Story: Winter snow
Flora-chan went smut, believe it or not...(and believe me, it's not a good thing!^^)
My first and *only* attempt at writing sex was fueled sometimes ago by a friend of mine who asked for some...Alexander/Hephaistion's healthy action - let's call it like that...My Italian friends seemed to enjoy it a lot, so I thought to give it a try and prompt a translation...
Thanks to my wonderful susa_938 for her infinite patience in revising my translation and for all her great comments and advices...If I didn't tell you this before, Susa, I'm happy to have a friend like you!^^
Title: Winter snow
Author: Flora
Ratings: for adults for graphic m/m sexuality
Archive: Please, ask before...^^
Summary: A cold snowy night, and two young boys very much in love
Feedback: of course...^^
Notes: Greeks used to have a lot of mores and conventions about sex; oral practices were considered highly shameful between free men, or between men and free women, and even the anal intercourse wasn't so frequent as one may think - among equals. But it's also true that (in every culture), there is a difference between the public façade and what's going on between two lovers in the darkness of their bedchamber. So I tried to find a compromise between the rules of the time (which surely existed and taken in some account) and the acts and desires of two youths very much in love with each other.^_-
WINTER SNOW
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Mea vita, mihi proponis amorem
Hunc nostrum inter nos perpetuumque fore.
Dei magni, facite ut vere promittere possit,
Atque id sincere dicat et ex animo,
Ut liceat nobis tota perducere vita
Aeternum hoc sanctae foedus amicitiae.
My life, you make me wish this love of us
being in perpetual happyness, without shadows.
Great Gods, make me only promise the truth,
that I speak with purety and sincerity,
and that it could last for all of our lives
this endless oath of friendship.
Gaius Valerius Catullus
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Alèxandros stepped lively along the hallway dimly lit by the oil lamps. Didàskalos had kept him awake till late that night, and the only thing he longed for at the moment was to slip into the warm woollen blankets and let the day slide off him like a snake’s old skins.
It wasn’t the first time he’d lingered with Aristotèles in his study crammed with parchments and old yellowed papyruses. Since his arrival at Mieza, more than two years ago, he had attended private lessons in politics and statecraft - lessons exclusively meant for him, as crown prince and future heir of Makedonìa. He had believed them to be the best part of his education - and it was undeniable Aristotèles knew perfectly each of the subtle and elusive shades of the art of ruling - nevertheless, what he seemed to want to do was just fill his head with abstract and unlikely queries about what he would do in a specific situation, given certain terms or others - and this always ended up wearing him out, somehow.
How he acted he would decide when - and if - he would ever find himself in those same circumstances and not before.
Politics is an exact science - said Aristotèles - but he thought differently. He doubted a situation could ever recur with the same identical contingencies, so it was perfectly useless to keep on discussing it for hours and hours.
He thought ruling would be similar to the prowess of a feline in hunting - agile, flexible and constantly vigilant.
Yet, school days were over after all. He would be sixteen that same year in the month of Loios and he would soon be back to Pella. Time had finally come for him to be a man.
He reached the threshold of the massive stone building which housed the school’s classrooms and a sudden lashing of wind sent a chilly shiver down his back; he pulled the heavy fur cloak tight around himself as his breath was already turning into small clouds of steam before his nose. Although the cold was mercilessly digging into his clothes and underneath, he couldn’t help but smiling with rapture.
The first snow of the season had finally arrived at Mieza, covering everything with a soft white blanket.
The conifer woods at the slopes of mount Bermios were completely hidden by a pure spotless surface and an icy storm had been raging all day, dying down its howling only late at night. Snow was still tumbling down - now lazy, placid - and everything appeared luminous and silent, somewhat different beneath that thick friable coat.
Alexandros stepped further, sinking into the snow up to his calfs.
His shammy leather boots were thick, but the cold seemed to grip him till the bones like he had been completely naked under that gravid sky. He thought longingly to his small room and to the woollen blankets of his bed and tried to quicken his pace, though the ground had been turned slippery by the ice and sleet which covered it.
The silence around him was almost unreal.
Alèxandros tossed off the snow which was already entangling in his hair and tried to become even smaller inside his cloak. The way to the dormitory had never appeared so long to him. He passed by some maples bare by winter, their dry branches grown heavier by the snow, as the wind was trying to get through him and rip his clothes off, whirling through the trees. When he reached the door of his bedchamber he opened it gently, trying not to make a noise. Hephaistion was surely asleep at that time, wrapped up in the warm shell of his bed, and he didn’t want to wake him up; he would slip into the blankets as quickly as possible, then that endless day would be finally over.
The small room was ice-cold but faintly lit by an oil lamp laid upon the window sill. He smiled. Hephaistion must have kept it on for him.
The boy was asleep and lying on his back; he had drawn the blankets up to his face but a toned and burnished arm was peeping out the bed, leaned against his hip. His breathing was deep and regular, his hair a dark tangle spread on the pillow. Alèxandros made for the lamp to blow on it, but he clumsily stumbled over a pair of boots forgotten right in the middle of the room, and cursed loudly. Hephaistion let out an annoyed growl and turned to him, laboriously opening his eyes and rubbing them hard.
“So you are finally back, are you? - impossible not to pay notice. Have you always to make such a row, when you move around?”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t do it on purpose - ” came the dry reply, as Alèxandros kicked the boots out to a corner “but I wouldn’t wake you up if you didn’t leave all your stuff scattered about the room! I’d need a map to move in here!”
Hephaistion had drawn himself up, still half-asleep, and the blankets had slid down, leaving him bare.
A shiver shook him, his eyes widening in shock.
“Gods, it’s chilly out here!”
“It’s snowing - I was about to freeze on the way to the dormitory -”
Hehaistion straightened the blankets over his naked body and gestured to him to come closer.
“Take your clothes off and come here, then. Your bed is far too cold for you to sleep in there all alone.”
Alèxandros smiled and nodded. He quickly got rid of his cloak and chiton as Hephaistion was pushing the blankets aside for him, then stormed into his friend’s bed with an agile jump. Hephaistion opened the arms and encircled his numb body. Alèxandros was trembling and got as close as possible to him, slipping his icy feet between his legs.
“You are completely cold.”
He just nodded, his teeth chattering. Hephaistion let his hands slide along his back, massaging and rubbing so to give him back a bit of his lost warmth. They had always kept themselves warm that way in the most severe nights of past winters, sleeping attached as two cherries, and this was surely going to be one of the worst and most inclement snowfalls of the whole season. Alèxandros briefly thought of Leonidas, who had taught him to manage almost without everything, even woollen blankets in full winter. He surely wouldn’t approve it, and the funny thing was he himself didn’t approve it either - but he had learned to allow himself something.
