Alexander and Alestria (23 page)

Tankiasis crouched before the pyre while the flames danced in her eyes. Her queen was no more: Talaxia, the indefatigable warrior, conqueror of men and women, would never seduce again. She had abandoned everything she had conquered, abandoned all her prey and her harvests, in order to travel up to the skies along that pillar of black smoke.

My aunt stayed by the pyre until the last spark faltered and went out. She took the decision to stay for my sake, to finish her instruction, to teach me the silent prayers that respond to the call of the glacier. Then one morning she left without a trace. Tan-kiasis went to join Talaxia among the stars, leaving me with an enigma: What is love? Is it a song with no odor or color or melody, but which bewitches the living and the dead?

My child, you carry in your veins all the patience of Tan-kiasis, who stitched every one of my garments, and the strength of Talaxia, who trained me on horseback. Are their souls rejoicing up there in the wind, the rain, and the zigzag of lightning? The fruit of their love has found fulfillment and now carries the fruit of a love with the king of warriors. You, my child, you in turn will bear fruit, and so the tribe of lovers will be perpetuated.

Ania is afraid of love and suffering, but she will help me bring you into the world. She will raise you, and you will call her your aunt. She will teach you the secrets of the Amazons, and you will teach her to love the volcano, which is just as tall and ardent as the glacier.

My child, you will be strong, courageous, and sensual as your father. You will be calm, reflective, and inspired as your mother.

You will take command of the army when your parents grow old. You will continue to open up roads in a world where there are no roads. You will wear the laurels of warrior men and know the language of warrior women. You will be a tiger and a bird, a king and a queen.

I am waiting for you, my child! Your father is impatient for you to be here! I can feel you moving, you kick so hard it hurts, you strike me with your fists, butt me with your head… you make my own head spin.

My child, you leap and bite and tear my flesh!

You cannot wait to be born, you cannot wait to sit in your father's arms, you cannot wait to become a soldier and meet your queen!

My child, I want all the treasures of this world for you, I want a life of battles for you, I want every bird and every horse for you.

When strength withdraws from our bodies, when Alexander and Alestria leave, hand in hand, to join glorious souls among the stars, you will be our flame, our word, our eyes.

My child, Alexandrias, sleep now. Sleep and have beautiful dreams, sleep and have a wondrous awakening!

Sleep, my child, you shall be king of the steppes, forests, and plains, queen of deserts, rivers, and oceans.

Sleep, my child, sleep peacefully. I pray that the God of Ice will send you a beautiful wife.

In the heart of the night the female's arms and legs thrash like tentacles. Her vagina opens like a carnivorous plant and slowly spits out a head, a hand, a foot. A life emerges. Blood streams. And in the middle of it the whitish cord. I seize it. I look for the knife to cut it, but it slips from my fingers. I reach for it. The child is already coiling in the gelatinous cord and strangling itself.

I wake with tears in my eyes. I, Ania, loathed the work of a midwife! I loathed myself for witnessing several births so that I would be ready for the queen! The Amazons were right to refuse this thankless task. Why was Alestria insisting on producing an heir when there were so many women crawling round Alexander who could have carried one instead of her? Why was she waging this pointless battle when other more experienced women could have won the fight for her?

The door to my tent was torn open, and one of the girls of Siberia ran in.

"The queen's in labor!" she cried.

I leaped up and ran barefoot to the queen's tent. Alestria was lying on the carpet, racked by violent convulsions. She had torn her tunic and was thrashing and moaning, trying to get to her feet and falling back down onto her back.

I asked for a fire to be lit and for water to be boiled. Two strong girls took Alestria's arms, and two more pinned down her legs. The queen bit into a cushion and stifled her cries, but her sweat-soaked body and distraught expression communicated her pain to me. I examined her inside: there was a trickle of blood, but the channel was not yet open.

