Keeper of the Flame (36 page)

Her mind was not present in the Library, however.

It had traveled back, many years, to a stormy night and a stranger with a disfigured face and an illegitimate baby born to a servant . . .

And then a sharp cry behind her brought her back to the present.

She whirled and found her pirates backing away as one from Pothinus. He held a torch in two hands and waved it before him like a flaming sword. “If you give the Proginosko to Caesar, Sophia, I swear by the gods I will kill you.”

She growled in frustration at the pirates’ inattention. But they were not trained soldiers.

“Get behind me,” she said to Sosigenes.

“The scrolls!” he said, pointing.

In the alcove nearest them, flames licked at the edges of a dozen papyrus rolled where they were stacked in tidy rows on stone shelves.

Her pirates had realized their mistake and were circling Pothinus.

“Fire!” Sophia pushed the nearest pirates toward the alcove. “Save the scrolls!”

Pothinus eyed his work, smiled greedily, and waved his torch. He seemed to sense his opportunity.

Her men scrambled over each other in confusion. She could read their thoughts. Should they flee the fire? Douse it? Move the scrolls? Hold Pothinus?

Pothinus dodged from the group and ran across the Great Hall, past the statue of Euclid in the center, to an alcove opposite them. He touched the torch to scrolls there, then ran back toward the Great Hall.

He is insane.

She must make a choice. Her mind sifted through options with haste.

She had the Proginosko. She had Sosigenes. She did not need Pothinus for anything but revenge. She could not sacrifice the knowledge of the Library to her own anger.

“Leave him! Douse the fires! We must not allow the Library to burn!”

They spread through the Halls, to each of the places where Pothinus had touched his insane torch. They pulled scrolls from shelves, stamped them out with smoking, melting sandals. Sophia did not let go of the Proginosko, only shifted it in her arms to pull burning papyrus to the floor.

Even Sosigenes fought the flames, his hand still at his bleeding throat.

And then it was over, the Library filled with smoke and the burnt remains of countless scrolls. Sophia’s eyes stung with smoke and with the realization of the lost knowledge at their feet.

But they had saved the Library, and the bulk of the scrolls that still lay enshrined in its sacred halls.

Pothinus was gone.

They ran to the Library steps but pulled up as a group when they reached the portico.

In the darkness beyond, the harbor burned with dozens of small fires, like an echo of what they left behind. Flaming arrows arced through the night sky, some plummeting into the sea, some finding their targets of man and ship.

The city had erupted while they fought inside the Library.

The lighthouse.

“Come!” she called to them all and led the way down the steps with pirates and scholar streaming behind.

They fought their way across the royal quarter, dodging rolling siege towers, small skirmishes between townspeople and Romans, and clusters of Alexandrians that clotted the streets with angry fists raised and clubs in their hands.

They gained the heptastadion, and Sophia slowed, breathless. The Proginosko grew heavy in her arms, and Sosigenes leaned against her, his strength clearly ebbing.

“Can you make it?”

He did not answer.

Behind her, Biti appeared and braced an arm under the scholar’s shoulders. “Come on, old man,” he said. Sophia thanked him with a nod.

Small boats were engaged along the causeway, Roman soldiers fighting townspeople who had put out in any craft they could find. Others scrambled over the rocks that lined the bridge to the island, their crazed battle cries lifted into the harbor air.

An explosion rocked the ground. Sophia turned without thought.

A warehouse on the dock erupted in flame.

More books. Oh, not the books.

Sophia held back the tearful cry and pushed on. They must reach the lighthouse.

They gained the end of the heptastadion and ran through the village, picking up angry townspeople along the way. Ahead, the lighthouse beckoned, its solid and dark strength a comfort to her.

But before they reached the entrance, a boat bumped against the rocks behind them and disgorged its passengers, too many Romans to count.

They roared with battle-lust and fell upon the townspeople. She had learned enough of Roman warfare to recognize that it was a centuria. What did they want with the island? With the lighthouse?

Sophia pulled Sosigenes to the newly-set wooden door and pushed against it. Latched, as she expected. She slapped her hand on the splintered wood and yelled.