“So, this night too Aristotèles kept you awake until late, for a change. I wanted to wait up for you - I didn’t even notice I had fallen asleep.”
“The old man is going to drive me crazy, sooner or later, I tell you - ” Alèxandros sighed resignedly, rubbing his feet together “but he had at least a fire lit up in his study. By Zeus, I start to think I’m never going to feel warm anymore -”
Hephaistion drew him closer, pressing his body to the bare skin of the boy and massaging him more vigorously.
“It’s not too hard to believe, you are an icicle - are you feeling better now?”
Alèxandros nodded and let himself go to his friend’s hands which were running along his back and hips in a rough yet pleasant friction that seemed to bring his stiff body back to life. They remained in silence for a while, the only sounds being the howling of wind and the muffled thump of snow falling from some branches - completely wrapped in the double layer of thick blankets which formed like a tepid shell around them. Alèxandros was aware of Hephaistion’s warm familiar hands brushing his exposed skin and realized, alarmed, that a blast of heat was climbing up his body, spreading everywhere.
With the heat, came an even more familiar feeling.
“Is that any better?”
Silence.
Hephaistion lowered his face, gazing at him and saw his eyes, usually polished as agates, were now clouded and smoky.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing -” a far too quick reply “nothing - at all.”
But his eyes and the flush on his face and upon the pale skin of his neck were telling a different story. Hephaistion felt a wave of ardour bursting into him, despite the chilly temperature. The bed seemed suddenly torrid as dry sands of desert. He started to rub him more slowly, turning his gestures into a light caress, languid, relaxed, and held him tighter, enfolding their bodies together - and provoking Alèxandros’ immediate reaction. He smiled slyly, like a cat studying a particularly succulent kind of prey.
Alèxandros would have to beg for it, tonight.
He slid a hand along his defenceless back, brushing him at the base of his loins and upon the firm buttocks.
“Are you - feeling warmer, now?”
Hands onto his body - possessive hands, heated.
“Stop - teasing me - ” Alèxandros babbled, his eyes flashing dangerously - the usual crease furrowing his forehead. Hephaistion knew that gaze - oh, he knew it well - but he was inclined to run that risk.
“I’m not teasing anyone - ” he murmured, drawing the mouth up to his and caressing him with his warm breath. He felt him shudder in his arms and struggled to hold his control.
“Let’s hear it, then. What do you want - Alèxandre?”
Hands now were onto his belly, lapping it - teasing his flat abdomen.
“You know - what it is that I want - ” Alèxandros hissed breathlessly, and before he could add anything more Hephaistion’s mouth was upon his - avid, greedy - forcing his lips open wide and kissing him fiercely. Alèxandros answered savagely to the kiss. He clung to him and began to bite his lips, then he found his tongue and sucked it hard. Blankets upon them, around them, were barely more than a torrid stifling cocoon when they finally forced themselves to break loose to gasp some air, breathing fast, their skin polished by a faint layer of sweat.
“Tìon - ”
“Hush - let me do it.”
Hephaistion closed his mouth with a quick kiss. He slid his lips along his neck, shoulders, chest - painfully slow - teasing him with the tongue and biting him light here and there, as if he was tasting. When he caught a flat nipple between his lips and started to lap it, he heard Alèxandros moaning his name, and grabbing his hair in an iron grip. He lifted his face and met the boy’s gaze, his ferocious eyes and the eyebrows which almost touched now, in the most dangerous of his expressions.
“Do you want me to stop it?”
“No - idiot.”
Hephaistion smiled to himself. That was utterly typical of Alèxandros - he was always very reluctant to surrender, in everything.
But he would capitulate.
He started to torment him again, indolent, exasperating. He shifted down, tracing the profiles of his abdomen with the tongue and leaving a wet track at its passage. Alèxandros’ grasp on his hair strengthened. Hephaistion could sense every sensation of him, every shiver reverberated in that grip, as it was the map itself of his pleasure. It was driving him insane.
End of the games.
He grasped his legs and spread them violently apart, positioning his face right in the middle. His sex was towering firm and demanding from the bunch of thin blonde curls - evidently more collaborative than its reluctant owner and Hephaistion couldn’t help but stifling an amused giggle.
“What - are you doing?”
“Just shut that mouth of yours, will you?”
He heard him hissing something between his teeth but the curse, whatever it was, turned into a groan when Hephaistion opened his lips upon his cock, capturing him whole into his mouth. Alèxandros arched toward the boy, clinging even more firmly to his hair and pushing his face down to the base of his own pleasure.
It was pure folly.
It was forbidden, they both knew it, but presently he could only see painful gashes of white behind his shut eyelids, and hear an echo of his own whimpers, blurred and afar - as if they were disjointed from himself. He always felt confused and dumbfounded when Hephaistion loved him this way. These caresses were considered shameful and he could remember the embarassment, the tender clumsiness of the first time it had happened. Nevertheless, he didn’t feel ashamed at all, it was crazy, but thus it was. Nobody could see them, nobody could violate the secret sanctuary of their intimacy.
Alèxandros tossed his head back; he couldn’t ever deny anything of his to Hephaistion. He would have himself eaten whole by him had he just asked for it.
He confusedly thought of all this as he arched rhythmically toward him, against his teeth, his tongue, feeling his flesh rippling at his touch. After a few instants Hephaistion lifted him grabbing his buttocks and making his legs lean against his back. Now he was completely wrapped up into him, in the wet warmth of his mouth and he felt the first spasm climbing along his back, echoing and spreading violently through his body, like a silvery net.
He was close. It was so close.
“No - Tìon.”
“Yes instead - ” a flick of tongue “It’s all right - don’t worry.”
Alèxandros shut his eyes and clenched at the boy frantically, as Hephaistion increased the rhythm of his kisses, of his caresses. Unable to restraint himself any longer he released himself with a choked cry and Hephaistion drank his seed, drank every drop of it as if nothing could or should ever be lost. It was sacred. Even the smallest part of Alèxandros was sacred to him. Nothing could be left out.
He took him in his arms, the boy still trembling from the violence of pleasure and leaned over to kiss him. As soon as he realized what he was doing he drew back confused, but Alèxandros grabbed him by the shoulders and led him to his face violently, tasting himself upon his lips. Hephaistion made another faint attempt to move away - Alèxandros growled enraged and pressed his mouth against his, licking it hungrily.
