"Of course."
He stopped suddenly, and looked back to the garden.
"And if I ever wish..."
"What, Ramses?"
"If I ever wish to be mortal again?" he asked. "If Julie ever wishes it?"
A long silence. She released his hand.
"I will grant that wish," she finally said. "But I will not grant it to any immortal you make in the days that follow this one, as I wish you to make no immortals at all. Can this be our treaty?"
Treaty. A deep sense of relief coursed through Ramses. A treaty. Ah, so we are equal, are we? This powerful being now honors me by speaking of treaties, rather than of judgment. Ah, the marvel of queens. Even in ancient times he had heard talk of queens protecting their kingdoms, while kings go forth to conquer new ones, of queens protecting their power, while kings seek more. And in modern times, he had heard tell of a great queen, Elizabeth of England, who had followed this very path, protecting her great kingdom and its far-flung colonies, but never initiating a war to gain increased power or land.
Ramses smiled.
"A treaty?" he asked. "You speak to me now as if I'm still a king."
"Are you not?" she asked.
"Beloved queen," he said. "I haven't told you of another to whom I gave the elixir."
"And you need not tell me, for I know of it. Elliott, the Earl of Rutherford--a learned and sober man."
"Yes," he said. "Nor can I swear to you that I will never give the elixir to another. I know too much now of loneliness and isolation to make such a pledge to you. Elliott Savarell, the Earl of Rutherford, is my responsibility now, just as is Julie Stratford. And Cleopatra, my wounded Cleopatra, remains my res
ponsibility. No. I cannot swear to you that I will not give the elixir again. We stand before a new and modern world of which I never dreamed. We may become lost from each other in this world, Bektaten. And who knows what tragedy or wisdom or need, for that matter, might guide me or drive me to do?"
Bektaten regarded him for a long moment in silence, and then she smiled. How bright and beautiful she appeared with this smile.
"Spoken like a king," she said. "But this elixir, in all its purity and power, you stole from the one to whom I'd entrusted it, and when you did this, you stole it from me."
"Yes, my queen, I know this now," said Ramses. "But I cannot go back and right that wrong. And I cannot erase the secrets of the elixir from my mind. Thousands of years have passed since that great theft. And right or wrong, I now possess the secret. Do not ask of me impossible things."
"You know what I am really asking of you," she said.
"I do. That I never act rashly again, that I never go against nature, that I never traffic again with the dead."
"Precisely," she replied.
"I give you my word on this. How could I not? I will never again do what I did in rousing this revenant Cleopatra from her slumber. I have made a nochtin, as Saqnos called it, and would I could undo it."
He broke off, unable to say another word.
"Nochtin?" Bektaten pondered. "Nochtin--a species described by a fool. Perhaps your broken Cleopatra is not a nochtin. Remember, it was with a corrupted elixir that Saqnos worked his resurrections, the same corrupted elixir that doomed his fracti."
"That's true," he said.
"It was the pure elixir that you brought to the corpse of your Cleopatra. Who is to say that she is a nochtin or that she will go mad?"
"If only...," Ramses whispered. "But she is going mad, is she not?"
"She is suffering. She is in confusion. She has a dark path before her. But again, it was the pure elixir that brought her into being, and very possibly more of it will help her now."
This almost brought tears to Ramses' eyes. "Perhaps..."
"As you have said, Ramses, she is your responsibility. And I do not presume to question you as to what you do with this creature so long as you do not seek to destroy her. That I cannot abide."