Hermes (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
messageforyou) wrote2025-06-15 01:56 pm
messageforyou) wrote2025-06-15 01:56 pm
For refusetofight
Through the smoky miasma, thick and smelling of conflict and heat and pressure, on the other side is a forest. This one is less garish, less saturated than the rest of Tír na nÓg. Two fae creatures, odd feathered humanoids that resemble crows with cracked and broken beaks, sit at the rocks around a steaming hot spring, soap and strigils beside them.
The fae are seemingly mute, but won't allow Achilles to leave without a thorough wash. The sort that practically scrapes a whole layer of skin off, the sort where they insist on his hair to be cleaned and his nail beds scrubbed. His white tunic is whisked off to be burned, and only once he is deemed fit by the fae attendants to be properly cleaned of the remnants of the Morrígan does one bring the clothes he left behind with Hermes. They're neatly folded, but Hermes' scarf sits on top like a nest, holding Achilles' ring, his bracelet, and the stone with a hole in the middle. The scarf smells distinctly of Hermes, like cleverness and courage and Greece. Almost like Hermes is trying to give Achilles his blessing and support, even when they can't see each other before his trial.
After he's clean and dressed, the bath attendants point in the direction he's meant to walk, a plunge into the dark woods. There's the soft giggling of children within.
In the woods, children from all across time and the world huddle together. A boy holds a fist of straws, and each of the children draw a straw at once. They mumble amongst themselves, checking the straws, and three boys have the shortest one.
"Seems unfair to make him convince Stab," says a girl with messy red braids and two missing teeth.
"If you want a mulligan, you gotta give up treats until the next hunt," a blond boy with gray eyes and a short straw says, waving it in her face. She wrinkles her nose.
"I didn't say I want a mulligan!"
"Then shoo!"
As Achilles approaches, the children with longer straws scatter into the woods, some laughing. Three boys remain. One boy, with pale skin, ragged dirty blond hair and crooked teeth, wearing an oversized sweater and shorts and no shoes and a canvas bag big enough on him to almost drag on the ground. A second boy, skin dark as jet and head shaved, a pair of binoculars dangling from his neck, wearing loose sweatpants and an old linen button-down with sneakers with a check drawn on. A third boy, the smallest of them, maybe close to Lyra's age, looking like one of the people from the far east but with a permanent glower in his face, sitting on the ground and looking a little like he's drowning in the adult-sized jacket draped around him.
The blond boy jumps up on a tree stump to greet Achilles at eye level, putting his hands on his hips and smirking. "Hello, grownup! Here starts your trials! I call being the judge."
"Don't be silly. It's not a court trial." The boy in the button down approaches, holding an aluminum can colored bright red. He pops the tab, a sickly sweet smell rising in the air as the liquid inside hisses, and he holds the can out to Achilles. "My dad said men welcome each other with a beer, but if you get to Birdy she's going to make you drink a lot, so here's a coke instead."
The boy in the button down strategically stands between Achilles and the smallest boy. The smallest boy makes no movement to greet Achilles, instead staying on the ground, glowering at him with dark eyes.
The fae are seemingly mute, but won't allow Achilles to leave without a thorough wash. The sort that practically scrapes a whole layer of skin off, the sort where they insist on his hair to be cleaned and his nail beds scrubbed. His white tunic is whisked off to be burned, and only once he is deemed fit by the fae attendants to be properly cleaned of the remnants of the Morrígan does one bring the clothes he left behind with Hermes. They're neatly folded, but Hermes' scarf sits on top like a nest, holding Achilles' ring, his bracelet, and the stone with a hole in the middle. The scarf smells distinctly of Hermes, like cleverness and courage and Greece. Almost like Hermes is trying to give Achilles his blessing and support, even when they can't see each other before his trial.
After he's clean and dressed, the bath attendants point in the direction he's meant to walk, a plunge into the dark woods. There's the soft giggling of children within.