“What are you doing?” Hephaistion murmured against his lips.
“I want all - all of you. All of us.”
He clung to Hephaistion and kissed him over and over, scratching the vulnerable flesh of his arms and leaving red streaks along his shoulders and neck.
“You are mine, Tìon - you’re only mine - ” he panted and Hephaistion smiled softly, rubbing the lips against his in a gesture of placid consent.
The cold was a far memory now; all their world was enclosed there, in that torrid embrace and in the quaking heat of their entwined bodies. No past, no future there. Only that parched, feverish present.
Alèxandros pushed Hephaistion aside so to stretch beside him and adhering himself completely to his body - then he grabbed his manhood with a sudden jerk and started to slide his hand up and down, along his whole length. Hephaistion repressed a grumble and Alèxandros adressed him a mocking little smile.
“You are going to pay for that, Athenian - ” he laid a light kiss onto his lips and started again with a murmur “I want to taste you too. I want to taste you all over - ”
Hephaistion closed his eyes and relaxed to the touch of his lover. Alèxandros began to smell him, lick him, taste him all over his face, his neck, tickling his ears’ lobes with the tip of his wet tongue. “You taste good, Tìon - ” he sank his face even deeper against his chin, and lapped him with renewed energy “you taste like summer - ” a bite, unexpected and possessive, against the tender flesh of his neck “and sun - ”
Now he was licking him the way an animal would do. He bit him more wildly, sinking his teeth deep down the yielding hollow between the shoulder and the base of his neck and Hephaistion let out a groan of surprise and lazy complaint. He lifted Alèxandros’ face and pressed the lips upon his, tasting the sweet flavour of a drop of his own blood and licking it off. His full erection painfully pushed against the boy’s belly, as Alèxandros mercilessly kept on sliding the hand which held him captive up and down.
“And you are warm - ” he murmured breathlessly “by the Gods, Alèxandre, you are so warm - ”
Alèxandros smiled and turned him belly up onto the bed, straddling him with a single supple movement. His body was light but as sculpted as an athlete’s. Hephaistion was about to brush him on the smooth chest but Alèxandros blocked his hand with a quirk, a menacing sparkle into his gray eyes.
“I don’t like that gaze of yours -”
Alèxandros curled the corners of his lips in an unreadable half-smile, trailing the edge of his hand against the boy’s firm muscles - then he tossed his hair back and drew his face up to Hephaistion’s groin. He smelt him at the base of his stiff penis, sinking the nose into the tangle of dark hairs at the root of his sex.
“I like - your smell - ”
Hephaistion flexed toward him, holding his breath in a hoarse moan when he sensed the flicking of his tongue and his lips running all along himself with studied slowness. He grazed his hair, moving at the wearing rhythm of that contact and giving himself up to the stabbing jerks which seemed to shake him like the burst of summer lightnings.
“Alèxandre - ” he murmured helplessly, suddenly feeling too close to the edge of himself, yet unable to articulate even a single sensible thought. He was roused by the feeling of the boy’s tongue which was slipping relentlessy down to lick the furrow between his buttocks and he stopped him with an abrupt gesture.
“No - enough.”
He turned him over with a thrust, as Alèxandros addressed him an annoyed curse and he was again onto him, as if in a continuous struggle against each other, a fight he knew Alèxandros would let him win - maybe the only victory he would ever grant him. The blankets now were a bundle of forgotten rags, piled up at the bottom of the bed. They weighed up one another in silence, like two fighters in the middle of a game. Hephaistion trailed a finger along the strong line of his jaw, passing it lightly on his lips. Alèxandros captured it, and bit it with full strength, leaving a purple sign upon its flesh, and Hephaistion tugged him by the hair, forcing him to toss his head behind and sinking the teeth into his pale neck.
“Now I want to -”
“All right -” Alèxandros interrupted him, burying the fingers into his sweaty hair and lifting his head with a painful jerk.
“It’s all right.”
Hephaistion realized, not without some regret, that his teeth had dug mauvish engravings into the boy’s flesh but they were both well over it all, over the pain - beyond the border of what could be considered acceptable or legitimate.
He knew what he wanted.
They hadn’t often loved each other that way. Most of the times they satisfied their needs just touching and brushing and rubbing - but not this night.
He must have all of him, tonight.
He grabbed the small vial of bath oils which lay upon the wooden shelf beside the bed and unscrewed the top with an impatient tug. Alèxandros was observing him, an amused and curious gaze painted on his face.
“You are going to shatter that poor thing on the ground, I’m afraid - ” he giggled.
Hephaistion shot him a glance, raising an eyebrow.
Soon after, an intoxicating fragrance of jasmine and roses spread through the room. Hephaistion knew that scent, having laid that ointment on Alèxandros’ body countless time, after sharing a bath. It was pure madness the way he had learned to recognize each single taste, each particular smell or sign of his body, of his skin.
He might have recognized him even blindfold, just at the touch.
He dipped his fingers into the scented oil and set himself between Alèxandros legs lifting them, then he entered two fingers into his opening, moving them lightly - delicately. Alèxandros bit his lips and closed his eyes, letting himself go to the caress of those familiar fingers which were penetrating him, delving into him, and he began to shift against his hand, rotating his hips almost involuntarily.
It was outrageous, insane. He couldn’t ever allow anybody else to touch him inside like this, this intimate way, so secretly.The sole thought was inconceivable. What he had granted to Hephaistion would have been his and his only.
He wasn’t ashamed of this anymore.
He wasn’t uncomfortable anymore before this need, he - who had been taught to do without anything, to never give himself up to any delight of body and soul. He was beyond shame, beyond that stringy and painful knot entangled at the bottom of himself.
“Stop. Stop it, please - Hephaistion -” and, Gods, was that really him, yelping and moaning in that ridiculous way?
He would have never thought it possible, but it was his own voice there - aroused, helpless - stripped as the groan of an animal on the altar of sacrifice. He had his face turned aside and could see the snow falling slowly, silent through the window’s frame - so cold, so pale as everything inside him, around him was fire, aridity, heat.
Hephaistion slid softly inside him, then he passed one of his legs over his shoulder so to enter him completely and began to hammer into his body like a living nail, skin on skin, flesh against flesh.
Alèxandros searched for his hands and intertwined his fingers with Hephaistion’s, as the rhythm became faster, frenetic. They could be delicate in their love, but never, never without vigour - without strength. They weren’t boys anymore.
