Athena's Son (23 page)

The golden man grabbed Archimedes wrists and pulled a dagger from a sheath on his hip. Archimedes tried to pull away but the man held on tightly and sawed through the rope with three swift cuts. Archimedes rubbed his raw wrists and wondered if this was some cruel joke. He looked first at Pollux, who was sneering, then to Ptahhotep, glowering with hatred, then back at the man.

“
Who are you?” Archimedes asked.

“
I am a specter, a ghost who wields the iron sword of retribution. I am god come back to life to reclaim my throne. I am Alexander IV, son of Alexander the Great, rightful heir to the kingdom of Macedonia.”

Chapter 29

Archimedes had gone from proving that Anubis did not walk the earth to having the ghost of a dead king appear before him. The son of Alexander the Great paced anxiously around the clammy room, gesturing wildly as he explained the chronicles of his life.

He was not poisoned at age 13. His mother, Roxanne, was too cunning and well versed in using poison to let her own son be assassinated. She knew that the generals vying for control of Alexander the Great’s empire would want to murder her son, the legitimate heir. Before the traitors could carry out their plan, she sent Alexander IV off to Rome and in his place hired an innocent boy who looked nearly identical to her son.

Roxanne martyred herself by allowing the assassins to poison her and the boy, giving Alexander IV the opportunity to live and grow up safely and secretly in Rome. Rome was the only civilization strong enough to protect him and young enough not to have generals who feared the legacy of his father.

Yes, he knew his mother poisoned his father. She admitted putting increasing amounts of deadly nightshade in his wine to mimic the effects of a fever. Alexander IV held no grudge against his mother because it was part of her elaborate plan to make him the king. Remove the unfaithful and increasingly unstable Alexander the Great, and in his place raise a new king who would be under her influence. Now he has returned, he told Archimedes, to claim his father’s body, and with it, the birthright to the throne of Alexander the Great.

“
But why the body?” Archimedes asked. “Why do you need me?” He was beginning to wonder how many more people would die in order to own a man who was already dead. Hopefully this king without a kingdom would have a lucid moment and let Archimedes, and more importantly, Berenike, free. Wherever she was.

“
Don’t you see?” Alexander turned fiercely toward Archimedes. “The body is everything! Whoever has the body of Alexander the Great possesses the symbol of legitimacy to rule his empire. That is why General Ptolemy robbed the funeral train while it was returning to Macedonia. He stole a god! He knew its power. He knew the body would make Alexandria the center of the known world and at the same time compel the Egyptians accept a Greek as their king.”

Behind Archimedes, Ptahhotep gave a cruel snicker. “Exactly why I am helping, schoolboy. By ridding my people of the body of Alexander, I weaken the false king Ptolemy, and Kemet—what you call Egypt—can have a rightful ruler sit upon the throne meant for true sons of Ra. It was my idea to kill the workers at the lighthouse.”

“
Our partnership,” Ptahhotep gestured an indolent hand toward Alexander, “has mutual benefits. He wanted the body; I wanted to be rid of it. He needed a ruse to get to the tomb, I sacrificed a few laborers. I learned about the simple expedience of a dart and poison from one of the many foreign spies that roam with impunity under Ptolemy’s rule.”

Pollux stretched his pink scar with a cruel smile of yellow teeth. “Strychnine. Clamps down on your heart like Hades himself reaching into your chest.”

“
I knew Ptolemy would eventually send his Medjay to guard the lighthouse,” Ptahhotep said, “thus leaving the tomb of Alexander the Great unguarded. The rumors of Anubis committing the murders were the lucky result of some large dog walking across the murder scene.”

Romulus and Remus, the masters of deception and substitution. They admitted their wolf was at the murder scene, but their twisting, contorted confession only hinted at Rome being involved. They must have known Alexander IV was in Rome and then came to Egypt to bring back his father’s body. All their double talk and innuendo only served to protect their own backsides from any repercussions from this plot. He would have to deal with them later, if there was a later. Right now he was trapped with three violent and unpredictable men, the worst being Ptahhotep.

All the running in the market and the dust from the floor made Archimedes’ throat feel like the Egyptian desert. He coughed before saying in a scratchy voice, “If I understand you correctly, you care so much about your people that you are willing to kill them.”

