‘You never meant to kill him. It was an accident,’ I said.
‘I killed someone I loved. You can’t imagine how I felt afterwards. I looked down in the clay and saw that he was dead. His body was streaked with the red clay. It looked like blood.’ He lifted his head and stared at me. The storm grew stronger. A flash of lightning showed Alexander’s face. ‘I wished that time could be stopped, that the moment could be undone, but time marched on. It was cold in the pit. I can remember standing in the wrestling pit and wondering if I could will myself to die. I wanted to stop my own heart. I closed my eyes and tried to stop it from beating. No one made a sound. Then I heard someone screaming. It was Plexis.’
‘He’s forgiven you,’ I said. ‘You must forgive yourself.’
‘I’ll never forgive myself. I’m a monster.’ His voice broke. ‘I killed Cleitus too.’
‘That was unfortunate, but again, not intended,’ I said.
Lightning cracked like a bullwhip in the sky, and a claw of rain scraped across the tent. Alexander pulled away and drew his knees to his chest. ‘Aristotle told me that I would lose everything if I didn’t learn to control my temper.’
‘He’s very wise,’ I said cautiously. ‘But he isn’t you. And you’re not a monster.’
‘I don’t know what I am any more,’ he admitted.
I heard such pain in his voice. Reaching over, I drew him close to me and stroked his back. When he could breathe easier, I asked, ‘Why did they kill those children?’
‘It was their ceremony for the spring. They believe that only the blood of innocents makes winter lose its grip on the world. They believe in the fire god and in the god of stone. They still sacrifice to the god of spring.’ He spoke in a monotone, and I shivered.
‘Hush, we’ll talk about it no longer. It’s over now.’
We lay back down to sleep, but I slept uneasily. My dreams kept veering into nightmares. Yet every time I woke up, Alexander was there, leaning over me, soothing me with his hands and lips.
We stayed in the mountain fortress long enough to completely subdue the tribes in the area and to make sure that they would never return to the valley of Nysa to steal children for their bloody sacrifices.
Alexander wanted to leave a statue on the top of the hill. It would serve as a warning to the people of the region. He used me to put the fear of the goddess into them.
My reputation was even stronger than Alexander’s. I was Hades’ minion; I was Persephone, the goddess, daughter of Demeter, mother of the moon’s child. Most of the time, I would have gladly given away all my titles. Like a much admired member of the royal family, I often wished I weren’t so well known. However, this time I was content to dress in my finest robes and stride into a small village to put the fear of Hades into the local head honcho, who was suing for peace with Alexander.
With Usse, I put together a little show. Nothing fancy or flashy, just two small beeswax candles hidden in my palms to make it seem as if I held fire in my bare hands. The people grovelled on their knees while I held the flickering candles over my head and told them that human sacrifices were displeasing to the gods. For that reason, I said, their fortress had fallen and the defenders been slain. If they kept up the sacrifices, there was a good chance Alexander would come back and wipe them all out, simply to amuse the gods who really had nothing better to do with their time than to watch foolish mortals fighting each other.
An artist carved a likeness of me in stone. Alexander placed the statue on an outcrop of rock overlooking the Hindu Kush Mountains. It was visible for miles around. I looked back at it as we left, but the memory of the slain children made me turn away. The place was beautiful, but damned.
We joined Plexis and the other half of Alexander’s army near the Indus River in May of the year 326 BC.
We made good time down the mountains. It is so much easier marching downhill.
When the brown river came into view, we shouted in unison. I rode my mare, Lenaia, and Alexander rode Bucephalus. We wore fine robes, and the soldiers around us carried tall poles fluttering with white and red flags. It was a fête.
Alexander was in a good mood and insisted on singing with his soldiers, which put a damper on their good mood. Out of pity for the soldiers, bravely marching along with their hands full of flagpole and unable to clap their hands over their ears, I decided to talk to Alexander about something that had been bothering me.
‘Alex,’ I said. ‘I’ve been meaning to ask you something.’
‘OnWARD maRCHing BRAve Men! ON tO VICTorY We go FOrwarD!’ he sang.
Well, I don’t think the verb ‘sing’ quite describes it. Neither does shout nor growl. If cacophony were a verb it would be easier to describe what he was doing. Let’s just say he was massacring a very simple marching song with only about four notes, none of which he came near.
