refusetofight | For @messageforyou

For @messageforyou

Thetis wings slow circles above the shore in the shape of a humble gull. Of all the many shapes she could take, this is the most unremarkable to mortals. They’re a common nuisance, curious and daring.

This isn’t the first time Thetis has watched her unexpected granddaughter play on the shore. She’s been a seal, watching from the safety of the surf, a keen-eyed osprey roosting at the top of a tree. In animal shape, her emotions are no less turbulent.

The girl’s hair shines like flax in the sun as she delights in the waves and warm sand. Thetis might as well be watching a memory: those peaceful, lazy days with her son, bookended by the pain of his conception and the grief of his death.

Every time she visits, she promises herself that this will be the last. The same as she did with Neoptolemus. But she finds herself gripped by guilt. She could have saved her grandson from the vile mortals who would use him like they used Achilles. She could have hidden him away again, perhaps this time in her father’s realm. But what would be the use? They would still find him. Neoptolemus is still mortal. He would still die.

What do the Fates have planned for this child? Lord Hermes’ divinity shines bright within her. She’ll be coveted by mortals, yes, but not as a weapon—as a beautiful lover and mother to powerful sons. Thetis knows the special agony of that life.

But for now, Lyra is a happy child, delighting in a beautiful day. Thetis pulls her wings in to stoop lower until she can hear the girl’s laughter on the breeze. Lower still and she can see her smile. Against her better judgement, the aching protest of her old wounds, she finally lights on the sand a few yards away.

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Hermes, rather than saying anything, just squeezes Achilles' hand. A little tighter than normal. Don't rise to the bait.

The typist lets out a bitter laugh. "A strong warrior? No one needs those anymore."

"They have guns." The musician frowns, nibbling her lip as she tries to think of how to explain it. "They're these metal weapons that kill people from a distance. A lot of them are small enough to hide in a pocket, and most don't really need any effort to use."

"Horrible things." Andreas draws himself up, frowning. Of all the topics of conversation, this one clearly gets under his skin the most. "They use tiny explosions to propel lead faster than the eye can see. They kill people so fast they don't have a chance to hear the sound of the explosion before they're mortally wounded."

"Your kind, warriors born into warrior classes with spears in your hands and groomed for battle and conquest from birth..." Walter makes a dismissive gesture towards Achilles. "Obsolete. A toddler can kill a grown man with a gun carelessly left in their reach. And many have, to terrible effect. No, no, Ember didn't take your son in because he can hit things hard."

"She probably took him in because she likes him." The musician shrugs helplessly. "And she probably likes him because they have something in common. Don't really want to think of what, though. I don't know anything about her besides she's terrifying."

Guns. Those were a primary feature of Apollo’s maddening visions. Patroclus remembers the field of Troy twisting itself into prophecies of new horror: the Greeks and Trojans became filthy men huddled in trenches exchanging hot slugs of lead, choking on gas and buried by explosions. The walls of Troy became the bomb-blasted ruins of cities. With a gun in hand, every man, woman, or child became a god of death and destruction. No divine blood needed.

“Mortal weapons are no threat to shades and gods,” Thetis says with a confidence that matches her son’s.

“But Neoptolemus is still a mortal. He can still die to these guns,” Achilles reminds her.

“Ember has no claim to him. Only the Morrígan does. We should keep to the plan and negotiate with the goddess herself,” Patroclus says, glancing at Hermes for confirmation. His eyes have the distinct look of a man haunted by prophecy.

When Thetis speaks, Walter scoffs a bitter laugh, shaking his head as he starts typing once more. Andreas and the musician cringe and grimace, glancing at each other. But none say anything outright.

"Patroclus is right. The Morrígan is the only one whose word matters." Hermes straightens, keeping a grip on Achilles' hand and tugging him towards the musician's road. Without thinking, he lightly touches Patroclus' back, a guiding hand to gently pull him out of the familiar haunting and towards the path. "We should get moving. Think of what you want to ask the river."

Lugh bows his head towards the artists, smiling. "Thank you for your guidance, wayfinders. We'll away now."

"Good luck finding your son," the musician says, giving a weak wave.

"Godspeed," Andreas wishes them, still looking troubled.

Patroclus didn’t expect to encounter this particular challenge during their journey. In the Underworld, there’s little to remind him of the maddening visions that preceded his death. Here people talk about things, ideas—both benign and terrible—that didn’t exist in Greece. Or rather, not yet.

