No One But You

Chapter Ten : Goodbye My Lover

A/N : They deserved better

You touched my heart you touched my soul.
You changed my life and all my goals.
And love is blind and that I knew when,
My heart was blinded by you.

I've kissed your lips and held your head.
Shared your dreams and shared your bed.
I know you well, I know your smell.
I've been addicted to you.'

James Blunt, 'Goodbye My Lover'

Achilles stood on the beach of Troy, his hands on his hips, as he watched a great warship with black sails run up onto the beach. His eyes narrowed slightly when he caught sigh of the young man with golden hair and dark eyes standing at the bow of the ship, but this was the only sign of emotion he showed at seeing his only acknowledged son for the first time in four years.

Neoptolemus swung over the side of the ship as it drew to a halt: stopped by the rise of the sea bed, and he landed knee-deep in water, before striding up the beach to where his father waited for him.

Achilles smiled inwardly as he watched Neoptolemus approach: he walked with the same arrogance that his father did, the same careless superiority.

"Father," Neoptolemus said, nodding his head slightly, as he approached. Despite putting on a show of the obedience expected of a son to his father, there was no real respect in either his voice or his manner.

Achilles, however, did not mind this. He acknowledged that the boy had done enough to have at least some pride in himself: where Achilles was seen on a god on a battlefield, Neoptolemus ruled over sea battles with an equal ferocity. The name Achilles would send shivers up the spine of soldiers; the name Neoptolemus would do the same for sailors. They were equals, in their own right, and both knew it.

"You've decided to join us at last," Achilles drawled, looking his son over slowly.

"I have my own battles to fight," Neoptolemus said in a voice far from friendly.

Achilles finally grinned. "So I've heard. You've done well for yourself."

The praise seemed meagre, when it was given to a man who, before his twentieth summer, had sacked at least seven armed coastal cities, beaten some of the most renowned pirates of both the Achaean and of the Aegean seas in ferocious sea battles, making himself and his crew rich. However, from Achilles, even this grudging approval was something quite rare.

Neoptolemus' eyes widened slightly in surprise. "My father acknowledges my worth. Who thought I would live to see the day?" he asked, the sarcasm in his voice doing little to hide the fact that he spoke in the same drawling tones as his father.

Achilles raised one eyebrow at his impertinence, but then a frown furrowed his forehead. "We need to talk," he said, his tone no longer light.

Neoptolemus nodded, and followed the older man to his tent.

Briseis stood on her balcony, her hands gripping the railing so tightly that her knuckles were white as she stared out in horror at the scene that was unfolding before her. Trojan soldiers were dragging the great wooden statue of a horse through the gates of Troy from where they had found it on the Greek beaches, abandoned, when the Greeks 'fled' the Trojan shores.
Briseis did not actually realise that she was shaking until she heard Cassandra's calm voice behind her.

"There's really no point in getting so worked up about it," the priestess said in a serene, detached voice. "They'll never listen to us, so why waste your energy worrying?"

Briseis turned around with forced calm. Cassandra must have really lost it this time. To know that somehow this was a trick, and that it would likely result in the sacking of Troy, but to stand there so calmly: it had to be madness.