In the woods, children from all across time and the world huddle together. A boy holds a fist of straws, and each of the children draw a straw at once. They mumble amongst themselves, checking the straws, and three boys have the shortest one.
"Seems unfair to make him convince Stab," says a girl with messy red braids and two missing teeth.
"If you want a mulligan, you gotta give up treats until the next hunt," a blond boy with gray eyes and a short straw says, waving it in her face. She wrinkles her nose.
"I didn't say I want a mulligan!"
"Then shoo!"
As Achilles approaches, the children with longer straws scatter into the woods, some laughing. Three boys remain. One boy, with pale skin, ragged dirty blond hair and crooked teeth, wearing an oversized sweater and shorts and no shoes and a canvas bag big enough on him to almost drag on the ground. A second boy, skin dark as jet and head shaved, a pair of binoculars dangling from his neck, wearing loose sweatpants and an old linen button-down with sneakers with a check drawn on. A third boy, the smallest of them, maybe close to Lyra's age, looking like one of the people from the far east but with a permanent glower in his face, sitting on the ground and looking a little like he's drowning in the adult-sized jacket draped around him.
The blond boy jumps up on a tree stump to greet Achilles at eye level, putting his hands on his hips and smirking. "Hello, grownup! Here starts your trials! I call being the judge."
"Don't be silly. It's not a court trial." The boy in the button down approaches, holding an aluminum can colored bright red. He pops the tab, a sickly sweet smell rising in the air as the liquid inside hisses, and he holds the can out to Achilles. "My dad said men welcome each other with a beer, but if you get to Birdy she's going to make you drink a lot, so here's a coke instead."
The boy in the button down strategically stands between Achilles and the smallest boy. The smallest boy makes no movement to greet Achilles, instead staying on the ground, glowering at him with dark eyes.
no subject
“Ask whatever you like, Miss Honey.” He chases the drink with a bite of strudel to help banish the residue from his mouth. It’s exquisitely flakey and he hums his appreciation. “I’m curious to hear what the bards and scholars have made of my story.”
And equally curious to know which memories Pyrrhus still retains without Neoptolemus. Maybe curious isn’t the right word. Anxious, more like, but the vodka should help soften the sting.
no subject
It’s strange hearing Honey speak those names. The pronunciation is slightly off, either from time or the influence of her native tongue, but it’s also the way she speaks about them as symbols rather than slain children. She learned their stories as a fabrication, a “parable.”
“I don’t disagree with your father. I can name more futures exchanged for glory if you like. Lamb and Pa—” He clears his throat. Saying the name aloud might still put him at risk with the fae. (Did Patroclus’ name even mean anything to Honey? Did it survive across the centuries?) He continues, carefully: “My dearest companion. I sacrificed them both with my decisions.”
He pauses to knock back his waiting shot of vodka in one go. Achilles winces, and it’s hard to say whether it’s from the drink or his own stinging admission: “It’s true, I was drunk on my own pride for much of the war, until I was sobered by grief. My own. King Priam’s. By then it was far too late.”
no subject
The vodka also might be having an effect on his volume.
“Of all the things to ask! Absolutely. Would a man grieve so deeply for a mere friend?” He shakes his head, incredulous, and takes his next shot, clears his throat. “Half of me died with him. The half that was worth anything.”
Achilles tears off another bite of strudel. “If he’d not been by my side since boyhood, I would have been a worse man. If you can believe such a thing.”
no subject
“If only that part of the story survived the centuries, I would be content.” He smiles, but the lines in his face look more pronounced. His eyes are fond, but weary. “I wish I could thank your father for preserving my love for Pat.”
The name is already out there, and the two women are mortals. It seems safe enough.
Achilles’ brow furrows and he turns in his seat to better face Honey. “But why would he be punished for such a simple thing?”
no subject
He brings his empty glass down on the table harder than he intends.