Inside the lighthouse, someone answered.

“Let us in,” she screamed. “It is Sophia!”

Behind her, the pirates turned on the Romans, holding them off.

The door swung open only a crack, and Sophia pushed forward, leading with the Proginosko. Ares stood within. She thrust the box into his hands and yanked Sosigenes through the opening.

“Secure the door!” she said to Ares, then turned in time to catch Sosigenes as he fell against her.

Ares set the box on the floor, shoved the door closed, and dropped the latch in place.

Sophia held Sosigenes upright. “I will take him to the others. Hide the Proginosko. Watch from a window. Come to us when the lighthouse is secure.”

Ares nodded and bent to the Proginosko.

Sophia ran her gaze over her young servant, and Pothinus’s revelation built inside her chest, until she feared she might explode as the warehouse had. But there was no time. No time to think, to question, to believe.

She pulled a hand free from Sosigenes to grip Ares’s arm. She waited until he lifted his eyes to hers. “Come to me. As soon as it is safe.”

His eyes flickered in response to the intensity of her voice, but he nodded, lips tight and jaw set.

Sosigenes was fading. From exertion, from blood loss, even perhaps from fear.

Sophia held him as best she could and pulled him toward the North Wing. Toward safety, she hoped.

But with the city and the harbor burning around them, she did not know if any of them would survive the night.

Forty-Two

F
rom the Eunostos Harbor where Bellus left his centuria in full control of the docks, the lighthouse seemed a distant thing, a far-off fortress on the tip of a remote island. The heptastadion, the village, and an encroaching second centuria stood between him and his impossible goal, to reach the lighthouse unharmed, and before any harm could come to Sophia.

He plunged to the task, the iron of his pilum cold comfort in his hand. He ran along the docks, avoiding citizens who would have engaged him in fruitless combat, keeping his head low when Roman soldiers passed.

He had not deserted. Not quite. His men had taken the docks as ordered, and now he went to secure the lighthouse, as only he could. Caesar would understand.

Though I care not whether he does.

The bridges were lowered to prevent ships crossing from one harbor to the other. Bellus ran along the edge of the causeway, prepared to climb down its rock wall if necessary.

Ahead, a mob of villagers clogged the end of the causeway, guarding the lighthouse.

Bellus glanced up as he ran, saw that the light still burned high atop the tower, a pinprick in the dark sky, a mirror of the flames that burned all around him in the harbor and on the docks behind.

Yes, the city burned. And Bellus feared for Sophia in spite of her stone fortress.

The smoke of flaming ships choked the causeway, a wall that stung his eyes and throat as he plowed through.

The lighthouse pulled him forward, calling to that buried part of him. He was a soldier, yes.
But that is not all I truly am.

The smoke cleared and Bellus kept his feet churning over the ground while his eyes darted left and right, aware of everything at once.

The battle raged in the harbor. Screaming Egyptian soldiers, ordered and disciplined battle calls of the Romans. Burning and cracking and grating ships.

Bellus ran like a silent Odysseus, flying to rescue the endangered Penelope.

He neared the end of the causeway. He could not plow through the townspeople, not as a Roman soldier.

He sheathed his sword with reluctance and took to the slippery black rocks that braced either side of the causeway. Algae and seawater slicked his hands and resisted his feet. He went down on one leg, felt the rock bite his shin, and scrambled forward through the pain.

He kept low, willing the mob above to keep their eyes on the sea, on the causeway, anywhere but the rocks. And then he was at the end, curving around toward the lighthouse, in full view of any of the people who might look his way.

A loud crack against the rocks behind him stayed his feet. He glanced back and saw that a Roman ship had bumped the causeway, and now a hundred hungry soldiers poured onto the stone and gravel bridge to engage the townspeople. The second centuria, come for the lighthouse. But first they must deal with the villagers.

It was the distraction Bellus needed.

He leaped over the uppermost rocks, reached the sand of the island, and plunged toward the lighthouse, barely keeping himself upright in his haste.

