FORTRESS of SUGHUD. SATRAPY of SUGHUDA
YEAR 10 of ALEXANDER, MONTH 6, XANDIKOS
YEAR 3 of ALEXANDER, MONTH 12, VIYAXANA
3 YEARS LATER
SUN RISING
“Wings!”
“Men with wings!”
Anxious screams pierce through the veil of silence of the early dawn, echoing off the sleepy walls of the ancient mountaintop Fortress of Sughud and the mountainous caverns cresting massively above it.
Rošanak opens her sleepy eyes. It is still dark outside.
Silence.
She pulls the soft warm blanket over her head, closes her eyes and drifts back to sleep.
Just another bad dream…
“They have wings! Bastards!”
“They can fly!”
Loud screams seep through the heavy windows of the ancient didâ, shut tight to keep out the cold mountain air of late winter. Silence splinters and shatters and falls on the stony floor like a delicate piece of thin green Persian kâsaka.
Rošanak quickly opens her eyes.
No… not a bad dream. A bloody nightmare.
The ancient didâ starts to awake and murmur with the sounds of feet running in all directions.
Rošanak jumps out of her warm bed, pulling the thick wool blanket around her, and rushes into the dimly lit hallway, blindly running down the dark stony steps, caught in the midst of a wave rolling and rushing into the middle courtyard of the massive ancient didâ.
Cold air brushes against her face like fine grains of desert sand. An eagle screams. She looks around.
She was swimming in a sea of elders and women and children. Everyone in the ancient didâ had poured like water out of a broken vessel and into the cold courtyard, crowding all around her…
… some hurriedly wrapped up in warm wool night blankets… the rest shaking and shivering and shuddering in the late winter cold… all anxious and scared and stunned… and tongueless and wordless.
No one left inside but the newborns and the very young… and the very old.
Itâna, her brother, and a few other young boys who have been up on night watch duty, excitedly point with their whole bodies to the crown of the high mountain that hangs silently over the ancient didâ.
“Look up! There! Up on the ice-covered ridge!”
All eyes, young and old, roll and hurriedly follow the directions of the hands pointing upward.
The pale winter sun is slowly rising from behind the old mountain ridges, its rays shooting like arrows into searching eyes.
Rošanak shades her eyes with her hands to see better into the sun.
The multitudes around her start to murmur with sheer disbelief and panic and terror.
High over the ancient Fortress of Sughud, on a snow-covered ridge below the crown of the high mountain, a row of armed and armored enemy warriors stood victoriously, waving pieces of their scarlet standards in the cold wintry morning air. It was hard to see how many enemy warriors in arms stood high over their heads ready to do battle and shed blood; their bodies were sheathed in the pale rays of sun rising behind them.
“Impossible!” Some voices murmur in disbelief.
“God help us!” Other voices murmur in sheer terror.
Other voices plead and pray desperately.
Cries of children fill the fearful ears.
Mothers are too terrified to be of any comfort to their children.
“It cannot be!” Rošanak mumbles to herself as she stands there motionless, utterly stunned. She forgets to breathe.
The ancient didâ, high on the crown of the sheer-faced Rock of Sughud and bigger than a town, was impenetrable, so they said. The King and all his kingsmen and warriors had sent their women and children and elders there for safe-keeping during the war. When an azdâkara had come from the enemy camp a few days earlier asking the ancient didâ to surrender in return for mercy and safe passage, the boys who were given the task of guarding the impenetrable ancient didâ, Itâna being one of them, had arrogantly laughed and shouted back:
“Only if you can fly!”
And the enemy warriors had grown wings overnight and had flown… high above them.
And now here they all stood in the icy morning mountain air looking up at the enemy warriors, standing over their heads with their sharp naked swords glinting in the early snow-golden rays of dawning winter sun, eager for the taste of their blood.
“Death or slavery!” An old woman standing close to Rošanak cries out bitterly in fear.
“Death.” Rošanak utters quietly under her breath, grinding her teeth, shaking her head.
When the old Fortress of Âriâmazda, perched on top of another sheer-faced rock, had fallen into the hands of the enemy army, the old Âriâmazda and all his sons and his kinsmen and his elders and all the warriors defending the old didâ had been put to the sword.
All their women and children had been taken and raped and sold in the slave markets in the Lands Beyond the Sea.
“Barefoot? Again? In this cold? Have you lost your mind?”
Rošanak’s thoughts are torn by the voice of her blood mother who pushes her toward the inside of the ancient didâ.
