I held my temper in check, although my stomach did flips and I remember the tears running down my cheeks.

‘You are still somatophylakes,’ he said. ‘And one of my royal huntsmen, for life.’

‘I want to hunt Persians,’ I said. ‘And I’ll go as a trooper, under one of Philip’s fart-sacks.’

Alexander smiled. It was like the sun coming through clouds. ‘You will?’

I frowned. ‘Of course.’

He nodded. ‘Well, we’ll find something for you to do. Antipater wants to keep you home.’

‘Antipater doesn’t trust me,’ I said.

Alexander laughed bitterly. ‘The opposite, Ptolemy. We all trust you, and that means you should be left at home. It’s the ones I hate that I have to take to Asia.’

The next day, Antipater began to sell the crown lands around Pella – for cash. Alexander wouldn’t discuss it.

I had handed all my palace keys to Philotas. He wasn’t bad – and neither was Nicanor. They were sitting together in what had always been my room. They rose when I entered. I was in armour.

‘My brother says you are like a lion,’ Philotas said, and held out his hand.

I didn’t feel much like smiling – but remember, my father and their father were old friends, and we all saw Parmenio as the head of our faction, the old aristocrats. I shook hands.

‘These are my keys to all the strong places in the palace,’ I said. ‘They are numbered and have tags on them with the name of the place they unlock.’

Philotas sat and read all the keys. ‘Perdiccas has a set as well?’

I shrugged. ‘Sorry, sir, you will have to ask him.’

Philotas shook his head. ‘Can we nothave this as us against you? Parmenio’s men against Alexander’s men? That won’t defeat the Persians.’

I folded my arms over my chest. ‘You really want to have this conversation?’ I asked.

‘Try me,’ Philotas said.

‘Alexander doesn’t need you or your father to conquer Asia. You went out there and got your arses handed to you by Memnon while the king was reconquering Greece with a handful of men and the will of the gods. Now you and yours are taking control of an army we created and we trained. So – yes, sir, there is going to be some strain.’ I felt much better, having said it.

Nicanor smiled at me. He looked at his brother. ‘I told you,’ he said.

Philotas shook his head. ‘You kids are arrogant, I’ll give you that. Webuilt this army, Ptolemy. My father and Philip and Antipater. I’ve been in harness with this army since I was twelve years old. I’ve trained more pezhetaeroi than you’ve had shits. I’ve pissed more water than you’ve sailed over. You kids have never seen a real battle – never fought an equal foe. And you have the gall to come here and tell me that you trained this army?’

I nodded. ‘Yes. That’s what I’m telling you. You were never a page, though – so you wouldn’t understand.’

‘One of Alexander’s butt-boys? That makes you special?’ Philotas laughed. ‘Let’s just leave it there. I don’t want you in my squadrons, however much my brother seems to like you.’

I looked at Nicanor. ‘Philotas, I think you are making a real error. I don’t think that you understand the king. Or what he can do.’

Philotas shook his head. ‘That’s what Nicanor said.’ He shrugged. ‘Doesn’t matter, though. He’s a figurehead, now. Pater’s in charge. As he should be. Pater will fix everything, and we’ll have no more of these desperate, amateurish thrusts around Greece or anywhere else – we’ll fight like experts. Amateurs excel when their backs are against the wall – I’ll give you that. At any rate – you think I’m insulting you, and perhaps I spoke too strongly. You and the king did brilliantly this summer – but Pater would have done it all without leaving Pella. None of those battles needed to be fought. The campaigns cost more than just buying peace would have cost – you know that, right? You work with Antipater – you know that for a quarter of the cost, we could have bought the Illyrians and paid them to fight the Thracians.’

I remember all this – because I had, in my darker hours, thought it all on my own. The king loved war. And he needed it. He needed to be in the saddle every day – he needed to make all those decisions, and make them correctly, and lead us to victory, and be seen to be doing it. It was food and drink and sleep – and sex – to him. When he didn’t have war, he had temper tantrums and little addictions and he was on edge all the time.

So yes – we didn’t needto be in Thrace. Or Illyria. Or Thebes, for that matter. Who cared, in Macedon, if the king was hegemon of the League of Corinth?

And yet, and yet – if you give all that away – if you buy your enemies – if we don’t fight Chaeronea, or Thebes . . .

How long before there’s an Athenian army at Pella?

Who knows, eh?

But the king’s way was the Macedonian way.

‘You planning to conquer Asia that way?’ I asked.

Philotas turned red.

Nicanor laughed. ‘I warned you,’ he said. Although to which one of us, I wasn’t sure.

I saluted and left. Later, in my own house, I thought about how Nicanor had, in effect, taken my side against his own brother.

I was worried that Philotas and Parmenio would ‘allow’ Alexander to be murdered. That it would just ‘happen’. So I started a cabal before I left for my estates, and arranged that the two adjutants of the royal squadrons should control the rotations on duty. And I arranged to be notified – in my person as a somatophylakes – if anyone changed this arrangement.

And I told Antipater that I had done it. I walked into his office, smiled and laid it out for him.

He sat behind an enormous table, his chin in his hand, and his eyes burned from under heavy brows.

‘So now you distrust me,’ he said.

‘I have reason to believe that there’s a plot to kill the king,’ I said. ‘I assume you will back my preparations.’

‘Why not take your suspicions to Philotas?’ he asked.

‘Parmenio is the most likely culprit and has the most to gain,’ I answered.

He tried to stare me down.

‘Very well,’ he said. ‘Parmenio was your father’s friend. We expected better of you.’

‘It was Pater who warned me about Parmenio,’ I said. ‘I’m going to tell the king of my arrangements, and then I’ll be heading to my estates. As I no longer have a command.’

‘Is that your price? You want a command?’ Antipater shook his head. ‘Why not just say what you want, instead of all this posturing like a boy?’

I sighed. ‘I’m not posturing,’ I said. ‘I don’t have a price. I’m too rich to need to have a price. But Antipater – consider this. Attalus crossed me, and died for it. Philip – bless him – died, too. Perhaps you and Parmenio should treat us like adults.’

‘If you are declaring war . . .’ Antipater said slowly – and I could see I’d shaken him.

‘I’m not!’ I said. And laughed. Oh, the power of it – I had just threatened Antipater and made him twitch.

Court intrigue. Everyone says they are above such stuff, but no one is, and next to war, it is the greatest game.

So I laughed and shook my head. ‘I am notdeclaring war,’ I said. ‘I just want everyone to note that if something happens to Alexander, there will be a general bloodbath – which I am seeking to prevent. But if that bloodbath happens – well, I wish to suggest that neither you nor Parmenio would emerge unscathed.’ I leaned forward. ‘Or even alive.’

Antipater nodded. ‘I understood you the first time.’

I stood back. ‘Good. I’m going to see the king, and then, as I said, go to my estates. Glad we could have this discussion.’

Antipater leaned forward. ‘He’s insane, you know. You must know.’

I shook my head. ‘No. He’s king. You old men should get that through your heads.’ At this point, Thaïs and I had had this discussion fifty times, and we had hammered out a point of view. I shot it at Antipater, a prepared missile. ‘You think he’s insane because he’s convinced he’s invincible, and because he can see right through youand acts accordingly, and because he says what he thinks. I agree it’s not normal – but he is the king.’