messageforyou | For refusetofight

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.

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Achilles takes another sip of his coffee as he considers where to begin.

“He didn’t know how to rule a kingdom, of course. My father could have mentored the lad, but he wanted nothing to do with him.” He winces, both at the bitterness of the coffee, and the words leaving his mouth. “I believe the concubine Lamb took from Troy grudgingly taught him the ways of statecraft and—given the tales of his brutality in battle—he was not well-liked by his peers.”

He takes a breath and his tone warms slightly. “But his slaves and house staff respected him; Lamb looked after them in his own way. They cared for him through his constant pain—old wounds from the war.”

Achilles swallows and runs a thumb along the rim of his cup. “He lost two young sons and blamed himself for their deaths. He cherishes his surviving boy. A good lad. Lamb had taken a new wife before the Morrígan took his name. I’m told she’ll give birth to a daughter.”

Ember hums softly and nods her head, sipping her coffee as she listens. She doesn't react visibly, not to the news of his grandfather's rejection or his concubine's bitter charity or his lost children.

"I find that people who are used to being afraid don't tend to be any more afraid of those that are widely feared by those used to safety," she muses. "And there's security in being familiar with fear."

It was certainly easier for her to get along with people used to dealing with soldiers and warlords rampaging through their homes than it was to do so with people in the capital who'd never had to throw a punch. She imagines it was similar for Lamb with slaves and concubines.

"He gets along with the quieter children," she says. "There are many who like the security of being near an adult, but panic if that adult pays too much direct attention to them. Lamb doesn't mind when those children just watch him craft or try to craft in the same space as he does." She tips her head to the side. "He understands them better than most. The shy, creative, sensitive sorts. The kind who don't tend to get along with other children their age."

He nods, thinking of Stab’s reaction to his assistance. Achilles’ urge is always to help and nurture, but Pyrrhus knows what it is to go without those things. He knows that gentleness can be as scary as—perhaps scarier than violence.

“Ah. Well. That means he’s needed here, too,” he sighs, almost willing to admit that the Morrígan was justified in plucking Pyrrhus from his life. Almost.

“But it remains that he’s not like you or the lads. Or Birdy and Honey. He’s not a shade yet. He lives on time borrowed from the Fates.” His eyes return to Ember and after a long pause, he asks with earnest curiosity: “If Lamb was your son, what would you wish for him? This place of death and reprieve, or his last years of life?”

"I had many sons. Daughters, as well. None from my womb, but plenty nonetheless," Ember says, finishing her coffee. The teeth of her necklace click together as she moves. "Each of them carved their own way, or they died trying. I'd expect they would do as they did in life in Lamb's place."

She fingers the teeth looped around her neck again. The necklace is so long that its loops rest on her breasts. Her weathered fingers run from tooth to tooth, a silver-capped premolar, a crooked canine, an incisor missing its tip. "But this isn't about what I would want for my child. It is about what it would take to give him the choice."

She stares at Achilles through her single clouded eye as she picks up her cigar again. She doesn't puff it yet, letting it glow between her fingers. "I'm curious. Have you ever made a sacrifice? I don't mean putting in effort for a goal, or giving up what did not matter to you in the first place, or not realizing what you were risking." Not the years spent at Troy fighting, not leaving behind Pyrrhus, not losing Pat to his own stubborn pique. "I mean, have you ever been faced with a choice between losing something important to you, or giving up on getting something you dearly want? And then made the decision and lived with the consequences?"

This question is met with a long silence. More people have made sacrifices for him: his mother suffered the mortal world to secure his legacy, she prostrated herself before the likes of Zeus. Pat took up his armor to drive away the Trojans. Pyrrhus avenged his death at Troy.

He drains the last of his coffee and drums fingers on his cup.

“I gave my place in Elysium to Patroclus. He deserved the honor. In exchange for this, I swore to serve the House of Hades. Bending the knee to a strict master aggravated my pride but …” It still doesn’t measure up to the sacrifices others made, he knows. “It was what I needed. The work proved important, and led to a reunion with my beloved.”

Ember puts her cigar to the hole in her cheek and takes a breath. The end of it glows. She holds that breath, then exhales, the smoke curling around her face.