“Go inside before you catch your death in this cold!”
Rošanak turns her head toward the familiar voice.
“But Mother―” She pleads with her blood mother, pointing with her trembling fingers upward toward the row of enemy warriors standing high above them.
“All of you! Go inside and get dressed! You all look like a flock of fleeced sheep waiting to be slaughtered!” Aššat Šarri Farânak, Rošanak’s mother, raises her voice above the multitudes.
Toth Totote!
The unexpected shattering sound of the enemy war trumpet blowing.
Everyone jumps, startled. Then, the loud accented voice of the enemy azdâkara breaks over their worried heads, asking for their surrender to the winged warriors.
Chaos and fear and panic pour down like snowflakes.
“Itâna, send a messenger to your father and the elders,” Aššat Šarri Farânak orders Itâna calmly.
“But―” Itâna protests loudly.
Aššat Šarri Farânak pushes her way through the murmuring multitudes and grabs Itâna by the shoulders. “But what, Itâna?” She speaks calmly, with her royal air taming his youthful pride, simmering with fear and anger and uncertainty under her skin.
“Nothing,” Itâna mumbles quietly, hanging his head low, looking aimlessly at his feet. “We told them we would surrender, if they could fly!”
“The blame is not yours, Itâna. These men would have found a way in, somehow. These are the same men who got through the Persian Gates in the middle of the winter.”
“NO? Was he not the same idiot who yelled: Grow wings and we will surrender!?” Rošanak yells mockingly from the other side of the stony courtyard, still lingering in the frame of the massive door, carelessly wrapped in her warm blanket.
All eyes turn and lock mercilessly on the young boys who are all now looking down at their feet, ashamed, defeated and utterly humiliated.
Aššat Šarri Farânak lets go of Itâna and turns around. She gives her a sharp look and yells, “Rošanak!”
Rošanak shrugs her shoulders. “I am going inside,” she yells back, “but if Utâna were here, he would have taken a barbed branch to Itâna and the rest of those idiot boys and bleed their bloody backs for good measure!”
Her voice echoes and hangs in the cold air, and then haunted silence. She turns and walks inside the massive doorway quickly to avoid the scornful gaze of her blood mother.
How could her mother be so calm and forgiving?
They were to become captives of murderous merciless ruthless enemies…
Life was over…
And her blood mother was screaming at her instead of choking that idiot Itâna.
Aššat Šarri Farânak looks at Rošanak, shaking her head as her daughter disappears inside the ancient didâ. She looks around and narrows her eyes.
The multitudes start to quickly head back inside the fortress, feeling her commanding eyes on their trembling backs.
LATER that DAY
Uxšiyârta, tall and weathered and weary, Itâna’s blood father, followed by Oštana, his middleborn son, and a few elders walk into the middle courtyard of the ancient didâ and into the midst of the anxious murmuring throng.
Cloudy skies hang low over their heads.
“We have surrendered the Fortress of Sughud to the enemy army in exchange for free passage. You can all leave in safety and return to your homes,” Uxšiyârta declares with authority. “They will garrison the didâ. Do not stand around! Go! Take your belongings and leave! Go!”
The multitudes murmur anxiously.
“Alexander has given quarters to all the women and children and elders, everyone!” Uxšiyârta softens his voice, trying to sound more comforting and reassuring. “He will honor his words! He just wants the damn fortress!”
More anxious murmuring.
No one moves, neither this way nor that way; all stand rooted in fear of death.
Uxšiyârta nods with guarded confidence and says, “We will host a feast for Alexander tomorrow night at my house. You can all come,” pointing to the other elders standing by his side who nod uneasily in agreement under their proud old brows.
Murmurs.
“What are you all still waiting for?” Uxšiyârta loses his temper and growls impatiently. “Stand where you are and die when Alexander and his men march into the fortress!”
The multitudes grumble. They finally relent and begin to scatter with heavy hearts.
Uxšiyârta looks around his fortress.
The stony courtyard slowly becomes empty.
Winter wind blows and howls.
“Do not be too hard on the boys!” Aššat Šarri Farânak says quietly to Uxšiyârta, her blood brother, as she gently puts her arms around him.
“My fault! All my fault! I should not have left a bunch of boys in charge. I should have told them, I should have warned them not to bait these men.
“Who would have thought they would climb a sheer iced rock, in the middle of a moonless night, no less?” Uxšiyârta says, shaking his head, grinding his teeth quietly, and blaming himself. “Alexander has been blazing with endless wrath ever since he crossed into the Lands, with Aešma, the Demon of Wrath and Fury, going by his side, bending grown men to his unbending will. He is not a man to match wits with boys.”
