The Fortune Teller(18)

No one had ever denied Cleopatra, and it seemed Caesar couldn’t either. She was twenty-one now, a woman in her full glory and revered by the people as their queen and a living goddess.

News quickly spread that Caesar had become Cleopatra’s lover and protector. He returned Cleopatra to the throne and reestablished the joint rule she once shared with her brother. But Caesar had miscalculated the royal ministers, who were secretly fortifying the Egyptian army to sever their ties and end their subservience to Rome.

Caesar had not come to Alexandria with enough men to fight, and his reinforcements from Syria would not arrive in time to save them from defeat. So when the ministers’ treachery became apparent, Caesar picked the most strategic place in the city, a cluster of mansions by the water, and barricaded himself there with his troops. He took control of the adjacent isle of Pharos, where the great lighthouse stood. After securing the entrance to the port, he ordered that both harbors be burned.

Alexandria was the finest port city in the world, with deep waters. Its two harbors could hold a thousand ships, which lit like kindling and stoked the fires for days. We tried to continue on while flames engulfed the ships on the water.

In the throes of worry, I didn’t think to consult the Oracle’s symbols. It’s true but I didn’t think of myself as a seer back then. Seers grasp the future and pull it back into the present, while the rest of us wait for it to find us. I waited. No one knew what tomorrow held. No one knew who would win this war.

*

The night the flames took the city I joined my father outside our home to watch the harbor. We lived in the Brucheion near the royal complex and had a clear view of the port.

Before us an endless sea of red fire stretched across the water like a titan’s arms, traveling in all directions. The flames leaped, full of rage and a strange kind of beauty that both repelled and mesmerized me at the same time. I would never see anything so magnificent again.

Then the sea breeze shifted and the black smoke began to roll toward us like viscous waves, causing me to choke.

“The winds are turning,” my father said, his voice filled with dread.

For days, ever since Caesar had given the order to burn the harbor, everyone worried that the fire would make its way to the library. The wind was now full of malice.

My father called to my brothers. “Ring the bells!” Then he ran after them to the library. He was too seized with panic to notice that I had followed.

Within minutes, the bells were ringing. My brothers had been quick. Soon crowds of people came running to help.

Imagine the flames of Hades. I have no other words to describe the devastation.

We all rushed inside together like a Greek chorus, suddenly players in an unbelievable tragedy, grabbing every scroll and codex we could carry in our arms. Outside we threw the bundles high into the air and far into the distance, hoping to get as many of the works as we could to safety.

I raced back inside to the lower gallery, intent on saving the Oracle’s box. As I rounded the corner, I saw my father unlocking the secret door to the lower gallery. I called out to him. When he turned, I saw the truth in his eyes. He knew I had a key, and he knew I had been down there before. He had let me go with his blessing.

“Stay back, Ionna!” he yelled.

Then I saw him disappear down the stairwell. I screamed and tried to run after him, but a shelf fell in front of me, blocking the entrance.

A man called out behind me. His robes had caught fire while he was trying to save a collection of scrolls. He ran toward me, but a wall of flames enveloped him.

I stood crying, waiting for my father to return, but the smoke forced me to go back outside. I collapsed on the ground and gasped for air. People dashed past me carrying buckets of water. At least a third of the library had already been destroyed, if not more. People were still trying to salvage what they could.

The Oracle’s stone box, her writings and symbols, were now surely gone. My father must have known what priceless treasures the lower galleries held. That was why he’d risked his life to save them.

I don’t remember when I was told to leave or by whom. My clothes were singed and covered in ash. When I arrived home, I fell asleep on a pallet by the door so I could hear when my brothers returned and, with the gods’ will, my father.

*

The next morning stillness greeted me.

I rose to wash my hands and feet and wiped my face. I changed robes and drank two cups of water. Dizzy, I sat down. I wanted to cry but knew if I started to weep I would never stop. What the day would hold, I could not fathom. I had foreseen my mother’s death, but not this.

When I returned to the library the blackened walls told the story. An eerie calm rested in the air, as if a great storm had blown through, and then left us.

In one night, nearly all the knowledge, all the dreams of dreamers had been extinguished like stars in the sky no longer shining. I saw bedraggled men staggering from exhaustion as they tried to organize the salvaged scrolls and codices blanketing the lawns. The wreckage was a giant puzzle that could never be put right again.

The director of the library saw me, and his face fell. “Ionna, go home,” he said gently. “I will have my daughter come.”

His daughter was of my mother’s generation. I did not understand why he would send her to me.

“Thank you, but there is no need,” I said. “We will be fine.”

He did not speak, but the anguish on his face told me my brothers would not be coming home either. I backed away, unable to believe that, in one night, I had lost them all.