One wearing a red cape stepped forward when it became clear that my intention was to enter. “What is your business here?” he demanded. His eyes flickered over Judah and Saba behind me.
“My name is Maviah, daughter of Rami bin Malik in Dumah,” I said. “I have come for an audience with Herod, tetrarch of Galilee and Perea.”
A faint smile crossed his face. “Herod?”
“Does he not rule here?”
“You are a whore?”
A guard behind him chuckled. In that moment I reached inside my mind and traded myself for the Roman mistress I’d served as a slave in Egypt—a powerful woman unlike any I had since known.
“Does the daughter of a king look like a whore to you, Roman?”
He appeared unimpressed, so I continued.
“And if I am Herod’s whore, would you deny him his lusts?”
“Then you don’t know that Herod has no whores who pass through this gate. Nor queens without Roman guard.”
“I have no Roman guard because I have brought my own slaves, each with the strength of ten Roman soldiers, as you can see.”
I held his gaze, boldly challenging him. Was this not what a queen would say?
The guard’s lips flattened. “You should watch your tongue here.”
“And you yours,” I said.
His expression soured and I knew I’d pushed the boundaries. So I calmly withdrew the dagger of Varus from my sash and held it out.
“Since you doubt my honor.”
He glanced at it, then took the knife and inspected the hilt, which clearly showed the crest of Varus. Another soldier had approached and peered at the dagger.
“What is it?”
“The insignia of Varus.” My interrogator looked up at me. “Where did you get this?”
“My father, ruler of Arabia, was given it for audience with Rome as required. It was Rami bin Malik’s victory with Varus at his side that allowed Herod to build Sepphoris.”
There was still doubt in the soldier’s eyes, but his contempt was gone, for he was surely familiar enough with the city’s history to know it had been burned to the ground before Rome gave Herod charge over Galilee.
He passed the dagger to the other soldier. “We will see if Herod agrees.”
“Of course. We will wait.”
As the second soldier headed for a horse tied by a smaller gate, I nudged my camel to turn. Then, on second thought, I glanced back.
“We’ve been on a long journey with urgent business and the sun is hot today. Please keep that in mind.”
I did not glance at Judah or Saba until we retreated to the shade of a palm, out of the guard’s hearing. Even then I turned my gaze to the gate, where the soldier looked my way, having dispatched his companion to Herod’s court.
Judah whistled under his breath. “And now the star shines.”
I fought my worry. “It wasn’t too much?”
“It appears not.”
“Be careful,” Saba said. “Such men shouldn’t be crossed.”
His words pricked me. “Then I overstepped.”
“Don’t fill her mind with worry, Saba,” Judah hissed. “She does only what comes naturally.”
He was wrong. I felt no more natural here than I might have stepping from a boat into the sea having never learned to swim. And yet I sat still and erect. The soldiers were watching.
Neither Judah nor Saba made mention of my calling them my slaves, which had come from me without forethought, because it was natural for a queen to be accompanied by such strong men. Judah would have no trouble, but Saba surely swallowed the notion of being slave to a woman with some difficulty.
Still, he played his role in service to his master, Rami, with grace.
We waited for nearly an hour before the soldier who’d been dispatched returned and gave his verdict to the other, who then motioned to us.
Again we approached, and this time he waved for the gate to open. “Quintus will take you.”
And so we entered the acropolis, inner city to Herod, Jewish ruler of Galilee under the authority of Rome. The soldier rode in silence several lengths before us, leading us over the clean-swept streets, in no hurry.
We passed magnificent villas like none we’d yet seen. Herod had indeed built his seat of power using impressive Roman and Greek architecture. Tall palms swayed in the wind along narrow canals and around pools. I felt as though I had entered an oasis, though we were high on a hill.
The cobbled way led past a massive circular theater with towering walls. Johnin, father of my son, had been killed in one such Roman arena.
A team of slaves worked at a wooden structure the height of fifteen men, an irrigation waterwheel. Its buckets lifted water from an aqueduct on the acropolis wall to suspended troughs, which I assumed fed pools and cisterns at the palace’s highest point. Many stone columns rose along the causeway, supporting covered walkways.