“Maybe it was all meant to be―” Aššat Šarri Farânak says quietly, taking a deep resigned breath.
“The Wise Lord has forgotten us.” Uxšiyârta mumbles bitterly under his breath.
“Watch your words, Brother! Lord is Wise. His eternal will unfolds beyond our mortal lives. Do not lose hope!”
“Do you blame me?” Uxšiyârta grunts and closes his eyes in white anger. “My Utâna, all your blood sons, your husband, your eldest daughter and her husband, all dead.”
Mournful silence.
Wind howls.
Winter sun breaks through low clouds.
“Life and death are by the favor of the Wise Lord,” Aššat Šarri Farânak says, pushing back tears, breaking the silence. “Some good will come out of this. You still have Oštana and Itâna, and I still have Rošanak and the little ones―”
“Itâna, Ha! The boy is useless. He cost me our old ancestral fortress. This ancient didâ would have held two more years under siege, maybe longer!”
“The boy is young, and we all would have lost all reason and gone mad if we had to stay here two more years.” Aššat Šarri Farânak says, “I know you miss Utâna. We all do. Rošanak― well―” Aššat Šarri Farânak pauses, takes a deep breath. “Those we love live in our hearts. If the Wise Lord had truly abandoned us, he would have taken our sweet memories of our loved ones instead, so we would suffer living without remembering why―”
“Forgive me!” Uxšiyârta gently holds Farânak’s hand and quietly pleads.
“What is there to forgive?”
“I should have given my blessing to Utâna to wed Rošanak, but her blood father had just died and I just could not think of a wedding in the middle of a war. No one thought this cursed war would go on for so long.”
Regret and sadness cloud Uxšiyârta’s face. “I could have had a grandson by now.”
“Oštana will make you a grandfather soon, he is handsome and girls favor him in abundance, and Itâna too,” Aššat Šarri Farânak says tenderly, “when he grows up into manhood. Wise Lord bless their mother.”
“Will you come to the feast tomorrow night?” Uxšiyârta asks hurriedly, hopefully, changing the subject.
His sister knew the truth but was forever hopeful…
Itâna was an idiot and no one had ever seen Oštana chase after a girl!
“Oh, no,” Aššat Šarri Farânak says as they start walking back inside, “we leave for Baktra as soon as the maids pack everything.”
“Ah!” Uxšiyârta grunts, his eyes become cloudy.
“What?”
The wind blows colder.
“The Hadiš at Baktra,” Uxšiyârta says in a low voice.
“Has my home been destroyed?” she asks worriedly.
“No. But Artâvazda, the old satrap was living in the small hadiš by the gates and Alexander in the other when Baktra fell into their hands. I hear a new satrap, one of the men of the enemy army, is to replace the old bastard soon!” Uxšiyârta says with a voice loaded with guilt. He fidgets with embarrassment and steals away his eyes. “I did not want to grieve you needlessly, so I did not mention anything.”
Not offering bad news was not lying.
Just delaying… and hoping for better news to replace bad news…
Aššat Šarri Farânak stops and turns half way and looks at Uxšiyârta, startled. Her eyes narrow with pain. “Artâvazda?” She lets go of Uxšiyârta’s arm. “Then Rošanak, the little ones and I are without a home, while a traitor lives in our house?”
“Your own properties are still yours, and you are still my sister. You can have any of my homes. My needs are few these days.”
“I just never thought of someone else living in my home, Artâvazda no less, the man who betrayed my husband, caused his wretched death.” She speaks with a faint voice as if coming from the bottom of a waterless well in the heat of Bakhtriš summer. “All my children were born there. Parânak was married there. Rošanak keeps telling me I am getting old. I am already old and forgetful.”
“Come to the feast tomorrow night. Ask Alexander! They say he willingly grants favors to women who approach him directly. He forgave a woman who had killed one of his own men for raping her,” he says with guarded confidence. “Forget Artâvazda! The old bastard is ancient. They say even the Wise Lord does not want his wretched old carcass and so he goes on living while the royal and the noble and the good die young all around him. His family still lives in the Satrapy of Sparda. He trails Alexander because he speaks his tongue and Alexander trusts the traitor.”
Uxšiyârta drops his voice and whispers wickedly with half a smile, “They say his eldest daughter, Barsine, half-Hellene, twice mothered, twice widowed, was the woman who initiated Alexander before Setâreh.”