He flinches instinctively at Hermes’ touch, but the cold dread in his gut disappears, replaced by fresh resolve to continue their journey. His feet feel lighter as they move along the musician’s road.

As he follows Hermes, Achilles’ simmering fury pauses long enough to give the musician and Andreas his own distracted thanks.

Once they’ve left the crossroads behind and they’ve all fallen in step, Achilles turns to Lugh. “What do you know about this ‘Ember’? And the ‘guns’ she wields?”

Hermes notices the kiss mark on Patroclus' cheek. He briefly considers just letting it sit there, but that seems petty, and he's trying not to be petty. Hermes shakes a cloth handkerchief out of nothing, offering it to Patroclus as they walk.

"It seems that the woman at the party was wearing something on her lips," he says by way of explanation, gesturing to his own cheek with a small smile. Despite his own feelings about Pat, he thinks that the man did very well by the poor woman, and he thinks it's sweet how grateful she was.

Lugh, meanwhile, rubs his chin at Achilles' question, humming softly. "I don't spend much time with the mortals here, so I wouldn't say I know much about her. But I understand that she died an old woman in a profession men usually die young, and that makes her formidable."

He smiles at Achilles, but it's an opaque one, similar to Hermes' when he's being professional. "As for guns... humans come up with all sorts of ways to more efficiently kill each other, given enough time. Guns aren't the most devastating weapons humans can make, but they suit the purpose of killing a person across the room in a blink perfectly well. Or across a field, if you have the right kind. They're not invulnerable, but they might as well be if you fight them with a spear. So I don't recommend picking fights with people who have them."

In the air, there's a scent that cuts through the verdant greenery of the land. It's crisp and cold, the smell of winter and mountains. Achilles might recognize it from Valhalla.

Patroclus’ brow furrows in surprise, but he takes the handkerchief and the hint. A little scrubbing and he examines the vivid red smear left on the pristine white cloth. He might have mistaken it for blood if Hermes hadn’t explained it.

Pat gives Hermes a quiet thank you and awkwardly offers the soiled kerchief back. Ironically, Hermes has been more attentive than Achilles on this quest.

But it makes sense. It’s a familiar situation. Achilles is once again embroiled in his own emotions and driven by stubborn purpose.

“Such a weapon must remove all skill and honor from battle,” Achilles huffs. Bows were already toeing the line of cowardice, but at least a man needed to draw and aim a bow with strength and mastery. “If Ember relies on such a thing, I doubt she can be so formidable …”

He trails off as the air shifts and his skin prickles with memories of danger. How far have they traveled? Was Valhalla already another stop on the honey road?

Hermes takes the kerchief back with a small amused smile, shaking it into nothingness again. But the smile drops, wings pinning against his head when the crisp mountain air cuts through the forest.

He catches himself, taking a deep breath and putting an opaque smile on again before looking to Lugh. "Tell me that isn't what I think it is."

Lugh has his own mildly amused smile as he looks to Hermes. "You didn't expect we'd just leave the body in a corner somewhere just because Odin took the head, did you?"

And then the trees part, revealing the mouth of the river of knowledge. The hulking headless body of a god is held in place by an old tree growing around it, the stump of its neck bowed forward. From the wound pours clear water, pooling at the feet of the body and roots of the tree, then forming a river that flows through the forest. The water smells of crisp mountain air, smells of a pantheon of gods far, far away from this place.

"Allow me to introduce you to Mimir, the god of knowledge in the far north." Lugh gestures to the body with a little bow. "Or most of him, at least. If his head were here, he could give you counsel on the best kinds of questions to ask, but I'm afraid we must work with what we have."

It takes both Achilles and Patroclus a moment to process what they’re seeing. Both of the mortals wince. Thetis looks unperturbed; she’s used to divine brutality and the remains thereof. The bodies of gods persist in all manner of strange states. It’s less of a corpse than a feature of the land.

“I have met Lord Mimir in Odin’s court,” Achilles says with a touch of grim reverence. And Patroclus, of course, heard the story in full and was vindicated to learn that the northern gods are every bit as brutish as their own.

“We can ask anything?” Pat approaches the water’s edge, surprised by its clear freshness given the gruesome source. “We will need to know about the Morrígan, and how best to negotiate. What can we offer of value?”

Hermes pins his wings. He gives a small nod of respect towards the body, then clasps his hands behind his back to smile at Lugh as he explains.

