With or Without You, Part 1: Surprise
He sees it clearly. Surprise dawns, comprehension follows.
200 Words
Words wound as surely if not more than the truest of arrows.
Despite his heart hammering-stammering in his chest squeezing air from his lungs, even as blood rushed mightily making deceivers out of his ears, Hephaestion thanked the gods for his eyes. Alexander told him once of them, seemingly all-seeing and true. He laughed it off then, but how he thanked the deities for them now.
Though now—as clear as those days when he saw a spear, an arrow, a scimitar arched through fragile air in battlefields—comprehension dawns upon Alexander, even as those treacherous words slide off that beloved tongue.
Hephaestion sees, as clear as a cloudless summer sky of their childhood days, how Alexander's eyes widen, as his ears catch up with his lips. Surprised, astonishment crashing upon that kingly shoulders like a mighty wave. Then shattering. His beloved is not half as defeated as he, but it is an echo all the same.
And thus Hephaestion knows, holds this knowledge close to his breasts, his private conviction. Later, Alexander might seek him out. Later Hephaestion might understand. But for now it is enough to know that he is not the only one bleeding inside.