Aššat Šarri Farânak raises her eyebrow wordlessly and gives a disapproving glance at Uxšiyârta.
He straightens quickly. “Ah, well, he is leaving and I can see no reason why the new satrap cannot live in the small hadiš and return the main hadiš into the hands of the rightful owner.
“How much room does one bloody invader need?
“He should be out sacking and burning and looting and killing somewhere, not living comfortably in a stolen palace!”
“I…” She hesitates, wonders, worries. “What if he declines my request?”
“Then we think of something else, no use worrying about it now,” Uxšiyârta shrugs his shoulder. “As the wife of the old king, you can always offer to marry the new king and then kill him in bed!”
Aššat Šarri Farânak shakes her head with dismay.
No wonder Itâna had turned out this way… he clearly had taken after his own father.
“It is settled then!” Uxšiyârta puts his strong arms around Aššat Šarri Farânak without waiting for her response and lets out a sigh of relief. “You all come down to my house tonight. Once you charm Alexander out of your own hadiš, I will take you down to Baktra myself!”
Aššat Šarri Farânak takes a breath and relents and nods her head agreeably.
Her face and fingers had lost all feeling… it was just too cold to keep arguing with her brother. He always wanted to have the last word!
HOUSE of UXŠIYÂRTA. SATRAPY of SUGHUDA
FOLLOWING DAY
AFTERNOON
“How can a gown shrink so much in one year?” Rošanak asks Mâr’at Bani Âriyânnâz, biting her lower lip. She looks at her gown again in the looking glass and straightens the heaving seams with the tips of her delicate fingers.
“Tell me! I want to know!”
When she had left the Hadiš at Baktra so long ago, they said it was only to pass the heat of summer in the coolness of the mountains… then until the war was over. So, she had only brought one of her royal silk gowns, the one in blood red crimson embroidered with golden lions. It was the one Utâna loved the best.
Summer had slowly turned into Autumn and then into Winter and then into Spring, Summer, Autumn and another Winter…
Why was happiness always no longer than a half blink of an eye and misery stretched forward and backward into eternity?
Utâna had died in battle in the first winter.
When she was told, she had worn this gown and had lain down on her bed in the ancient didâ day after day, waiting to die too. Utâna had sworn that he would come back for her and she wanted to be ready when he did… she did not want him to see her in an ugly old gown and lose his love for her.
When death had not come as beckoned, the gown was stuffed in an old wooden cedar chest to ward off gown-eating moths and then painfully forgotten… and now the once rose-scented gown smelled like old dead wood and had shrunk in half.
“The feast hall will be dimly lit, no one will see the rough seams,” Mâr’at Bani Âriyânnâz says, needle in hand, rubbing her fingers on the side seams of Rošanak’s gown to make them obey, without much luck.
“This is not a splendid palace feast of the Great King in the Royal Persian Court.”
“Âriyânnâz, Look!” Rošanak points down to the hem of her gown. “It is shorter too! It fit perfectly just a year ago!” She holds in her breath, standing straight, trying to make the unyielding gown fit her small breasts. “Well, at least there are no holes from hungry moths.”
“Rošanak, the gown has not shrunk. You have grown,” Mâr’at Bani Âriyânnâz says, smiling, “shapely like a beautiful virgin, ripe for womanhood.”
“This is not the time for flattery!” Rošanak grumbles and pulls on her gown again. “It still feels tight here and there is no more cloth to let out. If I take it off, I can never force myself back in!”
“You can wear one of my gowns.”
Rošanak turns her head and looks at Mâr’at Bani Âriyânnâz’s gown: big and flowy, perfectly hiding her round body underneath a thousand folds, looking like a royal tent with a head.
She would rather die!
“You are not going to the feast!”
Rošanak and Mâr’at Bani Âriyânnâz turn their heads toward the voice of Aššat Šarri Farânak, who is standing in the doorway, watching them.
“But,” Rošanak says, “this is the first feast in two years with music and dancing―”
“No.” Aššat Šarri Farânak dismisses Mâr’at Bani Âriyânnâz tactfully and sits on the edge of the bed.
Mâr’at Bani Âriyânnâz gets to her feet and bows her head. She quietly leaves the room and closes the door behind her.
“Rošanak, there will be other feasts, this one is just for men to make peace among themselves.”
“But you are going, right?”
“Yes, but not for feasting.”
“You are going to the feast, not for feasting? Then why are you going?”
“Rošanak!”
