Authors: Stephanie Thornton
With that, he turned again, but a red rage threatened to overwhelm my vision even as the bearish soldier he’d spoken to jogged down the citadel’s stairs.
Hephaestion.
The man with the fish-spine helmet was no common soldier, but the man who had tortured and executed Bessus.
My fingernails bit my palms and a wave of pure hatred surged through me. He’d made Bessus suffer, and for my brother’s sake I wasn’t sorry for that, but in killing my protector, Hephaestion had cost me a crown and turned me into the Whore of Sogdian Rock. The order may have come from Alexander, but I’d have to charm the conqueror if I ever hoped to leave this place. It was easier to blame Hephaestion for every soldier that I’d swallowed down, and for that, I’d loathe him until the end of my days.
Better yet, until the end of his days.
Yet I rearranged my features and pushed my way forward through the crowd, adopting a smile so sweet that a hive of honeybees might have flocked to it.
“I shall dine with Alexander tonight,” I said, daring to touch Hephaestion’s wrist as he paused to speak to a portly matron. A flutter of annoyance passed over his face, but he offered both the matron and me the same lazy smile. “Is that so?” he asked. I could see that he appreciated what he saw as his eyes swept over me, but his gaze didn’t linger as I’d expected. “You Persians prefer to try to kill Alexander or run in the opposite direction. You’re the first to demand his presence, but you’ll see him when he decrees it, and not a moment before.”
With that, Hephaestion turned and ambled back into the crowd, the flock of idiots parting to let him pass as if he were some sort of king.
I’d deal with him later. First, I had to get to Alexander.
• • •
A
riamazes’ quarters were identical to all the rest in Sogdian Rock, cramped, windowless, and built of the same straw-colored stone as the cliffs that held the fortress. Yet the door was flung open, a singer’s voice warbled from inside, and a healthy fire burned on the brazier to ward off the evening’s chill.
From Ariamazes’ distraught daughter I’d managed to borrow a delicate red head scarf sewn with tiny seed pearls, their knobby surfaces gleaming like tiny misshapen moons. I’d dabbed the last remaining drops of my spikenard perfume behind my ears while the poor girl blubbered about how she might never see her father or mother again now that they’d fled the fortress, leaving her behind to be claimed as Alexander’s captive rather than lose her to violence on a battlefield.
“There, there,” I said over her caterwauling, dropping a perfunctory pat on her shoulder. “I’m sure Alexander is much too busy to hunt down cowards like your father.”
Bagoas walked with me to Ariamazes’ former home, where the noisy gathering had already begun. Just days ago these women had been cursing Alexander’s name and now they flocked to him like a gaggle of empty-headed ducks. If I were Alexander, I’d have tossed them all from the top of the citadel just to end their squawking.
“Alexander’s mistress Barsine carries his child, but he left her behind in Susa and has yet to replace her. The Macedonian conqueror is a lover of all beautiful things,” Bagoas said as he adjusted my veil. “He won’t be able to resist you.”
I kissed the tip of his nose and ducked inside, glad for the firelight that danced on the sheen of my silk and brought a flush to my cheeks. A table had been set and rugs had been thrown hastily onto the stone floor, but it was still a garrison room filled with the birds of Persia’s finest families, dressed in feathers long past their prime. There was a dance under way dedicated to Mithra, the ancient god of light, a chaste performance by Sogdian Rock’s eligible maidens. I spotted Alexander immediately, seated alone at the longest table and looking as if he might fall asleep despite the drum and lyre music. I knew the steps to the dance, but I wasn’t here to copy the bland movements of these dry virgins. Instead, I clapped my hands overhead as I joined in, twirling so my veil and robe spun around me as I moved to the center of the line. The girls chirped angrily among themselves, but I didn’t care.
In Persia there are dances for women, but even more dances for men, infused with ritual and the lore of bull sacrifice in Mithra’s honor. But there are other dances that Parizad had taught me, performances meant to demonstrate the virility of the dancer, with moves to simulate riding a horse. These dances were reserved for warriors, but it was those steps that I danced now.
Alexander sat straighter as I bent forward and rose like a wave, as if I were galloping into battle, my legs spread as if astride a great warhorse. The conqueror’s eyes never left my body as he lifted his wine cup to his lips and took a long draft. I swayed in ways that left little to the imagination, while around me the rest of the girls continued their uninspired movements, out of tempo as the musicians followed my lead.