It was daybreak. The blood had stopped flowing, but the suffering did not abate. She was trembling, and her eyes were wide and full of tears. The entire city had been drawn to the spectacle: women gathered outside the tent and, behind them, crowds of soldiers. Their commanders came to speak to me, but I waved them away impatiently. No one was authorized to come into the queen's tent. A few days earlier Alexander had left the city in great haste, and no one knew where he was or when he would return. Without the king there, I was suspicious of every man's motives. I, Ania, armed the girls of our tribe and positioned them round the tent to protect Alestria.

My queen's stifled cries cut me to the core. She fainted after each convulsion. The army's best midwife came to help me. She palpated Alestria's belly for a long time and then told me we would have to kill the queen to save the child, for out of the mother and the heir, there would be only one survivor.

If only one of them was to live, it would be my queen. I had the madwoman thrown out of the tent.

The sun sank in the sky. Now exhausted, the monster Al-estria bore granted her a moment's respite. I washed the queen's body and covered her in a clean tunic. In the middle of the night the convulsions returned and the blood began to flow again. Having pulled the cushion to pieces, Alestria asked for a sheet to muffle her cries. It was not long before she lost her voice and, her mouth wide with pain, made a mewling sound. I fell to the ground beside her and prayed. Where are you, God of Ice? Save Alestria! Save my queen! Take my life instead of hers!

Day took over from the night. My queen could no longer cry, she lay there panting.

Ptolemy introduced a sorcerer renowned for his powerful magic, which had saved kings and princes of the Indies. With his wrinkled face, his protruding yellowish eyes and earlobes distended by earrings laden with diamonds, he looked like an old woman. He wore a pleated skirt around his hips, and his scrawny arms were covered in gold bangles set with rubies. He examined Alestria and told me he could save the mother.

"Yes, my queen must be saved!" I told him. "Alexander will give you ten chariots filled with bracelets and earrings if you drive death from this tent."

The sorcerer boiled herbs, roots, and dried fruit in water. He sang as he stirred the concoction with a black spoon, and made signs with his free hand. Even the bitter smell of his infusion seemed to soothe the laboring mother. I ordered the sorcerer to taste his medicine, which could have contained poison, then blew over the bowl until the liquid had cooled before bringing it to Alestria's lips.

She refused to open her mouth.

I shook her and begged her, wasting my breath trying to persuade her. Reluctantly, I cited Alexander's love for her and the possibility of another child. But Alestria, the intrepid warrior, did not back away from death. She kept her teeth clenched, would not admit defeat. Haunted by the legend of the Great Queen, who died in childbirth, I wept streams of tears.

Suddenly Alestria moved and opened her eyes. I ran over to lift her up and offer her the infusion. She looked at me tenderly, smiling and shaking her head.

Gripped by anger, I threw caution to the wind and cried:

"Let him go! He's a monster! He wants to kill the mother and control the father. He wants to annihilate Alexander and Alestria in order to be the one king of every land! Condemn him. Turn your back on him. Look at the light and turn toward our god."

"I am already in the light!" she murmured.

In her weak, halting voice she explained that Talaxia, Tan-kiasis, and all the dead warrior women had come down from the skies. They had gathered in that tent and were waiting for the arrival of the great king.

She was delirious. She had been taken over by evil spirits who wanted to bear her away. Night drove out the day. I sat beside my queen with two daggers in my lap, cursing Alexander for abandoning her. I was powerless, listening to the rustle of the wind and night birds chattering and sniggering. Alestria's body was racked with shaking and already looked as fragile as a pile of dead leaves.

I greeted the dawn when it returned at last. My eyes scanned the inside of that tent and came to rest on the trunk full of Alexander's gifts. I stood up stiffly and took those jewels and trinkets that had brought my queen so much joy and sadness, and laid them out around her inert body. I put my hand on her belly: the child had stopped moving. The monster had not found its path to life. Alestria, the invincible warrior, had lost this battle that so many other women would have won.

Now I, Ania, who had not slept for three days, saw an army of lost souls. They had come for Alestria. Oh, that they would take me with my queen!

Alestria's hands were cold as ice. She was still breathing, but her soul had left her body. She was there among those wild spirits who loved victory and light, laughing, dancing, and occasionally peering at me out of curiosity.