"You can ask anything at all. I don't recommend you do, though." Lugh crouches at the edge of the river, using his spear to gently stir up the water. The ripples from his spear bend the space oddly. Like the water no longer shows the river bed, but the trail of stars across the night sky in stunning detail. But the effect is gone as the water returns to its own undisturbed current. "Mimir's knowledge is great, and he's always been a generous sort to mortals because they're incapable of asking for any significant amount of his wisdom. You won't have to give him anything, so long as you don't ask a question beyond your ability. But if you ask too large or broad a question, it will give you that information even if it destroys your mind, and it will seize whatever price it sees fit."

Lugh looks at Patroclus and Achilles. For once, he's not smiling. His face is dead serious. "Listen well: I recommend you form your question based on who, what, where, how, or why. Then make sure to think of it narrowly, like 'how can we best negotiate the freedom of Neoptolemus from the Morrígan', not 'how can one best negotiate with the Morrígan.' If Mimir's head were here, he would coach you on how best to ask for the knowledge you seek, but all we have is his power and the remains of a generous spirit. And it will be generous to your doom if you're not careful."

Lugh looks to Thetis and Hermes. "And I don't advise either of you try, either. The river can get... temperamental when gods try to take knowledge. I'm not sure if it's part of Mimir's influence or that we grab at more information than mortals do."

He looks back to the mortals, still not smiling. “When you know your question, drink from the river and ask.”

Achilles remembers what Prometheus warned—that the Morrígan won’t test his strengths. Death has changed him, it’s true, but in a way that still requires vigilance. His pride remains tender and easily aggravated. His first instinct is always to dig in his heels.

At his core, he’s still the same man and it troubles him.

He joins Pat and Lugh at the water’s edge and kneels. It’s a difficult question to ask, but it’s the correct one if he wants to be adequately prepared for this negotiation.

Achilles stirs the cool surface with his fingertips, then submerges his cupped palms and brings the water to his lips to drink. “Please … Blood of Lord Mimir, grant me knowledge of myself: which of my weaknesses must be challenged?”

The water tastes like fresh snow melt on the highest mountain peak. The feeble stream of power the head of Mimir shared when giving Achilles guidance is now a roaring, frothing waterfall.

There are no words. This guidance isn't conscious like it was before. There's a glimpse of insight, insight into the Morrígan herself, just a chip of perspective from an entire mountain, and yet it still rushes through the knowledge with enough power to cause a headache.

She knows Achilles. She knows humans. She likes watching things grow, and humans do it so quickly and visibly. What keeps Achilles from growing? To her, it's easy to see.

Pride.

Stubbornness.

Impatience.

Shame.

Any time she's approached for a favor, it is an opportunity to cut the bonds that constrain growth, to put upon a person the pressure required to change. She will see Achilles grow, or she will see him gone from her presence without his son.

The current of knowledge eases. Hermes crouches by Achilles, resting a hand on his back, wings pinned tight to his skull. "Brain still intact, darling?"

He'd like to fuss more, but he's constantly conscious of the company they're in and the risk of making it clear just how much he cares for Achilles.

As the water’s chill disperses into his chest, the revelations rush in. They tumble over one another like a frothing cataract before they finally pool and cohere into something useful—as clear and certain as if they were his own observations.

“No need for worry, magpie.” A headache is the least of his problems. Mimir’s answer isn’t comforting. “The Morrígan will wish to see me grow. To push myself beyond my shortcomings.”

It sounds benign to say it aloud, but for Achilles, growth is hard-won and has always meant unimaginable pain. Patroclus knows this well, and strokes his hair soothingly.

“You will overcome any challenge she sets,” Thetis says with prim certainty. Her son isn’t perfect, but he’s not far off.

Hermes furrows his brow in concern. He's not quite as confident as Thetis--Achilles has been able to triumph in many impossible situations, but Hermes struggles to think of a time that Achilles triumphed against himself. But he's done harder things for those he loves.

"It's in her nature to do that sort of thing," Lugh says, back to his slightly amused smile. "It's part of her work with her husband, the Dagda. The humans conceptualize her as a goddess of death and war, but it's more that she facilitates change. She destroys the old and dying, and then the Dagda replaces it with the new and thriving. One can't happen without the other."

Lugh stands straight, leaning on his spear. "Are you ready to go to her?"

Achilles rises and nods to Lugh with stoic determination. Either he doesn’t see Hermes’ concern, or he chooses to ignore it.