"You made a sacrifice for your lover, then."

She leans forward, resting her elbows on the table and steepling her fingers. Her single, cloudy eye focuses entirely on Achilles' face. She allows the silence to linger for a moment.

"If I asked you to make one for your son, would you be able to do it?"

“Yes.” Their last meeting on the trireme—Pyrrhus standing in the moonlight, bloody and betrayed—is still burned into his memory. It will be for eternity. Achilles worked so hard to make everything right, but he failed again. It was hubris, assuming he would master fatherhood as quickly as combat.

“Yes, I would. He’s sacrificed so much for me—I owe it to him to do the same.” He leans forward to place his empty cup on her table and settles back in his chair, face set and determined. “What would you ask of me, Miss Ember?”

It's hard to really read her expression, but her lips turn slightly upward. She places her cigar on the ash tray and pushes it and her coffee cup to the side.

"You have beautiful eyes. They must have been in pristine condition when you died, with your age and blood. Excellent vision."

She makes a beckoning gesture to the side. The shadows move again, but there's a stinging, electric quality in the air now.

A finely polished wooden box appears on the table. Next to the box, a silver spoon with one serrated edge, glowing with verdant power and warm to the touch. It's a utensil forged using fae magic of some kind, the sort that is meant specifically for the dead.

"I want one of them," Ember says.

His face remains neutral. The sacrifice would be greater if he were alive, but not insurmountable. It may have simply made him less deadly in battle, and rendered his own failure, his own imperfection grotesquely visible. Achilles’ eyes—a turbulent blue like the sea, like his mother’s—flit over the tools, then back to Ember.

“A fitting request.” His jaw sets and he plucks up the spoon to examine it more closely. “One of Lamb’s eyes was ruined—due to my poor decisions.”

The silver feels a certain way against his fingers. Like it might slowly erode his shade’s flesh if he holds it too long. “I don’t suppose you would consider giving it to him. If such a thing can be arranged.”

Ember huffs a rough, breathy chuckle. Her lips upturn further, just enough to allow her golden teeth to flash.

“I was planning to already. The living need eyes more than us. But I wanted to see if you would agree to an old woman’s gruesome demand without the reason.”

She nods towards the box. She rests a hand on the human bone making her walking stick head. “Just put it in there, and my pixie can do the rest.”

This is all he needed to confirm his decision. It’s a very good thing that both of their lives were so violent and that Achilles’ hand is so deft:

With no further preamble, he works the spoon under his right eyelid, tearing through the resistance of muscle and tissue. An indescribable, chthonic smell competes with coffee and tobacco as the spoon cauterizes the edges of his shade. It’s excruciating, but not in the same way as a living wound; there is no blood. Fibers of his essence snap apart like thousands of static shocks against the serrated teeth. He bites down hard against the pain, but he doesn’t stop until the eye is severed loose.

Smoke coils from his now-empty socket and through his sagging eyelid as he places his right eye in the offered box. Morbidly, he still sees through it after a fashion—vague strokes of light and shadow, dizzyingly out of sync with his remaining eye. Achilles closes the box, relieved by the complete darkness it affords.

He wordlessly sets the spoon beside it, the silver now tarnished by whatever magical processes carved his shade.

Ember watches impassively, as if she's seen this sort of macabre spectacle many times before. Maybe she has.

When the box closes, it glows. Like it's alive.

She pushes herself up from her seat. She does it quicker than her age would imply. She stands tall as she leans on her cane and walks to Achilles' end of the table.

"Well done." She beckons to the side, then a patch is put in her palm. "This should ease some discomfort. People will struggle to speak to you if the wound is laid bare." She places the patch herself, sticking fast to Achilles' skin. Her hands are dry and rough, but precise as she does so.

His empty socket is filled by a cold numbness and he’s acutely aware of the blind side of his vision. The patch doesn’t alleviate this discomfort, but Ember is correct; Achilles has seen men with missing eyes and averted his own in revulsion.

It’s only now that he considers how Pat and Hermes might respond to his mutilation. Or poor Lyra … Styx.