“Mother, please! I am seventeen!” Rošanak sits down on the bed next to her blood mother, disappointed, brooding, sulking.
“Sixteen!” Aššat Šarri Farânak says, shaking her head.
“I will hide under a table. No one will see me. I promise.”
“No.”
“I will hide in one of Âriyânnâz’s gowns.”
“No!” Aššat Šarri Farânak says and then softens her voice.
“These are enemy barbarians who have invaded our Lands, not Persian royals and nobles of the Lands, worthy of the pleasure of your company.”
“What pleasure? Who will take notice of me? I am not fifteen anymore! I am an old maid, no one will even look at me. Uxšiyârta has invited everyone. Even that idiot Itâna is going.”
“No. The boys will not be there, just the men,” Aššat Šarri Farânak says while gently caressing Rošanak’s hair. “I am going because―” she hesitates, “our home, the Hadiš at Baktra is― well, we have not been there for a while, and in our absence, the new satrap and the invaders have made themselves at home there. It was to be expected, I guess. Where else would they live?”
“Nooo!” Rošanak moans. “Where will we live now?”
“The old satrap, Artâvazda, lived there for a while,” Aššat Šarri Farânak says quietly.
Rošanak eyes her blood mother under her long, dark, rolling lashes.
Her blood mother was getting old… she always repeated what everyone already knew at least once or twice. Sometimes more…
“I know, Mother. The bloody traitor who abandoned my father. A blood kinsman no less. Hell will be too good for him!”
“Rošanak!” Aššat Šarri Farânak says scornfully, taking a deep breath. “Uxšiyârta told me to go to the feast and ask Alexander myself for our home. So, that is why I am going. Men are more eager to grant favors to women when they are softened with wine and song.” She gets to her feet hesitatingly and then straightens up. She looks out the small window. “It is getting dark…”
The feast would start soon… she should get there before the men got too loaded with strong wine.
“If it all goes well, we can leave for Baktra tomorrow. If not, then we stay here with my brother.” She takes a deep breath longingly, “It will be good to be home again for the Festival of No’rouz.”
“Yes. Can I go to the feast with you?”
“No!”
“Mother!”
LATER that NIGHT
Alexander sips his strong wine and looks around the crowded banquet hall. Musicians are playing dancing drums. Wine and food flow freely among the multitudes, mostly his own men. Most of the Bakhtrian and Sughdians guests sit comfortably on carpets spread around the hall, while the Makedonians uneasily sit on chairs hastily arranged around the feast tables.
He preferred lounging couches for drinking wine with his kingsmen and his close companions. His chair was uncomfortable, but at least the wine was cold.
He did not intend to stay long.
They had been spending the last two campaigning seasons up and down the furthest satrapies of the Persians on the other side of Ecbatana.
Plagued by bitter snow, blistering sun, scanty food and filthy water, chasing ghostly rebels and faceless enemies, and this was all he had to show for it.
He knew how to win a pitched battle!
The Battle at Granikos had started late one evening and had ended in victory by the end of the following day.
The Battle at Issos had lasted one day… from sunrise to sunset… dawn to dusk.
The Battle at Gaugamela too had only lasted a day… a long bloody dusty day.
He was victorious in all the pitched battles.
He knew how to win sea battles on land too. He had captured or razed all the landports of the Great King, denying his ships access to land… and to provisions.
Like any army, the navy too moved on its belly.
The Great King was long dead and he was now in possession of all the gold and silver in all of Persia.
The heads of most of the rebel leaders had been cut off and handed to him. Still the region remained unconquerable and undefeated and untamed… caught in a circle of surrender and rebellion… and worst, his own men, the toughest warriors anywhere, were beginning to show signs of restlessness and weariness.
His enemies were as faceless and unpredictable as shifting desert sands.
He had broken his Royal Army into units to take every village and town and fortress.
What was taken had to be retaken over and over and over… another town and village and fortress rebelled against him for every town and village and fortress he defeated and destroyed.
How could such an enemy ever be conquered?
Even his own birth mother was hiding the sons of Makedonian nobles in the royal palace in Pella. He had to write to her and order her to hand over the young men to his kingsmen so they could be brought to Baktria to join his Royal Army.
He had given Amyntas, the new Satrap of Baktria, ten thousand Foot and three thousand and five hundred Horse and thousands of Hellene mercenaries to settle and secure the region― the largest force he had left behind anywhere on his path since he had crossed into Asia years ago…
He sips his strong wine slowly.