‘Alex! Be quiet! You’re scaring the elephants!’
He clapped his mouth shut and the silence was literally a blessed relief. The men around us sighed deeply and started getting their normal colouring back.
‘What is it?’ he asked, peeved.
‘Will you please tell me what exactly happened when you spent three days with the queen?’
He blushed.
I frowned. ‘I see,’ I said icily.
‘You do?’ he asked hopefully.
‘I see that I can’t let you out of my sight for even five minutes without you getting seduced by some sex-mad priestess or queen. What on earth am I going to do with you?’ I spoke heatedly.
Alexander opened his eyes very wide. ‘Me? Me? I did that? You weren’t even there. Do you want to know what you can do with me?’ He leered. ‘Tell me some more stories about sex-mad queens and priestesses. They sound quite entertaining, but wait until we’re alone. I don’t want to miss a word you say.’
I narrowed my eyes. ‘If I find out that you …’
‘If I what?’ he asked cheerfully.
I didn’t answer. I was looking over his shoulder at a figure in the distance. He must have seen the look on my face because he whirled around. For a moment he didn’t move. Then he dug his heels into Bucephalus’s sides, and, with a wild whoop, galloped madly down the dusty road leaving me staring after him with a bemused expression.
Chiron wriggled on my back and started to whine. I dropped my reins and unhooked the backpack, pulling him around to my chest. Holding the baby in front of me, I said to him, ‘There goes my husband, rushing to greet his best friend whom he hasn’t seen in over three months – his best friend who just happens to be your daddy.’
I spoke in English. I didn’t think anyone else would quite understand the complexities of the situation, which I’d already edited for Chiron’s ears. The soldiers around me thought I said blessings. Chiron waved and gurgled happily at my breast. All he was interested in was milk. I could never understand why Chiron seemed to be the only human being who didn’t mind Alexander’s singing. It made most babies turn purple and scream. At first I was worried that he was deaf, but then I realized Chiron was just a little oddball. He would probably turn into one of those weird kids who love broccoli and algebra.
The sun shone, the flags flapped merrily, the soldiers sang, and the Indus River, huge, brown, and deceptively sluggish, flowed like caramel by our sides.
We were in India!
We camped on the far side of the river. The second half of Alexander’s army had built a huge floating bridge. It was so sturdy even the elephants could walk over it. It took the army only a day to cross; the other half was already on the other side, and the encampment had been set up in a large, flat plain.
I stared in amazement as we arrived. After travelling for months with only about twenty thousand men, I wasn’t used to the sheer size of Alexander’s entire army. It took me nearly an hour to find the stables for my horse, and then I wandered around looking for the tent.
The encampment was set up with its usual precision. The stables and the bathhouses were on the eastern side, closest to the river sho
re. Then there were the mess tents, the infirmary, and the arsenal. Surrounding those were the smaller tents where the cooks, doctors, and scientists lived and worked. Smoke rose from nearby smithy tents, where men hammered and forged from daybreak to sunset. The smiths carved long poles for the spears, melted and cast bronze or iron spear tips, fletched arrows, sharpened arrowheads, fashioned bows, repaired armour, and fixed shields. I loved watching them work, and I would often accompany Alexander when he went to get his equipment repaired.
Children loved watching them too. The smithy tents were often surrounded by a gaggle of skinny-legged children, watching wide-eyed as the molten metal flowed into the moulds and listening to the bright clangs as the metal smiths pounded on anvils. A veritable thicket of spears leaned against their tents. The sun glinted off the bright points, an easy landmark to spot in the sprawling encampment.
Past that, in the centre of the camp, were rows and rows of small tents where the soldiers lived, usually two to a tent. They were not allowed to hang anything off their tents or put anything in the narrow alleyways separating the tents. Everything had to remain perfectly clean and the alleys clear in case they had to make a rush for it.
Each time they set up camp, the squadron leaders would make the same speech. Standing at the top of the rows they would announce, ‘Soldiers of Iskander! Hail! Raise your tents up as you have been taught. Leave nothing in the alleys that may block the passage of those coming through. Store your belongings in the overhead net in your tent or under your pallet. Lean your weapons on the eastern side of your tent and put your armour on the northern side. Never leave them in the rain. Dinner will be served at sunset. Hail!’
