Between Lions and Men

38: of a truth even in the house of hades

Helen

I stifle sobs as Peleus drags away brave Hecktor's body, his black hair inky in the dust as his body is beat upon the ground, his rich life's blood spilling out of him even as he is dragged thrice again around our city.

"All right, Hecktor had 239 to one odds of making it to noontime alive notwithstanding Apollo being a little bitch," Hermes is unmoved.

"Who bet for Hector?" I growl.

"Just one idiot."

"I like an underdog, all right? He had a warrior's heart; the son of Peleus shouldn't defile him thus," Ares says, annoyed at least. That's better than everyone else. Case in point:

"What? Stop it—all right, I'm sorry," our father sighs, as Athena tugs his arm.

"You thought that was MY hero? Seriously? The imbecil who stripped his own armor off before a fight? That person? You thought? That I might sponsor?"

"All right! I'm sorry I assumed you were supporting the actual hero who won on the battlefield and fought with true rage and honor, instead of the small shrewd person who spent the fight beneath a shade drinking wine and watching through a looking glass," our father sighs.

"You say that derogatorily as if you did not do that same thing," his wife says.

"She doesn't like me really."

Athena smiles at him.

"I demand an audience with—oh father," Apollo basically crawls along the ground. I have been in enough tussles with my brothers to know how a man looks and acts when he's been given a solid thrashing by a girl. There is much hair pulled, some claw marks on the face, definitely a general inability to walk due to pain between the legs. That sort of thing. That is how Apollo, god that he is, looks just now.

"Forget it. Your interference is done, Hecktor is dead," our father growls, "As you yourself foresaw."

"But—she—,"

"I did kick him and pull his hair he's going to say that and I am not ashamed I'd do it again right now," Athena says.

"Achilles is mine to slay, Hecktor called upon me when he died he—," Apollo begins.

"It is done. I shall decide the son of Peleus' fate, none other," our father says, silencing him.

"I should go and tell Andy," I say, quietly.

"Do you want company?" Ares asks me, as he finishes paying Hermes, who promptly vanishes.

"No," he would frighten her surly. They can only hide their true selves so far.

I turn and run down the stairs. Andy will be with her child, locked up safe in the nursery where they wait during battles at Hecktor's command.

I come in, trying to stay the sobs from my face even as I realize I have no clue what I am to say.

"What news—please--," she takes one look at my face and knows it.

"He did fall," I whisper. She sobs, clutching their child who mumbles for his father. Nico remained with them, he looks sadly down at his toys but says nothing.

"No," she whispers.

"He fought well---Achilles did slay him," I say, putting my arms to her as she clutches her precious son. The babe starts crying as well at his mother's sadness.

I hear a sharp scream. Hecube, Hecktor's mother has been told.

"Where is he? Can I—I always washed his wounds," Andy says.