Authors Note: My first Alexander fanfiction. It's set in the movie-verse, but I've read Mary Renault's Alexandriad so that may come across some. It's a series of oneshots but they are all connected, and revolve around Hephaistion who was my favourite character in the books and the movie! Oh... and angst ahead, be on your guard!

Lastly, I don't own the characters, they belong to history! Please review, it would mean so much to me!

The Palace of Wishful Thinking

It was long past midnight when Hephaistion awoke in that place of myths and dreams, the Palace of Nebuchadnezzr II. He was warm and content and for a moment he did not know where he was. Then through the open windows, the wind blowing from the river Euphrates came to him, cool and alloyed with the smell of perfume and incense, and he heard the sound of continued revelry. And then the sleeping woman alongside him, replete and the source of his warmth, moved and the snag caught the illusion.

A week since he had entered this Gateway of Gods, and already all had changed.

He extricated himself from the woman and put on the Persian garb discarded on the floor by the bed. On the second night he had stifled laughter with Ptolemy as Cassander commented slyly to Crateros about how the hardened general looked "absolutely ravishing!" in them. Of course they had all stopped laughing when Alexander had come in. It wouldn't do to give offence so soon into celebrations.

Hephaistion went to the wide window now and stared down at the magnificent sprawl of the Palace. It was all they had dreamed of and more. The ziggurats seemed almost alive in the night, dotted here and there with so many lights. In the distance the Tower of Babel rose up to pierce the heavens and everywhere there were magnificent gardens to rival those of the Gods themselves. Enough to fuel the dreams of a thousand men and more.

"We dream with you, Alexander." Hephaistion said aloud. He raised his eyes from the great, living city to the dark nothingness of the night sky. "But we also dream because of you." I dream because of you.

"What's wrong Hephaistion?" It was Ptolemy who had asked him that, the previous night. Alexander had not noticed. "Don't like it here, eh? Can't say I blame you altogether. It's a little too... well.. Oriental for my liking. Though," And Ptolemy had winked drolly. "It does have its charms!"

Hephaistion had laughed then. But now in his heart he thought, No Ptolemy. It is in reality not Babylon. The harpy that claws at my heart is called is called Sadness.

Hephaistion pressed his forehad against the smooth polished wood of the window frame and closed his eyes. In his mind's eye he coud still summon to life, as though perfume filling his soul, the touch and feel of Alexander, the sounds he made in pleasure, his great dark eyes wide in the candelight, his strong hands clutching desperately, the long column of his neck waiting to be kissed, the passion and hardness of him both. He had gone to Alexander on that first night behind Babylon's walls with something to say but it all been forgotten in a dream of a night that might last forever.

But with the new sun brought change. Alexander had been excited about following Darius into the East, he spoke of new lands to be conquered and explored, the fire was in his eyes. Change had been a long time coming and it was not as though Hephaistion had not been expecting it. But on the long road, the battlefield, in the desperation and fervour of war where they had slept together - too exhausted to do anything, but close enough to feel each other's cold knees - it didn't rankle with him so much.

But on that day, watching Alexander stride to and fro, resplendent in his Persian robes, loved by all, the color of his hair everywhere remarked as that of the Sun itself, and filled almost to overflow with his visions of a world of Alexandrias, the truth came home to Hephaistion. Alexander needed no other succor, especially not that of the mortal kind. The King, not the man, could not be touched for to do so would be asking for the embrace of fire.

Other things too. The new boy in Alexander's rooms, not just a rough tumble in the sheets for they had all had those, but some kind of inexplicable, strange creature to whom the nature of yielding was an art, a religion. It came to Hephaistion, as he looked into the boy's dark eyes, almost as though he wielded some strange, arcane power. A boy such as he, Hephaistion knew, would know how to worship the King, how to touch the God.

Alexander had not said anything of course. He probably would not know how to phrase the words if it had occured to him that they might need to be spoken. But Hephaistion understood all the same. Ptolemy, straightforward as always, had remembered to feel sorry for him. To that one Hephaistion had said simply, "It is the way of the world. We are not boys any longer of course."

Hephaistion could barely remember a time when he did not love Alexander the boy, Alexander the man. But to love the King was to love the World of the King, and Hepahistion who had known the sweetness of the world, must know now also its great bitterness.

End 21/4/06.

Thank you for reading. Please take the time to review if you could!