Hephaistion’s face was right over his, his hair moved at the rhythm of his thrusts, his lips were polished and half-closed in an unexpressed groan. Alèxandros reached a hand out, touching him on a cheek and the boy grazed his face against his palm, the breathing just a restrained gasp now. He was gazing at Hephaistion’s features, so perfect in their intensity to be almost painful and not for the first time he thought even Apollo couldn’t be more beautiful.
Warmth, snow, silence, pure white. Friction of bodies into the flesh, onto the soul.
It was like a breakable and pristine coat on everything, it was like - dying?
If that was it, it was fine then, there was a comfort, a sort of surrender into this white feverish death.
Snow upon his enflamed body. And the hands - these hands so warm. It seemed to him he was falling deep, in a dizzy mad fall, but it was a sweet abyss because it didn’t burn for the first time in his life, extinguished by this snow which suffocated its blood-red flames.
Oh Gods, snow everywhere.
He could fall forever until he firmly grasped at this body, and the fall would never end, he would never break and everything that was there was - love? Yes, love, but it was something more. There wasn’t a name for what it was if not in the language of Immortals. It wasn’t thinkable, it wasn’t conceivable.
No it wasn’t thinkable, one could just recognize it, fight against it, maybe.
Or surrender.
He had surrendered, and he probably didn’t even start the struggle, ever.
Such a shame it was. A slur which was as bittersweet as the nectar itself of Gods.
When Hephaistion burst into him with a husky moan, he held him tight to himself as their broken breathing seemed to roar through the room like a clashing of weapons and the snow was falling indifferently out of the window. They remained entwined for a time that seemed endless, listening to the cacophony of wind yelling its senseless speeches and the deafening noise of snow detaching from the sky.
Soon after, Hephaistion felt Alexandros’ body cooling down and a shiver climbing up his back. He reached out to grab the blankets bundled up at the foot of the bed and pulled them over themselves, wrapping them around their shoulders. He slid from onto the boy and leaned against his back, as Alèxandros stretched beside him, laying his palms upon Hephaistion’s chest and gazing at the window. The wind seemed to have quit his unanswered invocations and the pale flakes were now lazy and light, finally silent. Alèxandros could feel Hephaistion passing a hand through his hair, slowly, but when he raised his eyes he saw him distant and secluded, painfully unreachable.
“What are you thinking of?”
Hephaistion lowered his face, concealing with an expression of feigned innocence a mood which seemed almost of guilt.
“Nothing.”
“That’s not true - I know you, I know when there is something wrong.”
Hephaistion sat upright with a sigh, pulling him up and passing the blanket over his bare shoulders.
“I was thinking that we’ll be soon leaving this place - school days are over. It’s time to be men.”
“And aren’t you happy about that?”
“Yes, but sometimes I wonder - ”
He paused and Alèxandros nodded, gesturing to him to go on.
“Sometimes I wonder if this won’t change the things between us - wait let me finish! What I’m trying to say is - when we’ll be men you - will you grow tired of me, Alèxandre?”
There it was again, the usual frown clearing its way on his face like a dangerous stormy cloud. An instant more and he would explode.
“You misunderstood what I wanted to say - what I meant was - one day we will marry, you will surely marry-”
“I’ve never thought to marry!” Alèxandros burst out; one could see he struggled to remain calm.
“You haven’t, perhaps, but your mother has - and your father either. She hates me, she hates me just because of that - ”
“I would kill her should she just try to keep you away from me!”
Hephaistion shook his face, brushing Alèxandros’ cheeks.
“Yes, but listen - this has nothing to do with your mother. I thought about it. You will be king in the future, and you will be a great king, the greatest of all, I know it. You will have to have sons - your own heirs and I’ll be happy even just to stay at your side as a faithful soldier - one among the others - if you want to keep me with you. I would stay at your side even if all this shouldn’t exist anymore between us. I will never leave you, as long as you need me, even my simple presence, or the comfort of my friendship and - ”
Alèxandros embraced him all of a sudden and Hephaistion would swear to have seen his eyes glistening with tears hadn’t this been utterly impossible. He had never seen Alèxandros crying before. Yet, he felt the prince’s moist cheeks against his and he returned the embrace confused, completely off-guard.
“You are such a fool -” he mumbled, mouth pressed against his neck “how could you ever think such a thing? You will always be my Tìon, my philè - just like you are now, and nothing will ever change this -”
He swallowed hard then he raised his face to look at him, not even the slighest trace of tears on his cheeks, as if they had never been there.
“Emòs tymòs ei, Hephaistion.”
Words came out of him slowly, as if he had fetched them from the depths of himself with huge effort.
“You are my strength. My life. I couldn’t even stand up without you - how pathetic all of it is, isn’t it?”
Hephaistion was about to talk but he shook his face vehemently, the frown there again - even if not out of rage or exasperation, this time. It was grief. The grief of that admission he must have torn from himself with the utter strength of his will, as a bloody trophy laid at his feet.
“We are a sole thing, you and I - a sole thing, philè. Maybe you are right, we will marry one day, and it will be good, it will be right - but this - ” and he laid a hand upon his heart, light and warm as a kiss, the most intimate kiss they ever shared “this - will never change.”
Hephaistion embraced him, the tangle in his throat too sharp and painful for him to even utter a syllable, and held him tight, unable even to breath. Nevertheless he smiled, a soft smile, a little sad perhaps.
He would treasure the memories of these days forever, he thought, as snow seemed to cover all his life with a light veil. Past - with its haunting voices which were dangerously echoing, trying to stubbornly come back to him - future, with all its uncertainties and then - present, this sweet painful present which smelt of winter and of the tepid skin he held in his arms. All of this was indelibly etched inside of him, fixed into his memory - unstable moments of a dazzling perfect happiness.
Who knows if Gods could be envious?
If that was true, if happiness had a price, then he deserved to be burnt to ashes instantly by the lightning of Zeus, so huge was his fault, so immense was the mockery of this presumptuous mortal who had dared to compete with Gods themselves and overcome them. Because no God could ever have anything more than this, and if they, the Immortals, saw him, he knew there would be a punishment to serve, one day.
He cursed his own covetousness but held Alèxandros even tighter. Whichever the weight of his condemnation was, he would come to it with strength and honor, he would never shame the loyalty of the one who had placed all his pride in his hands.
He would come to his condemnation with a proud smile, upon his dead lips.
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Notes:
Not much to say about this.
Emòs tymòs eis: You are my strenght- there are many ways to say "strenght" in Greek, but I chose "tymos" because its root suggests more of an inner force than a physical one.