Patroclus, however, remains crouched, staring into the water and trying to formulate a worthy question. It would be a waste not to ask—if not to improve their negotiations with the Morrígan, then to help them in other matters. As shades, insight may be one of the most valuable gifts available to them.

He dips a hand into the water and the river whisks away fragments of Kelly’s glitter. Pat exhales and whispers his question: “Blood of Mimir, what does Neoptolemus need from his father?” And cups the water to his mouth to drink.

The rush of snow melt knowledge isn't quite as torrential--Neoptolemus is human, and his perspective something another human is capable of holding--but it comes with pain. Deep, tearing pain, like one's heart is ripped out, and ripped out over and over and over, a painful void yearning to be filled but never can be.

At first, the answer is just a scream. A long, agonized scream of knotted rage and grief and loneliness. A child leaning his face against the tombstone of his father, ignoring the name he doesn't recognize and convincing himself that his father loved him and would be proud. The reaching for fatherly attention from the men who most might have given it to him--Lycomedes, Odysseus, the Greeks, Peleus--and the rejection, the dismissal, not worth fathering. The gnawing jealousy and frustration of seeing other boys with their fathers, seeing their joys and conflicts and wondering why he wasn't good enough to have his own, convincing himself that he was good enough but his father just had a divine imperative to leave. The creeping, horrible thought in the back of his head that he tried to drown, ignored, repressed--that his father could have stayed, but just didn't care enough to.

The wrenching, horrible pain of the thought being confirmed. He didn't care enough to. Didn't care enough to stay, didn't care enough to think of him after he was gone, didn't care enough to live for him after his lover died, didn't care enough to give him the benefit of the doubt when others maligned him, didn't care enough to give him a chance until a better child came along and asked him to. Crumbling. Everything crumbling, his sense of self, his sense of the world around him, any sense that he can be loved.

His soul is marked. Everyone but his mother sees it. He's inherently unlovable, and he will exist and die and dissolve in the Lethe unloved.

The worst part is that his father does care. Just not enough. Never enough to choose him over anything else important.

Not enough to choose him over glory. Not enough to choose him over his lover. Not enough to choose him over following his lover into death. Not enough to choose him over his new child. Not enough to ever choose him over anything Achilles holds dear, because Neoptolemus will never be worth choosing.

Out of the cacophony, it takes time to extract the answer to Patroclus' question. Neoptolemus doesn't know it himself, consumed as he is by his pain, by his fragile sense of meaning collapsing, by the limitations of his ability to stop and reflect on himself.

But Mimir's knowledge is greater than Neoptolemus' ignorance.

Neoptolemus needs to be valued, and needs to be shown he's valued. He needs to be chosen over something else Achilles cares about, and needs to be chosen again and again, until he has enough time to trust that his father does value him and has decided to love him. He needs patience and understanding, to be accepted through his fits of anger and melancholy and pushing his father away, needs time. Time to drain the infection from his heart and heal, and then build his sense of self and meaning on something steadier and more real.

As the knowledge emerges, so too does context. Disorganized attachment. That's a term humans will one day use for people like Neoptolemus, people who so intensely want love and are so terrified of it at the same time. Pulling people close, then shoving them away, then hurting so deep if they actually leave, always unable to explain why they behave as they do, unable to predict how they'll feel or what they'll do, and so unpredictable to others. Common in people who experienced ambivalent, confusing relationships with caregivers growing up. It's not just Neoptolemus' father who contributed to this, but that's the easiest source for him to identify, next to all the adults besides his mother, the manipulations of Odysseus, the confusion of his relationships with the Greeks on the beach, and then Andromache, an ambiguous mix of mother and captive and lover and enemy. The work to mend his ability to connect with others can't be done by anyone else, only by Neoptolemus himself.

Hermes cringes at Pat's question, already predicting it'll have a painful, hard to swallow answer, and only hesitates a little before resting a steadying hand on his shoulder.

"And you? Your brain still intact?" he says, voice light but concerned.

Parts of this insight ring in painful harmony with Patroclus’ own experience. His own father mostly showed him ambivalence, and what love he showed was entirely conditional. In the latter case, the pride wasn’t in his son, but who his son stood next to.

Patroclus understands that much. He had the power to give up on his father, but it was only because he had people to replace him—Achilles, Peleus, his Greek comrades in arms.

He swallows hard as Neoptolemus’ confusion and despair crash over him. How could Achilles even begin to understand? He’s been adored his entire life. Pat grimaces, trying to imagine the dreaming conversations that Achilles recounted on his return to Elysium. How had they proceeded from Neoptolemus’ perspective?

