God of War: The Epic Story of Alexander the Great

He almost never accompanied us on campaign in the early years.

But he was, almost from the first ascension of Alexander to the throne, his chief treasurer. He was good at maths, but more importantly, he was expert at talking men into making donations, and he seemed to be able to conjure gold out of the air, so that, in the early days, he stood as a barrier between the king and his very real poverty.

In fact, I haven’t mentioned him because . . . how can I put this without seeming a cuckold? He never hid his admiration for Thais. And she liked him in a way she didn’t like me – as one brain to another, I think. They shared jokes – gossip – and secrets. Together. Without me.

To say I hated him is to do all three of us an injustice. But I confess that most of the time I tried to pretend he didn’t exist.

But he did.

While Alexander was sick – at Tarsus – he defected. He took an enormous sum of money, and left us – for Athens and Sicily. To me, it was good riddance.

Thais was pregnant, you recall, and delighted to be so. I was newly promoted to a taxeis, and all was well.

But when I spoke of him as a traitor, Thais would look at me – a look that always meant, ‘You are better than that.’

It made me think. After a while, I stopped referring to him as a traitor.

At Amon, the king included Harpalus, by name, in his prayers and sacrifices.

He was in Athens. And about the time the army arrived at Tyre, I realised that he was in Athens, and so was Thais.

There were two ways for me to read it. I could see the love of my life as despicable – capable of running off with another man, without so much as telling me where her feelings lay.

Or I could go back through all the conversations I’d ever had with either of them, and sort through for some facts.

I was, and am, intelligent enough to see that Thais was not the woman to behave that way. If she had left me for Harpalus, she’d have said so. Or so I had to believe, despite the recurring notion that her spectacular appearance as a priestess of Hathor was a form of farewell.

But the heart can be a dark place, and I could not conquer the image of Thais lying in his arms. In Athens.

We’d been camped at Tyre for a week when three ships came from Athens – the Athenian state galley Paralus and an escort, as well as a private ship, with them – Stratokles of Athens in his first Black Falcon.

I was drilling my taxeis on the wide plain when they came in, and an hour later, Polystratus rode up on a beautiful mare – a new one – and saluted.

‘The Lady Thais has arrived from Athens,’ he said. ‘She has a shipload of your goods, and requests your immediate presence.’

Polystratus slipped from the horse’s back while he spoke. ‘And this divine filly, and a pair of geldings for you. You lucky bastard.’ He patted her back. ‘Don’t keep the lady waiting.’

I could have kissed him. Instead, I vaulted on to the horse’s back – what a sweet horse – no war horse, but beautifully trained and responsive. A little small for me, but all heart.

I rode her down to the beach, enjoying every minute.

There was Thais.

With Harpalus.

I almost choked, but I am not a fool. If any of my unworthy suspicions were true, then they would not be standing on a beach together laughing. Or rather, they might, but only if Thais was a different woman.

So, not without effort, I dismounted, gave Harpalus a civil bow and opened my arms.

Thais moulded herself to me. There is no other way of describing what a woman can do with the man she loves, so that as much of the body is in contact as can possibly be managed. She raised her face and I kissed her. I think it was the first time I kissed her in public.

She laughed into my mouth.

Harpalus looked at me with a certain bewildered jealousy. I thought him a traitorous, fickle, high-strung idiot, and he, I suspect, thought me a clod. Still thinks it, I suspect.

There we go, then.

‘I have a few things for you,’ she said. She introduced me to Stratokles – father of the current politician – who looked at me with distaste. With him, and Harpalus, was a soldier – I knew him in a moment as one – well dressed, in the Athenian way.

‘I have all your armour,’ Thais said, delighted by her own success. What can be more wonderful for a man who has doubted his mistress than to watch her, in turn, be pleased at her ability to give pleasure? I didn’t need to hear the story to know that she had worked hard to get the armour shipment together.

I sent a slave to get the taxeis down to the beach. I had arrangements of my own to make – I needed a man to replace Isokles. I had asked Kineas, but he – and Diodorus – refused to leave their precious aristocratic Athenian cavalry. I wanted an Ionian or an Athenian to help me with the prickly sods I had from Memnon, but no one was forthcoming.

I digress, because of the association of ideas. The man with Harpalus and Stratokles the elder was Leosthenes, who had been elected an Athenian tribal general twice, and was as near a mercenary as you could be without carrying the name.

I was introduced to him. He looked familiar.

‘You served with us at Issus?’ I asked, as soldiers do.

He shrugged. ‘In the second line. Your king always puts men like me in the second line.’

He had the kind of charisma that Alexander had. It burned from his eyes. And he had a nice Ionian accent.

Thais laughed. ‘I brought him for you, dear. He goes with the horses.’

Leosthenes blushed. ‘I don’t like to seem a supplicant,’ he said.

Thais put a hand on his arm. ‘He has helped do the king a great service in Athens, and he needs a home for a few months.’

I held out my hand. ‘I need a company commander, and an Ionian one is ideal. I don’t suppose you have any way of qualifying as one of us? A Macedonian?’

Leosthenes laughed aloud. ‘My mother is Thessalian. The Athenian Assembly never tires of reminding me.’

By that time, Polystratus and Marsyas had brought the taxeis down to the beach, stripped to chitons.

I ambled the mare over to them and raised a hand for silence. ‘Listen, gents. I have spent a fair amount of gold to get you lot some new kit – so you can look like proper princesses when you go to the dance. Unload it from the ship, and we’ll have a feast tonight in the old way, and share it all out. This is my gift, lads – not an obol from your pay.’

Unlike Alexander, I knew what appealed to soldiers.

We unloaded that ship before the sun went down, and while we did, the regiment’s slaves built a dozen bonfires on the beach, and Leosthenes showed his skills by getting up fifty baskets of lobster. Just try to make fifty baskets of lobster appear. It takes skill and the will of the gods.

The slaves built the fires high and burned them down to coals, and we buried the brutes in the coals and roasted them. There were anchovies so fresh that some tried to get back into the sea, and Thais had brought wine. I suppose – no, I know – she brought good wine for the campaign, but I handed it all over to the troops, save a few lonely amphorae for us, and she rolled her eyes, but held her peace.

We had almost four hundred bales of goods, every bale wrapped in cowhide, with a layer of tallow, and then a couple of layers of linen canvas. When we had eaten, with all the mess groups in circles by their fires, and the officers all together – Marsyas and Cleomenes, the senior phylarchs, with the addition of Leosthenes, and Thais sitting with us as if the presence of a woman at a camp dinner was the most natural thing in the world – I took a sharp knife and started to open the bales.