Bessos executed…
Spitamenes beheaded…
Satibarzanes killed…
Mazćos dead…
Oxodates replaced…
Erigyios dead…
Parmenion and Philotas dead too…
Philotas tortured by his kingsmen and stoned to death by the Makedonian Royal Army… Parmenion beheaded in Ecbatana by Kleandros, Brother of Koinos, the kinsman of Parmenion… both by his orders… by his wishes…
One more of Philip’s kingsmen and his dangerous blood were eliminated when no longer needed.
He was prepared to forgive Philotas, even with all his arrogance and all his annoying boastfulness since the surrender of the Two Lands. If only he had proven himself absolutely loyal to him.
Why had he not even once mentioned to him that some Makedonians in the Royal Army were plotting to kill him? How could he have had such a careless disregard for the safety of his King? Was it not because Philotas would have benefited from the death of the King, even if he himself was not the one wielding the treacherous naked dagger of an assassin… just as he himself had benefited from the death of his own father at the hands of an assassin?
Well, at least most of his kingsmen around him now were his own men and not those of his father… men he could trust and as capable as Philotas and Parmenion. Krateros had served under Parmenion and had proven as good if not better… Perdikkas was leading some of the Horse now…
He had meant to rid himself of all the kingsmen who were still loyal to his father sooner or later and now only a handful of them remained under his command in his royal court.
Last year when the Sogdian rebel Spitamenes, the old kinsman of Bessos, had besieged Marakanda, he had sent two thousand and five hundred mercenaries under the command of the Makedonian Karanos and Andronikos and Menedemos along with the Lykian interpreter, Pharnuches, to negotiate a peace agreement, and the Sogdian Spitamenes had massacred them all… something he had kept from the Royal Army…
His Makedonians never fell in battle! And no one cared much about what happened to the Hellene mercenaries.
It was at a drinking feast after the royal hunt at Basista, where his kingsmen had hunted and slaughtered all the wild beasts in the Great King’s royal hunting grounds, some four thousand animals, when some of his kingsmen had criticized the command of the fallen Makedonians… the Black Kleitos, loaded with strong wine, had risen to the defense of the defeated… the fool!
Yes… the Black Kleitos was dead too… they were all heavy with pure wine and the Black Kleitos had dared to exalt his father, Philip, and to criticize him, the Lord of Asia, by quoting Euripides at the drinking feast:
“Alas! Warriors shed their blood, so that their king can claim all the glory!”
And so he had run the Black Kleitos through with a spear in a moment of drunken rage. Even sober, it would not have mattered much… he had hurled the spear like a thunder-wielding Zeus.
Afterward he had shown remorse openly, since Lanike, the sister of the Black Kleitos, was his own wet nurse during childhood, and Proteas, her son, was one of his kingsmen. Proteas had renounced the Black Kleitos quickly and had remained faithful to him and was drinking deep somewhere close by.
The Royal Army had turned a blind eye to the murder; they had declared him justified in killing the Black Kleitos.
“Whatever the King does, is his right to do!” they said.
The King was always right… even when he was murderously wrong!
It was not his golden Persian Purple clothes or the bended Persian knees in his royal court that had turned him into a Persian King… it was the tongues of his own men who extolled everything he did! Men like Anaxarchos, and all the rest…
“The King could do no wrong!”
“The King is godly!” Anaxarchos had declared in front of the royal court.
Uxšiyârta fills up Alexander’s wine cup again and says something with a courteous smile. His words drown in the beat of the drums.
Old Artâvazda leans forward and interprets for Alexander, “Oxyartes says the wine is local. He says he is pleased that you do not taint your wine with water, as the ignorant Hellenes do.”
Alexander nods and forces a smile and takes another sip of his wine.
He had captured another unconquerable fortress on a sheer rock in the cold of the late winter in the early morning dawn and he was praised for how he drank his wine!
Drums play loudly.
He looks around the banquet hall again.
His father, Philip, would have taken all the Persian gold at Sardeis and the long hands of one of the tall Royal Daughters in a marriage alliance with Darius and would have gone back to Pella, declaring himself victorious… the new kinsman of the Great King!
Not him!
He wanted it all… he wanted to be the Great King, not just another one of his many kinsmen… and the more he wanted, the less remained in his tight kingly grasp.
Alexander turns his head. A beautiful woman approaches his table and generously bows her head, in a courtly manner indicating her noble birth. He eyes her for a moment and then slowly gets up to his painful feet.
His leg was still healing from a month-old arrow wound. The pain of it he could ignore during the day… but at night, the pain was searing… strong wine helped it…
Uxšiyârta smiles and introduces his blood sister.
