The Beas sparkled like molten silver with the gentle touch of the morning sun. It could not assuage the mutiny that was mounting among Alexander’s soldiers, however. How long and how far? Coenus, the general of Alexander’s army, raised the question. We have come a long way in search of some mirage. We have bathed in the Tigris and the Indus, played in the Nile and the Euphrates, sailed across the Oxus and the Jaxartes. We breathed the air of deserts, mountains, steppes and fields. We trudged miles and miles, thousands of miles. Of victory, booty, glory and novelty, we’ve had our fill. Alexander looked into Coenus’s eyes. He saw longing in them. Longing for wife. For children. Father and mother. No harlot can ever replace the touch of the wife. No victory can match the smiles of your children. Eight years. They’ve been away from their homeland for eight years. But we are conquerors, said Alexander. Conquest is our way, our life, and our truth. There is no
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