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
Achilles knows—between having a child, helping depose Zeus, and permanently damaging his own shade—he’s really pushing his luck. Lord Hades would be well within his rights to toss him in the depths of Tartarus; he can’t have other headstrong heroes getting any ideas. Achilles’ good standing with the rest of Hades’ family (and Lady Nyx) is really what’s affording him so much leeway.
“It may well be my imagination, but I think I can still see through that eye.” He leans into Hermes’ warm weight, arms looped around his waist as he continues, “Nothing very clear. Shapes and shadows through a thick sea fog.”
no subject
“If Lady Hecate won’t indulge my questions, perhaps Lord Prometheus will have some ideas.” The titan made mortals, so he must have some ideas about the spiritual essence they leave behind.
“Does it look strange?” he asks after a moment, a timid note to the question. Achilles has never looked anything less than perfect, even after almost a decade of war. He has absolutely no regrets about his decision, but he has to wonder how his lovers—and Lyra—will take it.
no subject
“Not uncomfortable, no. Just odd.” How much worse this would be if he lost his flesh-and-blood eyeball? But his eternal essence has its own response to injury. “As if my shade is still reaching for it across the distance, trying to become whole once more.”
He rests his head against Hermes’ shoulder. “It might have reformed itself already, were it not for the fae magic binding it.”
He sighs against Hermes’ neck. Not troubled. Relaxed. Like a weight has been lifted. “It keeps him in mind.”
no subject
He continues dragging his fingers against Hermes’ skin, thinking. “The dog? I looked at it through the river stone and it was monstrous. Rat-like.”
Achilles remembers his knee-jerk violence and feels a fresh wave of shame. He’s positive Pyrrhus would keep Nephos around, even if the creature wore its real shape. A kinder man than me, he thinks.
“What did Lady Ember call it?” he wonders, his words stirring Hermes’ feathers. “A brownie. She said it only wishes to serve humans.”
no subject
Achilles shifts his seat, adjusting Hermes’ weight in his lap. “I’ll be very pleased if my family and I are done negotiating with foreign gods.”
He dots kisses along Hermes’ shoulder. “I much prefer the gods here in Greece. Some of them are very handsome.”
no subject
And that Hermes’ jealousy only extends to other gods.
“Forgive me, magpie. I misspoke,” he says with a breathy laugh. “One of them is very handsome. Stunningly so.”
He lifts his head from Hermes’ shoulder so he can cup a wing to his lips, illustrating his point. “And, I will gladly wager, the most caring father and skilled lover among the Olympians.”
Maybe he’s laying it on a little thick, but Hermes deserves to have his ego fluffed along with his feathers.
no subject
“Should I be jealous?” he murmurs, dragging a hand slowly, firmly up the length of his thigh.
Achilles still knows Hermes keeps at least one other lover—fair enough, given his own divided affection with Pat—but that doesn’t stop him from wondering if they’re another mortal, living or dead.