Artâvazda grabs his tall walking stick, gets up to his old feet and interprets in Attik, slightly bowing his head to the woman. “Alexander, this is Princess Faranak, Sister of Oxyartes.”
“I am Alexander,” he says with an easy smile.
Another beautiful older highborn woman…
He had always found it easier to bond with such women since he had crossed into Asia over six years ago.
He knew well how to be a Royal Son. Even Kallisthenes had made much of his relation with the old Persian queen-mother when he had written home about his bond with Queen Sisygambis, the Royal Mother of Darius. He had felt genuine affection for Sisygambis. She had the royal blood of the Great Kings. She was his adoptive Persian Royal Mother. She cared for him more than she cared for Darius. She was kinder to him than his own birth mother and she did not keep snakes in her royal room.
He hated snakes! Snakes belonged on coins and in temples, not in beds.
Uxšiyârta bellows again and Artâvazda interprets faithfully, “Princess Faranak used to live in the Baktra Palace.”
“Baktra Palace?” Alexander looks at Artâvazda. “Is that not the old residence of Bessos?”
“Yes, Alexander,” Artâvazda nods and adds quietly, “Princess Faranak was the wife of Bessos.”
Alexander looks back at her quickly. His eyes brighten. He forgets the pain in his leg. He orders one of his royal guards. “Bring a chair for the Princess.”
Alexander considers Aššat Šarri Farânak while a chair is quickly brought for her.
It was easy for the Persians to bow to him so gracefully. It came to them naturally.
It was an old custom of the Persian Royal Court, a mark of highest honor due the Great Kings.
He had not understood it before the Battle of Issos. Then after his victory, he had visited the Royal Women of Darius in their royal tent and after they had all bowed to him, it had all become clear, understood, desired.
It was not a sign decadent royal opulence; it was a sign of absolute royal power.
Men who mocked the Persian Royal Court customs were not Great Kings.
He had to crack the hard heads of his Makedonians to get them to show him the same royal honors.
She bows her head again and sits down graciously between Alexander and Artâvazda.
Uxšiyârta pours some wine in a cup and puts it in front of his blood sister. Aššat Šarri Farânak picks up the wine cup and takes a sip to quiet her trembling nervous body. Alexander eyes her sharply, slightly amused.
This was the first time he had seen a Royal Woman drinking wine with the men.
Alexander glances over at Hephćstion who is also watching them with amusement. He looks at her. She smiles graciously and utters a few words quietly, muffled by the beat of the drums.
“The Princess,” Artâvazda says, “wishes to return to her Palace in Baktra.”
“Her palace,” Alexander says, eyeing Aššat Šarri Farânak intently, “I see.” He leans back into his chair, picks up his wine cup and slowly takes another sip.
After the Battle of Issos, he had come into possession of the Royal Women of Darius… and now, with the surrender of the Sogdian Rock, he had come into possession of the Royal Woman of Bessos.
The capture of the damn rock had been more rewarding than he had first realized; he now had all the Royal Women of the Persians in his royal grasp!
Alexander smiles to himself with satisfaction.
He leans toward Artâvazda. “Artabazos, you should be heading back home to Pergamos to your family soon, and Amyntas, the new satrap, can take the house of one of the Baktrian nobles. I prefer to stay in my royal tent anyway, close to my kingsmen,” Alexander says smiling, looking at her intently.
“The Princess can return to Baktra Palace, as she wishes, with all her privileges whole. I will order Harpalos to provide for the Baktra Palace expenses from the royal funds.”
“Alexander bequeaths the Baktra Hadiš to you,” Artâvazda says, adding, “with all your royal privileges, funded with gold from the Royal Treasuries.”
“What does the King expect in return for such generosity?” she cautiously asks Artâvazda.
“Nothing.”
Aššat Šarri Farânak looks at Artâvazda, stunned. She narrows her eyes and then looks back at Alexander discreetly.
She had come fully prepared to hate the man who had ordered the execution of her king-husband and caused the death of all her blood sons… but in person, Alexander seemed boyish, generous, pleasant and eager to please…
Alexander smiles and nods his head.
Aššat Šarri Farânak relaxes. She smiles, gracefully rises and bows her head. She pushes back her chair and walks away without a word.
Uxšiyârta leans back smiling, satisfied with the outcome.
His beautiful blood sister could charm a snake out of its hole.
Alexander gets up to his feet slowly, looks at Aššat Šarri Farânak walking away and thinks about calling her back to him for a moment.