His frown deepens around the sour guilt that Achilles chose him over his son. Why throw away his one precious life to chase a dead man into the Underworld? The fool.

Hermes’ question cuts through the harsh insight, but Pat can only nod his head mutely in answer.

Achilles gives Patroclus a pained look, shame rising in his chest. “What insight did you receive?”

“It’s not simple, Achilles. It will take time,” Pat says softly as he stands and dries his hands on his tunic. Like the iron, “I’ll hold it until it’s needed. Focus on yourself.”

Achilles doesn’t appear convinced so much as irritated, but he would rather move on than waste time arguing. His attention snaps back to their guide, voice taut. “Lord Lugh, please take us to the Morrígan.”

Hermes stands up as well, brow furrowed. He's worried about Achilles, but worried about Patroclus too. His mind is at no risk of breaking apart, he's sure, but Hermes keenly knows that any insight into Neoptolemus' mind feels like sticking one's hand through broken glass.

He looks ahead and clasps his hands behind his back, walking and not giving any outward indication of his worry, but his does just... spread his aura a little. Warmth and the smell of Grecian air, gentle and unassuming, thrown around Patroclus like a cloak on a cold day. Hopefully, enough for Patroclus to be soothed, but not so much that he'll be aware of who's doing the soothing. Hermes doesn't expect that any comfort would be effective coming from himself.

Lugh obligingly leads them away from the river, into what seems like a random direction. But the verdant air grows thinner, colder, as they walk.

"I give you one last piece of advice: before you begin negotiations, ask her to speak to you as herself unbroken, in one body. It's a lot harder to speak to her when she's in pieces, and harder still to nail down a clear pact, and you need every advantage you can get."

Around them, the trees thin. The fertile ground turns hard and bare, the old twisting trunks turning white as bone with no leaves or signs of life. Crows perch on the dead branches, and they watch carefully. They're not pristine crows, either--crows with twisted feet, crows with missing eyes, crows with broken beaks--but all of them are still observing, croaking softly.

Before the gate is one particularly short tree with long branches. Across the branches are clean white tunics, hanging as if in invitation. Lugh stops at this tree.

"If you decide to speak to her in her entirety, you'll need to shed any clothes and possessions and put these on. Give your things to Hermes for safekeeping. Anything you take with you to meet her will have to be destroyed afterwards to protect the outside."

Hermes glances quizzically at Lugh. Lugh's smile breaks into a grimace.

"They'll understand once they see her. She's... not compatible with life when she's whole."

Neoptolemus’ pain clings to Pat like a suffocating miasma, but it begins to dissipate, Pat assumes, as the river’s water loses its effect and the piercing insight settles into simple knowledge. It feels as if the cloak he left with Kelly has draped back around him. He feels steadier with each step—with no notion that Hermes might have anything to do with it.

Their new surroundings bring to mind the worst parts of Hades’ realm. The places where shades go to suffer. Patroclus looks grim, but Achilles’ face remains as steely and serious as the day he faced Hector in battle.

“Yes, I would sooner negotiate with her whole self. No trickery,” Achilles confirms, unfastening the clasp on his cloak.

“Remember to beware her eyes,” Thetis reminds him, unwinding the fabric from her son’s shoulders.

“Who will accompany Achilles?” Patroclus asks anxiously. He can’t abide the idea of sending him unarmed and alone. Not when he has that look on his face. “May I join him?”

"Any or all of you could accompany him. It's your decision," Lugh says, leaning on his spear and looking up at the gate. His expression isn't grim, exactly, but it's solemn. There's an old, serious air about the land.

And it seems contagious, because Hermes' face is solemn as well as he holds his arms out to take Achilles' clothes. "I can't go without possibly dragging Olympus into things." He nods to Patroclus and Thetis, a serious furrow to his brow. "But I think it'd be a good idea for either of you to go with him. Or both. Maybe the two of you together would stand a chance of stopping him from losing his temper and doing something stupid."

Hermes gives a Look to Achilles. He tries not to look too pleading in front of Lugh. "Please don't lose your temper and do something stupid. You still have people to return to back home." It goes unsaid in front of Lugh, but Hermes can't bear the thought of losing Achilles, nor telling Lyra that her mortal father is gone and Zagreus that his father-figure is far out of reach.

“You have so little faith in me,” Achilles huffs, swatting a tunic from one of the tree boughs and tugging it over his head. His irritation only lends credence to Hermes’ concerns.