Philè: Friend
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Here is the Italian version - right click to save:
http://hephaistion.altervista.org/racconti/Neve_di_inverno.doc
My first and *only* attempt at writing sex was fueled sometimes ago by a friend of mine who asked for some...Alexander/Hephaistion's healthy action - let's call it like that...My Italian friends seemed to enjoy it a lot, so I thought to give it a try and prompt a translation...
Thanks to my wonderful susa_938 for her infinite patience in revising my translation and for all her great comments and advices...If I didn't tell you this before, Susa, I'm happy to have a friend like you!^^
Title: Winter snow
Author: Flora
Ratings: for adults for graphic m/m sexuality
Archive: Please, ask before...^^
Summary: A cold snowy night, and two young boys very much in love
Feedback: of course...^^
Notes: Greeks used to have a lot of mores and conventions about sex; oral practices were considered highly shameful between free men, or between men and free women, and even the anal intercourse wasn't so frequent as one may think - among equals. But it's also true that (in every culture), there is a difference between the public façade and what's going on between two lovers in the darkness of their bedchamber. So I tried to find a compromise between the rules of the time (which surely existed and taken in some account) and the acts and desires of two youths very much in love with each other.^_-
WINTER SNOW
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Mea vita, mihi proponis amorem
Hunc nostrum inter nos perpetuumque fore.
Dei magni, facite ut vere promittere possit,
Atque id sincere dicat et ex animo,
Ut liceat nobis tota perducere vita
Aeternum hoc sanctae foedus amicitiae.
My life, you make me wish this love of us
being in perpetual happyness, without shadows.
Great Gods, make me only promise the truth,
that I speak with purety and sincerity,
and that it could last for all of our lives
this endless oath of friendship.
Gaius Valerius Catullus
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Alèxandros stepped lively along the hallway dimly lit by the oil lamps. Didàskalos had kept him awake till late that night, and the only thing he longed for at the moment was to slip into the warm woollen blankets and let the day slide off him like a snake’s old skins.
It wasn’t the first time he’d lingered with Aristotèles in his study crammed with parchments and old yellowed papyruses. Since his arrival at Mieza, more than two years ago, he had attended private lessons in politics and statecraft - lessons exclusively meant for him, as crown prince and future heir of Makedonìa. He had believed them to be the best part of his education - and it was undeniable Aristotèles knew perfectly each of the subtle and elusive shades of the art of ruling - nevertheless, what he seemed to want to do was just fill his head with abstract and unlikely queries about what he would do in a specific situation, given certain terms or others - and this always ended up wearing him out, somehow.
How he acted he would decide when - and if - he would ever find himself in those same circumstances and not before.
Politics is an exact science - said Aristotèles - but he thought differently. He doubted a situation could ever recur with the same identical contingencies, so it was perfectly useless to keep on discussing it for hours and hours.
He thought ruling would be similar to the prowess of a feline in hunting - agile, flexible and constantly vigilant.
Yet, school days were over after all. He would be sixteen that same year in the month of Loios and he would soon be back to Pella. Time had finally come for him to be a man.
He reached the threshold of the massive stone building which housed the school’s classrooms and a sudden lashing of wind sent a chilly shiver down his back; he pulled the heavy fur cloak tight around himself as his breath was already turning into small clouds of steam before his nose. Although the cold was mercilessly digging into his clothes and underneath, he couldn’t help but smiling with rapture.
The first snow of the season had finally arrived at Mieza, covering everything with a soft white blanket.
The conifer woods at the slopes of mount Bermios were completely hidden by a pure spotless surface and an icy storm had been raging all day, dying down its howling only late at night. Snow was still tumbling down - now lazy, placid - and everything appeared luminous and silent, somewhat different beneath that thick friable coat.
Alexandros stepped further, sinking into the snow up to his calfs.
His shammy leather boots were thick, but the cold seemed to grip him till the bones like he had been completely naked under that gravid sky. He thought longingly to his small room and to the woollen blankets of his bed and tried to quicken his pace, though the ground had been turned slippery by the ice and sleet which covered it.
The silence around him was almost unreal.
Alèxandros tossed off the snow which was already entangling in his hair and tried to become even smaller inside his cloak. The way to the dormitory had never appeared so long to him. He passed by some maples bare by winter, their dry branches grown heavier by the snow, as the wind was trying to get through him and rip his clothes off, whirling through the trees. When he reached the door of his bedchamber he opened it gently, trying not to make a noise. Hephaistion was surely asleep at that time, wrapped up in the warm shell of his bed, and he didn’t want to wake him up; he would slip into the blankets as quickly as possible, then that endless day would be finally over.
The small room was ice-cold but faintly lit by an oil lamp laid upon the window sill. He smiled. Hephaistion must have kept it on for him.
The boy was asleep and lying on his back; he had drawn the blankets up to his face but a toned and burnished arm was peeping out the bed, leaned against his hip. His breathing was deep and regular, his hair a dark tangle spread on the pillow. Alèxandros made for the lamp to blow on it, but he clumsily stumbled over a pair of boots forgotten right in the middle of the room, and cursed loudly. Hephaistion let out an annoyed growl and turned to him, laboriously opening his eyes and rubbing them hard.
“So you are finally back, are you? - impossible not to pay notice. Have you always to make such a row, when you move around?”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t do it on purpose - ” came the dry reply, as Alèxandros kicked the boots out to a corner “but I wouldn’t wake you up if you didn’t leave all your stuff scattered about the room! I’d need a map to move in here!”
Hephaistion had drawn himself up, still half-asleep, and the blankets had slid down, leaving him bare.
A shiver shook him, his eyes widening in shock.
“Gods, it’s chilly out here!”
“It’s snowing - I was about to freeze on the way to the dormitory -”
Hehaistion straightened the blankets over his naked body and gestured to him to come closer.
“Take your clothes off and come here, then. Your bed is far too cold for you to sleep in there all alone.”
Alèxandros smiled and nodded. He quickly got rid of his cloak and chiton as Hephaistion was pushing the blankets aside for him, then stormed into his friend’s bed with an agile jump. Hephaistion opened the arms and encircled his numb body. Alèxandros was trembling and got as close as possible to him, slipping his icy feet between his legs.
“You are completely cold.”
He just nodded, his teeth chattering. Hephaistion let his hands slide along his back, massaging and rubbing so to give him back a bit of his lost warmth. They had always kept themselves warm that way in the most severe nights of past winters, sleeping attached as two cherries, and this was surely going to be one of the worst and most inclement snowfalls of the whole season. Alèxandros briefly thought of Leonidas, who had taught him to manage almost without everything, even woollen blankets in full winter. He surely wouldn’t approve it, and the funny thing was he himself didn’t approve it either - but he had learned to allow himself something.
