God of War: The Epic Story of Alexander the Great

Something terrible happened on Alexander’s face, then. His father had shown him no love at all for more than a year – had all but cut him from the succession. But here – all of a sudden – he was invited to walk with his father in the most important ceremonial of the most important two weeks of the year.

He had a difficult time getting his face under control, and twice he looked at his mother.

Then he walked forward, and he walked with the same nervous gait that Pausanias had used.

I thanked the gods for my own mother and father, that I had not been born to the Royal House of Macedon. And I didn’t know the half of it.

As we marched into the theatre, the royal companions entered after the statues and turned to the right, forming their ranks on the sand while the priests put the statues into their niches for the duration of the games. I was bored, and my left shoulder hurt, and I wondered if I would be any good. I had entered the pankration, and I was aware that a win would help restore me to Philip’s good graces. And the pain in my shoulder was a worry.

We were behind the king, and my squadron was to form to the left as we entered the theatre, while the king went to the centre and then Olympias and her ladies would enter with Cleopatra (the king’s wife, not that other one) and her ladies. Together, because it amused Philip to make them cooperate.

As we started to enter, Philip seemed to hesitate, as if someone had called his name. My front rank appeared to fall apart. I noticed that Black Cleitus, my left file leader, was hesitating. Well, we were cavalrymen being forced to march like hoplites, but I hated to make a bad show. I turned farther and heard the noise, turned back to where Cleitus was looking, and saw Perdiccas spring out of the second rank.

Pausanias went past us, his hand all covered in blood.

Perdiccas didn’t follow Pausanias immediately. He looked out on to the sands, turned, and then raced after Pausanias, followed by two more of my men – Leonatus and Andromenes, both highlanders. They were all three close friends, a tight group made tighter by shared blood and highland custom. I roared at them to halt, but they were stubborn bastards.

And only then did I realise that there was more wrong than the loss of cohesion in my ranks.

I had thought, I guess, that Pausanias had broken down and done himself an injury and his relatives were running to see to him.

If I thought anything at all.

But somewhere in that horrible moment I realised that Alexander was kneeling in the sand by Philip, who was lying in a growing pool of red, red blood, with a Keltoi sword sticking out of his gut, the ivory chariot team racing towards the heavens.

And only then did I realise what Pausanias had done.

‘Seal the exits!’ Antipater roared at my elbow.

Antipater – who I hadn’t seen to speak to in months – was suddenly at the head of the parade.

It was the right order. I turned and shouted it at my companions, and they snapped to.

But I could see that Philip was dead. Not dying. He was already gone.

And I remember thinking that I did not have the luxury to think. I know that makes little sense – but it all came together for me. Olympias, Pausanias and Alexander. And I knew – in a heartbeat – that it would mean my life to show a wrinkle of suspicion.

So I shouted for my men to close the exits, and Antipater got the royal companions into the northern half of the theatre.

The crowd was terrified.

Phokion was angry. It showed in his posture – the old warrior was stiff, hips set, ready to fight.

I did my duty, kept them in place and watched as Antipater cleared the theatre a bench at a time. Olympias and her ladies were already gone. They had never entered the theatre, and neither had Cleopatra.

Every foreign contingent was sent to their lodgings with a pair of guards – mostly royal companions – with orders to make sure that not so much as a slave got away until Antipater ordered them released.

I wrapped myself in my role and saw to it that the companions did their work. Slaves came and took the king’s corpse. No one pretended he was still alive.

That meant that Alexander was king.

We cleared the last of the seats, and for a moment, it was just me and Cleitus, way up at the top, watching the Theban embassy moved forcefully down the ramps.

‘Alexander is king!’ Cleitus said.

I nodded.

‘Pausanias killed the king,’ he said.

I nodded.

Cleitus caught my eye. ‘We know better, don’t we?’ he said bitterly.

I remember that moment well. Because I shrugged. ‘Philip was going to ruin us,’ I said. It was in every man’s heart – Philip had turned to hubris and self-indulgence. And in Macedon, when the king slips, you find a new king.

Cleitus thought for a long time. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Poor Alexander,’ he added.

And that’s all we ever said on the subject, except one night in Asia. And that was years and parasanges later, and I’ll tell that tale when I come to it.

TEN

You might have thought that having lost his father – whether he actively schemed at Philip’s murder or just sat back and let it happen – Alexander might have either suffered remorse, or at least enjoyed the fruits of success.

In fact, the next months are a blur to me, and I can’t pretend I remember them well. This is the problem with my secret history, lad – we never spoke of these things at the time, and I can’t really remember the exact order in which things happened.

On the afternoon of Philip’s murder, Antipater ordered the palace locked down, and all the former pages were in armour, as I said – we cleared the theatre, and then we came to a sort of shocked halt.

Antipater was there. And he started issuing orders. For us, the most important order was that we were now the first squadron of the royal companions. He ordered me to set the watch bill, and he took Philip the Red and more than half of us to clear the palace, and all of the dead king’s royal companions were put under what amounted to house arrest in their barracks and stables.

They went without a murmur, which saved everyone a bloodbath.

Perdiccas rode back covered with blood and told me – and then Alexander – that he had killed Pausanias with his spear – that the man had had a pair of horses waiting, so he had accomplices.

In the morning, I had been certain that Alexander had contrived the murder himself, or Olympias had done it, but by afternoon, my cynical observations were shaken, mostly because both Olympias and Alexander were behaving so . . . naturally. They were acting as if they were afraid that the plotters were after them. And the precautions they took were real.

I put a whole troop of the former pages – from now on I’ll just call them the Hetaeroi – on guard at the palace. I led them myself. Black Cleitus stood at Alexander’s side, and Hephaestion stood behind him, both in full armour.

Aeropus’s son, Alexander of Lyncestis, came in just after the sun touched the roof of the Royal Tomb. That part I remember. I was in armour, and he rode right into the palace courtyard, leaving a strong force of men at arms at the gate. I met him. He was the de facto ruler of the highland party, and he had some claim to the throne – distant, but in Macedon perfectly acceptable.

I had a pair of archers watching him with arrows on their bowstrings.

‘My lord,’ I said formally.

He slid from his horse. ‘Ptolemy,’ he said, with a nod. We weren’t friends, but we had enough in common that, in a crisis, we had some basis for trust. ‘I wish to surrender to the king. Will he spare me?’

I remember thinking, What the fuck’s going on? I shook my head. ‘I can’t say,’ I said. ‘I give you my word I won’t have you killed out of hand, but . . . if you conspired at Philip’s murder, I can’t save you.’ I couldn’t understand why he had come in or surrendered himself, and my suspicious nature made me wonder