He wished she had stayed longer, but she surely would be more grateful to him when he visited her later in Baktra Palace. She was almost the same age as Queen Stateira, and almost as beautiful and not as tall.
Alexander slowly sits back down.
Hephćstion walks over with his wine cup and sits to the right of Alexander with half a smile. “Who is she?”
“Wife of Bessos, Sister of Oxyartes.”
“Ah!” Hephćstion smiles mischievously. “Is she adopting you too?” He asks with the intimate familiarity of old friends and lovers, not expecting a response.
Alexander gives Hephćstion a sharp look and then sips his wine.
Hephćstion could be annoying at times… especially when he was loaded with wine.
But he was still sober and there was no hint of malice in his voice yet.
He had ordered his men to remain sober during the feast in case the Baktrians and Sogdians had treachery at heart… for the surrender of their fortress…
“Most kings take the wives of their enemies as theirs.” Hephćstion ignores Alexander’s gaze and continues undaunted. “You collect their mothers. You have more mothers than wives.”
“I have no wives!” Alexander grunts with annoyance.
“No, just three Queen-Mothers, Olympias and Ada and Sisygambis. Four, counting this one.” Hephćstion continues teasing and laughing.
“Olympias will be happy to find out that she now has to share you with your new Baktrian mother, the wife of a former sworn enemy, no less!
“Do not tell Olympias how beautiful your new adopted mother is. She will send her Makedonian ropes to hang herself!”
Alexander ignores Hephćstion and looks around the hall. Someone catches a corner of his sharp eyes.
He leans forward and looks intently at the other side of the hall close to the tall entrance doors, behind the rich standards hanging from the high ceiling.
“Hephćstion, look over there, by the doors, there, by the fire altar.” Alexander points with his finger.
Hephćstion looks in the direction Alexander is pointing. “You mean the girl leaning against the wall?”
“Yes.”
Hephćstion shrugs his shoulders. He leans back and sips his wine. “Well, it looks like these Baktrian girls are used to going to these feasts with their men. There are a few others too, mostly among the locals though. I think Ptolemaios and a few others have brought their Hellene mistresses with them too.”
“Is she not the one who passed us by yesterday, with her long hair flowing in the wind? The one who was following closely behind Oxyartes?”
Hephćstion narrows his eyes and says, “I cannot tell. She is too far away and it is not all that bright in here.” He shrugs his shoulders again with marked indifference and sips more of his wine.
Alexander beckons Artâvazda.
“Artabazos, who is that girl standing all the way in the back, by the fire altar?”
“Alexander,” Artâvazda smiles and shakes his head, “at my age, I am lucky to see my own feet.”
“Ask Oxyartes!” Alexander says eagerly.
Artâvazda takes a deep breath. “Very well.” He leans over and whispers into Uxšiyârta’s ear.
Uxšiyârta narrows his eyes. He looks around the hall. His eyes find their mark, the figure of a young girl, standing discreetly in the back by the fire altar. He curses under his lips and grunts. “No one!”
“Who?” Artâvazda leans closer to hear above the beat of the drums.
“Nobody!” Uxšiyârta mumbles again with a tone not eager for more words.
“If the King wants a girl to pass the night with, there are some dancing girls.” Uxšiyârta points with his hand to the girls dancing on the other side of the hall, close to the drums.
Artâvazda looks at Uxšiyârta, who has turned away from him, talking to the Bakhtrians sitting behind them, completely ignoring him. He leans back and interprets for Alexander. “Oxyartes says the dancing girls are here for your pleasure.”
Alexander looks at Artâvazda and then at Uxšiyârta with marked displeasure.
Did they think he was blind?
That he did not know a highborn woman from a dancing girl?
The arrow had torn into his leg, not his eyes. She was wearing a royal color.
He beckons one of his royal guards, points toward the girl and commands, “Bring her to me.”
The royal guard looks in the direction Alexander is pointing. “Sir? Who?”
Alexander turns his head and looks around the hall. The pain returns to his leg.
The girl had vanished in the thick air of the feast.
“I am going back to my tent.” Alexander grinds his teeth and slowly gets up to his painful feet and heads for the doors.
Hephćstion puts down his wine cup and rises to follow Alexander.
Royal guards follow them.
Uxšiyârta takes a deep breath, relieved, savoring his cup of pure Bakhtrian wine as he watches Alexander and his men peacefully leave the feast.
She will be well forgotten by sunrise, if not sooner!