“I— … we know your heart, Achilles. Your anger already simmers.” Patroclus has already made up his mind. He follows suit, exchanging his clothes for a tunic. In the process, Kelly’s Swiss Army knife gives him a moment’s pause. He’s not sure how any of the odd little tools could possibly assist them in negotiations with a goddess, but Kelly said it might be helpful somehow. “We can bring nothing?”

Meanwhile, Thetis gives Lugh a glance and foregoes a change of clothing in favor of an animal form: with a flap of wings she shifts herself into an osprey and alights on her son’s shoulder. She still doesn’t fully trust Patroclus, a simple mortal, to keep Achilles safe in this endeavor.

"Nothing," Lugh says, sounding firm for the first time this whole adventure. "Anything you take into her presence will be destroyed, and you will need to be washed and purified before leaving Tír na nÓg. To do anything else would be potentially catastrophic."

Hermes has never dealt with the Morrígan when she wasn't broken into pieces, so he's not sure why being in her presence would be so destructive, but he knows that Lugh is not one to lie. It just makes him more nervous about this whole thing.

He steps forward towards Achilles. "You should give me your jewelry, too," he says softly. He knows there's only one article of jewelry Achilles wears. He lowers his voice, keeping it soft as he says, "Please. Please be careful."

Patroclus gives a relenting nod and returns the tool to his belt pouch before offering the whole bundle of clothes to Hermes. He wishes he could at least take the cold iron, assuming the Morrígan is thwarted by some simple ore.

Achilles’ face softens ever so slightly at Hermes’ entreaty. He pulls Hephaestus’ ring from his finger and Pyrrhus’ shell bracelet from his wrist. Both of these are placed reverently in Hermes’ palm. Achilles folds Hermes’ fingers over the keepsakes and presses a soft kiss to his knuckles. “I will not fail, magpie.”

He knows it’s not what Hermes wants to hear. Thetis puffs her feathers and flexes her talons as if to echo the sentiment—or assure Hermes that she’ll remain vigilant.

It's not what Hermes wants to hear, but it's something. He dares to step close and bump his forehead gently against Achilles', closing his eyes and sighing softly.

Then he steps back, back to awareness of their company, and takes their gathered clothes and possessions and tucks them into his messenger's bag. It doesn't look like it all should fit, but it does effortlessly.

"I'm trusting you all to come back in one piece," he says. "Take care of each other."

The gates creek open of their own accord, opening the way to what looks like a churning gray void. Lugh steps back, nodding at the adventurers solemnly. "When you're ready, walk through the gate, and keep walking. You'll know when you've come upon her."

Thetis gives her head a jerking shake and clacks her beak. Hermes should know enough bird expression to understand what it means: Of course she’ll look after her son. What kind of mother do you take her for, Hermes?

Patroclus likewise gives a confirming nod. He doesn’t know how to deal with foreign goddesses—or any gods, for that matter—but he knows how to deal with his lover’s anger and hubris well enough.

Achilles turns to pass the gates and Pat falls into step beside him. He takes his hand in a firm grip, both to steel himself to enter the void and to steady Achilles. Stay focused. Don’t let anger get the better of you.

With each step, the two mortals and goddess-as-osprey are gradually eveloped by the thick, grey miasma.

The miasma is too thick to see anything through. Or hear, really. It smells like burning. Burning funeral pyres, gunsmoke, the subtle scent of melting sand into glass, coal smoke, the heat of the forge, oil smoke, fresh sawdust, the burn of grinding animal hooves, the dust of black powder. It's thick, like something great exploded into a fine mist, and now tiny bits of rock and concrete and wood and metal stick fast to the inside of one's throat and lungs, cloying, ready to drown from within.

And then the miasma dissipates. It's nowhere to be seen now. Instead, they stand on a familiar beach--the beach before Troy, the tents of the war camp softly flapping in the wind, the sky soft in predawn. It's like a stolen moment in time during the war, after everyone was asleep and before anyone had woken, the trembling peace and quiet of before the sunrise.

But Troy's gates are open. A familiar figure, or at least familiar from a distance, stands there, her hand resting against one of the doors swung open. The cause of the war, Helen, draped in finery and her face hidden by a veil, stands watching.

This isn't all of the goddess. Just a third. But the third still looks regal, her face concealed and yet held high.

"You came a long way for me," she says softly as they approach.

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Not me forgetting about Exagryph …

Pffff Well it's different when it's used by gods

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