Never thought of Hephaistion and Alexander not being friendly, but I quite like how you handled this. It felt authentic for the sort of confused things teenagers can feel, and boys for each other.

Ah my dear:

This is a fantastic story!

You made me cry when poor Alexander was so cruelly rejected by Hephaestion over and over again, especially on the occasion after taming Bucephalus he wanted to shared victory with his love yet Hephaestion uttered all those horrible words of hatred towards him and I gasped and really worried they would have a nasty nasty fight.

In the end I cried with happiness when everything solved out between our boys, and you catch the uncertainty and bewilderment of adolescent love so wonderfully.

Thank you very much for the great story.

Hua

This was beautiful! I absolutely loved it. Hephaestion's emotional roller coaster was very realistic, and poor Alexander trying to figure out what the heck was going on. And the end, very sweet. Great story.

Amyntor justs the brunt of the 'I'm a teenager and I know what's goof for me!' bussiness.

But SQUEE this story is just so cute!

This made me cry:((((

The part when Alexander cried...

Wow,you write so beautifully...Bewitching story, with a shrewd way of connecting historical evidence regarding our boys(for example Ηφαιστιων had connections with Athens, as his name suggests) and the perfectly interwoven fic part...The right words escape me, but your story is officially and panegyrically added to my faves-list and I am certain to check your other stories too. That I can say with certainty

Cheers from Athens;)

Hello,

It was such an interesting fic, congratulations.

This is a beautiful and intriguing story of adolescent love - because I think Hephaestion never stopped being Alexander's true friend. The forced return to Athens was a major separetion truma to him and his hatred towards Alexander a reversed projection of his true feelings of Love and Friendship. It didn't make things better that he met some anti Macedonian "friends" poisoning his mind against the young Prince.

Amyntor is a knowing father, seeing clearly behind his son's confused feelings and wanting what's best for him.

The Taming of Bucephalus becomes a definite turning point. ALexander wants to share his moment of glory with Hephaestion, but gets to hear some unforgiving words he doesnt't understand at all. Fortunately they both realize their true feelings and all is well towards the end. A most endearing and emotional moment...

All the best wishes and many thanks for sharing,

/NorthernLight

Brilliant story! You really are a great writer!

As usual, wonderful story.

I couldn't help but notice lots of neat foreshadowing - when Hephaestion says he was "fickle" we know how utterly loyal he will be to Alexander, and later he realizes that Athens was just a way for him to deceive himself regarding his true feelings for Alexander, which, at the core, never changed. When he says that he felt uneasy thinking of how he felt when his father took him away from Alexander, we know how deeply he'll throw himself into the relationship later, no matter what it would cost him to care so deeply. And that almost comes to fruition when Alexander tames Bucephalus; we know Hephaestion's only so angry because he's afraid to lose Alexander, afraid that something terrible will happen to him.

I really like the parallel between Bucephalus and Hephaestion! Both of them are very special and spirited, and there's only one person in the world who can really befriend them, and can see that it's really worth the extra effort to do so!

Entrenched in angst as I sometimes am, I really appreciate the hilarity! (And always I'm impressed by well-written humor, as I find it very hard to do.) I wish I could see Hephaestion's face and its myriad expressions during Alexander's dreamy run-on speech during the banquet, and when he saw their fathers looking at them!

That was beautiful. I'm pretty speechless about it. Wow... You have a lot of talent.

What a wonderful surprise! I don't know why I logged on tonight - but Zeus was kind and this was waiting! Thank you for a lovely Christmas Day present, moon71! I loved this "almost-first-meeting" story - it has a most plausible backstory with the Athens connection. I too liked Amyntor's character - most realistic. And what can I say about absolutely lovesick, still-innocent Alexander? He is adorable, as much as angry-young-beautiful teen Hephaistion is. I also liked the way you have shown the different levels of maturity of the two and how perhaps it led to the initial problems after Hephaistion's return to Macedon - 13 and 15 can mean quite a difference in emotional maturity, needs and desires.

Moon71 - your stories are so great and so different from each other, that I think if ATG was here now he would keep you at his Court to entertain him with fanfics!

I too realized that this site doesn't allow us to link to other sites. I tried to give the ShotoPress address yesterday. The description of The Golden Vine there seems wonderful - and I loved the fact that Alexander IV is Barsine's son and not Roxana's! Thanks to both moon71 and Frederika - I will order "Conspiracy..." from abebooks. Still waiting on my "Lord of the two lands" order.

thank you, thank you, thank you! so much for this much needed fic. it was so rivetting and touching. its been a long time since ive read a piece when they are still so young and still trying to explore their emotions. please do not stop here, i really hope you will continue, it is just too good to end it so soon. :-(

What a wonderful surprise to return home from family Christmas festivities to find this delightful story! I especialy enjoy your ability to pull the reader into your characters' psyches: Hephaestion's youthful, conflicting emotions and Alexander's loneliness. Also

appreciate your rounding out the story with a detailed description of the other characters (General Amyntor,etc.) All too often we are given only vague glimpses of their roles.

Thank you for a lovely Christmas gift. I look forward to your next posting.

Fredericka

P.S. I got my copy of "Conspiracy of Women", which WAS hillarious. from Abebooks. The website is I tried to send it to Coral Dawn but I don't think we can send personal messages.

That had my heart aching throughout, I just wanted to cry but I refused lol (It's Christmas, I'm not crying at Christmas lol). The climatic 'hate' speech from Hephaistion and Alexander crying, ugh, my heart broke! You fixed it again though lol!

And I'm sure you'll agree with me when I say that the wait for Doctor Who, so worth it! David gets my vote lol!