“Listen, this is important. Aristotle went off to Assos, as Hermeias’ guest-friend; they’d met at the Academy. He’s tyrannos there. You know where Assos is; it’s opposite Mytilene, it controls the straits. So, as soon as I thought, I saw why Father chose this man. This is only between us two.”
He looked deeply into Hephaistion’s eyes, as always before a confidence. As always, Hephaistion felt as if his midriff were melting. As always, it was some moments before he could follow what he was being told.
“…who were in other cities and escaped the siege, have been begging Father to have Stagira restored and the citizens enfranchised. That’s what this Aristotle wants. What Father wants, is an alliance with Hermeias. It’s a piece of horse-trading. Leonidas came for politics, too. Old Phoinix is the only one who came for me.”
Hephaistion tightened his arm. His feelings were confused; he wanted to grasp till Alexander’s very bones were somehow engulfed within himself, but knew this to be wicked and mad; he would kill anyone who harmed a hair of his head.
“They don’t know I’ve seen this. I just say Yes, Father. I’ve not even told my mother. I want to make my own mind up when I’ve seen the man, and do what I think good without anyone knowing why. This is only between us two. My mother is entirely against philosophy.”
Hephaistion was thinking how fragile his rib cage seemed, how terrible were the warring desires to cherish and to crush it. He continued silent.
“She says it makes men reason away the gods. She ought to know I would never deny the gods, whatever anyone told me. I know the gods exist, as surely as I know that you do…I can’t breathe.”
Hephaistion, who could have said the same, let go quickly. Presently he managed to reply, “Perhaps the Queen will dismiss him.”
“Oh, no, I don’t want that. That would only make trouble. I’ve been thinking, too, he may be the kind of man who’ll answer questions. Ever since I knew a philosopher was coming, I’ve been writing them down, things nobody here can tell me. Thirty-five already, I counted yesterday.”
He had not withdrawn, but, backed to the sloping gable-roof, sat propped lightly against Hephaistion, trustful and warm. This, thought Hephaistion, was the true perfection of happiness; it ought to be; it must be. He said restlessly, “I should like to kill Leonidas, do you know that?”
“Oh, I thought that once. But now, I think he was sent by Herakles. A man doing one good against his will, that shows the hand of a god. He wanted to keep me down, but he taught me to put up with hardship. I never need a fur cloak, I never eat after I’m full, or lie in bed in the morning. It would have come harder, to start learning now, as I’d have had to do, without him. You can’t ask your men to put up with things you can’t bear yourself. And they’ll all want to see if I’m softer than my father.”
His ribs and their muscle layer had knit together; his side felt like armor. “I wear better clothes, that’s all. I like to do that.”
“You’ll never wear this chiton again, I’m telling you. Look what you did in the tree, I can get my whole hand inside it…Alexander. You won’t ever go to war without me?”
Alexander sat up staring; Hephaistion was jolted into taking his hand away. “Without you? What do you mean, how could you even think of it? You’re my dearest friend.”
Hephaistion had known for many ages that if a god should offer him one gift in all his lifetime, he would choose this. Joy hit him like a lightning bolt. “Do you mean it?” he said. “Do you really mean it?”
“Mean it?” said Alexander, in a voice of astonished outrage. “Did you doubt I meant it? Do you think I tell everyone the things I’ve told to you? Mean it—what a thing to say!”
Only a month ago, Hephaistion thought, I should have been too scared to answer. “Don’t fight me. One always doubts great good fortune.”
Alexander’s eyes relented. Raising his right hand, he said, “I swear by Herakles.” He leaned and gave Hephaistion a practiced kiss; that of a child who is affectionate by nature, and fond of grown-up attention. Hephaistion had hardly time to feel the shock of delight before the light touch had gone. By the time he had nerved himself to return the kiss, Alexander’s attention had been withdrawn. He seemed to be gazing at heaven.
“Look,” he said pointing. “You see that Victory statue, on the top gable of all? I know how to get up there.”
From the terrace, the Victory looked as small as a child’s clay doll. When the dizzy climb had brought them to its base, it turned out to be five feet tall. Its hand held a gilded laurel wreath, extended over the void.
Hephaistion, who had questioned nothing all the way because he had not dared think, clasped in his left arm, at Alexander’s bidding, the bronze waist of the goddess. “Now hold my wrist,” Alexander said.
Thus counterpoised, he leaned out, off balance, into empty space, and broke two leaves from the wreath. One came easily; the second he had to worry at. Hephaistion felt clammy sweat in his palms; the dread that it would make his grip slide off turned his belly to ice, and crept in his hair. Through this terror he was aware of the wrist he held. It had looked delicate, against his own big frame; it was hard, sinewy, the fist clenched on itself in a remote and solitary act of will. After a short eternity, Alexander was ready to be pulled back. He climbed down with the leaves in his teeth; when they were back on the roof, he gave one to Hephaistion, saying, “Now do you know we shall go to war together?”
The leaf sat in Hephaistion’s hand, about the size of a real one. Like a real one it was trembling; quickly he shut his fingers on it. He felt now the full horror of the climb, the tiny mosaic of great flagstones far below, his loneliness at the climax. He had gone up in a fierce resolve to face, if it killed him, whatever ordeal Alexander should set to test him. Only now, with the gilt-bronze edges biting his palm, he saw that the test had not been for him. He was the witness. He had been taken up there to hold in his hand the life of Alexander, who had been asked if he meant what he had said. It was his pledge of friendship.
As they climbed down through the tall walnut tree, Hephaistion called to mind the tale of Semele, beloved of Zeus. He had come in a human shape, but that was not enough for her; she had demanded the embrace of his divine epiphany. It had been too much, she had burned to ashes. He would need to prepare himself for the touch of fire.
It was some weeks before the philosopher arrived; but his presence came before him.
Hephaistion had underrated him. He not only knew the country, but the court, and his knowledge was up-to-date; he had family guest-ties at Pella, and many traveled friends. The King, well aware of this, had written offering to provide, if it seemed of use, a precinct where the Prince and his friends could study undisturbed.
The philosopher read, approvingly, between the lines. The boy was to be taken from his mother’s claws; in return, the father too would let well alone. It was more than he had dared hope; he wrote back promptly, suggesting the Prince and his fellow students be lodged at some distance from the court’s distractions, and adding, as an afterthought, a recommendation of pure upland air. There were no sizable hills within miles of Pella.
On the footslopes of Mount Bermion, west of the Pella plain, was a good house which had gone downhill in the wars. Philip bought it, and put it in order. It was more than twenty miles out; it would do very well. He added a wing and a gymnasium; and, since the philosopher had asked for somewhere to walk about, had a garden cleared; nothing formal, a pretty editing of nature, what the Persians called a “paradise.” It was said that the legendary pleasance of King Midas had been thereabouts. Everything flourished there.
These orders given, he sent for his son; his wife would hear of them from her spies within the hour, and somehow twist their meaning to the boy.