But he’ll suffer that fresh pain when it comes. Right now there’s the important matter of Ember’s judgment. “And your decision? Will you allow me to see Lamb? Will you permit him to leave if he wishes?”

"I will no longer stand in your way. The rest is up to you and him."

She leans on her cane, nodding towards the box on the table. "Take it and bring it to him. He's behind the house, sleeping in a hammock with his little dog. The Bodach will show you the way."

The shadow slips over the floor. It leads into the sun-soaked kitchen, through a door that lets out to a porch with a magnificent view of the mountains. And on the porch, a colorful woven hammock is hooked up, and Pyrrhus sleeps on it with his fluffy dog on his chest. He's peaceful, his face smooth. The hand injured by Medea hangs off the side of the hammock, all the tainted flesh replaced by fresh wood, like a tree had grown over his wound and replaced his skin. The other hand rests on the fluffy dog, and the only outward sign of his injured eye is the slight depression of one of his eyelids.

“Thank you, Miss Ember,” Achilles says politely, as if they’d only shared a friendly cup of coffee, and he didn’t just gouge his own eye out. He takes the box in hands and finds it hums with distracting energy, as if his eye yearns to stitch itself back to his shade.

He follows the shadow outdoors, quietly thankful when the verdant mountain air cleanses his senses of the thick scent of Ember’s cigars.

Achilles pauses at the sight of his son; he’s never seen Pyrrhus look so serene but for once when he was a newborn babe, asleep in his mother’s arms. He swallows hard. What if this is the best place for him?

Well. Regardless, of his choice or his fate, his son deserves this gift.

Achilles approaches the hammock and, in spite of his better judgment, grazes the flat of his knuckles along the man’s cheek. “Pyrrhus,” and then, in case that name is somehow lost to him, “Lamb?”

The fluffy dog remembers (?) Achilles. It perks up as soon as Achilles approaches, tail immediately wagging and chest puffed proudly. As if to say, You told me to watch him, and I did!!

Pyrrhus takes a moment to stir. His remaining working eye moves under his lid. He curls his fingers in the dog's fur. Then he opens his eyes.

He starts, instinctively moving to sit up but the hammock threatens to drop him if he does. He grips the edge, blinking as he processes what's before him.

"Father?" Pyrrhus' damaged eye is gray and degraded, obviously blind. But his other eye is still alert, confused, cautious, "Why are--how are you here?" He shakes his head as if to force himself to wake up faster. "What happened to your face? Your eye?"

“When I heard you were taken from Greece, I followed,” he says, helping to steady the swing of the hammock. “With some divine assistance.”

Maybe the fluffy dog is part of that? Whatever the creature actually is, it gets a smile and an appreciative scratch behind the ears. Good pup.

“I was worried. Particularly after how we parted ways.” He reaches down and takes Pyrrhus’ hand, examining the strange bark growing over his flesh. Fae magic? “Forgive me, lad. I’m not the father I hoped I would be.”

It takes Pyrrhus another moment to just... process. As the Morrígan promised, his names are returned with his father's arrival. His breathing hitches as he struggles to keep up with all the memories suddenly returned to him, the realization that his father had followed. His dead father. Had somehow followed him to... this place.

"I..." He swallows. While he's struggling to get his thoughts together (so much harder without anything to write with), the dog is happy to accept the scratches, tilting its head and practically smiling as it lets its tongue loll out.

"I..." His father's here, and his father is looking at his hand. He looks down at it himself, as if only now realizing that it would require some explanation. "The woman in charge here--Lady Ember, she had one of her serving fae grant me my limb back. As much as it could."

He curls the partially wooden fingers around Achilles' hand. "How--even if you got here, how were you even able to find me? It's a labyrinth. I don't even know where I am half the time."

“One of the gods of this land served as my guide, as did a few mortal denizens.” Achilles settles into a kneel beside the hammock. “I met some of your companions. The lads—Gavroche, Scout, and Stab. The young ladies—Lizard, Honey and Birdy. Lady Ember, of course. They all seem kind and trustworthy.”

He gingerly touches the bark, turning Pyrrhus’ hand back and forth. It’s strange, but far better than it was.

