The Three Paradises

by Robert Fabbri

  OLYMPIAS.

  THE MOTHER.

  OLYMPIAS LOOKED AT the eight men standing before her, outside her tent in the army of Epirus’ camp, two days out of Passeron, and wrinkled her nose; she had never liked Thracians and seven of them were garbed as such in their stinking fox-fur hats, as red as their beards, knee-length boots and foul tunics and cloaks. They had refused to give up their rhompaia, slung over their backs, and were therefore heavily guarded and held at a distance from her. But it was the eighth man, unarmed and just five paces away, who intrigued her for she had often heard of Archias the Exile-Hunter but she had never seen him. And yet here he was, looking nothing like she had imagined: a round, smiling face and humorous eyes; he was not a killer, surely? And yet there was a coldness about him; his reputation went before him, bringing fear into all with cause to be looking over their shoulder for the assassin’s blade. Indeed, she had often expected Antipatros to send Archias to murder her, but even though they had been mortal enemies and she had tried to have the old regent killed or poisoned on numerous occasions, he had never attempted to assassinate her; perhaps he had been too wary of killing Alexander’s mother whereas, despite his mild looks, Olympias could sense that Archias would have no such compunction.

  ‘Whether it was Iollas who administered the poison to Alexander, if, indeed, he was poisoned,’ Archias said, coming straight to the point, his voice level and matter-of-fact, ‘I cannot say as I was not in Babylon at the time. However, what I can say with certainty is that Kassandros asked me to obtain a certain poison in Tarsus, which I did for a very handsome fee, and he travelled south to Babylon with it hidden in a hollowed-out mule’s hoof. All else is pure conjecture. I just present the facts; this is no mere reflection derived from hearsay.’ With this quote, he gave an exaggerated bow as if acknowledging the applause of an adoring audience.

  Olympias sat motionless, only just able to control her cold hatred. She had always suspected this version of events; in fact, she had continually claimed them to be the truth, but in her heart she never had complete conviction. Even when The Last Days and Testament of Alexander had been sent to her by her daughter, Kleopatra, claiming exactly this story, she had still feared that it could be just propaganda however much she wanted it to be true and believed it so. But now, to have one of the protagonists admit his part in the deed to her face was almost too much to bear; she did not know whether to weep with relief or scream with a burning desire for vengeance.

  Eventually, Olympias steeled herself and turned to Aristonous, whose men guarded the new arrivals to the camp. ‘Well?’ she asked, her voice tight. ‘You were there; does that make sense to you?’

  ‘I wasn’t in Tarsus, so I cannot vouch for Archias claiming that he procured the poison for Kassandros, but Polyperchon was in Cilicia at the time.’

  ‘I remember Kassandros coming through,’ Polyperchon said, ‘but I didn’t see Archias; he might have got the poison, he might not have; but either way, we all know what happened shortly after Kassandros’ arrival in Babylon and we all know that Iollas was, inexplicably, Alexander’s cup-bearer. I have no reason to doubt this man and yet I have every reason to believe him, for why would he risk the depths of your considerable wrath by lying to you?’

  Olympias nodded and looked back to Archias, whose face seemed as placid and unconcerned as one having a pleasant daydream. ‘And why have you risked my wrath to come here and tell me this to my face?’

  ‘Ptolemy paid me to; he wanted you to be sure of the truth.’

  So Ptolemy’s goading me into action, is he? ‘Ah, so I’m to be Ptolemy’s weapon now, am I? I can see how his devious mind works. Very clever.’ Olympias considered Archias with hard eyes for a few moments; he remained unmoved, unconcerned even, under the intense scrutiny. ‘And so the story really is true, then? You provided the poison to the man who killed my son.’

  ‘I provided the poison to the man who may have killed your son, I will not deny that. I will also say that the poison works in a remarkably similar way to how Alexander died. But what I will deny is that I knew what Kassandros intended to do with the poison when he paid me to acquire it for him; it is because of that fact that I felt I could take Ptolemy’s commission and travel all the way here to confirm the truth to you.’

  ‘And why should I not kill you just because you didn’t know what he would do with that poison?’

