What are the things that will make Alexander later feel proud of his close friendship with Hephaestion?
What are the things that will make him feel most unable to lose Hephaestion?
(Somehow I get the feeling from your books (and to be honest, also historically, although this is an unfounded assumption) that Alexander was much more emotionally dependent on Hephaestion.
Alexander and Hephaistion
Letâs start with the history, and that should also answer a lot of your question for the novels.
I think Alexander was more dependent on Hephaistion for the simple reason that power isolates. And the more powerful, the more isolated. Some people are better able to be emotionally self-sufficient. I think Philip was. He had to be, just to have survived, and I wouldnât be surprised if he found it virtually impossible to trust anybody once his mother died.
While being a prince was never âsafe,â by contrast with his father, Alexanderâs childhood was a cakewalk. That meant he would (probably) have learned Eriksonâs all-important HOPE via trust. To be fair, Philip probably did too, as a royal (male) infant, even the third brother, his needs would all have been met, but especially after the death of his father when he was about twelve, heâd have experienced increasing insecurity that Alexander mostly didnât suffer, or not to the same extent.
Why does that matter? It means Alexander was probably better able to make and maintain emotional connections. I doubt any Argead male was what weâd consider psychologically sound, but Alexander was likely more so than Philip because his childhood was less chaotic. He could form deep emotional ties to others, Hephaistion among them.
If Plutarch can be trustedâalways a fair questionâAlexander seems to have been inclined to emotional expressions, grand gestures, and generally liked people. He was an extrovert (as are most top-tier, successful leaders). He had friends, not just acquaintances, and he also seems to have taken it very personally when they betrayed him. Some might call that naivetĂŠ, but he was a prince, so I donât think he was naĂŻve. I think he knew how to trustâand wanted to trust. That is my impression for the sum of the various Plutarchian anecdotes, which is why I said it depends on how much we can trust Plutarch. I tend (by default) to question individual anecdotes (and so should you), but by the same token, itâs highly unlikely that theyâre all false. For some, too, it may be more a matter of âselective exaggeration and intentional narrative framing.â E.g., Plutarch tells us how to understand the story, and ânips and tucksâ it to meet his sermon-y needs. Weâre still left with âflavors,â if you will. And Alexanderâs flavor of human interaction involved a need for love and approval, as well as a willingness to give it (as long as you werenât beating him in a competition).
But of course, as he grew in power, the temptation for others to betray that need, either for their own advancement, or out of envy, or fear, worked to increasingly alienate him from his once-many friends. I suspect he always assumed some of those around him were sycophants. Again, he grew up a prince; it was inevitable. But the more powerful and successful he became, the less he could trustâŚwhile still wanting to.
That meant increasing emotional weight was put on those who remained part of that most inner ring, and at the apex, other than his mother, stood Hephaistion. And the reverse was also probably true for Hephaistion: the higher he rose, the more isolated he became, too. But as Iâve argued elsewhere, given that he appears to have had no (known) relatives on the campaign, he already was isolated, and that may have figured into his attraction for Alexander. And if, especially after the murder of Kleitos, I expect nobody felt entirely safe, I imagine Hephaistion felt as safe as it was possible to be. He also probably worked hard to stay in Alexanderâs good graces. Heâd thrown in his lot with Alexander and there wasnât any backing out of that (assuming he would even have wanted to).
That of course means, when Alexander lost Hephaistion, he lost the (emotional) ground he stood on. I think thatâs at least part of why he followed Hephaistion to the grave 8-9 months later. While certainly the poor state of his health after so many wounds, especially the lung wound at Malia, would have made it difficult for him to survive that final fever, he may also just not have cared enough to fight the way he had in the past. Itâs something too many people are inclined to dismiss, either because they find it âoverly romanticâ and/or they donât think Alexander cared enough about anyone besides himself (and his glory, or kleos) to matter. Thatâs the âHe was a narcissistâ crowd. Not only do I not belong to that crowd, I think most either donât know narcissism well, or donât know Alexander well enough to properly judge. That said, some people are also just unaware how much bereavement wrecks our health. Had Alexander fallen ill a year later, or even six months later, he might have been in better emotional shape to kick it.
By contrast, itâs hard to say how Hephaistion would have reacted to losing Alexander. Much would have depended on when. For one thing, I suspect they both assumed Hephaistion would outlive him, and such assumptions actually go a fair way towards preparing us to weather bereavement. Unexpected loss is considered a serious complicating factor in healing from it. The when also matters. Although Iâve said elsewhere that if Hephaistion hadnât died, Iâm not sure Alexander would either, for the sake of argument, letâs assume he would have. At that point in time, with not one but two children on the way, Hephaistion would have had a powerful reason to live. By contrast, if Alexander had fallen at Granikos or Issos, Hephaistion might not have survived him for long either, if he didnât fall on the battlefield with him.
Now, thatâs the historianâs assessment. And I do endeavor to base my characters on the real historical people, but for the books, I can be less cagey. The characters as Iâve written them are deeply intertwined. Alexandros knows that Hephaistion is the one voice not afraid to tell him the truth. (Curtius says as much and Iâve taken him at face-value.) They will fight, at points, because of that. In Becoming, Alexandros observes that the fact Hephaistion was willing to hit him made Alexandros willing to let him hold him. Alexandros is aware that Hephaistionâs commitment to him is absolute: heâs risked his freedom and his life for Alexandros, and Alexandros is not the sort to forget it. (Nor, apparently, was the historical man; itâs why he was so slow to believe Harpalos had betrayed himâŚbecause Harpalos had once been sent into exile for his sake.)
Loyalty is both my (and imo, the historical) Alexandrosâs most valued virtue in othersâand himself. Thus, when he loses the one person heâs confident will give it, he loses his will to live.
So yes, Alexandros will fight the fever mostly on instinct but isnât opposed to the idea of dying and joining Hephaistion. Heâs at a point in the bereavement process where heâs not sure itâs worth it to survive; he canât see that heâll ever again have anyone he can trust like that, and without Hephaistion, the kleos has lost all its glitter. My Hephaistion does have other emotional support, so he would be able to survive the loss of Alexandros, even if it were to occur earlier in the campaign. Not because he doesnât love Alexandros as much, but because he has other people to lean on, and other reasons so live.
