Alexander (Vol. 3) (Alexander Trilogy) (2 page)

The moonlight and the light of the lamps hidden behind alabaster screens mingled in an atmosphere perfumed with nard and aloe, glowing with amber reflections from the onyx tanks full of water, on the surface of which lotus flowers and rose petals floated. From an openwork screen of stylized ivy branches and gliding birds, came the quiet, gentle music of flutes and harps. The walls were completely frescoed with ancient Egyptian pictures representing scenes in which naked maidens danced to the sound of lutes and tambours before the royal couple on their thrones, and in a corner there was a large bed with a blue canopy supported by four columns of gilded wood with capitals in the shape of lotus flowers.

Alexander entered and looked long and ardently at Barsine. His eyes were still full of the dazzling light of the desert, his ears rang with the sacred words of the Oracle of Ammon, his whole body emanated an aura of magical enchantment: the golden locks falling on his shoulders, his muscled chest with the scars it carried, the changing colour of his eyes, his slender, nervous hands with their blue veins. Over his naked body he wore only a light
chlamys,
held loosely on his left shoulder with an ancient silver buckle, an age-old inheritance of the Argead dynasty, and he wore a golden ribbon around his forehead.

Barsine stood up and immediately felt lost in the light of his gaze,
‘Aléxandre . . .’
she said as he pulled her into his arms and kissed her lips, as full and moist as ripe dates. He pulled her down to the bed and caressed her hips and her warm, perfumed breasts.

But suddenly the King felt her skin go cold and her limbs stiffen under his hands; a menacing air permeated the room, sending all his warrior’s senses into alarm. He turned quickly to face the imminent danger and found himself being attacked head on by a body running towards him. He saw a hand raised as it brandished a dagger, he heard a wild, strident cry reverberate around the walls of the bed chamber, and he heard Barsine cry out in grief and in pain.

Alexander quickly pinned the aggressor to the floor, twisting his wrist and forcing him to release the weapon. He could have massacred him there and then with the heavy lamp holder he had instinctively grabbed, but he had recognized the young fifteen-year-old – Eteocles, Memnon’s and Barsine’s eldest son! The boy struggled and turned like a young lion caught in a trap, shouting all sorts of insults, biting and scratching now that he was unarmed.

The guards burst in, having heard the scuffle, and they took hold of the aggressor. The officer in command understood immediately what had happened and called out, ‘An attempt on the King’s life! Take him below and have him tortured before he’s executed.’

But Barsine threw herself crying at Alexander’s feet, ‘Save him, my Lord, save my son’s life, I beg you!’

Eteocles looked at her with contempt written all over his face and then, turning to Alexander, said, ‘The best thing for you to do is to have me killed, because I will try again and again . . . a thousand times until I succeed in vindicating the life and honour of my father.’ He was still shaking, partly because of the excitement and agitation of the scuffle, and partly because of the hatred burning in his heart. The King gestured to the guards to leave.

‘But, Sire—’ protested the officer.

‘Out!’ said Alexander. ‘Can’t you see he’s just a boy?’ and the man obeyed. Then the King turned once again to Eteocles, ‘Your father’s honour is fully intact. He died because of a fatal disease.’

‘It’s not true!’ shouted the boy. ‘You had him poisoned and now . . . now you’re trying to take his woman. You are a man with no sense of honour!’

Alexander moved closer and repeated, his voice firm, ‘I admired your father; I considered him my only worthy adversary and I dreamed of one day fighting him in a duel. I would never have had him poisoned; when I have to deal with my enemies I do so face to face, with sword and spear. As for your mother, she has made of me a victim because I think of her every waking moment; I am tormented by the thought of her. Love has all the strength of a god, love is irresistible and invincible. Man knows neither how to avoid it, nor how to escape it, in the same way that ultimately man cannot avoid the sun and the rain, birth and death.’

Barsine sobbed in a corner, her face hidden in her hands.

‘Have you nothing to say to your mother?’ the King asked.