  Archias feigned a look of surprise. ‘I would have thought that was reason enough; but should you require further cause to spare our lives rather than lose thirty or more men trying to kill us – and even then you cannot be sure that you would – then consider this: if you win this little war you seem to be embarked upon, then you may well have some prisoners who are a singular embarrassment to you; prisoners who you would love to see dead but not by your own hand. And what Macedonian would be willing to commit such an act against the sacred blood? I leave it at that.’ Again he bowed, acknowledging the plaudits of an imaginary crowd.

  He’s right and he would be eminently suitable; suitable for many of my tasks. ‘How much was Ptolemy paying you?’

  Archias looked mortally offended. ‘To expect me to discuss my dealings with a client is not just, Queen Olympias. I am a man of great discretion.’

  Olympias resisted the urge to order the impertinent man’s death. ‘Very well, Exile-Hunter, you will stay here with the army as we go into Macedon. If I can find a use for you then you will be paid with your lives; if not then they are forfeit.’

  Again he bowed as she turned and stormed off. ‘“Like blasts of wind her will drives her on.’

  ‘So it really is true,’ Olympias said, hissing through her teeth such was her agitation, as she stomped back into her tent. ‘I believe the man.’

  Thessalonike looked up from the book she was reading. ‘Yes, I heard what he had to say. What will you do?’

  Olympias’ eyes burned with hatred. ‘Do? I will wipe every trace of Antipatros’ family from the earth, down to fifth and sixth cousins no matter how many times they are removed. I will wreak such vengeance on the family that killed Macedon’s greatest son; my son!’

  And it was with a black heart that Olympias led her army through the pass in the Pindus Mountains to bring it within sight of Macedon; a heart that had grown blacker every day of the six-day march since she had had what she always suspected confirmed. But she did nothing to ease the growing canker within her. Indeed, quite the opposite; she nursed it, cherished it almost, for it was, to her, the fuel upon which she would feed as she inflicted her will on the country that had excluded her from power and rejected her; the country that she had not seen for five years and then only briefly after nine more years of exile; the country that harboured the murderous clan that had, in its jealousy, assassinated her son at the height of his success; the clan that had then gone on to exclude her from the settlement made at The Three Paradises. No, Olympias wished only that her heart would be blacker still once she reached Pella so that her will would drive her on, like blasts of wind, as Archias had so rightly observed in his quote from Sophocles. None of that clan would be left alive.

  It was with a great relief that her scouts informed her that the army of Macedon, about ten thousand strong, was but half a day’s march away. ‘We will face them in the morning, Aristonous.’

  ‘I would prefer to choose my ground and wait for them here.’

  Olympias shook her head. ‘I am worth any amount of high ground flanked by rivers or woods. No, we march on and meet them as soon as we might; I wish to be in Pella by the full of the moon. My business there is grown urgent.’

  The three-quarter moon gave a pale light to the grove as Olympias, swaying to the rhythm of the music, raised her phallus, made of fig tree wood, above her ivy headdress; with a clash of cymbals the congregation broke out in song, a hymn to Dionysus: ‘I call upon loud-roaring and revelling Dionysus, primeval, double-natured, thrice-born, Bacchic lord…’ Joy swirled through her entire being as she sang the oh-so-familiar hymn; so cl
ose was she now to the culmination of all her scheming and plotting that she could almost taste the blood that she would spill, could almost hear the screams and the unheeded cries for mercy and it made her black heart thump deliciously in her throat, such was the anticipation.

  ‘…hearken to my voice, O blessed one, and with your fair-girdled nymphs breathe on me in a spirit of perfection.’

  The hymn ended with the roll of drums; the white bull was stunned and then despatched with the double-headed axe that flashed in the hands of a huge man wreathed in ivy and sporting a prodigious erection. Down sliced the blade to carve its way through the bull’s neck, severing the spine and sending blood spurting, dark in the torchlight.

