Madison said, ‘Well, it so happens you’re looking at it. Sitting on it. This place wasn’t always called Afghanistan. You look at it now, and all you see is the hangover from the Mujahideen versus the Russians, or the Taliban and the Americans, and the talking heads on the TV and the latest social or political upheaval that’s here today, gone tomorrow, but there’s so much more to it than that. Right here under our asses is the stage where so many of the great dramas of ancient history took place. I’m talking epic, widescreen, cinemascope, Technicolor legends, like the biggest movie you ever saw, only ten times bigger. Where fifteen centuries of violent and bloody war and destruction like you wouldn’t believe alternated with short peaceful periods when great cities appeared, empires rose up, populations exploded, trade routes thrived, fortunes were made and culture flourished, only for it all to be smashed down again as the next cycle of ruin and devastation came around, like sand castles washed away by the tide. That’s the way it always went, all through the ages. And it always will.’

Chapter 28

Wolf said, ‘Wow. Dramatically put. Though I will say, when it comes to violent and bloody war and destruction, there’s nothing I haven’t seen before.’

Madison turned to him. ‘What you said about Alexander being a Greek general. In fact, he was just a little bit more than that.’

‘I never did pay much attention in class,’ Wolf said. ‘You’re the expert.’

Madison smiled. ‘What I know is only a fraction of what Dad could have rattled off. Alexander was the greatest military leader of antiquity, and probably the most important player in the entire history of Afghanistan, three centuries before Christ.’

‘So what was this super-important Greek doing here?’

‘What all super-ambitious leaders did back then,’ she replied, ‘and still do today: expanding his global empire. It’s a long and fascinating story. I think you’d enjoy it.’

‘Uh-oh, sounds like we’re about to get a history lesson,’ Wolf said, grinning at Ben.

‘You want one?’ she asked.

‘From you?’ Wolf said, grinning even wider. ‘Anything.’

‘You might even learn something,’ Ben told him.

Madison took a sip from the beer bottle she’d been nurturing since dinner. ‘Let’s see now. I guess the best place to start the story is in 336 BC, when Alexander inherited the throne of the Greek kingdom of Macedonia at the age of just twenty. As a boy he’d been tutored by Aristotle. He was brilliant, famously beautiful, a blond-haired blue-eyed demigod; dashing, heroic, supremely talented at the art of war and apparently incapable of fear. He always led his armies from the front, riding into battle right at the head of his men, who followed him adoringly.’

‘Sounds like our very own Benedict Hope,’ Wolf said. ‘I could tell you stories.’

‘Shut up, Jaden,’ Ben muttered.