When it finally ended, I fell to my knees, my skin damp with perspiration and my chest heaving as I dared glance up. The gaze of every man in the room was fixed on me.
And Alexander looked ready to devour me.
I raised my eyes to his and gave a small smile, parting my lips as I maneuvered my way to stand before him.
“Alexander of Macedon,” I said before he could speak. “I am Roxana of Balkh, daughter of Oxyartes.”
“It is a pleasure to have you here tonight, Roxana of Balkh,” Alexander said. He was daunting in full Persian dress with a gape-mouthed lion pendant gleaming at his shoulder, but his clean-shaven face in the Greek style jarred against his purple silks and the golden girdle at his waist. His curls were bound with a leather thong across his forehead, embellished with filigreed golden juniper leaves, as if he were a boy playing at being king.
But the man who stared at me was no boy.
“You must be weary from your exertions just now,” he said. “I’ve never seen a woman dance like that.”
“It’s an uncommon dance,” I said, “meant to strengthen the muscles and stimulate the blood flow as if one were riding . . .”
I let my voice trail off with a sly smile, letting him imagine what sort of riding I meant.
He flicked a finger to beckon me closer, desire making his blue eyes burn like the hottest flames.
I ignored barbed glares from the assembled girls and their mothers that might have made tremble even the
simurgh
, the ancient dog-headed bird that had witnessed the destruction of the world three times over. The women hissed like asps, flicking their forked tongues in my direction with whispers of
whore
,
harlot
, and worse.
Yet I had Alexander’s attention, and they did not.
“Will you do me the pleasure of dining with me?” he asked.
“Of course,” I answered. “You do me great honor,” I said breathlessly, marveling at the fact that the King of Kings was standing to move a chair for me so I could assume my place beside him at the banquet table.
“I would do a woman like you many honors,” Alexander said, setting my head whirling.
“Is that so?” I settled into my seat and pushed his chair back with my slippered foot, letting my toe brush across his muscled calf.
“It is indeed,” he said, his smile slow and enigmatic. I felt a heat start deep in my belly and spread still lower. Alexander possessed the power of a small sun in this dark, cramped chamber, a heat from which not even I was immune.
I tasted none of the simple garrison fare the servants spread before us: bread and dried apricots, dates and roasted pecans; several goats had been butchered and cooked in a gravy with fresh butter and onions and garlic from someone’s winter stores. My thoughts were an eddy of wind as Alexander watched my every movement.
“Is it true that you climbed to the fortress using only tent pegs and canvas?” I asked, letting my fingertips brush his arm. It’s a well-known truth that every man enjoys having his pride cosseted, and Alexander’s pride was surely larger than most. I almost mentioned that the Persian soldiers must have pissed themselves to see him standing at the precipice come dawn, but bit my tongue so he didn’t think me crass. “The soldiers here were fools to believe themselves invincible against a son of Zeus,” I added.
“A mistake other men have made before them.”
I smiled slowly, tilting my head so his eyes could follow the length of my long neck. “And so you took the fortress without spilling a single drop of Persian blood. An impressive feat.”
I neglected mentioning the thirty Greeks who had plunged to their deaths. Surely that was a small price to pay for a man like Alexander.
“And now I plan to enjoy the fruits of my cunning,” he said.
“I’m sure you do,” I purred, but I didn’t get a chance to ask what that entailed, as the soldier I now knew to be Hephaestion arrived with a wicker basket in his arms. I glowered at him as he stopped before Alexander, bowing with his fist over his heart.
“My apologies for the interruption,” he said, braving Alexander’s black glare. “But this arrived from the wife of Ariamazes. We rigged a pulley and winched it up the cliff so you might have it tonight.” He leaned forward, his dark brows drawn together. “You may lose your appetite after you view its contents.”
Alexander’s hand hesitated on the basket, yet I could see the curiosity deep in his eyes as he glanced around the room, ending with me.
“Open it,” I urged him.
“You’re a curious one,” he said.
“Always,” I taunted him with a dangerous smile, then wished I hadn’t when the soldier revealed the basket’s contents.
