Alexander and Alestria by Shan Sa Page A

on the wind, spreading through the air like pollen. People whispered that I had belittled myself by dressing as a Persian and forming an attachment for a slave like Bagoas. They said I had sunk into the arms of luxury and wasted nights on end cavorting with Darius's concubines. They said I had developed a liking for the trappings of the Great Kings and insisted my advisers and guards prostrate themselves at my feet.
    Not satisfied with spreading word of my preference for men among the Macedonians, my detractors persuaded the barbarian soldiers that Alexander had contracted an evil spirit while crossing the dark, shady Drangiane region. However fiercely I punished the gossipmongers to snuff out the defamation, the rumor persisted, nesting among the soldiers wearied by endless marching but flying away as soon as it was touched. As I had no concrete proof, nothing to indicate a particular enemy hiding in the shadows, I waited patiently.
    Eventually the huge conspiracy fell apart, quite by chance. An officer called Dymnus became infatuated with a prostitute known as Nicomachus. He confided in him his plan to assassinate me and invited the boy to join him and the other conspirators. Nicomachus was quick to denounce him to his brother Cebali-nus, who in turn spoke to Philotas, who had access to my private tent. Philotas was the son of Parmenion, a general to whom I had entrusted the command of Media and the management of our supplies, but he was careful not to warn me of the danger.
    Cebalinus eventually reached me himself and gave me the names of the parricidal plotters. But Philotas's silence struck me as more dangerous than a few little foot soldiers dreaming of killing their king. It proved that he wished me dead.
    Everything became clear to me then: Parmenion, Philotas's father, was the man hiding in the shadows and slowly turning the army against me! I made Crateros responsible for subjecting Phi-lotas to torture. His cries rang out, filling me with self-loathing. I could picture him in one of his languid poses and could not bear the thought that he only loved me the better to betray me.
    His father Parmenion, now seventy years old, had once enjoyed Philip's respect and Olympias's friendship. He had come over to my camp after Philip's death by executing my rival At-talus. He had used his skills as an orator to rally the Greeks, and his strategies had seen me win many battles. Two of his sons had died in combat, and he had offered me the vigorous young flesh of his last son. Blinded by this evidence of his support, I had interpreted his ambiguity as flexibility, his eloquence as sincerity, and his opportunism as loyalty.
    The old man was a monster; why had it taken me so long to see?
    He went to every banquet and invited himself into all the taverns, befriending the Persian nobility to build up his network. He waited until I reached the remotest regions of Persia to launch rumors that disrupted my soldiers. He arranged for supplies of food to arrive late or be lost along the way. Hunger and cold angered my commanders, and they too started criticizing me and plotting against me. Parmenion was a fine strategist; he could have eliminated me without touching a weapon. As governor of Media he could have taken over my empire without taking part in any conspiracy.
    This ploy would have been the perfect crime, but the gods decided otherwise. The moment Philotas's confession was ripped from him, I sent a well-chosen man to take a letter to Parmenion announcing a promotion. The general who dreamed of becoming King of Asia greeted my message with delight. He was stabbed on the spot; the strategist had lost thanks to his own strategies.
     
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    The steep mountains softened and curved; the hills turned to plains covered in meadowland. Despite warnings from my Persian generals, who still remembered defeats inflicted by the nomads, despite complaints from the Macedonians, who wanted to go home, I unleashed an arrow toward the sun and my