“So, this night too Aristotèles kept you awake until late, for a change. I wanted to wait up for you - I didn’t even notice I had fallen asleep.”
“The old man is going to drive me crazy, sooner or later, I tell you - ” Alèxandros sighed resignedly, rubbing his feet together “but he had at least a fire lit up in his study. By Zeus, I start to think I’m never going to feel warm anymore -”
Hephaistion drew him closer, pressing his body to the bare skin of the boy and massaging him more vigorously.
“It’s not too hard to believe, you are an icicle - are you feeling better now?”
Alèxandros nodded and let himself go to his friend’s hands which were running along his back and hips in a rough yet pleasant friction that seemed to bring his stiff body back to life. They remained in silence for a while, the only sounds being the howling of wind and the muffled thump of snow falling from some branches - completely wrapped in the double layer of thick blankets which formed like a tepid shell around them. Alèxandros was aware of Hephaistion’s warm familiar hands brushing his exposed skin and realized, alarmed, that a blast of heat was climbing up his body, spreading everywhere.
With the heat, came an even more familiar feeling.
“Is that any better?”
Silence.
Hephaistion lowered his face, gazing at him and saw his eyes, usually polished as agates, were now clouded and smoky.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing -” a far too quick reply “nothing - at all.”
But his eyes and the flush on his face and upon the pale skin of his neck were telling a different story. Hephaistion felt a wave of ardour bursting into him, despite the chilly temperature. The bed seemed suddenly torrid as dry sands of desert. He started to rub him more slowly, turning his gestures into a light caress, languid, relaxed, and held him tighter, enfolding their bodies together - and provoking Alèxandros’ immediate reaction. He smiled slyly, like a cat studying a particularly succulent kind of prey.
Alèxandros would have to beg for it, tonight.
He slid a hand along his defenceless back, brushing him at the base of his loins and upon the firm buttocks.
“Are you - feeling warmer, now?”
Hands onto his body - possessive hands, heated.
“Stop - teasing me - ” Alèxandros babbled, his eyes flashing dangerously - the usual crease furrowing his forehead. Hephaistion knew that gaze - oh, he knew it well - but he was inclined to run that risk.
“I’m not teasing anyone - ” he murmured, drawing the mouth up to his and caressing him with his warm breath. He felt him shudder in his arms and struggled to hold his control.
“Let’s hear it, then. What do you want - Alèxandre?”
Hands now were onto his belly, lapping it - teasing his flat abdomen.
“You know - what it is that I want - ” Alèxandros hissed breathlessly, and before he could add anything more Hephaistion’s mouth was upon his - avid, greedy - forcing his lips open wide and kissing him fiercely. Alèxandros answered savagely to the kiss. He clung to him and began to bite his lips, then he found his tongue and sucked it hard. Blankets upon them, around them, were barely more than a torrid stifling cocoon when they finally forced themselves to break loose to gasp some air, breathing fast, their skin polished by a faint layer of sweat.
“Tìon - ”
“Hush - let me do it.”
Hephaistion closed his mouth with a quick kiss. He slid his lips along his neck, shoulders, chest - painfully slow - teasing him with the tongue and biting him light here and there, as if he was tasting. When he caught a flat nipple between his lips and started to lap it, he heard Alèxandros moaning his name, and grabbing his hair in an iron grip. He lifted his face and met the boy’s gaze, his ferocious eyes and the eyebrows which almost touched now, in the most dangerous of his expressions.
“Do you want me to stop it?”
“No - idiot.”
Hephaistion smiled to himself. That was utterly typical of Alèxandros - he was always very reluctant to surrender, in everything.
But he would capitulate.
He started to torment him again, indolent, exasperating. He shifted down, tracing the profiles of his abdomen with the tongue and leaving a wet track at its passage. Alèxandros’ grasp on his hair strengthened. Hephaistion could sense every sensation of him, every shiver reverberated in that grip, as it was the map itself of his pleasure. It was driving him insane.
End of the games.
He grasped his legs and spread them violently apart, positioning his face right in the middle. His sex was towering firm and demanding from the bunch of thin blonde curls - evidently more collaborative than its reluctant owner and Hephaistion couldn’t help but stifling an amused giggle.
“What - are you doing?”
“Just shut that mouth of yours, will you?”
He heard him hissing something between his teeth but the curse, whatever it was, turned into a groan when Hephaistion opened his lips upon his cock, capturing him whole into his mouth. Alèxandros arched toward the boy, clinging even more firmly to his hair and pushing his face down to the base of his own pleasure.
It was pure folly.
It was forbidden, they both knew it, but presently he could only see painful gashes of white behind his shut eyelids, and hear an echo of his own whimpers, blurred and afar - as if they were disjointed from himself. He always felt confused and dumbfounded when Hephaistion loved him this way. These caresses were considered shameful and he could remember the embarassment, the tender clumsiness of the first time it had happened. Nevertheless, he didn’t feel ashamed at all, it was crazy, but thus it was. Nobody could see them, nobody could violate the secret sanctuary of their intimacy.
Alèxandros tossed his head back; he couldn’t ever deny anything of his to Hephaistion. He would have himself eaten whole by him had he just asked for it.
He confusedly thought of all this as he arched rhythmically toward him, against his teeth, his tongue, feeling his flesh rippling at his touch. After a few instants Hephaistion lifted him grabbing his buttocks and making his legs lean against his back. Now he was completely wrapped up into him, in the wet warmth of his mouth and he felt the first spasm climbing along his back, echoing and spreading violently through his body, like a silvery net.
He was close. It was so close.
“No - Tìon.”
“Yes instead - ” a flick of tongue “It’s all right - don’t worry.”
Alèxandros shut his eyes and clenched at the boy frantically, as Hephaistion increased the rhythm of his kisses, of his caresses. Unable to restraint himself any longer he released himself with a choked cry and Hephaistion drank his seed, drank every drop of it as if nothing could or should ever be lost. It was sacred. Even the smallest part of Alèxandros was sacred to him. Nothing could be left out.
He took him in his arms, the boy still trembling from the violence of pleasure and leaned over to kiss him. As soon as he realized what he was doing he drew back confused, but Alèxandros grabbed him by the shoulders and led him to his face violently, tasting himself upon his lips. Hephaistion made another faint attempt to move away - Alèxandros growled enraged and pressed his mouth against his, licking it hungrily.
“What are you doing?” Hephaistion murmured against his lips.
