waved a negligent hand. “An easy diversion from Syrene, and well worth the journey. The trade goods on the docks of Berenike, Keren, you should have seen the variety, from as far away as Punt and Sinae! It was marvelous to behold.”

  “Were there any seeds with these faraway herbs that you found, Uncle?”

  He grinned at her. “Seeds for all of them.”

  “Uncle! And did you bring some of each back for me, too?”

  He pretended offense. “What do you take me for, child? Of course I did.”

  Their voices faded as Tetisheri made her way to the atrium, a large, square room open to the sky. A fountain made of simple white marble tiers shaped into staggered rounds trickled pleasantly from one level to the next and finally into a small pool beneath. Citrus and pomegranate trees flourished in every corner.

  Her pace slowed when she saw who was waiting for her.

  He was looking into the pool, a contemplative expression on his face, and he did not hear her at first so that she was able to study him for a few moments. He was tall with a trim figure that gave the impression of motion even when at rest. His brown tunic was made from a rough weave and girdled by a wide belt bearing a gladius in a boiled leather sheath. Wide guards stamped with double-headed eagles bound both wrists, their leather well oiled and supple from use. Old scars gleamed whitely against his skin, across an eyebrow, a cheekbone, his jaw, both arms, slanted deeply across a calf, a history of service under arms, although he was anything but the grizzled old soldier. His hair was fair and thick, cut close to his head. He could have been any age from twenty to forty.

  He looked up. His eyes were the color of olivine, pale and clear and of a quality that one instinctively felt pierced directly to the heart of any matter, suffering no ambiguity, equivocation, or outright lie.

  “Tetisheri,” he said. His voice was deep and steady.

  “Apollodorus.”

  “She wants to see you.”

  She cast a look behind her, ready with excuses of a newly returned uncle and a massive intake in inventory to be accounted.

  “Immediately.”

  Her lips tightened briefly, and then relaxed. “I’ll get my cloak.”

  2

  on the morning of the Tenth Day of the Second Week

  at the Sixth Hour…

 
Nebenteru’s Luxury Goods boasted a prime central location on Hermes Street, which followed the docks lining the Port of Eunostos, which meant they could avoid the crowds and commotion of the Canopic Way by walking along the edge of the harbor. The manmade Port of Kibotos was behind them, Kibotos being the port of entry for the canal leading to the Nile, where all upriver traffic stopped to be checked by Customs for duty and by the Shurta for contraband. Coming up on their left was the Heptastadion, the causeway connecting the city with the Isle of Pharos. The island’s eastern end was dominated by the lighthouse, so tall and the flame of its light made so bright by reflecting mirrors that it could be seen from ships as far as ten leagues at sea. It could be seen from everywhere in Alexandria, too, and was the lodestone by which its citizens navigated about their city.

  It was a day as beautiful as were most days in Alexandria, a city benefiting from an idyllic location between the stifling heat of the interior deserts and the cool, onshore winds of the Middle Sea. Sunlight skipped across the ripples of the water, against which the Pharos stood tall and proud. The air smelled of salt. Gulls soared and dived and called raucously to one another, second in volume only to the low, continuous roar of the streets of Alexandria by day. A fisherman was selling his early morning catch off the stern of his boat and was surrounded by a gaggle of slaves and housewives bargaining furiously at the tops of their voices for only the best shrimp and squid and fish for that evening’s dinner. Stalls lining both sides of the street featured onions, leeks, and garlic, lentils, beans and spices, dates, figs, plums, pomegranates, melons and more. The latest in food and fashion from Rome, Athens, and Byzantium was hawked from the decks of larger ships, and the wealth of brightly colored fruits and fabrics was enough to blind the eye.

  The spaces between the vendors were, as always, well seeded with individuals hoping to gather a few coins in their bowls with magic tricks, juggling, and acrobatics. There were many musicians with varying degrees of talent, like the young Greek man who tootled mournfully on a flute, in accompaniment with another young Greek who sang a song of losing his mother, his job, and his dog all on the same day. They were very attractive young men, which accounted for the circle of adoring young women surrounding them. Here a man aged either by nature or by craft cast a spell on a half-circle of rapt boys with the tale of Achilles before the walls of Troy. Some of it Tetisheri recognized from Homer, the rest, especially the addition of Achilles’ hand-to-hand battle with Ares over the favors of Aphrodite, was new to her and probably to everyone else on the street as well. An older woman with soulful dark eyes read fortunes in palms under the baleful surveillance of a Jewish priest with long earlocks.