“
You Greeks are the last race to question the motives of others.” Ptahhotep shot back. “While your people were busy fighting and killing each other, Egypt built magnificent temples that reached to the skies. And that cursed lighthouse of the false king will only draw more of your ilk to Egypt like rats to a cargo ship. That is why I tried to destroy it by claiming it was cursed. It nearly worked, until you interfered.”

Archimedes stretched his cracked lips in a feeble but knowing smile that did not escape the attention of Ptahhotep. “Laugh now, schoolboy. All of our elaborate plans did not clear the Medjay from the tomb until we took from Ptolemy the one thing he values most.” Now it was Ptahhotep’s turn to give an evil grin, “His beloved daughter Berenike. You can thank your old shipmate Pollux for coming up with that ploy.”

“
No need to thank me, eh, little goat?” Pollux smirked. “Just pay a few coins to a scribe to write a forged note from your merchant friend and we catch two rats in the same trap, you and your girlfriend.” Pollux’s tone turned hostile. “You know all about rat traps, don’t you? Maybe your girlfriend will have to pay for the little joke you played on me.”

The implied threat to Berenike burned at Archimedes, but he knew he couldn’t do anything, yet. “I always meant to ask you Pollux if you found the taste of rotting rats to your liking?”

Pollux jumped up and nearly had his knife in Archimedes before Alexander pushed him back onto the crate. “I told you I need this boy alive.”

“
You must forgive my faithful servant Pollux,” Ptahhotep said. “He puts his whole heart into his work.”

“
Speaking of faithful servants, I saw how you pay them back when your devoted scribe Ipuwer was spilling his whole heart on the cold marble floor of the temple,” Archimedes said.

“
A worthy sacrifice for the gods…” Ptahhotep began, but was cut off by Alexander.

“
Quiet, priest!” Alexander heard enough. “Lies leak from your mouth like drool from a baby. You are after the same thing I am—power.” Ptahhotep slunk back into a corner and sulked.

“
As to you, Archimedes,” Alexander said, “It seems everyone’s had a chance to interact with your inventions. Pollux was paid back with your rat trap. You frustrated Ptahhotep with your crown solution. That was me watching you from the temple when you built your cart and I followed you when you demonstrated your machine that blew up the melon.”

He paced several steps toward Archimedes. “Ptahhotep made the mistake of hiring Egyptian engineers to remove my father’s coffin. I don’t need Egyptian engineers; I need a Greek genius.”

Archimedes ignored the compliment. “So all you need is to get a dead man back to Macedonia?”

“
Fool!” The crazy Alexander turned on him. “Macedonia is irrelevant. Greece is the past. Egypt is no longer important, despite what this priest would believe. The future is in the west. There is a new power that will outshine Persia, Greece, or Egypt. The future is Rome! I have seen what their legions can do. All they need is a man who can lead them. Who better than the son of a god? Rome will supply the men, horses, and weapons, and I will supply the brilliance of Alexander to conquer all of Europe!”

Alexander was pacing again, wild in his thoughts of conquest. “Rome and Europe are a large block of stone waiting for a skilled artist to shape it into an empire the world has never seen. It will make my father’s kingdom look like slums of Alexandria.”

The dizziness passed and Archimedes was able to sit up by leaning against the wooden pillar. “Your father was battle-tested by King Phillip and tutored by Aristotle. Why would Rome’s legions follow you?”

Alexander scrutinized Archimedes. “Soldiers don’t judge with their minds; they judge with their eyes. They will see Alexander the Great reincarnated before them and that will ignite the unused potential in them; it will be the catharsis to shed their old ways and absorb the power and promise I am offering. I am the god they have hungered for!”

He grabbed Archimedes by the arm and threw him toward Pollux. “Enough talk! Pollux, bring the boy. Ptahhotep, you know what to do. When I have the body safely in Rome, you can begin your insurrection and topple Ptolemy Pharaoh from his throne.”

Pollux was dragging Archimedes toward the door but Archimedes shook off his grip and turned to Alexander IV. “Wait. Please. If I agree to help you, will you release Berenike, unharmed? She is innocent and of no use to you.”