“I want all - all of you. All of us.”
He clung to Hephaistion and kissed him over and over, scratching the vulnerable flesh of his arms and leaving red streaks along his shoulders and neck.
“You are mine, Tìon - you’re only mine - ” he panted and Hephaistion smiled softly, rubbing the lips against his in a gesture of placid consent.
The cold was a far memory now; all their world was enclosed there, in that torrid embrace and in the quaking heat of their entwined bodies. No past, no future there. Only that parched, feverish present.
Alèxandros pushed Hephaistion aside so to stretch beside him and adhering himself completely to his body - then he grabbed his manhood with a sudden jerk and started to slide his hand up and down, along his whole length. Hephaistion repressed a grumble and Alèxandros adressed him a mocking little smile.
“You are going to pay for that, Athenian - ” he laid a light kiss onto his lips and started again with a murmur “I want to taste you too. I want to taste you all over - ”
Hephaistion closed his eyes and relaxed to the touch of his lover. Alèxandros began to smell him, lick him, taste him all over his face, his neck, tickling his ears’ lobes with the tip of his wet tongue. “You taste good, Tìon - ” he sank his face even deeper against his chin, and lapped him with renewed energy “you taste like summer - ” a bite, unexpected and possessive, against the tender flesh of his neck “and sun - ”
Now he was licking him the way an animal would do. He bit him more wildly, sinking his teeth deep down the yielding hollow between the shoulder and the base of his neck and Hephaistion let out a groan of surprise and lazy complaint. He lifted Alèxandros’ face and pressed the lips upon his, tasting the sweet flavour of a drop of his own blood and licking it off. His full erection painfully pushed against the boy’s belly, as Alèxandros mercilessly kept on sliding the hand which held him captive up and down.
“And you are warm - ” he murmured breathlessly “by the Gods, Alèxandre, you are so warm - ”
Alèxandros smiled and turned him belly up onto the bed, straddling him with a single supple movement. His body was light but as sculpted as an athlete’s. Hephaistion was about to brush him on the smooth chest but Alèxandros blocked his hand with a quirk, a menacing sparkle into his gray eyes.
“I don’t like that gaze of yours -”
Alèxandros curled the corners of his lips in an unreadable half-smile, trailing the edge of his hand against the boy’s firm muscles - then he tossed his hair back and drew his face up to Hephaistion’s groin. He smelt him at the base of his stiff penis, sinking the nose into the tangle of dark hairs at the root of his sex.
“I like - your smell - ”
Hephaistion flexed toward him, holding his breath in a hoarse moan when he sensed the flicking of his tongue and his lips running all along himself with studied slowness. He grazed his hair, moving at the wearing rhythm of that contact and giving himself up to the stabbing jerks which seemed to shake him like the burst of summer lightnings.
“Alèxandre - ” he murmured helplessly, suddenly feeling too close to the edge of himself, yet unable to articulate even a single sensible thought. He was roused by the feeling of the boy’s tongue which was slipping relentlessy down to lick the furrow between his buttocks and he stopped him with an abrupt gesture.
“No - enough.”
He turned him over with a thrust, as Alèxandros addressed him an annoyed curse and he was again onto him, as if in a continuous struggle against each other, a fight he knew Alèxandros would let him win - maybe the only victory he would ever grant him. The blankets now were a bundle of forgotten rags, piled up at the bottom of the bed. They weighed up one another in silence, like two fighters in the middle of a game. Hephaistion trailed a finger along the strong line of his jaw, passing it lightly on his lips. Alèxandros captured it, and bit it with full strength, leaving a purple sign upon its flesh, and Hephaistion tugged him by the hair, forcing him to toss his head behind and sinking the teeth into his pale neck.
“Now I want to -”
“All right -” Alèxandros interrupted him, burying the fingers into his sweaty hair and lifting his head with a painful jerk.
“It’s all right.”
Hephaistion realized, not without some regret, that his teeth had dug mauvish engravings into the boy’s flesh but they were both well over it all, over the pain - beyond the border of what could be considered acceptable or legitimate.
He knew what he wanted.
They hadn’t often loved each other that way. Most of the times they satisfied their needs just touching and brushing and rubbing - but not this night.
He must have all of him, tonight.
He grabbed the small vial of bath oils which lay upon the wooden shelf beside the bed and unscrewed the top with an impatient tug. Alèxandros was observing him, an amused and curious gaze painted on his face.
“You are going to shatter that poor thing on the ground, I’m afraid - ” he giggled.
Hephaistion shot him a glance, raising an eyebrow.
Soon after, an intoxicating fragrance of jasmine and roses spread through the room. Hephaistion knew that scent, having laid that ointment on Alèxandros’ body countless time, after sharing a bath. It was pure madness the way he had learned to recognize each single taste, each particular smell or sign of his body, of his skin.
He might have recognized him even blindfold, just at the touch.
He dipped his fingers into the scented oil and set himself between Alèxandros legs lifting them, then he entered two fingers into his opening, moving them lightly - delicately. Alèxandros bit his lips and closed his eyes, letting himself go to the caress of those familiar fingers which were penetrating him, delving into him, and he began to shift against his hand, rotating his hips almost involuntarily.
It was outrageous, insane. He couldn’t ever allow anybody else to touch him inside like this, this intimate way, so secretly.The sole thought was inconceivable. What he had granted to Hephaistion would have been his and his only.
He wasn’t ashamed of this anymore.
He wasn’t uncomfortable anymore before this need, he - who had been taught to do without anything, to never give himself up to any delight of body and soul. He was beyond shame, beyond that stringy and painful knot entangled at the bottom of himself.
“Stop. Stop it, please - Hephaistion -” and, Gods, was that really him, yelping and moaning in that ridiculous way?
He would have never thought it possible, but it was his own voice there - aroused, helpless - stripped as the groan of an animal on the altar of sacrifice. He had his face turned aside and could see the snow falling slowly, silent through the window’s frame - so cold, so pale as everything inside him, around him was fire, aridity, heat.
Hephaistion slid softly inside him, then he passed one of his legs over his shoulder so to enter him completely and began to hammer into his body like a living nail, skin on skin, flesh against flesh.
Alèxandros searched for his hands and intertwined his fingers with Hephaistion’s, as the rhythm became faster, frenetic. They could be delicate in their love, but never, never without vigour - without strength. They weren’t boys anymore.