I always liked listening to their speech. It was comforting, somehow, to hear it. It reminded me of the airline hostesses in my time. I wanted them to add, ‘Thank you for joining Alexander’s army and have a pleasant fight.’
The soldiers’ tents took up a great deal of space, but they were set up in such straight rows that you could see the other end of the camp in any direction. The cavalry soldiers’ tents were nearest the stables.
After the soldiers’ tents were the officers’ tents, the generals’ tents, the journalists’ tents, the scribes’ tents, and then the supply stores. The supplies were divided into several sections: food, cloth, articles for trade, the treasury, the scribes’ supplies, the raw materials for weapons, and so on. All these were distributed around the encampment, always in the same place.
The organization of the army amazed me, and I could watch it forever and never get bored. It was an intricate dance between thousands of people. It was like a spider’s web with each strand attached to a different item and everything linked together. Some strands reached all the way back to Greece, Macedonia, or Egypt, more than a year’s march away. As we advanced, the strands lengthened and stretched, but instead of growing thinner and weaker, they seemed to get thicker and stronger. More and more people followed the army. There was a constant coming and going along the paths we’d taken. New routes opened. Alexander had conquered everything between the Indus and the Mediterranean Sea, and trade was the first to benefit. Mail followed. Alexander loved getting mail.
Chapter Ten
I wandered through the camp carrying Chiron in his backpack. He was a little more than five months old now, but he was a small baby. Not frail, just fine-boned. He loved to take walks. The motion put him in a good mood. I could hear him cooing. The soldiers would often come over and say ‘hello’ to him. They were still a bit wary of me, the goddess, but they adored Chiron. They would stand and talk to me, but behind their backs they would be making the sign for the deity they believed protected them. Not everyone, of course. There were quite a few people who greeted me without fear. The doctors were very friendly because I was sometimes Usse’s reluctant assistant. And Seleucos, Alexander’s general whom I had bought as a slave in Mazda and freed in Babylon, wasn’t afraid. He was standing outside his tent carefully polishing the brass plaque on his armour. He looked up and saw me. A wide grin split his face, only to slip a second later.
‘My lady!’ he cried, his expression serious.
‘What is it?’ I asked. Everyone had been acting rather oddly, I realized. Crossing the river had taken me quite a while, and I hadn’t seen Alexander since he’d galloped off after Plexis. Nor had I seen Plexis. Usse had gone straight to the infirmary, but Brazza and Axiom had disappeared and I couldn’t find them anywhere. I frowned at Seleucos. ‘Are you going to tell me what’s going on?’
He licked his lips nervously. ‘Nothing,’ he said.
‘You are a rotten liar,’ I said evenly. ‘Out with it.’
‘Well, it’s just that … uh. Well.’ He frowned, searching for words. ‘I can’t tell you,’ he finished lamely.
‘I thought you were my friend.’
‘I am!’
‘So tell me what’s going on? Why the long face?’
‘My lady, Queen Roxanne is here! She’s brought her babe. She came to be with Iskander. She joined the army as we were laying siege at Charsadda.’
My hand flew to my mouth.
‘I wasn’t supposed to tell you. I’m sorry, my lady,’ said Seleucos lamely.
‘Where is she staying?’ I felt as if I’d just received a strong punch in the stomach. ‘That little bitch. She sent word saying she’d meet us in Ecbatana.’
‘She’s in the royal tent.’
‘The royal tent?’ I choked. ‘Not in Alexander’s?’
‘No, she has her own.’
‘Well, we’ll just have to sew it closed,’ I muttered.
Seleucos uttered a shocked laugh.
I peered at him suspiciously. ‘I’m going to give you some advice, Seleucos. Don’t trust that woman. No matter what she says, no matter what she does. She has a viper in the place of her heart.’
He lost his grin and his eyes grew fearful. ‘Yes, my lady, I’ll remember that.’
‘And stop “my ladying” me. Everyone seems to be afraid of me. I’m not a goddess. You know that.’
‘I do?’
‘Seleucos!’
‘I do, sorry. My la … Ash … Ash … my lady.’
I heaved a sigh. ‘How is Apames?’
‘Very well, thank you.’ He smiled happily. He was obviously still infatuated with his wife. ‘She’s staying in Sogdia, but she’ll join us in Ecbatana as soon as I send for her.’
