Chapter 5 - DEATH
Hephaistion was lost; he was surrounded by blackness and alone.
He had walked around and around but seemed to get nowhere. He had to keep walking because he found that if he stopped he would become so tired that he wanted to lay down for sleep and never wake up.
In his travels he came across a candle that was partly burnt down, he stopped and thought it odd that a candle was place in the middle of all the blackness.
Suddenly a great weariness passed over him and he found himself laying down and closing his eyes and as he lay in front of the candle it began to dim and at the same time a loud shouting began.
Hephaistion put his hands over his ears to block out the shouting, after a while he tried to get up to go and find the shouter but he felt so peaceful and didn't want to move and he fell deeper and deeper.
The shouting stopped as the candle went out.
It was another grime day in the palace, black banners hung in halls and off balconies and the servants and guards had been order to wear black clothes.
Alexander was sat on Hephaistion empty bed staring into space.
He had lost count of the number of days it had been since Hephaistion had lost the fight to survive.
He put his buried his face in his hands as he remembered how the news of Hephaistion arrived.
It turned out that a guard on his rounds heard scratching coming from Hephaistion's room, when he had called out he got on reply.
He had tried to enter but found that something on Hephaistion's side was stopping the door from opening.
He raised the alarm that something was wrong and Alexander had been sent for.
He remembered how he, despite his drunken head ache had stood outside Hephaistion's room pounding on the door all to no avail.
They couldn't get in by the door so they decided to use a siege ladder to get in to Hephaistion's room by the window.
Alexander had been the first to climb the ladder followed by two guards.
The room had been dark and still when the three men climbed into it
"Hephaistion!" Alexander had called out but there was silence
As one of the guards moved forward they had slipped and almost fell to the floor but had been steadied by his fellow guard.
Alexander had taken a candle and shone it down so that it had lit up the floor and all three where shocked to find blood everywhere.
It started in a pool as if someone had lain in the same spot for a long time and then slithered out in a line which headed towards the door.
They rushed to the end of the trail of blood and found Hephaistion laid out in front of the door not moving.
Alexander crouched down next to his fallen friend and took him in his arms.
There was a large bump on his forehead and a stab wound to his abdomen.
They moved him away from the door so that it could be opened and let everyone in.
"Hold on Hephaistion," Alexander whispered
At that point Hephaistion's eyes fluttered open they showed no recognition of any one being there before shutting again.
They would stay shut for many weeks of uncertainty.
The doctors had done everything they could and when they told him that it was up to Hephaistion he threw himself down on to his friend's body and begged them to do more he even offered to give up some of his blood but they just shook their heads and told him that they were sorry.
Once they had gone he had spent the next couple of minutes ordering Hephaistion not to give up then he went to address his generals.
He wanted to know what happened to Hephaistion after his last party, he wanted to know who he had left with and why that person couldn't have taken no for answer but the main question he wanted to ask them was why.
Only one person had failed to turn up and that was Cleitus. In the chaos of finding Hephaistion half bled to death Alexander had failed to notice that one of his officers had been missing.
He had sent a guard to Cleitus' room to see where he was while he started discussing the plan to track down Hephaistion's attacker.
A couple of minutes later the guard had returned with news that Cleitus had not in his room neither had he been seen any where in the palace.
It was then that the tiny steps of wonder and doubt first creped into Alexander's thoughts.
He told the guard to set up a search party to find Cleitus and bring him in and told the other to be on the look out as it would seem they wouldn't have to go far.
After that he had dismissed them all and had gone back to watch Hephaistion till the end.
Alexander took his head out of his hands and stood up.
He went over to the window and looked out; he saw the first four levels of the high tower on which Hephaistion was to be cremated.
It was going to be a beautiful sight with it hundreds and hundreds of sculptures and carvings and then once it was completed Hephaistion's body would be put in place at the top by a system of pulleys and then at sundown the final send off was to be held.
He turned back signing, he took one look at the room before closing the door and locking it.
Author's note
If I had done this chapter five then Cleitus would have seen the black banners and got in to see Hephaistion only to be caught by Alexander