Dark Prince



Book One, 352 BC

Pella, Macedonia, Summer

The golden-haired child sat alone, as he usually did, and wondered whether his father would die today. Some
distance away, across the royal gardens, his nurse was talking to the two sentries who guarded him during the hours
of daylight. The soldiers, grim-eyed warriors, did not look at him and shifted nervously if he approached.

Alexander was used to this reaction. Even at four he understood it.

He remembered with sadness the day three weeks ago when his father, garbed for war, had walked along this same
garden path, his cuirass gleaming in the sunlight. It was so beautiful that Alexander had reached out to touch the
gleaming plates of iron, edged with gold, the six golden lions on the breast. But as his hand came forward Philip had
moved swiftly back.

'Don't touch me, boy!' he snapped.

'I would not hurt you, Father,' whispered the prince, staring up at the black-bearded face, with its blind right eye like
a huge opal beneath the savagely scarred brow.

'I came to say goodbye,' muttered Philip, 'and to tell you to be good. Learn your lessons well.'

'Will you win?' the child asked.

'Win or die, boy,' answered the King, kneeling to face his son. He appeared to relax, though his expression remained
stern. 'There are those who think I cannot win. They remember Onomarchus defeated me when last we met. But . .
.'his voice dropped to a whisper, 'when the arrow tore into my eye at the siege of Methone they said I would die.
When the fever struck me down in Thrace men swore my heart stopped beating. But I am Macedon, Alexander, and I
do not die easily.'

'I don't want you to die. I love you,' said the child.

For a moment only Philip's face softened, his arm rising as if to reach out to his son. But the moment passed and the
King stood. 'Be good,' he said. 'I will. . . think of you.'

The sound of children's laughter brought Alexander's thoughts back to the present. Beyond the garden walls he could
hear the palace children playing. Sighing, he wondered what game they were enjoying. Hunt the Turtle perhaps, or
Hecate's Touch. He watched them sometimes from the window of his room. One child would be chosen as Hecate,
Goddess of Death, and would chase the others, seeking out their hiding-places, to touch them and make them slaves.
The game would go on until all the children had been found and enslaved by Death.

Alexander shivered in the sunshine. No one would ask him to play such a game. He looked down at his small hands.

He had not meant the hound to die; he had loved the pup. And he had tried so hard, concentrating always, so that
whenever he stroked the dog his mind was calm. But one day the playful hound had leapt at him, knocking him from
his feet. In that moment Alexander's hand had snaked out, lightly slapping the beast on the neck. The hound
collapsed instantly, eyes glazing, legs twitching. It had died within seconds, but what was worse it had decomposed
within minutes, the stench filling the garden.

'It was not my fault,' the child wanted to say. But he knew that it was; knew that he was cursed.

Birds began to sing in the tall trees and Alexander smiled as he looked up at them. Closing his green eyes the boy
allowed the bird-song to flow into him, filling his mind, merging with his own thoughts. The songs began to have
meanings then, that he could just decipher. No words but feelings, fears, tiny angers. The birds were screeching
warnings to one another.

Alexander looked up and sang: 'My tree! My tree! Get away! Get away! My tree! My tree! I will kill you if you stay!'

'Children should not sing of killing,' said his nurse sternly, approaching where he sat but halting, as ever, out of


reach.
'That is what the birds are singing,' he told her.
'You should come inside now, the sun is very hot.'
'The children are still playing beyond the wall,' he argued. 'And I like to sit here.'
'You will do as you are told, young prince!' she snapped. His eyes blazed and he could almost hear the dark voice


within himself whispering: 'Hurt her! Kill her!' He swallowed hard, quelling the rising tide of anger.
'I will come,' he said softly. Rising to his feet he walked towards her, but she stepped quickly aside to let him pass,


following him slowly as he returned to his own rooms. Waiting until she had gone, Alexander slipped out into the
corridor and ran to his mother's apartments, pushing open the door to peek inside.