Achilles watches the fresh scene unfold. The messages, the trickery, the subterfuge all carry the suggestion of Hermes’ power. Or maybe the gauzy, flowing scarf around his neck is simply keeping Hermes top of mind.

Do the French and the krauts only worship the one God? Do some of them still make offerings to older deities? That’s not important right now, he chides himself.

“It was your choice to help defy the krauts?” Achilles asks. He’s carefully comparing Gavroche’s experience of war to Pyrrhus’, but it seems the boy has more in common with the besieged (and conquered) Trojans. Gavroche was only doing what young boys are suited to: games and mischief and secrets. Not killing adults two and three times his size.

“And they were proud of you?” he continues. “The Limping Lady? Your mother and father?”