I saw that the men knew these household slaves well. Several of the women, and some of the younger boys as well, seemed to be lovers of certain of the guardsmen.
A messenger informed me of the queen’s command as I was bathing in the spring-fed pool outside the exercise yard. The water was icy but I did not mind it, nor did I care that some of the men laughed at me for washing myself.
“It will rain soon enough, Orion,” called one of them from the stone benches lining the yard.
“What are you, one of those Athenian dainties who has to take a bath every month?” jeered another.
But when the queen’s messenger arrived they quickly fell silent. To them it must have seemed as if I had known the queen would summon me. Or as if the queen had magically made me wash so that I would be sweet-smelling in her presence.
So I followed the messenger, a smooth-cheeked youth who smelled of perfume, through the many rooms of the palace to the queen’s audience chamber.
She was Hera, the flame-haired, imperious beauty who had told me in my dream that I would love her. It had to be a dream, I told myself as I walked from the entrance of her audience room to her throne and bowed low before her. How could it be otherwise? Men sometimes glimpse their futures in dreams. And she recognized me and knew my name because she had been informed by messengers from Philip’s camp. Messengers—or spies.
That could explain how she recognized me, I thought. Yet how could I explain that the Hera in my dream looked exactly like the Olympias, queen of Macedon, who sat before me on a throne of polished ebony? I had never seen her before, except for my dream.
Two guards in handsomely burnished armor stood behind her throne, staring stonily into infinity. Several women sat off in a corner of the large room. The floor was polished wood. Her throne was flanked by tall red-figured vases filled with vibrant flowers.
“Your name is Orion, I am told,” she said to me.
“Yes, Your Majesty,” I replied formally, thinking that she knew perfectly well what my name was. Then a new thought surfaced in my mind: Perhaps she knows more than my name; perhaps she knows who I truly am, why I am here, everything!
“I am told that you saved the king’s life.”
“I did what any loyal man would have done,” I said.
Again that ghostly smile animated her lips briefly. I realized that if Philip had been assassinated, her son might now be king.
“Olympias, Queen of the Macedonians, offers her thanks to you, Orion.”
I bowed again.
“What reward would you have?” she asked. “Speak freely.”
I heard the words on my tongue before I had a chance to think about them. “I have no memory, Your Majesty, beyond a few days ago. If it is in your power, I would like to know who I am and why I am here.”
She arched an eyebrow at me, as if half-amused, half-affronted by my request.
But she smiled once more and murmured, “Come to this room at midnight, Orion. Come alone and tell no one. Do you understand?”
“I understand.”
“Until midnight, then.”
I hurried out of her audience chamber. Come alone and tell no one. That sounded dangerous. What would the king think if he learned of it?
As it turned out, the king was also thinking about my lack of memory. The messenger who had conveyed me to the queen’s chamber was still waiting outside in the anteroom when I left Olympias. He told me that Parmenio wanted to see me now.
It was difficult not to like red-nosed Parmenio. He was an older man, probably almost fifty, his hair and beard grizzled with gray. He was built like a boar, low to the ground, thick in the chest and arms. Blunt as a boar, too; there was not a trace of dissemblance in him.
“The king wants you to talk with Alexandros’ teacher,” he said once I was ushered into his quarters. It was a sparse, spare room in the palace. If he had a family and a real home, they must have been elsewhere.