Sweat burned his eyes. He ripped his helmet from his head and swiped at his face.

The battle hardness was on him fully now, but he did not fight for Rome, nor Caesar, nor even his father.

He fought for Sophia.

He reached the lighthouse and stopped in shock at the wooden door he had never seen. He shoved against it with a yell, but it would not budge. He pulled his sword from its sheath and pounded the hilt of it against the door. Behind him, the centuria and the mob had fully engaged. He could hear the screams of untrained fighters. It could not be long before the soldiers stormed the lighthouse.

He pounded the door again and yelled for Sophia, for Ares, for anyone.

A muffled shout returned to him from the other side.

Ares.

“Let me in, boy! It is Pilus Prior Bellus!”

“I cannot! She said to allow no one!”

Bellus slammed a palm against the door and then his forehead. “It is for her own safety, Ares. Please! You must trust me!”

A pause, too long, then a single word called back.

“Wait!”

Bellus turned and leaned his back against the door, panting, and watched the battle beneath him, the flaming ships in the harbor, the burning docks beyond. The strength in his legs threatened to give way, and the fear in his chest tried to assert itself. He braced his head against the door. The words of
Sophocles ran ridiculously through his mind.
Men of ill judgment oft ignore the good that lies within their hands, ’til they have lost it.

Let me in, Sophia. It is time to let me in.

Forty-Three

S
ophia half-dragged the injured Sosigenes to the scholars’ study room. She called out through the door while still a few paces off. The door was unlocked from the inside and pulled open only a crack.

Several pairs of dark eyes peered out on her, then swung the door wide.

“Sosigenes!”

Strong hands took him from her grasp, led him forward to a couch in the torchlit room, and pulled her in.

They spoke, all at once.

“What is happening in the city?”

“Who cut you?”

“How did you find him?”

“Ah, the Proginosko!”

Sophia found herself breathing too hard to answer. She pointed to Sosigenes, to his pale cheeks and sunken eyes. “See to him.”

The scholars pressed around the two, blocking the torch’s light and making it difficult for her to catch her breath. And then Ares was there, at the edge of the crowd, standing on his toes, peering around white heads to find her.

A chill broke over her, passing through like a tremor. She reached out for him, her mind still muddled but her heart telling her impossible things.

“Sophia!” he called through the chattering lot. “I must speak to you.”

Yes, yes, I must speak to you as well!

He saw her hand extended to him, palm up, and reached past Archippos to grasp her fingers and pull her forward.

“Ares, Pothinus said—” Sophia began, looking up into his dark eyes, so unlike his mother, Eleni.

“Sophia, at the door,” Ares bent to whisper in her ear. “It is Bellus, yelling to be admitted.”

“Bellus!” She pulled back. “Why has he come?”

“He says it is for your protection. He says you must trust him.”

Sophia eyed the cluster of old men who had sprung into action now, treating Sosigenes’s cut and searching out clean rags. “The battle continues below the lighthouse?”

Ares ran his hand through his hair. “The Roman soldiers are being held off by the villagers, remarkably. I cannot say how long they will last.”

“But Bellus is alone? Not with his men?”

“I believe he is alone. But I did not unlatch the door. The men that he had left here in the lighthouse joined the fray outside.”

Sophia bit her lip and looked back to the scholars in the yellow pool of torchlight, the men whose lives she had sworn to protect. And Ares. She must protect him now. But it was not any Roman at the door. It was Bellus.

The floor seemed to ripple beneath her feet, and she covered her face with her hands. It was too much. Sosigenes hurt. Bellus returned. Ares—no time to even think of the possibilities. A long-unfamiliar swell of churning emotion broke like a wave over her heart, and her eyes burned with unshed tears.

Sosigenes called to her, as though he could read her heart. “You must believe that love overcomes, Sophia. Before it is too late.”

“What shall I tell him, Abbas?” Ares said. “In truth, I fear for him there at the door. I do not think he acts with the approval of his general.”

She could almost see Bellus, waiting at the door, his brow furrowed in frustration, entreating her to open her lighthouse.