Title: "Fire and Signs".
Author: too_beauty
Feedback: yes, please any kind of them will help me to improve my writing or leave it forever.
Pairing: Alexander & Hephaestion. Kronos and Athina were born from my imagination and I really loved creating them.
Rating: PG for first chapters.
Category: Historical AU so some personages will appear to serve the purpose of this story.
Disclaimer: I don't know the people involved; A&H belonged to themselves and to History, if not Hephaestion would be still among us, living under my "protection".
No beta so all mistakes are mine.
Chapter 4.
Alexander was expecting the new day anxiously; in fact it had been very difficult for him to sleep. He got up at dawn, went for his cold bath at the river – a custom acquired during Leonidas's training – and went back for his morning meal.
He didn't know when Hephaestion was coming. He was on his way to the dining room when he came to a halt; Hephaestion was standing in the middle of Queen Olympia's garden touching the petals of some exotic flowers. In that moment, Hephaestion bent over a red rose to smell its perfume and Alexander's heart shrunk at the vision of happiness plastered in Hephaestion's face.
Hephaestion was blushing, that's why he was bent over the flower; from the corner of his eye, he had caught a glimpse of a semi naked Apollo, with wet skin and curly blonde hair reaching his shoulders, coming towards the palace. He knew that he couldn't face the Prince being him in that state of undress; so he turned round and in that precise moment a ray of sun hit his face, enlightening his eyes and Alexander thought that two precious blue gems had fallen from the Olympo to set on that handsome face, just to make him feel dizzy.
Both youths were too deep in their own thoughts: the mute one thinking why he felt so attracted to the prince; the talkative one thinking how could be a walking god in his garden.
Their feet brought them together without realizing and Alexander started babbling due to his nerves; Hephaestion let him speak but when he was feeling tired of all that nonsense, he put a finger onto the Prince's lips and mouthed: "hello"
Alexander blushed and greeted him aloud, feeling his lips trembling due to the soft and warm touch of that single finger. Alexander asked him how he was and Hephaestion mouthed again "fine" and motioned towards the palace. Alexander remained stood there quietly seeing the brunette boy going away from him; Hephaestion, sensing that Alexander wasn't following him, stopped and looking over his right shoulder, he stared at his semi-naked Apollo and a smile appeared on his face when he realized that Alexander was looking at him with his mouth wide open. Alexander shook his head, trying to wake up from his day dreaming and set off running to his side.
Hephaestion, in moments like these, regretted his lack of voice and promised himself to get his voice back, no matter how much effort he would have to do.
Both youths arrived at the dinning room and some of the boys were already up, most of them still yawning, some rubbing his knuckles over their eyes. Ptolemy and Perdicas came running to greet Alexander and the prince introduced Hephaestion to them; the two noisy boys started to speak rapidly and Perdicas kept on talking loudly, almost shouting. Hephaestion just nodded to them and looking at Perdicas, he put his hands over his ears, covering them and frowning his forehead. The blonde boy, who was always speaking his mind aloud before thinking, slapped his forehead and said:
"Forgive me, you are mute not deaf!!" and giggled at his own stupidity.
Hephaestion just smiled at him and raised his hand as a salute. He started walking again when he felt a warm hand over his shoulder.
"Where are you going, Hephaestion?" Alexander asked
Hephaestion, taking a scroll and a stylus from his bag, wrote "Parthos" which was the name of King Philip main engineer.
"Come to my room with me, you can wait me there while I get dressed and then we could look for him together."
The mute boy looked at the prince with a strange expression in his gorgeous eyes and mouthed "Why?". Alexander's cheeks went a bit reddish and said that he was hoping to spend some time with him, Hephaestion mouthed again "why?" and the prince said that he wanted to know him better. Hephaestion shook his head and began walking away from Alexander. He knew that he had to be apart from the prince, his attraction was too strong and he was dying to spend more of his time in the palace with the prince, but he also knew that if he let his feelings for the young Apollo grow, everything was going to be more difficult when his time in the palace came to an end.
Alexander didn't follow him but his mind kept running at an amazing speed, thinking what he had down to offend the boy. Cassander saw the situation and decided to take advantage of it. When Hephaestion was passing by, he stopped him and asked:
"Who are you?" A wicked smile appeared on his face.
Hephaestion was about to take his scroll out to write his name, when the aristocratic boy stopped him and said with disdain:
"Oh! You are the poor mute my lover is feeling pity about."
Hephaestion looked at him with a strange expression on his face and due to this Cassander explained:
"I am Cassander, Philoalexandros, you know what I mean" Cassander added with a smile.
Hephaestion nodded and continued his way; but his day was just ruined with the news, and moreover because the prince felt pity for him. He should have realized that Alexander had put a show for his father but … he seemed so nice and real in his behaviour … he had to dawn on that he was just a simple builder and to put the matter worse, mute.
The day was a difficult one, the hours ran slowly and Hephaestion felt his heart so heavy that his eyes were about to release tons of tears anytime soon. The prince didn't meet him until lunch and when he appeared, he was followed by Cassander, his beloved who was all over him and Alexander didn't bother about it. When the prince made his way towards Hephaestion to share their lunch together, Hephaestion stood up and bowing towards the prince, he left the dinning room, almost running. He looked for a secret spot in Olympia's garden and he cried his heart out, sobbing and cursing his bad luck.
Alexander remained in the dinning room but his mind was not there, it had followed the strong boy who ran away from him! He wanted to follow him but his mother requested his presence in her chamber and he went to know what she needed.
The afternoon turned into evening and Alexander was free to look for Hephaestion and discover what was troubling his friend; he also realized that he really wanted to know the boy, he felt more than attracted to him and some months ago he had decided that women weren't as good as men. Walking towards the barn to look for his horse, he met Hephaestion who was taking his things to go back home.
"Hephaestion, please wait for me!" shouted the prince.
Hephaestion tensed his back and continued walking as if he hadn't heard the young man.
"Hephaestion, what's wrong with you today? Why are you avoiding me? What have I done to you?" the prince's voice sounded quite anxious.
Hephaestion turned round, lifted his gaze and Alexander couldn't believe what he was seeing; Hephaestion's eyes were bloodshot as if he had been crying a lot, they were almost dark blue and his whole face expressed such misery that it was difficult to look at him. Alexander stepped forward but Hephaestion took a step backwards, Alexander stretched his hand to take Hephaestion's arm but the builder showed the movement and mouthed "NO".
Alexander remained quiet and Hephaestion turned round and set off running towards the gate of the palace.
TBC
