“He would continue sailing along the shore of Libya, thinking he is sailing by Arabia,” Thais replied without hesitation.
“Indeed. See? The shore to the south from the Cape of Fragrances goes southwest to the Punt for five hundred skhens. Further along it turns southeast, and that is where the fleet leader would discover his mistake.”
“Then what?”
“I cannot tell you that, for I do not know Nearchus. He may turn back. If he is strong and brave, he would go forward and around, as Finikians have done when ordered by the great Neho.”
“The Cretan is stubborn and strong,” Thais said sadly. “Besides, Alexander himself dreamed of sending ships around Libya, having heard nothing of Neho.”
“Then expect the fleet in three years, as it happened with the Finikians,” the priest replied. “Two years have already passed.”
Five more years passed, and it became obvious that Nearchus’ fleet had vanished without trace in the vastness of the sea. Along with him, the Daughter of the Snake had gone forever from Thais’ life. Eris was all that was left to her.
The unavoidable losses followed one after another. She hadn’t heard from Lysippus in a long time. He sent word once that he’d sold the Anadiomena to Seleucus, who traded her to the Indians for elephants. Lysippus did not know how many elephants they offered, but twenty-five talants, added to the twelve talants that made up the value of the silver, added to two hundred twenty thousand drachmas, which was an enormous sum. She wrote to her teacher, asking him to use the money for the school of sculptors in Carius, which he had dreamed of starting for a long time, but she never received an answer. Something must have happened to the great sculptor. Or had the endless war over Alexander’s inheritance in Ionia and Mesopotamia interfered with the letter?
Thais had a vague premonition that her teacher was gone, and it was correct. After his departure to Hellas, where he met with Cassander who had supposedly ordered a statue, Lysippus fell ill and died shortly after. Following tradition, his heir, the eldest son Euticratus, opened the great sculptor’s secret chest. Lysippus had a rule. He placed one piece of gold into the chest after selling a statue. Euticratus counted fifteen hundred pieces, which made obvious the sculptor’s giant legacy. Thais would have been even more astonished had she known that not a single one of Lysippus’ fifteen hundred statues ever reached the heirs of Helenian art. Only a few of them became known to the future generations, thanks to the Roman marble copies from Lysippus’ bronze originals. Had she known that, Thais would have realized how little hope there was for preserving her silver statue, even though the bronze was more likely to be used for weapons of war by the future ignorant conquerors of Hellas, Asia Minor and Egypt.
Many people descended into the Amelet stream, the river of Rescue from Cares in the kingdom of Hades. So many changes, impressions, and so much turmoil took place over ten years. They swirled by like a storm from the moment Thais left Athens for Egypt and returned as queen.
Now, there were very few changes in her life. Time flowed slowly, like the Nile during winter. Was that the case for all who reigned without ruling? With the queens, whose husbands remained the true rulers? Thais realized Roxanne must have felt the same way with Alexander and probably felt even worse now that he was gone. Little Alexander, who was born two months after the death of the great army leader, was guarded like a talisman and a symbol of power — first, by Antipatros, the chief strategist of Hellas and Macedonia, and now, after his death, by Antigonus the One-eyed.
Aristotle died too, outliving his great student by only one year. Lyceum in Athens was now run by the scholar of plants, Theophrastus. There, serious students still walked among the splendid pine trees and chestnuts, having been allowed to obtain secret knowledge. The Athenians came in the evenings to listen to philosophic talks. In Ecbatana, Lysippus had told her about the birth of the new movement of stoics, who stated that all people were equal citizens of the world. They founded the first true system of evaluating one’s behavior not based on one’s faith in divine word, but on the importance of one’s life to the society.
The priest interrupted her thoughts. “Would Your Majesty like to learn anything else?”
Thais was startled from her thoughts. They were approaching the Neit temple, where a worried Eris paced gracefully up and down the broad staircase.
“Tell me, Father, why did they show me the secret drawings of land and sea, but did not do it for Alexander or even for Nearchus?”
“We were not asked, and knowledge only goes to those who seek it. You are one of us, you are harmless and not powerful, because you do not seek power. A great genius, an army leader, or a ruler, regardless of his origins, has yet to bring happiness to people. The greater he is, the greater the trouble. People usually follow laws that are thousands of years old, having grown from the healthy experience of generations. They are connected by the necessity of life, faith and service to gods and power. A great man places himself above all things commonly human, destroying the foundations of existence, and making the eternal mistake of reducing his deeds to nothing thus plunging him into the abyss of Darkness. Godlike people only bring happiness when they have no power. People like philosophers, healers, poets or artists.”
“Do you believe Alexander only brought suffering and misfortune?”
“His deeds have yet to be weighed on the scales of time, and the gods of destiny have yet to count the black and white sides of his life. My mind is too small to comprehend the enormity of his accomplishments. Initially he was given beauty and physical strength, a brave heart and a clear, all-encompassing mind, as well as knowledge. Then he obtained military strength: tough hearts and tempered bodies of Macedonian and Helenian soldiers. He wanted to multiply his knowledge but multiplied his wealth instead, having taken at once that which was stored over the centuries by a large people in a large country. Due to his youth, he gave away the treasures thoughtlessly, being neither greedy nor wasteful himself. He gave it into hands that were as unworthy as before. Except the prior owners kept it in their own country, and the new ones, having received it easily, spent it on trifles across strange countries, having enriched greedy and calculating merchants and sold for pennies the ancient works of art and tens of thousands of enslaved people. And so
Alexander’s forces fractured and lost any sense of purpose. The natural resistance of the people fighting against the intrusion into their native lands, brought forth savagery, cruel and bloody violence, the killing of the innocents that was offensive to the gods. Instead of studying the land and establishing peace, learning the common traits among the customs, beliefs and goals that unite all people of the world, endless circles of future power struggle emerged along with intrigue and misfortune. And here we are today, several years after the split of the empire. There is still bloodshed and war going on in Hellas, Ionia, Mesopotamia and on the islands of the Green Sea.”
“Then why did it happen that way and not differently, Father?” Thais asked.
“It could not have been different, if he who has power, gold, and the will to alter fates of countries and people, does not understand that each part of his might has a reverse side. This reverse side will inevitably be presented to him by fate unless he is careful. For gold, the result is humiliation, envy, and struggle for wealth in the name of wealth. For power it is cruelty, violence, and murder. For will it is persistence in the use of power and gold and blindness.”