Nestled in a bed of hay was a man’s head, freshly severed from its body, its eyes open and jaw gone slack to reveal two lines of perfect white teeth.
Teeth that had grazed my ear and nipped at my breasts as I was bent over the bed in this very room.
Ariamazes’ teeth.
“A rather foul thing to serve at a banquet,” I murmured as I fanned myself with my hand, trying to control the urge to vomit as Alexander withdrew a note from inside the basket. I’d never learned to read, so the scribbled characters meant nothing to my eyes, but Hephaestion stood and read over Alexander’s shoulder.
“A gift from Ariamazes’ wife,” he said. “And an offer of peace.”
I drank a hasty gulp of wine, then laughed into the back of my hand, masking the chortle as if I’d choked on my drink. The old lech had ogled my breasts and thought nothing of whoring me out to his men, but now he’d met this grisly end despite his cowardly escape. And at the hands of his wife!
“Ariamazes’ wife is a wise woman,” Alexander said, beckoning for a servant to take the befouled basket away. “For her husband’s head is more valuable than gold.”
“The rest of these godforsaken rocks will fall without Ariamazes to lead them, for they’re all held by incompetent fools,” Hephaestion said.
Alexander nodded and grinned like a child with a honey roll. “Thus clearing our way to India so I might rule from one end of the earth to the other,” he said as if dazed, then turned to the messenger. “Send Ariamazes’ wife a message of my deep appreciation.” He removed the golden lion brooch from his shoulder and tossed it to the messenger. “This should more than cover her disquiet at her sudden widowhood.”
I scarcely stopped myself from gaping as he swept from the dais with a flourish of his purple cloak, taking with him the spicy aroma of incense stolen from some Persian altar to Ahura Mazda.
And leaving me like a child’s forgotten plaything.
I must have stared too long, for it was Hephaestion’s low chuckle that shook me from my shock at Alexander’s abrupt departure. “Don’t be disappointed. Alexander has a penchant for all things shiny and bright. The allure of India’s riches just happens to sparkle brighter than you at this moment.”
“Leave me,” I commanded, for I doubted whether I could mask my disappointment, or my hatred for this man.
But he didn’t obey, and had the audacity to assume Alexander’s chair and drain the remainder of his wine. “Rather demanding for a captive of Sogdian Rock, aren’t you?” he asked.
“I’m no captive,” I said, nearly knocking over my chair in my haste to stand and depart. Ariamazes’ rotting head had squandered tonight’s opportunity with Alexander, and now I had to remaneuver to arrange another encounter with the powerful Macedonian. “I am Roxana of Balkh.”
“Roxana of Balkh?” Hephaestion’s brow furrowed. “Daughter of Oxyartes of Balkh?”
I swept past him, unwilling to waste one further breath on this man, but his hand clamped down on my wrist.
“I have in my possession something you’ll want to see.” He smiled, more snarl than grin. “Follow me.”
And there was nothing I could do, save act as he commanded.
• • •
“I
thought you were dead,” I sobbed into my brother’s chest, breathing in the scent of life and herbs that had always clung to him. I’d hurled myself into his arms the moment my eyes had adjusted to the dimness of Hephaestion’s lamplit chambers, screeching with wild joy once I’d realized it was truly my brother I beheld and not some trickster spirit.
Parizad hugged me tight, but not tight enough, for I wanted to cling to him as if a thunderstorm roiled overhead and never let go. “But I’m not dead,” he murmured.
“I should kill you for all you did,” I said around my hiccups, “spewing treason after I’d weaseled a position for you from Bessus.”
His hand in my hair pressed me closer to him and I could taste the salt of his tears mingled with mine. “Everything happened as the gods willed it, Roxana.”
At that, I shoved him away and grabbed the first thing I could find. The silver urn missed him and collided with the stone wall, then crashed to the floor like a lone clap of thunder. I searched for something that might shatter, but unfortunately, Hephaestion didn’t have any alabaster vases or glazed pottery available, only books.
Cedar chests and wooden boxes full of books.
I grabbed one in each hand and hurled them at my brother. One broke and its yellowing pages littered the ground, the scrawled figures on their pages indecipherable to my eyes. Suddenly two strong arms salted with black hairs picked me off my feet and held me so my toes dangled off the ground.