Christian Cameron - God of War - The Epic Story of Alexander the Great

That was scary talk. ‘Lord, I try to keep you in touch with the common men.’

He nodded. ‘I know you think so, Ptolemy. But I understand them perfectly. They are cattle – but glorious cattle, and I know how to make them rise above themselves. You want them to stay comfortable, down in the mud.’

I want to keep them from cutting your throat, you arrogant popinjay. Demosthenes isn’t all wrong, either. I can remember thinking that.

‘It’s all right, Ptolemy. You’re the best of my generals – but you can’t be expected to understand everything I can see.’ He put a hand on my back – too tentatively, not quite the right physical contact, the way a certain kind of boy touches girls – not enough firmness, not enough confidence.

He could conquer the world, but he wasn’t all that good with people. Unless they wanted to worship him, in which case he was perfect.

I remember giving him a cynical smile. ‘I do my best to keep up,’ I said. I pointed at Nicanor to change the subject. ‘Parmenio’s son is coming around.’

Alexander nodded. Ochrid brought us cups of warm, spiced wine, and Alexander took his and nodded gratefully. ‘Thanks,’ he said.

Alexander never noticed slaves. It was a sign.

Ochrid almost stumbled. ‘My pleasure, lord,’ he said.

Alexander beamed at him. Then turned back to me. ‘He’s a good man, your . . . what’s his name?’

Ochrid had been serving Alexander for three years. ‘Ochrid, my lord.’

Alexander nodded. ‘Nicanor will come around in time, but only until his father is here, and then something will have to be done.’ He shrugged. ‘You know that Attalus handed me all his treasonable correspondence – all Parmenio’s, all Demosthenes’ – before I had him killed. Yes?’

I had not known , but I had had my suspicions.

‘Parmenio was in the plot up to the hilt,’ Alexander said.

Now, I was no fan of Attalus, and I had little time for Parmenio, but my contrary streak was aching to point out to Alexander that before he killed his father, he’d been the plotter, and they were the faithful servants of the king. Luckily, I didn’t mention it.

I looked around to make sure no one was listening. ‘I think we’re facing an organised opposition right now,’ I said. ‘Thaïs believes—’

Alexander nodded. ‘I know what Thaïs believes,’ he said.

‘Do you have any news from Greece?’ I asked.

Alexander shook his head. ‘Thebes has already been taught her lesson. They won’t rise again.’

I felt like a conspirator. ‘They would if they thought that someone else was going to be King of Macedon,’ I said.

‘Amyntas?’ Alexander asked. ‘Or Caranus?’

I shrugged. ‘If you like.’ Amyntas son of Perdiccas was the heir apparent by virtue of being the last legitimate claimant to the throne left alive. He had ties to Attalus and to Parmenio – marriage ties, family ties, office-holding ties and landownership ties.

Caranus – I hope you are keeping track – was Cleopatra’s son by Philip, Alexander’s father. He was two years old and unlikely to make trouble for a would-be dynast, meaning that he was the perfect candidate to figurehead a rebellion.

‘Parmenio and Attalus and Amyntas were negotiating just four months ago,’ Alexander said.

‘Fuck me,’ I said. I hadn’t known, and I wasn’t cynical enough, yet. It’s amazing how cynical you have to be to keep up with human behaviour.

Alexander nodded. ‘When we leave the circle of the mountains, it is at least possible that we march to face Parmenio at Pella.’ He looked at the entrance to the pass. ‘And it is at least possible that Nicanor is here to watch us and do what damage he can.’

I had little love for the arrogant bastard, but – ‘That makes no sense, lord,’ I said. ‘Parmenio – whatever his faults – loves his sons like he loves himself. He wouldn’t sacrifice one.’

Alexander gave me the look of a man to whom all other men were expendable. ‘I can’t trust to that,’ he said.

‘The lads need a rest soon,’ I pointed out.

‘So you always say,’ Alexander said.

‘We’ve marched seven thousand stades, according to the Military Journal. We’ve fought four major actions and two dozen skirmishes.’ I raised an eyebrow. ‘Lord, that’s four years’ worth of campaigning in one summer. They’re tired. I’m tired .’

Alexander finished his wine. ‘I’m tired too,’ he said, very quietly. ‘But we’re not done. I can feel it.’

Three hundred stades south of Pellium we found Langarus and his little army of Agrianians marching to our relief. They had won two actions and burned a swathe through the home country of the northern Illyrian tribes, and the Illyrian confederacy was smashed to pieces.

But Langarus had opened the road to Macedon as he came up it behind us, and with him were a dozen couriers, elements of our camp, the siege train, and Thaïs.

Thaïs wasn’t showing, and she was riding astride, dressed as a man, with a big straw hat, and only her maidservant, the black woman. I embarrassed my friends by kissing her in public – most of them had no idea who she was in her men’s clothes, and the image of me kissing a groom in public was indelibly printed on them. I took a great deal of ribbing.

That was fine.

Thaïs had intelligence – dozens of reports, most of them from Athens.

I took her to the king, and left them together.

She told me that he listened to her, read the letters she had and then wrote a long letter to his mother – it took him an hour to write, and he did it entirely himself, with no secretary.

Alexander offered Thaïs anything she wanted – a rich marriage, an estate. She told him that when the time was right, she would ask her favour, and he kissed her and swore by Herakles.

We lay together that night. The sex was emotional but not very athletic. She was distant.

I prodded and pulled at her until she snapped.

‘It’s all coming apart,’ she said. ‘And friends of mine will pay. People I like are going to betray Alexander, and he will kill them, and I’ve chosen sides.’ She cried in my arms.

In the morning, she rode back down the hills to Pella, and I sent Polystratus and all my grooms to guard her.

Alexander was wrong. The Greeks had stabbed us in the back.

Demosthenes, that paragon among Hellenes, had arranged for a cloak to be shown, covered in blood, in Thebes and Athens. The story was that Alexander had been killed in a rout in the Thracian hills.

Thebes laid our garrison under siege and some Macedonians were murdered. Athens vacillated – Demosthenes was not universally trusted or popular, and men like Phokion and Kineas’s father were powerful enough to stop outright rebellion. But Athens was on the brink.

Sparta was calling up her allies.

But that was not the worst of it.

In Asia, the new King of Kings had finally reacted to Parmenio’s presence. He had sent his best general – Memnon, the brilliant mercenary officer – with a largely Greek army to turn Parmenio out of the Troad, a region bounded by the Dardanelles to the north-west, by the Aegean Sea to the west and separated from the rest of Anatolia by the massif that forms Mount Ida, drained by two main rivers, the Scamander and the Simois, which join at the area containing the ruins of Troy.

He crossed Mount Ida and almost caught Parmenio by surprise at Cyzicus, and then slipped past him and took one of his supply bases at Lampsacus. Calas, one of Parmenio’s brigadiers, lost an action and had to retire – in the messages, it sounded as if he’d been trounced. Parmenio had given up two years’ conquests in Ionia. And worst of all, Darius, this new and powerful King of Kings, had offered Athens and Demosthenes three hundred talents of gold to ally with him and Thebes against Macedon.