  ‘Euoi! Euoi!’ the congregation roared in unison; the men pumping a thyrsus, a wand of giant fennel covered in ivy and topped with a pine cone, into the air in time to the chant as the women brandished their phalluses ready for the next phase of the ceremony. As there were no new initiates to induct, the ivy-wreathed wielder of the great axe was ritually stoned to a rising tempo of pipes, drums and cymbals; wine was devoured by the gyrating congregation as a goat was led, terrified, into their midst.

  Oblivion approached Olympias as, after a bloody chase, she ripped the flesh from the animal’s torn and twitching body, its blood mingling with the wine that stained the fawn skin draped over her naked body; and oblivion was achieved as she was roughly entered, by whom she knew not, and worked with relentless thrusting into a sexual and religious state of ecstasy.

  And thus, as a bacchant, bloodied and dripping, she appeared at the head of her army as it formed up in the dawn that rose to greet it: the ivy headdress was still in place but very much the worse for wear, as was her fawn skin, stained with wine and bodily fluids; but she had abandoned her phallus, preferring instead to go into battle with a masculine thyrsus.

  If Aristonous felt any surprise at his commander-in-chief’s appearance and the lack of sleep writ clear across her face, he hid it well. ‘We shall be ready shortly, Queen Olympias,’ he announced. ‘My cavalry on either flank are in position, as are the skirmishers; I’m just waiting upon the report from Polyperchon that the phalanx is formed, before we can advance.’

  Olympias breathed deep, the air refreshing her. ‘Very good; where’s the boy?’

  Aristonous indicated to a troop of cavalry stationed at the front of the assembling phalanx. ‘Thessalonike’s looking after him.’

  ‘And the barbarian?’

  ‘Roxanna is under guard in her tent; she’s been demanding to see you.’

  ‘She can demand as much as she likes. She’ll soon get the idea that she is irrelevant now I have the child; useless baggage which, unfortunately, can’t be discarded – yet. Tell Thessalonike to watch for my signal.’ She turned to gaze over to the army of Macedon, now coming out of its camp, not a third of a league distant, forming up on the summit of the long, gentle slope that it had seized the evening before. ‘Their having the high ground will be of no avail to them; not after I show myself and the boy. Has there been much contact between our camps during the night?’

  ‘A fair amount; I gave orders not to discourage it as you were otherwise…well, not present.’

  ‘That’s good; so they will already know that they are facing Alexander’s son. That will give them something to think about as the armies approach one another.’

  And it was with drums beating all around her that Olympias, now mounted, led her army forward as soon as Polyperchon indicated that the phalanx, seven thousand strong, was set. Up the slope they advanced, at the pace of men keen for battle; skirmishers screening their frontage and light cavalry swirling around their flanks as the heavier Companions trotted, lances at ease, in noble ranks and files, a sight to impress.

  But the army of Macedon was equally impressive. It stood its ground on the slope’s summit; almost a mirror image of its opponent in both size and make-up, it would be an even contest in normal circumstances. But Olympias was determined that this would be anything but normal as horns sounded the halt, two hundred paces from the enemy.

  But for the occasional equine whinny or stamp of hoof and rattle of harness, a silence brooded over the field as the two sides faced each other, skirmishers to the fore, the breeze pulling at helmet plumes, cloaks and banners. For a long while did Olympias allow the tension to build, knowing that Adea would not order the attack first as she would be happy to keep to the high ground. On and on the face-off went, the silence growing more profound as the apprehension grew in the midst of the wilderness that lay between the two kingdoms, practically deserted due to centuries of cross-border raids.

  Soon, when she could bear it no longer, Olympias ordered the skirmishers to withdraw; they filed back through the gaps left in the formation, leaving her exposed, a mounted bacchant at the head of an army. And forward she urged her horse, forward onto the open ground between the two forces; until, midway, she halted and raised her thyrsus high above her head.

  Again she allowed silence to reign as she let every man in the opposing army look at her; many, as she well knew, for the first time. Ahead she could see Adea and Philip, both also mounted, at the centre of the phalanx. She appears in a soldier’s uniform as if that will give her authority over the men; well, we’ll see about that. ‘Men of Macedon!’ Her voice was clear despite the sleepless night of excess. ‘Many of you know me but for those who do not, I am Olympias, the mother of Alexander and the grandmother of the current king of the same name.’ She turned and beckoned Thessalonike forward; she came with Alexander riding astride before her. They stood together, side by side, facing the army of Macedon; again she let the silence grow as she allowed the enemy to see the boy.