Alestria, it is I, Ania, your sister, your servant, your scribe!

Alestria, have you forgotten those flat stones on which we started writing our story?

Alestria, have you forgotten the smell of lily of the valley, the song of the white birds, the gold and red clouds rising on the horizon?

Alestria, are you weary of Alexander, the man who brought an end to your galloping and who showed you all the pleasure and pain of being a woman?

Alestria, come back! The life of kings is an illusion. We can return to our own land and go back to our novel of the stars.

Come back to your body, Alestria!

Poros. The name obsessed me. People everywhere praised his intelligence and fine looks. His reputation for eloquence had spread along the banks of the Indus: he alone succeeded in rallying the princes to drive Alexander back out of their lands.

I had left my queen to fight this fearsome rival. I offered pacts to the cities I had conquered, and promised those that surrendered the fertile lands that belonged to Poros. Right in the heart of the web woven for me by my adversary, I was building my own net. Where he had found friendship, I set up an army. In my progress toward the south I knew that Poros was riding out on his white elephant, sometimes ahead of me, sometimes following behind me. Neither he nor I had yet chosen when we would meet. But the battle was already inscribed in the stars.

That night I saw Ania in my dreams. She was staring at me, her eyes full of hate, and hissing: "Alexander, the queen is dead."

I woke. It was not yet light outside. It was raining, and I thought I heard moaning from the queen I had abandoned for the toils of war. "Alexander, come back!" Ania, her faithful servant, called. "The queen is in labor! It's a boy!"

Alexander must not turn his back on war for a woman! He must show his soldiers that he can sacrifice his family for the sake of victory.

Kristna, a young Indian prince, had secretly sent me a message offering me an alliance against Poros on condition that I left him his fields of hashna, the grass of happiness. Was this offer a trap or an opportunity? Was it bait put out by Poros or the whim of a prince who wanted to play one warrior king off against another? I drove Alestria and Ania from my mind and concentrated on the lands of the Indies reconstructed in miniature on the table before me. Different-colored stones represented the various kingdoms spread out between the forests and mountains. Blue was for allies, yellow for adversaries, and green for those who had not yet chosen between Alexander and Poros.

I ordered my men to break camp and rode out at the head of my army toward Kristna's enemies. By killing them I could offer this prince a poisoned gift: he would have to ally himself to me, he would no longer have any choice.

Nothing-not Alestria's tears nor the birth of my child- must interrupt my progress. Nothing must slow me down or break my concentration. I shall race headlong toward this duel, this great battle.

I was haunted by Alestria's pale face. The dark foliage looked like her naked body giving birth. A snake the color of fire flew in front of me and bit a guard, killing him instantly. Hephaestion had toothache, and his gum was so swollen he could no longer talk. All these signs were bad omens and made me anxious. Alestria, forgive me, I am riding toward our glory! I am fighting for your beauty, for your radiance, for the future reign of our child! Alestria, do not weep. I shall return when I have won the battle. I shall return to give you Poros's white elephant and a river of diamonds.

The rain stopped, the wind blew, and the river Hydaspe roared. I heard Ania's voice accusing me: Why did you beget a child if you are afraid of being a father? Why have you abandoned your wife like every other Alexandria you conquered? What have you done with your life? You killed your father, rejected your mother, burned every land you passed through! You claim you want the sun but forge your way through the shades.

I galloped along the riverbank, fleeing this voice by urging my horse on, always faster. No, Ania, I am not an ordinary son, husband, or father. I am Alexander the conqueror, I am a phoenix flying above the flames, I am the man who brings about a new world, I am the son of Apollo and the father of all mixed-race children. Ania laughed bitterly and spat out these words: Then Alestria will die. She too will be a part of this charred path you leave behind you. You will stand alone with no wife, no heir, and no army. You will be a star condemned to flee, never knowing any rest. You will burn in a sky that never sees the light, in a frozen darkness where boundaries constantly retreat. You will slip away ever further, ever faster, ever more desperately into those eternal shades!