Hephaistion’s face was right over his, his hair moved at the rhythm of his thrusts, his lips were polished and half-closed in an unexpressed groan. Alèxandros reached a hand out, touching him on a cheek and the boy grazed his face against his palm, the breathing just a restrained gasp now. He was gazing at Hephaistion’s features, so perfect in their intensity to be almost painful and not for the first time he thought even Apollo couldn’t be more beautiful.
Warmth, snow, silence, pure white. Friction of bodies into the flesh, onto the soul.
It was like a breakable and pristine coat on everything, it was like - dying?
If that was it, it was fine then, there was a comfort, a sort of surrender into this white feverish death.
Snow upon his enflamed body. And the hands - these hands so warm. It seemed to him he was falling deep, in a dizzy mad fall, but it was a sweet abyss because it didn’t burn for the first time in his life, extinguished by this snow which suffocated its blood-red flames.
Oh Gods, snow everywhere.
He could fall forever until he firmly grasped at this body, and the fall would never end, he would never break and everything that was there was - love? Yes, love, but it was something more. There wasn’t a name for what it was if not in the language of Immortals. It wasn’t thinkable, it wasn’t conceivable.
No it wasn’t thinkable, one could just recognize it, fight against it, maybe.
Or surrender.
He had surrendered, and he probably didn’t even start the struggle, ever.
Such a shame it was. A slur which was as bittersweet as the nectar itself of Gods.
When Hephaistion burst into him with a husky moan, he held him tight to himself as their broken breathing seemed to roar through the room like a clashing of weapons and the snow was falling indifferently out of the window. They remained entwined for a time that seemed endless, listening to the cacophony of wind yelling its senseless speeches and the deafening noise of snow detaching from the sky.
Soon after, Hephaistion felt Alexandros’ body cooling down and a shiver climbing up his back. He reached out to grab the blankets bundled up at the foot of the bed and pulled them over themselves, wrapping them around their shoulders. He slid from onto the boy and leaned against his back, as Alèxandros stretched beside him, laying his palms upon Hephaistion’s chest and gazing at the window. The wind seemed to have quit his unanswered invocations and the pale flakes were now lazy and light, finally silent. Alèxandros could feel Hephaistion passing a hand through his hair, slowly, but when he raised his eyes he saw him distant and secluded, painfully unreachable.
“What are you thinking of?”
Hephaistion lowered his face, concealing with an expression of feigned innocence a mood which seemed almost of guilt.
“Nothing.”
“That’s not true - I know you, I know when there is something wrong.”
Hephaistion sat upright with a sigh, pulling him up and passing the blanket over his bare shoulders.
“I was thinking that we’ll be soon leaving this place - school days are over. It’s time to be men.”
“And aren’t you happy about that?”
“Yes, but sometimes I wonder - ”
He paused and Alèxandros nodded, gesturing to him to go on.
“Sometimes I wonder if this won’t change the things between us - wait let me finish! What I’m trying to say is - when we’ll be men you - will you grow tired of me, Alèxandre?”
There it was again, the usual frown clearing its way on his face like a dangerous stormy cloud. An instant more and he would explode.
“You misunderstood what I wanted to say - what I meant was - one day we will marry, you will surely marry-”
“I’ve never thought to marry!” Alèxandros burst out; one could see he struggled to remain calm.
“You haven’t, perhaps, but your mother has - and your father either. She hates me, she hates me just because of that - ”
“I would kill her should she just try to keep you away from me!”
Hephaistion shook his face, brushing Alèxandros’ cheeks.
“Yes, but listen - this has nothing to do with your mother. I thought about it. You will be king in the future, and you will be a great king, the greatest of all, I know it. You will have to have sons - your own heirs and I’ll be happy even just to stay at your side as a faithful soldier - one among the others - if you want to keep me with you. I would stay at your side even if all this shouldn’t exist anymore between us. I will never leave you, as long as you need me, even my simple presence, or the comfort of my friendship and - ”
Alèxandros embraced him all of a sudden and Hephaistion would swear to have seen his eyes glistening with tears hadn’t this been utterly impossible. He had never seen Alèxandros crying before. Yet, he felt the prince’s moist cheeks against his and he returned the embrace confused, completely off-guard.
“You are such a fool -” he mumbled, mouth pressed against his neck “how could you ever think such a thing? You will always be my Tìon, my philè - just like you are now, and nothing will ever change this -”
He swallowed hard then he raised his face to look at him, not even the slighest trace of tears on his cheeks, as if they had never been there.
“Emòs tymòs ei, Hephaistion.”
Words came out of him slowly, as if he had fetched them from the depths of himself with huge effort.
“You are my strength. My life. I couldn’t even stand up without you - how pathetic all of it is, isn’t it?”
Hephaistion was about to talk but he shook his face vehemently, the frown there again - even if not out of rage or exasperation, this time. It was grief. The grief of that admission he must have torn from himself with the utter strength of his will, as a bloody trophy laid at his feet.
“We are a sole thing, you and I - a sole thing, philè. Maybe you are right, we will marry one day, and it will be good, it will be right - but this - ” and he laid a hand upon his heart, light and warm as a kiss, the most intimate kiss they ever shared “this - will never change.”
Hephaistion embraced him, the tangle in his throat too sharp and painful for him to even utter a syllable, and held him tight, unable even to breath. Nevertheless he smiled, a soft smile, a little sad perhaps.
He would treasure the memories of these days forever, he thought, as snow seemed to cover all his life with a light veil. Past - with its haunting voices which were dangerously echoing, trying to stubbornly come back to him - future, with all its uncertainties and then - present, this sweet painful present which smelt of winter and of the tepid skin he held in his arms. All of this was indelibly etched inside of him, fixed into his memory - unstable moments of a dazzling perfect happiness.
Who knows if Gods could be envious?
If that was true, if happiness had a price, then he deserved to be burnt to ashes instantly by the lightning of Zeus, so huge was his fault, so immense was the mockery of this presumptuous mortal who had dared to compete with Gods themselves and overcome them. Because no God could ever have anything more than this, and if they, the Immortals, saw him, he knew there would be a punishment to serve, one day.
He cursed his own covetousness but held Alèxandros even tighter. Whichever the weight of his condemnation was, he would come to it with strength and honor, he would never shame the loyalty of the one who had placed all his pride in his hands.
He would come to his condemnation with a proud smile, upon his dead lips.
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Notes:
Not much to say about this.
Emòs tymòs eis: You are my strenght- there are many ways to say "strenght" in Greek, but I chose "tymos" because its root suggests more of an inner force than a physical one.
Philè: Friend
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Here is the Italian version - right click to save:
http://hephaistion.altervista.org/racconti/Neve_di_inverno.doc