  ‘Here stands Alexander’s son and here stands Alexander’s mother and half-sister; will you, men of Macedon, come against us?’

  Let me see you try to make them, Adea.

  ADEA.

  THE WARRIOR.

  ADEA LOOKED TO either side as Olympias’ challenge rang out, aware that this was a crucial time in testing the willingness of her men to fight against Alexander’s closest kin.

  It was hardly anything at first, just a slight murmur floating on the breeze, an undertone, but it was there. And Olympias must have heard, or sensed it too, for again she called out: ‘Will you come against us?’

  It was an arrow to her heart, the first shout of: ‘No!’ She turned her horse as the cry was replicated through the ranks of veterans.

  ‘That is your enemy!’ she screeched, pointing behind her; and then she pointed to Philip. ‘And this is your king.’ It was then that she realised the magnitude of her miscalculation.

  The first pike was pitched to the ground.

  And then came the second and third to unlock a wave of discarded weapons surging left and right along the whole line. ‘No! No! No!’ went the shout as shields followed pikes hurled to the ground. Adea looked around, panic mounting in her breast as the mutiny grew; nowhere could she see a sympathetic face, until, at the extreme right of the phalanx, she saw a small section of it standing firm, and beyond that, Nicanor’s cavalry.

  Men started to break ranks, not to offer her or Philip any violence but to walk over towards Olympias, still sitting there waving her thyrsus high in the air and singing the hymn to Dionysus. Now in danger of being swamped by her erstwhile troops as they changed sides, Adea grabbed Philip’s mount’s reins and kicked her horse to the right along the line towards the steady Antipatrid command.

  But it was then that something deep in the dark channels of Philip’s clouded mind detected a threat to both himself and his wife; the urge to protect surged to the fore. He yanked the reins from Adea’s grip and, holding his elephant towards Olympias, pushed his horse forward.

  ‘No, Philip!’ Adea shouted as the king charged, knocking aside many of the troops now swapping allegiance. ‘No! Come back!’ But it was too late: in his simplicity it was enough to charge with a toy elephant to achieve the same effect as a herd of the actual beasts and on
he went, waving the carved creature and trumpeting its call, bringing first astonishment and then laughter from all witnessing the bizarre battlefield manoeuvre. On he went with his bodyguards chasing him, but they were hampered by men in their path.

  Helpless, Adea watched her husband’s brave and well-meaning gesture as he was slowly swamped by the tide of troops changing sides, his horse trapped, unable to make progress, his bodyguards pulled from their mounts and despatched. To ride to his aid was to ride into Olympias’ clutches and so, as none had yet tried to lay hands on her, her Argead blood still holding her sacrosanct, she waded through the tide of turncoats, with Barzid at her side, towards the relative safety of Nicanor and his men.

  But although her blood kept her safe it was not so for Barzid; as blades hacked at him he offered no strokes in return for fear of enraging his attackers, goading them into action against his charge for whom he was now a proxy.

  Adea screamed as he went down, ripped and bloodied.

  ‘Keep going!’ he shouted as he disappeared into the scrum hauling at him. ‘Go!’

  And go she did, knowing that his sacrifice would only buy her a few heartbeats before the mob turned upon her, their blood-lust up and the respect forgotten.

  She kicked her mount on, pushing through the throng, avoiding meeting any man’s eye.

  ‘They have Philip,’ Nicanor shouted as she came within hail, ‘we must go, we have no legitimacy here anymore.’

  And the truth of the statement hit Adea with breath-taking force. I’m nothing now, without him; nothing at all in my own name other than the granddaughter of Alexander’s father but what is that compared to his mother, son and half-sister all standing together? Tears welled as she looked behind to see Philip, still mounted and waving his elephant, being led away by the men who had only recently sworn themselves to him.

  ‘Come,’ Nicanor said, ‘there’s nothing to be done other than to try to escape back to Macedon and hold out on my estates until Kassandros comes north to relieve us.’