‘From the very instant you first laid hands on her, she has no longer been my mother, she is nothing to me now. Kill me, I tell you, it is in the best interests of both of you. Otherwise I shall kill you and I will offer the blood of both your bodies to my father’s soul, so that he may find peace in Hades.’

Alexander turned to Barsine, ‘What shall I do?’

Barsine dried her eyes and composed herself, ‘Let him go free, I beg you. Give him a horse and provisions and let him go. Will you do this for me?’

‘I warn you,’ said the boy once more, ‘that if you let me go I will speak to the Great King and I will ask him for armour and a sword so that I may fight in his army against you.’

‘If this is the way it must be, then so be it,’ replied Alexander. Then he called the guards and issued orders for the boy to be given a horse and provisions before being set free.

Eteocles walked away towards the door, seeking to

hide the violent emotions gripping his soul as his mother called out to him. He did stop for an instant, but then turned his back once again, crossed the threshold, and went out into the corridor.

Barsine called out again, ‘Please wait!’ Then she went to a chest and out of it pulled a shining weapon together with its scabbard. She rushed into the corridor and held it out to her son, ‘It is your father’s sword.’

The boy took it and held it close to his chest, and as he did so burning tears flowed from his eyes and made tracks down his cheeks.

‘Farewell, my son,’ said Barsine, her voice quavering. ‘May Ahura Mazda protect you and may your father’s gods protect you too.’

Eteocles ran off along the corridor and down the stairs until he came to the courtyard of the palace, where the guards placed a horse’s reins in his hands. But just as he was about to leap astride the animal, he saw a shadow emerge from a small side door – his brother, Phraates.

‘Take me with you, I beg you. I won’t stay here, a prisoner to these
yauna
,’ and Eteocles hesitated as his brother continued to plead with him. ‘Take me with you, I beg of you, I beg you! I don’t weigh much, the horse will manage both of us until we find another one.’

‘I cannot,’ replied Eteocles. ‘You are too young and then . . . someone must stay with our mother. Farewell, Phraates. We will see each other again as soon as this war is over, and I will free you then.’ He held his tearful younger brother in a long embrace, then he leaped on to the horse and disappeared.

Barsine had witnessed the scene from the window of her bed chamber and she felt herself wither at the sight of her fifteen-year-old boy galloping off into the night to face the unknown. She cried disconsolately, thinking of just how bitter the fate of human beings can be. Just a short time before she had felt like one of those Olympian goddesses painted and sculpted by the great
yauna
artists, and now she would gladly have changed places with the most humble of slaves.

A
LEXANDER HAD TWO
floating bridges built so his army could cross over to the eastern bank of the Nile. There he met up with the soldiers and officers he had left behind to guard the country; having made sure that they had behaved properly, he reconfirmed them in their positions, dividing them up so that power over this most rich of countries was not concentrated in the hands of just one person.

Egypt welcomed him on his return from the Sanctuary of Ammon, heaping honours on him as if he were a god and crowning him Pharaoh, but destiny had it that these days of glory were darkened by sad events. Barsine’s despair lay before his eyes every day, but an even greater tragedy was looming. Parmenion had two other sons besides Philotas – Nicanor, an officer in a
hetairoi
squadron, and Hector, nineteen years old and deeply loved by his father. The younger man was much taken with the sight of the army crossing the Nile and had climbed aboard an Egyptian papyrus boat to enjoy the spectacle from the middle of the river. Hector’s youthful vanity had led him to wear a heavy suit of armour and a very showy dress cape; he stood up at the stern of the boat, straight and proud so that everyone could admire him.

Suddenly, however, the boat struck something, perhaps a hippopotamus which was surfacing at that moment, and it very nearly capsized. Hector lost his balance, fell into the water and disappeared immediately, dragged down by the weight of his armour, his clothes and his sodden cape.

