Page 23 of Cleopatra

23

CLEOPATRA

I cannot think. My thoughts are thick and heavy and lined with blood and tumble over one another. There is no grief. Only shock and dread. I hear their voices, raised in fear and horror, but they sound as if they are coming from underwater now. Caesarion has stopped running, realising that I’m no longer in pursuit, and he stands swaying in the grass and frowns, his small face painted with disappointment. I rush to him and scoop him up, and he wriggles and cries, no longer pleased with the game, and I hold him too tight, frightened, and will not let him go.

Everywhere there is noise, cries of grief and confusion and conflicting instructions. The entire household is in motion yet Caesarion and I remain an island of stillness amid the chaos. He softens in my arms, snuggling into my neck, sensing the change in mood. We don’t move as the shouts break around us, we’re the rocks amid the crashing tide.

I told Caesar that he could be King of Rome, and I was the bellows to the fire of his ambition. I said aloud the whispers of his heart. I did not kill him. And yet, guilt noses at me, insistent as a wet dog. I push it away. It was his own desires, his longing. I only gave them voice. But he is dead all the same.

Caesarion does not know. And he will never know his father now. He is dead but there is no time for sadness. We can grieve later. Rome is not safe for us. We must run.