Alexander leaned his face only inches from Archimedes. “You know nothing of leverage, boy,” he whispered. “Berenike’s kidnapping has the Medjay searching all of Alexandria for her, letting us get into the tomb undiscovered. Second, having someone you so obviously care about keeps you honest. I’ve seen your handiwork. I can’t afford to have your clever little mind devising traps for me. You better come up with a better solution for removing the coffin than those incompetent engineers Ptahhotep found or you won’t have to worry about your pretty friend. You’ll both be dead.”

Chapter 30

Outside the tomb of Alexander the Great, a small brown-speckled owl swooped down and trapped a mouse grown fat from pilfered grain. The talons tightened around the rodent as the owl turned its dispassionate gaze at three men driving a wagon. It spread its wings, caught the wind after several sweeps of its wings, and took off with its prey still squirming.

Archimedes, Pollux, and another man got off the wagon and entered the unguarded tomb. Four large murals depicted Alexander’s conquests across Babylonia, Egypt, Persia, and India. A pair of life size statues portrayed two of his more famous adventures—taming his horse, Bucephalus, and untying the Gordian Knot. Four slender Corinthian columns stretched up 20 feet to a ceiling with one skylight in the center that allowed the god Ra to sweep his light across the coffin of Alexander the Great. Now the skylight was beginning to fill with the first stars of dusk.

Archimedes had less than 12 hours to save Berenike. The directive from Alexander IV was explicit: Get the coffin out of the tomb by sunrise or he would kill Berenike. If Archimedes could remove the coffin, it would be loaded onto a wagon and then onto a ship waiting to transport Alexander, the coffin, and a group of minions back to Rome. To help Archimedes achieve that improbable task and at the same time keep him from scheming, Alexander left behind Pollux and another thug from the wharves.

Although one of the greatest generals in history lay only a few feet away, Archimedes was more interested in the design, weight, and proportions of the coffin. He approached this task like he did the autopsy of the corpse with Herophilos. It wasn’t a dead king or a symbol of some future empire; it was purely a scientific challenge.

Thoughts of Berenike tried to creep into the recesses of his active mind like tiny spiders, but he blocked them. He had to concentrate on the mechanics and materials required to confiscate Alexander the Great.

To Ra, Alexander was a fellow god, crowned King of Egypt and preserved in mummification like the pharaohs before him. To Archimedes, he was a weight to be calculated and moved by mechanical force. The Greeks called these Egyptian coffins a sarcophagus, which meant
flesh eating stone,
because they believed the limestone they were carved out of actually deteriorated the corpse. Fortunately, this coffin was not a massive limestone block, as most pharaohs’ sarcophagi were.

This one was designed with the clean, sleek design preferred by Greeks. The artisan who created this coffin was inspired by the work of the Greek sculpture Phidias who designed both the statue of Zeus at Olympia and the statue of Athena in the Parthenon. The artist created a likeness of Alexander for the lid and used ivory for the face, arms, and legs and gold for the armor. Like Athena and Zeus, Alexander held a small statue of Nike, the goddess of victory. The artist did an exceptional job because there was a definite resemblance to Alexander IV.

The coffin lay on a marble slab about 3 feet off the ground. The Egyptian engineers were right about one thing. The doorway was purposely narrow so the coffin could not be removed from the tomb. Not that it would be easy to even move the coffin. After removing extraneous ornaments and supports, it still would weigh just under a half ton. Archimedes lit a torch and it fluttered as he swept the tomb looking for another way to get it out. Was this tomb built around the coffin? He looked back up to the skylight and to the constellations he knew so well.

He took out his wooden amulet, gave a silent prayer to Athena, and the random stars began to align.

Archimedes turned to Pollux. “I’m going to need four wagon wheels, strong ones. Two hundred feet of hawser, not any rope, it has to be the hawser from a ship’s anchor. A ladder long enough to reach that skylight. Two stout timbers at least 10 feet long and at least 12 block timbers. Also, wood planks and tools. You can find all the tools and wood at the lighthouse worksite. There should be rounded logs near the stone blocks. Get about 10 of those, too. I don’t care if you or your friend goes, but make it quick, we have to box this coffin up and we don’t have much time.” Archimedes, backed by orders from Alexander, was in charge of this theft, but his real goal was to keep Berenike safe.