The Egyptian rowers of the boat wasted no time diving in, as did many of the young Macedonians and Hector’s own brother, Nicanor, ready to brave the currents and the jaws of the crocodiles, of which there were many in that area, but it was all in vain. Parmenion, on the eastern bank from where he had been watching the orderly arrival of the army, looked on, helpless, as the tragedy unfolded.

The news reached Alexander shortly afterwards and he immediately gave orders to the Phoenician and Cypriot mariners to try at least to recover the young man’s body, but nothing came of all their efforts. That same evening, after hours and hours of desperate searching, in which he participated personally, the King went to visit the grief-stricken old general.

‘How is he?’ he asked Philotas who was standing outside the tent, as though guarding over his father’s privacy. His friend shook his head disconsolately.

Parmenion was sitting on the ground in the dark, in silence, and only his white hair stood out in the gloom. Alexander felt his knees go weak – he was deeply sorry for this valiant and loyal man who so many times had irritated him with all his advice to be prudent, with the incessant reminders of just how great his father Philip had been. Now Parmenion looked like an age-old oak tree that for years had withstood storms and hurricanes and had now suddenly been rent by a bolt of lightning.

‘This is truly a most sad visit I pay you, General,’ he began, his voice shaking slightly. As he looked at Parmenion he could not help but think of the rhyme he used to sing as a boy whenever he saw him arriving at his father’s war councils with his hair which even back then was already white:

Almost automatically Parmenion got to his feet at the sound of his King’s voice and managed to say, his voice broken, ‘Thank you for coming, Sire.’

‘We have tried everything, General, to recover your boy’s body. I would have granted him the highest of honours, I would . . . I would have done everything if only . . .’

‘I know,’ replied Parmenion. ‘The proverb has it that in peacetime sons bury their fathers, while in wartime fathers bury their sons, but I had always hoped that I might be spared this grief. I had always hoped that the first arrow or the first sword blow would be for me. But instead . . .’

‘It is a most terrible loss, General,’ said Alexander. In the meantime his eyes had become used to the gloom in the tent and he could make out Parmenion’s features, distorted in his pain. He seemed to have aged by ten years in a matter of moments – his eyes were red, his skin dry and wrinkled, his hair untidy. He had never seen Parmenion in such a state, not even during the toughest of battles.

‘If he had fallen—’ Parmenion said, ‘if he had fallen in battle, fighting as he brandished his sword then it would have made some sense to me – we are soldiers after all. But to die like that . . . in those muddy waters, ripped to pieces and devoured by those monsters! O by the gods! Gods above! Why? Why?’ He covered his face with his hands and burst into a long, doleful crying that was truly heartbreaking.

Alexander could find no more words in the face of that suffering. All he could manage was to murmur, ‘I am sorry . . . I am sorry.’ And he left, saying goodbye to Philotas with just one pained look. The other brother, Nicanor, arrived just at that moment, he too stricken by grief and exhaustion, still soaked to the skin and covered in mud.

The following day, the King had a cenotaph erected in memory of the young man and he personally celebrated the funeral rites. The soldiers, all lined up, shouted Hector’s name ten times so that his memory would not be lost, but it was not like the occasion when they had shouted the names of their fallen companions on the mountains of Thrace and Illyria in the midst of the snowcapped peaks, under the sapphire sky. In that grave, dark atmosphere, on that muddy water, Hector’s name was immediately swallowed up by the silence.

*

That same evening the King returned to Barsine. He found her stretched out on her bed crying. Her maid told him that she had eaten hardly anything all day.

‘You must not despair so,’ Alexander said to her. ‘Nothing will happen to your boy – I had two of my men follow him to make sure he will be alright.’

Barsine got up and sat on the edge of the bed: ‘Thank you. You have taken a weight off my heart . . . even though the shame remains. My children have judged and sentenced me.’

You are wrong,’ replied Alexander. ‘Do you know what your boy said to his younger brother as he left? The guards told me about it. He said to him, “You must stay with our mother.” This means that he loves you and he has done what he has done because he feels that this is precisely what he must do. You should be proud of him.’