“I spoke to the Morrígan and convinced her to return your name. After I completed the trial she set, of course.” His eye’s focus returns to his son’s face. “Tell me, do you remember Troy and Epirus?”

The bark is pliable, like that of a young tree, and warm to the touch, though harder than flesh. Pyrrhus meets his father's eye (what happened to his eye?), and focuses on the question.

"I... yes, I do. At least, as much as I ever have..." he trails off. Then he starts again, almost hard enough to throw the little dog off his chest, except he cradles it before it can fall. The dog starts licking his arm in protest (? Or maybe it's just being like that). "Epirus. Molossus. Ophelia, Aspasia, Galene--my household, are they okay?"

There's a moment's panic. Right, yes, he's been gone. How long? It's not safe, not safe for a lone woman with a stepson too small to fight, has anyone attempted to usurp him while he's gone? Take his wife, his child, his ~~friends~~ servants?

He gives Pyrrhus’ hand a reassuring squeeze.

“Not to worry, lad. Your grandmother has seen to their safety. If men know a sea goddess watches Epirus, they won’t attempt anything that will draw her ire.” Doubly so if Hephaestus delivers some kind of automaton to defend the palace.

Achilles grips the box in his other hand and takes a steadying breath before he asks, “You remember how you were wounded, then? You remember all that happened in Athens?”

The relief is palpable. He relaxes, sighing out the panic and digging his fingers in the dog's fur. The dog, for its part, seems delighted to be used as a stress toy.

"Yes. Yes, I remember." He furrows his brow, his lips thinning at the memory. The hurt. The hurt.

He struggles to find words for it. To find what he even feels about it right now. It feels like yesterday, and yet it feels like a hundred years ago too. He wishes he had something to write with, and the urge has him digging his fingers deeper in the dog's fur.

"...The girl. What of her?" He cringes away from referring to her by name at the moment, but he also feels the nagging need to ask if she's okay. She's clearly a precocious child, but it still must have been frightening for her to see her brother and guardian fight in a rage. He's glad he didn't indulge his impulse to harm her. She doesn't deserve to bear the brunt of his hurt, no matter how intense it is. "The fae didn't take her?"

“I’m sorry, dear lad. This was my fault.” Achilles kisses his hand, at a loss for a better apology.

“Lyra is safe with her mentor.” As far as he knows. The fae would have their work cut out for them with Medea. “The Morrígan was only interested in you—for good reason, I suppose.”

He gathers his cloak aside and shifts into a more comfortable half-seat. “You lived longer than the Fates had planned. She knew this and wanted to protect you, to add you to her collection of young souls forged in the crucible of war.”

Pyrrhus nods, frowning. He doesn't know how he feels about The Girl, but he knows it's good that she's safe and away from the fae.

But--gods, it's strange to have been picked by a force like that to collect. His own grandmother isn't interested in him. Why something this old and unknowable?

"The Queen has... strange taste," Pyrrhus manages. He's met the Queen, he's been on the Wild Hunt with her, but that doesn't mean he understands her. Far from it. He doesn't know why she'd be so invested in him living, in any of them being in this oasis in the middle of the tumult of this strange place. "This whole place... I feel like I've been here for lifetimes. And for no time at all."

His friends. He's made friends. It's easy to exist here, where everyone understands. He shakes his head to clear it, pushing himself up carefully on the hammock to turn towards his father. The cloud wags its tail, sticking a tongue out and wiggling to encourage scratches.

"Your eye." Finally, Pyrrhus re-focuses on exactly what's in front of him. His father. His father, who is dead, so he shouldn't be wounded, and yet he has a patch over his eye. "What happened?"

“I hope they’ve been good to you.” Achilles can’t suppress a smile at the fluffy dog, so keen on fulfilling its duty. The expression bunches the flesh under his empty eye socket and wrinkles the patch that covers it. It’s a sensation he’ll have to grow accustomed to, but a small thing compared to Pyrrhus’ enduring pain.

“You’ve sacrificed so much for me. You’ve suffered so much. This journey has helped me understand that.” Achilles finally presses the box into Pyrrhus’ hands. “This doesn’t begin to mend the damage I’ve done, but … I dearly hope that it will be a start.”

For refusetofight

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