I saw Alexander’s tent being set up. But I hung back, now that I knew that Roxanne was lurking around somewhere. Her presence explained the new section added to the army. It was the royal court. The silly ninny had dragged along her ladies-in-waiting, the royal cooks and nannies, the royal pages, the royal entertainers, and Alexander would probably have a royal fit when he saw all that.
Then I saw something even worse. I groaned. Sitting in the shade of Roxanne’s tent, busily writing, was Onesicrite, our execrable ‘sex and scandal’ journalist. Great. Just what I needed. I stepped back into the deep shade of a large tent and thought of different ways to get rid of everyone. A lightning bolt would come in handy right about now, I thought, scrutinizing the sky hopefully.
There was quite a bustle around Roxanne’s tent. Women, pages, and slaves, all hustled back and forth between that tent, the food stores, the river, the infirmary, and the mess tent. Alexander’s tent was on the far side of the new court. Not far enough away for my taste. Moreover, I would have to walk right through enemy territory to get to my tent or else take quite a long hike.
I took a long hike. I needed time to think, and I especially wanted to talk to Usse and Axiom. Roxanne was around. It was time to watch out for poison.
I found Usse in the infirmary. He was busy, but I managed to get him alone for a few minutes – long enough to tell him what he needed to know. His face grew very grave. He listened without speaking, then put his hands on my shoulders.
‘Do not fear, I will take care of everything.’
Then I went in search of Axiom. He was probably in the mess
hall or with the food stores getting everything settled. I didn’t find him until sunset. I’d walked at least five kilometres back and forth, and I was getting as cranky and tired as Chiron.
Axiom looked worried when he saw me. I didn’t search him out unless I had orders from Alexander concerning emergency meetings. Axiom was in charge of secrecy, although very few people realized it. Which was normal – it was a secret. We went to a dark corner of the storage tent to talk privately.
‘What is the matter?’ he asked, his dark eyes glittering in the torchlight.
‘It’s Roxanne. I want you to be very, very careful from now on. She has already tried to poison me once, and I’m sure she hasn’t finished. I also want you to guard Alexander. Roxanne is a strange woman, and I wouldn’t put it past her to drug him. Remember, she was a priestess for Anahita and she knows many potions.’
Axiom narrowed his eyes. ‘She will not succeed in any of her plans. You can count on me. I will personally see to it that nothing happens to you, Iskander, or the babe,’ he said firmly.
‘Thank you. But you’re also going to have to watch yourself, Brazza, Usse, and Plexis. Her jealousy knows no bounds.’
‘It is like having a venomous serpent in our midst,’ he said seriously. ‘But if one knows it is there, one can watch out.’
‘Take heed of her servants and who she tries to befriend,’ I said. ‘Try to find out who her spies are.’
‘I will.’ Axiom placed his hand on his heart. ‘I swear.’
‘I know you will,’ I said. ‘I trust you with my life.’
‘I will not fail you.’ He stood still, watching me leave, his face lined with worry.
I went back towards the tent, keeping a sharp lookout for anyone in Roxanne’s cortège. I was worried. And with good reason. She was vicious, jealous, and single-minded; a rotten combination in an enemy. She also had charm and was pretty in a rather obvious way.
My mouth twisted. She was very lovely, who was I kidding? She had a perfect hourglass figure; narrow waist, wide hips, and lovely legs. Her large breasts were firm, high, and not the least bit saggy – yet. She had a narrow face with a high forehead and unusual colouring. Her skin was pale, her hair ebony, and her eyes were bright hazel. She had a small nose, a small mouth, a strong chin, and auburn eyebrows and eyelashes. She looked as if she had been put together with different parts of several beautiful women, but the whole picture was confusing. Her eyes were too close together, her nose too short. Her mouth folded upon itself, giving her a secretive, sly look. However, she had big tits. Frankly, it didn’t matter what her face was like. She had the perfect figure. Men gave her face a quick glance and fastened their eyes on her bosom. Very few of them ever looked back up to her cynical and knowing eyes. She always wore either transparent muslin shifts or went topless, fastening a brightly coloured skirt around her waist. The skirt was usually short enough to show her legs and was often slit all the way up the front, giving glimpses of a carefully shaved sex.
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