“There is nothing more masculine than loving another man. Nothing about that precludes him from taking a wife as well,” Achilles scoffs in disbelief.
“Or a wife keeping female lovers as she pleases.” A shrug. Did Sappho’s work survive to see Honey’s age? That should have been a wealth of evidence for modern scholars.
“Why must the laws be so arbitrary?” He sits forward in his seat. “And who makes them? Who upholds them? Judges? Kings? Gods?”
no subject
Honey has just described Achilles’ idea of a nightmare. He has trouble imagining that many tricksters collaborating on the same plan, though. Odysseus had a tendency to only look out for himself (or, occasionally, his family.)
There were, however, plenty of men who fancied themselves as clever as Odysseus, and that unearned confidence made them more dangerous. At least the king of Ithaca’s plots were well-reasoned, if grossly manipulative.
There’s one missing element here, though: “Are there no gods to punish mortals for this hubris? Or do they revel in watching such machinations unfold unimpeded?”
no subject
At this point, Achilles is unique among mortals; he’s met gods from several pantheons thanks to his relationship with Hermes. Whether that’s an honor or not, is questionable.
“Some of them are as petty and proud and vindictive as any mortal man.” Zeus. Ares. Loki. The Hebrews’ strange god. “Some are loving, patient and wise.” Hermes. Prometheus. Persephone. “Others are inscrutable forces beyond our reckoning.” Chaos. Maia. The Morrígan.
Achilles avails himself of the fresh spread of food, testing the fig jam on a slice of cheese and humming his approval. A good charcuterie truly transcends time and place.
“What did you ask of the gods, Miss Honey?” he asks after knocking back yet another shot.
no subject
That is, of course, if the Olympians survived the threat of the upstart god to answer prayers in Honey’s time.
“They wanted everyone to be exactly alike? But there are so few men who look like I do. There are far, far more with dark hair and skin. Eliminating them all would be an impossible endeavor, and such an effort would quickly enrage the gods.” Prometheus in particular. He’s sure the Titan would find the compulsion bizarre; he delighted so much in his children’s kaleidoscopic individuality. Even their flaws enchanted him.
Achilles cocks his head. “How exactly did your death ‘strike a blow’?”
no subject
“Spreading the plague to women and children—I cannot condone that.” He valiantly tries to enunciate the words, but a few of the syllables slur together. Achilles drinks his nearly-forgotten shot, and sets down the glass harder than he intends. A hairline crack splits the side. The vodka is really starting to soak in. “But to hear you and the lads tell it, all honor has been stripped from war. If ever there was any to be had.”
He frowns and examines the fractured glass, gives Honey an apologetic look. “Do you know what became of your father?”
no subject
Listening to Honey, there are practices that are familiar to Achilles: looting the slain, taking slaves, even humiliating, mutilating one’s enemies. He’s either participated in such things, or known men who have. Pyrrhus, of course, is one of them.
But in Honey’s war, they’ve pushed brutality to an incomprehensible extreme. In Achilles’ time, simple honor or fear of divine retribution kept most men from reaching such depths of cruelty. There were always exceptions, but never on the scale Honey describes.
“May I ask—how many among your enemy understood the barbarity of their deeds?” His large, calloused hand finds Honey’s as consolation for his continued questioning. “It seems as if they were overcome by a sickness. A madness.”
no subject
Achilles watches Birdy’s practiced hands work the other young woman’s hair while she speaks. How strange, that the most courageous people are not soldiers but women and—as the boys proved—children. The people who should have the least power.
“I cannot imagine a future without such people. I cannot bear the thought.” Why should mortals work hard to learn, grow, and better themselves, only to decline into such darkness? He gives Honey’s hand a reassuring squeeze. “I hope they prevail.”
He hopes Honey and Birdy’s own sacrifices weren’t made in vain. He turns his attention to the latter. “You were part of the same war, Miss Birdy? How did the two of you come to find one another?”